When the ocean came for me, I could see it rushing in from a long way off. My feet, clumsy and heavy, stood rooted to the tenuous ground they knew. I knew my demise would be by drowning, and I tried early to make my peace with the water, tilting my head back when it rained to taste the liquid and feel it running into my body, mingling with my cells, which I knew from biology were already three-fourths water. I hoped that I could soften the blow, warm up the frozenness of those far-off waves, I hoped that I could be prepared. Even back then, when I was so much younger, I was apart from the world with my knowledge. They asked why I didn't apply myself, why couldn't I be more sociable.
My mother says that everything I do in life is for dramatic effect; she warns me that the world doesn't like a faker; she tries to prepare me for this hard, prosaic world by espousing hard work and honesty. She thinks I should take more AP classes, get more summer internships, work harder, fulfill my potential. I wonder if adults see potential always where there is only an unwelcomed bitterness, cynical and farsighted, something that looks like Intelligence or Talent Gone Astray. In a few days, my mom will find out that I ended up in this place, no matter what my efforts are to hide it. When I came in, they asked if I wanted them to tell any family members that I was here. It seemed like too much bother, too much work. I can see all the conversations already, I have this farsightedness in me, like anticipation. The air moves and I can already feel the blow, is all.
The walls in this room are smooth and white, the lighting flourescent and sterile. There is a plastic potted plant in the corner, its leaves thick with dust. The floor is smooth and tiled; it reminds me of high school, that institutional white, with those flecks of gray so the dirt doesn't show up as much. They let me in through their extra-wide door, and they didn't even lock it behind them. It locks every time it shuts. I'm waiting here; an intake worker is supposed to come and tell me my sentence, scribble wisely on their notepad about my flatness of affect. I am glad that waiting is one of my talents.
I didn't mean to end up here, in this hospital in a strange town where I was only supposed to go to school, then scurry home every break like a good daughter. Between my bitterness and my cutting and the way the horizon got flatter and flatter, I knew the drowning was closer. But I made a good effort, I intended to do all of my homework, I went to classes when I could breathe, I even took a few notes. I smiled at people when they said hello. I tried, but I get the feeling that anything I did could only delay this imprisonment, or circumvent it with death.
But if I killed myself, I just couldn't take what my mother would say. They say I'm a danger to myself. She would tell me I'm faking it again. I guess you'd think my logic was twisted, because if I was dead I wouldn't hear what anyone had to say. I'm not so sure my mother couldn't reach me to criticize even beyond the grave.
There's nothing in this room for my eyes to rest on; the walls are white and slippery and the floor has no good pattern, and no interesting randomness either. I say waiting is a talent of mine because I am a very experienced daydreamer. You might even say I am a professional. It's a way to get accustomed to the water, like I was talking about. A way to swallow the rain so the ocean won't be so unfamiliar. Slipping away to a vivid daydream must be a lot like having hallucinations. I'm so good at it I can't be aware of the real world around me at all, not even if I tried.
This room is so slippery and sterile, I don't even need to close my eyes. I do anyway. I'm so fucking tired.
The fountain was an incredible piece of glasswork, really intricate and subtle, Möbius-strip-like the way the eye wound around and around in it. The very center was a wavery tube of opaque glass, a dark color on the blue side of indigo, and the glass was like water frozen in complex curvy patterns radiating asymmetrically into paler and paler blues. Valerie ran her fingers along the edge closest to her and it was clear glass, thin and sturdy.
She'd seen the fountain before, traveling the streets of the Endless City. Usually her daydreams started in an apartment she thought of as her own space. It was on the twentieth floor of a 50-floor glass building, in a northeast corner where the sunrise was cold and brilliant. Glass was overused in her daydream city, but she loved the excess, the land-of-Oz feeling it gave her. It wasn't only the skyscrapers that were made of their translucent colored glass, but the little buildings as well, the streetlights, the bridges. The wires and plumbing and innards were always hidden with a layer of opacity; the floors were texturized and gritty; other than that, her world was fresh and clean, visible and, well, Endless.
This particular fountain she found herself dawdling by was in a small park where three roads intersected in a triangle of traffic. It was morning, and there was a dewy velvet carpet of grass underfoot. She hadn't realized until now that the room in the hospital was completely devoid of windows. She drank in the outside morning air, lay down in the dew just to feel messy, a part of the world. Even the sensation of cold was welcome. She closed her eyes, opening her pores to the liquid underneath her, losing herself in the privacy of her own head.
"So they've taken you." The voice was quiet but peremptory, a little patronizing. How rude, Valerie thought. She kept her eyes studiously closed and concentrated on the dew.
"That won't go over well, you know."
Dammit, thought Valerie. Can't you see I'm ignoring you? She squinted one eye open to look at the intruder. The person was tall (or maybe it was just the angle), dressed androgynously in tight black leggings and a baggy Hamlet-style shirt, but black instead of white. It was belted, and Valerie wouldn't have been surprised to see a sword dangling from the left hip, but there was none. Their hair was dark and neatly cut; the expression on their face, looking down at her, was even more patronizing than the voice.
"What are you talking about?" she said grumpily. It was pretty common for people in the Endless City to address Valerie as though they knew her. She thought there must be a kind of logic to it, one just beyond her reach. It was better in the City to let intuition be as important as reason, she'd found. And it was better not to make assumptions. Gender, for instance, was often surprising. Valerie made friends with the plural-pronoun-as-singular-nongendered a long time ago. Otherwise, the assumptions were sure to embarrass her, later on.
"You. The hospital. Locked up."
"Who the fuck is they?"
"Are. Are they."
Oh, she did not want to be talking to this person. "I could have stayed in that hospital if I wanted to be patronized," she said.
"Oh, you'll get used to me. I'm not so bad. It's mostly show, you know."
"Please don't stick around long enough for me to get used to you."
"You're even spikier than they told me you would be, Valerie," the stranger smirked. "I just thought you might want to be warned."
"Warned of what?" Valerie snapped. "How do you know my name?"
"We're all aware of you, honey. You've been pretty important... up till now..."
"Look," she sighed. "You're trying to play some kind of game with me, and I'm not playing. If you want to be direct with me, you can come by my apartment later. I have to leave."
