Fiction
Friday, December 31, 2004
The Eternal Triangle
Her reaction was everything he'd feared, from the depths of desolation to the pinnacle of fury. He'd hardened himself as best he could, having envisioned all too clearly what pain and anger he would unleash, but he had known all the while that he could never truly be prepared.
She screamed that he had betrayed her love, and he hung his head. She wept at having been drained of life and cast aside, and he turned his face away. She probed for guilt, at first delicately and then with an undisguised intent to wound, and he allowed himself a single angry riposte about her search for a lever with which she might bend him to her will.
At last she fell silent, tears drying on her cheeks, and he knew that the end was in sight.
He'd written the scene a thousand times. He knew what was to come. There would be a last, philosophical exchange over the inevitability of it, more wistful than bitter. She would ask him if he had any regrets, and he would assure her that he wouldn't change a thing. She would praise him for his unflinching candor and his purity of motive, and he would speak gallantly of her many charms and virtues. They would embrace one last time, exchange the kiss of parting, and she would go. And perhaps, may the gods be forgiving toward one who had denied them for so long, he would be able to work again.
The artist, his lover, and his art. The eternal triangle, never in balance, never at rest. I told myself it would be different this time, but I knew better all along.
The silence ticked by in stately increments of sorrow, absorbed one by one to cement the accumulating finality.
The denouement played out exactly as he expected. She asked if he would be all right by himself, a passing allusion to the strains his dedication to his art put upon him. He assured her that he would, and asked the same of her. They reminisced over their time together, how she'd been more than willing to fight for his attention when his muse was upon him, how he had never left her company without a mountain of regret, how they both ought to have known. Presently she rose, donned her coat, and stood before him in her full glory for the last time.
So beautiful. So vital. So devoted. What am I doing, renouncing such a woman for literary ambition, for the cold fulfillment of mere aesthetic pride? Why can't I make a space for her in which I could show her an equal devotion, where we could be two alone together, instead of three?
It was only his fear and regret screaming for a reprieve. All his love affairs had foundered on the same shoal, his inability to confine his artistic yearnings to a finite portion of his life. The softer parts of his nature begged him to recant, to take stock of his solitude and find room in himself for a woman of such magnificence and magnanimity. He ignored them.
At last they embraced, and he saw her out. He sat silent for a long time after in the space that was now his alone.
Physically, the apartment hadn't changed. She'd never brought more than a change of clothing, never disturbed the least of his knickknacks. His shabby old furniture had never pleased her, yet, sensing the ineffable bond between his creative powers and his embrace of an unthreatening, undemanding seediness, she'd eschewed comment. She'd gone well out of her way to avoid giving even the appearance of disapproval. Yet the sense that a critical element had been removed pervaded the flat like the grief at a wake.
He knew only one cure for his melancholy. It awaited him in the bedroom, on the computer she'd glared daggers at whenever he sloughed her attentions in favor of its bloodless embrace. He shuffled into the bedroom, sat down before his computer, and flicked the ON switch.
The machine came to life without hesitation. It had awaited his return with digital patience. He invoked his word processor and opened the document that held his destiny. It was as he had left it, all its tension still pulsing with the colors of life, hero and heroine both turgid with unslaked need, tangled in their multifarious maneuvers and lies, teetering at the edge of the climactic scene he had not yet found the courage to write.
I will finish it this day.
It was an oath as solemn as any promise of marriage. He set his fingers to the keyboard and opened himself.
For a moment no words would come, and his carefully repressed fear spiked into panic. Could he have been wrong? Was it possible that she had not been his main obstacle but his principal source of strength and vision, fueling his creative furnace even as they struggled over the fragments of his attention? Had he driven from his life the very element upon which his quest for immortality depended?
Just as he was about to slip over the threshold to despair, inspiration descended upon him. Electric possibility flowed through his brain and into his hands. His fingers struck the keys at first slowly, but with accelerating strength and the steady return of confidence.
When, only minutes later, he pulled his hands from the keyboard and sat back from the screen, his regrets vanished as he savored the splendor he had wrought. A slow, wolfish grin spread across the face that had been frozen so long into an ascetic immobility.
Roughly he thrust his throbbing tool into her quivering quim. "Aaaah!" she wailed, caught fast on the jagged border between lust and outrage as her passion eclipsed her fury at his presumption. Their rhythms conjoined as their bodies had, her alabaster globes heaving in perfect time to the strokes of his velvet-headed love hammer. They moaned and surged as one, willing captives of the tidal forces they had loosed.
"I'm back," he said.
A New Look
She had felt herself to be the center of attention in the store. Other shoppers' eyes had pressed upon her, analyzing, weighing, passing judgment. As busy as the place had been, it had seemed that all talk ceased as she arrived, and did not resume until she departed. It was hard to believe she had done it.
As she approached her building, she felt again the heightened sense of scrutiny. Passers-by were only pretending not to stare at her; she knew better. Head down, shoulders hunched over her package, she scurried up the building’s front steps and down the hall to her family’s apartment.
Only she was home. Her mother and brother were undoubtedly hard at work. They would not have been surprised to find her at home, but they would have expected her to be at her studies, not whizzing through the house as if she’d committed an act of theft and couldn’t hide the evidence quickly enough.
She locked the apartment door and ran down the hall to her bedroom. As tiny and Spartan as it was, it was all the privacy she had. She felt lucky to have that much; individual privacy was not highly regarded among her people.
She closed and locked her bedroom door and sat at her desk, package still clutched to her chest, and tried to catch her breath. It was unreasonable for her to be in such a state over so small a thing, but she knew what her mother would say if she found out. Yet her mother would not be the worst of it. Her brother, the self-appointed guardian of her virtue, would leap into action at once, raging, accusing, searching for evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors she would never have the courage to consider. Though he was two years her junior, he nevertheless considered himself the paterfamilias, and her under his tutelage. Once he had even struck her. She, to her shame, had done nothing.
Her heart rate slowed, and she forced down the panic that had followed hard upon her act of daring. There were practical problems to be solved, and she would not forget them. But for the moment, it was time to enjoy what her thrifty habits and her episode of abandon had gained her, and to revel in her act of self-assertion.
She pulled the box out of the plastic bag she clutched, set it on the desk, and looked at it awhile. Her timidity surged back. It almost regained control of her. Would she regret her purchase when she opened the box? Would she see the symbols of her fantasy, or an expensive folly that would mock her hopeless attempt to be something she was not?
She lifted the lid, removed the contents and set them delicately on the desk like matching sculptures. Baby dolls, the clerk had called them. The black patent leather gleamed just as seductively as it had in the store’s window. She traced a fingertip up one four-inch heel, down the vamp and around the rounded toe, marveling at the smoothness of the finish.
She was certain her mother had never worn a pair of high heels. Her mother owned two pairs of shoes, both absolutely flat and as utilitarian as a dust pan. Probably no one in her community owned a pair of high heels. Bold as she had been to purchase them, she could not wear them here, or where anyone who knew her or her family could see. But she would wear them.
She pulled off the flat, scuffed shoes that were all she dared to wear in her own neighborhood, and the heavy black ankle socks under them. Her feet were delicate, even pretty. Her toes were well-formed, with undistorted nails. Her ankles were slender. Her insteps were smooth and her arches high. She knew she was pretty, in that special way called petite, and it pleased her that her feet were a match for the rest of her. She hoped that someone else would see her as pretty, some day soon. In her senior year at college, it had yet to happen.
She yanked open the top drawer of her minuscule dresser, groped under the piles of plain cotton underwear and extracted the single pair of pantyhose she had dared to buy. She pulled them on and yanked them up under her long denim skirt, then jammed her new shoes onto her feet and stood, thrilling to the still-exciting sensations and the new tension in her legs.
