by Sharon Webb
It must be emphasized that this is a temporary measure.
IT IS NECESSARY FOR THE SAFETY OF YOUR CHILD.
Mail-slots filled with directives:
TO PARENTS OF CHILDREN UNDER THIRTY-SIX MONTHS OF AGE
…will be cared for by skilled caretakers who have passed Government Standard Test 4098: Psychological Profile…
YOUR SCHOOL-AGED CHILD
…from the ages of thirty-six months to eighteen years of age are to be accompanied by parent or guardian to neighborhood collection points. Each child is to bring no more clothing than he or she can carry without undue fatigue. Provide your child with a packed lunch and personal hygiene items. Do not include large toys or other items…
THE PROTECTED INFANT
…and formulas to be provided by special nurses who have passed standard psychological profile tests…
YOUR HANDICAPPED CHILD
…up to the age of eighteen years, must be accompanied by parent or guardian to collection points designated HANDICAPPED…
WorldCo allowed limited debate about SAFETY DAY on its airways. The debates were controlled, of course, weighted with logic and subliminal message. It was unfortunate, it was conceded, but necessary. It was to be a temporary situation.
Subliminal messages purred in every part of the world, in every language… Home in time for Christmas… for Hanukka… in time for harvest… for festival… before the rains… before the snow…
Chapter 8
Kurt looked out of the living room window. In the live oak at the edge of the empty playground, a squirrel flirted its tail and nibbled at an acorn. Pink dawn colored the clouds to the east. Below the elevated tracks of TampaTran, a troop truck had discharged its cargo of soldiers. They sat on the damp grass under the big red-lettered sign:
SAFETY DAY COLLECTING POINT 76
It was almost time. His backpack lay on the floor beside him. Not much space left, but he could squeeze it in. He turned to his open oboe case, pulled out the little reed knife, and slipped it into his boot. Snapping the instrument case shut, he slid it into the backpack, pulled the flap over and latched it. Next to his pack, Eric's duffle lay half-open, a cornucopia of clothes and belongings spilling in disarray onto the floor. Eric was showering. Carmen Kraus still slept. She had stayed at the hospital until late last night.
Committee stretched, yawned, and wagged his tail. The effort served to exhaust him. He flopped flat on his belly, nose between paws, eyelids lowered to half-mast. Kurt scratched the dog's head between the ears, and Committee's eyes slid shut. A sudden clatter and a female shriek from the kitchen brought them both to their feet.
"What's wrong?"
His grandmother stood at the counter pawing at a scattering of yellowish discs. One flipped on its side and rolled off onto the floor where it broke into a dozen pieces. The empty package next to the bubbler proclaimed: OM-LETTES. She glared at the bubbler. "I hate those things. Believe it or not, Kurt, but when I was your age, a few people still kept chickens." She wrinkled her nose. "Now they don't even keep fresh eggs."
He rescued their breakfast and dropped the dehydrated discs into the bubbler through the clear plasti-port she had neglected to open.
She pressed her lips together in chagrin. "I was going to fix you boys a nice breakfast for your last morning here." She broke off and turned toward the wall, blinking away the sudden moisture in her eyes. "Couldn't even do that. I should have stayed home."
Slightly embarrassed, he pulled out plates and poured glasses of milk and cups of hot coffee.
Still half-asleep, Eric appeared at the door. He toweled his hair dry briskly as if that would rouse him. Kurt pulled out the pan and slid steaming Om-lettes onto the plates and put them on the countertop bar.
Four plates, three people. "Where's Mom?" asked Eric.
"Still in her room." Their grandmother rose. "I'll get her up."
The boys ate in silence. They were finished before the two women came into the room. Carmen Kraus's eyes were red and puffy. She had lost weight over the last few weeks and stress lines showed at the edges of her eyes and mouth. She looks old, Kurt thought in surprise. As old as his grandmother, in a way.
She ignored the food on her plate and took only small sips of the coffee. Several times she seemed about to speak, but each time she looked away, staring at the wall, or at the cup she held. Finally she said, "Aren't you two going to call your father-before you go?"
"Sure, Mom," said Eric easily. "We'll do it now." He got up and headed for the living room, stopped, and looked at Kurt, "C'mon."
Kurt shook his head almost imperceptibly. He hadn't told anyone what his father had said. He couldn't. It made him ashamed to think about it. He shook his head again. They were all looking at him. He stared at his fingers, running the close-clipped nails against his palms.
