Woman on the Edge of Time

“I was born in 1938. You want to see my welfare ID?” Actually, of course, she didn’t have it; it was back in the hospital.

“What eye-dee?”

“What you show—a card so they know who you are.”

“But everybody’s implanted. What’s the good them knowing who, if they don’t know where and how?” Gildina threw herself on the bed. “Maybe too much Rapture. I really ride out on Rapture. Cash says I ream it too much. But it makes me float.”

“I’m no hallucination.” Connie felt like giggling. It was so weird to be reassuring somebody else. “Feel me!”

“Don’t be lesby. You got no contract on me.”

“What’s a contract?”

“Maybe you arefrom the ancient past. Are you quiring serious?”

She nodded, sitting carefully on a roundish object that appeared to be filled with air.

“All the flacks make contracts. Contract sex. It means you agree to put out for so long for so much. You know? Like I have a two-year contract. Some girls got only a one-nighter or monthly, that’s standard. You can be out on your ear at the end of a month with only a day’s notice. That’s no life. Course once in a while some real bulger, she ends up with a ten-year contract. I never met one, but I beared of them.”

“But suppose you get tired of him before?”

“Then he can sue. Besides, you can’t get out of a contract unless you’re bought out. Unless you get a lot saved, and who makes that much? Course if he breaks it, unless he can prove negligence or adultery, then you got him cold and he has to pay or at least settlement you. My contract isn’t just support either. I get enough to maintain my shots and re-ops and clothes and a little for all the Rapture and other risers I like to ream.”

“What happens when your contract runs out?”

Gildina shrugged nervously. “Sometimes they renew. The first time I was on a yearly I got renewed by that flack—he was a lower-level ground transport smasher. If you’re dropped, sometimes you got a prospect. Sometimes you get by on one-nights or weekends till you turn up a prospect. But it drains you. Always worrying about maybe you’ll end up in a knock-shop. Sometimes you can’t keep up maintaining, and then your chances of getting even a lower-level flack run down.”

“Can you get married?”

“This is. I mean you know the richies marry old-style. I heard they figure back generations. But this is how it is for us.”

“Suppose you have a baby?”

“If it’s in the contract. I never had a contract that called for a kid. Mostly the moms have them. You know, they’re cored to make babies all the time. Ugh, they’re so fat!”

“But suppose you wanted a kid.”

“What would I do with it? It couldn’t live here at Cash’s. He can’t stand noise. I can’t requisition housing. Who ever supposed on a contracty living alone?”

“What about your mother?”

“She’s gone to Geri. You know, she was over forty! I kept getting transies for a year maybe, but I haven’t had one in ages, so I suppose she’s ashed.”

“Ashed? She’s dead?”

Gildina blanched. “Watch your language! What are you talking about? I didn’t hear you. Remember this is my mother we’re supposing on.”

“But forty—isn’t that young?”

“She must’ve been forty-three. How long do you suppose to live? Only the richies live longer, it’s in their genes. Like they say, it’s all in the genes.”

“How long do the richies live?”

“Oh, maybe two hundred years. Depends on what they can afford—you know, the medicos, the organs. I’ve never actually met one, of course, I never been off the surface—”

“What do you mean, off the surface?”

“Upstairs! The space platforms. The richies don’t live down here. Too much … thickness. The air’s too thick, like they say. Not in here, of course. Middle-and upper-level flacks are all conditioned. But you should see where I was born! You’re born coughing and you pass off to Geri coughing, like they say. I always thought the sky was yellow till I came here. Now I know it’s a real pale gray-blue, just the prettiest color. I did my hair like that for a couple months after I came here, I was so silly … . Even if you look like a dud, you’re not too bad to talk to. It’s funny, talking to somebody during the day.”

“Don’t you ever go out? Or have friends over?”

“Out where? Cash seals me in most of the time, he’s a jealous slot. Part of being SD, I suppose. He don’t trust anyone. Besides, I have everything I need here. You can’t leave the plex, because of security. It wouldn’t be safe out there!”

“Not even to take a walk?”

“Walk?” Gildina looked embarrassed, as if she had said something about bathroom functions. “I’m middle level, you know! I suppose on duds walking. I wouldn’t remember, myself.”

“Duds are below lower-level flacks? Poor people?”

“It’s not like they’re people. They’re diseased, all of them, just walking organ banks, like Cash says, and even half the time the liver’s rotten. It isn’t like they have any use. I mean some are pithed for simple functions, but they live like animals out where it isn’t conditioned. Such a sight—if you could see far, it would stretch forever. It’s lucky you can’t see more than a few feet.”