Dreamworld

At a dingy workbench in the back of a double garage in suburban Jefferson City, smack dab in the middle of the flattest, most monotonous Midwestern U.S. state, Elmer Dent had quickly switched from one profile on Mandate.net to the next. It had been a touch-and-go thing. Piningblond had been late this evening—again, for the second time this week. Jacko242 thought perhaps he’d have to cut him off; he wasn’t fitting into the schedule well. He flipped open to Legsopen4u, who was already there, on time, as usual.

“Are you hard?” Elmer tapped out under his jacko242 name. He ran his hand inside his robe and scratched his belly, not even bothering to look at the response from legsopen4u before tapping in the next sequence. “Stroke it.” The response was always the same—as were his instructions. These computer sex junkies never seemed to notice the sameness of it all. Elmer took a swig of his beer and burped.