Amy shows up on her doorstep the following evening, and her appearance immediately sets off alarm bells in Leela's head. She's not wearing the casual sweats she favors on her days off, or the tiny, overtly sexy outfits she wears when she disappears to parties. Today she's clad in black leather shorts and an oversized cashmere sweater. Her short hair is styled in feathery layers, and her eyes are shadowed in smokey black. The overall effect is somewhere on the borderline between sexy and sweet – a look Amy only ever reaches for on one occasion.
Standing behind her are two stylists: the girl with the blue bubble-cut curls, and a man with a quiff hairdo spray-painted gold. Their presence only serves to confirm Leela's suspicions.
"No," she says immediately. "No."
"Yes," Amy corrects. "Date night, Leela."
Leela swallows.
This isn't the first time Amy has dragged her and Fry out on a very public "date night". It's happened four times since the Games ended, and each time has been worse than the last. Leela hates every second of it, from the moment the stylists arrive to paint a fake face on her, to the moment they step out of the car and into the wall of waiting photographers. The heat and crowds bring her right back to the Cornucopia in the Games, and the flashing lights traumatize Fry. They're both sick and shaking by the time the doors close behind them, but once they're inside whatever hip new eatery or nightclub Amy has brought them to, there's nowhere to hide. People stare, and Amy nudges them to perform – hold hands, kiss now, laugh at my joke – so they sit on edge the whole night, afraid of slipping up the way they did in their interviews. The worst thing is that this is Amy doing them a favor, and Leela knows it. If she didn't put them on display for the paparazzi like this, they'd have to do more interviews, show up at more functions, appear in magazines and on TV. "Throwing out scraps to keep the beast at bay", that's what Kif calls it. And as much as she resents the intrusion, Leela doesn't disagree. She sees Amy disappear each night. She knows it could be a lot worse.
So she stands aside and lets the stylists in, lets them primp and preen and turn her into something gasp-worthy. She ends up with soft waves in her hair and a face smoothed free of any flaws – girlish and innocent, the way they always style her. Her dress is deep blue with silver threaded through it. It shimmers when she moves, and she suspects she'll sparkle in the dim light of the restaurant. Still, the neckline is lower than she's used to, and the hemline is higher. And she's wearing heels. She shoots Amy a quizzical look, but her mentor only shrugs.
"He reacts to it," is all she says, and Leela knows at once what she means. Fry, who can't act to save his life, was so intent on preserving their friendship last time they went out that he barely looked at her, or did anything more risqué than hold her hand and kiss her on the cheek. It had the effect of making him appear disinterested, and Amy had to run some damage control story about food poisoning the next day, in order to explain it away. They won't get away with that this time, so she's going to play dirty and make him stare. Leela has no illusions about her own beauty, but, well . . . Amy's not wrong. Fry does react when she dresses like this. He gets this dazed, hypnotized look, and he openly stares at parts of her that make her mother pull her aside for a lecture the next day.
So she nods.
"Where are we going?" she asks.
"A bar in L.A," Amy says. "The Splendor."
"Splendor?" Leela echoes.
"As in, Splendor of Earth," Amy explains. She rolls her eyes. "It's owned by the son of one of Nixon's cronies. A real playboy, but he failed the eye test for the Army and he doesn't have the brains for politics, so daddy ponied up the dough for this little venture. It's the place to be on a Saturday night, they say. Or at least, it will be for the next two weeks, til everyone gets bored of it."
She reaches out and daubs deep pink lipstick onto Leela's mouth.
"Don't bite your lip so much," she warns. "You'll get it on your teeth."
"Right."
"And don't worry. I'll be there the whole time. Kif too. I got us a corner table, in a booth. It's pretty private, for once."
Leela nods. It's never private. It's never anything less than a waking nightmare, but she nods anyway, because there's nothing else she can do.
Amy squeezes her hand, then reaches into her purse and fishes out a small bottle of pills. She unscrews the top and holds them out to Leela.
"I need to stay sharp tonight," she says. "But if you want . . . it takes the edge off."
Leela shakes her head.
"No."
