Air (or Have Not Have)

by Geoff Ryman

  The Muerain ran up the cobbles of the bridge. Below, through the pursed lips of the bridge's arch, the river made a noise like a child blowing through its own spit. Mr Shenyalar and Mae cleared the top of the arch.

  More like a stallion now, all in white, the Muerain plunged down into the cascades that swept around both sides of the Dohs' ancient house. His sandals were snatched away from him. The Muerain nipped and minced and hopped across the stones on tender feet. Ouch ooch eek ouch.

  The stars clutched their sides, their tiny eyes narrowed, wet with tears of laughter.

  Ahead of them was movement. Mae shone her torch.

  Mr Ken was giving a piggyback ride as if at a party, Mrs Okan's arms around his neck. Mr Okan shuffled beside them, clinging to the edge of his wife's dress and murmuring to her.

  Behind them came Sezen's two sisters; Edrem, carrying his youngest child; and Hatijah, who was carrying the goat. Its eyes were round and pink with terror.

  The Muerain said, 'Hurry up to Kwan's. The bridge will not hold.'

  'The current is terrible,' said Mr Ken. 'Mae, come with us.'

  'Not yet.'

  'Mae, do not be so foolish. Please!'

  Mae said instead, 'Loan the Muerain your shoes.'

  A moment's pause, the sense of it was seen, and Mr Ken kicked off his galoshes.

  'Is your mother out?'

  Kuei shook his head. 'My mother is packing!' The Muerain hopped on one leg, pulling on the shoe.

  'Packing! Does she think it's a picnic?'

  'I know!' Mr Ken began to run to gain momentum to get him and Mrs Okan up the steep slope of the bridge. 'I'll have to go back for her!' he shouted.

  The goat blinked and kicked in Hatijah's arms. Mae and the Muerain ran.

  They ran straight into the rusting bedding now washed into the roadway. Blindly they bobbed and bounded their way over the springs. On the moonlit hill, Sunni's house was dark.

  Out onto the bare slope, all trails gone. The stars glistened on the sheen of water. Ahead of them the white walls of the mosque glowed.

  They reached the door of the mosque. Mae waited, panting. The Muerain suddenly slapped his own forehead.

  'I've left the key behind,' he said.

  'You what?' Mae felt like the water – torn, broken, swept away.

  The Muerain stood back, raised a leg, and kicked at the lock. He was tall, strong, a herdsman. With a splintering sound and a shuddering of wood, the door chuckled its way backwards.

  The floor was flooded. He grasped the wooden railing of the prayer stall, splashed across the floor to a staircase, and ran up the steps to the tower. Mae ran after him. The flashlight licked hungrily over the back of the speaker down to the batteries. Mr Shenyalar bent and kissed the batteries, tasting them to see if they still worked. He flicked a switch; there was amplified crackling. He began, low and dark, to sing.

  Mae grabbed his arm.

  'Muerain. Please!'

  The flashlight glared angrily at her.

  'I'm sorry, Muerain-sir. But most people sleep through a call to prayer.'

  Pause.

  'They turn over in their beds.'

  Pause.

  And his voice, rich and deep, said, 'The Flood has come. For our sins, our godlessness, the Flood is upon us.' It was strange. Mae could hear his voice, which was so close to her, roll and fall away all across the valley.

  Then he said, 'Follow the advice of Mrs Chung. Take food, take blankets, and go to Mr Wing's. Do not go on Lower Street. Already you will not get past. Go on Upper Street. Now. The Flood is here.'

  He turned.

  'You go,' the Muerain said.

  She paused. Somehow she had pictured herself calling the faithful.

  'You must go and wake people. I can stay here.'

  'Not too long,' Mae warned him.

  'I have a duty,' Mr Shenyalar said. 'Go.' He passed her back the second flashlight. She turned and the Muerain's voice ballooned out over the sound of the water. 'The Flood has come.'

  Mae staggered down the steps and then had to lean over. Acids shot like venom up from her stomach and out of her mouth. The fumes were acrid; she had difficulty breathing. Her throat was raw and sore. She knelt down and scooped up some of the water and drank.

  Where could she do the most good? Sezen would have roused the plain, the houses in the low south. It was Sunni who had farthest to go; she was high, but next to the river. She would need to go down to the bridge to cross. Mae looked across and saw Sunni's house, high and alone. She blinked, and thought she saw it move on its foundations.

