Half Life

by Lillian Clark

  Maybe it’s every answer I could want. Proof I’m a person, that I’m whole, plus a step-by-step plan for getting me out. Maybe it’s graphic descriptions and images of my future as a “decommissioned asset” being scrapped for parts. Maybe it’s cat videos.

  What you have to remember, Lucy, is that there is no You. Not in an individuated sense. It is not your life. Those are not your clothes. We use pronouns for clarity and, because of our need for you to blend in, it’d be too incongruous to call you It.

  Good thing I have plenty of reasons for optimism, right?

  Lucille picked out my clothes for the next three days and hung them up in her closet in sets, each above a pair of corresponding shoes. I look at them for maybe eight seconds before I push them aside to go digging.

  When I walk into the art room after calc, Bode’s standing at a drafting table working on his laptop. He looks up, and I am not disappointed. His smile’s so wide his cheeks shift his royal-blue glasses. “Kick-ass shirt.”

  “Thanks,” I say, joining him at the table. “The narwhal is the unicorn of the sea.”

  He laughs. His gaze falls to my lips and stalls there. “You look…”

  Like me. That’s what I thought when I stood in front of the mirror this morning. Oversized graphic tank, black leggings, winged eyeliner, matte-red lips. I look—

  “Like yourself,” he says. And I die a little. “If that makes any sense at all.”

  “More than you know.”

  Today we’re sketching, preparing for our first project this semester. And though I know he doesn’t have to, though I know he has his own work to do, Bode sits next to me for the entire class. He settles in, his well-worn, half-filled sketchbook next to my virgin one, his arm brushing mine as he starts filling his page while I stare at my bright, white empty one.

  I laughed (loud enough that half the class turned to look at me) when Mx. Frank said we’d be doing self-portraits. Because it’s too perfect. Average and expected and so painfully appropriate for someone whose face isn’t (is?) her own. “Use whatever method, whatever style, you feel like,” they said. Abstract, surreal, impressionist, photo-realistic, illustrated. They don’t care as long as it’s a “true and moving expression of how you see yourself.”

  So, sitting next to Bode, settling into my (manufactured) bones and (bioprinted) muscles and (aftermarket) skin, I draw. We have mirrors, but I don’t use mine, flipping it over to work from memory instead.

  My memory.

  Memories of my reflection inside the capsule’s glass, clouded by (naked, twitch, inhale, choke, choke, choking on) blue gel.

  Of Lucille’s face looking down at me, eyes wide.

  Of my visage in every slick white surface.

  When the bell rings, I feel like I’m surfacing. Like I’m taking my first breath after spending the last hour underwater.

  Bode glances over at my paper and gasps. “Holy shit, Lucille. That’s amazing.”

  And I say, “Call me Lucy.”

  LUCILLE

  We pull into the trailhead parking lot around eleven, after a four-hour drive and a stop at a grocery store. Taylor leaves our permit receipt on the dashboard, then locks her car. Marco snaps a bear bell onto his pack before handing me a second one. It’s bright red.

  “Cute,” I say. “Think it’ll still be cute after a bear eats me and shits it out?”

  “Definitely. Bear-shit bling.” He grins and kisses me on the cheek. “But, also, I have bear spray. And Taylor has an air horn.”

  “Good.” I kiss him again.

  “Okay,” Taylor says. “Enough of that.”

  Marco laughs. “What, kissing?”

  “Yes.”

  “Aw, come on,” Remi says, hefting his pack onto his shoulders. “They’re adorable.”

  “Remi, of all people, you should be on my side. You’re the reason we have, well, had a moratorium on significant-other tagalongs in the first place.” She glances at me. “No offense.”

  “None taken. I think.” I shift my shoulders under my pack straps.

  Behind me, Marco lifts my pack, taking the weight of it off me, and says, “Tighten the straps so it sits higher on your back.”

  I do and feel immediately more comfortable.

  “One time!” Remi says. “I bring a boyfriend along one time and there’s a ‘moratorium’?”

