“Honey, you know you don't have to do this, we can find another way.” Emily’s arms wrapped around Stan’s slim figure, pulling him backwards as she leaned into him.
“You know I do,” Stan said sadly as he looked into his wife's bright green eyes reflected in the bathroom mirror. The bottle of red pills the agency sent over, laid un-opened on the bathroom sink. His heartbeat like a drum in his chest. The safety seal unbroken. With a grim determination he grabbed the bottle, his hands fumbled with the top as he struggled to open the safety container. With a loud pop, he finally opened the bottle and poured a few of the large red pills into his hand.
“Did they say how many to take?” he asked his wife, still clinging to him like he was in danger of drowning. He could feel her anxiety as if it had transferred through her arms into him.
“Don’t... I can get a job, my parents can move in and look after the kids. We can make it work,” she practically sobbed into his back.
Stan put down the pills on the counter as he turned to his wife of the last twenty years. His own eyes started to tear up. He hugged her close, snuggling her head next to his.
“It's going to be hard, but we can get through this. We can get through anything,” he comforted as they rocked slowly in their tiny bathroom. Her back caressed the kids’ still-wet towels from the night before.
After a while, fighting her own anxiety and sadness she sniffled. “They said... They said...” she collected herself. “Four pills the first day... Two a day after until…” she trailed off.
“How about I start tomorrow, would that make it easier?” Stan offered, reading the distress etched into her face. Emily thought about it for a moment and shook her head.
“Today, tomorrow, it's the same. Take them,” she said with a deep sigh that seemed to expel all the remaining air in her lungs.
“Don’t worry, they said it doesn’t hurt. That much,” he tried to joke as he kissed her forehead, doing his best to muster the beginning of a smile before he turned to take the pills he had already doled out.
He slid them into his mouth, filled the small provided cup with water, and tossed his head back as he swallowed all four in one go. Their size pressed on his esophagus as they traveled down towards their ultimate destination. Stan pursed his lips as the taste of the pills’ bitter coating stayed with him, coating his tongue.
“Ok honey, it's over,” he assured Emily as he turned to find her with her eyes squeezed closed, unable to watch. “Come on let's get some lunch, I’m starving,” he beckoned as he held her hand and led her out of their shared bathroom and into the hallway. He didn't want to admit how afraid he was himself, he had to be strong for her, for the kids.
Stan stopped in his tracks as he passed their children's rooms, the full weight of what he was doing suddenly hit him. He looked back at his wife, who he had shared so much of his life with, and hugged her again. As they stood there, his wife's delicate frame pressed against his own. His resolve grew. He wouldn't let them down, it was his duty as a father to provide for his family.
The day went on as many had as of late. Stan without a proper job did little things around the house that needed doing. Emily got the kids’ lunches ready in the kitchen. Both of them trying to forget that Stan had taken the pills just hours earlier. Stan helped Emily cut the green moldy blotches off their last good loaf of bread so that Emily could make sandwiches. They didn't have enough money for the school’s clean synthetic meals so they had to barter what little they had to provide what they could. Stan and Emily both exchanged worried looks as they packed the last of the meals away into pre-used plastic bags.
As Stan zipped up the last of the cloudy sandwich bags he felt a strange pinching on the sides of his head. His hearing became muffled as a high-pitched ringing grew ever-louder. He rubbed the sides of his head when he noticed Emily staring at him in disbelief.
“Stan?” he saw her mouth in shock, his hearing still uncooperative.
“Stan? Can you hear me?” her voice faded in as the pinching dissipated and the ringing became more subdued. He shook his head yes, afraid to speak as he brought his hands up to the sides of his head. His own eyes went wide as he felt smooth skin where his ears had been just moments before.
“Your ears…” she trailed off as she reached out to touch the side of his face, their hands meeting.
“It's ok honey, I’m ok,” he assured her, as the ringing finally disappeared. “How... How do they look?”
“They are... Different, that's for sure,” she replied cautiously, he could see her putting on a brave face for him. Stan sighed as he detached his hand from hers and moved it higher and higher before he was met with a small triangular nub of skin that now contained his ear canal.
“Wow, that was fast. Did they say it was supposed to happen this fast?” he asked, feeling a growing concern deep in his gut.
Before Emily could answer they heard the familiar footsteps of their oldest, stomping in their direction.
“Hey guys,” Kevin said in his normal cheery camber as he sat down at the dining table, slinging his heavy bag onto the worn surface before diving into his well-loved tablet. Stan quickly went to cover his head with a nearby baseball cap before Kevin could look up. He artfully avoided any mention of the pills or drawing attention to his complete lack of visible ears. Thankfully, like most kids their age, he was so engrossed in his own world that they hardly paid attention to the one around them.
“Where's your brother and sisters?” Emily asked.
“Oh…” Kevin looked up as the small lights in the back of his eyes flickered scanning the limited access sub-net. “Oh okay,” he looked back down at his tablet.
“Well?” Emily asked, a little frustrated.
“Oh right, looks like they are with Jenny and her family, over near the west exclusion zone,” he read the feed out-loud for his parent’s benefit.
“Well can you tell them I want them back by dinner tonight?”
“I keep telling you, it's only one-way. If I could get the G6 upgrade I could…” Kevin answered back smartly.
“And I keep telling you no,” Emily cut him off in the most commanding parental tone she could muster given all the things spinning through her mind at the moment.