His mother's voice was unbelieving, "Aren't you going to talk to your daddy?"
He felt old and at the same time he felt like a little kid. He wanted to cry, but all he did was shake his head.
Her voice rose. "You're leaving for God knows how long. And he's dying. You're not going to see him again, Kurt. Not ever." Her voice was a shriek, "Now you get in there and call him."
He felt his jaw tighten. Cold trickled through him. He shook his head.
She slapped him with all the strength she had. He sat staring at her for a moment, and then he stood up. "I can't, Mom." He walked out of the room and into the bathroom and locked the door.
He stayed there, locked away from them, until the wail of a siren signaled that Safety Day had begun.
A rise and fall of voices came from his mother's bedroom. He walked into the empty living room and looked through the window at the scene below. Already hundreds of people were gathering. It occurred to him that he and Eric could be separated in that crowd. The thought was untenable. Committee trotted up and nudged him with a cold nose. He ruffled the dog's fur and hugged him close. Then he went to a drawer and took out Committee's leash. The dog danced in delight at the prospect of a walk. "Not this time," he said softly. He wadded the leash and started to put it into his pack as Eric came into the room. "What's that for?" he asked.
"Just thought I'd need it." He squeezed the thin leash in his hand. It was something to tie the two of them together. "We don't want to lose each other-get separated or anything."
Eric looked at the leash, then back at Kurt, and nodded.
Their grandmother came out of the bedroom. "I guess it's time," she said, "I'll be going down there with you. Your mother isn't feeling up to it. Now, hurry on and say goodbye."
When Eric kissed her, Carmen Kraus clung to him with pats and little cries. She turned a cold cheek to Kurt to receive his kiss. She didn't look at him; she didn't speak.
He squeezed her rigid shoulder, "Goodbye, Mom." When she didn't answer, he turned, picked up his pack and w
alked out of the room.
* * *
The guard barred the way with a rifle. "No one over eighteen beyond this point, ma'am."
The old woman clutched at the boys' arms. She looked from Eric to Kurt, then back again, "Well, this is where I get off."
They kissed her. Then Kurt took her hand and whispered, "Grandma, I couldn't call him. I just couldn't."
She searched his face and said, "If you couldn't, you couldn't." She thrust a brown package into his hands, "For you and Eric. For later."
He put the package in his pack and kissed her again, then he and Eric had to move on. Lines of children were boarding the TampaTran cars. Once they were pushed apart and lost sight of each other. Then Kurt brought out the little dog leash, and Eric clipped the other end to his belt.
Eventually they found seats together on a car, and fifteen minutes later the train began to move. The children from the southern half of Hillsborough county were being relocated at the old abandoned air force base, MacDill Field, not far from there.
Five minutes after their car started, it stopped abruptly. There were rumors of explosive charges on the tracks. When the train didn't move for several hours, the children on board ate their lunches. At sundown, soldiers came aboard with bottled water. There was no food. Everyone was hungry, and the tiny restrooms were beginning to smell. It was ten that night before Kurt remembered the package his grandmother had given him. He opened it. It was full of the crumbly cookies that she always made. Most of them were broken.
He shared them with Eric, but when he tried to eat his, they seemed to dry his mouth and he had trouble swallowing.
Finally, the train began to move, and they arrived at MacDill Field at three A.M.
Chapter 9
As the first light of morning fell through the streaked window, Silvio Tarantino woke. He lay in a makeshift crib, a laundry basket propped on two chairs next to his mother's bed. He stared at the walls with his strange black eyes and sucked his fist until the first sirens of Safety Day blasted the silence. Startled, he threw out his scrawny arms and legs and squalled in outrage. The birthmark at the angle of his jaw darkened as it engorged with blood.
Kitty woke instantly at his cries. For a moment, the sirens confused her. Half-asleep, she thought she was back at the hospital, hearing the sound of ambulances. She fumbled for her baby and put him to her breast. The sirens continued. Awake now, she remembered, and fear flickered across her face.
She had thrown away the government notices of SAFETY DAY, trying not to think about it, trying not to believe that they would take her baby away. Until now, she had managed to repress her fears into a general nameless anxiety that haunted her dreams and turned her waking self into a gaunt wraith whose pulse raced fast in her throat each time her baby cried.
