Point B (a teleportation love story)

by Drew Magary

  “Screw you, Bamert.”

  She walked closer to the tracks and sat down in the dying zoysia.

  She said that no matter where she ported, he could find her.

  The sun was knocking but that didn’t make this part of Rockville any warmer, nor any prettier. People had left this stretch for dead long before porting came along. A couple of stray dogs ran by, their tags jingling frenetically as they searched for owners who had abandoned them in favor of roaming the world as yuppie Newmads. Across the tracks there was a rusted, empty playground, the ambient winds nudging the swings back and forth. Anna wanted to swing on those swings with Lara, and she didn’t know why. Just two girls in love, swinging merrily in the predawn moonlight.

  Bamert walked over and sat down next to Anna, patting her on the shoulder with his big wet paw.

  “You all right?” he asked her.

  “We used to live near here. Over in Garrett Park. We had a real house. It wasn’t very big, and I remember hating it. My parents never talked to each other. I guess they stayed together for our sake, but it didn’t help much. Anyway, that’s where Sarah died.”

  “I’m sorry, Anna.”

  “Yeah, I know you are. Everyone is when I tell them.”

  “Did you and your mom get counseling or anything?”

  “We couldn’t afford it. We couldn’t afford a burial either. We donated her body to a Bethesda hospital and they forgot to return the ashes to us.”

  “Judas Priest.”

  “We had a memorial and no one came, not even my old man. I try to remember my favorite times with Sarah and sometimes I feel like I mix the places up. My life has no chapters to it, Bamert.”

  “Druskin is a chapter of your life.”

  “Yeah well, it’s a lousy one,” she told him. “Maybe that’s why I look back on that lousy house so fondly. I don’t even like it, but at least I know that part of my life was real, you know? I had a home once. A real home. Sometimes I worry maybe that was the best I’ll do.”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “The worst part is that my mom couldn’t sell our house. She had to default on the loan. So now, she’s slaving away in these kitchens, chasing working hours, and all the money goes to some asshole bank, or to ShareSpace so she can bunk up with a bunch of randos.”

  “We can give her the money from the kebab trucks, plus maybe whatever we sell off of Bryce.”

  “I’m not giving Bryce Holton another dime of my money, and I’m not gonna become some bootlegger for the rest of Druskin. Vick would snuff us out within a week.”

  “The truck money, then,” Bamert suggested.

  “We might need that for something else, seeing as how Edgar says you’re cut off again.”

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “You Bamerts wouldn’t happen to be members of MyClub, would you?”

  “Goodness yes, we are. You should see me at the omelet station on Sunday mornings. I am a tank.”

  “How much is a guest fee?” Anna asked.

  “$500 for the day.”

  “A little bit more kebab van money, and we should have enough for that.”

  Anna’s PortPhone buzzed. She touched the screen and there was a News Alert for Lara that read: “PortSys Heiress Wilding Out In Fiji!” Bamert laughed and Anna got angry at him all over again. She wished he had a suit on so she that could strangle him with his own tie.

  “Oh come on,” he said. “I’m not laughing at you. I think it’s adorable.”

  “That’s just what people who are heartsick wanna hear. That they’re adorable. Pretty much the ideal reaction.”

  “And where is our girl right now?” Bamert asked.

  “The South Pacific.”

  “I bet she’ll wrangle an especially lame WorldGram out of that trip.”

  “Stop it,” Anna said.

  “Oh come on, you have to confess: it’s kinda lame. I clicked on her feed and it was nothing but hats and ads.”

  “Let her live.”

  “Why? She bailed on school and left you to twist.”

  “I don’t wanna hear it. The best thing that’s happened to me since that day is falling in love with her. I think about Lara and I’m happy, Bamert. I can feel joy right there beside me.”

  He rubbed her back in penitence. “You’re right. You’re right. Love’s a marvel, isn’t it?”

  It was. God, it was. It was a stubborn thing, this love. Needy. But the moment Anna felt it, she knew she wanted be in love for the rest of her life. Life before love was just a dress rehearsal. “I love her, Bamert. I have to find her.”

