Jigs & Reels: Stories

by Joanne Harris

  So, what’s a nice chick like you doing in a place like this? I assume you’re a chick. Not that it matters. Been one myself, as I was saying, so don’t take offence at the terminology. Welcome to hell.

  Not that I thought it was hell when they brought me here. No way. Thought I’d struck it lucky, back then when they pulled me out of the wreckage and stripped me down like an old bike for parts. Hear them tell it, I was gonna be a new man, an enlightened man . . . Hell, I was going to be the future of the whole fucking race!

  They needed a volunteer. The way they told it, I was going to be God and Adam and the Second Coming all rolled into one. To bring us back, they said. To put things right. To find the part of us that went wrong – find it, isolate it, wipe it out and begin again. A willing volunteer, they told me, might earn himself certain privileges in exchange for saving the race.

  I was willing.

  They managed to save most of my mind. First for interrogation purposes – they wanted why, who, when, what I was on, the same old crap. Then bye-bye, switch-off, or worse. Oh yeah, there’s worse. The City of New York State Penitentiary houses half a million discorporate inmates on one database – all wiped in the big Power Strikes of the Twenties, ha ha – all awaiting InnerSelf Enlightenment and maybe Redemption.

  Oh yeah. Didn’t you know? We’re all gonna be Redeemed. Leastways we would be if there was anyone left to do the Redeeming. But it’s all automated now, sweetheart; all docbots and psychemechs and empascanners sliding little syringes of craziness into our poor helpless cortexes, little surprise packages from the Good Olden Times like in the days before the world lost what few poor marbles it ever had.

  I always liked a chick with brains. Nowadays that’s all there is. The growth tanks are still out there, use-restricted by the InnerSelf Corporation on moral grounds but functional still. That’s where they grow the Normforms – minus brainstem – and the Xenforms we like to use in our InnerSelf jaunts out of the skull. All for the purpose of SelfDiscovery, SelfImprovement and eventual Nirvana. A shot, a grey shift of nothing-time, a shutterclick . . . and here we go again. What’s it to be this time? A furry Felform? A Dolphform singing weird scales under fifty million fathoms of liquid carbon dioxide? All I know is it has to be intelligent. The path to Nirvana is a thinking path, the Redemption man says. Through Suffering Our Goal. Beetles, it seems, don’t suffer enough.

  How long has it been?

  A hundred thousand mindmovies. Every one a slice of life. A 3-D Feel-o-matic, sense-enhanced Supasound InnerLife Experience (registered trademark of the InnerSelf Corporation slash company logo red-on-black ground). Cut off when They decide. Turned on when They see fit.

  Oh, they’re clever. They’ve given me the White Room scenario more times than I can recall. Patient waits, restrained; taste of foamrubber gag in mouth. Kindly face in medical mask – Ah yes, we’re awake, I see. How are we feeling? Loaded syringe shoots straw-coloured liquid into my bruised arm. I like that touch. The bruise. It’s the details that count when you’re going for realism.

  I’ll give them this: they’ve really tried. Makes me wonder how many billions died, way back when the world was sane, that they should hang on to me the way they do. Course, they’re machines; machines just never give in. Not till something breaks or runs down. Programmed for Nirvana, they never let up, even though the subject will never be Nirvana material. Every time, they scan for change. Every time, the same sad faces, kindly reproach, regretful shaking of heads and back to the White Room scenario, electro-shock walls and graveside manner.

  Pray for Redemption, they tell me in their sweet mechanical voices. Pray for Redemption. You die – again, again, again and again – that Humankind should live. Find the fault, put it right. Test, crashtest, retest. What Oz endures he endures for your sakes, citizens. Isolate the rogue gene, the psychopathic missing link in his fucked-up scrambled brains, and eradicate it from the clean wholesome battery-operated future.

  Hold that thought.

  Bullshit.

