Unwelcome Bodies

by Jennifer Pelland

  “Thank you,” Stephen whispered.

  The general’s nostrils flared. “Mr. Murphy, I had nothing to do with it. Truth be told, all I want to do right now is pick up a sign and march outside the gates with everyone else.” He shook his head, replaced his hat, and walked wordlessly down the hall.

  Lieutenant Guerrero stared after him with a bewildered expression, then turned back to Stephen, an apologetic wince briefly flashing across his features. He gave Stephen’s hand a quick shake and said, “I’m glad for you, Mr. Murphy. This is a good day.” He nodded, then jogged down the hall to catch up with his boss.

  If this works, the whole world is going to change overnight.

  Stephen rested his forehead against the cold metal door to his wife’s room.

  Truth be told, if she could, she’d be out there protesting right now, even after all she’d been through.

  And as much as he’d come to hate the whales for what they’d done to her, he’d still be right there beside her.

  Stephen opened the door and nodded at Dr. Hanlan.

  She smiled sadly and pulled a syringe from her pocket. “I thought so. I’ll sedate her now. She shouldn’t be awake for this.”

  He was going to lose her. He knew that. She’d never forgive him for letting them kill her beloved whales.

  But they were more than a fair trade to save the woman he loved. He’d spent too long seeing them through her eyes to have any sympathy for them anymore.

  I wonder what they’re saying? I can’t wait to find out.

  Notes on “Songs of Lament”

  One day, I thought, “What if whales are singing about terrible, violent things?” The thought of all those hippies and new agers blissing out to whales screaming in anger was just too delicious an idea not to play with.

  Firebird

  July 3, 2018

  I spent a lot of time this spring agonizing over whether to accept the admissions offer from Wellesley or the one from Spelman. At Spelman, I wouldn’t have to be “the black girl,” which sounded like a nice change, but at the same time, I would have had to be “All Black, All the Time,” which wasn’t really that appealing either. So I picked Wellesley, and promptly spent the next few months agonizing over whether I made the right choice.

  I’m not agonizing anymore.

  I just read in the paper that Kay Myerson is going to be in my class. Kay Myerson! Man, am I excited!

  (I should probably stop saying things like “man” before I start at Wellesley, shouldn’t I? Adjusting to a women’s college is going to be challenging.)

  Here’s the article:

  Bangor Daily News, July 3, 2018

  Musical and environmental icon Kay Myerson will be attending Wellesley College as a freshman this fall. In response to press inquiries, the college has released a short statement saying, “Ms. Myerson will be treated like every other student, and we would appreciate it if the public and the press would allow her a normal student experience.”

  Myerson achieved international fame at the beginning of the decade as a singer in the girl band “HippieChix,” which broke up in 2016. Last year, she made international headlines by setting herself on fire to protest continued inaction on the issue of global climate change, sparking a worldwide youth movement and dozens of copycats. Myerson survived the fire, and has been a recluse ever since.

  * * * *

  (Yeah, I bought a paper copy so I could glue this in to my journal. I know it’s bad for the environment to encourage printed newspapers, but there’s something about a newsprint clipping that feels so…I don’t know, permanent?)

  (And did they really need to use “sparking” in the article?)

  Anyhow, this is the part where I bounce around my bedroom like a crazy person. Kay Myerson! In my class! I feel like filling a full page with “EEEEEEEEE!!!!” This woman is my hero! (Heroine? Well, Wellesley will soon teach me which word to use.)

  I probably shouldn’t bring any of my Kay T-shirts with me to school, though. Or my old HippieChix MP3s. I loved them when I was twelve. I still dance around the room to them when I’m having a bad day. Who knew that one of them would go on to do something so important?

  * * * *

  August 12, 2018

  Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god.

  Kay Myerson is going to be my roommate.