  “Maybe she’s with Emilia Dearest. You could search for her mammy.”

  “I don’t want to do that. Emilia’ll know someone is looking for her.”

  “Yes, and what a profound shock that would be to her system. I can’t think of anyone else looking for Emilia Kirsch, except for Presidents, and dictators, and angry customers, and exploited laborers, and the family of that kid who died on Everest, and the Guardians of Ararat, and the Israeli Defense Forces.”

  “Ugh, fine. You’re deeply annoying this morning.”

  “Look how early I had to get up! You are not getting optimal Bamert here, and that’s a detriment to us all.”

  She put her finger on the search bar and typed in EMILIA KIRSCH. Nothing came up. Kirsch was porting around wherever she pleased. But, as with Lara, PortSys had rendered her invisible.

  FORMAL LAUNCH OF THE PORTPHONE 9P

  Partial Transcript

  Presentation date: 11/01/30

  Keynote Speaker: Jason Kirsch

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: Thank you! What a day. What an audience. Are you guys ready for a great day?

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: That’s a shame, because I have nothing for you.

  [laughter]

  JASON KIRSCH: Okay, I might be kidding. My name is Jason Kirsch, and I am the Chief Creative Officer here at PortSys.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: My mother, Emilia—who I think is not only the most important innovator of this century but also the most important person of this century, full stop—My mom once said to me, “Jason, it’s not about what our products do, it’s about how they make people feel.” And that’s been our North Star since our inception. We reintroduced the world to itself. We rendered horizons obsolete. We pulled the world out of the New Depression. We made it possible for Ian Berenson to rebuild the original World Trade Center twin towers in Dubai, to give new life and hope to those who lost their loved ones on that terrible day.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: But while we take pride in our genealogy of PortPhones, from the One to the Eight, we know that they are the means and not the end. A PortPhone doesn’t leave you breathless, the way the majesty of the Grand Tetons will. It’s not your mother smiling as she welcomes you into her dining room at Thanksgiving. It’s not the incredible rush you feel gazing out from the Kirsch viewing platforms installed off the Antarctic Peninsula, where, I would just like to note, global sea ice thickness this year increased for the first time since 1979.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: Thank you, thank you. Is that awesome or what? So while I personally find our phones beautiful, elegant—even a touch mischievous—I know they are merely a conduit to the things and places and people that make us feel joy, or wonder, or perhaps a touch of danger. It’s not just porting that saved us from climate change by ending our addiction to fossil fuels and allowing us to resurrect the oceans with iron fertilization. No no. It’s that porting allowed us all to gain a greater appreciation for this massive, strange, wonderful planet we call home. It made everyone on every continent want to save the world. Why? Because we could finally see all of it with our own eyes. We saw what was ours, and felt an instinctive need to protect it.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: That’s why I’m so excited to be here today. Because you see, when my amazing team and I set out to desig
n a new product, we’re not just satisfied to add on bells and whistles. We don’t update the blueprint. We throw it out.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: Earlier this year, I ported with my team to a retreat outside of Kathmandu where we studied the practice of Nyungne: a fasting ritual that fortifies the immune system and brings forth total mental clarity. We learned so much about our intentionality in those thirty-six hours, and our time fasting also gave us a renewed focus: the kind of determined visioning the world expects from PortSys. At the end of our fast, we, as a team, personally butchered a long-haired yak and prepared a banquet from its carcass, nose to tail, for our hosts at the Kopan Monastery. Best meal I have ever eaten. I did not port out once during that retreat, I’ll have you know.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: Thank you, thank you. After that incredible feast, we went back to the PortSys lab—and I know a lot of you reporters here today would like a peek inside there—and said to one another, “Starting from scratch, how do we build the perfect product for today?” And we did. If our products are truly less about what they do than how they make people feel, I think that you are about to feel a great many things when I show you what I’m about to show you. Because THIS is the PortPhone 9p.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: Ooooh, it’s blue! Excuse the pun, but that is cool. What you’re looking at is a galvanized steel casing with a ceramic finish, guaranteed to withstand fluctuations of over 200 degrees without cracking. And thanks to our beautiful, expanding global ice sheets, I doubt you’ll have to worry much about such insane temperature changes these days, no matter how far your travels take you. Also, we’ve reduced porting time by 1/32nd of an angstrom, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but I assume we’d all like to spend even less time freezing our butts off in wormholes.

