World 42: Waiting
Callie let her head ease back until it rested against the rock behind her. She wasn’t sure what it was she was hoping to accomplish with the movement. She was just too tired to sit up straight any longer. The next person to enter would see her looking vulnerable, but she didn’t think that it mattered. It wasn’t as though the decision hadn’t already been made. She knew what was coming. It was just a question of them taking the time to move through all of the formalities. She shifted her head a little from side to side in an attempt to ease some of the tension out of her shoulders; it didn’t work.
She ached everywhere. Every movement (as slow and gentle as she tried to make them) just shifted the focus of the aches from one spot to another. It was no wonder. She had been trussed up for she wasn’t even sure how many hours with her limbs at angles she was quite sure were not natural. She wasn’t tied up any longer at least. She figured she owed Devon for that. The older woman was really the only one who would have had both the inclination and the clout to do something about it.
She tried to remember where she had learned the word “clout,” but she couldn’t think of it. Either her memory was failing her, or she was just too exhausted to think straight. That would be ironic -- her memory becoming faulty now after it had already gotten her into so much trouble. She tried forward with her head next, but it really wasn’t any better. She might as well be trying to figure out why she knew a word like clout; it was better than thinking about being in pain. It was better than dwelling on what was coming.
The concept of one person in the enclave being able to influence decisions more than the others was not one that was spoken of amongst the people. To say such a thing out loud was to imply that the Instructor had individual priorities that might conflict with his dedication to making decisions for the good of the whole. It would imply that the Council listened differently depending on who was doing the speaking. One did not say such things out loud. Most people probably never thought such things within the confines of their own heads -- unless they were Callie.
Callie thought a lot of things that she wasn’t supposed to think, and she said them out loud sometimes. That was neither appreciated nor helpful to her personal safety, but she found that she couldn’t care. They had all tried to teach her over the years, but she hadn’t been receptive. If it was Devon who had intervened on her behalf (and there was really no one else that it could have been), then it wasn’t the first time that it had happened. She wasn’t supposed to know that either, but she wasn’t nearly as good at pretending as the rest seemed to be.
Surely the others noticed the way the Instructor’s eyes softened when he looked at Devon? It was blatantly obvious when you contrasted it with the hard look that his eyes held whenever he looked at anyone else. There was no softening even when the old man looked at Daniel, and Callie had long since figured out that Daniel was his (and Devon’s) son.
No one claimed children in the enclave. They belonged to the whole. You didn’t speak of parents. You weren’t supposed to treat any of them differently from any of the others. Theory, however, and practice were always very different things. If you paid attention (and Callie always paid attention), you could trace the family lines without a great deal of effort. There were features in common, of course, but you didn’t have to rely on that. There was a look that the adults got when they looked at certain of the little ones -- a twitch at the corners of their mouths and a difference in their eyes.
They might all pretend that children were common property, but the adults knew which ones were theirs. They watched them a little closer, paid them a little more attention, and you could see the tension when they got sicker and the grief when they passed. That was common. Most children in the enclave didn’t grow up. It was to be taken in stride. It was a fact of their existence. The Instructor was always saying that it was a necessary balance; there had always been more people than there should be.
His statement was supposed to bring acceptance. All it did was drive people’s grief under the surface. Callie saw. Devon saw. That, she thought, was why she had always trusted Devon when trust was something that eluded her when it came to most of the adults in the enclave. Devon recognized the grieving, and she acknowledged it by whatever means she could. Callie had understood the older woman’s lack of pretense before she was old enough to understand what pretense was.
She needed to stop thinking about Devon. The woman wasn’t going to be able to save her this time. She wasn’t a child any longer. She was fifteen, and the enclave was thoroughly sick of her and the turmoil she was always stirring in their lives. It wouldn’t even matter much to anyone when they finally got rid of her. There were no parents watching her from a distance to care.
