Pucker

by Melanie Gideon

  “That guy was an insurance adjuster. That girl worked in McDonald’s. We’re two hundred years back in time here. Think he knew how to shear a sheep? Think she knew how to churn butter? But they learned. By keeping their eyes open and their mouths shut,” he tells me.

  “I’ll nail my thumbs to the walls,” I say.

  Dash smirks. “Now, that would be amusing.”

  He walks me over to a wagon piled high with lumber.

  “Brian 689, this is Thomas 2,” he says to the man sitting up front. “Brian’s a master carpenter. You’re his apprentice.”

  “I don’t think so,” says Brian giving me the once-over. “Better look at his assignment again.”

  Dash reads my paperwork quickly and laughs. “Bloody hell.” He claps me on the back. “My mistake,” he says to Brian. He leads me to another wagon, this one loaded with equipment.

  “Thomas 2, meet your boss.”

  The person sitting in the front of the wagon whirls around. It’s Phaidra.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  WE’RE SITTING IN SILENCE, DRIVING the horse and wagon to the Ministry. She sits as far away from me as she can on the wooden seat, but the ruts in the road conspire to move us closer. At times our thighs and shoulders bump up against each other and her soapy smell overwhelms me.

  “So, how’d you learn carpentry?” I ask.

  She doesn’t bother to hide her disdain.

  “I guess you learned when you got here, huh?”

  Phaidra shakes her head in disgust and makes a clucking sound in the back of her throat that just about undoes me. This girl knows how to drive a team of horses and she sure as hell will know how to swing a hammer.

  I try again; this time I’ll appeal to her intellect.

  “Is Dickens one of your favorites?”

  “Oh, shut up,” she says.

  “Excuse me?” I say.

  She pulls back on the reins so abruptly I nearly slide off the seat. The wagon jerks to a stop.

  “Listen closely because I’m only going to say this once. I have no interest in babysitting you. Or becoming your friend.”

  “I didn’t ask you to be my friend,” I say, somewhat petulantly. And that’s true. I don’t want to be her friend: I want to kiss her, deeply, and for a long time.

  She blinks slowly and I realize I was wrong about her. I had read poetry into her gaze; I had imagined her like a November creek. She’s as cold and unyielding as concrete.

  “My job is to show you how to build bookshelves. That’s it. I don’t want to have conversations. I don’t want to pretend to be interested in you. I just want to do my job and go back to the dorm,” she says.

  “I don’t believe you. Why’d you come to Isaura if you wanted to be left alone?”

  She glares at me. “I came to get away from people like you, people who get everything handed to them. People who look like they walked out of some magazine.”

  This is so blatantly unfair—she saw me before the Change!

  “People like us, you mean?” I ask. “’Cause you look like you just stepped out of the pages of J. Crew.”

  God, I hate that catalog. It’s the worst insult I can think of. The sad thing is most girls would have eaten it up. Not Phaidra. It infuriates her, which unfortunately makes me like her even more.

  “What makes you think I’ve ever seen a J. Crew catalog?” she spits out.

  “Well, you lived in America, didn’t you?” I say.

  “You’re an idiot,” she says.

  “So they tell me,” I say.

  We’re approaching the city. Phaidra’s worked herself up into such a state she nearly runs over a woman and her small child. In true Isaurian fashion the woman doesn’t yell or scream. She simply hauls her child back onto the sidewalk until we pass.

  “Lordy,” I say. “Looks like you need a little practice in the horse-and-wagon department.”

  “You think you’re better than me?” Phaidra snaps.

  “What are you talking about? You saw me yesterday. You saw my face.”

  “I saw it, all right,” she says.

  “You weren’t supposed to be looking at us. It’s against the rules.”

  “I can look wherever I want. It’s a free country.”

  I snort. “It certainly is not. We may have been fixed, but we’re slaves now, in case you haven’t noticed.”

  She shoots me a strange look out of the corner of her eye but says nothing.

