by Bill Fawcett
Hayward—as he is so good to do—once boiled down the process for me: “On Earth, there are these beautiful black birds with red patches on their wings. They line the open fields, perching on a fence post or atop a bush and mark their territory by calling out ‘I’m a red-wing blackbird and this is where I live.’ That’s what rendering is, Threeve. You come each day and help me to remember ‘I am Hayward Madden, a representative of the North American Union, on my way to negotiate a truce with the Os.’ ”
And yet as a Même, I do more than simply regurgitate information. After I settle myself comfortably in the slingseat adjacent to the individual’s tube, I shut my eyes, clear my mind, and focus. Spreading my hand along the benumbed metal casing, imagining the warmth from my fingertips penetrating the barrier, conveying my touch, helps me orient myself. Then, sans scouring the d-comm files, trusting my memory alone to refresh nuances of facts and feelings, I tip my imaginary Sheltonian wild violet bone china teapot and let the relaxing aromas of ginger and lemon balm swirl warmly in the air.
Conversation. That’s all it will be. Between friends.
Though we may be nowhere near land or soil or even a planet, I infuse our homogenized air with civility, re-forming this artificially illumined cocoon into a lush garden: a prickly rosebush over there entwining its thorny arms around a wooden trellis, its vibrant velvety buds unfolding in delicate measures. And dangling over the top of the painted slats are plump purple lilacs. From time to time a mockingbird pops up, heralding a greeting in whatever tongue moves him, or a feisty robin redbreast skitters along the grassy green carpet. Sometimes I can almost hear the low rumble of thunder and catch a whiff of approaching rain.
And who’s to know?
Besides Hayward, that is.
“They’re gonna find you out, Sleeping Beauty. Then what?” he’d scolded on my last morning of true innocence. But before I could protest, he broke into one of his silly singsongs. “ ‘And the Raggedy Man, he knows most rhymes. Tells ’em to me, if’n I be good sometimes.’ ” Then he laughed as much of a laugh as any Tuber could. “My mother used to read the poem to me before I went to sleep. James Whitcomb Riley. He wrote children’s poems. Well, mostly children. I’m hardly a child, but could you find it and read it all to me, Threeve?”
“If the d-comms have it, I’ll be happy to,” I said.
“Try the library, if you can find the darned thing. The Admiral— kindly or wisely, I haven’t exactly decided which yet—lugged along some pulpies, a collection inherited from a lawyer father. You know . . . books?”
“I’m aware of the library,” I assured him. “It’s small, though, so I can’t guarantee this Riley will be there.” I withheld from Hayward the fact the Admiral was no longer at the helm.
“Have it tomorrow, will you? And don’t open it before you get here. Will you do that for me? I want to walk you through experiencing a book. It’s not a mere collection of words, you know. My mother taught me that.” He quieted for several seconds. “I doubt she’s still alive.”
I know I must have grimaced when he ventured into a forbidden area. Prime taboo subjects are time and . . . termination. I reasoned my own silence could allow his thoughts to move ahead, but they didn’t, so I thrummed the tips of my fingers on his tube to signal my imminent departure. “That’s all for today, Hayward.”
“It can’t be. I don’t remember talking about my folks or sports. I’m athletic like my mother. She was in the military. Fought the Os with the Admiral’s mother and managed to return in one piece when most did not.”
“Your parents always top the list—”
But he was on his own mental track, his own bullet train, swooshing ahead in high gear. “I was one of the last Olympians, you know. Won four medals in swimming. Breaststroke, freestyle, butterfly, and individual medley. Not all gold, but two of them were.”
Of all my assigned Tubers, Hayward’s memory rendering often pushed past our time limit because his being the oldest meant he had more memories and experiences. Railing—getting him started— was never a problem. All I had to do was sit down and engage him. But protocol is strict. I had to meet my quotas, still have time to update the rec ords, and fetch his blasted book.
