The Best is Yet to Be

Illustration by John Stevens

“But what if I don’t want to live forever?”

Schrader looked at his wife and frowned. Agnes, don’t be so difficult!

Swiveling a little in her chair behind the long wooden desk, Dr. Re-nard replied calmly, “The treatment won’t make you immortal. It makes you much more resistant to infections and life-threatening diseases, but you’ll be just as vulnerable to accidental injuries. And, of course, it makes you younger.”

“Agnes, don’t you want to be twen-ty-five years old again?” Schrader took her wrinkled hand in his. “It’ll be just like when we were first married!”

“But we won t really be younger. We’ll just look that way.” She glanced at the doctor. “This treatment won’t really ‘turn back the clock,’ like she said. We won’t really be newlyweds again, with our whole marriage still in front of us. It’ll just seem that way. We’ll still be in our seventies, retired, with our family already raised and gone! What will we really have to look forward to?”

Before Schrader could think of an answer Renard spoke again. “Mrs. Schrader, I can tell you how the rejuvenation treatment will affect your bodies. I can’t, however, tell you how it will affect your lives as a whole, for better or worse. Only you can decide whether having it is the right thing for you. But I will try to give you all the medical information you and your husband need to make the best decision you can. Now, with your permission, I’d like to go over the results of your tests.” She cleared her throat.-“Display file Schrader, Thomas J.”

The holoscreen on the nearby wall flashed to life. The doctor nodded approvingly at the text and complicated multicolored diagrams that appeared and disappeared at her command. Schrader winced, remembering what those dozens of invariably smiling, pleasant, white-coated people at the medical center had done to Agnes and him over the past month. It seemed like every square centimeter of his body—both outside and inside—had been poked, prodded, and scanned. Not content with draining what seemed like a couple liters of blood a few cc’s at a time, they’d also requested samples of every other kind of bodily fluid too. He’d thought that, at his age, nothing could embarrass him anymore. But when that perky nurse had handed him the little cup and graphically suggested several ways to obtain the required specimen, he’d blushed. Her patience in waiting over an hour and cheery “That’s all right, a few drops is all we need,” only made him feel worse.

The doctor said, “I’m happy to say, Mr. Schrader, that you’re in remarkably good shape for a man of your age. Your profile shows just the usual ‘wear and tear’ problems. Mild atherosclerosis. Some diverticula and polyps in the colon. A small focus of cancer in your prostate.”

Schrader blinked. Cancer?

Renard continued, “Nothing out of the ordinary. Most important, the tests we made of your cognitive functions and psychological status showed no significant impairments. You meet all the physical and mental requirements for the treatment.”

Then she said, “Access file Schrader, Agnes M.” The doctor frowned as a new display appeared. “As for you, Mrs. Schrader, your physical condition is also well within acceptable range for the treatment. However, your psychological tests showed a moderate level of depression, and we also found evidence of mild Alzheimer’s disease.”

She paused. “That’s the bad news. The good news is that the depression can be treated very easily and, as long as it’s dealt with relatively soon, we can reverse the Alzheimer’s, too.”

Alzheimer’s. Schrader looked at his wife, seeing how she would react. The expression on her face was completely blank. Then he said to the doctor, “So you think the treatment will work?”

“Yes. The overall success rate is nearly 100 percent.”

“And it won’t hurt?”

The doctor laughed. “Compared to what you’ve been through already with the profiling tests, the treatment itself will seem like nothing. Remember when both of you came in last year to receive those medicines for your teeth and eyes? We’ll give you these new ones the same way.”

Reflexively Schrader ran his tongue over his newly re-grown teeth. He was still getting used to not needing glasses anymore. Then he said, “And it’s safe?”

“To a very high degree. After the treatment, you’ll be monitored for any signs of rare problems, like uncontrolled cell growth. In my personal experience, the only problems I’ve seen have been relatively minor, and temporary.”

Renard leaned back in her chair. “The effects of the treatment are, in a way, very straightforward. Think of the body as a very complicated machine. Basic ideas about how the different parts of the body work and the cells they’re made of have been known for hundreds of years. It was only in the 1900s, however, that we really began to identify and understand the different chemicals the body produces, and how they affect things like aging. Then, after a map of the human body’s genetic structure was finally completed early in this century, what we know about those chemicals and the genes that produce them has increased astronomically.”

She smiled wryly. “My grandmother was a doctor around the turn of the century. Back then she was a ‘specialist’ in heart disease—a field of medicine that, at the time, was considered very ‘high-tech’ and prestigious. Now, looking back at what they knew and could do then, it’s almost like they were using leeches and magic potions.”

Schrader smiled back. “I read that the treatment is sort of like renovating an old house.”

“It’s a little more complicated than that, but that’s the general idea. After we become adults, our bodies start to deteriorate. Cells in certain important organs, like the brain and heart, can no longer divide, so if they’re destroyed the body can’t replace them. As the years go by, the damage from infections, environmental hazards like radiation, poisons the body itself produces, and general ‘wear and tear’ keep adding up. Meanwhile, the body is losing its ability to resist and repair all this damage. Over time, it also starts producing cells that don’t act the way they ‘should.’ The bad effects that problem produces range from making your hair turn gray, to getting cancer.

