by Lois Lowry
“I couldn’t bring myself to inflict physical pain on her. But I gave her anguish of many kinds. Poverty, and hunger, and terror.
“I had to, Jonas. It was my job. And she had been chosen.” The Giver looked at him imploringly. Jonas stroked his hand.
“Finally one afternoon, we finished for the day. It had been a hard session. I tried to finish—as I do with you—by transferring something happy and cheerful. But the times of laughter were gone by then. She stood up very silently, frowning, as if she were making a decision. Then she came over to me and put her arms around me. She kissed my cheek.” As Jonas watched, The Giver stroked his own cheek, recalling the touch of Rosemary’s lips ten years before.
“She left here that day, left this room, and did not go back to her dwelling. I was notified by the Speaker that she had gone directly to the Chief Elder and asked to be released.”
“But it’s against the rules! The Receiver-in-training can’t apply for rel—”
“It’s in your rules, Jonas. But it wasn’t in hers. She asked for release, and they had to give it to her. I never saw her again.”
So that was the failure, Jonas thought. It was obvious that it saddened The Giver very deeply. But it didn’t seem such a terrible thing, after all. And he, Jonas, would never have done it—never have requested release, no matter now difficult his training became. The Giver needed a successor, and he had been chosen.
A thought occurred to Jonas. Rosemary had been released very early in her training. What if something happened to him, Jonas? He had a whole year’s worth of memories now.
“Giver,” he asked, “I can’t request release, I know that. But what if something happened: an accident? What if I fell into the river like the little Four, Caleb, did? Well, that doesn’t make sense because I’m a good swimmer. But what if I couldn’t swim, and fell into the river and was lost? Then there wouldn’t be a new Receiver, but you would already have given away an awful lot of important memories, so even though they would select a new Receiver, the memories would be gone except for the shreds that you have left of them? And then what if—”
He started to laugh, suddenly. “I sound like my sister, Lily,” he said, amused at himself.
The Giver looked at him gravely. “You just stay away from the river, my friend,” he said. “The community lost Rosemary after five weeks and it was a disaster for them. I don’t know what the community would do if they lost you.”
“Why was it a disaster?”
“I think I mentioned to you once,” The Giver reminded him, “that when she was gone, the memories came back to the people. If you were to be lost in the river, Jonas, your memories would not be lost with you. Memories are forever.
“Rosemary had only those five weeks worth, and most of them were good ones. But there were those few terrible memories, the ones that had overwhelmed her. For a while they overwhelmed the community. All those feelings! They’d never experienced that before.
“I was so devastated by my own grief at her loss, and my own feeling of failure, that I didn’t even try to help them through it. I was angry, too.”
The Giver was quiet for a moment, obviously thinking. “You know,” he said, finally, “if they lost you, with all the training you’ve had now, they’d have all those memories again themselves.”
Jonas made a face. “They’d hate that.”
“They certainly would. They wouldn’t know how to deal with it at all.”
“The only way / deal with it is by having you there to help me,” Jonas pointed out with a sigh.
The Giver nodded. “I suppose,” he said slowly, “that I could—”
“You could what?”
The Giver was still deep in thought. After a moment, he said, “If you floated off in the river, I suppose I could help the whole community the way I’ve helped you. It’s an interesting concept. I need to think about it some more. Maybe we’ll talk about it again sometime. But not now.
“I’m glad you’re a good swimmer, Jonas. But stay away from the river.” He laughed a little, but the laughter was not lighthearted. His thoughts seemed to be elsewhere, and his eyes were very troubled.
19
Jonas glanced at the clock. There was so much work to be done, always, that he and The Giver seldom simply sat and talked, the way they just had.
“I’m sorry that I wasted so much time with my questions,” Jonas said. “I was only asking about release because my father is releasing a newchild today. A twin. He has to select one and release the other one. They do it by weight.” Jonas glanced at the clock. “Actually, I suppose he’s already finished. I think it was this morning.”
The Giver’s face took on a solemn look. “I wish they wouldn’t do that,” he said quietly, almost to himself.
“Well, they can’t have two identical people around! Think how confusing it would be!” Jonas chuckled.
“I wish I could watch,” he added, as an afterthought. He liked the thought of seeing his father perform the ceremony, and making the little twin clean and comfy. His father was such a gentle man.
“You can watch,” The Giver said.
“No,” Jonas told him. “They never let children watch. It’s very private.”
“Jonas,” The Giver told him, “I know that you read your training instructions very carefully. Don’t you remember that you are allowed to ask anyone anything?”
Jonas nodded. “Yes, but—”
“Jonas, when you and I have finished our time together, you will be the new Receiver. You can read the books; you’ll have the memories. You have access to everything. It’s part of your training. If you want to watch a release, you have simply to ask.”
Jonas shrugged. “Well, maybe I will, then. But it’s too late for this one. I’m sure it was this morning.”
The Giver told him, then, something he had not known. “All private ceremonies are recorded. They’re in the Hall of Closed Records. Do you want to see this morning’s release?”
Jonas hesitated. He was afraid that his father wouldn’t like it, if he watched something so private.
“I think you should,” The Giver told him firmly.
