Beep, beep, beep… Beep, beep, beep…Chapter 36
Outside in
the busy morning corridor what Fred notices most is that no one seems to
notice him; but then fashion never was one of his followings. For all Fred
knows dressing out of a clothes hamper and running your head under the
shower before going to work is a legitimate style. Once up in his apartment
the struggle to rid himself of his borrowed suit and get back into a work
jumper proves almost as grueling as when he first got dressed, but soon
Fred is back outside and down the elevator to the family section wearing
his very last unpacked work jumper. He even finds time to drag a comb through
his hair. At a doorway just three units down from Blade's apartment an
apprehensive Fred palms the security plate as the door beside it slides
open.
“Come on in, Fred.” Dusty’s deep friendly
voice invites. Even with twice the floor space of Blade's apartment the
place seems instantly crowded. Just beyond the living room the entire group
sits gathered around a table in the dinning area just next to the kitchen,
including Blade who sits lazily eating sugared yeast-pancakes and tiny
red aeroponic strawberries in a clean pressed sky-blue Atlantis Corp work
jumper, her face freshly scrubbed, her hair stretched neatly back into
a high thick blonde ponytail.
How does she do that?
Fred wonders for the millionth time since leaving Earth.
“Fred, where have you been?” Roselene demands.
Both she and Cara sit fully dressed and looking as if they've both been
up and ready to go for hours.
“Yah.” “Yah, Freddy.” The adults all tease,
Blade seeming to take the greatest delight in Fred's obvious embarrassment.
“I called your tablet, but you wouldn't
answer.” Roselene huffs hurt.
“I'm sorry sweety, I shut it off and...”
Fred barely starts his quickly rehearsed apology when Roselene blurts out.
“There's news about Johnny on the
nets, Cousin Fred!” A small piece of pancake flies out with the girl's
exclamation. “He saved a bunch of crewmen out in space, and got radiation
poison.”
“Really?” Fred faints surprise while
giving silent thanks to the powers that keep little girl's attention spans
short.
“Here, sit.” Dusty pulls out the chair
between himself and Blade.
“We still have some eggs.” Melanie
tells him as she stands. “And, a little pancake batter.”
“Real eggs?” Fred asks in disbelief.
“First level food production chickens.”
Melanie's beams. “Fertily-sterile rejects.”
“Fred-dy,” Roselene whines.
“I'm trying to tell you about Cousin John.”
“I'm sorry, sweety. Just one second.”
Fred pleads at the child, then back up at Melanie. “Two real eggs, if you
can spare.”
“I can spare three." The woman assures with
a warm smile. "Cheese and veggies?”
“You're a goddess.” Fred's stomach rumbles
low at the thought of food. The mingled smell of eggs, cheese, and coffee
have been killing his half-hungover stomach from the moment he stepped
through the door.
“Dusty always tells me that.” Melanie's
smiles before turning to crack a light-brown speckled egg on the edge of
her antique pyrex mixing bowl.
"I'm sure he does." Fred smiles at
Dusty’s growing grin.
“Fred-dy!” Roselene's powdered
sugar lip begins to pout. “Listen to me! I want to tell you about Cousin
Johnny.”
“I'm sorry. I'm listening, sweety.
I'm listening.” Fred again pleads forgiveness. Having poured him a fresh
cup Blade pushes sweet creamy coffee toward Fred, or whatever it is that
passes for coffee, sugar, and cream out here on Mars. He winks back a smile
of thanks. “So, tell me about your cousin John, Shorty. What's happened?”
“Cousin Johnny's a real hero,
Fred. A real live hero!” The child's bright blue eyes grow wide with excitement.
“He saved his ship and a whole bunch of his crew and everything. Here,
look!” Waving her orange over-sized student tablet across the dish-cluttered
table at him the small girl proceeds to then recount nearly verbatim much
of what Fred had learned in the shower. But looking down at the headlines
he now notices several regularly published posts seem to be missing. Attentively
nodding with the appropriately timed "uh huh" and "oh, really" Fred enters
his parental access code to find that almost all of the more recent posts
have been "violence" restricted. A quick glance down the headlines tells
Fred why. At least one of John's crew may possibly be dead. If true this
will be hard on John. An extreme bond exists between all spacers to the
point where even a stranger's death hurts all personally. Mission fatalities
within a crew can be devastating. Highlighting one of the more spectacular
headlines hinting at multiple fatalities Fred tilts the child's large orange
tablet toward Blade. She nods leaning toward him.