  My friends are all so jealous and have begged me to tell them all about her and maybe see if she’ll sign autographs for them, but I’ve promised them nothing. I’m going to be the perfect roommate. I’m not going to be some psychotic fan girl. At least, not on the outside. I make no promises about what will be going on in the privacy of my own brain.

  * * * *

  August 25, 2018

  Kay isn’t going to be here until tomorrow. I feel funny having already unpacked and chosen my bed and dresser and desk. If she wants this bed, I’ll just put my sheets on the other one. She really should get first choice. I know, I know, we’re all Wellesley women here. I shouldn’t be thinking that she’s better than me.

  Except she is.

  So, we’re in Claflin. It’s got a nice view of Lake Waban, and I’ve already walked down with a few other first-years from this floor to see the ruins of the old College Hall, which burned down about a hundred years ago, so we probably won’t do that walk again with Kay.

  Everyone’s surprised that Kay’s been given a roommate. Apparently, there’s a single in Tower that was built especially for Madame Chiang Kai-shek when she was a student here. Everyone thought she’d be put in that room, or would maybe instead end up in an expensive off-campus apartment. But no, she’ll be rooming with me in a tiny second-floor dorm room with a beautiful view of the dumpster.

  All the students I’ve talked to have been really cool and laid-back about her coming here. But I’m pretty sure other folks have been sneaking onto campus to try to catch a glimpse of her. They’re pretty easy to spot by their T-shirts: drowning polar bears, the planet on fire, stuff like that. Campus Po have been good about politely ushering them off the college grounds. Like they thought they could just blend in? Even the guys?

  Meanwhile, I’ve already gotten emails from Ethos and Harambee House. I guess admissions told them I was a new black student. And my mother is nagging me to join AKA. This is a campus crammed with people of all colors from all over the globe! Somehow, my dark American skin doesn’t seem like something to make a big deal about in the grand scheme of things.

  * * * *

  August 26, 2018

  Kay is so cool.

  My god, I sound like I’m still in high school.

  Screw it. Classes haven’t started yet. I can still sound high school for now. Plus, she’s Kay Myerson.

  She showed up just in time to dump her things in the room and introduce herself before we had to head out for an orientation assembly. Her skin grafts look a lot better in person than they do in high def, and her wig looks just like real hair. And you couldn’t even tell that her eyes were fake. “Sorry I’m late,” she said, and held out her hand.

  The fake skin on her hand felt like old paper. “I’m Njeri,” I said. But, of course, she knew that from the roommate letter the college had sent. “It’s great to finally meet you. If you don’t like that bed—”

  “It’s fine.” She wrinkled her scarred nose and said, “This is going to sound terrible of me, but when I saw your picture, I thought you’d—”

  “Sound more black? Yeah, I get that all the time.”

  “That’s not what I…” She sighed, and I think she was blushing, but it was hard to tell what with the fake skin and all. “No, that’s exactly what I was going to say.”

  All right, maybe I should go to that Ethos party after all.

  I didn’t get a chance to talk to her again until dinner. She sat with me and the other first years from our floor, and, of course, we all talked about global climate change. But she didn’t contribute to the conversation; she just smiled, nodded, and picked at her food. It was weird. No one knew what
to do, so we just kept talking, awkwardly.

  When we were done, I told her I’d help her unpack. Her sheets were softer than any I’d ever felt before, but that made sense, what with the skin grafts and all.

  She clutched her pillow to her chest and said, “Look, I know we’re roommates, and we’ll be living together for the next two semesters, but…” She sighed. “I’d really appreciate it if you didn’t ask me about…you know.”

  “Oh. Yeah. Sure.”

  “Thanks.”

  “But…”

  She looked up at me, and I swear, her fake eyes were watering with fear.

  So instead of all the questions I was dying to ask her, I simply asked, “Do you have to do anything special to take care of your skin grafts? I just want to make sure I don’t do anything to hurt you by accident.”

