In the living room Denise waited for the automaid to leave then sat back down on the newly cleaned couch and uttered a long, pleasant, “Mmmmmmmm …” as she found the Travels sphere careening down a luxurious expanse of deserted, golden beach. A moment later Bob, for some reason, kissed her – or did she imagine it? When she looked up, he was nowhere in sight. Off to work? she wondered. But no, he couldn’t have gone to work because after a few minutes he was back, sitting down beside her. And the sandwich she thought she had finished minutes ago was sitting untouched on the coffee table in front of her, along with a fresh glass of orange juice and Jacovik vodka. She picked up the sandwich and began eating, chewing slowly, eyes glazed over like glass marbles.
9. RAPE, RAPE
Savina caught up with her boyfriend at school. She walked right up to him in class – he was linked to his instructor through a headset and was oblivious to his surroundings. She stood behind where he sat, staring down at the back of his head and feeling hatred. His hair was so blond, so fine. Such a beautiful boy, things coming to him so easily. She just hated him.
Quiet so as not to disturb the other students, Savina grasped his headset by the cord and slowly pulled. It slid off his blond locks and dropped to the floor. Greg looked around for a moment, disoriented.
“Why did you lie to me?” she asked, sitting at the terminal next to him.
“What?” He stared at her without recognition for a full three seconds. “Savina,” he said.
“Why did you lie to me.”
Greg yawned and rubbed his eyes. He was either still in alpha state from interfacing or he was totally unconcerned about her being angry with him.
“Greg,” she said.
“Why did I lie to you?”
“Yes.”
“When did I lie to you?”
Savina lowered her voice. “When you told me you were taking the pill, you jerk.”
“The pill?” Greg looked bewildered for a few seconds, then the color drained from his face. “Did I say that?”
“Yes.”
Greg’s eyebrows lowered, and his thin mouth warped into a frown. “I thought you were taking the pill.”
“You know perfectly well I wasn’t taking the pill. I’m underage.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. You could have gotten them.”
“The point is that you told me you were on it, Greg.
Otherwise I would have gone out and gotten something.”
“Are you saying that you’re pregnant?”
Savina glared at him. “What do you think I’m saying? Yes, I’m–-” She cut herself off, resisted the urge to look up at the student monitoring cameras. Admit to something criminal in a public place and the software watching you will report it to the police. “I think we should discuss this in a place that’s a little more private.”
“I’m right in the middle of a lesson here.”
Savina reached across him and punched the keys to save his position in the lesson and to log him out of class. Unplugging his headset, she wound the cord up and handed it to him. Greg was looking around at the other students, embarrassed. He took the headset and put it in his backpack then reluctantly stood up. She grabbed his arm and led him out of the node.
Outside the sidewalk was black, made of carbon concrete, and was sprinkled with tiny glass bits to make it sparkle in the sunlight. They walked across its hot surface and then off onto the grass of the park where students took their lunches. Beyond the grass at the other side of the park was the boarder to the Lesser Depopulated Zone.
There was a terrible tension between then, and Greg wasn’t saying anything. Savina felt suddenly subdued, the heat of their confrontation eeking away. She grabbed onto it, held it – she wanted that anger. She wanted the irrationality of it because it shielded her from the reality of her situation.
“If they abort this child,” she said to him in a low, even voice, “they’ll sterilize me. You know that, right? It’s the law.”
Greg didn’t say anything.
“Why didn’t you tell me you weren’t protected? Why did you have to lie to me?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s so stupid! This could have been prevented so easily!”
She glared at him. “It’s going to affect me for the rest of my life, Greg. Me! Because you were too lazy do prevent it.”
His eyes were watering up. “I’m sorry.”
“You know what the really stupid thing is, Greg – if this had happened two months from now instead of now, I would have been legal. I would have reached legal age.”
“I’m sorry.”
“All I would have had to do was worry about raising the baby tax. It would have been possible to have the Church sponsor the baby.” She was silent for a moment. They were walking through the grass now toward the boarder of the Lesser Zone; beat-feet music boomed from the ruins beyond, anarchists having a party. Savina felt her anger slipping again, and she grabbed hold, pulled it back. “Goddamn you!” she suddenly shouted at Greg. “How can you be so cruel!”
“I didn’t want this to happen!” he yelled back. “I didn’t plan to lie!”
They stopped in the grass, standing and staring at each other.
“I want to have a baby, Greg. I don’t want to be sterilized.”
“I’m sorry!”
“I know you’re sorry.” It was gone, her anger was gone. Now she was just frightened. “I’m willing to forgive you if you’ll help me.”
“Help you? Of course I’ll help you.” He looked so ashamed that it was pitiful. His smooth angular cheeks were streaked with tears.
Savina sighed, and they sat down on the grass. “I’ve come up with some ideas,” Savina told him. “If I can get a fake Idex I can emigrate and have the baby.”
Greg’s blue eyes moved to-and-fro without focusing, as if he were searching around inside of his head. “Emigrate?” he exclaimed. “To where?”
Savina pointed up. “One of the colonies.”
Greg stared at her. “That costs a fortune, and they don’t let pregnant women on shuttles.”
“Yes they do,” she said, but was unsure.
Greg was dead sure. “Shuttles aren’t as well shielded as the colonies. Space radiation turns babies into mutants. Besides, the government makes you wait and have the baby here so you have to pay the baby tax.”
That was one idea shot down. Savina tried the next. “You and I can go down and apply for genetic testing. If we make it, they’ll let me have it under the special circumstance thing. You know, for the gifted.”
Greg shook his head, looking at her as if she were an idiot.
“No. You’re not old enough, and even if you had an Idex that said you were they’d dig into your heritage and when they did that … well, they’d find out. You’d be guilty of having a fake Idex, and you’d be guilty of underage sexual activity. Besides, I … I wouldn’t qualify. My sister tried this exact same thing, and she was disqualified because my family has a history of mental instability.”
Savina was silent for a second. “Okay, lets go to the Church and apply for sponsorship.”
Greg shook his head. “You’re underage, and we’re not married.”
“I’ll get a fake Idex, we get married, we apply.”
“They’d find you were pregnant before the marriage and kick us out.”
“We can have the certificate date changed.”
“We can also end up in jail, and you’d lose the baby and be sterilized anyway.”
“We could go to the anarchists.”
“What?”
“We could. They’d take us in.” She pointed at the direction of the beat-feet music.
“No.”
“They take in people. How else do you think they got there?”
“You’re dreaming, Savina. That’s your most ridiculous idea so far. Look, you can’t have this baby, there’s just no way. You’re underage, I haven’t got any money … Savina, there’s just no way.”
“The anarchists have children. They don’t pay taxes.
They–-”
“Those people live like animals and eat bugs! Do you want to raise a baby like that? Just to avoid being sterilized?”
“It’s not my first choice, but I’ll do it if I have to. Greg, what I want you to do is help me think of a way we can do it!
You’re intelligent, you’re creative … help me.”
Greg looked away. “I think you should just have the abortion and get it over with.”
“Oh, thanks a lot.”
“Savina, it’s the least painful way out of this.”
“For you, maybe – not for me! How would you like me to tell them you raped me? Then you’d be up for sterilization too!”
He turned to stare at her. “You’d do that?” His voice was small, astonished.
“How would you feel? Don’t you want kids someday?”