Real World

I'll call him Pippin. He always looked a little like a hobbit: short, with bright eyes and determinedly curly hair. He dropped out of high school when he found a hack for a popular piece of hardware. He traded the hacked hardware for a car which he selected because he'd recently seen it in a movie. Driving that around was fun for a while, but he sold his toy pretty promptly when he found out the price of an oil change. He tried college for a year, then started bumming around Umbrella, and rooming with Carne, which is how I met him. A year later I ran into him in Vegas and he hitched back with us to California to sleep on the couch. Now he sat in the living room couch of Alpha, sprawled in the pile of clothes he dumped out of his backpack.

"I need a job," I said, "Acad's ending soon, and I don't know what I'm going to do."

"Jobs suck. You're smart, why should you have to work 8 hours a day?"

***

Green actually finished school, but that was mostly because he enjoyed it. Writing apps for the iPhone had always been his real source of income.

I met him when he emailed a list of about 400 some people asking if anybody could give him a ride from the train station to the Torii. At the time I was sure I didn't like this kid who couldn't figure out how the public transit worked, but it is hard to stay mad at anybody who always smiles and means it. He stayed with Nexus for a week then disappeared, to return for one of Tynan's lectures. We asked him how long he planned to stay in the area, and he shrugged.

In reality he lived on our couch for about a month. Pretty sick deal for us, since he kept cleaning the house for us during that time.

***

"Hey," Ray says into the phone, "You should come out here." He puts his hand over his other year and tilts his head to smile at the phone, "You'll never guess who's here." There was a pause, and the bounty hunters in the lab and I looked at each other. "She says she knows you," he continued, "honestly, I didn't even know you knew Pika."

Pippin arrived from Chicago two days later. Apparently he'd been bumming around there buying beer for a fraternity in exchange for a spot on the couch to sleep. During the day he snuck into classes at the local university, sometimes to learn things, but mostly pretending to be an English major in order to pick up chicks.

"Good to see you again,"

"You too," he smiled, "you still working full-time jobs?"

***

"I'm going to Vietnam," Green said.

"Why?"

"Frozen yogurt?"

"What?"

He laughed a little, "my friend is opening a frozen yogurt shop there, I figured I'd come up for the grand opening."

I didn't get it.

"Cost of living is low there, and I'm self-employed, so I can work from wherever I want really."

There was a pause.

"Don't look jealous like that. Why don't you come with me?"

"I... can't program iPhone, I don't even have one."

"You'll figure it out, and if not that something else. You just need to believe you can really do it."

I sat, and I thought about it, but his plane was leaving before I had really gotten together the nerve to do it.

"I'm leaving this book with you," he said, "I want you to believe you can do it."

It was called "The four hour work week" and had a picture of a man on the cover laying in a hammock under palm trees. It called people like Pippin and Green 'the new rich.'

***

It's one of those relaxed evenings, and we're both sitting on couches staring at the ceiling in Alpha. I'm playing with a ball, and Pippin is idly turning a new Defcon blackbadge over in his hands.

"Do you think you could go back to the real world if you wanted to?"

"I live in the real world."

There is a funny sort of pause as I raise my eyebrows and catch his eyes.

"Ok, so I don't, but why would I want to go back there? The real world sucks."

"Yeah, well lets say you wanted to."

"Of course. I can do anything if I want to."

Meet Pacem

"You want to come over later?" I ask Carne, "we're throwing a party."

"What's the occassion?"

"It's some kid's birthday..."

"Do I know this guy?"

"No, technically I don't either. He's one of the new kids in the program. Actually, I'm not even sure its his birthday. I just want a really good excuse to throw a party."

There's a pause. I can't see her face over the phone but I know exactly what expression she's making.

"So, you coming?"

Hilariously enough, she met her current boyfriend at that party.

***

"So," I ask the blond kid who just walked in the door, "you normally go by Xenu?"

He stares at me, "what? Oh! My facebook! Yeah, I like messing around with that..."

I start cracking up and hand him a drink, "Well, happy birthday stranger."

"Birthday?" he's laughing too now, "oh yeah! Today IS my birthday on facebook isn't it?" He grins and poses with the cake with his name on it for a photograph.

"You know," he says, "according to facebook, I have a birthday about every two weeks...and there are a whole slew of my 'friends' who haven't caught on yet."

"Whatever, I like having parties."

***

"Ya-pach-um"

It was his first phrase, or more, that's how I can best type it an Anglesized version of it. I can gesture vaguely verbally at the myriad of hidden consonants in the actual polish baby-talked version, but I'll never be able to type it.

I'm observing.

His grandfather had found him sitting in the family's garage and asked him what he was doing. I find it a fitting summary of Pacem in general.

I'm observing.

Most people when they want to understand another person "walk a mile in their shoes," or imagine themselves as being in the other person's situation. Pacem instead has the sort of mind which permits him to observe himself from the same third person perspective he sees other people, and to understand them that way. This has many side effects, one of which is his ability to look at himself and have a good laugh from time to time, which is one of my favourite things about him.

I'm observing.

***

"Dona nobis pacem..."

