by Megan Hart
How nice it would be, she thought as she rounded another landing, to simply get in a box, push a button, and ride all the way up and down the way people used to. No use in wishing for what would never be. It was better to concentrate on navigating the old and crumbling stairs without falling.
She made it to the last landing and burst out into the old lobby in less time than she’d expected. Intent on getting back to the Main Hall, she didn’t even notice Job until he stepped out of the shadows to confront her.
“Getting your hands dirty again?”
Without stopping or turning, Elanna answered curtly, “Yes.”
“C’mon, Elanna.” Job caught up to her as she headed for the door to the street. “Don’t be like that.”
“Like what?” She navigated the series of tall columns dividing the room.
“You know.” Job stretched his gait to catch up to her. For a minute, until he reached her, he had to take two steps to every one of hers. “Not so friendly.”
“Watch out for the pits,” she tossed back to him, stepping around one of the deepest ones. The carpet had long ago rotted away, exposing the buckled concrete that could easily trip the unwary.
“Damn it, Elanna!” Job yelled, sounding really annoyed now. “Wait up!”
She paused just in front of the door. Job caught up to her finally, his handsome mouth pulled into a frown she didn’t need a lantern to see. He pushed her up against one of the columns, and she let herself be pushed.
“What?”
He tried to kiss her, and she turned her face away. “You know what.”
“Stop it.”
Incredibly, he sidled closer to her again, reaching for her hand. The smile she’d always found so charming left her cold this time. When he tried again to kiss her, she ducked away from him.
“It’s not allowed, Job.”
“You didn’t mind before.”
She’d been stupid before, and a lot had changed since then. “I care now.”
“I won’t tell if you won’t.”
He thought he was flirting, but his casual assumption she’d throw away everything she was for the sake of a three-minute schtup in the shadows turned her stomach. Especially since she’d proven him right in the past. She’d let that handsome face, those sweet words, turn her head, even though she knew it was wrong. More than wrong. Forbidden.
“Get away from me.” Even though her voice was low and dangerous, it echoed in the empty lobby until it sounded like a dozen screams. “Don’t you ever say such a thing to me again, or I’ll go straight to the Beit Din.”
This seemed to catch his attention, at least. “You won’t. You wouldn’t dare. You’d be in as much trouble as me. More, maybe.”
“Get off me!”
Only by bursting out into the sunlight at last did Elanna fight away the tears threatening in her eyes. She scrubbed her face hard, willing even that last bit of pain away. She’d made a mistake, one she wouldn’t repeat. Job wasn’t worth it.
“Elanna?”
“Reb Ephraim.” Elanna cursed the scene in the lobby that had forced her to reach the street five minutes later instead of earlier. Perhaps she might’ve missed the Reb entirely.
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.” Elanna wondered if her hair was in disarray, or her clothes. If he’d see the smear of her mouth where Job had tried to kiss her. There was no way to check discreetly, so instead she shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot.
“I thought I heard shouting.” Reb Ephraim stroked his beard thoughtfully.
“I was laughing,” Elanna lied. “With Job. In the lobby. It echoed, that’s all.”
“I see,” Reb Ephraim said with another tug at his beard. “I will see you tonight, then, Elanna.”
She had three other appointments tonight. She’d have to reschedule all of them. “Yes. All right.”
She could deal with another night with Reb Ephraim, closing her eyes while he thrust and grunted above her, his face the color of an autumn sunset only not nearly as pretty. Then later, the trinket or the sweet wrapped in crumpled paper he’d take from his pocket and dole out to her like he was doing her a favor.
Watching him walk away, she allowed herself to close her eyes for one moment, hugging herself in the thin spring sunlight. A baby. She thought of a tender, downy head, and a baby’s sweet scent. The weight of child in her arms. A mouth, suckling. Her nipples peaked at the memory, hot fluid leaking out to stain her shirt.
Reb Ephraim wouldn’t make an appointment with her if he knew she’d already caught. But then she’d have to explain why she hadn’t registered the pregnancy. Why she couldn’t pick out the father from her precisely kept and monitored list of appointments.
