by Darren Cole
“Slow down,” she huffed, and watched as Susan took to the entrance. “Do we have time?”
“We’ll just grab some fruit,” Susan answered, tilting her head inside. Tabitha wasn’t sure; anxious reservations crept in place of her hunger pangs.
“Quick though… right?” she pleaded. Tabitha wanted the fruit— more than she’d admit to. She’d always heard about picking fruit right out of the garden beds, devouring it on the spot. She was told that it was something everybody in the silo should try, at least once, that is. Susan stretched out a slender arm, reaching for Tabitha, clutching her fingers in the air as shouts from inside the gardens rang out, telling them to close the door. Tabitha sighed and took hold of her friend’s eager hand.
The feeling of a full belly was satisfying. Tabitha took to the next stage of their downward trek feeling just a little better than she had when they’d started out. Susan had been right, and more than once she acknowledged that fact. She’d eaten a whole tomato, right off the vine, followed by a dozen grapes, while Susan had crunched away on a pear, and then an apple, devouring them.
The ringing sound from the staircase told her that traffic was coming towards them. Instinctively Tabitha moved to the outside, taking hold of the railing. Susan fell in just behind her, slowing their pace as a rush of porters moved past in a quick upward motion. One boy huffed out a breathy hello, smiling up at her. Tabitha smiled back, seeing his face in full and thinking that he couldn’t have been more than thirteen. A shadow? she wondered briefly, and then took to the next step, trying to figure out how late in the day it might be before they reached the lower Mids.
Hours passed by like the second hand of an old clock—around and around—as they wound their way downward, deeper into the silo. In her entire lifetime, Tabitha had never traversed so many stairs in a single day.
“What did you say the person’s name was?” Tabitha asked, breaking the monotonous clanking and chiming of their feet hitting the steps. Silence. Susan had never offered a name. “Do you know their name?”
“Doc… I think,” she answered, her voice weary and uncertain. They’d traveled farther after eating the fruit, but the ache in her thighs was just the first indication that they needed to break again soon. The fatigue she heard in Susan’s voice supported the notion. “All I know is that he goes by the name Doc.”
“You don’t mean Doctor Nichols, do you? From the nursery on twenty?” A rush of dread went through her, escalating the ache in her legs and feet. Doctor Nichols was on the upper levels, running the nursery, and by her guess they were nearing level forty—more than three hours away.
“No. Not Doctor Nichols,” Susan exclaimed, stinging the air with a click of her tongue. “Do you really think I’d bring you all the way down to the lower Mids if we needed to go to the infirmary?”
“Suppose not,” she answered, and immediately regretted her tone, knowing that her chiding remark was due more to fatigue than anything else. Her energy was fading. She was different. Deep in the back of her mind, she knew that she’d already begun to change, that her body was transforming into a vessel meant to support another life. She had no control over it, just like she had no control over what the sheriff and mayor would do if they found out.
At once, a stench took her breath away, causing her to stop on the stairwell. Susan thumped her feet on the step behind her, and Tabitha felt the brush of her hands on her shoulders, taking care so that they both didn’t tumble downward. Susan pulled her arm around Tabitha, taking to the next step so that the two stood together.
“Do you smell that?” Susan asked, pinching her nose and laughing while trying to shoo the stink of manure away. “We’re here. Ninety levels in just a few hours. That’s saying something.” Tabitha offered a slight smile, but in her mind she had questions about why they were on this particular level. The farming level.
“Susan, this is an animal farm,” she reminded her. “It is. Isn’t it?”
“So,” Susan answered. Her expression quickly turned into a scowl. “So what if it is?”
“Why would they have the lottery tickets at the animal farm?” she asked, afraid that they’d traveled into the lower Mids for nothing. She watched as Susan pondered the question.
“Could it be that maybe the Mids is the most ideal location? I mean, if you were trading goods, like lottery tickets for chits, then you’d want to be somewhere in the middle… less travel. Right?” Tabitha considered her friend’s explanation a moment, and then shrugged, still uncertain as Susan pulled on her arm, leading them to the steel grate of the landing. Tabitha’s thoughts shifted to Justin and their baby, and for the first time, she found herself rubbing her hand over her middle, waiting for the life inside her to nudge back.
