Punishment

by Guerin Zand

  A few seconds later, the drink started to take effect and I smiled slightly. I turned around and went back to the rest of the group and took a seat. Cindy had just finished her explanation and the rest of my team looked in need of a drink as well. My daughter looked like she understood Cindy and simply said “Oh.” I sat there for a while with that stupid Gluark smile on my face. Everyone started to stare at me, but I ignored them. Finally, Stella spoke up.

  “So, Guerin, would you like to share with us what happened?”

  “I offered them what we discussed. I made it clear, it was their only option to spin the situation in any sort of favorable light for China. I gave them 48 hours to reach an agreement with the Americans after their ambassadors meet. Roger, don’t tell the Americans about the time limit. Their negotiating position is strong enough, ok?”

  “That’s fine. Did you offer them the IOET incentive?”

  “No. Let the Americans do that. I wasn’t in the best of moods being alone with those two. If we let the Americans offer this concession, then the Chinese might think they actually got more than what I promised. Now we wait.”

  “Well perhaps since we have some time, Guerin, it would be a good chance for me and you to have a private talk?”

  “Oh gee, Stella, I thought you’d never ask.” I rolled my eyes but stood up anyways. I offered Stella my arm and off we went. As we were walking towards the crew quarters I asked, “Your place or mine?”

  “Yours, Guerin. We wouldn’t want my husband walking in on us, would we?” Stella flashed me a sly grin and I shook my head.

  Another one of Stella’s private little chats. I was convinced she must be, or at least the consensus amongst the aliens was, an expert in monkey psychology. I think she probably just read a little too much Freud if you asked me. Either way, she felt it her duty to have a private chat with me whenever I had issues, which was quite often. I didn’t really mind. I mean, if it was her job and it made her happy, why not go along with it? It didn’t harm me, so I didn’t see a reason to be mean about it. We reached my quarters and entered. The cleaning bots were doing a good job and the place was a lot cleaner than I’d left it.

  I’ve tried to describe the alien décor before but the only word that comes to mind is IKEA. In the basic quarters, the ones I was always assigned, there is a single bed adjacent to the wall with the door. A half wall partition was the bed’s headboard and created a small hallway from the open door. This half wall also provided a little privacy, but not much. Along this hallway, from the door to the opposite wall, was maybe ten feet. At the end of the little hallway was a table jutting out from the far wall with a chair on both sides and a viewer interface on top. There were cabinets all along the top of this far wall somewhat similar to the overheads in our airliners. At the other end of the room was a door on the far side leading into the bathroom and the rest of the wall was a closet for clothes and stuff, essentially at the foot of the bed. The bathroom can only be described as having the basics, a sink, toilet, and shower, crammed into a very small room.

  Stella took a seat at the desk/table and I reached up and opened the cabinet located on the far wall above the table. I retrieved a bottle of Pappy’s and two glasses. I poured us both a healthy two fingers and handed one of the glasses to Stella. She took the glass and looked up at me.

  “Guerin, you’re not planning on seducing me, are you?”

  “God no, Stella. You remind me too much of my mother.” Stella frowned a bit. I don’t think a lot of women, even if they aren’t interested in you, want to hear that. “And maybe I should talk to YOU about that.”

  I grabbed my glass and the bottle, adjusted the bed’s pillows and sat back on the bed with my back propped up in the corner where the headboard met the wall. Stella slid her chair from the table to be closer to the edge of the bed. I figured if I was going to have a session with a shrink I should do it properly, right?

  “You know when you get that little tone in your voice and suggest we go for a private talk, it just strikes a bit of a nerve. It reminds me of my mother. ‘Guerin’,” I mocked, “‘Guerin, stop that. Guerin, come over here, Guerin, we need to have a talk’, you get the idea. You could try a little more pleasant tone and approach. You might think of some new lines as well. How about, ‘Guerin, Sammy has something to show us in the control center. Do you want to walk down with me?’ And when we end up going for a talk instead. just admit you lied. Not a big deal really.”

  Stella sipped her whiskey, I chugged mine and refilled my glass. “Hmmm, I suppose I could try.”

  “And as far as seducing you, it’s not that I don’t find you to be a truly sexy beast, but if you sound like my mother it just ain’t going to work for me. But who knows, right? We have each other and a full bottle of whiskey, stranger things have happened, trust me.”

  “Oh, I’m sure of that. I’ve seen some of your videos.”

  Still, those fucking videos haunted me. What was I going to have to do to get those things destroyed? These assholes will probably make them available to my daughter knowing them.

  “But we're here to talk about you aren’t we, Guerin?”

  “Sure, whatever you want, Stella. Since I’m all comfy this time, and we have this bottle, would you like for me to start from the beginning, you know, my childhood? We can make it a proper shrink session instead of our usual quickies.”

  “That sounds lovely.” Stella slammed down the rest of her drank and I poured her another.

  “Well, my childhood wasn’t the greatest. I wouldn’t say it was happy, but it wasn’t devoid of any happy moments. On a scale of one to ten, one being brought up to be a Trogan sex slave, and ten being all unicorns and fucking rainbows, I’d give it a solid three and a half. My father believed in the rod and he was full of anger. I think one of my biggest fears of having a child of my own was knowing I might be just like him. I’ve seen that anger in me at times. My mother just mostly stayed out of it. I think that was just because of the age in which she was raised.”