That, after all, was the beginning of all of the problems. She didn’t belong here. She never had. It didn’t actually matter, not really, not when she was going to die, but she was curious, and she did like having answers. She rather hoped that before they got around to their official verdict and their declaration of the necessity of her elimination for the good of everyone that someone would tell her what had ever possessed them to bring her here in the first place.
Didn’t they owe her that? They wouldn’t think so. She knew that (even though something in her wouldn’t let her cease to struggle against the concept). That they owed her an explanation would be too individual of a concept for the enclave to allow it. Providing her with answers would also require that someone admit, out loud, that she did not belong to them. No one had ever admitted that out loud in her presence. Devon hadn’t even said it out loud. She had only offered her that infuriating smile that Devon always got when she was refusing to answer a question when she thought you should already know the answer.
She was cold. That was hardly unusual; she was nearly always cold. That was just one more thing that marked her as not belonging. No one else ever seemed to mind the cold. ‘Siah didn’t even seem to notice the cold. She wondered whether it was because he was just tougher than she was or whether it had just been easier for him to adapt because he had been younger than she had been when they came here. The thought had occurred to her that he was simply so determined to fit in with the others that allowing anything out of their ordinary would never occur to him.
It was probably a strange mix of all those options. He had been too young to remember, and that made all of the difference. He didn’t have the knowledge of all the ways that being in the enclave felt wrong haunting him at every turn. He didn’t have a stubborn memory of the last moments from their before always in the back of his head telling him that this place was too cold. She did. She had the memory of feeling fuzzy headed from the warmth and curling up to take a nap in a patch of sunshine.
Was it any wonder that she was never completely comfortable in a world where there was no sunshine, no warmth, and no sky? The sky had been blue. She remembered that. She would always remember that. It didn’t matter how often they told her that she was wrong. It didn’t matter how many years she spent in this place where there was no sky to see. She remembered that the sky was blue. They tried to tell her that it was not, but she knew. She had stopped saying so to them. There wasn’t any point in explaining that you knew something to someone who didn’t understand what it was to know. They didn’t know anything -- not the way she did.
She knew lots of things. She knew that ‘Siah used to laugh. She knew that ‘Siah was ‘Siah. It didn’t matter that they had convinced him that he was one of them. She knew that there was a time before. She knew it was warm there in the before time where she used to be able to sit in the light. She knew that if you were there where it was warm sitting and squinting up in the way that she remembered you had to do when you looked around in the bright light from what she remembered was called the sun, then you would see the sky that was blue. It was blue just like ‘Siah’s eyes. She knew.
Knowing was dangerous. It was, at le
ast, for her. The fact that she knew differently from what she had been told by the Instructor (what the enclave had accepted without question because they had been told) mattered to her. It mattered. She couldn’t tell you why it mattered to her enough that she had allowed herself to end up where she had. She had tried to find the words to explain it to herself and failed even in that endeavor; she had no hope of finding the words to make any of the others understand. She didn’t even know if the others were capable of understanding.
There was Devon, of course, but Devon didn’t need convincing. Devon already knew, yet she somehow managed to exist without the endless need to push back that Callie always found herself experiencing. She may have stopped telling people that the sky was blue, but something about her internal rebellion against all the ways that she knew they were wrong still shone through all of her interactions with the others. She wasn’t Devon. She couldn’t sit back content with the knowledge that she knew what she knew and let the others continue on in their ignorance -- not when there was ‘Siah and not when there was Jordan.
She couldn’t bring herself to regret her attempts at dragging ‘Siah into the land of the knowing with her. That was probably pathetic on her part given how certain it was that it was ‘Siah who had ultimately made the report that drove the Instructor and the Council into action. Knowing that it was pathetic didn’t change the way she felt. He deserved to know. They all deserved to know, but ‘Siah was special.
‘Siah had not been born into this place any more than she had been. Shouldn’t he be allowed to know that? Shouldn’t he be allowed to question what had brought them here just like she did? Maybe that was selfish of her. The Instructor would certainly tell her so (which was a not so insignificant part of why she was driven to follow the instinct to include ‘Siah in the first place).
