HIGHLY COMMENDED
in the Frazzled Lit Short Story Award 2025!
Listen to Alison reading her story:
I thought I was a goddess this morning when I slipped on the new Ultra Pro Air XReality Gigi gave me for my birthday. Everyone had been itching to try this latest iteration because of its seamless biofeedback and ease of use.
It tracks eye movements, even. Gigi demonstrated the new features.
A blink, a nod, all hands-free. I was impressed. The biofeedback was so seamless I could even control my own neural responses -- pain signals, emotions, everything.
We'd spent a glorious night with the old VRs, my pulse hitting 185 before we collapsed back on the pillow laughing. Then she showed me how the new glasses used low-voltage electrical impulses but with protections.
The phone holds your encryption keys and identity markers. That's why they're such a matched pair—one experiences, one authenticates. It’s super safe.
I shuddered.
We may never leave this bed.
Gigi snuggled into my neck, murmured something about ultra-fast wireless charging, and I made a bad pun about that. It was going to be a memorable day, I whispered in her ear, not understanding the varied meanings that word would hold.
Eventually, I pulled myself away from Gigi’s bed, but she told me the birthday presents weren’t done yet. With a naughty grin, she suggested I walk to work with my XR on. As I glided down the street, Gigi sent me subtle arrows which appeared on the sidewalk guiding me toward my next birthday surprise. This was silly; I was a kid again, but my gait was steady until I tripped on a sidewalk crack and my glasses nearly fell off. I pushed them up with my finger and accidentally shared my screen with everyone in the area.
We laughed.
Do not do that again. Her voice admonished me, but her tongue-red lips were smiling. I don’t want to share you with anyone.
I think it was because I blinked at the same time? I was still getting used to the new commands.
On I walked. She pointed out the bistro where she had once teased me. Naturally, I entered.
With a nod, I shared my screen, stepping into a damp rainforest with vines and primary-colored flowers. She slipped into my projection and I watched her lie down in the moss as I sipped my latte in the cafe. I could barely keep a straight face or my coffee cup steady. She tortured me in what was for me, at least, plain sight.
Your fitness stats today look ecstatic! An unwelcome notification floated in front of me, partially blocking my view.
Because of you. I gushed, and Gigi giggled.
Gotta turn those notifications off, babe.
Yeah. They moved the controls for that.
I tilted my head to zoom in on certain body parts; I got wet when Gigi's virtual fingers traced me. As I moaned, the neural-mapping feature must have misinterpreted my emotional spikes as a command input, and the system read my arousal as enthusiastic consent.
EXPERIENCE SHARING ACTIVATED: ALL CONTACTS.
I jumped, the glasses slipped, and I had to punch the nosepiece to stop them from falling off, accidentally activating broadcast mode again. I blinked, unsure if that had happened.
But a blink might be the command to go live with anyone in the area. Or not? I was unsure. I darted my eyes and the XR, using the live function, turned my shared photo into a live event. It misinterpreted my eye movements. It all went too fast.
NO! I yelled too loudly.
Everything ok? The barista jerked her head up.
I was frozen in panic. Did that just happen? Please. No.
The other café patrons wearing XRs entered my rainforest. They were watching. Undo. Undo!
Did you just upload a video? Gigi’s voice confirmed my disbelief. She threw covers over herself. Are we live?
Notifications flooded my vision.
No. I mean, yes. Fuck!
Delete it! NOW. Gigi disappeared from my rainforest.
Messages floated in front of me, now easily readable. I instinctively turned my head, but the DMs, replies, voice memos were all inescapable.
Get the fuck out. You’re not safe! Gigi shrieked.
I grabbed my phone and bolted for the door. The phone was hot - wireless charging? - but I didn’t care. Outside, I glimpsed the traffic and piss-stenched sidewalks behind the beauty of my virtual world. But the rainforest was no longer habitable as avatars flashed me; demonstrated what they’re doing while viewing my reel, telling me what they wanted to do IRL with me. I sobbed.
I was still in there, though, unable to turn it off as I blindly ran down the sidewalk, terrified. I raised my hand to block a car, but the XR misinterpreted the gesture as a command.
There must be a glitch in the new system. Get out! Get out! Gigi’s scream did not help my panic.
ENVIRONMENT SELECT: NEUTRALIZE
The rainforest pixels dissolved into the default calibration grid. Suddenly I was suspended in a neon green void, my limbs still moving as if walking while my actual body stumbled forward into traffic. Reality and virtuality desynchronized.
A car horn blasted. I screamed.
I slipped, caught myself on a parking meter. I fumbled with my anchor point, but the notifications and avatars tracking me made it impossible. The reels were unstoppable. Fire emojis. Hate mail. I knew how this worked: the higher the engagement, the more people saw my posts. Then AI auto generated more content, and I’m in all of them.
The words they used to describe me flashed before my eyes. I raised my hand instinctively to block out my hunters, and suddenly the pixels dissolved again and I was running through the yellow grasslands of the savannah. On the street, people wearing their XRs sneered; I bashed into an abandoned scooter and cried out in pain. My shin pulsed; blood trickled out. Sadomasochistic DMs followed. The sharp sting pushed me back into my body, but my mind was distracted by the flickering lights and pings that chased me. I didn’t know if I should focus on the blood seeping through my jeans or the storm of notifications.
