It was his guilty pleasure. He knew he shouldn’t do it. It spiked his hedometer, and benefited nobody else. Gave him no altruism credits. But he couldn’t help it.
Anand had to cook.
It was spring, and the sun was setting later. Enough time to get to the market before nightfall. The market, where he was safe. Where every stall promised a new fragrance, a fresh ingredient. There were a thousand combinations, a million, he’d never tried.
Anand squeezed the handlebars of his motorbike, twisted the accelerator grip. The bike surged to life, drawing him away from BIGS. With every yard he put between himself and the bathhouse, the tension in his heart eased.
With the city trailing behind him, the residential section of Shangri loomed ahead. Anand twisted the accelerator further, and a spray of spring wind stung his cheeks. He shrieked his freedom into the chunks of air that forced their way down his gullet.
His tongue tasted it before his eyes could see the market in the dusk. The smoke from the trout fires. He salivated as he gulped down the sweet stench of the ocean. The market was black and syrupy in his nostrils.
Anand had never seen the sea. Master Dzogo said that it was a place far away. A salty, watery place, where the toxins from the nuclear fallout had settled. “Ocean is bad,” Master Dzogo would say. “Only death at ocean.” But there was the smell of the trout, sweet and alive on the air.
Anand parked his bike, and found his way into the messy mass of stalls and haranguing buskers. The sellers touted their wares at the top of their voices, clawing their recipes into the air. The aisles between the tables throbbed with customers, jostling for the freshest limes, the most pungent oregano. Anand’s heart soared at the possibilities. Love hit him square in the chest. The joie de vivre etched on the tight apron of the pastry chef; the way the customers sniffed the melons on the old farmer’s cart, suckling at the scent; bottles of jam glinting in the dying light. Love. Love everywhere.
Anand closed his eyes, and inhaled the market. He turned with the wind –
His nose erupted in a fire worse than the strongest chilies the market could produce. Worse than when the patrons at the bathhouse came in his eye. Through his watery vision, he saw her lying on the ground.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, kneeling beside her. He stared at her porcelain skin, her long black hair. Straight hair. Straighter than Mrs. Goldstein’s as the men in brown suits had dragged her downstairs. And her skin wasn’t wrinkled like Mrs. Goldstein’s.
The wind wrapped a plastic wrapper from the lettuce stand over his face, but he hardly noticed. He swatted it away. “I’m Anand,” he said.
She was laughing, her lips supple.
He drew his hand away from his nose, and it came away redder than the beetroot he bought from Mr. Calridge a few stalls further into the market. He smiled at her embarrassedly. The pain was gone.
“You’re bleeding!” she said, the laugh dissolving into concern. She sat up, removed her scarf and pressed it to his nose. Her fingertips brushed his cheek. They were hot on the evening air.
“It isn’t stopping,” she said.
“Oh, it’ll be fine.”
The two of them concertinaed to standing, she holding the scarf to his nose, he lifting her to her knees, and then to her feet. Neither could stop smiling.
“What,” Anand asked after a moment, “are you looking for?”
The woman lowered her eyes, some dark thought smothering her smile.
“Dumplings,” she said, pointing at the soggy balls lying in the dirt at her feet.
“Oh no,” said Anand. He stared down at the sandy masses. “Those are good, but I have a better recipe.”
“You do?”
“Add oyster sauce and coriander to the dough first,” he said. “And they’re better without sand.”
A gust of wind threatened to yank the scarf from her grip. “I’m Cyan,” she said, and kissed him on the cheek.
“Anand,” he said for the second time and felt stupid immediately.
“Where do you get the ingredients?” she asked.
Half an hour later, and the last of the evening sunlight had left the market. The sellers had ceased their yelping, and were packing up. Cyan, hidden under dozens of shopping bags, stood with Anand beside his bike. “Can’t cook it without that,” Anand had said as they passed every stall.