She's never taken a drug in her life, and she doesn't intend to start now. She can't handle that loss of control.
"It helps," Amy says. "It helps you get through it."
"No," Leela insists.
Her mentor sighs.
"If you say so. But just so you know . . . Fry took three."
Three of those little pills was three too many. Leela can see that the minute she lays her eye on Fry.
He's glassy-eyed and drunk looking, and his whole posture is loose. He's sprawled on his couch, staring up at the ceiling with a vaguely interested expression. Kif is watching him nervously.
"Time to go," Amy says brusquely. She kicks the couch, and Fry sits up.
"You can't make me," he mumbles.
Then he notices Leela, and . . . yep, here comes the dazed look. Like he's been hit by a mallet, but he's happy about it.
"I changed my mind," he says immediately. "I'll go. I'll go anywhere with you." He smiles up at her. "You're so beautiful. Do I tell you that? I should tell you that. I think it every time I see you. You're the most beautiful person I ever saw."
Leela feels heat rise in her cheeks. She has no idea how to counter that.
"You . . . you look nice too," she manages.
Which is true. He does. He's wearing navy pants to match her dress, and a smart gray shirt, and the tailoring is so sharp that for once he doesn't look like he's drowning in his own clothes. Leela could trace every inch of him with her eye – and finds herself doing so, until she makes herself stop.
"I'd follow you anywhere," Fry continues, in a dreamy tone. "But I don't think we should go anywhere. I think we should stay here, and make out."
Leela chokes, and coughs quickly to cover it up.
"We don't -" do that anymore, she starts to remind him – but Amy kicks her swiftly in the shin and shoots her a don't you dare make my job any harder look, and she shuts up. She takes a deep breath. "We can't stay here," she says. "We have to go out, Fry. On a date, remember?"
He groans.
"Come on," Leela coaxes.
She takes his hands and pulls him up. He sways alarmingly when she does so.
"You gave him too much," she snaps at Amy.
"Well, I can see that now," Amy says drily. "Just get him in the car. It'll wear off eventually."
It's dark in the back seat of the car, and Fry becomes fixated on the shimmering of her dress. His eyes roam the length of her body and he keeps laughing, putting out his hand to let it dance in empty air.
"You're sparkly," he tells her. "Like stars. I remember when we looked at stars. On the roof. Do you remember that?"
Leela nods.
"Of course. It was - "
Her breath catches.
Fry is tracing tiny patterns over the fabric of her dress. His movements are gentle and fascinated, and as his fingers ghost over her hip, Leela realizes it's not patterns he's outlining - it's constellations, as if Leela herself is a universe of stars.
That fluttering feeling starts in her stomach again. The one she felt when he first kissed her in the arena.
"Fry." It comes out sounding strangely hoarse. She tries again. "Fry."
He looks up at her. They flash past a street light and Leela gets a glimpse of his pupils, blown wide with the drug, or with . . . something else. There's a banked fire in his eyes, and Leela suddenly realizes that this was a very, very bad idea. She has never thought of Fry as an inhibited person – but whatever Amy gave him, it's stripped away all his self-control, and apparently he had some after all. Because he's never looked at her like this before, with such blatant, burning want.
He's slipped before. His eyes have wandered. He's been more enthusiastic than he should be, when they kissed. But nothing like this.
This . . . he'd burn and burn, and burn himself out, if she let him.
For her.
It's a strangely adult feeling, to have this kind of power over someone. Her mother would be horrified, Leela knows. Amy would probably laugh. Amy always seems amused by the fact that they aren't doing this already. She thinks Leela's reluctance is a sign of naivety.
Leela thinks the opposite.
In moments like this, she feels like she and Fry are skirting the edge of something terrifying. And whatever meager, illusory control she has over their situation, she knows it won't survive her letting go.
She stills his hand.
"Why did you take the pills?" she asks softly. She's not sure she wants to know, but it's the only thing she can think to say.
Fry blinks.
"The lights," he says at last. His voice is thick. "When the cameras go pop pop pop." He flashes his hand in imitation. "It makes the world go white. White light, everywhere." He settles, and turns solemn. "That's what I saw, at the end."
