by Megan Crewe
“I’m going to kiss you now,” he says.
I’m not sure what’s gotten into me—the exhilaration of the win, the pent-up energy of being confined to the apartment so much, the desire I can see on his face that matches what’s been building in me—maybe all of that combined. “No, you’re not,” I say. And in the instant when uncertainty flickers through his expression, I shift forward, cup his jaw, and kiss him.
Jule’s arms slide around me, and I end up halfway on his lap. Which is fine, because it makes it easier to keep kissing. I loop my arms behind his neck, positioned just a little above him. Just a little in control. He tugs me closer, his fingers tangling in my hair, an urgency I hadn’t expected in the way his mouth meets mine. As if I am exactly what he’s needed. And right then I feel more powerful than I have since the moment I stepped onto this space station.
I don’t care how long we have, how long this lasts. Right now, it’s exactly what I need too.
15.
The party dress Jule brings me is stiff around the bodice and poufy with crinoline that springs back up when I push at it on the hanger. But this is the first time a guy’s bought me an article of clothing, so I guess I shouldn’t complain.
“I have to wear this?” I can’t help asking.
“These functions, the whole ‘point’ of having Earthlings as servers is to be exotic,” Jule says. “They want you to look like a stereotype from your approximate time period. This is supposed to be a 1950s prom dress replica.”
“So I’m representing my grandparents,” I say, hefting it by the shoulders. Well, it’ll definitely convey a harmless piece of fluff vibe.
“It’ll be close enough for the guests to appreciate the effort.” Jule leans closer, trailing his finger up my back, and his voice lowers in a way that sends a pleasant little shiver after his touch. “I could help you into it.”
“Thank you, but no,” I say. “I’m supposed to be there in, like, half an hour, aren’t I?”
“As you wish,” Jule says, with an unoffended smirk, and I haul the dress into my bedroom alone.
I’m not sure how much he meant that offer. There’s been a fair bit of kissing in the last few days. And more than kissing. My face warms, remembering, as I pull off my clothes and struggle into the dress. I’ve drawn lines—I feel I need to, with him right here. He hasn’t been in this bedroom since that first morning, or me in his. All clothes have stayed on. We’ve never gotten to the point where it would be a problem if the doorbell happened to sound.
It’s hard to imagine he wouldn’t like to go further. But I’ve never had anything even this intense—I’ve never been able to relax enough. Never felt normal enough. I think the only reason my one “relationship” lasted the two months it did is the guy didn’t care enough about me to notice my tics . . . which is why it only lasted the two months it took me to realize that.
Lisa would be so excited by this development. Tugging at my hands, insisting on, “Details, details!” with that mischievous glint in her eyes. She’s always been more comfortable with guys, and she’s been prodding Angela and me to find someone ever since she and Evan hooked up a year ago.
Or rather, she was. I have no idea what she’s like now, whether she’s even still alive, seven years after the accident I read about. My fingers curl into the dress’s fabric, and I force them straight, smoothing down the skirt.
I’m happy enjoying just this with Jule, without it getting more serious. I’d feel awkward asking, but I’m pretty sure from the way he talks that he’s happy to take this as it is too. After all, as soon as our mission is finished, I’ll be back on my real planet, in my real present, and never see him again.
When I come out, Jule’s waiting by the door. “Well, the color suits you,” he says, studying the bright blue fabric. He holds out his hand when I join him, offering a thin loop of woven Kemyate metal. The flat plate mounted on it is imprinted with several characters, the ones that represent sounds rather than words—spelling out his name.
“I don’t like that I won’t be able to stay,” he says. “I know this is strange and it isn’t at all the way I actually see you, but . . . if someone hassles you, you can show this to them, and they’ll know you’re—supposedly—my property. And there’s an indicator here . . .” He shows me a tiny button on the side of the plate. “If you press down on that for a few seconds, I’ll get a signal and know you’re in trouble, and I’ll be able to find you wherever. All right?”
