The Music! The Trees! The Dead Cats!

06 Sunday Dec 2015

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I have about a zillion tiny changes to make in a bunch of Publisher files, and seeing as tomorrow I’m unavailable from roughly 1pm to bedtime, guess what? I’m avoiding doing it now! Yay me!

I also have to finish looking at somebody’s YA novel–50 more pages; thank mercy it’s a) better than usual and b) I dimly recall the first one, done 18 months ago. Then there’s a write-up. Also stalling there. Instead, I decided to catch you up (read: whinge) for a bit.

How do y’all feel about holiday music? I go all over the place, from fist-shaking and snarling (usually in stores, and when Mariah Carey is involved) to enjoying it (usually when doing something holiday-esque, and when the Rat Pack is involved). I am sad to say, though, that I’m not feeling the feels as a young neighbor practices Jingle Bells on some simple wind instrument. He just can’t get that G to save his little life. ( E-E-E! E-E-E! E . . .F?)

The issue is problematic at work. As far as I can tell, I have a few uncaring people, a whole bunch of rabid Christmas people–and one sad, lonely, angry guy who finds holiday music triggering and depressing. Oh sheep. Last week we were lucky, because he had a cold, but this week is going to be–unpleasant. I can see it now. We will probably resort to Mozart and please nobody but me. But I’m the boss, so hey now.

We are buying our first live tree in years next weekend, and I’m already nervous about it, as if it’s a temporary pet: I’m afraid of it dying on me almost immediately. That happened once; through the universe’s bad taste in black humor, one of our cats died right underneath it as well. (Probably a heart attack–sweet little guy, but he looked like he swallowed a bowling ball.) So I loaded up the tree, took it back to the lot, and was hysterical and incoherent. The poor, poor guy patted my hand a lot and gave me another tree for free. The kitty suffered the ultimate ignominy of ending up in the dumpster, seeing as the ground was frozen and what with Christmas and all, we didn’t have the funds for cremation. The whole experience was, shall we say, scarring.

And then there was the Christmas where we were new in town and discovered that the trees weren’t drilled for our spike stand. I remember digging into the pine with a pair of scissors and getting nowhere . . . I think twine played a part in tree support that year, and since we put it right near the heating duct on the floor, duhhhhh, of course it died too.

On the other hand, both kids hate the fake tree with a passion that ruins the tree trimming. So this year, I’m getting a real tree, baking me some cookies, and we’ll see what happens. I’ll keep you posted.

Caught in the Middle of the Non-Profit Funding Wars

01 Tuesday Dec 2015

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Back at my day job. I’ll try not to go berserk until I leave in a couple of months for my knee surgery, when they’re expecting me to be gone. Maybe oddly, it helps to know that this isn’t my real place in the world; that I’m not stuck here.

Unfortunately, I walked into the center of why this has turned into such a crappy situation: There is toner in my desk printer, but my computer died at the beginning of October. There’s a computer here at the so-called receptionist’s desk–but the laser printer has run out of toner, which I ordered like a good little bunny before my two-week hiatus. No word yet. I don’t (much) mind doing the bulk of the web stuff at home, but sheeped if I’m going to do the copying there too.

There is some vaguely theoretical chunk of money floating around that’s supposed to fix all this. It came from our grantor at the end of the fiscal year, but it’s been floating around Big Faceless Hospital for months. Nobody knows where it is. You’d think we were the government or something.

The temporary answer is to schlep over my desktop printer, but that’s heavy and cabley and might make me cry. Sigh.

On the bright side, I touched base with my personal trainer this morning (the only bennie to this job is that it has a gym, and the gym guy likes me enough to train me for free). And the peers were glad to see me. Social service jobs rarely have a lack of love–just a lack of money.

And I can’t fundraise, because fiscally we’re Big Faceless Hospital, and people would laugh in my non-501 (c)(3) face. Nope, when it comes down to it, it ain’t the thefts, or even the triggering smell of urine. It’s the feeling of being in the wilderness with a dull Bowie knife.

Looking Back

30 Monday Nov 2015

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I started writing about my alien people almost eleven years ago. I also did other things during that time: wrote a doctoral dissertation, had a major breakdown, was homeless for seven months, spent three years being able to only deal with one major thing a day–and by major, I mean going to the doctor or doing my laundry. But I kept writing, and to my surprise when the story was DONE–it was the length of a trilogy: Moby Dick and a half.

