Charlie Huston - No Dominion

– You still have people in the straight world?

She grunts.

– Straight’s not really my thing.

– Not like sex-straight. Uninfected. I hear you still have a public face.

– Yeah. Heard that, did you?

I tap a Lucky on my thumbnail.

– You used to do gay rights and stuff.

– I used to fight against ignorance. I still do.

– Sure, sure. I know you got that covered in the Society, but out there, in the world, you still do that?

– Yeah. I still got a face. Me, some of the other members of the Lesbian, Gay and Other Gendered Alliance still have faces. We still work out there.

– AIDS?

– What?

– You work with AIDS people?

– AIDS people?

– People who are sick. HIV positive.

– I do some needle exchange. Talk to sex workers sometimes.

I balance the Lucky on top of the Zippo.

– Got a destination with this, Pitt?

I pick up the cigarette and light it.

– Say I had a friend who was sick.

– You got a friend?

– Use your imagination.

– OK.

– This friend is HIV-positive, medication isn’t working, could be trouble with her insurance company, that kind of stuff.

– OK.

– There other options? This person needed to get meds and whatever, there other options?

– Well, there are exchanges, mostly run online. People with meds they don’t use anymore, or they have understanding doctors who write them scrips for whatever, they swap meds. Try things the HMOs would never allow. But it’s all pretty catch as catch can, you know.

A flake of tobacco gets stuck to my tongue; I spit it on the floor.

– So you want a number? Some web addresses for your friend?

– Sure.

I find a pen. She rattles off numbers and letters. I draw a series of boxes on the blotter, one inside another.

– Anything else my friend could try?

– Depends.

– On what?

– Your friend got money?

– Why?

– There’s a black market for meds. You have the money, you can get anything. Experimental stuff that’s not even approved yet. Anything.

– No, no money.

– Hunh. You know…

– Yeah?

– You could ask the girl. For money.

The girl.

– No.

– She’d give it to you. The girl would give you anything you needed. You know she would.

– Not the girl.

– Sela says she asks about you all the time.

I look at the butt end of my smoke, watch as the cherry consumes the little LUCKY printed on the paper.

– Sela talks to her?

– All the time, she’s like her personal trainer now. The girl got her to move up there, wanted her close.

– That’s Coalition turf.

– I know. Sela renounced the Society.

– She renounced?

– Had to. She would have Rogued-it up there, but you know the Coalition: No dogs allowed. Pledged the Coalition.

– Jesus.

– She loves the girl. Only way she could stay close to her. Figured better to join the Coalition so she could keep an eye on her.

– Terry must have shit.

She laughs.

– Not half as much as Tom.

– Fuck him.

– You fuck him, Pitt. He’s not my type. Fucking fascist.

– Still not getting along?

– It’s not just me anymore. I hear you were around to see Terry.

– Yeah.

– I hear you didn’t have an appointment.

– Yeah.

– Picture how that kind of stuff goes over with the members. Terry’s always been open-door. You need to talk to him, he’s there. Part of his appeal. Part of why so many of us trust him. Now Tom wants all contact to go through his security desk. Not popular at all.

– So how’s he keep the job?

– He’s got his supporters. Younger members mostly, guys mostly, machos that like the idea of a strong and independent Society.

– Younger members. I hear there’s been a lot of that going around lately.

I hang on the line while she doesn’t say anything. I hear a clicking sound, like maybe she’s flicking her thumbnail against her front teeth. The sound stops.

– We got a little off the subject, Pitt.

– Just saying, seems there’s a lot of new fish in the pond.

– Hadn’t noticed. Anyway. You have a friend who’s sick and needs help, I’m happy to give you some advice; that’s something I do anyway. Society politics, that’s for members only.

– Just passing the time.

– I know what you’re doing. I may have helped you out once, done something that wasn’t strictly by the book, but don’t think I’m not a believer. I’m Society, Pitt, through and through. Got it?

– Sure.

– Good. So. You want me to talk to Sela, have her talk to the girl?

– No.

– It’s your business, but if you’ve got a friend who’s HIV-positive, money always helps. The girl would love to do something for you. This isn’t the time to get stuck on your pride, Joe.

– Thanks for the advice, Lydia.

– I’m just saying. If you want to help your friend, then help.

– Like I say, thanks, for the numbers and such. I owe you one.

– Right. Whatever you say, Pitt.

Lydia ’s alright. She may have fallen for the Society line, she may be a pain in the ass PC crusader dyke, but she’s alright. She helped me with that Coalition mess last year. She helped me with the girl. The girl and her fucking sick-ass father and…

I need to stop thinking about this stuff. I think about this stuff, that means thinking about the thing that took out the girl’s father. The thing that shouldn’t exist. The thing that was in the same room with the girl, that got a look at her. Don’t think about it. The girl’s OK. She’s got Sela as her angel. Sela, the baddest pre-op Vampyre on the Island. Anyone tries to mess with the girl, Sela’s gonna improvise a sex change on their ass. The girl’s OK.

And I got other problems now.

I manage a couple hours’ sleep. I don’t dream about the girl, so that’s good. But I do dream about Evie. Normally dreaming about Evie is as good as it gets, but these aren’t those kind of dreams. These are the other kind. When I wake up I have hours to go to sundown. And still no idea how I’m gonna get my ass above One-ten.

Figure I call Terry, tell him the trail leads Uptown, he’ll have some way of getting me across Coalition territory. I go to the Hood with Terry’s blessing, things won’t be so bad. The Society and the Hood have a relationship. Both Clans were born out of the same revolution, both were snapped off from the Coalition. So yeah, figure that’s how to go about this. Except for the way Lydia got all touchy at the end there. She’s Society, sure. But she’s not rank and file. That queer alliance she put together within the Society has some pull, and she often pulls it her own direction, has her own ideas about how things should be done. She clammed up tight when I started talking new fish. Figure that means something’s up. As if I hadn’t already got that. But now I figure it’s something to do with Terry and Tom. Something to do with the way Tom is trying to put a wall around Terry. And this thing with the new high? Figure that’s Terry’s angle, figure it has something to do with his play, whatever it turns out to be. Fine. But if that’s the case, if this is an angle, if it’s Terry’s angle, it’s worth something. And not just whatever he’s planning to slip me. So figure I don’t want to go to Terry for help getting Uptown. I got time before I need to fill him in on my findings. Let him wait. I work this alone? I could end up with the angle, make it pay out, get me some serious money maybe. Money I can use not just for fucking rent, but for Evie.

Got to be that way.

Cause there’s no way in hell I’m going anywhere near the girl.