Walter Williams - The Praxis

Gredel shrank away from Caro’s look. She didn’t want Caro to tear into her the way she ripped into other people.

One night Lamey took them both to a party. “I’ve got to take Caro out too,” he told Gredel. “Otherwise I’d never seeyou.”

The reason for the party was that Lamey had put up a loan for a restaurant and club, and the people hadn’t made a go of it, so he’d foreclosed and taken the place over. Inheriting a stockroom of liquor and a walk-in refrigerator full of food, he decided it shouldn’t go to waste, and so invited nearly everyone he knew. He paid the staff for one more night and let all his guests know the food and drinks were free.

“We’ll have fun tonight,” he said, “and tomorrow I’ll start looking for somebody to manage the place.”

It was the last great party Gredel had with Lamey and his crew. The big room was filled with food and music and people having a good time. Laughter rang from the club’s rusted, reinforced iron ceiling, which was not an attempt at decor but a reminder that the floor above had once been braced to support heavy machinery. Though Gredel didn’t have anything to drink, she still got high simply from being around so many people who were soaking up the good times along with the free liquor. Her mind whirled as she danced, whirled like her body spinning along the dance floor in response to Lamey’s smooth, perfect, elegant motion. He leaned close and spoke into her ear.

“Come and live with me, Earthgirl.”

She shook her head, smiled. “Not yet.”

“I want to marry you. Have babies with you.”

A shiver of pleasure sang up Gredel’s spine. She had no reply, only put her arms around Lamey’s neck and rested her head on his shoulder.

She didn’t know why she deserved to be so loved. Lamey, Caro, her mother, each of them filling a dreadful hollowness inside her, a hollowness she hadn’t realized was there until it was filled with warmth and tenderness.

Lamey danced with Caro as well, or rather, guided her around the dance floor while she did the jumping up and down thing she did instead of dancing. Caro was having a good time. She drank only a couple bottles of wine over the course of the night, which for her was modest, and the rest of the time danced with Lamey or members of his crew. As they left the club she kissed Lamey extravagantly to thank him for inviting her.

Lamey put an arm around both Caro and Gredel. “I just like to show my beautiful sisters a good time,” he said.

He and Gredel took Caro to the Volta Apartments, after which they intended to drive back to the Fabs to spend the dawn in one of Lamey’s apartments. But Caro lingered in the car, leaning forward out of the backseat to prop her head and shoulders between Lamey and Gredel. They all talked and laughed as the doorman hovered in the Volta vestibule, waiting for the moment to let Lady Sula past the doors. Finally Lamey said it was time to go.

“Save yourself that drive back to the Fabs,” Caro said. “You two can use my bed. I can sleep on the sofa.”

Lamey gave her a look. “I hate to put a beautiful woman out of her bed.”

Caro gave a sharp, sudden laugh, then turned to kiss Gredel on the cheek. “That depends on Gredel.”

Ah. Ha,Gredel thought, surprised and not surprised. Lamey, it seemed, was looking for a return on his investment. Gredel considered it a moment, then shrugged. “I don’t mind,” she said.

So Lamey took Gredel and Caro up to the apartment and made love to them both. Gredel watched her boyfriend’s pale butt jigging up and down over Caro and wondered why it didn’t bother her.

Because I don’t love him,she decided.If I loved him, this would matter.

And then she thought,Maybe Caro loves him. Maybe Caro would want to stay with Lamey in the Fabs, and she could take Caro’s place in the academy and go to Earth.

Maybe that would be the solution that would leave everyone happy.

Caro apologized the next day, after Lamey left. “I was awful last night,” she said. “I don’t know what you must think of me.”

“It was all right,” Gredel said. She was folding Caro’s clothes and putting them away.Cleaning up after the orgy, she thought.

“I’m such a slut sometimes,” Caro said. “You must think I’m trying to steal Lamey away from you.”

“I’m not thinking that.”

Caro trotted up behind Gredel and put her arms around her. She leaned her head against Gredel’s shoulder and put on the lisping voice of a penitent little girl. “Do you forgive me?”

“Yes,” Gredel said. “Of course.”

Suddenly Caro was all energy. She skipped around the room, bounding across the carpet as Gredel folded her clothes. “I’ll make it up to you!” Caro proclaimed. “I’ll take you anywhere you want today! What would you like? Shopping?”

Gredel considered the offer. It wasn’t as if she needed new things—she was beginning to feel a little oppressed by all her possessions—but on the other hand, she enjoyed Caro’s pleasure in purchasing them. Then another idea struck her.

“Godfrey’s,” she said.

Caro’s eyes glittered. “Oh yes.”

It was a glorious day—summer was coming on, and warm breezes flowed through the louvered windows on the private rooms at Godfrey’s, breezes that wafted floral perfume over Gredel’s skin. She and Caro started with a steam bath, then a facial, a lotion wrap, and a massage that stretched all the way from the scalp to the toes. Afterward they lay on couches, talking and giggling, caressed by the breezes and drinking fruit juice as smiling young women gave them manicures and pedicures.

Every square inch of Gredel’s skin seemed flushed with summer, with life. Back at the Volta, Caro dressed Gredel in one of her own outfits, the expensive fabrics gliding over nerve-tingling, butter-smooth flesh. When Lamey came to pick them up, Caro put Gredel’s hand in Lamey’s and guided them both toward the door.

“Have a lovely night,” she said.

“Aren’t you coming with us?” Lamey asked.

Caro only shook her head and laughed. Her green eyes looked into Gredel’s—Gredel saw amusement there, and secrets that Lamey would never share. Then Caro steered them into the hall and closed the door behind them.

Lamey paused a moment, looking back. “Is Caro all right?” he asked.

“Oh, yes,” Gredel said. “Now let’s go find a place to dance.”

She felt as if she were floating, moving across the floor so lightly that she almost danced on her way to the elevator. It occurred to her that she was happy, that happiness had never been hers before, but now she had it.

All it took was getting Antony out of the picture.

The first crack in Gredel’s happiness occurred two afternoons later, when she arrived at the Volta late due to a blockage on the train tracks from the Fabs. She let herself in, and found Caro snoring on her bed. Caro was dressed to go out, but she must have got bored waiting for her to turn up, because there was an empty wine bottle on the floor and the med injector near her right hand.

Gredel spoke to Caro, then shook her. There was no response. Caro was pale, her flesh cool and faintly bluish.

Another long, grating snore shredded the air. Gredel felt her heart turn over at the pure insistence of the sound. She seized the med injector and checked the contents: endorphin analogue, something called Phenyldorphin-Zed.

Caro began another snore, and then the sound simply rattled to a halt. Her breathing had stopped. Terror roared through Gredel’s veins.

She never dealt with an overdose, but there was a certain amount of oral legend on the subject that circulated through the Fabs. One of the fixes involved filling the victim’s pants with ice, she remembered. Ice on the genitals was supposed to wake you right up. Or was that just for men?