  So Mae ran to save Sunni.

  The hill between the high mosque and the high house was no longer flowing with water. It was pouring mud; the mud stirred around her like porridge, but porridge with teeth, for it was also full of stone. I will have to give up soon, Mae thought, I will have to save myself.

  Already.

  Another voice spoke, unbidden:

  The hillsides dissolve like sugar in tea. That undermines the terraces and they fall. The houses fill with mud or are crushed by stone.

  Ahead, the river leapt up, white and snarling. The river had become a kind of dragon, rearing up over its banks, leaping, challenging, and opening its maw.

  Mae thought of Sunni, of their delicate chats in the ice cream parlour, of adjusting each other's hair. The stones nibbled her ankles, the mud tugged playfully. A boot was pulled free from her foot. Mae forged on, against what was becoming a tide of mud.

  Sunni's high stone front step was already an island. Mae pounded on the door. She shouted. The river was louder.

  The door was not locked. Mae ran into the darkened house. It looked so calm and normal and safe, with its rack of kitchen pots and new pool table in the living room.

  'Sunni! Sunni! Mr Haseem! Wake up!'

  Mae ran up the stairs – narrow, steep, unfamiliar. She had never been upstairs. She bashed her head on a beam. There were many doors. Which one? She pushed her way into a bedroom full of snores and reeking of booze. Starlight through the window fell over the bed, making chessboard squares.

  'Wake up, wake up!' Mae cried.

  Sunni jerked and sat up and then wailed and covered herself with the bedding, her face full of fear.

  'What are you doing here? Get out!' Sunni wailed.

  Her husband snored, fully clothed, still in his boots.

  'Sunni, the Flood is here.'

  'Get out of my bedroom!'

  'Sunni, please, just listen. The snow has melted. Listen to the river.'

  'Madwoman!'

  Sunni was in a rage. She tried turning on a light. Nothing, no power. She got up and threw on a robe and stormed towards Mae and pushed her. 'Madwoman, get out of here!'

  Mae pushed her back.

  'Ow!' shouted Sunni, scandalized. 'Husband, wake up, she will kill us both!'

  'Stupid cow, I don't know why I bother with a woman with cowshit instead of brains!' Mae raged, and seized Sunni by the wrist and pulled her out of the room.

  'Husband! I am assaulted. Help!'

  Mae's strength surged out of panic and anger, and Sunni was dragged to a corridor window.

  'There,' said Mae.

  Outside, the river was full and white. It filled the gully; it was pouring all around the bridge. It hauled itself over the top walls of Lower Street and down, a waterfall now. Under the steaming moon, they saw the entire valley. It glittered like a sea.

  'My God,' whispered Sunni.

  'See! See!' raged Mae. 'Who is the madwoman now!'

  'It's terrible.'

  'You are nearly dead! The hill outside this house is moving, whole and entire.'

  There was a sharp breath; Sunni spun into the dark, wisps of white twirling after her, and went back to her husband. 'Wake up! Wake up!' Sunni shook Mr Haseem's bright-red face by the ears. She looked back at Mae.

  'I know him when he is like this. He won't wake up,' she said.

  'Leave him,' said Mae.

  'Oh, you would say that –
you hate him.'

  Mae limped forward. 'I don't, Sunni, but it is too late for all but final things. Do you want to die with him?'

  Sunni looked at her, blankly.

  'It's come to that. If he doesn't wake up now, you either love him enough to die with him, or you go with me now. Now!'

  'You hear her? You hear her?' Sunni shouted. She slapped Faysal hard on the face. He snorted.

  'Wake up!' She slapped him again. He turned over. Sunni said to Mae, 'Okay, let's go.'

  Mae turned and clattered down the steps.

  'Don't hit your head on the beam,' Sunni said. Too late. Mae's eyes watered a second time.

  Sunni grasped two tins of food as she soared through the kitchen.

  Out into moonlight.

  'Okay, we're together,' Sunni said. 'If one of us goes, the other tries to pull them free, but only for so long. We promise each other, ah. We save ourselves, but we try to help the first.'

  'Right,' said Mae. 'But I'm going to Lower Street.'

  'Madwoman!' said Sunni, again.