Cyan regarded him carefully. “Would you,” she asked slowly, “would you … like –”
“Would you like me to cook it for you?” Anand completed for her. The beats. The beats in his chest. “Cook it … with you?” Oh, but they were glorious now, the beats. Not like they were at BIGS, heavy and dusty. It didn’t matter that the sun had set. It didn’t matter that the only light emanated from the lanterns that burned around the parking lot. When he looked at Cyan, everything was light.
The small engine on his bike felt the strain of the extra rider. It sputtered and protested. But none of that mattered to Anand as he drove Cyan to his apartment. The sum of existence was reduced to the feeling of her arm around his waist. His brain didn’t register the ghetto Wall with its spotlights and holograms. He didn’t think about the public service announcements. He didn’t think about the messages that floated on the surface of the barrier between them and the Breeders.
SHANGRI
Because sterilization is too good for them.
Because they took the food from our mouths.
He didn’t think about anything as the woman leaned into him, resting her chin on his shoulder. He didn’t think of her as a Breeder when she pressed her cheek to his. He didn’t think of himself as a Breeder. He couldn’t.
Chapter 2
Utilitarianism (n.)
The doctrine that an action is right just in case it maximizes the utility, or happiness, of society as a whole.
Gemini scratched at the smooth glass surface below his hairline. Touched the margins of the hedometer. Felt where the glass met skin. Where the machine ended, and he began. A hot shiver passed over him.
Boop
A bead of sweat ran down his brow, and rested precariously in the crook of his nose. The pencil he gripped was poised an inch above the sketch-pad on his desk. It was an unbreachable force, that inch. The pencil stabbed at it, but with little success. He’d drawn nothing all afternoon.
“Gemini!” his boss’s voice erupted from the loudspeaker on his desk. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”
Gemini dropped the pencil at the sudden noise. Sweat pattered onto the sketch-pad. He looked up, squinted at the sight from the small, grimy window above his desk. Endless black clouds simmered above the city, snagging against the tops of buildings, burnishing the edges. The once-white masonry had yellowed, then blackened, the clouds leaving behind ever-thickening veins of soot that nobody noticed. Nobody but Gemini.
“Yes, sir. Beautiful,” Gemini said.
“That’s all. Just wanted to check in. Say hello. That sort of thing. Carry on.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”
The LED on the loudspeaker faded to black. Gemini raised the pencil with trembling fingers, and placed it against the pad.
“Oh, Gemini,” his boss’s saccharine voice interrupted a moment later. “You know we love your work. Always a pleasure reading your stuff. My eldest especially loves it.”
“Appreciate that, sir.” The emerald LED on the speaker pierced his retinas.
“Yes, we love your work, really we do.”
Gemini waited for it.
“Yes,” his boss continued, “terrific work. Terrific! Would it be possible to finish the cartoon by the end of the day?”
Gemini swallowed. He glanced down at his hand. Splayed the fingers. His thumb twitched.
Boop, the tone at the back of his brain sounded again.
He clenched his fist. Wiped his brow.
“Yessir,” he said cheerily. Cleared his throat. “That won’t be a problem.”
“Ah, yes, Gemini. Dependable as always. Did I tell you how much my daughter
loves your cartoons?”
“Yes, thank you, sir.”
“Carry on, Gemini. Beautiful day, isn’t it? Beautiful.”
The LED on the speaker snapped off.
Gemini took a breath as big as his cubicle. Bigger. He held it for a count of five, just as Master Dzogo instructed. His shoulders sank into his sides as he released the stale air. He splayed his fingers again. Scrutinized them for movement.
His ring finger trembled.
It didn’t matter how many times Gemini rubbed it. How many times he tried to shake the shakes out of his hand, shake the blood back into the pale fingertips.
“Citizens of Shangri,” the radio on his desk blurted, “rejoice! For today marks exactly twenty years since the Holy Bhutanese Empire replaced dollars with hedons. To commemorate the elimination of the Green Greed, I call upon our Holiness, the Sixth Vitta, to announce this year’s budget. In the name of Gross National Happiness, Honorable Vitta, we are grateful for your presence.”
Gemini’s hand trembled more than the cartoons could handle. The balloon-round heads he’d usually draw without effort were jagged and ominous today. He tried warming up his hand. He rubbed it vigorously, against his other hand, against the sole of his shoe.
