“That’s where Ulla lives,” said Nina. “She used to be a doctor.”
“She has this floor all to herself?”
“I suppose you think that’s strange, but yes, she does.”
Vanja shuddered. “I see.”
“We check in on her every day, go around the rooms and mark everything. You’re very welcome to help. She’s getting a little senile, but she means well.” Nina continued up the next flight of stairs. “The alternative is to leave some houses empty, Vanja.”
Vanja’s room was of standard size but furnished for one person instead of two. The bed by the far wall had a thick mattress and ample storage space under its high frame; a quilted duvet, a worn blanket, and a pillow lay neatly stacked at the foot of the bed. By the window a small desk and a chair had replaced the usual second bed, but there were still two storage cabinets that Vanja would have all to herself.
Nina set the bag down on the bed. “I’ll let you make yourself at home.” She went into her own room next door.
Vanja put her satchel and typewriter case down in the doorway and made a circuit of the room. She touched each object, reading its label and saying its name aloud. When she was done, she heaved the heavy typewriter case onto the desk and stacked the satchel’s contents—folders, typewriter paper, and notepads—next to it. Finally, she emptied her suitcase: the set of sheets, which she laid out on the mattress; towels, sleep clothes, a few sets of underwear, trousers, sweaters, and a pair of overalls, all of which she folded and put in one of the cabinets. The suitcase only just fit under the bed. After some consideration she put on another pair of trousers and the thickest sweater she’d brought. It didn’t make her feel much warmer.
“You need proper clothes.” Nina was back, leaning against the door frame.
Vanja pulled the sweater down over her hips. The shirt underneath bunched up. “You’re right. But I’m not sure what I need. Is it always this cold?”
“Yep.”
“Do you get used to it?”
Nina grinned and shook her head. “Nope. But you’ll get very good at dressing for the weather.” She pulled away from the door frame and went back into her own room.
Vanja sat down at the desk, took the lid off the typewriter case, and loaded a blank sheet. After punching the buttons one by one, reciting each character and number, she was confident everything was in working order.
There was a knock on the open door, and Nina entered with a note in her hand.
“Here,” she said. “I’ve made a list of the clothes we wear here. So you know what to get.”
Vanja scanned the list. “A sleeping cap?”
“The nights are even colder.”
Vanja thanked her and turned back to the desk to organize her papers. After a while she fetched the blanket from the bed and wrapped herself in it until only her head and hands could be seen. The temperature in the house wasn’t much higher than outside.
Her assignment was to find out everything E.H.S. needed to know about hygiene habits and needs in Amatka. That was it. Vanja had asked for more details, but Öydis, the supervisor, had shrugged her shoulders.
“We’ve never done this before, Vanja. Nobody’s done it before. We’re pioneers, you know? Just like our forebears. You, Vanja, have the honor of being a pioneer in this project. You’re perfectly suited. I’m sure you’ll find a good solution.”
Vanja still didn’t fully understand why she was so perfect for the job. Öydis had referred to her “quiet discretion.” Vanja suspected, however, that it had more to do with Ärna’s powers of persuasion. Ärna had told her she ought to have a change of scenery, and then made it happen. She was ever the big sister. Nepotism wasn’t really allowed, but Ärna had risen quickly through the ranks at E.H.S. and somehow managed to get Vanja the position.
She put two folders on the desk in front of her and took a thick marking pen from her satchel. She marked one folder CONTENTS: REPORTS and the other CONTENTS: NOTES. She picked up the notepad and leafed through it. It was mycopaper, shiny and new, with the scrap-by date printed in the bottom right corner of every single sheet. There should be time enough to fill the whole notepad, and transcribe the important parts, before it had to be scrapped.
Vanja was supposed to submit reports once a week. She grabbed a pencil and stepped out into the hallway to knock on Nina’s door.
Report 1
* * *
The following notes are the result of my first meeting with one of my hosts, Ulltors’ Nina Amatka Four.
