Children of the New World: Stories Read Online Free PDF Page A

beam a vacation, you remember swimming at the beach and caipirinhas in coconut shells, not the unexplored outskirts of town. Granted, if a tourist tried to remember swimming far enough, say, past the ships, had they gone farther than the edge of town, up a highway, stepped onto the dirt roads at the edge of the map, they’d see that place where the ground ended and the white light began, but people were happy with their memories. What they wanted was a family trip that went well. They wanted the feeling of skydiving to tingle their bones. They didn’t care about the rivets and bolts of the plane they jumped from; they merely wanted to remember that the pilot’s name was Chip, that he patted them on the back, that he’d said nice jump.
    What the populace wanted, what they still want, what they’ll always want, is pulp cybernetics. Perhaps not so cheap as the corner-store memories China’s producing—$8.99 porn thrills so poorly constructed you can see the patches of light where the software burns through the girls’ skin—but give them palm trees, a restaurant with an attractive server, coral reefs, and sand dollars for the kids, and you have a package that retails for $79.99.
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    IT WAS SHORTLY after Circuitry did the article on us that Quimbly began experimenting with bad memories. It was a natural progression for him. He specialized in emotional recollections: childhoods, marriages, and adolescence. He’d always cringed from anything Hallmarky—the happy marriages and quintessential childhoods—“puppies and kittens” as he called them. His first generation of memories all contained some element of sadness within them: grandchildren for the childless elderly and losses of virginity to lonely men who’d never known love. But there was something truly sinister to Quimbly’s second batch. He sold heroin addictions to artists wanting darker aesthetics, affairs to couples who’d never cheated on one another, gunfights to rappers, and suicide attempts to Goth kids.
    It was to get away from the dark energies Quimbly was manufacturing that I ended up meeting Cynthia. She was sitting in the coffee shop, across from my office, where I’d go to get coffee, clear my head, and work on constructing happier memories. There was no computer or phone in front of her, only an open journal that she leaned over in concentration. I was fascinated. I hadn’t seen anyone using a pen since college, and even then it was mostly older professors who’d used them. She was in her thirties, with long brown hair and flushed cheeks, and every now and again she rested the pen against her bottom lip as she tapped her sandaled foot against the table. If her pen hadn’t run dry, she probably never would have seen me.
    “Hey,” she said.
    “Me?” I asked stupidly; there was no one else around.
    “Yeah, you. Do you have a pen?” She held hers in the air. “This one’s done for.”
    “Sorry,” I said and looked back at my tablet, wishing I wasn’t such an idiot around women. Say something, I told myself, and so I looked back up and said, “Hey.” She raised her eyes. “I’ll go ask if the barista has one.”
    It turned out he didn’t. I walked back to her table. “Sorry,” I said, “no luck.”
    “Doesn’t surprise me.” She closed her journal.
    “What are you writing?”
    “Memories,” she said, and pointed her pen at my tablet. “What about you?”
    “Pretty much the same. It’s my work; I make memories. Maybe you’ve heard of us? Quimbly, Barrett, and Woods?” She shook her head. “We’re in a lot of blogs right now.”
    “I don’t read blogs,” she said. “I try to stay disconnected.”
    “You’ve heard of beamed memories, though, right?” She shook her head again. “Well, I’m Adam,” I said, and extended my hand.
    “Cynthia,” she said.
    “I could show you what I do, if you’d like. Our workshop’s just across the street. I’m sure there’s a pen there.”
    She put her