Static Mayhem by Edward Aubry

Author:Edward Aubry
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: WorldMaker Media
Published: 2010-09-23T23:00:00+00:00

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When Harrison returned to the buggy, however, he found Claudia sitting in one of the seats, listening to music. He admired her foresight. She had anticipated stretches of downtime on this job that Harrison had not even considered. While he had been scooping random gadgets into his pack, she had been organizing her portable entertainment equipment. She had let him borrow her Game Boy for the last few days, and he was up to the fourteenth level of Lemmings. He had not realized that she had brought music as well. He sat down next to her.

"What are you listening to?" he asked.

She looked at him, seeming neither particularly glad nor annoyed to see him, and handed him the headphones. He put them on, in time to catch the last verse of "Big Yellow Taxi," by Joni Mitchell.

He handed the phones back to her. "I love that song."

"Yeah," she said. "It's a kick-ass punch line. You think she's singing about progress rolling over nature and the inherent sadness of change, and then it turns out it's all a big metaphor for her broken heart." She tapped the Walkman. "This thing is amazing. Have you had this the whole time?"

He had no idea what she was talking about. Then he took a closer look at her Walkman. It was the music storage device he had picked up an eternity ago in the Worm station. He had completely forgotten that he had it. "That's mine," he said. "Have you been in my pack?"

"I was looking for my Game Boy," she said, not registering his indignation, "and I found this thing. You have a ton of great stuff on here."

Harrison found this remark intriguing. "You know," he said, "one of the things I had been planning to ask you, when I finally met you, before it turned out that you hated me …" He paused for her to interrupt him, but she waived the opportunity. He went on. "Why do you only play music from the sixties and seventies? I mean, I'd think you'd try to draw in as diverse a population as possible, and yet it seemed like you were targeting a specific demographic. Don't get me wrong," he added. "The stuff you were playing was exactly what I wanted to hear. I love that stuff. It's what my parents played at home all the time. My friends' music, whatever was current when I was growing up, never really spoke to me. It just struck me as odd, like you were playing those songs just for me."

Claudia stood up. "See?" she said. "This is why I find you creepy." She started to leave.

"Claudia, wait."

She turned on him. "Can I tell you something?"

"Of course," he said. He did not really want to hear whatever she was about to say, but his sour relationship with this girl had nagged him from the very beginning, and if this was some kind of opportunity to truly communicate with her, he was willing to risk further abuse.

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