Angry Young Spaceman (32 page)

“Ssss-sss-ss,” he laughed.

“But you are very quiet when you help me, or tell me something — so I don’t feel like an outsider. I don’t know how you say it in Octavian — dignity? Do you know?”

He nodded, and told me.

“That’s what you give me,” I said. “It’s more important than fast service.” I realized I had been leaning forward with the urgency of communicating this, so I leaned back in my chair

We drove on in silence, except for his occasional nose sound.

***

“What’s amazing is how exceedingly fond I’ve gotten of that sound,” I said, hefting the bowling ball. “It’s sick. I’m getting nostalgic about people I haven’t even left yet.” I whipped it down the alley and got a strike I didn’t deserve.

Matthew frowned at this injustice, watching the score tally up.

The autoscore was about the only concession to modernity. Everything else breathed the ancient art of bowling, as it had been played for millennia. I found it a little pretentious, but not nearly as bad as some places — they’d let you use your own shoes at a pinch. Which was good, because they only had Montavian sizes, the largest of which I could wear as an amulet.

“Yeah...” he said, after he took his turn. “I probably shouldn’t ask you about Jinya, then.”

I nodded and grabbed a ball. “I just have to forget I’m leaving in four months. But it looms there, you know? Always in the shadow of it.” Crap. Gutterball.

“Oh, too
bad
,” Matthew said, jumping up. “Yeah, just enjoy the moment, I guess. Although...” He paused as I took my shot, watching the ball pick off a few pins. “...it’s good to think about it. It can kind of sneak up on you. Fuck you up.”

I looked at him. This was the closest he’d come to alluding to his breakdown at the club. I took my shot and wondered what to say about it. If anything. I wondered if Matthew was waiting for me to say something.

He took his last turn, seemingly focused on the game, watching the score after each shot. I found his competitiveness amusing — so Earthling. It annoyed the hell out of Hugh.

“Did you call Hugh?” I asked.

“Yeah, I left messages with both of them.” He checked the time. “I’m surprised 9/3 hasn’t shown up — we’re practically in his neighbourhood. It was kind of last minute, though. I just couldn’t stand the idea of being on display for the weekend.”

I nodded. It was hard enough for me, and I had a place with non-transparent walls to escape to. I picked a cherry red ball.

“Unfortunately, they’ve figured out how I masturbate,” he said glumly.

“Yeah, I was wondering about that,” I said after another strike.

“After my first week, I realized that they had no idea what human sex organs were or how they worked. So when I was in the mood, I’d walk around naked in my living room till a crowd congregated. There were always a few fine-looking women there for stimulus.”

I laughed and got another strike, just because I wasn’t trying. Matthew cursed bitterly in Squid, and I realized I had won.

We went to sit down on the row of multicoloured chairs, which we had adjusted to our height. Matthew waved the waitress over.

“So what happened? How’d you get caught?”

“Well, it was fine at home — if I just kept it regular, they figured it was like grooming or something. But one day I was walking home and I see this beautiful girl having sex in her apartment. So being horny, I whip it out and casually started beating off. I wasn’t, like, staring at them or anything obvious. I was just standing on the corner, old ladies were shopping and stuff, no one even noticed.”

He shrugged. “But then one of the English teachers from my school came by. At the worst possible time.” Matthew leaned back and impatiently watched the waitress help the only other group in the alley.

“Right when you —”

“Yep. So I’ve got this ecstatic look on my face. She was smiling at first, as if she thought I was so fucking happy to see her. She doesn’t even live in town! Fuck, what a fluke. Anyway, the cum’s just floating there because of the stupid atmosphere. And like an idiot I look down, and she notices it. ‘Urine?’”

I cracked up, imagining the snaky semen wriggling, floating, the look of confusion on her face.

“But then — she must have seen me looking before I realized she was there — she looked over at the apartment, where of course they were still having sex, and figured it out.”

“Holy,” I said.

“Can’t go anywhere now without people staring at my crotch,” he said, adjusting his Speak-O-Matic as the waitress neared. He ordered some drinks.

He snapped it off as she left. He had a pendant version. I wondered how different my life would be if I hadn’t lost it.

“Wanna try it on?” teased Matthew.

“
May wallens have sex with your mother’s corpse
,” I said cheerfully.