The only sizable mirror was in her mother’s room. Though she had heard no sound from the front door, she peeked out the door of her bedroom, listening for the presence of others. When she was certain that she was still alone in the apartment, she walked carefully -- one does not run in high heels! -- to her mother’s bedroom and admired herself in the full-length mirror that hung on the closet door.
They were beautiful. She was beautiful! She would never be tall, but her new shoes raised her nearly to average height. Her posture was affected as she had expected, bosom and rump more prominent, more inviting to the eye. When she pulled up her skirt enough to see, the effect on her legs was sensational; she actually had calves now.
She ran her hands along her contours, from her neck down to her thighs. She had always envied women who had the courage to dress to glorify themselves. Soon she would be one of them. How did they feel? How would she feel, when she had assembled a properly feminine wardrobe and had amassed the boldness to wear it? Excitement built in her again.
One hand pulled her skirt up high, bunching it in her fingers. Her other hand moved to her mound, where a trickle of wetness had begun to leak through her white cotton panties, endangering her precious pantyhose. It seemed unimportant now. Her fingers stroked her mound, sending exquisite spasms through all her muscles. Waves of tension and surrender surged through her. At last she pressed down against her most sensitive spot, middle finger digging in hard. Her head tipped back and a curious low growl escaped her lips, as the spasms changed from small transient currents of pleasure to something infinitely more.
She descended from her climax to find herself still posed before the mirror, face flushed and chest heaving. She let her skirt fall and breathed deeply, trying to regain her composure. Who could know how soon her family might return on any given day? They always closed the restaurant for an hour between the luncheon and dinner periods. But before she left her mother’s bedroom for her own, she could not resist one more appraisal of the image in the mirror.
Everything had to go. She could no longer bear the thought of such frumpishness. She would work even harder, and she would save, and soon she would have clothes suitable to wear with her beautiful new shoes. A silk or satin blouse, cut to accentuate her figure. A skirt that revealed her legs, perhaps in suede or leather. More pairs of pantyhose in several shades. Maybe even some jewelry. If she had to leave the house dressed like a drudge, she would stop at a public ladies’ room to change, and of course to change back again before returning home.
She could not resist putting her fingers to the corners of her eyes and trying once more to pull them into a Caucasian configuration. The epicanthic folds resisted her stubbornly. She squinted a bit and willed the mirror to show her the image of what she wished to be: a confident, indomitable, thoroughly feminine Western woman.
The folds remained, as did the long black hair plaited into a single thick braid, and the golden-brown skin on which all her experiments with cosmetics had looked so wrong. She ceased to tug at her eyes and let her hands fall to her sides.
Some would see it as a great irony. There were limits upon her attempts to remake herself that all the money and privacy in the world could not overcome. They had been imposed not by her actions, but by the actions of others. Even in America, the land of infinite choice, still one could not choose one’s parents.
The ghost of a sound from the hallway outside startled her out of her reverie. She scurried back to her room, there to become again the plain, dutiful young woman she was expected to be, the only kind of girl tolerated in that part of Chinatown.
Thursday, December 30, 2004
A For Effort
(I particularly like to write about the discovery of one's own worth. People are, in the main, brighter, stronger, braver and more appealing than they realize. Why don't they realize it? Well, sometimes it's a deep, dark, and complex affair...and sometimes it isn't.
Gentle erotica set in Onteora County. Emil Deukmeijian also appears briefly in the first of my Realm Of Essences novels.)
The Clean Genie was about seven inches long and two inches thick. It had a hemispherical head and a spherical reservoir at its base, and was covered in soft latex with a skin-like texture. The shaft was dotted with pinprick-size orifices. The head sported several more of the tiny openings around its rim, and a larger one at its tip. It emitted a faint but delightful scent, at once fresh and delicately musky. Morgana regarded it soberly.
"Why a woman would want to stick that into herself is beyond me," Glynnis grated.
Morgana turned the device over and read the tag glued to its base. " 'Cleanses, soothes, and deodorizes. Best used in a warm bath.' " Glynnis snorted. "Have you got an infection?"
"I don't know. I might."
Another snort. "You're obsessed with your odor."
Morgana clenched her teeth. Don't get into it here. You know what she's like and you room with her anyway. She looked for the price, found it, and beckoned an Albrecht's saleswoman over from the main counter.
The saleswoman was a willowy blonde, elaborately dressed and made up. "Can I help you, Miss?"
Glynnis's lip curled. Morgana forced a smile. "Do you carry the refills for this separately?" She presented the Clean Genie, half embarrassed to show the thing to the store's own staff.
The saleswoman glanced at the device and smiled, demonstrating considerably more self-control than Morgana could have mustered. "Yes, we do. Citrus, pomegranate, vanilla, honey, and Heavenly Breeze, our best seller. They're a dollar ninety-five each."
"What does Heavenly Breeze smell like?"
The saleswoman gestured at the appliance. "Like what you're holding."
Morgana mentally totted up her discretionary fund. "Then I'd like one of each." She handed the appliance to the saleswoman, who returned to her counter and started working the register.
"Meg --" Glynnis's tone was half pleading and half monitory.
"Enough, Glyn. Two minutes after I step out of the shower I stink like Cannery Row, and we both know it."
"I don't mind, damn it!"
It's not you I was thinking of. "That's very tolerant of you, but I'd rather not have to wear a plastic diaper to my graduation."
Glynnis's eyes narrowed. Her short, round body seemed to tighten from her neckline all the way to her knees. "You aren't getting involved with...men, are you?"
Morgana turned to face her squarely.
"Let me remind you of a few things, Glyn. You're a lesbian. I'm not. I'm a twenty-two-year-old heterosexual woman who hasn't had a date since she was fifteen years old. That might not bother you, but it bothers me!"
Glynnis's eyes went from threatening to pleading in a millisecond. "But, Meg --"
"Enough, Glyn. I'm getting tired of being alone in the world. My odor has to have something to do with it. So --"
"You're not alone!" Glynnis wailed. Despite her baggy clothing, Morgana could see her quivering. "You have me. For two years now!"
Morgana started to reply, bit her lip instead.
From the first weeks of their acquaintance, she'd known what Glynnis wanted from her. Artfully concealed when the young lesbian answered Morgana's ad for a roommate, shortly thereafter it became as plain as print. Even so, Glynnis was a good roommate: clean, responsible, and always respectful of Morgana's privacy.
Well, almost always.
"Someday you'll find someone, Glyn." Morgana kept her voice low and soft. "You'll meet her at school, or in our complex, or in the city somewhere. And I'll be overjoyed for you. Really! But it won't solve my problem."
Glynnis's eyes grew moist. Morgana held back a cruel remark.
"Miss?" the saleswoman called from behind the register. "Will this be cash or charge?"
Morgana fumbled for her wallet.
As soon as they got home, Glynnis ran to her room and slammed the door. Morgana sighed, tossed her purse onto the dinette table, and extracted the Clean Genie from her shopping bag. She slumped onto the couch and cradled it in her lap, pondering what she'd embarked upon.
From before the onset of puberty she'd been short and pudgy. She'd accepted her physical mediocrity as a fact of life, and had concentrated on the expansion of her intellectual horizons. It had been effort well spent. In six weeks she'd be awarded a Master's degree in engineering with summa cum laude honors. She'd accepted a lucrative full-time position at Onteora Aviation that would begin a week after that. She'd be poised to launch her career, in a field that employed twenty men for every woman. Men who were legendarily desperate for female company.
But she stank like a fish market on a July day.
It pained her even to think about the emissions from her nether parts. She'd been this way for seven years, but had never dared to seek a corrective. It was a handicap, but it was also an excuse. What if, once she was stripped of her odoriferous defenses, she still couldn't attract a man?
You know it's possible. There's more than your odor to think about.
