Vera & Luvius : Part 3 : Luvius (Marta & Gallanol Ch. 6)

Vera and Luvius : (Chapter 6) : Part 3 : Luvius

Luvius had watched many films on Vidnet over the years like most people. Invariably the lead characters male and female would experience adventures together, learning the value of each other. When the danger was defeated and the adventure completed they would declare their love for each other and the fitting conclusion of togetherness would be reached. If it could only be so easy to find a woman in real life. But then he would remind himself, there were no adventures or stories worth telling in real life, just the dull repetition of endless learning and rigorous work, followed, for too short a time, by the enjoyment and appreciation of other people’s lives, real or imaginary, over the Vidnet.

His dissatisfaction had not been for the want of trying. In his thirties he had tried very hard to make something more of his life than his work, to find a woman, even if only for a brief entanglement. Vera was not the first woman he had approached, but as none of the others had taken him far down the road to love he had the feeling that she might just be his best chance of love in a life which he already believed was passing him by at an alarming rate. Whatever he was to do he must not let this opportunity pass him by like so many others. The way she had hung on his every word and agreed with all his opinions and all his suggestions and the way she had looked at him. He could hardly imagine it but she had looked upon him with respect. Behind that polite exterior he imagined that she looked upon him with the admiration that she might give to a higher being such as if a famous actor from the Vidnet films or a Director of MIOST, or the Prime Minister himself had come down to bless her. She was a shy creature it was true. He supposed she might probably have given the same polite adulation to any man who paid her any attention, or even a woman who was a stranger, he guessed.

She was not, of course, the first shy woman he had met. Most of his attempted relationships had been with shy women. Most women he had ever known were shy, even the ones who pretended like the actresses in the Vidnet films. With shy women he had found communication was often a problem. They were not well socialised. They soon ran out of things to say, they could not express themselves, did not know what men wanted or how to talk to them. Their romantic notions were based on programmes and films they had seen on the Vidnet, and rarely on real life “experience”. Those who had had real life experience were generally confused by those experiences. Sometimes their experiences had been in conformity with some of their hopes. He had found he was unlikely to live up to their hopes. He had received precious little in return for his efforts, but those experiences had made him stronger, more understanding, better able to accept the disappointments of life.

Vera was different though. Shy she may be, but there was genuine respect and thanks in her eyes. She was very lonely, he could tell, and to her he was an answer to her hopes. Perhaps her expectations were very low, but she seemed to care for him in a way that could result in a real relationship.

Luvius wanted a woman badly. He was forty now and felt he had wasted most of his life. At five he had been tested as an above average. At ten he had passed his elementaries with flying colours. At fifteen and sixteen he had passed his school stages on time. At eighteen and twenty he had passed his General Higher Educationals and his Engineering Basics. Like most, he had then gone on to specialise in higher Engineering and Electrical Engineering topics which he had struggled with, like most, having to retake a number of times on various levels. Now at forty he was nearly at the highest grades of these, although there had also had to be other courses on various other subjects over the years.

Many had not got as far as he had. Many went on until they got stuck on the treadmill of retakes, going round and round in circles, failing over small and petty points, which the examiners appeared to find essential, or over subject areas which were not normally examined, or of much practical use, but which were kept in the syllabus “to keep the students on their toes”. Many reached the end of their natural ability to understand or to retain large amounts of dull detailed information in their heads. Others failed on speed, unable to maintain the pace of performance that their fellows did. Most of those who did not stay the course chose to stop at a level which would provide them with a steady job, a place in society, and sufficient credits rolling in to maintain the lifestyle which they had chosen to lead. But their failure, as many of them could not fail to view it, left them with a bitter aftermath of frustration, resentment and sometimes self loathing.

He had stopped and started again a few times in recent years. After each level of achievement over the last few years he had decided enough was enough. There would be no more study for him, he would devote more of his free time to other pleasures. At the centre of this strategy had been the desire to find a woman. In his thirties he had been acutely conscious of the opposite sex because of the awareness that in a few short years he might no longer be attractive to them and he would have access only to ones of his age group, fast becoming less attractive to him.

