"The Laugh" by Charles Mills Trowbridge

  It's late afternoon, according to the sunlight pouring into the room. KC rolls over. "No use", she thought, "windows on two walls".
  With much effort she sat up, wiping sweat off her forehead, pushing her chair back. "Must not have ever made it back to bed", she mutters to herself.
  Another lonely breakfast at the dark, smoke-filled diner down the street. "The perfect start for my day", she can't help but mutter to herself again. Pushing thick plastic glasses onto her oversized nose, she stumbles over to her dresser and pulls out some cloths, a huge hoody and loose jeans. It's only a short walk to the greasy spoon, "and besides," she thinks it herself "it isn't like I could cook".
  Breakfast and the newspaper comfort her. New products and politics and promises all wrapped up in virtually identical packages for the masses to buy, she thinks. KC smiles wide as she walks home from the diner that afternoon, thinking about an article she read.
  She laughs again, then stops, self conscious about the sound it makes. Then she opens the lock on the building's front door, letting herself into the decayed front corridor.
  The boy from down the hall passes her as KC is walking by the mailboxes. He's so cute, with that synthtech hair and beautiful crystal eyes. KC trips over her shoelaces, and shakes her head disapprovingly at herself.

  Back up at her room she can't help but wonder why she's always so stupid around him, around beautiful people. Her mind drifts off to thoughts of actresses, adventurers on the screen who are always so dashing and heroic. The mirror offers KC her reflection, letting her watch herself sink into her chair and try to sink out of her body.
  Her eyes dart over to the deck on the table. "A little trip might make me feel better".
  Her bony fingers slide through the greasy black pageboy haircut until they hit the interface. KC's other hand reaches out and grabs the quarter plug and the stud's in.
  Booting up the deck, she takes a deep breathe and closes her eyes, waiting for the system to load. She can hear the click and whirl of the hard drive working, she grabs the keyboard and begins.

loading...
time remaining: (O)(O)(O)(O)(O)
time remaining: (X)(O)(O)(O)(O)
time remaining: (X)(X)(O)(O)(O)
time remaining: (X)(X)(X)(O)(O)
time remaining: (X)(X)(X)(X)(O)
time remaining: (X)(X)(X)(X)(X)
password: *********
logging in...
:
: /dialup
finding server
dialing...
1 206 555 1213
now connected
:
: /vmode activate

inside a whirlpool of colors can't breathe breath now air open up eyes inside and see the alerts no time to read now surge ahead inside the wire like a wraith through walls out past the civgrid with neon advertising lights stretching on past infinity zoom past outside now the badlands now floating in the corpgrid there lie the fortresses like shimmering spheres in the desert no pretty skins out here only raw data find one who owns that who cares anymore have some fun invisible I will overhear inside that sphere scans miss sideways shadow front door knock knock hard quicksilver parts like a run in pantyhose keep moving through the tear 411 3rd eye flares understand oh ironic fate leads me here inside the mainframe one more wall pass remove box borrow your bandwidth jumping board to the next level redrover i'm coming right over next level inside clean white perfect look around got 'cha reach into my bag of trix felix there we go ghostwriter should do the trick log out back out back door no time trace's started feel it like a noose getting tighter can't cut the wire bounce off the remote another 2 seconds gained back out with a broom behind nothing to follow to the desert outside now safe exit

:
: /shutdown

  KC reclines, breathing hard. Reaching back she pulls the stud out of her skull as the deck powers down.
  Pleased with herself, she decides to go out to dinner. Walking back to the diner, she takes her usual booth in the non-smoking section. The cook has the radio on in the back, and she orders, overhearing the news as it blares on the little box.
  "This just in, a hacker has tampered with the Seattle Times central computer. Changing the layout before it was sent to the printers, this computer criminal has literally made news. Tune in for more detailed coverage of this" The chef turns it off and KC giggles, pushing her thick black glasses back up her nose. A copy of the front page from this morning's newspaper stares up at her from the tabletop. "Compcrime Ends In Seattle" she reads aloud from the largest headline.

KC laughs again and enjoys her meal.