In the past, she'd veered away from all such thoughts. But her mind, conditioned by six tough years of study to rigorous analysis of data and the close examination of theories, would turn from them no longer.
She took the Clean Genie into the bathroom, closed the door quietly behind her, and regarded herself in the full-length mirror that hung there.
Still short and pudgy. Well, the short was genetic, and not to be undone except by artifice of clothing. But the pudgy...
It wasn't hopeless. Twenty pounds or so. Perhaps it was time to start an exercise program. She'd have time for it now, with her thesis work complete and graduation in sight. If she could get the weight off, perhaps she could motivate herself to upgrade the rest of her grooming.
For the first time in years, she studied her face.
It wasn't a bad face. Her skin was clear, her forehead high. Her features were regular, properly sized and spaced. Her teeth were white and straight. Her hair had promise. It was a deep, lustrous brown, thick and healthy. She'd never done anything with it -- why bother? -- but perhaps a shoulder-length cut and a wave...
She looked at the Clean Genie in her reflection's hand.
She'd spent good cash money on it. She was going to use it.
"In for a penny, in for a pound," she murmured.
The tub took seven minutes to fill.
It was a shame Morgana had to get out of the tub. She'd never before felt this relaxed, this complete, this luxuriously right. But she was turning pruny, and dinner wouldn't make itself.
As the water gurgled down the drain, she hoisted herself out of the tub, wrapped a towel around herself, and contemplated the evening.
Is it too late to call a few health clubs, ask about membership plans? They must make appointments in the evening. Most people work during the day.
She patted herself dry with particular care. It had been months since she'd last shaved her legs. It took a long time. But the results had delighted her. Her smooth, taut skin seemed to glow with a new vitality. It brought such a sense of renewal that, feeling slightly naughty, she'd continued northward to remove all the hair there as well.
Morgana was reacquainting herself with her own body. Every turn produced a new surprise.
The Clean Genie had produced more than one surprise.
Subconsciously straining to minimize the import of her actions, she'd thrust the device into herself unthinkingly, with a what-the-hell motion. Something she'd forgotten about gave way with a spasm of exquisite pain. But it was only a few seconds and the flick of a switch before the pain was an irrelevant memory.
The Clean Genie didn't just soothe, cleanse, and deodorize. It hummed. And hummed, and hummed, and hummed.
It ran for half an hour before the pump exhausted its reservoir of Heavenly Breeze and started to complain. Removing it and switching it off took all the willpower she had.
The device had left her sweetly clean. The powerful nether odor that had tormented her and anyone near her for a decade was entirely gone. In its place was the fresh, slightly musky scent she'd first smelled in Albrecht's.
She peered into the mirror again, unsure what to expect.
Her reflection was strange. It was recognizably her, of course, but there were differences a bath and a shave wouldn't account for.
Was it the absence of tension? Or the sense of new vistas unfolding?
"Doesn't matter," she murmured. She folded and hung her towel, slipped into her robe and ambled barefoot out into the apartment.
Glynnis was sitting on their couch, staring at her. The intensity of that stare almost stopped Morgana in her tracks, but her newfound serenity reasserted itself at once.
"Something wrong, Glyn?"
"You were in there a long time." The words hovered at the border of reproach.
Morgana smiled. "Sorry." She went to their kitchenette and rummaged through the cabinets for a quick snack. She found a granola bar at the back of a low cupboard, stood up and turned, and found Glynnis standing right behind her, looking abashed.
"Meg? Does it, uh, work?"
Morgana peeled the foil wrapper from the granola bar and took a leisurely bite. She chewed carefully and swallowed.
"Oh my, does it ever."
"Meg --"
"Get your own, Glyn."
The six weeks to graduation went by like so many days.
Morgana transformed her life with a thoroughness that shocked everyone around her. She joined a health club, visited it thrice each week, and drove herself like a team of oxen. She purged her larder of all the starchy, sludgy things she'd subsisted on throughout college and replaced them with lean meats, vegetables and fruit. She returned to Albrecht's several times, not just for refills for the Clean Genie, but for clothes, shoes, cosmetics and perfume. She pushed every limit she'd ever had, including a few she hadn't known about.
And she changed.
Her excess weight blitzed off her as if it had been packed and awaiting an order of eviction. Her waist and thighs narrowed. Her muscles gained tone and power. Her plodding, self-concealing walk became a confident stride. She sloughed her sweatshirts, jeans and loafers in favor of sheer blouses, short skirts, and high, high heels. Passers-by took note and pointed her out to one another. Men smiled at her, and she smiled back.
And each night, she filled the tub and took her ease.
When the Dean of Students called out "Morgana Rothman, Master's in Engineering," and she mounted the dais to accept her diploma, he looked at her, then at the diploma, then at her again. She almost had to rip it out of his hands.
After the ceremony, her reserved, standoffish father hugged her with an intensity that was near to life-threatening. He'd been as bowled over by the new Morgana as anyone else.
Her mother kissed her, tears of pride running down her face, and whispered, "You can do anything."
It wasn't what Morgana was accustomed to hearing from her mother. Grace Rothman had been less than encouraging about her daughter's academic and professional ambitions. She was so stereotypical a suburban homemaker that even her closest friends joked about it when she was out of earshot.
Her classmates headed off to a local watering hole to toast one another and celebrate their commencements. Several approached Morgana to invite her, but she excused herself, bade her parents farewell as they departed for Westchester, and returned to her apartment.
Glynnis was sitting in their little living room, reading. She said nothing as Morgana entered. Morgana bade her a cheery hello. In response, Glynnis marked her place, rose, and went to her room, closing the door emphatically behind her. Morgana could only shrug.
When she'd folded and boxed her graduation gown properly for return to the rental center, she removed her tailored pink skirt suit, her slingbacks, and her glitter-flecked pantyhose, and filled the tub.
Things changed when she started at Onteora Aviation.
Though intellectually she'd known better, Morgana had subconsciously assumed that work would be much like school, with many options and alternatives to choose from. The pace and intensity of OA's Engineering Center jolted her from the moment she arrived. Her manager, Dick Orloff, was a kindly, fatherly man of middle years who expected excellence from everyone he supervised, and always got it.
She hadn't been expected to be fully competent from her first day, but it was plain that her more senior colleagues would not carry her simply because she was new and female. Though they never said so, they regarded themselves as an elite, membership in which had to be earned. She received no indulgence, no special treatment.
Morgana struggled to absorb the huge knowledge domains that were prerequisites to getting anywhere in aviation engineering. At first, her schedule came under intense pressure. She gritted her teeth and bore down, refusing to give up her health club, her grooming appointments, or her time in the tub.
Toward the end of the summer, it started to pay off. At first acutely conscious of being "the new kid," by October she carried herself with the authority of burgeoning, well-earned confidence. She spoke up at meetings. Her colleagues sought her opinion on design questions. Her struggle to master her new field began to abate.
Each night she got home tired. Each night she found Glynnis waiting in the living room, silent and immobile. Waiting for Morgana's return only to rise from the couch and seal herself into her bedroom. Morgana would simply shrug, undress, and fill the tub.
It went on like that through the fall and into winter.
"Meg?"
"Hm?" Morgana looked up to find Dick Orloff standing in her cubicle entrance. The manager looked slightly apprehensive.
"Want to be on a tiger team?"
"What! Who, me?"
He nodded. "On the F/B-6 upgrade. They need an ace at wringing the oscillations out of a multi-layer digital circuit."
Her brow furrowed. Tiger teams were always formed from the Engineering Division's elite, and only to handle utter save-the-baby emergencies. When a tiger team was assigned to a problem, regulations and procedures were swept away. They operated under only one rule: Get it done.
"Dick, are you sure you want me for this?"
