The Girl Who Chases the Wind

Chapter 16: Aura

After the books, she wound her way over to some of my other collections. There were games which even she was familiar with, noting bluntly, “They sucked.” She added, “Still worth it though” with a nostalgic grin. At each turn, I had classic images, cards, or artifacts to show her which were among my better kept and cared for possessions. Not a peep from me about those records though.  

At a certain point, she gave me a wry look and said, “You know, when I called you a hipster, I didn’t realize you actually were one.” We exchanged looks at that, and I told her, “And I didn’t realize you were really afraid.”

She snorted and found a spot to sit on the couch which wasn’t cluttered. “I thought you’d just get annoyed and go away.”

“You were far too interesting a mystery for that.”

She rested against the cushions. “I’m just a stupid old man.”

I couldn’t resist resting against her there. She was solid and firm, with a faint smell which seemed more like she’d picked it up from the upholstery than produced it herself but wavered in my embrace. I was gurgling with hunger. Her stomach was mute. I thought of an old movie where a synthetic human tried to eat, and they began to break. I put this question before Greenie.

She shook her head, “I don’t know quite how it works, but I’m able to eat and keep food. The Memetic Crystalline is involved in how I’m able to move, but food isn’t necessary. It can even take a fair amount of energy for my body to process it. Still, I suppose I wouldn’t mind going somewhere with you to eat…”  

I had a couple choices in mind. Greenie had suspicious questions about each, mostly the sort my parents would ask when I proposed treating them to somewhere and they wondered first about whether anything would be good and furthermore about how much it would cost me. This was before I became a regular article writer…

The article. With everything I knew now, it seemed ridiculous, but the idea had morphed into something different. I could’ve sold off what I knew of Feldon’s work and Greenie’s existence to the highest bidder and found my way to countless web broadcasts. But the thought wasn’t a serious one. For the moment. If it turned out that I wasn’t a Feldon, then I had some big choices to make. Was it right for me to share these kinds of secrets? What would happen to the ranch? What would happen to those children?

I let out a slow breath and offered up a steak place I liked. Nothing so hipster as an all-natural café or a synthetic meat bistro. Just the same, ordinary steakhouse which had hung on through several ebbs and flows of fashion diets and medical opinions.  

Greenie had no complaints about that but noted, gesturing to her clothes, “So long as there’s no dress code…”

My eyes widened. I’d nearly forgotten. One thing I had in mind for this excursion to kill a little time was to take her shopping. It was a nice idea. But, at the same time, my sense of fashion focused on how to mold a boyish shape with an outfit and how to get a suit to look nicely androgynous. With Greenie, something more feminine was called for. I just had no idea how to go about it.

Fortunately, I had an expert I knew when it came to fashion and, while she mentored me about men’s clothing, I felt she would be clever enough to do interesting things with Greenie. Her store was just off the main road but still technically on our way for the return trip, with the steakhouse just beyond it.  

I had a moment to ponder all this before Greenie’s suspicious expression set in and I had to say something. I assured her that I had a plan. She promptly pointed out, “That’s not what worries me…” I leaned in close with a curious look.

She shook her head and muttered, “Restroom?” I raised an eyebrow but pointed it out to her around a corner. I spent the time she was away wondering what I’d wondered about before, specifically how she maintained her internal fluid levels. I’d wondered the same thing when my parents got me a doll early on and I was curious about how it got a wet diaper and cried. I wound up dissecting it and taking notes. My parents were annoyed.

However, the prospect of dressing up Greenie/Mari, my possible granddad, in all sorts of creative ways blazed through and over all those silly dolls. She kept the same sense of wariness when she returned with water dripping off her fingernails.

I noticed she seemed to dry slowly as her palms still appeared moist when we arrived at the clothing store. It was rather humid, even with the skies clearing. Still, my hands would’ve dried a long time ago. Something to consider amidst all the clues. I wouldn’t dream of taking Mari apart though.

My friend met us, eager and delighted to see me. We chatted a bit before I introduced Greenie.

“This is a relative…possible relative. Complicated. We’re having a day out. Got anything I’d never wear in a million years on a dare?”

She was dressed in a paint-spatter purple outfit with complimentary khakis. Mari fussed as she instructed her to turn and shift in her track/athletics-friendly outfit. I recognized the fact I was wearing the most androgynous, form-occluding getup possible as I was lining her up for whatever my friend fired at her.

I camped on a doughnut couch made of stuffed denim and vinyl. She led Mari away for measurements while I slumped back and caught an upside-down look at the kind of dresses my mother forced on me. I sighed awkwardly and clasped the back of my neck. My phone was in the car. It wasn’t a weekend, so they wouldn’t be expecting a call. Not that I wanted to call. I was thinking about asking them. I figured I’d be able to hear them lying to me over the line, if they were. But my phone was in the car and I didn’t want to get up.

Mari returned soon after in a green and black floral dress which cinched close around her legs, hugged her shoulders, and gave her a nervous shuffle. I thought it went well with her hair. She said nothing and fussed with the narrow cut around her neck. My friend flashed me a look, but I held my tongue. The material was an altered substance that merely looked and felt like polyester.

Moving gingerly, Mari kept brushing down the bottom of the hem, not pleased with its length. My friend resorted to full gesticulating as Mari found her way to a mirror. I casually closed the distance and looked her up and down before turning my attention to my friend. She lied, “I have something…special order for…Logan…be just a moment.”

