When the boy realised he’d slaughtered the wrong village he thought how tired he was, how he’d have to do it all over again. He went into a mud house to find some food. He was eating a blackened cheese when he heard a thumping noise outside in the street. He peeped outside, frightened the dead had returned to life. Instead, he saw a sight as terrible as the bodies piled in the road. A group of women danced up and down in the street, waving their left fists in the air and pounding their bellies with their right. Dressed in lion skins with lion skulls on top of their shaven heads, and phalluses made of cast iron strapped to their groins, the women only displayed their original gender through an occasional breast visible underneath a sloppily hung skin. The ‘lion-men’ they called themselves, creatures who lived in the hills north of the Bitter Beach, and they announced in shouts and stamps their allegiance to the Great One who had liberated so many souls in such a short time. From that day they served him, as a force, as a priesthood, until the night he decided to become a wise ruler, beloved as well as feared, and knew he must rid himself of his loyal band of monsters.
They called themselves the Death Squad, and it took them a week to find his village. In that week of murders something strange happened to He Who Runs Away. As he lay at night with the lion-men asleep and the mask behind him an odd purpose awoke in him. He wanted to create the world.
He looked at the stone and dust and he saw paved roads with buses and trucks propelled by blue sails that filled the sky. He thought of the shack where he’d lived with his mother and he saw apartment buildings miles long, with rooms lit by lights plucked out of the sky and hung from the ceilings. He licked his dry lips and tasted water from underground lakes, carried thousands of miles through pipes so wide whole cities could live inside them. By the time he reached his home town he only wanted to fulfil the punishment and begin his true work.
The lion-men herded everyone together and He Who Runs Away shouted, ‘I have come on my father’s business.’ His voice stripped the layers of dust from his victims’ eyes so that the sun burned through their closed lids and they saw the world as it really is, a place of such misery they only waited for this strange being to relieve them of life. The Death Squad took up their double-headed axes. Led by He Who Runs Away, they split the villagers’ skulls, outdoing each other with the swiftness and elegance of their strokes.
When it was finished, and the lion-men were celebrating, He Who Runs Away sat down to listen to the black birds with white necks who fluttered down to peck at the bodies. In the beat of their wings the killer heard a voice, a teacher who told him about laws and government, administration and bureaucracy. And when it ended its instructions the voice told him how to find the hidden bridge that would take him and his followers across the Sea of Sorrows to the bulk of the world.
The Death Squad rolled across the continents. In each land He Who Runs Away left behind him—along with mountains of dismembered bodies—repaved roads, and district courts, and laws and licences, and progressive and regressive taxes. When he had killed the kings and presidents he turned their palaces into distribution centres for free food, clean clothing, and explanations of the new code of equality and opportunity. Besides supplies and weapons he began to carry paint. When he conquered a city he would wait until night and then send the young women to paint the streets and trees and buildings, so that when the sun rose the people saw a new world brighter than the sky. In a country pockmarked with caves he found a large black rock. He took it with him and called it the Seat of Heaven. Wherever he went he would sit on the rock, draped in black, to hear petitions. When the time came for judgement he would throw off the black cloth and stand up dressed in gold and purple.
The lion-men understood none of this—not why their leader moved so slowly, not why he kept so many people alive, not why he spent so many hours talking, not why he sat on that stone listening to people’s complaints. Most of all, they did not understand why he was building an army from all those weaklings. For in each place Son Of A God ordered a tax of young men, stripping them bare and ordering them to flay themselves until their blood washed away their past lives. Then he would kiss each one on the lips and tell him, ‘This is your birth, and I am the breath of your life.’
Late one night, while the army camped beside a waterfall, the leader woke the lion-men and whispered to them that he’d discovered a plot to kill him. Silently they followed him into a cave behind the foam of water. It was only when the young men rolled the Seat of Heaven against the cave’s mouth that the lion-men realised their god had tricked them. In the darkness they could hear the buzz of the flies as he raised the mask onto his shoulders. Later, when the young men opened the cave, He Who Runs Away handed each of his generals a cast iron phallus wrapped in human flesh.
