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All Yesterday's Parties (Chapter 49)
🕑 Added 2023-04-09 21:49:24 +0000 UTCLike a hand swatting through mist, the sanctity of Aster's life was at once untangled, the little stability within it feathering through the fingers of fate.
Euthanization was something that Aster had never expected to deal with in her life.
It was what happened to other, unfortunate people on the news. It was a punishment, the sad result of a washed-up life. She could not reckon with it at her doorstep.
An endless list of considerations and questions suffocated her thoughts as she tried desperately to piece together the news.
What would this mean for her family? Why had it come about so unexpectedly? Would they really be able to argue a successful case?
Aster's blood chilled as her thoughts went silent in response to her rumination, a tacit negative to the question.
She hated her mother though, she made sure to remind herself. So why did she feel so uneasy about the decision? Why did it fill her with rage?
The rage stemmed from Marienne's involvement, she told herself. She and her father were convinced Marienne directed the decision.
Yet, for all it's ferocity Aster's anger at this moment could find no reasonable outlet. There was no course of action for her but to grow numb, awaiting the shroud of death to visit her family.
It was there, in that great garden of fear where a light bulb lit. In the darkness it radiated, twinkling in Aster's eye. If I could only stay in Peppermint Plains forever, she thought.
She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them. The light was still radiating.
A sunbeam, pouring in through the shattered, splattered colors of Nancy's glass fresco caught Aster's eye as it traveled the length of Nancy's great living room and played sparkle upon her row of gilded china.
It teased her, breaking through her clouded mind like a bolt of lighting in a midnight storm. It cast aside her fog of anxiety for just a moment, as she noticed Nancy's stern eyes upon her, locked in that characteristic didactic look she got whenever she was imparting something of importance upon Aster.
She was going on at length about the fears Aster would have to surmount now that she was to expect far more scrutiny and notice in her musical career— a topic which normally would have captured Aster's full attention as the implications of it scared her to death, but she could not pry her nervous mind away from her chief goal that afternoon— inquiring about a permanent stay in Peppermint Plains.
The very thought of it caused Aster's stomach to writhe in pain, the sheer audacity of even considering it filling her with a horrid angst.
She had up until the very most recent moment thought of the consideration as nothing but impossible— a hopeless wish that her stress-addled mind sought refuge in.
Like an infected cut she picked at it in her nervousness, thinking hard upon it until the great anxiety that always came upon leaving Peppermint Plains, in conjunction with news of her mother's euthanization and the confusing feelings it brought forth, had finally catalyzed within her the gall to ask.
As Nancy lectured on, Aster's mind returned to drifting, struggling to process the fear she was now burdened with. Her heart was thrashing as she attempted to steel her nerves, and could think of nothing but how best to broach the topic, when suddenly, a certain name stole Aster's attention.
“Vincent Theodora, was it?” Nancy suddenly asked.
Aster frowned, turning her attention back to Nancy.
“Yeah, what about him?” she replied cautiously.
“You should go with him as your producer.”
Aster's frown wilted into a scowl.
“Like hell, fuck that prick!” she seethed, crossing her arms.
Nancy herself frowned.
“Why? Because he ordered you around?”
Aster glared, embarrassed to be read so easily.
“He wasn't just ordering us around— he was trying to change my fucking song!” she argued.
Her eyes were wide with indignation, frustrated that Nancy did not see her side of things.
“Like, we're the ones paying him!” she continued, cutting off Nancy who was moving to speak. “I didn't ask for his input, nor did I want it. I don't need help from the guy recording clowns for a living!”
“He's a producer, Aster. That's what they do. You shouldn't be so quick to disregard others. Did you forget about your squabble with Cecil? The way I look at it, you should count yourself lucky that you've even found a producer who cares enough to push you— especially when dealing with an attitude like yours!”
Aster glowered at this implication, gritting her teeth.
“I wouldn't have cared as much if his suggestions weren't all awful! He wanted to turn down the guitar when I expressly told him it's a fucking jangle pop song—”
“Listen. I have worked with hundreds of producers. I can tell you he is far from as bad as it gets.”
Aster looked up, her lips still pursed in a scowl.
“He's still pretty fucking bad!” she retorted.
“Not even close!” Nancy rebuffed, a tone of irritation coming into her voice. “Shall I tell you about my first producer, Aster? That malignant fucker?”
Aster went silent, taken aback by the sudden tonal shift. Her scowl dissipated as she watched a new, dark expression fall over Nancy's countenance.
