by Jesse Gordon
“Coke,” said Chris.
Mike and Sharon shook their heads.
Monica’s trip upstairs took only a moment. She fetched a glass of water for herself, a can of Coke for Chris, then returned to the basement—where everyone had shifted to the edge of their seat as they gaped at the video screen. At first she thought that Jackie had perhaps lost a scrunchie, but then she saw the grave look on her mother’s face, the grim set to her father’s jaw.
“God, Monica,” Sharon breathed. “Come look at this.”
Monica reclaimed her spot on the floor, the drinks still clutched in her hands. The Patriot Cup had been preempted by a breaking news report—a hostage situation at an elementary school in Alabama. 300 teachers and students had been crammed into a gymnasium while a group of armed radicals engaged in a heated stand-off against the police. Someone from inside had managed to keep a cell phone, and was feeding the news crew morbid images of women and children sitting huddled, frightened, some bleeding or bruised.
In the background, a man could be heard shouting:
“Give us our sovereignty! The Global Ranking System is a facade designed to take from the poor and give to the rich! Our farmers and workers are forced into slave labor by sneaky U.S. officials and Canadian yes-men who make deals behind closed doors to ensure our teams never advance in the ranks! We will be a slave nation no longer! Your diplomats say the GRS has abolished war—the war has only begun!”
Monica felt herself squirm (as she often did whenever a band of domestic terrorists made the news). The people on the screen looked to be of varying ethnicities. They had American accents—they might have, at one time, been businessmen, politicians, community pillars. Now they carried guns, dealing in desperation, mourning the death of the middle class by making an example of themselves.
“God almighty,” muttered Sharon.
“Christ,” said Mike.
(Amazingly, the two of them were still eating popcorn.)
After a while, the Patriot Cup came back on.
No one felt like watching.
CHAPTER 9
Extremist demonstrations in Patriot America were nothing new. The formation of the NAU was as controversial a move as the conversion to a paperless monetary system ten years prior—strikes, picket lines, marches, rallies, and, sometimes, violent displays of civil unrest were common symptoms of a nation trying to consolidate its vision of prosperity.
For many Americans, these were cursory worries, facts of life to be added to the backs of minds already preoccupied with an ailing job market, skyrocketing fuel prices, store shelves carrying bloated markups and limited variety. However, the repercussions from Sunday’s hostage crisis reached deep, and were manifested startlingly quick. First thing Monday morning the Hamilton administration announced over the P.A. system that it was time to initiate a long-overdue security plan, starting with mandatory real-time tracking for all students. Several days and one signed parental consent form later, Monica found herself standing in line (along with several hundred other students) on the soccer field as a delegation of police officers updated everyone’s tag information.
“The terrorists have already won,” said Pat Sandsby—fourteen years old, blond, bespectacled, perennially clad in anti-establishment T-shirt and camouflage shorts—as he offered himself cuts in front of Monica. (She only allowed him the privilege because the line was in alphabetical order, and because Pat often loaned her lunch money.)
“How’s that?” asked Monica.
“Something like this new security plan,” Pat said, “it’s not to protect us, it’s to keep tabs on those labeled as ‘misfits,’ those who might be inclined to check out the wrong combination of books from the library, those who might show an interest in converting to a non-Christian faith and running amok with a pipe bomb. Whether or not they stop something like that before it happens isn’t as important as the principal being able to tell authorities, ‘It’s not our fault—we had a security plan in place!’”
“Something had to be done,” Monica said. “Can you imagine all the phone calls the school got after everyone’s parents saw the news broadcast? And anyway, we’re minors—our parents signed the forms.”
Pat scrunched up his nose. “My old man wasn’t going to sign anything, but my mom was concerned. They went at it all through dinner. The short version is that I’m to be tagged and tallied—but that doesn’t mean I’ll be in the matrix, per se.”
Monica rolled her eyes. She knew Pat had a way with computers that belied his skater-punk exterior. “Are you going to hack your tag? Turn it off?”
