by Mark Mann
Noah scoops some water from a large bucket into an old saucepan. He stands the saucepan on a wire rack on top of the fire. The fire is filling the room with smoke.
When the water is boiling Sara adds a few dried leaves and fills four cups. Noah takes a loaf of bread from the shelf, cuts four slices and spreads a thin smear of jam on each slice.
I take a bite. The bread is hard and stale.
Noah chews thoughtfully. “Not bad. Dandelion tea and strawberry jam. Dandelions and strawberries from the garden. Rainwater from the roof. Homemade bread too. Of course, we still have to buy the flour.”
After we’ve eaten Sara leads us into another room. There’s an old double mattress on the floor.
“How are you two feeling?” she asks. “You took a bit of a beating back there.” She presses Jack’s rib and he winces. Sara presses a couple more times. “I think it’s just bruised,” she says. “You’d be in a lot more pain if it was broken.” She turns to me. “Now let’s look at your leg,” she says. She makes me roll up my trousers. My shin is bloody with a deep purple bruise. Sara presses the bruise with her thumb. It’s painful but not too bad. She gets a bowl of water and a cloth and washes the wound.
“You’re lucky. The way you went down, I thought he’d broken your leg for sure. Anyway, get some rest.” Sara shows us how to flush the toilet by scooping water into it from a bucket, then leaves us to sleep.
“Shit,” Jack says. He buries his head in his hands. “Shit, shit, shit.”
“I know,” I reply. There’s nothing to say really. We’re home, but we’re not home. But we’re going to have to deal with it. At least we know what we have to do this time. Survive until the next full moon and get back to the portal. Although I’ve got a terrible feeling that surviving in this world won’t be easy.
The mattress is old and lumpy, but it’s the softest thing we’ve slept on for a month. I fall asleep almost as soon as I lie down. It’s been a big night.
***
Sara shakes us awake. Jack sits up and yawns sleepily. Sunlight shines through the gaps in the boarded-up window. I know this window faces west, so it must be afternoon. Sara takes us out into the back garden and puts us to work building up one of the vegetable beds, piling soil on top of large stones. She says the vegetables need to be raised because the tides are getting higher. It’s a hot afternoon and it’s hard work. Sara wasn’t joking about making us earn our keep.
Noah, who’s been out somewhere, returns at dusk. He starts the fire in the metal drum and puts a handful of potatoes and carrots on to boil. He unwraps a cloth. Inside is a chunk of ham. He shaves a few thin slices into the pot.
“Don’t suppose you know anything about preserving meat, do you?” he asks.
“Since we lost electricity we need to learn all that stuff,” Sara says. “Well, re-learn it really. How they used to store food in the days before electricity. Pickling, smoking, drying, curing, salting ... with all these heatwaves, food goes off so quickly.
“But without electricity, of course, we can’t use the internet to look things up. And most of the books at the library got destroyed in the big flood last year. Old Mrs Lipardi, down the road, still remembers some of that stuff from when she was a girl back in Italy.
“What happened to the electricity?” Jack asks.
“Can’t afford it any more, like everyone else. Even if we could, they’ve stopped repairing the power lines. The power is out more often than it’s on. The only places you still get regular electricity are the Plaza and up in the Fortress.”
“The Fortress?” I ask.
“The Heights. It’s where the rich people live,” Noah says. “It’s high enough that it doesn’t flood, you see. Everyone calls it the Fortress now, since they built that wall around it. Didn’t you notice the wall when you got into the van?”
“The people in the Fortress aren’t really rich, of course,” Sara explains. “Anyone with real money moved Inland ages ago. But they’re rich for Coasties. That’s to say they’ve got jobs. Government jobs, mainly—they’re just about the only real jobs left on the Coast.”
“Even they won’t last long,” Noah says. “The government is slowly closing services on the Coast. They’re just focusing on Inland now. Scarce resources and all that. At the same time, they’re beefing up security. There are the Fences that cut the Coast off from Inland. More patrols. Soon the Coast—all of us down here—will simply be left to die.”