  “I have to baby them,” she said. “Soft fabrics, sunscreen, lots of lotion. I won’t be able to borrow your clothes or your soap or anything, so don’t worry.” She looked at me and grinned, the grafts on her face crinkling like a paper jam. “They got me out of the P.E. requirement.”

  We stayed up until one in the morning, talking about our favorite bands (I downplayed my Hippie Chix love), the classes we wanted to take (lots of liberal arts), things we wouldn’t miss about high school (gym, cliques), how well her fake eyes worked (well enough to read large-print books, not well enough to pass a driving test), politics (both Green Party), but she never steered the conversation to talk of global warming. Okay, I could understand how she’d feel talked out about that, but still.

  For the record, I’m writing this in the hallway. It’s past midnight. I’m too excited to sleep. Kay Myerson is snoring in the bed next to mine!

  Oh my god, listen to me, I should just tattoo “Fan Girl” across my forehead and get it over with.

  Still, she’s the only political icon our generation has. And she’s just on the other side of this wall. How cool is that?

  Right, I’d better try to get some sleep. Classes start tomorrow. I can’t major in Kay Studies, after all.

  * * * *

  September 1, 2018

  Wellesley’s motto is “Non Ministrari sed Ministrare”—“Not to be ministered unto, but to minister.” It would be irresponsible of me to come here just to get a self-indulgent liberal arts education. That would be being ministered unto. No, I need to minister, to do something for the future.

  Forget Spanish. I’m going to major in chemistry.

  It wasn’t my favorite subject in high school. That was, well, Spanish. But I got solid grades in chem, even if it didn’t excite me. I should be able to pull this off if I put my mind to it. After all, it’s not like I can help reverse global climate change with Cervantes. And Wellesley has an exchange program with MIT, so I can take science courses there, too, maybe get in on their Center for Global Change Science. I’d go into engineering if I thought I could handle the math, but I can’t. No, chemistry it is.

  I told Kay about my big decision this morning, and she just gave me this weird, thin smile and grabbed her giant bottle of lotion and went off to take a shower.

  It’s very strange to be inspired by someone who doesn’t seem inspired herself. How can she look at herself in the mirror and not want to have what she sees have any meaning?

  * * * *

  September 3, 2018

  I managed to get into Chem 105. Five courses is going to be a tough load, especially since Chem has a lab, but I’ll manage. Right now, I’m just auditing it until I can get my advisor to sign off on me taking an extra course, but if I have to, I’ll drop Spanish. Cervantes can wait. (Actually, we’re reading Borges and García Márquez this semester. They can wait too.)

  Kay says she’s not sure what she wants to major in. She’s currently waffling between anthropology and history. I asked her what she thought she’d do with a degree in either of those, and she shrugged and said she didn’t know yet. And I just sat there, watching her comb her wig, trying to figure out how she could have gone from international pop stardom to making the biggest political statement of our generation to…anthropology. But as soon as I opened my mouth, she said, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  So we didn’t.

  I can’t imagine setting myself on fire for something and then walking away from it.

  * * * *

  September 7, 2018

  Kay’s stopped eating with us. When I asked her why, she said we all seemed strained around her, and she didn’t want to bring us down. “It’s like you’re trying really hard not to talk about what I did,” she said.

  “Well, you keep telling me that you don’t want to talk about it. So I told everyone else not to bring it up either.”

  “But it’s all you want to talk about, isn’t it?”

  “Of course it is. How could it not be?”

  She got quiet for a moment after I said that, and traced a nail along a ridge of scar tissue on the back of her hand. “I thought about going to college online,” she said. “Or maybe waiting until people had forgotten who I was—”

  “And postpone Wellesley?” I joked.

  She laughed a little at that. “Exactly.” Her expression darkened. “I don’t want to bring everyone down.”

  “You’re not bringing us down,” I said. “You’re just…well, you’re keeping yourself from us.”

  In a small voice, she said, “There’s not much to me anymore.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean I’m not a person. I’m just a symbol. A mascot. If I were still in the hospital, I’d be a campaign photo-op.”

