by Aya DeAniege
Because we hadn't exactly brought bathing suits, now had we?
Getting to the tallest building in the slum and then the top of it was easier than I thought it would be. The ones guarding that building were of the old guard. One of them recognized me because when we were children, I used to beat him up and steal his popsicles.
What?
Some days he'd beat me up and steal my lunch. It was the way it was in the slums at that time for young boys. If someone had what you wanted and wasn't wearing a skirt, you took it from them. If they wanted to keep it, they had to defend themselves or have friends willing to stand up for them.
“Izzy? These guys bothering—" and then his eyes fell on my chest, and he hesitated like he forgot where he was. Ever so slowly he met my eyes, and all emotion drained from his face.
Because he recalled the beatings I had given him, I like to think. I like to think that it was also because he was thinking about the beating I'd give him if he looked at my chest again, or if he made a comment on my tits.
“This is Nathaniel Edwards,” I said, my eyes following the guards' hands as they moved for their tasers. “Related, but estranged.”
They didn't quite relax.
“I'd like to go to the top of this building,” I said, motioning upward. “Want to see all of the slums. Practically tradition, right?”
“Uh, a tradition for couples," the strange guard said, almost wincing. "There's three of you."
“I'm considering throwing them both from the building," I said, keeping my face as emotionless as I could. "One leads the Program and keeps fucking up my case. The other one's a brat."
“There's also a tradition of payment,” the stranger guard said.
“Whoa,” the other said, turning to his partner. “That payment is typically a peek at the goods.”
“Peek at the goods?” I asked.
“He means your boobs,” both Nathaniel and Mr. Wrightworth said at the same time.
I turned and glared at them both. Nathaniel seemed to be studying the building, but Mr. Wrightworth met my eyes and almost smiled at me.
With a shrug, I pulled off my wet top. Nathaniel was already carrying my jacket because I didn't want to walk around wet and uncomfortable.
“Now give me yours,” I said, holding the wet shirt out to both the guards. “I'd like something dry to wear.”
They gaped at me. I had no fear, however.
Yes, the naked form is supposed to be kept private. Or so they say. In reality, a body is what it is. Hiding it away does not change the fact that under your shirt and skirt you have breasts and butt and all sorts of wonderful curves. I've always felt that by hiding them away, I was giving power to men who would objectify me.
“What? You thought this would be a problem?" I asked, looking at the two guards. "This is me. This is my body in all honest bareness. These are my boobs—and yes, they're real—and these are the scars I bear because a man thought he owned my body by proxy. Give me your shirt. Unless you bearing your chest is somehow inappropriate after asking to see mine."
Both of them fumbled with their clothing. I received a dry shirt, donned it and was granted access to the building.
“I did warn you about that, didn't I?” Mr. Wrightworth asked, almost purring out.
“Me?” I asked.
“Him,” he said, looking at Nathaniel.
“I thought it was an in-house thing," Nathaniel said.
“She's getting bolder. You should see to that."
“I'm right here,” I said as I laid a hand on the door that led to the roof.
Both men were silent as we stepped onto the roof. I was resolute to ignore them as I walked to the edge. If they wanted to talk about me, so be it. But I wasn't going to participate in the conversation because they were cryptic and I didn't like it.
Below the building, stretched out for miles and miles, was my slum. It looked like any city might, though it didn't reach as high as the cities built in the richer areas of the country. To the west of the slum was Nathaniel's hotel and the rich city that was building there. I could see it standing against the setting sun.
Not quite dipping below the horizon yet, the sun was still in the sky. It shone down on the slum yet was casting more of an orange light than the bright yellow it normally did. The light of dusk made the slum seem warmer and more inviting somehow.
I watched the people, larger than ants but still reminiscent of insects scurrying about, on the streets below, hurrying home for the evening meal. No building was over five stories high besides the one I was standing atop.
“This used to be a hub,” Mr. Wrightworth said, stepping up beside me. “The building we're standing on. It was the main building of the slum, back when the slums were allowed to govern themselves. Except debt was falsified. You can't make it disappear, but you could transfer it to your enemies. When it was discovered what was happening, the government removed the hubs, leaving the buildings derelict, executed those involved, and told no one why they were doing it.”
“I've never heard of that before,” I said.
“Debt wasn't counted down before, but afterward everyone was told how much debt they had. Except it was impossible to figure out where the debt had been changed, so everyone just accepted the debt that had been transferred to them. There was only one exception."
“Mr. Wrightworth's father is crazy,” Nathaniel said.
“No, well, yes. But no, he kept a detailed record of every dollar paid off and how much we started out with because it's a family tradition to pay back debt. Since long before the collapse.”
“Then how did you end up in debt?” I asked.
Mr. Wrightworth shrugged, "The same way most did, I suppose. Many who ended up in the slums held debt on cards or through loans, but of course, some of that was petty dollars. If you owe ten thousand, you aren't dropped into the slums. However, when the world crashed, the countries which would become our country held national debt. That debt was split amongst all the people. I don't know why, it doesn't make any damned sense, but that's what they did.”