Leela goes rigid. She doesn't have to ask which "end" he means. It's the end of the Games, when his heart failed - before the doctors cracked him open and made it beat again.
When he died.
He relives it, then, every time they do this. No wonder he chose to get out of his mind tonight. Leela would too, if it had the same effect on her.
Amy is watching them, her eyes hard and bright in the dark. Beside her, Kif is so still he hardly seems to be breathing.
They all survived the Games, Leela thinks. They all have that horror in common. But only Fry died. Only Fry killed, and died, and saw what was waiting on the other side.
"What did you see?"
It's Kif who asks. His voice is quiet.
He killed a girl from his home planet, Leela remembers. Electrocuted her when they made it to the final two.
Fry stays silent. When Leela touches his hand he shivers.
"Nothing," he says dully. "There wasn't anything. Just light. And nothing."
"So no choirs of angels then," Amy notes. Her tone is brittle.
Fry shakes his head.
"No angels. No devils. Nothing," he says. "When you kill them, they don't go anywhere. They're just gone. And you did it." He stares down at his hands. "You did it."
In the silence, Kif swallows audibly.
"You shouldn't have drugged him," he murmurs to Amy.
Amy mutters something under her breath. It doesn't sound like English, but it does sound like swearing. Whatever it is, it makes Kif touch her hand in silent apology. Leela doesn't miss the gesture, although she pretends to.
She knows better than to ask . . . but she does wonder, sometimes, about Kif and Amy.
The walk past the paparazzi is as harrowing as always. Amy smiles and waves – the look on her face disturbingly false – and Kif holds it together well. Leela's own smile is a rictus, and she grips Fry's hand so tightly he really should be in pain. But he doesn't seem to feel it, and Leela has to admit, he's not as much of a wreck as he usually is when the doors to The Splendor Of Earth close behind him. He looks rattled, but not on the verge of vomiting. She supposes that's a good thing.
They push through the crowd, Amy throwing out smiles in all directions. She seems to know everyone here, and pretends to be delighted to see them. Once they order and escape to the relative privacy of the booth, however, her smile falls away like slime.
"Parasites," she hisses. Kif grimaces, and says nothing.
A discreet sweep of the booth reveals no bugs, to Leela's surprise. It must be too loud in here for them to pick up anything useful. Either way, she feels herself relax infinitesimally, knowing their conversation won't be recorded.
The food is probably good, but it all looks like fancy nothing to Leela. She picks at garnishes of black truffle and gold leaf, and tries to work out which parts are edible, and why such expensive food comes in such tiny portions. It doesn't help that no-one else is eating either. Fry's appetite is the first thing to go when he's nervous, and Amy is eschewing her food in favor of wine. Even Kif can't seem to bring himself to do more than push the food around his plate.
"It's not the food," he says, when he catches Leela watching him. He smiles thinly. "It's the company."
He gestures out over the crowd.
"Surface people," Leela says.
Kif laughs.
"Not to me," he reminds her. "But that's not a bad word for them. The surface of things is certainly all they care about."
"Hah." Amy takes another swig of her wine. "That's right. The great and the good. All facelifts and jewels and shiny, shiny surface. But I could tell you stories. I could make your hair curl. I could make you sick."
Leela frowns. She's never understood the surface, but these people don't seem dangerous. They just seem vapid, with their braying laughter and expensive clothes. They live in a shiny, uncomprehending bubble. It's hard to imagine any darkness lurks beneath their frozen faces.
"Amy's right."
Fry raises his head. His eyes have gone glassy again, and he's speaking in the same dull monotone he used in the car.
"She's right," he continues. "They're bad people. They used to come to the orphanarium sometimes. To look at us. Because they gave us money. They gave us money, so it was like they owned us."
Amy up-ends the last of the wine into her glass and drinks deeply, without stopping.
As if she knows what's coming next.
