by K. M. Szpara
“You should probably soak them.” I plug the drain, then turn on the hot water.
A little cry slips from his throat as he straightens his legs and leans his head on the porcelain rim. He’s holding back. Holding on to his pride. He doesn’t need it, here. The sooner he realizes that—the sooner he relaxes and falls into place—the happier we’ll both be.
I cannot stay here and coddle him. I swallow and push myself to my feet. “When you’re finished, dry off and meet me in my room.”
“Okay,” he says.
I close the door behind me and listen. A small splash breaks the silence. Labored breathing and quiet groans follow. I need a distraction. Normally, Saturdays bore me. If Elisha weren’t here, I’d pop down to the lab for a few hours. I’m not used to babysitting—and that’s what this is, for the time being.
I return to my mystery novel—something I can lose myself in for a while—but glance at the bathroom door every few paragraphs. It’s mostly quiet, now. Twenty pages in, the door opens.
Elisha stands with the same towel from earlier wrapped around his waist. Below the hem, dimples mark his knees. I stop reading and watch while he smooths the sides of his hair down—any excuse to busy himself and not acknowledge that he’s standing naked in front of me.
“You can put on a pair of briefs and a tee shirt,” I say. “Your clothes are in the drawers on the other side of my bed.”
Relief grips Elisha as he searches for the prescribed clothing. I didn’t buy him any underwear I wouldn’t want to watch him walk around in; if he’s looking for boxers, he won’t find them.
Elisha settles on red boxer briefs that cover a few inches of his thighs, and a white, V-neck tee shirt. He looks cute, like a guy I would’ve flirted with during undergrad. Suddenly, he doesn’t feel like such a chore.
Without warning, I stand and kiss him. Elisha tries not to look flustered when I end it.
“Downstairs.” I nudge him with a hand to the ass and he moves quickly, still not used to my touch. Hopefully, he will be soon.
“Have a seat.” I gesture to the breakfast bar and tap its surface to bring forward the new rules I brainstormed while he was running. The original four remain, followed by:
5. Tell me immediately if you feel ill or injured. I’m legally obligated to care for your health.
6. Do not ask superfluous questions. I will always give explicit instructions. If I don’t tell you something, you don’t need to know it in order to complete a task.
7. Keep yourself groomed. Nails, hair, skin, clothing. You should always appear aesthetically pleasing, not only in public, but in private, as well.
Elisha’s eyes follow when I reach back into the shopping bags from my morning errands. His body relaxes when I pull out a notebook rather than another bag of rice. I set down the leather-bound journal and a pen in front of him. “Write these down—and any others I give in passing. The rules are a living document that I can edit at any time. Don’t try and debate them.”
“Yes, Alex.”
“Remember them. Live them.” I smile, satisfied with the authority in my words. I’m getting better at this. And won’t it impress my parents and the Board when I’m able to show off a presentable and compliant Docile that I trained from scratch?
* * *
When dinnertime finally rolls around, Elisha sets our places at opposite ends of the table. I put two fingers against one of the black ceramic dishes and slide it down toward the other.
“Sit.” I gesture to a chair and Elisha takes it.
He waits, either for my instruction or for my approval. He’s made roasted potatoes and chicken breast. The preparation appears amateur at best. I slice easily into the juicy chicken and taste a bite. Elisha watches. Chefs have watched my first bite, before, but I’ve never had such a rapt audience.
“Not bad,” I say, before trying the potatoes. “Could use a little more seasoning. But they’re cooked well.”
“We don’t have the same spices back home. I wasn’t sure what to use.” Not the response I wanted, but at least it was devoid of attitude. Well, mostly.
“You’ll learn,” I say. “I scheduled a chef for your afternoon lesson on Monday. Eat.”
He tries to match my pace, but I can tell he’s hungry even after he cleans his plate.
“You’re allowed to have seconds. I’m not trying to starve you.” I allow a slight smile.
“Thank you. Do you want some more, too?”
