Focusing on the plasticott food box before me, I snapped open the top and removed the jewel-case-enclosed burger, the sculpted bear blaster drink cup pricked with five straws, and the gratis tray of fries, each individually wrapped and resting beside drops of several gourmet sauces. This was exactly the sort of chaff that Pheff lived on. Every other day I would find the disassembled boxes, cups, trays, and the scraps of peculiar, fashionable food in the office trash.
For a moment, I felt sorry for him. Although he was both talented and competent, I feared he lacked the sand and gravel needed for a life in fashion. His life, from what little I knew, was exactly like this meal: hyper-processed, sweet and smooth, but ultimately safe.
By now, my hands were no longer trembling and my heartbeat felt like it had finally slowed. But I just sat there staring forward the golden-orange of the drink cup seemed the color of the sun setting in the slubs.
I had been coming out of the corn syrup processing factory into the burnt orange of afternoon. Six feet ahead-in silhouette- stood a man. I didn't recognize him-I didn't even pay him any attention-but started toward the bus stop that would take me back to the house where I lived.
The man said, "Tane."
His voice wasn't the same-it had shrunk in depth and tenor- but it stopped me instantly. Gradually, as my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw his face. A dark bruise covered his right cheek. The left side of his mouth was covered with a bloody scab. Worse, his arms and what I could see of his neck through the tear of his B-shirt were covered with pinkish sores. I hadn't seen him for more than nine years. "Dad!"
"I found you." He sounded exhausted, and I got the feeling he had been searching for a long time.
"What happened?"
He shook his head slowly as if counting the abuses and tragedies.
"Were you in a fight?" I figured he had clashed with a group of
L. Segu men, but what really worried me was his rash. M-Bunny reps were always on the lookout. While some diseases could be cured with doses from the M-Bunny COM, if it were bad or unknown, the man would have to be recycled.
He looked me over and eked out a smile. "You're good."
"How'd you find me?" Before he answered-not that he seemed about to-I continued. "I never heard anything since you left that night. I was only at that house for another year before they moved me. I asked the reps and the man at the COM all the time, but no one heard anything."
He pulled himself straighter and looked me in the eyes. "I don't have much time." He scrunched his wrinkled mouth to one side as if in thought. "I'm dying."
My mouth was so dry, I couldn't swallow. I shook my head.
"I've got a day… I don't know… maybe two."
I forced a smile. "You're just hurt and… and… tired and probably hungry." As I tried to think of something more positive, my eyes lit on the sores that peeked out the neck of his shirt. It looked like his chest was covered.
"Go south to the slubs around Ros Begas."
"Ros where?" I was still trying to keep my tone light, but the intensity of his glare made me fearful. "Why? What's going on?"
"There's a Europa brandclan there called Bestke. Switch to them."
"Switch?" I knew of the concept, but had never met anyone who had actually changed. The rumor was that most L. Segu men wanted to switch to Bunny, but maybe that was just propaganda. And all I knew of Bestke was that it had something to do with potatoes. "Dad," I said quietly as several M-Bunny men walked past eyeing us suspiciously, "let's just get you a dose or something."
"Do as I say!"
"I will," I said. "But, please, let's get you something at the COM."
"Bestke," he repeated. "I've told them about you."
"Shh!" The idea that he had talked to another brandclan terrified me. I had no intentions of switching and didn't want my reps suspicious. "I'm sure there's some M-Bunny dose that will help you.
I know a guy at the COM. He's good. It's near the house."
"You have to go. Promise me you will."
I knew what happened. Dad was debranded! He had destroyed corn somewhere, he had not recycled, or maybe he had killed a rep! When a man did something against the corn or M-Bunny, he would not just be recycled, but his father and his sons would be taken away. That's why he wanted me to go. "Dad," I said quietly, "what'd you do? What happened? Did you do something to the crop?"
He sighed and stared down at his feet.
Disappointment and shame began to harden in my body like another skeleton. In that moment that dad had been debranded it felt worse than his death. "Let's get the bus. The COM's near my house. We can see what they say."
"Promise me."
