Strange Flesh (62 page)

A still I isolated from Billy’s trove of necrotic family videos. The nasty conclusion of the force-feeding episode.

Continuing the theme, the next flower contains one of freelance photo-pharmacist Pete Novak’s least-flattering shots of Blythe in distress.

Her fingers tear violently at the next one: a full nude she let me take of her in perhaps our most tender moment. That’s when she really absorbs the pictures’ message:

You
can’t
trust me. I
will
hurt you.

But the next one puzzles her. A crime scene photo of Billy’s disfigured corpse. An inset zooms in on an exposed fingerprint on the batteries’ throw switch. Blythe raises an eyebrow at me.

“Amazing the police didn’t run down an unidentified print at the crime scene. I guess someone else must have been there when he died . . . Can you account for
your
whereabouts?”

“Tampering with a closed case file? A rather fanciful use of your talents, James.”

“Consider it a tribute. Using a technique I learned from you. You think it’s
fanciful
because you weren’t actually there. You didn’t
do
anything, so you couldn’t have left fingerprints, right? But you did
play a role,
and you
did
leave fingerprints.”

I whip open the last flower for her. This one is not an image, but rather a transcript of my final NOD chat with Billy’s avatar. The words are annotated with interstitial numbers denoting detailed timing metrics on each character as it was typed. Together, those measurements, called “keystroke dynamics,” can be processed for any given person into a behavioral biometric signature. When I worked for Ravelin during college, they made telecommuting employees use an app that periodically verified your identity this way, and it had recorded Blythe’s profile when she sent an email from my laptop. On matching her keyboard signature to Billy’s av, at first I couldn’t believe she’d risk hijacking it herself. But then Blythe probably didn’t even trust McClaren with her most delicate business. Having known Billy from birth, she’d have been the best choice to channel him.

“That’s clearly you, Blythe. Your w’s and s’s are real slow.” I wiggle my left ring finger at her to contrast it with the crooked immobility of hers.

“Hardly proof of anything.”

“No, just evidence. You think anyone might find it interesting that you were impersonating Billy online just after his death, but before you could have known about it?”

She doesn’t make a sound, but her chest rises with a deep breath. She’s mastering herself, suppressing rage. She couldn’t even abide sharing
power with her twin. Now my standing here with this scintilla of leverage must drive her insane. And beyond that, I suppose it will torture her that I found a crack in her masterwork. One that perhaps exposes a structural weakness and portends more cracks to come.

She says, “A very risky move, James.”

“My point is, I’m through playing games. So are you.”

“Oh, but there’s a lot of fun for you and me still to come. You’ll see.” She casually tosses aside my flowers.

I’m surprised she’s insisting on our new partnership. Has Blythe developed the same crush on the Dancers that everyone else did? I suppose to her they’re a trophy of her conquest of Blake, or maybe worse: they’re part of some dark stratagem I can’t yet imagine.

“All I can see is your brothers’ blood on your hands,” I say, “and I don’t want any more on mine.”

I try my best at a penetrating stare. And maybe I do all right, because she meets it for a while as though she’s deciding whether to argue. She pulls on her cigarette, down to its end, and flicks the butt to the street below.

Softly she says, “Maybe you don’t see things as clearly as you think.” Then she starts blowing the smoke directly into my eyes. I try to hold her gaze, thinking that this is some kind of test, but the smoke is too much, and I have to close them. Tears flood forth, and one escapes my left eye.

I’m amazed when I feel her lips catch it, as it trails down my cheek. Her hand at the back of my head, her body pressed close. A hint of her perfume induces a trill of vertigo. She makes a soft sound as she tastes it, like an alcoholic relishing her first sip after a decade of abstinence.

She whispers, “James, can’t we just be friends again?”

Then she kisses me.

Part of me just wants to dissolve into her. But another, newer facet recoils.

She thinks I’m still so easy to seduce?

A year ago, I was deliriously happy to serve Blythe Randall in any way she might name. I delighted in making myself her creature. What she doesn’t realize is that her deposed enemies Billy, Blake, and even Olya have given me a new banner under which to march. I have my own portfolio now, and I will pursue it with all the subtlety and ruthlessness at my disposal, regardless of her belief that she controls it. I am still formally a
pawn, but I feel like one who’s fought his way up the board to the seventh rank, on the precipice of promotion. Like her brother, she sees me as a knave, but I know that in the relentless shuffling play of the days ahead, I’ll come out a king. And I want her to grasp that. To understand how things have changed.

Since that spring day in Cambridge on the steps to her apartment, I’ve often dreamed of once again kissing Blythe Randall. But I never imagined the touch of her lips would ignite a feeling of righteous rage.

I murmur against her teeth, “We were never friends.”

Then my hand that was moving to caress her hair clenches and jerks her head back. My other hand moves to her throat, pressing on her larynx with my thumb. I thrust my tongue into her mouth.

I suppose I was hoping to shock her a little. Force her to take a cautious step back. To say to her:

We can do this, but it won’t be like it was.

But Blythe just makes a low hum of appreciation. She steps into me, pressing her thigh hard between my legs. Then she bites down sharply on my tongue. My whole body convulses tightly with pain, bending her farther back. My teeth ram against her lips. I can feel her sucking, not content with my tears, now trying to taste my blood.

There we remain, locked in a farrago of pain and lust, neither willing to relent. And I know this position will define my life in the coming days.

It feels good.

There are a number of people without whom this book would have remained at the far left of the idea/object continuum.

My family. Your boundless love and support have always amazed me.

Dustin Thomason inspired me to pick up my pen. He is an outstanding writer and a matchless friend.

Better writers than me have written encomiums to Jennifer Joel’s many virtues as an agent, a word to which they tend to append modifiers like “super” and “über.” As a person, she deserves the same prefixes, but to avoid some awkward constructions, I’ll just say that she is simply wonderful.

Whatever meager pleasures this volume holds were coaxed to life by my editor, Sarah Knight. Rendering the dross from a manuscript is supposed to be a painful process, but I must admit I found it a rare pleasure to bask in the glow of her coruscating wit and perspicacity.

I’d also like to thank:

The good people at Simon & Schuster: Jessica Abell, Renata Di Biase, Jonathan Evans, Jonathan Karp, Molly Lindley, Aja Pollock, Richard Rhorer, Kelly Welsh, and Jason Heuer.

My early readers: Clay Ezell, Nick Snyder, Mike Fisher, Adam Hootnick, Sam Brown, John Crouch, and David Kanuth.

The faculty, staff, and students at the Interactive Telecommunications Program at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts.

MICHAEL OLSON
, a Harvard graduate, worked in investment banking and software engineering before earning a master’s degree from NYU’s Interactive Technology Program, where he designed a locomotion interface for virtual environments.
Strange Flesh
is his first novel.

www.strangeflesh.net

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