He grinned. "Can't quite believe it, can you? You'll be working with Emil Deukmeijian on the self-protection jammer. Have you met him?"
She shook her head. He gestured her out of her chair, and she followed him down the corridor of gray fabric panels.
"Now's a good time. You'll like him. He's the sharpest engineer in Tactical Software, and a hell of a nice guy to boot." Orloff looked furtively from side to side. "Don't tell his boss I said that."
She laughed uncertainly.
Deukmeijian awaited them in a small conference room. He stood as they entered.
"Emil," Orloff said, "this is Meg Rothman. She's new, but she's my best debugger. You two play nice." Morgana blushed and held out her hand. Deukmeijian took it gently. Orloff vanished as they regarded one another.
Deukmeijian was tall, broad-shouldered, husky, and darkly colored. His hair was an unruly mat of thick black locks. He moved fluidly, very much at home in his big body. There was a suggestion of pain behind his eyes, as if there were something on his mind he couldn't chase away. But his smile looked genuine, and his voice was deep and pleasant. There was a plain gold band on the ring finger of his left hand.
"Hello...Marguerite?"
She smiled. "It's Morgana, actually. But Meg will do fine."
"How'd you wind up being called 'Meg'?"
"I didn't like 'Morg,' and all the other good nicknames were taken."
He grinned. "Okay. Did Dick tell you about the problem?"
"Only that it's an oscillation in a multi-layer digital circuit."
Deukmeijian nodded. "I hope you're as good as Dick said you are, because this one's a doozy. Bit-slice design. Three parallel processors. Mucho pressure. Come on, let's get to work."
They made a most effective team. Emil's knowledge of the programmable parts of the circuit was encyclopedic. He had an equally complete knowledge of the huge microprogram that drove the nanosecond responses of the jammer. Whatever sort of pattern Morgana needed to trace the behavior of the circuit, he could easily provide.
They worked almost continuously, from eight each morning until well into the night. She found his intelligence and grace powerfully appealing, wedding ring and all, but on the few occasions she ventured a personal sally, he deflected it neatly back to engineering. Even over lunch, she could hardly get him onto another subject, be it politics, sports, or entertainment. She sensed a layer of sorrow wrapped around him, something that forbade him any personal involvements. Plainly, he used his work to buffer them away.
In six working days, they pinned down the source of the problem: a heat-sensitive clock generator that could be driven over the edge by too tight a loop in the microprogram. They debated whether to work around it in the code, or replace the clock with a more stable model.
Morgana wanted to work around it. Respecifying the component would require government recertification, and would cost enough time to endanger the contract. Emil wanted to fix the board. A software kludge might have unforeseen unintended consequences. They fought it out for three hours, late on a Friday evening when all their colleagues had already left, until Emil called for a truce.
"We won't settle this tonight. Hungry?"
She grinned. "Almost always."
He was silent for a long moment. She was about to pack up and head home when he said in a tight voice, "There's fresh swordfish at the Aquarium tonight. Join me?"
It caught her off guard. She was slow to answer. He was married, after all. As she dithered, the corners of his mouth drooped.
"That's okay, Meg. Never mind. I'll see you Monday morning." He shoveled his working notes into his briefcase and made for the door.
"Wait!" she all but screamed. He halted and swung about to face her.
"I, uh, I'd love to." His eyebrows rose a fraction of an inch. "How far is it?"
Something crept over Emil's features. Something slow and heavy, half sad and half sweet, at once wistful and hopeful.
"I'll drive," he said, and held out his hand.
They took a table near the restaurant's front window. Emil ordered for both of them, and then fell silent. Morgana asked about his wife and family, in the hope of discovering something light and pleasant to talk about.
It developed that he was a widower. His wife's name had been Katrina, and she had died in a plane crash. He would say nothing more about her, despite Morgana's gentle prodding. Indeed, he said little enough about anything.
Morgana didn't want to talk about work, so she talked about herself. With Emil sitting there, listening silently, it proved surprisingly difficult. It wasn't until she started in on her master's thesis project that she was able to get him to participate. It propelled them through their entrees and well into dessert before she became embarrassed and ran down.
"I shouldn't go on about myself like that," she said.
His mouth dropped open. "No, don't stop! I haven't enjoyed listening to a woman this much since --" He jerked to a halt. His eyes slid closed and the cords of his neck stood forth.
She reached across the table and laid her hand over his. His eyes opened again. They were filled with pain and guilt.
"I envy her, Emil," she murmured. "You must have loved her very much. I've never had anyone to love me like that. How long has she been gone?"
His shoulders jerked against the urge to hide his face. His facial muscles contorted against the need to cry.
"Not quite five years," he said.
"And you've been alone since then?"
He nodded and looked away.
The little restaurant, all but empty, was silent around them. A lone busboy roved the tables against the far wall, gathering unused flatware and vacuuming up crumbs. A car rolled sedately past the window, street lights glittering in the frost on its roof.
She felt a great and inexplicable affection for this man. On a mere six days acquaintance, it was plainly absurd. She knew nothing beyond how he worked and his widower status. But there was no denying it.
Was it her own desperation speaking? She'd thought that well behind her. Yet she was still quite as much alone as she'd been before graduation. Glynnis's silent reproof had negated even the sterile companionship she'd once provided.
What kind of choice is this? What good is there in running from isolation toward pain?
What if he rejects me?
She marshaled her courage.
"Emil," she said as she caressed his hand, "come home with me."
His head jerked around. "What?"
"Do you have a dog to walk or something like that?"
"No, but --"
"Then come home with me. Tomorrow's Saturday, isn't it? Let's have an evening and a night and a morning together, and see what comes of it. You've been alone long enough, don't you think?"
He said nothing.
"Don't you owe it to yourself to try?" she whispered.
He winced, and she feared she'd gone horribly wrong.
"It's so easy for you," he said. "Beautiful, talented, smart. You've probably had five dozen lovers already. You could have any man you wanted. It wasn't that way for me. I was always so awkward. I didn't meet Katrina until I was twenty-three, and I was still a virgin. From our first date I was terrified that she'd drop me for someone better. But she never did, and we married, and then I lost her. How could I think I could get that lucky again?"
It stunned her speechless. He saw the astonishment in her face and smiled sadly.
"I just don't want to rip all those scars open again, Meg. Not if it's never going to amount to anything."
A preemptive rejection.
It was a maneuver she was intimately familiar with.
"Emil," she said, barely above a whisper, "I'm twenty-three. And I'm a virgin."
The color fled from his face. She clutched his hand and pressed on.
"You can't imagine how thrilled I am to hear you speak so highly of me. But you need to know the whole story. If we except my father, I've never had a man in my arms." She winced as she realized how that sounded, and hurried to correct it. "I mean, uh --"
"I know what you mean," he said. He turned his hand over to return her clasp. The warmth of his palm against hers sent a thrill through her that ejected all of Clean Genie's ministrations from her memory. "And you're offering it to me? Meg, why?"
Her throat tightened. She bore down. "I don't know why. I'm not in love with you, not yet. But you're a good man, and you're alone, and I'm alone, and neither of us deserves to be, and the clock is ticking, and why the hell do we have to analyze it all the way down to the electrons? Why can't we just take a modest chance on each other and see how it works out?"
"Easy, Meg." He looked around the restaurant, at everything but her. "So even if I might not be a 'keeper,' you're willing to take a chance that I might be? That's the long and the short of it?"
She nodded vigorously.
"But you see," he said, "that's the problem. You are a 'keeper.' I'm going to want to keep you. If you decide otherwise, what do I do then?"
"I don't know!" Tears rose to her eyes. "I can't guarantee you anything. I can't even promise you good sex. I've never done it before!"
He squeezed her hand and waited for her calm to return.
"I can handle that part," he said. "You're sure, then?"
She took a deep breath, counted to ten, and let it out. "I am."
