Read Online Pills and Starships by Lydia Millet - Free Book Online Page B

orange-and-white clown fish and even those things that look like insects again, big insects wearing body armor.
    And then the last thing was the whales returning: a pod of them, you call it, swimming toward the underwater camera. A whole family of whales, singing their mournful songs. And then they swam away from us again, getting smaller and smaller until they disappeared into the dark.
    The lights went up a little after the whales were gone, though it was still pretty dim, and the mermaids and seals silently sank back beneath the water of the pool. Sam and I saw that our mom was crying, and then we saw that this time our dad was too—not making any noise, just silent, big tears running down his cheeks and into his mouth. Of course, because of the pharma both of them were also still beaming . They smiled and smiled and tears ran down their cheeks and dripped right off their chins.
    I was—well, I’d never felt that way before. Overwhelmed. I’d seen some of the old footage on face, but it’s so different on that scale—it’s personalized and miniature, it’s cutely enclosed in the colorful frames you’ve chosen for your browse experience—and somehow you feel superior to it, like it’s a snapshot or a fairy story.
    But this was huge and real.
    And then, of course, it’s not real after all, being just ancient history, with nothing left. Ghosts filling the room, a world of amazing and mysterious ghosts.
    So Sam and I were blown away, just sitting there blasted and in a daze. At the same time I was thinking—for Mom and Dad, and the pain of their memories—what are these corps doing? Are they, like, torturing them?
    Because it was bittersweet and shit, I got that, no kidding. But it also seemed like a knife twist in a wound.

    We have a family field trip in the afternoon. Before that, a few minutes from now, Sam and I have our Survivor Orient, where we go to a special session with some other future survivors of this week’s contracts.
    I’ve got my beige robe on already and am just waiting to go. Like with the family therapy, they make us all dress the same; no makeup or other decorations. We are survivors and loved ones, joined in togetherness of being , says the handbook in my Coping Kit. Dressing for impressing is not how we are striving, in this together-time. We are simply being, deeply authentic and without appearance divisions .
    Sam just went back into his room to dress in his own robe, but before that he was in the living room for a while, talking to me. He decided not to take any moodpharms this morning. He says he wants to be “perfectly lucid,” is how he put it.
    “But you’re supposed to take the minimum dose , at least,” I protested. “You know you are. Mom and Dad need you to.”
    “Nat. It’s my decision. I’m not gonna be spaced out while this is happening,” he said, standing in my doorway.
    Our parents had finished their daily cliffwalk by this time and were in a couples prep session titled “Bountiful Passing.”
    “Okay,” I said. “So yeah, it’s up to you. But I have a right to say what I think about it. Are you going to give Mom and Dad a harder time, if you don’t take a basic dose? Because this is, like, their time. It’s their last week, not ours. It has to be about them .”
    “I have to be honest, Nat. I can’t make any promises.”
    “But Sam,” I replied, more and more annoyed, “they’re already doing something so hard! And you’re going to make it even harder on them?”
    “Don’t be a brainwash, Nat. They’re taking the easy way out. Something so hard? Bullshit. They’re doing exactly what the corps want them to do.”
    “That doesn’t mean it isn’t hard for them.”
    “It should be hard. Because it’s wrong, and it’s cowardly, and it’s completely fucked.”
    We were looking at each other right in the eye, which we don’t do that much since, I don’t know—maybe since Sam hit puberty. He started getting all shifty around when he turned