Going Shogun (19 page)

“You were unreal, Brick.”

I think that’s the first time I’ve
ever heard her call me Brick.  I’ve always been Chris to her.  She’s never
bought into my not-so-alter ego.  Nor anybody else’s for that matter.  We
underlings of society, the serfs of everyday servitude, all use these
ridiculous nicknames as a way to step outside of ourselves, as a way to
maintain a miniscule modicum of control over our own lives, as a way to give an
invisible middle finger to The Board.  Where it started, when it started,
nobody knows, but it’s been accepted practice since before I was born. 

My mom goes by Bluebird.  My dad is
Railroad.

Forklift’s real name is Walter.

Bingo’s real name is Ellen.

She’s told me before that it doesn’t
make a difference what people call themselves, or each other, or what they call
her, but she likes the way
Bingo
sounds.  Told me it fits her
personality better, so she stuck with it. 

For her, it’s not about the unspoken
mutiny, it’s about making people feel like they won something whenever they
meet her.  Not because she’s cocky or arrogant, but because she wants them to
associate her with that same sense of joy.  It’s a good attitude to have.  An
easy way to bring sunshine into a stranger’s day.

She says, “I heard what the other
Flo said to you when we were leaving.”

“You did?”

“Well, I caught most of it.  She was
right.  You were brave.”

“
Pffft
.  I almost pissed
myself.”

“I’m serious.  You were.  And you
should
stand up for yourself more often.”

“I haven’t seen you in months.  How
do you know I don’t?”

“Please.”

Her scoff says she knows enough
about me to know it’s the truth.  I don’t stand up for myself.  I might as well
get a tattoo that says WELCOME across my upper back.  But tonight, for that one
moment, I was the guy I’ve always wanted to be. 

I say, “It did feel pretty damn good.”

“I wish you could’ve seen yourself
swaggering through the parking lot.  Confidence looks good on you.”  And then,
changing subjects, she says, “Okay, I know I said I wanted in so I could stick
it to Dorna, back when we were in Elite, and then again after almost dying at
The Minotaur’s place, but all this madness has gone beyond my level of commitment.”

Thank you
. 

She adds, “I’ve been waiting to hear
this all night, and you have about two minutes to explain yourself before I
shower this nastiness off me then fall asleep into next week.  You said it was
fun.  And I’ll say it again. 
Really?
 
Fun
?”

“I thought we were talking about me
being awesome?”

“Dude,” she says, elongating the
word so that it comes out like
Duuuuuuuude
, in feigned frustration.  “Out
with it.  Now.”

“You’re the one that said I should
be more confident.  Tell me again how cool I was.”

I get a light-hearted punch in the shoulder. 
Just enough to let me know I’ve taken it too far.

I pick up where I left off outside. 
“First, sorry about that almost dying thing.  And the blood thing.  And the LX
thing.  And for Forklift being Forklift.  But yeah, aside from all that, before
tonight it was fun.  Is fun.  It’s fun to live in his world.  It’s exhausting,
but he’s a break from The Routine.  I feel like I’m stuck in this hole, and
without him, every day would be the same thing.  I’d work, eat, sleep, rinse
and repeat. 

“If he didn’t drag me on some crazy
adventure every other night, I’d spend my days wondering what it’d be like to
Ascend without any kind of effort, wondering what it would be like to not have
any worries.  And it would suck, doing that every day without any kind of hope
or interruption.  But it’s funny, the guy doesn’t give a shit about anything
but having a good time, and getting laid, and finding the next super cool place
to hang out and it’s easy to piggyback off that type of energy when I can’t
really generate it myself.  He brings...he brings
life
into mine.”

“You look up to him, don’t you?”

“I guess so.  He’s fearless.  Life
is a toy he plays with.  And he’s carefree.  So carefree.”

“
Hah
.  Sounds like he’s your
hero.”

“I wouldn’t go that far.  Maybe he
is.”

That settles for a second, and a
clock I hadn’t noticed is ticking away somewhere in the room with us.

“Here’s what I don’t get, Chris.  If
he’s so carefree and doesn’t give a shit about anything, why is he going
through all of this to Ascend?  If he doesn’t need Ascension to have fun with
life, why bother?”

“He told me this story last night,
while you were asleep on the way to Cat’s, about how his dad never spoke to him
again after he lost his level.  Seems like he feels guilty and wants to make up
for it.”  I leave out the part about him being a genius.  That’s too much to
get into, too much to explain.

“And you believe that?  Breaking and
entering, robbery, selling recipes on an illegal website.  That’s going to
clear his conscience?”

“There are definitely better ways to
do it.”

“I know why
you’re
doing it. 
You’ve always wanted it and you’re desperate.”

Protesting, I say, “I’m not
desperate,” but she knows it’s a lie.  Even I know it’s a blatant lie.

“Whatever, dude.  You give that some
thought while I hit the shower.  I’ll get a pillow and blanket for you when I’m
done, but you could use a ball-rinse too.  You smell like rotten milk,” she
says, patting my thigh.  She groans and pushes herself up from the couch, using
my leg for leverage.  She heads down the hall, and I can’t help but notice how
cute her butt is as she walks away.

I hear Bingo turn the shower on then
listen to her shuffling around in the bathroom.

Her question is significant, and
it’s one that I don’t truly have an answer for.

Thinking back, I remember that I’d
been working at Wishful Thinking for a while before Forklift showed up one day
and filled out an application, and then the next day he was standing beside me,
rolling up silverware before the lunch rush, speaking what sounded like
English, but making no sense whatsoever.  It took me about a week to get to the
point where I could sort of decipher what he was saying, and then about six
more weeks before we started hanging out.  I guess maybe I was the one that was
always talking about Ascending, because I can’t remember him ever bringing it
up.  Not once.  He never said a thing about the need to Ascend.

