But I want to help him. He seems genuinely upset, and telling him I’m not only willing to do this, but I’m kind of excited, seems a little unproductive.
He shakes his head, a little green around the gills. “No, I don’t want to know. Don’t tell me. I don’t want you getting arrested for breaking the NDA. Also, I’m not sure I want to know howyouget off withthem.”
“Suit yourself.” I shrug and slap him on the back before pulling my sweatshirt on. We’re jogging to the gym, and it’s cold outside today.
Mid-October in Michigan is wet, but I’m used to it. I was born here and never plan on leaving.
Especially not now that the portals are here.
“Can we just not talk about it anymore?” he pleads as he tightens the laces on his shoes.
I sigh, trying not to be annoyed with him. “You can’t avoid it forever. It’s part of our duty, a public service for the important shit they give us.” I know I sound like a monster PSA, but it’s the truth.
I still can’t help but think about how if they’d come just a little sooner—just a few years earlier—my parents would still be here. And that is a tough pill to swallow.
His ears turn pink, and I know he doesn’t get it. “Fuck off with the ‘it’s our duty’ bullshit. And, like, what if my dick doesn’t get hard? Then what?”
“They give you some kind of medicine if you can’t get it up.” Which is true, though I’ve heard horror stories about the medication and what it does to the body. “But look, you still have your appeal. Maybe someone will be willing to take your place.”
Zane peers at me, a glint in his eye. “You don’t seem to have an issue with it. Why don’t you take my place and do double time with the monsters? Two blow jobs a week wouldn’t be the worst thing, right?”
Something in my gut squirms, but I can’t tell if it’s want or revulsion. “Yeah, we’ll see. I have a job, you know? I can’t be running to the clinic all the time to cover your ass.”
“Oh please, you work at a fucking hot dog stand.”
He’s not wrong. I’m not exactly changing the world by slapping mustard on hot dogs and serving people at the mall, but the shit at the clinic doesn’t pay, and it’s bad enough I have to miss one shift a week for it.
“Maybe if we didn’t have to do this for the rest of our lives,” he says as I reach for the front door handle, “it wouldn’t be so bad. But I don’t want to be some old man with sagging balls watching a monster…you know…”
He’s exaggerating. It’s not for the rest of our lives. It’s either until we get married or age out, but I’m not going to play his game.
“Stop being such a Debbie Downer. It’s only until we’re sixty. After that, it’s totally voluntary.” I hold the door open for him. “You coming or what?”
He stuffs his phone into the pocket of his hoodie and follows me outside. The cold hits my skin, and I feel my cheeks reddening from the biting wind.
“I hate that the fucking monsters are everywhere now,” Zane grumbles. “We can’t even go to the gym without seeing them there.”
He’s not wrong about that, either. The monsters have developed a love of human physical activity. They don’t seem to build muscle the way we do, but they’re always in the gym, lifting absurd amounts of weight I will never attempt.
“Such a fucking grump. You should have had some coffee before we left,” I tell him as I stretch my calves.
He does the same, glowering at me from the corner of his eye. “Yeah, well, at least I care about something. If the government told you to roll over and take it up the ass for them and they’d save all the sick babies, you’d do it.”
That stings because yeah, I probably would, but I brush it off. They need what we produce in order to live, and we need their tech.
“I don’t know why caring about people living makes me such a bad guy, Zane,” I say quietly. “I would have done it before, too, if it meant saving my parents.”
Zane’s cheeks turn a little red, his head tipped down as he mumbles an apology. “I know losing them sucked. I just wish it wasn’t all on us to fix everyone else’s problems.”
I don’t know what to say to that, so I shrug. It doesn’t matter anyway. Buckets of cum won’t bring my parents back, but if it means no one else has to feel this way, I’ll do what I can. And I’ll endure anyone’s judgment about it. Even Zane’s.
Stretching my arms above my head, I take off in a run, and Zane follows me down the road, our legs moving in tandem as we jog. The air feels good, and by the time we hit the gym parking lot, the endorphins have improved my mood.
Heading inside the gym, the blast of warm air hits my skin, defrosting me almost immediately. My face tingles hotly, and I take a moment to adjust before we head to the check-in counter.
Behind the desk, there’s a monster scanning membership cards, his blue hair pulled up into a bun, his pierced ears flicking back and forth as he converses with the people ahead of us.
I take a moment to observe him without being obvious that I’m staring. I’m used to them now—several of them work at the mall, too, but even after all these years, they’re still so…strange.
