Unquenchable Fire

by Rachel Pollack

  When Jennie stepped outside there was Gloria, at the head of the crowd. ‘Get out,’ Gloria told her. ‘Get out of our hive.’ At first Jennie thought she had heard Doris. Or maybe they had all felt the touchstone’s pain in their own hands. She soon realized that none of them knew what had happened. Gloria would have said the same thing if Jennie and Doris had jumped on the velvet couch and made love.

  ‘Get out of our hive,’ Gloria said again, and this time Jim Browning and a few others joined in, like actors who’ve waited too long for their cue. ‘Get out,’ they said. ‘You don’t belong here.’ Soon the children were chanting it and clapping their hands. ‘Get out, get out, get out of our hive.’

  To Gloria, Jennie said, ‘I suppose the hive will buy my house?’

  Al nodded. ‘That’s the usual procedure.’

  ‘Researched it, have you?’ She looked at the crowd. They were laughing, shouting, so excited. ‘All of you,’ she called out, ‘listen to me.’ An amazed silence rolled through the mob. ‘Where is this going to get you? You think it’ll make you happy? You think it’ll take away your pain? Or replace what you’ve lost? Can it replace what the Tellers have taken away from you?’

  Someone shouted, ‘Liar! The Tellers give us everything,’ and someone else added, ‘They gave us the Revolution.’

  ‘They’ve thrown away the Revolution,’ Jennie said. ‘You all know that. You just don’t want to admit it. They got scared and threw the Revolution away as soon as they could.’

  Someone started a droning chant of protection and soon most of the crowd had taken it up. A few people yelled, ‘Get out, get out, get out of our hive.’

  Jennie called, ‘You’ve got to start doing things for yourselves. That’s the real lesson. That’s what you’ve got to learn. The Tellers have abandoned you.’

  ‘Liar,’ a couple of people shouted, and a few others yelled, ‘Evil One!’ It was hopeless. The chant boomed in her whole body, people were stamping and clapping to drown her out. Next to Jennie Gloria smiled sweetly at her. You fucking bitch, Jennie thought. Gloria, perhaps achieving a moment of telepathy, laughed.

  Jennie took a step down the hill, then stopped. Turning her head side to side she looked at the wild faces. She said, ‘Once, the mother of all the people lived among her children.’

  Near Jennie the adults and the children stopped chanting. They sat down in a semi-circle in front of her, listening. ‘The Mother lived in a stone building in the centre of the city.’ Now more people were sitting down. Jennie spoke no louder than when she used to stand in the kitchen and talk with Karen; but the drones were dying, and the whistles, the clapping. ‘All day she sat outside on a bench and the people could come and touch her.’

  ‘What are you doing?’ Gloria said, but she was whispering, and no one paid her any attention. And then she too listened, as Jennifer Mazdan told her a story.

  THE QUEEN OF THE PROM: A version of Jennifer Mazdan’s story, as remembered and written down years later by Susan Rich (five years old on the day of the Telling):

  Once, the mother of all the people lived among her children. She lived in a stone building in the centre of the city. All day she sat outside on a wooden bench, and the people could come and touch her.

  At first everyone gave her offerings and came to sit beside her, telling her all the news. But after a while people forgot. At night they would play loud music so she couldn’t sleep. In winter, children threw snowballs at her to see them melt. If it rained, people would wipe their hands on her as they passed. In the old days, which people came to think of as a dream, they would paint their cars with the Mother’s favourite colours, then dress themselves in the skins of her favourite animals to drive past in a slow procession from dark until midnight on the Rising of the Light. As the bells rang for midnight they would switch on the lights and honk their horns. But now that dreamtime had ended, and people dressed in black leather raced their cars throughout the year along the ‘old straight track’ as people called the highway that ran in front of the Mother’s house. The air filled with smoke, while every morning the road stank of rubber.

  On the Day of Truth one year a woman wanted to spice up her pot of Founder’s Stew. She sneaked up behind the Mother, who sat sleeping on her bench. With a small knife the woman cut a little piece of skin and ran back to chop it up into the stew. Everyone liked it so much she went back the following week and soon every day, and then she told her friends, and all the women of the neighbourhood began to sneak out at night with scarves or stockings over their faces and black knives in their hands. It doesn’t hurt her, they told themselves. It’ll just grow back. She’s so big she’ll never even notice.