  “One time?” Taylor scoffs. “That ‘one time’ ended in us bailing on the whole trip before dawn on the second day because you and what’s-his-name, Buck?”

  Remi gives her a look. “Beck. Like you don’t remember.”

  “Bickered literally nonstop.” She looks at me. “Non. Stop. I don’t think they even breathed. Or they’d mastered circular breathing.”

  “Circular bitching,” Remi says with a grin.

  She glares at him. “Funny.”

  We start for the trailhead. It’s hot, the sun high above us, and I’m already sweating. My sunglasses slip a millimeter down my nose. Remi falls into step behind Taylor. Marco holds his hand out for mine and together we cross the parking lot.

  “Well,” Taylor says, glancing over her shoulder at me, “that circular bitching ended in Beck chucking all of our food in the lake.”

  “Ha!” I say. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously,” Marco says.

  “He had a flair for the dramatic,” Remi says, pretending to flip his hair. “It was a passionate affair.”

  Taylor snorts. “Right.”

  We step onto the trail and Marco lets go of my hand to walk single file behind me. “Didn’t he send you a video of him burning the hoodie you left at his house?”

  “Passion!” Remi cheers, throwing his arms in the air.

  “Sure, Rem,” Taylor says. “You two were a train wreck waiting to happen from the moment you left the station.”

  “That,” Remi says, “is the cheesiest thing I have ever heard.”

  “Also,” Marco says, “Lucille isn’t planning to throw all our food in the lake. Are you, Lucille?”

  I laugh. “Probably won’t set anything on fire either.”

  Remi spins around, taking two steps backward on the trail to blow me a kiss, then spins back and says, “Except for Marco’s loins.”

  “Rem!” Marco yells.

  I blush.

  Remi cackles.

  I look back at Marco, who, smiling, meets my eye. He’s blushing too.

  The eight-mile hike takes us all afternoon. We stop for breaks, catching our breath as the elevation gains, snacking on trail mix, using Marco’s and Taylor’s water filters to refill our bottles from a stream. I love every step of it.

  I love the heat in my lungs when we gain elevation, the smell of the sage, the dirt, and the feel of the sun on my arms and heavy pack on my shoulders. I love how much Remi and Taylor and Marco bottom-line like each other, how comfortable they are, and how easily I seem to fit. I especially love how huge the sky is and how, depending on where you look, it’s all different hues of blue.

  LUCY

  Standing outside Dad’s apartment’s door that evening, I hesitate. The moment’s too potent. Lucille’s memories, two days before the Mimeo, are too assertive. I can feel her lingering nausea, her disgust. When she made this memory, I was in pieces. Intestines, rib cage, kidneys, ovaries and uterus (Functioning? Will I ever get a period? Be able to have kids? Live long enough to do either?), eyes, spine, all in their own blue hydrogel-filled pods.

  Keys in hand, I take deep breaths (in, one, two, three, out, one, two, three). The Life2 phone buzzes in my bag. But it isn’t them, reading my nerves about meeting Dad in my heart rate, it’s Bode.

  But, his text says, will the octopus army overcome their primary obstacle? Can you really see them conquering Idaho?

 
I can’t remember how it started. Someone at lunch saying something about how smart octopuses are, how they problem-solve, and how the one in Japan that got famous predicting World Cup games ended up being eaten. Then Bode turned to me and joked that they’d probably already been plotting their revenge before that for humans turning the oceans into plastic soup.

  Smiling, I write back: They won’t need to. They’ll use their superior intellect to lure us into the sea.

  The three grayscale dots appear immediately on the screen.

  True. Plus their land dwelling allies, the spider horde, will eat those of us who manage to escape.

  I mean, we probably deserve it, right?

  Definitely. The election of that sentient skid mark sealed it. It’s time for another species to get their shot.

  I gave him this number yesterday. It feels bigger than it probably should. It’s just a few texts, right? One small thing. One tiny secret. But it’s mine. I write back: All hail our eight legged overlords. Both the exoskeletoned and tentacled sorts.