“No, but I appreciate you offering.” He was just being polite, but I’m not; I mean it. I like when he picks up on acceptable behavior. Hopefully, we’ll reach a point where I barely need to instruct him.
“So,” I say, “did you enjoy the harbor, this morning?”
“Yes,” Elisha says between bites. “I’ve always liked the water.”
“Do you swim?”
“I can stay afloat.”
“I’ll enroll you in lessons.”
“I’d like that.” Elisha fiddles with his last potato, picking at the skin with his fork.
He’s stalling. It’s nearly time to retire, and he knows what that means.
“If you’re finished, you can clear the plates and put the dishes in the sanitizer. It’s under the coffeemaker.” I point so he can find the camouflaged appliance.
Elisha takes both our plates and puts them away. When he finishes, he remains standing. “Do you want anything else?”
“Nothing from the kitchen. Why don’t you head upstairs and wait for me on the bed.”
His body is heavy when he walks. His emotions cannot rule his actions; he needs to learn that. When he’s distracted, I’m the one who has to deal with it.
I give him a few minutes—enough to unwind, not enough to become nervous—then walk upstairs to my room. Elisha dents the otherwise smooth comforter, curled up on his side. His eyes lock on me when I close the door.
I take off my shoes, socks, and pants until we’re in equal stages of undress. Elisha watches, unmoving. I recline beside him and do the same. I never really look at people—not even lovers—it’s too awkward, too intimate, vulnerable. But I like looking at him, studying where the tension builds in his body. His shoulders and lips. Calves. Always so guarded.
This would’ve been easier for him if he’d just taken the drug instead of carrying his pride around. Now I want to unlock him.
“Why did you refuse Dociline?” I’m not even sure it’s the right time to ask, after his earlier outburst.
“The side effects.”
Surprising. I expected some ideological objection, some kind of martyrdom. But a medical decision? I can’t help asking, despite how it may reflect on me. “What side effects?”
“Are you joking?” Elisha narrows his eyes at me like I’ve just said the Earth is flat. “Didn’t your family invent it?”
I feel the warmth of embarrassment on my face, but I cannot allow him the upper hand on this. “What did I say about talking to me like that?”
Elisha’s gaze falters. “Sorry.” He sounds like he means it, so I go easy on him.
“Lines, tomorrow.”
“Fine.” He doesn’t fight it, this time.
“Continue.”
“Dociline doesn’t always leave your system when you stop injecting. Maybe it does for short-term Dociles.” He picks at a nonexistent thread on the sheets with intense focus. “But not after a decade. It holds on to some people and doesn’t let go. They keep doing what they’re told. They’re empty inside. I didn’t want to turn into one of them—a drone.”
I roll my eyes. The number of times I’ve heard that goddamn word shouted by Empower Marylanders. Dociline doesn’t turn people into drones. It’s designed to exit the body within two weeks of the final dose. “No,” I say.
But Elisha plows on. “A lifetime on Dociline is mental suicide.”
“That’s a lie.”
His face tenses, brows furrow, while he stares at me, incredulous. “No, it’s not. Rule number one, I’m te
lling you the tr—”
“If you followed all my rules perfectly, that might mean something.” I feel my jaw tense, teeth grind. I take a breath to relax myself. How dare he. As if refusing my family’s drug wasn’t enough, now he’s slandering me.
“If you don’t believe me, ask my mother. That is, if you can get her to answer you.”
“That’s enough!” My voice fills the room. Its silent echo laps against the walls. I can hear myself shouting at him over and over.
But he doesn’t fight. He opens and closes his mouth like a suffocating fish.
“Additional lines, tomorrow. Sleep, now.”
Elisha slinks down to his trundle. I remove a small lock from the nightstand, reach down, and unfurl the chain from his cuff. He doesn’t resist when I lock it to a rung on the bed. I dismiss plans for sex. How can I touch him after what he said—a direct affront on my family, my work? It’s within his rights to decline Dociline, but he has no right to spread lies and make false accusations.