“The assets of everyone were seized," Nathaniel said. "Those who became rich folk had enough to pay it off. They might have ended up homeless, but at the end of the day, they paid it. For those who had money left over, or assets, or intelligence enough to do something about their position, they became the marvellously rich. They quickly realized the problem of breeding. There weren't enough of us to keep our genetics stable enough not to end up like old European royalty."
“Then, apparently, one of them thought it'd be fun to take over the world," Mr. Wrightworth muttered. "And decided that'd be easier if we were a people united and free. Forced marches don't go over so well. Conscription doesn't help. With a war with the poor folk already going on, they couldn't fight a war overseas as well."
“There's no war with poor folk," I said, motioning over the slum. "We're here. They're above us. All through history, it's been rich above poor. Poor live in bad conditions and exist to serve, and rich live above them. His excitement about taking over the world is insane. No country has ever worked like that.”
“We want this to be more like the first world countries pre-collapse," Mr. Wrightworth said. "Before the goal of every major business was to squeeze every cent out of people and before the bubbles that burst, and the drought that drove millions beyond the poverty line just to get clean water. Within our lifetime, sights like this? This will be a historic location or a tourist spot."
“Or just paved over to make way for new housing for full citizens," Nathaniel said. "Class division always fails. The rich get richer, and the poor get poorer. Eventually, some poor sod gets killed or tortured and the poor people revolt and the rich people respond by expressing too much control and the poor people revolt some more, overthrow the rich, kill most of them, and replace them with new rich. Then the process starts all over again."
I watched the slum, silent as I considered his words. Turning to Nathaniel, I frowned.
> “You do realize that I was that poor sod, right?”
Chapter Eight
We stayed on the rooftop as the sun set, then returned to the hotel. Nathaniel and I slept there, then went from there directly to the Program building the next morning. As we entered the building, it dawned on me what had happened, what my father had said, that I could never go home again.
My mother was a strong woman, but my father ruled the house.
What we learned at the Program building made it worse than I could have ever imagined. Which is an odd thing to say, I know. The news outlets obviously had a great deal of information, but it wasn't until I was sitting in the Program building that it all seemed just to dawn on me.
My life is over.
...Again.
“Was it Kathy?” I asked as I sat at the conference table.
Mr. Wrightworth sat with the members of the board as well as several gruff looking men dressed all in black. The men shifted uncomfortably at the mention of the name. I took that as to assume that it had been Kathy. She knew so much, about everyone and everything that happened within the Program building. She talked to everyone about everything. Not just details of her life, but details of the lives of everyone else as well.
There wasn't a shadow of doubt in my mind that she was the conniving bitch who had leaked the information.
“Kathy is a security measure,” Mr. Wrightworth said.
This was the first moment we had been with Mr. Wrightworth since the slum the day before. He hadn't told us anything about what would be going on at the Program building. He had been very quiet, in fact. I hadn't even heard Mr. Wrightworth mention the meeting at the Program building, which meant that it had probably been emailed to Nathaniel.
Emailed and not texted, only because Mr. Wrightworth would never be so crass as to text a formal form letter to a person who was being affected by someone under him.
“She's fucking annoying,” I said.
Mr. Wrightworth nodded as he smiled wryly.
“And that's the point?” I asked.
“It is, you'd be surprised what Kathy learns by talking to people, by flustering them,” Mr. Wrightworth said. “She's the one who alerted us to the changes in someone's behaviour, self-destruction, withdrawal for social interactions, sudden clumsiness. Ring a bell?”
“I thought the controllers told you that,” I said.
“Do you believe the controllers watched you every moment of the day? Most of their waking and sleep changes, even the elevators, are programs they wrote, and only monitor from the control room. No, I told them to check in on you, after Kathy's report."
“So Kathy didn't do it,” Nathaniel said.
“With all due respect, Nathaniel, we only invited you here because of your relationship to Isabella Martin,” Mr. Wrightworth said.
“And with all the respect you deserve from the relationship we have outside of the Program, kindly go take a flying leap," Nathaniel said, sitting forward in his chair. "My home has been violated by someone in the Program. Information leaked that I gave to you. How can I trust you to hold contracts from my home if my security system no longer provides security because your people gave my information to the news companies?"
“I thought you owned the news companies,” Mr. Wrightworth countered.
“I own four news companies, which are relatively small," Nathaniel said. "I own them. I don't manage or gag them, as the law prevents me from doing so. If your people gave that information to my outlets, I might receive a warning before they broadcasted something. However, none of my companies received the information until after it had aired on the major broadcast stations."
“The person in question is in custody, they will be charged to the full extent of the law,” Mr. Wrightworth said.
“Oh, for this you press charges,” I said.
“It was our property that was stolen, technically,” Mr. Wrightworth said.
“Then technically, it was your property that was damaged,” I said, still very much—and rightly—annoyed that the Program had almost cost me my justice against Albert Edwards.