Jennie Mazdan went to a clinic on Smith Street on the north side of town, to find out what she already knew, that she was two and a half months pregnant.
When the doctor had done the test Jennie sat in the bare waiting room for the results to come through. The clinic was a poor one, with hard benches, torn magazines on a chipped table, and old posters giving advice on spiritual hygiene. Graffiti made the posters half illegible. Through the closed door Jennie could hear a rheumatic patient complain that neither the doctor’s pills nor the chants of the healers down the hall had driven the Malignant Ones out of her knees. A few minutes Later Dr Karim called Jennie back for the results.
‘The Spirit has breathed its life into your womb,’ he told Jennie formally. Jennie closed her eyes and sagged deeper in the narrow chair.
‘Do you want a copy of the report?’ the doctor asked. Jennie shook her head. ‘Do you want me to send a copy to the father?’ He was a bald man with a slight potbelly. He wore a stained shirt and no jacket.
Jennie opened her eyes again.
Under his metal desk the doctor tapped his foot on the floor. ‘Do you know the father?’
‘No. Not exactly.’ A moment later she smiled slightly. ‘Yes. Yes, I know him.’
‘Is this your first pregnancy?’
‘Yes. I’m a virgin.’
The doctor half spun round in his seat to stare dramatically at the ceiling. ‘I don’t think that’s very likely.’
‘I was married once,’ Jennie said. ‘But my husband got an annulment.’
The doctor didn’t bother to hide his grin. It occurred to Jennie that the doctor assumed her husband had made her pregnant and then pressurised a judge to annul the marriage. ‘So you’re a virgin,’ the doctor said.
‘Yes.’ She was about to leave when the doctor said, ‘There’s an Enactment, you know. You’re supposed to perform it on the discovery of—’
‘No.’
‘It’s very simple. We can do it right now if you like. Usually the father does it with you, but since you, since you’re a virgin—’
‘No.’
‘Ms. Mazdan, the law requires we do the Enactment within a week of positive lab. results.’
‘I don’t want any Enactments.’
He sighed, tapping his foot again. ‘Enactments join us to the Living World. The Founders gave them to us as actions we can perform to help recognise the Spirit in our lives.’
‘I know what Enactments are. You don’t have to explain them to me.’
‘It doesn’t signify a wanted pregnancy, if that’s the problem. I mean, you won’t be a hypocrite. In fact, even if you get an abortion right afterwards, the Enactment will still apply. More so, actually.’
‘No.’
‘The Chained Mother will help your abortion. But you have to join with her first.’
‘I know. And then join with her in the abortion clinic. That way the abortion signifies the breaking of her chains rather than the denial of life.’
He sat back, unprepared for this sudden eloquence. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘if you know all that, you’ll also know you should do it.’
‘No!’ She got up. ‘What do—do I pay something?’
‘No, you don’t pay something.
This happens to be a free clinic. For people who can’t afford to pay.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Next time maybe you’ll take your problems to someone who has time to waste. I’ve got patients who need me.’
‘I won’t bother you again.’
‘Please don’t,’ Doctor Karim said.
On the way out Jennie passed a partly open door. Inside, a healer had begun work on some teenage girl who looked as though she couldn’t have weighed more than eighty pounds. Not a ‘pure’ (the kind who worked without props or systems), the healer had drawn a series of concentric circles with coloured chalks on the wood floor. The sick girl sat in the centre, the ‘heart of life’, Jennie knew. She’d studied the system in college, and remembered now that the circles represented the different worlds: the Earth, the Sky, the Land of the Dead, she forgot the others. As he travelled through the circles the healer acquired power and knowledge from each one so that when he reached the centre he could clean the girl’s soul by pressing his charged hands to her forehead and the base of her spine. Anyway, that was the idea. Jennie caught only a glimpse of him hopping from one circle to the next before an assistant slammed the door.