  [laughter]

  JASON KIRSCH: The camera is entirely new. It can shoot video at a rate of forty-eight frames per second and get this: I’m gonna shoot a movie right now. Are you guys ready for your close-up?

  CROWD: YES!

  JASON KIRSCH: Good, because I’ve hit Record. There you all are up on the screen. Looking good, you guys. Now watch this.

  [ports a foot away]

  [crowd gasps]

  JASON KIRSCH: Hey look at that. That movie is still recording. Yes, we’ve engineered continuous video through wormholes.

  [applause]

  JASON KIRSCH: I know a lot of you would still like to see what the inside of a wormhole looks like, as do I. But that we haven’t quite cracked that yet. You’re just gonna have settle for live, continuous video of your globetrotting efforts. Are you ready for chained port-bys?

  CROWD: YES!

  JASON KIRSCH: There’s more. Now, you might have heard rumors about this, and while I am not usually a big fan of gossip, this time I’m happy to confirm it’s true: YOU PLUS TWO is now YOU PLUS THREE.

  [gasps]

  JASON KIRSCH: Yes. We have engineered a way to increase the spatial orientation of our wormholes across our 9P network, so that porters can accommodate up to three extra kilograms of mass. This is one kilogram that is going to change everything. Think about what it means to volunteers delivering food to those in need, or to construction workers who won’t have to make multiple port trips to bring all his accessories to a work site. Think about what it means to new mothers whose infants may fit in under that threshold. Think about how it will further reduce the traffic burden we place on trucks, ships, and railroads. Think about what it means to a young man who wants to bring extra Valentine’s Day gifts to his girlfriend, especially now that there’s no such thing as long-distance relationships anymore. That’s for better or for worse depending on the couple, I suppose.

  [laughter]

  JASON KIRSCH: Think about what it means to Doctors Without Borders, who are now truly without borders.

  AUDIENCE MEMBER: What about guns?

  JASON KIRSCH: We at PortSys have always made your security our top priority.

  AUDIENCE MEMBER: More people are gonna die because of you! Only people who can afford a decent portwall are gonna be safe! You are inviting more death into our lives!

  [boos]

  JASON KIRSCH: No no no, let him say what he has to say. I value transparency.

  AUDIENCE MEMBER: If you did, you wouldn’t sell porting data to hate groups and terrorist organizations!

  JASON KIRSCH: Okay, this is not the forum for this. We’re gonna have a question-and-answer session on this a week from now during my Jase Dismissed portcast, and that’s going to be a better venue for that particular line of inquiry, rather than you causing a disruption here.

  AUDIENCE MEMBER: HE’S A FUCKING LIAR! THEY’RE GONNA SELL US ALL! THEY’RE GONNA SELL US ALL TO HELL!!!!

  OTHER AUDIENCE MEMBER: You promised all of us a PortWatch last year and never delivered, asshole!

  JASON KIRSCH: Security?

  ASSEMBLY HALL/DRUSKIN GATE

  When Anna emerged from hiding with a properly ashen November complexion, she was amazed to find that other girls in Sewell acknowledged her presence. Some of them even talked to her. Stares that had been rude on her second day of school were now curious, some even a touch sympathetic. When she nailed a back tuck in diving practice, Katie Gray gave her a high five. The dreaded Jubilee still hated Anna with a blazing fury, and the rest of Jubilee’s crew gawked at her like she was a lying nutjob, but otherwise she was a now viable human being on the Druskin campus. She wasn’t quite sure if she liked it or not.

