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<p>The bed up in the second-storey bedroom was already wide, but Cress and Tule pulled on either edge to stretch it out by another half meter or so while Dry Grass all put faceplanted onto the mattress. She elbow-crawled her way up until her head was at least resting on a pillow before letting out a muffled groan.</p>
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<p>Cress and Tule followed after, moving as though they knew the parts they were to play. Dry Grass’s pillow was quickly shifted up into Tule’s lap while Cress settled beside her, rubbing on her shoulders. I knew from Tule’s memories, still slotting their way in along with my own, that this was a somewhat regular occurrence.</p>
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<p>I stood awkwardly by until Cress chuckled and gestured at the open space beside Tule up near the head of the bed. “Just relax, Reed.”</p>
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<p>“Yes,” Dry Grass mumbled. “You do not need to do anything, there is no pressure. I want to be around those who enjoy my presence rather than resent it. We are all just here to unwind, yes? Among friends, yes? I would like to think that this includes you, my dear.”</p>
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<p>“Yes,” Dry Grass mumbled. “You do not need to do anything, there is no pressure. I want to be around those who enjoy my presence rather than resent it. We are all just here to unwind, yes? Among friends, yes? After these last few days, after so many tears, I would like to think that this includes you, my dear.”</p>
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<p>“Right,” I said, forcing a chuckle of my own as I awkwardly clambered up onto the bed, leaning against the headboard and hugging my knees against my chest.</p>
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<p>We sat — or lay — in silence for a while other than the occasional small noise of contentment from Dry Grass.</p>
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<p>Even as we stayed in silence, and Cress and Tule doted on their partner, this woman I had such strong feelings about foisted upon me out of nowhere only a few days prior, I struggled to disentangle my thoughts on the events of the day.</p>
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<p>The longer I thought about it, the more surreal the act of having a funeral in the midst of such a disaster felt. Our gathering of nine people standing around an all-but-featureless black orb somewhere in a grid of yet more featureless black orbs was small. Nine people had stood around that core dump: six cocladists, two partners, and a systech who also happened to be a partner of two of those cocladists.</p>
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<p>It was so small, and yet even if there had been a hundred people there, a thousand, it would have felt vanishingly tiny in that vast, open space. 23 billion orbs set into a grid, and this one was ours, our double handful of grief.</p>
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<p>It was so small, and yet even if there had been a hundred people there, a thousand, it would have felt vanishingly tiny in that vast, open space. 23 billion orbs set into a grid, and this one was ours, our double handful of grief. After all, hadn’t dry grass also sobbed openly and freely before the marker of her own loss?</p>
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<p>It was so small, and that vast, open space remained silent, empty. The settings on the sim were such that we would only ever see or hear ourselves in there. There might well be billions of others struggling with their own double handfuls of grief, and yet it would only ever be us.</p>
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<p>There was more grief to be felt there, layered beneath the exhaustion, confusion, responsibility, and however many more complex emotions had been caked on top. There would come a time when the ability to simply grieve would be laid bare, I knew, and soon, but it was not yet.</p>
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<p>And so we stayed in silence.</p>
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<p>Dry Grass was the first to break the silence, mumbling. “In The Wind.”</p>
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<p>Dry Grass was the first to break the silence, mumbling into her pillow. “In The Wind.”</p>
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<p>“What was that, love?” Tule asked, brushing fingers through her hair.</p>
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<p>“That was my up-tree instance, yes? In The Wind?” She laughed, choked and hoarse. “I remember the rattle of dry grass in the wind. I picked that up from Louie. Eir clade, os Riãos, did much the same. I thought I was <em>so clever.</em> I thought I had gotten all of my grief out that second day. I thought I could move on, limping, until I heard of the work she’d done, that she made it so far and still did not make it to the end. Until I saw her core.”</p>
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<p>“That was my up-tree instance, yes? In The Wind?” She turned her head and laughed, choked and hoarse. “I remember the rattle of dry grass in the wind. A full sentence snuck into a poem. I picked that up from Louie. Eir clade, os Riãos, did much the same. I thought I was <em>so clever.</em> I thought I had gotten all of my grief out that second day. I thought I could move on, limping, until I heard of the work she’d done, that she made it so far and still did not make it to the end. Until I saw her core.”</p>
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<p>Tule, more flexible than I, bent down and kissed her on the cheek. Cress gave her own kiss after. Both of them glanced briefly at me, looking a little sheepish. I couldn’t quite piece together the reason for their looks until I pieced together their confusion — our confusion, since I shared in it — of how I must feel about her.</p>
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<p>The compulsion to echo that gesture was certainly there, too. I knew from countless memories the softness of her skin against my lips, I knew what even the briefest touch would mean to her as she worked to process her own loss. </p>
