Another Place, Another Chance

The sun set magnificently on the steep Rocky Mountain peaks.  A bright golden charm descended upon the forest and fields.  For all this, the robotic courier merely registered his proximity to the delivery site. 

         Like most advancements, the larger cities and urban areas were the first to encounter this new species of mailman.  Unlike previous workers, these new postal workers never threatened to strike, could never grow lazy under a monopoly status, nor could they earn the pejorative connotation of the word postal.  Earlier in the decade, demands for a more efficient and streamlined government led to local control, cities, towns, or counties, of the postal system; innovations could now occur without having to survive the gauntlet of an enormous bureaucracy.  Soon after the initial trials, cities, Denver and Phoenix first among them, placed large orders to replace their current workforce.  In an effort to usher in the replacements, most cities agreed to pay off the current mailmen with three quarters of their expected lifetime's salary, bonuses and all.  Ironically, even accounting for the sunk cost of the shiny new mailmen, this move cost less than continuing to employ humans.  The gains from Sunday deliveries alone brought tears to management's, still human, eyes and hope to many a mayor's heart.  The latest innovation quickly spread to rural areas: decreasing delivery time, increasing customer satisfaction, and almost eliminating the peculiar “lost package” notice that so many unhappy recipients had grown frustratingly accustomed to.

         Along county line 34, while the dusk settled gently amongst the trees, Postal Unit # 353 exited mail truck #501 to deliver package #770051 to Jim Gregory.  Upon arriving at the Gregory residence, the only recognition the immense gorge, approximately 228.6 meters east of the dirt driveway, received amounted to a mere environmental variable modifier indicating the danger posed. 

         Tonight, a Sunday indistinguishable from last, Jim sat reading a mystery novel as sports updates occasionally broke the peaceful silence.  The novel Jim held in hand, as predictable as the last, cataloged the exploits of an underachieving protagonist turned unwittingly into a hero.  The shadowy organization of nefarious purpose would, at the climax, be defeated by the cunning of everyman.  Despite the thin plot and formulaic presentation, Jim felt satisfied with the inevitable victory. 

         A soft knock echoed through the home.  The wooden frame of the home, built of trees almost a century old before they were harvested, creaked, acknowledging the greeting and subconscious expectations most have of a small farmhouse.  Sally would have appreciated the noise, and, for that reason, so too did Jim.

         Trained as an engineer, Jim had consciously adhered to a scheme that plotted the remainder of his life.  Happily, fate, on a chilly autumn night, intervened.  Celebrations have a way of enhancing the radiance of all whom attend; the exit from daily life liberates those ill-defined qualities of the soul.  Since that time, much of that college night had faded, aging with the passing years.  Yet, that most important moment remained etched as deep as the night it was carved.  A college friend, Keith, introduced a stunning young woman to Jim with a gesture of casual disregard.  How could he have known then that this was not a woman, but an angel?           

         The introduction had been affable, polite, and banal.  That is, at least, what the average onlooker would later recall.  For Jim, taking Sally's hand, the room morphed in a subtle, soft, effervescent way: like hot chocolate coursing through the body after a day spent toiling in the depths of winter.  Had the world been a film, the motion would have slowed as their eyes met for the first time.  The cue for a lifetime's contentment has seldom been as clear.  He smiled as she took his hand.  The grace of her presence stole his heart.  From then on, everything in life felt dull and tasteless compared to a moment spent searching those honey colored eyes and running his hand through her long auburn hair.  That night Jim understood how destiny truly revealed itself.  It may not have happened yet, but he already knew how the rest of his life would play out, and he was happy.

         Loving Sally was like breathing, a vital essence that permeated his very being.  After college, they moved to a small suburb outside of Denver.  Jim found employment with a technical firm that consulted companies designing medical equipment.  Sally spent her days teaching small children.  For thirteen years she taught bright little faces of the wonders of the world around them.  Jim enjoyed hearing the stories Sally brought home each night.  The cute children populated the stories, but Jim listened for the affection that layered each telling; Sally's joy endeared her to every child that passed through that small classroom. 