“All right, then,” Jonas said. “Tell me how.”
The Giver rose from his chair, went to the speaker on the wall, and clicked the switch from OFF to ON.
The voice spoke immediately. “Yes, Receiver. How may I help you?”
“I would like to see this morning’s release of the twin.”
“One moment, Receiver. Thank you for your instructions.”
Jonas watched the video screen above the row of switches. Its blank face began to flicker with zig-zag lines; then some numbers appeared, followed by the date and time. He was astonished and delighted that this was available to him, and surprised that he had not known.
Suddenly he could see a small windowless room, empty except for a bed, a table with some equipment on it—Jonas recognized a scale; he had seen them before, when he’d been doing volunteer hours at the Nurturing Center— and a cupboard. He could see pale carpeting on the floor.
“It’s just an ordinary room,” he commented. “I thought maybe they’d have it in the Auditorium, so that everybody could come. All the Old go to Ceremonies of Release. But I suppose that when it’s just a newborn, they don’t—”
“Shhh,” The Giver said, his eyes on the screen.
Jonas’s father, wearing his nurturing uniform, entered the room, cradling a tiny newchild wrapped in a soft blanket in his arms. A uniformed woman followed through the door, carrying a second newchild wrapped in a similar blanket.
“That’s my father.” Jonas found himself whispering, as if he might wake the little ones if he spoke aloud. “And the other Nurturer is his assistant. She’s still in training, but she’ll be finished soon.”
The two Nurturers unwrapped the blankets and laid the identical newborns on the bed. They were naked. Jonas could see that they were males.
He watched, fascinated, as his father gently lifted
one and then the other to the scale and weighed them.
He heard his father laugh. “Good,” his father said to the woman. “I thought for a moment that they might both be exactly the same. Then we’d have a problem. But this one,” he handed one, after rewrapping it, to his assistant, “is six pounds even. So you can clean him up and dress him and take him over to the Center.”
The woman took the newchild and left through the door she had entered.
Jonas watched as his father bent over the squirming newchild on the bed. “And you, little guy, you’re only five pounds ten ounces. A shrimp!”
“That’s the special voice he uses with Gabriel,” Jonas remarked, smiling.
“Watch,” The Giver said.
“Now he cleans him up and makes him comfy,” Jonas told him. “He told me.”
“Be quiet, Jonas,” The Giver commanded in a strange voice. “Watch.”
Obediently Jonas concentrated on the screen, waiting for what would happen next. He was especially curious about the ceremony part.
His father turned and opened the cupboard. He rook out a syringe and a small bottle. Very carefully he inserted the needle into the bottle and began to fill the syringe with a clear liquid.
Jonas winced sympathetically. He had forgotten that newchildren had to get shots. He hated shots himself, though he knew that they were necessary.
To his surprise, his father began very carefully to direct the needle into the top of newchild’s forehead, puncturing the place where the fragile skin pulsed. The newborn squirmed, and wailed faintly.
“Why’s he—”
“Shhh,” The Giver said sharply.
His father was talking, and Jonas realized that he was hearing the answer to the question he had started to ask. Still in the special voice, his father was saying, “I know, I know. It hurts, little guy. But I have to use a vein, and the veins in your arms are still too teeny-weeny.”
He pushed the plunger very slowly, injecting the liquid into the scalp vein until the syringe was empty.
“All done. That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Jonas heard his father say cheerfully. He turned aside and dropped the syringe into a waste receptacle.
Now he cleans him up and makes him comfy, Jonas said to himself, aware that The Giver didn’t want to talk during the little ceremony.
As he continued to watch, the newchild, no longer crying, moved his arms and legs in a jerking motion. Then he went limp. He head fell to the side, his eyes half open. Then he was still.
With an odd, shocked feeling, Jonas recognized the gestures and posture and expression. They were familiar. He had seen them before. But he couldn’t remember where.
Jonas stared at the screen, waiting for something to happen. But nothing did. The little twin lay motionless. His father was putting things away. Folding the blanket. Closing the cupboard.
Once again, as he had on the playing field, he felt the choking sensation. Once again he saw the face of the lighthaired, bloodied soldier as life left his eyes. The memory came back.
He killed it! My father killed it! Jonas said to himself, stunned at what he was realizing. He continued to stare at the screen numbly.
His father tidied the room. Then he picked up a small carton that lay waiting on the floor, set it on the bed, and lifted the limp body into it. He placed the lid on tightly.
He picked up the carton and carried it to the other side of the room. He opened a small door in the wall; Jonas could see darkness behind the door. It seemed to be the same sort of chute into which trash was deposited at school.
His father loaded the carton containing the body into the chute and gave it a shove.
“Bye-bye, little guy,” Jonas heard his father say before he left the room. Then the screen went blank.
The Giver turned to him. Quite calmly, he related, “When the Speaker notified me that Rosemary had applied for release, they turned on the tape to show me the process. There she was—my last glimpse of that beautiful child—waiting. They brought in the syringe and asked her to roll up her sleeve.