He had twisted the dial but only caught the end of it. “What about a corpse?” he said.

“You bowl like a corpse,” I said.

“So you’re still keeping at the language lessons,” Matthew asked it like it was a subject that horrified and fascinated him. “I dunno... I have trouble remembering any words without connecting them with an English word. Like dichchimp -- ‘thanks’ in Squidollian -- I learned by thinking, ‘Thanks for being a dick, chump.’ But every goddamn word has to have this chain of words attached to it.”

I shrugged. Despite the laborious and inefficient method, I doubted Matthew had stuck at it long enough to be worthy of sympathy. “Sucks to be you.”

He was rubbing at his temple. “Every word, I have to make up some dumb connection... I gotta haul up the chain every time... but you! Damn you. Are you fluent yet? Bastard?”

“Not yet.” I shrugged. “But if I keep at it, I think I may be the first one.”

Our drinks arrived. Matthew paid the waitress and hooked his small glass of black soda. Mine was lime-coloured, with a fizz. It was tasty.

He gave me a mean look over his glass. “Doesn’t that worry you? That no one else’s bothered?”

“Fuck off,” I squeaked. Literally. My voice was several octaves higher.

Matthew laughed uproariously, then took a gulp of his drink. “Who you telling to fuck off?” he said in a rumbly boulder voice that echoed slightly.

“Hee hee hee,” I laughed, mortified by my tone. I noticed the waitress looking over at us curiously.

“HO HO HO,” he chuckled.

Another round of giggles, which I got under control. “Last time I let you order the drinks,” I squeaked.

Matthew belched like an earthquake, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. The other group of bowlers looked over at us, the guy who had just thrown a gutterball standing there in the classic hands-on-hips munchkin pose of annoyance.

We looked like utter morons. I tried to stop my hysterical high-pitched hee-hee-hee-ing with my hands, and looked over at Matthew.

“What else’s in the drink?” I said, feeling light-headed.

“Just the pitch juice,” he boomed quietly, looking nervously at the argument taking place in the other group. “Let’s go call the guys and tell them off.”

I took stock of the munchkin pointing furiously at us and said really quickly, “OK let’s go I don’t wanna get in another fight.”

It sounded so wimpy we couldn’t help snickering as we left. I pictured the Montavian’s tools flashing into action and that helped sober me up, although (if Matthew was to be believed) there was nothing unsober in my system.

We left the bowling alley and snapped (stomach flip!) into zero g. We pulled ourselves along the hallway, where a half dozen or so Montavians were headed to the alley. I was surprised that there were so few people on the little orbiting amusement, since I had heard that Montavians liked bowling — one of the few sports their tiny size didn’t handicap them in intergalactic competitions. But I was surprised that this place stayed open —

“Great!” baritoned Matthew. He had found a vidbooth, and ducked into it. I looked at the icon, a dish with waves emanating from it, and realized I would never have figured out what it indicated. Matthew was already inside and looking at the instruction-laden panel. It was Montavian, and I looked at the angular characters with a feeling of defeat.
Why did everyone have to do it their own way?
I thought, the stupid lazy thought penetrating my carefully placed barriers of cultural tolerance.

Matthew was punching buttons.

“Do you know what you’re doing?” I chirped.

“Nope,” he said, and stood back. The vid snapped onto standby, and we were bathed in the green glow. I looked at Matthew in profile, and he was already smirking in anticipation of how 9/3 would like our voices.

“You’re a good man to have around, Chan,” I said as gruffly as my high pitched voice would allow, which wasn’t very.

The vid snapped a connection, and the image resolved itself. 9/3 was working on this huge metal sculpture that was wider than the range of the vid, and came up to 9/3’s barrel chest.

“What the fuck?!” Matthew boomed. “You passed up a night with us to stay home with your metal collection?”

9/3 adjusted something near his ear, I presumed because he thought the sound had to do with the vidphone. I piped up. “Yeah, dude, I had no competition bowling against this guy.”

9/3’s red eyes flicked once in confusion. Then, “Oh, you are drinking Montavian juice. Only children drink it here. Young children.” He placed a ball bearing at a high level of the metal structure, and it started rolling.

“Does this sound like a kid’s voice to you?” I squeaked indignantly.

“Ha,” said 9/3 hollowly.

I looked at Matthew. Matthew shrugged.