“I know. Dusty told me.” Comes
Blade's whisper as she sits back to listen attentively to her daughter's
detailed account of how John had personally EVAed out to save several crewmen
flicked adrift by a raging solar storm that was about to crash the Flying
Jib down into Earth. Then right about the time the small girl's distorted
news regurgitation begins winding down Melanie sets a steaming omelet in
front of Fred. The herbed aroma of melted cheese and sautéed veggies
erupt Fred's stomach into a rumbling growl.
“Are we hungry?” Melanie's asks with
her usual note of playful sarcasm.
“Excuse me.” Fred takes up his fork
with a smile. “This smells wonderful, Mel.”
“I'm good at what I do.” Melanie smugly
chimes as she pours herself another cup of coffee and walks over to take
a stool at the kitchen counter. Then just as Fred all but has that first
bite into mouth he suddenly remembers some of the other things Melanie's
just might be good at and glances over at Dusty.
“She doesn't bring any other
work-stuff home, does she?”
“Nothing I let her keep in the refrigerator.”
Dusty sips at his steaming cup, lazily enjoying the fulfilling warmth of
his Saturday breakfast afterglow.
“Good.” And the most delicious omelet to
ever touch Fred's lips bursts into his mouth. “Umm. This is delicious,
Mel. This is the best thing I've ever had on my tongue.”
The words escape his mouth before
Fred even has time to think. He halts mid-bite, his eyes like a startled
deer-in-the-headlights as next to him Dusty merely smiles sympathetically
while on his other side Blade stamps a barefoot heel down onto Fred's shoe
and across the room Melanie's nearly laughs synthetic coffee up her nose.
"Thanks, Fred." The woman grabs for
a dish towel to wipe her face. "That's quiet some complement."
“I mean, this is the best omelet ever,
Mel.” Fred blushes.
“Mommy, what's wrong?” Roselene asks
confused by the sudden exchange.
“Nothing, honey. Fred's just sometimes
a little funnier than he knows.”
The young girl feels sure there's
more to it than what the grown-ups say, but then grownups always do that.
“Do you think Cousin John will post
me?” Roselene asks. “I hope he does. I'd take it to the learning center
and show it to everybody just like a real news-post.”
“I think you should post to him.”
Fred tells the girl between wide gulps of melted cheese, sautéed
hydroponics vegetables, and real honest-to-goodness fluffy herbed eggs.
“That solar radiation the news posts talked about will keep your cousin
John in med-center for a long time, and you remember how it was when your
mommy was in med-center, don't you?”
“Uh huh.” The suddenly somber-faced
child nods.
“That means Johnny will be spending
most of his time hooked up to some big ugly machine and laying in big vats
of green gooey goop.”
“No fun, I assure you.” Blade confirms,
stabbing her last slice of strawberry down onto her plate's final pancake
wedge.
“That's right.” Fred agrees.
“That means Johnny will be spending a lot of time being boring. You remember
how we use to make your mommy all those funny posts when she was in the
ship’s med? How we use to walk around archiving stuff on our tablets then
run it all with tracks from the ship's public archive through your mom's
fancy little post-editor? You should do something like that for John. He's
never seen Atlantis Tower. Maybe you and Cara could show it to him.
I'm sure he'd really enjoy it.”
“Yes he would.” Blade adds as slips
Fred's hand a thanking squeeze.
“Yah,” Roselene quickly agrees, the
tiny wheels already spinning. “That was fun.” Then turns excited toward
Cara. “Me and Fred use to go out all the time to like the food pavilion
or the rec-room or even just out in the hallway. Sometimes we'd just watch
people, and then sometimes we'd walk around and talk about all kinds of
stuff and make up all these funny stories to try and make mommy laugh.”
“And, you did too, sweety.”
Blade's voice reflecting a gratitude her words only faintly convey. “I
watched them over and over again. Even the meds liked them."
“Can me and Cara go out and record
in the commons today?” The tiny version of Blade pleads.
"Can we?" Cara quickly joins the cause.
"Please, Blade."
“Well, it's all right with me, but you'll
have to ask your mother.”
“Can she, Melanie?” “Please, Mom?”
Both girls plead in a unified inflection only achievable by small girls.
“Please?”
“Sure.” Melanie shrugs. “I'll even
take you. I wanted to go shopping this afternoon anyway.”
“I’ll go with you.” Blade quickly
adds as beside her Fred's tablet chimes for a live-link. Reaching down
Fred pulls open his thigh pouch.
“Good.” Showing a sympathetic smile
Melanie suddenly realizes that today of all days Blade probably doesn't
want to be alone. “It’ll be just us girls then. We can all take a late
lunch and then go shopping.”
“That should cheer John up.” Fred chuckles
down as he thumbs open the live-link. “Yes?”
“Davis, you coming with me or what?"
Buck's distorted voice yells from inside a public booth just outside some
busy vehicle air-lock.
