His father blew out a long breath through his nose, and stared at him long enough that Jake felt like his knees were going to give out and pitch him onto the ground. “I don’t like this,” he said at last. “I don’t like that you defied me, that you’ve been sneaking around behind my back to do something you explicitly know is forbidden, and that somehow you think a few words can make that okay.”
“I don’t need you to like it, and I don’t need you to stop being angry, but I need you to respect me,” Jake said. “I need a second chance as much as I need to offer one to you.”
“Wait here,” his father said, and abruptly turned and walked away.
It was almost two hours later when his mother appeared in the park, walking toward him shivering as he sat at the top of slide. “Jake?” she called out.
He climbed down, and she wrapped him in a tight hug, and for a moment he was afraid she wouldn’t let go. Then she stepped back and held him at arm’s length for a moment, before she reached into her coat pocket and pressed something into his hand.
The minder key.
“There are some other kids missing. Friends of yours, I guess,” she said. “Do you know where they are?”
If they were still at Jonathan’s house, they’d be gone soon. Riley and Nate, certainly; he didn’t know about the others, and didn’t know where they would go. “No,” he said.
“You demand your so-called freedom, but it comes at a cost,” she said.
“What?” he asked.
“Don’t ever lie or hide things from us again. And don’t . . .” Her voice faltered.
“Don’t what, Mom?”
“Don’t stray from the path of being good,” she said. “Not for the sake of trying to be smart, and certainly not just because you feel a need to disagree with your father. Because if you think your minder was a pain, you have no idea how many arguments you have set yourself up for instead.”
“I will do my best,” he said.
“Then come home. Your dinner is ice cold by now.”
“I don’t mind,” he said.
Riley, Nate, and Kitt were gone. Kitt came back about a month later, not wearing her minder. She was no longer allowed to speak to him or the others remaining from the Study Club, but whenever they saw each other in the halls they made a beeline to intersect and high-five as they passed.
Jonathan was very relieved that Jake was still willing to help him with math.
Lynne seemed to blame him somehow for what happened, and his hero status was gone, but every once in a while she’d dump her tray next to his in the cafeteria and sit with him. He assumed that meant either she’d eventually stop being mad at him and knew it, or she was strategically re-upping their association to keep Harris and Deke off her back.
His mother had not lied when she told him he’d set himself up for a world of arguments with his father; every single thing that the minder or his old censored text would have kept from him, his father had to hash out in excruciating detail. It was exhausting and felt pointless, except as the weeks and months wore on, his father’s arguments became less a belligerent lecture and more a heated exchange of near equals.
He missed Riley and Nate, and worried about them, wondering if they’d gone their separate ways or had stuck together, wishing he knew where they were or even just that they were okay. There was no one he could ask who would know, but wherever they were, he knew they were joining the fight against minder tech.
On the last day of school before summer, he was cleaning out his locker and found a dog-eared paperback book called The Fellowship of the Ring inside, a note sticking out from the middle.
For when you still need to escape, the note said, and was signed Nate.
At the bottom of the page was a postscript. PS, it read, This is like a year overdue. Please return it to the library when you’re done and pay my fine. Thanks.
Jake tucked it in his bag, shut his empty locker, and went home.
10
The Monogamy Hormone
Annalee Newitz
Edwina was smearing bacteria on the walls of the preschool lunchroom. Bubbles snapped inside the rubbery microbial slime. Toddlers love to lick walls, and the more they came into contact with this stuff, the better. Stepping back to survey her work, she stripped off her compostable gloves and set the timer on her watch. In twenty minutes, this coat would be dry and she could apply the next layer of cultures. The San Francisco Health Department had just released an updated childhood microbiome recipe, including dozens of newly sequenced bacteria that contributed to intestinal health. Every public building for children had to buy the stuff. That’s where Edwina’s nonprofit came in. AFDC, or Aid for Facilities with Dependent Children, raised money to infect schools and day cares that couldn’t afford it.