She’d have to admit to everyone what she’d allowed to happen.
“Elanna!”
What now? It seemed that she spent all day and most of her nights hearing her name called. Everyone knew her, but did that mean everyone had the right to her time?
Instead of replying to the short girl who’d accosted her, Elanna only waved and smiled. It wasn’t enough. Chedva plowed toward her, sturdy legs moving her along the dirty pavement with the alacrity and power of one of the Gatherers’ trucks.
“Chedva.” Elanna knew her lack of enthusiasm sounded in her voice, but she was powerless to stop it. The good mood she’d had from spending the day in the gardens had evaporated from the triple onslaught of Job, Reb Ephraim and now, and probably most horribly, Chedva. “What do you want?”
Part of Chedva’s charm, or rather lack of it, was her complete inability to notice when people didn’t want to be bothered. Clearly expecting Elanna to stop to talk to her, the other girl frowned when she saw she’d have to keep moving, too. She fell into step beside Elanna with a conscious effort that made Elanna grit her teeth.
“I just wondered how many appointments you had tonight, that’s all,” Chedva said.
“Three.” Elanna spoke before remembering Reb Ephraim had booked with her. She didn’t say anything about that. She could tell Chedva wanted desperately to ask who the appointments were with, but Elanna didn’t say anything about that, either.
“Oh.”
“You?” Elanna asked, though she didn’t really care or want to know. She concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. The pavement here wasn’t as cracked and eroded as in other parts of the city, but it still made sense to watch where she was going if she didn’t want to end up falling on her face.
“Oh, just one. But it’s with Mered. And I’m right in the middle of my cycle, too. So this time I’m sure I’ll catch.”
Elanna tried a smile. “I’m sure you will.”
Chedva, so far, had only caught four times since starting her flow four years before. None of the pregnancies had lasted longer than a few months. Elanna had begun her cycles at age eleven. In the past seventeen years, she’d caught nineteen times. She’d born thirteen children, and eleven had lived. Eleven babies to help the Tribe grow and survive. Suddenly, her irritation with Chedva made her feel awful.
“Mered’s very generous,” Chedva chattered on as she followed Elanna toward the doors to the Main Hall. “He gives all sorts of neat things. Sometimes clothes and stuff, but mostly candy. I love candy!”
Elanna glanced over at the younger girl, whose round body showed just how much she loved candy. “I’d rather have an extra hour in a hot bath, myself. Or an extra hour of light at night.”
Despite the interruptions, Elanna had managed finally to walk the two blocks to the Main Hall. She hated living there, though it was considered by many to be a privilege. She’d have preferred one of the small apartments like those in the buildings surrounding the Hall, or one of the ones located just below the rooftop gardens, high above the city so she could look out her window and see something beyond the buildings next door. Sure, the apartments were dank, dark, without the amenities the Main Hall had, like the bath center. But they were private.
Chedva laughed uncert
ainly. “But you can have a hot bath or an extra hour at night if you want it, Elanna. You can have anything you want.”
Elanna stared at the huge front doors of the Main Hall. Once, when the Hall had been New York’s most famous department store, the doors had been made of glass, huge panes of it. Time and the riots had destroyed them. Now the frames were filled with scraps of metal and wood, fabric and plastic, all bound together. It seemed to her that the patchwork effect, created by the Tribe working together, was more useful and beautiful than any simple glass could have been.
She looked at the shorter girl again. “So could you.”
Chedva had the grace to flush. “No I couldn’t. I’m not like you.”
“Like me?” Elanna said rather cruelly, unable to help herself. “You do the same thing I do.”
“It’s not the same,” Chedva said.
“No,” Elanna replied, thinking of the babies she’d carried and given away. “I don’t suppose it is.”
The other girl kept looking at her with a vapid grin, blinking steadily until Elanna wanted to scream. Instead, she forced a smile. It wasn’t Chedva’s fault she was a pain in the behind.
“Good luck tonight,” Elanna said kindly.
