It was the hot part of the afternoon, and I was boiling inside my pants. I could smell my own body odor above the sweet scent of deodorant and baby powder. Mother didn't care that it embarrassed me to sweat. God, she was crazy. No wonder the CIA had rejected her application.
I couldn't wait to get out of the house.
"Later," I said, clutching my purse and hoping she didn't search it.
"Nice to meet you, Mrs. Vuoto," said Jason.
"Ms.," Mother said.
"Whatever," said Jason, and I rushed him out the door and into his van.
The seats smelled a little sour, like summer sweat and brake fluid. I unrolled my window. The whoosh of air released the scented evergreen from Jason's paper tree air-freshener across the seat. We drove off.
"Did you get the tickets?" I asked.
Jason reached in his shirt pocket and fanned out two stubs.
Our alibi was going to the movies – a Star Wars marathon. That gave us time to fool around, eat, and even actually see a few episodes after, if we felt like it. Jason drove past the lumberyards, out of town, and onto the Mackenzie Highway. The thick trees shrouded the road, their shadow lowering the temperature enough that I stopped sweating. He passed the Leeburg Dam and drove over a narrow bridge. He turned left and eased the car onto a gravel road leading to the river. He parked. Once the engine was off, I heard the drone of flies and mosquitoes and I rolled up the window to keep them out. I began to sweat again.
Jason was all over me while I was still trying to figure out what to do in response. It wasn't easy knowing how far to take things. My pants emitted a warning beep, followed by a test buzz.
He pressed against me and thrust his tongue into my mouth. He reached beneath my shirt to fondle my breasts. In a minute I stopped caring that Mother was, no doubt at this very moment, watching the readouts that showed what we were up to. Jason pushed me back against the seat. As his hard crotch rocked against me and my breathing quickened to match his, I felt a tingling begin at the base of my spine and radiate outward. I thought I was having an orgasm, my first, but too late recognized that the tingling announced an impending discharge of electricity.
My pants came in a jolt of sparks and current and heat. I shrieked in shock as Jason shrieked in pain, then rolled away. Damn it! I could have dry-humped until morning!
"What the fuck?" he asked, drooling, his hair disheveled and eyes red and watery.
"I'm sorry," I said. "Really sorry."
He drove me home. We didn't speak. I never saw him again.
Merck Prescription Information, advertisement in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) – Brief Summary (for full prescribing information see professional information brochure): S.M.A.R.T. utilizes technologies of lie detection, laboratory testing, and skin and mood sensors to detect the presence of HIV, STDs, and changes in EEG and cognitive abilities that suggest the presence of stress and deceitful behavior.
Indications and Usage
S.M.A.R.T. is available in a permeable chip designed to be implanted into subcutaneous fat, generally in the thigh, and is indicated for use in the prevention of sexual encounters. It may be used alone or in combination with other desensitizing agents.
Hiroshima Day – August 6 – The First Bomb Drops
I got off restriction and immediately got a date with some guy named Billy that I once met at the mall. Mother had retrofitted my cattle-prod pants with a tracking device, but I thought I had figured out a way to outwit her. Billy was my test drive. I couldn't wait to get out of my pants and hit the road.
I stocked my backpack with supplies and said I was going to the library. When I got there, I ducked into the bathroom, broke open the instant hot pack, and exchanged my cattle-prod pants for a pair of jeans. I duct-taped the hot pack an inch below the thermostat and GPS sensors in the crotch, carefully placed the pants in my backpack, then carried the backpack over to the information desk.
"Can you hold this for a while?" I said. "I forgot my library card and need to run back home and get it."
"Sure," said the librarian.
I gave her my pack, which she set under the counter, where it would be safe until I reclaimed it before the library closed.
Excerpt from the September 20 Times Picayune front page:
Republican Senator Hieronymus Bartholomew Bush of Jefferson Parish resigned yesterday after allegations that he had fathered three illegitimate children by three different women. Senator Bush's legislative career has been marred by controversy since it was revealed that his election was financed by the five-million-member Chastity Party, whose members helped to vault him from a relative unknown to a figure of national prominence. His campaign platform promised a return to family values, and he successfully sponsored several bills that provided tax waivers and tuition vouchers for teens who tested positive for virginity. Senator Bush recently spearheaded national legislation banning the sale of condoms without prescriptions. His attorney had no comment on the latest allegations.
Seretta checked the readouts soon after Ginny left the house and knew her daughter was up to something. The GPS seemed to be working okay, and Ginny appeared to be at the library. But the temperatures were too even, the location unwavering, and that scared her.
Ginny had never listened to her warnings. Seretta was doing everything she could think of to protect the girl but, evidently, that wasn't enough. What was the point of being a parent if you couldn't use your experiences to prevent those you loved from suffering hurt and pain? It was time to get serious, to take drastic action before Ginny did something she'd regret forever.
