From: gardabr@unix1 (Gard Eggesbo Abrahamsen)
Subject: I know a girl
Date: 6 Nov 92 11:04:28 GMT


I know this story isn't very cyberpunky, but it should be read to get more
from a story I will post later, which is called "I don't know (a girl)"


                              I know a girl
                                  -or-
                             She said "Hi!"
                                  -or-
                          Hello, anybody home?
                                  -or-
                        Another artistic article?
                                  -or-
                           Wait for this one!
                       by Gard Eggesboe Abrahamsen
                        (gardabr@unix1.mrih.no)


There  is a female,  living in Norway,  a country far up  north.  A  cold
country,  a  windy country,  a long country,  a polluted country.  To  be
precise, she didn't live far from the (un)known group that carried a name
of four letters with four punctuation marks and was pronounced "ouch". Of
course, she didn't know the existence of an ST group called O.U.C.H., and
she didn't know that it was nearby. Of course not. She had a C64 herself.
   Once,  one  of  the members of this group had  a  bad  experience.  He
accidentally fell in love with her,  without even knowing her.  Since his
modesty still was hanging around,  and he still was cutting his hair,  he
didn't dare to say "hi" to her,  even though she did, he found out, go in
a class parallel to his own class,  and there should be enough of reasons
to suddenly get to know her.
   But  he  was a good programmer,  and he had  recently  discovered  his
talent as a poet. Well, he wasn't exactly talented, or at least he didn't
think so himself,  but he had a lot of practice,  and knew how to put the
right words together.  When it came to literature,  he preferred  writing
short stories.  But these took time to write. A lot more time than he had
if he wanted to send a short story to her every day.  Instead,  he sent a
poem  to her every day.  Sometimes,  her first name could be read as  the
first letters of each line.
   These letters were anonymous,  and little is know of what this  female
thought of these poems.
   The  annual  christmas  ball of the school closed  in,  and  a  letter
revealed his identity, something he would regret bitterly afterwards.
   The  part  of  the ball when the  sixth-formers  performed,  he  spent
recording  this event on video so that he and another in the  group,  who
happened  to  be a sixth-former that year,  could edit it  and  sell  the
edited  stuff.  The  main character in this story would do  most  of  the
camera and make the scroll text programme.
   The  other part of the ball was mostly spent looking for this  female.
Perhaps he would dare to ask her for a dance?  But no.  She wasn't there.
He felt somewhat depressed.
   Christmas  went  by,  and he sent more letters,  and at  the  end,  he
thought it was time to give up.  He wrote a miniature short story to  her
that ended with a death wish. The next day, the female and her girlfriend
laughed at him behind his back, as observed by his friend.
   The boy felt depressed, and more depression would follow.
   Not much later,  he observed her together with another boy. Ah. So she
already  had  a  boyfriend.  Fuck  it!  Other,  rather  late  sources  of
information  could  tell him the same thing.  He was also told  that  she
liked drinking a lot, but he couldn't decide if he liked that or not.
   On one side,  he had a very negative view on alcohol, and didn't drink
himself. On the other side, he worried about her. If she had problems, he
wanted to help her out.
   Still,  he managed to suppress his thoughts of this female out of  his
mind,  but  quite  a  while later,  he observed that  she  sometimes  was
observing him, and since he still was single and felt very lonely, he was
hoping that perhaps something had changed.
   Even though the crush had ended,  he still liked the female.  For some
reason,  he liked her girlfriend, too. He wrote a new letter. Damn, miss!
Nothing happened... as usual.
   After  having  written  a lot about her in  the  UCL  (Ultimate  Crazy
Letter,  the  letter to Stefan and Richard that ended up at the  size  of
800-something  kilobytes),  he decided to print all he had written  about
her  (2-300 kilobytes) and give it to her.  He "mailed" it in her  school
bag at what he though would be a good time to do so.  Unfortunately,  she
would  round  the corner only a few seconds  later,  so  he  accidentally
dropped his pen-case in her bag (or at least that is what he believed was
what happened).
   Then... nothing happened.
   After a while,  he managed to suppress also this,  and he fell in love
with another female and broke his personality.  This time,  however,  the
girlfriend  of  the female this story is about gave the boy  a  dance  to
comfort him.  This would prove to be the first dance he ever had had with
a female, which would explain why he usually felt depressed.
   He  felt  so  thankful  for  this dance (and  the  hug  she  gave  him
afterwards  before  disappearing into nothingness) that he  dedicated  an
entire game to her.  (This game is actually present on this disk.  It  is
called "Reverse" and is found in the "Features" folder - Ed)
   But  inspiration persuaded him into making a music video,  and  as  he
needed a female to star in it, and he couldn't think of anyone who wanted
to, he did, after many other females, contact the first mentioned female.
This happened on the bus, to be precise.
   The first thing she said would be "Hi,"
   Of course she didn't want to star in it herself,  but agreed to  check
out  if anyone else would.  After a week,  he asked her if she had  found
anyone. She said "Hi!" (Sorry, haven't done anything).
   After yet another week, he stopped her in the corridor. She said "Hi,"
   Of course,  she still hadn't done anything,  and threw out a  comment,
that noone would want to,  anyway.  And she spitted it out, as if she was
talking to some shit that just was in her way.  For some reason,  he felt
hurt.
   After  having given both her and her girlfriend a sixth-former's  card
each with unique comments (with rhyme,  of course), and he met her in the
corridor once, she said "Hi," and continued.
   Other times,  they kept meeting each other by accident, she said "Hi,"
and continued.
   As  Commune  Responsi came together,  and they  discovered  that  this
female  was  born on the Day of Beginning of Life,  he  quickly  wrote  a
letter (school was over) and wanted more information on her,  so that  he
could write an article on her. Nothing happened.
   He  tried some other channels to make her speak,  but at the  time  of
writing, nothing has happened.
   An hour ago (upon writing,  that is),  he met her at school as he  was
fetching his final grades. She said "Hi," and went.
   He took a small trip to Ulsteinvik City to buy a CD single  (Metallica
live at Wembley Stadium,  London,  April 20th 1992).  For some reason, he
met her there, too. She was talking to her girlfriend, so he didn't think
of interrupting them. Instead, he went straight into the music shop.
   When he came out,  they were both out of sight, but as he got into the
car and left the car park,  he ended up right behind her. He followed her
most  of the way home,  since she lived on his way.  Only a minute or  so
before she would be home, he overtook her, even though she already was 10
km/h above the speed limit.  (The speed limit was 80.  She was driving in
90,  so he pushed his car up to 130 to make it at a reasonable amount  of
road) When he was in front of her, he kept a more reasonable speed, which
meant that she would have to slow down (heh, heh, heh).
   When he knew she would leave the road, he put his hand up the sun roof
and  waved good bye to her.  (He had originally planned to drive  to  her
place,  but  with the post of today in the back of the car,  he  wouldn't
have  time  to  visit her,  and he hadn't thought much of  what  to  say,
either. Another thing is that he wouldn't be welcome there, anyway.
   Do you know what she will say next time he meets her? "Hi,"
   Do  you know what she will say if he looses his mind and rapes her  or
her girlfriend? "Hi,"
   Do  you  know  what she will say in  any  situation  given  (including
murder, suicide and bank robberies)? "Hi,"