  'I have to see if Siao has come back, if Mr Chung got out, if Sezen is okay!'

  'Okay, but I'm not coming with you,' said Sunni.

  'At last you are talking sense.'

  'It will make a change, I admit,' said Sunni. The moving earth was unstable. Both of them fell into the mud. They thrashed their way to their feet, and held each other up.

  'The flashlight!' said Sunni.

  'I've got it, it's covered in mud.' Mae wiped it on her coat, and the light shone dimly again.

  She pointed the light ahead.

  On one side of the Dohs' house, the river had risen up. On the other, mud was mounting the back of the house like an unwanted lover. Mae and Sunni would have to cut down through the gap between the Dohs' and the Alis'. There was no other way down. Mud and water carried them down into Upper Street.

  At some point the calling of the Muerain had fallen silent.

  'Zeynap,' panted Sunni, thinking of her friend Zeynap Ali. They tumbled together onto the street. Mae shone the light. The doorway of the Alis' house was open.

  'They're out,' said Mae.

  From inside the house of the Dohs came yells and shouts. Mae cried, 'Dohs! I have a flashlight.' She ran. Inside the kitchen Young Miss Doh was flinging food into bags amid unwashed glasses and crumbs.

  'Go upstairs, get my parents down!' Miss Doh raged – as if Mae were stupid, standing still.

  Mae turned and ran up the stairs. In the upper corridor, Old Mrs Doh spun into the flashlight beam, waving her arms as if fighting cobwebs.

  'This way!' said Mae.

  'Who's that?' wailed Old Mrs Doh.

  'Chung Mae.'

  'What are you doing here?'

  'Trying to help. These are the steps. Come on.'

  Mrs Doh felt like a loose bunch of sticks in strong wind. She shook. 'What,' she said. Not even a question. Mae passed her to Sunni at the foot of the stairs.

  'Here we are, dear,' said Sunni, as if it were a party.

  Mae turned and ran through each of the rooms. She heard the river's roar. She heard a creaking, in the walls, in the wooden beams, and she felt the weight of the mud leaning against the house.

  'This house is going to go!' she shouted to anyone who could hear her. She went from bedroom to bedroom. The good fairy of the flashlight blessed the walls of each room.

  In the last of them, Old Mr Doh stood, sobbing. He was trying to button his shirt and could not.

  Mae imitated Sunni. 'Oh, good Mr Doh. This is Mrs Chung. It's time to go.'

  He flung off her hand, impatient, sobbing, still fighting his way into his best shirt.

  'No, no,' she cooed, and laughed. 'You look wonderfully elegant. Come down now.'

  'My wife,' he said, dazed.

  'She's waiting.'

  The whole house groaned and listed forward.

  'Mae!' screamed Sunni, from the street outside.

  Mae simply seized him and pulled.

  'Oh, oh,' he said, fighting the dark. She hauled him towards the stairs. The walls suddenly snapped forward, leaning, dust puffing out where the floorboards joined them. Everything was looser underfoot. She pulled him down the stairs, he lost his footing, and they skidded together in the dark, slammed vengefully by gleeful wooden steps, until they both tumbled into the kitchen.

  'Leave me!' he said. He started to fight Mae, the light careering over the walls. Someone entered, seized him, and pulled. Out they all went, clattering against chairs, slipping on oil spilled from bottles, as if all the contents of the house had been upended. In the street, the Dohs waited.

  'I told you he was not outside,' raged Miss Doh, to the others. 'It took Chung Mae, as always.' Miss Doh pushed the old man, turned in the darkness, seized Mae, and pushed her tongue into Mae's mouth.

  'In case one of us dies,' Miss Doh said, and darted back.

  All the world was careering like the light; the stars themselves seemed to threaten to fall.

  Over the sound of water Mae heard a grinding rumble. She turned and saw headlights trailing up the road. Against the lights she saw water gushing up against tyres.

  Siao, she thought. That could be Siao.

  'You go on,' Mae said to Sunni.

  'Where are you going, fool?'

  'Back home.'

  'Okay.' Sunni was suddenly in front of her. 'Mae. You were right,' she said. Mae began to move. Sunni gripped her. 'You heard me say that, didn't you? You were right!'

  'Sunni! Yes. I heard. Go!'

