Delusions
25 Apr 2021Prochaska
It had started the day before. Zoe was on the planetary port Cabana Hub in the system HIP 95864, it was the evening of the 6th of June 3304. Actually Zoe was here on this planet under false identity to investigate a case of alleged AI research. On this evening, after a busy day of talking to various people without making any actual progress in her case, she had been drifting through the stations corridors. She had stopped again in front of the colourfully lit shop window of a bar in the entertainment district and her gaze wandered over the interior and the only dimly recognisable people inside. Finally, with a yawn, she buried her hands in the pockets of her long, black leather coat and strolled on. She came closer and closer to the unlit end of the district corridor, her gait slowing noticeably and she had started looking around uncertainly several times, back to the beginning of the hall, when she found a small quiet bar. She went inside. The room was dimly lit except for the counter. The few scattered people in it were busy with themselves. Then she saw a woman sitting at the bar, and her long blond hair and that way of tilting her head in conversation had reminded her directly of her childhood friend Fay. The fascination for her already had a firm grip on Zoe. The woman looked very inconsistent: she had long, blonde hair, her clothing was very feminine, a tight fitting top, cut out low at the neck, and a short skirt with high boots. Her body on the other hand was very slim for her height and her hips very slender, which, on the other hand, gave her a rather masculine appearance. Also despite her slender form, she looked quite athletic and agile. Her eyes and lips were strongly enhanced by makeup, and her exuberance sometimes seemed exaggerated. Zoe had sat down next to her, and then she had looked into those eyes. The eyes looked instantly familiar. When the blonde noticed her gaze, she eyed Zoe critically, and then pointed to her blue hair: "is that the official Princess Duval fan club hairstyle?" she asked. "No, I'm definitely not a fan of anyone in that family," Zoe replied earnestly. Zoe was captivated by the woman in a way she couldn't explain to herself. The two talked for a while, and the blonde introduced herself as Jeanette. Zoe couldn't tear her eyes away. "Love at first sight?" asked Jeanette at one point with a jokingly pitying expression; but the put-on jocularity of her question couldn't hide the fact that she was flattered by Zoe's attentive looks. Some time later Jeanette said provocatively:"You look way too well-behaved with your blue-tinted hair," while smiling at Zoe with a tilted head. "Are you actually just paying attention to my hairstyle all the time?" Zoe retorted, looking at her with an intense gaze. For a long time, anything even close to a relationship had felt far too close and demanding for Zoe. Suddenly, her longing for intimacy returned with all its vigor. Now, she felt driven by it and did not want to stop. They stayed in the bar talking for a while after that, and then went out to be by themselves.
Zoe woke up in the morning in the small apartment with sparse furniture. Jeanette lay next to her, still sound asleep. She stroked the sleeping woman through her long blond hair. She remembered the previous night, Jeanette's soft skin, the feeling of being held, and letting go and just drifting. She eyed the sleeping one's features, and couldn't help thinking of Fay.
Fay had been her best friend in her teenage chaos clique, back on Mars. She had hydrogen blonde, tousled hair, and looked severely anorexic. Fay had always been volatility personified. Her moods were unpredictable. Always driven, she knew no rest. When she wanted something, there was no rule in the world that could have stopped her. When Zoe had first seen her, it had been very late, and the Apex had been nearly devoid of people. Fay had been asleep at one of the rearmost tables in the obscurely lit room, and Zoe had not taken notice of her. But once she was awake, it was no longer possible to overlook her presence. She had got up, stood a little shakily on her feet, and then had trudged across the room in her heavy boots, to the front of the counter, while her open laces were dragging carelessly across the floor. Arriving at the bar, she mooched a beer from the guy standing behind it. When she heard the raspy voice, Zoe turned around involuntarily. The young woman wasn't very tall, but it was impossible to tell if her lopsided posture was from a drug-induced loss of control or if she was tense like a predatory cat and was going to suddenly lunge at her opposite. Anyway, when the guy wouldn't give her a beer, Zoe expected her to jump right over the bar and then pounce on the guy's neck. Nothing of the sort happened, but the young woman's glare made Zoe's blood run cold. She saw an aggressive unpredictability in her eyes that scared her to the core. Later that evening, as she was on her way back home, she looked around several more times to make sure she wasn't being followed. But some time later, when she met her again and got to know her, Fay was very affectionate and familiar with her from the beginning, as if someone had flipped a switch in her. To this day, Zoe was always amazed anew that this friendship had worked.
