Island

by Johanna Skibsrud

  The cruelty was not so much in what he said but in how he said it. Offhandedly, as though the thing hardly needed to be discussed.

  Rachel lunged—raised her fist at him as if to strike. He and she stared at one another—and then at her raised fist between them. “How dare you,” Rachel said, before lowering her hand. She and Ray were roughly the same height. As she brought her hand down, she leaned her face in toward him, forcing him to look her in the eye. “How dare you say something like that.”

  The cruelty—as she was forced to reflect later—was that she knew it was true. Even as a baby, Zoe hadn’t been like other kids. She’d avoided eye contact, been painfully shy. Now, at six, she talked to herself and, honestly, most of the time seemed to prefer her own company.

  It was difficult for someone like Rachel—who’d always felt obligated to at least appear confident and self-assured—to understand. It was, perhaps, the one thing that still connected her to her own parents, who—for a brief, sweet, and now just barely recalled time in her early childhood—had actually had her fooled. She remembered, a little wistfully now, how she’d at one time believed them to be everything they imagined. She’d thought them fearless, intelligent, cultured; above all, rich.

  Now, of course, she recognized them for what they were: solidly middle-class people from sensible penny-pinching Presbyterian stock—decent enough folk who’d worked hard to balance, on the one hand, their aspirations toward upward mobility with, on the other, an innate sense that they were fundamentally unworthy of what they already had.

  But there’d been a decade or so before Rachel began to notice the signs of obvious strain—of the way that her parents struggled, together, but more often against one another, to appear better off, better educated, and more apparently in love. Once she noticed it she couldn’t unnotice it. It began to cause in her a profound embarrassment that bordered on physical dread.

  This was a feeling she still experienced—now not only on account of her parents. Because of it, Rachel respected her daughter—was even slightly awed by her at times. But this did nothing to change the fact that, deep down, she still held on to the fervent hope—no, the actual belief—that it was only a matter of time before Zoe “caught up” (that’s how her mother always put it), became just like everyone else.

  Ray knew it. He’d flinched slightly when Rachel leaned in toward him. But he hadn’t backed down.

  “You always need there to be some reason,” he’d said. His voice was cold, but the meanness in it had ebbed. His eyes looked softer, rounder—like there was something at the bottom. Rachel had certainly got to him—but it wasn’t a good feeling this time. “You really don’t understand anything, do you?” Ray asked.

  Rachel took a step back.

  “It’s like you’re always looking for something, or”—Ray’s voice sharpened in his throat. For a moment it felt dangerous—“or someone,” he continued, “to blame.”

  “Fine,” Rachel said. Hot tears had sprung into the corners of her eyes and she took another step back, turned away.

  But then over her shoulder: “It really doesn’t matter what it’s about, though, does it?”

  She wasn’t prepared to admit that Ray was right, exactly. It was just that, when it came to certain subjects, she and he both knew that she was immediately out of her depth. Until recently—until Zoe was born—that had never really mattered. She’d felt proud of the difference that existed between herself and Ray—proud that she understood and could respect that difference. But when it came to Zoe. When it came to her own daughter…How dare Ray suggest that she didn’t understand.

  “No, it won’t matter what it’s about,” Rachel said, “when it’s not just name-calling anymore.”

  She hated herself a little for needing, as usual, to have the last word, but in this case she couldn’t help it. Ray was acting purposely obtuse. He knew as well as she did how thoroughly violence permeated the island—and how much they had at stake.

  Although it was true that, so far, their own lives had been well isolated from violence, to presume they were somehow exempt was just as wrongheaded as it was to play the victim; Rachel had been arguing as much for nearly two years. It was not something that could be hidden any longer, she’d insisted, not something that could be simply patched up. The rift that had grown between rich and poor on the island, as well as between inside and out, threatened—eventually—to swallow them all.

  If you wanted statistics, hard facts, Rachel had plenty. Since the collapse of the fishery, at least 67 percent of islanders were unemployed. The money they received from government pensions was spent on alcohol—or supported the one industry, besides telecommunications, that had ever thrived on the island: the manufacture of cheaper and cheaper forms of methamphetamines. According to the latest global health poll, over half of the island was addicted to one form of the drug or another. This was a statistic Rachel had cited at countless meetings with the ambassador and representatives of foreign aid. She permitted herself a little pointed emotion when she added that the youngest addicts were no older than her own daughter: six.

  After a moment or two of silence, Rachel would shift to a more practical note. The problem didn’t originate on the island, she’d say, and it couldn’t be contained there. There was simply no way forward either for the island or for the Empire without breaking down the imaginary borders that existed between them—and accepting responsibility for the mistakes of the past.

  What she didn’t say was that she only sent her daughter to the local public school because there weren’t enough foreign kids on the island to merit a private elementary. Or that she had her daughter picked up and dropped off every day by a driver; or that since her arrival on the island, neither she nor her family had engaged with the local population in any way, outside an official capacity.

  This last point had to do, of course, with “issues of security.” The sorts of issues that were mentioned so often at the embassy that no one wondered anymore exactly what they were—or perceived the disconnect between the level of caution advised and the fact that, except for a handful of isolated incidents, foreigners on the island had never been the target of any real violence. They simply weren’t “part of the equation.”