“Come on take your lunch and get going, your mother made it special.” Stan handed Kevin the best of their freshly-packed moldy-bread sandwiches.
“Ahh, man…” Kevin’s face dropped as he took the dirty plastic bag like he had been handed a dead marsh-swarmer.
“None of that, come on, get going it's almost noon,” Stan said in as commiserating a tone as he could.
“Okay, Okay...” Kevin grabbed his bag, stuffed the sandwich somewhere deep inside, and strapped on his filtration mask as he went to leave.
“Have a good day!” Both Stan and Emily chimed in unison as he gave a half-hearted wave on his way out the half-broken outer door.
Stan sighed as Kevin disappeared out the door. They watched him from the small porthole of a window in the kitchen until he disappeared over the hill towards the west markets. If he had noticed Stan’s lack of visible ears he did a good job of hiding it. Emily went back to her kitchen duties as Stan ducked down under the sink and retrieved a company-branded metal shipping container.
Emily looked up with sad eyes and let out another resigned sigh as Stan hoisted it onto the living room table with a mighty thunk. It felt heavier than he remembered it being when they dropped it off the day before. He stared at its gleaming silver expanse for a long time before he got enough willpower to unpack it. The latches clicked open easily enough, he half-expected fog or a mystical light to issue out like in the movies. To his disappointment, there were just packets of reading materials. The first page was his test results, green checkmarks all the way down. Probably why they had rushed him up the list.
He tried to read the test results but they were over his head, he could barely understand the ingredients on the cheese-flavored food cubes they ate. Below it were the same marketing and coercion packets they had shown him when he had signed up. It felt like ages ago. A quick refresher couldn't hurt.
As he read through the marketing pamphlets provided they did nothing to assuage the growing and persistent churning fear in his gut. The brochures spoke of what an exciting time he was entering. The packet on his duties in the profession was only on a few glossy semi-transparent pages. He tried to be as casual as he could as he flipped through it. What he saw inside made his eyes bulge and hands shake. He was too embarrassed at signup and testing to look at that one, and now he felt that same feeling in his own home. Stan put it away quickly under the box hoping Emily wouldn’t take notice before he could dispose of it. His cheeks felt flushed as he reached for the final brochure. As he read the high-level benefits of his new position the words flowed out of his mind just as quickly, unable to gain purchase over the pictures of the previous brochure now obscured under the metal container.
His father had always told him that courage was doing something even though you are afraid. That was just about the perfect description of what he was feeling right now. Below the brochures, there were enough waivers and contracts to sign that if he focused could keep him busy enough to not think about what he was signing up for.
Stan got busy signing, not bothering to read more than half of the first liability contract. He signed and signed, his eyes darting between pages looking for the “SIGNATURE HERE” tags the company helpfully placed on the forms. Having signed his name what seemed like hundreds of times he finally reached the bottom of the box. There was a note thanking him for his participation on what looked like real paper. He rubbed in between his fingers, creased it. It was worth saving if nothing else. Below the card was a vacuum-sealed package marked “AST. CLOTHING - PLEASE OPEN AFTER STAGE 6”. He grabbed hold of the surprisingly heavy stack of compressed fabric and began to draw it out of the case to set it aside.
He thought that they had made a mistake and sent him multiples, the clothes were at least ten inches thick even with all the air removed, the bundle felt like it was somehow heavier than the entire case had been. He twisted open the airlock on the container, only reading the label after the wheezing-whining sound of the clothes re-airing was too far along to stop. He tried to twist it closed again but it was a one-time latch, the cheap plastic handle broke off in his hand as the package below it ballooned. Stan sighed as he began to unload the clothes from the bag onto the table. It was hard to tell what some of the pieces were for. Then pulled out what he assumed was... No… It seemed impossible. It had to be something else. He looked down at himself and then up at the unfurled proportions of the garment he held. There was no way. This was a mistake.
Stan felt his heart begin to race. He hastily stuffed the clothing back into the box and shut the top. Stan’s breathing ragged and fast. What had he done? He had to get some air! Maybe he could make himself vomit. Thoughts were racing through his head faster than he could act on them. He got up and stumbled towards the kitchen. His legs suddenly felt like jelly as his stomach gurgled. He felt like he was going to throw up. He wretched and dry-heaved a couple times, almost collapsing. He wasn't going to make it to the kitchen. His shaky arms used the table for support as he continued to heave.
His heart was beating a million miles a minute as he coughed between heaving breaths. Sweat beaded and poured down his face as the muscles in his neck strained. His fingers scratched at the table's rough surface as his chest grew tight. No, there was still time. It was panic, it wasn’t happening yet he told himself. But he knew that was a lie. Knowing what was coming didn’t stop the fear that had gripped him. All his determination felt like it had evaporated at that moment as he was helpless to stop it.
“Emily! I need you! Emileee!” he cried out as his back suddenly spasmed. His vertebrae cracked and crunched, wrestling for position, as the skin on his back stretched to accommodate his growing spine. It was growing thicker by the moment in great spasming waves. He staggered from the table to the entrance to the kitchen. The door-jam his only support. Emily had disappeared from the kitchen.
“Emilleee!” he screamed again through the wracking convulsions that ran up and down his torso. His eyes squeezed shut as tears forced their way out from the corners of his eyes.