"Waiter!" He reached for his wallet.
He undressed her slowly. Perhaps he was giving her every chance to change her mind. Or perhaps he wanted to be sure she was real. When her blouse and skirt were puddles of cloth on the floor and he made to remove her panties, she pulled back, and he froze.
"Is everything okay?"
"Uh, yeah." She stepped backward, felt the edge of her mattress press into her thighs, and lay back on her bed. "It's just --"
He rose and moved toward her. "I know."
No you don't.
They'd been working too late for her to have her regular nightly sessions in the tub. Her last application of the Clean Genie had been on Sunday, nearly a week behind her.
He spread her legs gently and knelt between them, put his fingertips to the wisp of silk over her loins, and teased it away. She fought to hold down her panic, strained not to show any tension or shame.
He was silent for a long instant. Her fear spiked.
"How beautiful you are," he breathed.
He put his lips to her labia and parted them with his tongue, and her world was made new.
Bladder pressure woke Morgana at half past two. Emil was asleep beside her, sprawled on his back and snoring gently. She resisted the urge to caress him, slipped out of bed, and headed for the bathroom.
As she came out her bedroom door she collided with Glynnis. Each threw her arms around the other instinctively. They started to giggle simultaneously, and quickly shut it off.
"I didn't know you were home," Morgana whispered.
"I got in after you did." Glynnis's eyes darted toward Morgana's bedroom. "Who is he?"
Morgana blushed. "How did you know?"
"You don't snore. So who is he?"
"A guy I work with. His name is Emil. He's awfully sweet."
Glynnis's lips curved upward. "Good for you."
Morgana couldn't quite believe she'd heard it. "Glyn, is everything okay?"
Glynnis giggled again. "You're not the only one with company."
Morgana gasped. In an instant all the awkwardness and distance of the six months past were swept away.
"Glyn, that's wonderful! I told you it would happen. Is, uh, is she a 'keeper'?"
Glynnis shrugged. "Maybe. You have to take a few chances, don't you?"
Shorn of all words, Morgana pulled her roommate close.
"You took a chance on me, didn't you?" Morgana whispered. "When you moved in, I mean."
She felt Glynnis nod against her shoulder. "And you took one on me. I hope you didn't let these past few months get to you, Meg. I was being stupid."
"No, you weren't. You were just disappointed. You've been a great roommate." Morgana pondered. "Are you going to want your own place now?"
Glynnis pulled back and peered at her through the darkness. "Do I need one?" She looked at the bedroom door again. "Is he a 'keeper'?"
"I don't know yet. I like him a lot, but, well --"
"Let it be, Meg. We'll take it as it comes. We've been doing that for two and a half years, and it's worked out okay."
"Okay." With that, Morgana felt the future open to her, possibilities beyond all counting.
"Hey, are you still using that, that thing?" Glynnis said.
"Yes, every...well, just about every night, why?"
"Does it really work?"
"You tell me."
Glynnis nodded. "I guess it was a good thing you tried it. Say, Meg...?"
Morgana saw the question in her roommate's eyes and held down a burst of laughter by main force.
"Get your own, Glyn."
"Ha! Okay."
Prices
It was Alex’s habit to arrive early for class, especially a class where he expected to be conspicuous. Analysis II might be one such, attended mostly by Chinese who had been sent to the university because of its reputation in mathematics. He might well be the only Caucasian enrolled in it. It had been that way in Analysis I, the semester before.
There were only two others in the classroom when he arrived. He took a seat against the windows, near the front, and busied himself arranging his notebook and writing tools. The classroom filled steadily with students and the low gabble characteristic of an as-yet-unconvened lecture class. He paid no attention.
The last student to arrive was a young Chinese woman, the only female in the class. She was beautiful in the subtle, delicate way of her people, with flawless features, porcelain skin, a gently curved figure, and straight, shiny black hair that fell just past her shoulders. Alex looked up just as she walked in. Her eyes met his briefly; then she turned away and took one of the few seats remaining, on the far side of the room.
As he'd expected, the class was entirely Chinese except for himself. He had nothing against the Chinese, but it grieved him that his countrymen showed so little interest in the queen of the sciences. As he surveyed the room, he noticed that the young woman was looking at him. Their eyes met again for an instant. He felt a pang pass through him that was unrelated to the study of mathematics. Most of the other students were appraising the young woman as well.
The instructor swept in and tossed a large briefcase on the table at the front of the classroom. Alex collected himself and made ready to concentrate.
Alex arrived early for the next meeting of the class as well, and settled again into a seat against the windows. He was startled when the girl walked in thirty seconds later.
At the previous session, her clothes and grooming had been college-student normal: denim and loafers, and no makeup at all. Today she was garbed in a black silk blouse with a cowl collar, a black leather skirt that came to just above the knee, sheer stockings, and black leather high heels. More than that, she had made herself up. Her face, which had been beautiful even without cosmetics, had become a glowing song of subtle reds and yellows. It was a look a woman might take hours to perfect, and it was unheard of among the Chinese.
Alex watched the young woman in fascination as she scanned the almost empty classroom, found him, and walked directly toward him. She took the seat at his elbow. She seated herself in silence and extracted a notebook and pen from her large purse. Alex noticed that she was also wearing fragrance, a light but musky scent that would be impossible to ignore. When the instructor arrived ten minutes later, it was all Alex could do to tear his eyes and thoughts away from her.
An hour later, as the class dispersed, he tried to shovel his materials into his backpack and exit without looking at her again. She did not permit it.
“Excuse me?”
“Yes?” He hoped his internal turmoil was not evident from his face or voice.
“What was the reading assignment again, please?” Though her English was perfect, the lilt on her words made it plain that she had not been born in America.
He waved toward the blackboard, where the assignment was still on display, and started away, hoping to lose himself in the rush of bodies seeking nothing but the next class of the day.
She laid a hand on his arm. The gentle touch rocked him more than any blow could have done.
“Have I made you uncomfortable? Please tell me how.” Midnight black eyes opened wide looked straight into his own, threatening to drown him.
He felt himself becoming light-headed, losing control not only of events but of his rationality. His breath seemed caught in his chest. He was able to produce only the falsest of smiles, no poise in it at all.
“No, it’s all right, really, excuse me please, I have to go.” He turned and tried to hurry away, but the strap of his pack caught on the arm of the chair. The chair went over with a crash, and the contents of the pack distributed themselves over the classroom floor. Heedless of everything but the need to escape, he scooped up his belongings, jammed them into his pack, and darted for the door, not daring to try for a more dignified exit. The other students tittered at his back.
She continued to arrive just after he did and to seat herself next to him. He could have sworn she was following him. When he chose a seat at the back of the room, so did she. She also continued to dress as if she were on her way to a high-society dinner party. A number of the Chinese men tried to attract her interest. She disregarded them completely.
She made no attempt to conceal her interest in him. He could not help sneaking glances her way. Almost always, she would be doing the same.
Alex began to dread the class. Mathematics, his major, was becoming his least favorite subject, for he could no longer think of it without thinking of her. She began to intrude upon his thoughts at all hours and occasions. He, who had prided himself upon his ability to focus, was having trouble clearing his thoughts of a young woman whose name he did not know.
After a month he could bear it no longer. Instead of hurrying from the class at its conclusion, as had become his habit, he steeled himself and turned toward her, and found her already looking at him. She showed no sign of surprise.
“Why?”
He hated himself for the tremor in his voice. He had never had any luck with girls in the past, but at least he could be proud that he had never lost his head over one. Now it was all going wrong.
“Will you come and talk with me?”
There was no special intensity in the words. She seemed to have been waiting for this. He clenched his teeth and nodded once.
She rose and reached out toward him. He took her hand and allowed her to lead him from the room, acutely conscious of the many pairs of eyes that followed.