He had looked more actively for a woman at times and in ways that he would not have had the confidence for when younger. He had come to the view that his twenties had been wasted on work and study. Too much of his energy had been channelled into achieving those exam results and dealing with the day to day tasks expected of him. He had wanted a woman then but brief efforts had been badly handled and perhaps he had aimed for women who were not right for him in one way or another. He had come eventually to realise that some of those women who might have seemed not to want his attention might have been more interested if he had persisted and gained their confidence. In those days he was easily put off. A woman who replied to his queries but returned quickly to her work might have been merely a hardworking soul, stressed by her managers or by her own drive to succeed. He might have been far from her thoughts at that moment in time, she may have been unprepared for a conversational advance of any sort. A woman who seemed speechless after the initial polite exchange might be one who was unused to conversation, or to strangers, or to men. There were many such of all these types of women at work in the world today. He was quite sure now that he had met a number of them that the ones he had met, and there were many like that, were just the tip of the iceberg. How many millions more of them must there be hiding away in their little rooms at night, feverishly revising their next assignments, and practising the skills they had been taught to practice by teachers, lecturers, managers, foremen, advisors and therapists.

Luvius had often considered these millions of women, segregated from men, most of them, by the pressure of workload and time, and the desire to succeed. He often wondered what their thoughts and feelings were. Did they feel lonely as he did, or were they satisfied by their work or studies? Did the lives they led provide them with all the contentment they required. Many of the women he had known in work or study situations, and even in social settings, had seemed very much to acquiesce, even to believe in the duties they were set. Women, he had always believed, were practical creatures, not fantasists like many men he had known. Women sought to improve themselves, and if they had them, their families and husbands, with dedication. But rarely had he ever heard many of them to suggest that their lives should be organised in more sociable and kindly ways. Women complained about men sometimes, the lack of desirable ones, and they complained when duties, private or workplace ones, were not performed, or were performed incorrectly; but rarely did they ever complain that there was something wrong with the system they had been trained to take part in.

It gave him great pleasure to have made contact with this Vera. She was naturally attractive. Even if her submissive and hardworking attitude made her appear tired, withdrawn and introverted, she still had the fresh beauty of youth. He would have been pleased to talk to any woman in this way but this one’s modest, wholesome beauty was a bonus. The years had taught him to make the most of every opportunity that came his way.

They began to meet regularly for breakfast, lunch and tea, preferring to spend these times together than to waste these opportunities for social discourse. Vera had not been in the practice of spending her teas or breakfasts there in the past, except on those occasions when shifts went on late or started during the night.

On a space station there was no daylight as she had known it on the planet below. Daylight was replaced by the ever-present light of the sun, which seemed more dominant here, in that it could be seen from the station all the time, although its position altered by the hour as the station altered, spinning in its orbit, around her home planet. The station did follow a familiar routine of day and night times. The night time was a time as at home, of quiet and personal rest, but there were many operatives on the station who worked in shifts through the night to cover the station’s requirements. Engineers were a large part of the station’s population, keeping it functional, maintained and repaired. It was important to keep everything in perfect condition in order to keep them all alive in this unnatural world away from “ordinary” planet surface sunlight, and winds and vegetation, not that she had known much vegetation where she had lived, worked and studied in Marta City.

He felt more confident now. The signals she was giving him seemed reliable and authentic. Not only was she a shy woman unused to talking, but she responded to every suggestion he had made. She agreed to spend lunches and teas with him and even approached him now when he arrived at the table first. Even then he had wondered whether it was her need for social companionship or a deeper interest in the man. He doubted she would have chosen him if she had the choice of other men, but he knew her social outlets were few and her personal self confidence levels not high, so perhaps she was interested in him. He didn’t really care how interested she was in him. With his paltry experience of success with women he was not expecting devotion, only friendship, respect and hopefully intimacy if all continued well. If she paid him that sort of interest beyond the mere social, then he would be flattered and pleased whatever her motives or her doubts.

On one evening after the work shifts were done Luvius suggested that they return to his room and eat there while watching the Vidnet together. Although she had watched Vidnet with Luvius before in his own room, they had not gone there directly after the work was done. Always they had met in the Breakfast Room after shift and eaten there. Vera had the feeling therefore that something new between them was occurring. A new stage in their friendship was being opened, which she looked forward to.

She knew now that Luvius thought of her as more than just a friend. He had been hinting on all of their previous few meetings that she was more to him than a friend. He lost no opportunity to describe her as “an attractive woman”, and a “lady”, and to compliment her on the cut of her hair and even the clothing she wore, although that was usually only the uniform of a MIOST Space Engineer. He said she suited her clothing, and that she made more of it than other women.