“Citizens of Shangri,” the Vitta’s voice seeped through the radio speaker, “we are grateful to our Lord Buddha for giving us such wealth on this day.” A crowd cheered. “On this beautiful day. To mark its auspiciousness, and the joy of all the world, I give to you the annual tax rebate. Sixty hedons!”
Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep
But Gemini hardly heard his hedometer. He sat on his hand. He sucked on the fingertips. Bit them. It didn’t matter what he did – they wouldn’t stop trembling. He couldn’t draw.
“But …” The cheers on the radio died down. “But we must always strive for Greater Happiness. Less suffering. Greater Compassion. This year’s budget contains even better ways for us to …”
Back in the ghetto, before he’d been released by the lottery, Gemini had known others with trembling hands. The old woman who lived in the cattle shed. The priest. His father. It had started with the shakes in their fingers. But the shakes travelled, up their arms, into their legs, their necks. Their memories.
In his last months, most days Gemini’s father couldn’t remember his son. He’d examine Gemini at length every morning over his oats. “You look so familiar,” the dying man would say. “Did we serve together? Ah, I knew it! Fourth battalion, Battle of New York, right?” Gemini had resisted them at first – his father’s regressions. But he learned to accept them. To accept the joy that saturated his father’s cheeks when he played along. “That’s right,” Gemini would say, “what a battle that was.” And his father would blurt out, every time, “Blew those Brownie fuckers right to hell, we did!”
“For this reason, by the hand of our Lord, the Minimum Hedometer Reading is hereby lowered to six-hundred and fifty hedons.” The crowd on the radio roared its appreciation. But, wasn’t the threshold five-hundred and fifty hedons last tax year? Gemini wondered. “And,” the Vitta continued, “the Maximum Hedon-Altruism Deficit has been increased to fifty hedons! For those young Shangrians listening to the budget speech for the first time, don’t gain fifty pleasure units more than you give.” The Vitta chuckled. “Unless you’d like an unpleasant visit from a tax man.” The crowd laughed quietly. “To help you achieve this Middle Way, the Tax Bureau will perform monthly hedon-altruism deficit assessments on all citizens. Just another way Shangri makes life easier, better, happier.”
The day before his father died, Gemini had carried the old, old man to the summit of the district heap. Cardboard boxes, plastic packets, clothes hangers, rags, and a thousand other remnants of the past had sagged, crunched and scratched beneath Gemini’s bare feet. By the time he’d reached the top, he was out of breath. But it wasn’t the weight of his father in his arms, clinging to his neck. His father weighed less than a memory. No, it was the thought that this would be the last time they would share the view together.
The heap was higher than the ghetto Wall, higher than the Devas. From the top, they could see it all. Rows and rows, and rows, of tin shacks stretched behind them. And before them, a mile away, was the great Wall, brown as the earth. Beyond was the city, its brown-white spires shrouded in fog. Brown fog.
His father had looked at Gemini then. Really looked. Looked at him, his son, not as a war veteran. Not as someone from the past. “Boy,” his father’s voice was hollow, soaked up by the heap, “are you happy?”
The breath in Gemini had caught. Of course he was happy. Everyone was happy. It was Shangri. But his lips formed a different reply. “No,” he said, and stared out beyond the Wall. His cheeks burned.
“That’s okay, boy. They say they’re happy. But they’re not. Nobody is.”
Gemini swung his head to study his father’s eyes. The blasphemy. Sure, there was unrest here, in the ghetto. Sure, there was discontent. But few spoke such … such blatant heresy. Such negativity.
“Find a girl,” his father said, placing a veined hand on his son’s. “Be happy with her, but not too much. Never forget …” His head twitched. “Never forget that there is more.”
His father fell silent. Gemini scooped together a pillow of detritus so the dying man could lie comfortably as he stared out at the city. The city the old man had fought for, and lost –
“Gemini!” the speaker on his radio summoned. “Visitor for you, Gemini. It’s The Tax Man.”
