Near + Far (20 page)

I don't use the Captures of Grizz's body or Lorelei's death in my art, but I replay them often, obsessively. Sitting on the toilet, showering, eating, walking—Capturing other things is the only way I have to escape them.

Between the royalties and Suzanne's continued employment though, I do well enough. She's moved into Ajah's place, and I've taken the room behind the clothing store where she used to live. I cook what I can there, small and tasteless meals, and watch the memories in my head.

Memories of moments, as bright as falling stars.

Afternotes

The story started for me with a vision of Grizz and Jonny putting the memory wire on each other. From there, I tried to build a world that paid attention to class dynamics—in a system where money buys you the augmentations necessary to move ahead in the system, what happens when someone gets augmentation that they weren't supposed to have? It drives me a little nuts when speculative fiction doesn't acknowledge issues of class, and so here, as with other stories, I've tried to think about where the money in the society lies and what effect that has.

This piece originally appeared in
Talebones
, edited by Patrick Swenson, with an absolutely beautiful illustration by Ben Baldwin that really showed he'd read the story. It's always such an odd delight to have someone else illustrate your work, and I took great pleasure in his lovely artwork.

Y
ou may remember the ad campaigns, which they yanked hastily just as the trial began: a shot of a woman, damask skin and midnight hair, her back turned, against a red-draped background.

As the commercial begins, she has apparently just stepped naked from a fur coat, which lies pooled in silvery-gray folds around her feet. Looking over her shoulder with a Mona Lisa smile, she dips and extends her hands to the fur, which surges upward to meet her touch. Like a cloak of furry snakes, it slides over her exquisite form, and she turns as it extends over her torso. Skin flashes, tantalizing, before the fur curves over it. So cool, so clean, so seductive.

"I believe," she informs us with a touch of hauteur, "in being pampered." She slides a palm along the fur, stroking it.

The fur lengthens as her hand passes over it, extending to calf-length. Her sculpted chin brushes along the fur collar and the subtle soft gray darkens at the touch, like a monochromatic blush. Lifting her face, she gives the camera an orgasmic smile.

"Don't you deserve something real? RealFur. Because there's no luxury like life around you."

Scrolled across her belly: http://www.noluxurylikelife.com.

The Yahoo Most-Mailed Photo of the Day featured her standing with the coat sliding slowly off her. Most of the media furor was manufactured, sponsored advertising hype: few people could afford the coats at 10k a pop.

But Larry always had to have the latest thing for Libby. And because they had a two for one deal, he bought me, her sister, one as well.

At the time I lived in the back of the house, where I had my own little studio apartment, bathroom and kitchenette. Most of the time I was home with Libby; sometimes I went out running errands or working with one of the foundations that sometimes call me in. I'm a CPA, the sort you hire when everything else has failed, or if there are mysterious gaps in the database that need to be reconciled. I could afford my own place easily but this way I felt like part of the family. Larry hinted that he wouldn't mind me out, but he also liked the money I bring in—the way I covered half the mortgage on his lakeside house. That was us, the New American Family.

The package arrived in a big brown truck, two large boxes labeled REALFUR(TM), which I signed for. They were addressed to Larry, so I left them in the hallway and went in to find Libby in the living room, staring out at the water.

I've always hated that room. It's the Land of Exotic Knickknacks, souvenirs from Thailand, Bali, Australia, Japan, Switzerland, all over the world. Larry's sole decorating criterion was that it not be American-made, and every time Libby suggested it might be updated, he'd whine ferociously until she abandoned the thought.

"Larry got some packages," I said.

She pulled her attention back from the water and looked at me. "What sort?"

"Looks like two RealFurs."

"What? Those cost an arm and a leg."

I shrugged. "Latest thing," I said, my tone noncommittal.

She went into the hallway and looked at the boxes. Even the outside packaging was distinctive: glossy plastic coating with a metallic sheen, the logo like a sleek animal sprawled across the surface.

"I'm opening them," she said. "Well, one at least."

The kitchen knife whispered through brightly colored packing tape. The Styrofoam pellets inside were the same color as the label.

"Nice packaging," I said, peering over her shoulder.

"Piss off," she said. "How much do you think he spent on this?"

"There's the bill of lading." I pointed.

She snatched it up and unfolded it. "Two for one deal," she said.

"What's the description?"

"Basic RealFur (lilac) and Basic RealFur (pink). Two complimentary feeding stations. Two manuals and certificates of ownership."

I pulled out the silvery sack. "Do you think this is RealFur (lilac) or RealFur (pink)?"

"There's only one way to find out."

The knife spoke again, and fur spilled out in lavish warmth. As the air struck it, it stirred, and Libby stepped back.

"Pink, evidently," I said.

She knelt and stretched a hand out to it. It rolled forward and rose to meet her touch like a cat arching its back into a caress.

"So soft," she said.

It crept forward to nuzzle her ankles.

"Will it become a coat now, I wonder?"

"I think it's waiting to be asked," I said, watching it.