The household consists of three people: Nina, Jonids’ Ivar Four (farming technician), and Sarols’ Ulla Three (retired physician). Nina is 34 years old and employed as a medic at Amatka’s clinic. She informs me that Ivar is 32 years old and employed as a farming technician in the mushroom farming chambers. Both were reared in Children’s House Four in Amatka. They have produced two children together, Ninivs’ Tora Four and Ninivs’ Ida Four, eight and six years old respectively. The girls live in Children’s House Four and visit during weekends.
The general attitude to hygiene in Amatka is somewhat different, chiefly on account of the cold and the conditions it entails. Each household is allotted a ration of hot water, which is rarely enough to fill more than one bathtub. For this reason, household comrades often coordinate bathing. Nina states that the members of this household bathe every week to ten days. Otherwise they use washcloths to wash. Nina also informs me that the soap they normally use is difficult to rinse off with water and washcloth alone.
When it comes to hygiene products, the household uses the commune’s standard products without exception. Nina appears negatively inclined to externally sourced products. Her opinion is that it is important to maintain a basic standard, but she declines expanding further on the subject.
SECONDAY
Vanja woke to the sound of thunder. The little windowpane showed a brightening sky, halfway between black and the gray of the daylight hours. She waited for the patter of rain against the glass. Nothing happened. Instead, more thunder.
She had gone to bed early, shortly after dinner. They’d had boiled turnips and carrots with savory fried mushrooms, a small round variety Vanja had never seen before. Ulla, who turned out to be old and bent but with a sharp gaze, had joined them at the table. She asked countless questions about Essre: how many people lived there nowadays, what did they wear, who was on the committee, and above all—was free production really a good idea? It seemed that the general population of Amatka didn’t receive much news from the rest of the colonies.
Vanja replied as well as she could. The last question she had no answer for, other than the official statement: to stimulate the people’s pioneering spirit and encourage cooperative development. It’s just my job, she’d said, I do what they tell me. Ulla shook her head and wondered how Vanja could be so uninterested. You’re completely inane, she’d said, and Vanja stared down at her plate. Nina had told Ulla that she ought to think before she spoke. Ulla had replied that she was too old for that.
Vanja excused herself, washed her plate and cutlery, and retired to her room, where she got into bed with her clothes on. No one came after her. It seemed that a closed door was respected in Amatka, too. She had lain awake for a long time, sorting through the things that had been said and done, coming up with all kinds of caustic retorts she could have delivered. Essre and its committee were ambitious and thinking ahead; free production was a necessary step in the expansion of the colonies. The people were ready to give it a try, in a carefully controlled effort. Amatka seemed to be doing well, no matter what Ulla might think. Did Ulla not have faith in her comrades?
Her boots lay next to the bed; she’d managed to take those off, at least. She pushed the duvet aside and shuddered in the sudden cold. She fumbled her shoes on, fetched a towel and washcloth from the cabinet, and went downstairs.
Ivar was at the kitchen table, eating with an opened book on the table in front of him. He nodded at her and jerked his thumb at the frying pan and the
steaming pot sitting on the stove. Vanja nodded in reply and went into the bathroom. There was just enough room for a toilet bowl, sink, and bathtub. The third shelf on the wall was hers, not that she owned anything other than some washing products and a toothbrush. She reached for her toiletry bag, mumbled “toiletry bag,” and opened it.
She twitched and almost dropped the bag in the sink when she saw the contents. The bottom of the bag was coated in a thick paste. It was the toothbrush. She’d been careless. She’d noticed it on the train: the letters TOOTHBRUSH etched into the shaft had begun to lose their definition. Still, she’d thought it would last a little while longer.
Vanja forced herself to close the zipper. Now that she knew what was inside, holding it made her fingers tingle. She had a sudden vision of the contents escaping, slithering up her arms. The thought made her throat burn. She backed out of the bathroom with the toiletry bag in both hands.
“Ivar?”
Ivar’s hand and fork stopped midway between the plate and his mouth. “Yes?”
“I need to scrap this.” She turned around to show him the bag.
