"What is a Big Change? Oh, you guys broke up? Thought that the pandemic is the chance to be extra romantic, to be together at the end of the world."
She scoffed. "Firstly, the world is not ending. Otherwise, I won't be arsed to gather like-minded people to build Prattle and the business of companionship. Secondly, even if the last person on earth was him, I would prefer to stay alone to spend my last seconds here."
"A complete fuckwit?"
"Broke me, actually. Never mind. About the Big Change, it refers to the whole reorganisation thing of the world. The government, the policymaking, the vaccine project being carried simultaneously in many research centres across the globe."
"So, he travels a lot? I never saw any aeroplanes so far."
"With government covering all expenses, yes. But maybe the jets haven't taken off for months. It's very rare, as only the task force and important people from the government fly. And it's rare, too, as in not many people work in engineering maintenance anymore. Quite risky to have frequent travel for something left for chance."
"Hey, about a couple of days ago, I'm sorry for being such a whiny. I shouldn't have insisted to stay to protect you. It was completely rude to make demands in your own home. I was being a dick."
Sometimes the universe was so funny in setting up events leading up to different people saying sorry's for being rude on the same day.
"Oh, Mark. I understood where you came from." Stephanie didn't have the ground to argue. "One of the tenets of being a Companion is to judge less and listen more. It must be hard for you to know your new friend was in danger, and you were desperate to do something, especially when making a normal friendship is just a pipe dream nowadays."
She almost stumbled in her next words.
"I'm sorry for reacting badly, too. I guess I've forgotten how it felt like to have somebody who actually cares."
She missed Mark's eyes became comically wide.
"That bad, huh? Alright if you don't want to talk about this. You've got a job to do," was all that she heard.
Focusing back on the task at hand, she checked that they had laid out all the ingredients. "Ah, see, we've been dallying for your cooking. Let's start. Stir-fry and its variations are the best for simple and easy dishes. You receive weekly wages, right? Do supply chain people call dibs?"
"Nah. Nobody can do that. We're still at an equal ration. Equal pay. Actually, this is good. But the bosses make me uncomfortable."
"Because they remind you of the penitentiary? Do they treat you differently?"
He shook his head. "No, I'm alright, the structure is still there. But, yeah, I guess it's the type of freedom that I'm after."
"With structure placed by someone else so you only follow?"
He hummed.
"Anything to look forward to about your next adventure?"
"Adventure," his eyes gleamed. "I like it. I'm an old man but I don't know shit about life. Maybe if I see it this way."
"Yeah, man, my mind is always split between being optimistic for the future aka Companions are essential tools for maintaining society, and the other one is I just wanna curl up and reminisce the good old days."
"I heard from the folks that the recidivism was high, y'know. The prison was becoming their home, the place where they could belong. I wanted freedom, too. I was angry at the system, mad with the felons who put me there in the first place. Because I was turning a blind eye to the small business I worked at. Because the youth were told not to ask too many questions. Because ignorance was never bliss, especially if that entailed being taken to a police station and interrogated on heroin."
Stephanie listened in silence, offering necessary murmurs.
Mark continued to wash the cooking utensils while Stephanie adjusted the fire and kept stirring. "After my life screwed me six ways from Sunday with twenty years sentence, other personal relationships crumbled, too. I had nothing. And it wasn't just because. I was stupid, so I . . ."
She didn't know what moved her. But her body leaned forward and her arms inched farther, snaking around his shoulders.
"I'm sorry for all the bad things that happened in your life."
"Is it too selfish to consider this as a new start when billions of others had gone? I'm sorry, I didn't know it was gonna be amidst this pandemic."
She shook her head, her nose grazing the soft shirt that clung to his skin between his neck and shoulder. "If there's one thing we should be thankful for instead, it's the fact that at least one person, you, has something to look forward to every morning. A fresh start."
Stephanie thought she just imagined it. But when thousands of receptors in her skin sang for joy, she couldn't deny it any further. Mark's arms tightened around her slender waist in a friendly gesture, and his head tilted her way. Any inch closer, his lips could brush her hair.
But she felt his body tense up before he pulled away.
"I'm sorry, I keep being a burden for you. No Companion is still necessary to keep me in my lane. I promise I won't be bothering you after today."
"Well, a Companion needs company, too. Please stay."
"But I don't have any money, Steph," he said in a clipped tone as if pain flared inside him.
"What?" She blinked, forcing her eyes to pick something out of the depth in Mark's.
"I— I don't have anything to offer to our friendship. I don't have the money to cook for people like Gema did. Or help with you anything, really, as Val does. You rushed me out when I wanted to protect you from that rebel, but that was the only thing I could do. At least I could fight. Because I don't know anything else to do for you after you've done so much to reinstate me."
"What?" Seemed she lost her eloquence and smooth speeches skills.
"I'm not anyone you'd expect to be on your side. How do people make friends in this world nowadays?"
She pulled away with a frown on her face. Why had she failed to think this way?
Forehead against forehead, they shared the quiet moment, eyes closed, but ears could catch the ticking clock in the background.
"You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here," she murmured. Her breath warmed up the air between them.
"Huh?" Now his eloquent response was heard.
She chuckled, and their foreheads moved apart.
"It's from Desiderata. A poem from the book given by Pak Maryono yesterday. Let me pick it to recite to you."
Hearing the name, he froze. She braced herself, saying, "I chickened out and lied to him that I hadn't heard anything about his son."
She searched for disgust and misplaced trust in his eyes, but she found none.
"Would it be . . . would I have another chance to speak the truth?" she asked.
