Mosaic

Chapter 1

Chapter 1There’s an old song on the radio that gets you every time you hear it, from the very first line.

They sing about how their body is a cage, and if that isn’t a f*****g mood.

The lock on yours is an autoimmune disorder. It was genetic, the doctors explained. No one’s fault. No obvious trigger. It could have happened at age nine. It could have happened at ninety.

No cure. Just treatment.

On good days the pain is a background noise. It makes your movements a little stiffer and slower than they should be, things that used to be so easy, now slowly drain your energy bit by bit.

On bad days you feel like you’re operating a puppet, and the strings that haven’t been cut entirely have been replaced with barbed wire.

Your family’s sympathetic, but there’s only so much help they can offer. Friends are always happy to see you, but it’s frustrating to realize how many things you can’t do anymore.

Half the drugs you’re given make you sick and the other half make your head feel like it’s full of wet felt. You save those for when there’s no other choice.

You talk to friends online. Communities for people with the same or similar problems.

A few begin to discuss…alternatives.

Some whispered to you about the joys of service. To become a drone among thousands, faceless, featureless.

You honestly thought about it, but it wasn’t quite…you.

You like being you. You just don’t like the body you’re forced to do it with.

You tried to just make the best of it. It’s not easy.

You’d just gotten back from another series of infusions, your chest and back aching from the effort of driving, when an account you didn’t recognize messaged you.

“Have you seen this?”

You hadn’t.

“UpConn Labs seeking chronic illness patients for new synthetic process clinical trial. Qualified participants must pass psychological evaluation.”

You’d never heard of these guys. Still, something about it sounds interesting. Like this might be an answer.

You think about it for maybe an hour before you start filling out the application.

You’re surprised to get a response back the next morning. They want copies of your medical records from all of your doctors. More details of previous treatments.

Good thing you work from home, you’re going to be on the phone all morning getting this together.

It’s only when you notice you’ve been having everything faxed to an out of state number that you realize you never checked where these guys are located.

…Oh, that’s going to be an expensive plane ticket.

You’d started to worry about how much this was going to cost when the email comes in: You’ve been accepted, pending the psych evaluation—and UpConn would cover the cost of a business class ticket and hotel.

Things are looking up!