Read Asimov's Science Fiction: October/November 2013 for Free Online Page B

folds of my suit. Mom had gotten it a size too big—so I'd have growing room, she said. I took some colored pens out of my pack, and by the time we got home, I'd drawn three butterflies, purple and hot pink, on the right sleeve.
    I made sure she noticed them when we went through the front door into the staging vestibule. She pointed her gloved hand at the bioshower and scowled through her faceplate: we would talk—meaning she would yell—later, after we went through decon. Scowling right back at her, I shook out my hair, leaving a pile of petals for her to deal with. I knew she'd dial the ultravac setting on top of the regular chem decon, so I thought: fine, let her take care of the mess.
    I stuffed my gear and pack into the detox chute, threw my clothes—including my favorite tank top—into the incinerator, and stood naked in front of the porthole, mentally daring her to watch as the shower jets stung me. I gripped the handholds and shrieked when the vacs came on. They tore the hair right off my body, and the facial treatment didn't feel much gentler: the depil foam made me a baldy with no eyebrows.
    The next round's chem sprays made my eyes burn, and the drying jets hurt almost as bad as the shower—but by then my skin was red and raw. When the green light flashed, I shimmied into the warm disposable tunic provided by the machine, went through the airlocks into the house, and stomped barefoot upstairs to my room.
    I felt too tired to voicecom Clare—and too embarrassed to say that here I was again, a browless egghead. So I threw myself on the bed and surfed channels in my earplants. After about twenty minutes, the connection reset and Mom's voice blared into my skull: "Maxine. Get down here. This instant!"
    I rolled out of bed, but first went to the mirror and drew in two jagged eyebrows, like cartoon lightning bolts, with my lumino-kohl pen. I didn't look menacing, but I knew she'd hate it.
    I dragged myself downstairs and slunk into the kitchen, but she ushered me to the dining room, where she made me sit at the opposite end of the white acrylic table. I fidgeted, and the tunic's plastic crackled.
    She sat still, her hands folded on the tabletop. In seventh grade, I'd grown three inches taller than her, but she still made me feel small. She always held her shoulders squared and her head high. The neckline of her tunic exposed her collarbones, and she breathed evenly, practicing that relaxation technique she'd once tried to teach me. Whenever she did that, I knew I'd gotten to her.
    She'd chosen not to wear one of her stupid househats or sani-wigs, and her round-rimmed glasses made her look like a plucked owl. So there we were, two baldies facing off.
    "Maxie—"
    "I'm Xam, Mom. Call me Xam."
    "Do you know why we're here, Maxie?"
    "I do not like green eggs and ham."
    "We're here at this table to have a summit. Do you know what that means?"
    "I do not like them, Xam-I-am!"
    "Stop it, Maxie. Just stop it." She waited until the crackles from my tunic quieted. I folded my hands on the tabletop, mirroring her, baldy to baldy.
    "Listen," she went on, "I'm not happy either about having to go through the ultravac—"
    "What's the difference if you're bald? I mean, it's not like you care about going out on dates or anything."
    "Being bald isn't as bad as you think, Maxie. When I was your age, a lot of us, even girls, sometimes shaved our heads just to look cool. That was the fashion."
    "Yeah, like those gross tattoos you had all over your arms? That you had to get a skin replacement for? And all those piercings you had to have refilled, for the sake of being sanitary— and not just on your face?"
    She was already red from the ultravac, but I watched with satisfaction as a deeper flush rose from her neck to her cheeks and then up along the crown of her head. She took several even breaths and continued. "We're here to talk about you, Maxie."
    "So you can ground me. Go ahead."
    "Yes, and you need to understand why.
    Look out