The coffeehouse was almost empty that afternoon. Alex and the girl had seated themselves in a corner recess. Even had the shop been filled with patrons, they would have been hidden from most and turned away from the rest. A single waitress sat at the counter, reading a romance novel. Soft folk music issued from an unseen source.
“Will you tell me why? Please?”
She looked down at the table and the untouched cinnamon roll he had bought her. “It’s not easy to explain.”
He waited in silence. She looked up and said, “Have you ever been to China?”
“No, of course not.”
She smiled sadly. “ ‘Of course not’ ? But you are an American and can go anywhere, while I am only here because the People’s Republic of China thinks I am likely to repay its investment.”
He said nothing, fingers playing idly with his sticky bun.
“Most Americans know very little of my country. Women are not respected there as they are here.”
He grinned at that. “You might hear a different opinion from some of the feminists.”
She sneered, and his grin slipped away. “Then they are fools. They do not appreciate America. One week in the People’s Republic would teach them to love it.”
She looked down. “More than anything else in the world, I want to be an American girl. I want to feel the freedom they feel, and have the same sense of possibilities.” She hesitated, then looked directly into his eyes. “At least, I want an American boyfriend.”
Alex sat motionless, hands folded before him on the table, as he groped for some purchase on this incredible conversation.
“You want . . . me.”
She nodded, face serious. “Yes.”
You'd like to remain in America, wouldn't you?
“You haven’t told me your name, you know.”
“Chen Hsiao-ling."
“Hsiao-ling, my name is Alex Betancourt.” He wiped his hand clean of frosting on his jeans, then extended it across the table for her to shake. She did not shake it. She clutched at it with both of her own and pulled it to her cheek. Her expression was absurdly, dreamily blissful. After a moment’s hesitation, he pulled their joined hands down to the surface of the table and waited for her to calm down.
“Hsiao-ling, have you ever dated? Anybody?”
She shook her head.
His grin returned. “Neither have I, really. Why did you choose me?”
The question seemed to puzzle her.
“Why should I not choose you? You are bright, handsome, and a good mathematician. Are you damaged in some way that does not show?”
He had no answer to that.
At first Alex assumed that it would not last more than a week or two. He might be only nineteen, but he was a realist. He knew nothing of her, and it seemed obvious that her fancy for him was based on her fantasy of life in America, not on any attributes he possessed. Nevertheless, he took it, and her, seriously; it was his nature.
He saw her as often as possible, and took her everywhere he could think of. The coffeehouse during the week. Museums, restaurants and movies on the weekends. When the weather warmed, they began to sojourn into New York City, sometimes to shop, sometimes simply to stroll, enjoying the pulse of so much human activity. The income provided by his part-time job was not large, but his tuition was covered by a scholarship, and he had practiced thrift all his life. He could afford to entertain her in these and other ways, and so he did.
They talked of many things. She told him of her upbringing in China, of the bleak years of her childhood on a tea farm where there was always too much work and seldom enough to eat, of her slow discovery of her intellect and her love for mathematics. Then came the glimmer of hope: the competition to be selected to go to college in America and drink of the intellectual riches of the West, to bring them back to the parched and destitute East. It was not easy to gain permission to leave the People's Republic. One had to promise many things. But no promise would be considered sufficient if there were not at least one living relative from the immediate family to remain behind as surety for one's eventual return. Family feeling being as strong as it was among the Chinese, it was an inducement to return that few could resist.
Hsiao-ling's surety was her mother. A widow at fifty-two, she now worked the tea farm with occasional assistance from two distant cousins and continuous obstruction from two government-provided "helpers."
He told her of his own childhood, which seemed banal and carefree when compared to hers. Only the loss of his father when he was fifteen could match the least of her stories in poignancy. Yet she listened with complete attention. She probed for details, always relating them to her own experiences. She marveled that there were no ideological monitors in the grade schools. She reeled in shock upon being told that the State permitted schools other than its own to exist. And she could not quite believe that upon graduation, Alex was not to be assigned willy-nilly to a post of the State's choosing.
He came to know and admire her with a speed as uncanny as the manner of their connection. Soon he had ceased to think about that at all. Their time together passed swiftly.
The assaults began shortly thereafter.
At first he paid no mind to the jostlings and impacts, assuming they were only the usual consequence of the press of bodies one had to endure just before and after a large class. But the frequency and severity of the incidents increased, and became difficult to ignore.
He was tripped many times. He suffered several sharp blows to his back and to the back of his head. Two of them were powerful and unexpected enough to send him sprawling to the floor. When he looked about for an explanation, none was evident. No one stood there to confront him. He would find himself standing apart, the faces of his classmates turned away from him, as if he were the least noteworthy thing in the room.
Once it happened in the open, as he was going from one building to another. The impact was to his lower back, near his kidneys, and was sharp enough to pitch him face-first into a patch of mud. He turned without rising, and saw a tall male figure receding from him at good speed. The young man's shoulders were hunched forward, denying Alex the sight of his face. His skin was Oriental in tone, and his short, glossy black hair was hardly disturbed by the early spring breeze.
He thought about telling Hsiao-ling, and decided against it.
She was always radiant when he was with her. He could not imagine a more beautiful, more vital, or happier woman. She continued to dress and make herself up for every meeting with him as if they were headed to a White House ball. Once he asked her why.
"It's for you."
"It's not necessary, you know."
She smiled. "Yes, Alex, I know. But do you like it?"
He stared at her. "What's the superlative of 'Christ, yes' ?"
Despite a powerful reluctance to draw attention to himself, he resolved to try to match her. Over a period of weeks, the contents of his closet changed completely. A barber cut and tamed his rough blond hair. A manicurist brought refinement to his hands. He added cologne to his morning grooming ritual. She said nothing, but there was no concealing the delight she took in his efforts to make himself over for her.
On the night of his twentieth birthday, after they had been seeing one another for about three months, they were walking back from their restaurant to his car, when she bade him to stop and look at an image on a television in a store window. It was of the two of them, captured by a video camera trained on the sidewalk.
The tall young man in the picture was the image of youthful male elegance. He wore his navy blue blazer, his sharply creased gray trousers and his highly polished black Oxfords as if he'd been born to them. His grooming was immaculate, and his bearing was rich with self-assurance and pride. Alex could hardly believe that it was he.
The young woman who held his hand and rested her cheek against his shoulder was the essence of youthful female beauty. Her gaze was not upon the image in the monitor, but upon him. It spoke of a devotion that bordered on adoration.
He turned to face her, and she slid into his arms, face uptilted. When their lips met, the current that surged through him made him press the length of her body against his own. Her arms tightened around him in response. Neither of them noticed that dozens of passers-by had stopped to watch that kiss.
She came back with him to his room that night, and they made love for the first time. He had never before done more than hold her hand. He could not bring himself to tell her that he was a virgin. He could hardly bring himself to think about what it would be like or what he would have to do. She guided him silently, her manner more comforting than any words.
Afterward they held one another, weeping softly from pleasure and relief. Presently he said three words, in a voice that quivered only a little. Without inflection, she said them back to him, and the world was made new.
"Hello?"
"Hi, Mom."
"Alex! How are you, dear?"
"Terrific." He paused. "Mom, I'm in love."
There was a moment's silence on the line.
"That's wonderful, dear. Where did you meet her?"
"In class. She's a math major too."
"How long have you been seeing one another?"
"About four months now."
"Well? Aren't you going to tell me about her? What's her name?"
"Hsiao-ling." He did his best to pronounce it as she would have.
"Charlene? A very pretty name. What does her family do?"
"Uh, they're in . . . agriculture."
Another pause. "Farmers, Alex?"
"Well, yes."
"I suppose it's respectable enough. But you said she's headed into mathematics, too?"