"Have it your way," they said, and sprawled on a park bench nearby, forcing Valerie to back her words up or endure this person's presence. Well, that's just fine, she thought. I don't need dew anyhow. She stalked off down the street, looking for a bus stop or a street sign. She kept walking until the world faded around her.
Doran sighed as he watched Valerie walk away. She knew so little, and stood for so much. He worried about this abrasive girl, so painfully direct and guileless. He suspected that they had more in common than she would ever want to admit. Anyhow, it was dangerous of him to try to speak to her. The Red Court would call her up on the carpet, shred all that dignity, spit out another docile, broken twit. And they would know if he tried to interfere, especially if he won Valerie over. Her naďveté with its layer of the tough-girl act was rare in this beautiful, dangerous, oppressive city.
If there is fear in her eyes, he reflected, it's not a knowing fear.
But the outside mattered more than most Citizens knew. Doran knew; he remembered Valerie's birth four or so years ago. Before her there was another Valerie, one who lived peacefully now in her tiny locked apartment on Fourth Street. The old Valerie never asked questions or resented her lot in life; in the end that was why she did not make a successful or believeable teenager. It is difficult to teach things to someone with no curiousity. The new Valerie was turning out to be another disappointment, a failure, a nutcase. Doran was afraid they'd scrap her as well, start over. Her replacement would be a little less intelligent, less reflective, less proud. He knew where his loyalties belonged, and the Red Court would really have his ass if they knew the way his thoughts were so tinged with blasphemy. But he felt a compassion for Valerie, a little twinging sadness.
She disappeared from sight, walking north on Seventh, dangerously near a part of the City not approved for her use. Damn it. He'd have to get in touch with someone to bring her back, and his radio unit gave him such a damn headache lately. He made a mental note for the hundredth time to ask a techie to look at it later, and wired the info in anyway. They'd find her even if he didn't report; security (especially around such an important fronter) was always double- or triple-layered. Or more. Still, they'd also find out that he'd talked to her, sooner or later, and he'd slipped up too many times to withhold information. The Red Court always assumed incompetence was treachery.
He'd really been too direct with the girl, earlier. But he had no patience with games, despite her accusations. Life in the City necessitated meanings-within-meanings, manipulation, layers of screens and obscurity. Secretly, he was fed up with it. There is only so much hiding, so many passwords, so much code that a person can take, he thought. It's why I like her. It's why I told her. She has nothing to mar her forthrightness. And everything I told her, she'll know soon enough. It would be a waiting game to get called on it, though. Not a single liason would be pleased with him; his privacy clearance was high, but he doubted it was that high. Valerie was, after all, a matter of national interest.
"Ms. Nesbitt? Hello?"
I open my eyes to see a woman looking at me with pursed-up lips and an opinion already forming in her pointy little head. Dammit, if I'm going to waste such time daydreaming (or was it dreaming, period?), I could at least be refreshed by the experience. You know, wild sexual adventures, exhilirating explorations of bug-free wilderness, that kind of thing. The dew and the sunrise were pretty good; I could have lived with that. This room feels stuffy and hot. But that person who talked to me really kind of shook me up, more than I'd like to admit.
"Valerie, is it? I'm here to admit you," the woman says. Like I've been waiting outside the door all this time. No, they're plenty quick about locking you up, but you're not actually there until you get The Chart.
I've never been in a hospital before that I can remember, and this hasn't caught me at the best of times. I really don't know if I can summon up the energy to talk to this person.
Maybe that's the whole problem, what put me here: an energy leak, like a hole in a tire. And all they need to do is stich it up, pump me full, and drive me away. Except most people, when they get tired, if they get a chance to rest they're fine. Most tired people would not experience the world as so many waves licking around their ankles, hips, neck. There is no darkness innate in tired. Or maybe there is, and no one passed me the guidebook.
Maybe everything's wrong with me, maybe nothing. I've never felt so lost about my life. (That means you're borderline) whispers a voice in my head. (Persistent identity crisis. Manipulative behaviour.)
Oh yeah, and I have voices. I actually thought everyone had those, until earlier this quarter. My roommate, who is talkative, is taking Intro to Psych. Not that they teach you about voices there; they save that kind of juicy stuff for Abnormal Psych. But conversations have a way of meandering, and we got on the subject late one night.
It was when she was talking about how sorry she felt for schitzophrenic people, maybe. She said something like, "Do you know that crazy - mentally ill people, some of them, hear voices all the time in their heads? Like, they can't get away from them."
I've learned to be neutral and follow along. Maybe it was when I decided to open my mouth and swallow the water that I found out talking about myself made people uncomfortable. Imitation can be closer to the real thing than the thing itself, and I was always a quick study. So social interactions, fraught with hidden dangers, are mostly a matter of me nodding and looking interested. When I've heard a person talk for a while, I pick up their cadence, their style. When I'm in a group of people, I mold myself to the accepted flow, which never has too much room for individuality anyway.
Every interaction, every situation, has hidden expectations, concealed sinkholes. I walk carefully. I have a reputation for being quiet, but I'm not a quiet person. Just too tired to venture into unsafe waters. Too anxious.
"So tell me, Valerie. What brought you here to Wilbur County Memorial?" I thought tiredly about what would happen if I punched her in her lipsticked, sickly sweet mouth. I'm not a violent person, but I should warn her to check the box that says "hostility towards authority figures."
I wonder how she'd react if I told her the ground just slanted more and more until my feet simply couldn't find purchase on the slope. I wonder how she'd react if I told her the waves just keep coming, and I can see that they've got it in for me. For all my studiousness, for all my intelligence, I just don't know how else to put it right now. I lost the ability to breathe. I lost my fluency in your langauge of Normals. I developed this fascination with getting under my skin.
I clear my throat; my voice sounds dry and creaky, so different from a moment ago. (You give too much importance to your own fantasies, Val. Watch it,) says a voice in my head. "Um, I think the... the doctor called me in."
"Well, I know that, Valerie. I'm wondering what your side of the story is."
I have no story. My story is all plagarism. "I guess he was thinking I'd... hurt myself, or something."
"Do you think you might hurt yourself, Valerie?"
"It doesn't hurt," I say before I think. (Oh, good one, you're just waxing glib today, aren't you Val?) (Shut up,) I mutter back, being careful not to move my lips.
The woman looks me over with those pursed-up lips again. "What doesn't hurt?" Her words remind me of mine, a few moments ago. Who the fuck is they?... Don't play games with me. It's hard to be direct with someone who doesn't share your world.