I was sure I could see disgrace in his eyes. And then I noticed that the sores weren't on his face, neck, or hands. "How'd you get that… those… that stuff on your arms and chest?"
"Promise me!"
My frustration shattered like a pane of glass. "Nine years ago you just walked away! You turned down the path. And I don't know if you know it, but I followed you. As far as I could, anyway." I don't know if I wanted to surprise him or demonstrate my sorry longing. His mouth pinched. "Dad, I figured you were recycled."
He twisted his lower jaw to the right, and I thought he was going to yell. He bared his teeth and clenched his eyes. A small grunt came from him and that was all. Then I heard his teeth slip against each other as he bit down.
"Dad?" My exasperation turned to panic. "Smut! What's the matter?"
His legs buckled and he fell to his knees. I grasped his shoulder to keep him from falling on his face.
I woke from my reverie and glanced around me, hoping the other customers hadn't noticed. A mother and child silently worked on a mound of fries. Two teenage girls lip-synced to the blaring music. Behind them sat a saleswarrior from some nearby store in her tiny spandicott dress and neon make-up. She ate sullenly as if fully absorbed in daydream or rehearsing her warTalk.
I opened the jewel case and unwrapped the lurid pink foil. The bun was colored the livid yellow of the sun, the meat dyed a pastiche of reds, blues, and purples. It looked awful. I set it down.
I thought about how I had changed after my father left. Maybe to compensate or lure him back, I tried to be the most loyal and virtuous M-Bunny man ever. I had worked long and hard in the corn. I recycled everything. I praised M-Bunny's food, her clothes, and the corn oil that powered her buses.
But when Dad showed up that day in the slubs, beaten, and sick, my attitude changed forever. I understood that he wasn't the man I thought he was. If that memory was a lie, then maybe I had understood nothing.
I began stuffing my food back into the plasticott box. I couldn't even look at it anymore. When I got up and started toward the trash, the dandelion chimp girl chased after me.
"Sir, would you like me to wrap your treats?" She clenched her small hands together nervously as she peered at me. "Or is something the matter?"
"Something's the matter." When her mouth tightened into a frown and her eyes got watery, I hastened to add, "But not with the food or you. With me."
She offered to have the on-duty nurse come and check me and do a full and complimentary gastrointestinal check, but I told her it wasn't like that. "It's memories," I told her. "Memories."
SEATTLEHAMA: PASTEL RUFFLES
The Black Blossom Shopping Amphitheater and Custom Fashion Art House was a cacophony of competing rhythms, clothing racks, undulating displays, and hundreds of saleswarriors. I found it hard to see anything for the flashing lights, the made-up faces, and the jangle of sounds and conversation.
We passed a nine-foot-tall chunk of clear ice. Frozen inside was a frilly violet jacket. Kira stopped, eyed me, and then the jacket. I got the feeling she had just copied my head and was now affixing it atop the thing.
A saleswarrior in tiny white shorts and a dripping wet shirt came toward us. Her orange eyelids accented her huge blue eyes. "My theme is cloud."
Gazing at the encased purple jacket, Kira replied, "Mor
e than cloud: atmosphere and the passion of the storm."
"Take me," swooned the saleswarrior, "take me to the eye and see me where none have stitched before!"
The two of them laughed. They had been quoting something. A second later both squinted at me, not undressing but redressing.
The saleswarrior said, "He's the visage of Warrior Remon of Loin!"
"With some slight adjustments," Kira agreed.
In the next moment, I found myself being fitted for that violet jacket. The rich material was stronger and more supple than anything I had ever felt, and once the saleswarrior swirled her fingers over a silvery remote, the sleeves changed length and the shoulders fit perfectly. Kira stepped before me and primped the thick flow of ruffles that spilled down the front. She combed the fringe on the sleeves, buttoned the seven buttons down the front, and then stepped back to take me in. Her pupils seemed large, her lips, thicker. She was breathing fast, her breasts swelling above the neckline of her dress with each inhale.
Stepping toward me close enough that I could see the powdery luminescence of the browns and gold around her eyes, the colorless fuzz that salted the corners of her mouth, a few tiny red threads in the white of her eyes, she whispered, "High-fashion fornication."