Outside in her car, Jennie looked at the shabby six storey brick buildings, the people sitting in the folding chairs by the small patches of yellowish grass. Children dashed past the car, shouting in code. Double doors of peeling red paint stood open to let some air into the buildings. Jennie glanced at the totems that squatted above the doors. She wondered if the tenants chose their own building totems, or if the city housing bureau made the choice for them.
‘Why did I do that?’ she said softly. Would the doctor report her? Probably not. Too busy. She’d never refused an Enactment before. Never.
She looked at her watch. She’d better get back to work, or else she wouldn’t reach her last service, a factory, before they closed for the night. As she drove slowly down the street in the direction of the housing project guardian (her excuse to herself for coming to the clinic) she noticed a group of children playing some game which required them to roll around on the grass. She stopped across the road to watch them. A picture game, she saw, for one of the children stood over the others and gestured with her short arms, like a Teller declaiming a story. She wore a necklace of artificial flowers, like the kind kids get in Woolworth’s to wear on Founder’s Day. A wool blanket was tied around her shoulders—her ‘recital skin.’ A couple of mothers hovered nearby. They looked worried, as if they feared the game might go too far in some way. Jennie wondered what Picture they were doing.
She drove round a corner. Had she made a mistake refusing the Enactment? She remembered that weird idea she’d had, of some sort of agency making her do things. She was pretty sure the refusal had been her own decision.
At the building that housed the guardian she pulled over, then got her equipment from the trunk. No one paid much attention as she walked past the children and old people gathered outside. On the roof the husk looked a little shabby, not quite as gleaming as some of the others. Jennie set to work, spraying it with cleaning fluid and rubbing it down with her cloths.
Outside, she hurried back to her car. She just wanted to finish her rounds and go home. She wished she didn’t live in a hive. She didn’t belong there, with all those people bound together, going to Recitals together, doing Enactments together. Hell, she thought, if she started refusing Enactments she didn’t belong anywhere.
As she approached her next stop, a research lab., she had a sudden pang of missing her father. Jimmy. The Jimmy and Jennie show. She remembered snuggling onto his lap while he read to her from The Lives Of The Founders. So long ago. Maybe that was the last time she belonged somewhere. And now she was pregnant. Her very own baby. Hers and—She didn’t want to think about that.
That night, after dinner—she’d made herself an egg salad and hardly eaten it—Jennie sat in the dinette with the phone book in her lap, determined to find an abortion clinic and end this nonsense once and for all. But what should she look up? She tried ‘abortion’, ‘pregnancy’, ‘birth control’, even ‘marital advice’. Ridiculous. She must know the name, everyone knew it. Named after one of the Founders. Why couldn’t she remember? It’s the agency, she thought. Bastards.
‘Keep your secrets,’ she said, and threw the phone book on the floor. Karen. Last year Karen D’arcy had got pregnant by that guy from the record company, the one who turned out to have a wife in North Carolina. Jennie remembered her surprise that Karen had confided in her. She grabbed her light zipper jacket from the couch and marched outside.
With each step a little of her militancy leaked away. What she was planning was crazy. She should be giving thanks or something. Going on a pilgrimage or something. When she reached Karen’s house she nearly walked on, as if she’d just gone out for a stroll. But then her anger returned. They didn’t ask her. That was the point. Nobody had asked her. She had to keep herself from pounding on Karen’s door like some Hollywood Viking demanding entrance to a castle.
Karen came to the door almost immediately. ‘Oh,’ she said when she saw Jennie, ‘Hi.’
‘Are you expecting someone?’
‘No, not at all. Come in.’ When Jennie had stepped into the little alcove that led to the living room Karen laughed and said, ‘Well, to tell you the truth, I wasn’t expecting anyone, but I sure was hoping it might be this guy I know.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Jennie said. ‘Should I go?’
‘No, of course not. If I didn’t see anyone until Jack came I could apply for hermit status from the government. Come on, sit down. Want some coffee?’
