Refracted Neurons

“We used to think space was the final frontier.  We had no idea we were wrong,” the woman mumbled as the robot ran a brush through her thinning, white hair.  “I was young once, like you.  I’d like to think I was pretty.” The robot paused, a hand half raised, “I am not a biological organism.  I do not age.  I am here to care for your physical and mental wellbeing.” “Yes, yes, I’m not senile, you know.  I’m not some cyberspace junkie who can’t tell reality from virtual.  But I do like . . . oh, you wouldn’t tell on an old lady, would you?” “I am required to report any instance whereby threat or implication, there is the possibility of real or imagined harm to a person or persons as defined by the law,” the robot set the brush on a tray and picked up a comb. “Whatever that means,” the woman looked down at her swollen knuckles, “Sometimes I like to go into the backwash where no one knows I’m an eighty-year-old woman.  I suppose if you tal...

“You don’t look like you’re from around here,” the man in the leather cape peered down at Tristan. “Yeah, you’re right,” Tristan met the stranger’s eyes, grinned, “Know of a good place to stay the night?” The man let his cape fall open and the light from the street lamp glinted off something metal.  Everything around Tristan suddenly seemed much clearer.  He could see every kink and whorl in the wood of the raised sidewalk, taste the warm bitter smoke from a nearby fire, and sense the curvature of the black sky.  The sky itself sealed over him, trapping him like an insect in an overturned water glass.  There was no way he was going to die in this backwash. Tristan’s mind reached for his revolver seconds after his hand had.  He stepped back, straightened his right arm, then stopped.  The stranger drew his cape back with a flourish.  He had an accordion.  Tristan blinked, then started to chuckle.  Of all instruments, it had to be an ac...

I shake out my pockets for a currency, forgotten until this moment, when the mist settles on chimneys and the white sky trickles down to the tops of street lamps, and I can no longer breathe without puffing steam in a spiral, delight, liquid with the violence of living.  Please, another song. oooooooooooooooooooo I haven’t forgotten about y’all, I’ve just been working almost exclusively on a super-secret project that I’ll share with you soon. I’ve been so wrapped up in it that I feel like there’s nothing in my head except stardust. You know that feeling? No? Well, it must be a personal problem, but nothing that a good day of accounting won’t fix. The other day I went to Safeway and saw the most amazing thing. There was a man outside the store playing an accordion. I always think of accordions as being wheezy and brassy, but this was rich and nostalgic. Everyone kept throwing money at him and I was grinning like ...