"Yes, she's really smart."
Mrs. Andrew Betancourt of Washington, D.C., nee Angela Tessier of Niagara Falls, New York, chuckled dryly. "I don't suppose you'll be willing to consider medical school now, if there'll be another mathematician in the family?"
"Mom -- !"
She chuckled again. "I've missed you, Alex. I've even missed that tone of exasperation of yours. I only ask because your father wanted it so much. But even he wouldn't have tried too hard to talk you out of mathematics. He knew how much you loved it, and I do too."
He sighed. "I know, Mom. It's okay."
"But let's get to the important matters now. Is your Charlene a Catholic? And will I get to meet her soon?"
As the end of the semester approached, Alex found himself unwilling to face the prospect of a separation from Hsiao-ling. Yet it seemed inevitable. He would return to Washington, and she would return to the People's Republic of China. It took him a long time to work up the courage to ask her if she could contrive a way to stay.
"I will be back in September, Alex, just as you will."
They were seated on his bed, having passed the afternoon in study. Textbooks and notes were spread all around them.
"Are you sure?"
She shrugged. "Not perfectly sure. Sometimes the government changes its mind. But it has no reason to do that to me. My grades are good, and I have shown no sign of disloyalty."
"Oh, you haven't? What about your relationship with me?"
She said nothing.
"Well, how would they know about anything you've done here?"
She pursed her lips. "One or two of the students from the People's Republic are monitors. I don't know which ones, of course. Their duties include keeping watch on the rest of us. They would report any indication that I was about to request political asylum, or had filed for permanent residence, or..."
"Or had gotten involved with an American?"
She sat unmoving for a moment, then nodded. "Perhaps, if they knew."
He took her hands between his own. "Hsiao-ling, when we first met, I assumed that what you liked best about me was that I'm an American citizen. That may have been callous of me, but a lot of girls from other countries do marry American men just for the right to stay here. That never occurred to you . . . did it?"
Her eyes had gone very wide. Mutely, she shook her head. After a moment she tried to pull her hands from his. He did not permit it. She looked down into her lap, face red with shame she did not deserve.
He began to speak, and found that his tongue had cleaved to the bottom of his mouth. His throat had gone completely dry, and his pulse had begun to pound in his ears.
"Hsiao-ling, will you marry me?" It came out as a croak.
She looked up at him, astonished. "What did you say?"
Without releasing her hands, he rose from the bed, moved to face her, and sank awkwardly to his knees. Her eyes were riveted to his.
"Chen Hsiao-ling, will you marry me and be my wife? Come live with me and be my love for all the days and nights of our lives? Share my successes and failures? Bear my children? Grow old with me? For ever and ever, till death do us part?"
He had never seen a human being so taken by surprise. Her eyes had opened so wide that her epicanthic folds had disappeared. Her mouth was open, but no sound issued forth. She was shaking from head to toe.
"Hsiao-ling, will you marry me? I won't ask again."
Her voice was the faintest of whispers.
"Yes."
He rose and pulled her into his arms. She continued to shake. He waited, holding her close. Presently she spoke again, her voice still whisper-faint but piercing from grief.
"My mother."
The next day was the final examination for Analysis II. Alex and Hsiao-ling arrived together and were heading for their usual seats when he received a savage blow in the small of the back.
Rage too long repressed flared within him. He whirled and flailed a tightly balled fist. By luck he caught his assailant across the face. The young Chinese staggered back and righted himself, but the target who had been so passive until now charged and took him by the throat.
Alex gave the thug no time to react. He shoved the young man's head into the wall of the classroom with all his strength. The crack of the impact rang through the room. The Chinese slid down the wall and lay there, slumped against its base.
"Get up."
The boy didn't move. Perhaps he was too dazed to make sense of the words. While the rest of the class watched, Alex reached down and grabbed his attacker's shirt front, hoisted and heaved him into a vacant seat at the front of the room.
Alex breathed once deeply, pulled himself upright and turned to face the rest of the class.
"Is there anyone else here who'd like to lay his hands on me?"
Silence gripped the room. At that moment the instructor arrived. He stopped in the doorway, examination papers clutched in one hand. Alex ignored him.
"I have been struck from behind too many times this semester for this piece of garbage to be the only one who was doing it. Who else is involved? Are you willing to face me openly, or is your government unable to afford the services of men?"
After a moment, a student near the back of the room rose.
"We are not in the employ of our government. We are only students."
Alex scowled as contempt rose within him.
"That would only make it worse. That would mean that all of this has been because you don't want your countrywoman to be involved with a white man."
The boy sat. Alex went to where Hsiao-ling stood, well away from where the violence had occurred, and led her by the hand to stand before their classmates.
"This lady is my fiancee. In a week she'll be my wife. If any of you have a problem with that for any reason at all, I'll be happy to give you satisfaction." He waved at his assailant, who had slumped forward in his seat. "I believe I've satisfied him."
He waited a moment more before leading Hsiao-ling back to their seats. They sat and waited as the instructor, himself of Chinese birth, moved falteringly among them to distribute the examinations.
She finished the examination before him and hurried from the classroom, leaving him to finish alone. Everyone else in the room turned to look at him. He ignored them.
When he had finished, he went to her room. She admitted him in silence. She had begun to pack her belongings. Apart from her clothes, there wasn't much to pack.
"Have I done something to offend you?"
"No." She would not meet his eyes.
"Are you frightened of something? Maybe of me?"
"No."
He moved forward and took her by the shoulders. "Hsiao-ling, I've grown accustomed to longer sentences. I should tell you that in this country, it's customary for husbands and wives to talk to one another. At least, I expect it."
She looked up at him then. "You still mean to do that."
"Of course I do!"
"But the price is so high!"
He started to expostulate, then stopped and forced calm upon himself.
"Yes, it is. The prices of valuable things usually are. Even today, there's enough racism left in America to make trouble for us. A lot of people who think of themselves as tolerant sorts get all bent out of shape at the sight of an interracial couple. There probably won't be any more violence, but we'll have to deal with snide comments and gestures of contempt for as long as we live. We might have professional difficulties. There are neighborhoods in which we wouldn't be accepted and could never live. You're worth it to me."
He heard his voice rise with his emotions, and forced himself to calm down once again.
"It's worse among your people than mine. Much worse, or so I've been told. Am I worth it to you?"
In response she wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his chest. Neither spoke for a long time.
Presently he said, "You haven't heard about your wedding gift."
She pulled back and looked up at him. "What?"
"I've got a little something picked out for you. Hope you like it. I'm afraid it's going to be very hard to wrap."
She sputtered. "I thought wedding presents came from the rest of the family."
"Yes, and that's sort of where this one is coming from, too. Did I ever tell you that my father worked for the State Department his whole life?"
She gaped. He smiled.
"There are still quite a few people in State who knew Dad and liked him a lot. I've been in touch with a few of them. They've told me that an exit visa for your mother won't pose much of a problem, once we're married. And she'll automatically have permanent resident status here, too. So that part of the price you won't have to pay at all."
He had thought her beautiful before, but it was as nothing to the light of joy that transfigured her features then.
"Of course, there is another price we'll have to pay."
She cocked her head. "Another price?"
He swallowed hard and forced a smile.
"Hsiao-ling, have I ever told you about my mother?"
Tuesday, December 28, 2004
Foundling
(This is probably my favorite among my own stories. It’s about a man who takes the obligations that flow from his chosen trade seriously. Very, very seriously.)
Jerome Huygens padded into the kitchen, his burden squirming feebly against his chest. The infant’s eyes were closed. Its limbs moved sluggishly, as if the little body barely contained enough force to move them. He laid it down on the great oaken table, stood a moment looking down at it, pulled out a chair and sat.
This is the price of being first to rise.
