The Power

by Naomi Alderman

I took my son to the mall yesterday. He’s nine. I let him look around the toy store alone to pick something out – it was his birthday last week, he has birthday money and he’s smart enough not to wander out of the door without me. But when I came to find him, there was a girl talking to him, maybe thirteen, fourteen years old. One of those tattoos on the palm of her hand. The Hand of Fatima. I asked him what she’d said and he started crying and crying. He asked me if it was true that he was bad and that God wanted him to be obedient and humble. She was trying to convert my son in the fucking store.

  Buckyou

  Fuck. Fuck. That is disgusting. Fucking stupid little lying bitch cunt. I would have hit her so hard she’d be sucking dick through her eyeballs.

  Verticalshitdown

  Dude, I have literally no idea what that even means.

  Manintomany

  Do you have a photo of her? Some kind of ID? There are people who can help you.

  Loosekitetalker

  What was the store? What was the exact time and place? We can find security footage. We can send her a message she won’t forget.

  Manintomany

  PM me details of exactly where you met her, and the name of the store. We are going to strike back against them.

  FisforFreedom

  Guys. I call false flag. A story like this, the OP could make you attack anyone, with minimal evidence. Could be an attempt to provoke reciprocal action just to make us look like the bad guys.

  Manintomany

  Fuck off. We know these things happen. They’ve happened to us. We need a Year Of Rage, just like they’re saying. Bitches need to see a change. They need to learn what justice means.

  UrbanDox933

  There will be nowhere to hide. There will be nowhere to run to. There will be no mercy.

  Margot

  ‘Now tell me, Madam Mayor, were you elected Governor of this great state, what would your plans be to tackle the budget deficit?’

  There are three points to this. She knows it. She has the first two right off.

  ‘I have a simple three-point plan, Kent. Number one: trim the overspend on bureaucracy’ – that’s good, that’s the one to hit them with first: ‘Did you know that current Governor Daniel Dandon’s office for environmental oversight spent more than thirty thousand dollars last year on’ – what was it? – ‘bottled water?’ A pause to let that sink in.

  ‘Number two, cut aid to those who really don’t need it – if your income is over $100,000 a year, this state should not be paying to send your kids to summer camp!’ This is a misrepresentation followed by a gross misrepresentation. This provision would only apply to two thousand families state wide, and most of those have disabled kids, which would exempt them from means testing anyway. Still, it plays well, and mentioning kids reminds people that she has a family, while saying she’ll cut welfare payments makes her seem tough – not just another woman in office with a soft, bleeding heart. Now the third plank. The third.

  The third plank.

  ‘Point three,’ she says, in the hope that the words will find themselves on her tongue if she just keeps talking. ‘Point three,’ she says again a little more firmly. Fuck. She doesn’t have it. Come on. Cutting bureaucracy. Cutting unnecessary welfare payments. And. And. Fuck.

  ‘Fuck, Alan, I’ve lost point three.’

  Alan stretches. Stands up and rolls his neck.

  ‘Alan. Tell me point three.’

  ‘If I tell you, you’ll just forget it again onstage.’

  ‘Fuck you, Alan.’

  ‘Yeah, you kiss your kids with that mouth?’

  ‘They can’t tell the fucking difference.’

  ‘Margot, do you want this?’

  ‘Do I want this? Would I be going through all of this prep if I didn’t want it?’

  Alan sighs. ‘You know it, Margot. Somewhere in there, somewhere inside your head, you have point three of your budget deficit programme. Reach out for me, Margot. Find it.’

  She stares at the ceiling. They’re in the dining room, with a podium mocked up next to the television set. Maddy’s little hand-print paintings are framed on the wall; Jocelyn’s already demanded hers be taken down.

  ‘It’ll be different when we’re actually live,’ she says. ‘I’ll have the adrenaline then. I’ll be more’ – she does jazz hands – ‘peppy.’

  ‘Yeah, you’ll be so peppy that when you can’t remember the third plank of your budget reform you’ll throw up live onstage. Pep. Super-pep. Puke.’