“The so-called ‘smart molecules’ we use are programmed to either turn certain genes back on or change the way they’re working, so the body can repair and rejuvenate itself from the basic DNA and protein level on up. Once they’re done, it is sort of like having a ‘new house’ again. You’ll just need to have booster treatments every five years or so to keep it ‘renovated.’ ”

Schrader turned toward his wife. “Agnes, don’t you think we should—”

“It’s not right!” Agnes glared angrily at him, then at the doctor. “What you want to do is#’t natural! We’ve lived our lives, we’ve already done all the things that were important to us! What would we do with all those extra years, except do the same things all over again? Have the same problems, the same heartaches we’ve had before? They were hard enough to bear the first time. I don’t want to have to go through them again!”

“But Agnes—”

“No, Tom! There’s a reason God meant us to live only so long. We struggled and worked hard all those years; we’ve done the best we could in this life, and now we’ve earned our rest. We should be satisfied with whatever time we have left on this world and then, when it’s our time, go on to our eternal rest.”

Schrader looked pleadingly at the doctor for help. The latter shrugged her shoulders. “As I said before, I can’t tell you whether having the treatment is the best decision for you. Think about it. Talk about it. If you decide to go ahead, or if you just want to discuss it with me again, please make an appointment to see me.”

She paused. “One last thing. I said before that the treatment renews or regenerates all the tissues and organs in the body. It makes them function as well or better than when you were in your twenties. But there is one organ that’s a bit of an exception. Whether you believe a ‘soul’ works through it or not, you need a healthy, intact brain to be the person you are. If the parts that deal with your memories, what you’ve learned and experienced in your life—the ones involved with your personality, and the individual way you think—are destroyed, all those things are wiped out, too. Oh, we can still make those lost brain cells grow back—but all the information they stored, all the connections between them that made you a unique individual, will still be gone forever.”

The doctor looked intently at Agnes. “Wait too long before you have the treatment, and your Alzheimer’s will progress past the point where we can prevent that from happening.” She shrugged. “There’s no point in renovating a house if the only person who can ever live there is never coming back.”

They had a bitter argument about it when they got home. Late that night Schrader did something he hadn’t done in years. Making sure Agnes saw what he was doing, he took some blankets and a pillow from their bedroom and arranged them on the downstairs couch. After a while, when she didn’t come down, he quietly went upstairs. The light was off in their bedroom, but he, could hear her in there, softly whispering the rosary. Sighing, he went back down to the couch. When she did that, he knew from long experience that she was too mad to make up that night.

After a few days of hostile silence, they starting speaking to each other again—but only when it was really necessary. Over the next few weeks Agnes went out often. “Shopping,” she said, although all he saw her bring home from those many trips was a single pair of gloves. Or, “Out with the girls.” Schrader wondered which “girls” she was referring to. Over the past year or two, all the women in her usual crowd had either gone into nursing homes, died—or had the rejuvenation treatment. He knew it’d been hard on Agnes when Betty and Sally, her closest friends, had seemed to shun her after they’d had the treatment. Apparently, they didn’t want to hang around widi “old” people anymore.

He spent much of his time on the Nets, trying to get the latest information on the rejuvenation treatment. Despite all he’d read about it over the past few years, the biology behind it was still mysterious to him. Nearly all the articles and reports he reviewed about how it worked were either too simplistic or too technical, with little in-between.

But the political controversy still raging over this new power to make the old “young” again was much easier for him to follow. It had quickly become a major, emotionally-charged issue, sharply dividing society into hostile “Pro-Nature” and “Pro-Life” camps. Some small, fringe groups opposed it strictly on religious grounds, or from a general fear of “Frankenstein” science. But mostly, which group you were in depended on how old you were. “Truly” young people, those in their twenties and thirties, saw themselves competing for jobs with rejuvenated rivals having much more experience and seniority. And any inheritance they might be expecting from their older relatives would also be postponed indefinitely. On the other hand, those in their forties and above, much more mindful of their own mortality, were almost uniformly for the treatment.

Dr. Renard had said that the first tests of the treatment in people had been done about five years ago. However, it hadn’t become a political issue until some months before the last election. The story was that the President’s press secretary had read a supermarket tabloid (“FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH DISCOVERED ON THE MOON! ALIENS GIVE DOCTORS MEDICINE THAT CAN MAKE YOU LIVE FOREVER!”) and, after getting more information from somewhat more reliable sources, had thought it would make a good campaign issue. When the rest of the media latched onto the story, every candidate hoping to remain in or go to Washington had to give their position on it.

After the election, the new Congress and President had quickly passed legislation to regulate use of the treatment. Despite all the overblown rhetoric about “the Constitutional right of every American to a full and youthful life,” Schrader was sure the real reasons why rejuvenation was now officially sanctioned were more mundane. On average, middle-aged and senior citizens were wealthier than younger voters, and had contributed generously to the campaigns of those candidates favoring it. Also, the average age of a congressperson was fifty-five—and the most powerful incumbents had just had the treatment themselves.

To placate younger voters, Congress did decree that no one could receive the treatment unless they were at least seventy-five years old. That was supposed to lessen competition from their elders, by making it more likely that the latter would stay retired and not re-enter the work force, or die of some age-related infirmity or accident before they qualified for rejuvenation. The loophole was that any doctor could approve a “Certificate of Need” if, in their opinion, there was a valid medical reason for someone to receive the treatment at an earlier age. just how easy it was to obtain one of those certificates was shown by the disproportionate number of middle-aged holo stars, athletes, and politicians who were suddenly looking like youngsters again.