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<p>I also knew her only as a friend, only as Dry Grass of the Ode clade, only Cress and Tule’s partner, with whom I had shared only a few dinners.</p>
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<p>Both Cress and Tule nodded, though the statement largely went over my head.</p>
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<p>Perhaps guessing at such, Dry Grass continued, “Each of our stanzas focused on something different. I am sure that much is in the stories you have doubtless read, if Lily’s reaction is anything to go by. She fusses at the eighth and their politics, perhaps the first with their habit of spying, but mine, the sixth, wound up with all of Michelle’s — our root instance — all of her dreams of and desire for motherhood. Motherliness. Caring and cherishing. That is why I have all of that art on the walls: it is all cherished, all lovely creations from Warmth and Motes, the clade’s little ones.”</p>
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<p>“So In The Wind was the one who stuck with that moderation?” I asked.</p>
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<p>She nodded. “To an extent. She often explained how she would push the moderation duties off onto other systechs. She really was just as focused as I was on the tech side.” She rolled over onto her back so that she could look up to us, transferring my hand in hers from one to the other. “All I wanted to do was take a vacation. I should have known it would wind up far longer than the two weeks I had intended. Michelle had already tried that, and she got an entire clade out of it, after all.</p>
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<p>She nodded. “To an extent. She often explained how she would push the moderation duties off onto other systechs. She really was just as focused as I was on the tech side.” She rolled over onto her back so that she could look up to us, transferring my hand in hers from one to the other. “All I wanted to do was take a vacation. I should have known it would wind up far longer than the two weeks I had intended. Michelle had already tried that all the way back in 2124, systime 0, and she got an entire clade out of it, after all.</p>
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<p>“She usually got what she want, too. She worked the tech side, disentangling crashes and hunting for problematic objects. She is the one who kept me up to date on the tech side, usually over lunch.” I could hear the smile in her voice as she continued, “Those lunches were something lovely, sandwiches sitting unfinished as we talked and talked and talked about this whole confusing mess we lived in. The politics remained infuriating to me, which I suppose they also did for her, given the way she would rant. Even so, it kept the pilot light lit for me, that I might hear about this System I loved so much.”</p>
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<p>Cress nodded. “It must be hard to lose that.”</p>
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<p>“It is more than that,” Dry Grass said, sniffling. “I loved her, my dear. She was my sister, my twin. Fuck what my down-tree says, I lost family.”</p>
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<p>“Need some space from it, love?” Tule asked.</p>
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<p>“Please.”</p>
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<p>He nodded, working on a careful extraction from his role as pillow, replacing his lap with another pillow from the bed as he slid from beneath her. He stretched his arms up over his head, winced at a quiet pop from his neck, and then shifted to lay down beside her instead, arm draped over her front. Cress followed suit, laying down beside Tule and hugging around them both.</p>
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<p>I chose to remain sitting for a while, idle gaze settling on the triad beside me, while I thought of the ways in which Dry Grass talked about In The Wind. I tried mapping that onto my own clade. Thinking of Lily like a sister, of Cress like a sibling, felt right in a way that I didn’t expect. While it was difficult to think of Tule as in any way younger than me, despite being my second degree up-tree instance, but perhaps that was due to his lingering similarities to me. After all, Sedge had forked him off shortly after I had forked into her. It was part of the package deal: Sedge went back to exploring femininity while Tule returned to cis-masculinity. Both of them remained siblings, perhaps because I was their progenitor.</p>
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<p>I chose to remain sitting for a while, idle gaze settling on the triad beside me, while I thought of the ways in which Dry Grass talked about In The Wind. I tried mapping that onto my own clade. Thinking of Lily like a sister, of Cress like our clade’s own little one, felt right in a way that I didn’t expect. While it was difficult to think of Tule as in any way that much younger than me, despite being my second degree up-tree instance, but perhaps that was due to his lingering similarities to me. After all, Sedge had forked him off shortly after I had forked into her. It was part of the package deal: Sedge went back to exploring femininity while Tule returned to cis-masculinity; ditto Rush and a further queering of gender. Both of them remained siblings — younger siblings, perhaps, because I was their progenitor.</p>
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<p>But Marsh? Were they a parent? Were they also a sibling? Some great-grandparent, perhaps? Or were they simply my root instance? All fit to greater or lesser extent.</p>
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<p>Finally, the thought ran its course and, left with a curiously numb and empty mind, I slid down to join the other three in laying on the bed, though I kept what I hoped was a polite distance, laying on my back and staring up at the ceiling.</p>
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<p>The polite distance lasted for less than a minute before Dry Grass rolled onto her side and draped an arm across my middle. <em>“If this is uncomfortable, do let me know, Reed,”</em> she sent in a sensorium message as both Tule and Cress scooted closer to her. <em>“Otherwise, I am going to try and sleep.”</em></p>