Folding her arms yet tighter, Aster leaned back into the couch in a silent assent for Nancy to continue.
“Where do I even begin, really? I was young— twenty-one I think? Of course, he took advantage of that. He was actually my manager but had wormed his way into producing my songs— to maintain full control. He talked smooth and looked the part, but of course had no Earthly idea what he was doing. He was a leech looking to get rich, forcing a relentless schedule of releases on me. He told me I'd sink like a fucking rock the moment my name fell out of the charts.”
A column of sun poured through the great window, casting a wall of sunlight between Aster and Nancy's positions.
“I'd release a single, and it'd fail to chart. He'd admonish me for an awful performance, and we'd get right back to it. Of course, they never charted, though that never stopped him. At one point the demand for releases had become so intense that we had a group of hack writers working for dimes just to put out enough songs. He didn't understand how to best use my talent, and pissed away my first years as a songwriter.
Aster's lip quivered, and she averted her eyes from Nancy in shame.
“I consider myself one of the lucky ones, too. At least I managed to find a career in the end, but I can't say that for many people I knew.”
Nancy looked down at Aster, who had drawn her knees close to her chest. Her fists were balled, and from her lowered head emanated the sad, soft sound of an incipient cry.
“That's why I'm telling you to think a little harder about it. Sure, you may be guaranteed to succeed, but you could also say that I succeeded as well— and I'm telling you that my path wasn't worth the pain, if you can avoid it.”
“I just want to make my music,” Aster muttered through clenched teeth. “I don't want some fucking prick telling me what to do!”
Her voice quivered, her struggle to choke back tears evident.
Nancy's face softened.
“You can disagree with him— you realize that, right? They're only suggestions, Aster. You have to remember you're from a hundred years in the future. I mean, even I don't understand the music nowadays! And what's more, you're from an entirely different world! You can't blame an old man for being shocked at your choices. The fact he even let you use the Chamberlin is astonishing.”
“The record label we're meeting with has a list of top-tier producers picked for us, though,” Aster whimpered, sniffling.
“You want a bunch of fucking suits recording you? 'Cuz that's what you'll get. Yeah, your music will sound pretty, but I guarantee you they're not going to let you pull any weird shit.”
Nancy continued to watch Aster compassionately as the girl slowly brought up her sheepish, embarrassed gaze.
“You're the leader. Your band will follow you. Go with their choice if you wish, but I'm telling you picking the right producer is crucial, and finding one as idiosyncratic as your group is even more important. You'd have better luck finding a needle in a haystack.”
Aster sniffled, drying her tears as she mulled over Nancy's words.
“Yeah, but the rest of the group doesn't want to work with him either. Marion hates him. I can't just decide for them.”
Nancy looked at her with a puzzled expression.
“I appreciate immersing yourself within the scenario, but they're not real, Aster.”
Aster's eyes widened.
“Of course, don't be rude about it, but your number one goal should be achieving your dreams. That is the point of the device, after all.”
She looked at Nancy incredulously, suddenly sitting up.
“What do you mean, 'not real'?”
Nancy, clearly reading the anger coming into Aster's face, preempted her rage with a stern tone.
“It's a simulation, you're aware of that. They may act like real people, but you must remember they are nothing but computer programs.”
Snarling, Aster rose from the couch.
“How can you say that?!” she suddenly barked. “Have you even used it yourself?!”
“Aster, calm down.”
“No!” she again exclaimed, shaking her head. “Answer me, have you used it yourself?!”
“I have not,” Nancy replied, motioning for Aster to sit. “I've never wanted to use that ghastly machine.”
Aster was startled by her description of the device, but in her anger continued.
“Then how can you say they're not real if you've never seen them personally— if you've never seen them fucking cry or laugh?!”
“Because I understand that the device only shows you something that's convincingly realistic, not actually there. I would hope that you could make the same distinction, Aster. They're only in your head.”
At this remark Aster's little sun-flare pupils constricted, as she took in the sight of Nancy's ignorance with pure, hateful disbelief. Like a torrid sea her blood roiled as she tried to set her trembling lip still, all the while defiantly standing.
She knew the window to ask about a permanent stay within Peppermint Plains was growing smaller with every angered reply, but she could not help herself. She looked at Nancy and when she saw that her words could not get through to her, felt a shiver of fury arc along her body.
"Who the fuck are you to determine what's real or not? You're just one person, who barely knows how computers work. If the simulation is completely indistinguishable from reality, who has the right to say it isn't just another reality? Who's to say that we're any more real than them?!"