And, despite outraged protests by the science groups and AMA, further research using genetic engineering to “improve” humans was effectively banned. The polls said that, like the “Pro-Nature” crowd, even most people favoring the rejuvenation treatment were worried that a scientifically-created “Master Race” might one day take over the world. As long as it only restored what God or Nature “intended” a person to be, it was all right. But, except for some irresistible cosmetic improvements, like adding or subtracting fat from certain areas of the body, “unnatural” enhancements were forbidden.

Of course, few politicians or anybody else talked about what kind of long-term effect the treatment would have on the world’s population. After the great pandemics and wars that ravaged so much of the world early in the century, and extensive (if still often fiercely resisted) use of safer and more effective contraception, a tenuous Malthusian balance had finally been reached. The last several years, in fact, had actually seen a net decrease in the number of people on Earth. Maybe, as good as the rejuvenation treatment might be for individuals, in a few generations it might lead to disaster for the planet. But, as usual, few politicians thought further than the next election.

As for himself, whatever the future held on that point was beyond his control. Whatever happened, whether or not two more people had the treatment wouldn’t make a difference.

When he’d turned seventy-five early last year, Schrader hadn’t given any thought to having the treatment immediately. Until Agnes qualified too, there was no point in doing it. He hadn’t even bothered to talk to her about it until several months ago, right after her birthday.

He’d been surprised at her reaction. She’d made it perfectly clear that she wasn’t going to have it. Every time he’d brought it up again, it was either “I don’t want to talk about it!” or, if he persisted, it led to shouting matches and bad feelings that made life nearly unbearable for the next few days.

The worst part was, she wouldn’t tell him why she was so much against it. All his sweet talk, shouting, and threats pried out of her was a few vague protests that it was “unnatural.” Then, when they were making up days after a particularly bad argument, she’d finally responded to his misty-eyed pleas and agreed to see the doctor with him. She hadn’t said more than a dozen words during that first appointment, just shrugged her shoulders apathetically and said “I don’t mind,” when asked to come back later for tests.

And now, after all that, it was clear to him that she’d never had any intention of going through with the treatment. All she’d been doing was leading him on, making him think she’d changed her mind, just to avoid more arguments.

Then, one Sunday evening several weeks after their last appointment with the doctor, he was sitting in his old recliner in the living room reading a book. Retirement had finally given him time to catch up on things he’d had to put off when he was working, and especially when the kids were growing up. Now he actually had time to watch the holoscreen that formed most of one wall of the room, searching the Nets for the latest documentaries and news. Even, when he just needed to relax, a play or concert.

Often, though, he just liked to reread favorite, old-fashioned printed books from his personal library. That evening he was curled up with Volume 3 of The Histoty of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. On the ’screen he’d found a performance by the Vienna String Quartet of Beethovens’s Quartet in F major, Opus 135, that was just beginning. With the music playing softly in the background, he became more and more absorbed in the book’s depressing story of decay and defeat.

Agnes walked into the room and sat on the nearby couch. Reading his book only a little now, mostly he watched her out of the comer of his eye. Then she said, “Access wedding file.”

The string quartet players shrunk into a tiny square in the right upper corner of the holoscreen, and Beethoven’s music faded away. Instead the screen was filled with sights and sounds from almost fifty years ago. From a technical standpoint, the two-dimensional “video” was jarringly primitive. Still pretending to be reading his book, he looked up just enough to watch two very young, very naïve people saying their vows in the large ornate church.

Take this ring as a sign of my love and fidelity…

Memories flooded back to him. Memories of a shy, smiling young woman with dark curly hair he’d been introduced to at a church-sponsored “singles” party. Of an incredibly awkward, socially inept boy asking her in a stuttering voice if she’d like to go out to lunch after Mass that Sunday. And maybe go to the planetarium afterwards? ( The planetarium? Damn, Schrader, you really knew how to be romantic!)

From the very beginning their courtship seemed so perfect, so—right. He didn’t need a video to remind him of their first kiss, the way she’d felt in his arms. With both of them trying to juggle their class schedules and work, there hadn’t been nearly enough time to spend with each other. But it was enough that, a year later, when he’d gotten down on one knee and asked her in that same stuttering voice if she would marry him, she’d said, “Yes.” Naturally, the ring he’d bought was too small, and it had taken the jeweler several weeks to get it right. But when it finally did slip on her finger, they’d both cried.

Agnes spoke again. “Reception.”

The scene on the ’screen changed. Now a young bride dressed all in white pulled her new husband to the dance floor while a polka band (her idea, certainly not his!) played a lively tune. The camera panned the room, revealing smiling, impossibly young versions of their closest friends and relatives. Her grandfather, his grandmother. Her brother, his two sisters. Both sets of parents. All gone now. Unless there really was some kind of life after death, he would never see them again.

As the groom on the video removed the garter from his blushing wife’s leg, Schrader tried to crowd out those memories with happier ones. They had both been virgins on their wedding night. It had taken them what seemed like an inordinately long time to figure out the exact technical details but, eventually, their persistence paid off. He’d always thought that, for Agnes, it was mainly a result of her very conservative religious background. Although his was similar, for him the main reason was different. Maybe it was from watching too many romantic early twentieth-century movies, or reading too many historical novels like Ivanhoe in his early teens. Whatever the reason, while attending his all-boys high school he’d dedicated himself to the “ideal” of loving, of sharing the most intimate experiences with only one woman in his lifetime.

