Friday 11th September

Diary Entry – 20660513

“I have been working for two days now.  And when I say working I really mean it. For years I have sat at some computer terminal, at crammer, at uni, and then at my various job placements, and I always thought that was work.  But I never had to work with my hands before, a few chores around the home excepted; and I cannot begin to tell you how fucking hard it is.

I am picking potatoes out of the still part-frozen ground.  A tractor goes ahead of us, turning the soil and Ben and I scrabble in the freezing dirt for the small marble-sized potatoes.  My back aches every time I bend down and my fingers are bleeding and raw, the dirt is ingrained under my cracking nails.  We have worked all morning, and now that the sun is breaking through the morning sea-mist we are sent home.  Even the farmer is careful to only let us work while the fields are obscured in dense white cloud.  I haven’t heard the familiar whirr of a Polis copter out here, but no-one takes too many chances.

We are rewarded with a bag full of spuds, a cabbage and a couple of eggs each. “Now be on your way” the brutally unkind farmer waves us away, as if he will become contaminated by the scum he considers us.  We trudge the few miles home, tired and worn-out, but happy.  Before we get to our beds Ben has already traded most of his food for a small bottle of hooch, which is a rough and raw spirit made from the very potatoes we have just picked.  He was already swigging it before we got to the hotel.

I hand my little bag of food over to Charlene.  She protests that she cannot have it all, insisting I keep some to trade with. “It’s okay,” I say, “you fed me for the first few days I got here, this is my way of saying thank-you.”

“Don’t think I’ll fuck you though.  Not for just a few spuds and a cabbage.  I don’t know what sort of a girl you think I am, but I ‘aint that cheap.” She retorted.

“Look.  I just wanted to say thank-you.  There’s no ulterior motive here, I can assure you.”  I was amazed how everything was seen as a commodity, to be bought or sold; that old-fashioned kindness was just that.  Old-fashioned – and somehow suspect.

I lay down and slept until woken by the smell of cooking.  Charlene had made a meal and had even managed to boil the eggs in the cabbage water.  It tasted delicious, the potatoes, though tiny were so full of flavour.  We used to eat quite a bit of real food but it never tasted like this; it had probably been sprayed with some anti-bacterial shit and might have been cold-stored for months, who knew?

Later she crept up to my mattress and lay beside me, “Did you like the meal I made?” she asked, cuddling into my back.

“Yes, it was fantastic.  I never realised how wonderful food could taste, especially when you have worked so hard for it.”

“Janek?” she said, “Do you like me?  Do you think I am pretty?” and she opened wide her greeny-grey eyes and looked right into mine.

What could I say?  Compared to Cathy, my wife, she was certainly not pretty, but then my wife went to the gym and the salon twice a week, and had kept her skin tight, her tits pumped up and always wore make-up, even indoors.  Besides though in her fifties like me, she only looked thirty-five at most.  I had no idea how old Charlene was, but she had bags under her eyes and was a bit fat, her teeth were yellow and some were missing, and she had really straggly hair.  Oh, and she smelled.  I suppose I did too, but I had gotten used to my own smell by now.  But Charlene really smelled, she must still have had hair under her arms and no sweat reducing implants, so as she propped herself up on one elbow the waft of her strong body odour was right in my nose.

“Look Charlene, I am….was, married, back in my old life.  And though my wife and I haven’t you know, actually copulated for a few years, I haven’t done that with anyone else either.”

“Oh, so you only like syn-sex, is that it?” she said. “I just thought we might hook up and see how we went for a while.  Would you just like me to suck you, then?”

“I am sure that would be nice, but really I don’t need it.” I said, desperate not to offend her. “And it isn’t that I dig syn that much, in fact it really bores me.  It’s always good I suppose, but like porn before it – it’s always the same.  Besides, I just don’t want to get involved with anyone.  I really don’t know how long I will be staying here.  I am sort-of passing through.  I don’t know where I am really heading, but I don’t think I will be staying here for that long.”

“Okay,” she shrugged and turned her back to me. “But just let me lie next to you for a while.  I just want to feel the warmth of a body next to mine.  I don’t really like sex that much myself; done it with too many shits I s’pose.  You seemed nice, that’s all.  Different.  You’re different from the usual crap that ends up here.”

“Of course you can lay beside me Charlene.  I would really like that.” I lied.  But what did it really cost me, this small gesture of kindness.  And Charlene looked as if she had been through a lot of crap in her life, was kindness such a rare commodity here in two-oh-clickety-click?”