Chapter 21
James
Kate flounces out of her room the next morning, wearing what James thinks must be what workout clothes are now, but might have been worn to the club in his time.
They are futuristic but have a throwback quality to them.
She’s tucked a—because why would she spare him— sheer collared shirt into a short, subtly metallic pleated white skirt.
She’s cinched her long auburn hair in a high ponytail and wears what appear to be extra bouncy sneakers.
Kill him now. The look is equal parts naughty schoolgirl Halloween costume and Tennis Player Barbie.
He can’t peel his eyes away from his roommate.
She’s nothing like Blythe, or any of the elite pool of women he and his family would consider wife material.
Kate was certainly polished, but not in a demure, understated, pearls on Sunday and a house in the Hamptons sort of way.
It seems he’s stopped caring. He thinks she’s perfect—loud and revealing outfits, dragon scale tattoos, ridiculous virtual dogs, and all.
“Where are you off to?” he asks.
She shows very little interest in him as she breezes into the kitchen. At least she seems to be in a good mood. All sins from the night before are forgotten, or at least are being ignored. Over her shoulder she says, “Tennis. Then the spa.”
He huffs, giving her an indignant glare as she comes to stand before him. He watches her down her morning pick-me-UP packet before taking a few sips of water.
“You didn’t think I might like to go?” he asks.
Her eyebrows lift slightly.
“Never mind,” he says. He shouldn’t have said anything.
He should leave her to do her thing and be happy with copious amounts of research time, hoping to discover some employment he’s qualified for.
It isn’t as if he’s feeling bored or purposeless.
He only wishes he had some agency or some actionable task to focus his mounting energy on instead of research.
At this point, he’d take nearly anything.
“Oh, James. I’m sorry. I didn’t think,” she says. Her head quirks to the side. Then she’s on her device. A minute later, she looks up. “Got you added. Go change. Hurry, or we’ll be late.”
Despite himself, James is glad for the opportunity to get some movement in, and possibly spend more time with Kate, so he goes to his room to put on a pair of jogger-like pants and a T-shirt.
Maybe they have a pill in the future to help people to get over weird crushes.
He should look into that, because his little Kate is off-limits problem is already becoming difficult.
When he comes out, Kate gives him a once-over, landing on the joggers. “Don’t you think you’ll get hot in those?”
“I’m fine. Let’s go.” He frets to think of what the men in this time consider appropriate gym attire.
The Sports Center is on level CA25-100. They enter and get checked in.
James follows as Kate shows him the locker room.
Before he goes in, she tells him to put his things away and meet her at Court 16.
This is easy because he has no things to store.
Instead, he noses around, curious what other amenities the Sports Center offers.
Does she have a membership? Can he get one too, or does he always have to be with her?
Figuring out how to get an ID will solve that issue. Aside from learning everything he can about the future—the present, he corrects himself—including but not limited to the financial systems, he will make getting the ID a priority. Then unicoin.
The locker room holds a compression chamber, which looks to him like a steam room with an airlock.
Plus an infrared sauna, showers with the same little timers as his at Kate’s unit, sinks, toilets, recycling bins, towel racks, and lockers.
Nothing out of the ordinary. He always thought the future would be more futuristic.
Like Mars trips and robot assistants. Mostly, it’s just weird.
Outside the locker room, he finds a section called Classic Country Sports.
The placard below has a long list written in several languages, like the police station.
It lists baseball, golf, archery, tennis, track and field, horseback riding—which elicits a shudder considering the dog park thing—and beach volleyball.
He enters, first coming upon archery. A slim woman outfitted in neon pink army fatigues stands facing the inside of the small cube she’s in.
She wears an elaborate VR headset and holds what he can only compare to a bicycle pump in her hands.
Her fingers wrap around the handle, and she pulls it back.
Her knuckles go white as her arm trembles.
Clearly there is tension in the tube. Then she lets it go.
Whatever she sees must be climactic because her mouth falls open and she emits a shriek that is muffled by the glass.
James shakes his head. He passes golf next, which holds a similar spectacle, except the clubs are full length.
