Identity (remix)

I talked to a friend of
my girlfriend
and we made jokes
about

No Child Left Behind,
dog owners who don't know their own dogs well,
skinny theater girls,
and de Sade.

"de Sade as in the creepy guy
who did creepy things?"
she asked.

"de Sade as in the guy
who got sent to prison for silly reasons,"
I said.

The conversation ended eventually
and I was pissed off at everything.

otters

i am living in a medium-sized city of otters
i go outside and say 'hello' to the otters next door
they don't say 'hello' back
i walk to the college where young otters go to school
they take their classes disinterestedly and swim at the pool there
i order a burger from the otter with down's syndrome
i walk into the clothing store where an otter greets me
i go to the library where otters are chewing on books
i go into the bathroom
and unzip my pants at the urinal and start to pee
i turn left and see an otter
i turn right and see an otter
i look behind me
and i pee all over the otter standing behind me
'goddamnit,' the otter says

caffeine

It's pretty dumb.
Actually really really fucking stupid.
I was at home because I didn't want to go to class.
I felt bored and just wanted to be bored.
I wanted to talk to someone.
But there was only that creepy guy from the online dating site.
Another shithead, pretty much.
The kind of guy who's okay with dating people five or six years younger than him.
Because he's basically immature and wants to feel like he's twenty or twenty-one for the rest of his life.
Or he wants to feel like he's in control and can't deal with people his own age.
Which I think is bullshit thinking for him.
We're as mature as we're forced to be.
And there are twenty-one year olds who have to do everything for themselves, and twenty-six year olds who still live at home.
Anyway.
I got offline and started to feel better.
I started listening to the Dresden Dolls.
They've basically made a career off of people who feel like me.
When I stopped feeling like that I drank some Coke.
Then I drank some more.
I drank like a two-liter bottle of it.
And ate a few caffeine pills.
I wasn't bored anymore.
I started shaking.
I sat under the table and didn't stop shaking for a while.
So I went online and tried to talk to him.
I started typing in FULL CAPS, self-consciously.
Oh fuck I feel like it's coming back when I type "self-consciously."
He's in his class basically not paying attention.
I give up.
I get offline.
Drink some more Coke.
Take some more caffeine pills.
My hands won't stop shaking until I do something with them.
I start typing at full speed, just random letters after a couple of minutes, but there's some poetry there at first, yeah, pretty good.
I back away from the computer.
I look up at the posters of bands I liked, like Radiohead and Coldplay and The Shins last year.
I'm sick of them.
Actually I've been sick of them for a while.
They don't sound like what I like anymore.
I'm not looking for any easy sounds, give me something loud and pounding, like someone's stepping on their instruments because they're too pissed off to play them right.
If Thom Yorke and Chris Martin and James Mercer were here I'd punch them in the face.
I jump up on the bed.
And pull the posters off the wall next to the bed!
Jump from the bed to the desk!
Pull the posters off the wall above the desk!
Jump down to the floor!
Kick over the chair!
Throw the cell phone in the corner and watch the cover fly off the back!
I stop and look around at all the posters, the shit knocked off the bed and desk, the broken cell phone and chipped corners of the desk.
I lie down and just laugh for a while.
I laugh.

deva

She was at a reception in September.

Her professors, TAs, and classmates from a few classes last semester were there too.

Everyone looked normal; teeth straightened, breasts lifted but not augmented, limbs and torsos slimmed down or fattened up as wished.

One man grabbed his nose and ran into the changing room for fifteen minutes.

Deva was spotted.

“Hey there, Sara. How's it going?”
“Oh, great. We've got the next Context screening planned, all the hardware needed, we should get a few by the end of the night. We're in the black by about ten thousand too, so that just proves how much we've been in line with the Priorities.”

“Wow, that's great. What's school like?”

“It's okay, I guess. It's a little boring, but Architectural History is fun. Looking at pictures all day. It's great."

"Yeah, you know you want me back.”

“Yeah, we'd love it, but if you're still feeling bored, you know the Tertiary Rule. 'Boredom is, uh,'”

“'Sign of Corruption.' And all Contexts must be free of all Signs, and it's willful violation to show up.”