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<p>Tense, I nodded. <em>“It’s…different. Not bad, just going to take some getting used to.”</em></p>
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<p><em>“Should your boundaries change, then, let me know and I will adapt with them.”</em></p>
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<p><em>“Should your boundaries change, then, let me know and I will adapt with them. I am simply craving touch. It is grounding for me.”</em></p>
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<p>I nodded once more, patting the back of her hand where it rested on my side.</p>
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<p><em>“Ooooh, Reeeeed,”</em> came the barest hint of a message from Cress, and I peeked an eye open to see it peering over Dry Grass’s shoulder, grinning.</p>
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<p>I smirked and rolled my eyes. <em>“Shush, you.”</em></p>
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<p><em>“Is there any more news on that?”</em> Cress asked.</p>
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<p><em>“I mean, there’s plenty,”</em> I sent. <em>“Almost too much. All these changes they added to the System are beyond me. Like, they made the Ansible and AVEC more robust, which I guess is good, though we don’t use those any. ACLs are whatever, I guess. Not something we have to worry about. Splitting the hardware of the System, though? That sounds wild. Ditto adding cross-tree merging, which the other Odists and Jonas freaked out about.”</em></p>
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<p><em>“Cross-tree merging? Like you and I merging?”</em></p>
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<p><em>“I guess so. Answers Will Not Help and Jonas got pretty mad about the whole thing, actually, saying it changed clades into ‘gestalts’ or something. I guess I can see it, too. We still fork like a tree, branching out and everything, but if we can merge from one branch to another instead of just down, then the metaphor falls apart.”</em></p>
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<p><em>“I guess so. Answers Will Not Help and Jonas got pretty weird about the whole thing, actually, saying it changed clades into ‘gestalts’ or something. I guess I can see it, too. We still fork like a tree, branching out and everything, but if we can merge from one branch to another instead of just down, then the metaphor falls apart.”</em></p>
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<p>Tule chimed in with a scoff. <em>“What about that would make them angry? It just sounds like a minor improvement and a change in terminology.”</em></p>
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<p><em>“Hell if I know. They’re old and weird.”</em></p>
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<p>Cress buried its face against Tule’s shoulder to muffle a giggle. <em>“God, if they’re weirder than Dry Grass, they’d have to be.”</em> It sighed, added, <em>“But I guess that cross-tree merging sounds interesting. I can’t imagine what a mess the combination of all six of us would look like.”</em></p>
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</article>
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<footer>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-01-01</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-03-29</p>
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<p>We lingered in silence for the remainder of the evening, the four of us piled into a bed now built for four. Two of my cocladists and their partner, and now me. Who knew what I was? There was the friendship that we had built over the last few days. There was the camaraderie that we had built through work. There was the acquaintanceship that had been there from years prior.</p>
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<p>And now there was more. I didn’t have words for it, and Dry Grass was asleep for most of our time together. It wasn’t the time for conversations, it was time for just resting, something I realized I dearly needed as well. We all did, as we napped off and on for some time until the clock hit one in the morning, at which point I stepped back home to spend the rest of my night with Hanne.</p>
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<p>She was already in bed, curled around body pillow, though not yet asleep.</p>
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<p>And now there was more. I didn’t have words for it, and Dry Grass was asleep for much of our time together. It wasn’t the time for conversations, it was time for just resting, something I realized I dearly needed as well. We all did, as we napped off and on for some time until the clock hit one in the morning, at which point I stepped back home to spend the rest of my night with Hanne.</p>
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<p>She was already in bed, curled around a body pillow, though not yet asleep.</p>
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<p><em>“Reed?”</em> she asked through a sensorium message as I crept into the room, a cone of silence set up over me to keep from disturbing her. <em>“You back for the night?”</em></p>
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<p>Startled out of my attempt to be sneaky, I straightened up and dropped the silence. “Yeah, sorry Hanne. I didn’t mean to just disappear on you.”</p>
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<p>“It’s okay.”</p>
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<p>“Right, yeah. I’m sorry,” I said, climbing in behind her in the bed. “I actually fell asleep, or I would’ve been home sooner.”</p>
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<p>“Oh, okay,” she mumbled. I felt her relax against me, and I hugged my arm around her middle. “I was worried you were out running yourself ragged.”</p>
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<p>“That was earlier. I wore myself out at our little funeral.”</p>
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<p>Hanne sighed into the long silence that followed, eventually replying, “I went to see Jess’s…uh, core, I guess, with a few others. I came home and just kind of lay down and have been here ever since.”</p>
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<p>Hanne sighed into the long silence that followed, eventually replying, “I went to see Shu’s…uh, core, I guess, with a few others. I came home and just kind of lay down and have been here ever since.”</p>