Everything about the Instructor grated on her nerves and made her want to do the opposite of what she was told just because she didn’t like him. She couldn’t argue that it wasn’t a petty response on her part. She knew that it was, and she had made her peace with that better than she had most things in her life. How anyone who exhibited enough sense to understand that Devon was wonderful could still be the way that he was was baffling to her, but that really didn’t matter. Devon didn’t matter. The Instructor didn’t matter. She was going to die very shortly.
Josiah had (most likely) turned her over for wandering through the restricted tunnels. Did that matter? Maybe. She was hurt, but she wasn’t angry at him. He just didn’t remember. That wasn’t his fault. He just wanted to belong. She couldn’t be angry about that even if she had never been driven to belong. She had only ever wanted to find out why she didn’t. Josiah wasn’t her, and she couldn’t expect him to make the choices that she had made. If she expected that, then she wouldn’t be any different than the Instructor.
Josiah had to make his own decisions, and he had. It wasn’t what she had hoped. She had wanted him to know what she knew in the hope that he would see things the way she saw them and she wouldn’t be alone in her searching any longer. He knew what she knew, but it wasn’t her type of knowing. He knew only because she said so -- not because he knew himself. He had chosen not to believe her. It felt like closure somehow. He knew, but he didn’t believe. He had chosen, and it felt like some sort of a weight had lifted off her shoulders. She didn’t have to take care of him any longer.
She didn’t know why. She had always taken care of Josiah. She remembered that from before. There was a woman’s voice telling her to keep Josiah out of trouble. She had taken that as her responsibility for as long as they had been in the enclave. She thought (or maybe she was only being a wishful thinker) that the woman would forgive her if she didn’t take responsibility for Josiah now. The only thing left that mattered to her was Jordan.
She wanted to say good-bye to Jordan. That mattered to her. Jordan deserved to have a good-bye. She didn’t know if he would get one. Devon might help with that. He was, after all, her son’s son. Devon wouldn’t be able to intercede in Callie’s fate at this point, but she might be able to convince them that she should be allowed good-byes. That, however, might not be such a good idea. Jordan might deserve to know that she hadn’t simply left him behind, but knowing might not be what he needed. She shuddered as the thought rolled around in her head; it sounded far too much like something that the Instructor would say.
She comforted herself with the knowledge that he would only say something like that about the group as a whole (never about Jordan as an individual). Jordan was so tender hearted. Which would hurt him more -- to think that she had run off without him or to know that the enclave had had her executed? She didn’t know. It didn’t matter which she decided. She wouldn’t be getting to make that decision.
Jordan would miss her after she was gone. He would, at least, miss her stories. Jordan always believed her stories; it never seemed to occur to him that she might be making such things up. He asked to hear about the blue sky and the sunshine that was warm and the places where you could run out in the open on the days that he was so tired from being sick that his voice came out in a barely heard whisper. He told her that she painted pictures with her words. He told her that her stories made him forget when he was in pain.
Jordan had been ill for as long as she could remember him. Nearly all the children in the enclave were. Some were just sicker than others. Jordan always seemed to hover in the middle of the spectrum. He might make it to adulthood. He was, after all, in her year group. He was close to being fully grown. She wanted Jordan to grow up. It wasn’t that she wanted any of the others to die. She was always sad when one of the little ones passed, but Jordan was special.
The Instructor couldn’t live forever. The members of the Council couldn’t last forever. Someday, someone else would have to lead the enclave. She wanted it to be Jordan. He had Devon’s manner about him. He would care about the people as people. He questioned like Callie did. He was quieter about it. His manner was gentler, but he still thought of the questions. Jordan could make the enclave better. Jordan could make it into a place that didn’t decide to kill girls in their fifteenth year because they wanted to know things.