         Their life together had been a grand adventure on a small stage.  However, even a little stage eventually plays host to tragedies.  A week into another school year Sally felt weary: a strange weakness overcame her exuberance.  Several days later, Sally, prostrate and pale, lay dying in a hospital bed.  A combination of viral infection and genetic abnormalities of the immune system lay waste to her body.  Jim, despite the time since, still experienced a hollow emptiness upon recalling that fateful word: terminal. 

         For what time she had left, Jim constantly kept his ailing wife company.  While she was conscious, they discussed the retirement Sally had planned.  Tears mixed with bittersweet conversation while Sally painted a life not to be.  A small blue farmhouse, in the middle of a Colorado forest, complete with white stained fence, rocking chairs creaking on a quaint porch, and a brilliant vista would be the setting of their golden years.  That night, gripping her hand and praying for death to spare her a little longer, Sally passed away. 

         The funeral was short.  A wound tore Jim's heart while he poured soft dirt into the tomb that concealed his future.  Though relatives paid their respects and attempted to console him, they eventually went their separate ways to lead their own lives.  Jim hardened.  A solemn manner overtook his previous personality as he continued the chore of living.  Three years passed in near silent introspection and occasional drinking bouts.  The friends he used to accompany faded into the background.  Whether he slipped away or the world did, Jim was never able to connect to another person as he had with Sally.  His few attempts at dating left Jim resolute in his opposition; why bother when all the waking world had to offer fell short of the one you wished for? 

         Finally, five years after Sally's death, Jim withdrew from the company.  A generous retirement, thanks in large part to Sally's astute planning, met the morbid man.  That night, weighing his options, the scene from the hospital, all those years past, played out.  He could think of no more fitting monument.  That farmhouse would be built in her memory. 

         Construction, aided by robotic workers, lasted just under a lunar month.  The house sat in the middle of a field, ringed by trees on three sides.  The fourth side ran a couple hundred meters from the house before dropping precipitously into a deep ravine.  At night you could hear the rushing water a thousand feet below.  The idyllic baby blue building brought a sweet sorrow to Jim's bereaved heart.  “Sally would be happy,” he whispered to the wind as he entered their dream home for the first time. 

         Three weeks of moving and unpacking had transformed the house into a home.  Sally's decorations, adornments, and mementos peppered the interior.  Any visitor could be forgiven the assumption that two people inhabited the dwelling, a storybook aura masked death's presence.  Yet, only Jim haunted here.  Out in the lonely mountains, he would spend months at a time without human contact.  Bulk purchases, online shopping, and guaranteed couriers severely limited what once passed for necessary social interaction.  So, without surprise, Jim rose from the soft reclining chair to answer the doorbell, placing the crisp novel on a nightstand.           

         “Good evening sir,” issued from a metallic figure blocking the entryway.  “Evening,” Jim replied in a self-conscious tone that underscored the mock social scene.  It is hard to treat a toaster with indifference after it greets you.  As the robot turned away, Jim examined the crate sized red package before him.  Looking up, Jim watched the robot turn out of the long driveway on his way to the next destination; Jim couldn't help but wonder if the mailman ever considered missing a delivery. 

         “Sleep Life,” a garish sticker proclaimed from the top of the box.  Surrounded by the ruins of packaging, Jim listened as a soft female voice walked through the basic setup.  “While wearing the helmet, click the green button and concentrate on the person, place, fantasy, time, memory, or object you desire to interact with.  After ten minutes of concentration, the headgear will display 'pattern recognized' in red flashing letters.  If this does not --,” the voice faded as Jim marched up the stairs, helmet in hand.  If, and only if, there was a problem, would he waste time listening to the rest of the recording. 

         His excitement overcame his usual tidy habits; he ignored the faint television and female voice echoing from the package.  Jim collapsed in his large bed, still covered with the satin sheets and midnight comforter Sally had chosen those many years ago.  Memories of her flooded his mind, easily overwhelming the master bedroom's unimposing atmosphere and the faint voices still speaking downstairs.  With closed eyes, his mind navigated the soft currents of better days while the machine silently registered which areas of his brain stored those precious memories. 

