Screen Read Online Free Page B

few
remaining office buildings and shops. People were returning to work
heavy-lidded after short and unfulfilling lunch breaks. Some services still had
to be conducted outside the big screen, for now. Health care was one that had
not made a full transition to the virtual world, as people could not find a
substitute there for surgery, dialysis, or anything else that required a hookup
in the hospital. Acupuncture had made an easy transition into the virtual world
and was currently thriving there. For the rise of the buzz in the population,
the Centers for Disease Control had announced that increased time spent in the
big screen would eventually normalize the symptoms and that everyone’s
adjustment period was different.
    Out of
nowhere, a homeless man across the street yelled out to Misha ,
“Naughty girl! Naughty girl!” Misha avoided eye
contact and started walking faster, yet the bum began to walk in her direction
and kept calling her “naughty” in an uninterrupted string of words until it
sounded like “ teenaught ” instead. He stopped in the
middle of the street, shaking his head and giving her the ‘shame-shame’ hand
gesture, running one index finger along the other like scraping ice off a
windshield. “Naughty, naughty girl. Wandering the old streets of San Francisco.
Naughty like Saran Wrap. Remember Saran Wrap? It never does what you want it
to. Sarannnnn …”
    Misha remembered Saran Wrap, and it was true it never did what you wanted it
to. Only soccer moms and chefs knew how to expertly use it. For a moment, Misha’s buzz somehow felt calmed by the homeless man’s
insights. She turned back once to look at him and he stood there in the middle
of the street expressionless and seeming to discover he did not know where he
was. The way he looked described how Misha felt today
and she remembered that she still had to meet up with Tsai.
    As Misha reached the intersection of the Embarcadero and
Chestnut Street, she could see that only a handful of people were seated inside
Minnie’s. One of them would turn out to be Tsai. Tsai had been a one-of-a-kind
friend in her life, one that had redefined in Misha’s mind what a friend could be. Fifteen years ago, they had worked together in a
tense and pompous office setting doing research for the most prestigious and
trusted medical community in the nation, Ballard’s Holistic Medical Group. It
had been the nation’s premier medical establishment that combined conventional
and alternative health care into one approach, without the two groups wringing
each other’s necks.
    Somehow
even with a bunch of diverse and eclectic doctors working together, the white
coat stench of orthodox medical training still hung in the air and made
patients’ blood pressures consistently rise in the office. The positions that Misha and Tsai were hired for had been their first jobs out
of college and they'd been very enthusiastic and bright-eyed about the
place—for about three months. After that, the two friends became frustrated by
the lack of challenge at work, the low pay, the workplace drama, and the
pushiness of medical professionals. The worse things got at work, the closer
the two friends became and the more they tried to find humor in what happened
around them. With creatively doctored paperwork, they convinced the research
department to pay for their “work-related” education at the Ballard University,
including courses on how to make ice cream, draw self-portraits, and do the
quick step. They drew caricatures of the doctors they worked for and hung them
up behind the office door. They set up elaborate baskets to shoot crumpled
paper balls into.  
    Misha and Tsai only saw each other at work, but they knew everything about
each other’s lives. When Misha learned she had to get
a root canal treatment, Tsai was the first person she told and Tsai offered to
accompany her to the painful appointment for moral support. The two came to
take it for granted, but they actually