Ivar looked at what was in her hands, then at her, and nodded curtly. He rose from the table, went over to a cabinet under the sink, and pulled out a box. He opened the lid and held the box out to Vanja, who carefully placed the toiletry bag on the bottom. Then he put the lid back on and left. Vanja heard the front door open and close. Ivar came back in and sat down at the table.
“I apologize,” Vanja said.
Ivar smiled at her for the first time, a small smile with lips closed, and his face softened. “Don’t worry about it. Make sure you eat something.” He returned to his book.
Vanja fetched a cup and a plate and looked out the window. It still wasn’t raining. In the frying pan she found reheated leftovers from yesterday’s dinner; the pot contained coffee, so strong it was nearly brown. Vanja let the grounds sink and tasted it. It tasted unfamiliar, spicy and both sour and sweet, made from some mushroom unknown in Essre. She filled her plate and sat down across from Ivar. From what she could make out of the upside-down text, he was reading about plant-house farming.
When Ivar had emptied his plate, he stood up and closed the book.
“I’m off to my shift now,” he said. “Nina’s already at hers. She started early. You’re on cooking duty tonight. But you don’t have to get anything from the store. There’s plenty in the pantry.”
Vanja nodded. “What time?”
Ivar shrugged. “We’ll be home around five.” Saying nothing more, he washed his plate and left.
“Let’s mark all the things in here,” Vanja sang under her breath, letting her eyes wander around the room. “Table, chair, and a pot here; stovetop, fridge, and pantry there. We mark all things in our care.”
—
“The Marking Song” was part of everyone’s life, from the first day at the children’s house. When Vanja was younger, marking day at the children’s house was the best day of the week.
Her teacher Jonas would walk around the room, pointing at objects one after the other. Sometimes it was hard to make the name of a thing fit the rhythm of the song, and they laughed. Vanja’s voice was the loudest. Then they’d sing “The Pioneer Song” and “When I Grow Up.” Afterward it was nap time.
It was not until much later that they were told the reason for all this marking and naming. It was a special lesson. The children had spent several days before this lesson retouching signs and labels, singing extra rounds of marking songs. Teacher Jonas monitored them closely, punishing the careless. Finally, the children gathered in the classroom. The lecture was short. Teacher Jonas stood at the desk, his face tense and grim. In a silence so complete one could hear one’s own pulse, Jonas spoke. His powerful voice sounded thin.
A long time ago, when the pioneers came here, they built five colonies. Now only four remain.
When the lesson was over, the children spent the rest of the day singing marking songs and retouching signs and labels with a new intensity. It wasn’t a game anymore.
Vanja had been in a storeroom, tasked with marking pencils and rulers, and she took to the job in earnest. Pencil pencil pencil pencil pencil pencil, she had chanted, touching the pencils one by one, until the stream of words inverted and made a sound like cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen, and the row of pencils had shuddered and almost turned into something else, and she realized that this is how it happens, and her whole chest tingled. Right then, the door to the storeroom opened, and Teacher Jonas was in the doorway. He looked at the row of pencils, then at Vanja. “I saw that,” he said. Then he grabbed her by the arm and steered her into the classroom.
The other children were already in their seats, except for Ärna, who was standing at the teacher’s desk with a strange expression on her face. Teacher Jonas pushed Vanja ahead of him and made her stand next to her sister. Vanja looked down at her shoes and waited. He was going to tell the others what he had seen, and she would be sent away. The silence seemed endless. She was about to look up when teacher Jonas spoke. “Vanja and Ärna’s father, Anvars’ Lars, has been taken into custody on charges of subversive activity.”
A murmur rippled through the classroom. “We have just talked about Colony Five and what happens when rules are broken. Now you all understand just what a terrible thing that is. A truly terrible, terrible thing. Do you want to destroy our community, to ruin everything we’ve struggled so hard to build?”
He turned to Vanja and Ärna. Vanja’s head filled with a buzzing noise. His voice seemed remote. “It’s important that you girls renounce your father and his actions. Because you don’t want to be traitors like him, do you?”