That didn’t alarm Mari as she seemed too preoccupied with taming the dress. We walked into the back room. Knowing Mari probably had good hearing along with vision, I urged my friend into a room further back and closed the door.

“She has no nipples…”

That’s what she said first and all I really needed to know. Her eyes widened as she added, “And I didn’t see any scars or anything. What’s going on?”

I massaged the back of my neck and told her, “I trust you with my secrets. Who I am and what I feel…” She gave me an eager affirmation. I sighed.

“Well, I’m trusted with her secrets about who she is and the complicated things in her life.” It felt weird to be on the same ground I wanted to challenge yesterday. I knew she wanted to pry and perturb the same secrets I’d sought out. I sometimes even found her as persistent as me, especially when I first laid my personal history bare before her over late evenings in the store.

I kept my gaze steady and my mouth tucked seriously around its corners. She inspected me and let her head droop. She would accept that but had a question for me as well, “She doesn’t seem to like the girly stuff any more than you do, so why put her in it?”

It was the same question I couldn’t answer. I said, “I just want her to try it on. She’s never really experienced it. Oh….actually….idea.” It was an idea, a better idea than stumbling through whatever my friend could put together. I rushed out to Mari and asked, “What would Aura wear?”

She’d curled up before a mirror, as though trying to diminish her reflection in it. Turning towards me, she said, “Let me look…”

Some of her choices felt like glimpses I’d seen in the photos of a perhaps-sibling. She didn’t look at the clothing as if it was an ordeal but rather a memory. She even smiled as her hand drifted across a bit of glossy cloth.

What she wound up with was an assortment of clothes not too far removed from what she’d been wearing out and around the track but subtly tweaked with little accents which showed personality and joy. She still glared at some of the clothes.

While glossy and slim, her pants would’ve gotten the approval of any of the teenage girls I interviewed for a story a while back. But then I'd always found teenage girls terrifying and that story did nothing to alleviate that feeling.

What she came out wearing was nearly monochrome but for some pale-lime tinting to compliment her hair. It would be suitable for dinner. I paid for some extra stuff as I promised to my friend in private moments that I would explain someday, in some way, especially if it turned out I was a Feldon.

What Greenie had on would’ve been horrifying for me to wear because of how much it traced and implied. I could tell she had the same misgivings but admitted more than once that Aura would wear it, so she did as well.

The restaurant was busier than I hoped but not so bad I wanted to reconsider. Greenie didn’t seem particularly impressed by the looming, log cabin lobby and faux plants everywhere. A hostess led us around to the back of the main dining hall with a cozy and secluded booth. Menus were already at the end of the table and I passed one to Greenie.

She flipped through it as she brushed back her hair. After a quick look, she put it down. I raised my eyebrows and flipped a couple of pages myself as I said, “There were a couple of things I could’ve made at home but not with the stuff I have in my fridge.” Which included bottles of juice, old Chinese food, and some crackers which didn’t really belong there.

Pressing her wrists against the menu, Greenie shrugged and noted, “It doesn’t matter.”

This place had fake meat for a while as a “healthy choices” option. It didn’t work out for them. Despite the premium, people still wanted meat, no matter how much it constantly added to the advancing horrors of the global climate. I was one of them, even after several articles I’d written.

But my mind was on Greenie. I set my own menu aside and asked her something which had been brewing for a while, “Is it because they haven’t figured out how to make taste work properly either?”

She settled into the cushion on her side and folded her arms. “Pretty much. It’s highly diminished. A lot of feelings are.”

With wide eyes, it clicked for me. Of course. I kept asking questions, “You mean…they nullify sensations…but why?”

Rubbing at her neck, she said, “I’m a test case. Same with Lily. Still gotta figure it out. Lily had a moment when it was first done, when the crystal was fresh. She woke up screaming because the air on her skin felt like a blazing flame. It’s a slow process of introduction and adaptation. Fortunately, our bodies aren’t as noisy or complicated as real ones.”

When the server came with her curly-cropped brown hair and tight grin, I only asked for water before sending her away for more time. I persisted, “So, you can’t taste anything?”

She gave a half-shrug. “I remember tastes, so it’s easy to fill in the gaps. All I get is the consistency. Lily tries to supplement it with harsh flavors, so she has something.”

That explained the weird, terrible flavors of cake. Like turning up music to the highest volume because someone can barely hear it. I assumed sounds were something which had been fixed already, since they didn’t seem to have a problem with that.

Greenie confirmed this with a bob of her head, noting, “Priority of sensations. Taste and smell are nuanced, subjective, and not critical when you’re a synthetic slab of tissue and crystal.  

I inquired, “You’re not interested in trying extreme flavors to see if you’ll get anything?”

She glanced down at the menu. “I have therapy sessions. Lily’s made holes in her throat…so that’s not the best way. But they can’t stop her any more than they can stop me from running.”

I thought about her running form, pounding the ground like she wanted to crush it. Running so fast she could and did fly apart. I leaned forward and asked, “Do you run so hard because Aura never could or because you want to feel it again?”

She pulled her jaw in tight and whispered, “That’s not a question you get to ask me….not yet.”

I put my hands up and acknowledged, “I know…no idea if we’re family and it’s a touchy subject…”

Greenie shook her head. “Good point but those aren’t my reasons.”