F IC T IO N
did when they were children, deep and full and joyful, like they were best friends, like they were brothers, but when Benjamin left Charlotte, they spoke maybe twice. Matthew said it was busyness, with work and other things, but he wouldn’t say what it was he was doing. A few months later, Benjamin stopped trying, and they hadn’t spoken since. “Benji!” Matthew exclaimed with outstretched arms. “You’ve lost weight. You look good.” Benjamin was always the shorter brother, the stockier brother, and when they were kids, sneaking cookies from the kitchen, Benjamin gained weight; Matthew never did. Matthew was tall, thin, like a wire, with a mop of brown curls on top of his head. He wore thick glasses that got him made fun of in school, but were sort of cool now, in a weird sort of way, and he always wore a jacket, woolly and scratchy, with lighter colored patches on the elbow. Benjamin wished, as he was hugging his brother, that, just once, he’d have worn something else. “Thanks. I’ve been running some, eating better.” “Good for you.” He was nodding, smiling, hands in his pockets. He was good at making uncomfortable silences even more uncomfortable. “Thank you for inviting us for dinner,” Mary chimed in. “We both love having family close by.” Mary was shorter, but not short, standing to Matthew’s shoulder who was six foot and change. She had long black hair, soft eyes and a kind smile; it was always a wonder Matthew had gotten her. “We met at Clemson actually,” Mary replied when Benjamin asked, over dinner. “He and I were both taking a bioethics course and,” She laughed, “and Matthew was arguing with the professor about...what was it?” Matthew coughed on a mouthful of pot roast. “The state of prosthetics.” “Right! Prosthetics. And Matthew was—well, you tell them.” Matthew swallowed his water, rubbed his chest, and coughed to clear his throat. “Well,” he began, scratchy and hoarse. He coughed again. “Well, until then, prosthetics had been cumbersome at best. A hand, I’m sure you guys know, could only close if you pressed a button or pulled a cable. Ben, you remember Mr. Green a few houses down when we were kids? His was like that.” “Sure. I remember.” “Anyway, later on they started redirecting the nerves to nearby muscles, using the electrical activity generated in that muscle to move the limb, blah blah blah, but it was basic. One way and rudimentary, until—” He paused. “They began interfacing directly with the central nervous system by way of biochips being inserted directly into the brain. I’m sure you both remember when this all started.” “I do,” replied Allie. “I was in high school, I think, at the time. Every time I passed through the science hall, that’s all I heard about.” “Exactly. It was a big deal back then. Still is, but we don’t think about it much anymore. It’s part of our society. Nine out of ten of us have some sort of something going on, even if all we have is an HM chip. Large stuff though, like bio-mechanical augmentation for the entire body is a business in and of itself and somewhat of a grey area some believe. My professor was one of them. He said that—what did he say? He said that we were dangerous enough as is, yeah that’s it, and could do enough—no, plenty of damage with what we had available.” “I thought he was interesting,” Mary said, smiling at Matthew, “the way he talked about this stuff. You have to admit, though, he wasn’t far off, at least with the state of things now.” “Yeah, but he didn’t know that at the time,” Matthew said, taking a bite of potato and carrots. “He was just being crotchety.” From there they talked about their kids, their home, their neighbors, work. They told stories saved up about their trip to the grocery and all about the check engine light in
97