  The problem is this: someone told them there was something worth saving. The soul, the elusive spark no one has yet managed to isolate. That’s what comes of trying to bring religion into the world of electronics. I’ve told them before. Told them a thousand million times. There is no G-SUS factor. They’ve been looking for it for so long that even if they found it they probably wouldn’t know what to do with it. What the hell does this G stand for, anyway? God? Genesis? Ginelli’s Pizza Emporium? General Accident Insurance? Greetings From Hawaii? Gagging for a drink? But a machine’s faith is infinite, its patience longer than God’s. They’ll find it, they assure me. It’s in there somewhere. I just haven’t suffered enough.

  I’ve lived so long so often I’ve even begun to have memories. I’m not supposed to, you know; wipe the slate clean and make it squeal anew; if it breaks, chalk it up to experience and wheel out a new subject – though I’m not sure how many available subjects there are left – and begin again. Trial and error, not necessarily in that order; trial by mechanical jury, trial and control.

  Could be that I’m just the control, and that the real experiment is going on someplace else, maybe just down the passage.

  Could be I’m all they have left.

  And yet I have a memory – or a dream, or synthscan recall, what the hell – of a hilltop, cheering crowds, of the lance in my side and the sun filling the whole sky with a whiteness bigger than God . . . And in my dream it seems like all the lives I’ve lived, all the part-lives, the fragments of sensation, the fake memories come down to this one moment, a fleeting instant of Redemption, an X-marks-the-spot of perfect understanding where everything comes together for just one single second before entropy drags it back forever apart and I understand that behind all the InnerSelf posturing and bible thumping there may have been a core of truth . . . Take a man apart and find the wheel that turns the human race, the mystic spiral beyond DNA which keeps us bound together. Maybe inside that axis there’s the Redemption gene, the thing that turns bad to good, straw to gold . . . The G-SUS factor.

  Is that what you’re trying for in me? Is that it? Genus messiah vulgaris, the last link in the chain of Redemption?

  You Are Part of Humanity. You Are All of Humanity.

  Chant 5742 of the InnerSelf LifeCreed, circa 2141. Test the subject to destruction, rebuild, begin again. I sense that I am a kind of challenge. Cure this, you can cure anything. God is in your genes. Simply let him out.

  The White Room coalesces around me: bright spotlights winking against brighter needles; metal clamps tightening around my temples as they begin the process again.

  Ah, you’re with us again. And how are we feeling today?

  I try to bite his pixilated fingers through the rubber gag that he forces between my teeth. He won’t feel a thing, of course, but the satisfaction remains. The look on his face is one of polite regret.

  Aggression, Mister O’Shea. Don’t you know that all LifeKind is one? The needle descends towards my face in a steady, merciless arc. Its load of salvation drips venom into my open eyes. Through Pain My Deliverance. Chant 49900 of the InnerSelf LifeCreed, five thousand repetitions.

  However often you say it, babe, it’s still bullshit.

  My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?

  The machine with the electronic clipboard stops, whirrs mutedly to itself for a moment, moves on. Inside the zillion synapses of my jellied brain the sly G-SUS factor continues to evade them, the one gleeful grain of Redemption right at the bottom of the whole sad world’s shitty store.

  The memory stirs again: the lance, the soldiers, the chants and circus catcalls, my own voice ringing out in pleading and command.

  My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?

  My God. If only He would.

  A Place in the Sun

  There are beaches in Brazil where prospective bathers are vetted according to age and looks, and from which the old, the ugly and the overweight are barred . . .

  I’M NOT GREEDY. Rea
lly I’m not. That’s all I want, a place in the sun: a nice patch, six by four; room for a towel, cosmetics bag, suntan lotion, deckchair. Hot sand, rolling surf; designer sunglasses; that magical scent of salt and coconut. Platinum SandsTM, they call it: the Beach of Beaches, the ultimate in solar pleasure. And it is; real palm trees to hide the perimeter fence; filter-nets to discourage unwanted visitors; air-purifiers for year-round freshness; and those twin watchtowers, staffed by A-grade coastguards, to ensure that the exacting standards of Platinum SandsTM are upheld at all times.

  The zone is completely litter-free, of course (any infraction results in automatic downgrading). Weeds, stones and beach-life are painstakingly screened, examined and, if necessary, removed. Authenticity is encouraged to a certain degree, though not at the expense of aesthetics. After all, Loveliness is both the duty and the privilege of a Platinum cardholder, and it is the responsibility of the Management to maintain his/her exacting standards.