Yes, the desk was Rhodesian teak. And yes, The Tax Man knew that before the Collapse, when they still used money, it would have cost more than he could possibly afford. But since the Debreeding, there was enough for everyone. The Bhutanese officials guessed that Breeders made up about 85% of the population. With the Breeders off the streets, and safely packed away in the ghetto, the remainder had the pick of the furniture.
The Tax Man knew it was a magnificent desk. The drawers were etched with decades of loving use. Abraham Lincoln had run his fingertips over the inscriptions on its drawers. The tabletop gleamed with the sheen of history. Yes, it was quite a desk, but his legs wouldn’t fit beneath the damned thing.
The Tax Man wasn’t short. When he stood, he was tall enough to brush the ceiling with his graying hair. And he was thin. All angles. Hard angles. As though he’d walked out of a holo-movie with the projector configured to the wrong dimensions, and the contrast set to maximum.
He sat at his diminutive but superlative desk, and looked over his schedule. It was the middle of March, two weeks after the end of the tax year. And people needed visiting. He’d already called on three this morning. Two kneecappings and a broken thumb. Standard stuff. Mid-range Pleasure Monsters, who’d been greedy last year – lost track of their altruism credits while they gorged themselves on the pleasures Shangri offered. He brought down their hedometers to reasonable levels. Returned them to the Middle Way.
The handgun in The Tax Man’s holster was warm against his thigh, as he read through the list of offenders that needed visiting this afternoon. He didn’t hate his job. Sure, the work involved inflicting pain. He didn’t like the way people shivered when he came knocking on their apartment doors. (He’d had more than a few full-grown men lose control of their bowels when they recognized him). But it had to be done. Couldn’t have Pleasure Monsters running around unchecked. They were sucking up hedons, without giving them in the form of altruism credits. They were a blight on society. Selfish.
What made it all worthwhile were the memory removals – the repossessions and the marriage counseling he did once tax collection season was over, usually by May. This was holy work, The Tax Man thought. The reason Lord Buddha had placed him on this Earth. To remove suffering from the needy. To lessen the pain in this world was a holy purpose.
“MC - Gemini Rustikov,” read the first line on the list. It was unusual to have a marriage counseling case on his schedule so early in the tax year. Normally his superiors would assign only tax c
ollections to his March caseload, but who was he to argue? Gemini Rustikov must be an unhappy man, and that wouldn’t do.
The Tax Man grabbed the piece of paper with Gemini’s work address, and found his car-keys hanging beside the Rembrandt on the wall above his desk. The drive to Gemini was short. The Tax Man recalled the traffic before the Debreeding, the way it could take an hour to drive two blocks if there was an accident or road-works. But now, even during peak-time, a trip across town took no longer than half an hour. Not that he would have minded a long trip in this car – a 1954 Mercedes SL, with customized whitewashed wooden interior. Grace Kelly herself had chosen the oak tree used for the dashboard. She’d sat on that passenger seat, her gorgeous ass adorning its white leather.
The car purred as it slunk through the empty streets, its gleaming body sullied by the reflections of the browning buildings that flanked it. There were advantages to being a tax man. Since the Bhutanese took over after the Collapse, since he’d become a Shangri official, life had suddenly improved for The Tax Man.
He was an obvious candidate for public service, with his bisexual inclinations. It was true that he could no longer exercise his heterosexual desires, but his bisexuality allowed him to understand both Breeders and normal men alike. Bisexuality was indispensable for marriage counseling.
As it crept closer to the Cartoon Bureau, the Merc’s climate control had no problem maintaining the cool interior of the leather-seated vehicle. (He’d retrofitted the air-con and a better suspension when the Tax Bureau had given him the car as a starting bonus). Yes, life was good in Shangri. At least, it was until later that afternoon.
Gemini watched The Tax Man stoop to enter the doorway of his office. The towering man wore an expression impossible to read, buried behind mirrored glasses and pockmarked skin. His leather jacket creaked as he swung his enormous legs. In a moment, he was standing before the cartoonist’s desk.
Hedon Page 2
