Lydia Netzer - How to Tell Toledo from the Night Sky

Belion spent long, thoughtful minutes looking at Silvergirl naked on his screen. He thought of the bag of silver coins, the bear named Good-bye Silvergirl, and the other enigmatic offerings. He wondered if he should interact with her, in the game. He could animate one of the computer-controlled characters sitting around on benches, and she would know it was something special. He could lead her down to the duck pond, by the willows, and say, “Why are you saying good-bye?” What would she say? Would she say, “I can explain, but first let me fellate you until your eyes pop out.” Belion had never cheated in real life on a real-life girlfriend. But he had cheated on all his girlfriends online. He could never explain what he was doing or why. He only wanted to know that his virtual cock was getting reliable attention. If there was another reason to have a virtual cock, Belion didn’t know what it was.

Belion was not introspective. His behaviors came from an immediate place of desire and fulfillment, about an eighth of an inch under his skin. In life, he was faithful. In pretend, he was a whore. But what god isn’t? He could possess the body of the stalwart warrior-guard outside the city gates, express an arrogant but urgent love for a passing maiden, and before he knew it he was sneaking with her into the robing room of the monastery chapel across the street, and she was ripping off her jerkin and yanking down her leggings, touching her pixelated hands to her pixelated crotch, drawing him between her legs, pulling him down by the neck. Women love special attention from gods. They never know who they’re fucking, they don’t really care, and it has been this way since the beginning of time. Ask Leda. Ask any of them. Let a god come down in the shape of a mortal, and see if you can keep your legs together.

Two days after Irene went to Toledo, Silvergirl went into a cave and stopped moving. Belion became concerned. Maybe real-life Silvergirl had shoved her head into an oven and turned on the gas. That would be a giant bummer. He wanted more time to lay in wait for her, stalk her, seduce her, push himself into a fold in her silver slip. Belion broke down and hacked open her account information. When he saw that the log-in from her last session was from Toledo, he slid backward from the keyboard, stunned. An idea entered his mind and lodged there. Silvergirl was Irene. He scanned her logs and saw that she rarely spoke, had joined no guild, and had no allies. He was convinced. Was she spying on him? But why? Was she trying to tell him something?

It was morning in Pittsburgh. He had been up all night. He was eating some fresh salsa from a plastic container, chewing down whole-grain corn chips, shoveling the tomato squares and onion bits into his mouth. He was nervous and upset. Without Irene present to soothe him, he felt his brow must form a permanent furrow. It’s not that he missed their conversations, because they didn’t have them, or their love, because she had never loved him. It’s not that he missed the sight of Irene’s naked body, because, honestly, he had never been allowed to see it. Light or dark nipples, belly button, he had no idea. Was she showing herself to him online, through this avatar? Was he to unlock this puzzle she had set for him? How?

There were times when Belion, frustrated and cantankerous, would rise from his office chair and go to Irene, where she was sitting at the kitchen table, hunched over her laptop. He would stand next to her, and put his big hand on her head. He might say, “Hey.” She would turn and look at the top of his pants. She would unbutton the button. Unzipping him, she would reach inside with her soft hand, ease him out of his underwear, and bring his balls along, too. The balls would hang out over the zipper, at first uncomfortably and then not. She would take him in her mouth and swallow everything in turns, and put her hand around to the back of his legs, to bring him in tight to her face. It was decisive.

From the moment she unzipped his pants until he was shaking, his broad hip locked in her arm, life was a blur. He could put his hands around a beam in the ceiling of the kitchen and rock against her biting mouth. Then he would stagger off. Looking back, if he did look back, he could see her spit into a paper towel. Wipe her mouth off on it carefully. Stretch her lips into a smile. Turn her face back to the glow of the laptop. Then the typing, tapping would begin again. Was it a lonely operation if it made Belion feel so damn much better? What is loneliness? How long would it take him to drive to Toledo?

He decided to go to the cave. Maybe Irene would allow him, in a virtual cave, to do what Irene, in an actual bedroom, had never allowed: to see her naked, touch her with his hands, or be near her with his face. He had always been longing to do it, and he had earnestly tried. She had rebuffed him. There was no ire in it. But still, it was a rebuff. And if there’s anything Belion knew about women, it was that when rebuffed, one had to withdraw, even if you were withdrawing your face from a crotch belonging to someone who should by all rights allow you to put your face right in it. What does the word boyfriend mean anyway, he thought.

Belion, Archmage of the Underdark, was a huge man, part ogre and part water buffalo, clad in black leather with a long sweep of a cape clasped around his neck. He wore a leather helmet shaped to his buffalo head with horns that draped down over his shoulders. He wore heavy boots, held an iron cudgel, and had no upper limit on his carrying capacity. If he had wanted, he could have picked up the whole world. If he had wanted, he could fly. Everything and anything was open to him in this world, all commands, all powers, everything. There was nothing he could not test or try.

Belion teleported himself to the grassy area outside the cave, and he marched straight in, ignoring whoever was standing around. His animated legs carried him along. He touched a button on the keyboard and changed from an aerial view to a first-person view, so that he looked at his screen as if through the eyes of his avatar. Had Zeus enjoyed this capability? Had Apollo been able to summon any item, any character, any object to his hand? Probably.

The cave was deep but lit with wall torches. Belion knew exactly where Silvergirl was hiding in this cave and exactly how to get there. He marched through the dim cave, his boots making sounds he could hear through his monitor. When he was around the corner from her, he hesitated, and his avatar sat down on a crate to think. Irene was not likely to have sex with him in a cave, with a buffalo head. She wouldn’t even have sex with him in a bed, with his regular head. “I’m a virgin from the neck down,” she would say. “Let’s keep that dream alive.” His avatar stood up. The cave lights flickered. He decided that he would try. Pittsburgh is a long way from Toledo. He got up and marched around the corner to confront her directly. His pulse elevated. His brow a Gordian knot.

She sat on an outcropping of rock above his head, her silver slip folded against the dark gray of the cave wall. She was halfway up to the ceiling. His avatar had to look up to see her. She sat with her hands in her lap, in repose. Long bare feet hung down. Irene’s real feet don’t look like this, thought Belion. Irene wears a five and a half. For a few minutes, he waited for her to say something, but she didn’t.

“Silvergirl,” said Belion. He used a special communication channel that sent a message to a player on their phone or computer even if they were away from the game screen. “Silvergirl,” he repeated. “I’m here. I found you. I got your message.” She stayed still.

Belion’s hand dropped to his groin. He was wearing very large athletic shorts, cotton knit, the kind with two layers of fabric. Under the inner layer, he was rising against the seam. He looked at the silver slip she was wearing, remembered the peach nipples she had, remembered her round breasts. He rubbed himself with one hand, as if scratching an itch. He was all alone in his apartment, and it was morning, and he was tired. But he could not sleep. He could not go to sleep without something happening. If something didn’t happen, he would just stay awake, keep working, keep trying. He shifted a little and loosened his shorts around his balls, but he did not put his hand inside.