I take the bracelet, dangling it from my fingers. It’s lighter than I expected, like almost everything Kemyate-made. I’d be wearing his name, like a dog tag.
“I wouldn’t want you to wear it when you’re here, or working with the others in the group,” Jule says. “It’s just, if you’re going to be out of the apartment on your own, please, if you could have it with you. You’ve seen how people can be when it comes to Earthlings.”
He sounds honestly worried. Knowing he takes no enjoyment from it, that it’s only for my safety, dampens my revulsion. “Of course,” I say. When I slip it over my hand, the bracelet expands briefly to fit over my knuckles before contracting around my wrist. I slide the plate so it’s on the inside, where people won’t constantly be seeing his name on me.
The silky smoothness of the alien metal reminds me of the glass beads on my old bracelet, the one my brother Noam made me, that kept me safe in a different way. Safe from the panic attacks, from being overwhelmed by my sense of the shifts.
If all goes well, this function will take me one step closer to ending those shifts for everyone back home.
“Okay,” I say. “Let’s go.”
The inner-shuttle ride is brief, just a short hop up and to the right. I twist my hands together, bracing myself for the hours ahead, facing dozens of strangers without any support. The shuttle’s starting to slow when Jule steps toward me, slips his arm behind my back, and leans in to kiss me, so quickly I’m hardly prepared. My gasp of surprise is lost in the tender but insistent press of his lips. I kiss him back, not sure if he’s looking for reassurance or offering it or simply getting off on the unexpectedness—and not really caring. Then the shuttle stops and we jerk apart.
“Shall we?” Jule says, extending his elbow with a smile. I take it, shaking my head at him, but I’m smiling too. I’m no longer sure how much the flutters in my chest are thanks to him or my nervousness about the night ahead.
The woman who opens the door to the event room is clothed in a dress that looks vaguely like a kimono, although trim and seamless, no extra fabric expended, in the usual Kemyate style. She must be the one who’s “hired” me for the evening—or rented, more like. My throat tightens as she inspects me, but I keep my gaze dull.
“As agreed,” she says to Jule. “She will be well taken care of.”
Jule’s fingers graze my back. “Behave yourself,” he says, his voice teasing, his eyes serious. Then he walks away. The hostess is already ushering me inside.
“English is best for you?” she inquires, I assume having noticed Jule’s use of it.
I nod, not quite trusting myself to speak. The room we’ve entered appears to be huge, the walls ahead of me and to my left so distant in the hazy light I can’t make them out—or maybe that’s a special effect, designed to give the impression of spaciousness in the limited real space available. A few clusters of men and women are already gathered around the glowing diamond-shaped tables that hover at waist height, and I think the dim distant figures are actually reflections.
The rest of the room’s light comes from a view of space outside, a swath of darkness stretched across the ceiling, glittering with innumerable stars. I can’t tell whether that’s real or constructed either. Regardless, it’s hard not to stare.
“We’ll be starting shortly,” the hostess says. She leads me to a doorway on the right. “Wait in here. I’ll instruct you when we’re ready.”
She shuts the door behind me, and I find myself in a room only fractionally bigger than my bedroom in J
ule’s apartment. Four others are already sitting on the L of benches along the walls. The woman in what appears to be an actual kimono, her face painted like a geisha, and the middle-aged man in a toga both look so dazed I assume they’re doped up on Kemyate tranquilizers. The other two, an older man wearing only a loincloth and stripes of paint, and a girl about my age in a loose hooded robe, appear more alert. Pets who were brought here young enough that they could adjust without the drugs?
“Hi,” I say tentatively. The girl smiles shyly, and the older man says something that sounds like a greeting in a language I don’t recognize. The other two dip their heads.
“How did you all end up here?” I venture, and get blank looks all around. Okay, so I’m the only English speaker among the Earthlings tonight. It looks like our hostess aimed to represent a variety of nations as well as eras.
