Tubby Shu had been at the home for almost two years when they began phasing in the Bio-E subsidy program. She attended the mandatory information session, but none of the nurses on duty that day spoke Mandarin, so Tubby spent the time looking through the new mathematics and physics textbooks she had ordered online, good translations of Dover softcover classics.

Despite her lack of mandatory information, the home scheduled Tubby for an introductory session on the Bio-E machine. Nurse Tingting was waiting in her room, chewing caffeine gum and reading some novel with a cover photo that looked like computer-generated art from 1980. "You're late, Teacher Shu," she said in questionable Mandarin. Tingting was a heavy girl, and not often friendly; but she always had her nose in a book, so Tubby liked her well enough. Her real name was Tiffany, but Tubby felt like a child trying to pronounce it, so she called her Tingting. "I have to leave at 4:00. Linda's going to take over when I go."

"The train from Puda was late," said Tubby. "Electrical problems."

"Funny, Teacher Shu. Take your blouse and skirt off and lie down."

"I don't want to lie down."

Tingting shrugged. "You have to stay still for four hours. Do what you want."

"I'll sit." Tingting stood, and Tubby took her place in the armchair. "Why do I have to take my clothes off?"

"For the electrodes. You have to take your hair down too. Didn't you go to the mandatory information session?"

"It went over my head." Tubby's blouse was unbuttoned; she sat down with her skirt hiked up, then took the bobby pins from her hair. "There. You can get to my chest and legs."

Tingting brandished a tube. "The gel's going to get on your clothes."

Tubby grunted her indifference. Tingting took a piece of cloth and began to rub the skin on Tubby's outer thigh. It felt like fine sandpaper. "That's rough."

"It helps the impedance."

"How much longer would I have to sit if you didn't scrape my skin off?"

"That wasn't part of the mandatory information." Tingting put the gel on the scraped site, then rolled out a green box on a wheeled stainless steel tripod from beside the bed. It had a few big Roman letters on it in a slightly darker green, one of them fading into the stylized outline of a leaf. Tingting pulled on one of several foil tabs dangling from the bottom edge of the machine; a length of green wire followed it. She put the foil lead on the gelled spot, then stuck it to Tubby's leg with athletic tape. The gel felt warm.

"What does the machine say?" asked Tubby.

"'JustBE,'" Tingting said in English. "Like 'simply exist.'"

"Fuck me," said Tubby.

She turned the TV to Chinese news while Tingting worked. At last Tingting stepped back to view the results. "You look good, Teacher Shu." She waggled her phone. "Want a picture?"

"No."

"Suit yourself." Tingting turned the machine on. Tubby didn't feel anything at the electrodes, just the warmth of the gel. "Am I supposed to feel it?"

"I don't think so," Tingting said. "Let me know if you do."

Tubby flipped through the Chinese channels, which were all reporting on the Europa rover, whose samples had just splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico. The gist was the same everywhere. Life on one of Jupiter's moons. High hopes for transformative discoveries in cell biology and biochemistry. A triumph for all the sciences, and all mankind.

+++

Hello, readers. Matt here. I'm not going to do this at the end of every part, but I will do it here and at the end.

I have a blog and a mailing list. If you're enjoying "Tubby's Letter," you might be interested in checking out either one; joining the mailing list will score you a copy of my novel, THE DANDELION KNIGHT, for free (you'd pay $4.99 at Amazon, B&N, Google, or Kobo). The URLs should make it clear which is which:

www.cobblerandbard.com/blog

www.cobblerandbard.com/mailing-list/

Thanks for reading. No more interruptions!