A La Carte
by Joy Kennedy-O'Neill
I usually don't hug my ex-husband's girlfriends, but she's sobbing in the restaurant's bathroom, screaming "ghost babies" and "children are burning!"
A tumble of ladies encircle us. And Stephanie, this woman-child he's dating, with honey-blond braids and wide blue eyes says, "Look!" She points toward the restaurant's front door. "Children are trapped in the doorway. Burning! They're wearing old-timey clothes--"
"Oh sweetie," one lady says reassuringly. "It's an illusion. Are you a tax Opt-Out?"
Stephanie sniffs and nods.
I feel their sympathies change. "New upgrade." The woman taps the side of her temple.
"Oh, it must be a new projection only you're seeing," I tell Stephanie. "Doors have to exit outward. OSHA building codes. But I guess you'd call that government interference? So it's showing you what can happen--"
"THAT kind of regulation is OK!" Stephanie says.
"Can't pick and choose," a women tsssks. She gathers her purse and leaves.
"I'd heard the new update was going to be controversial," I tell Stephanie.
"You really didn't see anything?"
"No. I don't opt out of taxes." I'm trying not to sound smug. She smells like coconut oil and is beautiful, and I really want to kill my ex-husband and his whole "Let's-stay-friends" thing.
"I'll call Doug and see what's keeping him." I step outside the restaurant and ring him.
"Heya. What'cha think of Stephanie? Ordered yet?"
His voice is cheerful and smooth in that way I loved when we were newly-married, and loathed when we were near-divorced.
"She's curled up in the bathroom, crying."
"What? What'd you say to her?"
"Nothing! Her overlay just showed her some scary stuff."
"OK, I'm almost there."
I know he's late because he opts out of local taxes. His car's restricted and probably bouncing along the old rutted 288 that was never repaired after Flyway 12 opened. He can't get a library card. He was always cheap. Never political. But this new girlfriend sobbing in the bathroom is political, and I bet you money she's a vegan and won't order anything they have here.
See, I opt in for ALL taxes. Rewarded for it too. My overlay heightens sunsets and sunrises, and on Monet's birthday they look like watercolors. I can literally see the world in rose-tint, if I want. I get all the entertainment channels, plus the option of turning off optical enhancements.
I guide Stephanie to our table as she wipes her eyes. She says the ghost-children aren't there now; it was just when she opened the door.
"Welcome!" the server-bot chirps. "Please scan."
We look into the table's eye-reader and it blips, accessing our tax records and activism charts. My water comes immediately -- I'm pro-fluoridation -- but Stephanie gets nothing.
"So, you're an Opt-Out? What taxes DO you pay?" I ask.
"Well, I don't support military spending," she says. "But I donate to local schools and the arts and--"
The restaurant's door opens and I nearly drop my glass. My ex-husband has lost about thirty pounds and looks ten years younger. He's grown a beard. Outdoorsy.
He walks over and hugs her. "What happened?"
Part of me twists inside.
"It was horrible!," Stephanie says. "Like when we went to the anti-vaccination rally and those people from the CDC gave us free yoga mats to carry, and then everyone's overlay turned them into sick babies."
She looks at me. "It was just like we were holding dead babies."