It was time to activate Ginny's S.M.A.R.T.
From Get Your Hands Off My Body: The Ginny Vuoto Story, by Ginny Vuoto as told to Kitty Kelly:
People have made fun of me since that first article in Nature, where my mom detailed how she invented the Smart Twat and how I was going to test it. Sure, I'm embarrassed, but I try to think about it like it's all happening to someone else and not me.
My mom doesn't mean to be a monster, but she is. Some things should be private. We all need the chance to make mistakes, just like we need the chance to succeed because of our own efforts. And that's why I think they should never have made the Smart Twat legal. Because even if it does "save" us from ourselves – and from guys – we don't learn from our experience. All we do is react to some mechanical device, and where's the lesson in that?
I know there are lots of problems in the world, and people feel like they have to do something. And I don't really have an answer to teen pregnancy or HIV. Maybe everyone just needs to lighten up. The world keeps changing. Morals change along with the times. Maybe we live in a world where every girl is just going to have a baby before she drives a car and that's that.
I really think the world is going to end because of war or global warming or some horrible disaster, so anything that happens to me doesn't really matter anyway.
"Crisis in Feminist Values: The Smart Twat," excerpts from a paper presented by Lilith Miller-James, Ph.D., M.S.W., Department of Women's Studies, California State University, Fullerton:
There has been a vociferous outcry from the feminist press concerning issues of choice and how the ST encourages the perception that women are helpless and unable to choose appropriate courses of action. I would argue that the ST be seen as it was intended: as a stopgap measure to be used until another device is invented, approved, and distributed to assist abusers in changing behaviors and responding to the challenges of contemporary relationships.
It is naive to ignore the reality of women's lives. Statistics show that one out of four women experiences some form of sexual abuse. Inaction is not an option. To paraphrase Hippocrates: Extreme Diseases require Extreme Remedies.
Hal slumped down in the passenger seat, waiting. His camera was fitted with a high-quality telephoto lens and loaded with a fast film. Fast times required fast film, as he liked to say. School had let out twenty minutes ago, and the kid should be here any second.
They were doing a special issue of the Enquirer on teenage pregnancy, and Hal's job was to spy on that Smart Twat kid, the one with the famous scientist mother, and to catch the girl in unflattering poses that would suggest tawdry caption ideas for the copywriter. He had wanted to cover the original court case, when the father failed to win custody before the device was implanted, but that was a big story, pitting parental rights against the rights of the individual, and his boss had given the assignment to someone with a little more experience. It took five years for the brouhaha to die down, and now here he was, covering yesterday's news. Sometimes he hated this job.
He noticed a teenager approaching the house.
He looked at the old press release and compared the picture to the girl now jogging down the walkway. It had to be her.
Jeez, he thought, she's just a kid. She was tall, wearing too much makeup. Her face was still chubby, her cheeks naturally pink, her legs spindly, like she hadn't quite grown into them. She reminded him of his youngest granddaughter.
He patted his equipment. No way, he said. She's just a kid. Let somebody else do the dirty work. He picked up his cell phone and was about to dial in, say he was sorry that he hadn't been able to arrange the shoot, when he noticed movement in the car parked in front of him. Morgan from The Star.
"Fuck it," Hal said. He popped the lens cap and focused. With his foot he honked the horn. The Smart Twat kid turned his way, exhibiting a look of surprise and maybe fear. He clicked the shutter, again and again, using up half a roll before she made eye contact with him and he felt too guilty about the whole thing to continue.
Transcript from the October 6 Episode of MTV's The More Real World:
(Camera pans the living room where twenty-somethings Jill, Mandy, and Tim sit on a futon couch.)
Jill (sipping a Diet Coke): Seretta said the Prozac made her gain weight, so she switched to an herbal antidepressant, but that didn't seem to help either. She said that it felt like a dark cape had been thrown over her, like the world was closing in, crushing her at its center.
Mandy: Yeah. We felt really bad for her. Her clothes didn't fit, and she thought she looked frumpy and a lot older than forty. (Giggling.) We tried to tell her she wasn't old, but of course she was; so she knew we were lying.
Tim: I don't think she cared much about her personal appearance, except that she was supposed to set an example for other women.
Mandy: It's so sad. That family is, like, so fucked up.
Jill: Oh, and, like, we're not?
Tim: Zing! I guess we all have to share a bite of that weenie.
(Jump-cut to kitchen, where Seretta sits at the breakfast table holding the sides of her mug.)
(Ginny enters. She is dressed in black and has a new piercing through her lip.)
Ginny: Mother.
Seretta: When you call me "Mother" instead of "Seretta," it usually means you want something
Ginny: I have to go to school, but I wanted to tell you something, so just listen, okay?
Seretta: Okay.
Ginny: I'm thinking that I'd like to go live with Dad.