In multiple language, instantly translated for me, I learned the number of ways CUNT could be expressed. I limped on faster; changed avatars; swapped out usernames but Ping! Ping! I was still traceable. Others told me to stop so they could meet up, but adrenaline fuelled my pace onward.
An overload warning flashed; lines blurred; my renderings flickered. My phone burned hotter with each step until it seared my flesh. I threw it down, but in doing so, I raise my hand again above my head and the pixels dissolve once more.
The blinding sand of the desert, where my AR environment has now transported me, was no place for someone with a hand that seethed. I blew on it but that only increased the notifications. I heedlessly climbed red jagged rocks which cut into my burned hand, until, resigned, I slumped on a boulder unsure if it was virtual or real. Panting.
Are you okay? Gigi came back into view and I cried with relief. I wanted her to hold me, dab my wounds.
I gotta stop for a minute.
No! Keep Moving!
I staggered a few paces to a park bench. Humiliated. Embarrassed. Defeated.
Immersed in fear, the electric light of agony surged. I groaned, registering the unbearable hurt - of my shin, of my hand - while the visual notifications ceaselessly rolled past my vision. It occurred to me to turn off the spinoreticular tract to numb my emotions, but what I really wanted to do was erase my memory.
I ripped off the glasses.
I slow my breath, as I blink in the sunlight, my vision flickering in and out. Slowly, the world settles. I’m in a city park now; it’s midday. My brain registers snowfall just before my skin feels the cold. I shiver. A freak snowstorm blankets the ground, the trees, the bench with a hushed layer of white. All is quiet. The damp, earthy smell of wet soil matches what I feel and see for the first time all morning. My body aches but the scene calms my beating heart.
The heavy, wet snow packs easily. I press my burned hand into it, the cold numbs my pain just as I have shut off all emotion. It melts all too quickly against my hot skin, so I scoop up more. I drop to my knees so I can more easily sweep up the snow, which soothes my shin where blood has coagulated in an ugly bruise. My tongue detects the metallic taste of blood but I’m not sure if that’s real or imagined. I’m still shaking.
I found you!
I have to blink a few times to register that Gigi is really walking up to me, smiling. That purple puffy jacket she bought ages ago at a vintage shop is so familiar that I think I want to cry but I’ve numbed my emotions.
I realize I’m staring at her wild-eyed; cold, wet and shivering, but her dark eyes are kind. Her warm touch reassures my clammy hand as she helps me onto a bench.
There, with emotions switched off, I am robotic; neither she nor I are burdened with the snapshot and reel. I can’t speak, hear only my pounding heart and Gigi’s kind voice. It’s fine.
She picks up the glasses, dries them off. Finds my phone and turns it off; makes another joke about wireless charging gone wrong, but I don’t laugh this time.
They’re still going to come, Gigi. Those avatars. They’ve geo-located me.
Shhhh.
They do come. One by one. Not avatars, but people. Real.
Gigi spins wildly around, searching for an escape path while I rock back and forth on the bench, comforting myself. Neither of us able to speak. But they, too, are silent; and they step as gingerly as they can, so as not to spook us. They raise their hands to show they are safe. All of them, too, have marked hands.
They’re women, a few men, many androgynous. They are still wearing their glasses, though, the tinted shades still hiding the glare of reality.
This small group envelops Gigi and me in a circle.
Different story, same scars. One says.
The circle enlarges as more people arrive.
Gigi slips on her glasses, but I can’t. I need my spinoreticular tract light to remain off. What counts as a safe space these days? What is consent in a world where technology has blurred the lines almost to nothing, I wonder.
But Gigi understands now. Consent is more than an agreement; it’s a lens through which we understand ourselves. It’s how we relate to others, she tells me as she pats my back. Urges me to turn it on; feel the emotion; reclaim your body as a site of wisdom.
Each sensation deserves its space, someone with a marked hand nods encouragement.
You are allowed to take up space, the group chants silently.
XR can’t silence you. They tell me.
The lingering burn, my throbbing shin, the notifications that I’m sure are still coming, Gigi's presence beside me, these gentle folk around us -- must be felt. A symphony of nerve endings singing their rightful place.
My hand hovers. Gigi waits.
My hands are jittery as I adjust my glasses as they teach me. I now see us; see each person clearly as we are: wrinkled, dumpy, tattered, vulnerable. Their tenderness feels fierce – like snow against a burn, like truth against shame, like everyone who know exactly how much courage it takes to stay soft in a hard-edged world.
Now switch it on. The emotions. Ready? Gigi’s voice is soft.
I exhale and press on. Consent isn’t a checklist. It’s a culture. We get to create it, not the algorhythms. Every body. Every relationship. Every day.
I’m comforted for now, like the snow that won’t heal my scars. I’m still here.
Learning.
Alison Langley is a former journalist whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, among others. Her novel, Budapest Noir: Ilona Gets a Phone (Dedalus Books, 2024) won the Irish Writer’s Centre Novel Prize. Langley's short stories have appeared in various literary journals, and The Date was shortlisted for the 2024 Bournemouth Writing Prize.
Terrifying!