She guesses. “Bhanu must have helped far more than my lessons.”
He beams. “Yes, he’ll be helping my wife too. But your lessons did so much for us! When I have my first pay, I’ll contact you.”
A given that she will want to be repaid, that she needs the money as much as he, or at least that she’s as greedy as Bhanu. A cut for everyone to whom one owes any measure of debt, so that in the end one may be free. “It’s no hurry.” Even so the promised compensation must be substantial or he would not have offered. Compensation as substantial as what Atam will transmit to her account, after the ribbon-fish intermediary has taken their percentage.
She studies him. Someone has polished him to a high gloss, without much regard for personal style. His lips are pastel blue, a point of jade dabbed beneath the cupid’s bow. Ivory qipao, brass bracelets. It is not pleasant to look at but it is polish, and she does not think it is due to his caseworker’s generosity. Wyomere inhabitants descended from exiles who prioritized their phenotypic purity above practical concerns. Like the rest of them, Rachel is naturally frail, with eyes like stained methane and hair the yellow of dead grass. A phenotype extinct on Anatta, and perhaps the client finds Rachel novel enough to warrant a high price. It may be the same sort of job Ovuha has just come away from. It may be quite something else.
“I wish you good fortune,” she says, after a moment. “You and your family.”
He nods, ringlets bobbing. “And we wish you the same. Oh!” His breath catches; she follows his gaze.
A double rainbow high in the sky, curving along the ground. It is artifice, but Ovuha murmurs, “A sign of good auspice.”
To a citizen. Good fortune, as with much else, is a privilege of those who deserve.
She would not see Rachel again until the broadcast that night.
In climax Vipada sounds bovine, the grunt through her teeth, the low shout from the back of her throat: a rutting bull, a tortured cow. Perhaps to Vipada’s other lovers this is arousing—the abandon, the unfiltered noise—but Suzhen decides that she’s not going to sleep with the actor again. Not that this time was a premeditated act or even something Suzhen was hoping for; Vipada invited her home for a drink, they kissed, and why not. Why not, Suzhen suspects, is a good reason to try a new cocktail or culinary novelty, but not necessarily sex with someone to whom she feels no real attraction.
Suzhen disentangles herself from between Vipada’s legs, wiping her mouth. Her jaw aches. At least Vipada tastes pleasant, clean. She tries not to think how much she would rather be in Taheen’s arms, enjoying the warmth of their palm on her jaw, the weight of their hand on her belly. Those hard lines of their muscles bunching and flexing against her skin.
The actor looks up at her through half-lidded eyes, her breathing harsh, her mouth parted. “That was very nice.”
“Thank you.” There doesn’t seem to be anything else to say.
“I’ve got interesting virtuality programs we could share. Or you could let me return the favor manually,” Vipada drawls, in a tone that makes it clear she has no such intention.
Not that Suzhen wants her to. Somewhere between foreplay and Vipada fingering her perfunctorily she’s been drained of all desire, the act has turned mechanical. “No, it’s fine.”
Vipada’s bathroom is a study in opulence, the ceiling panels done in clusters of pomegranates, the marble floor venting essential oils in low, perfumed clouds. Suzhen stands in front of a mirror and turns on a cool shower. She cups the water in her hands, watches it drip down between her breasts, and slowly touches herself. But her imagination comes up short in supplying her with an ideal lover, and she’s not in the place or time to virtualize. She gets clean. In the corner there is an immense metal apple that mixes body oils for her; she chooses orange and port wine.
“You smell so pretty,” Vipada says when she emerges. The actor is still in bed, nestled in ermines. Even her bedsheets, like all her furniture, seem selected to enhance her. The white and the red to compliment the deep honey of her skin. “Anything catching your fancy in the liquor cabinet? Help yourself.”
It is easy, Suzhen supposes, for Vipada to be magnanimous with things that cost her no effort to dispense: liquor, toiletries, money. Not sexual reciprocation. Perhaps it is a matter of occupationally induced narcissism. Someone who takes on the robes of divinity, the mantles of warlords and monarchs onstage, and so accustomed to rapt attention—Vipada’s body is an object of worship. And a deity who receives tribute does not return it in kind; gods take, not give. Suzhen thinks inevitably of Samsara as she asks the drone to make her a drink. Even Vipada’s domestic unit is a cut above, its veneer nacreous, its face charmingly made. It curtsies.
“So how is your work?”
Suzhen swirls her glass of cream-topped, liquor-thickened coffee. “I’m thinking of quitting.” This comes out before she can stop herself. Vipada is the last person in whom she would confide. The thought is that much at the forefront, coiled to spring free.
Vipada sits upright. “But why?”
It astounds her, to be asked such a question. In a tone of such surprise. Surely the potential burnout—and the rates are high at the Bureau, save for careerists like Nattharat who are unburdened by conscience—must be obvious. Her mentor. His funeral. “A lot of us do.” She sips the coffee, inhaling deeply. Exquisite, as expected of anything Vipada owns. It galvanizes her to honesty. “The Bureau is a system. We’re functions. Drones would do the work I do just as well, more efficiently. There’s no reason for me to be there.”
“It’s humanitarian work, Suzhen. Having human faces is the point. How can a new arrival feel safe interacting with a drone?”
Safer by far than interacting with humans—the camp wardens, the Interior Defense officers. The face of Anatta punishment is human more than it is Samsara. She doesn’t say this. She doesn’t say, How fucking dare you when you don’t know anything. “That may be. I’m not doing anything meaningful and I’m exhausted.” Suzhen swallows another mouthful. So gorgeously made, so cold. How much simpler it is to enjoy a drink; how much simpler it would be to enjoy this as abstract discussion, one that has nothing to do with visceral experience and everything to do with intellectual experiments. “I’m exhausted.”
The domestic unit glides into the bedroom, bearing a bowl of sesame-dusted, sautéed jellyfish. It seems a heavy post-coital snack, especially when Vipada did none of the work, though Suzhen knows she’s being petty.
The actor purses her lips. “I’m not going to convince you to stay there if it makes you unhappy—I’m not your superior or any such thing—but potentiates you helped would say your work’s meaningful. Taheen told me a little and, how do I put this, I suspect not every caseworker is like you.”
Such absolute, shameless manipulation. Suzhen imagines putting on her clothes, walking out. That would not be so difficult. “It is a process,” she says slowly, “in which I no longer wish to participate.” Much like fucking Vipada.
She returns to the domestic unit, asks for a mooncake—she might as well take advantage while she still can, almost a gesture of defiance. The actor follows her into the parlor, half-wrapped in a mauve robe, arms crossed. “It’s not my business,” Vipada begins. “I don’t want to overstep anything.”
“I’m sure you wouldn’t.” The mooncake is served, cut in thin slices. She samples one. Velvety filling—pandan custard and lotus seed, mixed just right—and hot enough to scald going down.
“And I didn’t mean to sour things between us.”
“The mooncake’s fantastic.” A connection request from Ovuha, which doesn’t seem like her. Nevertheless Suzhen appreciates the rescue. “I’ve got to take this call. It’s work. Do you mind?”