Empty Streets (10 page)

She tapped on her light, feeling irritable and grumpy. She was tired and something was off. She stood up, grabbed the last clean t-shirt and shorts out of her clothing bin as well as the handful of clothes she had worn outside, and headed to the bathroom downstairs.

She had survived to the third day without a shower. After the late night exploration and the sweaty sleeping, she was pretty sure she wouldn't be able last another day without one. She was allotted only six minutes of water today-not quite enough-but she was nevertheless grateful for it and was determined to make the most of it.

Eri crept up to Ezra's bedroom door, peeking in. His bed was empty. He must be at school, she thought. She had no idea what time it was, and usually it didn't matter, but it nagged at her until she checked. She stopped in the kitchen to check the clock, which told her it was one-thirty in the afternoon. She would need to attend alternate classes today since she missed her one o'clock sign-on, but she didn't really care. She needed time to think about the stuff Bodhi had told her last night, time to let it simmer in her brain and become real.

She felt a new discomfort with being alone; she found she enjoyed conversation and the physical presence of another person. She enjoyed having a friend. She wasn't sure if there was a way to see Bodhi without sneaking out. Since their conversations were dedicated mostly to the outside, talking in the Sims world seemed to be an impossibility.

Eri showered quickly, rinsing her dirty clothes as she went. Wringing them out, she left them on the floor and wrapped herself in a towel. She opened the door to let out the steam and then stood in the doorway of the bathroom, listening as footsteps ascended the basement stairs. The hairs on her arms stood on end and her skin prickled with goose bumps. An odd calm overtook her as she waited to catch a glimpse of her brother.

He emerged, a ghost floating through the kitchen.

"Hey, Ezra, done with school already?" Her voice was loud and abrupt, a stark contrast to the shadow moving through the kitchen.

Ezra turned his head slowly, drawing his chin away from his chest in slow motion. Eri tried not to flinch at the sight of him; his sunken eyes and green-tinted complexion startled her. He moved in her direction.

"Yeah, I left…I don't feel very good." He grew noticeably paler upon acknowledging his discomfort.

"Um, okay, are you going to throw up?" Eri moved out of the doorframe to make room for him to get by. Maybe he was just sick. Maybe a virus came home from work with her parents, or was transferred from the work shuttle.

He looked at her, dazed, and then walked past her into the bathroom, where she heard him throw up. She went to the kitchen and dampened a cloth with the small bit of water she had access to in the sink. She typed her code into a key-pad near the sink and got part of her drinking water ration for the day, walking it carefully to Ezra.

When she reached the bathroom, she saw him slumped against the wall next to the toilet, face white and damp with sweat. His eyes were closed, his dark hair sticking to his face and neck. Eri knelt down, touching his face softly with the washcloth. He barely opened his eyes. She tried to hand him the water, but he shook his head.

"Ezra, you have to drink something," Eri said. She pressed the cup to his lips, and waited until he relaxed his mouth to try to pour water onto his dry tongue. She saw him swallow once, a small bit of water, and determined it was enough for now. Setting the cup down, she transitioned from kneeling to sitting on the floor next to him. She wiped his face again, noticing how much like a child he still was, with his smooth features and slightly rounded cheeks. He didn't have a hint of facial hair yet.

"Do you feel a little better?" she asked.

He shook his head almost imperceptibly.

Eri took his limp hand in hers, trying to push down the feelings of panic and fear that burned like bile in her throat. Tears pricked her eyes, and she realized how much she missed her brother. She recalled the times they had played together over the years, talking and pretending until they were older and had their own friends on the Sims. She could see his face, alight with excitement, when she would suggest they make up a play or song. He would dance around, with endless energy, always asking her for more ideas, more time, more play. She couldn't remember when that had stopped.

She sniffed hard. "Hey, Ez," she started, but her voice cracked. She waited for a moment before trying again. "Remember when you were little and you drew on the fridge with peas? And it looked like dad? I thought you were so naughty at the time…but now I just think you had a talent in you trying to escape." She choked on the last word.