As it set, the bacterial slime slowly became translucent. Edwina eyed it critically, looking for spots she’d missed. Her watch pinged her contacts with a chat message, and she blinked open a text window that hovered to the left of her vision.
Chester: I got tickets to the vocaloid show with TrixxieStixx! Are you in?
Edwinner: Hell yes!!!!!
Chester: Meet at DNA Lounge at 9?
Edwinner: Sure. See u there!
She blinked out, feeling the now-familiar twinge of guilt. Chester was adventurous and adorable—lovable, even—but so was the other person she was dating. Augie, the bookworm who got social anxiety in crowded places, could spend hours talking to her about the minutiae of public policy and never get bored. Chester and Augie were both smart and great in bed. She genuinely liked them, too. And it wasn’t as though Edwina had ever lied to them about what was going on. They knew about each other, had even met a few times, and neither of them seemed particularly concerned. But after almost a year of dating the two of them, Edwina was starting to feel like she had to make a choice. If she was honest with herself, she was falling in love with Chester and Augie, and that didn’t seem right. Especially not if she wanted to get married and have kids in the next decade.
Sighing, she put on a new pair of gloves, opened the next tub of bug-laced goop, and plunged her hand all the way inside. It felt like her fingers were trapped in an amorphous, unnameable embrace.
Four days later, Edwina met up with Daisy and Alyx for their weekly bad rosé night at whatever wine bar had the lowest rating on Eater. When she arrived, Daisy was gushing about a new product from ProTox called Eternalove.
“It’s this amazing breakthrough based on vole hormones!” Daisy en-thused. “ProTox says it will turn anyone completely monogamous! Isn’t that insane? Apparently there are slutty voles and monogamous voles, and they figured out the hormone that switches monogamy on and off. So when you’re ready to get serious, you and your sweetums take Eternalove and never want to fuck anybody else again!”
“Sounds real,” Edwina snorted, rolling her eyes. “I mean, you know this is the company that said they’d genetically modified wheatgrass to cure cancer.”
Alyx smirked and raked their fingers through their long bangs to create a perfect fan over one eye. It made them look like one of those 1990s Filipino movie stars that Edwina’s aunties loved. “The placebo effect is real, man,” they said. “Scientists have measured it! Who cares if it’s a sugar pill or some vole sweat? I bet this will make some people super happy. And it’s going to make a great subplot on Natural Urges.”
Alyx and Daisy ran a startup that made video content for brands, and their biggest success was Natural Urges, a streaming series sponsored by ProTox. Mostly it was about the trashfire romantic lives of twentysomethings, who always happened to be using ProTox’s latest beauty and health gadgets. This season, Daisy played an elementary school teacher who was secretly addicted to hookup apps.
Daisy continued. “Yeah, we’re going to have my character dose her new boyfriend with it, but then he falls in love with this other guy and it’s going to be really hot.” She rubbed her hands together gleefully.
“Well, that does sound pretty cute,�
� Edwina admitted. “I’m glad ProTox is still supporting queer stories. I guess that means the show can’t officially air in North Carolina anymore.”
Alyx and Daisy shot each other pained looks. Alyx fiddled with their glass and sighed. “ProTox might ask us to make a special hetero-only version for North Carolina markets,” they said. “We’re not sure. I mean, people there could use a streaming proxy to watch the original version. But ProTox thinks that more states will pass Family First laws, and we’ll need alternate content for them.”
The three of them got into a heated conversation about the Family First legislation in North Carolina, the first state in the United States to ban homosexual and transgender content. There were a ton of protests, and some hollow threats from streaming companies like Disney that didn’t want to deal with the nightmare of figuring out what to block and how. But in the end, the law had passed. Now Disney was scrambling to perfect its geolocation algorithm so that nobody in North Carolina would be exposed to gay wedding videos or transgender superheroes or whatever else they decided was dangerous.
“I can’t wait for Disney’s ‘whites only’ channel,” Alyx muttered, draining their glass.
