Geoff Ryman - Lust Or No Harm Done

How delicious, he thought. I can pay my bills and iron shirts at the same time. I can stay late for one hour and do two hours' work. Everything will be perfect. My desk will finally be cleared; the flat will finally be clean. At last, I'll finally get everything done! He felt merry.

There were all kinds of admin he could feel virtuous about. There was his own personnel file that had been left blank. Let's get that out of the way. He had to fill in the name of the nearest relative to call in case of accident.

Once again, it would be his mother, miles away and untelephoned in Sheffield.

Was there anyone else for whom he was number one? It wasn't Phil.

Who loves ya baby?

'All done,' he heard himself say. Michael looked up at the big, reliable broken face. He felt himself smile with gratitude. 'So am I,' he said. 'Thanks.'

'You'd do the same for me,' said the Angel, and grinned. It was a Michael kind of joke.

He wouldn't be able to get a copy of himself past the security guard without telling some pointless story. Hi, this is my identical twin. 'I'm going to have to let you go,' Michael said quietly. His voice, he realized, was full of love.

'I understand.'

The whisper in the air, like a blown kiss. Papers on the desk rattled, lifted up, and sighed back into place, and Michael was left feeling a little lonelier. He packed up his bag, turned out the light, and decided in the corridor just to look at all the beautiful slides.

The cold room had a big white door and a big chrome handle. It was like a 1950s refrigerator you could walk into. Its surface trembled slightly from the chundering of the generator. It shook like Michael. You are in a bit of a state, mate. The door clunked open, the cold room breathing out refreshingly chill air. The temperature only sank into your bones and numbed your fingers once you were inside.

He switched on the light and pulled open a drawer, to admire the neat rows, to be grateful.

Instead there was a crumpled, much reused box, its red ink finger-smeared, cluttered with a cross-hatch of piled slides. A, whole week's work, neglected and growing.

It was as if someone had reached into him, and grabbed his heart and held it still.

He pulled open another drawer. It too simply stored an unsorted box.

All that beautiful work was gone.

But he had seen it! He'd seen it all being done, it was all just here!

In a panic he pulled open one icy drawer after another. The tips of his fingers stuck to the metal each time. One drawer was spread with unsorted slides. The next was empty. He pulled open another drawer. And ah! this one was full of ranked and ordered slides. There was a moment's relief, until he checked the dates. It was the first batch of slides from the learning group. Emilio had finished sorting that last week.

It was all undone, as if the Angel had never been. Michael clasped his own forehead in his hands. You may have seen it Michael, and you may be going nuts.

He called his Angel back. 'Where are your slides?' Michael whispered.

'What? What do you mean?'

'Well have a look!'

The copy pulled open the drawer. His face fell. His chin dropped and looked temporarily double. He turned his whole body as if his back was stiff, his chin still resting on his chest.

'Yes. Well,' the copy whispered. 'I'm not real, am I?' He did not manage to smile. He closed the drawer slowly, delicately with the tip of his finger. He stared at the drawer. 'I can't change anything.'

He looked back at Michael, and tried to smile. 'I can't write anything. When I go, so will all the marks on the page. I could do all your annual accounts and in the morning, you'd be back where you started. I can't father a child. I can't make a difference to anything.'

The two Michaels stared at each other.

'It really is a very peculiar sensation,' said the copy and chuckled. 'I am completely and totally impotent.' The grin glazed. 'Can you send me back now, please?'

Afterwards, Michael went to the security room. The guard, Shafiq, sat there in slate-blue uniform, watching EastEnders .

'Shafiq, do you think we could look at the CCTV tapes, please?'

Shafiq was eating a Pot Noodle. His mouth stopped circulating for an instant and he froze in place. Then he swallowed and stood up.

'Why, Michael, is something wrong, has there been an intrusion?'

'No, no, no, Shafiq, nothing's wrong. I just want to check on something.'

Shafiq was upset. 'I have been here all the time, Michael. Watching, really.' The television was still talking, and his eyes listed guiltily towards it. 'I watch the television, you know, but I always keep one eye on the CCTV, too.'

'I know, Shafiq, you do an excellent job. I just want to check.'

In a more normal state, Michael would have been stricken with concern: Shafiq was a good man, a good father, who was proud of his work. Shafiq seemed to drop to his knees in prayer and began to open up the banks of secure tapes.

'What rooms do you think suffered? When?'

'About two hours ago. Let's try my office.'

'Your office.' Michael could hear the bottom drop out of Shafiq's stomach. 'With all your records, and papers!'

He really does care, thought Michael. Why does he care? What have I given him that he should give a tinker's?

Shafiq inserted the cassette and nervously punched rewind.

'But Ebru and everyone were here two hours ago. Michael, they would have heard something too.'

It wasn't fair to scare Shafiq like this. But looking at the security tapes would confirm something.

'There it is, sir.'

Michael's office. And there was Michael, turned around in his chair and plainly talking to empty air.

'Thank you, Shafiq, you can turn it off now.'

'Don't you want to wait until you leave the office?' Shafiq was beginning to look baffled. 'How would there be an intruder, if you were there all along?'

'It's not an intruder, OK? Please Shafiq, don't be too concerned. Do you think you can show me the cold store interior at 5.03?'

Shafiq was going from baffled to slightly annoyed. 'What are we looking for, Michael? Perhaps I could suggest something else. The CCTV looks at all the doors and even the ventilation shafts.'

'I'm sorry to trouble you, Shafiq, but please show me.'

The cold room looked grey and indistinct and empty. It was hard to see; for a moment Michael thought he saw something move, as if through fog. He peered, but was finally sure beyond doubt. There was no one there.

The security video jumped between frames taken one second apart. Suddenly, the door was half-open. Suddenly it was wide open. Suddenly Michael himself stepped in in stages, lurching like Frankenstein's monster. He stayed alone and chatting to no one.

'OK, Shafiq. False alarm.'

Shafiq stood up straight and adjusted his blue shirt. 'But if there has been anything moved, surely it would be better to study tapes when you weren't there.'

Michael closed his eyes, to avoid Shafiq's face, and his voice was unnaturally quiet and precise. 'I was mistaken, Shafiq. I don't want to worry you further. Thank you for helping.'

He walked out of the room, his back held straight.

In the corridor he thought, I'm alone. I'm really alone.

Maybe I am just crazy.

But even if I'm not, they aren't real. My Angel said that. They are the universe breaking its own rules. If unreal people walked free to change the world, it would be a catastrophe. And so they come and work and love and when they leave, they leave no evidence or trace behind.

They can't sort slides; they can't be video taped.

The only evidence, the only scars, will be in my memory. I am the only thing they can change. Otherwise, poor Angels, when they go it is as if they never existed.

Michael felt sad for them. Because I know that when they are here, they love and feel and want. When they're here, they're alive.