"I guess when I... when I cut myself," I say.
"Dr. Herman thought those cuts were pretty serious," the woman observes, like I'm stupid. "He told us you're a lucky girl to be here, you could have done some serious damage to yourself."
When I discovered cutting maybe four years ago I thought I had it made. I ripped the plastic off of my little pink shaving razor, ripping my fingernails all to hell in the process, and caressed my skin so gently with the edge of it, and all my problems seemed to fade in a calm euphoric haze. It never lasted long, but it gave me an edge I hadn't had before. The trouble is, I guess it did get deeper and deeper, for it to still feel. My blood was used to flowing and it needed a special occasion to make me feel so calm and relieved, nowadays. It couldn't have hurt me really, though. I knew to avoid my wrists. That horrible doctor was just trying to scare me.
The woman hasn't yet told me her name. Maybe I missed it. I'm not about to ask, though. Besides awkwardness, being a drowning person in a world of people who are breathing fine has taught me that no matter what they say, stupid questions do exist. They're any question I would think to ask.
She seems to grow tired of waiting for me to respond, and went on with her speech. "So why have you been cutting on yourself, Valerie?"
Grant me the strength to answer enough questions so she gets out of here, oh please. Just that much strength, just a little bit of energy. But how do I answer such a question, and still seem normal? Close to normal, anyway. Halfway to normal. Appearances have to be kept up, even in the hospital. Otherwise the awkwardness of this would swallow me up.
"It makes me feel better," I mumble. Something about this room, the way the air manages to be stagnant and air-conditioned at the same time.
"So you've been having some problems with depression?"
"I guess so."
She scribbles triumphantly. Ah, something to put on the The Chart. I fit her mold. I'm glad cutting is more common these days; from what I've read, they used to give you a real wide berth for doing things like that. Maybe they still do, but at least they've heard of it before. I hate it when people say cutting on yourself, though. On simply isn't a preposition that goes with the word. You can cut things, you can cut through things, you can even cut into things. But you can't cut on them, unless you're perhaps sitting on top of them when you cut. I'm not a contortionist.
"Have you tried any medication for this, Ms. Nesbitt?" Oh ho, now that I have a category, I'm worthy of a surname. I feel sorry for this woman momentarily, even if she is ranged against me, jingling her keys in her pocket for security. What a tired life she must have. Even tireder than mine. At least when I gave up, they could tell. They sent me away.
She is still talking. "... been having any trouble eating, or sleeping? Have you been feeling hopeless, like there's no point? Worthless?" She seems energized, purposeful. I can see her pointy little mind thinking about Prozac and a short little stay, just till they can make me say I won't cut any more. My gift of anticipation.
I'll humor her, because I'd be just as happy with being here as little as I can. I don't care if I have to fit into her box to do it. What she doesn't know won't hurt her. "Yes, no, yes, yes."
"I see..." she wrote more quickly. "And have you seen anyone about this in the past? A therapist, a doctor?"
I catch myself on the brink of telling her that my mom wouldn't appreciate that, now, would she? Keep it short, and they'll let me out. Maybe they'll even let me out tonight. My spirits rise a tiny bit with that thought. "No," I say.
"It's probably a good idea to make an appointment at your school's mental health center," says the woman. "And a psychiatrist. You know, the right medication can really help lift your spirits. Our doctors here will be able to prescribe you something, but you'll need to have a follow up." She is closing her notebook. "In the meantime, why don't you get some rest? You'll be in room 15... Have you had supper?"
"Yes," I lied. Three hours ago I was sitting in the health center waiting on the doctors, an hour before that I was sitting in my dorm waiting on the residential assistant. I guess the cuts (day-old ones, even) freaked my roommate out. I didn't mean to let her see them. I skipped lunch, too, but that was normal. It is true that I haven't been hungry lately. Food seems like too much work.
The woman has gotten up and I glean from her posture that I'm supposed to precede her out of the room. She shows me towels, where the extra blankets are supposed to be although they're out right now, and my room.
There are two beds, both empty. The door is the same as the other, heavy and extra-wide, and the floor is just as hard and tiled. I am thankful for the solitude, and turn out the lights as soon as she goes away.
Not to sleep. To make friends with the darkness.
It is said that everyone gets what they need in the Endless City; that there is no poverty, no hunger, no need for theft or violence. It is true that the City is in a unique position in regards to an energy source, being fueled entirely by psionic power, in some cases even unwitting. It wasn't much different from the principle that governs some fantasy kingdoms; that a place needs only to be believed in to be real. In the Endless City, things needed to be believed with sufficuent force by people who possessed a talent for it. People were the City's one true resource, so it was certainly true that there was a place for everyone. Perhaps the lack of poverty was only a form of safekeeping for those who needed to believe in their freedom.
Valerie was one such person, and if people were resources, a fortune was devoted to keeping her world subtly enclosed, Truman-Show-like. Her apartment was large and airy, with special attention devoted to her particular interests. The sound system was state-of-the-art, the bathroom had a shower/tub that was fantastical in its proportions, the VR suit thorough and realistic. Valerie even had and practiced on a bass guitar, which she didn't play in the outside world.
The apartment was simple to maintain - Valerie did most of the upkeep herself. The energy required for four-or-so roomsful of gadgets, furniture, plumbing, and foodstuffs was practically negligible. The books and music required a little more effort, but on the whole needed very little maintenance because for the most part they existed in the outside world Valerie was used to.
Such things were as plentiful in the City as salt water in a seaside town, so the City council was able to make their claims about 0% poverty.
But the true measure of wealth was friends (even enemies, acquaintances), and freedom, or similar intangibles. Information was valuable enough to be hoarded like gold. Although a fortune of these things were spent on Valerie, she had little of them for herself. She was practically friendless, limited to chance encounters with strangers, half of which always seemed to end in sex. (This too served its purpose; it was easy for Valerie to believe she was only daydreaming if her encounters were so predictable, reasonable.) And while Valerie had never noticed, she was a prisoner. Her cage was portable, watched-over, and all the more complete for its unobtrusiveness.
For a vivid daydream, the world she was allowed to live in was pretty good, escapism at its finest. She could taste the food, feel the textures, immerse herself in sensation. Often, especially when she was making an effort to participate actively in the outside world, the memories of her experiences in the City did not stay with her, at least not consciously. Lately, she remembered everything. And the City council was worried about the implications of this.