“No, no, that would only cause problems whenever I pass a scanner or when the teachers take roll and I don’t show up on their readers even though I’m standing right in front of them. No, I have this program that lets you swap tag information with other people who are close by. It works best in crowds. I’ll be on campus, but I won’t be who their computers say I am—and if it doesn’t work this week, it will next, ’cuz they’re always hacking the firmwares.” Pat winked. “I can e-mail you a copy, if you want.”
“Maybe on a rainy day,” Monica said, laughing, stepping forward with the line.
Pat wagged his finger at her. “Hey, that day may come sooner than you think. Look at it this way: Let’s say tomorrow a gang of militants decides to lock down the campus—they’d have to keep us all in check visually, and that’s pretty hard. Someone could sneak away, get to a phone, call the cops. But if everyone’s got their tag broadcasting in real-time, instead of having to manage several hundred people individually, all the gun-heads have to do is deal with that one single administrator who has the reader, and suddenly they know where each and every one of us is located.” He scowled. “We’re giving them real-time rosters to play with—we’re making it easier for them to fuck with us.”
Monica considered. “Well, if our enemies don’t bring their infrared equipment with them, that is.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Pat said. “The point is that this is an extraneous amount of effort with very little payoff, if any at all.”
“But it’s politically correct.”
“And how.”
Afterward, once Pat and herself had had their tags updated, they sat together on the grass and had lunch. Angeline, also a freshman, joined them.
“I don’t know if I like this,” Angeline said, brushing her arm as if her tag was an actual device that had been implanted subcutaneously.
“What?” asked Pat.
Angeline glanced over her shoulder. “I feel like I’m being watched.”
“You are being watched.”
“I know. I don’t like the feeling.”
“You’re just a blip on the administrators’ screen,” said Monica. “They can’t actually see you.”
“Still, they’ll know when I’m at the snack machine or when I’m in the bathroom…”
Pat grunted. “Yeah, they probably have nano cams installed in the urinal cakes so they can get candid shots of my dick dangling over the bowl whenever I take a piss—in the name of domestic security, you see.”
Monica put her hand on Pat’s shoulder. “Trust me, Pat, no one wants to see your dick—on or off camera.”
Angeline laughed.
Pat blushed, and was quick to ensure the conversation was directed elsewhere. “Hey, Angie, did you see the Alabama Massacre on Sunday?”
“Oh, it was terrible!” replied Angeline, brushing her arm once more and then settling into a more relaxed posture. “I feel so sorry for those people.”
“A hundred dead by the explosion, a dozen more from dehydration, fifty injured. Fucking terrorists.” Pat wrung his hands and looked like he wanted to hit someone.
Monica tried to think of something meaningful to say, but it was difficult. Here, perched at the southeast edge of Wisconsin, where it was safe, familiar, the events on the news seemed like bad dreams. Nothing ever happened in Waukesha County. Not directly. But there were repercussions. A slow decay, little things lost here
or there over time. The States performed poorly for three Olympic terms, and Monica’s parents could no longer afford to keep her training with the Keenes; a biofuel crop in Africa went up in flames, and prices at the corner pump jumped half an amero; a school in Alabama was devastated by political guerrillas, and Hamilton’s students were required to submit to ’round the clock surveillance. Regardless of the how’s, why’s, and where’s, there was little a teenage girl—without a Patriot contract—could do except shake her head and wring her hands.
“My dad used to tell me stories,” Pat said, once he’d calmed down, “about when he was a teenager, back before the Patriot System was introduced. They still fought wars out on the battlefield—the news was always showing the aftermath, the fields littered with corpses. My dad said people were getting tired of it. They didn’t want to see it anymore.”
Angeline nodded. “Now it’s all done in courtrooms, in think tanks, and on Heroes’ Day.”
“Strategical economics,” Monica said, holding up her hand and turning on a more teacherly tone of voice. “The disbursement of resources according to global rank. Military is only used to enforce compliance with the Patriot System, if necessary.”