I then found out that agents weren’t magickally falling out of trees, and began the almost as difficult process of finding somebody–anybody–to just read the sheeping thing. I found a few, and most of them gave up early. One said that I never used an adjective if two would do. As you might imagine, my iddle feelings were hurted, but then I got a sympathetic writing buddy who made me sit down with a couple of highlighters and underline all my adverbs and adjectives. Whoa Nelly! I gave up on the adjectives after a few pages, because the adverbs were bad enough. I then pounded hard on the first volume–only to give up after a year of pounding because I didn’t know how to sell a book that had only one third of a plot curve.

I turned my back on it for three years and wrote Max instead. Still no agents stalking me in dark alleys, but I discovered something tonight, when starting to go through the other book again. (I got bored, k?)

For over a year after the first draft of Max was done, I rewrote and polished and had it beta-commented and all kinds of stuff, until I said ENOUGH (babies were going out with bathwater with every new run-through). But–it seems to have taught me a lot about writing, at least compared to the trilogy, as I discovered to my dismay just now. Never one adjective if two would do, indeed! Mind you, Max has its flaws (all books do), but at least it’s readable.

As a prologue, I tacked on the short story which was the first thing I wrote on the topic, so I peeled it off and will beat it with a stick, then run it through here for your amusement. Once it’s, you know, better.

 

Back to the Grindstone

28 Saturday Nov 2015

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Now that the pleasant obsessive flurry of NaNoWriMo is over (at least for me, ha ha!) I went back to Max, who needed a few stitches as I ported over the wrong version from the machine I needed to reformat last week. This meant tweaking all his agent files, including taking out scraps I just thought were stupid and the piece bragging about his sequel, which my main beta reader pointed out at length is pretty sucky and needs a lot of work.

All this took only about half an hour, and yet my brain hurts and I’m tired. Why? At which point does writing click over from being fun to being work? That word again.

I think for me, at least part of it is tied into (let’s be honest here) my illness. I have no idea what part of my complex of diagnoses it is, but I have a morbid phobia of anything like filling out forms. I have a simple and important one going to the IRS out in the living room now. So far, I’ve filled in my name and the first part of my address. This form is not scary. In fact, seeing as it clears up a minor misunderstanding, it’s un-scary. But it makes me hyperventilate. I don’t know why. I can fill out forms for other people, but as soon as I’m involved, my gut tightens.

And, Best Beloveds, sending out query letters to agents is the worst sort of form-itis I know. I have a neuronormal writing buddy who can pump the things out like popcorn. I just don’t get it. It would be bad enough, knowing that 99.9% of all these people are going to reject me–and only about a third of them will be polite enough to tell me so–but they all want something a little different. And this makes my ADHD brain go into whimpers and curl into a fetal position. (Maybe the form phobia is just ADHD, mixed with the PTSD of having had to fill out SO many to get into The System.)

I just have to get to the bottom of my agent list, and then I can give up, admit I’m a professional publishing failure, and self-pub poor Max, who will then be bought and read by fewer people than have beta read him. Depressing or what? I know I have to change my attitude, but you see, it was a dream, back when I was brand new and naive. I thought of course I’d find an agent–I actually thought a Famous Professor from school would be glad to help me–and then I’d be catapulted to fame and fortune at last.

None of that happened, nor, statistically speaking, is it likely to. Depressing, or what?

Or what. I have to change my attitude. I’ve done it before; I can do it now. Sempers toujours, as Podkayne says.

 

 

 

 

And Da Winnah Is . . .

26 Thursday Nov 2015

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I just finished my NaNoWriMo submission, which has kept me busy for the past couple of days, hence no blog. Sorry!

This year I also chose cat narrators (see Eureka, under the “Fiction” tab) and maybe that’s gonna be my claim to fame when I die. I dunno. I’ve always enjoyed animal narrators myself–the genre is called “beast tales,” apparently.

Please note that I finished early–not as wicked early as some, true–so now I have all this mojo circulating in my bloodstream and you’re the only place to go with it. Unfortunately, my brain still isn’t awake (I found that I do my best and most prolific writing when I roll out of bed) and this may be randomness.

