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

I raised my eyebrows. Her complexion didn’t seem as grey as the others’. With a quirked smile, she passed me a folded note on synth-paper. It read : u planning on going to the next show? Shit, did I really want to go? I wrote back: sure, sure, what’s your name? And tossed it back to her while the teach wasn’t looking. She responded with: Name’s Lem, next time you better sit next to me. When I looked back at her, I could tell just from her crooked smirk that she was aggressive, cocky, vivacious.

Though I had lived on Earth for fourteen years, and breathed real air, drank real water, and ate real food, she somehow had lived more than me.

I sent back: sure, sure.

After we received the notification to switch classes, Lem followed me to the science hall. I didn’t know what to say, so I awkwardly smiled as she complained about the dearth of girls at last night’s show. I nodded like a fool, bumping into other students in between gawking glances. She must have been late to her next class, because I had hardly entered mine before the tardy notification appeared on the cracked screen of my tablet.

I remembered nothing of the rest of the school-day. I assume I spent it scribbling sketches of dying planets on synth-paper, ignoring teachers. After school I roamed the halls looking for Cox, Todd, Lem, or any of the gang, but those who hadn’t ditched earlier in the day, hadn’t stuck around after school. When I got home, I was already irritated. Mom—her eyes rimmed red—put on a smile for me. That irritated me more.

I left after dinner, ignoring mom’s silent pleas to be comforted.

I paced our sector, subconsciously moving toward the skip station, but without the handy hacker Cox had, I was marooned, unless I wanted to pay.

As I roamed I passed silicon flowers and earthen landscape murals so awful they only could have been painted by someone who’d never stepped foot on Earth’s surface. The bleak, artificial lighting did nothing to uplift my brooding.

Why had they stayed? They were ants on our cosmic threadbare screen, scurrying, helpless. Too poor? After father had died, mom and I were too poor to live anywhere but the stations.

Could it have been different long ago? I asked myself as I studied the awful perspective of a different earthen mural. None of the shadows looked right, and the trees were far too thin. Was Cox’s gang where I should try to fit in? The mountains looked like triangles, completely inorganic, completely wrong. How long could they go ditching school and skip-hacking before a pig bashed them? The sun was a brighter orange than that, the sky more blue—this painting belonged on a wasted planet, full of frantic ants. What happens if I got stranded on some station a billion light years away? Trees don’t grow in concentric rows, and there’s no patterns to the way leaves sprout from branches. Why did they stay? Why didn’t they just leave?

Over the following weeks I grew closer to Cox and his gang; we were vines twisting together, using each other to reach a sunspot, not that any of my new friends would get the metaphor. We poured hours of work into discussing plans over half-eaten synthetic lunch food, spreading the news only by word of mouth to those we knew wouldn’t rat, hunting down potential show sites: the station had to have a powerful telescope that the brothers could hack, and it couldn’t be in a high-traffic area.

I hardly saw Lem in class—I think she ditched more than not—but when I did, her cherry smile brought my thoughts away from indecision. Cox’s gang was the key to the lightshows, and lightshows were the key to her. She was the most attractive space girl I’d seen, and I’d chase her to far-off galaxies if given the chance.

One day between the first show I’d seen and the second, Lem and I ditched before Earth History class. Using a battered old skip-hacker Cox had graciously given me, I took her to stations we’d never seen. We walked through offices—stealing idle hand tablets, synth-papers, and whatever would fit in our pockets, ran through cafeterias—snatching genuine planet-baked cinnamon bread and rolls with real butter, laughed in game rooms as we played VRs with what little money we had. In the cold, bleak expanse of our galaxy, I had found light.

Back home I would lie awake on my thin mattress thinking of Lem’s dark hair with its purple shimmer, wondering if she was thinking of me too. It was a nice change from my brain replaying my father’s babbling death as fast-acting poison ate his body. I never saw it, the leak at his station was far above Earth, but that hadn’t stopped my mind from speculating about his final minutes.

Hell, I was beginning to be able to ignore my mom, too—but it wasn’t all wonderful amongst the bleak stars. I still second-guessed myself. Joining Cox’s cohorts could lead down a strange path. I’d never run with a crowd like that back on Earth. But the stations were different from Earth. To fit in here, I told myself, I had to run with these guys.

On the day we set up the show room, I ditched class entirely. My whole body trembled in anticipation. This room yawned bigger than the last, and I was one of the first to arrive.

Cox unsuccessfully attempted to hang the screen while Trager and Timmet worked on the projector and hacked a nearby space telescope. Cox caught sight of me. “Damn Earther, you scared? Your skin’s white as mine. Relax. Come here, help me hang this damn thing.”

“Sure, sure. Not scared—excited.”

“Don’t drop the screen. Your fingers shakin’ too much.”

“No worries.”

By the time we finished setting up, a dozen boys lay about the floor on insta-inflate mattresses and backpacks, smoking paper soaked in colorful synthetics, drinking delicious toxins from recycled bottles, playing the knockout game.

More came skipping in. And girls. Three girls, then four, awkwardly watching the boys. But Lem wasn’t there.

She’d come, I knew, unless she got caught by the pigs. I shook off the thought; she was too quick and determined to be caught.

Someone slapped a bottle to my chest. I drank, spilling the burning, icy liquid down my chin. Todd slammed me on the back, hooting. My head buzzed, harmonizing with the hum of the station’s electronics. The lights dimmed, hacked. Yet, it felt too early to start, more people were passing through the portal every minute, Lem wasn’t with them.

An uproar of murmurs met the flicker of the projector. Too soon, the murmurs said. Friends on their way, it complained. An image flashed, a volcano bleeding orange and red. More complaints. But what could we do? There’s no rewind button on telescopes.

Cox stood, “Ease, ease. This is a preshow. Settle your pretty heads. Staunch those flowing tears.”

Tension in the crowd dissolved as we realized that the best was yet to come. A wet pinch on my neck startled me. I turned to see Lem, she’d snuck in and bit me on the neck, playfully, “So tense. Need to relax, Earther. Let me work on your shoulders.”

She massaged my back. I could smell the synthetic sweetness of a hand-rolled cigarette between her cherry lips. She pulled me to her, touched my lips to hers, and exhaled a remedy, a toxin, a delight into my lungs. My world spun for the moment, her tongue in my mouth, fingers running through hair.

We kissed, her tongue assertive, experienced, mine stumbling, awkward. On the sheet above, magma flickered and flowed. She was my first kiss.

Our passion had not worn off when the show started, but we mustered a glance at the screen. The room was stifling with packed body-heat. Despite the haze in my head, and the pounding of my heart, I made a mental note to tell Cox that we would have to scout larger locations for the next show.