Child Garden

by Geoff Ryman

  There were long periods of silence, when unheard music played. Then Ewig again, each time softer than before, the voice throbbing without going harsh. A technique. Ewig. Unlike the recording, it was not too loud. The GE stared in silence for some moments and then looked up.

  'Oh, sorry,' she said. 'There's a pile of boots over there.' She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. Milena peered helplessly into the darkness.

  'Golly,' said the Polar Bear. 'I keep forgetting you people can't see in the dark. Shall I find a pair for you?' Her voice seemed to float, airily.

  'That would be very kind,' said Milena. 'Size six. Something less floppy?'

  The GE took the pirate boots and shuffled off into the racks. Her feet were bare. The fur on top of them swept across dust and whisky, making streaks on the floor to mark her passage.

  Milena didn't know what to think. She felt she had been humbled in some way, and that made her annoyed. She suspected that she deserved it, and that made her worried.

  The GE was gone for some time. 'Who's been pushing over all the racks?' her small voice wondered out of the darkness.

  Milena looked at the phantasmagorical waste on the desk and the floor. Books, more books, papers with pawprints across them, old coins. These were real things, the real things that Milena had never seen. She began to feel an ache of jealousy, an ache of nostalgia. This is history, she thought, let the Vampires see this. She picked up a thick black book and opened up its crinkly pages, and realised that it had not been printed. The lettering, in fantastic sweeps and swirls of black ink, had been written by hand.

  Penetrating Wagner's Ring, the lettering said with an excess of eloquent strokes.

  'Not a fortunate title,' murmured Milena, a smile creeping sideways across her face.

  It was an exposition of the Ring cycle. There were drawings of all the characters, slightly amateurish in execution. Each one was identified, not by name, but by a series of notes. The last page said only 'Conclusion: the Ring cycle is a symphony.' It was written in gold.

  'That's not right,' said Milena. It was not what her viruses told her.

  But the clock in her mind told her the labour-hours it must have taken.

  'Bugger,' said a voice, and a rack of dresses collapsed somewhere in the darkness. Milena hurriedly dropped the book. The GE emerged carrying boots.

  'Typical of me, somehow, that title,' the GE said.

  She's seen me reading her book, Milena thought, and went rigid with embarrassment.

  'I console myself,' the GE continued, 'with the thought that there was a book of piano exercises that really did call itself Fingering for Your Students. Here are your boots. Try them for size.'

  Milena pulled one of them on, feeling awkward. She hopped up and down on one foot and thought she was going to fall over. Her cheeks felt full and flushed.

  'Fit?'

  'Yes, yes, I think they do,' Milena replied. She really couldn't tell. She pulled the boot off again. The GE belched roughly. 'Excuse me,' she said, covering her mouth.

  'You sing very well,' said Milena, surprising herself. Her viruses told her that the Polar Bear sang quite as well as anyone at the Zoo.

  'Ah,' said the GE and shrugged. 'I suppose I do, yes.' She blinked. 'Why don't you take this with you.'

  She gave Milena the Mahler score, yellow and plump.

  'You might as well have these too.' She slapped on a Shostakovich and a Prokofiev. 'Don't tell anyone they're Russian.' Russians were not in favour.

  'I can't take them,' said Milena. She didn't want them. The GE stared back at her dolefully.

  'Really. I think I'm blocked from taking them.'

  She didn't know if that were true. 'I think I'm supposed to feel that they belong to everyone.' She did know that the scores were too valuable to be given away so lightly. Milena held out the scores back towards her. There was a fruity smell of booze and lanolin.

  'Ah,' the GE said, and blinked, her eyes distant and unfocused. She took the papers, and held them low and level just over the top of the desk before letting them drop.

  'What's your name?' Milena asked.

  'My name?' said the Polar Bear, and sniffed and smiled. 'Well, let's see if I remember it. Rolfa.' She grinned 'Woof woof.'

  'I'm Milena, Milena Shibush.'

  'Milena,' said the GE and bowed. 'Shall I show you the way out?'

  'The door is locked,' said Milena.

  'Ah! I have the key,' replied Rolfa. 'Here, hold on to my hand so you won't get lost.'