His thoughts would not jell. He’d have liked to put it down to the hour, but he knew better.
Ordinarily, the kitchen was his favorite room. He loved the size and brightness of it, the warmth of its woods, the gleams from its porcelain and brass. He’d assumed the duties of house cook upon arriving three years earlier. With them came an authority over the kitchen that no one dared challenge. He had decreed order and perfect cleanliness here, and it was so. He decided what would be served, and when. Outside the kitchen, he got as good as he gave, but here his rule was absolute.
They’ll certainly have something to say about this.
“Jerome?” Felix LaMontaigne stared at him from the archway. “What is it?” LaMontaigne’s voice was early-morning soft.
“A foundling.”
“From where?” LaMontaigne approached, plainly curious.
“The porch. Don’t touch it!”
LaMontaigne jerked back the hand he’d extended toward the baby’s pallid cheek.
“Why not? Are you afraid I’ll infect it with something?” Hurt clouded LaMontaigne’s moonlike face.
“Au contraire, mon frere.” Huygens put forth his own hand. With his fingertips, he teased back the light blanket to expose the baby’s neck.
LaMontaigne’s eyes went wide.
“Bon Dieu.”
“Still want to pet it, Felix?”
The stout little man put both hands to his mouth and fled from the kitchen.
Five minutes later all the house’s occupants had crowded into the kitchen to gawk at the foundling and its discoverer.
“Jerome, how could you have done this thing?” Allard Boileau’s voice was pure disbelief.
Huygens looked sideways at the gaunt septuagenarian. “Would you not have done it, Allard? It was lying on our porch, with naught but that miserable blanket for warmth and protection. Would you have left it there?”
“Who has done this?” Jacques Giverny whispered.
“Done what, Jacques? Made the child a vampire? We shall never know. Left it at our door? The same. Brought it into our house? I, Jacques. I did it.” Huygens rose and stared down at his colleagues. “I arose before you all, as I always do. I donned my robe and went to the porch to check the post, as I always do. I saw the child lying motionless on the cement, covered by that blanket, so I picked it up. The blanket fell away from its neck and I saw the wounds, and I knew at once what I held. Nevertheless, I turned and entered the house, and brought it here where we all stand. Now will you have done with your astonishment and help me to consider what to do next?”
Huygens’s gaze moved across the seven faces. They were filled with variations on embarrassment, shame, and mortal fear. No sound rose from them.
“What can we do?” Laurence Gottschalk’s words were halting, tentative. “We cannot simply cast it into the streets. Yet surely we cannot have it among us.”
“We have it among us now, Laurence. Where is the harm?”
“Jerome!”
“Do you propose that we take it to the convent, Laurence?”
“...no…”
“Then where? The Satanist coven in Melun? They’d be delighted, I’m certain of it. They’d have all manner of uses for an infant vampire. It chills my heart to contemplate the joy such a gift would bring them.”
“Enough, Jerome.” Allard Boileau’s voice had gone hard. “You know that we cannot have it among us.”
Huygens looked the old man full in the eyes.
“You shall not harm it.”
“Jerome, it is a vampire. It is the enemy of everything that lives and breathes and walks in sunlight!”
“Is it, Allard? It is at most six weeks old. It weighs perhaps ten pounds. Do you fear it so?”
“I do.” Dominic Bretigny stepped forward. “And you are a fool not to, Jerome. If you are not man enough to admit what we must do, there are enough of us that are.”
Huygens took the Provencal by the lapels of his robe and slammed him against the doors of the pantry cabinet. The others gasped as Bretigny’s back thudded against the birch.
“Do you fancy yourself with a hammer and a stake, Dominic? Have you done it before? No? Well, then you’ll want practice. Perhaps before you assault a helpless child, you should try your mettle against me. You’ll have to.”
“Enough!”
Boileau thrust his arms between the two and forced them apart.
“This is unseemly. This whole affair is unseemly. Dominic, you shall not hurt the child.” The old man turned to Huygens. “It is Jerome’s responsibility. Whatever is to be done, Jerome shall do it.”
Huygens’s mouth dropped open.
“You brought it here, Jerome. To your demesne, the kitchen, where all rules and decisions are yours. So long as the child remains here, this one shall be yours as well. But if it should leave this room, I will take it in hand.”
“Will you, Allard?” Huygens had begun to shake from rage. “Would you strike me down to do it?”
The old man’s eyes narrowed. “Would you force me to do so?”
“I will take this child,” Huygens said, straining to keep his voice steady, “to my room, and I will make a place for it there. I will see to its care, and to its feeding. It cannot feed itself, and you know that vampires neither age nor grow. Will you prevent me, Allard? Will you raise your hand against me?” He swept his eyes over the others. “Will the lot of you raise your hands to strike me down, for fear of a babe that cannot even turn over without assistance?”
“Jerome, it feeds on blood.”
“I know.”
The silence had the weight of a lead cloth.
Boileau tore his eyes from Huygens and addressed the others. “You all have tasks. See to them. Breakfast will be at eight. Leave us in peace.”
Feet shuffled, a voice muttered, “Mon Dieu,” and presently the old man and the young one were alone with the foundling.
“How did this come to pass, I wonder?”
Huygens’ gaze remained on the child. “Does it matter, Allard? Perhaps the mother found it this way, and could not bring herself to destroy it but feared to keep it. Or perhaps the mother was a vampire, and succumbed to a bloodlust she could not control, then left it here to mock us. We have no idea how long it has been… what it is.”
“It is already dead, Jerome. Its soul is long gone. Why perpetuate the unnatural life of this body, when the soul has departed?”
“How certain of that are you, Allard? We have nothing but conjecture to guide us in this.”
The old man’s jaw tightened. “We know they feed on the likes of us.”
Huygens nodded. “As we feed on the beasts of the field. For we consider them less than us, and the relationship to be a proper one.”
Boileau could scarcely credit his ears. “Do you set them above us, then?”
“No, Allard. But I’m sure they do.”
The child’s eyes popped open. It began to cry softly.
Huygens glanced at Boileau, rose and fetched a saucer and a small sharp knife.
A nick at the base of Huygens’s thumb and a steady pressure put an ounce of blood into the saucer in less than a minute. He wadded a dishcloth against the wound and put the saucer to the baby’s lips. It drank with relish.
“Every day, Jerome,” Boileau whispered. “Every day for the rest of your life.”
“There are other sources of blood.” Huygens grinned. “Perhaps one or two of the others can be persuaded to contribute.”
“Jerome!”
“Relax, Allard. I will find a way.”
The older man opened his mouth to speak, then closed it. He waited until the baby had emptied the saucer.
“Why, Jerome? You have always been headstrong. From the day you arrived, I knew trouble would attach itself to you. I thought I had made ready to deal with it, but I never expected this.”
The grin vanished from Huygens’s face.
“How strange that you must ask, Allard. Are we not priests of the same Christ? The one who said, ‘Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not’ ?”
Boileau’s heart clenched, and he nodded.
The younger man rose from the table and looked down at his new ward. “Allard, I have the Mass at the convent this morning. Would you watch over the baby until I return?”
It was an expression of trust for which the old priest was unprepared. He found that he could not refuse it.
“Of course.”
Huygens passed a hand over the infant’s wispy hair. It smiled and closed its eyes. Traces of red were visible at the corners of its mouth.
“Take it to my room. Be sure to keep the blinds drawn.”
“Jerome…” Boileau swallowed and tried to calm himself. The bridge he was about to cross would surely crumble behind him. “Have you thought about a name?”
The young priest turned to him in obvious surprise.
“No. I don’t even know its sex.”
“Well…”
Huygens’s grin returned. “I’ll leave that honor to you, my pastor.” He tossed the bloodstained dishtowel at the sink, then mounted the stairs to don his cassock and begin his day in the service of God.