  Halloween came and went with little fanfare, save for another torpid Dunbar Hall mixer. Some of the more enterprising kids walked around dressed up as WorldGram posts, and as PortPhones with screens that actually lit up, and as daredevils like Steve Fryman, who once jumped off the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur and ported, in midair, safely over to the top of the Empire State Building. There were more than a few kids dressed as Lara Kirsch—or “Lara Kush”—complete with pot leaf hairstyles. Every time the fake Laras walked by Anna, she got equal doses of joy and longing.

  Out in the free zones, Halloween was always a roiling cauldron of crime and debauchery. Little kids skipped through time zones, chasing dusk to amass candy from every continent (in Antarctica, they doled out Zero bars as a gag), while the adults ported from one shrouded time zone to the next, looking to either terrorize people or fuck them. Sometimes both. The Huffs traditionally made a point of staying in for the night. But this Halloween, Anna could walk campus freely. She dressed as Brendan McClear. Bamert dressed as Burton. Burton dressed as Bamert.

  The next morning, during a leisurely roll across the quad, Nolan told Anna that she was getting a C+.

  “When you write for this class,” he said, “Take it seriously. Tell me how you the material makes you feel, and then tell me why I should care.”

  No more quote-mashup English papers for her. No more big fonts. Nolan began assigning her short stories. Within the work, she discovered writing stories had the power to take her away from Druskin and from herself, mentally porting away to Cinque Terra, to Hans Island above the Arctic Circle, back to Kewarra Beach, and to anywhere else far away. She poured hours into each assignment because they didn’t feel like work at all. One of them was a love story between two young women, set in Lily Beach. Her grade in the class skyrocketed.

  She didn’t port for another two weeks, keeping her secret phone stashed on the top shelf of her closet underneath a buffalo plaid blanket that her mother insisted she take for extra warmth. The blanket looked, smelled, and felt like 1982. She would have rather frozen to death than sleep under that thing.

  One Wednesday morning, they streamed into Assembly Hall and were greeted not with the usual guest speaker, but by a very angry Dean Vick, who ordered them to sit down even before it was technically time to sit down.

  “Two weeks ago there was pecan bulldog on my desk in my office. That bulldog was purchased for me by my late mother when I was growing up in Georgia, and I have kept it with me in the five
decades since. One of you took it.”

  He jabbed his finger out at the crowd. Anna grinned and quaked at the same time.

  “Not only did one of you take it, but apparently you thought it would be fun to do this with it.”

  He queued up the big screen and there was Vick’s little bulldog hanging out by an unidentifiable railroad crossing, and out on a tropical Australian beach, and also in the middle of Cleveland for some reason. The kids cheered and Vick shushed them sharply, like he was blowing a poison dart at them. Anna, Burton and Bamert—all self-exiled to the balcony—kept mum.

  “I’m sure whoever did this also finds it funny, but they won’t be as amused when we track them down. The photos have been scrubbed of metadata but I can assure you that we will find this person, and we will step up night patrols until we do.”

  When Anna left Assembly that day and trudged over to Goren to get her weekly postcard from Sandy, she saw a small camera mounted right above Vick’s door. A roving eye. Its motion detector blinked red as she scooted past.

  On a deadly cold Wednesday Night, Anna met Sandy at Druskin Gate. Her mom’s fingernails were caked in black grease. Her hair was stringy and thinned out. The guard refused to open the gate despite Anna giving him her best puppy dog eyes (admittedly, she wasn’t that great at playing cute), so she and Sandy had to settle for reaching through the wrought iron bars to embrace one another, like a monitored prison visit.

  “Mom,” Anna said. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You don’t look like you’ve slept.”

  “Ugh.” Sandy looked around. She used to hate early winter nights, when it would go dark at 4:30 and you’d be seemingly trapped in night forever and ever. But now she missed this anodyne darkness. The day brought work, the late night brought fear, and there was little rest to be found anywhere in between.

  “I’m a mess,” she told Anna. “But look at you! My god, you look so healthy! It’s like you went on vacation!”

  “Nope, nope. No vacation,” Anna insisted. “I’ve been here the whole time.”