  Rolfa's hand was as large as a cat curled up on a carpet and just as warm. It enveloped Milena's hand and most of her forearm. It was ridiculous. Milena's heart was pounding, and when she turned to say goodbye, Milena could only gabble. The words were confused. The Polar Bear just smiled and shut the gate. Milena felt as though she had had some kind of narrow escape.

  Walking back alongside the wall of brick, Milena finally saw the windows, high overhead. They had been there all along, but she had never noticed them. Windows in a bridge.

  chapter two

  A DOG OF A SONG

  (COMING OUT OF THE SHELL)

  People lived in communities called Estates. Estates were based around one economic activity, but each Estate had services of its own: a market and a laundry, plumbers and street cleaners. Amid the vastness of London, Estates helped keep life on a human scale.

  Milena lived in the Estate for actors. The dormitory had once been the offices of an oil company, so everyone called it the Shell. It was built around a courtyard, like two vast, sheltering concrete-and-marble arms.

  The Shell had its own messenger service. Every morning, every lunchtime, and at six o'clock each evening, Jacob the Postperson called to see if Milena had any messages.

  Jacob was a small, finely boned, shiningly gentle black man, and he made Milena feel horrid and mean because he bored her.

  'Good morning, Milena,' he would say with a delightful smile and dead exhausted eyes.

  'Good morning, Jacob,' Milena would reply.

  'And how are you today?'

  'Very well, Jacob, thank you.'

  'The weather is looking better.'

  'Yes, Jacob, I suppose it is.'

  'Do you have any messages for me, Milena?'

  'No thank you, Jacob.'

  'Well enjoy your day, Milena.'

  'You too, Jacob.'

  His mind had been opened up. He remembered everything, was unable to forget anything. He went from door to door passing messages, reminding people that someone wanted his razor back or that the bus was leaving at three o'clock. He was a way of saving paper. It seemed that he could only talk in an unvarying string of formulae.

  'Good evening, Milena.'

  'Good evening, Jacob.'

  That wide enraptured smile as if he were seeing angels.

  'Did you have a good day?'

  'Yes, Jacob. And you?'

  'Oh, very good, Milena, thank you. Do you have any messages for me?'

  When his mind was full, it would blank out completely, in a kind of epileptic fit. To avoid lost information, he was cleared at regular intervals.

  The day after Milena had visited the Graveyard, Jacob had a message for her. This was an unusual occurrence. Milena did not receive many messages.

  'I have a message for you, Milena. From Ms Patel.'

  'Who? Who is Ms Patel, Jacob?'

  'She is the lady who is covered in fur.'

  Oh. Somehow Milena had not thought of Rolfa as a Ms anything.

  'She asks if you would not like to have lunch with her this afternoon. One o'clock by the front steps of the National. Should I tell her that is all right?'

  Milena couldn't think of anything worse. The first meeting had left her disturbed, irritated. Why did Rolfa want to have lunch with her? Milena considered saying that she was busy.

  But that would be beneath her high standards.

  'Tell Ms Patel,' said Milena, 'that one o'clock will be fine.'

  Milena found herself considering w
hat to wear. It was summer and the sky was bright. She would need to shelter from the sun if her complexion was to be preserved. She had two pairs of trousers, one white, one black. She decided to wear the white, with a long-sleeved, high-neck blouse. She also took her gloves and parasol.

  Rolfa's eyes narrowed when she saw her. 'You're not taking that thing, are you?' she said, nodding towards the parasol.

  Milena was rather proud of her parasol. It was made of canvas and had thick, brightly coloured stripes and was not at all frilly or mimsy.

  'Of course I'm taking it. It's part of my job.'

  'Bloody hell,' murmured Rolfa. 'Well, there's nothing for it. Come on.' She turned and began to lumber off in the direction of Waterloo Bridge. She was wearing nothing but blue running shorts and a pair of very dirty white cloth shoes. One of them had a loose sole. It flapped.

  Milena stood her ground. 'Where are we going?' she asked.

  Ponderously, the GE turned around. 'Flitting off to see some of my chums,' she explained. 'We are going to a palace of amusement.'

  Milena felt an eddy of misgiving. 'Where?'

  'Across the river. It's a pub. Do you drink beer?'

  'No,' replied Milena.