Fay and Zoe had always been very close in a vague way; when they sat together, they leaned lightly on each other. Often they had sat together and fantasized about the future. Zoe used to imagine how old her parents would be now, and how they would fall into each other's arms when they saw each other again. And Fay had fantasized about a future with her own family, and a little daughter. As far away from Mars and her past as possible. The idea of an ideal dreamworld was always very nice, even if it seemed completely unattainable to both of them.
Then came this one evening when they had wandered the streets together for some time. Zoe walked a few steps ahead, and behind a street corner this guy suddenly stood in front of her. The gloomy guy was full of drugs, he fixed Zoe, his voice slurred, and he was looking for a victim. Zoe just stood there, transfixed. The guy had surprised her, had suddenly appeared from around the corner. But he hadn't counted on Fay, who sprinted at him from behind the corner on his right side, screaming "get lost!" in a flipping, shrill voice, and immediately kicked with her way-too-big steel-toed boots. The first kick knocked him off balance and he just managed to catch himself on his knee; the second hit him square in the face, shattering his nose bone with an ugly cracking sound. Then Fay had turned to her. "Hey, you can't just stand there, Zora!" she exclaimed to Zoe, but when their gazes met, Fays eyes had widened. Probably seeing how transfixed and shocked Zoe still was, her serious features then quickly gave way to a deep, reassuring smile. Her eyes lit up at Zoe when Fay wrapped her arms around her, and then she kissed the perplexed and still petrified one on the mouth. Zoe's breath caught at first, and a muffled and startled sound escaped her. But then she returned the embrace and fervently leaned into the kiss. Zoe's tension fizzled out completely as their tongues made contact and toyed with each other in their open mouths. After parting from the kiss, they remained standing together for a while at the spot on the street corner, heads leaning against each other, and their hands stroking through each others colorful hair; then they had moved on, hand in hand.
Fay the tireless one. Fay with the beaming eyes. Fay with the self-carved scars on her arms. That had been the most intimate moment they ever had together. That kiss remained the only one between them. Then quite a while later, when Zoe had left the clique and the chaos behind, the two lost sight of each other altogether. But ever since Zoe had some distance from her chaos days after graduation, she had kept asking herself where Fay now was and how she might be doing.
Zoe looked around Jeanette's apartment. She had already had the impression yesterday in the pub that she was taking drugs because of her overexcited behavior. Looking around the gloomy apartment, she was sure that it was so. She had seen enough addicts that she could recognize them immediately. Jeanette's personality was still stronger than the drug, her eyes shone with vivacity, just as Fay's had back then, but Zoe had seen often enough how these things turned out. It was like a scale that eventually tips over, first you consume the drug, and then the stuff eats you up from the inside. Zoe had seen people with empty eyes often enough in the past, after the drug had consumed their personality.
After the two had got up, they sat together over a sparse breakfast. "What are you doing today," Zoe had asked. Jeanette had hunched her shoulders: "get the day over with". Then she had tilted her head again and looked at Zoe with slightly narrowed eyes: "and then work in the evening". Zoe had immediately been embarrassed by her naive question. Her thoughts drifted for a moment. And how long do you have left before your eyes go blank and expressionless, she wondered? Zoe suddenly saw Fay in front of her, and her head dizzied. She suddenly wanted to get out of here badly, needed distance, felt like she was suffocating in the room. That Jeanette would think it was because of her line of work didn't matter to her at the moment. Without thinking about it, she stood up and muttered "take care," and kissed Jeanette goodbye on the cheek. She still fleetingly noticed the hurt in Jeanette's gaze, then quickly turned and hurriedly walked out of the apartment. She just wanted to leave this place as soon as possible. Shortly after she closed the door behind her, realization hit her. Her eyes becoming watery, she felt vulnerable and did not want to be seen in that state. She leaned against the wall under a ventilation shaft, her forehead against the cold metal, and she felt the breeze above her. Actually, the answer had been there all along, plainly in front of her eyes, she had just never wanted to see it. In her mind's eye she saw an emaciated Fay with a blank stare, and the time of self-deception was over all at once. I would have wished you to find what you were looking for, Zoe thought, and the pain inside her became unbearable. She felt like throwing up.
She stood there for a while, in tears, when someone put a hand on her shoulder. "I had the impression all along yesterday that I reminded you of someone from the past...probably a tragic love story," she heard Jeanette's voice. The feeble Zoe allowed Jeanette to pull her close and embrace her. "Let's go back inside, you won't make it home in this condition anyway," she added, putting Zoes arm over her shoulders and dragging her back to the entrance.
Some time after she had completed the operation at Cabana Hub, Zoe had "Fay" tattooed in red letters on her right wrist.