Bubbies vs. Crims: Deathmatch Vol. IV Emrys Donaldson (bio) The passing of each day skims a sliver from Jess's body. Each time you look there is less of her. Ever unobservant, it took you awhile to notice. At first you attributed it to disordered eating, then, after a concerned conversation that blew up into a fight, you chalked it up to the softening effects of progesterone and estradiol. The creation of negative space began with her belly. Her skin receded until it was just behind her lower ribs. The sloping lines of her hipbones protruded. Cheeks sank. Her skin blurred at its borders, edges decreasing in opacity until they were nearly translucent in the light. Slow, fast. In a day her limbs and head progressed to a diaphanous shimmer. Now she appears as a distortion in the air around her, like a mirage or a cloud. The two of you used to spend evenings on the porch of the computer shop you co-own in a doublewide that sits in a gas station parking lot twelve exits outside the city. Behind the trailer, signs faded almost to obscurity read UNCLE JIM'S BOOM BOOM SHOW. Together, you drank cheap beer as the sun set behind the highway. Sometimes you talked. More often, the dogs snoozed at your feet as you sat together in contented silence. Though now and then you hear the signs of Jess's presence—water running in the bathroom, the slammed back door—you no longer sense her physicality, and when you do, she might be something else. The movement of hairs on your arm from her breath or the air conditioner. The press of her embrace like sweat sticking your shirt to your back. The neon OPEN sign buzzes in the cool humidity of dawn as you stretch and boot up the game. Your socks sink into the musty pile of the industrial carpet. The genital socket Jess made you itches where it folds over the skin of your mons. A few of your rescue dogs wrinkle their snoozy eyes at you from the corners of the room. You convince yourself that playing the video game will help you figure out what's going on. If you play through all the levels, take notes on specific combinations, then you will understand. In the game, pixelated elderly ladies fight pixelated criminals. When the arcade down the road shuttered, Jess rescued the console and modded it. New characters, new storylines, the works. The characters themselves are Jess's commentary on the State of Florida, where you have both lived since birth. Jess used to go on and on about the bubbies and crims, about how they were outsiders, how the whole state was arranged for their benefit. She loved the Florida Man meme for its sendup of the behavior of these outsiders and hated how it became your state's main [End Page 58] representation online. When you zone out and dissociate, you think of yourself as Florida. This Florida, your Florida, where waves of decay spread outward from strip malls in slow waves to cannibalize everything you loved. In addition to the arcade, the bowling alley closed last spring, followed over the summer by the Italian place a few miles away, the one where the cook sang arias as he tossed pizzas. The dive bar with hitching posts out front looks to be next. The screen carves brilliant arcs of light in your night-adjusted vision. White text floats in over a black background as Jess's mashup of vintage rock 'em sock 'em themes and classical Indonesian gamelan plays. Eight-bit images of Bubbies fly in on the left, Crims in the right. You like to play as a dark-complexioned Bubbie with mega stats in attack. Her avatar wears large glasses and her hair in a donut bun. Her foe, a young pale man with a triangular goatee, appears pixel by color-changed pixel, his face contorted in a grimace. Your palm slicks the joystick as you beat the Crim into submission with your Bubbie's handbag. It must be heavy, but what's inside? You note the possibilities. • Gold stones. • Pieces of brick...