Inescapable Escapism

I blinked again, trying to focus my eyes on the book in front of me. It was a new one, a last-minute purchase that I thought I’d love, but I just couldn’t get into it. I was too distracted, and I knew that was the problem. A smile came across my face as I picked up my phone again, my eyes scanning the last message from Duncan.

I’ll see you when you get back? he’d said.

Sure :), had been my reply.

He hadn’t responded. Was the smiley face too much? It was the kind of thing that a loser would use. Duncan never used emojis or smileys or anything like that. It was probably just stupid enough to make him change his mind and regret ever texting me.

Or, he was busy and my message didn’t warrant a reply. It didn’t, not really. I was just anxious and overthinking things. It all felt so new to me. I wasn’t used to texting people, especially Duncan, like that. Phoebe thought I’d done well, though. She was convinced that not only was he flirting, but he was also into me.

I locked my phone again and stared down at the book. I should be into it. A month or so ago, I was certain I would have devoured it and then immediately bought or downloaded the rest of the series, but it was different now. Everything felt different now. I glanced up at my bedroom door, listening to see if my mom was nearby or still in the kitchen. I couldn’t hear anything. With a grin, I reached out for the familiar dizziness, opening my eyes into my other world.

It was dark. I was lying in the dark. All of the lights were off and… I was in bed. Memories revealed themselves to me hazily. We’d finished eating, gone back to our room and chatted for a bit before getting ready to sleep. I’d gone for a shower, spotted the scarily dark bruise on my stomach and panicked, before just deciding to go to bed. I would ask to speak to the doctor in the morning if it still hurt me then.

The pain was pretty bad, even in the fantasy though. I dropped my conditioner when I was in the shower, and bending down to retrieve it made a shooting ache grip my stomach. It felt like someone had stabbed me. I couldn’t catch my breath for a few seconds; it was terrifying. If I could, I think I would have shouted out for Abbie or Katie to call the doctor immediately.

It disappeared before too long though, returning to the steady throbbing that I still felt as I lay in bed. Was it stupid not to go to the doctor about it? I truly wasn’t sure. I wanted to, I was scared that something was damaged, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. They might think I was being ridiculous. That I couldn’t handle a little bit of pain and would go running to a doctor any time I so much as stubbed my toe.

No. That wasn’t right. I was training to be a spy. I needed to get used to pain and being injured because I knew they wouldn’t take it easy on us at the Academy. They already told us that much. Rodgers had warned us that injuries were common and learning to deal with them well was a good skill to have. But what did that mean? Was I meant to learn to ignore it and pretend that it wasn’t an issue? Or actually seeking medical advice when it was needed.

I wasn’t sure, but I wasn’t willing to risk it. Pressing a hand against my stomach, I rolled over. It was weird sharing a room with other people. I’d had sleepovers with Phoebe before, but having two people in the same room as me felt different. It might have just been that I wasn’t used to it, and I was used to Phoebe. Whatever it was, it meant that I couldn’t sleep.

I should have been able to; I was exhausted. Sleep just wasn’t coming for me like it usually did. Well… I normally struggled to sleep in real life. And in that world too. But, with how tired I was, it should have been easier. Irritation washed through me, and I returned to reality. I didn’t want to stay in that world and spend all night being annoyed about the fact I couldn’t sleep. Staying in reality would be better than that.

I let out an irritated sigh and looked down at my book again. I must have turned the page since the last time I paid attention to it because I had no idea what was happening. I didn’t even know who the character the main character was talking to was. His name was stupid though. What kind of a name was Tristophen? That wasn’t a name.

I dropped the book, giving up on it. I didn’t like giving up on books. Before, even if they didn’t grip me, I still tried to finish them. The one in my lap felt like a lost cause though. It didn’t appeal to me at all, despite hearing people talk about how great it was online. Maybe I just needed to try another book.

