14
Identity: Nancy Killiam
“I feel so cloudy.”
It was pssi-kid expression, an attempt to describe that feeling we got when we couldn’t understand our own splinters and it felt like our conscious minds were spread outward from a single point to become an indistinct smudge in time and space. I knew Aunt Patty didn’t quite understand, but I had no other way of explaining how I felt.
We were walking through the Lollipop Forest under a beautiful night sky lit by a bright, chocolate-chip moon surrounded by twinkling gumdrop stars.
“Why didn’t you tell me you wouldn’t be there?” Finally, I let myself ask the question.
She looked away and then back at me, but avoided my eyes. “I was there, dear, at least my primary subjective was, but I thought that you were the one throwing the switch. We all did.”
“But I checked with you not minutes before, and your body was on its way to the ballroom. What changed?”
Patricia looked up at the gumdrop stars. “Something with Uncle Vince.”
I angrily kicked at some lollipop sprouts. “I’m so stupid.”
Everyone had some last minute excuse, but in the end, it was my responsibility. It wasn’t like I couldn’t have seen it. Everyone’s physical metatags had properly indicated they were somewhere else, but I’d stopped paying attention to these a long time ago.
“You shouldn’t be beating yourself up so much,” Aunt Patty said gently. “You’ve done a wonderful thing for the world.”
“Yeah—I’ve given them something to never stop laughing at.”
The lollipop trees rattled as they jostled together on their spindly stalks. Aunt Patty suggested coming here for a walk, just like we used to do when I was just a little splinter-winky, but the place had lost its magic.
To cheer me up, she’d first tried taking me on a walk topside with Teddyskins, a reality skin that turned everyone around you into cute pink teddy bears. It was one of my favorites as a child, but I wasn’t a child anymore. Now all these cutesy worlds and spaces felt contrived and creepy.
“Don’t be silly,” she said, taking my hand and pulling my head into her. She always gave herself an ample motherly bosom and a sturdy frame in these childhood worlds.
My tears started again.
“You took the first step in bringing distributed consciousness to the world. You’re still so young. Your whole life is ahead of you.”
Now the tears came in great heaving sobs, and she let me, smothering me in her chest.
“Have you talked to David?”
“No, that’s over,” I choked out. “David was the reason I stayed at home physically for the launch. I felt so bad for always being away. We had a huge fight afterward.”
“What about Bob? Did you try him?”
I shook my head and the tears spilled down my face. “He dropped me a splinter, but he’s so stoned all the time. What’s the point?”
Aunt Patty stroked my head and then dried my tears. We walked on in silence, stepping gently through the lollipops.