“I’ll be back tomorrow,” I said. “Do you have a dream sequence in mind?”
“I feel restless tonight. Set the dials for brackish winds in my face and the snap of sails in my ears. Come with me, sweet Threeve-ofKenning. There’s room for one more in my little Bermuda rig.”
“As tempting as that sounds, I’ll have to pass. I don’t think I can swim.”
“I’m betting you could, but I’ll wrap my arms around you and keep you safe.”
“Be careful, Hayward. Tynan might get jealous.”
“That’s right. I forgot you were a contracta. And with your supervisor, no less. Conflict of interest. Clearly. But he doesn’t have to find out. You could claim you needed to tend the vegetation in the Lada Garden or something. Tynan’s not the farmer type, so I doubt he’d check for you there. We could have such fun. I could teach you songs and maybe even whisper a poem or two in your ears. I know plenty more of the bawdy ones you like.”
If his physical features hadn’t been frozen in place, I know his bushy eyebrows would have wiggled.
“Good night, Hayward.”
“Sleep tight.”
“Don’t let the bugs bite.”
In reality, there were no dials to set or buttons to punch or even “dream sequencing.” I’d made it up, and he was all too easily hooked.
Since Tubers wear their unique personalities like battle decorations, the fib could not be employed with blanket utility, meaning I would never consider it for Lieutenant Commander z’Bette Cooney.
“I. Do. Not. Dream.” Words popped from her. Abrupt and annoyed. As though with my arrival, I’d swung open the door to her private room without politely knocking.
“This is not a dream,” I said.
“I am fully aware of what’s happening.”
I closed my eyes and sucked in a breath through my nose. “I understand you were a deep diver when—”
“We already covered that nugget of my life several times. Move on.”
As always, I kept my words steady and calm. “Before signing on, you mastered three extra languages—”
“Mettre fin à cette.” Her angry words cut me off.
“Vous voulez parler français?” I replied.
If a mind could growl, hers did. In several languages, not just French. While Hayward’s mind overflowed with words and ideas, Cooney seemed to pride herself on clamping hers shut and sealing it. I, on the other hand, was insanely determined to prod and poke at her softer edge. She had to have one.
Luckily for me, rendering is not an option; it’s mandated. I straightened my back and placed one hand on my d-comm unit and the other flat against Cooney’s cold metal tube. “You are Commander z’Bette Cooney, a soldier of the North American Union—”
After she repeated the basic information, I eased into reminding her of her talents and accomplishments, which were numerous.
“Fewer than a dozen people have ever gone as deep as three hundred meters on a self-contained breathing apparatus. You’re one.”
For the first time, I noted what could have been a waft of joy or happiness. I know technically Mêmes register words only, generated by the probes attached to the Tubers’ brains, but . . . well . . . since my accident . . . I . . . sense things. It’s difficult to explain exactly.
After a couple of hours sparring with Cooney, I was more than ready to indulge in a bit of relaxation, and since the ship’s library was near where I quartered, I swung by there. Though most everyone knew about the cabin of pulpies, few felt worthy of even touching them. I was an exception. Too often Hayward’s silly singsongs referenced leafy trees, fragrant flowers, chatty birds. The images niggled my senses, like the name of something you can’t quite recall, but it’s there on the tip of your tongue, just out of reach. While his words z
ipped through the air, almost animating themselves, the d-comms provided only bland explanations and sparse graphics. I thought whatever was in those pulpies might sate my inquisition.
The first book I opened puffed out a curious odor. Paper. I liked it at once, even before I smoothed my fingers over a page, which elicited such a pleas urable experience, I couldn’t stop. And it was as though I could inhale each syllable, making my mouth water. Which drove me to taste each word as I pronounced it aloud, perking my ears. The same ears Hayward promised to whisper bawdy things into.