“Damaged property gets a slap on the wrists, perhaps a fine," Mr. Wrightworth purred out. "My way, the public sees you as a person. Or at least they did until these wild rumours began to swirl. The only way to end it is to tell the public what happened."
“Absolutely not,” Nathaniel said. “I pay for privacy. I expect privacy.”
“What would you have us do, write books?” I asked.
Don't laugh. Writing memoirs and biographies was just starting to take off amongst the rich. I had several of them sitting on my nightstand awaiting the night when I came to them on the ever growing list I had. At that time I did not believe it was legally possible to write a book based in the community, I thought we would be destroyed, if not laughed out of the publishing house.
The first edition of my book was published through a vanity publisher with money I earned doing talks about the rights of victims. Thankfully it sold, and the community was quite eager to see what happened behind closed doors with Nathaniel and I. They were a little disappointed—wanted more play, less 'romance'—and passed the books on to their friends as fiction.
The rest, they say, is history.
Mr. Wrightworth drew in a small breath.
“No, no, that wouldn't do," he said. "I suggest making the last of the videos available for viewing by the public, just as any of the cameras in public areas are viewable. I've seen the footage, I saw you go and come back, I know that anyone in the community would support you in saying that you didn't lend her out. I know your accounts will stand against such a claim."
“I pay for privacy,” Nathaniel protested.
“We are more than willing to pay your security costs for that time, Nathaniel.”
“No.”
“Think of Izzy,” Mr. Wrightworth said. “She's being painted as a whore. You and I both know she's not, not even close.”
“Just because she's been violated, doesn't mean that I should be as well,” Nathaniel said.
“It's some videos," I said. "My entire life is on film. Anyone can view it. Everyone probably has at this point. What's the difference to you if everyone knows where your moles are, or how big your penis is?"
“It matters,” Nathaniel said.
“Unless you're afraid they'll compare your dick to mine, then okay, I could see there being a problem,” I added.
“It's not about being naked," Nathaniel said. "It's one thing to purchase my board. It's quite another to purchase investors."
“They already have the most damning of the footage,” Mr. Wrightwroth said. “The discipline just before your father arrived? That's what's circling right now. The person in question had access to all of the footage, but only sent some of it. Send the rest, open your doors.”
“And lose my business.”
“Sell the business,” Mr. Wrightworth said. “Your trust fund alone—”
“I used that to pay for the final contract.”
“You mean you're poor?” I asked Nathaniel.
“Without the business, I am ruined,” Nathaniel said.
“You gave up all of your money?” I asked.
“I'm sorry, do you have a problem with that?” Nathaniel asked in response.
He paid a lot more than they told me he did.
I couldn't believe what Nathaniel had given up for me. Money versus a woman he barely knew. It is hard to wrap my head around as I turned my attention to Mr. Wrightworth, mouth hanging open just slightly.
“You need to be an open book, it's the only way to stop this sort of thing,” Mr. Wrightworth said.
“With all due respect,” another board member said. “We shouldn't be giving him advice on what to do with his life. It is Mr. Edwards' choice as to whether or not he should share what he knows.”
“You're pressing charges?” Nathaniel said. “I suppose that's the end of that, then, isn't it? Unless you plan on telling us who did it, that's the end
of it all.”
“Certainly, we'll give you the room,” Mr. Wrightworth said, standing.
The other board members stood as well. Nathaniel pointed to Mr. Wrightworth, then down towards the table. The others left, Mr. Wrightworth stood rooted in spot until the door closed.
“There are cameras in here,” Mr. Wrightworth said, taking his seat slowly.
“Your relationship with Izzy is out there, just as mine is," Nathaniel said. "I'm somewhat surprised you're still sitting on the board, given the dislike of our preferences."
“Your relationship and choices would also be made public," I said, then shrugged slightly. "Mine is already. You two are linked to me. Society doesn't look at BDSM as a good thing. Just being open is what politicians do. We'd get those broadcasts in the slums. All downtrodden but honest about everything. Apologizing for sleeping with that woman, but their wife is remaining strong at their side."
Both of their attentions turned to me.
“Someone in the slum came out as gay. It's not—it's dangerous for someone to do that. Our purpose is to have more children to pass on the genetic debt. This guy was a manly sort of man. The view is usually, gay guys have that tone to their voice and are effeminate."
Barren women had it worse. Before the genetic profiles were set up, some would hide the fact that they were barren and stole babies from the hospital, or from women who gave birth at home. A barren woman couldn't find a husband. A sterile man could find a partner if he could convince his wife to take up a lover to produce a child.
“That's a big word for you to use,” Nathaniel said jokingly.
“Mr. Wrightworth continued my reading studies," I countered. "But the view is pretty clear. It's what we're taught to expect from gay men. This man had a wife. After she had passed away, he came out. He was in the community, and he was a foreman that my father worked under. When he came out, he invited everyone over. They had a nice meal, drank some swill and then he made his announcement.