  We had a good, well, no, a totally mixed review run. Art is cool.

  And ice cream, I type. Put that in the win column.

  Yes. Ice cream and art. The rest is a wash.

  Heading into my dad’s. You should probably stop texting me now.

  Okay stopping.

  I mean it.

  Me too.

  Sure you do.

  Do you ever think about how we eat crabs but we don’t eat spiders even though crabs are basically giant spiders that live in the ocean?

  I laugh and type: Yes. All the time. I think of literally nothing else.

  I bet the crabs side with the octopuses at first then swap sides when the spiders join thanks to centuries of resentment for being eaten.

  Probably. Or they’ll start eating us too for revenge. Also now I’m thinking about what eating a giant spider would be like. Would you boil it?

  I wonder if he’s smiling. If he’s home or skating with Aran or at work at the print shop. If his coworkers are watching him, wondering what he’s smiling at, asking What’s so funny? But Bode doesn’t answer them because, like me, he wants this weird little pocket of space to be no one’s but ours.

  He responds: Crack its exoskeleton and dip its flesh in hot butter?

  Do spiders even have flesh? Or just goo.

  Gross Lucy. Who wants to think about spider flesh?

  Don’t judge me Bode. For all you know I’ll side with the spiders.

  Lucille’s phone chirps in my bag. I pull it out and see a message from Dad, wondering if I’m here yet.

  I text Bode: Okay I really do have to go now.

  Good. This was boring anyway.

  I’m telling the spiders you said that.

  Do it. I dare you. Gray dots. Actually no don’t. I take it back.

  I put my key in the lock and open the door, eyes on the screen.

  Lucy?

  LUCY??

  I reply with a line of spider emojis.

  The apartment smells like chicken and roasting onions, set to the sound track of a sizzling pan.

  “Hey, Kid,” Dad calls from the kitchen. He rinses his hands, dries them on a dish towel, and comes to meet me in the entryway. I hold my breath.

  But he doesn’t notice. Doesn’t go wide-eyed or start screaming. Just opens his arms and waits for me to drop my bag before wrapping me in a warm hug. I’m glad when he lets go and turns away without studying my face, because I’m not sure how I’d explain away my expression, the tears in my eyes. With his back turned, I wipe my eyes and fix it.

  “How was school?” he asks, in front of the stove again.

  “Good.” I take a seat at the counter. “Though I can already tell AP bio’s going to be tough.”

  He laughs. “Well. Isn’t it supposed to be?”

  “Yes. Fair.” Not like I’ll need to remember any of it anyway. Though I am taking detailed notes like a good little life surrogate.

  He flips the chicken in the pan, asks something else, I answer. And like with Mom, it’s easy.

  Honestly, it’s cruel. I catch myself wishing they’d failed. Or that they hadn’t succeeded quite so well. Would it be better if they’d spared me the capacity to love? If they’d cut it out and replaced it with obligation or some brand of benevolent apathy instead? Why make me capable of feeling, deep in my manufactured bones, that he’s not only Lucille’s dad, but my dad too, that it’s my life too, if it isn’t?

  Maybe my quiet and pretending, my keeping the depth of myself a secret from Life2, isn’t power but foolishness. If they knew, they wouldn’t do this, would they? Put an expiration date on me as a daughter, a friend. A person.

  Later, after we’ve washed dishes and are watching TV for a bit before I need to head home, he asks, “How’s Mom?”

  “Fine, I think. A little lonely.”

  He nods, gazing, unfocused, at the TV. “I feel like we never talk about it. The divorce. You’ve handled it so well. Sometimes I worry, too well.”

  “Too well?”

  “Your mom and I dismantled your normal, Lucille. And through every step, you’ve just been…fine.”

  I could laugh. Lucille dealt with that “dismantled normal” by letting a secret company literally duplicate her. Which, of course, reeks of being “fine.”

  “Yeah,” I say, because he’s waiting and I have no clue how else to fill this empty air.

