Page 6 of Elanie & the Empath
“It’s for you. To put on.” I waved my hand uselessly in the air. “For modesty.” And while she stared at me like I’d just suggested she fish a moon jelly out of its tank and wear it as a hat, I wondered—and not for the first time—if I’d chosen the wrong career.
“You want me to be modest?” She didn’t sound offended or even amused. Only confused. “Is that normal for a doctor’s appointment? I’ve never done one of these before.”
I opened my mouth to say,well, no, but I thought you might feel more comfortablebut decided not to bother when she opened the paper top, examined it for a moment, thenplaced it behind her on the table, obviously not intending to put it on.
Alrighty, then. Gluing my eyes to the safety of my ceiling, I watched the clouds on the digtiles float by, wishing silently that I was on one of them.
“They’re lopsided,” she stated, staring down at her chest, pulling my attention inexorably there too.
Lopsided? Was she blind?
“Come again?” I set my focus over her shoulder, at a spot on the wall above her head, at a digpic of some snowy Tranquisian mountain range in the corner. Anywhere but at her breasts. Which was absurd. I’d seen thousands of breasts in my career. There was not a single known species hurtling through space whose breasts I hadn’t examined. Why, then, did I believe that if I looked at hers for more than a fleeting glance, I’d end up behind bars in some dank prison cell, never to see the light of day again?Get a grip, man.
Regrouping, digging deep to pull myself together, I took a breath. Reaching behind my back, I fumbled for the pen and pad of paper I kept on my counter. I could use the autonotes feature of my viewChip. It would be easier. But I always appreciated the steady feel of a pen gliding across paper. Faced with a half-naked bionic on my table, I craved the familiar, grounding sensation of it now.
Clicking my pen, I said, “Let’s start over. At the beginning. First of all, what is your name?”
“Elanie,” she replied.
“And what generation are you?”
“Twenty-six. But what does this have to do with my breasts?”
Glancing up from my pad of paper, then right back down to it, I cracked my neck with efficiency and said, “Generation twenty-six bionics weren’t designed with built-in hormone functionality. So, obviously, you?—”
“Upgraded,” she said.
“And when did you install?”
“Ninety-two days, thirteen hours, and twenty-two Standard minutes ago.”
“I see,” I said, jotting down those two exact words,I see, before scratching them out. “And how has that been going for you?” I hated that I didn’t already know the answer. I wished I could use my gift even a little, tiny, infinitesimal bit.
Her expression remained as flat as Captain Jones’s singing voice as she answered, “Not good.”
“Not good.” I jotted that down, leaving it. “Gotcha.”
“How long have you been a doctor?” She leaned forward a little while her brows slid together in what I thought might be a furrow of judgment.
Doing the mental math, I said, “Coming up on ten years.”Saints, that long. Then I asked, “Why do you believe your breasts are lopsided?”
“Because Blake, my boyfriend, said they were.”
Ahh. So it’s her boyfriend who’s blind.
“Do you like it?” she asked.
I raised my eyes until they met hers. “Like it?” I repeated through a tightening throat. Surely she hadn’t just asked me if I liked her breasts. Surely not?—
“Being a doctor?”
I ruffled my hair a little roughly, trying to shake some sense into my head. “It’s a good career.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Who was examining who here? “Let’s get back to your breasts” was something I did not think I’d be saying to a bionic today. Yet here we were. “Your boyfriend said they were lopsided.”
“Yes. And they also hurt.”