Of course, during his undergraduate years in college, he found out how unrealistic that was. His loneliness and puerile romanticism had produced several intense but one-sided infatuations that, even after all these decades, still hurt to remember. Maybe, if any of those women had returned his passions only a little more, things might have been different. It sure as hell hadn’t been easy fighting those raging hormones. He hated to think how many liters of water he’d wasted taking cold showers. But, thinking back to that one night so long ago and all that came after, it had been worth it.

“First anniversary.” It was a scene in their cramped apartment. Agnes, in a thick, purely functional nightgown, laughing “That camera better not be on!” They’d worked hard those first few years—he to get his Ph.D., while she with her new Masters had found a job teaching English Literature at a local high school to support them. They still hadn’t had much time for each other. And when they did, they often wasted it arguing over money, in-laws, and so many things that seemed so important then, but so unimportant now.

“Fourth anniversary.” Their new condominium. A new job for him, teaching history at the college. More strains on their marriage. Many nights on the couch.

“Seventh anniversary.” Not a happy one either. They were both worried about their upcoming visit to the fertility specialist.

“Eighth anniversary.” Agnes, smiling brightly for the camera, her abdomen bulging out so far she seemed ready to topple over.

“Ninth anniversary.” Agnes, running after their son as he crawled rapidly across the floor like a speeding rocket.

“Twelfth anniversary.” Their first house. The picture was jittery, and the 3-D effect from the new holocamera kept blinking on and off. But, as Agnes valiantly tried to feed the new baby his strained carrots, the recording was good enough to preserve for posterity their older boy’s historic words, “Mommy, I just pooped in my pants!”

“Fifteenth anniversary.” No, Agnes, not that one! The two boys were fighting over a toy spaceship while Agnes gently rocked the new baby. The bottom of their younger son’s pants was visibly wet. They had argued bitterly about whether they should have a third child. She’d said that, at forty, she was getting too old, and the boys kept her bu£y enough. But, seeing how hurt and disappointed he’d acted, she’d finally given in.

Little Emily Marie was born with Down’s syndrome. A few months ago, he’d learned on the Net that there was now a medicine women could take to prevent it from happening. But it was discovered far too late to help their daughter.

After the first shock, and recriminations, Agnes had finally seemed to bond to her. If you didn’t look too closely, she almost looked like a “normal” baby. Any special education or needs she would have were still years away.

But they’d never had to worry about those things. Three months later, just before her first birthday, they’d found her in her crib one morning, dead. After all these years, he could still remember what it felt like to hold his precious baby girl in his arms.

As Agnes murmured softly, more scenes from their lives flashed briefly on the screen. Birthdays and Christmases. Their two boys, in grade school, high school, then college and beyond. Occasionally it was Agnes holding the camera, and him in the picture. He saw himself and Agnes changing, aging, as the years went by—less and less hair on his head, more and more padding around her middle. Growing old together.

He hadn’t bothered to do much recording over the last ten years. Mainly just when they’d gone on a cruise or other trip after they had retired. Agnes never smiled in any of those recordings. Just the ones when the boys came back home to visit—something neither had done in over a year. Maybe, if their sons had taken a different path, these last years would have been happier for Agnes. Maybe, if there had been grandchildren for her to fuss over and enjoy, her will to live might be stronger.

But their boys had the right to chose the kind of lives they wanted to lead. And even if those lives didn’t include marriage and children, they were doing something just as important and worthwhile—maybe more so. Even if Agnes had wanted their sons to grow up and be nice, sensible, stay-at-home college professors like their father, he was proud of them. He’d only managed to teach history. They were making it. Hell, when they were just old enough to talk he’d playfully planted the idea in their little brains himself. How could he have known that, when they got older, they would take it so seriously?

“Stop personal file.”

The image of the Vienna String Quartet expanded again to fill the whole ’screen. Dimly he noted that they were playing the F major quartet’s final movement. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Agnes sitting on the couch, looking at him. Although she didn’t say anything, he could hear what she was thinking. We’ve had a long and full life together. Happiness, and heartaches. It’s time to put our affairs in order, and go gently into that good night.

It sounded so convincing. Now it was his own voice saying, You’ve loved a wonderful woman. You’ve been a husband, and a father. You had a reasonably good career. Most of the dreams you had when you were young finally did come true. Why risk more pain and failure trying to achieve the unfulfilled ones you still have? Be content with what you’ve already learned and done.

Suddenly he felt very old, and weary. The full weight of all those years—the regrets, disappointments, and tragedies—seemed almost too great to bear. Maybe Agnes was right. Maybe, after all those years of struggle, it was time to just—rest.

And then he saw something in the night sky, outside the picture window behind the couch. The pale Moon, riding low in the heavens. If he looked carefully, he could even make out Mare Tranquillitatis. He remembered all the clear nights he’d taken the Schmidt-Cassegrain in the garage out to look at it. And, a much smaller, more elusive target.

He shook himself violently. Damn it, there is more to live for! No, it wasn’t’ a question anymore of gracefully accepting the inevitable. Now, “letting Nature take its course” because Life had become too difficult or challenging was just plain laziness. It was stupid. Worst of all, it was cowardice!

Then he shouted at the ’screen, “Access personal file, 2044!” Quickly he scanned through the recordings month by month until he found the one he was looking for.

It showed a room in the nursing home where they finally had to put Agnes’s mother. Their teenage boys, uncomfortable in their suits, fidgeted nervously in the comer. Agnes gently encouraged the person in the bed to look at the camera.

