The Story of Sam J. Jones
His name was Sam Jones. He was a Junior Data Collator (fourth class!) in the World Government Office of Censored Statistics in Omaha, Nebraska. He was handsome, strong, muscular, and had bright blonde hair (at least, until he arrived at the Station).
When he arrived he was bewildered to find the Earth destroyed, gone, five hundred years in the past, and thousands of light years that-a-way. He felt lost at first, until a kind woman named Susan Shinn took him under her wing. She seduced him, fucked him, and partnered with him, and then stopped speaking to him altogether after they got a combined score of only 580.
Sam felt fairly miserable about the whole pairing process after that. He tried to spend time with the other guys but didn't really like them either. He felt they were blowhards, fakes and phonies. One claimed to be a governor; another a billionaire, and yet another a famous Survey Service Captain, but to him they all seemed like frauds.
The only guy he
kind of
liked was Haggis O'Leary, which was odd since Haggis was perhaps the
least friendly
of the bunch. At least Ardis and Craig and Gavin would smile and pretend to be friendly with him. With Haggis there was no layer of friendliness but neither, he sensed, was there any phoniness. So he sat and talked with Haggis though whether Haggis was listening he wasn't always quite sure as he always seemed to be gazing at other people in the room.
And then Serra came.
At first Sam thought it was Sarah. Sarah, his beloved. Sarah, the love of his life... and the woman who barely knew he existed. They had both worked in the Office of Censored Statistics and for Sam it was love at first sight. But Sarah had been dating a tall black man named Obamaungabunga and thought of Sam as little more than an officemate or at most a casual friend. Sam had been secretly in love with her for six months when he got taken. Sarah was long dead now, 500 years gone, and yet still he pined for her.
And then... Sam saw her again, one morning in Bermuda!
From the back it looked exactly like Sarah. Of course, Sarah had been blonde and most everyone's hair here was white, but then he heard her girlish laugh and he knew it was her!
He ran over to her, raising eyebrows all over the lounge.
"Sarah!" he cried.
She turned around to face him. She had almost the same, thin girlish face as Sarah... but it wasn't Sarah.
"Excuse me?" she said.
Sam skidded to a halt.
"How did you know my name?" she said.
"Sarah?" he asked, sounding confused.
"Serra, S-e-r-r-a. Is that what you were trying to say?" she asked. She had an amused little smile on her face.
"No, I was saying Sarah."
"But my name is Serra," she said. "What is your name?"
"Sam," said Sam, feeling dazed. "Sam Jones."
"You look flustered. Why don't you sit down and join me for breakfast?"
"Sure."
Her name was Serra. The face was almost the same, the voice was almost the same, but clearly it was not his Sarah. Her eyes were blue, not hazel, her face was a bit longer, and her breasts were somewhat larger. She had just arrived two days ago. She had been immediately seduced by a kind man named Ardis McDuff, "A billionaire!", who had fucked her, partnered with her, and then stopped talking to her when they had only scored 590 together.
Since Serra was new and had only partnered once, she still had men chasing after her. A thought occurred to her. "You're not here to partner with me, are you?"
"No!" said Sam.
"Good," said Serra. "I need a break from that stuff."
Sam sat and listened to Serra talking about her life in Nova Scotia. She had been a Fishing Auditor for the World Government, instructing fishermen when to fish and when not to and what was permissible to fish for. She felt good preserving the environment, but obviously felt sad that despite the well intentioned efforts of herself and millions of World Government social engineers that the planet had still be destroyed by Galactic Temperature Change.
She talked about her parents, she talked about her sister Seska, she even talked about her boyfriend Hirogen. Sam just sat and breathed it all in. It didn't take very much imagination to think he was with Sarah again. It was like being in Heaven.
As she stretched her arms and yawned and said she was going to bed early, Sam impulsively asked if he could have breakfast with her tomorrow.
"Of course," she said with a smile. She extended a slender hand. "It was so nice to meet you, Sam!"
He felt chills shaking it.
********
Sam walked by Haggis's table at lunch. "You look happy," said Haggis.
"I am!" said Sam. "Can I tell you about it?"
Haggis gently tapped the table with his fingertips. "Why not?"
Sam sat down opposite him. "I met this girl, Serra."
"And she's going to partner with you?"
"No," said Sam. "But she
does
want to be my friend."
"How nice," said Haggis, playing with his electrofork.
"You don't understand. Serra looks and sounds almost exactly like Sarah."
"Excuse me?"
Sam explained Serra's resemblance to the woman he had had an intense crush on back on Earth. "She even has the same name! Almost."
"What are the odds of that?" Haggis asked with mock interest.
"I know!" said Sam, mistaking mock interest for the real thing. "And she likes me!"
"And so?" said Haggis.
"So... what?" Sam asked.
"What's next?"
Sam shrugged. "Maybe our friendship will grow into something more."
"Is that the strategy you used with the other Sarah, on Earth?"
"Well...."
"And would you say you have more time to try this strategy here, or less?"
"Probably less," said Sam. He sucked his lips inward. "I do really wish I had had the courage to tell Sarah my true feelings. But I'm afraid if I do the same with Serra that she'll reject me. Just having a friend in this place is really important to me, you know?"
"Especially a friend you're very much attracted to."
"Yeah." Sam gave a goofy smile. "Is there anyone you're attracted to, Haggis?"
Haggis cast a quick glance at Marla, who was chatting with Hamilton Jurgenson across the room. "No. Attraction is a weakness here. One which can be used against you."
********
After three days of having breakfast with Serra, Sam got up the courage to walk by her table at lunch. To his delight, she invited him to join him. Soon they were having breakfast and lunch together almost every day.
"What about dinner?" Haggis asked when Sam gave him his next update.
"What about it?" Sam asked.
"Why don't you ask her to dinner?"
"Oh... I don't know... I couldn't."
"Why not?"
"She might say no," said Sam.
"You'll never know unless you ask," said Haggis.
Before long Sam and Serra were having nearly all their meals together, and they were the talk of Bermuda and sometimes Algeria and Oregon. And yet... they never partnered together. As far as anyone knew, they never even has sex. They were just friends.
"Is that really possible?" Marla asked, sitting at Haggis's table.
"Is what possible?"
"Them," she nodded in the direction of the table Sam and Serra was at. Sam was saying something and Serra was laughing. "For men and women to be friends. Just friends."
"No," said Haggis quickly. Too quickly.
"That's what I thought," she said. Then she leaned forward and stared provocatively at him. "You know, you have your cycle and I have mine. It's time for me to select another partner."
"Good luck with that."
"I was thinking about Hamilton Jorgenson." She looked for any trace of emotion in his face.
"Yes, I saw you talking with him," said Haggis.
"Really?" She smiled at him. "Watching me?"
"Among many others," said Haggis.
"That's probably what you did back on Earth. You worked in surveillance. I can see you watching women on a hundred different holoscreens, watching, recording, listening."
"It sounds like a very voyeuristic profession," said Haggis.
"But that's all you, Haggis. All you do is watch. You dutifully select a partner once a month, one you have absolutely no feelings for, but the rest of the time you simply watch, simply wait. What are you waiting for?"
"Maybe the next bus back to Earth," said Haggis. He paused. "That idea you had about Hamilton Jorgenson."
