by James Roy
‘Does it have to be everyone?’
‘Jacq, all we’ll be doing is talking.’
Edsel Grizzler took a deep breath. The Common Room was almost full, and it was time to speak.
‘Don’t,’ Ben warned. ‘I’m begging you, Robert, don’t do this.’
‘I’m sorry, but I have to. All right, listen up,’ he said in a louder voice, and a gradual quiet spread across the crowd of kids. A couple of the older ones had to shush the littlies, but eventually everyone was listening.
‘I know what we’ve all been told, but I wonder if we’ve been fooled,’ Edsel began. ‘When we came here we were given a choice – to go home, or to accept our Heart’s Greatest Desire, whatever that might be. And obviously we all chose to stay, didn’t we?’
Most of the kids nodded, while a couple looked around blankly. It was hard for some to understand what was happening, but Edsel pressed on, hoping it would become clearer for those who were slow to catch on.
‘But I’ve been thinking that maybe we chose too quickly. Who thinks they might have chosen too quickly?’
A number of hands shot up, while a few others went up more slowly.
‘How many of you think it’s a bit unfair to expect us to agree to stay here forever?’
A few more hands were raised.
‘I know that after time we forget where we came from, and what life was like before. I don’t know why that is, but most of us find it hard to remember what our families were like, or what our parents even looked like. It seems that that’s what happens in Verdada, and because we forget, we accept it.’
A low murmur ran through the group.
‘I’m thinking about telling the Mira that some of us want to go back.’
‘Who?’ asked Henrietta, with the sunburnt skin.
‘Anyone who wants to. I’m starting to think that we’ve been tricked, and maybe if we gave it a bit of thought, we’d all realise that what many of us really want is to go home. Joe, tell me, do you remember what happened just before you came to Verdada?’
‘I was camping with my mum and dad and brother. We were in the bush.’
‘And what happened?’
‘I wandered off, then I fell down a bit of a cliff thing and broke my leg. See, it’s all crooked—’
‘I know, I’ve seen it,’ said Edsel. ‘And did you die?’
Joe looked puzzled. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘So you were lost in the bush, and you came here, and you chose to stay because …’
‘They’ve got a jumping castle here. And other cool stuff, too.’
‘Don’t you miss your family? Isn’t your Heart’s Greatest Desire to see your family again?’
‘Maybe,’ Joe replied, scratching his head. ‘I don’t really remember.’
‘And you?’ Edsel said, pointing to Henrietta. ‘You were lost too, weren’t you?’
‘I guess so. I fell out of my dad’s fishing boat, and they couldn’t find me, even though I had a life-jacket.’
‘So you were lost at sea. That’s why you’re all sunburnt. Don’t you want to go back and be found?’
Henrietta looked across at Joe, as if she needed permission to answer. ‘I thought about it, but I couldn’t,’ she said at last. ‘If I did, I’d still be lost … or something. But if I stayed, I could choose another thing.’
‘And what did you choose?’
‘This. Verdada. But I’d still like to see my mum and dad and sister.’
Edsel turned next to Lloyd, the latest addition to Ver-dada, who was standing to one side looking rather bemused by these new events. ‘And Lloyd, you told me that your father lost you because …’
‘Because he kept drinking even after he was told not to.’
‘Right. And what was your Desire?’
‘I haven’t chosen yet.’
‘But what do you think it will be?’
‘For my dad to stop drinking. Then I can stay with him.’
‘But Lloyd, don’t you see?’ Edsel said ‘You can’t have that unless you agree to stay here. You can’t go back to play happy families with your dad unless you say you’ll stay here. You have to stay here! Can’t you see how that’s impossible?’
Another murmur rose up as a few more of the kids began to see the problem.
‘Stop it!’ Ben shouted, standing up suddenly. ‘Stop it! Stop confusing everyone, Robert!’
‘I’m not,’ Edsel protested.
‘You are!’
‘No, I’m trying to make things clear to them! Ben, I thought you’d understand better than anyone after what you told me before.’