  'You go! And come back quickly!'

  Nothing else was said.

  Mae ran past the backs of the houses of the Hos, the Matbahsuluks and the Kemals. She held on to the corner of Mr Kemal's house to wrench herself around into Lower Street.

  A sound like applause. If you hear it above you, you are dead.

  This is it, Mae; one check on the house, and then you go yourself.

  Her old house glowed white, like a cake under the stars. In front of it rested one of Mr Pin's old vans, empty and dark. The courtyard door was open. Mae ran in.

  Her courtyard was knee-deep in mud.

  'Siao? Siao?'

  Mae shone the light. The door to the barn was shut firmly, mud already pushing against it. Across the surface of the mud, rivulets of water flowed. If there were no one here, she would run.

  From inside Mr Ken's house someone wailed, 'I can't get out!' It was Old Mrs Ken.

  Above them something hissed, like water on a skillet.

  'The terraces are going!' Mae screeched. And she felt a click.

  I have been here before, she thought.

  Mrs Ken began to pound on the inside of the kitchen door, the weight of mud pushing it shut.

  'The window. Break the window!' Mae called. She waded forward. Mud was a slow and heavy evil. It sucked at her feet, and held her back like glue. She could not advance. 'I can't get any closer.'

  A chair was punched through the glass, which sparkled like snow, in the air on the liquid earth.

  'Mae!' someone called, from by the courtyard gate. Mae turned and it was Kuei. He surged forward, pushing through the mud up to his waist. 'Mother! Mother!' He jerked, thrashed, tossed himself from side to side, rocking through the mud towards the broken window. Suddenly the mud heaved him forward and off his feet.

  For the first time the thought came to Mae: We've left this too late. We could die.

  A head, arms, then legs came through the kitchen window. 'Oh. Oh. Kuei! Help me out!'

  The mud gripped Kuei and held him fast. His mother was out of reach.

  'Kuei,' called another man. 'Walk on this board.'

  Siao? Mae turned. Three men were carrying the lid from the coal-bunker.

  There was Siao.

  And there, helping him, was Joe. Joe! Where? How?

  The three of them flung the broad plywood lid on top of the mud under the window.

  'Jump down onto it. Maybe it will take your weight for long enough. Try to walk forward
to us.'

  'Mother,' Kuei said. 'Just fall forward. I'll catch you.'

  Old Mrs Ken without another word pulled herself through the jagged window frame, and fell gently forward onto the raft. It listed down into the mud and she scuttled forward towards her son's hands. Kuei grabbed her and pulled her forward. Joe and Siao rocked forward and pulled as well. Kuei cradled his mother, who juddered out a single sob.

  'Mae!' demanded Siao. 'What are you doing here!'

  'Trying to find you!'

  A current of mud pushed them back away from the gate, like some kind of living thing, a slug.

  'How do we get out through this?' Joe despaired.

  Mae remembered her washing line, strung across the courtyard. 'This way,' she said, flashing her good fairy light along the rope. Then she reached up and began to pull herself along it, through the mud.

  Mr Ken said, 'Okay, Mama, pull, like Mae says.'

  All of them seized the rope and pulled themselves forward. Mae turned at the gate, and shone the light on them.

  There they were, her three men: her husband, her lover, and Siao. She looked at Siao's steady face. 'I got a message at the Teahouse,' he said. 'Joe had got to the Desiccated Village.'

  Joe looked up at Mae, and then down, quickly, in shame.

  Did Mae hear applause?

  She turned to the open door, not daring to breathe, and looked behind.

  There was a sound of delight – massed clapping from the eastern slope. The sound had a shape, a shape like a blade, sharp at one end, but widening behind. A wedge of the walls had fallen.

  'That's it!' she keened, her voice box tight, wet.

  Ssssh, said all the stones. They trickled like water, made a sound like water, were borne by it and their own weight down the hillside, one collapse knocking into the terrace below, catching it, knocking it free. Mae fought her way to the street and, glinting in the moonlight, she saw it, a flow of rocks on the eastern side of the bowl.

  A river of stone.

  'Come on!' she screeched again.

  She looked behind her wildly; Ken and Joe were up to their ankles, and pulling Mrs Ken free.

  Mae fought forward and pulled.

  Then the applause started on the hill directly above them.