“It must be nice,” Chedva said wistfully. “Having a baby.”
Now Elanna wanted to cry. Hot and surprising tears stung her eyes and her throat was squeezed by a velvet-covered fist. “It’s more than nice. It’s the best thing in the whole world.”
Then she was crying, tears streaking her cheeks, and she fled into the Hall, not caring who saw her as she ran through the lobby and social rooms. She found the narrow escalators that had long ago ceased moving and climbed them, rounding each landing without even a glance to the people and rooms on each floor. At last she’d made it to the top, past the bath center and the latrines until she finally, finally reached the hopemothers’ quarters.
Gasping, she flung herself through the open doorway without even pausing to press a kiss from her fingers onto the mezuzah on the doorpost. She passed the other beds and finally reached hers, where she fell into the softness with a cry of relief. Ironically, her tears had stopped with the running. Crying would soothe the dull ache in her throat and chest, but the tears were gone. She’d spent so many years forcing them away that when she needed them they wouldn’t come.
Without leaving the bed, she reached into the small table beside her and pulled out a small ledger. Tiny, cramped handwriting filled in every white space. Paper was valuable. Just once, how she longed to write a letter using the lines preprinted on the paper! The luxury of it! But being able to write on anything was a luxury at all, and one she only merited because of her value to the Tribe.
She hadn’t asked to be a hopemother. At eleven years she’d woken one morning to cramps and red-stained sheets and thought she might be dying. The realization that she’d only begun her flow had frightened her more than filled her with pride. She’d become a woman before she was ready to leave being a child.
Bracha, the mother who’d raised her, told her what was happening in her body. “Thank Adonai for this blessing. This is a rare and wonderful thing.”
The event was marked with celebration and ceremony just as it had been for a hundred years. Elanna was presented to the Tribe in the Main Hall and given gifts to ensure her future fertility: extra rations for dried milk and meat to keep her strong. Later, they took her to the hopemothers’ quarters and showed her the bed that was to be hers. They left her there with the other hopemothers, and she’d never slept another night anyplace else. She’d never been her mother’s daughter again.
She could still remember the tears she’d cried that first night. The other hopemothers, some only a year or two older, understood. They’d all been through it, too.
Seven nights after her flow ended, she’d had her first appointment. The man had been gentle, but the experience was still awkward and uncomfortable. For both of them. By that time, Elanna had been lauded enough to be excited by what was meant to happen, young enough to think the promise of candy and admiration would be worth everything else. When the Beit Din learned Elanna had caught pregnant from that very first time, she’d been admired as never before. The pregnancy ended in the eighth week. Two months later she was pregnant again.
She flicked her finger down the pages. The first entries were written in a looser, younger hand. The writing grew tighter and more careful as she grew older and the list of names grew longer.
Here, an extra line denoted the man who’d sponsored her first pregnancy. A little further down the page, another line to note that the baby left her womb. Another few pages and another note. Her second pregnancy. And the list stretched on and on. She paused to mark with her finger the name of the man who’d fathered the first child to survive, but passed it quickly by. The child had died before its second day.
Out of all the forty hopemothers, Elanna had caught pregnant the most times. She’d had the most births and the most children surviving. She didn’t need her ledger to remind her of those honors. She wanted it to remind her of the children.
She slipped the book back beneath her pillow and found the other item there. She pulled out the tiny nightgown, its pattern of ducks and teddy bears faded into an uneven whiteness. She brought the small garment to her nose, breathing in deep, but the scent no longer clung there. It had been over a year since her last infant had worn it. She rubbed its softness against her cheek, remembering the feeling of her babies’ skin.
Elanna forced herself to put the gown back beneath her pillow. “Boaz!”
A little breathless as always, the hopemothers’ squire ran into the room. “Yes, Mother?”
Though her heart leaped at the word, Elanna didn’t show her emotion. Boaz called all the hopemothers by that name. It was only a title, not a term of affection.
