Retirement Restart - Part Two

 

A sharp scoff comes from beyond the door as my mother quickly paces away to someplace else in the room. "Well of course I mean you, me, and your Aunt" she explains from someplace out of view.

My faces twist into a look of confusion for a moment before an expression of shock creeps across my features. My aunt, who was only a few years younger than my mother, was the wild child of the family. She hadn't really done any productive with her life beyond her four divorces. Mostly she had spent her youth partying, dropping out of college in her first year due to flunking all her subjects, and her adult life leeching off of rich men around her.

It had been relatively easy for her to live that way, having been blessed with good looks and a charming personality to match. However, by now those looks had begun to fade and the years of free and easy living had taken their toll on her charms as well.

"Aunt Stacy?" I mutter, remembering how distant she and my mother had been since I was born. "Why are you..."

"We may not have seen eye to eye..." my mother states, cutting me off. "But she's still my sister, maybe she'll do better on a...second run" she says defensively, unsure as to her own reasoning as well.

"She gets a second shot while you're making me..." I begin to shout, my voice crackling as I cry out through my dry throat.

"She can pay for the procedure, she just made some...poor decisions in the past. You...I gave you all the help I could, and you're still just...just..." she hisses angrily, growing silent as she returns to whatever task she was doing.

As I stand there in shock a set of footsteps begin to approach me, the clicking of heels against the hard floor making a sound that was very distinct to those I had heard before. Suddenly the small window is filled with the silhouette of someone new, the scent of smoke hitting me before she is even fully in view.

Her face is illuminated by a cigarette, the faint glow of the embers at the end barely providing enough light to make out her wrinkled tanned features. Recently cut and styled short honey blonde hair frames her face. What had once been stark sharp cheekbones and a sweet button nose now adorned a face marred and scored with countless wrinkles, heavy bags under her eyes and deeps sets of crow's feet appear to be smothered in makeup in a vain attempt to hide the flaws. Begin taller than the small window in the pod she is forced to lean down the bit, revealing her abundant chest as it sags low thanks in part to age and in part to the years of indulging in her numerous vices.

"Well hey there buddy" she croaks, smoke slipping from her thinned lips as she speaks in a harsh cracking voice. "How's my favorite little guy doing?" she chuckles, referring to me as she had done when I was far younger.

"Stacy!" I squeak, leaning close to the window as I try to get a better view of her. "Please, get me out of here. Mom...She's gone mad"

"No can do kiddo" she states, taking a drag from her cigarette before throwing it down and crushing what remained beneath her heel. "Do you really think I'm giving up a chance to start over? Sorry, I love you but I'm sure I'll love you more when you become my new mom as well" she explains with a laugh, blowing the smoke into the glass before walking over to where my mom stands beyond my field of view.

"So..." Stacy croaks, the impatience apparent in her tone. "When do we get started?"

"Just give me a minute" my mom replies in a sharp albeit distracted tone "I have to find all the traits we bought and sold. I don't want anything out of place once this is done"

"Well can you hurry up" Stacy groans, having never been one to take things slow or put in work. "I'm sick of feeling this...Urrrrgh" she continues, the ruffling of her blouse growing loud as she readjusts her clothes around her aged form.

"Can you just... I'm beginning to have second thoughts about including you in all this" my mother hisses, remembering just how irritating her sister could be.

"Alright...Alright, just...do what you gotta do"

As the room falls silent I begin to weakly pound on the door to the pod, my drained limbs struggling to do much more than drum at the metal. After a short while of my feeble attempts to get the door open I hear a sigh come from Stacy, a sudden flash of warm light coming from beside the window as I'm once again hit with the scent of smoke.

"Can we quieten him done sis?" Stacy asks followed by a band on the side of the pod as she hits it in an attempt to shut me up. "I'm really hungover and..." she trails off with a sigh, obviously struggling to think through all the noise.

"I...let's see...how about..." my mom mutters, the hurried clicking of a keyboard quickly filling the room. "Here we are...this should help start us off" she chirps with a short giggle.

As she finished her sentence a low rumbling noise begins to start in the booth, slowly traveling up from beneath my feet to climb up further and further around me.

"I'd take a seat sweetie" my mother chimes sweetly, reveling in the moment just a little too much.

I open my mouth to reply but the words seem to just fumble out in a strange mixture of gasping sounds. The room, or more specifically the pod, begins to spin in my vision as I'm forced to stumble back into my seat. My head throbs and a strange numbing sensation begins to spread over my skin, slowly but surely penetrating deeper and deeper at the room begins to fade from view.

"Alright, I guess we can begin on him now" I hear my mom mutter before the world around me snaps into darkness.

What feels like mere seconds later I find myself laying on my back, my arms and legs splayed out and no longer confined to the tiny cramped space of the strange pod. Sunlight streams in from a nearby window, burning at my aching tired eyes as I slowly come to my senses.

For a moment I wonder if it had all been some strange nightmare, a stress dream born from my own anxieties about where my life was heading and my unemployment. However, those hopeful thoughts are vanquished as my eyes flutter open and I find my vision obscured by long...