"They were better than us," Fry goes on. "Because they had fancy clothes and cars, and money. And money makes you friends in high places. That's what the warden said. But it didn't make them good people. Once a lady in a fur coat came. Mrs Astor." He frowns at the silverware. "And one of the little kids touched her coat. He was only a baby, he didn't mean to. But she screamed that he was dirty, and she wouldn't shut up, so Warden Proctor put him in a bath in front of everyone and poured stuff on him. It wasn't for people. We were supposed to clean the floor with it, and it made his skin all prickly. He was bleeding, and he kept crying, but Mrs Astor just sniffed at him and said That's better, and then she went back to her car. Like it didn't matter."
Kif puts down his fork, no longer even pretending to eat.
"That's awful," Leela says.
Fry shakes his head.
"That's not the worst," he tells her. "A man came last year. Before the Games. He had jewels in his cuff links and his face was all stretched, like . . . like he had pins holding it up behind his ears. And he had big square teeth. White teeth." He bares his own teeth in a phony grin, and shudders. "He took Colleen in the Warden's office," he mumbles. "When she came out she was crying. She had bruises on her. Here -" - he wraps his fingers, featherlight, around each of Leela's wrists, and then lets go - "and here."
This time he touches a point high on her thighs, above her knees. It's a light touch, his fingertips barely brushing the skin, but heat surges through her all the same. Heat . . . and nausea, as she realizes what Fry is saying.
"I never knew you could hurt a girl like that," he says distantly. "I never hurt a girl like that."
He moves his hands away and Leela shifts uncomfortably. There is a hot, insistent pulse thrumming between her legs, and she has a horrible feeling it shows on her face. Amy doesn't seem to notice. She's staring into the depths of her empty wine glass, like she wants to drown in it. Fry is lost in his own memories, and Leela doesn't think he can see his surroundings clearly at all. Kif has focused his gaze on a painting of the Nixon Monument, just behind Fry's head. It's hard to tell what he's thinking.
"What happened to the girl?" he asks.
"Nothing." Fry toys with his fork, pressing the pad of his thumb into the tines hard enough to leave a mark. He doesn't seem to feel it. "Everyone pretended it didn't happen," he says. "Even Colleen. When I told Warden Vogel he said I didn't see what I thought I saw. But I think I did, because Warden Proctor locked me in the sick room for a week after that. She said I had a fever that made me tell lies, and she wouldn't let me eat anything until my mind was clear. But I didn't feel hot. And my mind didn't get any clearer. Just foggier." He frowns. "After a week I was so hungry I couldn't remember why she put me there in the first place, so Warden Vogel made her let me go."
Amy's chair falls back with a sudden screech. She stands up.
"See, this? This is why we don't let you talk." She touches a hand to her temple. "I need more wine. Leela, get him some air."
They find themselves in the alley out back, by the trash cans. A lifetime in the sewer has left Leela immune to the odor, so the air smells pretty fresh to her. And it seems to revive Fry a little. He's not staring into space anymore, anyway.
He leans against the brickwork, watching her.
"I didn't know," Leela says at last. "The orphanarium. I didn't know it was that bad."
Fry closes his eyes and puts his head back. He seems dizzy.
"I bet the sewer was worse."
Leela frowns.
"They let us starve," she admits. "And they let us die when we were sick."
At the time, it had seemed inhumane. But there had been an honesty in it. The Peacekeepers spat at her and called her genetic scum, but Leela had never expected anything else from them. It had never occurred to her that humanity's visceral disgust for mutants might have protected her from something even worse. It had never occurred to her that humans could be just as vicious to their own.
Fry and Amy have forced her to revise that opinion.
"Let's talk about something else," she says.
This doesn't feel like a safe topic, even if the alleyway isn't bugged.
"I hate this," Fry says morosely. "Lying. Pretending."
"I know." Leela stares up at the cloudy night sky. "It'll be worse on the Tour."
The Victory Tour is something neither of them want to think about, but neither of them can avoid. It's standard protocol. The winner of the Games is always paraded through every planet on Nixon's empire, as an example of the might and magnanimity of Earth. It's a powerful propaganda tool.
And it starts in the new year, a month from now.
Fry nods.
"It'll be like this," he says. "Every night. For months."