What’s bugging me in the back of my mind is a convo I had last year or so with the writing guru I sometimes do evaluations for. I brought up NaNoWriMo, and he said, dismissively to the point of mild contempt, “Oh, I have people do 50,000 words in a weekend.” Now, this is theoretically quite, quite possible. When typing, I’ve clocked myself at a rough 1K per hour, maybe a little more, and if you check in Friday, check out Sunday or possibly Monday, and don’t sleep–it’s doable. Thinking a moment on this brings out a feeling of sadness, of compassion: How pressured these folks must be! How hard these novels have been trying to claw their way out! But it’s so easy to let the world discourage you from being a writer, God knows. And that’s what the writing guru’s thing is–he midwifes those poor unborn novels into the world.

Now, we’re not necessarily talking about literary merit (whatever that is; when 50 Shades made it big, I officially Gave Up) or even readability. I see these texts at what is most often an early stage of their being–these writers have not yet been scared by the prospect of needing to EDIT, bless their pointy little heads and unscathed souls; let alone having shown them around and asked for critique. I suspect I am often the first beta reader (defined later) and most of them are . . . surprisingly OK, all things considering. True, some of them are awful, and a few of them are wonderful–so wonderful I wish it were professional to ask for a comp copy. But the difference between them and what they were before is that they have been born.

NaNo does a similar midwifery. Most WriMos in my area are college-age women, and in a culture that still silences women, especially brainy women, isn’t it great that they’re gonna pump out that fan novel they’ve been thinking about? Maybe it’s crappy, but as my late friend Barry Walden once said to me, years ago, “That’s one less piece of crap I have to write.”

(A moment of silence here for all writers lost to depression.)

A word on and for beta readers: If you don’t have them, join a writer’s group through Meetup and show them your stuff. They will (or should) understand that your work is still in beta (the software testing mode) and they will look for bugs in your code.

There will be (to your mind, anyway) many, many, many bugs in your code. You will learn the phrase “murder your darlings;” some of you might learn how to punctuate. And that’s a good thing. Trust me.

 

 

What Does It Feel Like?

21 Saturday Nov 2015

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As recent readers know, I finally just caved in and accepted the tattered hand-me-down mantle of Writing Person For Reals. I had the epiphany that it didn’t matter whether or not I’d found an agent for my current novel; what mattered is that real flesh and blood people had beaten it into me that I Had It–that my writing was what one beloved beta reader called “absorptive.” And that was all I ever wanted for the Reader’s experience–that for a little while, in even a little way, they could be Somewhere Else. That’s the first step, isn’t it?

So what does making something like that feel like? Well, to be honest, very rarely does the Inspiration Fairy drag you out of bed and make you write, and when she does (a friend in an APA once remarked that the Inspiration Fairy smokes cigars and wears hob-nailed boots) it’s often a tad on the self-indulgent side, screaming “Oh my GOD I’m NAKED over here editor PLEASE.” Instead, most of the world’s writing is done the old-fashioned way, which looks suspiciously like work.

As many have remarked, the first step is putting your butt in the chair. Then you open the file or the notebook. This is accompanied by a whiny sort of vagueness: You’d sort of rather be doing something else, and you may or may not know what it is, but right now there’s this blankness looking at you, tapping its foot.

For me, it is processed like mild pain: My fingers are clumsy and sluggish. I scrawl or tap out something inspired like, “Miranda rang the doorbell.” At that point, I don’t know why Miranda is dropping by, I just know that it’s at least remotely plausible that she might. And then I stare at it. Slog, slog, oh god I’m no sheeping good at this, another sentence. I stare at them and heave a sigh. Maybe two, remembering that I should practice good diaphragm breathing for choir anyway. My brain feels dull and far away, and the idea that this will ever be a novel is a possible symptom of incipient mania.

And that’s where the scariness starts to happen. Miranda, the wench, opens her mouth and says something–and Darjeeling says something snarky–and then they’re having a conversation, and the conversation is bringing new ideas into the piece of writing just like you thread a new piece of yarn into knitting–really; that’s the point of that metaphor: You watch your fingers as if they’re possessed of a sudden ability to type or make the pen work, and new colors appear before your eyes like magic.