  “What you did was—”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “It doesn’t matter if you want to talk about it. Everyone else is talking about it. That makes it important.”

  She looked back down at her hands and sighed.

  “Maybe…” I took a deep breath, hoping that the time was finally right for what I was about to propose. “Maybe you should just sit down with all of us. You know, so we can get it out in the open and over with.”

  Kay stared out the window at the lamp-lit dumpster and said, “Just our table. No one else. Tomorrow, before lunch.”

  The little fan girl inside me jumped up and squealed. The rest of me felt vaguely ashamed of the fan girl. But only vaguely.

  Ugh, I think the fan girl is winning.

  * * * *

  September 8, 2018

  Someone blabbed about our little get-together. There were a couple dozen people waiting outside our room at 11:00. I was furious! Kay wanted to call the talk off, but I told her I was willing to be the angry black bitch who turned people away. (The stereotype ought to be good for something, after all.) And I was. I also turned on the radio and put it in front of the door so that anyone trying to record the conversation through the door would get a block of oldies instead (Hannah Montana—ugh).

  I have to say, it was a real honor to be Kay’s protector, if only for this.

  Poor Kay, she was too upset to let us ask questions. “I’m just going to talk,” she said. “I know what you want to ask anyway. It’s always the same.”

  She reached up, pulled off her wig, and said, “No, I don’t have any hair.” She set the wig down next to her on the bed and added, “My eyebrows and eyelashes are implants. No, I don’t want to get implanted fingernails, but yes, the hospital offered them. Yes, Green Day paid for my artificial skin. Yes, I did get to meet them. Yes, I’ll get you tickets to their next concert.”

  Deena opened her mouth, but Kay held her hand up and said, “No.”

  I glared at Deena. We all did.

  Kay took a deep breath. “Yes, it hurt worse than anything you can imagine. Yes, the smell of grilling meat still makes me want to throw up. Yes, the Kennedy family pulled the strings to get me access to the replacement eye program at Mass General. Yes, I was still conscious when the fire was put out. Yes, I’m glad I didn’t die. Yes, it was a mistake to set myself on fire in the first place.”
r />   “But Kay—” Celeste clapped her hand over her mouth to stop herself from saying anymore.

  “It was a stupid mistake,” Kay said. “It didn’t change anything. I was just a stupid drama queen of a fifteen-year-old has-been pop star who wanted attention so badly that I was willing to die for it. Or at least to pretend I was. If I’d really wanted to die, I wouldn’t have set fire to myself in the chem lab.”

  She put her wig in her lap and twisted it in her scarred fingers. “The worst part was all the copycats that came after me, that said that I’d inspired them. That’s not what I’d wanted to… I… I don’t want to talk any more.”

  I ushered everyone out, and when I turned back, Kay was straightening her wig on her head, staring at herself in the mirror with a far-off expression.

  “It wasn’t a mistake,” I said.

  “The Buddhist monks we were copying knew what they were doing,” Kay said. “The rest of us were too young to know any better.”

  “That’s not true. You showed the world—”

  “They already knew. They’d known for a long time.”

  “But they weren’t doing anything about it. And you—”

  Kay wrapped her arms around herself and said, “Please don’t shout.”

  I slapped my hands over my mouth, horrified. “I didn’t mean to.”

  She tucked her knees up, her fake eyes staring at the floor. “You probably weren’t. I’ve just…when I lost my skin, I lost my armor. This fake skin I’m wrapped up in, it’s so porous. It lets everything through.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that.

  “Would you…” She looked back up at me. “Would you mind leaving me alone for a little while?”

  Leaving was the hardest thing I could do. I wanted to hold her, to explain to her how important she was, how much she meant to my generation, to the world. But being a good roommate right now meant doing what she wanted. So I went to Deena’s room, where we spent the next hour talking about how horrible it was that Kay regretted her heroic action. What a terrible thing it must be not to see how important you are.