Sylvia and Cal had been married for twenty years. They still cared for each other, but that spark just seemed to be gone. When they graduated in 2095 they were so much in love and ready for the world. Together they could do anything, and after twenty years as a couple, they had. They now lived on the Mars colony where Cal policed the Import Docks. They had even joined the "Interplanetary club" when they made love on the way to the red planet. Sylvia didn't find Cal unattractive now, he had taken care of himself as had she, but so many times with the same man had made sex... a routine.
Cal, with his thinning brown hair and deep dark eyes looked up from his holopad with the morning news as he heard his wife's deep sigh. "What is it?" he said, not with concern, but the shallow curiosity of a long term partner.
"Do you still love me?" the blonde and blue eyed lady with crows feet around the edges just threw out there.
Cal was a little stunned, but Sylvia did have a flair for the dramatic. "Why would you ask that?" He shook his head. "Of course I love you."
"Last night you didn't want to." She sounded hurt as if she took it personally.
"You didn't seem to want to either." He said in defense. "I didn't want to make you if you didn't want to."
Sylvia looked out the kitchen window not meeting his eyes. "But I would have."
Cal reached for her hand. "I know, but I DO love you."
"In the old days you would just ravish me, and take my body, no matter what I wanted." Sylvia said dramatically
Cal looked at her askance. "I never just ravished you, and you always wanted to."
"Did I?" Her blue eyes looked at him now over her Espesso cup.
Cal let it drop, shaking his head at his melodramatic wife.
Weeks go by and Cal walks in from work to find his shapely wife dressed in a shimmering sexy blue dress that he had bought for her from Marilyn's Fashion Designs, earthside . His eyes narrowed in on the deep cleavage she was presenting. The material was open nearly to her navel with little bands going across every few inches as if to hold it together. Finally he noticed her handbag.
"Um, are we going out?" She hadn't said anything and he was looking forward to tonight's game.
"We have an appointment." She supplied.
"We do?" Cal was confused, she generally told him about these things ahead of time. "Where? I hope it involves food."
"We're going to marriage counseling." She said with a finality.
"What? Sylviaaa!" He almost whined. "We don't NEED marriage counseling." he emphasized.
"We do, Cal." the blonde said confidently. "I love you and I don't want to fall OUT of love with you. Do this for me, for US." Her eyes pleaded as she walked up to him and took his hand.
Cal breathed a deep sigh before relenting. "If it will make you happy, but I think we're fine." he put his briefcase down and turned to offer her the door with a grand gesture. "After you."
Sylvia kissed him quickly and smiled as she walked by, having gotten her way. Cal really just hoped that there would be food at some point, and closed their front door.
PSYCLINIC CALIBRATIONS INC. it said on the signs in the parking lot. It was a modest facility in the middle of an industrial park. A hovertrain sped behind the building over its magnetic path.
"This is a marriage counselor?" Cal was skeptical as they stepped out of the computer driven Johnny Cab.
"Its new." Sylvia said excitedly. "The doctor is working with some of the latest technology."
"Where at the edge of the domes. How dangerous is this 'latest technology', Sylvia?" Cal asked with trepidation.
Inside the building everything was eggshell white, conveying a sense of the freshly painted. In fact it all looked new. There was no receptionist in the vestibule, just a buzzer panel next to a door. That door opened.
"Mr and Mrs Thompson?" said a tall thin man smiling wide as he reached for Cal's hand "A pleasure to meet you, Sir. I'm Dr. Ekman."
"Likewise, I'm sure." Cal shook his hand but didn't like him already.
"Sylvia tells me you're High School sweethearts. That's good, it means there's a real commitment there."
"Well, I told her I think we're fine." Cal interjected defensively.
The Doctor summed Cal up quickly and responded, "And you very well might be right, Cal, and the fact that you came with her today says you value her opinion and are willing to do what it takes to make her happy." The Doctor complimented Cal and at the same time made him feel guilty if he thought of leaving.
"Well, um, of course I do." Cal looked to his blonde curvy wife. "I love Sylvia." who smiled at him, "We're partners."
"Good, that's what I like to hear." said the psychologist. "Let's get out of the reception area and into my office and have a chat, just the three of us." Dr. Ekman was all smiles. Sylvia was all smiles too, but Cal couldn't help feeling he was being conned.