“You suggested, Jonas, that perhaps she wasn’t brave enough? I don’t know about bravery: what it is, what it means. I do know that I sat here numb with horror. Wretched with helplessness. And I listened as Rosemary told them that she would prefer to inject herself.
“Then she did so. I didn’t watch. I looked away.”
The Giver turned to him. “Well, there you are, Jonas. You were wondering about release,” he said in a bitter voice.
Jonas felt a ripping sensation inside himself, the feeling of terrible pain clawing its way forward to emerge in a cry.
20
“I won’t! I won’t go home! You can’t make me!” Jonas sobbed and shouted and pounded the bed with his fists.
“Sit up, Jonas,” The Giver told him firmly.
Jonas obeyed him. Weeping, shuddering, he sat on the edge of the bed. He would not look at The Giver.
“You may stay here tonight. I want to talk to you. But you must be quiet now, while I notify your family unit. No one must hear you cry.”
Jonas looked up wildly. “No one heard that little twin cry, either! No one but my father!” He collapsed in sobs again.
The Giver waited silently. Finally Jonas was able to quiet himself and he sat huddled, his shoulders shaking.
The Giver went to the wall speaker and clicked the switch to ON.
“Yes, Receiver. How may I help you?”
“Notify the new Receiver’s family unit that he will be staying with me tonight, for additional training.”
“I will take care of that, sir. Thank you for your instructions,” the voice said.
“I will take care of that, sir. I will take care of that, sir,” Jonas mimicked in a cruel, sarcastic voice. “I will do whatever you like, sir. I will kill people, sir. Old people? Small newborn people? I’d be happy to kill them, sir. Thank you for your instructions, sir. How may I help y—” He couldn’t seem to stop.
The Giver grasped his shoulders firmly. Jonas fell silent and stared at him.
“Listen to me, Jonas. They can’t help it. They know nothing.”
“You said that to me once before.”
“I said it because it’s true. It’s the way they live. It’s the life that was created for them. It’s the same life that you would have, if you had not been chosen as my successor.”
“But he lied to me!” Jonas wept.
“It’s what he was told to do, and he knows nothing else.”
“What about you? Do you lie to me, too?” Jonas almost spat the question at The Giver.
“I am empowered to lie. But I have never lied to you.”
Jonas stared at him. “Release is always like that? For people who break the rules three times? For the Old? Do they kill the Old, too?”
“Yes, it’s true.”
“And what about Fiona? She loves the Old! She’s in training to care for them. Does she know yet? What will she do when she finds out? How will she feel?” Jonas brushed wetness from his face with the back of one hand.
“Fiona is already being trained in the fine art of release,” The Giver told him. “She’s very efficient at her work, your red-haired friend. Feelings are not part of the life she’s learned.”
Jonas wrapped his arms around himself and rocked his own body back and forth. “What should I do? I can’t go back! I can’t!”
The Giver srood up. “First, I will order our evening meal. Then we will eat.”
Jonas found himself using the nasty, sarcastic voice again. “Then we’ll have a sharing of feelings?”
The Giver gave a rueful, anguished, empty laugh. “Jonas, you and I are the only ones who have feelings. We’ve been sharing them now for almost a year.”
“I’m sorry, Giver,” Jonas said miserably. “I don’t mean to be so hateful. Not to you.”
The Giver rubbed Jonas’s hunched shoulders. “And after we eat,” he went on, “we’ll make a plan.”
Jonas looked up, puzzled. “A
plan for what? There’s nothing. There’s nothing we can do. It’s always been this way. Before me, before you, before the ones who came before you. Back and back and back.” His voice trailed the familiar phrase.
“Jonas,” The Giver said, after a moment, “it’s true that it has been this way for what seems forever. But the memories tell us that it has not always been. People felt things once. You and I have been part of that, so we know. We know that they once felt things like pride, and sorrow, and—”
“And love,” Jonas added, remembering the family scene that had so affected him. “And pain.” He thought again of the soldier.
“The worst part of holding the memories is not the pain. It’s the loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared.”
“I’ve started to share them with you,” Jonas said, trying to cheer him.
“That’s true. And having you here with me over the past year has made me realize that things must change. For years I’ve felt that they should, but it seemed so hopeless.
“Now for the first time I think there might be a way,” The Giver said slowly. “And you brought it to my attention, barely—” He glanced at the clock, “two hours ago.”
Jonas watched him, and listened.
It was late at night, now. They had talked and talked. Jonas sat wrapped in a robe belonging to The Giver, the long robe that only Elders wore.
It was possible, what they had planned. Barely possible. If it failed, he would very likely be killed.
But what did that matter? If he stayed, his life was no longer worth living.
“Yes,” he told The Giver. “I’ll do it. I think I can do it. I’ll try, anyway. But I want you to come with me.”
The Giver shook his head. “Jonas,” he said, “the community has depended, all these generations, back and back and back, on a resident Receiver to hold their memories for them. I’ve turned over many of them to you in the past year. And I can’t take them back. There’s no way for me to get them back if I have given them.
“So if you escape, once you are gone—and, Jonas, you know that you can never return—”
Jonas nodded solemnly. It was the terrifying part. “Yes,” he said, “I know. But if you come with me—”