I paw at my expansive dress as I sit, trying not to take up more than my fair share of the room. My efforts don’t matter much, because it seems like only a few moments after I’ve sat down, the hostess bustles in. She motions us up and through another door into what appears to be the outer section of a kitchen area. Glass-like platters of shining cups and morsels of food are being set on a buffet opening between this space and a prep area on the other side. The hostess points to the platters and rattles off a series of instructions in four other languages before she gets to English.
“You take one plate and go out,” she says. “Walk through the room, slowly, and if someone comes up to you, stop so they can take what they want. If they wish to speak to you, please answer them. When your plate is empty, come back and fetch another.”
Simple enough. Each of my fellow servers has already taken a platter. I grab one covered with what look like real shrimp on a smaller, thinner version of the standard Kemyate brownie-bread in shades of orange and green, and follow the others into the main room.
In the short time since I came in, the space has filled up. At least a few people stand around every table, others weaving between them, pausing to greet each other or exchange compliments or sympathies. I catch snippets as I circulate. The content of Kemyate small talk is pretty similar to what I’d hear on Earth: light comments about the job, the family, the latest sports game.
Keeping my face slack, I let my eyes wander as I walk, watching for people I recognize. I spot one guy I think was in the Earth Travel contingent at Joining Day, but when I sidle closer, what I can make out of the conversation around his table has to do with apartment lighting options. My first platter is nearly empty when I catch the Kemyate word for Earth as I squeeze my dress between two chattering groups. Pulse skipping, I edge around the table, looking elsewhere but perking my ears.
“Do you think they’d really go through with it?” a man’s voice asks, pitched low. I steal a glance at him and his companions, but I don’t recognize any of them.
The woman next to him takes a shrimp-thing from my platter. “It would be shocking,” she says. “But I can see”—she lowers her voice further as a couple of laughing young men approach me, and I force myself to smile at them, straining to hear—“how it is with Earth.”
How what is? Go through with what? I itch to ask, but then I’d be giving away that I’d been listening in—and understood them. I notice the hostess gliding my way. Planning to circle back, I push myself onward.
Before I get very far, a ruddy-faced man plants himself in front of me and makes a comment that’s neither Kemyate nor English.
“What?” I say, attempting to look befuddled rather than irritated.
“Ah, American!” he says, and tugs at my skirt. “Nice dress. Did you bring it from home?”
He guffaws without giving me a chance to answer, because of course that’s absurd. Pets don’t get to bring their wardrobes. I grit my teeth behind my smile.
“No,” I reply, which just makes him laugh louder. He pats my head. Then a woman comes up to him with a disapproving stare and pulls him away. I’m grateful for the second before her voice carries back to me.
“No one’s going to be impressed if you spend your time playing with the dirt,” she says.
Someone snatches the last of the shrimp-things off my platter, so I head to the kitchen. As soon as I’ve returned to the main room, this time with a spread of steaming beverages, I look for the group that was talking about shocking developments on Earth. They must have moved; I’ve lost them in the crowd. I wander into its midst, hoping I’ll stumble on them.
The guests are loosening up—this time I get several teasing or outright mocking comments in a variety of languages, and one girl stops me and demands to know the exact year I’m from so she can pump me for inside info on some TV show she’s hooked on. Others are turning to more serious subjects among themselves.
“They brought her to the medical center yesterday, but I don’t see any improvement,” one woman says to her friend as they come over to me for drinks.
“It makes you wonder, when something happens that they can’t cure,” her friend says. “Perhaps it’s an error in . . . they don’t want to admit.”
As they wander off, I spot the Earth-talking crowd again. I amble toward them, but from what I pick up of their conversation, they’ve gone on to a new topic, a debate about some financial issue involving a lot of terms I don’t know. I linger for a moment, wishing there was some way I could nudge them back to the subject I want, and one of them waves to a woman I know. Tabzi’s mother. She sweeps over, all smiles, asking after one of the men’s children.
