Talking Man

CHAPTER TEN - CALLIE

To my loving brother, Fyodor Shurovsky,

My heart was broken to receive your letter. Knowing now the way you feel, knowing how horribly this news is affecting you and your children, I utterly regret having kept the announcement from you. It was my hope to spare your feelings for as long as possible, but now I see how selfish that was, and how it was my own feelings I was sparing as I delayed.

So I will tell you plainly now, that I have been infected by Eams. That should answer your first question. I will never know where I acquired the bacteria, for my dealings with all my patients were under sterile conditions. Perhaps it had nothing at all to do with my work. That is what I suspect. It could have been a glass of unfiltered water, or a fork that hadn't been cleaned all the way. The odds are nearly miraculous. It is almost as if Eams chose me.

Your second question is an easy one to answer, because I happen to be the expert who knows these things. It is likely that I have less than one year left. I hope your family is prepared to see a lot of me in the upcoming months, because I plan to take a step back away from my work and spend more time with my treasures. While it is tempting to only absorb myself deeper in my work, I believe that my devotion to scientific research over my whole life has robbed me of much of my humanity. Maybe in my last year I can regain some of that humanity.

Your third question is the most complicated to answer. You ask two things, really. The first is whether I have treatments to extend my own life. To that I answer: only slightly. My injections have an effect which has been much exaggerated by my corporation's publicity. At most they will give me a few more months of life, but I will suffer greatly. No, I will not use the treatments, though they were my own development.

In answer to the second part of this question: is there a cure? Yes, and also no. For a long time I have known about something that would eradicate Eams completely from the human body. In some ways I knew about this cure before I knew about Eams, but that is a very long and complicated story.

Why did I not use this cure on others? For the same reason I will not use it on myself. It is too unpredictable. The benefits may not be enough to justify using something we have not been able to fully study. It is not really even a cure, speaking technically, since it pre-existed Eams. It is more an enemy of Eams. That's all I can really say about it, since this subject is not public knowledge.

I'm sorry if that is not the answer you were looking for. I know how hard it must be for you to explain to your young children that they are going to lose an aunt. But maybe it will help them to know that I don't feel sad. For my part I have accepted my fate. It seems a beautiful irony that the universe should bestow Eams upon me, of all people. It seems like justice.

I'm afraid I've grown long-winded. This has been enough talk about myself. It would be my pleasure to see you and your family sometime soon. Perhaps Spring Solstice? I can hire a zip jet and be in Moscow whenever you will have me. I'll bake my famous minty candies, which I hope the children will remember. They seemed to take a liking to them last time I was there.

With love,

Galina

* * * * * * * *

The weeks that followed his expulsion from the SASH were the worst of Weston's life, bar none.

He lived alone. The long hours of producer work had for years prevented him from ever feeling the pangs that usually accompany a lack of human companionship. With no office to go to and no bustling production schedule to maintain, he felt the emptiness crash over him like a wave (if waves were hollow and cold inside).