by Joy Dettman
Time passes. I am aware of him and his cleaning tool that hums and sucks at the mess I have made on the floor. I am aware of the scent of chem-wash powder, and the air-cleaning spray. I am aware that he stares at me, too, for the paper towel that wrapped me is now on the floor and I am on the bed.
When he is done with his cleaning the grey men return. They are wearing plasti-coats and full-face plasti-masks over their half-face white masks. I hear only garbled words through the breathing filters. They do not approach me, nor does Lenny, who now stands in the passage before Granny’s door, grunting replies to their questions.
Do they know of my great awareness? Do they care that my mind is open to their every word?
‘Ready her for transportation.’ Such an odd rhythm their words have, as if each statement is a question.
‘She ate something bad, that’s all,’ Lenny says.
‘The basic immunisations are complete. We will take her where we can monitor her fever.’
Hollow are their voices, as the places behind their bird bones where their hearts should live are hollow. I wonder if they wait for a sowman’s heart and curse their bad luck when the incubating sow gives them a son. I wonder if they once knew the screaming of childhood, or the joy of laughter, or were they born of a plasti-womb, old, empty and grey?
Lenny does not want them to take me. ‘No one’s been here to bring your frekin fever to her – less you brung it to her. And if you brung it, then she’s still frekin safer here than she is out there.’
If my features could smile, I believe they would, for I think perhaps Lenny is frekin safer too while I am here, and he is also well fed. He is as the disabled males, tied with ropes of blood to the city foetus, who care not for the one they feed, but for the food and care provided to the feeder.
‘The Implantation has now been twice delayed. Ready her.’
Then Pa’s voice is there. ‘How many of your Plantings are gunna be delayed when she’s dead like the rest of them, boy? Take her to your frekin city and you’ll find out, I reckon.’
They do not converse with Pa, and he has no dealings with them, but tonight he has made his bad leg climb the stairs. I think he has a good heart deep inside him; he has a wildness too. It is about his yellow-brown eyes, and a part of him he did not pass to Lenny. The grey men stand a while more, then seemingly with no words passing between them, they reach agreement. This is their way, as if decisions are made behind their masks without need of spoken words.
They test my heat, stick my arm twice with their fine pins, then I hear their quick footsteps receding, hear the flying vehicle roar into life, hear the thunder of its heartbeat as it swoops overhead, and I wait, unable to move.
I have been in this place many times. The paralysis will pass in time; it is of no value to fight it from within. Better to sleep through it and when I wake it will have passed. But tonight I can not sleep through it, my mind is wide open, thinking, thinking of foetus and Jonjan, of city and cave.
No light is about when Lenny returns to my room. I hear his breath and his footsteps but do not see him. I hear the door close, and I think him gone. Until his battery light is on me, and on certain places of me.
He has done this before, and always after the grey men have stilled my limbs with their pricking machine. Have I not smelt the scent of his perspiration? When he came before I had not been in this place of such awareness.
So close is he, I can feel his fast breaths upon me – as a pumpkin flower may feel the air moved by a wasp’s wing. The lightbeam wanders over me, then the tool is placed on my chest of drawers and he sits down, on my bed. I am aware of movement, but more aware of the closeness of his voice, which is a low murmur, as his dogs murmur low when I sit with them.
‘So now she lay there down to sleep I pay the law me strength to keep. And if I stray before she wake the bastards then me life will take.’
I hear a slide fastener open. What is this game he plays?
My limbs awaken, so quickly. My eyes open. I must not move nor alter my breathing. And I do not move, but Lord, how I think.
‘So now she lay there down to sleep I pay the law me strength to keep. And if I stray before she wake the bastards then me life will take.’ He is still murmuring, but the words are slow, rhythmic, my bed moving to the rhythm of his words.
Certainly I am breeding. And certainly, too, the grey men will know of it and suck the foetus from me when next they come, though it is not of their Implanting and does not belong to them.
And who will they blame for the making of this foetus? There is only one answer. They will blame Lenny. And certainly they will take his life – and take me to the city.
Ah. How well I bring logic to this riddle tonight.
The bed rocks faster, and his words grow faster. I did not know he had enough air in him to make so many words.
So . . . so I will go to the hills. I will take my basket and go to the hills, as Granny always bade me go to the hills if the city men came.
And what will I eat when my basket is empty? I have stolen the sharp knife, but I think I could not slit the throat of a rabbit or a rat. And how might I cook it?
Lenny can spill a rabbit’s blood, and a pig’s. And though I think I do not like him much, I do not want him dead.
An idea comes to me, the mere thought of which causes me to flinch.
Lenny senses my awareness and he is off my bed, his back turned. I see by the slim beam of the battery light that his hands are clumsy as they seek to fasten away that which does not wish to be fastened away.
‘I stopped them taking you, girl.’ His voice is strange, strained.
It was old Pa who stopped them taking me. I know this, but do not speak of what I know. I do not speak at all, but Lord, what is this thing I am thinking? Still, I am thinking it.
