by Sarah Lahey
The setting sun is fierce, and Matt heads inside to fix cool drinks while Quinn plays with the pup on the veranda. She notes that his air system is intermittent. He uses an old solar configuration; maybe it’s a corroded panel. An easy fix—she’ll look at it tomorrow.
Matt returns with their drinks, and they move to the southern side of the veranda, where there’s shade and respite from the westerly sun. The vista on this side of the property takes in the valley and surrounding hills. Eucalyptus forests, still green and healthy due to an underground water supply called the Source, border the steep cliffs. The hidden water supply flows down from the ridge to a reservoir not far from Matt’s house. Quinn can’t take her eyes off it.
“It’s pink,” she says.
“Cerise. Perfect shade.”
“Algae bloom. Past the tipping point.”
“Yeah. Can’t get on top of it.”
The bloom is profuse, a carpet of deep pink, shockingly beautiful against the green foliage. Another easy fix. She’ll engineer a synthetic life form and code it to eat the algae. When the job’s done, she’ll program it to self-implode.
“Right, there’s a bit to do,” she says. “I’ll do the air system tomorrow, I’ve a plan for the pond, and can I name the puppy, please, please let me name her? We could call her Mellon Ball, or Rosy, or Bella. Yes, don’t you think she looks like Bella?” She thrusts the puppy into Matt’s face.
“For fuck’s sake, sit down. Relax. God, you never stop. You’re just like your mother. Speaking of which, I’ve something for you, from her. A birthday present. Arrived a few weeks ago.” He hands Quinn a heavy box with a card on top. “She’s organized, I’ll give her that.”
Quinn opens the card, an automated note in classical scribe. “It says, ‘To my darling Quinn. Happy 30th birthday. I’m so sorry I’m not with you, but I love you very much and I’m thinking of you. This is your birthday present. I acquired it recently, but I like to think it found me, and now it’s found its way to you. It’s a 5,000-year-old Phaistos Disc. The text is indecipherable, but it means something. Or maybe it means nothing.’ Sounds like her, but it’s not her writing.” She hands the card to Matt and opens the box.
Inside is a platter, half a meter wide, deep blue with gold veins coursing through the surface like swirling cumulonimbus clouds. “Storm clouds,” Quinn says, holding it to the light.
“Nah,” Matt says. “It’s music, a symphony.”
The surface is carved in three concentric circles, and each circle contains a series of small markings that Quinn thinks could be birds, or fish, or triangles, or maybe just awkward stick drawings. In her hands, the disc is warm, and her fingers begin to tingle. “It means something. Or nothing. Nothing comes from nothing. Keats?” She turns to her father for confirmation.
“Shakespeare, King Lear. If you do nothing, you gain nothing. Ex nihilo nihil, out of nothing comes nothing. Your mother believes the universe is made of nothing.”
“Yes, she does. But space isn’t empty, it holds all of us. We matter. Don’t we?”
“We’re living, we have mass, we matter.”
“Ha, handed you that line on a platter.”
“I took it. Hand it over.”
She passes him the Disc. “It’d make a nice . . . fruit platter.”
The sun settles lower, drops behind the hills to the west. The puppy falls asleep in Quinn’s lap, and she and Matt sip their drinks— an ice-cold lemongrass and ginger infusion—in contemplative silence. Nothingness proposes that no concrete things exist in time and space. It declares the mind to be a shallow place, just a piece of machine-learning architecture that computes mathematical codes and electrical signals. The world around them is an illusion, a fabrication of the brain, because there is no physical world as they know it. The brain conceptualizes the surroundings, creating a version of reality, a three-dimensional image of the sky, the trees, and a land filled with people—a world that’s only real when looked at.
Quinn stares at the blue hills and trees in the distance, telling herself they are not real, there is nothing there. But there is something there; thousands of trees are there. This is the problem with nothingness; it doesn’t bloody work, because everything’s so fucking real. She gazes up at the sky, at a real flock of real birds flying over in a V formation. They flit, catch the crosswind, and then change direction and reverse again, darting back the other way.