She reached her hands down and it flowed upward and along her shoulders. Her eyes closed, focusing on the sensation.

"It's warm," she said a little breathlessly.

I paged through the manual. "It cleans itself through an electrostatic charge," I read. "You set the feeding station up in a corner of the closet you'll be keeping it in."

"Won't that smell?"

"It says it lives off protein molecules."

"That's pretty meaningless. What sort?"

"Doesn't say."

She stroked her bare forearm along the fur, eyes dreamy.

"It's like being hugged," she said. "So soft, so warm."

I found her that night asleep in front of CNN, the coat wrapped around her like a blanket. I shook her awake and left it there on the couch as I walked her off to bed. When I returned it came willing into my arms, soft and warm, stirring against my skin as though scenting it. As instructed, I laid it on the floor on the closet where its feeding station had been placed. They must have figured everyone who can afford one has a walk-in closet, I thought, amused.

Back in my own rooms, I opened the package to extract RealFur (lilac). Libby had claimed the pink without wanting to see this, but I thought I had gotten the better part of the deal. The subtle coloring enchanted me as it shaded to a deeper hue at the touch of my hands. I fell asleep with it layered around me like a cloak of feathers.

Every night that week I heard the rain, the delicious warmth of the RealFur around me in bed. Early every morning it released me to steal out and curl briefly around the rod of the feeding station, and then return to me, bright with heat and a little restive. I grew accustomed to that familiar warmth, the weight of the thick fur along my side.

Over the next few weeks, we took our coats with us everywhere. No matter where we were in the house, they would be nearby or even at hand, coiled around our shoulders like companioning arms, or spread beneath us to shield us from the cold floor while we watched TV during the long hours while Larry was away at work. He laughed about it at first, but he took to hanging the coat up downstairs before coming to bed. He started turning the heat higher in the house as well; he and Libby followed each other from room to room, adjusting the thermostats.

I slept with mine each night. I kept my window open and listened to the rain, nestled in its warm embrace.

He offered to get her a kitten, but she said no.

"Are you offering to clean its litter box for me as well?" she asked, and he hemmed and hawed as she chuckled.

"Get me tickets to the Ballet instead." She wore the RealFur to it, and I wore mine. In the lobby, friends swarmed around us, caressing the coats. We had dressed to match them; Libby wore a shell pink dress and shaggy ivory boots, while I dressed in a more sedate eggplant-colored pantsuit.

My friend Margery fingered the cuff, pinching the soft flesh between her fingers. The coat stirred and I pulled away.

"Doesn't it like being touched?" she asked.

I ran my hand along the front lapel and felt the swathe stir in the wake of my touch. "There are too many people here, it's making it nervous," I said. I made my way to a quieter part of the room and watched the two of them from a distance.

Larry kept one hand slid through the crook of Libby's elbow, his fingers intertwined with hers. He looked around, smiling and nodding to as many people as possible, while Libby focused all of her attention on each person as they spoke to her, leaving out the rest of the world. The fur framed her face. Mine settled in heavy warmth along my shoulders and pulsed slowly along my thighs, subtly nudging them apart.

Outside, the air was cold and crisp before we slid into the taxi back to Redmond. My coat cocooned me, smoothing itself out to catch any gaps.

"Well," said Larry, leaning forward to adjust the car's heating upward. "You two were certainly the belles of the ball with your furs."

"I love mine," Libby said dutifully. "Thank you again."

I kept quiet, pretending to be asleep. We were crossing the bridge across Lake Washington, and the Seattle lights glittered and guttered on the dark water.

Though I love her, I'd be the first to admit that my sister Libby is a flake. She reads her horoscope and watches for signs of it in her day; she believes in aromatherapy and Rainbow Paths. And I think it's one of the reasons Larry was attracted to her in the first place, that delicate nuance of belief he could mock in public and take comfort from in private. He insisted that she not work, but made sure to mention it around friends. He laughed at her for talking to her plants, but at the same time sang the praises of her vegetables to guests.

She named her RealFur Petunia. It gave Larry plenty of fodder.

"It's just a coat," he said. "You don't name your underwear, for Christ's sake."

She stroked the RealFur.

"It's Petunia," she said. "The Findhorns think you should name everything, even your appliances. We could name the refrigerator."

Larry marched through the kitchen, naming the appliances: "Freezy! Heaty! Washy! Blendy!" He turned, pointing at her where she stood with the fur wrapped around her. "Coatie!"

"Petunia," she said.

"It's ridiculous."

"It keeps me company."

He lapsed into silence, looking at her. I was unsure whether to turn away and let them fight or not. They had argued about his hours all through the previous evening. She wanted time; he had none to give her.

"Would you give it up," he said very quietly, "if I stayed home more?"

She stroked the collar. "Find out."

But his hours didn't change—if anything, they grew longer. He was on the fast track, and pausing would have ended in his sliding off.

"Explain it to her, Pol," he begged me one night. "Tell her about the payoff."