“Yes, of course I am.” Fred tells
the image on his display. “I'm all stowed and secured. You said meet you
at ten-hundred. It's not even oh-nine yet.”
“Who is it, Cousin Fred?” Roselene
asks. Cara whispers something behind her hand and the younger girl's face
falls sad.
“I'm leaving the instant
you get here, Davis, or in exactly thirty mikes; whichever comes first.
This place is itching me. I need to be outside, so haul your ass down here
and let's get gone!” The fat old prospector's image shouts out over
the doppler roar of a passing container transport.
“I’ll be right there.” Thumbing
off the link Fred looks down with great regret at his still half-eaten
omelet, then up at the others. “I guess old Buck's getting buggy on me.
Looks like I've got to get down to the surface-locks.”
“I want to go.” Roselene shouts. “I want
to wave good-bye to Fred when he goes outside.”
“So do I.” Blade reaches for Fred's hand.
“Can I go too, mommy?” Cara's chair bounces
in contagious excitement.
“If it's all right with Blade.” Melanie
agrees.
“Sure.” Roselene's mother nods. In unison
Blade and Fred stand as the girls both struggle to disengage themselves
from the table without spilling everything on it. “Melanie, can I borrow
a pair of shoes?”
“In my closet.” Melanie sets down her coffee
and stands.
“Dusty.” Fred offers his hand as the broad-chested
construction foreman stands to return the farewell. “Been nice knowing
you.”
“Same here, Davis.” Dusty pumps his
large callused fist. “Going to miss you at the center's parent-instructor
group. You be sure and look us up the next time you're down Mars.”
“Count on it.” Fred smiles, both men
knowing full well that any such meeting, if ever, lay off several decades
in the future.
“Melanie, I hate to eat and run.”
Fred turns a smile as the two women return from the bedroom, Blade's bare
feet now in a pair of white canvas work shoes. Shaking his head down at
his half-eaten breakfast Fred sighs. "More than you'll ever know."
To his surprise Melanie walks over
to give Fred's chest a hard warm hug before smacking a wet kiss up on his
stubbly cheek.
“That's okay, Freddy Boy. You stuck
around when you were needed.”
“You take care, Mel.” Patting
her shoulders in parting Fred hopes the woman is referring to his help
parenting Roselene these past months and not staying with Blade last night.
Women possess forms of information transaction Fred knows exist but has
yet to even remotely fathom.
The departing mob ambles
noisily through the apartment's open door, children dashing about shouting,
adults redundantly repeating good-byes, until finally the door slides shut
and silence returns to rooms that haven't held the experience for several
hours. Walking over to clear the piled shambles of breakfast dishes Melanie
hears Dusty chuckle as he steps close.
“What?” Bumping her husband's
hip with hers Melanie passes some breakfast dishes into the sink.
“So, you're telling me that
those two have been a legal family-unit for the past M, all the way out
from Earth and the last thirteen months here on Mars, and that last night,
the night before Fred leaves for the Belt, is the very first time they've
ever been together?” Turning up the hot water Dusty begins rinsing down
the assorted mound of plates and eating utensils.
“Unless they're both incredibly good at
synchronized lying.” Melanie mumbles as she slips several juice glasses
into the sink.
“And, Fred's not gay?” Having rinsed
most of the larger food chunks down the sink's bio-reclaimator Dusty seals
off the drain and runs suds. Hand washing Saturday brunch dishes is an
old Earthborn family tradition transcending time, logic, location, and
convenience.
“Nope.” Melanie shakes her head.
“Blade's seen all Fred's psych evals. He's just a very sweet comfortably
shy extrovert with a strong cultural sense of extended family.”
“But the way they touched?”
Dusty finds the logic don't fit facts. His own wife is more than beautiful
but Blade might be called truly gorgeous. And statistically speaking Fred
and Blade were only slightly more blood-related than strangers. "I mean,
how could he not?"
“Beats me.” Melanie smiles.
“Icetroid miners are just different, I guess. That's why they're icetroid
miners.”
“So?” Hands down in the sink's
hot suds sifting plates from bowls and glasses Dusty’s grin tilts lascivious.
“Did you give Blade some of your new oil?”
“Uh huh.” Slipping the last few forks and
spoons into the sink Melanie's slides her arms up around Dusty’s chest
to rest her cheek up on his broad muscled shoulder. “Some of my new stuff
with the improved bi-gender pheromones. It even smells real nice.”
“Poor bastard.” Leaving the hot dishwater
to cool Dusty turns to kiss his suddenly painfully beautiful wife.
“Never knew what hit him.” Melanie
whispers soft and warm into her husband's ear, a lingering hint of jasmine
in her golden hair.