Sneak Peek: An Encounter (Patreon)

It''s not always easy to pick a sneak peek: there's a lot of content to choose from, but I want to pick something that tempts readers at all tier levels, but I also don't want to spoil the story. But what do people want to read? Salacious moments, or bits of character development, or hints at new characters or past events?

For this week, I went for a random encounter in the street that sets up some later events, also hinting at some important backstory for our protagonist. This is from Chapter 4-5. Enjoy. And if you've got a preference in terms of what sneak peeks offer--let me know in the comments below.

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Julia laughed. Then she indicated a moment earlier in the day, a blue surge in a rolling sea of mild pink data. “But this—we need to talk about this.”

            This: early afternoon, tummies glowing with a light lunch and glass of wine, head fuzzy with the effort of projecting the Cindy she expected, that the AI wanted. We left the café, click of heels against sidewalk slabs as we cut along a warren of backstreets under October skies. Bright sun and lost in both character and chatter, I felt—happy—a genuine surge of pleasure trotting alongside Julia on a beautiful Sunday, light dress fluttering in a cool wind.

            “Food?” called a voice. “Money?”
            He sat on a flattened bit of cardboard, dirty, menacing, dark-eyed. Successive governments over the past two decades promised homelessness would be a thing of the past but nothing changed. There would always been forgotten people and lost places in which they sheltered. Julia probably hadn’t even noticed the rent-a-cops we’d passed during our walk; I did. Private security forces swept through the city centre and moved the beggars and rough sleepers along, usually towards the periphery. On those seemingly, increasingly rare nights I slept in my own bed, I saw many of these lost souls on my morning run through the suburb.

            Up close, this guy reeked of despair, of piss and sweat. He couldn’t have been much older than twenty—no, not even that. Just a kid, and his eyes betrayed both disbelief and sullen anger at his own loss of dignity. He eyed these two pretty women in their bright clothes and resented them and keenly felt his own grubbiness. He needed their help but would hate them for it. Maybe he remembered women from his past and felt the disdain they’d feel seeing him like this.  

            Before Julia could stop me, I crouched in heels and a dress that cost enough to house him for a week. “Hey,” I said. His clothes were filthy but not yet tattered, his breath rank but his teeth still healthy and white. Homeless, but maybe only recently.

            The man eyed me warily. His eyes flicked to somewhere past me, searching, looking for the catch, the authorities, for something to explain why this beautiful girl might talk to him. When his attention returned to me, he took in my shiny lips and earrings, the meticulous makeup and prissy cleanliness. I felt ashamed.

            “What’s your name?” I asked.

            He shifted uncomfortably, scratched at a spot under his armpit. “Theo.”

            “Well, Theo, if you’ve got a phone, I’ll spot you some cash.”

            I could feel Julia hovering disapprovingly behind me. Well, fuck her.

            Theo reached into an inner pocket of his puffy jacket. There were a few tears and rips in the fabric, taped over. He’d feel those come winter. He pulled out a phone. I tapped it with mine, transferred some money.

            He stared at me. “You’re pretty.”

            “Yeah.” I leaned in a little closer and spoke so only he could hear. “We passed some cops a few streets back. They’ll be here soon. You should move,” I said, and recommended an unofficial shelter near my neighbourhood, a derelict building of squatters, homeless and gang kids living in uneasy harmony.

            Julia and I walked on, until we turned a corner. She grabbed me hard by the arm, yanking me into the doorway of a fancy café. “What the fuck was that?” she hissed.

            I stared back at her, then at her hand. “Let go of me.”

            “You’re a young girl, you idiot. He could’ve hurt you.” An exasperated sigh, and she released me. “What were you thinking?”

            “He needed food.”

            “Food?” She laughed. “He’s a bum. He’s going to—”

            I shoved her up against the wall, hard and ignoring the scorching pain in my wrist jabbed a finger in her face and spoke with barely restrained fury. “Don’t you fucking say it, Jules, you don’t have a goddamn clue what you’re talking about. Yeah, maybe he’ll spend it on—whatever. Drugs. Booze. And who can blame him? His life’s shit.” My finger curled into a fist, and for a moment Julia must’ve thought I was going to throw a punch. But my arm fell impotently at my side. “His name’s Theo. And maybe—just maybe—he’ll take that tiny bit of money and… eat, or get himself a room for the night, shower and for just one day feel like a man again. It might make a difference. It might not.” I glared at her, flushed red and breathing hard. “He deserves the chance.”

            Julia stared at me and let it drop. It took a solid hour before the dark cloud over us lifted and we could enjoy the rest of the day. We finished our shopping; she punished my aggression with an extra hour of maid duty when we got back to hers; and then over wine and a charcuterie board, she pointed at the data that captured the encounter and the computer, in its digital fucking ignorance, determined it was an especially unfeminine—or un-Cindy—thing to do. Compassion and empathy were outweighed by anxiety and revulsion: a girl like Cindy shouldn’t stop and talk to homeless men—too scary, too icky—and if there’s a single time this whole goddam week I wanted to tell Julia and her goddamn AI to fuck off, it was then.

            “You used to do the same thing, too, back then,” Julia said, musing as she pushed the laptop aside. “I’d forgotten, you know. It was one of the things that first attracted me to you, fourteen years ago when we first met. It just seemed so—out of character.”

            I titled my head and smoothed hair over my shoulder and felt a buzz at my left wrist. “How so?”

            “You were so arrogant, especially after the tech buyout, really cocky. The way you splashed cash around, the flash suits, expensive restaurants. You could be such a dick, you know?”

            “You quite liked my dick.”

            She rolled her eyes. “But then, every time we went out and you passed some homeless person on the street, you’d stop. Talk to them, just a quick word and some money. I swear, you were kinder to them than anyone in the office.”

            I shrugged.

            “Why?”

            An itch, raw skin beneath a hardened scab.