Something way back in the distance snaps, and your hands start making words as fast as they can. You’re no longer at your desk or at Bucky’s, you’re in that crowded Victorian living room with Miranda, Darjeeling, and the intruder they turned into a garden gnome. Your deeply beloved child of your actual loins, who will care for you in your old age, stops by to say “Good morning,” and you grouse something curt at them, because dammit Darjeeling is saying something exciting, and you can’t wait to know what it is.

You feel sort of stoned. This is only aggravated by your caffeine intake. I exhort you to drink actual water for each cup of speed.

You take a break to obey Eleanor Roosevelt’s advice (“Fill what’s empty, empty what’s full, and scratch where it itches”) and hate your body for being so interrupty. Then you get back to it.

It is addictive.

For me, after about two-ish hours I can stop for at least a while; at that point, I admire my word count (especially for NaNoWriMo). Then I do at least a little of the other things in my life, knowing that again and again I’ll have that almost nauseating start-up, maybe in the same day.

Worth it–for me. Then after it’s DONE and I scream and do a bit of the hokey pokey, it’s time to edit. And that’s for you.

The Scariest Thing to Ever Happen to Me

20 Friday Nov 2015

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Sitting here at the computer, having just posted a catch-up blog for the first time since July. I’ve been depressed for that long. Sheep. No job is worth living like that; what was the point to work really hard to become mentally well if it was only to become mentally ill again?

The idea of quitting a PAYING JOB terrifies me; appalls me with its stupidity. It was only a part-time job–I knew that I couldn’t handle anything more, at least until my recovery got stronger, so luckily I didn’t lose my disability. I won’t starve, and there is a roof over my head. What amazing luck! How glorious a miracle! For reals, that sentence always makes me feel like I’ve won the lottery. I guess skipping some meals so your kid gets to eat and becoming homeless–twice–changes your perspective.

Anyway. The scary thing. I’ve just realized that–I have to write. And possibly do other art. It would be swell if I find a way to monetize that, but if I don’t, I am choosing to give up the luxuries of clothes shopping and always being able to eat out (somewhere cheap). If I don’t, I’ll get sicker; I might die. And I don’t want to die.

I have a strange little life, being mentally ill. My plans just changed at the last minute this morning, and for a few minutes my ADHD had a tantrum while it rebooted. Hate that. I would love to be spontaneous, but my brain chemistry has different ideas. I have to work around that every day. It’s a challenge to just be me, let alone living life on life’s terms. Why make it even worse?

If you’re not an artist, you may not understand this; if you are an artist, then you will: We are wired differently. If we don’t create, we wither and die. Our growth stops. Our joy vanishes. And then we start looking at knives and pills with a certain longing, as we calculate the odds: How much longer can I stay alive just for Them? Because staying alive for US is about as appetizing as the freezer-burned bargain-brand burrito you forgot about last June: A hard thing to swallow; we chew each day, trying to overlook its taste of cardboard.

I was definitely in the burrito stage, realizing at the end of each weekend that I had to go back to that place. At last the tears broke through my concrete facade and I told my boss (who has been the main thing keeping me in the job; I stay because I love her) that I wasn’t coming in this week. We have next week off anyway; by its end I will have exercised (and exorcised) my rusty, weeping brain by finishing my NaNoWriMo project, and I’ll see if I’ve built up enough residual joy to garner a few more small paychecks.

Very small paychecks: All they buy are the depression force-feeding me the bargain-brand burritos, pre-wrapped in neglect; only in my field they all smell faintly of unwashed bodies and of urine.

Working and Playing

19 Thursday Nov 2015

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Sorry to be so silent for so long, but I’ve been grappling with a huge chunk of depression and writer’s block. I was half-afraid to even try to come here, expecting that it would just turn into a clod of whiny crud that I would only end up deleting at some point, the sooner the better.

My daughter, who is wise, has been telling me for several months now that I need to quit my day job. (Or at least the main one.) Being at heart a Worker Bee and a Brave Little Soldier, I resisted. Then my desktop computer in my office blew, and so did something in my brain. It wasn’t that I was using it for immoral purposes or anything; pretty much anything I did on it I could do in the receptionist area. But there was also this petty political foo-foo going on–and I finally realized that I hated my job.