The dogs’ trust I have bought with my feeding of them, with my soft words and petting. Old Pa? He liked my cooking well and cleaned his plate tonight, but Pa’s trust does not need to be bought; he is a freeborn, and he hates the city men as Granny hated them. If he were young and strong he would fight them – if not for me, then for the joy of fighting. Lenny cares little how his food is cooked, only that there is enough. Lenny likes the grey men’s supplies, so when they return and call ‘come’, he will come and hold my arms.
But he likes to look at me with his battery light, and he likes to speak his strange rhyme and . . . and shake the bed. Perhaps he would also like to hear soft-spoken words and have some petting.
What is this twisting path my mind follows tonight? Is it my mind, or Granny’s? In her final days her body had little movement, but how well her mind had moved.
How can I think of this thing that I am thinking? How can I reach out my hand to Lenny, pet him?
I find I can. I pat his shoulder and he does not move away from my touch, so I take first his arm, then his hand, and I place it on my breast and I hold it there.
He is afraid. He gasps air. ‘Cover your frekin self,’ he says, but his hand remains where I have placed it.
‘Now you say cover yourself, but you do not cover me when my limbs die the grey men’s fake death. You shine your light on these parts of me.’ He swallows, does not deny it, and I lie to him, as I lie to his dogs. ‘Your soft-spoken words gave me comfort. You may speak them again to me – if you wish to.’
And he says the words; they are not so soft, but desperate as he tries a little to remove his hand. I will not release it and his breath is coming short.
I open his fastener as I opened Jonjan’s, and now it is Lenny who is made of wood, but this thing begun must be done. It takes much time before he lies with me, and it is I who must move close to the heat of him for his panting breaths have become a moaning, a sobbing.
‘Is this closeness good?’ I say. ‘It comforts me. Does this closeness to another not also give you comfort?’ I brush his chest and, in truth, I do not feel so good about this petting as I did with his dog. He has much hair there, rusty hair, and it
is like the sharp wire of the fence and near forces my hand away, but I will not allow it to force my hand away.
And at last I have done enough and his hands are upon me and they are all over me and he is near choking for air and he is not saying his words.
I have done this entwining thing before and I think it is a good plan to do it again. If Lenny believes my foetus is of his own Implanting, he will be afraid to hold my arms for them when they say ‘come’.
I shut my eyes once he begins the closer thing and behind my eyelids, see what I wish to see, and I wish to see Jonjan. He is not Jonjan – not so youthful, so beautiful – or so strong, for though his mating tool thrusts, it is but once, twice, then he sobs and spills his seed. I know not if it is seed of labouring clone or son of a sow, only that it is thankfully done, and fast. Now I wish him to go.
He does not go, nor does he release me. He can not; his arms shake and his legs shake. I think they would not hold him should he rise from my bed, and I think of Jonjan’s weakness after the mating.
‘Oh, girl,’ he says, and I believe he cries.
I pat his head as I do the heads of his dogs, but I can not say, ‘Good Lenny. Poor Lenny,’ so I say nothing.
It is a long time before he draws a deep sighing breath and rolls to his back, drawing me with him. ‘Oh, Christ,’ he says. ‘Oh, girl, what have I done?’
‘You have been as the bull at the heifer and you –’
‘The little bastards will kill me.’
‘You fear too much. They are not so big as you, and tonight they were only two. You . . . you may leave now. You smell of hard work.’
He does not wish to leave me. ‘Oh, girl,’ he says, again and again and again. ‘Oh, Christ. We shouldn’ta done it.’
Already he is sharing the blame of it with me, but he does not release me. I cover my nose with my hand for the close scent of him is of much perspiration, and I try to move away. In my trading for the dogs’ goodwill, I was able to leave them when I wished. In the cooking of the food, I gave only of my time and as much as I wished to give. I can not walk away from Lenny, for in this thing that he has done, there is more that can be had of it. He has always been greedy with food, always wishing to fill his plate again and eat more. And he . . . he eats his fill of me.
(Excerpt from the New World Bible)
The Chosen named the first year of the borrowed calm the New Beginning, and they named the year One.
And in time, many worked in the rubble of the western quarter in the clearing of city streets. And in time the mother and daughter moons were accepted, and expected in the night sky.
And all who would labour laboured, and in time some earth was cleared and crops planted. And in time water from the ocean was cleansed of its salt and the ocean’s weed harvested, for it gave nourishment enough to sustain those who laboured for the Chosen.
There was starvation or swift death for those who did not.
And there was much death, for there was raiding and plotting and great religious division amongst the greatest of the survivors and amongst the least of them.
And there was defilement and the ravishing of the female and of the youths who were below the least of the survivors. And there was much fear and distrust.
In the year 10 of the New Beginning the Chosen called for a counting and a numbering of the survivors. And they sent forth their army to the outer reaches of the eastern city where they crawled into every concrete hole that sheltered life.
And in the year 10, in all of the city there were 1034 males and 504 females. Of these numbers, 162 females were of breeding age.
And each was marked, with number and status, on the left shoulder. And her name and number was recorded in the book of records.
THE ESCAPE
Lenny has a machine to calculate the days, and though he can not read Monday from Wednesday, he can recognise the colours. When it is time for the grey men to come, the light flashes red. It is a city tool, which the little men have given to him, and on each visit they set it for him with the press of colourful buttons.