The vibrant images in the pulpies proved a hose- blaster: lofty trees with scabrous barks, their leaves rustling and crinkling in greens and golds and reds in chilling winds; reedy stems rising from loamy carpets, threading themselves around stilted fence posts and knotty trellises, sporting multihued and fragrant blossoms like glittering jewels; a covey of feathered birds, their beaks atwitter with a cacophony of chits and chatters, resounding happily in melodies tendered to unseen deities.
Books. Each page—Oh, how do I tell you?
Of course, I couldn’t tuck these immensely stirring feelings in some payload bay or under my cot. My ecstasy spilled over into my relationship with my contracto. I sought the same satisfying and nourishing experience with the dark-eyed, black-haired Tynan that I’d found in the books.
My fingers didn’t touch him anymore. They caressed his smooth, warm flesh. My nose poked in his long, clean hair, inhaling the fresh soap intermingling with his sweat. I longed to lick his eyelids and have him devour all of me with a searching mouth.
But he took it all the wrong way.
“I see you stroking their tubes. What is that? Threeve’s foreplay?”
“Stop it.”
“Then what is it?”
“Nothing dirty.”
A superior scolding glower shoved aside his usual playful twinkles. “Then what?”
“Touch.”
“Touch? You can’t ‘touch’ them. You could contaminate them.”
“With what? This ship is my home and my prison in one fell swoop.”
“They have auto- stimulators.”
“Which are not human fingers. Not ‘touch.’ Don’t you see?” He didn’t flinch when I trailed two fingers from his temple down his cheek and along his hard jaw. “ ‘Touch,’ ” I whispered. “They long for skin on skin, flesh on flesh. Just like we do.”
“It doesn’t follow protocol.”
“No, it doesn’t. It follows human”—I formed my fingers into claws and clicked the tips together several times—“feeling.” I had stretched out the last word. Let it roll off my tongue.
“That dirty old man!”
“What?”
“It’s Hayward, isn’t it?” Angry red splotched Tynan’s cheeks. “What? Did he sweet-talk you with the pulpies’ pretty words? I can see the two of you as he ‘crumples the lace that snows on your breast.’ Or how on his ‘palette is a tint of your lips.’ Nonsense like that. Crap from the Admiral’s books. I should disservice the old bastard and be done with it.”
“No! It’s not like that. It’s not!”
But no matter what I said, how I tried to explain, Tynan refused to hear me, to comprehend my words. I swore then I would mask the feelings I experienced with the Admiral’s treasured books from Tynan and everyone else.
Except Hayward.
“I found the Riley book, Hayward, but you really don’t have to explain to me about the experience of them.” I smoothed my hand over the ragged embossed cover and the frayed grosgrain ribbon binding it closed. “I . . . know.”
“But you didn’t open the Riley, did you?”
“No.”
“Clearly you’ve been in some of the others.”
Too quickly, the conversation with Tynan flitted through the mind I was attempting to keep clear. But it was useless for me to offer empty denials or feeble rationalizations. Hayward could read my thoughts almost as well as I did his.
“ ‘If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim . . .’ ” He spoke slowly, then paused. I thought it was for my confession, but it was really so he could skip over a line in the Kipling poem. “ ‘If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken / Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools . . .’ ”
A crushing wave of sadness descended first inside my chest before radiating outward. Slowly. Deeply. But I couldn’t explain it or truly identify where it was coming from.
“Untie the ribbon, or what’s left of it, and open the book carefully.”
“What page?”
“You’ll know.”
There was something stuck inside, bulging it a bit at the seam, but not protruding from the top. Opening the book gingerly, I found a long, slim leather pouch resting in the crease, indenting the pages as though pocketed in its own snug little place. “What’s this?”
“Sometimes people press flowers or ribbons in pages, marking special places.”
“This Raggedy Man must have been special to the Admiral, too.”
O the Raggedy Man! He works fer Pa; An’ he’s the goodest man ever you saw! He comes to our house every day—
But as I skimmed the text, I noticed the faint squiggles between the lines. Of course, I couldn’t keep my hand against Hayward’s tube and raise the book to better determine the smudges. They were words, too. Not printed ones, but ones scratched in with something that didn’t damage the paper page, but rested lightly in a faded dark gray color.