  Isaurians scurry around the streets, intent on their morning errands. Their beautifully woven baskets are filled with produce. Their clothes are homespun and made from vegetable dyes. At that moment I hate Isaura with a loathing only an exile can feel. Everything about the place infuriates me: its rigidity, its rules, and its stalwart refusal to move into the future.

  We come around a corner, and the huge stone fortress that is the Ministry looms in front of us. Somewhere in there is my mother’s skin. I sink down in my seat, already overwhelmed and I haven’t even started looking. I touch my face for comfort. It pulses beneath my fingertips like a beacon.

  “Just stay out of my way,” Phaidra says finally. “I’ve got a reputation. I’m sure Dash has already told you all about me.”

  “You’re wrong,” I say.

  She raises her eyebrows in disbelief. “Well, if he hasn’t, he will.”

  “I don’t believe everything I’m told.”

  “You should. Everything he says about me is true. Besides, there are many girls here who are far prettier than me. Girls who will wait in line—who will go through the proper protocol in order to get a date with you,” she sneers.

  She makes it sound so pathetic, all those calling cards.

  “I didn’t ask for that,” I say softly.

  “Sure, you didn’t, but it came your way anyway. And you didn’t turn it down.”

  We’ve arrived at the Ministry. Four other carpentry wagons have beaten us there and are already unloading. Phaidra turns to me.

  “Look, you’re my apprentice: that doesn’t mean we’re shackled to each other. Do as I ask while we’re on the job and get on with the rest of your life. You’ll have a good time here. Everyone seems to. All you have to do is surrender. At least that’s what they tell me.”

  When she climbs down off the seat, I sit for a moment, trying to pull myself together. The last thing I want to do is walk into the Ministry.

  “Move it,” Phaidra yells.

  Obediently I jump to the ground.

  TWENTY-NINE

  ONCE WHEN I WAS FIVE, my mother took me to work with her. I wasn’t well that day. I had a fever and the sniffles. I remember walking down the long corridor, shaking with fear. My mother had warned me that the Ministry was not a place for children and that I wasn’t to say a word.

  Everybody seemed to be expecting us and on their best behavior. Because of my mother’s high ranking they made an effort to appear friendly. Her fellow Seers said hello and chucked me on the chin. They gave me sweets and milky tea. I knew even then, at five years old, that this was not the norm, for they were a solemn bunch, and forecasting every little thing from food cravings to bowel movements so that every Isaurian would have every moment of his life pre-scripted was a solemn business.

  I made the rounds with my mother that day, visiting two departments of Seers: Meals and Marriage. Now, the Marriage Seers, they were a lively bunch. I suspected that my mother, had she been less gifted and thus not relegated to predicting natural catastrophes like blizzards or hurricanes, would have settled in this department.

  As soon as somebody was born, the Marriage Seers began working on finding the person a match. It could take that long because by the time they found a match, they might have had to imagine somebody’s future with a thousand possible partners. But somehow they always managed to pull it off, and by the time each Isaurian came of age at eighteen, she knew who she would marry.

  After visiting the Marriage Seers, we went to the Meals Department. By the time we left, I was salivating with
hunger despite the fact that I had spent the last four days throwing up. Who wouldn’t when all the talk was of the Murphys having a crown roast of pork on Thursday and the Lewingers having scones and clotted cream for tea next Saturday? The Meal Seers tended to be large and big bellied and they sat around a table overflowing with food, because as they forecasted everybody else’s meal, they also forecast for each other. You’re having pumpkin ravioli for supper tonight. And you’re to have grilled cheese and ham! A bunch of clowns, my mother called them. She considered the Meals Department totally superfluous. Who needed to know what they would be craving a week from now? I had to agree with her. There was, however, the matter of the Changed. They needed to know, for they were the ones growing, harvesting, and preparing pretty much all of our food.

  So when Phaidra and I enter the Ministry, I’m flooded with a wall of memory. Crops Room to the left. Children’s Room to the right. My mother locked in her bedroom a world away.

  “What wrong with you?” asks Phaidra.

  “What’s a crops room? Something to do with horses?” My valiant attempt at appearing ignorant.