His fine hair was the color of gold, not like her own dark auburn ringlets, but his eyes were the same piercing blue. He had her eyes and her quick tongue, and it got him into just as much trouble as it got her. He was eight years old. Elanna was not allowed to call him her son.
“I need to change my appointments for this evening,” she told the boy gruffly. “I need you to run and tell these men I can’t see them tonight. Levi, Nachel and Goren. Tell them Reb Ephraim has made an appointment with me.”
“I’ll go right away!”
She wanted to grab him and kiss the cheeks still so soft and sweet, even at eight. She knew he’d be highly offended should she try. Elanna contented herself with digging a sweet from beneath her pillow and tossing it to him. The boy grinned, his smile as much hers as his eyes. With a flick of his feet, he was gone and down the hall.
Elanna sank back onto the pillows for a few more minutes of respite. She was lucky to have such a soft bed. She ran her fingers over the fresh linens, unstained and smooth. Another privilege. Most people were only allowed to change their sheets once a month. Hot water and detergent was too scarce, as was the energy to run the washing machines, to allow any more often than that. In the hopemothers’ quarters, linens were changed every week.
She didn’t have all afternoon to waste in bed, though, no matter how much she would have liked to. Reb Ephraim would expect her immediately after the evening meal. She had to prepare.
She made her way through the maze of halls and stairs to the bath center, which was empty except for the three old women whose job it was to fill and clean the tubs and shower stalls. Elanna nodded at them as she came in, but waved them back to their seats. She didn’t have to show a ration tag, and she didn’t need any help in the tub.
“Tub three’s the cleanest,” Raizel, the oldest woman said, probably grateful she didn’t have to get up. “Have a nice bath, Elanna.”
“Thanks, Raizel. I will.”
Elanna went to the tub the old woman had offered, stepping quickly behind the ragged curtain and pulling it shut. It didn’t close all the way, as usual, but nothing worked the way it was supposed to. Everything was old and h
ad been repaired a thousand times.
The tub, too, was worn but still sturdy. Once it had been painted white, but years of skin sliding over it had worn most of the tub to a silvery sheen. Tub three was the largest out of the ten in the room, and Elanna’s favorite. It was the largest and most private. Even if it had not been the cleanest she’d have chosen it.
Mindful of the time, Elanna opened the spigot until the water flooded out. It hissed and spurted roughly, the pipes knocking. Next she opened the battery panel at the front of the tub. Twiddling with the knobs was a delicate business – too much one way and the batteries would give off too little power. The timer would shut off before the water got hot enough. Turn the knobs too far the other way and the batteries would give off too much power. The water would become scalding, but the power ration would be used up before the tub filled. Sitting in an inch of boiling water was not Elanna’s idea of a nice hot bath.
She sighed as she adjusted the knobs just right. The tub would fill with water hot enough to soak in but not hot enough to peel off her skin. Elanna shed her robe and slipped into the tub, enjoying the smooth metal against the curve of her spine. She closed her eyes, letting the water rise up over her legs and belly and breasts, feeling it finally settle around her neck just as the battery panel pinged and the water coming out of the faucet got cold. The stream of water shut off an instant later. Perfect timing.
The water felt delicious, as always. Elanna let herself sink beneath it, feeling her hair fan out and float, tickling her cheeks and nose. It was quiet beneath the water, and warm.
This must be what babies feel like in the womb, she thought drowsily. She let her hands find her belly. As always before an appointment, she thought about the miraculous mess of tubes and eggs and blood that could create and harbor life. No matter how many times it happened to her, she never ceased to be amazed. No matter how many babies she lost, she never ceased to grieve.
If only she could stay here, Elanna thought. Just sleep. Like a baby, protected. Floating.
Her hands rubbed circles onto her belly. Again, Elanna thought of a baby’s soft skin and sweetness. She needed to register this pregnancy. Find a way to name a father, figure out to explain away the difference between the DNA of whatever man she’d named and the truth. Pray that even though Job had never been approved to have an appointment with her that nothing went wrong, that the child they’d created by mistake would be healthy. Without blemish or flaw.