“Ah, yes. Threeve experiences yet another beauty of the printed word: reading between the lines.” Hayward didn’t laugh. It was more of a chuckle that reminded me of Tynan. After the first time we’d coupled following the accident, he’d flicked a tendril of red hair off my nose and chuckled when I questioned our varying from procedure in his inseminating me for yielding. Maybe that’s why I thought he would understand about “touching.” About feelings. About the books.
Abruptly, I shifted the Riley and the pouch slid into my lap, exposing the tarnished zipper running down its side.
“Threeve, dear, open the pencil case.”
“Pencil case?” I rested the book on my knees and unzipped it. Out tumbled an orange oblong plastic object with two small holes along with three dark gray sticks with sharp black points on one end and metal flattened squares with soft black protrusions on the other. Etched along the side of each were other words palomino blackwing 602.
“You use them to write with,” Hayward said. “Pencils. And these are the very best. Used by writers and composers back in the day. The black point colors the page directly. Try it.”
“Try it? You mean—”
“Look at the pages, Threeve; though I suspect you’d already noticed.”
“I thought they were shadows or something. I—” Something so foreign, yet how had I instinctively perched the pencil between the exact fingers required?
How had I known?
My inkling to conceal what was happening from Tynan proved a solid decision, but keeping mum and finding time and a quiet place to read and write proved far from easy. For one thing, Tynan enjoys a heightened sense of smell. That poses a problem during intimate moments. He has a thing for hands and especially fingers. He began dwelling on mine, kissing my palms and rubbing them together against his nose and cheeks.
“What long digits you have, Threeve.”
I recall doing my own chuckling because of a child’s fairy tale I’d read. “Better to touch you with.”
But he was far from amused, and after that, I became diligent about washing my hands following any prolonged handling of the pencil.
Hayward was no help at all. In fact, the next few days he hurried me through his renderings, his usual jocularity diminished. He kept badgering me about what else was written between the lines, what else I’d read.
In what little free time I had, I’d been so engrossed with the shapes and forms of the squiggles and loops and trying to emulate them, I had neglected to let the words impart their meanings. I’d perused the ac
tual printed words of the stories and poems, but I’d obviously missed the most important part.
Finally, I curled up on my bunk with the well-worn collection of James Whitcomb Riley’s poems. Had Hayward not quoted them to me, I might have struggled with the language. Not so with the penciled-in musings between the lines.
Woven amidst the poetic hum of “The Used-To-Be” were the heavily underlined lamentations of the Admiral. Yes, lamentations: “There lies a land, long lost to me—”
Reading it both broke my heart and spawned an eruption of that niggling sensation again. As though I, too, yearned for some vanished place. But how? How could I possibly wrap my brain around the Admiral’s homesickness?
Damn him. Damn Hayward. What right did he have exposing me to sights and sounds and feelings I would never have wondered about? Or missed.
The Domum Ignes was the only home I could remember. So why was it that my life, safely cocooned in my own tube, in my own stasis, no longer seemed enough?
“Imagination, the sharpest of all senses,” the Admiral had penciled in between. “Dull down the taste and smell and sound and feel and sight—suspend them all—and still they live inside. Or so we are to imagine.”
I had no clear recollection of a bee buzzing my ear or feeling its sting or tasting its sweet honey. But somewhere inside was . . . something. Just my imagination?
The book fell too easily open to the poem “The Man in the Moon.”
Said the Raggedy Man, on a hot afternoon My! Sakes! What a lot o’ mistakes
Just after the words “Might drop a few facts that would interest you” came the familiar dark scribblings of the Admiral. They are clearly madly in love. Sometimes I think when the two of them are within an arm’s reach of each other, lightning will flash, singeing us all. And it makes me yearn for the day when my own true love and I can finally be together again.