SWNOVELS Chapter 2
ET Aliens and Earth Cocktail Drinks...
“What is that? What are you making there?”
The ET Alien asked me.
“That -. That is a bullshot.”
I looked up at her, him, whatever. “You know, it’s almost exactly like you people’s gin & tonic aspic stuff that you love so much.”
“Oh.”
“You’re not serious though, right? I mean, you know what this is – you already know what a bullshot is!” I laughed.
“Yes but what did you put into that one there? I saw you put something into it... ...that isn’t supposed to be there.”
“Ah. Ssshh. Naughty naughty. You are not supposed to interfere, are you?”
She guffawed. And clicked. They do this light ‘clicking’ thing somehow inside their mouths with their lips closed.
Charlotte breezed back into the salon with her electric blue nuno felted jacket still on, with its high almost pointy French shoulders making her overall appearance rather austere, really.
I kept an awareness on Charlotte but I looked up into the face of Xan, the other thing. I mean we are talking ridiculously pretty here... Charlotte was good-looking, yes, but she had so much going for her too, French gene red hair, freckles, crystal clear grey-green eyes, bow-shaped upper lips, soft billowing lower lips and a wide mouth, slightly angular facial bone-structure, straight across long eyebrows, symmetrical features -, small waist, reasonable hips.
Xan was different.
Certainly you could be tempted to make out with a ‘Xan’ but they all have this synthetic chemical stuff going on when it happens between themselves and humans because once they click their tongues or whatever it was they used inside of there to make that sound – you get scared; it’s unavoidable and so, the drug stuff. Then you’re just lolling about only half awake, totally not in control and bits and pieces of your anatomy are doing things you did not know they could do. You know, with them, it’s all clockwork almost. Precision nonsense as far as I’m concerned. Predictable. Too predictable. These guys are predictable fucking machines.
Humans are by comparison a total fucking mess.
Which is part of the attraction for me.
You can always take control of a mess, and modify it then towards something more, um, glamorous.
Xan liked Charlotte. I don’t know whether I could really discern - liked her a lot - because I just couldn’t tell that far, but liked her, yes. The smiling was less menacing. Oh Xan had this other kind of smile. Like the one in the Junkie XL mix of the Mirror’s Edge theme song.
Charlotte, in her cover life, was a classical concert-standard pianist. She did a few performances at Versailles for the private parties sometimes, and also often enough with the Helvetic Nerds out in Switzerland in their live ‘big room’ events; that was trance music though, or techno-trance, whatever. Bartok and Bach with huge speakers and heavy liquid drum-and-bass! Xan loved all of it.
There was a keyboard in the salon.
I could see Xan surreptitiously shifting the stool closer and closer with a foot over to where Charlotte was standing, who was trying to get my complete attention. I was pretending to concentrate on the lead crystal glasses after I had finished swallowing up Xan’s pulchritudinous visage.
“John. Johnnie. Are you you here with me, Johnnie?”
“Oh yes. Quite, my beautiful magnificent Charlotte.”
She shoved a hand onto one hip and pouted at me.
“This is important, Johnnie. I have fully instructed Alon already on what to run in the advertisements. You have to make provision for the venue as you said that you would. I don’t know this place enough. You live here. What if we get responses right away and there is nothing ready?”
I nodded over towards Xan. “They are making the arrangements, Charlotte.”
Charlotte turned toward Xan and gave a little shiver.
Xan just nodded and shoved the stool just a little more forward again.
“What do the advertisements say?” I asked, casually, and handing across one of the bullshot cocktails.
“Well.” Her hand slipped down from her hip and her demeanour was now quite pleasant and receptive. “Well.” She took the offered glass. “It say like zis: show your fiancée how much you love ‘er reeli wiss a private gifting suite expehriahnce.
“What doos you zink?”
“I sink, iss vereh nahse.”
“You are making fun of me.”
“I am not. I am speaking your language now, is all. You know, this ‘Clémence-ish’ thing... Is, is, is nolly lahk Engleesh, bu’ iss Clémence-ish. Still, I understands ’im all ze same.”
She shook her head disconsolately at my pathetic boyish foolish attitude.
I tried to appease her via her ego: “Xan would like you to play some piano.”