  I appreciate all that. More than that, I approve wholeheartedly; after all, rules are rules and it wouldn’t be Platinum SandsTM without them. I’ve seen the adverts. I know what it’s like. Not in the flesh, of course – as a Silver cardholder I only have access to Silver SandsTM, quite nice of course, but not nearly as exclusive. Not that I’m complaining. I was on the Silver SandsTM waiting list for nearly two years before I made the grade, and the day I first took my place on the Silver beach was the happiest of my life. Sure, the palms are plastic, and the aesthetic rule isn’t as strict, but most of the time you can hardly tell you’re on a Silver beach at all, except when the wind blows back from the All-Public beach up the coast, and you get that whiff of sweat and sewage and cheap sun lotion to remind you. Think of it, the shame of the All-Public beach: no filters, no coastguards, no palm trees, no fences, no nets. Attendance is completely unmonitored, and unsightliness is so commonplace that hardly anyone seems to notice any more.

  You get all kinds of sickness on the All-Public: fat women; hairy women; pregnant women; women in polyester slacks. And the men are no better: pale men; plump men; bald men with tattoos; grizzled men with crêpey skin. It’s just gruesome. Like the Third World, or something. Some try, poor things; like Tanya, a girl from my old neighbourhood. Platinum blonde, nine stone four, two facelifts, boob job, lipo, hair extensions, tummy tuck, and still waiting for her Silver card. She knows it’s touch and go; those backstreet cosmetic surgeons might sound good value, but there’s always a price – in her case a baggy bum and a nasty fold of flesh just above the bikini line that no beach inspector would pass. On the All-Public, she can get away with a one-piece swimsuit, but a Silver beach has a standard to maintain. Show it or blow it, so the saying goes, and I think we all know Tanya’s blown it for good. I reckon it’ll take her at least three years to pay for the treatments she’s already had, and by then she’ll probably be too old to qualify for a Silver pass, even if she does manage to complete the remedial work on her Brazilian.

  I’d help her if I could, of course. But I can’t; I live in a Silver flat now, and people might talk if they saw me hanging around the All-Public. I might even be downgraded, and I couldn’t bear that. Besides, I have to pass my Loveliness Check every day, and believe me, that takes time. Waxing, buffing, manicure, massage; an hour at the gym every morning and another at the hairdresser – not to mention the beach itself. All-body tanning is mandatory at Silver SandsTM, and if you show so much as a strap-line you can be downgraded on the spot. Then there’s beach volleyball, swimming and posture perfection – all quite tricky now I have to wear heels. And that’s just the maintenance.

  Of course, it’s even harder for a Gold or a Platinum. My best friend Lucida passed her Gold last month, so of course I don’t get to see much of her now, but we still talk sometimes, on the phone, now that her bandages are off. It sounds so glamorous. Real palms, topless volleyball, cocktails on the beach . . . Dark is out on the Gold beach, though, with an obligatory Factor 15 for everyone and a range of only five officially sanctioned shades (Cappuccino, Cinnabar, Mink, Sunkissed and Peach). There’s no tanning limit on a Silver, of course (I’m a Cappuccino going on Chocbar – so I’ll have to improve on that), but in any case I must avoid wrinkles if I’m to make the grade next time. Lucida thinks Silver’s a bit tacky now she’s gone Gold; coloured swimsuits, for Heaven’s sake, and oh those plastic palms! On Golden SandsTM all swimwear has to be black, which is chic, but (dare I say it) a bit boring; on Platinum, everything’s flesh-coloured, like ballet wear, so that any unsightliness shows up at once.

  I have to admit I’m just a little bit annoyed with Lucida. We were such good friends on the Silver beach; we even had complementary hair extensions and little matching bikinis. Now she’s bobbed her hair and lost a stone, and thinks blonde is tacky. I think she’s been screening my calls, too; last night I was sure I could hear laughter in the background as the recorded message played. My God, maybe she thinks I’m tacky, too; she always was a snobby cow, even before her rhinoplasty.