         Ten minutes greatly underestimated the capabilities of the device, but it did guarantee that any variance, emotional responses, and secondary memories evoked would be captured intact.  While field testing, researchers designing 'Sleep Life' found that the common monetary, power, and sexual fantasies rarely required more than a few minutes for their algorithm to entirely image the appropriate brain processes.  Yet, several subjects, otherwise physically healthy, demonstrated pronounced activity in the Amygdala during recall.  These subjects subjectively chose intense situations or events, and, as a result, the instrument required more time to guarantee correct process gain for accurate inducement later.  As an added precaution, the device limited exposure to a maximum of eight consecutive hours a day and twenty-four nonconsecutive hours a week when the Amygdala was involved.  After the capture of such a pattern, a warning message displayed informing the user of these precautions and recommending that, given psychological stress and associated long-term physiological degradation, future patterns avoid such intense emotional content.  As far as legal culpability stood, the corporation's responsibility ended with that message.  A resurgence of individual rights in the last century had paved the way for innovations in fields once considered legally impassable.  The lawyers at Prometheus Corp. happily encouraged mass production of ‘Sleep Life’ following the addition of appropriate safety equipment and a small pink slip contraindicating the use of equipment to satisfy morally questionable impulses. 

         Jim witnessed with minor annoyance as the warning flashed before his eyes.  His previous experience in engineering informed him of the legal issues involved, but also provided him the requisite knowledge to bypass such feeble safety measures.  Most likely, the engineers at Prometheus had only added the limitations after an intervention by the company’s upset legal division.  Jim grinned inwardly: this meant that the addition would not affect the functionality of the base equipment and should be simple to remove.  A few hours surfing the internet, mainly Chinese technical sites thanks to the Chinese government's lax enforcement of foreign property rights and the language training mandatory, for at least the last decade, as part of an engineering degree, afforded detailed schematics of the 'Sleep Life' device both post and prior to the additions.  Tomorrow, a few hours and tools later, his product would have full functionality minus the safety constraints.  Anticipating tomorrow's challenge brought a delicate pleasure, reminiscent of college lab work, as he drifted off to sleep.

         Proving measurably simpler than originally thought, the engineer's at Prometheus must have received the legal directive late in the development process.  A last minute change, the safety addition was practically plug-and-play.  A minor amount of soldering later and the device was free to provide all the time he desired with Sally.  After all, the device provided a user-set timed allotment for each sleep cycle, he had merely extended the time frames available.  Jim loved technology and the still limited education most people had in the area.  Rather than a complex safety feature that prevented after-market modifications, a simple chip had sufficed the needs of Prometheus Corp.  It was sad, Jim thought, reattaching the casing to cover the internal components, that in a time so incredibly dependent on technology, especially in comparison to the past, that so few bothered to understand the foundation of their lives.  But, for now, it did entail far less work on his part. 

         With the pattern set, only unconsciousness remained absent.  For that, Jim walked into the bathroom, opened the white medicine cabinet, and withdrew several small pills.  Sleeping pills, though not intended for this particular use, wouldn't mind helping Jim in his hour of need.  He walked into the kitchen, filled a small glass with purified water, and downed the medicinal essence of sleep.  The soft bed conformed to his body, even the helmet, as Jim entered slumber and exited the waking plane.

         Disoriented, Jim removed the gray helmet.  Darkness greeted his groping hands.  The helmet gone, only a black vista speckled with white lights painted his vision.  Slowly, the confusion melted, and the painting solidified into the view of a clear night sky.  He rose slowly, trying to steady himself under the added weight of damp clothing sticking to his body.  Thankfully, upon turning about, the outline of a farmhouse appeared.  Apparently, sometime in the night, he had wandered from his comfortable bed to the edge of the western woods.  After a short walk home, he sat in front of the monitor, stretching across the living room's shorter wall, studying technical blueprints. 