“I don't want to talk about this, that's depressing. How's June and Tris?”
“Fine, I guess, probably back together again. Who cares.”

“All right, be boring. I've got to go talk to Heather and get the drugs ready for Context. Bye, hon.”

She wandered past the changing room to go outside.

There was gagging and choking from the changing room.

She looked out at the city.

The city was glowing orange.

The sky was black and it was still hot.

The air felt thick inside and outside.

She got a call.

“Hi, Mark, it's good to hear from you.”

“Did you say yes?”

“No, but I didn't say no, I don't know.”

“No one's coming to kill you, just go again. It's fun.”

“I don't know. I'm bored. It's like I'm having some kind of existential crisis or something. I just want something new to believe in.”

“Aren't you atheist?”

“I don't know, I don't see the point of believing sometimes, and sometimes I don't see the point of being atheist.”

“What are June and Tristan doing these days?”

“You know, people talk about that a lot, what's going on?”

“I think people just like hearing about drama, but Tristan's my friend.”

“I thought you hadn't spoken to him in months.”

There was crying from the changing room.

“I don't talk to my friends sometimes, but I still care.”

“You talk to me a lot. You talk a lot in general.”

“To you, yeah, but I slept with you, you're a special and unique person.”

“That's sweet, I can tell you care.”

“Well, I hope you feel better, I've got to go.”

A man walked out of the changing room laughing.

He threw away a handful of napkins soaked red.

Back in the party, Deva heard Sara talking.

“...to overcome self-doubt and embrace success. You believe in God, you said, God believes in you, and wants you...”

as squirrels and chipmunks fly by me

while a beaver dam appears in the living room
and stop signs begin marching in protest
along with counterprotests by traffic lights
and the leaves on the trees grow heavier than the wood
while hot dogs have paper clips shoved into them
as I try to write "as squirrels and chipmunks fly by me"
when I get asked how to spell "license"
and the money in my pocket ceases to exist
along with the spelling of "money"
when the squirrels dig into the ground
and the stop signs are ignored
and I can see the cracks
and the ground tears away, breaking into whiteness, and I

old porn stars who got fired from their jobs for cocaine habits and started working the overnight shift at a stop & shop with each other

remember the first time you ate something sweet?
broke down the meaning of "sweet" into
something other than words, something on your tongue
moving into your stomach and flooding your brain
with
sweet

the first time you were
a) sure you could find words for anything
b) unable to find words for this

the drop-off, some call afterglow
(everything is less
sweet
then, why say it glows
when the moment before is what you wanted to feel?)

Yeah, it was just like that.
Now help me pick up these boxes.
I don't want to talk about that anymore.

the reason i am not participating

imitation is not understanding
you are crazy and i am crazier
i have been eaten by a salmon
i have to pay to participate
someone else will have to pay for all of this
puppets are not participating because they want to
i cannot drink through my nose
this is less fair than i think it is
i cannot ask you the questions i have
i do not represent anything but food and air

i'm going to stop talking to you now

i'm not going to talk to you anymore
because you expect me to be violent with you
and write love letters to your sister
i'm going to stop talking to you now
in the hope that your sister will talk to me
and make plans with me to be violent with you
i'm going to go to new york city
to be a violent person because everyone is violent in new york city
i will go to new york city and stop talking to your sister
because she wants you to move away from these thoughts
and stop pressing backspace or delete on the keyboard
or even hesitating for a second or less about what you type
i will leave new york city and hunt for bears in the woods
because they eat salmon which i have not had in several months
and because i do not like to eat salmon, but i can pretend
it is you or your sister i will be eating
i am going to leave the woods and go back to new york city
because there are bears in central park
that do not eat salmon, but who may eat you or your sister
so that i can always taste the two of you being violent with me