I clench my fists beneath the covers, then unravel them, releasing my anger where Elisha cannot see. Dociline works. Dociline helps debtors make better lives for themselves. In all my years at the lab, I’ve never once seen the drug affect a person after their dosage wore off.
Then again, I’ve only been working there ten years. Bishop Labs never studied the effect of Dociline over a life term because, well, we would have died before the study concluded, and the Office of Debt Resolution was eager to get their hands on the drug and we were similarly eager to help.
I feel blasphemous even thinking we might’ve been too eager. That Elisha might not be making this story up. For the second night in a row, I lose sleep because of Elisha.
11
ELISHA
The next morning, we shower and dress in near silence. My arm aches with stiffness from being cuffed to the trundle all night, and I’m itching with anger. Alex practically shoved me over the side of the bed when I didn’t answer his questions about Dociline the way he wanted me to. I make a note to weigh the truth against its consequences, from now on.
He dresses me in clothes I’ve only seen trillionaires wear. A baby-pink button-down shirt, silk mustard scarf, pale khaki pants with a brown belt, and a matching pair of soft leather shoes. Alex hands me a textured gray-brown blazer with patches on the elbows—tweed, he calls it—and the same notebook I copied the rules down in.
We are clearly going out—someplace nice, at that—but I don’t dare ask where. We pass Tom at the front desk, then cross the street and walk along the harbor path that I ran yesterday. Despite the cold, city dwellers walk along the water with brown paper shopping bags swinging from their arms. Others dine on enclosed balconies that overlook the harbor. While I look around, Alex looks only ahead.
We don’t go far. I’m surprised when we enter the Science Center building and even more surprised when Alex leads me through a door marked “Bishop Laboratories: Staff Only.” The hallway on the other side is long and beige. A stocky white woman in a black security uniform nods at Alex when he passes; her eyes linger on me while he goes through multiple security scanners and enters half a dozen codes. Finally, a door swings open and we leave the hallway behind.
The sight of our new surroundings stops me. I feel as if I’ve stepped through a gateway into another world. The room is a giant hollow cylinder. There must be thousands of rooms. A tall railing encircles each floor—I immediately grab on to the one nearest me, imagining what it would be like to fall over the edge. My stomach drops, eyes squeeze shut.
I feel the warm weight of Alex’s hand on my shoulder. “You okay?”
I nod. “Yeah.”
“Take a few deep breaths, if you need to.” He casually glances over the railing, down dozens of floors. “We call this the Silo. Magnificent, isn’t it?”
“Mm-hm,” I manage, slowly opening my eyes again. The ceiling is only a few floors above us, a wide circular stopper made of glass so clean and clear I almost don’t notice it.
Alex leans forward on the railing beside me. “Bulletproof, acid-proof, hacker-proof.” He smiles. “Everything-proof.”
“Good to know,” I say between the recommended deep breaths.
Alex chuckles, sliding his arm around my waist. He pulls me away from the safety of the railing and toward a glass box. With a swipe of his hands, a door slides open for us and we board. We’re in an elevator. A clear elevator that is about to drop a hundred floors—oh god.
“Lower lab,” Alex says.
My stomach flops again.
We drop.
I grab on to Alex, digging my fingers into the wool of his coat. The fall pulls a gasp from my lungs. Terror ripples through my limbs. I close my eyes.
“I didn’t realize you were afraid of heights.” I can hear Alex’s amusement.
“Neither did I.” When I peek, we’re already slowing to a stop. “I don’t think it’s heights. Just falling from them.”
“Well, we have a safety system installed that will catch any object that drops more than two floors. So, rest assured.”
I am only slightly assured. When the doors open, I’m the first one out, glad to be safely on the bottom floor of this place. From here, the glass ceiling is a small sky-blue disc. We must be a mile deep, if not more. It doesn’t hit me until then: Bishop Labs is empty. Mostly.
“Where…” I trail off, realizing I’m about to speak out of turn. I haven’t forgotten I’m still in trouble for that.
But Alex says, “Please, feel free to ask questions. I brought you here to demystify Dociline. When you’ve only heard lies and rumors, you’re bound to believe them; I understand that.”