The white-haired woman’s body was shriveled and contracted, almost like a cockroach. Her dull eyes roamed vacantly. Low guttural noises issued from her mouth, and drool trickled out of its corners onto her chin. A thin tube snaked into her nose, its end secured to her withered cheek by a few strips of tape. Once, not too long before, she’d been a jolly, portly woman who’d enjoyed making delicious apple pies for her son-in-law and grandsons. Now, she had metamorphosed into—someone, or something else.

He’d wondered at the time why Agnes had wanted him to record that last visit with her mother. But, he realized later, as much as age and senility had changed her parent, it was still better than no remembrance at all. To a stranger, there was only an empty shell of a person on the bed. But to Agnes, it was still her mother.

He shouted at Agnes, “Look at it! Don’t close your eyes, look at it! Remember how the doctor said that if you don’t get the treatment, soon you’re going to get Alzheimer’s, too? Is this how you want to end up in a few years?”

Seeing his wife’s eyes turn moist, his resolve nearly failed him. He almost went over to the couch and hugged her. But, he told himself, just like when the boys were growing up, if you really care about someone, sometimes you have to practice “tough love.”

The recording ended. Once again the four musicians filled the ’screen, playing the concluding measures of Beethoven’s final string quartet.

Agnes dabbed at her tears with the sleeve of her blouse. “Do we have to do it, Tom? Must it be that way?”

“Yes, it must be!”

With a last few chords the quartet ended—and filled the room with silence.

“How are you feeling?”

Schrader squirmed uncomfortably on the bed. “Fine.”

Dr. Renard stared for a moment at the flashing numbers and graphs on the monitor suspended from the ceiling near his head, and smiled. “Everything looks good.” Then she turned to Agnes, who was lying on the bed next to his. “And how are you feeling?”

Agnes shrugged her shoulders, and said nothing.

Schrader glanced down at the tape covering the inner crease of his arm and the clear tube that led out of it. “How much longer will it be, doctor?”

“Another hour or so. You both have only two more bags of fluid to infuse, then all the medicines will be in your systems.”

He looked up at the latest small plastic bag they’d hung from the pole next to his bed. Before hooking it up, the last nurse had joked, “Another drink from the Fountain of Youth.” The fluid in the bag was bright yellow. He’d almost told the nurse, “Looks like somebody took a wizz in the fountain,” but stopped himself. Stuff must be working. My sense of humor is turning sophomoric.

The doctor continued, “When you’re finished, a nurse will give you instructions on the diet you should follow, and the pills you need to take. We’ll have you come back to the hospital in a few days for some blood tests and scans. I’ll see you in my office in a week to go over the results with you.”

“Are there any side-effects we should look for?”

“Excellent question. Actually, this soon, you shouldn’t have any. Later, there are a few you should look for.” The doctor lowered her voice. “Your wife is getting several medications you aren’t. One of them is designed to reverse the early stages of Alzheimer’s. Because of the particular brain cells it regenerates, sometimes it can cause temporary problems with memory and behavior.”

Schrader stared at her. “What kinds of problems?”

The doctor glanced knowingly at Agnes, who didn’t seem to be listening to the conversation, then back at him. “In most people, they’re barely noticeable. And they don’t occur for months after the treatment. I’ll go over them with you later, during an office visit.”

Noticing the worried look on his face, she smiled at him. “Don’t worry! None of the patients I’ve worked with have had any major problems with the treatment. I’m sure you and your wife won’t have any either.”

Then, to his surprise, she winked at him. “I can even speak about the benefits of the treatment from personal experience. Try to guess how old I am.”

For the first time Schrader looked beyond the doctor’s starched white lab coat at the trim curvaceous figure and shapely legs beneath it. She had beautiful blonde shoulder-length hair, and green eyes that twinkled when she smiled.

Then it hit him. Could she have had—No, it couldn’t be! No way could she really be as old as him!

“Uh—thirty?”

The doctor’s full pouty lips smiled again. “Thanks for underestimating by two years. But you should see my grandmother! Now she makes me look like an old hag!”

Afterwards, Agnes was even more quiet than usual. In fact, what few sentences she spoke to him over the next month rarely had more than three or four words. Though they stayed in their same old routines, like grocery shopping on Saturday and church on Sunday, an invisible wall seemed to divide them. He wanted to reach out, hold her, comfort her—but she wouldn’t let him.

And she never talked to the doctor when they went for their appointments. At the last one, Dr. Renard had said, “Everything’s right on track. Your tests are looking fine.”

“But, to be honest, I still can’t say I feel any different. Or look any younger. Do I, Agnes?”

Agnes shrugged.

The doctor said, “So far, all the changes in your bodies have been on the inside. They’ve been ‘invisible’—nothing you can see, or feel. But the tests we’ve done show they have happened. Hormone levels returning to ‘young’ levels. Your bodies’ resistance to infection and cancer—boosted far beyond what it was even fifty years ago. All your organs and body tissues—regenerated, or beginning to regenerate. Now, it’s just a matter of time.”

Out of curiosity he’d asked Dr. Renard for a hard copy of their test results. Not that he understood what “GH,” “DHEA,” “FSH,” “LH,” “ASF,” or even the terms that were spelled out meant. But it was reassuring to see the “before” and “current” values—and see how they now fell within the “normal” range for someone in their twenties.

Then, after getting out of bed one morning, just as he started to shave, he saw something in the mirror that startled him. The stubble on his face wasn’t white. It was black. Even more shocking was the fine brown fuzz covering the top of his head, putting the few wispy gray hairs that had been its sole occupants for the past several decades to shame.