Cheeseburger from McDonald's

"This poem is like a cheeseburger from McDonald's," I say
while eating a cheeseburger from McDonald's
and reading a poem that reminds me of a cheeseburger from McDonald's
titled "Cheeseburger from McDonald's"
when I put down my cheeseburger from McDonald's
and look over at the cheeseburger from McDonald's
in the hands of my friend, who's eating her cheeseburger from McDonald's
while reading a newspaper with an advertisement offering a cheeseburger from McDonald's
and another cheeseburger from McDonald's for $1.00
(just $1.00 for a cheeseburger from McDonald's
and another cheeseburger from McDonald's),
then past her to someone else eating a cheeseburger from McDonald's
with their fat son eating his cheeseburger from McDonald's
and someone else (a skinny Asian guy, it looks like from here) getting on line to order a cheeseburger from McDonald's
(perhaps just to look at the cheeseburger from McDonald's
with his vegan girlfriend standing next to him, who like him would never eat a cheeseburger from McDonald's);
my friend finishes her cheeseburger from McDonald's,
I finish my cheeseburger from McDonald's,
and we leave.

for my republican friends

Bill checked his suit for lint and stains one last time.
He picked up his notebook, with "DEBATE NOTES" handwritten on the front cover, and flipped through.
Everything was there the way he wanted it to be.
He left his apartment and got on the bus to the auditorium.
He flipped through the notes at varying speeds while the bus rattled down the street.
A friend of his in dress uniform waved out of the corner of his eye after a couple minutes.
"So you're going?"
"Yeah, it sounded like I'd get a chance to hear something interesting," Bill said.
"But it's all bullshit, it's the same thing we all hear in our one-hundred poli-sci class."
"Of course Tom, these people don't know anything. They just read the Saltman Dissent and figure that's good enough to get into bed with someone."
"You're never gonna change anyone's mind. No one wants to admit Satan exists."
Bill smiled. "I may get lucky some day."
The bus stopped at the ROTC building and Tom got off.
Bill kept reading his notes.
At the next stop about a dozen hippies and a couple of women in hijab got on.
They stopped talking for a second when they saw him, then started talking again.
Everyone got off at the main hub and walked to the auditorium, avoiding the potholes in the pavement.
The three dozen students there chatted amongst themselves.
Bill sat in the corner looking at the notebook.
The speaker entered the room.
Everyone clapped.
The speech went the way Bill expected, a lot of apologist whining for the Squigs.
They'd evolved a lot like humans (the woman claimed), even in their physical needs (oxygen, water, and heat), but without our disease immunities and resistance to our pollutants; and therefore purposely filling our ships with Manhattan air to be vented into the atmosphere on touchdown was unforgivable slow genocide.
The Squigs had "religions" like a lot of human religions, with alien visitors prominent in several of them like in human tribal religions, even coming from the same stars as the human tribes believed their alien visitors arrived from, suggesting shared history despite physical and cultural differences.
Their planet ("Bellone," not some unpronounceable Squig whistle) was rich in resources, and by looking at the papers leaked to Daniel Saltman, it was obvious that the stories about Squig "atrocities" were UNCRE propaganda to justify the occupation.
The conclusion was that we had to stop the war, because war is bad, or some other hippie thing.
Bill partly listened.
The speaker said, "Thank you for listening, I'd like to take questions from the audience now."
Bill raised his hand.
An usher handed him a microphone and he stood up.
"What about Monday the 16th, when the Squigs attacked all our hospitals, isn't that the kind of thing you're accusing us of doing to them?"
"That attack was sponsored by rogue elements within our own government, that particular point was covered halfway through the speech, and I'd thank you not to refer to the [whistle] as 'Squigs.'"
The crowd grumbled.
"Yeah, that was revealed by Saltman; did you know he's got a multi-million dollar movie being made about it?"
"What are you talking about?"
"I think you know."
The crowd started getting noisier.
An usher took away the microphone.
Everyone shut up, but they kept frowning through the rest of the half-hour Q&A period.
Finally it was over, and everyone applauded politely, then left talking to each other.
Bill pushed through the crowd and overheard a couple of the women in hijab talking about him.
"You've got to respond to that kind of bigotry and ignorance with outrage."
The other woman didn't respond, she just looked angry.
Bill got outside and got on the next bus.
Everyone left him alone.
He opened up his notebook again.
Everything in it was either badly-drawn pornography or "FUCK YOU, SQUIGGLY" in some variation of the phrase.
He pissed people off so they'd respond to him.
He was happy.