Council was a polite way of putting it though, a euphemism. Doran thought of the organization he worked for as the Red Court, which for all he knew was another euphemism. He wasn't fooling himself that he was anywhere near the bottom layer, if there even was one. He suspected at times that the layering system was an endless loop, repeating with new shades of meaning every time you thought you had the real thing.
Sometimes he envied people like Valerie who had their invisible prisons. He had more freedom and connections, but not the same degree of choice. Valerie, were she to take up a hobby or job in the City, would be doing it because she felt like it. He had the ultimate in job security: the only reason he existed was to fulfill the miscellaneous intelligence and security operations that fell to him, and to scour the City for problems even on his own time. Valerie might have had less choice than she knew about the matter, but illusions were almost always comforting. He could have done with a few more illusions, himself.
He sipped a latté he'd just purchased at an autocafe, scanning the street up and down, eagle-eyed out of habit. It seemed unusually quiet; a sense of quiet fear perhaps, anticipation. Enough of the City was aware of the current outside situation to be wary. It'd be a busy week.
Doran was hopeful after the intake interview, though. It sounded as if the hospital was as interested as Valerie was in getting her processed and out of there. If she only managed to get it together and tell the doctors what they wanted to hear, she'd be out of there tomorrow, and maybe she wouldn't encounter the Red Court at all.
Wishful thinking, maybe, but the mind had a lot of power in the City.
Rain streaked grayly on the outside of the apartment's floor-to-ceiling windows. People below hurried by, their umbrellas tiny dots of lightly tinted plastic. Valerie sat down on her couch, leaning back until her head rested against the cold glass behind her, closing her eyes and listening to the thudding drops, drawing in deep shaky breaths.
She wasn't going to cry. Valerie never cried. But it had been an extremely long, terrible day. One of the worst she could remember, all in all. Now that she was back in safe, familiar surroundings, she wanted to curl up into a tiny ball, go to sleep, and wake up maybe in a year or so. Maybe never.
She didn't sleep, though. She thought about her encounter earlier that day, in the brilliant sharp autumn sunrise. The person who had said they only wanted to warn her - warn her of what? What could possibly hurt her now? Valerie knew better than to say that things had gotten as bad as they could get. Things had a way of always getting worse. But right now, it didn't feel as though there was anywhere to go but up.
This evening she was restless but tired, moody, unsatisfied. She flipped through her meager collection of music without seeing anything that caught her interest. She was bored, unsettled. She loved rainy days, usually, because they made her feel vital, as though she were maybe a part of the world after all. She was most at home in the water, for all that she made a big show of drowning. It was why she'd imagined herself a glorious bathtub in this place - it was a combination jacuzzi and surround shower, with six heads to beat their liquid soothingly into her body, and four jets in the tub for bubbles and relaxation. She liked water even in such a tame form, and had been known to splash in the tub just to see the way it moved.
But she didn't want a bath tonight, and all of her amusements and gadgets seemed pale and boring. She thought it was cruel of the world to inflict her with restlessness and exhaustion, especially when she was only daydreaming. (Valerie never worried about how real the daydreams were to her, anymore. It was too much a part of her reality by now.)
She twisted her arms around to try to rub her own shoulders, only making the pain more insistent and throbbing. I am so screwed, Valerie thought. I really don't know what is wrong with me. I can't seem to manage this living thing, at all. I thought I was joking when I said I'd kill myself if it weren't for my mom. Now I'm not so sure. The intensity of her emotion suprised her. If there was one phrase Valerie had become familiar with, it was "flatness of affect." Her mask was thorough mostly because she let herself be it. And to perfect the composure she had to present, Valerie was used to being hollow and detached. It wasn't just that she didn't have to feel things she didn't want to; she couldn't feel things even when she yearned for them. Not really. That was one theory, anyhow. She didn't know if she would even be able to tell the difference.
Her hair fell into her face like it was an enemy. It always seemed shaggier in here than outside, as though it knew she couldn't rule it as completely with trimmings and hair products. She'd never found a barber or stylist that she could remember while wandering the streets, but her hair didn't grow over time. It was always the same, a couple shades darker and redder than her plain brown hair in the real world, chin-length, with long unkempt bangs obscuring her vision whenever possible. She pushed it back from her forehead decisively and used the momentum of the movement to stand up.
"Fine," she said aloud to her empty apartment. "I'm going out." She pushed her finger into the slot that would open the door only for her, walked through, and waited for it to close behind her. She could never get over the technological wonders of this world that the real one couldn't help to compete with. I guess if you dream, you might as well dream big, she thought. She particularly appreciated the air chutes that replaced elevators – you stepped in, floated (okay, more like zoomed) down or up, and there you were. She could never get over that little jump of fear as she stepped over the edge, and she always wondered what would happen if the chute was malfunctioning. She kind of wished it would, sometime. Today.
She had forgotten to bring an umbrella and the rain was cold and shocking, waking her up with little slaps in the face. Out of habit she tilted her head back to taste; this rain was ice-cold and had a faint bitter aftertaste. It varied, especially between the country and the city. It seemed especially appropriate to drink in the smog-flavored water, she thought, because when the waves closed over her head for the last time she suspected they'd be especially acidic. She'd never noticed smog in the City.
Valerie set off in a random direction and just walked. She didn't want to meet anyone, or talk to anyone, or think about her life. She didn't want anyone to know her name, or what she was doing, or about her hospital admission. She wanted the water to wash into her body through her eyes and mouth and ears and fill up her body until there was no more room for thoughts or emotions or anything. She wanted not even to notice the scenery, she wanted oblivion. So she walked. Maybe a bus would run her over. Probably not. The probably had some kind of space-age braking system that didn't even need a driver's input. She saw what she assumed to be buses, occasionally, but she'd never been on one.
When the buildings started to seem repetitive, she turned a corner. She let minutes turn into hours and refused to feel the tiredness in her limbs. She didn't listen to the constant critisicms that were her companions in her head. Although the voices always seemed more subtle her in her world of daydreams, which was just another thing to be grateful for. Gratefulness wasn't her strong suit.
A shadow flickered in the corner of her eye, intrusive and suspicious. She turned around and saw only a shop front, some sort of deli. She ducked into the doorway on a whim.