  'Oh, that's a shame. Perhaps they'll make you some tea.' Rolfa turned and began to shuffle on ahead. Milena considered simply staying where she was. No, she thought suddenly, I'm not going to let her think I'm afraid of anything. So she followed.

  It was a bit like trying to keep up with a brontosaurus. Rolfa's arms hung down by her sides, and her shoulders were hunched, and each shuffling step seemed both small and slow, but the distance covered was deceptively great. Milena sheltered from the sun and found she had nothing to say. Next time she asks, Milena promised herself, I will be busy.

  They made their way through the ruins of Fleet Street. It was now an Estate for boatbuilders, with its own market.

  Tykes with tough, demanding faces pushed burned cobs of corn at them, or cupfuls of roast chestnuts. 'Miss! Miss! Just take one whiff for luck, Miss!' Their older brothers and sisters baked straggly chicken in thick lengths of blackened bamboo, which they broke open for customers with chunks of rubble. Whole families lived under the stalls, mothers nursing or knitting. Little boys sat on street corners, turning the wheels of sewing machines, repairing pyjamas or underwear. Their baby sisters tugged at Milena's sleeve, and she walked past them.

  People seemed to find the two of them, Milena and Rolfa, funny. The way Milena walked, as if on slippery ice, her parasol and her gloves, all betrayed her fears and ambition. They made her absurd. Milena heard the children giggle. Life in the Child Garden had taught Milena to hear laughter as the sound of other people's cruelty. Laughter made her fight.

  Milena went cold and awkward. Her parasol caught on an awning and showered dust over a stall. The stall sold old plumbing and dusty glassware, the very dog-ends of history.

  The stallowner laughed gracefully, hand over her heart. She meant that her things were so old that dust could not hurt them. To Milena, the laughter was a mystery, and she walked into the knobbed point of her parasol. There was more laughter.

  Laughter followed them as they walked westwards to St Paul's Cathedral, rising like a great domed egg. Then they turned north and walked past the Barbican, towards the Palace of Amusement.

  The Palace of Amusement was a pub in the Golden Lane Estate. Milena's nervousness increased. The Golden Lane Estate was for the Pit's sewage workers.

  The pub was called the Spread-Eagle, and the sign over it showed a man falling on his face. Milena had to step over drunks snoring on the broken pavement outside it. Even semi-consciously, they picked at the little crabs that patrolled their hairy chests. The sun had burned them the colour of bruises.

  Inside, the Spread-Eagle was dark and cramped and the floor was made of bare, cracked concrete. It was varnished with spit and beer and dogturd from the street. It was full of skinny, naked men glossy with sweat. The whole place smelled of armpits.

  It's like something out of Dante's Inferno, thought Milena.

  'Quite jolly once you're sitting down,' said Rolfa. 'There we are. Oyez! Lucy!' Rolfa shouted and made semaphore-sized signals with her arm.

  There was an ugly squawk from the corner and someone jumped up and had to be restrained. Milena couldn't quite see the people. They sat round a table in front of the glare from a window. They were lost in the light, but there was something horrible about them. Milena's mind blotted them out and she looked away.

  'I shall wrestle with the bar staff,' said Rolfa. 'You go make yourself comfortable over there.'

  You're not leaving me! thought Milena in panic. Rolfa gave her a gentle push. 'Go on,' she said.

  In a desperate fashion, Milena made her way through the sewage workers towards the shelter of the table. Disease, disease, disease, disease, her mind was ringing in terror. She clamped a gloved hand over her mouth, her nose was pointed at the ceiling, she was trying not to breathe. She could feel how slippery the arms and legs were around her. She was anointed with sweat. A man near the bar roared, his mouth full of cheese, and he picked up a jug of beer and poured it over his own head. Milena caught only a light cool spray from it. The drops clattered onto the floor like applause. She found the table, gripped the edges of a chair, and sat.

  'Hello, love,' said a warm voice next to her ear.

  Milena turned to see a terrible head, framed in unnaturally orange curls. The lips were covered with crumbled red cosmetic, there were only a few teeth in the mouth, and the face had gone soft, like overripe fruit. It was covered in lines and cracks.

  'My name's Lucy, but my friends call me Loose. Ha-ha-ha!' the voice barked.