  She rolls her eyes at me.

  Phaidra leads me down three corridors and up two flights of stairs and to an unmarked door. I hear hammering. The sound of wood being battered around. She raps on the door impatiently, three quick knocks, and we are let in. I look around in amazement.

  “What is this place?” I ask her.

  “We’re building a library for a man named Otak. The High Seer of Isaura,” she adds.

  Some would call it luck. Others fate. Me—I’m not sure what to call it. This library? Well, it’s also the antechamber to Otak’s private quarters, where my mother’s Seerskin is probably hidden away.

  THIRTY

  I SHOULD BE BESIDE MYSELF with joy that the only thing that may separate me from what I have come for is a decorative steel door. That sometime in the next few days, maybe tonight, I’ll be cruising home with my mother’s Seerskin tucked under my arm.

  Instead what I feel is dismay. Because of my new face eight girls are coming to call on me tonight. I have to see them, right? To do otherwise would arouse suspicion.

  Phaidra hands me my tools. A broom and a dustpan.

  “Oh, come on,” I whine, hoping nobody has seen her handing me the broom. “Give me a hammer, a saw. Something I can dig my teeth into.”

  She crosses her arms. “No way am I setting you loose with a saw. Besides, we’re way past saws.”

  I look around the room. There are floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and cabinets on each of the four walls. Other workers stand on ladders, some with levels in their hands. Long maroon wood shavings litter the floor. I pick one up and sniff it.

  “Cedar,” I say, hoping to impress her.

  “Peltogyne paniculata, dumbass. Purpleheart.”

  “Why’s it called purpleheart?”

  She hesitates, like I’ve asked her a personal question.

  “It’s a chameleon,” she says slowly. “When the heart of the tree is exposed, it’s brown. But when you slice into that heart, it turns a brilliant purple. Right before your eyes it changes color. You have to cut into it before it comes alive.”

  Normally I would have eaten this kind of stuff up, but something in me pulls back.

  “Do you always speak about lumber in that tone of voice? Like you’re talking about the Dalai Lama?” I ask her.

  Her eyes widen. “Pick up the broom and get to work, Quicksilver. You won’t feel so manly when you slice the tip of your finger off.”

  And so the morning passes and I make no attempt to get through the steel door that leads into Otak’s inner sanctum. My mother has nearly three weeks left and I’ve decided I can afford one night here for myself with my new face. She wouldn’t deny me that.

  THIRTY-ONE

  THERE ARE RULES THE CHANGED are expected to adhere to and I’m informed of them at lunchtime when a group of Isaurian schoolgirls strolls by.1. Never speak to Isaurians unless spoken to.

  2. Relationships of any sort between Isaurians and Changed are forbidden.

  3. Never touch an Isaurian.

  Ah, number three. The one the previous two rules are just leading up to. Bottom line: don’t hook up with an Isaurian. No matter how cute she might be or how much you might be tempted. In other words, no interbreeding. Wouldn’t want to dirty up the bloodline.

  I nod obediently when Brian recites the rules to me. We’re sitting on a bench outside the Ministry eating our sandwiches. I’m feeling smug; these rules don’t apply to me. First, because I’ll be gone before anybody knows it. And second, because I’m really an Isaurian.

  “Better wipe that look off your face,” says Phaidra.

  “Ladies first,” I retort, realizing in an instant that she, too, feels smug about something. She has a secret.

  The schoolgirls whisper and I look up. They’re teenagers. My heart thuds as I realize chances are good I know some of them. But I’ve been gone for nine years. Will I recognize them? Will they recognize me? Suddenly I need to test the possibility.

  I stand up so I can see better and I hear a low warning growl. Accompanying the girls is an old woman. Of course they wouldn’t be unchaperoned, especially here in the city among the Changed. The woman wears the brown hooded robe of a teacher. I can’t see her face—it’s hidden in the shadow of her hood—but there’s no mistaking her warning. She steps closer so she can see me better and I busy myself with my sandwich.

