Six Scifi Stories by Robert T. Jeschonek Read Free Book Online

involved with someone like you, not again."
    "It doesn’t have to be like that," I said. "I won’t lie to you and say I wasn’t hoping for something more, but I’d be honored just to be your friend."
    For a moment, Lynda stared at me, biting her lower lip. "TAKE ME," I wanted to shout at her. "I LOVE YOU! I NEED YOU! TAKE ME NOW!"
    But I waited silently. I knew she was so fragile that one wrong word – let alone a desperate plea – might be enough to drive her away. I had done all that I could and now would have to accept the consequences, whatever they might be.
    Unfortunately, it seemed that my hopes were doomed to be crushed.
    "I’m sorry," Lynda said finally. "I just can’t. You’ll find someone else."
    "No one like you," I said sadly as she turned away. "Promise me you’ll at least think it over."
    "No, thanks," she said, moving down the aisle with her hovercart. "Goodbye."
    I said nothing in return. Lynda had become so important to me, I could not bear to say goodbye to her, knowing the two of us would likely never meet again.
    Despondent beyond belief, I sat there, letting my glow and fragrance fade away. My first love, the love of my life, the woman of my dreams, had rejected me. My dreams of passionately merging with her, of feeling those crimson lips close around me and those ivory teeth BITE into me, had been forever denied.
    No snack cake, I was certain, had ever been so lonely and forlorn as I.
    At least for a moment.
    As Store eased my display back out of the aisle, my mind smoothly switched tracks, shunting from the loss of Lynda to consideration of another target. Lynda had been right after all; being who I am, I knew I would find someone else, and I knew I would give myself just as completely to that new love.
    Imagine how surprised I was then when a miracle happened.
    Just as I was about to realign the thread of white icing on my face to erase Lynda’s name, Store shot a flash-feed visual from buyspy into my video buffer. Even as the image burst into me, I could not believe what I was seeing.
    It was Lynda, marching swiftly up my aisle, the hovercart sweeping along behind her.
    Before I could fully process what was happening, she snatched me from the shelf, my wrapper crinkling in her beautiful, thick fingers. The next thing I knew, she was dropping me into the hovercart on top of a tub of tofu and a sack of grapefruit.
    Abandoning my thoughts of finding someone else, I reactivated my bond with Lynda and exulted in the certain knowledge that our love indeed was meant to be. She had come back for me; there could be no greater proof of her devotion.
    As I rode along in her hovercart, I knew what lay ahead...and it would be glorious. She might resist me for a while, hiding me in a cupboard or drawer, telling herself she would stick to her diet, pushing me away.
    But in the end, she would surrender. It was written in the stars.
    In the end, she would not be able to help herself. She would come to me, ready and willing, wanting me to do what only I could do for her.
    And I would do it. Gladly, I would give myself to her.
    "Thank you for coming back for me," I said as she placed a jar of wheat germ in the cart. "You won’t be sorry."
    "I already am," she said, not looking at me. "I hate myself for this. I hate you, too."
    Her words, sharp as they were, did not faze me. I knew what she really meant.
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    *****
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    It is impossible for me to describe the state of ecstatic anticipation that engulfed me as I waited for Lynda to have her first taste of me.
    That night, as she fixed and ate a salad, I watched from the kitchen counter in her tiny apartment and wished that she were putting ME in her mouth instead of the lettuce. Each time her plump, ruby lips parted, admitting another green forkful, I quivered with excitement in my wrapper, barely able to hold back from crying out for immediate consummation.
    It only intensified my arousal that she had not hidden me away