The place was full of people, the buzz of conversation quiet and steady. Everyone seemed to have their place, to be sure of what they were doing (and eating) and where they were going. Valerie scanned her eyes across the whole room, which wasn't big. She didn't know what she expected to find or notice. The food dispensers along one wall smelled stale and overworked; it was a busy place. Most of the businesses in the City had these dispensers; people talked about "buying" things, but most products for sale were so cheap that the dispensers only needed a fingerprint, and goods were dispensed automatically. There were, of course, people who prefer to make things by hand, to cook their own recipes imperfectly, with varying degrees of success. Most people she'd met had something they liked to do with their hands. Her hobby was special – a sleek Fender p-bass she'd named Odile rested on its stand back in her living room. She could never afford a bass outside her head, but she worked hard at it here, and derived satisfaction from the way she halted through the notes, her fingers growing calloused and rough, her progress tangible. Stores that sold people's handmade items, or restaurants with cooking from scratch, usually operated on a sort of barter system. Mostly shopowners wanted Valerie to put on a VR set, not a full one, just the headset, and concentrate on some scene they'd made. She assumed they were collecting memories for a sort of scrapbook; she never thought too much about the idea. She was used to taking things in without questions, suppressing and concealing any curiousity that arose. Even in a place as populated as the City, building contents were usually just backdrops for Valerie. She preferred to spend her time outdoors, or in her apartment.
She punched in an order for a coffee (caffeine seemed to be the City's drug of choice) and took it to a table in the corner, tiny but empty. She wished she knew if the person who'd flickered out of view was even in here, and if they were, who it was. She felt nervous, out of place, conspicuous. A little ridiculous even. Which was bad. If she didn't belong in the City, there was nowhere for her. The City was her refuge, her space. The City was why it was okay that she was so out of place in the real world. Why it didn't matter if she couldn't make friends, if she had no niche in the college or the world. She'd always drifted through, apart, and even before people knew her, they knew to give her space. People had a kind of sixth sense about who was an outcast. College wasn't very different from high school. There were more people, so it was less known that she had no social life; there were no rumors and whispers the way there had been in high school. But there was no one who paid her the slightest bit of attention, not really. Her roommate talked to her occasionally, but that was more a reflex; she was someone who couldn't help talking to whoever is at hand. She never ate with Valerie or offered to go study in the coffeeshop together.
Valerie didn't have much of a social life in her daydreams, but she did have something as precious, which was a sense of belonging. There were no whispers, no roomfuls of people instinctively giving her space. When she went for a walk, she didn't feel stupid or ugly or afraid. She felt quiet, and alone rather than lonely. If she met someone, going for a walk, say, or at a coffeeshop like this, they'd usually talk to her. There were no forced interactions, which made the world quieter and safer. But today that security seemed to have fled, along with her composure, along with her success at scraping by in the real world. Out there, she was locked up in a psych ward, and it felt like people knew. Like they were looking at her. She was so egotistical it was funny. Here she is sitting in a roomful of people she'd never met, and Valerie was imagining that they knew all her shameful secrets, that they were looking at her.
Disgusted with herself, Valerie jumped up, nearly tipping her chair over, and hurried outside, leaving her coffee on the table behind her. Outside the rain had slackened, and the drizzle was not satisfying the way the cold shocking rain had been. It was half-assed, indecisive. Being there, but not putting much effort into anything. Like Valerie.
I'm staring at the hospital wall, sleepless, annoyed. I feel like I have nowhere to go, no place in the world. I'm acting just as weird in my fantasies as outside; maybe it's really true that I'm crazy. Maybe I am in the right place, and I shouldn't try to make them let me leave. The thought of going back to school fills me with tiredness so heavy it's almost like despair. I don't know what to do. I'm lost no matter where I am. School isn't right, hospital isn't right, City isn't right. I'm out of options, I have nothing left. The wall above me is white and black, between the natural darkness and the light that pours in through the crack in the door. I want to sleep, I really do. The woman who showed me this room told me that I could come and get a sleeping pill if I was having trouble, but the thought repels me. I don't like feeling drugged; I don't like feeling out of control. Not that I'm particularly strong on control over my life right now. She told me I was on a 5150, which means 72 hours of being locked up, no consent necessary. She said that didn't mean I'd necessarily be here for all three days, but I think she was just trying to make me feel better.
The mattress and pillow under me feel flimsy and plasticky. They rustle every time I move, and I'm not a very quiet sleeper. I've always been too restless for my own good.
Someone in the hall outside is pacing up and down, crying. I hear a nurse with brisk staccato footsteps come, repeating "Settle down, now" over and over, in an exasperated voice. The crying subsides into louder sniffling, then fades as they go back down the hall to the dayroom. This world is unfamiliar and uncomfortable; I reflect that it's no wonder so many patients ask for sleeping meds. I didn't even need a doctor's order for it. They were the default for everyone, a standing prescription. I don't fit into their world, and I know that means nothing good for me. But we've established that there is no world I really fit into. Life seems so hopeless, a story aleady told, one where a calm unchanging rut is the best I can hope for. I want to cry here in the partial darkness that won't be quiet and won't be friendly and won't forgive me for my messiness. I almost wish I did fit into the one of the boxes that stood waiting open for me to slip into and get lost.
My mother would say that my sense of not belonging was more of my drama, an immature need to feel different, to be exciting. I wish sometimes that I could swallow her view of the world, because I'd be so productive and, supposedly, happier. But I've tried to make that work for me so many times. I've been so afraid of seeming self-centered that I never open my mouth, and people assume I'm too much of a snob to talk to them. I'd try to be hardworking, and force myself to do so much that suicide starts looking better than going to work, or finishing that paper, or whatever. I'm a failure any way you slice it.
I am in that dozy place where I'm too tired even to sleep, but my mind kind of quits on me, blurs confused dreams with reality. It seems to me that the squishy hospital mattress I'm lying on is in a vast dark room, elevated on some sort of table, with candlelight flickering all around me. Someone speaks to me but I can't understand what they're saying. They repeat themselves over and over, with increasing urgency, and I am afraid that they want me to do something, but I don't know what. I try to tell them I don't understand, but my tongue feels swollen and my vocal chords won't work. They recede into the darkness, then approaches, again and again. The ebb and flow is like the tide, dizzying, grand and frightening. Finally I sleep.