“Yeah,” said Pat, “but we’re still at war with each other. It’s just that nowadays we hide behind rules and regulations. We’re no better off than we were twenty years ago. The Massacre is proof of that.”
“It’s proof that terrorists will always try to ruin it for everyone else—”
“It’s proof that nothing changes, and that progress is in the eyes of the political candidate running for office. Why do you think it’s mandatory to enlist when you turn eighteen? How else do you think the losing countries are made to turn over their quotas to the winners every four years?” Pat smiled grimly. “We’re still at war, girls, don’t you forget it. And now we’re getting real-time Big Brother monitoring—and you, Monica, you’re a gymnast. Did you hear how those four Patriot girls ditched the national team after what happened on Sunday?”
Monica shook her head. “I kind of tuned out once the news report hit the feeds.”
“Yep,” said Pat. “It was too much for them. Something about their coaches insinuating their inadequate scores were part of what sent the militants over the edge. They reneged on their contracts. The rest of the team isn’t faring too well, either. We haven’t a clue who’s going to make it to Heroes’ Day. Well, I’m sure that Davisson girl will—but she’s the prima donna type, probably isn’t biting the bullet for her country so much as she’s holding out for the endorsement checks, the modeling contracts and record deals.”
“Yes, yes,” said Angeline, rolling her eyes. “We all know the world is coming to an end, and your family will be the only ones prepared because you and your father built that bunker beneath your house.”
Monica chuckled, apt to dwell on the unexpected downturn of Patriot morale, but instead finding solace in her friends’ self-deprecating routine. Poking fun at the Sandsby family’s End of Days practices was always comforting. Sarah, no doubt, would have suggested making out with Pat instead of merely making fun (he was reasonably cute, in a rough-and-tumble kind of way), but Monica was perfectly content to have him as her on-campus buddy. Her big brother. As odd as the notion may have been, he represented all the little concerns tossing around inside her head, and if she could playfully disregard him, so could she disregard the things that bothered her most. She hadn’t the means to do anything else.
“Haw-haw,” said Pat. “We’ll see who’s hiding in whose basement once push comes to shove. But let’s move on to more important matters.” He looked at Monica. “You owe me for yesterday’s sandwich. Chicken, lettuce, and tomato, I believe.”
Monica blanched, knowing it was true. She’d promised a favor in exchange for the lunch money her parents had decided she could do without. “What do you want me to do?”
“Go out with me?” Pat asked, smiling.
In answer, Monica exchanged an amused glance with Angeline and said, “Try again, geek boy.”
“Okay, so you’re not ready to admit you want my manhood—I’m patient. I can wait.” Pat looked thoughtful for a moment, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose as he surveyed the field. “Well, seeing as how we’ve just eaten, let’s have a little sparring contest. Backflip off that wall over there. You outperform me and I drop all charges. Angie can be the judge.”
“You’re on,” said Monica, standing, stretching.
Pat stood as well. While he wasn’t necessarily an athlete, he was athletic, and practiced urban parkour (which Monica oftentimes referred to as “a degenerate form of gymnastics”). He waited until there weren’t any students in the way, then ran at the wall, planting his foot firmly against the brickwork, leaning back, and springing off again with impressive height on his rotation. He landed on his feet, pivoting and flashing a smile at Monica as he took a bow. A nearby onlooker whooped and clapped.
“Well?” he asked, nodding at Angeline. “What does the judging panel think?”
Angeline frowned, pursed her lips. “Hmm. Good energy, but sloppy form, and your boxers were showing—and you hopped a little there at the end.”
Flicking her off, Pat said to Monica, “Your turn.”
Monica gave herself a good running start, then scaled the wall. She was glad she’d worn sneakers today; as she pushed off, she added a twist to her rotation in mid-air, so that when she landed, she was facing Pat and Angeline—and Ms. Baskett, one of the north campus teachers currently serving as monitor.
“Young lady,” said Baskett (unlike Monica’s peers, she wasn’t smiling), “this isn’t a jumping room. Come with me.”