  Milena looked about her. A hunched and beaky man leaned around Lucy to look at her, black freckles over his muscular arms. His eyes were a watery blue and his face had collapsed into its own hollows and was veiled by a network of lines like a cobweb.

  Milena felt her heart catch. They were old. These people were old. This was what age looked like.

  'Meow,' said the old man.

  'You mustn't mind Old Tone,' said Lucy. 'He hasn't been the same since the war. Have you, love?'

  War? What war? Milena wondered. Lucy wore a beige jacket that covered her arms. It was splattered in front and grimy around the cuffs. Her fingers were blackened. Across the table sat an identical couple in identical grubby grey suits, their arms linked. Both of them were completely bald. They looked like leaking balloons. One of them leaned forward and spoke to Milena in a low, sensible, confiding voice. She could not understand a single word.

  'OO er oi af ger whuh oi fough veh fink,' he said with a concluding nod. He had a tiny, very black moustache painted onto his upper lip.

  'That makes sense,' said Milena. He was speaking with the accent of a hundred years before.

  They were Tumours.

  Many diseases had cured cancer. One of them sealed the proto-oncogenes in Candy. Others produced proteins that coaxed cancerous cells into maturity and stopped them dividing.

  But some of the cancers were new and viral and quick. The cures did not stop infected cells producing new copies of the cancer virus, and the virus spread with the flow of blood. A curious balance was struck in the bodies of some of the people who already had cancer. The cancer virus infected the body cell by cell in an orderly fashion. The cancers differentiated. They matured and ceased to proliferate in wild shapes.

  What was left was a systematised tumour in the form of a healthy human being, with its memories, its feelings. As long as it was fed and avoided accidents, it would live. It was immortal.

  The Tumours looked at Milena with friendly expectation.

  'Do,,, do... Have you come far?' she asked the orange head.

  'In my time, love, in my time,' Lucy chuckled darkly and gave a hearty wink.

  'And where do you live?' Milena was wondering if the old creature had fleas. She wondered how far they could jump.

  'In the laundry,' Lucy replied. 'The room w
here they dry the clothes. You know...' She made a circular motion with a crooked finger that was shiny and blue-grey. 'I just slip in there of a night. Lovely and warm it is.'

  She lived in the Estate laundry. Milena was appalled. She wondered what it meant for the supposedly clean sheets.

  'Don't they give you a place to live?'

  'Oh. I suppose they would. Whoever they are these days. I wouldn't be knowing, would I?'

  She's crazy, Milena thought, addled with age. No one could help her.

  Lucy was bored, and so she became incensed on Milena's behalf. 'Oooh, that Rolfa. Honestly, you'd wait all week for a slup out of her. Here.' The old creature shoved a mug of beer towards Milena. 'Go on, have a lick on me.'

  Milena gave her head a little shake. 'Oh no,' she said. The mug had lipstick all around it.

  'Go on, love, I don't mind,' said Lucy. She patted the top of Milena's clenched fist. Milena thought she was going to be sick. She began to wonder if she could make the door in time.

  Then very suddenly, Rolfa was looming over them, streaming beer, lowering the mugs onto the table in front of Milena. Lucy laughed and held out her arms.

  'I wanted tea,' said Milena.

  'Mwom mwom mwom,' said Lucy, making motions with her mouth, wanting to be kissed. She looked like a goldfish. Rolfa leaned over and hugged her, and sat next to old Tone, who meowed like a cat. Rolfa barked like a dog, and put him in a headlock under her arm. The old man made gleeful squeaking noises and stamped his foot in merriment. The beer smelled of other people's kidneys.

  The leaking balloon leaned forward. 'Ghoul,' he said. 'Ear. Whuh yer wan, ay? Ay?'

  I want, thought Milena, to go home.

  The old orange head slapped the table and made Milena jump. 'Listen. Listen,' she demanded. 'Rolfa. Time for a song.' There was a soft groan of assent.

  'It's your turn,' said Rolfa. 'I believe you owe me a pint as well.'

  'Oh all right then,' said Lucy. 'But I warn you, you'll get the full whack.'

  Then she began to climb onto the table. Milena couldn't think at first what she was trying to do. The old woman simply bent over the table top and worked her legs back and forth, her old crooked hands trying to hold. She finally succeeded in getting one knee onto the table and then clung to it desperately, as if to the wreckage of a ship.