From then on, he had trouble sleeping at night. It was almost like being a kid again on Christmas Eve—overexcited, anxious to see what new surprises awaited him in the morning. Every day, when he woke up and looked in the mirror, he looked different—younger. It was like pushing the “reverse scan” button on one of those old VCRs. The command “Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight,” wasn’t only a nice line of poetry anymore. Now, Time was actually obeying!

And Agnes was changing too. Although she never said anything about it, sometimes he caught her looking in the mirror—stroking her softer, rosier cheeks, and running her hand through gray hair to search for slowly lengthening brown roots.

Not that those changes didn’t have disadvantages. His old clothes didn’t fit his new physique—more muscular, and without the potbelly that had been his companion for so long. And he no longer bothered using their senior citizen discount cards. It took too much time explaining the situation to skeptical, acne-faced ticket sellers and checkout clerks. The most embarrassing incident was when he’d ordered a glass of wine at that restaurant—and the waitress had asked to see his driver’s license! Despite telling her over and over why the picture and date of birth didn’t seem to match the way he looked, she hadn’t believed him.

But through it all, Agnes remained cold and distant. Every time he tried to get close to her, she wouldn’t respond. Desperate to get some kind of reaction from her, he’d even tried starting arguments with her. But that didn’t work either.

The disgusting part was, those raging hormones from his first youth were making a dramatic reappearance. Although, as the years had gone by, the flames had never died out, he had to admit now that just before the treatment they’d been more like a pilot light. Sometimes the rational part of his mind was almost overwhelmed by feelings and urges that, in their intensity, bordered on temporary insanity. Especially when he saw his wife taking a bath. Every morning she looked younger, more radiant and desirable. The beads of moisture glistening on her bare voluptuous flesh made her look like a water nymph from Greek mythology, or a houri.

If he’d asked her, Agnes would probably have let him do what he wanted. But he never asked. That, he knew, would have just been using her body. If it wasn’t a mutually desired act of shared love between them, what really was the point? So, after all those years, the cold showers started again. Worst of all, after nights with particularly vivid dreams, sometimes he had to take a shower when he first woke up in the morning for an embarrassing, hygienic reason.

He’d almost laughed when Dr. Renard, in one of their recent visits, had even brought up the subject of birth control. Even if their bodies really had changed that much, considering how things were between his wife and him, fat chance they would need that!

The only times Agnes seemed even a little happy or almost smiled at him was when the boys were scheduled to call. She always asked them so anxiously how they were feeling. If they were eating the right foods to keep up their strength, and getting enough sleep. He half-expected her to ask if they always wore clean underwear in case they got hurt and had to go to a hospital. Or tell them to wear something warm if they went outside.

She never seemed to grasp that it took nearly two seconds for her words and image to reach their older son, and at least another few seconds for his reply to come back. When his picture on the ’screen didn’t respond to her immediately, she always asked, “Can you hear me? Did we get cut off?” The other night Gerry told them that he’d been selected as a crewperson on one of the new ships that would be heading for Mars in six months. Schrader had felt his eyes mist over when he’d told his son how proud he was of him. Agnes had cried too but, he knew, for a different reason. Her little boy was going even farther away from her.

At least there wasn’t a noticeable transmission delay when they talked with David. He’d had good news, too. Next week he’d finally be leaving the space station and heading up to Lunar Base 4 to join his big brother. No, he wouldn’t be going with Gerry on the new fleet. You had, he said, to have at least a year’s experience on the Moon to qualify. But they were scheduled to build another few ships next year, and if he kept his nose clean and worked hard, he might be able to hop a ride to Mars on one of them. Just before he had to end the call, David said, “I still can’t get over how good you and Dad look. It’s almost like looking at our old home holos when we were growing up.” His last words actually did make Agnes smile.

“Mom, you look so—young!”

And then, one morning, he woke up and saw Agnes lying on her side in their bed, staring at him with a frightened expression on her face. When he asked her what was wrong, her answer terrified him. She said, “Who are you? Are you my husband?”

Fortunately, he was able to get through to Dr. Renard almost immediately. She had apparently just arrived at her office. The ’screen showed her exchanging her winter coat for a white lab jacket.

She said, “The side-effect you’re describing is not uncommon, though it’s usually not as severe or sudden. Some of the medicines we gave your wife as part of the rejuvenation treatment were designed to cure her depression and Alzheimer’s disease. They either ‘reprogram’ brain cells that aren’t acting properly, or replace cells that have been destroyed by making the remaining, healthy ones multiply. While those ‘good’ cells are busy growing new brain tissue, however, they have to temporarily stop working themselves. So, if enough healthy cells are ‘off-line’ at one time making repairs, the problem they’re trying to take care of—like Alzheimer’s—can seem to get worse before it gets better. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“I—think so.”

Renard sat down at her desk. “The good news is, the effect usually lasts only a day or so and then, suddenly, the person is completely well. I’ve seen patients who were totally confused and disoriented and then, literally minutes later, were perfectly fine. Odds are, that’s what will happen with your wife too. The best thing you can do in the meantime is to watch her, and help her. Keep reminding her about the simple things, like who you both are, where she is, what year it is, and so on. When she makes a mistake, gently correct her. Be patient. She should get better soon.”

The doctor paused. “But, if she hasn’t improved by tomorrow morning, please call and let me know.”