  “Were you like your father with Maria?”

  “No, but at times I would channel him a bit and go out of my way to act disapproving. The other fear I had of having a child was that it might turn out like me.”

  Stella was sipping her whiskey when she heard that last bit. She choked it back up and we had to take a short break for her to get settled and clean up the mess.

  “You ok?”

  “Yes, yes. Let me guess. That fear was realized?”

  “Well, sort of. It started with her vegan rebellion, and after that she started to act up and test the limits. That’s when I’d channel my old man and scream and berate her. I’d make her think I was ready to kill her and walk off. Anna would come talk to me about it later and I would chuckle. I mean, she tried, but she didn’t really have the skills I had when I was her age. Perhaps my father helped with that, and it was my fault she never measured up in that department. Maria’s worst paled in comparison to the shit I pulled in my teenage years, but I’d let her think I was impressed. It helped encourage her. I was really proud of her for standing up to me over the vegan issue, but I still give her shit about it whenever I get a chance.”

  “So, you told me why you feared becoming a parent, but why did you never marry before Anna?”

  “A couple of reasons. I was close once, but she didn’t trust me. I traveled all the time. I would come home sometimes and I’d be on a plane back out the next morning. It was just my job at the time, but she thought I was screwing around. We weren’t together enough so she dumped me. She was right, not about the screwing around part, but the never together part. I decided I probably should just be screwing around.”

  “That’s it? One girl dumped you and you gave up?”

  “No, and I was actually dumped by more than one girl. I know that’s hard to believe, but it’s true. I had other issues.”

  “I would have never guessed.”

  “Ha, ha. I have never been very responsible. I find it a chore to be
responsible for myself most of the time. Being responsible for a wife and family seemed to be pushing it with my skill set at that point in my life. On more than a few occasions, I would have disagreements with the law and I was not a fan of the police. Having been cuffed, and then beaten by a group of them, I think justifies my feeling that way. Some people say I have issues with authority.” Stella raised her eyebrows and gave me a mock look of surprise. I ignored it. “More than a few times, I spent a night or two in jail. Luckily, I made enough money to beat some lame ass charges when it came to that.”

  “So, why did you decide to marry Anna?”

  “Well, as far as being responsible, not much had changed, but I was set financially. I knew she, and whatever family we had, would always be taken care of. But still, there were a lot of reasons not to get married. The only good reason I could come up with for getting married was I simply wanted to. I didn’t want to lose Anna too.”

  Stella nodded understandably and we both finished that round of drinks. I poured us each another.

  “Thanks, Guerin. You know, I’m not sure if it’s the alcohol, but I think I’m starting to understand you.”

  “I’m pretty sure it’s the alcohol, Stella.” We both nodded our heads in agreement.

  “I’m sorry I never got to meet Anna. We’ve never talked about her so why don’t you tell me a little about her. How did you meet? What made you fall in love with her?”

  “I didn’t go looking for someone. After Milly dumped me, I just went back to my old habits with women. Just a little fun here and there. I was bored, and when the opportunity to get away for a while came up, I took it and moved to Tokyo. Anna worked in a little coffee shop around the corner from my home and that’s where we met. She had the most beautiful eyes and smile. It wasn’t like love at first sight, but I knew there was something the first time I laid my eyes on her. It was probably fear and my instincts telling me to run fast. That probably would have been best for Anna.”

  “Guerin, you can’t blame yourself for what happened to Anna.”

  “Who should I blame then?” I slammed down my drink and poured myself another one.

  Stella just looked down for a second or two. She didn’t push the issue and changed the subject back to her original question. “So, when did you know you loved her?”

  I got comfortable in the bed again. “That’s a good question because I don’t know. I would often go to the coffee house because it was so close, and when I did she’d come and sit with me if she wasn’t busy. Soon we were spending time together, outside of her work, going out for dinners, drinks, or cooking for each other. We’d go out for rides on my motorcycle and she’d show me the Japan that she knew. I was trying to avoid anything serious, because of my Milly issues, and I don’t know what happened. At some point, she just totally owned me. Maybe I always loved her and was just too stupid to realize it. One night I told her why I was hesitant to get serious. We had a short talk about Milly, and we never talked about her again.”

  “You never talk about Milly, do you, Guerin? Don’t you care about her, or think about her anymore?”

  “I think about her almost every day, Stella. Whenever I’m alone, with just my thoughts, she’s there. It just doesn’t do any good to talk about it, and when I was married, I learned to ignore those thoughts. Milly said it was over, so that’s that. What’s the point of bringing it up other than causing more pain?”

  “You’ve mentioned a few times that you decided to do this job after Milly left because you promised her you would. Is that the real reason?”

  “Maybe part of the reason. I mean, it sounds a lot better than saying I didn’t have anything better to do, right? After what Julie did to me, lengthening my lifeline, what else can I do?”

  “You’re still mad at Julie for increasing your lifespan. I don’t understand why. Most people say they want to live longer.”

