Air

by Geoff Ryman

  Granny, Granny, I’m here.

  “Hoo-hoo-hoo, strange how the mind plays tricks. I suddenly remembered—oh, I don’t know why—something long before your time.”

  And Mae-in-time, fresh from laundry and Joe’s noodles, and the smell of Siao in the loft, would lean forward, hopeful for novelty, wanting beauty. “Remembered what, Granny?”

  “Oh!” Mrs. Tung waved it away. “I remembered … I don’t know why—hoo-hoo-hoo—I remember one year, the rice fields were full of poppies. Just for no reason. And we all left them there, because so many of our young men had died. Poor souls.” Her old blind eyes still glittered with joy. As if they could see the eternity beyond.

  And Mae would stand up to go, and Mae-in-Air would collapse herself back down.

  Then she would huff and puff and blow herself back up to another day, another visit.

  Mae followed herself, haunted herself, trying to find whenever Mae had been near Old Mrs. Tung. She reasoned that there might be some closer link, the closer she got to their final relationship, their final state.

  Then, finally, Mae went back to the day just before the Test.

  Mae-in-time thumped her way up the stairs to Mrs. Tung’s room. It was a duty visit. Her head full of dresses and how she could deliver them all in time by leaving off lace collars. She was feeling impatient, a tickle of nerves making her jump as she collapsed onto the chair Mrs. Tung kept for guests. They talked about wishboats and pumpkin seeds. Mae outside time, could see now that Old Mrs. Tung was in a mysterious mood.

  “I remember the day you first came to me,” Mrs. Tung said as if the time had come to talk of final things. As indeed it had. “I thought: Is that the girl whose father has been killed? She is so pretty. I remember you looking at all my dresses hanging on the line.”

  Yah, yah, yah, a sweet old lady’s memories, thought Mae. She replied, half thinking, “And you asked me which one I liked best.”

  Another Mae thought: Pay attention, Mae, this is precious. This is the last time this will happen.

  Mrs. Tung giggled. “Oh yes, and you said the butterflies.” She sat up straight up in her chair as if surveying all of her life from a high cliff. The air from the open window blew her hair. “We had tennis courts, you know. Here in Kizuldah.”

  “Did we?” Mae pretended she had not heard that before.

  “Oh yes, oh yes. When the Chinese were here, just before the Communists came. Part of the Chinese army was here, and they built them. We all played tennis, in our school uniforms. Oh! They were all so handsome; all the village girls were so in love.” Mrs. Tung chuckled. “I remember, I couldn’t have been more than ten years old, and one of them adopted me, because he said I looked like his daughter. He sent me a teddy bear after the war.” She chuckled and shook her head. “I was too old for teddy bears by then. But I told everyone it meant we were getting married. Oh! I wish I had married him.”

  There were so many people Old Mrs. Tung wished she had married—from her Cossacks to boys in other villages and of course her Kalaf. She even managed to love the ones she had married.

  It’s all so precious, thought Mae-in-Air, it’s all so beautiful, we have to ignore it, to get on with the laundry.

  And Mae felt a wind blow, a movement in Air.

  Old Mrs. Tung did a slight jerk, and turned her head and tried to chuckle. “Ooh. Hoo-hoo-hoo. Someone just walked on my grave,” she said, in time.

  And outside time, dim and confused something rippled, like a voice: Mae?

  Dying people say their fathers return. The dead sit down beside them, to comfort them. They give them kisses in dreams. Missy lay dying in summer, in an attic room that was always hot and smelled of old sweat in clothes. Mama would not let Mae visit, for fear of making her ill as well. But Mae still crept in and marveled in horror at the dark circles under her sister’s eyes and the dew of sweat. Missy looked at her said sweetly, “Isn’t lovely that Papa lies so quiet next to me?”

  Again: Mae?

  It was just a whisper, unclear, unformatted, a swirl, an eddy in time from a place where nothing can move.

  Mae-in-Air reached across for it, across the breakfast table of time.

  And very suddenly, like the incomplete thing it was, the room, the space it contained and the bodies in it, collapsed like cards fell back and down.

  And there in infinite layers reflecting back, reflecting forward, babe, child, woman, Granny, was Mrs. Tung.

  Mrs. Tung was a weaving blur around the landscapes of three villages lost in forgotten hills. Mrs. Tung was a serpent-weaving pattern of someone’s entire life, a sinuous wild shape through time, folded in on itself.

  Folded in on Mae.

  Mae didn’t use one name to call it. She used all names: Young Miss Hu, Ai-ling, Mrs. Yuksel, Mrs. Tung, Granny. The names were a weaving serpent blur as well.

  And the entirety seemed to rouse itself, in something like recognition. It rose up like a ghost.

  There was no speaking to it. There was nothing clamped to its head to translate and set other people’s messages in order. It rose up and then settled down, into the most probable shape. But it could be teased down the hill, edged towards the imprints.

  “Help me,” whispered Mae.

  And the entirety lifted up its aged, young, beautiful self and corralled its separate parts like hundreds of waving chiffon scarves, collected itself, trying to recognize and learn in a realm where time and learning were complete. Finished, meaning, accomplished.

  Mae nipped in and out of that life like a mouse through floorboards. Mae called, and the entirety tried to lift its head as Mrs. Tung slept.

  Mae whispered to Mrs. Tung in dreams.

  A young wife tossed fitfully in her bed in a village called Mirrors. Mae tried to lead her back to the moment when the cauldron spilled, when the fire shot through the Air.

  Little Miss Hu shivered on the grass as she slept by a campfire, trading horses. Mae called.

  Granny shook her head, aching in a wooden chair, asleep in dreams, in Air.