“Have you heard from Hugh?” I said, getting sick of my voice.

“No. He left,” 9/3 said, grabbing a whole boxful of bearings in his pincers.

I knew, suddenly, what he meant.

“Left to come here?” Matthew said.

“He went back home,” said 9/3, pouring the bearings onto the structure. “To the moon.” I watched the bearings slide, sparkle, whiz. So did 9/3.

“Fuck...” said Matthew. “Did he tell—”

“No,” 9/3 said. “I called him today, and his number was out of service. His school told me he left three days ago.”

I was stunned. I had known how unhappy he was, but why would he leave without saying anything? I felt abandoned, and by the look of it that was a tenth of what 9/3 felt.

We watched the last bearings slide to the bottom. I could hear them clinking into a pile offscreen.

“Well, we’re still going on holiday, right?” said Matthew. His voice was suddenly back to normal.

“I’ve already paid for it,” I said, and 9/3 nodded. He static-sighed and used his pincers to bend one of the tracks by a small increment. The vidphone flashed for more money.

“Good,” said Matthew, relieved. “Fuck him. He’d just slow us down, anyway. And you, my good roboman —” he said with a point and a leer, “You make sure you remember to pack your android body, ‘cause you’re gonna need it!”

He blinked no. “I am leaving that at home. It just makes problems.”

Out of time, the vidphone winked out.

Matthew raised his eyebrows. “I hope he forgets to pack his bad mood.”

As we left the booth I realized that originally, it was Matthew and Hugh who had lobbied for Pleasureworld 33. Now it was just Matthew, and I felt a surge of annoyance for him.

“Holy fuck!” he said suddenly.

I didn’t say anything.

“God
damn
it!” he said, slapping his forehead.

“What!?” I said finally.

“Hugh owed me 150 creds!”

I felt a little bit better.

***

Later that night, Matthew tried to convince me to go down to Montavia to try and cheer 9/3 up. I didn’t. I regret it now, but how was I supposed to know? Even with Hugh’s departure proving how quickly things could change.

But consider the argument against it, without the benefit of hindsight: I would have had to take a rocket home from the surface, and it would have cost a lot more. I was sure we’d get wasted, and I knew from recent experience how dangerous that could be on Montavia.

On the other hand I could take a quick shuttle back to Octavia and be able to slip into my accustomed atmosphere in a few hours which I craved like a warm bath. (I’d never admit that to Matthew, of course, even though he probably felt the same way.) And I might be able to see Jinya tomorrow, before she went to her folks’ place.

So an hour or so after talking to 9/3, I was on a shuttle staring out the window, seeing the shape of a certain woman in the constellations, silver star eyes.

***

I was leaning against the twined tree waiting for her to show up. I hummed a song by Intergalactic Cool Youth and watched the road. It was twilight, and I shot an occasional glance over my shoulder to the house of the old man who cared for this tree. A saucer whizzed by and lit up the house and then me, the twilight atmosphere rippling in its wake.

I previously had sat beside the tree, which had been a step up from standing beside it. Now I lounged indolently, possessively against it. My physical comfort was almost nullified by an equal quantity of anxiety, and perhaps even exceeded by it. So why was I doing it?

I decided I was doing it to look relaxed and cool. And how ridiculous was that, when Octavians relaxed in a totally different way? When their concept of cool was utterly different from an average Earthling’s, which was different from a pug’s?

A saucer went by slowly. I listened to the hum of its motor for any slowing, refusing to squint in the glare of its lights and looking as hardcore as possible. When it moved on, I blinked.

The whole scene had a distinct familiarity. After a second, I realized why. We would be waiting for the subway, going to London or somewhere for a fight, twenty or so of us warming up and goofing around. Most of us would squat down along the wall, leaving the seats for the normal patrons. A transit droid would inevitably trundle by, attracted by our motion and noise, and blind us with white light. No one would pay attention ‘cause none of us had any weapons except the ones attached to our wrists from birth.

The only time there had ever been trouble was when Skaggs had filled his jetpack with a green solution that left this fantastic trail, and it turned out it was mildly toxic. The droid detected “tainted fuel.” Seth had reared back and kicked the droid onto the tracks as the subway was coming in. After lasering the droid the train locked down and kept going, of course, and we missed our only ride to the Bolivia fight.