‘Yeah, Okay,’ Jennie said, and sat down on the short grey couch. Karen’s house always looked a little like an illustration from a furniture catalogue. The couch and the two gold chairs and the pale gold tables with their bulbous porcelain lamps all went together, but none of it reflected Karen. Furniture didn’t interest Karen any more than it did Jennie. She just made more of an effort.
She came back with a couple of speckled mugs. ‘I made a whole pot,’ she said, and added, ‘Milk, no sugar, right?’ Jennie nodded and took the mug.
Karen sat down on one of the chairs. In a narrow skirt and pink blouse she looked as if she’d been hired to grace the furniture. She said, ‘Sorry I got so silly at the door.’
‘That’s okay. Who’s Jack?’
‘No one.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘No, I didn’t mean you shouldn’t ask. It’s just—’ She pushed her hair back with her hands. ‘I met him through work. He’s a buyer. And I thought he might become—someone. I guess I still hope so. Never give up D’arcy.’
‘Married.’
‘Yeah.’ She laughed. ‘At least he told me.’
Jennie knew she should ask what happened but she couldn’t make herself speak. Karen went on, ‘You know what I thought? You know what I told myself? That it was a good sign. I mean, that he was married and he told me. Showed he was honest. Isn’t that incredible?’ Jennie didn’t answer. ‘Oh hell,’ said Karen, ‘I’m sorry. I’m sure you didn’t come here to listen to me complain about life.’
‘It’s okay.’
‘No, really. I’ll tell you, though, sometimes I wonder why I do it. Go for these bastards. Is it just because the choice is so narrow? Have you started dating yet?’
‘What?’
Karen laughed. ‘Sorry, didn’t mean to catch you like that. I’m a little—disconnected, I guess. But it’s been a long time now, hasn’t it? Since—’ She waved her fingers, ‘You know.’
‘I haven’t really thought about it,’ Jennie said.
‘You should. Not that I make a very good case for the singles lifestyle. Sometimes I think I’m on a pilgrimage that never gets anywhere.’
‘You do all right.’
‘You think so? You must not be paying attention. God, I’m sorry. Still, at least it would give you something to worry about besides Gloria Rich.’
Jennie di
d her best to smile. ‘I can manage Gloria. And I can certainly find things to worry about.’
‘Can’t we all.’ The two women sipped their coffee. Hesitantly Karen touched Jennie’s hand. ‘Jennie,’ she said, ‘is something wrong?’
‘Wrong?’
‘Yeah, you don’t look too great.’
‘No, of course—it’s—’ She stopped.
‘Why don’t you tell me what it is?’
‘Karen, I’ve got a problem.’
‘I’m listening.’
‘Umm—I need—do you remember that guy you went with a year or so ago? Bruce, I think.’
‘Sure. Good old Brucie. What about him? Don’t tell me he’s grabbed you now.’
Jennie said seriously, ‘No, I don’t even know him. But, you remember when you got—pregnant?’ Karen nodded. ‘Where did you go? For the abortion, I mean.’
‘You’re pregnant?’
Jennie looked down. If only she could have found the name and avoided all this. ‘In a way,’ she said, and felt like an idiot.
‘In a way. Jennie, you said you’re not even dating.’
‘Well—’
‘Oh shit, you weren’t, you weren’t attacked?’
‘No, no, it…’ She stopped. ‘Yeah, I guess that’s what it was. A kind of attack.’
‘Oh, Jennie.’ Karen jumped up to hug her, then let go when Jennie stayed stiff in her arms. She sat down next to Jennie on the couch. ‘Where did it happen? When did it happen?’
‘Recital Day,’ Jennie said. If only she could get the information and get out.
‘The Day of Truth?’ Karen asked. Jennie nodded. ‘Great Mother,’ Karen said, ‘that’s horrible. How could someone—Wait a minute. That’s why you didn’t go to the Recital?’ Jennie nodded again. ‘Oh, Jennie, sweetheart. God, that makes me want to go over and pound Gloria Rich’s tiny head against a fucking wall.’ She saw Jennie’s alarm and added, ‘Don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone. Especially not our local saint.’ She thought a moment. ‘Did you call the police?’
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