Not when I showed up, partly because since my knee blew (more on that later), I’ve been using paratransit and that entrance is the one that doesn’t smell like pee. No, it would hit later in the day, after I’d put out the usual fires (when you’re the boss, even a little one, there are always fires). I used to live to put out fires. What happened?

I think it was because when my computer blew and they didn’t replace it because of a completely different chunk of sheepness, I realized how little my employer (Huge Faceless Hospital) valued my job. That the only reason HFH knows I need a TB test is because the timer on their HR software went ding; not because I’m assdeep in homeless people all day and others with questionable coughing hygiene.

I realized that instead of being a valued professional employee, I am a paid volunteer. The last time I ran into that concept was when I was in another sheepish job similar to this one, and the local Girl Scout leaders were being paid to lead their troops. Having done my time in this particular gig myself as just another mommy, I was kinda furious. But it was the only way those little girls were going to get any scouting at all in that depressed neighborhood. So it goes here too.

Everybody talks about how little we spend on or care about mental health, and as a peer specialist I see it from the bottom of the sheep pile. We are only now beginning to be billable; i.e., major insurance and Medicaid/care is seeing us as a valuable and exploitable resource. We give provably comparable or better support, and because we “aren’t professionals,” we’re paid and treated accordingly.

Enough of that: I took the week off, and will go back after Thanksgiving for as long as I can hack it/until Christmas/or my knee surgery. Then I will slip into being JUST their webmaster and graphics person, where I don’t have to do any direct service, and can stay home, where the only shenanigans my computer gives me is turning off when I play WoW. (Either the Powers are trying to tell me something, or it’s a fan problem.)

Meanwhile, I walk with a cane now because I effectively no longer have a meniscus in my right knee. Time to be a cyborg! I was lucky enough to listen to the Second Opinion Club (thank you, all of you!) and found a doctor who is willing to operate on a fat person. I see him on the 9th of December and VERY hopefully will be scheduling the surgery at that point. No idea when, because he might well be booking two months out. More on that as it develops. I am already working out and doing physical therapy to prep the knee and the rest of me for the rehab period. (I already know it’s a bear, but I am Kidney Stone Lass, and have a high pain tolerance.)

Anyway, I spent the first day off sleeping and writing (NaNoWriMo time!), then went back to the writing today instead of so much sleeping–and I realized I am no longer depressed. Whoa. I need to pay attention to this. The reality about my recovery from Major Mental Illness (primarily Bipolar Disorder I) is that some things are more important than others. My brain has been saved through a combination of miracles and a lot of hard work, and I can’t soak it in the smell of pee until it regresses into illness again. That would be stupid.

Having been raised in the Protestant Work Ethic, this scares me to death. (There are no peer specialist jobs that don’t smell like pee, and very few of them are part-time.) Guess we are in Wait and See Land.

Doncha hate that?

 

I’s a Fat Lady o’Color. Ain’t That Enough?

07 Tuesday Jul 2015

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Well, apparently not. From the Just-Can’t-Win Department:

I just came back from the orthopod, where I was told that the sometimes excruciating pain in my right knee means I most likely have a degenerative tear of my meniscus, which isn’t worth scoping. He also told me that it didn’t matter what the studies said about fat people having a decent outcome for knee replacement, Hospital Protocol said BMI of 40, which for me means losing 45 pounds. End of discussion.

I wasn’t at my best for it even if I did have a shot in Sheepdom, because the PA had put me on the exam table with my head near the door, and thus I had just heard his entire little precis for the attending, which included the words:

“She’s not a good candidate for it no matter what she does–she has a history of bipolar disorder.”

I mean, sheep me. He said WHAT???

Apparently stigma is alive and well in the People’s Republic of Cambridge.  So I came home and wrote the following letter in their MyVoice(tm) email system:

Please make sure Dr. Ortho sees this; I expect a response from him. [These emails are read by the entire team, or can be. Attendings are too important for this sheep.]

Dear Dr. Ortho,

I’m not sure whether or not you realize it, but (having my head right near the door while on the table) I heard every word of what Jerkface said to you before you came in the room: “I don’t think she’d be a good candidate no matter what she did–she has a history of bipolar disorder.” I unfortunately am one of those women who cry when they’re really upset, so I didn’t say anything while I was there. But–I’m REALLY upset.