The Psychologist's office wasn't eggshell white, it was beige with chromium fixtures and furniture. Cal had expected a couch, like the old cliche' suggested, but he guessed that was Psychiatrists. They all took seats but not around his desk.
"So, Sylvia has told me some of your past romantic exploits, Cal, and she just feels things are getting stale, repetitive."
Cal wondered what Sylvia had divulged. He looked to her before answering. "I guess, but since we came to Mars we've been busy...and we're not young anymore."
"She told me about the space flight over. You sound like an adventurous guy. Don't sell yourself short."
"Well, truthfully that was her idea." Cal admitted.
"You didn't like it?" Sylvia finally spoke, sounding hurt.
"I didn't say that." Cal complained.
Dr. Ekman interrupted, "I have a very simple exercise for you two to try, it's the core of why you're here and not at some other marriage therapist." He looked from Cal to Sylvia. "Each of you need to see it from the others perspective, to gain an empathy for each other, deeper than you've ever had before."
"What do you mean?" Cal was still unsure.
"You love each other, it's obvious, but you are at that stage in life when a couple can grow apart, feel isolated from each other."
Cal couldn't argue with that. Most times he had no idea how Sylvia was spending her day. And after sex they used to talk as he held her in his arms, the only time he truly told her everything. Now they both rolled over and fell asleep. "What do we do?" He finally asked.
"It's experimental, but that doesn't mean it's dangerous, just new." Dr. Ekman assured them.
Cal looked sceptical, but Sylvia knew her husband, "Please, sweetie, for me?" She reached over and squeezed his hand and gave him her best "pleading" eyes until he relented.
Cal and his wife were each in archaic reclining vinyl covered chairs that looked like they came from a dentist auction. He still looked around nervously although there was nothing else to see in this otherwise barren little room.
"How's this going to work?" The grey templed husband asked, more for reassurance than a technical curiosity.
"This is a Gamma wave simulator," started the Doctor. "Through alpha waves and biofeedback we can put you both in a near trance state. Then we actually capture your Gamma waves and manipulate them, sending them then to the other subject."
Cal let this sink in. "You're gonna put her thoughts in my head?" The older man was skeptical.
"Not her thoughts, but her perceptions." The Doctor became animated at describing his process. "You will think as you, but it will seem you are perceiving things from her body."
Cal began to get up. "Oh, this is bullshit!" He began. but Sylvia still had a hold of his hand and tugged on it. He looked into his wife's sparkling blue eyes, the eyes he fell in love with so long ago. She asked him to stay without saying a word. "Fine." He finally relented, "but when this turns out to be just a dog and pony show, remember I know the people that can have you tossed off this rock."
Dr. Ekman just a gave a reassuring smile and then addressed Sylvia as he put the headset on her. "This is usually most difficult for the female. You will be receiving urges from him that you won't know how to repress."
"Wait! WHAT?" Cal interrupted "If she..."
"Calm down, Mr. Trask. No physical harm will come to either of you. I am merely pointing out the psychological effects." The doctor slowly handed the headset to Cal. "I promise."
"Psychological EFFECTS isn't reassuring me, Doc." Still, Cal put the headset on.
Dr. Ekman began to walk out of the room, towards a control booth behind glass. "Relax, It will take a little time."
Cal sat in the dimly lit room. He would glance over at Sylvia just out of the corner of his eye to see her glancing at him. He began to wonder how long this would take. Minutes seemed to go by. Cal looked over at Sylvia again who seemed to be staring at her shoes. Cal looked at his own shoes and then glanced the other way wondering where the "Doc" was and saw... Cal.
He saw himself sitting there. "What the hell" ran through his brain. He looked down to his pale blue heels at the end of his slim ankles...
"Aahhh!" Cal whipped the headset off and nearly jumped out of the reclined chair and looked around himself frantically to see... himself. He looked at His hands, felt His hairy arms and saw his brown shoes."
"It's OK, Mr. Trask" said a voice over a loudspeaker.
Sylvia spoke up. "You saw it too?"
"What?" Cal was still shaken.
"Us. I was you, Cal. Were you me?" His wife gave a funny little smile.
"Yeah, I guess. That was weird, Sylvia." He still sounded rattled.
