I’m Honour, and this is the worst day of my life.
I’m twenty, single, and before today I believed my dream of becoming a doctor was possible. It’s jaw-dropping how quickly your life can change. One minute you’re in your first year of med school. The next minute your parents are dead. Poisoned from a faulty batch of bacteria-riddled Kombucha Tea. Worse yet, it was their own company. There goes my inheritance in lawsuits.
So here I am, riding my magna-bike down this nightmare street to The Corp Employment Center. Good thing the magnetic strip in the road pulls me along. My legs are trembling with shock. I’m not sure I could pedal a vintage cycle even if I wanted to.
Normally I love going downtown. Seeing the plants that tumble down the sides of the skyscrapers from the green roofs. Smelling the vegan creations made by the lunch trucks. Window-shopping for alpaca sweaters and hemp dresses. Watching the elite drive their electric sports cars down the strip.
But not today.
Today, I’m trying to see the road through my tears and make sure the CCTV cameras don’t see how upset I am. Extreme public emotion is a no-no in Corp Town. They have roaming Emotional Counselors to take care of people making public nuisances out of themselves.
A magnetic bus whizzes by and I jump out of the way.
“Look where you’re going!” I say, sniffling up snot and shaking my fist.
Why do they make them so silent? Great for the environment, but a menace to pedestrians and cyclists.
The Corp Employment Center is intimidating. It’s the biggest building in the city and has zero charm. All solar panels and a hundred stories high. My neck hurts when I crane it to look up. It’s a risk coming here. I know that, but my parents left me zero money. The poison tea fiasco will take everything. So, I either move into the poor zone or put my fate in the hands of The Corp Computer. If you apply for a job here, you must take what you’re given. No reneging. No changing your mind. Guaranteed living wage though.
I’m so nervous. I feel like I’m going to puke.
It doesn’t take long to take the test. There are fifty machines. You line up, answer a few questions, and then get the results envelope. The recycled paper is damp in my sweaty hand. I’m opening it…
I blink a few times as I read the result.
You’ve got to be kidding me. I can’t do that! Jesus. I might take a jail term over this. How bad can it be to clean nuclear waste in the Northern Colonies?
Holy shit. Just when I thought my life couldn’t get worse.
Pleasure Provider?
I didn’t even know THAT was considered an official job! I’m gutted.
People stumble out of my way as I barrel out of the building. I think I knocked one guy down, but I don’t slow down to help him up.
My eyes are so blurry from tears I can’t even ride my bike. I’m walking it. According to this envelope, my first client arrives in an hour!
§
I hate this job. No matter how bad I imagined it would be? It’s worse. The only way to get through this is to count each thrust and hope the sweaty John will hurry up. I’ve got to get to class. I don’t intend to be a hooker forever, you know. No matter what the damn assignment center says. It’s the smell of sweaty human flesh. The sound of skin slapping against skin. The grunts vibrating against my chest—
And…there, he’s finally done. Dave. A regular.
Dave’s a journalist on some underground news site. I hear all sorts of secrets in my new profession. Like there’s a dark web alive and thriving. Dave’s your basic slimeball. Tells the same story I hear from half my clients. Whining that his wife doesn’t get him. Sure, guy. It’s not that you’re a gander bored with your goose. No, it’s his wife’s fault. I’m glad to see his back.
To clear the smell of sex out of my apartment, I throw the window open. And take a shower. Not that I will ever feel clean.
I’m so bloody exhausted, working in the morning and studying till late at night. I’d pour a glass of wine, but ARISA, my apartment AI, counts every drink. One way out of this shitty hole I’ve dug myself into is to accumulate social credits. There’s cash, and then there are rewards for socially acceptable behavior. Ironic isn’t it? A hooker trying to be socially acceptable.
Becoming a doctor is a dead dream. I’ve swapped from medicine to Executive Corp training. Cheaper schooling. Plus, I’ve got some special motivation.
One day I’ll have a job at head office. In the same building that gave me this shit job assignment. There’s something seriously wrong with the system. I’m going to learn how to change it from the inside.
Honour the Spy.
It’s got a nice ring, doesn’t it? Maybe I can gather intel for that dark web. Or maybe I can do worse. Sabotage. Cause you know what?
I won’t be a Pleasure Provider forever.
The Corp? Look out.
Angelique Fawns is a journalist and speculative fiction writer. She began her career writing articles about naked cave dwellers in Tenerife, Canary Islands. Her stories have only gotten stranger since then. Though she has no idea how she finds time to write, it often involves hiding in a dark corner of a pub, sipping on Chardonnay, and letting her nightmares spew onto paper. Find her work in Amazing Stories, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Space & Time, and Mystery Tribune, to name a few. If you dare, check out her podcast, Read Me A Nightmare, or her blog at https://www.fawns.ca/
If you enjoyed this story, you might also want to read “The Hangover and the Hag” and “Graveside Dining,” which we published earlier. And watch for “Seagull Surveillance,” coming in Q1 2025!
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