  I hear Phaidra chewing methodically beside me. I glance up at her face, which is uncharacteristically vacant. I wave my hand in front of her and she smiles dimly. She lifts her hand to tuck her hair behind her ear and her shirt cuff falls to her elbow and I see that her forearm is riddled with tiny slashes. It looks like someone’s taken a penknife and cut her again and again. Did Dash do this? Punishment for her insolence?

  “Phaidra,” I whisper, and snap my fingers.

  She stares out into space

  I grab her wrist and gently twist it. She gives a little screech. When she sees her arm exposed, that I’ve seen the crisscross of cherry-colored lines, she gasps. She yanks her sleeve down and buttons it tight around her wrist and in that instant I understand that Dash didn’t do this to her; she’s cut herself. But why?

  “I see you’re done hiding, Tom Quicksilver,” a familiar voice says.

  I groan silently and look up. It’s Otak and this time he’s not alone. He’s flanked by a coterie of blue-robed Seers. You’re Changed; they can’t read your mind, I remind myself, but I’m filled with doubt. They look at me like they know exactly who I am and what I’m thinking. Otak leans in close to me, so close I can smell his breath, which is surprisingly fresh, and he turns my face to the left and right. I half expect him to pull my lips back and inspect my gums.

  “Some of the Maker’s best work,” he says, letting me go.

  I feel a weird combination of shame and pleasure at his comment.

  He looks over his shoulder at the group of Isaurian girls.

  “Rule number three, girls,” he calls out.

  “Never touch a Changed,” they answer in unison.

  But he’s just touched me. That doesn’t seem to occur to anybody. I stare at the girls with bewilderment. Each one holds a set of books in her arms—they must have been coming from school. Before walking off, they examine me so coldly that I feel shredded.

  “Bitches,” whispers Phaidra, glaring at the Isaurian girls as they sashay across the plaza.

  I turn to her, surprised by this gesture of solidarity.

  “Don’t get all excited. A jackass is a jackass,” she says. “Doesn’t matter what world you’re in.”

  THIRTY-TWO

  THAT NIGHT THE GIRLS COME CALLING. There’s Lina, Tammi, Trixie, Veronica, Penelope, Mee-Yon, Alex, and Mildred-I’m-changing-my-name-to-Montana.

  I can’t help myself. “Have you given the name Nebraska any thought?” I ask her.

  “Why, no,” she says. “I should have, though.
I should have considered that.”

  She sounds just like Judy Garland, tinny and yippy, like her voice was imported from 1938.

  “Certainly you toyed with Dakota?” I say.

  “No,” she says, blinking like she’s just come out of a movie theater.

  “Wyoming, then? Surely Wyoming. It’s a nice place. No speed limits. Or maybe I’m confusing it with Montana. But cowboys live there. That’s the important thing,” I say. I pat her hand.

  She smiles. She has no idea that I’m mocking her.

  I am powerful for the first time in my life. I lean forward and kiss Mildred-I’m-changing-my-name-to-Montana and very quickly it no longer matters what she’s changing her name to.

  It’s four hours later and I’ve had eight dates. Exactly thirty minutes with each girl. Now all I want to do is to go to sleep and replay the moment before the kiss when I have no idea how a girl’s lips will taste, how her teeth will feel against my tongue, when I have no clue that her neck will smell of limes.

  Tonight Montana is kind enough to show me a way out of the backwater of my inexperience, as are Lina and Trixie, and it’s more than enough to make me believe in a life where anything is possible.

  “You shouldn’t have kissed all of them,” says Dash.

  “I only kissed three,” I say.

  “They’ll talk. They’ll compare notes. They won’t be happy when they find out you’ve been with all of them,” he says.

  From the chirpy way they greeted each other as they passed on the porch steps, it seems unlikely to me that they’ll care.

  “I just told you,” I say. “It was only three.”

  “Whatever,” says Dash. “I’m going to bed.”

  “Wait.”

  “Now what?”

  “I need to ask you a question.”

  Dash’s eyes narrow. “Tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “I’ll take you to the infirmary. You’ll get your protection, don’t worry.”