dissenting viewpoint

He woke up strapped to a chair. His head felt mangled.
"Spencer, you woke up. Good for you!"
Daniel kicked the chair over and kicked up through the seat, hitting Spencer in the balls. Two men pulled the chair back upright.
Spencer coughed.
"Yeah, I'm up. What the hell?"
"The fuck you talking about? What did we agree to?"
"You gave me all the rocks you had on yourself. That's it."
"Don't start playing dumb with me. You saw this coming-- what's the rest?"
"I'd... pay you on Friday, I didn't have any money then. Let me get my dad's credit card. You take American Express?"
Daniel kicked Spencer over again and nailed his balls another few times. He got pulled up again.
"What's it called? 'Insult to injury?' Shit's corny."
"I didn't say it."
"What day is it?"
"Let me get my day planner out."
"It's Saturday, dickhead. And where's my money?"
"Hold on, I'm getting a vision."
"Cause it's not in my pocket, my boys-- y'all don't have it, do you? No. I should have known better. Should have known you wouldn't have any. Cause you're a shitty liar, that scar above your eye twitches when you lie."
Spencer sighed.
"You're right. I stole from you, I didn't pay you off."
Daniel pulled out his gun.
"And you know I got a reputation to keep. You knew exactly what was going to happen, that's how you 'came up with' that corny shit to say. Probably knew I was gonna say this."
"Yeah, I did."
"Couldn't just pull the trigger yourself?"
Spencer shrugged.
"Well, no more Bruce Willis Sixth Sense shit for you. You wanna see dead people, just look in the mirror, if you can still see when you die."
Daniel shot Spencer. His last thought was, Bruce Willis didn't see dead people.

future tense

I will get out of bed as soon as the alarm rings.
I will eat until I'm full during breakfast and watch TV.
I will be prepared to face the day with a brave expression on my face when I leave home.
I will drive to work this expression on my face, though it may change if I have to deal with other drivers.
I will enter the workplace ready for anything at nine o'clock.
I will engage in corporate politics with my co-workers, subordinates, and superiors.
I will jockey and squirm for an extra $1,000 per year with greater responsibilities because I will be able to say I did it when I leave this job for one that pays an extra $1,000 per year with even greater responsibilities.
I will complete tasks with no knowledge of the eventual results of said tasks.
I will eat until I'm full on my lunch break and read http://www.cnn.com/.
I will go back to work after my lunch break and consider going on a diet or buying cocaine.
I will look up diets online while I'm supposed to work.
I will drive home aggressively.
I will attempt to make several phone calls but stop dialing every time.
I will order a pizza.
I will eat until I'm full.

desensitized

[note: this is a different style, I'll try a version of this more like what I usually write as well]

The light woke him up. It didn't seem sunny outside, but it wasn't too cloudy either. He pulled himself upright and got out of bed, then showered, got dressed, and went into the kitchen. He felt numb as he cut up some fruit and poured out some orange juice.

While eating breakfast, he turned on the news. He opened up his pill case and started watching. Taking small sips, he swallowed a red pill (terrorists had bombed a foreign embassy), a yellow pill (drug-resistant tuberculosis cases had risen in Africa by thirty percent over the last six months), and three orange ones (an elderly man who competed in a break-dancing competition and won, a three-year old boy who knew the names of every pope, and a cat who could speak on command). He then refilled each part of the case from the tap to make sure he wouldn't be caught in public without the appropriate pills.

On the subway, like most riders, he kept the case in his backpack. By the time he arrived at work he felt numb again, and looking around, so did everyone else coming in. He wondered what it'd be like if the subways ran smooth enough for him and the other commuters to take their pills without accidents, but decided he'd rather stay clean until he had to work anyway. He sat down at his desk, saw the red border on his monitor indicating a violent event, swallowed a red pill dry, and began translating from shorthand when the assignment (guerilla fighters had robbed a bank in Guatemala, killing six people) opened up.

