Primal Elements

“Welcome to Perfect Match, version 3.5.”

The voice of the computer faded leaving the spinning logo of the dating service on the screen. A loud chorus of cheers erupted from the small collection of women gathered in the booth.

“You guys are insane,” Jenna laughed and squeezed onto Rhonda’s lap.

“Shut up, jerk, and enjoy your present,” Rhonda said and gave her arm a light shove.

Ruby piped in, “Yeah, jerk, it’s not every day the baby of our group turns thirty.

Now what are our options?”

The holographic face of the host appeared above the viewer. Relief ran through Jenna—thank the gods he hadn’t shown up in person again. It was bad enough having him take her picture for her profile. The prospect of having to spend another minute in that creep’s presence, especially in this cramped space, was nauseating. At least this way she had the pleasure of knowing he was safely three rooms away.

“Ladies, I hope you find the booth spacious.”

“First-rate. Hell, you could put a king-size bed in here,” Rhonda said and rolled her eyes.

“Glad you like it, sweet cheeks.”

The angle at which the holograph hung gave the proprietor a perfect look down the front of their shirts. Rhonda tugged the neckline up half an inch and glared.

Jenna knew this would get ugly fast if she didn’t put a stop to things. Waving her hand in front of his holographic face, Jenna smiled sweetly at him. “How does this thing work?”

The man sniffed before a holographic arm appeared from out of nowhere and hovered above the smooth keypad. His hand began to whip wildly around, pointing out the features.

“Press here to access the database. You’ll be asked a series of questions. Questions and images will be displayed here on the screen. If you lie on the questions the matching system won’t work. And remember the information you enter will be kept confidential.”

“Are you sure you don’t peek?” Michelle asked.

The man laughed, “I can’t even if I wanted to. The database is locked tight with both a hard-coded and soft-coded password. Only the owner has them.”

Somehow, that didn’t completely reassure Jenna. Neither did it seem to reassure 4

Rhonda, who now had her arms crossed firmly over her chest.

“And who’s the owner?” Rhonda asked in a tone that was less than inviting.

The holographic host licked his lips before winking at her. “That’s the million-credit question now, isn’t it? I don’t ask, don’t care as long as I get my paycheck.”

“What do we do when we’re done?” Jenna piped up, not wanting things to get nasty.

The host turned back to Jenna and his slick smile was quickly back in place. “The file saves automatically once you’ve completed the questionnaire. It runs a compatibility test and then you’ll see your perfect match. Any questions?”

“Nope. Bye now!” Rhonda waved.

Jenna tapped the back of her friend’s head. “Settle down.”

“Don’t do that on my account. I like them wild.” The man winked before the holograph disappeared.

“Okay, eww,” Ruby shuddered.

Michelle laughed, “I hope he’s not in the system.”

Ruby smiled. “I bet he is.”

Oh shit.

“I’m out of here,” Jenna said and stood to leave.

Six hands reached out and stopped her escape.

With a groan, Jenna fell back on Rhonda’s lap. “Come on, guys, I was only kidding when I said there wasn’t a man on Mars for me. Don’t make me do this.”

“Too late, it’s too late,” Rhonda said in a singsong voice. “Now let’s get this party started.”

After tapping a few of the keys, she managed to get the program up and running.

“Welcome to Perfect Match home screen,” the computer cooed in a distinctly feminine voice. “To begin your journey to find your ideal mate, please complete the following questionnaire. If you have questions or problems at any time, please contact the proprietor.”

“Fat chance, sister,” Ruby giggled.

The screen popped to life with a slick, interactive questionnaire. Rhonda dramatically cracked her fingers then attacked the keypad. “First off, is your perfect match male or female?”

“Male please,” Jenna said and hung her head, knowing she wasn’t going to get out of this. At least not without inflicting bodily harm on her best friends on the entire planet, and that wasn’t high on her list of things to do.

“Easy enough. Question two is to list the ideal height of your Romeo,” Rhonda rolled her tongue over the r to produce a purr-like sound as she said it.

“Earth plays suck. Especially old ones,” Michelle said and kicked the wall under the vid screen.

5

Ruby turned. “Hey, you have an Earther here. No slams, please.”

Michelle merely smiled.

“Let’s make him tall,” Rhonda typed quickly as she spoke. “I’m thinking around six-two.”

“Smart too. The professor here would get annoyed with a lesser man.” Michelle laughed.

“I would not.” Jenna tried to sound offended, but it was probably true. Not that she was a snob, but she needed a man who could keep up with her when she talked about work. Or at the very least, a man whose eyes wouldn’t glaze over at the mention of terraforming and soil compounds. She sighed as her friends continued to chatter around her. “Look, don’t I get a say in any of this?”

“No,” all three of her friends responded at once.

Jenna rolled her eyes. “Dark hair, please.”

“And blue eyes!”

“No, hazel. She’s always liked hazel.”

“He should be artistic.”

“No, athletic.”

Jenna shook her head at the flurry of adjectives flying around the small booth. She laughed and tried to remember how she’d let the girls talk her into this. Vague memories of lots of homemade booze and a long heart-to-heart chat with Rhonda one night a month ago surfaced. The idea of turning thirty was harder than she cared to admit. It wasn’t the age as much as the fact that she was turning it alone. Her students at the university referred to her as the pathetic professor. She didn’t have much of an urge to take a closer examination at that title. She may have considered herself many things in the past, but pathetic certainly wasn’t one of them.

The chorus of voices grew louder to the point of chaos. There was no holding back her friends once they got going.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Rhonda practically shouted. “Time to describe his libido.”