‘But can’t you see that none of these kids had a choice?’ Ben said. ‘They could go back, and still be lost, or they could stay here and settle for something else.’
‘But that’s exactly what I mean!’ Edsel shot back. ‘Why do we have to choose? Why do we have to settle for anything? How come the Mira or Richard or whoever can say you can have this or that, but not both?’
‘Because those are the rules! It’s all written down!’
‘But what if we don’t like the rules?’ Edsel asked.
Ben’s voice was strained. ‘What if we don’t like the rules? I guess we do this. We try to break them. But think! What if that means we lose what we have, and spend forever feeling terrible about it? Or worse?’
‘So you’re afraid of losing what we’ve got? Is that it?’
‘Basically,’ Ben replied, and a number of the others nodded their agreement.
‘What if we say the rules should change, or we’ll stop sorting? If the Mira can make food appear in the middle of the night, and can create wind with wind turbines that are powered by other wind turbines, and can find a way to return elastic bands and paper clips and passports and … and slippers, why can’t they find a way to return some of us? Aren’t we more important than slippers?’
‘What are you going to do?’ someone called out.
‘I’m going to talk to the Mira.’
‘That’s just crazy,’ Ben said, shaking his head. ‘No one talks to the Mira.’
‘Why not? Because they won’t let us, or because no one’s ever tried? Or is it because you’re afraid to try? Come on, Ben, you hacked into the system twice, but now you’re getting all weak?’
Ben sat back down. He had no reply, and after a few moments of silence, Edsel spoke again. ‘Who’d like me to talk to the Mira?’
Once again, a number of hands flew up, and others went up more slowly, more uncertainly.
‘It’s crazy,’ Ben repeated.
‘Maybe, but I’m going to do it anyway. All right, I’ll let you know how I get on.’
The crowd of children began to disperse. Groups were talking, discussing, some were arguing. Edsel tried not to feel responsible for the arguing, although it was hard not to. They hadn’t been arguing before – in fact, he couldn’t remember seeing anyone quarrelling in Verdada. Until now. And he’d made it happen.
‘I just want you to know that I don’t agree with what you’re planning to do,’ said Ben. ‘It won’t work, and all you’ll do is upset people.’ He turned his head slightly to one side, listening. ‘And they are upset. I can already hear them, Robert.’
‘Ben, every time you call me that, I wonder who you’re talking to. Can you just call me Edsel!’
Ben stood up and turned to leave the room. ‘It doesn’t matter what you’re called – you’re still making a huge mistake.’
‘Yes, a very, very grave mistake,’ said Richard, who had appeared in the doorway. ‘Robert, I think we need to have another discussion, don’t you?’
‘Sit, Robert. Please.’
After he’d watched Edsel take his seat, Richard turned, walked to one of the windows and stood there, looking down on the lawns, with his hands loosely folded behind his back. ‘It’s so peaceful, don’t you think?’
‘Sure, I guess.’
‘You guess? No, Robert, you know it’s peaceful. Or at least, it was peaceful, until som
eone started to stir things up.’ Richard turned slowly, his eyes stern. ‘By someone, I mean you, Robert, just in case I wasn’t being clear.’
‘I’m not trying to stir things up,’ Edsel said. ‘I promise.’
‘You might not be trying to, but you’re certainly succeeding. Is that what you want – to cause trouble? To wreak havoc in Verdada? To ruin the natural order of things?’
‘Of course not. I just—’
Richard cut him off. ‘You see, Robert, Verdada is a delicately balanced place. In fact, it’s not just Verdada that’s finely balanced. Everything is balanced – we call it equilibrium.’
‘I read about that,’ Edsel said. ‘It’s in the Charter.’
‘Indeed it is. You see, there’s loss in life, and there’s loss in spirit. Verdada deals with loss in spirit.’
Edsel looked blankly at him. ‘I thought Verdada dealt with lost things.’