“Mind you,” Sara says, “inside the Fortress it’s like the old days. Electricity, computers, fridges. With food in them. Things get fixed.”
“Though less so now,” Noah says, more to Sara than us. “Even up there things are starting to fall apart.”
Sara gives us a quizzical look. “Of course if you’re not refos then you already know all this. Don’t you?”
Not really. None of it makes much sense.
***
In the morning we find out why the ground floor of the house is abandoned, and why Sara wanted the vegetable beds raised, because the ground floor is ankle-deep in water. The garden is flooded too, except for the raised beds. Yet I didn’t hear any rain last night. I check with Jack. He didn’t hear rain either.
We find Noah and Sara in the garden, standing in the water, examining the vegetable beds.
“That must have been a big storm last night,” I say, wading over to join them.
Noah snorts. “Storm? Taste the water.”
I scoop some water in my palm and wet my lips. The water is salty.
“See,” Noah says. “It’s the sea, not rain. It’s a king tide. All of Baytown floods on these big tides now. All of the Coast.” He looks at me curiously. “Surely you know that,” he says.
He inspects the vegetables. “The water will go down in a day or so. The problem is it leaves salt behind, and too much salt will kill the plants. That’s why we’re raising the vegetable beds, so their roots are above the salt water. But if the sea keeps rising, soon nobody in Baytown will be able to grow food.”
Noah pauses to slap a mosquito against his arm. It leaves a squidgy mess on his skin. “It gets worse,” he says. “The salt water soaks down into the soil where the trees draw their water. So they’ll die too. Including the fruit trees.”
Sara looks up. “We’ve got to grow food to survive. It’s just too expensive to buy it. All the droughts and crop failures Inland have pushed food prices up. Even bread’s a luxury now, since the wheat harvest failed.”
“The salt will make the underground aquifer undrinkable too,” Noah points out. “We need that water. Every time there’s a power cut, town water stops because all the pumping stations run on electricity. And rainwater tanks don’t hold enough to get us through the droughts. And ... well, you can’t live without water, can you?”
He shrugs. “Anyway, we can’t do much in the garden until the water goes down, so we might as well get your identity papers.”
***
Outside Noah and Sara’s gate, the streets are all flooded. It’s tiring to wade through the water, but after a few blocks we come to a house with two giant scrap-metal sculptures of dragons out front. Some metal birds hang from a tree. We slosh through the water to the front door, which is opened by a thin man with small round glasses and a ponytail.
“Noah, Sara,” he notices us, “and friends ... pleased to meet you. The name’s Leo. Come in. Jill’s in the garden.”
Sara goes through into the garden while Leo takes us upstairs to a disorganised artist’s den of papers, pens and half-finished paintings. He waves us to the sofa and Noah says we need Resident Permits.
“No problem,” Leo says. “Want some tea? I’ve got some real green tea leaves. Put your thumb in the ink and press here. I’ll need names, birthdates, place of birth...”
Leo puts a saucepan of water on the fire then scrabbles around on his desk for the right materials and sets to work.
“Did you measure the tide Noah?” he asks as he works.
“Yeah. A metre
twenty. It’s higher, of course.”
Leo pauses. “Yeah, that’s what I got, roughly. A rise of six centimetres this year, eh?”
Leo holds one of the permits up to the light to examine it.
“So, one metre twenty. That’s … erm …” he scribbles some figures. “I’d say we’re on track for a three-metre rise within thirty years. My front step is two metres above sea level. Yours?”
Noah nods. “About the same. Maybe less.”
“And of course that’s just the start. Who knows how high it will go if all the ice in Greenland and West Antarctica melts. It’s just a question of time before Baytown is uninhabitable. The whole Coast too.”
“Let’s hope they get a move on with the Resettlement Program,” Noah says.
“Yeah, right,” Leo snorts. “Maybe we’ll all be sent to live on Mars. Anyway, you two, stand against that wall so I can take your pictures. I can’t use a digital camera at the moment because I’ve got no electricity to run the printer. I’ve had to go back to the old method—you know, using film and a darkroom—so you’ll have to collect the permits tomorrow when I’ve had time to develop the film. Puts the price up too, I’m afraid. You can’t imagine how hard it is to get hold of rolls of film nowadays. Right, let’s have some tea.”