Another familiar face crosses my line of sight, and my gaze jerks away. Jackpot! It’s the woman who was talking to Thlo at the ceremony, the head of the Earth Travel division, Milades Silmeru. She’s striding over to greet an elderly man I don’t remember seeing before. I drift that way, ears pricked. She’s commenting on a dinner they had together. But who knows what else she might say if I stick close to her . . .
“Hey! Hey, Earthling!” A hand flails in front of my face, and I flinch, nearly losing my grip on my platter. The guy who wanted my attention doesn’t seem to notice. “Come here,” he says, grabbing my arm. I hurry after him, knowing I can’t do anything but get this over with as quickly as possible. He pulls me into the midst of a circle of avid faces.
“You can settle an argument,” he says, sounding immensely pleased with himself.
“Wait,” one of his friends says, eyeing me. “How long ago did you leave Earth?”
Leave, as if I had a choice in the matter. “It was only a few weeks ago,” I say slowly, as if sluggish with the drug.
“Perfect!” the first guy says to the others. “I knew I hadn’t seen this one at these parties before.” Then, to me, “So while you were on Earth, how many environmental disasters did you have to live through?”
It’s easy for me to give him a blank look, because I really am confused. “Disasters?”
The group twitters. “Earthquakes, flash floods, tornadoes—what do you call them?—hurricanes,” a young woman says. “Drought. Landslides. All those . . . planetary problems.”
“The Council makes it sound like any place on Earth, something happens at least a few times a year,” the first guy breaks in. “But I think it can’t be that much. Someone your age, you’ve maybe been through ten or twelve?”
“I . . . No,” I say. They seriously think everyone on Earth is experiencing earthquakes and hurricanes on a monthly basis? “I heard about . . . disasters, but there haven’t been any where I live.”
The guy frowns. “None?”
“She’s too . . . to remember,” his friend says with a sigh.
“But . . .”
“Drop it,” the woman says. “What does it matter? Any disaster is more than we have here.”
They wander away without so much as a thank-you. I stare after them. With all those scientists watching Earth, no one could really think the planet is that unstable.
No one who had access to all the footage and media. What’s available on the public network is somewha
t limited.
It would suit a group who wanted to keep the positions and influence they have, and who got their influence by convincing everyone what they do is essential, to give the impression that planetary life is incredibly unsafe and unpredictable, wouldn’t it? I’m starting to suspect Jule was too generous to his superiors at Earth Travel when he suggested they might not realize they’re holding Kemya back unnecessarily.
That thought reminds me of my earlier target. I head off in search of Silmeru, passing the Earthling woman in the kimono. She gives me a flat smile. What sort of questions has she been asked? I wonder just how numb the drugs make her, and feel sick. The only possibilities are not enough or too much.
I’ve emptied my third tray and just come out with my fourth when I manage to cross paths with Silmeru again. She’s standing by the wall, slightly apart from the crowd, in intense conversation with a woman I think I saw in the inner circle on Joining Day too. I meander toward them. She looks up, but her gaze barely registers me.
“I don’t understand why Earth would matter so much to them,” the other woman murmurs.
Silmeru mutters a phrase I can’t translate. She falls silent as a bunch of men who’ve clearly had a fair bit of that tipsy drink barge over to me to pick from my platter.
“I don’t know whether to feel more sorry for her or her parents,” one of them says to the others. “Did you hear, they put all their strength behind her younger brother, because of one mistake she made as a child. But you see what she’s made of herself since, and you have to wonder . . . the sort of mistake a child like that might have made.”
“To go from daughter of once-mayor, to Enforcer?” The reply comes with a tone of disgust.
An Enforcer—here?
“And just look at her,” the first man says. “Whatever reason she had to insist on coming, they shouldn’t have let her.”
I turn, and my heart stops. Kurra is stalking through the crowd, her ice-pale skin and hair gleaming in the starlight. I spin back around before she can look my way. The room that seemed so vast suddenly feels far too small.