Leela can't think of anything comforting to say. Comfort was never really her area. She lays a hand on his forearm instead, and squeezes in a way she hopes is reassuring.
Fry shuts his eyes again, leaning back against the wall. He sighs.
They stand together without speaking, until the dizziness passes and Fry can open his eyes again. It's a long wait, but when he does, his pupils are smaller and his expression is clearer. The drug is wearing off.
The relief must show on Leela's face, because Fry frowns at her.
"I don't think I should take those pills again," he says. "You look freaked."
His forehead creases as he plays the evening back in his mind.
"I made Amy mad," he manages at last. "Didn't I?"
Leela sighs.
"She was mad already. But you didn't help."
"And . . ." Fry stops short, horror dawning. "Um." He looks Leela up and down, his cheeks blazing as bright as his hair. "I don't remember, but, um . . . I think maybe you should be mad too."
Leela doesn't know exactly what he's remembering now, but from the look on his face, it has to be one of the times when he touched her.
"I - wasn't." The words are out of her mouth before she can stop them. "I wasn't mad. I wasn't . . . I didn't . . ."
I liked it. I didn't want you to stop.
Leela resolutely bites back those words. That's too much, too dangerous . . . But there's a part of her that has no desire for self-preservation at all, and it keeps wresting control of her mouth.
"I didn't mind," she hears herself say.
Her voice has gone hoarse again, like it did in the car. That's trouble. It's a bad, bad sign.
And her traitorous mouth is still talking.
"I minded that we weren't alone," she hears herself say. Quiet, but sure.
Fry blinks.
He's only two steps in front of her. Her hand is still resting on his arm.
Leela doesn't move it.
She doesn't stop him either, when he puts a tentative hand on her hip. His touch runs through her like a current, short-circuiting all but this treacherous, wanting part of her brain. Fry doesn't pull her, but Leela falls into the space between them anyway and she knows she must have stepped forward. And then his mouth is on hers and she doesn't know which of them to blame but she doesn't much care.
This isn't the way they're supposed to kiss. It's open-mouthed and needy. Her fists are balled in the front of his shirt and then Fry is breathing hard and fast against her neck, his breath warm on her throat, and Leela doesn't know where it came from, this explosion of need – but it doesn't exist to please anyone but them, and so she pushes closer, twists her fingers in his hair and shifts her hips to hold him in place. Fry groans and sucks hard on her neck, his teeth grazing the skin. That draws another unfamiliar sound from her mouth - a shivery "oh-ohh" - and Fry gasps, overloaded. He pushes her away suddenly, wrenching them apart.
"We – we should – stop," he pants.
Leela reddens. Mutant anatomy shares some basic similarities with human. And Fry is very, very human. It's immediately obvious what will happen if they don't stop.
She nods, breathing deep. Her lips are swollen and there's a hot pulse throbbing under the mark on her neck. She rearranges her hair as best she can to cover it, and wipes off her smudged lipstick with the back of her hand. The sparkle has rubbed off whole tracts of her dress, but there's nothing she can do about that except pray no-one notices.
Fry takes a lot longer to recover.
"We should go back inside," Leela says when he's stopped reciting the names of long-dead presidents and can look her in the eye again. "They're waiting for us."
"Right. Right. Wait!" Fry catches her wrist as she turns to leave. "Leela." He stares at her, as if he doesn't know what he even wants to ask. "Why?" he says at last.
It's one word, but it contains everything. Why now? Why here? Why me?
Leela swallows.
Because you don't belong to Nixon, she thinks. Because whatever the Gamemakers made us do, they didn't make us do that.
It matters. It matters to have something Nixon can't touch, something the Gamemakers can't control.
"Because," she admits. "I hate it too. Pretending. Lying. I wanted something . . . real. And I wanted - I wanted it with you."
It doesn't feel like enough, but it's the only answer Leela can give - the only form she can put to the storm inside her head.
And it must be enough for Fry, because he nods, slowly, and takes her hand.
"Okay," he says. Just "okay", without pushing her to further unravel that spool of thought.
"Okay," Leela echoes, and for the first time in months - just for a moment - she almost feels it.