Doran's radio beeped insistently in his ear, the triple tone his boss used, and he cursed under his breath, mostly from sheer laziness. Then he turned it on. "Yes?"
The voice in his ear was nasal, and often tinged with whining in normal speech. His boss, whom he was supposed to call Spider, was nothing like the code name he aspired to: he was short and dumpy, balding, and sweated easily. An oily sort of man; Doran could see him scratching his nose as he spoke. "Doran," he said slowly, in a delighted sort of voice that usually meant he had information he could use to torment the person he was talking to, "you've been speaking to Valerie."
Damn and double damn. Had they taken her already? How had they found out? "Yes sir," Doran said, "I don't believe I did any harm. I was trying to encourage her to put her back up, sir."
"Harm? No harm? Well, this time you're lucky, Doran. If it were up to me, I'd put you at the mercy of the court, a suspension for re-education at the least, but lucky for you, it isn't my choice. The Court has seen the potential of such an interaction, and wishes you to talk to the girl again. We wouldn't choose you, you understand, but as you have already spoken to the girl we have no choice. You know her interactions are supposed to be limited."
"Yes, sir. I'm sorry about that, sir."
"No messing around with your orders this time, or I will make sure that you are punished to the full extent of the law." He paused; probably wiping the sweat off his face. "You're to be subtle, careful, and give nothing away. It is to our advantage that she thinks of this world as something in her own fantasies; encourage the supposition that you are only part of her unconscious trying to help her back on her feet. Maybe you are, at that," Spider chuckled wetly. "This sort of thing happens in daydreams. Since you have taken it upon yourself, you are now responsible for the expedient resolution of this... er, situation. After you have talked to her, Valerie must be able to talk her way out of this place, and either stop the cutting or hide it much better. We're counting on you, Doran."
"Yes, sir."
"You know what you've done isn't a minor thing, the cause you serve is very serious. You should do some long hard thinking about your loyalties, my boy, or you might not enjoy your current quality of life for long."
"Yes, sir."
"Remember how lucky you are; you're getting a chance to do some really effective work for the Court, really make a difference. If this goes well, we might even look at a promotion. And most important of all," another pause, "you serve, if even in the smallest way, the most important Organization in not only this world, but all the worlds. That is nothing to sneeze at. We're counting on you," he repeated. "Do you understand that?"
"Yes, sir. I'll do my best."
"Do better than your best, we have no room for failure. End communication." The radio crackled, starting up another headache, and the line was silent.
Damn, damn, damn, Doran thought. What the hell was I thinking? Did I really hope that they wouldn't find out? Now I'm the one who gets to be the scapegoat if she isn't out of there in a day or two. Plus they'll probably decide it's a good idea to have a liason responsible for making Valerie do whatever they want from here on out. Do they think I can work a miracle just by talking to her? He paced down the street angrily. It wasn't his fault that she'd gotten herself locked up. It wasn't his responsibility that her life wasn't working out the way it was supposed to. He didn't have anything to do with the outside at all! Except now. Now he did.
Spider hadn't told him when or where to talk to Valerie. He assumed that he now had clearance to her apartment, although it would probably be a nice touch to knock first. He'd have to track her for a while, try to catch her at a time when she was well in the City. Her body faded when she was completely in the outside world, but there had been many times when she wandered sort of half-in, half-out. He needed her full attention if he was going to do this right.
Valerie awoke to the sound of gentle knocking, confused for the moment as to where she was. She felt the softness of the couch and the smoothness of the hardwood floor one foot dangled onto, and realized she must have dozed off soon after getting back to her apartment. Then she realized she was probably still dreaming, wishing the real world was the dream like she'd sleepily supposed for a moment. She did visit her fantasy life in dreams sometimes, and it was always more vivid, if that was possible, feeling so much more like the real world than it should have. She always wished, after waking up, that she could have stayed in the dream forever.
The knocking sounded again, a bit firmer this time, and she brushed her hair back from her face, slipped her feet into the shoes that rested on the floor by the couch, and went to the door.
It was the same stranger that had talked to her yesterday, and they bowed, dramatic and cocky. "Valerie," they said, "I told you you'd have the opportunity to get used to me."
She sighed, and gestured them in. The door slid shut behind them. She'd read somewhere that dreams involved no element of choice, that the events were mapped out beforehand by the unconscious mind and only played to the dreamer like a videotape, or more like it, a virtual reality disk. Except VR systems were clunky and impratical in the real world. The thought that she had no control over her actions was both comforting and disturbing, like the thought of fate or destiny. Valerie liked to be in control, but if there was no choice in the matter, she wouldn't have to second-guess herself so much. Here she comforted herself with the thought that there was no choosing whether to let this person in or not, whether to talk and listen or stay cocooned in comfortable solitude.
Except she didn't really believe it, and suspected that she'd allow a stranger all kinds of freedoms with her just out of loneliness. It wouldn't be the first time.
"Allow me to introduce myself," they said with a smile that was much too dazzling to be sincere. "I'm Doran, and you would be... Valerie."
"You're laying it on a bit thick, aren't you?"
The smile this time was realer, rueful and tinged with exasperation. "I suppose so. Can we talk a bit?"
"I let you in, didn't I? It's not like I have anything better to do," Valerie said, and returned to her couch by the window. She refused to do the hospitable thing and tell them to sit down. They didn't seem like the type that needed much invitation, anyway. Yes, they crossed over to the other sofa and lolled there, picturesquely, as though they'd been arranged. A mystery to Valerie was why so many people in the City appeared to be, or at least looked just like, gay men. Femmey ones. Assumptions aside.
"I'm worried about you, Valerie," Doran said, leaning over confidentially as though speaking about delicate things. "It's not good for you to stay in that hospital – you know as well as I do that you're not crazy."
"How do you know me, anyway?" she asked, ignoring the hospital reference.
"I know you because I am a part of you. Created by you. In your head," he said, softly but audibly.
"Part of my fantasies..." she wondered aloud. She thought of how real they'd seemed lately, how she'd almost believed the City was something that would live and breathe apart from her, something bigger than she was. She didn't seem to have the kind of control that befitted a fantasy or daydream – it was more like a night-dream carried over into the day. Where the choices were already made.
