J Mauldin - Final Solution

“No love life? No special lady?”

“You’ve been around me long enough to know the answer to that.”

“Maybe so, far as here, but sometimes us guys keep a lady in the pocket, just waiting for the right time to see it through. I still got a special little hidden contact folder in my tablet, if you catch my drift.”

“My pockets are empty right now.”

“Too bad. Too bad. Seen a few new lovely faces around the ship. Too bad they’re off limits.”

“Because you’re married?” I glowered at him, recalling a rumor that the Comm and he had had a fling for an instant. I’d never believed it. He just didn’t seem to be the Comm’s type.

“Because it’s a bad idea, man.” It was his turn to shrug. “You’re aware of that, right?”

“Painfully aware.” I closed a fist, the gasket tightening around my right ring finger.

“Hey, it’s okay, we’re not the only ones having to suffer out here. The XO, he’s got a wife he hasn’t seen in almost two years, not to mention, a couple kids under the age of ten he loves to hell and back. Christina and Sam? I think that’s right. Then there’s that security officer you call Higgins, been married twenty five years and hasn’t seen her in five. Crazy shit, huh? He’s got two kids, both now graduated and out on their own, and I ain’t even got one. I think the oldest is like a physicist, working on the mass driver project, that thing to send cargo back to Earth without ships. That’ll put some folks out of work, but maybe innovation is good. Then there’s some who just can’t hang in, or family just can’t keep up. I think Graham’s divorced because of this life; Briggs is in his thirties and never married before coming here, poor bastards. I know it’s not all about the pussy, but damn, sometimes you just get sick for it, am I right? Need a place to test your power cord, right, right?” He grinned.

“Yes, you’re right!” I hissed, and my voice grew louder, drawing the attention of others. “It sucks. It’s sucks hard. That’s why I’ve been alone. That’s why I’m still alone. This place thrives on bastards with no solid roots and pasts that they’d rather run from. Shit can’t reach you out here.”

“Geez,” Devins said, raising his hands in supplication. A cross dangled from a silver bracelet on his right wrist, tapping his inner arm. “Not tryin’ to get you all hot, man. My bad. It’s just I thought you might want some cheerin’ up, ya know? Some conversation. Like Kerrigan, now that guy—”

“Do you ever shut up?” I interrupted. “All you ever do is ramble. Did you think for one second that maybe, just maybe, I wanted to be alone with my thoughts, not have them editorialized line by line by some greasy kid of an ASI family?”

Devins averted his eyes and began rubbing his hands together. “Oh. I guess I just thought, I don’t know, maybe both of us had had enough time alone.”

I got up and squeezed past him, putting my back to the cupola. “I don’t think I’ve had enough time alone. I’m never alone in here.”

As I walked away he asked a question, making me pause for an instant. “So, what are you, David? A man with no solid roots? Or some guy tryin’ to run from his past?”

But I didn’t stop to answer, I merely hung my head and went back to my quarters. I needed three things right now: a drink, a smoke and some time to myself. But I knew I would get none of these, just a plate of slop in overly cramped quarters with four other people that slept within slapping distance.

As I passed Officer 2, I noticed the hatch had been left open. Inside, a wrapped Hershey’s bar was laying unattended on a table, suggesting rather loudly that I whisk it away. It might not be alcohol or nicotine, but it was sugar. Almost as good.

I stuck my head inside and found no one. Before I knew it my right foot was traveling over the hatch’s threshold and half my body was invading forbidden territory. It was time to do this or flee, no messing around.

The chocolate bar was inches from my right hand, almost within reach. I could taste the sugary sweet milk chocolate, feel it melting over my tongue to ooze across every God-given flavor center. It would be mine, hot damn, it would be mine.

A voice came from out in the hall. My breath caught. I reversed my automated actions and glanced behind me. Lank Hair was facing the other way, harassing yet another person just as stupid as I. Swallowing my heart, I walked the rest of the way to Crew 1, thankful I hadn’t gotten caught red head, yet pissed I’d come away empty handed. Chicken shit.

“What were you thinking?” I mumbled. “Am I going to have to tie a band around your wrist and slap it every time you’re stupid?” My face was hot with anger and shame. I just couldn’t help myself. It was only a candy bar.

César was laid up on his bunk watching TV, stomach down, legs in the air kicking like a damned schoolgirl. When I saw what he was watching, I rubbed my temples and groaned. As always, César had deflated my heightened emotions like a balloon. He was a powerfully disarming individual even when he wasn’t trying.

“Holy shit, Enela,” I growled, “are you watching Days of our Lives ?”

He grinned up at me, flashing a spread of pearly white teeth.

“How the hell is that even still on the air?” I tried to remember when I’d first seen it in the archives. It predated most of my favorite music and movies, and even at that time, it had more episodes than any other TV show ever made. “It has to be like, a hundred years old by now.”

“Hundred and ten, actually.” César pressed pause, freezing the image on an older Latina woman in far too fancy clothes and too much makeup. She was a caricature of an image of beauty, not its realization. That’s soaps for ya. “I hear the original writers are still alive, and that they’ve had some sort of experimental life extension process involving stem cells and Martian bacteria. We might get another fifteen or twenty seasons out of ’em before they go to the Cold Well.”

I plopped down on my bunk and tried to get comfortable. “That’s a load of shit and you know it.”

“Maybe? Maybe not.”

“You’re weird for watching it.” I sighed. “They don’t broadcast in 3D?”

“Nope,” he said as if I should have known that fun Days fact. “They keep it old school, lends to the artistic medium. Just because we have digital screens doesn’t mean paint and canvas aren’t cool. Feel me?”

“I do, but, I mean, come on… Days of our Lives ?”

“Cyborg Stephano will rule all, my friend. He’s married to a Lunar princess now.”

I covered my face with a pillow. “This has to be your mother’s doing, sangre loco .”

“Loco for sure, but Papi and my big sister are at fault.” He paused. “You alright, señor?”

“I’m fine,” I groaned, starting to feel bad for getting mad at Devins. Just my luck he’d never speak to me again. Another bridge expertly burned. I was good at that.

“So, I’ve been thinking about home a lot lately.”

I set the pillow aside and sat back up. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, since we’ll be back there and all.”

“Let’s hope.”

“Nah, we will, si Dios quiere . But here’s a random question; do kids stand out by the main roads and beg for saccharin tablets in Arsia Mons?”

“Sometimes.” I felt my eyebrows crowd in on my nose. The thought of fake sugar made me pissed once more that I’d chickened out in the great Hershey’s heist of 2072. “What’s the deal with that?”

César chuckled. “In Valles Rojo, the older kids stole our sugar rations or whatever bits of candy that came our way. Us little kids, and I was one of them, just wanted to be cool, I guess. The older kids got to suck on candy all day with crossed arms propped against the railing watching people stroll by, like it was the best day ever and they owned the place. So we sucked on saccharin tablets and did the same.”