He opened his eyes to slits and stared at her. She heard him clear his throat, barely, and held her breath awaiting a response.

"I always wished," he whispered, stopping to take a deep breath, "that there were more colors around here." He attempted a small smile at her.

She reached up and smoothed the hair away from his eyes. "Ez, there are ways to get you colors. And textures and music and surfaces to work on. Don't give up on that. Please, don't give up." Small tears, tears she tried to hide, slipped their betrayal down her face.

He shut his eyes again. "It's lonely...without colors."

Eri brushed the hair off Ezra's forehead. "Yeah, Ez, it is. But we have color, inside our brains. It isn't that the colors don't exist."

"No, Eri, they don't exist. For us." He breathed out a long breath. "I'm so tired all the time."

"Do you want me to help you to your room?" Eri wasn't sure what else to do.

"Yeah," he mumbled.

Eri stood up and then leaned forward to get one of his arms around her neck. As she stepped back to pull him up, she knocked over the cup of water she had gotten for him. She paused to watch the water pool in a small circle on the floor, invisible and useless.

Ezra stood, leaning heavily on Eri, and allowed himself to be half-led, half-carried to his bedroom. There, Eri laid him on his bed and kneeled beside him. He curled up on his side, facing her.

"Hey, Ezra, you will be okay. Just remember that." Eri touched his face, softly, hoping he was still awake to hear her.

He reached up, touching her hand with his before letting his arm fall lifelessly back to the bed. "Love you, sis," he muttered.

"I love you, Ez," Eri whispered, her nose warm with the tears that hid behind her eyes. His breath became slow and even. She went to her room and cried.

* * * *

Ezra never woke up.

* * * *

Eri's mom logged on to Eri's Sims and punched in her parent code. There, she excused Eri from school for five days for mourning and a funeral. After removing the headgear, she looked over at Ezra's Sims machine, and cried until she felt sick.

Eri pictured herself as a steel pole, cold and solid, cemented into the ground. Around her whirled decay, destruction, weeping and screaming, but she stood, planted in the ground, emotionless. She felt the wind and rain an inch from her skin, but it didn't touch her. She saw the sun beating down, its deadly rays burning the flesh of everyone, but it didn't touch her. The existence of people, of boring day-in, day-out survival, of TV watching, tasteless, consuming people, zoomed around her on fast forward while she sat still, mute, and invisible. No one could touch her. No one could reach her. No one could hurt her. No one can calm someone who is already calm, calm with an eerie coolness, calm with an unnatural acceptance, calm with a burning vendetta that seeped into her pores and became a part of her genetic makeup.

They said it was heart failure. They said he had a defect that hadn't been detected in any of his testing as an infant or his yearly physicals. They said. They say. They will say. Eri hated lies, and with the lies she came to hate the liars. She returned to school with a hard countenance she hadn't had before.

Presentations

Eri returned to school seven days later, still numb and uncomfortable. She shied away from attention from her parents. She had almost completely forgotten her experiences outside with Bodhi. She was overwhelmed with anger; she was angry that her brother was gone, angry that she hadn't noticed earlier how sick he was and angry that there were people other than him who'd suffered a similar fate. She focused on the anger and let it grow and burn inside her. It felt better than being sad.

Eri logged onto her Sims machine, going through the motions automatically. A bright, sunny day emerged before her eyes. She cast her eyes downward, trying to curl inside herself and will away the warm light. She walked towards her classroom, still unsure if she should be here, if she should ever come back.

She stopped short when she entered, all of it feeling less real than it ever had. Class would start in five minutes and she was struggling to keep her composure. She took a deep breath and looked down at her feet. She had chosen to wear all black, as was custom for personas upon returning to the Sims world after a tragedy. She heard the door behind her shut quietly, muting the counterfeit daylight. How different this world was, with its bright skies and painted walls, its colorful flowers and chirping birds.

She saw Bodhi's back as he sat at a desk. He leaned back with his fingers laced together behind his head and then sighed and leaned forward. His shoulders were tense.