Once they were inside, Tabitha reeled back, covering her nose and mouth. The odor of fertilizer was stronger than she’d imagined it would be. She’d smelled it before, but what was spread in the beds of the gardens was only a thin reminder of the animal farm’s main product: manure. The face of the young porter came into her mind, and she wondered how many bags of fertilizer he’d humped up and down the stairwell, twenty or more levels, every day. How many days a week, and weeks a month, mounting into years? What kind of life was that?
A young woman greeted them at the entrance. She had a pleasant smile, and an expression that told Tabitha the young woman was unaware of any smell. The woman led them back into the animal farm, taking them to the man Susan asked for. She was no more than their own age, but seemed older. Tabitha thought that maybe she was already a shadow, having started years before. She’d heard of shadowing at an early age, but mostly in the lower Mids and the Down Deep, and then wondered just how young they started. When a little boy came running from a pig stall, tackling the young woman’s leg, Tabitha could tell it was her son. Her heart filled unexpectedly, swelling at the sight of the affection shared between them.
“You go on now, and get that stall cleaned,” she told him, pecking him with a kiss atop his head. “When you’re through, I’ve got a few more chores before supper. Mind your manners, too, say hello to these nice folks from the Up Top, and then be off with yourself.” The boy nodded to each of them, waving comically into the air before disappearing back into one of the stalls.
“Looks just like his father,” the young mother said, her eyes still facing in the direction of the stall. When she turned back, Tabitha saw something else in the woman’s eyes. Pain, the kind that’s tucked away, carried but never explained. “Just around the corner. I’ll take you to see Doc.”
At some point the smell of the animals and manure had become almost normal. Although it hung in the air like a drift of dust, she now only noticed the essence of it, like the cafeteria’s kitchen carrying the smell of citrus cleaners. Her eyes weren’t watering and her nose wasn’t irritated. In fact, there was something almost pleasing about the smell. Homey. Tabitha didn’t know when that had happened, but hoped they’d gotten past the worst of it.
The room they entered wasn’t much different from the apartments in the upper levels. She supposed most apartments, regardless of their level in the silo, were probably the same. What surprised her, though, was the continuation of the farming inside the apartment. Straw and dirt lay scattered on the floor. Farming equipment hung from the walls, dangling and sounding eerie chimes when the metal touched. Bales of roughage were strewn along the side of the wall, waiting to be eaten. A lone desk and chair sat across from the entrance, pressed against the far wall and looking out of place in the room. Susan stayed to Tabitha’s side, but slightly behind, reserved; yet close enough to hold her arm.
Tabitha stepped into the room and felt the steel grate beneath her feet disappear. In its place, the floor was level, flat, and absent of the metal tread that her feet had grown accustomed to. The straw and dirt accumulated in drifts with the dried manure, piling up in the corners. A stainless steel table sat in the center of the room, a small spigot and water hose hung from the side of it. Susan’s fingers du
g into Tabitha’s arm, motioning her to look at something else in the room. Across the lip of the table there hung a collection of instruments, the likes of which she’d never seen. Long and thin, with a metal handle on one end, and an oddly shaped fixture on the other.
“What are those things?” Susan whispered into her ear. She lifted her hand from her belly and ran it over her friend’s arm, gripping it.
“I… I don’t know,” she replied in a shaky voice, sounding uncertain. Her mouth had gone dry, and her throat was stuck, unable to swallow. “Let’s just get the lottery ticket and go, okay? I don’t think we want to be here.”
“Good afternoon,” a voice bounced from the far wall. A small man stood up from behind the desk, having been invisible to her eyes when they’d first entered the room. His coveralls were dirtied to the same shade as the floors and walls, hiding him from their sight. A lively wrinkled face—squished and creased by age—peered up at them, revealing beady eyes that were set far back into his head. Long straggly gray hairs puffed wildly in all directions from above his ears. A shallow cap rested atop his head and was adorned in the same dirtied colors as his coveralls. For a moment, Tabitha thought the man’s outfit was intentional—a way of disappearing within the silo—but then wondered if that was even possible.