“Wild man, ready for nonstop sex.” Ruby spoke in a voice that a news anchor would use.

“Adventurous lover, willing to do anything for his partner,” Michelle offered.

“Perfect,” Rhonda said and entered the information.

Jenna shook her head, “Guys, you’re not going to find anyone if you make the profile too specific. Or else it’s going to spit out a weirdo.”

“I’ll do a psych profile on him if you’d like. Free of charge too.” Rhonda waved her hand in the air, as if to dismiss all Jenna’s worries. “Now we need to put in Jenna’s profile.”

“This will be fun,” Ruby said and rubbed her hands together.

“Be nice, it’s my birthday,” Jenna said but couldn’t stop cringing.

6

Ruby poked her, “Remember the thirty red bras hanging in my apartment?”

“And the thirty black teddies?”

“And the thirty thongs?”

“First of all I wasn’t all alone in those little capers,” Jenna said, even through she knew her protests were weak.

“But they were your ideas,” Rhonda added.

Jenna crossed her arms across her chest. “Second of all, lingerie is a little different than this. Can’t you just buy me some leopard-print panties and get it over with?”

The three friends looked silently at each other, smiled and turned back to the screen. Rhonda pushed Jenna off her lap so she could lean in better. Now forced to skirt around to stand behind them, Jenna’s heart raced.

“If you three aren’t nice I’ll go get our charming proprietor. I bet he’d be more than happy to help me out. Come in to fix some imaginary problem with the computer.”

They completely ignored her. Jenna pushed away her growing frustrations and tried to relax into the fun. That’s all it was after all, a bit of fun. She could play along or be miserable about it. What did it matter that the idea of getting back into a serious relationship was the last thing she ever wanted to do as long as she lived? There wasn’t any way this could turn out worse than her last stint in the dating world. Was there?

“Okay, I have smart, tall, blonde hair, female with hazel eyes. What else?” Rhonda said as she tapped her fingers on the smooth datapad.

“Committed, passionate.”

“Loyal, friendly.”

“Good gods, you’re making me sound like a dog,” Jenna groaned.

“Put sexy,” Ruby piped in.

“I am not. Shit, don’t lie to it. The guy will walk out on the date ten minutes after we meet. Sue for false advertising.”

Michelle rolled her eyes. “You are too. The way you wear those stuffy shirts buttoned down to show cleavage. Guys eat that shit up.”

Jenna looked down to check out the cleavage in question. She’d never intended to be sexy, or enticing in any way. Gods, she could just imagine what the university board would say if they thought she was trying to entice her students or colleagues.
Proper
ladies don’t dress this way.

“Okay, here’s what we have. Jenna is a tall blonde woman with hazel eyes. Her educational background is a PhD in environmental studies. Defining traits are loyal, committed, passionate and unintentionally sexy. Now,” Rhonda took a deep breath, “it wants us to write a few lines about your ideal mate.”

“I thought we did that? Someone needs to change the order of this thing.” Michelle threw her hands up.

“No, that was a physical description. Now we need to describe his personality.”

7

“Well, they should have asked for that sooner.”

Rhonda patted Michelle’s arm, “Baby, when you design a mate-matching program, you can write it however you want. Now who’s Jenna’s perfect mate?”

The room went quiet for a minute as the three women stopped to consider. Jenna hated silence and wasn’t one to let others handle her fate.

“Put down, an open communicator, who enjoys socializing, going to the movies and debating political issues.” She said the words quickly and prayed they’d listen.

“Boring. But we can start with that.” Rhonda poised her fingers above the keyboard.

“I know. A mysterious man, who is looking for a woman to unlock his inner beast.”

Ruby giggled.

Rhonda typed frantically. “Better. Think, ladies. Who’s the perfect match for our little Jenna?”

“A quiet music lover, who prefers alone time with his lady rather than socializing,”

Michelle added.

Rhonda laughed. “I love it.”

Jenna rolled her eyes. “You’re not actually going to expect me to go on a date with this person?”

“Hush, I’m clicking next,” laughed Rhonda. “Oh! Time for her sexual match.”

Another round of hoots and laugher filled the room. Jenna’s face was hot and she knew she must be three shades of red by now. This was such a stupid idea.

Ruby spun around in her seat to face Jenna. “What do you want in the bedroom, a tiger or a lump of clay?”

“Lump of clay?”

“You know, a lover you can control and mold to meet your needs. I call them clay,”

Ruby winked.

All of a sudden, the birthday game took on a slightly more serious tone. It’d been so long since she’d been with a man she almost forgot what it was like. The last thing she needed right now was her three best, though slightly demented, friends trying to determine what her sex life needed.

“I want to do this part myself.” The words slipped out, but once said Jenna’s resolve grew.

Michelle shook her head. “No way, we’re doing the—”

Jenna held up her hands and the protests quickly died down. “I promise I’ll treat it seriously and won’t change anything else. But just in case this guy turns out to really be my perfect match, I want to make sure everything is, well, perfect.”

The three women looked at Jenna then at each other. An unspoken agreement was reached between them, and Rhonda nodded.

“If you promise to fill this in and to not change anything, then we’ll step outside the 8

booth. You have five minutes, chickie.”

“Give me ten, I need to think.”

“Fine,” Michelle said with a huff, standing dramatically. “Let’s go.”

It took a few minutes for the gaggle of women to leave the small booth. Once gone, Jenna could suddenly breathe again.

The screen still flashed at the prompt waiting for her to disclose her darkest sexual desires. The butterflies in her stomach tried to take flight as she walked around to sit down in the chair closest to the datapad. She reached out with an unsteady hand and hovered for a moment before she tapped next.