Eri stood next to his desk, just out of his peripheral vision, trying to access hazy memories. Who was he to her? In the Sims world, they were friends. Barely friends. They had worked together on a project, which she was pretty sure was due today or tomorrow. They were nothing more.

He turned, sensing her proximity to him. Without thinking, he stood, grabbing her into a fierce hug that both stunned and melted her.

"No," she said firmly, but softly. He abruptly let go, and took a step back.

"I-I'm sorry. I mean, I know we don't know each other well," Bodhi backpedaled. "Ms. Fritz told me…since we couldn't present she had to alter our assignment…she told me what happened. No one else knows, though."

"I know…I guess, what I meant was…I don't want to be upset, here, in this class." As Eri fished for coherent thoughts, Ms. Fritz walked in.

"You two?" Ms. Fritz pointed at Eri and Bodhi.

Eri's heart raced. "Yes?" she answered. Bodhi stood there with his mouth open.

"Due to…circumstances…I want you to go to study hall and discuss the work you have completed on your project. You will be excused today from listening to presentations, but it is expected that you will be prepared to listen tomorrow and present on Monday. Do you both find this acceptable?" Ms. Fritz raised her eyebrows. Eri thought this must be what compassion looked like in the simulated world.

"Sure," Bodhi said, nodding. Eri nodded, too. Digital eyes from all over the room were on her. Her cheeks burned with the attention. Digital eyes are hard to read. They don't communicate the way physical eyes do; the cold, electronic voids seemed to burn holes in her skin.

Eri turned abruptly and left the room. Bodhi waited, watching as the class transitioned to the presentations. The room's attention turned to the presentations quickly. He exhaled, relieved. If even one person had been too interested, his raw response to Eri's appearance would have given away too much.

Eri sat on a bench alone, arms crossed tightly in front of her chest, looking smaller than Bodhi thought was possible. He shut his eyes and turned his face to the sky, willing himself to remain unemotional.

Bodhi sat down beside her. "Sorry about the hug. I have most of the project done. There are a few slides you will need to read from the timeline we worked on. I can send them to your log-in so you can read them before we send them to the class for notes. Make edits." Bodhi cleared his throat, unsure if anything he said would register in her brain, her distant, angry, closed brain.

She paused before answering. "Did you include anything on the timeline concerning pre-Sims education?"

He looked down, trying not to panic. "No." Please, he thought, don't be erratic in your anger.

She paused. "Do you think anyone would have any questions about that?" Her lips met in a thin line, her question crisp.

He looked down, pinching the bridge of his digital nose with his thumb and forefinger. "Only you, I am pretty sure." He turned and trained his hazel eyes on her dark, round eyes, losing himself for a moment in the pools of dark, liquid complexity.

She nodded. "Okay," she said. Then she added, "Your eyes are never blue anymore."

"I…I decided hazel suited me better."

She blinked back tears, turning her head away from him and pushing a button for a simulated laptop, which appeared before her. Bodhi tapped a screen through the Sims machine that allowed him to access his digital files.

"Send me what you have and we can work from there," she said. Her words were stale, like they had sat in her mind for too long.

He typed, accessing files and sending them to her. When he stopped, she was already reading slides.

He watched her, just as he had always watched her. She chewed her bottom lip as she thought, a deeply human trait. The line between real and simulation grew blurry for him when it came to Eri. He had known her for so long, feeling like she was important and interesting and meant for something. And now, seeing her outside of this place, he knew she was those things, and funny and adventurous. It was hard to reconcile in his mind that the image he saw now was not the real her. It was a shadow of her, an imprint of her, and yet it held her voice and, miraculously, her eyes.

"You are staring at me." Eri altered her attention from the laptop to Bodhi's face.

"I am. Busted." Bodhi shrugged. "I missed you."

Eri looked at him, her lips parting in surprise. A hiccup of emotion jumped into her throat.

"I wondered if you were doing okay." Bodhi raised an eyebrow, worry etched into the lines around his eyes.

"Nope," she responded matter-of-factly.

"Nope?"

She sighed. "Look, I know you feel sorry for me. I don't want you to. There are too many other feelings to have that matter more."