I distinctly remember preforming this piece in fourth grade. The harmony and simplicity mezmorized me, and still does to this day.

Let us have peace.

I remember singing at the very top of my lungs. The world is complicated, and the things which you know are beautiful are true are worth really clinging to.

***

He looked worn out, tired, and depressed. His boss was an asshole and his team's aptitude left much to be desired. Furthermore, two of the team members no more qualified than him had escaped the worst of it, and had a lot of goodies and attention from his boss's boss which would surely let them escape the looming fallout this work team would suffer. One of them wasn't being particularly nice to him either.

He locked himself in his room for hours with his laptop and didn't speak to much of anybody. I would come in to tell him when dinner was ready, but realistically there wasn't a whole lot I could do.

"Ya-pach-um," I grinned and waved to him from the doorway. When all else failed, I guess act like an idiot.

"Ya-pach-um," I repeated, falling into a game of word sounds, "Ya-pach-um, pach-um, pacem, dona nobis pacem."

"What?"

"Peace, you could use some probably."

"Huh?"

"Dinner's ready."

***

"Red four on the five."

"Oh man I didn't see that one."

Nerds do some fairly impressive things when deprived of internet, but the words "communal solitaire" still crack me up. I think it was one of the best things that happened to the house, because with nothing better to do we all got to really know and care for each other. Pacem and I remained close considering the distance my senior year, and we even found time to visit him on the road trip with Ginger and Giraffe. When I found we were both returning for a second year I was overjoyed.

***

"Quesadillas and bud lite," he looks down at himself, "I feel like white trash."

Pacem is wearing a wife beater and athletic shorts since the rest of his clothes are currently in the drier. The two of us are on our knees loading up gallons of milk and orange juice into the upper shelves of the refrigerator.

"I figure," he says as he hoists the 30 rack into the new space we have created, "Its all about the finer things in life anyway."

I'm on the couch later when Pacem wanders back with a box labled Xerox. It once to contained printer paper but now it carries his clean laundry. He sits down on a couch to begin folding it.

"You want...us to pick up a real laundry basket for you?"

He shrugs, "this works."

He pulls out a hilighter colored shirt with the bright pink AMP logo. Its the most horrendously beautiful shirt I have ever seen in my life, and I always make fun of him for it.

"Directing traffic soon?"

"Fuck, give me direct sunlight and I'll blind you!"

***

We've been fighting a lot recently for no real good reason. Well, I know mine. I have a terrible pressing need to escape and keep finding him in my room when I want to be alone. I guess that's one of those things roommates have been known to do. Pacem probably has his own reasons, but I wish he wouldn't vent them by helping in the efforts to circumvent me that have cropped up.

"We're heading up to the casinos that last weekend," he says.

I glare at him. We have four houses to shut down and clean and a ton of furniture to move and now he's skipping out with how many people?

"We'll clean up a ton on Sunday and Monday to make up for it. We don't really need a whole weekend to clean. I promise, we'll make up the time."

I shrug. There isn't a whole lot of point to arguing with somebody whose mind is made up that firmly. Pacem knew damn well how much work this was going to be: he, the guy I was dating at the time, and I had spent a whole weekend last time cleaning up only one house, and that one had been subjected to a lot less wear.

***

They came home Sunday sunburnt and tired. They slept a few hours and then drank until one threw up on the carpet we had finished cleaning. The next day was Monday. They sat on the couch, still hung over, and announced they were going to the beach. I was carrying a load of food and supplies from Delta to Alpha when Pacem came up to me to say goodbye since they were getting on the plane right from the beach. He wanted a hug. His eyes were dead.

"You're going?"

"Yeah."

"You said you'd help..."

"Well the car's leaving now."

"We'll see you again soon Pika," Tiffany interjected.

"Yeah, whatever," I respond.

"Aww," she continues, "don't be sad, we probably will..."

The truth was that right then I never wanted to see any of them again in my life. Turning back to Pacem I hugged him so I wouldn't be that asshole who leaves somebody with outstretched arms hanging, "You promised," I said.

"Promised what?"

I'm pretty proud of not flat-out decking him right there. It was just the last straw after a whole summer of passive aggressive bullshit from somebody who I had relied on to back me up and help me out.

I walked back into the house and Joker's friend followed me. "Who were those guys?"

"People who lived here."

"Aren't they going to help us out?"

"Apparently not."

"That blond kid, you knew him well?"

I shrugged. What am I suppose to say other than 'I thought I did.'

"He seemed like a real asshole."

"Yeah I guess he is."

***

I left this post for months because I didn't want this story to end like this. Pacem was one of my closest friends in AMP. It wasn't that I was even mad at him, it was that I was disappointed that this was who he turned out to be.

We talked briefly only about business a few times over the next while in the course of wrapping up the house stuff. It was not until six months later when I had had yet another stupid boy-related adventure that I was upset about that we wound up striking up a serious conversation.

"I've been..." he pauses, "working through some stuff. I'm really sorry that I took it out on you."

I use to hear stories like this from my friends and tell them they're crazy to forgive people like this, but I guess if all people were held to those standards I'd be shit out of luck myself.