“I’m Doc,” he said, extending a small child-sized hand in their direction. Facing a man whose height barely reached her shoulders, Tabitha leaned down to take his hand in hers. Susan followed, but stayed safely behind Tabitha’s shoulder.
“And which one of you, can I ask, is here for my help?” His voice was pitched high, matching his stature and appearance. “Wait… wait, don’t tell me. I love to guess,” he continued. Tabitha felt the grip of Susan’s hand, and heard a muffled snicker when the small man began to jump on his toes, darting a finger between them. “You girls always show up in pairs. Never three. Never one. But always pairs! So it must be one of you.” Before Tabitha could object, Doc approached them and laid his boyish hands on her belly and then pressed two fingers against her neck. His finger felt warm on her skin: tender. She watched his eyes bounce between her and Susan and was taken aback by his quick movement when he suddenly moved to rest his hands on Susan.
“Well, this might be a first! Two of you, it is… can’t say I’ve ever had two come for my help at the same time.”
“What?” Susan blurted. Her eyes dashed from Tabitha to Doc, and then back again, as she furrowed her brow with frantic concern. “That’s not possible!” But before Susan could say another word, the boyish man howled a screechy laugh, his breath wheezing, sounding labored by the years in the lower Mids. Tabitha traded a puzzled glance with Susan while she crossed her arms and waited for the laughter to end.
“I love that joke,” Doc finally said, catching his breath and swiping a tear from his eye. He stretched his hands outward, palms up. “I can’t tell who’s pregnant. That’s impossible. So I let you tell me!” He was laughing again, and Tabitha caught a red-faced glare from her friend. Doc stepped forward, taking hold of Tabitha’s hand, and walked her towards the center table.
“Step up, Dearie. This isn’t going to take long. Quick and simple. Easy peasy, and you won’t even get queasy.” Doc’s voice was without laughter or humor, or any hint of joking around. Instead he was sincere and calm, singing out instructions and helping her to take a seat on the cold steel. Tabitha stole a look at her friend, wondering about the table. Confusion mingled with thoughts of the lottery ticket while she tried to understand Doc’s instructions. She wanted to know when they would trade her chits for the ticket. But so far, he’d made no mention of the lottery or their intended trade. Susan shrugged her shoulders in an I wish I knew expression, and motioned towards Doc, suggesting she say something.
“You’ll be back home, to the Up Top, before you know it,” Doc told her, and put his child-sized hands on her shoulders, giving her a little squeeze. “Okay, Dearie. Now let’s get you ready. Shall we?” Tabitha looked into his beady eyes, shyness rising in her throat, finding herself afraid to ask for the lottery ticket. Instead, she sat on the steel table, feeling the cold metal leach through her coveralls. At some point, her jaw had begun to shake, her teeth to chatter, but she couldn’t be certain if it was her nerves or the chill that had settled in her.
Susan only stared back, her eyes wide and perched over a limp smile, sharing in the uncertainty. Doc took hold of the rubber hose, turning the spigot on, and began washing one of the instruments. He ran the water over the egg shaped loop and then held the shaft next to Tabitha. “That’ll do,” he muttered, and then proceeded to the next instrument, washing that one too, and sizing it next to her.
This isn’t right, she thought, fixing a hard look at the instruments, imagining what they were used for. Tabitha pressed her hands against the cold steel, guessing that the farm animals had been laid here and operated on. “Your name,” she mumbled. “Doc!”
“Yes, Dear?” he answered, his upturned face staring back at her with an absent expression.
“They call you Doc?”
“Yes… I’ve been the Doc for years.”
“Why?”
“Because I am is why. I doctor the animals, and… and my shadow helps me. And then one day, they’ll call her Doc.”
Tabitha tried to ask her next question, but her mouth was too dry. The pit of her stomach turned when she saw what was beneath her dangling feet. Round crimson stains, spilled by the patients before her, dressed the floor with reminders of what went on in this room. Her chits were as worthless as the dried manure gathered in the corners. There was no lottery ticket to trade for.