Or perhaps that wasn’t the issue. Reading on the whole hadn’t been appealing to me for a little while, and I wasn’t sure why. Actually, once I started thinking about it, I realised the reason was obvious. How could I just sit there and read about people doing wild and fun-sounding things like having superpowers or somehow marrying royalty, despite being poor and knowing nothing about the royal family?

Even with the book I’d given up on, it just felt wrong. I was reading about some girl who lived in an awesome and futuristic world but complained about the most mundane things. It all just felt so… flat. I didn’t want to be reading; I wanted to be out there actually getting to experience it myself. I longed to be living the life that the girl in my book was. No. I wanted better. I wanted more.

I felt my lips stretch into an even bigger smile than before. I could do that. I could just slip into that world and do whatever I wanted there. Letting my eyes flutter shut, I began to search. It was hard to know exactly what I was searching for; I wasn’t sure that I knew. There was a specific dizziness. A specific sensation that would be right. I’d recognise it when I felt it.

Worlds pulled at me, vying for my attention, but I ignored them. They weren’t it. They weren’t the world I was looking for. Some felt familiar, even if I didn’t know what they were. I just felt like I’d been there before. Finally, I found it. There was a world, a dizziness, that was sharp and demanding. There was an almost metallic edge to it that I could taste. That was the right world.

I slipped into it, ignoring the nausea that pulled at my stomach, keeping my eyes shut for a moment longer. Red letters flashed across my vision, even with my eyes closed. “MAKE IT NATURAL”, the letters said, and I wasn’t quite sure what they meant at first. Then, the urge to roll my eyes came over me.

I couldn’t though, so I settled for just rolling over in my bed. The soft bedding was so perfectly warm, and I didn’t want to wake up and face the cameras so soon. I wanted to go back to my dreamless sleep, where I didn’t need to feel anything or perform for anyone. But it wasn’t right. It was seven minutes past nine, the correct time to wake up to optimise views. People will have just gotten to work or school and settled in for the day. The screens would be on, and they’d be searching for something to watch.

Even if I didn’t want to wake up, the producers made the decision for me. My opening music started blasting through my speakers, causing a smile to come to my lips. I was facing the wall; it was fine. I could allow myself a few seconds to enjoy the music I’d heard every morning for the last two months.

It was so much better than the last track they’d made for me. That one was jarring, not right at all and horrible for stats. I begged the producers to commission a new one, pointing out the fact that my numbers showed people waited until I was already up to tune in. It was intentional, I knew it. And I was right. With the new music, people had gone back to waiting for me to wake up. Right as I lay in bed, listening to the pop-y music, my sleeping form was being streamed on thousands of screens.

I waited a moment longer, watching the counter at the corner of my vision jump upwards, before forcing a sleepy look onto my face and rolling over. Blinking slowly, I sat up. The lights brightened immediately, blinding me. It hadn’t been particularly dark in the room before, of course. There was no way it could be. The viewers needed to be able to see me, and we couldn’t exactly use night vision. They tried that before. Viewers didn’t like it. I wasn’t sure what the focus groups said about it exactly, but it was bad enough that the idea was scrapped immediately.

I smiled drowsily and lifted my hands to my face to rub my eyes. The implants glitched, flickering for a moment before going back to normal. I hated it when they did that. It happened every time, but it was what I had to do. When I first came to the City four years ago, I wasn’t used to the lights. They were blinding and hurt my eyes. Every morning, I’d rub them until they adjusted to the light. People thought it was cute. They thought I was just sleepy, which played well on the merch apparently, so now I had to do it every morning. It was what my audience expected of me.

I stopped rubbing my eyes and lifted my hands above my head, stretching and feeling my crop top ride up. The urge to pull it down and cover my stomach came over me, but I immediately dismissed it. I was sixteen. It was appropriate for me to accidentally flash some of my stomach. Then, like every morning for the last year, I looked straight into the drone lens that had flown close to my face for that very purpose.