“No.” That was Ärna.
“Then say after me: ‘As a loyal comrade of the commune, I renounce Anvars’ Lars and his actions.’ ”
Ärna repeated his words, her voice so bright and loud Vanja could hear it through the growing roar in her ears. Vanja had to be guided through the sentence word for word, three times until Teacher Jonas was satisfied. Then they were allowed to return to their seats.
Teacher Jonas held a speech about the importance of reporting infractions immediately and renouncing anyone who tried to bring harm to the commune. After class, teacher Jonas took Vanja to see a committee official.
—
Teacher Jonas told us about what happened with the pencils, the official said. You’re just a child. You didn’t know that what you did was wrong. Now you know better.
Yes, Vanja had replied, eyes downcast. I know better now.
We will be watching you, the official said.
—
It was time for Vanja to register at the commune office in Amatka. She left the house dressed in two pairs of trousers, with three sweaters under her anorak and her notebooks in her satchel. She pulled down the anorak sleeves over her hands. The sky had brightened to a light shade of gray. Farther down the almost empty street a woman in bright yellow coveralls pulled a cart from door to door, collecting scrap boxes. Vanja turned away with a shudder and started walking toward the center.
The commune office of Amatka had rounded corners and small, recessed windows. Like all central buildings in all colonies, it was built from concrete, that rare material that the pioneers had brought with them. And like all other things from the old world, concrete didn’t need marking to keep its shape. It was solid, comforting. The plaque next to the entrance read Central building constructed and erected year 15 after arrival. Long live the pioneers! Long live Amatka’s commune!
Immediately inside the entrance, a lanky receptionist sat behind a counter. Vanja showed him her well-thumbed papers and received two copies of a multipage form to fill out. Complete name, age, home colony, temporary address in Amatka, profession, names of children and their place of residence. Education, employment history, and other skills. Was she aware that she might be drafted should any of her skills be needed by the commune during her residence in Amatka? Did she have any diseases or othe
r conditions of which the commune should be informed?
At long last, Vanja handed over the completed forms to the receptionist, who bent over the counter to read them through. He tapped his pen on one of the boxes.
“Here. You haven’t filled in the section ‘children and their place of residence.’ ”
“No,” said Vanja.
The receptionist tapped his pen on the box where Vanja had given her age. “I see.”
Vanja looked down at the floor. Her cheeks were hot.
He asked for her credit book and stamped it with hard little thunks.
“Welcome to Amatka,” he said as he handed it back to her. “You’re registered as a visitor and may move freely within the colony. Thank you.”
“I would also like to fill in a request for information from the archive.” Vanja avoided his eyes.
“Next floor, first door on the right.” The receptionist turned around and continued stamping documents.
On the next floor, Vanja presented her papers once more and filled in a request for a list of local independent businesses. She was told the procedure would take a few days, thanked the clerk, and left.
—
The necessary formalities thus taken care of, Vanja visited the clothing depot, Nina’s shopping list in hand. After wandering about among work clothes and outer garments at the front of the store, she eventually found her way to the section for sweaters, underclothes, and small items. The store had few visitors at this time of day; the only noise came from a clerk who moved from shelf to shelf with a marking pen, mumbling at each garment.
The fabrics were different here, the materials warm under Vanja’s hand. Most clothes were monochrome and bright. Vanja, who was entirely dressed in brown, hesitated. She thought of Nina’s blue overalls and Ivar’s green shirt and chose clothing in shades of blue and green: a sleeping cap, long underwear, a thick shirt, gloves, socks, a scarf, and an outdoor hat with earflaps and a chin strap. She tried some of the garments on in front of a mirror. She looked a little peculiar with the hat on; her hair stuck out from under the rim and the earflaps stood straight out. She pushed the hat back a little, tucked her hair in, and tied the flaps. That made it look a bit better. She fingered her thin anorak. It was worn at the elbows and shoulders, but it was freshly marked and would do for now. Her trousers were still decent enough, with plenty of space for underclothes now that they had become so loose.
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