“A network is a bunch of computers connected together.”
“Like, with wires?”
The brewery was particularly gray, not quite dark enough to snap the industrial lights on. Loose printer paper was scattered across the picnic table, covered in coffee rings and bad sharpie-marker pictograms. Keiko on the opposite bench, U.H. beside her, tinkering with a tiny green circuit board and cicada-shell lens small enough to require jeweler’s glasses.
“In the old days it was with wires, yeah,” I told Keiko, “but now it’s usually through wifi.”
“Wifi?”
“Yo, bitch, you don’t know what wifi is?” U.H. knew just enough English to laugh at Keiko’s limited technology knowledge. “You’re like my grandma, Koko. Naw, you’re like my great grandma, ‘cause she’s been dead for 30 years. That’s what you sound like. Like you’ve been dead for 30 years.”
It was too early for this. “She gets it, U.H.,” I grumbled. “Wifi is… the internet.” Not technically accurate, but IEEE 802.11 was above Keiko’s paygrade.
“Oh,” K said. It was not a confidence-inspiring “oh.” When perplexed, she had a habit of messing with her lighter. Nimble fingers thumbed it open and snapped it closed over and over, the golden glint of the serpentine shape constricting around my thoughts. Focus.
With a dramatic sigh, Martina arrived in one of the pantsuits she customarily wore to her “job” on the campaign. This one was some Anne Taylor Loft situation, a shimmery blouse and hunter green jacket with overlong, victorian cuffs. “I just got into these awful clothes and I already can’t wait to get out of them.”
“I can help you with that, Martina,” Keiko answered with a lecherous grin that looked much too much like the face from my dream this morning.
Martina made a show of adjusting the overwrought cuff of her jacket. “I don’t know, Keiko,” she crooned, “there’s an awful lot of buttons.”
“Oh, don't worry,” Keiko said, thumb pressing her lower lip. “I know all about buttons.”
This was normal by now. It was hard to tell if they fed off each other, or if this was some kind of duel. After our strange night out a few weeks ago, I knew there wasn’t more to it, and couldn’t tell if I was happy for the reprieve. In a way, what Keiko and I did felt similar—more rhythm than earnest exchange. I just rebuffed her instead of flirting back. Nevermind the obscene amount of Bikini Kill I’d been listening to lately for absolutely no reason at all. I guess refusal came naturally to me. I never really “got” flirting. The cheap lines Keiko traded with Martina were too silly to take seriously.
With a clack, the door to Lear’s office burst open. He and Cat marched out with drawn faces. “Put on channel six.”
Puzzled, I picked up the remote and punched in the channel number, changing from a security camera feed. Godoy’s melting face came on the screen, smiling his mustache at someone off-camera. They cut to Lear’s ex, Teresa, listening politely in a chair, wearing a cardigan and a knee-length skirt. Behind her was a moody, out-of-focus TV-studio living room.
“And, why choose Valparaíso for the fundraiser when it’s such a left-leaning town? It seems antithetical to your business-oriented agenda.”
“Forward-thinking isn’t exclusive to social issues. I want my campaign to be associated with forward-thinking businesses that can assure economic growth for the country. The new Ek Inc. office in Valparaíso is a perfect emblem of that great step into the future.”
“Maybe your campaign slogan should be Godoy Mañana.”
It earned a hearty laugh from Godoy.
“Why’s she so chummy?” Cat grunted.
“She’s setting him up,” Lear said, arms folded. “Watch.”
“Though that’s quite the opposite sentiment of some people in the city. The Ek building in particular has seen some energized protests.”
“These aren’t protesters, they’re thugs! Take the incident a few months ago, breaking the windows of the building’s lobby, flooding into private property, looting and ransacking! Thank God no one was working in the building yet. Who knows what those criminals would have done to them! It just goes to show President Morena and her cadre of delinquents aren’t interested in maintaining the peace and prosperity of our country. They’re anarchists that don’t follow the laws of God, the laws of marriage, not even the laws of nature. So why would they follow the laws of men?”
“Considering your strong stance on criminal behavior,” Teresa said, “how do you explain your association with certain individuals involved in the benefit? The muralist commissioned to paint the Ek building’s lobby is an ex-con, for example.”
“Well… I’m not involved in the office building’s decorating decisions,” Godoy said with an easy chuckle. “That’s the purview of the Ek corporation. Certainly I don’t approve of any criminal behavior, however, one of the benefits of independent businesses is they can make these decisions themselves, without consulting government officials. They are their own man, as it were.”
“Is it bad that he doesn’t sound totally crazy?” I said.
“He’s making himself more palatable,” Lear said.
“It’ll backfire,” U.H. said, not even looking up from their camera. “His core crazies think nuance is for pussies.”
“You make a good point, however,” Godoy went on, flashing Teresa the most gracious fuck-you face I’d ever seen. “We should hold ourselves to the highest standards, show ourselves to be a shining example to others that we will not tolerate anarchy, and show them that actions have consequences.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. From the muttered, “damnit, Teresa,” under Lear’s breath, he didn’t either.
Truly been dropping the wednesday ball… uhhh have a good weekend 8D;;;
DAMMIT TERESA!!