A new bird, not like the others, joins the end of the formation. It’s darker and larger than the other birds, its breast streaked with yellow ochre. It looks like Tig’s carrier pigeon, Martha2.
It can’t be. Quinn checks again as the bird swoops, circling under the flock. It’s her, it’s Martha2. She looks at Matt; he maintains a nervous, uneasy expression. He knows. She tilts her head. “What breed is this dog?”
“Dingo.”
“Pure, because they’re extinct in the wild?”
“Believe so.”
“He’s here, isn’t he? He gave you this dog?”
“Arrived about six hours before you.”
“Impossible.”
“Considerate of Maim to lend you a transporter. Apparently, she likes you, but she likes him more; he got a rotor, was here in two hours.” Matt pauses, nervous. “His words, not mine. He’s keen, I’ll give him that.”
“Where is he?”
“Not sure. He wanted to give us some time together. Said he’d be back . . . later.” Matt shrugs. “So, what happened?”
“I saw my future: Unus, his culture, life on a boat, our future life together on a boat in Unus, with a baby. I wasn’t sure I liked what I saw.”
“Fair enough. So you’re not in love?”
“I didn’t say that. It’s complicated. He’s different. He’s nothing like me. He’s traditional, and his culture is foreign, and he has this SelfMed thing happening. I was overwhelmed by all of it.”
Matt tilts his head, gives her a knowing look. “So you do like him.”
Quinn throws up her hands. “Yeah, I do. I like him a lot. But I didn’t have a plan, and—”
“You don’t need a fuckin’ plan. Trust your instincts. What does your gut tell you?”
“Intuitive thinking? Are you serious? No one uses that anymore. It’s primitive, it panders to the ancient brain, and it’s not at all scientific—”
“How does he make you feel?” Matt demands. “If he walked in right now, what would you do?”
She smiles. He came to Hobart. He really came. Good lordt, I’m so relieved. “First, I’d kiss him. Then, I’d ask him to go neutrino hunting with me.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means.” She swallows hard. “It means I’m crazy in love with him.” She smiles. She loves him. He loves her. They’re going to have a baby. It’s a good beginning, a very good beginning.
Antarctica. There’s a neutrino detector in Antarctica.
Book 2
Nostalgia is Heartless
Coming in 2021
Acknowledgment
WRITING A BOOK IS not easy—it’s a daunting and time-consuming process—but getting a book published is just as difficult. I would like to express my ongoing gratitude and appreciation to everyone who has helped me at She Writes Press and SparkPress. Special thanks goes to my publisher, Brooke Warner, for her commitment and passion to the industry, and her inspiring “Green-Light Your Book” legacy. Also thanks to my editorial project manager, Samantha Strom, for her commitment and attention to detail. I would also like to thank Krissa Lagos for pulling the book into shape with an amazing copy edit, and to Ben Perini for the beautiful cover design.
This novel would not have been possible without the help and support of my family. Thanks to Jordan Howes and Hamish Howes for being such delightful, funny, and caring people and for reading countless beginnings, endings, and iterations, and especially to Lucinda Howes for her ongoing mentorship, proofreading and amazing brain—none of this would have been possible without her. Her wit and wis
dom have been an invaluable source of inspiration and motivation.
I am also eternally grateful to Andrew Aitken, who has had to put up with me as a writer, and I know that’s not easy. Thank you for not strangling me, thank you for still hanging around, and thank you for your patience, wisdom and love—I wouldn’t be the person I am without you.
About the Author
© Alise Black
SARAH LAHEY IS A designer, educator, and writer. She holds bachelor’s degrees in interior design, communication, and visual culture and works as a senior lecturer teaching classes on design, technology, sustainability, and creative thinking. She has three children and lives on the Northern Beaches in Sydney, Australia.
SELECTED TITLES FROM SHE WRITES PRESS
She Writes Press is an independent publishing company founded to serve women writers everywhere. Visit us at www.shewritespress.com.
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