I bite my lip to stop myself from mouthing off. When the urge passes, I ask my original question. “Where is everyone?”
“It’s Sunday.” Alex says, as if that answers my question. When I continue staring blankly at him, waiting for further explanation, he says, “No one’s required to work on the weekend.”
Right. People in the city can afford not to work on the weekends. I nod and fold my arms behind my back. The magnitude of Bishop Laboratories is even clearer from the bottom floor. Rows of glass-doored rooms line each floor and, if I position myself properly, I can see inside some of them. I can see—“There are people.” I turn. “Hundreds of them.”
“Thousands,” Alex says. “They’re Dociles. Like you, they all interviewed at the ODR, negotiated, and signed contracts. Though their contracts are with Bishop Laboratories, the company. Not me, individually.”
“And who are the people in scrubs?” I point at a woman walking along a floor above us. She glances into the Dociles’ rooms, as she passes, tapping her tablet.
“Caretakers. We don’t need a full staff on the weekends, but for those who want flexible hours, the opportunity exists. Since most of our subjects are on-meds, we don’t even really need caretakers. On-meds follow their prescribed routines without prompting or monitoring. But, for safety reasons, we employ caretakers twenty-four hours per day, every day of the year.”
“Most? There are off-meds here?” I’ve never heard of anyone else refusing Dociline.
“Well, yes,” Alex says, as if the answer is obvious. “We need a control group.”
I don’t know what that is, so I ask, “What do you do to them?”
“We don’t ‘do’ anything to them.” He wanders out across the workroom floor, between glass tables and panels with softly glowing lights. “They take a variety of enrichment classes—practice crafts, read, exercise—and participate in periodic tests to act as a comparison point for those on various Dociline formulas. All painless, I promise.”
A door slides opens across the way, prompting both Alex and me to glance over. I don’t like that he’s caught by surprise. Despite the bright colors and open, airy feel, this is still Bishop Laboratories. The drugs made here still change people. Still hurt them.
A light-skinned Black woman in a yellow blouse and purple knee-length skirt walks toward us. She tuck
s her stylus into the pocket of her unbuttoned lab coat and waves casually at Alex. “What are you doing here?” she asks, sitting on one of the workstation tables. “And who’s— Wait. Is this…” She smiles at me. “Elisha?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I say.
“Oh.” She waves my comment off. “You can call me Jess.”
“Dr. Pearl,” Alex interjects.
“Jess,” she reasserts.
“Fine,” he says. “This is Dr. Jessica ‘Jess’ Pearl. Bishop Labs’ Head of Research.”
I’ve yet to see anyone overrule Alex. They must be close. Already I like her better than Alex’s other friends from his birthday party, Dutch and Mariah. She doesn’t seem to take herself too seriously, and yet she must know what she’s doing if she’s Head of Research. I don’t know how I feel about that. I dislike this place on principle, but it’s harder to dislike the people involved when they’re kind.
Jess nods her head in my direction, forgoing a handshake. “Nice to meet you, Elisha.”
“You too.” I return her nod with a smile. Why does she have to be so nice?
“Did you get the Board’s memo about our latest trial?” Jess asks Alex.
“Yeah, let’s”—he glances between me and Jess—“continue that conversation in a few minutes. Elisha has something to take care of, first.”
“You’re the boss.” Jess hops up and repositions herself in an actual chair, at one of the workstations.
Alex gestures to another elevator, and I’m already nervous about the ride. At least up is better than down. Inside, he types a passcode into a panel, then says, “Lower lab three.” We rise so quickly, I have to steady myself on the railing. Alex doesn’t. He steps off and I follow.
The third floor is not an open-air walkway, like the others. The same glass that makes up the doors and tables and panels walls-off this floor like a glass doughnut. Portions of the panels light up as Alex passes them, sensing his presence.
“Is this your office?” I ask, hoping the invitation to ask questions still stands.
“Yes.” Alex pushes through another glass door to a small room with a single workstation. “Have a seat and take out your notebook.”