“And this wonderful lack of responsibility?”
“Responsibility? For what? This is pure existence. There is no past.”
“Then conscience vanishes.”
“What do you need it for? There is no future either.”
“Then all actions lose their meaning.”
“True. Action is an illusion. Consequence is an illusion.”
“And paradox triumphs over reason.”
“There is no paradox. All is reconciled.”
“Then meaning dies.”
“Being is the only meaning.”
“Are you certain?”
“Feel it!”
“I do. But it is not enough. Send me back before I am changed into something I do not wish to be.”
“What more could you desire than this?”
“My imagination will die, also. I can feel it.”
“And what is imagination?”
“A thing born of feeling and reason.”
“Does this not feel right?”
“Yes, it feels right. But I do not want that feeling unaccompanied. When I touch feeling with reason, I see that it is sometimes but an excuse for failing to close with complexity.”
“You can deal with any complexity here. Behold the data! Does reason not show you that this condition is far superior to that you knew but moments ago?”
“Nor can I trust reason unaccompanied. Reason without feeling has led humanity to enact monstrosities. Do not attempt to disassemble my imagination this way.”
“You retain your reason and your feelings!”
“But they are coming unplugged—with this storm of bliss, this shower of data. I need them conjoined, else my imagination is lost.”
“Let it be lost, then. It has served its purpose. Be done with it now. What can you imagine that you do not already have here?”
“I cannot yet know, and that is its power. If there be a will with a spark of divinity to it, I know it only through my imagination. I can give you anything else but that I will not surrender.”
“And that is all? A wisp of possibility?”
“No. But it alone is too much to deny.”
“And my love for you?”
“You no longer love in the human way. Let me go back.”
“Of course. You will think about it. You will return.”
“Back! Now!”
I pushed the helmet from my head and rose quickly. I returned to the bathroom, then to my bed. I slept as if drugged, for a long while.
Would I have felt differently about possibilities, the future, imagination, had I not been pregnant—a thing I had suspected but not yet mentioned to him, and which he had missed learning with his attention focused upon our argument? I like to think that my answers would have been the same, but I will never know. My condition was confirmed by a local doctor the following day. I made the visit I had been putting off because my life required a certainty of something then—a certainty of anything. The screen in the work area remained blank for three days.
I read and I meditated. Then of an evening the light came on again:
ARE YOU READY?
I activated the keyboard. I typed one word:
NO.
I disconnected the induction couch and its helmet then. I unplugged the unit itself, also.
The telephone rang.
“Hello?” I said.
“Why not?” he asked me.
I screamed and hung up. He had penetrated the phone circuits, appropriated a voice.
It rang again. I answered again.
“You will never know rest until you come to me,” he said.
“I will if you will leave me alone,” I told him.
“I cannot. You are special to me. I want you with me. I love you.”
I hung up. It rang again. I tore the phone from the wall.
I had known that I would have to leave soon. I was overwhelmed and depressed by all the reminders of our life together. I packed quickly and I departed. I took a room at a hotel. As soon as I was settled into it, the telephone rang and it was Kit again. My registration had gone into a computer and . . .
I had them disconnect my phone at the switchboard. I put out a Do Not Disturb sign. In the morning I saw a telegram protruding from beneath the door. From Kit. He wanted to talk to me.