I’m not sure why my *past* history of BP automatically makes me a bad candidate. I do know, however, that although I’m not a big success at controlling my weight, I kick serious butt in recovering from a major mental illness. Check and see–I haven’t been hospitalized in over seven years, and in fact my job requires me to be in strong recovery.

Jerkface’s remark was ignorant and insensitive. It doesn’t matter that I wasn’t meant to overhear it, it shows that he needs to learn a lot about mental illness. He gives a good shot, but I’d rather he not be involved with my care in the future. I very seriously suggest that your staff have an in-service on mental illness and stigma: NAMI is a great source for such things if you can’t arrange it in-house.

As for my being a poor candidate “no matter what:” I’m fat, not crazy. I’m fat, not incompetent. I’m fat, not lazy. I’m just fat, not some creature without feelings. Just fat.

Please respond.

Most sincerely,
Me

(Ok, I didn’t call him Jerkface.) What surprised me about this was how upset I got. Why should I care what some escapee from an overzealous tanning bed thinks about my mental status, based on a five minute interview and a cursory scan of my chart? It’s not like Dr. Ortho responded with, “Yah, I don’t cut them crazy bitches. We cool.”

Maybe it was the sum of the whole visit, with stigma piled on top of the obligatory medical fat-bash. (Dr. O did say something like, “WELL. It all depends on how important your knees are to you.”) I dunno.

I think I’m going to take the rest of the evening off and have some ice cream. With a potato-chip garnish.

Squirrel the Printer 1

28 Sunday Jun 2015

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I made myself start writing something that had nothing to do with the sheeping Th’nashi. Here’s the first chapter of . . . sumthin. . .:

Squirrel was afraid of the baby. Her baby. Oh, Duncan’s baby too, of course—well, not really. His sperm had activated her gene plasm, but that had been it. She had dutifully gone to doctors in the Community, who had supplied her with the necessary ultrasound photos and very particular prenatal vitamins, but in truth she was about to give birth to a crudely humanoid lump of green Play-doh.

“But at least it’s healthy Play-Doh,” she said to the air freshener hanging from her rear-view mirror. Plum Blossom, it was. Little Camber Stichson had adored fruity, floral scents, so Squirrel did too, even though she had matured (wearing Camber’s print) past the age when she should have changed over to liking muskier odors.

But that was how it went. Sometimes prints were like snapshots. Despite the age on her driver’s license (26), Squirrel still wanted to play hopscotch, yearned for every new doll on TV, and regularly made herself sick from too much candy and ice cream. Too much sugar was very bad for Printers—Squirrel was considered to have a Problem, and was at risk of becoming Mushy, parts dissolving into a disgusting mass of green Play-doh streaked with blood.

She had been careful about what she ate during her marriage, and more so during the pregnancy. Squirrel was pretending she was going to have an ordinary human baby, because the green Play-doh gave her nightmares, as she carried within her the undeniable proof that the alien existed. She would cling to Duncan in the sweaty sheets, always grateful that Camber had been a sneeze past an early puberty when she’d been printed, so Squirrel was able to get horny and have a satisfying relationship with Duncan. For days and weeks on end, Squirrel was the Camber-print: human in almost every detail.

Now, she started the car, hoping she’d make it through the freeway traffic before the frozen veggies in her grocery bags thawed and refroze into an unforgiving lump. She had shopped hastily and would have to make a sketchy dinner for Duncan, because she had spent the afternoon touring Bryson Cryogenics, which was run by the Community as a source for emergency prints. Like babies.

Squirrel blinked and froze. A strange man had gotten into the front seat with her; an equally strange woman had barreled into the back seat, pushing the grocery bags over to make room with a savage swear.

“What . . . the?” Squirrel managed to croak before the muzzle of a gun was jammed into her ribs.

“Drive, lady, if you and the baby wanna live,” the man snarled.

“Oh shit, Jude, she’s pregnant?” the woman in the back wailed.

“Shut up, Suzanne!” he barked. Squirrel flinched as a reflex. That happened to be the name on her driver’s license. Nobody called her that except her boss and her father-in-law. The muzzle of the gun slid down an inch, making her wince with pain. It was now digging into the area of her liver, which the baby was fond of pounding from the other side, exercising its protolimbs with a vigor Squirrel found dismaying. It added to the nightmares.