I didn't know the last word, but the way she snarled it, I guessed. I hadn't seen anyone ever kiss, but had a notion to press my mouth to hers. I leaned close enough to feel the warm atmosphere around her.
"Warrior Remon!" She pushed me back. "You're not fully dressed!"
From there we shopped for a shirt, tie, scarf, kerchief, chemise, hose, shoes, slacks, and a man's non-fantasy skivvé.
At the last booth, Kira told me to sit in a large chair.
"What for?"
"We're going to style your face and hair."
A team of technicians, clinicians, and gender counselors worked me over. My hair was primped; my forehead reshaped, my hands smoothed, and my Adam's apple enlarged with some sort of injection.
"I don't like this," I complained between pricks and twists.
"You're done," announced a woman who wore a crown of lights.
The man in the worm-covered jacket that had been with Kira when we first met stepped before me. Behind him I recognized the man in the giraffe mask. Worm Jacket was gazing at me. "He is Warrior Remon of Loin from Sensitive Dead Penisless Boys."
Kira held a mirror for me to see. My hair had been lengthened, fluffed, and highlighted with reds. My forehead was taller, which made me look serious, even severe. Somehow my eyes looked twice as wide. My eyelashes were dark and felt heavy when I blinked. My lips had been puffed and felt tender. I looked like a t'up man, like a friend of Vit and Flak.
Giraffe rocked his mask forward and back. "Beautiful!"
Worm Jacket raised a fist. "To the buttonhole machine!"
"First," said Kira with a naughty grin, "I need a fashion fornication coat."
Both Worm Jacket and Giraffe let out excited whoops.
As the three of us headed through the crowded shopping floor, other t'ups began to follow, and by the time we reached a display of huge jackets, forty more were tagging along.
"The woven lining provides body, hand, and contact." The saleswarrior wore a thick, fuzzy coat. The front was unbuttoned and she was nude underneath. Hers were the first breasts and vulva I had ever seen. I couldn't stop staring. I knew Kira didn't have a root in her skivvé, but now I wondered how she peed. "Electrical and mechanical stimulation is built into the lining," continued the warrior. "Our sensations are industry-leading."
"Get the hunter green!" suggested Worm Jacket.
Kira thought that funny.
"We love you in black emerald," agreed Giraffe. "It brings out the mystery and cruelty in your eyes."
Kira relented and selected a dark green coat. The gathered crowd cheered.
Behind the fashion runway, Kira and I dressed separately. Worm Jacket came to help me. "Remon! Slow down. Take your pants off. This goes on first!" He held a strange silky blue pair of shorts with a round clump of fabric in front.
"What is that?"
"Don't you know what a Mr. Troy is? It's only the best men's panty. It's got the Spandik Cup front and Absorb-it technology.
You know, it's like they used to say… it shapes and cups and helps you go nuts." As he sang, his enthusiasm dimmed. "The skin on your fashion pin…" He narrowed his eyes. "Kira won't tell us anything about you. Where are you even from?"
I looked him in the eye and said, "I was a prisoner."
He froze. "Cut me," he muttered.
For that instant I was in control. It wasn't a feeling I had often.
"You really are like Warrior Remon."
I was back on my heels again. "Who is Remon?"
"Only the biggest character from the biggest epic. He's the dream man. And the thing is, he lived part of his life in the corn. That's the secret unmentionable thing about him. He meets and falls in love with Bunné, who is Neutering Queen JackRabbita. They have a secret affair and he loses his… well… you know."
"This is made-up," I confirmed.
"No. Like all Bunné's epics, it's based on a true story. That's where the power comes from." He struck a pose, stared intently into the distance, and then laughed. "I look a little like Remon, but he's so convinced and strong… I can't pull it off." He shrugged and then gently touched one of the live worms woven into his jacket. "I dress like Commander Sheppard in the Mulberry Jacket. He's Remon's best man." He gazed at me for a dejected moment then picked up the Mr. Troy. "So, anyway… um, when you get solid, this fabric stretches and surrounds you with sensitive silk. It's called sensi-silk. And the Absorb-it drains away those unsavory liquids." He peered at me. "Have you fashioned before?"
