She really deserves an apartment upgrade, Brady thought. I ought to do something about that.

Z-Boy also brought her the rest of the Zappits he’d pilfered from the library, and Freddi amped the Fishin’ Hole demos in all of them . . . for a price, of course. And although the price was high, Brady paid it without a qualm. It was the doc’s money, after all, the dough of Babineau. As to what he might do with the juiced-up consoles, Brady had no idea. Eventually he might want another drone or two, he supposed, but he saw no reason to trade up right away. He began to understand what contentment actually was: the emotional version of the horse latitudes, where all the winds died away and one simply drifted.

It ensued when one ran out of goals to grow.

• • •

This state of affairs continued until February 13th of 2015, when Brady’s attention was caught by an item on News at Noon. The anchors, who had been laughing it up over the antics of a couple of baby pandas, put on their Oh Shit This Is So Awful faces when the chyron behind them changed from the pandas to a broken-heart logo.

“It’s going to be a sad Valentine’s Day in the suburb of Sewickley,” said the female half of the duo.

“That’s right, Betty,” said the male half. “Two survivors of the City Center Massacre, twenty-six-year-old Krista Countryman and twenty-four-year-old Keith Frias, have committed suicide in the Countryman woman’s home.”

It was Betty’s turn. “Ken, the shocked parents say the couple was hoping to be married in May of this year, but both were badly injured in the attack perpetrated by Brady Hartsfield, and the continuing physical and mental pain was apparently too much for them. Here’s Frank Denton, with more.”

Brady was on high alert now, sitting as close to bolt upright in his chair as he could manage, eyes shining. Could he legitimately claim those two? He believed he could, which meant his City Center score had just gone up from eight to ten. Still shy of a dozen, but hey! Not bad.

Correspondent Frank Denton, also wearing his best Oh Shit expression, went blah-de-blah for awhile, and then the picture switched to the Countryman chick’s pore ole daddy, who read the suicide note the couple had left. He blubbered through most of it, but Brady caught the gist. They’d had a beautiful vision of the afterlife, where their wounds would be healed, the burden of their pain would be lifted, and they could be married in perfect health by their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

“Boy, that’s sad,” the male anchor opined at the end of the story. “So sad.”