  And then one morning the Mother was gone. She had changed herself into a river to flow around the city and down to the sea. A storm came. The river began to flood the town, and everyone stood on their rooftops to beg the Mother to let them live. Water roared through the streets. Finally a young woman painted her body with spirals inscribed with pleas for forgiveness. Then she leapt into the flood. She vanished, but soon after that the storm ended and the river settled into a normal path.

  The city council kept the girl’s death a secret, announcing only that the tears of all the people had melted their Mother’s rage. For several years the river remained placid. The town decided that the Mother had given them a blessing. They built sewage plants and factories and let the pipes drain into the water. Then one year the water began to rise again and the sky darkened with clouds. The mayor and the city manager and the Chief of Police met secretly to plan what to do. The river needed a sacrifice, they decided, another woman who would give herself so that the town might live. They came up with a plan. The high school had just chosen its Queen of the Prom. They would go to the Queen’s house, tell her she had won a special award and lead her out of town. Then they would give her a chocolate filled with drugs to make her sleep. They would tie her up, dress her in a white gown, and throw her in the water. The Chief of Police, who had just trained a pack of ferocious dogs, suggested they should kill her first. Leave her overnight, he said, let the dogs loose at her, and then in the morning they would give her to the river.

  Now, the city manager tried to say that that was not what had happened before. Then, the woman herself had dived into the water. In fact, he said, no one really knew that she had drowned. Children playing by the river sometimes claimed they saw a beautiful woman dancing on the water. Maybe, he said, they should ask for a volunteer. Or maybe one of them should give himself. The others told him he was being ridiculous. There was no time, they said. They needed to act.

  When they came to the Prom Queen’s house her younger sister opened the door. The girl thought the mayor looked suspicious. Instead of calling her sister the girl said that she was the Queen. ‘Come with us,’ they told her, ‘you’ve just won an award.’ The girl went to get her things and on the way she went into the kitchen and gathered a knife and several biscuits which she had just baked as a present for her sister.

  The mayor led her to the river and gave her the chocolate. The girl sniffed it, and realizing it was drugged, she didn’t swallow it. Instead, she pretended to fall down asleep, and when the mayor and his gang weren’t looking she spat it out into her hand. They dressed her in the gown and tied her up to leave her by the water.

  As soon as they were gone the girl cut her ropes with the knife, and climbed up a tree. When the dogs came she threw them the biscuits and they ran off, never to bother anyone again. At dawn the mayor returned to throw the body into the river. He saw the girl lying on the ground, the ropes gone, her dress and body untouched. Surprised, he bent down to look closer. The girl leaped up and jammed the chocolate into his mouth. Before he could think, the mayor had swallowed the drug and a moment later he lay asleep on the ground.

  The girl ran home. She sent her family away and locked all the doors, drawing seals of protection on them so the police couldn’t break in. The telephone rang. The girl pulled it out of the wall.

&nb
sp; Soon the mayor arrived, leading a team of council men, teachers, and police. Please come out, they begged her, they just wanted to speak to her. The girl didn’t answer. Then the mayor shouted that it was true they wanted to offer her to the river. But she had to think of the rest of them. Already it had started to rain and the water was rising. The girl’s teachers joined in, reminding her how they had tried to instil a sense of civic duty in her.

  Finally the girl became so sick of all this that she told them she would go and speak to the Mother. By now a TV crew had come up and the girl knew the mayor wouldn’t dare attack her. So she marched to the river, with the whole crowd behind her. When they got there they saw that the water ran black and thick and the sky hung grey with clouds. The frightened people all ran away, leaving the girl alone by the water.

  ‘Please,’ she said, ‘why are you attacking us? No one ever meant any harm.’ But the water only splashed over the girl, and the sky thundered. She went home and once again barricaded herself in her house. When she looked in the mirror she discovered that she had aged and was no longer a girl.

  Once again the crowds surrounded the house. Now all her friends from school joined them, begging her to save them. Again she left the house and again everyone fled when they came to the river. Clouds sat upon the Earth, and the wind blew. The woman said, ‘They’re frightened. They know how weak they are, and the world scares them. That’s why they behave so badly. Can’t you forgive them?’ A wave of oily water crashed down on her. When she got home and looked in the mirror she discovered she had become an old woman.