  Bureaucracy. Welfare. And. Bureaucracy … welfare …

  ‘INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT!’ she yells it out. ‘The current administration has refused to invest in our infrastructure. Our schools are crumbling, our roads are poorly maintained, and we need to spend money to make money. I’ve shown that I can manage large-scale projects; our NorthStar camps for girls have been replicated in twelve states now. They create jobs. They keep girls off the streets. And they’ve given us one of the lowest rates of street violence in the country. Infrastructure investment will make our people confident in a secure future ahead of them.’

  That’s it. That was it. There.

  ‘And isn’t it true, Madam Mayor,’ says Alan, ‘that you have worrying ties with private military corporations?’

  Margot smiles. ‘Only if public and private initiatives working hand in hand makes you worried, Kent. NorthStar Systems are one of the most well-respected companies in the world. They run private security for many Heads of State. And they’re an American business, just the kind of business we need to provide jobs for hardworking families. And tell me’ – her smile positively twinkles – ‘would I send my own daughter to a NorthStar day camp if I thought they were anything other than a force for good?’

  There’s a slow round of applause in the room. Margot hadn’t even noticed that Jocelyn’s come in by the side door, that she’s been listening.

  ‘That was great, Mom. Really great.’

  Margot laughs. ‘You should have seen me a few minutes ago. I couldn’t even remember the names of all the school districts in the state. I’ve known those off by heart for ten years.’

  ‘You just need to relax. Come and have a soda.’

  Margot glances at Alan.

  ‘Yeah, yeah. Take ten minutes.’

  Jocelyn smiles.

  Jos is doing better now. Better than she was, anyway. Two years of NorthStar camp have helped; the girls there have taught her how to tone down the highs. It’s been months since she last blew up a lightbulb, and she’s using a computer again without fear of fritzing it. They haven’t helped her lows, though. There are still days – up to a week sometimes – when she has no power at all. They’ve tried linking it to what she eats, to her sleep, to her periods, to exercise, but they can’t find a pattern. Some days, some weeks, she’s got nothing. Quietly, Margot’s talking to a couple of health-insurance providers about funding some research. The state government would be very grateful for their assistance. Even more so if she becomes Governor.

  Jos takes her hand as they walk through the den towards the kitchen. Squeezes it.

  Jos says, ‘So, uh, Mom, this is Ryan.’

  There’s a boy, standing awkwardly in the hall. Hands in his pockets. Pile of books on the side. His dirty-blond hair is falling into his eyes.

  Huh. A boy. Well. OK. Parenting never stops bringing new challenges.

  ‘Hi, Ryan. Good to meet you.’ She extends a hand.

  ‘Nice to meet you, Mayor Cleary,’ he mumbles. At least he’s polite. Could be worse.

  ‘How old are you, Ryan?’

  ‘Nineteen.’

  A year older than Jocelyn.

  ‘And how did you meet my daughter, Ryan?’

  ‘Mom!’

  Ryan blushes. Actually blushes. She’d forgotten how young some nineteen-year-old boys are. Maddy’s fourteen years old and already practising military stances in the mud room and doing the moves she’s seen on TV or that Jos has taught her from the camp. Her power hasn’t
even come in yet and she seems older than this kid standing in the hallway, staring at his shoes and blushing.

  ‘We met at the mall,’ says Jos. ‘We hung out, we drank sodas. We’re just going to do homework together.’ Her tone is pleading. ‘Ryan’s going to Georgetown in the fall. Pre-med.’

  ‘Everyone wants to date a doctor, huh?’ She smiles.

  ‘MOM!’

  Margot pulls Jocelyn close to her, hand in the small of her back, kisses the top of her head and whispers very quietly in her ear, ‘I want your bedroom door open, OK?’

  Jocelyn stiffens. ‘Just until we’ve had time to discuss it. Just today. OK?’

  ‘OK,’ whispers Jos.

  ‘I love you.’ Margot kisses her again.

  Jos takes Ryan’s hand. ‘Love you, too, Mom.’