I tensed. "No."
He nodded slowly. "Well… okay. Here's what you should really know-and I'm not saying this to be a cut-Kira is an amazing knitter and a completely beautiful warTalker. She's my favorite celeb knitter… I mean, she's not a big one or anything… and her fashion company is really beleaguered now. But she's special. She's a real rebel, and she's risking everything and that's stunning. What she's doing with you is such a gift. You have to cherish this." He stared forward for a long beat, and I got the feeling he wanted to be with her. "I guess she knows what she's doing." I heard him swallow again. "Anyway, let's get you dressed. First put on the Troy and then your stockings… and then you've got a nice cream chemise here… and a ruffled lavender shirt…"
When I was dressed, Worm Jacket and I headed to a room just behind the stage. Several t'ups in ornate and lavish costume waited to go on next. Thumping music and the occasional squawk of a voice echoed beyond the curtain.
Kira came toward me in a thick, fuzzy jacket. Her large eyes were filled with warmth and unfamiliar vulnerability. She smiled and whispered, "Hello, Warrior Remon of Loin." She teased the ruffles and frills of my jacket and shirtfront with her lace-gloved hands. "You are truly majesty and honor… you are the smoke before fire… the silence before the crash."
A warm tingling filled me as I stared into her eyes.
"Kira," said Worm Jacket, "I'm not trying to be a cut or anything, but you know that he hasn't fashioned before, right?" He smiled nervously as his eyes darted between us.
"Deep instincts of the forgotten men," she said, eyeing me knowingly, "are never forever lost. Just as cloth remembers the body and the creases of time, so too the warrior lays deep within the breast of the male."
Worm Jacket smiled sourly. He swallowed, nodded slowly, and then stepped away. For an instant I felt bad for him.
"The interlocked closeness," continued Kira, her voice tender and hungry. "Knits rubbing against wovens. The tightness of the stitch. The slight pilling across the friction of our longing. The stretched and then torn yarns of desire."
The black emerald of her coat made her eyes glow with promise. I reached to touch her cheek, but she moved so that my fingers met the thick collar of her jacket. The material was warm and soft and as I ca
ressed it, she closed her eyes and let out a long teardrop-shaped moan.
A second later she pushed me back in a playful faux anger. "Save Troy for the show!"
"Shoppers, customers, consumers, and buyers…" A man in an enormous orange suit spoke at the far side of the stage. "On this auspicious day of late winter afternoon shopping, The Black Blossom Fashion Shopping Amphitheater fashion show continues!"
Kira and I were peeking between the heavy white curtains. Through the glare of the lights I could see hundreds of t'ups around the runway clapping and cheering. As others strutted out before us, Kira showed me the mechanics of the walk, the sort of dower, unhappy face one made, and what we were going to do at the end of the runway.
"Let's have a passionate welcome for our favorite independent men's fantasy skivvé knitter Celebrity Executive Officer, Kira Shibui!"
Kira fiddled with the ruffles of my jacket and sleeves one last time and then turned, and headed through the curtains to the runway. The crowd screamed.
"There she is! Today's shopper! Today's luxury consumer! And just behind her, new shopper to our boutiques… welcome Tane Cedar as Warrior Remon of Loin!"
I held closed my eyes for an instant and then stepped through. A crash of applause hit me in the chest as I started after her.
"Kira is in a Bietnamese tower wool blend with a silk-a-pussi core and dovetail lady lining," said the announcer. "Her warrior is wearing a wounded sky robust purple jacket in pleated zero denier high-twist Halyn with fall curl and spilled ruffle gut details by Rebel Sheep. His blouse is a quad-collared taffeta with splatter-curls by Exceptional Red Self-Injury Santa. His shoes are fine goat scrotum leather cement-skippers from Aurora Boring Alice."
The man went on, but with the screams of the crowd and beat of the music, I couldn't hear and didn't care. Ahead of me, Kira reached the end of the runway, stopped, glanced one way with a haughty turn of her head, and then turned to gaze at me. In the glare of the lights, the blast of the sounds, and the frenzied motion of the crowd, she seemed like the center of the store and the apex of the earth.
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