  Now her own family had joined the crowd. ‘Why should everyone die,’ they told her, ‘just so you can live? Do you think that’s right?’ Disgusted, she left the house. When they saw how she’d aged they wanted to run, but she insisted she would only go to the river if they all followed her.

  As they came closer they saw great rocks fly through the air. Beyond the river the mountains trembled, while all about them the clouds smashed against each other. The old woman called to the river, ‘I understand. They’re no good. But can’t you let go of them anyway?’ The rain swept over her in a great roar of wind. The people fell down and covered their eyes, but the old woman shouted at them to watch.

  She stepped into the river. The rain ended, and the ground stopped shaking. She took a step further. The water rose over her waist, but above her the clouds began to clear. Finally the waves of foam covered her head. The sun came out and the water ran smooth again.

  For a long time no one could see anything of the old woman. Some of the people went back to town, but others waited for the body to float to the surface. All night they sat there, silently staring at the water and holding hands, while back in town the others got drunk and ran through the streets.

  Morning came. The people who’d celebrated woke up sick and no one wanted to look at anyone else. All day they argued, and at night they lay awake, afraid to sleep. By the river, however, the smooth silver of the water began to ripple. The girl stepped out, as young as when the mayor had first come knocking on her door. She led the people upstream to a place where the air was sweet and the water as pure as the sun. There they created a new city. In the centre of it they built a stone house, with a wooden bench. When the girl became an old woman she would sit there, and the people would sit beside her and tell her their stories.

  When Jennie finished speaking she stood there, staring in amazement at the amazed faces of the crowd. She was dizzy and she had to grab hold of someone not to fall down. For a moment she thought they’d flown again, lifted together into the sky, only this time she too had forgotten. She began to walk down the hill. Someone—Karen? Gloria?—reached out to touch her. She kept going. At the bottom she turned to lean against someone’s car. She looked up at them. They all just stood there, unmoving, their faces as clean as the snow.

  20

  That night Jennie slept over at Marilyn Birdan’s house, and the next day she moved into a motel on Route 44, in Pleasant Valley. Three days later she brought her two suitcases to a dreary apartment on Cannon Street, east of Market Street and the county offices building. The following week she went back to the hive with Mar and a van full of cartons to pack whatever she didn’t want to leave behind. The whole day, as Jennie and Mar worked, people seemed to hover round the house: children on bicycles, adults walking or driving, they would come close, slowing down or stopping in the road, stay for a moment or two, and then hurry on. Jennie even thought she caught a glimpse of Gloria Rich at the line dividing the two lawns.

  After a while Mar began to notice the parade of neighbours. ‘Hey,’ she said to Jennie, ‘maybe you should go speak to these people.’

  ‘Why?’ Jennie asked.

  ‘Maybe they’re sorry, you know?’

  ‘Then let them come and say so. Let them come knock on the door, ask to come in, and tell me they’re sorry.’

  ‘Hey, they’re probably scared.’

  ‘That’s no excuse.’

  ‘Wow. You’re really tough, you know that? I never knew you were so tough.’

  ‘Tough,’ Jennie repeated. ‘Blessed Spirits. Tough.’ She turned and began packing towels, afraid she’d start to cry and ruin her new image. If only Karen would come. Karen was the only one she really cared about. If she just came, just up the walk, she wouldn’t have to say anything, or even knock, Jennie would run out to get her. But Karen had to make that effort. It wasn’t pride; Jennie didn’t care about that. It all had to do with choice. Karen had to choose to come to her.

  Three weeks after Jennie moved her belongings the estate agent closed the deal selling the house and furniture at an assessed price to the committee representing Glowwood Hive. With the money from the sale Jennie could have moved to a more modern apartment on a street with trees instead of offices. She thought about it. She looked at the rent ads in the Poughkeepsie Journal, and even circled a couple. She never got around to calling them.