It interests me. I wish to play with the buttons, which are many; I think there is much I may learn from it but Lenny says I may not touch them, though each night when he wishes to come to my bed, he thinks first to buy my goodwill with the calculator.
I have seen the colour grow more bright as time moves from Monday to Friday, from yellow to orange. Today it will be flashing red and I do not care to see it, or the day, or Lenny. I had planned to be as the rabbit and hide in my hole in the hills when the light reached the red, but this morning when I try to lift my head from the pillow, nausea rises with it, and a stream of bitter bile gushes from me.
I am afraid of this morning illness which will not leave me. Lenny is also afraid of it. When I do not rise, he comes to my room with pill and chem-tea and the smell of it is enough to make me spill more bile.
‘Pa reckons you got their frekin plague, girl.’ One finger rubbing at the ginger hair of his face, he moves from boot to boot, watching me.
My reply is more bile.
He goes away, and I sleep a while in my unclean bed. It is later when he returns to strip its coverings and to pick me up and carry me to the old bath, where he has spilled a near barrel full of water.
‘Pa reckons I got the “munity”. Reckons just now he saved me from fever when I was a young ’un. Reckons a bastard searcher come down and I took his bag of pellet food and near died of it. Carried me up to the pool, Pa did, held me in it for a day.’
I look at him and his small eyes are concerned, or fearful, as he places me down in the water. ‘He reckons lay you in it. Water’ll wash the ills out from you.’
I sink gratefully into the water, my face submerging, my hair waving over my breasts like the old water weed might float over one who has drowned in a watery womb, for I am drowning, drowning in this nausea, choking on it.
This breeding of Jonjan’s foetus is worse by far than the Implantations. Once having been Implanted, there are changes in me, but not this continuing flip-flopping illness of the belly. Lenny watches me for a moment, then he leaves, and I float there, my belly calmed by the water.
How I love the scent, the buoyant liquidity of water. The chem-tub, supplied by the grey men, cleanses me, but Lord, this water is sweet. I remain in it until my hands are white ridged and the flip-flopping of my belly settles, stills.
Lenny does not speak when he brings his buckets to empty my bathwater onto Pa’s pumpkins. Eventually I give it up and stand dripping precious water to the floor while I wrap myself in a paper towel. I think he reads this paper more hungrily than I read the newsprint, but he keeps dipping water, filling his buckets.
‘Fever’s raging in city,’ he says. ‘I seen the shed of dead on the last V cube. Seen them feeding the dead to the Godsent.’
‘I believe I will vomit on you if you speak more of this, and Granny did not think that blacrap Godsent.’
‘Didn’t think much was Godsent, that one. Hard old bitch. Reckon you’ll be well for the little bastards tonight?’
‘Perhaps I will vomit on both of them,’ I say, ringing water from my hair, wasting water on the floor.
He stands, watching each precious drip. ‘Diseased little bastards. They left you here where you was safe from their frekin plague and they bring it to you themselves.’ Then he turns, carries his buckets away.
Later I walk downstairs and make a cordial, adding hot water from the kettle. I sip it slowly as I stare at the grey men’s pill container, which is not empty. I pour many pills into my hand. Small they are, round and blue, smaller than the ones they bring for Pa. I crush one, mix it with a little grey spread. It makes a blue paste, but I have much good blue paint from the old ones, so I drop the pills, one by one, through a gap in the floor. There are many gaps in this creaking floor, and many rats that live beneath it. Perhaps they will enjoy my pills.
The hot cordial sits well in my belly. I eat a slice of cornbread. It remains in me. So the
nausea has left me for today, but it will rise again, for it is as the sun of this season.
Granny once said that God did not make man, that man had grown from the animal, and that we each still possess a little of the animal brain. Today I believe I can feel that animal within me and it tells me danger is lurking, that I must take my basket and run to the hills.
From this window I cannot see to the top of our hill, only the woods in the distance, and as I sip, the trees grow more distant, until escape loses its importance.
It is time, girl. She is back, her cold fingernail running down my spine. I shiver.
‘The sun is shining. The searchers may be about.’
When is a searcher less loathsome than a viper?
‘I do not like your riddles. I never liked your riddles.’
When the viper is poised to bite you, girl.
I sit down and think of Jonjan. How many times have the grey men been here since his coming? I think three, but between the first and the second was the longer period of the ten bottles of cordial, which is allowed me before the new Implanting. On the visit previous to the coming of Jonjan, they had Harvested the six. And how many visits do they make between the Implanting and the Harvesting?
Lord, I wish my mind would give me the answers I seek. I do not know this answer. How much time do they allow for the tiny foetus to grow? I do not know. Why have I not measured time?
It is time, girl.
‘You are not here, Granny. You are in the graveyard. And if you are here, then you said often to me that time is a gift. Always, you said that your time on earth was a gift.’
Follow the rabbits, girl.
I shiver, stand, walk to the window, look towards the hill. Perhaps it is time, for though the foetus gives me much discomfort, I think I do not want it Harvested.