Nancy, who up until this moment had masked her irritation adeptly, grew wide eyed.
"Do you want to be killed?” she uttered gravely.
Aster started.
“Do you really want to know what suffering is?" she repeated, a wild glint now in her eye. “If you speak like the Vanguard, then you are the Vanguard— and will be treated as such.”
Aster's hitherto searing rage had become nothing but an unsaid rebuttal on her trembling lip. An immense notion of fear had suddenly come about her, and as if to swing out in defense against it, her anger returned one-hundred fold.
“Since when do you give a fuck about legality?!” she shouted, returning to life. “My entire being here is illegal!”
Nancy looked wildly about the room, then stepped quickly to Aster.
Aster, astonished, braced herself for what she did not know.
“Shut your fucking mouth will you?” Nancy hissed in a low voice. “I'm not saying these things to be cruel, I'm only worried about you!”
“Worried about me? For what, finding happiness?!”
“I've never told you, but there are side-effects to the usage of the Eden device."
Aster's mouth went slack.
"Side-effects?” she sputtered. “What the fuck are you talking about?!"
"Did you expect miracles to come without conditions? The device operates by triggering hallucinations. Extended use can inhibit normal mental states. Normally, the device operates with its user in a coma so it's never an issue, but it becomes a problem when used sporadically. I fear your seeing them as real people could be a portent of those delusions.”
Aster was speechless.
Her already turbulent mind could not decide whether she was more angry that Nancy had kept this from her or that she was adamant in denying her bandmates' humanity.
Her sources of rage tripped over one another as they clamored to make themselves known, wishing to somersault from Aster's tongue as some incendiary, hateful comeback, but they piled up in her brain, and she could only mutter to herself, her lip quaking.
The old woman before her— that aged face which had come to symbolize refuge and the bizarre strokes of fate and its stochastic friends— had suddenly become a visual she despised.
She observed her wrinkles, which ran as deep as canyons across her face, whose skin was leathery with time. She looked at her clouded eyes, the windows which no doubt must have had more reflected across them then Aster could ever imagine.
It filled her gut heavy with hatred as she scrutinized and despised this face.
Time erodes wit into witlessness, not wisdom, she thought, scowling.
She could not understand how Nancy could deny the people of Peppermint Plains their humanity, when the truth was now so painfully clear to Aster.
Nancy was no more a fragment of perception than Sylvia, or Cecil, or Marion, or anybody else. Yet, this fragment held an air of superiority above all the others, simply because it believed its purpose was right.
Nancy, who had been indistinctly rambling on as Aster fell into her apoplectic thoughts, tried to re-engage with her and apologize.
"That doesn't mean they can't be special to you," she said with a careful tone, once again donning a soft expression.
Aster shirked her apologetic tone and sat back down on the couch, fuming.
"Let's just get the device on," she muttered.
"Is there nothing else you wish to discuss?" Nancy asked.
Aster's heart seized.
The opportunity to ask was there, closing right before her. A fit of despair washed over her as she turned away from it, realizing their argument had significantly damaged any chance she had of a positive reply that afternoon.
"No," she whispered, reclining back on the couch.
Nancy shook her head and rose slowly, heading off to fetch the device.
Once her footsteps could no longer be heard, Aster looked up at the ceiling, fuming, and closed her eyes.
“Fucking idiot!” she hissed under her breath, striking her fists against the couch.
In all of the worst case scenarios she imagined, none of them involved her finding failure in something as stupid as an argument not even related to her wish.
It was the banality of this road block, which only required Aster to have held her tongue to avoid, and her contradicting belief that her indignation was valid.
She wished more than anything that Nancy had been even an iota less stupid than she thought she was, and then everything would have been okay.
As the sound of Nancy's approaching footsteps once again sounded into the living room, Aster's heart started, and she became besieged by a wave of neuroticism.
The prospect of having to wait a whole two weeks more in Peppermint Plains to try again at her uncertain wish filled her with a panicked urgency.
She stretched back with effort, hoping that in doing so she could physically will the anxiety out of her body.
She arched her back, then went slack, allowing Nancy to affix the device to her temple.
As the technicolor haze delivered a surreal buoyancy to her body, she felt her jaw go slack, and her vocal cords vibrate.
Somewhere in that dreamy fog, its vines of ecstasy crawling up her veins as it took through her Eden at a trillion miles per hour she could hear those words coming from her own mouth.
“Let me be like this forever.”
