”“Oh, info chinfo. Now what?”“I couldn’t understand why herpes wasn’t in the STD stats I gave you last week. So I checked closer. Those st...ts were only from federally funded control programs. CDC documents show 20 million current cases of HPV—human papillemavirus and 45 million curent cases of herpes.”“Mom, that’s a lot of dick juice!”“Yeah! Especially with young adults. From ages 15-24, more than 9 million get an STd every year. That works out to one STD per person over that ten year. The porch was no prob.I could reach it easily, but the other one was connectedto an eight foot ceiling and the globe hooked to thefixture with three screws. I sighed as I wished forMikel back from Canada. With his monkey arms, changingbulbs was a piece of cake.I reached into my right coat pocket for the key andbanged the screen door shut behind me. My fingers gropedaround for the hole and I shoved the key in. The dooropened and I stepped inside. I sniffed for gas as thefurnace tends to blow. I was probably asleep on my desk right now."You may not have been but we don't have any FDA guidelines to conform to andwe have a very wealthy sponsor who wants the first model off the line. Ifyou'll pardon the pun" she waved at the body on the table and laughed."Now, say goodnight George, when you wake up you'll be Sophie." I watched asshe turned a dial on an IV with one of her slender hands and the world beganto go dark for the second time that day.The rest of my memories are just snapshots,. ) Aftershock. As usual, it fairly much kept itself in check till I got home. I paced back and forth in our living room. It was worse than it usually is, much worse. It smouldered and pounded and hurt in my stomach. I couldn’t keep my hands still. They constantly fisted and opened and I remembered. I began to remember. Things he had said. Things I had said. ‘I don’t have a particularly good memory,’ I had said. ‘No,’ he had said with a grimace and thereby mockingly agreed. When I’m having a down.