Don’t get me wrong, he’s
always
talking, but is he ever really
saying
anything?

Me, though, I bet I yammered about getting
out of the 11s for two years straight.  Then a couple of months ago, we were
working a shift together at Wishful Thinking and I was blathering on about
starting my own restaurant and he said something in Forklift-speak that sounded
like he wanted to partner up with me.  I’d told him it’d be cool, that I had a
few bucks saved up, but without Ascending, we’d never have the money to do it. 
He came back a few minutes later and in plain English said, “I’ve got a plan.”

I was so excited and ready to try
anything and yes, desperate, that I said, “I’m in,” as soon as he gave me the
details.  It never occurred to me to question the fact that Ascending is
completely irrelevant and superfluous to All That Is Forklift. 

No matter what his supposed
motivations might be.

All this time, I’ve been operating
under the assumption that it’s something he wanted to do with me, as friends,
since that day. 

I know he’s been acting weird
tonight, but helping out a friend is far more likely than any other ulterior
motives he might have.  Even if he did, what would they be?  It wouldn’t fit
into the Holy Trinity of the Forklift Religion: Sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll.

Pondering it past that point is put
on semi-permanent hold.  As I’m sitting there staring into my lap, wondering
about possibilities, I hear Bingo come back into the living room and she goes,
“Hey.”

I lift my head and—

Super nummy noms.

She’s standing there naked, looking
a little shy but not covering herself in any way, and one detail is immediately
obvious.  What hasn’t been shaved downstairs, what little there is left, has the
same purple-highlights to match the upstairs. 

It’s a nice touch.

With an embarrassed smile, she says,
“I was thinking, you know, the shower’s nice and warm and—”

Dumbfounded, I blurt out, “—and
what?”

“...and I have a few hard to reach
places.”

***

What comes next is lot of hot water,
and soapy washing, and rinsing, and drying off, and then putting things where
they’re supposed to go.

Wait, that sounds like we’re doing
the dishes.

What I mean to say is, sex.

The kind I’ve never had before.  The
kind where there are no wrong moves.  The kind where there are no awkward
moments or toe cramps.  The kind where the mattress has just the right density,
enabling you to reach all the proper angles. 

The kind where it’s okay for the
light to be on, because nobody is ashamed. 

Bingo is fluid, graceful, and
limber.  Her back arches.  Her lips are soft and exploring.

And for once in my life, I’m super
smooth in my super smoothness.  I caress with confidence, touch without
trepidation, manipulate sans malfunction.

We’ve untapped our remaining energy
to experience something that I plan to lock away in my memory bank forever. 
Not in a perverted way, but a complimentary one, and I’ll record it as one of
the greatest moments in my own short history.  Let them teach
that
in a
class.

I flop onto my back, staring at the motionless
ceiling fan above me. 

This changes everything. 

Doesn’t it?

I try to think of something to say
to keep my over-analytical mind from beginning the dissection process and
ruining my afterglow.  I say, “I’d call that a win.”

“That wasn’t just a win,” she says. 
“We took the championship.” 

I laugh, hard, relieved that my
stupid comment was well-received.

She rolls over, puts her head on my
chest.  I watch it rise and fall with every breath I take.  I put my arm around
her, hug her closer. 

It’s all so
right
, so
reachable
.

Bingo has already drifted off.  I
try to time my breathing with the rhythm of hers, to get a stronger sense of
that total
oneness
I’m experiencing between us.

Why now?  Why couldn’t this have
happened months ago?  Before RollerNinja.  Before LX and The Minotaur.  Before
my desperation to Ascend took control of me.

I answer my own question when I
realize that after all the yearning to climb out of my rank, all the desire to move
ever higher, all the wasted days looking up at that apex, that this,
this
is what Contentment feels like.

Chapter
14

I wake up a few hours later, unaccompanied,
to the intermingled smell of real coffee and real waffles.  It must have cost
her a fortune for all the ingredients.  I don’t know what she does for work
now, but the authenticity of both of these lavish delicacies is usually
reserved for special occasions like birthdays and Board-declared holidays. 

I’m famished, remembering that I
never got to eat a bite in
Diner
, but her bed is so comfortable that I
can’t force myself out of it.  All I want to do is lie here awhile. 

Grow roots.  Join it in symbiosis. 
Never leave, yet leave everything behind.

The decisively detrimental effects
of yesterday’s atrocious attempts at Ascension are temporarily forgotten.

The smell of breakfast is too
enticing to stay long.  I get up and put on my contaminated clothes from last
night because I know she won’t have anything here for me to borrow.  It smells
like I’m wearing a garbage can that’s been sitting in the sun too long. 
Frankly, it kind of smells like Forklift’s apartment.

Out in the kitchen, Bingo is
standing in front of the waffle iron, waiting on the timer, wearing nothing but
a tiny t-shirt, naked from the waist down.  I open my mouth to say good
morning, but she takes one look at me, and says, “Oh God no.  Go look in the spare
bedroom.  You can probably fit into some of my dad’s old clothes.  You guys
were about the same size.”

And I obey, making off in the
direction she points, but not without wondering why she said
were
.  Past
tense.

I’m not sure, but I believe she says,
“Wait...” and the rest of it trails off as I walk down the hallway.

The spare bedroom is a bit of a
misnomer.  It doesn’t even have a bed in it. 

One small table is nestled against
the wall and sitting on it is a warped, Cardinal-red piece of metal, about the
size and color of one of Wishful Thinking’s dinner plates.