Seretta: That ass!
Ginny: He's not an ass, Mother. He's my dad. Anyway, you said you would just listen.
Seretta: You can't mean this! We moved into this TV house because you said it would be good for us. You can't just abandon me to these morons.
Ginny: Guess I was wrong. I'm late. (She grabs a handful of Fruit Loops and hustles out the door.)
(Jump-cut to living room)
Mandy: Officially, it's called the Sensory Motivational Assessment and Response Test, though everyone in the world – except Ginny's mother, who invented the fucker – calls it the Smart Twat. Sometimes, I can't believe she did this – made Ginny go guinea pig. I can't believe it, but it's true.
(Jump-cut to kitchen, where Jill and Seretta sip herbal tea.)
Seretta: (wiping eyes with tissue) Nothing prepares you for parenting. Sometimes you don't know what to do.
Jill: I never really thought about what it was like for my mom. Not that she thinks about what it's like for me.
Seretta: I tell myself I've got to snap out of this, but it's not that easy. (Swallowing herbal uppers and chasing them with half a box of fat-free chocolate bars.) I haven't felt especially suicidal, but one thing still terrifies me. Too often, it feels as if it would be just as easy to be there instead of here.
Richard's attorney said, "Of course the decisions in cases like these usually go with the mother, but since the child wishes you to have custody, we can hope."
So much drama and publicity surrounded the entire court case. The phone rang constantly, even in the middle of the night. Reporters waited at Richard's door like hungry dogs wanting to be let in. Thankfully, all his legal expenses were being paid by Male Rights (MR), an organization founded by men who had been denied custody of their children.
"The one thing that could hurt us," the attorney said, "is if she brings up that accusation of date rape. I know it isn't true; I'm just worried about how it will sound in court."
The way Richard remembered events, Seretta had been as willing as he had. But she had since tried to poison his relationship with their daughter with some crap about him forcing himself upon her. He remembered that first night in detail, the way Seretta had dressed (a black lace shirt, tight jeans, heels), the delicate scent of spice at the base of her neck, how she had used her tongue in ways his wife had long since forgotten.
There was no force involved. He had gone over it enough times in his mind to be sure. It was only after – when her period was late, when Seretta realized, finally, that he was not going to leave his wife for her – that she began to accuse him of taking advantage of her. Not that he had ever promised anything. She knew he was married from the start, but never thought twice about the immorality until later.
They were close in age, and he was no worldlier than she was. Why did she blame him because she had gotten pregnant? He'd naturally assumed that she had taken precautions – if he had been the one at risk for an unwanted child he certainly would have. So maybe he had pressed a bit too hard for the abortion, but it had seemed like the best course at the time. When Seretta changed her mind, she accused him of wanting to murder their baby.
Should he have tried harder to be sensitive to Seretta's needs? Probably. He could see that now, just not then. She blamed him for everything that had gone wrong. So did his ex-wife, who had legitimate cause. Thank god Ginny didn't hate him. His marriage had dissolved years ago, and he was racked with guilt for causing everyone so much pain. His daughter meant the world to him.
Transcript excerpts from the Jerry Springer Show:
Jerry: Richard Derringer's very public relationship with Seretta Vuoto has left him vulnerable to the label of "woman hater," but Richard says this isn't true. It's only Seretta that he hates.
Richard: Mr. Springer . . .
Jerry: Call me Jer.
Richard: Mr. Springer. . . .
Jerry: Okay, call me Jerry. You look nervous. What's the matter? You never watch the show?
Richard: Once or twice. I saw the one with the Siamese twins.
Jerry: My finest hour. So tell me about your ex-wife.
Richard: She's not my ex-wife. We weren't married.
Jerry: Whatever. I bet she was hot. Or was your wife the cold fish?
Richard: Look, I'm not going to answer that.
Jerry: She's some sort of scientist, right?
Richard: Her degree is in psychology. It's a soft science. Not hard like physics, but she sure acts like she knows everything.
Jerry: I like this hard and soft stuff. Can we talk a little more about that?
Richard: I worry that my daughter might be watching.
Jerry: (laughing) You let your daughter watch a show like this?
Richard: It's not up to me. She lives with her mother.
Jerry: But not for long, eh?
Richard: I think it's better not to talk about this on ca
mera. Did you hear talk of a planned school shooting in Minneapolis?
Jerry: Got my guys on it already.
A letter to JAMA:
Recently, the adult guardians of a teenage patient demanded I prescribe a Smart Twat on the child's behalf. This raised several issues of consent, as well as a general question of accountability on the part of the OB-GYN toward the psychosexual health of her/his patients.
1) If I fail to follow the guardian's directive, and my patient suffers from abusive relationships as a result – perhaps contracts diseases ranging from genital warts to HIV – will I be liable for monetary damages?
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