Page 3 of Ghosted in Arkadia
Cathy had one conversation with her soulmate on the day she hit puberty. They exchanged names and ages, then quickly realized there was a decade-long age gap. Her soulmate insisted they refrain from further contact until she turned eighteen.
Too bad he died before that.
Cathy messaged him on her eighteenth birthday and was met with silence. She searched his name and came across his death report. Now, she keeps pictures of him she found online, printed, and pinned to her bedroom walls. She hates that she keeps them, but can’t bring herself to remove them.
She loves me for giving her a hard time about it. That way, it’s not just her beating herself up. The mateless have to take care of each other. We all know no one else will.
Cathy said something clicked inside her when she first saw her soulmate’s eyes on the monitor. They had never met, but she suddenly felt they had known each other their entire lives. Next came the agonizing, crushing realization that she would mourn someone she had never met for the rest of her life. If she could, she would dig that part out of her soul.
The hole left behind would be better than mourning something she never got to have.
The only thing that helps now is dark humor and violence, just like all the mateless.
“ButAlexander,” Cathy whines, getting back to the topic of making fun ofme.
“Excuse me, but you were the one that set us up.”
“I told you there was a creep in the corner staring at you.” Cathy stands straight, putting her hands on her hips. “That did not mean stride over to him and shove your tongue down his throat. That was all you.”
“Whatever.” I smile at the memory. It made a hell of an impression.
“But you’ve been with him for a while now…” Cathy’s trailing silence attempted to ask what her lips didn’t want the blame for speaking.
“Maybe.” I shrug, not wanting to say the word marriage out loud any more than she did. It tastes too much like desperation.
I look around, catching the other officers listening in again.
“At least I know that I’m getting laid tonight,” I say loud enough that they know I’m talking to them, too.
“It’s Friday night. Bet I get some ass tonight, too,” James says, raking a hand through his short sandy hair.
“I keep telling you, all you have to do is ask.” Cathy slides James a mischievous smirk. Rex whines again.
“You let me know the day you hand in your resignation papers, doll.” James winks, ending their flirtatious romp with a dose of sobering truth.
The only ones allowed to date within the workforce are soulmates.
“You just want that promotion, and you know you’ll never get it without getting rid of the competition,” Cathy says, before returning her attention to me. “Don’t settle, Kira.” She taps my desk to punctuate her point.
Rex follows by her side as she returns to her seat. The large brindle shepherd lays down on the floor with a loud huff. There is less than an hour before our shift ends, and no one has anything better to do than sit and wait.
I drive the cruiser home, the same as every other day. It allows me to volunteer for emergencies at night. There isn’t anythingbetter to do most of the time, so why not? It’s not like I have a family to come home to.
As long as I’m sober when I get the call.
My house looks identical to the others on the street. They are all one bedroom, one bathroom, and given free to the mateless. The politicians like to tout them as accommodation. As if we are all diseased. They act like we could spread our infliction to them.
As a police officer, I am acutely aware that the mateless are responsible for nearly all crime. Ninety-eight percent of the population finds their mate by the age of twenty. After that, they are ideal citizens. The only type this society wants.
Really, they’re too busy wrapped up in each other to notice anyone else. Let alone hurt them.
I unlock my front door, grabbing the handful of mail from the box before heading inside. The air smells stale, and I move from room to room, opening windows to let in the breeze. It’s a hot summer evening, but I would rather the heat than the stench of loneliness.
There are several hours to waste before Alexander picks me up, and I already know what to wear. The choice isn’t difficult. I only have four nice outfits that I wear on rotation.
Alexander has seen them all and doesn’t have a favorite.
I close and lock the door to my bedroom, a habit from childhood I haven’t been able to break. There is something unsettling about sitting in the middle of the living room by myself watching TV or standing alone in my kitchen cooking a meal for one. It feels like a neon sign, baring down behind me and blinking in an advertisement. Alone. Alone. Alone. At least, my room feels like a place where only I belong.