She was sorry that she wouldn’t see it, but she wasn’t really sorry that she was leaving the enclave. That was why she had been wandering the restricted tunnels in the first place. She had wanted to leave. That it would happen at the Council’s discretion would not have been her first choice, but she was tired. She might not be so defeatist if she wasn’t so sore. She might not be so defeatist if she wasn’t so cold. She might not be so defeatist if she didn’t feel as if she had been beating her head against the rock behind and above and all around her. It would move before the Instructor did.
She thought she was seeing things for a moment when her eyes focused to find the man himself standing in front of her. She blinked, but he was still there. She wasn’t imagining his presence. The Instructor was standing there staring at her as if he was pondering something. That didn’t help her feeling that she was imaging this. The Instructor had nothing to ponder when it came to her. He would be pleased when she was gone. He registered her knowledge of his presence and gave her what would be termed an amused smile on the face of anyone who didn’t look as hard as the rock that surrounded them.
“I’ve never understood the fascination,” he told her. Callie only blinked again. He shook his head slowly. “They’ve always been so fascinated with you,” he continued. “But all you are is an unruly child.” What was she supposed to say to that?
“So obsessed with saying things you shouldn’t say, and look where it has gotten you. And you don’t even care, do you?” He inquired actually sounding vaguely interested in an answer.
“I don’t know what you mean,” she said feeling her shoulders straighten despite the further discomfort that it caused her. She knew it didn’t matter, but there was something about facing
the Instructor that made her want to look not weak. She would stand up, but she wasn’t sure that her legs would function properly with the way in which they were still cramping. She wouldn’t take the chance on trying to stand and falling when it didn’t work -- not in front of him.
“If I made you an offer right now you wouldn’t take it, would you?” He asked. “If I told you all you had to do was give up questions, declare that the things that you have said were wrong, and follow directions from now on, then you could walk out of this room and back in to your life, would you do it?”
“You wouldn’t offer that,” she replied. “You wouldn’t trust me to keep my word.”
“No, I wouldn’t,” he answered. “Do you know why that is?”
“Because you shouldn’t,” she replied holding back the wince that wanted to escape her as her shoulders shrugged out of habit before she could stop them. “I wouldn’t do it.”
“No, you wouldn’t,” he agreed. “You are just a spoiled child who can’t manage to learn. Tell me why you say the sky is blue.”
“Because it is,” she retorted letting her confusion over the interview come through in the words.
“Why should that matter?” He asked her calmly as if he was assessing something in her words that she wasn’t even aware of saying.
“Because the sky is blue,” she said carefully enunciating each of the words.
“What if the enclave needs it to not be?” He countered.
“It’s blue,” she insisted. “And why would . . . never mind,” she trailed off changing her mind about asking the question. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to you,” he told her, “because you think you need to know. That’s why you’ve never managed to be one of us. You think that what you know matters. What you know doesn’t matter. What is necessary matters.” They looked at each other for a long moment before he continued. He held out his hands in an encompassing gesture. “Why does the enclave stay here?”
“Because you tell them to.” He actually chuckled.
“You are an annoyance, Callie, but it has been many a year since I have had the pleasure of actually having to work to make my point. I dare say the novelty would wear off rather quickly. You won’t be around long enough for us to find out. I will rephrase my question. What is the reason the children are given for why the enclave must remain here?”
“There is nothing left to go back to,” she recited the appropriate part of the litany that had been drilled into them from the time that all of the children were functional enough to repeat the words. (All of the children, that was, except for her. She had time in her head from before the litany. She had memories in her head that told her that the litany was wrong.)
“You don’t think that is an adequate reason.”
“It isn’t true,” she told him not knowing what he wanted from her and not in a frame of mind to try to determine what it was. “Outside still exists. It isn’t dark. It isn’t cold. There’s sunlight, and the sky is blue.”
“What good will it do any of them to know that, Callie, when they must remain here just the same?”
