ALIEN STILL LIFE

John Gregory Betancourt

Copyright (c) 2009 by John Gregory Betancourt. Posted online with the author's permission. See end of story for copyright restrictions.

She strolled up to Cris in a knot of friends and hangers-on, her skin chocolate and azure, her hair a shimmering bow done in soft shades of orange. Her holodress swirled around her like a writhing snake, revealing dark thighs and the occasional smooth curve of breast, but Marica was like that and Cris expected it of her. It was part of her charm, part of her power, all of which drew him inexorably closer, a moth to her flame. After all, what did he, mere painter, mere artist, know of fashion? Only her eyes seemed normal tonight, that pale piercing shade of blue he'd always found so distracting.
"Crispin darling," she said, and when she smiled her teeth were dark as her skin, crawling with geometric designs.
"Marica," he said. "I wasn't expecting you. I thought you found my gallery openings too tame."
"Wifely duty," she said, and a titter came from her coterie. Cris glared and they shut up. They too sported holographic clothes and wild polychromatic hair designs. He remembered none of their names; they were just glitterfolk, like Marica. They came and went and others would replace them tomorrow.
He forced a smile. "Of course, your portrait. I'd forgotten it's on exhibit." She hadn't been his wife in months, not since he'd finished painting her. That portrait hung on the far wall, a masterful study in oil and holo laserwork, five meters high and ten wide: Marica, naked on a beach, with gulls constantly wheeling overhead, the interplay of shadows on her face the piece's focal point. It was his greatest work thus far. Something about Marica inspired him as no other woman ever had. Or, he thought, ever would again.
A lull in talk around them brought the gulls' raucous voices to his ears. After Marica abandoned him, he'd dubbed in crow caws. It made an interesting contrast to his usual hyper-realism.
She pressed something into his hand. "I'm having a party later tonight. Come?"
"I don't know . . ."
Her lips pursed, a mock kiss. "I'll send someone to pick you up, dear. Ta." And off she swept, followed by her glitterdressed friends, a quick circuit of the room then away.
Cris watched silently. He doubted she'd even remember having asked him in an hour . . . but that was the way she'd always been. He'd known their time would be limited when he'd proposed in January. Still, their three months together (he'd dawdled over her portrait) had been more than most of her lovers enjoyed.
He glanced at the card. Someone (surely not Marica) had neatly inked ALIENATION in all caps.
He crumpled it up. Then something made him smooth it out and read that single word again. With a sigh he put the card in his breast pocket, next to his heart, and tried to force her from his thoughts for the rest of the evening.
"Something to drink, master?"
It was a squat emerald-colored alien with flesh like gelatin and dozens of waving green tentacles, each holding a half-filled champagne glass. Cris couldn't see where its voice came from. One tentacle uncoiled toward him, and Cris took the offered glass with a nod and a muttered, "Thanks."
Sipping, he put on his charm and began to mingle with the patrons. It was expected. With megamoney everywhere, some alien, most human, there was no telling where his next sale or commission would come from.
An old lady with blue-and-gold striped hair and too many tatoos for Cris's taste, hanging on the twin right arms of an Auctoran hominid in a pale gray tunic, cornered him by his holostatue of starships crashing into the sun. "You're a genius," she cooed, "the last artist left who actually feels the human condition." The Auctoran just nodded, the coiled ropes of reddish-brown flesh on the sides of its head swaying.
"Thank you," Cris murmured as she nattered on and on and on. "You're too kind." His gaze kept straying back to the door, to where he'd last seen Marica, and he felt a strange, empty sort of longing inside.

* * * *

To Cris's surprise, when his opening ended two hours later and he wandered slightly drunk, slightly melancholy out onto the rooftop parking lot for a breath of fresh air, the glitterfolk were waiting. They had a huge new aircar taking up half a dozen spaces, and the raucous, somehow crowlike noise of the party inside settled heavily on him. The aircar itself rippled under holos, looking first like some ancient Greek temple, then a seagoing luxury yacht, then back again in a looped cycle.