  On the night that Jennie’s house was sold, in homes up and down the hive, people found themselves fighting with each other or bursting into tears or tripping and banging their shins against the bathtub. On Cannon Street, meanwhile, the residents all broke into laughter at the exact moment that the Sun set, while shortly after nine o’clock many people claimed they saw a large bird circling above the street. The next day people who had been driving on Cannon Street the night before claimed that a formation of either flying saucers or winged women had hovered above the buildings and then returned to their secret bases far from human knowledge.

  More from That Story

  On the seventy-eighth day of the rule of ‘Mr President’ it happened that in a certain suburb of the Democratic City of God a lion attacked a young woman who had gone out in the street thinking she heard someone weeping and calling her name. The next night the lion came again and killed a waiter who had stepped behind his restaurant to retrieve a bottle of wine. After two more deaths the community sent a delegation to ask the risen President to destroy the evil.

  The President and the remains of the administration marched through the city, accompanied by child drummers, rows of police carrying banners, and sacred messengers circling overhead. They arrived at the village square and they stood among the flowers and the cracked concrete while the exhausted sun lowered itself beyond the edge of the world.

  It came. Slowly walking, its back and shoulders rippling, its gold skin flecked with black, its mane like a curled halo about its face, it stopped six feet away from her. The movement of its muscles flicked light into the air. For an instant words formed and then the bits of light broke apart in the sun. With its head tilted slightly to the left the lion stared at her, while her hands hung open and her ceremonial gun fell beside her feet. One of the police lifted his rifle; she knocked it out of his hands.

  It’s him, she thought. He has come back. Not for them, but for me. He couldn’t bear to leave me.

  The lion strolled away.

  Jennie’s apartment occupied one-half o
f the top floor of a four storey building across the street from the Cannon Street parking lot. A small legal firm kept the ground floor bright and clean, a contrast with the rest of the building. Two doors down stood a large building with high rounded windows in between white stone columns. Letters chiselled in the stone blocks above the door pronounced it a ‘Masonic Temple.’ Jennie had no idea what that might mean. On the other side of this curious building stood a modest bank with the immodest name, Empire of America.

  The other apartment on Jennie’s floor housed a divorced hotel manager. Below Jennie lived a hairdresser whose front door displayed a medallion of the Hidden Sisters, from Cleveland—his home town, he explained to Jennie. The hotel manager was an alcoholic; Jennie could smell it on his body, and she suspected he wouldn’t be holding on to his hotel much longer than he’d held on to his wife. The hairdresser now and then played his stereo late at night, but he always stopped when Jennie banged on the floor, and the next day he would bow his head, as if posing for a government poster urging penitence. If he saw Jennie on the stairs he would ask how the baby was doing, how much time she had, whether or not he could do any errands for her, if she’d decided on names, and did she want him to call the hospital or the midwives when the moment came.

  The apartment—three small rooms, kitchen, and bath—looked like the last occupants had belonged to one of those groups who vow never to clean themselves or their homes, as a penance for some crime committed in a past life. ‘Dirt-lovers’ people called them, or just ‘dirties.’ As Jennie scraped at the grease coating the cooker, or carried away the shower curtain at arm’s length, she thought how the dirties could have held their national convention right there in her apartment.

  When Jennie had lived there for a week it came time for the ‘Rising of the Light’, the most important of the Winter Enactments. All over town, people were crowding the department stores for last minute presents, queueing at the supermarket for turkeys, baking cakes in the shape of sunbursts, and ironing white dresses or polishing white boots. Jennie made sure to stay in all that day. As evening approached she thought of everyone squeezing into their neighbourhood Picture Halls, all of them wearing long black coats or even opera capes to conceal their white clothes. At nine o’clock the heat died in the radiators; Jennie banged on the pipes and when that failed she went down to the second floor where the superintendent lived. No one was home. He’s gone to the Enactment, Jennie realized. He’s turned off the goddamn heat because he’s figured everyone’s gone to the Enactment. She climbed the stairs back to her apartment. When she got there she lay down on the bed she’d bought the week before (the apartment had come furnished but Jennie had thrown out the bed after one night) and covered herself with the quilt Betsy Rodriguez’s mother had given her in college. There she lay, imagining the Tellers intoning the Pictures, seeing everyone lighting their gold candles, hearing the shouts as the spotlights came on in the Hall and everyone threw off their black coverings to hug and kiss each other in their whites.