‘Let me try to explain it more clearly than it’s explained in the Charter. If someone from the place you once called “home” dies – you call it “lost”, but I think you’ll now agree that using that word isn’t entirely accurate – they have to go somewhere, don’t they? Do you agree?’
‘I guess.’
‘But they don’t come here. No, they go somewhere altogether different. I can’t tell you anything about that place right now, but you should know that it’s far from here.’
‘You can’t even tell me what it’s called? Not even now?’
Richard shook his head. ‘No. But when someone dies, and goes to that place, a new life begins back in the place you called “Home”. One dies, another is born. Equilibrium, you see.’
‘But the earth’s population is increasing,’ Edsel said.
‘Is it? How do you know?’
‘I read it once … I think.’
‘Well, there’s some catching up to be done, and some preparation required for the future, but that’s getting more complicated than we need to be right now. The point is that there’s a balance. And if people from Verdada start questioning that balance, we’re in all sorts of trouble.’
‘I just want to understand,’ Edsel said.
‘Of course you do – that’s only natural. But if what I heard you say to the others just a moment ago is accurate, you’d also like to go home.’
‘Yes, I think I would.’
‘You want that more than anything else, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do I need to remind you of what you said? You made a promise. A promise to stay. You’re marked, here,’ he said, pointing to his own forearm.
‘Maybe I am, but now I’ve changed my mind. And I don’t think it’s fair, the way it’s worked out. You trapped me. You trapped all of us. You told us we had a choice, but really it’s no choice at all.’
Richard sat down, speaking with unsettling calmness. ‘My boy, for some it is a choice. I know you’re familiar with a boy called Kasep. Those scars across his face, and on his body – you don’t know where those scars came from, do you?’
Edsel shook his head.
‘Terrible, terrible horrors. The kind of horrors that you, from your safe, boring, suburban street, can’t even begin to imagine. Why would he want to go home?’
‘But it’s still his home,’ Edsel said.
Richard’s voice was still calm. ‘No, it’s not, Robert, because he has no home to return to. Or a family. Neither does Hashim. But do you know what their greatest wish was when they came here? It was to sleep safely at night, and to have a full belly, and never to be afraid again. And there are many, many others like them. Too many.’
‘Where?’ Edsel asked. ‘Where are they?’
Richard chuckled. ‘Do you really believe that this is the only place where lost children go? I could show you places where there are many, many children like Kasep and Hashim. Children whose homes are gone, families are gone, whole villages, towns, cities destroyed or uninhabitable.’
Edsel’s voice was low. ‘So show me. Where are these other places? What are they called?’
‘Verdada. They’re all called Verdada. They might not be the same place, but they all have the same name, and the same purpose. And most of the people who live in them have no idea that there are others. And they never find out, mostly because they don’t bother to ask. They think that they live in the only Verdada, and they’re happy to believe that.’
‘And these other Verdadas – are they full of kids like Kasep?’
‘That’s right. Children who are happy to stay here, because returning to where they were is no choice at all.’
‘All right, but why are the rest of us punished?’
‘Punished?’ Richard looked like he was about to burst out laughing. ‘You’re not punished! You have everything you could ever need, or want!’
‘Except a family.’
‘If memory serves, you hated the family you lived with.’
‘I don’t think I hated them, exactly …’ he began, but he knew, down deep, that he wasn’t being entirely honest.
‘You despised them, Robert. You loathed the very sight of them, and you felt betrayed by every word that came out of their mouths.’
‘But they were still my family. They were my flesh and blood. Besides, I wasn’t lost, like Jacq, and Ben, and Kasep, and all the others. I’m different.’
‘Different?’ Richard spat the word out like it was poison. ‘I think I need to show you something.’
With a gesture towards the wall beside the door, a panel opened and a screen appeared silently from within. Richard walked closer, and beckoned Edsel over.
‘Touch the screen,’ he said.
‘Why?’
‘Just touch it.’
