Yarn (35 page)

"She was in pain," I said. I pushed myself up and found I couldn't put any weight on my right leg.

"Cut me," said Gregg sullenly. "I really thought you'd get it."

"Sir, come here! I've found something."

Still holding the Xi girl, I followed the barker into the studio, where we found another satin standing beside the mannequin. On the end of his dark purple-gloved index finger rested a single red fiber.

"What's that, Cedar?"

The Xi girl grasped me and nuzzled her face into my neck as she wept. I turned her so that her hair didn't touch my face. "It looks like a fiber," I said. "The place is filled with fibers."

"If that's Xi, I have orders to exterminate you."

While I patted the girl's shoulder, the other satin took a clear plastic bag from one of the utilities hung from his belt. After he had opened the fish mouth of the bag, he held his finger over the opening and shook. The fiber was gone from his glove, but wasn't in the bag. "Shit!" he said, dropping to a crouch to search the floor.

"What's wrong?" asked the barker.

"I don't know where it went, sir."

I turned to the galley, satisfied. All errant yarns and fibers would dissolve once they were away from the low 'tricity layer we'd built into the jacket.

"Don't go anywhere, Cedar! We're not done here."

"I'm putting her to bed," I told the satin. "And keep your voice down."

Twenty or so hours later, once Gregg and I had gotten out of Seattlehama, we split up-him traveling west and I east-I sat alone in a second-class compartment in the Rim Train, shooting across the continent at 2.2.

I had hidden the rip beside the yarn from my dad in my foundation when I re-dressed in the darkness at the top of the Parfum Spaceship. Only after I checked the aisle outside the compartment window, and then pulled down the blind, did I undress and take out the yarn from Bunné.

In many ways it was like my father's yarn, only much more advanced. It had several circuitry-imprinted matrix-fibril yarns, a tiny conduct yarn that I guessed was a signal-carrying system, around that was a z-twist spun part and what looked like a dozen super-denier monofilaments.

When the train began to slow into Shikago, I headed up to the observation deck, which opened during arrivals and stops. A few others passengers stood huddled in the swirl of air, the screech of other nearby trains, and the flood of sunlight. Holding up the ripped yarn between my index and thumb, I watched it flutter in the wind. It seemed almost alive-a helpless worm, or maybe part of me: my hope, my longing, and my dreams. Or maybe what it really represented was the twisted story of my youth.

I let it go.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

I am grateful for the help of the following people: My wife, Elba, who read
Yarn
to me out loud; my daughter, Caroline; my dad and mom who looked at many drafts; Lee, who also slogged through some of the early versions; my agent, Ginger; my editors, Juliet and Marty; and at Night Shade Books, Jason, Jeremy, and Ross.

I would also like to thank Wikipedia, my professors at FIT, and my fans.

Jon Armstrong is the author of the critically acclaimed "fashionpunk" novel Grey. The son of parents trained in the Arts, he was raised in the shadow of Modernism and misspelled his way through school. In college, he spent a formative year in Japan. That neon/noisy culture forms the roots of the world in his novels. After college, he traveled the world as a by-product of stints at travel agencies and an airline, studied fashion design, did stand-up comedy, worked as a temp doing graphic arts, and (still to this day) designs web sites.

Jon lives with his wife and daughter in New York City. He is currently working on the third book in the Grey/Yarn series as well as the golf swing of the future.