He felt sad, not angry, as he translated, but it was all right. So long as he could identify his emotional state as a negative one, he could be confident the medication was working, even if his own neurochemistry was, for some reason, playing tricks on him that morning. He reconsidered the idea of risking spilling his pills on the subway in the future to keep as regular a state of medication as possible and kept working on the stories. After five minutes, he was done, and the next story (coded green; atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases had decreased by 8% over the last year) came up.

He had a hard-on at that story. Somehow greenhouse gases were leading to arousal. He'd heard about this sort of thing happening before, but he didn't think it'd happen to him, even though he knew that peoples' reactions to the drugs were sometimes unpredictable. Most of the time, particularly when the drugs worked, he accepted that; small price to pay for a quiet life with the right amount of passion, he thought.

But after the erection subsided and his transcription was done, a yellow story about a bank robbery came up. He was anxious, and whether it was the story or the drug, he couldn't tell-- and it didn't matter. It was enough for him that he wasn't sure what he would feel at every single moment to make him even more unsettled. He was, perhaps for more than one reason, on very uncertain ground.

When a pink story about a husband and wife reunited after both thought the other dead in a fire brought him to choked, anguished sobs, however, he started connecting his emotions to his thoughts. It wasn't sad that they were reunited; the tragedy lay in their reactions. He knew they, like he was before, must have not felt anything until instructed to feel. Marriage was meant to be for a lifetime-- meant to change two peoples' lives-- and now, it no longer even touched their hearts.

He stopped working. He thought about what a poet laureate of the city had said to him once. He realized how boring the poet had been, how he'd confused foreign languages for profound ideas, and it made him sadder. He stood up.

"DO YOU REALIZE WHAT WE'RE ALL DOING?" he asked. Everyone kept working, and the receptionist, with a worried look on her face, picked up the phone.

"WE'RE TAKING MEDS TO TELL PEOPLE WHAT MEDS TO TAKE!"

Everyone's screen flashed red. Everyone swallowed a red pill. Everyone rolled their eyes and got back to work.

"DON'T YOU SEE HOW FUCKED THIS IS?" He left the desk. He couldn't believe how easily everyone else accepted this. There was so much to be sad about; how could his co-workers agree to be what others told them to be? He kicked over a wastebasket and punched a glass-framed picture, doing nothing more than bruising his hand, crying all the time.

A policeman entered and shot him. He fell back into his seat. The policeman walked up to the chair and quickly removed the dart.

"It's all right. How do you feel, sir? Breathe deeply for a few moments."

He breathed deeply for a few moments.

"I'm fine now. What, um, happened?"

"You were taking the wrong medication."

"Oh. Oh my God. I had--"

"I know. Your dispenser wasn't working properly today. It happens once in a while, sir. We got an alert only after your shift began. We were coming here to warn you."

"So you're not bagging me?"

"Did you do something else, sir?" The policeman stiffened up a bit.

"No. I didn't even take the pills in the subway, so I didn't even know there was anything wrong-- then."

"Well. Just sign off on this report, and we'll be on our way."

The policeman held out a pad with a stylus. He signed.

"Thanks, officer."

"I'd recommend taking a sample before leaving for work. Just to be sure. And you can stop at a pharmacy and explain to them what's going on."

"Right. Thanks again, officer."

They replaced his pills, called their dispatcher, and left. Those who'd taken their yellow pills breathed sighs of relief. Things could have gone much worse.

He, meanwhile, while numb, had nonetheless thought quickly and realized two things. First, within the office, people were going to always consider him suspect if he showed any emotions they didn't expect. Second, with the sort of experience he'd gone through, especially as publicly as he had, even the emotions they did expect would be viewed negatively by his co-workers. That led him to one conclusion.

He took the pills and threw them in the trash. They were purely optional, after all, so long as he was stable. He could be certain of his stability while numb. It was better, he'd realized, to be desensitized, reliable, and secure. Emotions, controlled or not, were too messy.