  Still, I’m sure I can make Golden SandsTM if I put in the effort; I’ve got the height, thank goodness, but I do need to get my teeth fixed, and I need to get back down to eight stone to meet the Slenderness requirement. I could have lipo, I suppose, but it’s expensive, and doesn’t always work – look what happened to poor Tanya. Never mind; I can always take up smoking as long as I don’t drop stubs on the beach, and if I cut my calorie intake by another two hundred a day – that will bring me down to four hundred – then I reckon I should hit eight stone by the end of the month.

  The face? Last time I checked, the inspector told me my face was almost a Platinum, except for the nose, so I can’t be due a lift for a couple of years, at least. Good. That leaves the boobs. Well, I’ve been meaning to get those seen to anyway; 32C just isn’t enough, not for a Gold beach, and definitely not for a Platinum. Besides, those teeny little flesh-tone bikinis they wear at Platinum SandsTM don’t provide much support, and you know how droopy real boobs can be. Ghastly. My mother’s boobs could almost be Gold, and she had them redone over a year ago, on her Loveliness Insurance, which goes to show that it always pays to be prepared.

  Of course she thinks I’m too young for my first boob job. There’ll be plenty of time for that later, she tells me, but then she’s already too old for the beach scene, and she doesn’t understand how little time my generation has left. After all, Mother has me; some compensation, I suppose, for all those stretch marks and wobbly bits. But what do we have? Nothing but the beaches. Nothing but our three duties of Loveliness, Aspiration and Citizenship. Don’t get me wrong; I do want to get married some day. I might even have kids – you can get a Caesarian, boob and tuck all in one now, so the scar doesn’t have to show. But imagine the shame of having to marry an All-Public boy. Even a Silver doesn’t seem quite so wonderful as it once did, not when I can look through the electric fence into the Golden perimeter, or watch the ads for Platinum SandsTM and see those bronzed, buffed surfers lying on their Louis Vuitton towels and watching the girls go by.

  But you’re so pretty already, says Tanya in her plaintive voice. You could have any nice boy. She doesn’t understand. Nice is not enough. Even pretty is a backhanded compliment to one who aspires to Loveliness. It isn’t just the beach, with its real palm trees, or even the exclusive parties and designer clothes. It’s the sense of achievement: the knowledge that you have done it all, gone all the way from Loveliness to Perfection. A Platinum cardholder lives in a world of perpetual pleasure; all obstacles removed; every hint of unsightliness excised. A Platinum girl never needs to work; her duty is to herself alone, and it takes up her every waking moment. A Platinum girl never gets a blister, never a blemish. A Platinum girl is sleek, groomed, plucked, airbrushed, expensive, fabulous in her fabulous clothes. She is infinitely sexy, ultimately desirable; she is loved and she is lovely. How could I settle for less? How could anyone?

  But time is always the enemy. In a few years I’ll be too old for the beaches, where youth and freshness a
re the first and most important requirements. No one wants to look at old flesh, and no surgery lasts for ever. I realize now that I was on that Silver list for far too long. Two whole years wasted in trivia while my friends worked to earn their Gold cards, clocking up valuable hours in the gyms and salons and lounging on the beach like young goddesses. I’ll have to work hard now if I am to catch them up. I know I can’t make up the whole time, but I’m already on the waiting list for the Gold card (subject to the agreed remedial work); I’ve ordered a new nose and I’m saving my pocket money for that boob job. Mother doesn’t like it; but after all, what does she know? Besides, I’ll be thirteen next year. I don’t want to leave it too late.

  Tea with the Birds

  Some people spend their lives without ever raising their eyes from the ground. Others dream of flying.

  THE FUNNY THING about Mortimer Street is that no one really seems to know anybody else. It’s one of those places; busy without being comfortable; crowded without being friendly. The big stucco-fronted houses at the far end are too remote; the ones of us who live in the terraces feel diminished by them, even though they are past their best, like a row of wedding cakes left out in the rain.

  The terraces are closer together; but the people in them live like birds in cages, bickering over parking spaces and pecking at each other from behind the net curtains. Gossip is currency – the more slanderous the better – and the worst crime of all is to be an outsider.