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eBook Category: Science Fiction Hugo Award Nominee
eBook Description: Mila's once competent husband Gus is disappearing into Alzheimer's before her eyes. An expensive experimental technology may offer hope.

eBook Publisher: Fictionwise.com, Published: The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2002
Fictionwise Release Date: June 2003

512 Reader Ratings:

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Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: eReader (PDB) [43 KB] , ePub (EPUB) [97 KB] , Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [28 KB] , Portable Document Format (PDF) [124 KB] , Palm Doc (PDB) [30 KB] , Microsoft Reader (LIT) [104 KB] , Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [99 KB] , hiebook (KML) [83 KB] , Sony Reader (LRF) [61 KB] , iSilo (PDB) [25 KB] , Mobipocket (PRC) [32 KB] , Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [60 KB] , OEBFF Format (IMP) [46 KB]
Words: 9837
Reading time: 28-39 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Portable Document Format (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

"Ah, the nets of memory. "Presence" by Maureen F. McHugh is a challenging story that reminds of another piece about reversing Alzheimer's I've read in the last year, but heck if I can remember what. This story isn't particularly SFnal, except in a narrow, technical sense of having a meaningful treatment for Alzheimer's as the McGuffin. It is about memory, loss, and the possibilities of and for recovery, and in the most obvious sense, about ageing."--Jay Lake, Tangent Online (Learn more about Tangent Online, the Internet's leading SF&F short fiction review website)

Mila sits at her desk in Ohio and picks up the handle of the new disposable razor in ... Shen Zhen, China? Juarez, Mexico? She can't remember where they're assembling the parts. She pans left and right and decides it must be Shen Zhen, because when she looks around there's no one else in camera range. There's a twelve hour time zone difference. It's eleven at night in China, so the only other activity is another production engineer doing telepresence work--waldos sorting through a bin of hinge joints two tables over in a pool of light. Factories are dim and dirty places, but cameras need light, so telepresence stations are islands in the darkness.

She lifts the dark blue plastic part in front of the CMM and waits for it to measure the cavity. She figures they're running about 20% out of spec, but they are so behind on the razor product launch they can't afford to have the vendor resupply, so tomorrow, underpaid Chinese employees in Shen Zhen raw materials will have to hand inspect the parts, discard the bad ones and send the rest to packaging.

Her phone rings.

She disengages the waldos and the visor. The display is her home number and she winces.

"Hello?" says her husband, Gus. "Hello, who is this?"

"It's Mila," she says. "It's Mila, honey."

"Mila?" he says. "That's what the Speed Dial said. "Where are you?"

"I'm at work," she says.

"At P&G?" he says.

"No, honey, now I work for Gillette. You worked for Gillette, too."

"I did not," he says, suspicious. Gus has Alzheimer's. He is 57.

"Where's Cathy?" Mila asks.

"Cathy?" his voice lowers. "Is that her name? I was calling because she was here. What is she doing in our house?"

"She's there to help you," Mila says helplessly. Cathy is the new home health. She's been watching Gus during the day for almost three weeks now, but Gus still calls to ask who she is.

"She's black," Gus says. "Not that it matters. Is she from the neighborhood? Is she Dan's friend?" Dan is their son. He's twenty-five and living in Boulder.

"Are you hungry?" Mila asks. "Cathy can make you a sandwich. Do you want a sandwich?"

"I don't need help," Gus says, "Where's my car? Is it in the shop?"

"Yes," Mila says, seizing on the excuse.

"No it's not," he says. "You're lying to me. There's a woman here, some strange woman, and she's taken my car."