But right now it had penetrated that strangers and gun meant carjacking, and Squirrel, going on 13, was terrified.

“Drive!” he urged her, and Squirrel did, not knowing how this adventure would end.

For about twenty minutes, Jude directed and Squirrel obeyed, while from the back seat Suzanne would interject an occasional comment: “C’mon, Jude, she’s pregnant.” “I told you this was fucking stupid.” And at last, “Shit! Is she almost out of gas, or what?”

Jude half-turned to backhand her then, as being the bearer of bad tidings, and Squirrel thought of going for the gun, but she was even more unsure of how that adventure would end. But Suzanne was right; in fact Squirrel was cursing herself for this just on general principles. She had no idea what Jude would do—and she plain hated running out of gas. She did it a lot—it was one of the reasons her nickname still stuck.

Jude made her ask the GPS where the nearest station was, and Squirrel’s heart leapt. She knew it—it was off the beaten trail, run by a nice old widower who was a shade-tree mechanic with a single rusty pump. He had been a Marine in ‘Nam, and the staties had once had a hard time explaining to him why he couldn’t keep a junkie’s head as a trophy, after the kid had played a 9mm, and discovered that old Mr. Bubba had double barrels in the hole.

Squirrel pulled into the gravel driveway under the huge live oak without a word, her heart pounding.

“Go on, get out and pump the gas,” Jude said, gesturing at the placard reading “Self-Serve.” Squirrel got out of the car, her knees a little wobbly, but as she turned to the ancient pump, a ribbon of agony tore through her, and she cried out, clutching at the car for support. It was time. The one thing Printer and human births had in common was that they couldn’t be argued with.

Suzanne yelled through the window, “Your water break? Jude, I think her water just broke. We gotta get outta here!”

“Not without gas,” he gritted, and leapt out of the car, gun waving in all directions like a malicious iron wasp.

Squirrel sank down to the ground, tugging her gauzy maternity top out of the way so she could burrow a thumb inside her body. It hurt, but not like the spasms now racking her entire circulatory system. She felt resistance; then the bubble of amniotic fluid cascaded over her lap in verisimilitude of a human’s water breaking. She kept her hand clutched to her belly, while the other tried and failed to pin her long honey-blonde hair behind her ears so it wouldn’t blend with the sweat pouring into her eyes.

Suzanne also had gotten out of the car, ignoring Jude’s barking. As he pumped the gas, swearing at the rusty contraption while still holding the gun on Squirrel as best he could, Suzanne knelt beside her and took her hand. This unexpected kindness in the middle of the surreality of the last hour undid Squirrel, and she burst into tears.

Jude’s head exploded, raining blood and brains over the two women. Mr. Bubba, thought Squirrel in vindication as Suzanne screamed and flattened herself on the ground. Squirrel felt that everything was happening in slow motion as she tugged at the hole she had made, keening like an animal hit by a car. She pulled forth the squirming green mass and, pushing up Suzanne’s jean leg, applied it to her bare unbloodied skin.

The carjacker was in too much terror to notice, and Mr. Bubba had lost a leg in the jungle, so by the time he and his M-16 peeked around the hood of the car, the print took hold, and pink replaced green with a rapidity that made even Squirrel blink with surprise.

Mr. Bubba limped over, and, forcing Jude’s body out of the way with his cane, peered down at them. Squirrel had turned away, and was sheltering the baby as best she could as it busily thrust forth fingers and toes. She heard Suzanne babble for her life; heard Mr. Bubba tell her to stay just as she was.

“Squirrel?” The old man put a gentle hand on her head. She looked up, and only then realized she was still sobbing. Thank God I’m wearing Aunt Dorothy’s hideous maternity skirt today, she thought somewhere in the back. I never could have pulled this off in jeans.

Then they all looked up, as a huge greyish wedge hurtled over their heads, followed by another, and then another. There was a massive rush of air, but no sound.

I’m dreaming, sighed Squirrel. The Community had records. The ships which had dropped them off in 1642 looked much like this. Dreaming. She relaxed into Mr. Bubba’s arms in a drowsy relief. Dreaming. None of it real.