Chevette looked up at this black guy, his big white grin, all those teeth, a micropore filtration-mask pulled down under his chin, and that was how shed met Samuel Saladin DuPree.
Two days later she saw him again in Union Square, hanging with a bunch of bike messengers. Shed already put messengers down as something to watch for in the city. They had clothes and hair like nobody else, and bikes with neon and light-up wheels, handlebars carved up and over like scorpion-tails. Helmets with little radios built in. Either they were going somewhere fast or they were just goofing, hanging, drinking coffee.
He was standing there with his legs over either side of the cross-tube of his bike, eating half a sandwich. Music was coming out of the black-flecked pink frame, mostly bass, and he was sort of bopping to it. She edged up to get a better look at the bike, how it was made, the intricacy of its brakes and shifters pulling her straight in. Beauty.
Dang he said, around a mouthful of sandwich, dang, my am-phalang. Where did you get those shoes?
They were Skinners, old canvas sneakers, too long for her so shed stuck some paper in the toes.
Here. He handed her the other half of his sandwich. Im full already.
Your bike she said, taking the sandwich.
What about it?
Its its
Like it?
Uh-huh!
He grinned. Sugawara frame, Sugawara rings n railers, Zuni hydraulics. Clean.
I like the wheels Chevette said.
Well he said, thats just flash. Lets some motherfucker see you fore he runs you over, yknow?
Chevette touched the handlebars. Felt that music.
Eat that sandwich he said. Look like you need it.
She did, and she did, and that was how they got to talking.
Shouldering their bikes up the plywood stairs, Chevette telling him about the Japanese girl, how she fell out of that elevator. How she, Chevette, wouldnt even have been at that party if she hadnt been standing right there, right then. Sammy grunting, his Fluoro-Rimz gone dead opal now they werent turning.
Who was it throwing this do, Chev? You think to ask anybody that?
Remembering that Maria. Cody. Said it was Codys party
Sammy Sal stopped, his brows lifting. Huh. Cody Harwood?
She shrugged, the paper bike next to weightless on her shoulder. Dunno.
You know who that is?
No. Reaching the platform, putting the bike down to wheel it.
Thats some serious money. Advertising. Harwood Levine, but that was his father.
Well, I said it was rich. Not paying him much attention.
His fathers company did Millbanks PR, both elections.
But she was activating the recognition-loop now, not bothering with the screamers from Radio Shack. Sammys FluoroRimz pulsed as he set his bike down beside hers. Ill loop it to mine. Be okay here anyway.
Thats what I said Sammy said, last two I lost. He watched her pull the loop out, twist it around his bikes frame, careful of the pink-and-black enamel, and seal it with her thumbprint.
She headed for the yellow lift, glad to see it there, where shed left it, and not at the top of the track. Lets do this thing, okay? Remembering shed meant to buy Skinner some soup from Thai Johnnys wagon, that sweet-sour lemon one he liked.
When shed told Sammy she wanted to mess, wanted her own bike, hed gotten her this little Mexican headset taught you every street of San Francisco. Three days and she had it down, pretty much, even though he said that wasnt like the map in a messengers head. You needed to know buildings, how to get into them, how to act, how to keep your wheels from getting stolen. But when hed taken her in to meet Bunny, that was magic.
Three weeks and shed earned enough to buy her first serious bike. That was magic, too.
Somewhere around then she started hanging out after work with a couple of the other Allied girls, Tami Two and Alice Maybe, and that was how shed wound up at Cognitive Dissidents, that night shed met Lowell.
Nobody locks their door here Sammy said, on the ladder below her, as she lifted the hatch.
Chevette closed her eyes, saw a bunch of cops (whatever that would look like) standing around Skinners room. Opened her eyes and stuck her head up, eyes level with the floor.
Skinner was on his bed, his little television propped on his chest, big old yellow toenails sticking out of holes in his lumpy gray socks. He looked at her over the television.
Hey she said, I brought Sammy. From work. She climbed up, making room for Sammy Sals head and shoulders.
Howdy Sammy Sal said.
Skinner just stared at him, colors from the little screen flicking across his face.
How you doin? Sammy Sal asked, climbing up.
Bring anything to eat? Skinner asked her.
Thai Johnnyll have soup ready in a while she said, moving toward the shelves, the magazines. Dumb-ass thing to say and she knew it, because Johnnys soup was always ready; hed started it years ago and just kept adding to the pot.
How you doin, Mr. Skinner? Sammy Sal stood slightly hunched, feet apart, holding his helmet with both hands, like a boy saying hello to his girlfriends father. He winked at Chevette.
What you winkin at, boy? Skinner shut the set off and snapped its screen shut. Chevette had bought it for him off a container-ship in the Trap. He said he couldnt tell the difference anymore between the programs and the commercials, whatever that meant.
Somethin in my eye, Mr. Skinner Sammy Sal said, his big feet shifting, even more like a nervous boyfriend. Made Chevette want to laugh. She got behind Sammys back and reached in behind the magazines. It was there. Into her pocket.
You ever seen the view from up top here, Sammy? She knew she had this big crazy grin on, and Skinner was staring at it, trying to figure what was happening, but she didnt care. She swung up the ladder to the roof-hatch.
Gosh, no, Chevette, honey. Must be just breathtaking.
Hey Skinner said, as she opened the hatch, whats got into you?
Then she was up and out and into one of the weird pockets of stillness you got up there sometimes. Usually the wind made you want to lie down and hang on, but then there were these patches when nothing moved, dead calm. She heard Sammy Sal coming up the ladder behind her. She had the case out, was moving toward the edge.
Hey he said, lemme see.
She raised the thing, winding up to throw.
He plucked it from her fingers.
Hey!
Shush. Opening it, pulling them out. Huh. Nice ones
Sammy! Reaching for them. He gave her the case instead.
See how you do this now? Opening them, one side-piece in either hand. Left is aus, rights em. Just move em a little. She saw how he was doing it, in the light that spilled up through the hatch from Skinners room. Here. Check it out. He put them on her.
She was facing the city when he did it. Financial district, the Pyramid with its brace on from the Little Grande, the hills behind that. Fuck a duck she said, these towers blooming there, buildings bigger than anything, a stone regular grid of them, marching in from the hills. Each one maybe four blocks at the base, rising straight and featureless to spreading screens like the colander she used to steam vegetables. Then Chinese writing filled the sky. Sammy
She felt him grab her as she lost her balance.
The Chinese writing twisted into English.
SUNFLOWER CORPORATION
Sammy
Huh?
What the fuck is this? Anything she focused on, another label lit the sky, dense patches of technical words she didnt understand.
How should I know he said. Let me see. Reaching for the glasses.
Hey she heard Skinner say, his voice carrying up through the hatch, its Scooter. What you doin back here?
Sammy Sal pulled the glasses off and she was kneeling, looking down through the hatch at that Japanese nerd who came around to see Skinner, the college boy or social worker or whatever he was. But he looked even more lost than usual. He looked scared. And there was somebody with him.