  “I don’t think I’m the only person that feels this way. After Maria had left for San Francisco, Anna and I talked one night. I was going to ask Julie for a favor. To do the same for Anna so I would have someone to share that time with. Anna told me she wasn’t sure she wanted that, and I didn’t try to talk her into it.”

  “But tell me why you feel like that?”

  “For me, I think I look at life as if it were just another prison.”

  “You’re kidding? That’s not a normal thought, Guerin.”

  “Well, I’m special. Think about it, Stella. Isn’t being sentenced to life in this universe no different than a life sentence in a prison? You can’t just step out for a bit when it gets to you. The only way out is to die. Our primary instinct for survival makes us want to live, not, not die. That’s why someone who’s dying says they want to live, that primary instinct always wins out. When we’re young there is so much to do yet we don’t think of death. As we get towards the end of our lives, we look at death as a promise. A promise of rest, and finally freedom. Julie fucked that promise for me.”

  “It sounds to me like you’re depressed, Guerin.”

  “Wow. Is that your professional opinion? I think we shouldn’t be too hasty. Let’s finish off this bottle before jumping to any conclusions.” I finished my drink, and since Stella was ready, I poured us both another one. “Obviously, current events have me slightly down. You have to agree that’s normal, and I know it will pass. Unhappy, angry, and pissed off is my most pervasive mood set, not depression. See, a person suffering from depression takes pills to turn themselves into zombies or performs acts of mass murder. Maybe sooner or later they may choose suicide. If I was a person suffering from depression I would have probably done all three of those things after the last few days I’ve had.”

  “And who, or what, is it that makes you so angry?”

  “Well, number one on my confirmed list of culprits is Julie obviously, and of course, there’s whoever is responsible for this inconvenience we call life. What makes me so unhappy and angry? I mean, there are times that I’m happy, but as you can see that never lasts for long. I think you’d have to agree that me being unhappy right now is also a very normal emotion to have. Maybe that’s what makes me so angry all the time.”

  “So, you’re angry with God?”

  “Well, if the shoe fits, and don’t forget Julie.”

  Stella started laughing and it wasn’t long before I joined in. I poured us both another drink and we continued laughing. Obviously, the whiskey was starting to have an effect.

  “So, you want to die so you can yell at God?”

  “Well, I don’t know about yelling at God. That might be considered inappropriate, and you know what a stickler for protocol I am. Hopefully, He isn’t as annoying or arrogant as the Bree and He’ll take the time to answer a few simple questions.”

  “I really think I’m starting to understand you now, Guerin. It’s kind of scary if I think about it for too long.”

  “I told you, Stella, it’s the booze. You’ll eventually sober up and realize you understand me even less than before this talk.”

  “No, it’s not…the booze. You keep asking what makes you special and maybe this is it. All the unhappiness and anger makes you fight. You’re probably angrier than you’ve ever been yet you’re still fighting. You haven’t given up or run away. No, you don’t let that rage control you. Perhaps because you saw that in your father and you learned to control it. Yes, your angry and full of rage, but with all the power at your disposal, you decided to talk.”

  “Only because you suggested I try.”

  “No, that’s wrong. We’ve told you before, the quality inside you that is truly special is your ability to do the right thing without even knowing or thinking about it. You think the reason you talked to the Chinese is because I suggested it, but it was you that asked for our help and suggestions. You stopped, took a step back and looked for options. I didn’t tell you to talk to them. You asked for our opinion and you listened. You decided to give it a try, we didn’t make you do that or decide for you.”


  I looked at Stella strangely. I think that was mostly because we were about done with the bottle. I emptied the rest of the bottle into our glasses and said, “So, let me see if I got this right. What you’re saying is that I’m so unhappy and angry because someone in this universe has to be, and I’ve been chosen?”

  “Actually, I believe I said a little more than that, but yes, more or less.”

  “Thanks, Stella, now I’m really depressed. I’ve just had an uber-intelligent alien space lady tell me I’m totally and truly fucked. How much do you charge for an hour of this bullshit?”

  “Oh, it’s totally free.”

  “A bargain at twice the price dear lady.” And we finished our drinks. Overall, I’d have to say that Stella was not bad as drinking partners go.

  “You need to talk to Maria.”

  “I thought you said I should leave her alone, give her space?”

  “Not forever, you idiot. Did you know she blames herself for her mother’s death also?”

  “Why would she think that?”

  “When Maria changed her plans, Anna wanted to change her reservations as well, but Maria talked her out of it. She wanted to spend some time alone with her new boyfriend. She feels if she hadn’t been so selfish, Anna would have changed flights. She’s mad and full of rage just like you. She is your daughter after all. She needs you to help her deal with it.”

  “Ok, I’ll talk to her. Mind if I wait until after I sober up?”

  “That would probably be best.”

  Chapter 24

  Détente

  The next morning I woke up to a knock at the door and a pounding in my head. I opened the door and Maria was standing there with two cups of coffee in her hands.

  “Here,” she said as she handed me one of the coffees. “You probably need this.”

  “Thanks.” We both took a seat at the table.

  “So the world is on the brink of war and you and Stella decided it was a good time to party?”