The Typist and the Kiss | Teen Ink

The Typist and the Kiss MAG

May 31, 2011
By Stefan Malmsten BRONZE, Lebanon, Ohio
Stefan Malmsten BRONZE, Lebanon, Ohio
1 article 0 photos 0 comments

Mitchell Kamarov did not know his parents. No one knew their parents, since it was not necessary to know them nowadays to survive. There was no such thing as money; no one had a need for it. In the 137th Amendment to the Constitution of The World, everyone was guaranteed a right to a computer and a feeding tube.

Mitchell hated his feeding tube and his computer. But he did not dare tell anyone. It was a law, according to Amendment 245, that everyone had to be happy. Period. He dared not think it either, as that would have been grounds for what the WorldNet police called “termination.” Your feeding tube was removed and the hard drive was wiped of your thoughts and feelings and memories, all kept in folders. You were left to die.

For an occupation, Mitchell had been assigned Document Destroyer. The basics of this job was to read old texts and to put them into a computer document, in case they needed to be referenced by an Important Person. The advantage of the job was that Mitchell, who had been educated as a typist, was able to learn beyond the education he had received.

He was very secretive about his occupation and, during the first five years of his life, he had trained himself to remember things without storing them on his computer where, he knew, WorldNet would assuredly find them. And kill him.

The most interesting thing Mitchell had ever discovered in his work was the definition of the word “kiss”: to touch or press with the lips slightly pursed, and then often to part them and emit a smacking sound. It haunted his thoughts.

Today was Mitchell’s twentieth birthday – the day when, according to tradition, he was to reproduce and be terminated. But Mitchell had other plans.

Mitchell knew he had not lived a good life. It was an empty life. And then, a plan came to him. A most devious one that was sure to work. A twentieth birthday present, he thought, just like in The Birthday, which he had transposed not two days before.

In the fourth hour of the day, after six hours of mandatory sleep, he began his work day, just like all citizens. At exactly the eleventh hour, he hooked himself up to his kitchen unit and continued to work like everyone else. It was when the thirteenth hour struck that Mitchell put his plan into action.

He stood up from his desk and exited his tiny cubicle. He walked down the only one of the long gray hallways he had ever been in and, when he reached the end, he turned left. He knew he did not have much time; the WorldNet police knew where he was because of the GPS in his head. If he was gone from his office, they would suspect something. He began to move quicker, peering into every cubicle until he found a woman. He entered.

“Hello,” he said. She turned around.

She stood to address him. “Please kindly return to your office and call me. I am sending you my number now.”

“Excuse me, but I-” She cut him off.

“I am very busy and do not have time to-” But she was cut off too, not by another person, but by Mitchell’s lips. For reasons she did not know, she was kissing him back.

The spectacle continued for some two minutes before a tinny voice behind Mitchell spoke.

“Stop what you are doing at once.” A WorldNet drone had arrived. Mitchell did not stop. Nothing was going to ruin his moment. “You are breaking the law. Prepare to be terminated,” warned the drone.

Mitchell had been prepared for this but did not care. He was to die today anyway. His life was now complete. He broke away from the woman and said, “Smack.”

The dart exited the drone’s barrel and found its target with precision. Before Mitchell had so much as hit the ground, the woman was back at her desk, working fervently for fear of her own termination.

“Proceed with your work, citizen; there is nothing to see here.”

And so Mitchell Kamarov became the first person in over 300 years to die smiling.


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This article has 7 comments.


on May. 24 2014 at 8:27 pm
honest_iago BRONZE, Midway, Utah
2 articles 0 photos 41 comments

Favorite Quote:
"Look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else." --Tom Stoppard

Oh dear. That was a little haunting. But awesome.

on Aug. 31 2012 at 1:38 pm
justjosie PLATINUM, Scottsburg, Indiana
38 articles 1 photo 21 comments

Favorite Quote:
"Love a girl who writes,
and live her many lives;
you have yet to find her,
beneath her words of guise."

oh my gosh, this just made my favorites list!!! this is amazing... wow. Litterally i cannot describe the epicness of this story, but it is very very very epic. Loved it. Love love love!!

on Apr. 1 2012 at 8:43 pm
Bagheera-Rose BRONZE, Tacoma, Washington
1 article 7 photos 22 comments
I like your story a lot. Very interesting idea, although it reminded me a little of George Orwell's 1984. But to be honest I liked yours more than his....

kyrireese GOLD said...
on Mar. 20 2012 at 12:39 pm
kyrireese GOLD, Dallas, Texas
17 articles 0 photos 20 comments

Favorite Quote:
"Everything will absolutely be all right."
"Hold fast to dreams." - Langston Hughes

The ending was too quick for me. I would have liked it drawn out a bit more, with more information. But I love the thought of post apoctolypic worlds.

on Nov. 23 2011 at 9:21 pm
TheGoodDrsWorkman BRONZE, Uniontown, Ohio
2 articles 0 photos 3 comments

Favorite Quote:
You laugh because I am different; I laugh because you are all the same.
- Anonymous

This is absolutely remarkable. Brava I say, brava!

 


.Izzy. BRONZE said...
on Jul. 20 2011 at 7:26 pm
.Izzy. BRONZE, Broadview Heights, Ohio
1 article 0 photos 388 comments
I liked this. It reminded me a little of The Giver. 5 stars!

on Jun. 13 2011 at 6:43 pm
DeusExMachina SILVER, Reading, Pennsylvania
7 articles 6 photos 93 comments

Favorite Quote:
The universe was exploding, each particle away from the next, hurtling us into dark and lonely space, eternally tearing us away from each other--child out of the womb, friend away from friend, moving from each other, each through his own pathway toward the goal-box of solitary death

Great job! I really like the concept and I like how you made the world believable. One thing to be careful about is being over-expository. These are things like "the WorldNet police knew where he was because of the GPS in his head". This kind of tone can sometimes mess with the flow of the piece. Just somethign to be aware of. The reason this caught my eye is because I actually just submitted a sci-fi story called Ashes that is oddly similar in the way that  it's also about a dystopian, dictatorial future. If you were curious you could check it out (sorry I don't like to do that in my feedback I just thought the similaritiies were interesting).