#connectionlost

He shut his laptop with a sigh, turning to look for the remote control. He hadn’t turned the light on this evening, and the darkness hindered his search. Rubbing his bleary eyes, he stood up from the couch and stretched, padding his way over to the light switch that was, of course, on the other side of the room.

The sun had only just begun to go down, so there was enough of a gloaming to keep him from banging his shins into the coffee table as he had last week. Small victories, he guessed. The light hurt his eyes as he snapped it on, and he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror that hung over the sink in the kitchen. Not pretty. He had forgotten to shave, again, and he couldn’t remember the last time he had bathed. Ugh.

Of course, it didn’t matter. His avatar looked professional enough, and it’s not like there was anyone around to smell him. Even the cat had long ago run off, escaping the confines of the small and dark apartment. Technically, like him, the cat was mandated to stay indoors, but since when had cats ever been adept at rule-following?

Grabbing a beer from the fridge on his way back to the couch, he decided against showering that day. Maybe he could log on to his Nintendo Switch and play around for a few hours. He looked at his watch. He didn’t have to log into work for a while yet.

Just as he sat down, a buzzer sounded at the door. Food, probably. Was it Monday already? His weekly grocery delivery always consisted of the same things and always appeared at his door on Monday mornings. He knew it was delivered via drone, and sometimes he tossed around the idea of watching for its arrival just for something different to do, but every Monday without fail, he forgot. The days all ran together. If he didn’t have an alarm to remind him to log into work, he would probably lose his job.

He padded over to the door and looked through the peep hole. He wasn’t sure why he bothered to do this; nobody was ever in the hallway. They, like him, lived their lives indoors waiting for drones to deliver the basic necessities. He had seen YouTube videos and HGTV shows that told him that some of them decorated their boxes more than he bothered to. Entire YouTube channels were devoted to DIY home makeovers. The online mall had entire stores—tabs on a webpage—devoted to such things, and every so often he tossed around the idea of logging on and making purchases to upgrade his little hole in the wall, but the motivation quickly left him. After all, he wasn’t a YouTuber and his boss didn’t require live Zoom meetings, so what was the point? Not even the cat was around to appreciate his handiwork.

He cracked open the door while holding his breath, bent over, and grabbed the bags of groceries, yanking them into his apartment. Taking out the Lysol wipes from his last order, he wiped down the bags and disposed of them, then wiped down the cartons inside the bags and shoved them into cabinets. Sometimes, he tossed around the idea of ordering something different, but he inevitably ordered the same things. After all, what was the point? He knew what he liked, and he had limited funds for experimenting on something he might not like, but would be stuck with for the week.

This task accomplished, he went back to the television. Nintendo no longer held any appeal for him. Maybe he would get on Snapchat. Nah. He couldn’t think of anyone he was following who might interest him at the moment. He got up to use the bathroom. He thought he needed to pee.

On his way back to the sofa, his phone rang. He jumped at the sound. He wasn’t used to this kind of thing. He fumbled with the device for a minute before accepting the call. “Hello. This is Max from Cardholder Services,” the monotone recording intoned. “You have been presell—,” he pressed the end call button and flopped back onto the couch.

He pulled his computer over to him and logged in. The home page popped up with the news again. Today’s numbers and statistics flashed in a banner across the top of the screen. Four different news articles that had been considered most likely to generate traffic and clicks popped up right beneath them “CELEBRITIES DO THEIR OWN HAIR” was accompanied by a picture that he was certain was photoshopped. The other three chosen stories told contradictory information about the latest speculations and data. There was, of course, nothing new or concrete. There hadn’t been for years.

He didn’t even bother clicking on anything before navigating to Facebook. He only really looked for the memes. Some of the people he’d known in school—back when school was done in person—posted the most hilarious memes. Sometimes, he amused himself by scrolling as far back in their timelines as he could to see the tone of the memes change. From actually funny to sarcastic and biting, the earliest memes were filled with optimism that things might one day go back to normal. Four years in and not much change, the memes had shifted from optimistic humor to nihilistic humor. Well, there had always been a mix, but the balance shifted. After the New Sedition Act 2043 was passed, the memes no longer spoke of politicians, scientists, leadership, the media, or how any of them were handling the crisis. The most recent memes didn’t talk about modern events at all. That wasn’t allowed. Posting memes on current events was punishable by a fine of up to $1200 and removal of your online account.

He supposed imprisonment wasn’t enough of a deterrent anymore.

Sometimes, he wondered why the New Sedition Act wasn’t retroactive. The memes from early in the crisis portrayed the leadership of the time in the worst possible light. He supposed current leadership didn’t care much about viral videos from a couple of decades ago making fun of how terribly their predecessors had done. Also, when the thought about hit, he remembered something about an amendment and a right to freedom of speech. He had learned that, too, in in-person school, back before everything went through internet censorship.

 A banner flashed across the top of his screen. Was it an election year again? He tossed around the idea of logging in to the voting portal, but it was September or something, right? November was far away. He’d do that later, maybe. He didn’t much see the point. His little hole in the wall wasn’t really altered much by the whims and ways of the elite.