He'd rather do without.

what do you get for the man who has everything

[note: older story, working on a couple new ideas as well]

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, so he always had a good one.
It was always different and always delicious.
He ate it and tried to make some sense out of the voices that moved to the kitchen from the bedroom.
They didn't make any sense.
He thought he heard sentences, but they weren't really.
He got showered and dressed for work. His skin felt perfect.
He tried to think about that when he went to work, but the voices playing in his car distracted him.
He tried to change the radio to something else.
There wasn't something else.
There was nothing else to think about, just his skin and the voices.
At his job he sat by himself in his office pretending to work.
The computer didn't even work, it just played the voices constantly.
He'd always hated the people who worked for him, but wondered if the alternative was any better.
From 12:00 to 1:00 p.m. he ate lunch out of a vending machine. The random voices were played over the PA.
It was good, even out of the microwave, and very good for him, whatever he ate.
He went back to work and tried to pretend the voices were his co-workers talking.
It didn't work.
At 5:00 p.m. he left and drove home.
There was no traffic, but the voices on the radio stopped his thinking about the people who worked for him.
He thought they were talking about him, but that was impossible.
He got home and ate a perfect dinner while listening to the voices and trying to pretend they were talking to him.
But they were just random voices, programmed to give him something to listen to.
Because he had to listen to something.
He went to his room.
Under his bed he found a box.
He opened the box and found a gun with one bullet and a typed note.
"I put this here if you want to escape. It's the only way out."
He put the gun in his mouth but didn't pull the trigger.
He wasn't sure if it'd work, he was afraid of what would happen if it did, and he didn't want to think about what he'd do if it didn't.
He went to sleep and told himself what had happened was a dream.
He woke up in his bed. Something had happened, but he'd forgotten.
The voices started playing out of the speakers in the walls.
He got dressed and got breakfast off the kitchen table.

repeat track

When he woke up, she had left already.
It was late and he was hung over.
She'd taken most of her stuff and didn't tell him what was going on with her. He was nervous.
There were dishes in the sink and a note explaining that she'd be busy that morning, but she'd be back later to cook, and as recommended, she'd apologize by way of some romantic music.
He let himself be scanned.
The analyst recommended that he explain his decision to Brian.
It explained that Josh had let other people control his decisions too much, and needed to assert himself more often; this was, according to the analyst, a good first step.
The analyst continued, reminding Josh that Emily's behavior was due to, according to its scan, her frustration with her own life, not his behavior.
He called Brian to invite him to the local Starbucks for some coffee.
Josh was confident.
They went to Starbucks, got some coffee, and sat down.
"You're my friend. So I have to say this. You're being a fucking idiot, man."
"I don't know what else to do. I've never known someone who made me feel that happy."
"Tell her no. She cheated on you."
"I can't care about that."
"Yeah, you do care about it. You're gonna think about it every time you're with her."
"I don't think so. I think I can grow from this and be a better person."
"Everybody says that."
"I know I can."
"Everybody. And they're wrong."
"I'm a smart man with good friends and people who'll be honest to me."
"We all just love you and have the best intentions towards you, just remember that."
"I really appreciate your advice, Brian."
"Just think about what I'm saying at least."
He left and went back to the apartment.
She was boiling pasta in the kitchen and had a Mountain Goats CD playing in the living room.
He turned on the TV and watched the weather for a few minutes, then flipped through HBO and the Sundance Channel, not stopping for more than a few seconds on anything.
He picked up the guitar and tried to play a song, but it was too loud.
"Could you turn that down?" he asked quietly. No one answered.
He picked up the phone and started looking through the Caller ID.
He then went over to the computer and checked through the browser's log of visited sites.
He didn't look through her belongings this time.

endgame

It was a beautiful warm cloudless day and everyone looked anxious.
A boy played chess outside with his teacher on a broken chess set with an old lipstick tube substituted for the white king.
The boy, playing white, was getting frustrated losing to his teacher.
A horn blared over a loudspeaker. The game was over.
Everyone in the town walked single-file into the gutted town square, scrubbed their faces, brushed their hair, and smiled as broadly as they could.
Soldiers marched in, looking closely at their teeth, hair, and into their eyes.
The teacher was pulled from the line.
The soldiers gestured to all the grown men of the town and pointed at the teacher, then a box full of clubs they brought with them.
Single-file the townsmen picked clubs from the box and inspected the handles.
One townsman finally found the red-painted handle. The soldiers on either side of him gestured at the teacher.
He swung his club and hit the teacher in the back of the neck. The teacher fell to the ground and cracked his teeth.
The rest of the townsmen began swinging at him with their clubs.
All the women and children kept smiling as hard as possible. One woman coughed.
The soldiers dragged her from the line and threw her at the teacher still on the ground.
The townsmen started beating her until motioned away.
The soldiers then dragged the bodies into their cart and left the village.
A baby almost cried, but his mother slapped her hand over the mouth and tucked him under her jacket. She quickly ran away with one hand over her own mouth.
The student went back to the chess game. He hoped someone else would play with him.