This flattery had its effect on Vera. Instead of thinking about the next day’s work or study for her ever looming examinations, she thought instead of her appearance. She would check herself more frequently than before in the mirror and spent her lonely moments, and some of her work ones, imagining what it would feel like for a man to touch and hold her, and to kiss her tenderly in the way that the Vidnet stars did in the romantic films which she had in recent years tried to ignore in favour of study. She had to admit to herself that she had always enjoyed such films. In that she followed her mother, who would sit for hours on occasion watching such escapism, believing its myths and imagining its reality. She now saw that those films had a purpose, preparing her for her gradually intensifying encounter with a man. Without such films, what would she know of men, beyond their work?

Luvius’ request excited her beyond rationality. She had been to his room on a few occasions and although excited by his presence she had not feared that he would touch her in any way. She had actually wanted him to, but knowing him for a gentleman, to use the old-fashioned term, she had remained calm because she had trusted him not to act until the time was appropriate. Tonight she felt that an appropriate time had been reached and his suggestion that they avoid the Breakfast Room tonight seemed to her like a meaningful signal, whether it was one or not.

These thoughts renewed her nervousness. She wanted Luvius to touch her now, but she did not know how that would feel. She had to find out what the touch of a man would be like, and she was aware that if they did not achieve a higher level of closeness soon, she may lose the opportunity forever. But what if he did not touch her tonight? She was partly nervous at the promise that he would touch her for the first time, and partly nervous that he may not understand her desire for him, or that she might have misunderstood his intentions.

She felt her life had turned. When once her work had meant everything to her now she felt bored by it. She wanted to think only of other things, of Luvius in particular. She could no longer concentrate. Whenever she looked at the wires inside an electrical box, or looked at the workings of another mechanical door or robot she felt sick with boredom. Another one to fix, or worse; another one to check. Checking gadgets which she knew well were most likely perfectly correct was dullness in the extreme, but there was no way of avoiding work to relax and think the thoughts which bubbled up in her head. She had checked or fixed so many of the damn things and she had to admit it had lost its wonder for her. While her function was a very necessary one, particularly being on a space station, and a complex one, requiring many years of training, she now saw clearer than before that it was a very dull one.

If she could have worked short shifts and was able to relax into the arms of Luvius the rest of the time she would have been happy and her chosen profession would not have seemed so onerous now. Having tasted real leisure, exciting and completely relaxing for the first time in life she could no longer find long hours of work stimulating. Her life was opening up. The first cracks in her old life had appeared and the sun was shining through, but she could not climb out to spend whole days or even whole evenings with her new lover. She had glimpsed freedom but her awareness of the prison she was in had become stronger too. No longer could she view her life in the way that she had before, stoically going on with the study and the work experience and the never ending levels of examinations while suppressing the other side of life, which she now knew lay in potential waiting for all people. Never again would she be able to close the shutters of her room on her limited view of the city or to put out of her mind the fact that there were many millions of people out there of whom she knew almost nothing. Even the people she had worked with or been taught by had been strangers, except for a very few of them, female friends mainly, particularly Morag, with whom she had had so much in common until she disappeared. Now she knew what had affected Morag but unfortunately her friend had not been able to control her desires and keep her position.

Of males there had only been Diocletian before Luvius. She looked back on her infatuation with him with a new knowledge of people, learned from her relationship with Luvius. Diocletian probably had been interested in her, like Luvius was now, but unlike Luvius he had not been available. Probably he had a wife or a girlfriend. She was sure he must have suspected that she had feelings for him, although it occurred to her that perhaps he had not recognised the messages she had so subtly planted. At any rate his position as teacher would have made it dangerous for him to become too friendly with one of his students. Teachers and lecturers who did that could lose their jobs, or be reposted. Reports would go into employment files. She was surprised that Luvius had been brave enough to breach the unwritten convention of the workplace, which was understood to disapprove of close romantic relationships between work colleagues. Such relationships could bring disharmony to the work group, but in most workplaces these were not real contractual rules, only the unspoken suspicion and disapproval of managers or colleagues who would look to the relationship as a reason for falling standards and lower efficiency.