  Ryan picks up his books awkwardly, with one hand. ‘Nice to meet you, Mrs Cleary,’ and then a look across his face like he knows he’s not supposed to call her Mrs, like he’s been schooled in it, ‘I mean, Mayor Cleary.’

  ‘Nice to meet you too, Ryan. Dinner’s at six thirty, OK?’

  And they go upstairs. That was it. The start of the new generation.

  Alan’s watching from the door to the den. ‘Young love?’

  Margot shrugs. ‘Young something, anyway. Young hormones.’

  ‘Nice to know some things don’t change.’

  Margot looks up through the stairwell to the upper floor. ‘What did you mean before, when you asked me if I wanted it?’

  ‘It’s just … aggression, Margot. You need to attack on those questions. You have to show you’re hungry for it, do you understand?’

  ‘I do want it.’

  ‘Why?’

  Margot thinks of Jocelyn shaking when her power switches off, and how no one can tell them what’s wrong with it. She thinks of how much faster she’d be able to get things done as Governor, without Daniel standing in her way.

  ‘For my daughters,’ she says. ‘I want it to help Jos.’

  Alan frowns. ‘OK, then,’ he says. ‘Back to work.’

  Upstairs, Jos pulls the door closed, turns the handle so softly that even her mother couldn’t hear it. ‘She’ll be down there for hours,’ she says.

  Ryan’s sitting on the bed. He circles her wrist with his thumb and forefinger. Tugs at her to sit next to him. ‘Hours?’ he says, and smiles.

  Jos slants her shoulders one way, then the other. ‘She’s got all this stuff to memorize. And Maddy’s with Dad till the weekend.’ She puts her hand on his thigh. She makes slow circles with her thumb.

  ‘Do you mind?’ says Ryan. ‘That she’s busy with all this stuff, I mean.’

  Jos shakes her head.

  ‘I mean, is it weird,’ he says, ‘with the press and everything?’

  She scratches at the fabric of his jeans with her nails. His breathing speeds up.

  ‘You get used to it,’ she says. ‘Mom always says, our family is still private. Anything that happens behind closed doors is just between us.’

  ‘Cool,’ he says. He smiles. ‘I don’t wanna be on the evening news is all.’

  And she finds that so adorable that she leans in and kisses him.

  They’ve done this before, but it’s still so new. And they’ve never done it before somewhere with a door, and a bed. She’s been afraid that she’d hurt someone again; sometimes she can’t stop thinking of that boy she put in hospital, the way the hairs on his arms crisped and how he held his ears like the sound was too loud. She’s talked about all this with Ryan. He understands like no boy she’s ever met before. They’ve talked about how they’ll take their time and won’t let it get out of control.

  The inside of his mouth is so warm and so wet and his tongue is so slippery. He moans, and she can feel the thing starting to build up in her, but she’s OK, she’s done her breathing exercises, she knows she can control it. Her hands are on his back, and down past his belt, and his hands are tentative at first but then more confident, grazing the side of her breast, then his thumb on her neck and at her throat. She has a fizzing, popping feeling across her collar and a heavy ache between her legs.

  He pulls away for a moment. Frightened, excited.

  ‘I can feel it,’ he says. ‘Show it to me?’

  She smiles, breathless. ‘Show me yours.’

  They’re both laughing, then. She unbuttons her shirt, first button, second button, third. Down to just where the edge of her bra starts to be visible. He’s smiling. He pulls off his sweater. Unbuttons the undershirt beneath it. One, two, three buttons.

  He runs the tips of his fingers along her collarbone, where her skein is thrumming slightly under her skin, excited and ready. And she lifts her hand, touches his face.

  He’s smiling. ‘Go on.’

  She feels from the point of his collar along the bone. She cannot feel it at first. But then, there it is, faint but glittering. There’s his skein, too.

  They had met in the mall, that part was perfectly true. Jocelyn has learned enough from being raised in a politician’s house to know that you never lie outright if you can avoid it. They’d met in the mall, because that’s where they’d decided to meet. And they’d decided it in a private chatroom online, both of them looking for people like them. Weird people. People in whom the thing hadn’t taken right, one way or the other.