putting on your face

She wanted to make him jealous, so she stepped into the changing room that morning.
She turned on the computer, chose full, ripe breasts, light brown hair, and skinny boys' hips, and lay down on the table.
After about thirty minutes of torture, she was ready.
She dragged herself out of the changing room and towards her bathroom.
She swallowed pills off the sink in the bathroom and could walk again five minutes later.
When she was done showering off the blood and tissue, she staggered out of the bathroom and onto her bed.
With a few moments of relaxation breathing, she could ignore the aches and tears (quickly healing), and so grabbed the remote.
She flipped on the TV and went into the kitchen.
Bravo! was showing clips of a fashion show. Every model looked alike.
She cut up a banana into a bowl of cereal and drank grapefruit juice (all from an organic foods co-op a few blocks from her).
She went to the closet and, glancing at the screen, picked out some clothes-- underwear, a blue dress her body (less sore now) almost fell out of, matching pumps, and earrings and a watch.
A look in the mirror and she left.
When she reached the street, she gasped.
Every woman on the street looked exactly like her.
This was the third time so far this year. She was pissed.
Every man she saw looked like him, too; blond hair, blue eyes, square chin, wiry yet muscular, and around six feet tall.
Some of the people had trouble balancing, but most of them-- men and women-- were used to their centers of gravity.
It felt like the world was teasing her.
She went back up to her apartment and started watching TV. Not everyone looked the same, but the people that looked like him and her looked the happiest.
That's where they got the idea, she realized.
I don't know what to do, she thought. If I change again, what will I change to? Will he be jealous if he sees me, or will he think I don't care about my appearance?
Isn't that a sign of low self-esteem?
She stayed there all day, unable to come to a useful conclusion. She decided to go back to the original look the next day, and she felt better about it.
When the skin grafts and bone lengthening healed, and she could walk without crying, she went out to the bar.
It was evening by then, and Deva was there.
"Hey June, what's up?"
"I'm all right, life sucks right now but I'm okay."
"Yeah, my job's really pissing me off and I think I'm going to quit."
"You can't quit, Deva, you make that place more than a store," June said.
"I know, it's such a nice place but it needs help, I need to make it better."
"I don't want to talk about my life, how's school?"
"School's great, I'm on drugs or drunk here when I'm not in class or at work, and I get all the lectures from a guy I'm paying to copy his recordings."
"That's great, you should write a book about it, I think someone would make a movie out of it."
"Yeah, it's great."
"Tristan dumped me," June said.
"Oh, sweetie, I'm so sorry."
"No, he was an asshole, and I'm glad he left me. I didn't need his shit."
"Yeah, you're right, what happened?"
"Tris was angry about something that happened, I don't know what."
"He didn't want to talk about it."
"No, he just got home from school a couple days ago, got on the Internet, stayed on until about ten, and went to sleep on the couch. The next morning I woke up and he was gone and he'd taken his change of clothes and toothbrush, and I didn't see him until work on Monday and he wouldn't talk to me."
"What the hell."
"Yeah, I know. My last boyfriend used to hit me, he'd get so mad about shit," June said.
"That must have sucked."
"It's not as bad as getting ignored."
"June, that's fucked up."
"I know it sounds fucked up, it is, but I'd rather get hit than ignored."
"I can't relate, I'm sorry but that's how I am. I'm meeting Jim in a couple minutes. Take care, sweetie."
Deva left then. June opened up the catalog on the bar. It was new. She looked through for new features, body types, and hair colors, selected them, and downloaded them to her changing room.
She still wanted to make him notice her.