“Good morning,” I said with a smile.

No one responded, of course. Or, at least, I didn’t hear them respond. Apparently, some people liked to though. The producers said it became a thing, and the viewers liked it. It made it seem like I was talking to them directly, like I was their friend. That was good. People liked friendly. It wasn’t quite enough to push me into the top forty streamees, but I was top fifty. That was good enough for now.

Climbing out of bed, I faked a wide yawn.

“Wow, I was out like a light,” I said loudly enough for the cameras to pick it up but not so loudly that it would seem like I was doing that intentionally. “I had the weirdest dream too. I got into a fight with some guy on a floating bouncy castle… That’s got to mean something.”

Good. That was good. It was just weird enough that people would be talking about it and probably making some jokes but not unusual enough for people to be worried about me in any way. A fight was a risky decision though. Viewers didn’t always like violence. I needed to turn it somehow, make it more of a funny thing than an alarming thing.

“He was kind of cute,” I mused as I walked towards the bathroom. “But the chicken wing fingers were a deal breaker for me.”

There. That would do it. I had no idea where that thought had come from, but people would talk about my weird chicken wing finger-related dream, and they’d gloss over the fight. Actually… maybe the producers could work with that. They could do some kind of advertisement with an overly dramatic chicken wing finger couple arguing or something? I wasn’t sure, but I grabbed my contact card from the top of the toilet and began typing a quick message as I peed.

I couldn’t take too long. They couldn’t show me using the toilet before I got to eighteen, thankfully, and even then, they might not want to. I wasn’t sure how they wanted to portray me after that. I hoped that they’d go for a more wholesome persona. One where they limited any nudity and didn’t show my showering or using the toilet. It just felt… horrible.

But then it got views and clicks. I knew it did, even if I didn’t like it. I had a couple of years to wait until then. I could try and cultivate it now, though. I was already fairly innocent. I’d kissed a couple of boys, but that was it. They hadn’t let me go any further, so I assumed that was their plan for me.

I hoped to was, but I’d find out at some point. I was due a medical exam soon enough, so I’d get a production meeting then, I thought as I checked my calendar on the contact card. It was a sparse thing. Used only off camera, it was only meant for messaging the production team and alerting me to any scheduled appointments or emergencies. There were none coming up there. Not for a few weeks, at least. That was fine. I could wait.

I finished using the toilet and stood up, walking towards the sink and vanity, which had a camera hidden inside. I ignored it as I washed my hands and grabbed my toothbrush. It wasn’t until I started brushing my teeth that I looked at it. The camera was slightly above my eye line. I think they expected me to grow more, so I had to tilt my chin up to be able to stare directly into it. Not everyone did that. Most people chose to ignore it completely, but I preferred not to for some reason. It made me stand out more, I liked to think.

Spitting out my toothpaste and splashing water on my face quickly, I straightened up again and looked at my reflection before sticking my tongue out in mock disgust.

“My hair looks horrible,” I said as I ran my fingers through it, knowing the comments would be flooded with people arguing both sides immediately. “I should dye it or something… maybe a nice pale blue or pink.”

A green light flashed at the corner of my vision, denoting the producer’s approval, before a poll went up. The viewers weren’t meant to know that I could read the question ‘Should Grace dye her hair?’, but I had to fight not to grin. Votes were pouring in already, each one costing people credits. Credits they were spending on me. Good. That would help my placement on the tables.

That was the one thing I did well. I could make a poll out of pretty much anything. It was great; it meant I didn’t need to rely on cheap sponsorship deals like so many other streamees did. That would be so embarrassing. I saw the more obvious ones all the time around the City. There was some girl I saw just last week who literally wore a jacket with some energy drink logo plastered all over it. She tried to play it off like it was intentional, like it was a fashion choice, but I saw right through her. She was placed in the eighties anyway. An embarrassment.

