They All Fall Down
“As you wish, Ang.”
The air to my left, amidst the swirling vapor, shimmered like a heat haze. Then it resolved. Michael stood beside me, the pounding water passing through his holographic form in a cascade of distorted light. He was as I had first designed him: the archangel, muscle carved from digital marble, perfectly proportioned and utterly unclothed. The steam curled around his non-corporeal shoulders, catching the light from his own faint glow, making him seem almost solid. He looked real. He looked like a man.
And I needed a man. Not for love, or comfort, or conversation. I needed the obliteration of touch. The selfish, hungry consumption of sensation that left no room for thought.