Feed Read online

  Feed

  By Nicole Grotepas

  Copyright 2012 Nicole Grotepas.

  Kindle Edition

  Cover art: Ace-BGI

  Cover design: Stoker White

  For more information, please visit http://www.nicolegrotepas.com or email the author at [email protected] to receive emails on new releases.

  For Stoker

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 1

  He knew he was being ridiculous. He knew she was only being polite. He knew it was only because he was a client that she was paying any attention to him at all. Clearing his throat again, he tried to not let the silence get to him. She glanced up from the electronic slate on the mahogany desk—she seemed to enjoy the visual references to old things, where Ramone himself preferred the sterile feel of modern glass touch-screen desks.

  “What is it?” Blythe asked.

  “What? Oh, uh, nothing, pardon me. Something caught in my throat,” he said, wiping his hands across the black corduroy of his trousers.

  “It’ll just be a few more minutes, Mr. Ramone,” she said. She was many years his junior—ten, maybe more—with the kind of face that spawned myths about gods and the creation of rivalries between countries; not only that, her mind was an iron trap that sliced to the bone when sprung. Not usually a desirable trait, it was something to admire in a lawyer. So far Ramone had yet to say anything that she didn’t catch onto in a matter of seconds. All his explaining, his inferences, his references to references. She understood his language and therefore, him.

  She was too young for him. Yet he couldn’t help but respond to the electricity he felt when around her. It stirred up a mixture of long dead feelings: that he was alive, that he was young and eternal.

  Before he left for the meeting that morning, he had shaved with a razor and shaving cream in the bathroom rather than his usual halfhearted method—in the car with the electric razor as the car drove itself through clogged morning traffic. He’d taken his time at home, studying his face in the mirror. The eyes staring back were as familiar as ever. It was the deepening creases around his mouth and eyes, the thickening brows, and the changing colors of his skin that he often didn’t recognize. His jet-black hair had collected a good share of gray—he noticed that with chagrin, turning his head to inspect the short-cropped sides. At least he still had his hair. And he wasn’t ugly, by any means. Or was he? He couldn’t say, but he didn’t feel totally repulsed by himself. Ugly people did, didn’t they? He sighed at that, shoulders drooping, and rinsed the razor.

  There was a new light in his eyes that embarrassed him. He’d hummed and whistled intermittently as he shaved, thinking about the younger woman. Sue appeared in the bathroom doorway, staring at him with amusement. A half-smile tugged at her lips.

  “A new crush, Ramone?” she’d asked playfully. The razor had slipped from his fingers, clattering into the sink. She laughed and gave his arm a squeeze. They’d been married twenty-six years—had made it so long by being honest about things like attractions to coworkers and neighbors, the sort of things that crop up from time to time that were harmless when pushed into the light.

  Ramone hadn’t confessed this new interest to Sue yet: he was letting it grow. He thought it might go away. Eventually he’d have to tell her, of course, because Sue meant everything to him.

  He stood with the razor poised by his jaw, listening to Sue chuckle as she went into the kitchen to make coffee. She hadn’t waited for an answer, taking his reaction for a confession.

  He reflected on the morning’s exchange with his wife as he watched Blythe enter notes into her slate. Her brow furrowed for a moment as she concentrated, her bottom lip tucked beneath front teeth, a strand of hair falling loose from its hair-clip and into her eyes. She had no idea how much effort he’d put into preparing for their meeting, he thought, as he rubbed his jaw. Ramone had created something—a machine, though they weren’t speaking of it openly and Ramone himself still found difficulty articulating it, even mentally—and the lawyer was drawing up patent information for him. He was paranoid of the information being extracted and destroyed before the machine even had the chance to breathe. But the lawyer had found a loophole that would protect him. Normally, the company he worked for could appropriate it, because of the non-competition contracts he’d signed eight years ago when they hired him.

  Ramone leaned forward and absentmindedly drummed his fingers on her desk, watching her, feeling his heart racing. Sue didn’t know he’d hired a lawyer. In fact, she knew nothing about his project. It wasn’t that he wanted to go behind her back. It was because of the requirement of secrecy that he’d kept his actions from Sue. The eyes of his company and the Organization were everywhere. He was impotent. His only chance to regain a measure of freedom and privacy depended on the lawyer. It was the only avenue he had left.

  So Ramone went to the lawyer first. He would tell Sue someday, when he knew his plan was going to work.

  “It just keeps getting better, Ramone. Beautiful. I love it,” she looked at him and paused. When she said love her eyes had flickered to his, away from the slate. She looked away again, blossoms of red forming on her cheeks.

  Ramone shifted in the chair, rubbed his palms on his thighs and cleared his throat. He knew his face was red. He pushed his glasses up his nose, only to have them slip down again. “I’ve been thinking about it a long time. I obviously had to code them, but I’ve been making notes for years. The idea developed over time, piece by piece. You should see the mess in my office at home,” he said. He blushed more when he realized he had just invited her to his house. Hadn’t he? “I mean, it’s just that it’s been a long time coming, is all.” He coughed and shifted again when he heard himself say “long time coming.” She would think he was a pervert. Nonsense, he thought, calm down Ramone. People say “long time coming” all the time. Not everything is an innuendo. He laughed awkwardly. She didn’t look up.