         The couch was wet as Jim hadn't bothered to shower or dry off.  Curiosity and confusion fed the urge to discover what side-effect the modification unintentionally triggered.  Jim did not note the passage of time while scanning the blueprints until a bright dawn shot through the window.  Exhausted, he rubbed his sore eyes and shuffled down the hall.  A shower and coffee would help, he thought.  Yet, five hours and several translated Chinese documents later, he was no closer to understanding his night's outing.  Placing the fruitless search to the side, Jim reminisced of the time before waking at the forest's edge.  He and Sally had traveled deep into a forest in the warm summer sun.  There, in a small clearing, they ate a small lunch Sally had packed.  She told him how happy she was to recover from such a terrible ordeal, and that he need not worry anymore; she would never leave him.  Tears rolled down his cheek as he told her of the nightmare without her.  He had dreamt she had died in that hospital; that he had to carry on a shadow of living without her.  Sally held his hand as he spoke, and her soft touch reassured him of the foolishness of dwelling on dreams.  She was here now, and that was all that mattered. 

         Awaking in the dead of night had only intensified the discordance.  Jim recognized now that the tired, lonely, miserable existence was the real world, but couldn't help but yearn for the earlier unreality.  Where Sally was, whatever the reality of it, did not matter when compared with the beauty of her face, the softness of her gaze, and the warmth of her touch. 

         With zealous resolve, Jim dismissed the forest ordeal as a simple setback.  Rather than attempt to alter the helmet again, which was working perfectly in all other respects, he decided to barricade the bedroom door.  That way, mobile or not, he would remain in his own home.  For the second time in twenty-four hours, Jim gulped pills as payment to gain entrance into another world.  Safely locking his bedroom and front door before falling asleep, Jim climbed into his comfortable bed free of concern.  The smooth satin embraced him as he slipped away to Sally. 

         She sat waiting in a beautiful meadow.  Green grass and colorful flowers painted the landscape, accentuating her figure.  The horrors of the world left him as one leaves a dreary rain for a bright room.  “What has you so happy, darling?” she asked.  Her honey colored eyes swept across him, filling Jim's soul with a reassurance he had not experienced in a long time.  “Nothing, I am simply glad to see you.  I had a horrid dream where you had passed on, leaving me behind.”  “Jim, you must stop putting so much stock in these dreams of yours.  It's a marvelous day; enjoy it with me.”  And so, Jim spent that day with the woman he loved. 

         A harsh light peeled his lids apart.  Glancing from side to side, Jim removed the helmet obstructing his vision.  The confusion didn't last as long this time.  For a second time he found himself amidst nature, far from the farmhouse he intended to stay in.  From here, he heard the roaring river traveling its path through the mountains.  He had wandered southeast of the house, down into the woods, and stopped near the Ponderosa Pine tree line.  From there, only a few hundred feet separated Jim from the perilous drop into the ravine below.  Mentally Jim shook himself and decided that a greater barricade was needed to ensure he remained in his own home.  In spite of the latest failure, Jim felt life again.  It had been so long since he last felt the vital touch that only Sally provided.  She had given it to him once more: meaning, purpose, and joy.  Whatever her metaphysical status, memories, brain patterns, or even delusions, Jim did not, could not, care.  He felt alive. 

         After a short eternity, night finally arrived.  Jim had spent the day preparing to circumvent his soon to be efforts at escape.  He tied himself around the ankle to the bed's frame with a sheet, locked all of the doors and windows in the house, and even installed a new lock on the inside of the bedroom door.  This lock required one to insert a key, depress the button above the key, and then, while still depressing that button, turn the key.  Jim thought that such new innovations, as far as his other self was concerned, combined with their unlikely placements would prevent further nighttime exploring.  His twin was probably acting out previously ingrained habits, of which these new changes were not included.  So, with a last glance around the room and a tug on his sheet rope, Jim swallowed two more pills and departed this world. 