Not dyeing my hair won the poll, and I cocked my head to the side, pretending to reevaluate my appearance.

“Nah, it looks good as it is. But, maybe I’ll get a perm or something,” I announced before turning away from the mirror and grinning as another poll went up.

I was allowed to smile at that. It made it look like I’d decided to accept my hair colour rather than because I was reacting to the poll and the flashing approval light. They’d vote no anyway. They seemed to not like changing my hair. In the four years that I’d lived in the City, they’d only voted to change it twice, and both times were before I hit sub one hundred. Neither were particularly bad, but I liked it how it was. Mostly. Sometimes I couldn’t help but look at Dina, who dyed her hair once a week, and be jealous.

But she was top thirty. That made a difference. And part of her brand was impulsiveness. She loved dyeing her hair and getting the transport drones to fly to the highest point in the City, right up near the roof, and she bungeed out. It was awesome and terrifying. Bungees weren’t mainstream then. No one expected her to do it. I wish I had gotten there first. It would have catapulted me up the ranks.

I stopped in front of my full-length mirror and tapped it softly.

“Wakey, wakey,” I said to it. “Time to choose my outfit for the day. It looks like a nice day out. Maybe I’ll wear a dress.”

I really wanted them to choose a dress. The controllers had chosen to make today bright and hot. It would have been horrible in anything else, and I wasn’t a high enough rank to have an aircon drone. That was a top twenty perk. But I’d get there one day. I still had four years in the City, maybe more if my parents renewed my contract again. I had plenty of time to get to the top twenties.

That would be great. I would be able to retire rather than having to go to remedial school or college to catch up on everything I missed from not having classes in the City. I wouldn’t need to get a job; I’d be able to live off of the royalties forever. Or maybe I’d become a consultant or a producer. I’d heard rumours that people did that once they fulfilled their contracts and had to leave. They still got to work in the field rather than in one of the horrible dead-end jobs that everyone else in this world had.

A shudder went through me in both worlds, but I hid it. I didn’t want that. I didn’t want to have to grow up and leave the City. The idea of it scared me more than I’d ever be able to put into words. I longed for the freedom of it, of course, but that was nothing more than a passing whim. Well, it was a bit stronger than that. It wasn’t strong enough to make me do anything about it, though. I wanted to stay in the safe, predictable reality I’d been thrust into for as long as possible.

Plus, I’d heard horror stories about the real world, the one outside the City. I didn’t remember much about it, but I’d heard people talking about how bad it was. Streamees were often given a security detail when they left. Top fifties, like me, had them for at least a year. People got weird, I’d been warned. They had their favourite streamee, and they were used to being able to see them all the time. They felt entitled to that privilege.

The mirror dinged loudly as people finished voting on what I was to wear. I always liked that part when I was a kid. I remembered that much. It was like getting to dress up a doll or something, but better because I could choose anything for them to wear, and then people got to vote on the options submitted. The favourite, and the one the producers approved of, would be worn by the streamee all day. Unless it was really that bad, and then there was usually a way to get out of it.

One of the girls in the fifties showed me. She’d been given some horribly revealing dress like a year ago, but she was just so clumsy and managed to spill her drink all over it, so she had to change. People got to vote again though, so they weren’t even mad. The girl had met my gaze and winked at me. That opened so many opportunities up for me. It gave me a small amount of freedom, of choice, and I clung to it.

A light pink dress was thrust towards me, and I clapped in delight as I examined it. It was perfect. Light and fitted enough for people to stare but not so tight that I felt like I was on display or would garner the wrong type of attention. The colour felt intentional too. I could use that.

“Oh, I love this shade. I guess now I don’t need to dye my hair that colour!” I said, hoping that was the reason the viewer picked it for me.

I clutched the dress against my body, keeping the smile on my face as I stared at my reflection. After a brief pause, the green light reappeared, accompanied by a comment.

I was right, and the viewer seemed thrilled. It was going to be a good day.