Holding her baby, standing behind the skimpy curtains so that no one would see her, Kitty peered down from the window at the street. Soldiers in twos and threes were everywhere. A couple led their three children toward a collecting point a few blocks away. As she watched the little group move below her, she clutched her baby closer. It couldn't be real. It couldn't be happening. With one hand, she drew the curtains shut. The movement dislodged her nipple from the baby's mouth. At the loss, Silvio gave an outraged scream.
"S-sh-sh." She gave him the nipple again and stared fearfully at the door. Had anyone heard him? "S-sh-sh, little boy. S-sh-sh," she whispered urgently. She had to keep him quiet.
When he had finished nursing, she bathed him with warm water from the tap and changed him. The box of diapers was empty. She had not dared to go out for more, not since the notices had started to come. She had stayed in her rooms with him, not going to work, not venturing out. There would be a time when all the food would be gone and there would be no money to pay for more. But that was in the future. The thing was to wait-get past today, past next week. Then she'd be able to find someone to take care of him while she went back to work.
She diapered him with a clean, ragged dish towel and slipped on the little pink dress. Then, laying him back in his bed, she carried the night's accumulation of soiled clothes into the bathroom and washed them out.
No one knew about him, and there lay her safety. Only Janice. Janice and Mrs. Forrest, the building superintendent. Janice hadn't told anyone at work. Just said that Kitty was sick with the flu and down with a relapse. And Mrs. Forrest… Kitty didn't want to think about her, as if by not thinking about her, she would go away. Silvio hadn't caused Forrest any trouble. He had been quiet at night. The woman had no reason even to remember about him. Anyway, it was none of her business. He was hers. Her baby. Nobody else's. Nobody had any right to him except her. Nobody.
She draped the wet clothes over the towel rack and went back into the bedroom. Silvio lay sleeping. She ran her fingers in a gentle caress over his little body and brushed her lips against his hair. He was hers. He was a miracle, and he was hers. She crawled into bed again and tried to sleep. After a while, she did.
Later, Silvio woke and she fed him again, exulting in the feel of his warm little mouth against her and the press of his body as she held him. When he slept, she went into the little kitchen and looked for something to eat. There were only a few food packages left. She opened one and made herself some soup.
She wondered what was going on down there in the streets. It would help to turn on the news, but she resisted the urge. The sound might draw someone's attention. Better for everyone to think that no one was here. She chanced peeking from the window again. Drawing up a chair, she sat staring through the gap where the skimpy curtains didn't quite meet.
She thought of a world without children, without babies. Sure, the government said it was just temporary, but she didn't believe it. She remembered the old joke: God giveth, and the government taketh away. Her lip curled at the bitter thought. Not her baby. Not hers.
She made herself think beyond today, beyond next week. She had to have a plan. She could take him away. Out to the country somewhere-to one of those tiny little towns. If she moved at night, she could avoid people. But how?
Maybe she could give him something to make him sleep. Then she could tuck him into a backpack and get out of the city. She could find a village with a little hospital where she could work. She stared at the street.
As the day wore on, the crowds passing below became a trickle. At five o'clock another siren sounded, and then a voice reverberated through the streets:
"Only thirty minutes remain in the grace period. All children-repeat, all children-under the age of eighteen must be taken at once to the closest receiving station. For your child's safety, do not delay.…"
The countdown continued at five-minute intervals through the next half-hour with the additional warning, "…any citizen defying the Safety Day edict is reminded that such defiance constitutes a felony, pun
ishable by fine and imprisonment.…"
Silvio cried fretfully. Kitty snatched him up and offered her breast, shushing him with little pats and coos.
It was nearly seven before the knock came at the door. She sat staring in the dimness, not daring to move, not daring to breathe. The knock came again. "Open up. Building superintendent." Next to her, Silvio stirred in his sleep.
Don't wake up, she thought wildly. Oh, don't wake up. Don't cry. She rose on tiptoes and crept toward the door. The hammering began again. She looked around the twilight room with a frantic idea of barricading the door with something. Anything. Her hands fell on a chair. The pounding at the door stopped. They've gone away, she thought. It worked. They thought she was gone. Then, with growing horror, she heard the sound of a card moving into the lock. A house card! A master-The door fell open.
With a quick fumbling movement, the superintendent flicked on the lights, and she and three soldiers moved into the room. Folds of flesh fell around her little pig eyes. "I know you want the best for your baby, Kitty. That's why we're here." Her mouth moved in a prim smile, "It's for his own good."