“Because you can’t help yourself. Because you do it all the time. You remembered the model.”
“That’s nothing. You don’t see a lot of Cadotas on the street. They’re about as rare around here as a Rolls.”
Eric turned suddenly and grabbed his friend’s shoulder. His expression was grim.
“Come on, Charlie. You got that ID, didn’t you?”
“Hey, take it easy, buddy.” Eric relaxed his grip.
“I would have noted it myself, but I was looking at the girl and I didn’t see anything else after I saw her face.” Charlie adjusted his sleeve. “I might have seen it briefly, I suppose. Part of it, anyway.”
“Come on, don’t make me wheedle it out of you.” When Charlie continued to look reluctant, Eric sat back in his seat and raised a hand. “I promise I won’t go off the deep end with this.”
“So far you’re doing a lousy job of convincing me of that. What the hell would you do with an ID number? You’re no cop, and the police sure aren’t going to supply you with any information. I think you’ve got a bad case of optolok.”
“Just give me the ID number … buddy.”
“Okay. Arizona plate LEF 46672. You’d think a Cadota would have a customized number engraved.”
“Thanks, Charlie. Thanks a million.” Eric’s fingers danced over the transmitter on his right wrist. The computer remote obediently entered the information via public line into his home terminal. Only when that was completed did he relax again.
Sick, Charlie thought to himself. He’s got it real bad, whatever it is. Then he shrugged mentally. Not my problem. He’ll probably come to his senses after a good night’s sleep. Eric was too sensible to go phantom-hunting. Besides, he’d be in Hong Kong next week. Let him play with it for a couple of days. What was the harm if he wanted to pretend he was the hero in some flashy opto serial? He had about as much chance of running down his lady-in-the-night as either of them did of being promoted tomorrow to senior vice-president.
It was a harmless obsession. Charlie had his own. Eric could be relentless in pursuit of something he wanted, but he wasn’t blatant about it, Charlie knew. He was a good friend, always ready with a surprising observation, always ready to laugh at another’s jokes. He wasn’t threatening, never tried to dominate a party or conversation. And if the prettier half of a double date preferred him, that was okay with Charlie. He wasn’t overly ambitious. No mysterious beauties for him. He was quite content to restrict his obsessions to the clerical pool at Selvem.
The tube car slowed as a mellifluous female voice spoke through an overhead speaker. “We are approaching New River Station One.”
Several minutes later it was New River Two, then New River Three and “Last call for New River; next stop Camp Verde.”
Charlie and Eric detubed. Parked beneath the canopied landing were several sizes of all-terrain scoots. Charlie chucked his briefcase into the stern compartment of his own transportation, strapped on helmet and goggles, mounted the foreseat, and revved the electric motor.
“See you in the morning, buddy.”
“As usual,” Eric assured him with a wink, checking the charge on his own scoot.
They departed in opposite directions, Eric climbing toward his small hilltop home, Charlie buzzing downward to the sprawling singles-only codo complex that paralleled the dry arroyo.
As he hummed along, Eric considered his friend. Charlie was brash and often overbearing, but rarely obnoxious. And despite his tough front he was clearly concerned. Hard to fault him for that.
I’ll just have to hide it, he thought. It wouldn’t do to have Charlie worried about him. How could he confess that the face so briefly seen tonight had overwhelmed him and pushed every other concern so far into the background as to be unnoticeable? Towers and restaurants, pedestrians and potential muggers, traffic and business and Gabriella’s invitations, everything was like a memory now. The only thing that was real and immediate was that pale fairylike visage floating behind a veil of smoked safety glass. Big and bright as the desert moon, it shone in his eyes.
He pulled into the rampway of his compact prefab adobe. Below him were the lights of New River, thinning out westward where they straddled the freeway and tube.
Inside, he climbed out of his suit and hung it carefully in the cleaner. It promptly went to work, electrostatically eliminating dust and grime. He did not turn on the opto or pick up a book as was usual before retiring.
Instead he walked out on the back porch and sat staring through the night at moon-washed Table Mesa, a glass of ice water in one hand.
Laughter reached him from the codo complex. The little square cubes were colored the same shade of red as the sandstone on which the complex was constructed. For a while he considered running down to join Charlie for a late-night chat and maybe a dip in the simulated desert pool, hoping to forget the ridiculous situation in which he found himself.
Except that it was real, this love, and how could love be considered ridiculous? That thought made him smile and he sipped at the cold water. The face would not leave him alone for a second. He could still see it sharply in his mind’s eye. It called out to him, pulled insistently, clung to his psyche like a limpet to a piling. Phantom, ghost, dream, obsession—whatever adjective he appended to the beauty didn’t matter.
Obviously he was going to have to do something about it.
He didn’t sleep very well that night. The face never left him. Somus tablets helped only a little and he was afraid to try anything stronger. He tossed restlessly on the chilled waterbed. When he finally sat up, nearly an hour before the alarm was due to go off, it seemed as though he’d never been asleep.
Charlie’s chatter about obsessions and his own comment that some obsessions were necessary came back to haunt him. Not that his friend’s common sense would stop him from pursuing the matter. His confused mind gave him no alternatives. A sharp ring shook him out of his torpor. Sitting in dark silence on the bed, he’d forgotten to turn off the alarm.
He rubbed exhaustedly at his eyes and listened to the steady drip of the brewer in the kitchen as it processed his morning coffee. More programming he’d forgotten to change.
Not that coffee now was a bad idea. Soon he’d have to get dressed. There were schematics to proof, hard copies to be approved, a presentation to be prepared. The Hong Kong trip could be an important milestone in his career.
In the bathroom he washed his face, noted the redness in his eyes. Suddenly he found an unfamiliar face staring back at him.
It should have been Eric Abbott, age thirty-one, first junior designer for Selvem, Inc. It had to be.
This is my house, he thought. My best friend lives down the hill, and his name is Charles Simms. There is a girl in our building at work, a very pretty girl, who I believe wants to go to bed with me. Her name is Gabriella Marquez. I am six feet one inches tall and weigh 185 pounds, thanks more to good genes than regular exercise.
I am not obsessed. That’s unhealthy. I’ve always been healthy, in body and spirit, and I’m not going to change now.
But what about the stranger in the mirror? Mightn’t he change, in unpredictable, unpleasant ways? Mightn’t he fixate in a fashion alien to Eric Abbott?
The longer he stared, the more the face seemed to change. The eyes widened, the lashes above lengthened. Black hair grew long and wavy and the neck serpentined. Then features began to soften and flow like plastic, until no face at all looked back at him from the glass. There was only a featureless, pulsating mass of flesh, all meat and no soul.
He twisted violently away from the mirror, knocking a bottle of aftershave to the floor. It bounced off the vinyl, caromed off the base of the commode, and tumbled to a stop in a corner. Green liquid sloshed from side to side inside the container, looking the way his guts felt.
He leaned on the sink, suddenly in need of support. For the first time he could remember, he felt queasy.
Crazy, this is crazy, he thought frantically. Maybe Charlie’s right. This can’t be love, or even romance. Those are healthy feelings and right now I don’t feel real good. Time to grow up. Time to forget this and get on with real life.