Schrader spent the rest of the day following Agnes, trying to make sure she didn’t hurt herself. It tore him apart to see her like that—wandering aimlessly from room to room, babbling to herself. Where are the boys? They’ll be late for school! I can’t remember Mother’s number, and I need to call her to see if we can go to her house this weekend! He lost count of all the times he explained things to her, have her seem to understand what he was saying—and then a few minutes later hear her repeat the same nonsense. He’d had to feed her like a baby, spooning some food into her mouth, and clean her up after she’d soiled herself. Once, when he left her out of his sight for a few minutes to use the bathroom, she’d gotten out the front door. He caught up with her at the corner, pulling her back just as she was about to step in front of a speeding car.

That night, after finally getting her into her night clothes, she fell asleep in their bed. Lying beside her, he did something he hadn’t done in years. Fervently, meaning every word—he prayed. Please, God! Please make her well! Maybe there was no one out there listening—but, then again, maybe there was. Hoping that, magically, in the morning everything would be all right again, at last he fell asleep too.

But Agnes didn’t get better—not the next morning, nor the two after that. During his latest daily call to Dr. Renard, she looked worried. “I have to admit, your wife is taking longer to recover than any patient I’ve ever treated. However, the textbooks say that some people can take a week or more to respond.”

Almost too afraid to ask, Schrader said, “Does anyone ever not recover?”

The doctor hesitated. “Well, there are a few case reports in the literature. But please remember, such cases are rare.”

“But it does happen.”

Renard sighed. “Yes, it does happen.”

That evening, Agnes fell asleep on the couch in their living room. Sitting on the floor, looking at her sweet, angelic, but vacant face, he felt his eyes turn moist. Agnes, what have I done to you?

It was his fault. He was the one who’d browbeaten her into having the treatment. Oh, he’d done it for the best of reasons—“for her own good.” Just like when he’d browbeaten her to have Emily Marie. Just like all the countless other, lesser times he’d made her do things by taking advantage of her love for him, or her fears, when he thought it was “for her own good.” Yes, all those times, he really had done it because he loved her. Yes, he really had been trying to help her. But, like a pompous fool, he’d forgotten that he was only a fallible human being, who only thought he knew all the right answers. And that, even when you truly loved someone, even when you had the best intentions, you could still wind up hurting them more than anyone else possibly could.

And then he remembered something important. It had totally slipped his mind in the recent chaos and confusion.

Tomorrow was their fiftieth wedding anniversary.

The woman slumbering so peacefully in front of him now looked almost the same as when they were first married. But it wasn’t Agnes. Her personality, her intelligence, her mind—all the things she was, all the things she had been—were gone. What lay on the couch was an empty shell—a shadow, a remembrance of things past.

In the darkened room, a moonbeam glistened off the tarnished gold band around her finger.

I, Thomas, take you, Agnes, to be my wife. I promise to be true to you, in good times and in bad…

Whatever happened, he would be there for her. No, he didn’t know all the answers. But, he’d do the best he could. Whatever he could do to help her, to love her, he would do.

In sickness and in health.

Though her mind was gone, her body was still healthy. Even without the booster treatments, she might live like this for—what, another fifty years or more? Even if his love and devotion to her were strong enough to endure them, what about her? He thought of all the pain and indignities she would have to suffer. At least when her mother got Alzheimer’s it wasn’t long before her old worn-out body gave out too, and ended her misery. Agnes wasn’t going to be that “lucky.”

I will love and honor you all the days of my life.

There was a large throw pillow on the couch. As physically strong as he was now, it wouldn’t be that hard to cover her face with it and—

No!

No, he repeated to himself, a little more calmly. There had to be a better answer. He didn’t know what it was just yet. But, as hard as it was, the best thing right now was to wait, take each day one at a time—and pray…

He woke up on the floor the next morning, and heard someone praying. Agnes had dressed herself and was sitting on the couch, fingering her rosary. He stared at her in wondrous disbelief as she recited a monotonous string of “Our Father’s” and “Hail Mary’s.” Then, most of the way through, she paused, frowning. “Tom,” she said, “what’s the fifth Sorrowful Mystery?”

His own forehead furrowed. What the hell was it, anyway? “Isn’t it—”

“Never mind. I remember now. The Crucifixion.” The litany of prayers continued. When she was finished, she looked at him quizzically. “Why did you sleep on the floor last night?”

He stammered, “Beats me.”

She shrugged, then started another rosary. This time with the Glorious Mysteries.

When Agnes went into the kitchen to fix breakfast, Schrader made a call. Dr. Renard’s smile beamed at him from the ’screen. “Excellent! I think we’re finally out of the woods. Keep watching her, keep helping her remember things if she has a problem. Call me anytime if you need to.”

They spent a good part of the day in town, shopping. Whenever she could, she held his hand tightly. Several times she asked him what the date was. The second time she asked, he felt an instant of panic that her recovery was just an illusion.

But then she seemed fine. No, better than fine. For the first time in years, she seemed really happy.

That evening Agnes cooked them an elaborate supper. Afterwards, despite his protests, she insisted on clearing off the table herself. After gently pushing him into his recliner, she’d handed him one of his favorite books from the nearby bookshelf and turned on the ’screen. “Now you just relax until I’m finished.”