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t,” he agreed, “and that’s why you cannot be allowed around the others. You don’t understand, and you think that understanding is necessary. Understanding doesn’t matter. Knowing doesn’t matter.”
“It’s the truth.”
“Of course it is,” he snapped. It was the first time she had seen the man ever anything other than calmly collected. “You’re just like them. You’re just like all of them. It’s like it’s been bred into you -- all the ones who refused to listen to reason and insisted on remaining outside. We should have put bullets in all of their heads and been done with it in the first place. Truth isn’t relevant. What does it matter if it is the truth? If it isn’t expedient, then why know it?” He took a deep breath, and his voice returned to its normal calm.
“The truth doesn’t do you any good, Callie. In fact, it’s going to kill you. I should have killed you the first day I set eyes on you -- the day he dropped you down in front of me after he brought you back from that trip to the outside. I should have snapped your little neck right there where you stood. Is that true enough for you? Does it make you feel better? Does it do you any good to know that the truth is that you shouldn’t ever have been allowed here in the first place? What good does truth do for you? Does it change the way things have to be? Does it reconcile you to what is to come?” He stared at her for a long moment as if waiting for her to answer him, but she had nothing to say. She was far too caught up in the fact that he was actually admitting that she wasn’t theirs.
“You were an experiment, Callie,” he told her. “Not mine,” he hastened to add. “I never wanted it. I didn’t care. I don’t care, but Devon and Daniel swayed the Council.” His eyes lost their intensity as he gazed beyond her as if he was seeing the past play out in front of him.
“I’ve always underestimated how foolishly sentimental people get about children. They thought they could raise the children in the outside for a couple of years -- just a few years of sunlight to ward off the sickness that takes all of them to a lesser or greater extent. They thought they could bring them back after a while and that they could still function here as they need to despite the contamination of being exposed to what is really out there.” His hard, focused look was back and directed at her.
“As if more of us surviving was ever a laudable goal,” he spat. “They kept you to see if it could be done. They watched you to see if we could get a child to forget. I don’t suppose I need to spell out for you how the experiment has ended?”
“There’s Josiah,” Callie found herself whispering as she tried to process what she was hearing.
“A fifty percent success rate is hardly a respectable figure to base the future of the enclave on, Callie. Even you must see that,” he chided with a clucking sound from his tongue. “I suppose I should thank you. After all, if you had proven less intractable, they would have pursued the idea further. I have only to point at you to silence any dissent on the topic now.”
“Why?” She demanded suddenly hit with the reality of how out of place it was for the man in front of her to offer the explanations that had been forthcoming during his visit.
“Why?” He echoed looking startled by the question.
“Why are you bothering to tell me this now?” She demanded.
“I thought you liked truth, Callie,” he hedged looking decidedly uncomfortable. “Isn’t that what’s gotten you here?”
“And you don’t care to tell it when it doesn’t suit your purpose,” she countered. “What’s your purpose?”
“Does it matter?”
“I’m going to die very shortly,” she paused as she considered if there was any way to phrase what she wanted to say that might mean something to the man in front of her. “If I’m going to die because I believe the truth matters, then I would like as much of it as I can get before I go.”
He actually laughed, and the sound wasn’t even mocking. “I find it difficult to argue with that point,” he told her. “I must be getting very old. I told you in exchange for something that I wanted from someone else.”
She nodded her head. He looked at her very carefully before nodding in return. “Yes, you would accept it as if it was expected. You know much more about the people here than any ordinary member of the enclave should.”
“Yet another reason to kill me?” She quipped trying to hide her exhaustion.
“No,” he stated suddenly very serious. “Under different circumstances, it would have been a very good reason to keep you alive.” He made a dismissive motion with his hand. “That’s a final bit of your truth to dwell on in your last hours. I’ve kept my end of my bargain. I won’t be troubled with your presence again.”
He walked out, and Callie sank back into the rock again with nothing bu
t a tumbling confusion of thoughts to keep her company.