  “It will change things . . . for the better. Some of us will think so, at least,” she said, glancing up at him, then back at the document.

  He nodded. “I think so too. Though I worry it will transform into something I didn’t intend.”

  “You can’t control that. And you can’t keep this from the world. The world should have this. You think so too. And you’re right.” She gave him a meaningful look then finished with the document. A quick whirring sound announced that it had been printed. She turned to the cabinets behind her and lifted the papers from the sleek black printer, so odd among the vintage office furniture. “Now,” she said, placing the papers on the desk between the both of them. They smelled chemical and earthy all at once. Paper. Such a fashionably out-of-date thing. She went on, “this flow-chart illustrates the process almost entirely. We only have to summarize a few more elements and make a visual representation, and we’ll be ready to finish your patent.”

  Ramone drew a sharp breath. It was, as she said, beautiful. He had only ever seen an approximation of his idea as coded notes. Here was the process that would free him, laid out before them, stripped and nude, showing off its simple grandeur, representing months of his life—the efforts to which he’d gone to conceal it, the careful planning and execution. He wasn’t one hundred percent sure it would work—he hadn’t even been able to make a working prototype of his idea he was that concerned about knowledge of it le
aking and drawing attention.

  Their eyes met. “I know,” she said when she heard his inhalation. “You should be proud, Ramone. This is . . . gorgeous,” she said almost absently. Ramone’s heart raced.

  “Thank you.” His bones were singing. His muscles were surely vibrating at a thousand different frequencies. Her eyes were swallowing him whole. He thought he could see eternity in their black depths.

  *****

  Marci caressed the slate and the screen flashed alive. Her fingers glided over its pearly surface until she found the desired streaming video. She’d been watching this one for a few days. Only ninety thousand people were watching, but that would change. Marci could feel it. Along the outer rim of the feed, a steady flow of advertisements flashed and changed, a continual stream of content. She ignored them, even the one for a sale on Mediterranean cruises.

  She glanced around the university library—thin shafts of light glittered down through the stained glass windows above the alcove where she sat, but did little to dispel the gloom of the room. The sound of approaching footsteps echoed down the stone floor behind her. She quickly set her slate down and feigned interest in the desk-screen, pretending to be absorbed in the lecture notes she’d pulled up. Soon the librarian passed by, pushing a cart full of heavy books, the wheel of the cart squeaking slightly as it rolled by. As soon as he was gone, Marci slid her slate in front of her again.

  Onscreen a man sat in a high-rise office, nervously drying his palms on corduroy trousers. Across a desk from him sat a woman, several years his junior. Marci watched, summing the man up again, wondering what it was about him that enthralled her. There was something. But what? She bit the tip of her thumb, studying him again. He had a wide, bland mouth like an unintentionally heavy brush stroke pressed across the broad canvas of his face, and dark, graying hair sweeping up from his forehead as though he’d been pushing his hands through it in frustration. Graying! Who let their hair go gray these days? Get some dye, she thought, mentally counseling him on how to upgrade his appearance. He had an awkward half smile, but there wasn’t anything she could do about that except coach him on consciously making it a whole smile. “Both cheeks, now, that’s it, use those facial muscles,” she thought with a grin.

  The something was impossible to pinpoint, Marci thought, nibbling on her other thumb. Maybe it was the intrinsic awkwardness he displayed in all his mannerisms. The way he moved, the way he spoke, the way he struggled to make eye contact with the woman. Once upon a time he might have been hot, she realized, considering all his features again. Once . . . he blushed almost continuously as he interacted with the woman, and licked his lips nervously a few times. She was a lawyer. They could make anyone nervous.

  Nervous. Wow. Who got nervous these days? Everyone was a star! Stars didn’t get nervous.

  Really, if Marci thought about it, there was something honest about him. Ramone, that was his name. And that honesty made Ramone sincerely intriguing for Marci to watch. In addition to that, all the usual stereotypes were at play: the lawyer—the consummate professional; the older man—the socially awkward geek. It was a veritable grocery store romance novel—at least that’s what her mother ranted about when she caught Marci watching the romance feeds, saying they were worse than the paperbacks the grocery stores used to sell. What did her mother know of grocery stores? That’s what Marci asked when Vivian went on about what Marci did during her leisure time. It stopped the tirades, if only momentarily.

  This new affair climbed Marci’s personal top-ten charts quickly to supplant her ex-number one affair (a Trappist monk who violated his vows for a married women who bought ale from the monastery store. The entertainment value dwindled after she left her husband and he confessed to his prior). And truth be told, Marci didn’t just watch the feeds during her leisure time. She managed to sneak her slate into class at the university, at least those in the auditoriums. There were other times when she opted to watch the feeds and shouldn’t, but what was a girl to do? Pay attention to the dry old professors going on about boring subjects that no longer mattered? History? Why should she care about history? The present was so intriguing! At least the present on the feeds. Though, right now nothing was happening between Ramone and the lawyer. Marci almost tuned into her real life, but managed to resist that pointless temptation.