He tried to read a page or two from The Federalist Papers, but couldn’t concentrate. On the ’screen the New York Philharmonic was starting a performance in English of Haydn’s oratorio, The Creation. He barely heard the confused, unsettled harmonies of its opening section, “The Representation of Chaos.” The sounds from the kitchen—dishes rattling, a beautiful soprano voice humming a lively polka tune—kept distracting him Nor did he notice when the chorus faintly intoned the words, Let there be light. Simultaneous with the bright fortissimo outburst by the full orchestra on the following And there was light, Agnes entered the room. She pulled another book from the shelf, and curled up on the couch. He recognized the slim volume she was reading. Sonnets from the Portuguese. He could read the words on her lips. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

Then he got up, sat down on the couch beside his wife, and said, “How are you doing?”

“Fine. How are you doing?”

“Fine.” Then, with a rare flash of inspiration, he said, “Access wedding file.”

Once again, for many minutes, images from long ago appeared on the ’screen. The bad times, the good times. Sorrow, and happiness. Regrets for things that might have been. Gratitude for dreams fulfilled.

“Stop personal file.” The orchestra and chorus again filled the ’screen. The baritone and soprano soloists, representing Adam and Eve, were singing their final love duet. With thee each joy is enhanced, with thee my enjoyment is redoubled; with thee life is blissful; to thee may it be wholly dedicated.

With his wife cuddled snugly in his arms, Schrader repeated, “How are you feeling?”

“Fine. It’s like I’ve been half-asleep for a long time, and now I’m finally awake.”

Then the young, vibrant face of the woman he loved gazed up at him. “Do you think we did the right thing? Getting the treatment, I mean? Think of all the stupid things we’ve done, all the mistakes we’ve made. All the heartache. Maybe the next fifty years will be just more of the same.”

Schrader sighed. “Maybe. But it doesn’t have to be that way. We may look the same as when we were first married. We still, hopefully, have a long life ahead of us together. But you were right. It’s not like when we were first married. We’ve already made a lifetime of mistakes—and we’ve learned from them. We survived all those bad times, and because we have, now we’re stronger than we were before.”

He kissed his wife gently on her forehead. “I won’t say life is always going to be easy from now on. One of the few things I’m certain of is that there are still going to be plenty of bad times, maybe more tragedies ahead. But, because we’ve already shared and endured so much, I think we’ll be able to cope with whatever comes our way. And find new ways to be happy together.”

Then he smiled playfully. “I know what we can do. It’s a perfect way to start our new lives. I remember Gerry saying that the lunar bases are so big now they’re almost like small towns. They’re even letting the permanent residents bring teenage and older family members up from Earth to live with them. Next time we talk with Gerry, let’s ask him how many high school and college-age kids are up there now He’ll know whether they could use some very experienced volunteers willing to go to the Moon to teach those kids, say, History and English Lit.”

He grinned at the dubious “Say what?” look on her face. Agnes always had anxiety attacks every time they flew in a jet. Or even if their ultra-reliable Al-navigated car went, in her mind, a little too fast. Apparently, even after the treatment, some things hadn’t changed. Well, even if he’d sworn off browbeating her, maybe, with a little help from the boys, she might eventually come around to his idea on her own.

Then Agnes said, “What time is it?”

He checked his watch. “Eight forty-five.”

She glanced at her wedding ring, then smiled at him coyly. “Do you remember what we were doing at 9:00, fifty years ago tonight?”

“How could I forget?”

Silently, she took him by the hand, and led him upstairs. Into their bedroom.

“I think,” she said, “we should reminisce some more…”

The call woke her from a sound sleep. She glanced at the clock on her night table. “Damn!” Then she sat up in bed and said, “Answer, audio only.”

“Dr. Renard?” The man on the other end of the line sounded frantic.

“Yes, but I’m not on call tonight—”

“I know. I’m sorry to bother you, but…” He went on to explain the nature of the “emergency.” As he finished Renard, now fully awake, smiled at her unseen caller.

“—And she’s stopped bleeding, but I’m afraid it might start up again. What should we do?”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Schrader. The mild pain and bleeding she had are perfectly natural. Remember when I told you that the rejuvenation treatment makes all tissues in the body regenerate?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that means, all tissues.”

There was a long silence. “You don’t mean—”

“Yes, I do. Hymens grow back too.”

One spring evening, a few months later, Schrader slumped wearily onto the couch. Even with his rejuvenated body, resuming a full schedule of teaching at the university after vegetating for over a decade was still exhausting. He said, “Holoscreen on.” A moment later, after checking the mail, he turned it off disappointedly. Still no message from the International Space Agency on their travel permits. You’d think, he told himself, with two sponsors and the glowing health summaries Dr. Renard sent the Agency all those weeks ago, they should have been approved by now. With the obligatory ten-week training program after they got their permits, if those bureaucrats didn’t hurry he and Agnes might not get to the Moon before Gerry left on his mission.

Then Agnes sat down beside him and whispered in his ear, “I went to see Dr. Renard today.”

“Did she find out why you’ve been feeling sick the last few mornings?”

“Yes, she did.” She smiled in a way he hadn’t seen in many, many years. “Gerry and David are going to have a little sister. Emily Marie—and no arguing over the name!”

Schrader let out a long sigh. Well, the Moon had waited this long. It could wait a little longer. Maybe, someday, the whole family could finally have a reunion on Mars.

Suddenly a horrible thought popped into his mind. Gerry and David had it easy. All they had to do was colonize hostile, dangerous planets. In another three years or so, he and Agnes would be faced with a task far more challenging than that. One that, he knew from past experience, would strain their patience and endurance to the limit.

Potty training.