***
This morning Sara takes me with her up to the Fortress to help her clean. That’s her job, or one of them. Cleaning. “You have to take what you can get,” she says. “It’s so hard to find a real job now that all the businesses have moved Inland.”
It’s early but it’s already warm. It feels like it’s going to be another hot day. As we walk across town there are still puddles everywhere from the king tide. Rats scurry for cover and a man lies sprawled on the pavement. I can’t tell if he’s dead or alive. We walk up Hillview Street. When we get to the Heights—Castle Heights—there’s the wall again, topped with barbed wire, running along the street to our right. Big metal security gates block the entrance. Beside them, a guard stares blankly out of his booth.
I can see why they call it the Fortress.
“Hi George.” Sara smiles at the guard. “Just coming to clean Mrs Peterson’s. This is my cousin Kaya. She’s giving me a hand.”
The guard looks at me.
“Don’t recall seeing you before, love,” he says.
“I, erm, no I...”
“Her parents don’t let her out much. I’ve promised I’ll take care of her,” Sara says.
“I’m sure she’s in good hands then,” the guard says. He presses a button and the gate swings open.
Sara leans into the booth. “Noah’s made some smoked possum. Thought you’d like some.” She gives the guard a small bag. “We trapped a possum in our roof. Old Fred Hoskins showed us how to smoke it.”
The guard pulls a face. “Possum, eh? Who’d have thought? But we got to take what we can these days, don’t we.” He slips the bag into his pocket. “Okay, in you go.”
I notice Kaya glance at the guard’s security camera screen. She frowns slightly and looks like she’s about to say something, but she quickly changes her mind and smiles sweetly. “Thanks George. You’re a darling.”
Inside the gate it’s a different world. Or rather, it’s like being back in our world. The windows still have glass. The trees haven’t been ripped apart for firewood. It’s all tidy houses and neat gardens. There are cars in the driveways. A middle-aged man passes by, walking his dog. He reminds me of someone but I can’t quite place him.
“Hi Mr Jones,” Sara says. The man glances round and nods, then keeps walking.
That’s who it is. Mr Jones. His daughter Emma is in my class at school. Dad chats to him sometimes.
“Excuse me, Mr Jones,” I call after him. “I’m Kaya Johnson. I go to school with Emma.”
Mr Jones turns round. He looks puzzled.
“You must be mistaken, my dear,” he says. “I don’t know anyone called Emma.”
“I... erm, I’m... sorry, I thought you were someone else for a moment,” I mumble. The man carries on walking his dog. But I know I’m right. He is Emma’s dad. Except, in this world, it seems he isn’t.
Sara looks at me curiously.
“What were you looking at on the guard’s screen?” I ask, to change the subject.
“Nothing. Literally. Nothing at all. Here we are.”
A slim middle-aged woman in a tracksuit opens the door. A draft of cool air escapes from inside the house. A small dog hides behind the woman’s legs and yaps at us.
“Shush Milo. Silly dog. Come in Sara. Who’s your friend?”
“Hello Mrs Peterson. This is Kaya. She’s going to help me.”
We follow Mrs Peterson into the kitchen. It’s what I’d have called, until recently, an ordinary kitchen. Oven, fridge, microwave, cream floor tiles, spices in a rack and a coffee machine on the counter. A television turned on in the corner. There’s an air-conditioning unit on the wall and the room is wonderfully cool.
“Well,” Mrs Peterson is saying. “If she’s as good a cleaner as you... but I can’t pay you more, you know. We’re having to tighten our belts as it is. They’re cutting the Coastal Living Allowance.”
“We don’t expect more money. I was just thinking we could do more houses. If you know anyone else who needs some cleaning ...”
Mrs Peterson promises to ask around for us. She pauses to watch a news bulletin on the television.