         Sally tugged at his arm.  In the brilliant sun, Jim's eyes took a moment to adjust.  Sally was motioning toward a giant inverted ‘u’ planted firmly in the ground at both ends.  At the pinnacle a wire attached to a pivot.  The wire also attached to a harness where two people could climb in in order to free fall from a tall platform and swing out over a crowd; the swing converted the potential energy gained climbing the platform to kinetic as it traveled through its arch, ending, friction and wind aside, equally high up, or at the same potential energy, above the observing crowd opposite the metallic summit.  Jim knew all of the simple physics involved, but still felt a queasy reluctance.  Sally gave him another tug and pointed with enthusiasm towards that piece of recess equipment suited for a titan child. 

         Jim gave her a defeated smile, knowing all along he would go.  For that she kissed him and told him to get up so they could exit the roller coaster.  He went to move, but she pinched him saying, “Silly, don't forget the ankle restraint.”  Jim felt vague apprehension, like he had as a child wandering off to discover another aisle while his mother shopped for a cheaper lunch meat, but dismissed the notion as ridiculous; once the ankle restraint was removed, he and Sally walked to the photo booth to view their faces in the midst of the roller coaster's loop the loop.  Sally wore a cute expression, and Jim, for his part, kept most of his tense exertion from his expression.  He purchased one copy of the photo, for Sally's classroom, and they continued on their way. 

         Sally kissed Jim lightly, a simple reminder to cement his earlier agreement.  “I've got to use the restroom.  You should probably go too; that way you don't embarrass yourself above all those people,” Sally said abruptly.  “Ha-ha, very funny,” Jim responded playfully.  He mirrored her movement, entering the men's bathroom; the urinals were at capacity, but rather than stand in line with other distressed patrons, Jim entered the nearest stall.  The stall had a strange lock.  Unlike most, the simple lock was apparently not enough for this amusement park.  A lock set above the standard one required that a key, dangling on a string nearby, be inserted into it.  This was to be followed by pressing and holding in a button above the key while you turned the key.  Jim read the directions and examined the adjoining pictures with mild bemusement: what a ridiculous lock for a bathroom stall.  However, it worked as pictured, and as instructed in English, Spanish, and Chinese, so he didn't see any sense in dwelling on the matter. 

         Sally was waiting outside.  “You sure took long enough.  I thought you might be chickening out.”  “Not for the world, babe.”  He took her hand and guided her toward the ride.  Jim crossed the field outside his home heading for the eastern edge of his land.  They waited in line, reminiscing of the carnival he had taken her to back in college on their second date.  A clown had given Sally the creeps, or so she claimed at the time, and she had spent the whole night holding Jim tight.  They both laughed in unison at the obvious charade.  Though the fear had been false, her affection had been real.  “If you are not scared of clowns, what are you really scared of?” Jim asked her.  She responded instantly: “A world without you.”    Jim felt a cold chill rush down his spine, a harsh dread awash with repressed memories.  “I wouldn't want to live without you either.”  She kissed him soothingly: “Then don't.” 

         They mounted the platform and strapped into the harness.  Jim leaned in as a gust of wind shook the platform.  “Wow, it is windy up here.”  The robotic operator nodded: “Sometimes the ride must be closed because of the danger the wind can pose, but right now the weather is acceptable.”  Rather than yell a response over the howl to a machine, Jim returned the nod and held Sally close, smelling the calming fragrance of her silky auburn hair.  Jim tiptoed to the edge of the bluff while he and Sally tiptoed to the edge of the platform.  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Sally asked him.  A quiet uncertainty tinged her question.  Jim, summoning his courage in spite of the primal signals demanding his return to the ground, said “you should know by now that for you I would do anything.”  “Ready?” the mechanized operator asked with imitated enthusiasm.  Jim and Sally both gave a thumbs-up.  A final 'love you' passed between them before they stepped off the platform.  Jim, glad to live the rest of his life with Sally, enjoyed the fall as he plunged into the ravine below.