The alarm on his smartwatch sounded. He had ten minutes before he had to log in to work. Where had the time gone? He mustn’t let society down, as the commercials on the TV told him. They needed his productivity, his work ethic, his fortitude to help them get through this current crisis and return society to its former glory. He snorted. He didn’t much see the point. Summer pool parties and movie theaters were a thing of the past as surely as covered wagons and throwing tea into harbors. He only logged in to work because the Internet was only provided free by the government to those with essential online jobs. He wasn’t really sure why his job was considered essential. He just punched words and numbers into various documents, sometimes a spreadsheet, sometimes a blank page, and sometimes, when he was really lucky, he got to go to the Zoom meetings where avatars could talk at each other about data.

Which is what he had to do now. He selected his avatar from the list of options. His avatar was what he would have looked like if he had any reason—or ability—to go outside. His avatar’s hair was short and carefully combed. His avatar’s face was clean-shaven. His avatar wore a button up white shirt with a tie, black slacks with a crease in the leg, and polished patent leather shoes. He gave his avatar glasses even though he didn’t really need glasses because he thought the glasses made him look more professional. Actually, he rubbed his bleary eyes, he wasn’t sure he didn’t need glasses. Perhaps he should schedule a telehealth appointment with an optometrist.

He walked his avatar over to the meeting table, a completely useless series of pixels that his bosses, who were from the generation when meetings actually took place in person, thought would help boost productivity and lend a professional air to the meeting. Damn! He had forgotten his headphones with the microphone. Where had he put them, again? A quick glance around the room told him they were probably in his bedroom, the only other room in the apartment where such a thing could be. He tossed around the idea of getting up to look for them, but he didn’t see the point. It was highly unlikely they’d actually need him to say anything, and if he really needed to communicate, there was always the chatbox.

“Can everybody hear me?” the gravelly voice of his boss came through the speakers loud and clear. At least he could hear what was going on in the meeting. Last week’s Zoom had had to be rescheduled because of audio difficulties. Perhaps this was why his bosses voice sounded so hoarse. Two weeks without speaking makes a voice weary from lack of use.

He thought it funny that something could break because of lack of use as much as from overuse. Then he thought about how long it had been since he had used his own voice. He tossed around the idea of making an actual phone call, but he wasn’t sure who he would actually want to call. He tossed around the idea of turning on a song and singing along, but didn’t see the point.

The meeting ended quickly, though someone always tried to prolong it by asking useless questions. Today, he could tell, many of his coworkers were not engaged. Their avatars sat silently at the table. He imagined what they might be doing in real life. Maybe Susan, whose avatar had red hair even though he thought he remembered her as a brunette from the company webpage, which had actual pictures of staff taken by a professional online digital photographer, was helping her son login to online schooling. He thought she had a son. Might’ve been a daughter, and actually, she might have graduated by now. Maybe Susan was just in the bathroom.

Still, his avatar was as silent and still as hers was, and he was here. Maybe Susan was staring at the screen with the same bored expression on her face as he was sure he was wearing. He smirked for half a second at the thought. It was nice to think of having something in common with someone else, but then he remembered he was only imagining that connection.

He logged off of the Zoom meeting and knew he was supposed to click over to the app that would allow him to enter secure and confidential corporate data via a VPN. Hackers had been stepping up their game since everything had moved to online, and corporate espionage was a booming industry. He tossed around the idea of taking a break for lunch, but what was the difference between eating now or later? He might as well get this over with.

But when he tried to log in to the app, the stupid thing gave him an error message. This wasn’t a huge surprise. Often the VPN was clogged with traffic right after the Monday morning meeting. He sighed. He guessed this meant he should eat lunch first and then try to get his work done. He opened his freezer and found a Hot Pocket to toss into the microwave. He tossed around the idea of making something more substantial, but he wasn’t that hungry and he didn’t see the point. His apartment was too small for a treadmill and he hated online workout videos, so it’s not like his body was going to use the energy much anyway. He was getting tubby again. His physician would yell at him during his annual telephysical if he didn’t get this under control before then. The problem was, he wasn’t sure when that appointment was for. Had he already had it this year? He couldn’t remember.

It didn’t take long to eat the Hot Pocket. He supposed he shouldn’t have washed it down with a Coke, but he hadn’t ordered any diet soda from the supermarket page. He couldn’t remember if he liked diet soda. He tossed around the idea of ordering one next week just to see, but he didn’t want to log on to the supermarket website right now. It just seemed like too much effort for no point.

He sat back down in front of his laptop and clicked the app again, hoping that this time the traffic would have abated enough that he could get in. It hadn’t. The stupid app wouldn’t even open now! He clicked on another app to get him to his email so he could send yet another message to tech support complaining about how slow the app was and how often the VPN clogged, but the email app wouldn’t open either!

Frustrated, he clicked on another random app on his screen. This also didn’t work. In fact, the only app that would work was the one that showed the date, time, and percentage of battery power left on his device. He was floored. This had never happened before! What was wrong with his computer!

He grabbed his phone to log into his email from that device, but that wasn’t working either. 

Frantically, he clicked the apps on his phone, and he found that the simple calculator app was the only one that worked. He leapt off the couch, moving rather more quickly than he had in years, and marched to his bedroom to find his tablet, which he had fallen asleep playing the night before. It took him a while to find it buried in the blankets on his bed, and when he did, he found it had the same issues as his phone.

Whirling back into the living room, he grabbed the remote had previously forgotten to find and clicked on the TV, which promptly portrayed a “no signal” box that bounced around the screen from corner to corner. His unused voice let out a little squeak. What was going on?

He sat down in front of the laptop again, only this time, he looked in the lower right-hand corner to the place where the network icon was. He blinked three times before he understood the words that appeared when he hovered his mouse over that icon.

Connection lost.