Doran said nothing, but their silence was an assent. It seemed strangely self-referential, for a part of her dream to know their limited scope. It seemed not-quite-right, like an imperfect splicing in a movie. She asked, "Why would I be so annoyed by you if you were something that I made up?"
They chuckled. "Perhaps that is all you are prepared to believe in." It seemed just wrong enough to be plausible.
"So why'd you come to me with your blinding worry? I don't want to be there either. You got some advice?"
"Maybe," they said. "I don't know. Maybe I just want to offer my support, help you through it. It can be hard to deal with people who don't understand you."
Valerie felt her skepticism weakening. Why was she always so suspicious of everyone, anyway? Maybe her mother was right about some things – maybe people didn't like her because she pushed them away. Sometimes she wondered if the only reason she was so wary all the time was a grandiose sort of pessimism, or maybe a lack of self-esteem. Being afraid to believe that she was worthwhile to anyone else in the universe, that they would ever have any kindness or even time of their own to offer her. She wouldn't even be surprised if her mother was right about everything. But she was a stubborn girl, dammit, and she clung to her perceptions because they were all she could trust. The world seemed ranged against her, but better to know about her battle than be duped and used and left out in the rain, realizing too late that her trust was misplaced.
"What makes you think you understand me?" she quipped, a kind of parting shot as her resistance faded. Sort of faded, she amended to herself. She'd listen to this person, talk to them, waste time with them; she didn't debate that she was lonely. But she would keep herself back, allow herself the wariness. This person seemed to understand and be armored against sarcasm and suspicion anyway.
"Call it a hunch. I'll let you judge for yourself, if you like."
"I will."
"So... are we at an impasse yet or can more conversation be dredged from the foxhole? Are you holding up okay out there?"
"I'll survive."
They sighed, exaggerated. Everything they did was exaggerated, come to think of it; their clothing was too black and anachronic, their gestures grand and sweeping, their voice too feeling, even in sarcasm. The kind of person her mother would hate, and Valerie felt the same repugnance rising in her. She squashed it firmly, not wanting to have anything in common with her mother, thinking how wonderful that this person could allow themselves such excess, how wryly they pulled it off. "You're not making this easy, you know," they said.
"I guess I don't make much easy for people often."
"They don't make it easy for you. Even I'm not making it easy; I know that much." They winked at her. "I'm not quite as dumb or foppish as I come off."
"I wouldn't say dumb... just determinedly annoying." They laughed a little, and Valerie allowed herself to join in. "Can I ask you a question?"
"Ask away," they replied, with one of their grand gestures.
"Do you even have a gender?"
Doran laughed so long and hard that Valerie was a little scared, and very irritated. It might be a dumb question, but they'd made a big show about wanting to be her friend, confidante, etc etc.
They turned up the swish when they answered. "Oh, darling, I'm flattered. Androgyny takes so much work to attain." They wiped tears from their eyes. "Last I checked, I still had that pesky Y chromosome, but you know it could have been cowed by your relentless feminity, my dear."
This was meant to be a joke; Valerie had an uneasy truce with her natural sex, at best. She envied boys not their penis, but their freedom, maybe, a little. It seemed to her that they could do more of what they wanted, say more of what they were thinking, go more places. Her mother was always trying to get Valerie to act "more like a lady" and usually it precluded most interesting activities.
"You're lucky I'm not easily offended," she retorted.
"I always wonder why gender is so important to people anyway. I'm impressed that you didn't make an assumption about me."
"It was your eyes," she said, suprising herself. Doran's eyes were liquid and hazel, intelligent, understanding. They were not masculine. She didn't think she'd even noticed them.
"I'll take that as a compliment," he said, yawning. "Life is easier when you assume the best, don't you think?"
"I wouldn't know." She looked out the window at the city lights. They illuminated so many colors of glass like pixels on a screen, spelling out some cryptic message Valerie felt she could almost have understood. They were beautiful and strange, unfamiliar, far away.
"How sad for you."
She focused her attention back in the room, looking at his shoes, which were black and polished. Because she looked down so much of the time, Valerie had an excellent memory for shoe and sock styles and colors. It was easier than looking at someone's face. She didn't have anything to say, so she waited for Doran to say something. He was quiet, though, and they sat like that a while. It made her uncomfortable, but on reflection she kind of liked that he could let the silence be there without feeling the need to fill it. The sun started to rise in the blue-tinted glass behind his head, giving him a witness-protection kind of a look. Valerie relaxed deeper into the softness of the sofa. She realized she'd been tense for days or weeks, and she didn't let the tenseness go altogether, but it went down a peg or two. The sunrise always made her vulnerable, dammit.
Finally Doran said something. "It's getting light. Are you going to go back and show them how sane you are at the hospital?"
"I guess," she sighed, reluctantly. "I hate talking to people."
"Buck up, and you'll be out of there before you talk to many."
"I'm not so sure..."
"Me neither, to tell you the truth. Never having been hospitalized myself." Valerie smiled at this. He continued, "But it seems like it shouldn't be too hard. I don't get the impression that they love being understaffed and overcrowded."
She didn't say anything. She didn't want to think about the hospital. She wanted to stay here in her cozy little world forever, saying not much at all to some tall androgynous stranger with liquid eyes. Christ. She ought to listen to herself. Not that it would be the first time that her daydreams got steamy; actually that sort of thing was normal enough to be reassuring. Everyone fantasized that way, didn't they? Many people, anyhow. She always went from suspicious to horny in real life, too. It was a failing of hers. Sometimes she was both at once.
Valerie was getting annoyed with herself. She always did this, always obsessed enough to destroy any situation. Even bad situations were made worse, and she couldn't allow herself to enjoy anything. The sun inched up in the sky. She wanted to weep for the second or third time in less than a day. Who was she kidding, escaping to these vapid daydream interactions? Sometimes an anger at herself surged up so intensely she felt like she would have had the strength to wrap her fingers around her own neck and squeeze hard enough and long enough to never breathe again.
"No," she said faintly, "but then again, what do I really know about how it works?"
He looked at her seriously for a moment, then laughed as though trying to break the spell. "You're smarter than they are, or I miss my bet. You'll figure it out. And here," he scribbled a number on a scrap of paper, "my radio. You have a link somewhere in your apartment, I presume?"
"Yeah," she mumbled, taking the paper.
"Then you can call me. I have places to be," he spoke briskly. "See you." And he strode purposefully out of the room.