  “You know, it’s okay to not be fine. Pretending to be when you’re not can really screw things up in the long run. That’s a big part of what happened with Mom and me.”

  “I know.”

  He looks at me with love and concern. But, he’s not looking at me. He’s looking at Lucille. “Do you?”

  “I think so.” I smile, small and solemn, and he leans over to squeeze my (3-D-printed) shoulder. But of course that’s a lie. What’s the “long run” in my situation? Three more weeks living half of a life as half of a person before getting turned into a product sample?

  We settle back in to watch the show. I hear my phone buzz in my bag and get up to check it, hoping it’s Bode. Reminder. In-person check-in Friday, 5 p.m.

  I text back a thumbs-up and dump the phone in the bag.

  LUCILLE

  We brush our teeth using water from Marco’s Nalgene, spitting into the grass, then pack even the toothpaste into the bear-proof canisters he, Taylor, and Remi brought.

  “It’s fun,” Remi says, “because while the bear tears open our tents like a Snickers wrapper and munches us up like the tasty treats we are, at least our food will be safe.”

  Taylor rolls her eyes. “That’s why we’ll leave it over there,” she says, pointing to a group of bushes a hundred yards off from our campsite.

  “Ah yes, the relative safety afforded by a short distance of flat, easily crossable ground.”

  “Hey,” I say, “at least with all that candy you ate, the bear will probably munch you first. Giving the rest of us a chance to escape.”

  “True,” Marco adds. “Thank you in advance for your sacrifice.”

  We finish packing up the food, and Taylor and Remi carry the canisters to the designated bush while Marco and I triple-check that the fire’s out. We’re quiet. A little awkward. He asked if I’d rather share a tent with Taylor, but I blushed—so much blushing, it’s my default now—and said no.

  Walking back, Remi starts shouting at the top of his lungs. “Stay away, bears! Nothing to eat here, bears! No sweet treats or savory human meat!” His voice echoes a little, rebounding off the shallow hills surrounding the lake.

  “Great job, Rem,” Marco says as they near. “You’ve scared off all the bears while alerting every forest-dwelling psycho, alien, monster, or ghoul in a ten-mile radius to our pre
sence.”

  Remi shrugs. “If I’m going to die in the woods, I’d rather it be a horror-movie-level death than a basic-ass bear mauling.”

  “Yes, please,” Taylor says, “let’s discuss the merits of death by bear-eating versus being skinned by a mutant hill person. I so want to have this conversation. Right now. Out in the open. In the dark. Miles away from anyone who might hear us scream.”

  “Except for the other ghouls,” I say. “Ghoul and monster and mountain-serial-killer party!”

  “Okay, this is fun,” Taylor says, “but also stop.”

  Marco takes my hand. “On that note,” he says, and waves to Taylor and Remi while pulling me away toward our tent.

  “If you two decide to bone,” Remi says, “keep it down, okay? Or, no. On second thought, don’t. We all know what happens to teens who have sex in horror movies.”

  Marco holds his free hand up, giving Remi the finger.

  Remi calls, “Thank you in advance for your sacrifice!”

  Marco drops my hand to unzip then rezip the tent door after we climb in. We’re quiet, listening to Remi and Taylor talk as they head toward their tent. I sit on the end of my sleeping bag to take off my hiking shoes and set them in the corner by the door. I wonder if my feet smell, if I smell, then decide not to worry about it. If I do, Marco does too. Level playing field. He sits on the end of his sleeping bag beside me, taking his shoes off like I did and setting them neatly in the other corner of the tent near the door.

  “So,” he says.

  “So.”

  The quiet’s so loud I think my ears might pop.

  “I’m going to change,” I say, then turn to my pack to pull out the old T-shirt and terry-cloth shorts I brought to sleep in. Behind me, I hear him shift too, unzipping his pack to rummage around like me.

  I change, pulling my shirt over my head, not telling him not to look because, well, I want him to look, but waiting to take my bra off until after I pull my sleep shirt on. I crawl into my sleeping bag to change my shorts.