And there is a ball attached to a tee. When the man swings, he somehow hits the ball perfectly even though he has the VR set on.
Upon impact, the ball spins down under the floor before popping back up, ready to be struck again.
Finally, he gets to tennis. He passes several cubes labeled Court 1, 2, 3, and so on, until he gets to 16. Inside, Kate is bouncing around, reacting to whatever she sees in her VR headset. He pushes the door open, and she turns around. Something must have sounded in her ear.
Her warm-up has already created a slight sheen of sweat on her skin and the dragon scales peeking out of the neckline almost shimmer.
Now that he’s used to them, he thinks he might like them.
He wants to touch them, anyway. He can make them out curving around her sides through her shirt, which the bright lights of the cube have made ineffective.
Her sports bra is minimal and—Heavenly Father—the top clings in ways he should not be considering.
He’s definitely not here for the exercise.
“Hi,” he says stupidly as she comes to his side, clicking a setting on the crystal VR set so he can see her eyes instead of the usual reflective surface.
“James is here,” she says to someone he cannot see. Then to him, “I switched us to doubles. We’re playing with Lessa and the third member of my friends group, Aurone, who you haven’t met. Here.”
She hands him a VR headset that she plucks from the wall.
Then she passes him a tennis handle minus the racket head.
Once she gets him set up, she goes to the cube across the hall.
This is so overwhelmingly foreign that he can’t help but go along with it.
There are no questions or protests. And he’s curious, which feels so much better than being afraid.
Jett’s voice rings in his head as a reminder. Be open to possibilities. He hardly has a choice, but this seems to make Kate happy, which is enough to melt away any misgivings he may have.
Through the glass walls, he watches Kate put her headset into place before he mimics her position, flipping his down.
Unlike the set in her unit, the one he wears now surrounds him with an image of him and Kate standing side by side.
Across the net stand Lessa and a tall, fit man with a physique that almost reminds him of himself but with dark bronze skin and hair nearly the same shade.
On second thought, the man looks eerily similar to an eighteenth-century Apollo statue his mother had been rather proud of.
The man is possibly better looking too, if one were to line up their flaws for comparison.
It’s not James’s fault his parents couldn’t select his traits so he resembled a Greek god.
James is not jealous. He does not care how close a friend this man is to Kate.
“You know the rules?” she asks, walking to the net. He nods, following her, only slightly worried he’s about to walk into a wall inside the tiny cube.
The team on the other side does the same, and Lessa spins the grip in their hand. “Up or down?” they ask.
They play “tennis” for the next two hours.
The handle, James discovers, is more than a piece of graphite.
It’s an electronic device that vibrates and creates the simulation of weight and impact as he swings it and strikes the ball.
If he didn’t know better, he would think what he’s experiencing is real.
The sounds, the smells. Even a breeze in the room is simulated, as if they’re playing outside on a sunny day.
Then he realizes the floor must be somehow moving beneath his feet as he sprints to the net, because he hasn’t crashed into the wall once.
The only thing that is off is when it’s his turn to serve.
The ball appears before him, and he takes it from the air.
But his fingers close around nothing. He has to adjust, and he takes several tries to get the fake toss right.
James and Kate lose 3–6, 6–4, 5–7. He thinks if he got the serve down quicker, they would have won. They meet Lessa and Aurone in the break room once the match is finished.
Aurone steps up beside him and claps him on the shoulder. “James, right? I might have to steal you for my Sixthday league, if you’re open to it?”
“Or get your own,” Lessa says, biting their lip. “I may have filled Aurone in . . .” They nod in James’s direction.
Kate puts a hand on his arm. “Don’t worry. Your secret is safe between the four of us. We’ve been a friends group forever.”
Then Kate gives Aurone a sweaty side hug. “Sorry I haven’t told you sooner.”
James’s jealousy flares when Aurone doesn’t immediately release her.
“Kate mentioned you,” he pauses for dramatic effect, “at breakfast one morning. Or was it before bed? You’re a systems engineer?
That’s basically a fancy way to say IT guy, right?
” Aurone’s eyes narrow as if he’s picked up on the subtext: I live with her, not you.