Valerie felt tireder than ever.
I don't want to open my eyes, but there's a person standing in the room who only knocked once before barging in. She says I need to get up so they can draw blood from me. I wonder why they need my blood; I'm not sick! I'm not here for some fever or disease or something. I mean, I don't have a big problem with needles, but I don't like the way these people assume they can just do whatever they want with me, like I'm some kind of a rag doll. She's standing there waiting for me, repeating my name, because I haven't given her any sign that I've heard her.
"Valerie? Valerie, hello, time to get up!" Her voice is much too bright, saccharine, not hiding its impatience but layering the cheer on as a complement to it. Irritated and cheery, what a terrible combination.
I roll over, squint at her. I'm glad that I never took my clothes off last night. I brought a bag of things to wear with me, because the doctor told me I should, but they took it back into the nursing station and haven't mentioned it since. They said they needed to search it.
"Well, look who's finally up. Hello, Valerie, my name is Linda, and I'm one of the nurses on the floor today."
"Yeah, ok," I mumble, shielding my face from the light she's flipped on.
"We need you to come get your blood taken, and we're a bit behind schedule this morning, so you'll need to come right away," she smiled. She was waiting for me to follow her out of the room; this is cruel and unusual! How can they possibly be behind at... I squint at my watch... 7:23 in the morning? I sigh and heave myself upright, following her out into the hallway in my sockfeet.
The hall is wide and sterile, bright with fluorescent lighting. There are some windows, but they show only a little strip of concrete with some pathetic dying bushes, an ashtray full of cigarette butts, and another panel of windows with another hallway on the other side. Completely closed in. Or maybe it's a mirror, but I don't see myself in it, so I figure it's not.
The nurse notices me looking. "That's right, you got here pretty late last night, didn't you? That's the atrium, which is where you can smoke if you need to, or get some fresh air." I wondered how any air could make it down into the tiny gap surrounded by building, especially when it was choked to death with cigarette smoke, but I wasn't going to argue with her.
"And this," said the nurse triumphantly, as though it were some kind of crowning glory, "is the dayroom." A shriek sounds; a short, middle-aged woman is sitting at a table with her sleeve pulled up, looking like she'd rather be slowly tortured to death than be pierced by a needle. A nurse is holding her hand, and the man with the needle rolls his eyes.
"Looks like someone's ahead of you; just have a seat and wait, Valerie. He'll be with you soon." I choose a chair and sit, rather glumly. Not only did I have to be dragged out of elusive sleep at the crack of dawn to lose another few CC's of blood, but I have to wait in line for the privilege. I feel like running, but there was nowhere to run to. There is nothing to do but sit down, as I was told, and wait.
The dayroom is roughly the size of a one-bedroom apartment. On one side of the room is a big square of low, couch-like, squishy vinyl chairs. They are a horrendous shade of mauve. In front of them is a counter that looks like it could have been a bar, but there are no stools. The counter is sealed off with low swinging doors, and opens into a room where people with badges scurry about – the nurses' station. The other side of the dayroom is filled with tables and chairs, and there is a sad-looking, half-finished puzzle spread out on one of the tables. A regular counter, with locked cabinets, spans the far wall. It has a mini-fridge, a sink, and a stove with all the burners removed.
Two hallways extend from either side of the section with low chairs, away from the nurses' station. My room is down one of them; the other one looks like a mirror image. There are all kinds of doors in the walls, but I don't know where most of them lead. There the one I came in through from the outside, and there's the room with the plant where they had me wait. There's not much to look at. I think I'll go crazy here if I wasn't already. There is a pile of ripped-up magazines on the chair next to me, things like Cosmopolitan and Vogue, People and Glamour, all of them advertising sex sex sex on the cover, my only reading material here in a place where sex is not one of the options. The women on the covers look thin, airbrushed, and ugly. My best bet is a Family Day with a giant dessert on the cover. Blah. No thank you.
My eyes start to glaze just as they call me over. "All right Valerie, your turn," another nurse says. I walk over to the table and sit down, silently submitting to the procedure. They don't talk to me, just hurry about their business as though relieved that I'm not making a fuss. Now they're done and I'm sitting in an unfriendly room with unfriendly people and nothing to do. I know I said waiting was my talent, but I'm frightened because I see my time here stretching out endlessly, with no changes, each day a thousand years long. I have these moments of anticipation, at least that's what I call it. Just a sense about what is to come, and it knocks me down sometimes, like now. I'll be really lucky if I leave here today, but something in me doubts the likelihood of that possibility. I'm caged up and I can't really believe that they would be so quick to let me go. Intuition whispers to me that being a prisoner is permanent and irrevocable. It feels familiar, somehow, this lack of control, lack of choice. I feel like I wouldn't be surprised at anything they did to me, and I think that making me wait here, without my stuff, with nothing today, I think that's going to be the worst.
I've already tried to drift into my daydreams this morning, but it isn't happening. Sometimes it's like that. I don't know why it only works some of the time, most of the time. But right now I'm too paralyzed with fear to relax into my world; this one looms so intimidatingly that I can't look away. I can't explain where this panic, this fear is coming from. My ground is unsteady like that lately; I guess it's just part of the drowning. The waves throw me off course, off my feet, out of my way. I get afraid, and I can't say why, and I don't know how to fix it. I get depressed and can't snap myself out of it. I know these waves are a metaphor, but they seem so real to me that I'm afraid I really am going crazy.
Doran sighed as he pushed through the glass doors at the bottgm of Vacerie's building. His conscience, which hadn't much troubled him in thirteen years or more, was giving him twinges. He didn't want to have to deal with anyone face to face, much less an innocent and definitely not someone of Valerie's status. That wasn't part of his job description; he was strictly a behind-the-scenes man, running ahead of the camera to secure the territory. Or something like that. He had no training for this, nothing to go on.
And, damn it all, he found himself liking this intense, troubled girl. And while it wasn't exactly cross purposes with her own desires, to try to spur her out of the hospital, he still felt those twinges of guilt. Maybe the definition of betrayal was simply that which the betrayee would be angered and violated by.
Another sigh. A radio had come while he was in her apartment, summoning him to the local Court building (not the official local Council house, but a warehouse where offices were set up in the basement.) He was on his way now, and he knew that the experience would be nothing good.