“Ugh. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised.” Daisy lowered her eyes to look at her hands, pale pink next to the brown of Alyx’s arms resting on the table.
It reminded Edwina of how she’d met Alyx back in high school. Alyx’s family had just moved up to Stockton from Manila, and they were the first person at school to use nonbinary pronouns. Edwina thought it was badass, and kept looking for ways to catch Alyx’s attention. Finally she overheard them telling a classmate that they missed banana ketchup, so she filled a little bottle with the sweet, vinegary glop from her mom’s secret stash and brought it to lunch.
“I really hate this stuff,” Alyx said, making a face. “It’s just something I tell white people about when they ask me about the Philippines.”
“That’s a really random troll,” Edwina said. “I don’t get it.”
Alyx cocked their head at Edwina, meeting her eyes for the first time. “People don’t really want to know what it’s like in other countries. All they care about are weird brands that aren’t available here.”
Edwina thought about the comment and realized it was true. The main thing her white friends knew about Filipino culture came from watching off-brand Filipino superhero shows on YouTube. But it was the “knockoff Captain Marvel” part that sucked them in, not the Filipino part.
Even back then, Alyx had a lot of thoughts about branding and social justice. Edwina vowed at that moment to be their partner in crime forever, and so far her plan was working out. She’d met Daisy much later, at a crappy job after college, but had the same feeling about her.
Looking at her two dejected friends, Edwina decided it was time to lighten the mood.
“So,” she said. “I need relationship advice.”
They both looked up with matching grins. “What’s going on?” Daisy asked.
“Nothing bad. I mean, things are going really well with Chester and Augie, but I think I’m ready to get serious. I can’t keep dating random people. I need to settle down. I want to start planning for kids and stuff.”
Alyx looked alarmed. “You’re going to have kids?”
“I mean, not right away. But in like five or ten years, yeah.”
“Why do you need to settle down now for potential kids in ten years?” Daisy asked, pouring more rosé from the carafe.
“It seems weird to keep dating two people when I should be focusing on one.”
“You could be polyamorous,” Alyx suggested. “It’s not illegal, even if nobody in North Carolina can watch shows about it.”
Edwina thought about the polyamorous people she knew. They were all old white millennials who had a lot of drama on social platforms that nobody used anymore. When she thought about calling herself polyamorous, it felt wrong, like putting on a muumuu when she wanted to wear a tux. “I don’t think that would work for me,” she said finally. “It seems creepy. Plus I hate combining Greek and Latin words.”
Alyx arched their right eyebrow ironically. “Good point. All sexual and gender identities should follow traditional rules of syntax.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Edwina laughed. “I’m just saying it’s not me.”
Suddenly Daisy started bouncing in her chair. “Oh shit!” she yelped. “You should try Eternalove! We could do a whole story arc about this!”
“This is my actual life, Daisy. Not a branding campaign.”
Alyx shrugged. “That’s quite an on-brand thing for you to say, Miss Nonprofit Worker.”
“Dude, I’m actually feeling kind of upset about this, and I don’t want you to turn it into social commentary.”
“Whatever. Stop debating,” Daisy said, waving her hands to make them both shut up. “You should try it. Why not? ProTox sent us all these testimonials from people who swear it worked.”
Edwina found herself taking the idea half-seriously. What harm could it do? Eternalove was completely unscientific, but as Alyx said, the placebo effect was real. Maybe it would be like flipping a coin, where merely the act of doing it would help her decide. And hell, she supposed it was remotely possible that the scammy ProTox gang could have licensed an elixir that actually did what they claimed. Twenty years ago, nobody would have believed that smearing germs on the walls of schools could save a whole generation from asthma and irritable bowel syndrome. Vole hormones might be the next game changer, like birth control pills in the twentieth century.
Shaking her head, Edwina realized she’d talked herself into it.