  Well, precisely! And yet, Rachel acknowledged, her own family’s situation was more difficult. There came a point when you simply had to choose, she told Ray: big picture or small. Of course she hated the idea of “running away” just as much as Ray did—possibly even more. But they had their own family to think about now, and wasn’t it a bit foolish—self-aggrandizing, even—to imagine that their personal decision about whether to stay on the island or go would make a difference to anyone?

  She could see it all too clearly. Two more years of arguing for “clear policies” and “centralized strategic planning.” To whom? For what? As she’d been told countless times now, “every imaginable step” had already been taken: an imported foreign police presence, educational outreach programs, support groups for battered women and abusive men…None of it, so far, had made the least bit of difference. People continued to talk about having their faces “rearranged” the way they talked about cricket, or the weather. Only the week before, a teenager had been nearly killed in broad daylight behind Josie’s canteen over something less than ten dollars.

  There was an important distinction to be made, Rachel informed Ray, between taking responsibility for one’s life and safety and “running away.”

  Still, for some reason, Ray had resisted, and it was not until some weeks later that he finally admitted that something was wrong.

  “Ray!” Rachel had shrieked when Zoe walked in the door after being dropped off by Grigor at the end of the drive. Zoe didn’t speak; she didn’t need to. She had her arms stretched out in front of her and Rachel could clearly see the places where her forearms and wrists had been chafed nearly raw.

  “Ray!” Rachel had shrieked again—as though Ray had inflicted the harm on his daughter himself. Then she flew t
oward Zoe. “Who did this to you?”

  Zoe began to sob.

  “Tell me!” Rachel begged, her voice nearly pulsing with anger. “Tell me who did this!”

  But Zoe was sobbing too hard to speak. Rachel reached for her again, but this time Zoe pulled back reflexively. As usual, Ray—standing there like a long shadow against the wall—looked to her like a safe retreat. Zoe ran to him, flung her thin arms around his waist.

  Ray’s arms closed around her. “Let’s calm down,” he said—both to her and to Rachel. “Let’s all just calm down.”

  But it was a long time before either of them calmed down enough for Zoe to tell them what had happened. When at last she did, Rachel had exploded a second time—she couldn’t help it—and the whole thing had started over again.

  Three girls, Zoe told her parents, had pinned her to the fence after the last bell—in plain sight of the gate—and twisted her skin on both arms until it burned. “They said…bad words,” Zoe sniffed. “They told me to say them too, but I wouldn’t—I didn’t.”

  “What bad words?”

  Zoe sobbed loudly; Ray shot Rachel a reproving glare.

  “What bad words?” Rachel asked again. She hovered above Zoe, her jaw set. She knew goddamn well what words they’d been—even if Ray wanted to pretend that she didn’t.

  But Zoe only pressed her face harder against Ray’s shirt and spoke into the cloth. “I didn’t say them!” she said. “I didn’t say any bad words.”

  “It doesn’t matter, honey,” Ray said. “It wouldn’t matter if you did.”

  Zoe’s little body stiffened. “But I didn’t,” she insisted. “I wouldn’t.”

  “Okay,” Ray said, stroking his daughter’s back and looking steadily at Rachel. “You’re all right,” he said—more to Rachel than to Zoe. “Everyone’s all right now.”

  But they weren’t all right, and both of them knew it. After Zoe was in bed that night Ray paced the living room angrily, and Rachel wept.

  They’d call the school to complain, of course—and yet they worried that drawing attention to the problem would only make things worse. “We should keep things in perspective,” Ray said at one point. He was standing with his hands dangling at his sides, blinking into the glare of the TV—turned to the ten o’clock news. He’d become heavier in the past year or so and, though Rachel knew it wasn’t what required her attention at that moment, she noticed that there was something in his posture that accentuated the added weight. “We should remember,” he was saying, “that we’re talking about chafed wrists. It’s the sort of thing that could happen anywhere. I mean, that level of aggression in kids, it’s clearly impossible to avoid.”

  Yes, Rachel thought. He really shouldn’t stand like that. It made him look a little…sad, ineffectual. Decidedly middle-aged.

  What she said was: “This isn’t about you or me anymore, Ray. It isn’t about our careers. About how much we can take.”

  Rachel faxed an official complaint to the capital the next day. Was the situation “untenable”? Did she feel that a “direct threat” was posed in the country of residence to either herself or her family? After only a moment’s hesitation, she’d checked “yes,” and then again, “yes.” Two weeks later they were making arrangements for Ray and Zoe to leave the island. Rachel, it had been agreed, after a somewhat disorienting meeting with the ambassador, would stay. The ambassador assured Rachel that he was, of course, sensitive to the situation; but with rotation schedules and personnel shortages, she would certainly be doing everyone a favour if, knowing that her family was out of danger, she’d consider staying on at least until early May.

  She’d agreed. Without consulting Zoe—or Ray. Well, really (as she explained to both of them afterward), she was in no position to refuse. Everyone had been remarkably supportive, nothing but sympathetic from the start. The ambassador had even personally apologized—and, as though reading Rachel’s mind, assured her that the decision wasn’t at all likely to have a “negative impact” on either her or her husband’s career.