He knew that it was difficult to leave the chance to fate alone. Firsthand experience of living behind bars while the days went by. Even the monotonous schedule mocked him, saying his life would be just a series of repetitive actions until death. He left it be.
As for Stephanie, it was natural for someone to chase the next physical contact once the first had been comfortable. It grew the yearning she never thought was possible after the Ex. After the guy toppled her wobbling Jenga tower of anxiety and self-deprecation.
She should have been guarded. She should have erected a fortress around her heart this time. A small part of her judging mind should have warned her that Mark's past was a definite red flag to even test the water. But as Mark said, the world might be ending. Or, she might just be yearning to open a new chapter. Sense of urgency, just like putting a countdown on the marketplace sale, always worked anyway.
So, she plopped down on her sofa to read the poetry book together. It was hot that day. The type of hot that even after you took shower you'd still sweat not long after. Stephanie questioned why people still bothered to do so since they'd perspire and get smelly again. But the crisp breeze slipped through the ajar door and two glasses of iced tea wetted her coffee table with condensation.
"You think since I'm a Companion I'm an expert at making friends and small talk. No, I do this because I crave human connections in the first place. I'm sorry I've made you feel that way the other day. Tell me when my words make you uncomfortable, okay? I want you to stay."
He nodded, and Stephanie couldn't be more grateful when his eyes blinked brightness. New hope for him. Having been released when the world he knew it had been upended
The idea about a man out of prison couldn't feel right, but Mark defied that notion.
Maybe she was just crazy after the Drop finally took its toll on her.
Maybe he was her cure.
~*~
Convincing Lila, on her fourth visit, was apparently an arduous task.
"You still accept his behaviour which clearly put you in harm?"
She shook her head more ardently. "I can't just leave him here. Are you crazy? Then he'll be snuffed out of the office! Or what about revenge? He'll seek me out for retaliation, and the wound wouldn't be treatable like the last time."
Stephanie knew. She knew what she fought was the uncertain future where the present was still manageable.
"Lila, please. We'll keep the safe house secret, and we got the blessings from the Department of Wellbeing. We'll keep you safe. You wouldn't have to deal with his explosive anger anymore."
"I . . . can't make up my mind just yet. Could you come back another time to discuss this?"
Stephanie was ready to leave until Lila spewed more words.
"What if I'm not eligible for miracles, Steph? That the magic has expired."
Stephanie huffed in her mind.
"Expired? You think magic and miracles are just some tuna in a can?" Lila was not just a random client, she was the one who started all the investigations leading up to the safe house. But Stephanie couldn't help it if her tone was a bit jumpy in the beginning.
She couldn't offer physical consolation like hugs or reaching for Lila's hand to give a comforting pat because to do that she had to be at a close distance from her; Lila would be assaulted by the rancid odour from her a-day-old shirt which she herself could even smell. Coupled with the hot morning sunlight and fresh sweats, she felt filthy.
"But that's what this life feels like. With what problems, what torture, there's simply no way out! Other people have it together. Young people have it laid out before their eyes, but for old people, desolation."
She was regressing. That was not new in the patients with depression and anxiety. All was bad. The world unforgiving.
"How come? What makes you think you're not eligible for happiness in life, Lila? You can tell me everything and I won't hold it against you," she asked softly. She couldn't believe this stray thought when she was this close to getting Lila away from her abusive husband, but when it rained, it poured.
Lila sobbed and her breath hitched for almost every word.
"The expectations of a woman over 30. It's done. You're expected to get married, have kids and a family of your own, simply disappear from the world. Or if you're a businesswoman, you're somewhere up commanding the tribe, leaving footprints and making an impact. Look at me, I haven't been published anywhere in my entire life and even in this secluded married life I fail."
The seconds passing by between their silence made themselves known with their ticks and tocks.
"For one thing," Stephanie tried to approach this delicately, "your brain is tricking you. It tricks you into thinking that you're not worthy, that life stops at a certain age. Some other books say life begins at thirty or forty. I call nonsense for all. There is no expiration date for miracles in life as long as you're alive. Our rational brain associates miracles with luck. As we grow older, the more ruthless this part becomes towards inexplicable things, so the lesser we see the world with our playful lens. Everything in life feels more mundane, daily tasks become chores, even showering simply reduced to a boring to-do."
She knew it. She didn't choose her words carefully. She just threw them out of her mouth based on recounting, nothing newly devised in her mind on the spot.
"So did I, about the world. This is a part where a psychologist might coax you into positive thinking and find joy in life. But I'm not one and I don't know how. Instead, I'll share the fact that it was always hard for me, too. No shower for days. Only washing face and brushing teeth, could you imagine. Blending fruits for breakfast, lunch, and dinner—sometimes skipped—smoothies. But it ended."
And . . .
"And if it helps, I'll tell you a secret. I met someone new who doesn't belittle my ability or insult my communication skill. Someone who knows I'm here as me and doesn't desire to change me. And not to forget mentioning my current job here, creating jobs for the Immunes and social contact with the Protected. Sometimes a miracle is something you create for yourself."
"But I don't need a new man nor a job like yours. How can I free myself?"
Stephanie would just need to yell and shake Lila's shoulders until her words were stamped on her brain. She wanted to shout why did you invite me over to talk about the transport on this gloomy and wet Thursday morning if you haven't convinced yourself.
But again, Companionship politeness.
So, "Why don't you move into the safe house and you'll see? We're working on a project about a safety net. Protected or Lawless—," she surprised herself mentioning this, "there's no competition over misery. Your problems are valid, and so are theirs. Well, frankly, I want this safety net to encompass everyone under the global government, too, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. The bottom line is the safety net will help you if you want to live on your own."