  The stars were sitting in the lawyer’s office. Blythe—that was the woman. Marci laughed when she thought of it. Blythe. It was too perfect, really. The most accurate name she could think up for an uptight lawyer—and here Blythe was, being unraveled by the geek with the patent.

  Of course, Marci only knew it was a patent because they’d talked about it. She just didn’t know what kind of patent it was—neither of them were giving any details away and the feed itself naturally blurred out details like that. There were rules, apparently, not that Marci paid too much attention to what they were, but somehow the corporations who supported and advertised for the Epic Romances and Steamy Affairs Video Feeds insisted that certain aspects of the real world were off limits, like identity information, social security numbers and things that could compromise people or hurt them. For all Marci cared. She’d never seen anything that she wanted to steal. Of course, she wasn’t poor. And even though it would be nice to live in a gorgeous house with a beach-view—the reward for getting to level five on the Upgrade Your Life feed incentive program—she didn’t need the handouts that went with feed stardom.

  She frowned at her slate, watching the interplay between the characters. Marci couldn’t tell what Blythe was feeling. Her face was too stoic, too unmoving, too cold sometimes. Marci had always fancied herself skilled at reading faces, it was part of her upbringing and all that irritating politicking and diplomacy she had to endure at the merciless grasp of her wealthy parents. Manipulating mom and dad had become second nature—their faces always gave them away. So far, the only feature Blythe allowed to speak, aside from her voice, was her eyes. Her mouth, her eyebrows, and the way she held her head always stayed the same.

  Marci looked around again, leaning out into the corridor where the librarian had passed a few minute ago. Was he coming back? There was no sign of him. She let the desk-screen time-out with its lecture notes from business ethics class, nestled into her chair, and huddled closer to her slate.

  So much for studying.

  Ramone said something, running his hands over his thighs repeatedly like he was sweating; Blythe responded, and her cheeks colored a little. Normally Blythe’s complexion was pale and smooth like white marble.

  Marci yelped at seeing Blythe blush. Finally! she thought, hoping the ball would get rolling at last, though also wishing in some way that the climax of this story would stretch out, adding to the tension. Tension always paid off. Crescendos were more pleasing with a good build up. She’d learned that much from being a student of the feeds.

  Marci fumbled to attach her ear-buds, again glancing around the alcove and stacks beside it. Beneath the smell of book must, there was the acrid odor of wood polish hanging over the cavernous library like a cloud. She scanned the room, feeling the eyes of the setting cameras on her. Not her specifically, necessarily, just everyone. And she was part of that, as she was in the room. No one was watching her, were they? At least, no humans? No, they were all immersed in their studies, not even registering her inappropriate vocalization, hiding in the lit alcoves along the nave of the library on the edges of the stacks of shelves. Libraries just weren’t catching on that no one cared for books anymore, she thought with a disapproving click of her tongue. At least they’d updated their desks. Not that Marci was using hers to study at the moment.

  Glancing back at her slate, Marci got herself plugged in just in time to hear Blythe tell Ramone his project was gorgeous. The electricity between them could have fried Marci’s fingertips where she touched the slate.

  A cloud of butterflies exploded in her stomach. Her fingers tingled. She felt like she was floating. The camera panned back to show the old guy’s face, his ey
es, his hand as it brushed through his graying hair—he really was too old for the lawyer chick. “Thank you,” he muttered.

  “Thank you?” Marci said aloud, not even realizing she’d spoken. “Kiss her, you jerk!” She pulled the slate close to her face, trying to get through to him.

  “Shhhh!” a voice said beside her. Marci glanced up, stomach lurching in surprise. It was the young librarian—probably a student—on his way back to the main floor from the deep end of the stacks. He shook his head and gave her a disapproving stare. At least he didn’t kick her out, she thought, cowering in her seat. He pushed on and Marci turned back to her slate.

  Nothing happened. Blythe tore her eyes from Ramone’s gaze and went on, discussing the particulars of whatever boring patent they were working on. Marci continued to watch, listening to each word for double meaning, innuendo, or anything that would betray their real feelings. She knew it would go somewhere, otherwise the Editors at Epic Romances and Steamy Affairs wouldn’t have picked it for the on-the-fly editing, the filters, and montage music they’d thrown on top of it. They had faith something would happen here. And Marci did too. It was inevitable. It was the formula. Throw the right chemistry between two people into the perfect setting and there was no way you’d not get the Epic Affair. Or Romance. Blythe was married, and so was Ramone, unfortunately, but that just gave the romance angle more heat. It was the way the world worked.

  *****

  “You dirty bastard,” Ghosteye said with a smile, the sound of his voice disappearing quickly into the angled, blue walls and the dark brown baffles of the studio. It was soundproof, cold (for all the machinery), and carefully constructed with angles that funneled sound quickly in directions that prevented echoes. Ghosteye squinted at the large screens in front of him. Even with the muted track lighting, his vision tired after so many hours.