  “Times have changed,” the ambassador had told her, smiling benevolently and giving his head a quick toss so that his neck cracked sharply. He straightened again, looking relieved. “Yes, you’ve come in at a good moment, Darling,” he said. “Times have certainly changed.” Some of the old guard would sniff, no doubt, he continued—would wonder what a “hardship tour” was these days, when one was permitted to choose one’s woes—but it was clear that the old guard were being left further and further behind. “It’s remarkable when you think about it,” the ambassador went on, chuckling softly to himself. “Given the way that nothing ever seems to change at all…”

  It was true that even over the course of Rachel’s own brief career she’d seen clear signs that things were beginning to shift—and would continue to. It was impossible not to notice, for example, how, as you moved from the outer to the inner offices, the staff got whiter, maler. In less than a generation, these central offices would be inhabited by those (like Rachel) now located in the outer offices, and all that would be left of the old guard would be their nearly featureless images, which—for who knew how many years yet—would continue to stare down at them, disapprovingly, from the bank of photographs that lined the main hall.

  No, requesting to leave a post on such reasonable grounds would not be held against either Rachel or Ray—Rachel felt confident of that. But she also saw no reason to push their luck. When she’d agreed to remain on the island until May it had “made sense” to everyone. Now, though, she got the distinct impression that both Ray and Zoe resented the situation.

  She tried to tell herself it was only her imagination, that it was all in her head. Of course, as a woman, she was—one way or the other—going to wind up feeling like she was letting everyone down. Of course she was going to feel that the decision she’d made was stubborn and selfish rather than inevitable (the way she was quite certain they both would have felt had Ray been in her shoes).

  Knowing this changed nothing, however, and—more and more—Rachel suspected that she’d misread things from the very beginning. That Ray’s saying the decision “made sense” was just another way of saying she’d be heartless to choose it; that agreeing it was “the only choice” had included the silent amendment: “if, that is, one is more interested in one’s career than in one’s child.”

  Well, why hadn’t he come out and said it then! Did she actually need to remind Ray that the decision had been as hard on her as it had been on Zoe and him? That she’d chosen to remain on the island not out of selfish desire (she’d give just about anything to be putting in easy time back on the mainland, like Ray; to never have even set foot on the island!) but based on a series of practical calculations that would soon benefit them all? After this, at any rate, it would be simply impossible to say they hadn’t “put in their time.” Ray knew this as well as Rachel did. And also this: that if it hadn’t been this island, it would have been another. And in the scheme of things, even Rachel had to admit…it hadn’t been so bad. A scrape. A few bruises. But they would come out stronger for it—she was nearly sure of it. The time she’d spent apart from Ray and Zoe—something just less than six months—would pretty soon disappear entirely, would hardly be recalled.

  The telephone buzzed in her purse. She slid it out and stared expectantly at its lit-up screen. But it was only Phil Mercer, CIO of the major telecommunications company—Ø Com—that managed a base on the island. Calling to ask for another favour, no doubt. Jesus Christ, it was her last day in the office.

  Reluctantly, Rachel tapped the screen. “Phil,” she said.

  “Hate to bother you, Rachel.”

  “No bother. I’m just on my way out the door. Why don’t I—”

  “No, listen,” Phil said. “I wanted to catch you while you weren’t in the office.”

  Rachel could see Grigor out the window, leaning against the hood of his car, staring into his phone. “You know it’s my last day, Phil,” she said. She’d paused
on the second-floor landing and now she leaned her weight against the narrow banister. “What’s up?”

  “You’ve got to talk to Vollman.”

  Ed Vollman had been acting president of the island for going on fifteen years. The island didn’t have any stipulation on the length of time any president could serve, and there was no reason to suspect, at this rate, that he would not be the president for another fifteen. Every election the same islanders trickled into the polls and, so far, there’d never been any genuine opposition. But then there had never been anything to oppose. Vollman was president in name only. The island was an independent nation, but everyone knew that all the real decisions were made by the capital—and by Mercer, by Ø.

  So what was this about talking to Vollman, when she’d never talked to Vollman and no one else had ever talked to Vollman? Except about vacation rentals and imported booze.

  “What’s Vollman got to do with anything?”

  “Everything,” Phil said. He sounded breathless. As though he were walking uphill. “He’s got us blocked. Some old paperwork—hard to explain it all over the phone. I’m telling you, though, it’s a real mess. Something about a clause in the original cable deal—somehow no one caught it till now. Vollman dug it up. Can you believe it? Vollman!”

  Rachel’s phone buzzed again. Her heart leapt. But it was Grigor, wondering what was keeping her.

  “Look, Phil, I’ve got to go.”

  “The cable station,” Phil continued, his voice going uphill. “The old paperwork says it has to be physically located on the island. I mean, we’re talking about a deal that was drawn up nearly two hundred years ago, Rachel. For telegraph wires. And Vollman, for some reason, isn’t budging. He says it’s a matter of national pride. I kid you not, he pulled that on me. National pride, he said. And I said—”