"I'm sorry too."

A Brave New Job

We're being taught how to write and how to speak.

"Never say we would crush the competition, we have only the utmost respect for our competitors..."

The desks of the hall form a large semi-circle and we're all seated quietly, each clutching an identical bookbag, a gift from our new employer. We also each have a laptop, a shirt...

"And now it is time for lunch," the orientation lead smiles and leads the 20 of us to a cafeteria. We're all the people who began work on this day, they call us a class.

"Ribs or salmon?" the cafeteria employee asks me.

I stare at him blankly before finally managing an "uhhh."

The employee looks concerned, "You know...if you don't like..."

"Oh no! I like!"

***

It's a few weeks later and another smiling cafeteria worker is holding a lobster claw in a pair of serving tongs. I'm immediately struck with the realization that I have no idea how to eat this item and that I will be figuring it out in front of a large number of coworkers.

"It's ok," I tell her, "I have enough food, no thanks."

***

"You're so lucky," my friends told me.

"Is it true they feed you three meals a day?"

"Is it true they do your laundry?"

***

I roomed with a bunch of people from this place briefly years ago. Their refrigerator was eerily empty save the bunny food which contented Carne. I worked for the feds, she worked for something similar, and we use to talk about how the way our other housemates were so dependent on their workplace was a little creepy.

One of these housemates, Sharpie, fell off his bike and skinned his arm. The company nurse fixed him up, but he wore the bandage in the shower. Seconds later he came running out of the bathroom in a towel talking clutching his burning injury.

Carne and I laughed at him for wearing his bandage in the shower and expecting any differently. He laughed too once we pointed it out, "you know, I use to know that."

"They all drink some hardcore kool-aid over there," Carne shook her head, "bet you it's something they put in the water."

I laugh, "So that is what the cafeterias are for..."

***

The sign above the ribs says they were cooked in molasses. The meat is tender and falls off the bones, and a touch sweet. I assume that's from the molasses, though I have never had anything like this before so I wouldn't know for sure.

"You'll never be far from food," the orientation lead tells me, "we have snack kitchens..."

***

"Don't you think this is all a little excessive?" Giraffe asks me.

"Yeah, but it is how it is around here I guess."

***

I'm sitting at an awards dinner, courtesy of the feds, earlier this year. Sys's dad is sitting nearby and laughing with us.

"I wonder sometimes," I said, "if I could just hop from company to company on crazy employee benefits and just outrun the rate of reality catching up to these places and them realizing it isn't affordable."

His dad throws back his head and roars, "You missed out on the real chance for that, kid. This is nothing compared to how it was in the 90's."

***

"It's just like A Brave New World," Giraffe said.

"Isn't that about some crazy dystopia where everybody is oppressed?"

"Well yes, but it's completely voluntary and they are all happy."

"Then home come are they oppressed?"

"The book talks about that a lot."

"What?"

***

I'm walking through the halls for what turned out to be my final interview. A perky HR lady is asking me my least favourite interview question.

"And do you have any questions for me?"

My eyes clutch the walls, searching frantically for something which will make me sound smart yet curious.

"You changed the brand of juice in these refrigerators since I was here last, didn't you?"

"Oh," she smiles, "Yes, well we have panels here which study things like this, and if they changed it I suppose that means that the new one is healthier."

There is a brief an awkward pause where the HR woman innocently smiles, and then adds, "You really do learn something new every day here."

***

"When you start work," Doug said, gesturing to the Torii building, "We'll miss you."

"I don't understand."

"Well you'll never leave work there. You'll never come here anymore."

"That's silly."

"Well, why would you want to leave?"

***

I sat down and looked back at the mental list of things I wanted when I was homeless and compare them to the things I want now. While I still want a car and maybe a boyfriend or some other form of social ties to this place, pretty much everything else has been taken care of: food, shelter, medical insurance, free time, and respect for my work. I find it odd to realize that the list is a lot shorter but I am not a much happier person, in fact in some ways the optimism afforded to me when I was homeless of rapidly becoming un-homeless and general excitement probably meant I was happier then in my day-to-day life then than I am now.

***

"Because our world is not the same as Othello's world. You can't make flivvers without steel–and you can't make tragedies without social instability. The world's stable now. People are happy; they get what they want, and they never want what they can't get. They're well off; they're safe; they're never ill... they're so conditioned that they practically can't help behaving as they ought to behave."

The Savage was silent for a little. "All the same," he insisted obstinately, "Othello's good, Othello's better than those feelies."

"Of course it is," the Controller agreed. "But that's the price we have to pay for stability. You've got to choose between happiness and what people used to call high art. We've sacrificed the high art. We have the feelies and the scent organ instead..."

The Savage shook his head. "It all seems to me quite horrible."

"Of course it does. Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the over-compensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand..."

"But I like the inconveniences."

"We don't," said the Controller. "We prefer to do things comfortably."

"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."

"In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy."

"All right then," said the Savage defiantly, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

A Brave New World, Chapters 16-17

"You're still coming here," Doug smiled.

"Yeah. I think it's not good for me to spend all my time there."