Pat covered his mouth and pointed at Monica. “Busted!”
The gathered students offered a round of applause.
CHAPTER 10
Monica’s wall-flip stunt earned her an afternoon of detention, as well as scheduled visits to the counseling office, where it was decided her “acting out” was the result of suppressed emotion regarding her retirement from club gymnastics. Though she made every effort to convince the counselor otherwise, it seemed her parents had no qualms over jumping at the chance to explain their daughter’s “asymmetrical” behavior. She hadn’t cried in front of them since leaving KG, and so they assumed she hadn’t cried at all, hadn’t released the pressure.
“Poor Monica,” they said, shaking their heads and clicking their tongues whenever they thought she was out of earshot. “She’s kept everything inside, and now it’s reached a fever pitch. All those years foregoing a normal childhood while trying to become the champion who wasn’t to be, and now she hasn’t a clue how to re-assimilate. She spends all her free time down in her corner of the basement. She still trains like a gymnast. I don’t think she even realizes there’s something wrong…”
(The only thing wrong, as Monica saw it, was that she was doing backflips for chicken sandwiches instead of for Patriot contracts.)
“You could lay on that shrink’s couch for years,” said Pat, catching her one afternoon after a counseling session, “and she’d never grow wise to the fact that you’re A-OK. It’s just not possible for doctor-types.”
Monica scowled, slung her backpack over her shoulder. “She doesn’t even have a couch. We spend the whole hour sitting together at a table and drawing out what I’m supposed to be feeling on a piece of paper. She must buy art supplies by the crate.”
“She doesn’t sound very intuitive,” said Pat.
“I don’t think it’s ignorance so much as it’s a desire for a paycheck that keeps her wanting to find something seriously wrong with me.” And my parents are actually paying for our time together. We’re living in a basement because of rising expenses, and yet somehow there’s room for me to see a shrink! “‘Do you think it’s your fault your parents lost the house?’ she asks. I tell her, ‘No, of course not. That’s silly.’ And she’s like, ‘You were an elite. Many elites feel pressure to live up to their parents’ standards, as well a
s those of their community—even after they’ve gone common.’ So I say, ‘Well, there’s certainly pressure from educational institutions to conform to current standards regarding emotionally-fragile teenage girls,’ and she just smiles smugly and says, ‘Hmm. That’s all for today.’ Like she’s had a revelation or something.”
Pat laughed. “Paid professionals: the blind leading the blind. Walk you home?”
“Sure.”
They left the north campus, swinging by the elementary building to pick up Chris, then passing through one of Hamilton’s shiny new checkpoints (where bored, underpaid-looking security guards mumbled for them to stand still as they waved their wands and checked their clipboards) and heading northwest along Silver Spring. It was a good forty-five-minute walk, but Monica had the legs for it, and Chris, his limbs never tired. Not unless the planets were in a certain specific alignment (and even then it was tricky).
Pat was on and off his skateboard, and didn’t talk much. When he did, it was in a quietly accommodating kind of way—totally uncharacteristic for him. No government-this, no politicians-that.
“You’re awfully quiet,” Monica said after a while.
Pat raised his eyebrows. “Am I?”
“You are.”
“Guess I’ve got some shit on my mind.”
“Like what?”
Pat took a deep breath, a sudden reddening evident in his cheeks. “Like us.”
It took a moment for Monica to respond—namely because Chris was still walking beside them and looking like he was interested in what Pat had meant by “us.”
Indeed, he stepped beside Monica, tugging on her sleeve and whispering, “I think he wants to do big-kid stuff with you!”
Monica grimaced. “What’s ‘big-kid stuff?’”
“Smooches!” Chris puckered his lips—and jumped out of the way as soon as Monica swatted at him.
Beside her, Pat looked like he was about to have a coronary.
Oh, my God, thought Monica, straightening, realizing Chris’s observation wasn’t far from the truth. Big-kid stuff.