Edsel did as Richard had suggested, and the screen brightened. Right in the centre was a blue folder icon. And beneath it: ARM-0364J4 – CLASSIFIED: DO NOT OPEN.
‘Open it,’ Richard instructed.
‘I can’t. It says—’
‘You can. You’ve been cleared, for now. Open it.’
Cautiously, Edsel reached out a finger and touched the icon, and with a tiny blipping sound, it opened to present a screen full of icons, each with a name beneath it. Across the top of the screen were the words ARMANDINE 0364J4. ‘Now what?’
‘That one,’ Richard said, pointing to an icon on the left side of the screen.
‘Robyn Armandine?’
‘Yes. Open it.’
Edsel touched the icon, and a file opened. In the right corner was a photo of a woman, perhaps thirty years old, and pretty. Edsel thought she looked sad. She also looked a little familiar.
‘Who is it?’
‘Read the file,’ Richard replied.
Edsel began to read. There was a lot of information about things Robyn had lost in her childhood; when, how and if they’d been returned; and so on. It was all pretty standard stuff, and kind of boring.
‘I don’t understand,’ Edsel said.
‘Keep reading.’
Then, like a slap across the face, Edsel read a name he recognised. It was under a heading, in bold print, partway down the page listing lost things. The heading said CHILDREN, and beneath that, in slightly smaller words that made a greater impact on Edsel than any words he’d ever seen, was a name.
Armandine, Robert.
He blinked, and read it again. ‘Is that … me?’
‘Yes,’ answered Richard.
‘I … I don’t understand. She lost me?’
‘Read.’
At sixteen years of age, Robyn gave birth to a healthy baby boy, whom she named Robert Henry.
‘I’ve got a middle name?’
‘Keep reading.’
Due to the absence of the child’s father, and an unsupportive family, Robyn felt the need to hand the baby over for adoption. Through the actions of various government agencies, Robert was adopted by a recently bereaved couple, Barry and Tilda Grizzler.
‘My parents!’ Edsel said. ‘So that’s why you’ve been calling m
e Robert?’
‘Yes, it was the name you were first given. But go on – there’s a little more to read.’
Despite being offered the opportunity to maintain limited contact with her son, Robyn chose to cut off all ties, a decision which she often regrets.
Under that was a smaller heading: Outcomes of Arbitrary Assessment. And then, in flashing red letters: ‘Reassign to alternative location/owner’?
‘It was decided that it would be too painful for your birth mother to return you to her, not to mention the pain to your adoptive parents,’ Richard explained.
‘How come you get to choose? Shouldn’t that be their choice?’
‘It wasn’t a decision we made lightly. But it was, in our opinion, the best decision.’
‘We? Who’s we? Who makes the decision about lost people?’
‘The Mira. They decide, in their wisdom.’
Edsel shook his head, disbelieving. ‘So that’s how I was lost?’
Richard didn’t reply straight away. ‘The first time,’ he said after a moment.
‘So there’s more? If I touch my name, will it show me my file?’
After a tiny gesture from Richard, the screen sank away into the recess in the wall. ‘You can’t see your own file. That’s absolutely forbidden.’
‘Why? It’s about me.’
Richard shook his head. ‘You can’t see anything to do with yourself or your immediate family. Even showing you as much as I just did is beyond what we would normally allow. I’m sorry.’
‘So why did you show me that much?’
‘You told me that your family are your own flesh and blood. But clearly they’re not.’
Edsel sank back into the couch. ‘But they feel like it,’ he said. ‘They’re my family. They feel like my flesh and blood. And that’s why I want to go home. I want that more than anything. And that’s why this is so unfair – what I want more than anything else is exactly what I can’t have.’
‘Now you’re getting it.’ Richard stepped to the door and opened it. ‘I’m glad we had this talk.’
‘So that’s it?’
‘That’s it. You understand now.’
‘Do I?’
‘Oh yes, absolutely. Goodbye, Robert.’
‘Goodbye,’ Edsel said as he heard the door close behind him.