  Jocelyn had looked at the horrible UrbanDox site some stranger had emailed her, all about how this thing is the start of a holy war between men and women. UrbanDox had one blog post where he talked about sites for ‘deviants and abnormals’. Jocelyn had thought, That’s me. That’s where I should go. Afterwards, she was amazed she hadn’t thought of it before.

  Ryan, from what they can tell, is even more rare than Jocelyn. He has a chromosomal irregularity; his parents have known about it since he was a few weeks old. Not all the boys like this grow skeins. Some of them died when their skeins tried to come in. Some of them have skeins that don’t work. In any case, they keep it to themselves; there have been boys who’ve been murdered for showing their skein in other, harder parts of the world.

  On some of those websites for deviants and abnormals, people are wondering what would happen if you got the women to try to wake the power up in men, if you taught them the techniques that are already being used in the training camps to strengthen the power in weaker women. Some of them are saying, Maybe more of us would have it if they tried. But most men aren’t trying any more, if they ever did. They don’t want to be associated with this. With weirdness. With chromosomal irregularity.

  ‘Can you … do it?’

  ‘Can you?’ he says.

  This is one of her good days. The power in her is even and measured. She can dole it out by the teaspoon. She sends a tiny portion into the side of him, not more than a jab in the ribs with an elbow. He makes a little sound. A noise of deliciousness. She smiles at him.

  ‘Now you.’

  He takes her hand in his. He strokes the middle of her palm. And then he does it. He’s not as controlled as she is, and his power is much weaker, but there it is. Jittering, the power growing and waning even over the three or four seconds he sustains it. But there.

  She sighs, with the feeling of it. The power is very real. The feeling of it delineates the lines of the body very clearly. There is already so much porn of it. The single dependable human desire is very adaptable; what there is, in humans, is sexy. This, now, is what there is.

  Ryan watches her face as he sends his power into her hand, his eyes eager. She makes a little gasp. He likes it.

  When his power is spent – and he doesn’t have much, he never has had – he lies back on her bed. She lies next to him.

  ‘Now?’ she says. ‘Are you ready?’

  ‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Now.’

  And she touches his earlobe with the tip of one finger. Brings the crackle to him, until he is writhing and laughing and begging her to stop and begging her to carry on.

  Jos quite likes girls. She quite likes boys who are a
bit like girls. And Ryan was only a bus ride away; it was lucky. She messaged him privately. They met at the mall. They liked each other. They met two or three more times. Talked about it. Held hands. Made out. And she brought him back home. She thinks, I have a boyfriend. She looks at his skein; it’s not pronounced at all, not like hers. She knows what some of the girls from NorthStar camp would say, but she finds it sexy. She places her lips to his collarbone and feels the vibration beneath the skin. She kisses her way along it. He is like her, but unlike her. She sticks her tongue between her teeth and licks him where he tastes like battery.

  Downstairs, Margot is on to much-needed support for vulnerable seniors. She’s using almost all of her attention to remember her lines. But a little part of her brain is still whirring over that question Alan asked her. Does she want it? Is she hungry for it? Why does she want it? She thinks of Jos and how she’d be able to help her if she had more power and influence. She thinks of the state and how she’d be able to change things for the better. But, as her fingers grip the cardboard podium and the charge begins to build across her collarbone almost involuntarily while she speaks, the real reason is that she can’t stop thinking of the look she’d see on Daniel’s face if she got it. She wants it because she wants to knock him down.

  Roxy

  Mother Eve had heard a voice saying: One day there’ll be a place for the women to live freely. And now she’s getting hundreds of thousands of hits from that new country where women had, until recently, been chained in basements on dirty mattresses. They’re setting up new churches in her name, without her having had to send a single missionary or envoy. Her name means something in Bessapara; an email from her means even more.

  And Roxy’s dad knows people on the Moldovan border, he’s been doing business with them for years. Not in flesh, that’s a dirty trade. But cars, cigarettes, booze, guns, even a bit of art. Leaky border’s a leaky border. With all the disruption recently, it’s got leakier than ever.