SL Huang - Up and Coming - Stories by the 2016 Campbell-Eligible Authors

Silence again, but this time it couldn’t touch her. Her blood surged like ice through her chest.

“How dare you,” Candice breathed. “You ungrateful—”

“I’m just being honest with you,” Becca shot back. “Without the nonsense, just like you wanted. Without pretending this is okay.” I can do this. I can stand up to her. I can protect him. “Because it’s not. You are toxic, and if you want to get anywhere near Sam, things are going to have to change.”

Candice brandished the belt. “You can’t take him away from me. From Julie.”

Becca snatched it out of her hands. “I’m his legal guardian. Anyone can see she’s not fit for motherhood.” She took a deep breath and leaned close enough to smell the laundry soap on her mother’s gown. “I will miss her until my heart stops, but it would have been kinder to everyone, especially her, if you had just let her go.”

Becca re-shouldered the bag. “I’ll bring Sam to you to say goodbye.”

Sam had mumbled groggy goodbyes. Becca had tried to wake him, but the boy just wanted to sleep, so she’d tucked him in the car with her carry-on and the remains of the typewriter and driven to the airport to wait for their standby flight. He slept the whole way, and barely woke when she piloted him to an empty gate lounge. Becca sat in the row next to him and rifled through her bag for her jeans and jumper to drag on.

He should be with his mother.

I can’t leave him with Candice.

She scrabbled faster through socks, underwear and camisoles. No jeans.

Candice wouldn’t hurt him.

he’d control him.

Deciding this for him isn’t control? You can’t be a parent. This isn’t your life.

Hands shaking, she dragged the jumper out of its tangle with a t-shirt and her headphones. She must have left the jeans at Candice’s. She tied the jumper around her hips.

I’d be better than she would. Julie would want this.

Would she? Would Sam? Or is this just what you want?

This was ridiculous. She’d made the decision. She wasn’t going to unmake it. She shoved the escaping underwear back in, hauled the laptop out and set it up on the table with the typewriter pieces and the gravy-sodden notebook. Her fingers jittered on the keys. Sometimes distractions were necessary.

The program took less time than she’d expected. Components just fit , like something guided her code, pulling it into a prototype effortlessly. She could almost smell her father’s aftershave on the keyboard.

Gripped with a frenzy, she snatched some napkins from the table, hammered the broken key through the ribbon onto them as fast as she could and held them up to the webcam, tapping the keyboard impotently while the program churned up the translation. Next to her, Sam rolled on his bag in his sleep, curling around it.

There it was: the astronaut’s team had been colonising Titan when unfriendly ships arrived from outside the system. He stole one and escaped, largely by jabbing everything to see what it did, and broadcast his distress call until the American shuttles turned up.

Sam was right, this guy had her father’s attitude. Poke it with a stick. Never let ignorance or fear stand in the way of trying.

Don’t let her beat that out of you again.

Dawn crept over the horizon of the runway. Becca’s hands ached. The program struggled with words not in the dictionary, and she paused to decipher them by hand.

“Dear Grandma and Grandpa,

I don’t know how this’ll reach you, I think their tech latches onto whatever it can. I set the ship to do a data dump at the end of this transmission; hopefully there’s something Uncle Sam can use. I’m taking a lot on faith, you know, with your stories. Tell Mum I love her, and say hi to Uncle Sam.”

Becca frowned. Was Uncle Sam actually a person?

There was an address before the message, like a letter: Rebecca Willoway and Michael Oaks, 275 Tempus Terrace.

Her name. Candice’s address.

Becca hugged the laptop to herself and pressed the ‘A’ key a few more times against the last napkin. It wrote ‘A’. She wasn’t surprised.

But it couldn’t be her, if it was “Uncle” Sam. Sam would be a cousin to any grandchild of hers. And she wasn’t staying here.

Except Sam was her son, now. If she had any other children, he’d be more brother to them than anything else.

The dawn sun soaked through the window into her spine with the realisation, sickeningly warm. Becca slumped as her life collapsed back inside the walls of Candice’s rule.

Even if you believe in magic typewriters from the future, it doesn’t mean that future’s going to happen.

No, but it’s possible. I hadn’t thought of that. I hadn’t thought something good might come of it.

The warmth roiled in her chest.

It’s not possible, because you’re taking Sam away from that. For his own good.

Maybe I just don’t want to give up my life. My friends, Rick.

You’re doing the right thing for Sam.

Am I, though? Or am I just doing the easy thing for me?

The thought slammed down like stone. Becca shut the lid of the laptop, fighting the urge to curl up around her knees.

Forget the stupid typewriter a minute. What’s best for him? That’s my job, now. That’s what Julie wanted.

The plastic seat squeaked softly—Becca stopped herself from rocking.

I stood up to her once. I can stand up to her again. Maybe I could make some happiness here.

She unfolded herself from the seat and stoked Sam’s hair from his face.

He deserves to have his mother—his real mother—in his life.

You’ll have to keep fighting for it. Keep fighting her, every moment.

In the carport of Candice’s house, Becca gathered the last of the scrawled-on napkins from the back seat. Sam, finally awake, had scampered off to tell the whole thing to Julie as soon as the engine had stopped. Hands full, Becca flicked the door closed with her knee as another car pulled up in the drive.

A young man in blue scrubs and coiffed black hair stepped out, hospital-branded duffel bag slung across one muscular shoulder. He gave her a wave, smile gracing perfect cheekbones, and Becca was suddenly acutely aware that she stood in the front garden wearing a tied-on jumper and a child’s dressing gown, hands clutching stained napkins and sticky with gravy, face still swollen with tears.

“How’re you doing?” he called out with a rich burr from one of the southern states of America. He held out his hand. “Oakes, Michael Oakes. I’m your sister’s physio-nurse.”

“Oh, yes. They—they said.” Becca stammered, trying to wind the robe more tightly against herself. “I’m sorry, it’s been a bit of a night. Michael, was it?” Belatedly, she offered her hand to shake, still full of napkins. His warm fingers wrapped over hers securely. A small scar bisected his left eyebrow, giving him a permanent inquisitive expression. He didn’t even flinch at the gravy.

“Oakes, yes. It’s okay. It’s like that.” He stepped closer, professional manner softening for a moment. “It gets easier, I promise.”

Becca looked back down at the address on the napkins. “Are you sure?” she said, not entirely to him.

He smiled again, and extended his arm to lead her toward the house. “Trust me,” he said. “We’ll figure it out.”

Originally published by Daily Science Fiction in November 2015

Bret woke with a piercing pain in his side, the roar of the battlefield still raging in his ears. The ceiling and walls were white. A white curtain hung at his left. A bag pumped liquid into his vein. His ragged breaths burned. The exoskeleton must’ve pushed through his lung. Could they fix that? God, he hoped so.