Digging through her enormous tote bag, Daisy finally pulled out a flat, rectangular box in matte crimson. It was embossed with silver lettering that read: “When the feeling is exclusive. Eternalove.”
“This is a full course,” Daisy said, handing it to Edwina. “On the house.”
Alyx snorted with laughter as Edwina slid the box open and stared at the silver blister pack resting on a bed of cotton. Each pill was a tiny red heart. They looked like Valentine’s Day candies.
“I’m going to regret this, aren’t I?” Edwina sighed. “How do they work?”
“ProTox says you take them every day for a month, and you’ll stop wanting to have sex with anybody except the person you love.”
Edwina didn’t think that’s how vole cognition worked, but she’d already given up on plausibility at this point.
“It’s a love potion, Edwina! It’s magic.” Alyx used the voice they used to pitch branding ideas to companies. “ProTox is about making fairy tales . . . real.” They widened their eyes and did some jazz hands for full effect. Alyx was a master at wrapping sincerity up with irony, then enclosing the whole package in sincerity again.
“Okay, I’m doing it.” Edwina popped the first pill out and put it on her tongue. She held it against the roof of her mouth until the sugar coating melted and she tasted its bitter core, imagining what it would be like to say goodbye to Chester or Augie forever. Then she gulped down half a glass of wine.
It was Saturday morning, and Edwina was pretty sure the Eternalove was having some effect. Augie, still asleep on her futon, had never looked more beautiful. Her pale eyelids were lacy with faint purple veins and the sunlight turned her messy blue hair into a fiery sapphire. Edwina pulled the blankets away from Augie’s right shoulder, kissing its plump curve, then biting into it lightly.
Augie opened one eye. “Hi, sexy.” She rolled onto her back and fixed both green eyes on Edwina. “Would you say I’m more of an organic farm-to-table kind of meat, or something grown in a vat?” Augie worked in food safety, and a big part of her job involved inspecting synthetic meat facilities.
Edwina pretended to consider. “I’ll need to taste you again.”
Augie pulled the covers down further. “I wouldn’t want to mislead consumers, so you’d better be certain.”
As she licked Augie’s stomach, Edwina felt her heart race and knew thi
s was right. Completely right. The pills had worked their magic. “Augie,” she whispered. “I think I’m in love with you.”
Augie wrapped her arms around Edwina’s head, pressing her belly hard against Edwina’s cheek, awkward and intense. “Oh sweetie. You know I love you, too.”
They spent the day cuddling, ordering Mexican dim sum from an indie delivery service app and bingeing on episodes of Fae Killers. The whole weekend was like that—quiet and romantic. Of course the pills weren’t the cause. Edwina knew that. But as she’d suspected, taking them had helped her figure out what she really wanted. She and Augie took a long walk together on Sunday afternoon, climbing to the barren top of Twin Peaks, where the Army Corps of Engineers had planted a plaque in the ground 150 years ago. The lettering stamped on it had been erased by weathering, leaving only a smooth metal disc in the middle of a rocky outcrop. A few other brave people had hiked up here, too, rewarded for their perseverance by a sunset that filled the Bay with a deep rosy light. Wind turbines stood like giant robots over the water, churning invisibly behind their bird-proof screens, and fat crows made a racket in the air overhead. Edwina looked north toward the green rectangle of Golden Gate Park, obscured in part by the red spines of Sutro Tower, and took Augie’s hand. They kissed as the sunlight was demolished by the earth’s rotation, and Edwina was almost certain she was the luckiest person in the city that night.
The next morning at work, Edwina swallowed another heart-shaped pill. Somehow she’d gotten superstitious about them and wanted to finish out the whole pack. Only three more weeks of placebos to go—and a very awkward conversation with Chester. She managed to shove him out of her mind until he texted her at the end of the day.
Chester: Want to play the beta of the Captain Marvel AR game? My friend Long is showing it at the Hurricane Warehouse.
Edwina blinked the chat window out of existence. She didn’t want to deal with this right now. But then he texted again.
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