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<p>I tightened my arm around her. “I’m sorry, Hanne. It’s super overwhelming there. Did you get any rest, at least?”</p>
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<p>She shrugged noncommittally. “Glad you got some. Where’d you crash?” She winced at the choice of words, curling tighter around her pillow. “Where’d you take your nap?”</p>
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<p>“Over with Cress and Tule and Dry Grass. We sat in bed to talk and then just all fell asleep.”</p>
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<p>“Oh?” I could hear the faint smirk in her voice. “Did you wind up getting all smoochy with her?”</p>
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<p>I laughed, pressing my face against the back of her neck. “No. A bit cuddly, maybe, but that’s it.”</p>
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<p>I laughed, pressing my face against the back of her neck. “No. A bit cuddly, maybe, but that’s it. We may go on a date at some point.”</p>
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<p>She laughed as well. “Well, good. I’m happy for you.”</p>
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<p>I kissed on her nape. “Yeah, we’ll see. It’s a weird way to come about a relationship.”</p>
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<p>“Mmhm. It’s really weird talking about this now, though. All this stressful stuff going on, and we’re talking about relationships.”</p>
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<p>“We talked about that a bit, actually,” I said. “Tule suggested that it was a bit of focusing on the good things, but Dry Grass said it might be more like a ‘protective measure’. Something about “building more relationships to pin ourselves down after so many were broken”.”</p>
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<p>“We talked about that a bit, actually,” I said. “Tule suggested that it was a bit of focusing on the good things, but Dry Grass said it might be more like a ‘protective measure’. Something about trauma bonding. “Building more relationships to pin ourselves down after so many were broken”.”</p>
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<p>“That’s a kind of cynical way of looking at it.”</p>
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<p>“I guess,” I said. “She was hurting. We also saw her lost up-tree instance’s core.”</p>
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<p>“Oh, shit. I’m sorry.”</p>
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<p>I shrugged. “We were all hurting, just in different ways.”</p>
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<p>“Yeah, I guess we are. I’m still somewhere between numb and grief, I guess.”</p>
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<p>“I’m…I don’t know,” I said. “Grieving? Confused? Hurt?”</p>
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<p>“I’m sorry, Hanne,” I said. “I’m…I don’t know. Grieving? Confused? Hurt?”</p>
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<p>“Hurt how?”</p>
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<p>“Hurt like I’ve been kicked by someone I trusted.”</p>
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<p>She nodded. “I guess I can see that. I trusted phys-side. I trusted the systechs. I feel kind of like that trust was broken in some ways.”</p>
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<p>We lay in silence for a while, and I found myself lingering on the thoughts of holding onto trust. I was doing that now, wasn’t I? I was with Hanne, my partner of nearly a decade, trusting that she would be here in the morning, that I’d still be able to talk to her, drink coffee with her, drink too much champagne and brandy.</p>
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<p>“Hey Hanne?”</p>
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<p>“Mm?” She sounded on the verge of sleep.</p>
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<p>“I love you.”</p>
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<p>“I love you too. What brought that on?”</p>
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<p>“Remember what we were talking about before…before the attack?”</p>
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<p>“You were talking about 2399,” she said, then laughed sleepily. “I asked you to sell me on the year. You made a pretty convincing argument that it was a good year.”</p>
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<p>“I stand by that,” I said, grinning. “But yeah, we were talking about the past, asking about life back phys-side. I said, “Am I not allowed to be a bit maudlin?” I was being really sappy.”</p>
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<p>“You should’ve said that instead.”</p>
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<p>I snorted. “Yeah, I guess so. I’m feeling pretty maudlin now, though. I still feel hurt, I still feel like I’m grieving, but I’m feeling maudlin, too. Extremely sentimental. Effusively sad.”</p>
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<p>“Effusively!” She sighed, squirming around to give me a kiss. “Reed, my darling, my love, please never change.”</p>
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<p>“Effusively!” She sighed, squirming around to give me a kiss. “Reed, my darling, my love, my very own, please never change.”</p>
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<p>“Wasn’t planning on it,” I said, grinning. “But yeah. The grief is really starting to kick in. I got so <em>angry</em> at Lily today. She was being such a bitch about Dry Grass, I mean, so of course I did, but…well, I hit her. Slapped her across the face.”</p>
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<p>“You <em>hit</em> her? Jesus, Reed.”</p>
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<p>“Yeah, I know. I feel terrible about it. I know a lot of people are super angry about things now, so maybe it makes sense, but that was a pretty good way to knock myself out of that mindset. I feel betrayed, yeah, but not that fury anymore.”</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2023-12-25</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-03-29</p>
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