“... the US has suspended wheat exports following the failure of its wheat harvest,” the newsreader says. “Experts fear the move will spark a food crisis in countries that now rely on US wheat after the failures of their own harvests. US Secretary of Agriculture Isaac Abrams blamed global warming for the poor harvest and says ‘America must feed its own citizens first’ ...”
Mrs Peterson turns the television off and picks up her car keys.
“We’re one of those countries, aren’t we? That needs American wheat.”
Sara nods. “I think so. I don’t know.”
“They’ll have to consider food rationing now,” Mrs Peterson continues. “Otherwise we’ll all end up fighting for food. Don’t you agree?”
“Yes, Mrs Peterson.”
“Okay, I’m off to the gym. You know where everything is. And remember to feed Milo.”
Sara watches Mrs Peterson leave. “End up fighting for food!” she snorts, once we’re alone. “We already are. She’s got no idea.”
“I thought she was quite nice,” I say.
“She is. But she rarely leaves the Fortress these days. They’ve got their own gym and cafe and school and swimming pool up here. She’s driving three blocks to the gym. Can you imagine? The only time they see life outside is at the Plaza. They don’t realise what it’s like now for the rest of us.”
“She must see it on the news?”
“Somehow the news is always about somewhere else. Look...”
Sara turns the television back on. The news is still on.
“... India has closed its border with Bangladesh, saying it can’t cope with the estimated twenty million refugees after Bangladesh’s worst floods yet, as aid agencies warn rising seas mean Bangladesh ‘may need to be abandoned entirely’ ...”
We watch the report for a few minutes. There are pictures of streets flooded with dirty brown water and people living in overcrowded tent cities and staring through wire fences with blank, exhausted expressions. There’s another report about fighting in a country called Somalia. Then we’re on to the sports news. Sara turns the television off. “See. Bangladesh. India. Somalia. I don’t even know where half these places are. Terrible stuff, of course. But nothing about what’s going on here.”
Sara gets a packet of dog biscuits from the cupboard. She eats some and gives some to the dog. She offers me the packet but I decline. “Suit yourself,” Sara says. She pats the dog. “We used to have a dog when we were kids. After Mum and Dad died it got too expensive to feed him.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “What happened?”
“We took him to the woods. Maybe he’s still out there.”
Sara doesn’t say what happened to her parents. She fetches the cleaning stuff from the laundry and we set to work. The house is already spotless but we go through the motions of wiping and dusting. After we’ve finished, Sara goes up to the bathroom.
“Fancy a shower?” she asks. She gets undressed and steps into the shower cubicle.
“Are we allowed ...”
“Who cares. It’s hot water.”
I shower after Sara. It feels wonderful. Hot water and soap. The towel is soft and fluffy and comforting. I close my eyes and imagine myself back in my own bathroom. Then I open them again and look in the mirror.
I blink and look again.
I’m not there. I have no reflection.
Maybe it isn’t a mirror but a trick window or something. No, that’s not it, because I can see Sara’s reflection.
“Hey Sara ...” I stop. Maybe I should keep quiet about this, at least until I figure out what it means. I move away from the mirror.
“What?” Sara says.
“Oh, nothing. I was just … thinking it’s the first hot shower I’ve had in ages. It feels nice.”
“It sure does,” Sara says. She dresses, tosses our towels into the laundry basket and takes it downstairs. While we wait for the laundry to run, she goes through the pantry in the kitchen, taking a biscuit from one jar and a cracker from another and putting them in her bag.
“Don’t worry, she never notices,” Sara says.
We step out of Mrs Peterson’s house into the street and the hot air hits us like we’ve opened the door of an oven. On our way back, Sara smiles at the security guard and gives him a couple of biscuits.
We step back into the broken world outside the Fortress.
***
It’s late in the afternoon when we get back. Jack and Noah have just returned from gathering firewood.
Once we’re all inside, Sara’s mood changes.
“Sit down. We need to talk,” she says. She sounds tense.
“What’s wrong?” Jack asks.
Sara takes a small mirror from the shelf and hands it to me.
“Explain that,” she says.