Tabitha’s heart emptied of the hope she’d filled it with earlier. What she’d come for wasn’t here. The tickets were never here. She couldn’t find her words, but Susan found the words for her, blurting them out with the same sentiment that she was feeling.
“You mean you don’t have a lottery ticket we can trade for chits?” Susan asked. Her voice escalated to an irate tone. And as Doc continued to clean the instruments, Susan joined Tabitha at her side, taking her hand. Tabitha gripped her friend’s hand tightly, shaking her head when she found her words.
“I think there’s been a terrible misunderstanding. We were… I was looking for a lottery ticket,” she told him. She would have been content to just leave without another word, to take flight on the staircase, head back to the Up Top, and forget that the day had happened.
“No misunderstanding. Your copper band told me that you’re married,” Doc started to say, pointing to her with the end of the medical instrument, waving a dismissive gesture. “I fix things, and can even take out birth control implants… but that isn’t why you’re here. You’re with child, and if you have no lottery ticket, well then, that means there’s going to be a cleaning. I can fix that for you. I can fix that easy peasy.”
Tabitha pulled her arm around her middle, protecting the life that Justin had put inside her. Instinctively, she’d already started turning away from Doc. She was off the table, tightening her hand on Susan’s, moving towards the door. Her heart was racing as she fought back the emotions that wanted to come.
“No. No,” she started, and pulled at Susan, hurrying their step. “Thank you anyway, but I’m sorry, this isn’t what I wanted.” Doc shrugged his shoulders, hanging the instrument back on the table.
“Your man is going to die out there,” he said. His voice had lost the boyish sound from earlier, turning flat and exacting. Cold. “You know that… don’t you? You know that he is going to die!” His words felt like tiny stings, focused and hurting.
“We’ll figure it out. My husband talks to the mayor and sheriff all the time… and maybe… maybe they’ll make an exception for him,” she continued, her dreams of saving Justin spilling out of her as quickly as her words. There was an awkward silence then. It was brief as Doc backed away from the table, shaking his head at them.
“Well then, they’ll probably put him to cleaning right away. That’s my guess,�
�� he answered sharply. “They won’t want to spend all day in the company of someone they know. Someone who they’re going to kill.” And as they backed out of the room, Doc continued talking, a smirk forming, his voice growing louder.
“Don’t you say that!” Tabitha yelled at him. The emotions caught up to her then, putting a hitch in her breath and stinging her eyes, while Susan pushed forward, leading her away from the room. “You don’t have to say that!”
“I service a lot of girls… from the Up Top to the Down Deep… married, unmarried. It’s all the same… easy peasy,” his voice continued from behind them.
The view in front of Tabitha was just a blur of the farming level, perverted by her tears like the truth about the lottery ticket they’d come for. She swiped at her eyes, a sob heaving in her chest while Susan tried to calm her.
“This can’t be happening,” she said. She held her empty hands in front of her, clutching for a missing lottery ticket, her attempts to save her husband crushed.
Their ascent back to the Up Top seemed to move quickly at first, her mind stuck in a dizzying cycle of cause and effect. Again and again, like the constant spiral upward, she stepped through their day’s journey and how it had gone so very wrong. And when the climb had become a struggle, the monotonous grind burning in her lower back and high up in her thighs, she’d crumbled onto the steps. The effort of the climb proved too much. Carrying the realization that Justin was going to die weighed heavy, exhausting her. Is this what it’s like when you lose your lover? Your soul mate? The fatigue inched upwards, covering every part of her, turning her stomach.
As the levels passed, she noted the landing numbers, counting backwards from the farming level. At most of the levels, she fixed her eyes on the level’s insignia, staring at the squared numerals until they passed below her, disappearing from her view.
Tabitha didn’t know which level it began on. She thought that maybe she’d missed one of the landing numbers. Till now, she’d coped with being tired; she’d coped with feeling drained. But there was something else wrong. She was sick.