  Dreams are a way for the finished self in Air to live again, to have a before and an after in which to think. We learn through all eternity in our dreams.

  And so did Mrs. Tung. The dream had recurred all through her life.

  It was a terrible dream, always the same. A friend, a daughter, even Lily perhaps, needed her. She, Mrs. Tung, had done something. She didn’t mean to do it, she had not known she had done it, but it was something she had done. Sometimes, at its most nightmarish, she had somehow stolen her friend’s body.

  And the answer was always the same.

  Old Mrs. Tung lifted all of herself up like a thousand ragged ghosts. And she was blown by love towards one particular time.

  “Mae Mae Mae Mae Mae Mae…”

  And she met a friend, and that friend seemed to pour her like slithery silk scarves to one particular thing.

  That thing was a part of Mrs. Tung’s life. A moment of her life that had been taken and frozen and held. It was like a burn victim, so scarred that it could not move, embittered and incomplete. Incomplete and angry, after the beautiful pattern should have been finished. Mrs. Tung settled on it with her whole self, and enveloped it and welcomed it and hugged it and stilled it. She was reunited with a tiny, hardened, mean little part of her life. She wove it back into the beautiful carpet.

  And then said, very clearly, quoting the poet through all her life:

  “Listen to the reed, how it tells a tale, complaining of separations.”

  SOMEWHERE IN TIME, MAE’S EYES FLUTTERED AND OPENED AGAIN.

  She was in her kitchen, back in herself.

  “I’m back,” she managed to whisper. There was a sound of scraping chairs as two men jumped up from the table.

  But somewhere else, two spirits sat together as if in an attic exchanging memories, joined forever, remembering the poets.

  “Body is not veiled from soul, nor soul from body, yet none is permitted to see the soul.”

  In the fu
ture, everyone will be able to talk with their dead.

  26

  MAE, SIAO, MR. KEN AND HIS CHILDREN ALL STROLLED TOGETHER TOWARDS THE CELEBRATION.

  They were a new kind of family. Mr. Ken walked on ahead, cajoling and calming his two daughters who were beside themselves with impatience to get to the square to join their friends.

  Mr. Ken’s arms were full of little paper boats. Each one had a birthday-cake candle balanced in it. The girls kept jumping up and trying to snatch them, as if they were full of bonbons.

  “Careful, careful!” said Mr. Ken. “The candles are only held by a little wax, and these are for Auntie Mae and Siao as well.”

  “Let me have mine,” said the eldest, trying to look more mature. She delicately peeled a boat from her father’s grasp. She looked at it with experienced eyes. “What happens if the candle falls over and the boat catches fire?”

  “Oh, that is very good luck: That means your wish gets to Heaven even faster.”

  Mae thought, I think Kuei has just made that up.

  But, oh, he was handsome, his hair combed, his broad shoulders in a nice new shirt, his round legs in beautiful new slacks.

  Mae and Siao strolled slightly behind them, holding hands.

  Siao had caught her glance and grinned. “I have found you out,” he said, teasing. “I know you have a lover. But I am not sure who it could be.”

  “Ah, now I am undone,” said Mae. She played along, but she could still be taken aback by Siao’s unexpected habit of turning the most painful things into jokes.

  “People even say that once you had a crush on my brother Joe,” said Siao.

  “Joe? Don’t be silly. Maybe when he was younger and more fashionable. I only like fashionable men.”

  “Ah,” said Siao, who even on this big night wore his stonemason’s gray sweatsuit. “That is what you see in me.”

  He grinned at her with his beautiful catlike face. That was the village face when it was beautiful, like Mrs. Tung’s. I love both of my men, thought Mae.

  She walked, ponderous with contentment and pregnancy. I feel like a ewe on the pastures at lambing time.

  “Mrs. Chung-ma’am!” someone called. Mrs. Hoiyoo, Kwan’s sister, was waving from a high window. “Your special dress is so beautiful!”

  It was airy and embroidered. “Shen Suloi made it for me!” Mae called back.

  “The girls look excited.”

  “They are beside themselves. See you there!”

  The village square was already full of people. Mr. Ken’s daughters saw friends, squealed and ran off, clutching their boats of wishes.

  The village square was newly paved with honey-colored stone. Their once wayward little river was now firmly disciplined in a decorative zigzag channel. The bridge which had conveniently dropped down from Upper to Lower Street was now firmly mortared in place, and hung with lights.

  Once, the lights would have hung from the One Tree, and the children would have been in the swings soaring higher and higher over the heads of the festival. The children did not even miss the tree now.

  “Dad! We’ll need more duct tape!”

  Genghiz Atakoloo shouted down from scaffolding at the edge of the drop. It would hold all the village TVs, for everyone to see. His father, Enver Atakoloo, bristled his white mustache. Mae remembered that her first real crush had been for Mr. Atakoloo, who in those days had been strong and bull-like with his black eyes and black stubble. On the terrible day that he killed Mr. Pin and was carried off to prison, Mae had wept. Joe came up behind her and said that she must get used to that, because one day, he, Joe, was going to kill someone and go to prison, too.

  “I miss Joe,” Mae said to Siao.

  “I know,” said Siao, and gave her hand a shake.

  Mae coughed up bile, and moved her handkerchief over her mouth.

  Dawn came bouncing up, pulling her mother, Mrs. Ling.

  “My mother says you are no longer pretty,” giggled Dawn.

  “Oh!” exclaimed her mother.

  “She says that you are an Imam instead.” Dawn dissolved into giggles. “Where is your white turban?” She kept chuckling.

  “Mae,” said Ling, in apology.

  “It is nice to be called an Imam,” Mae said with a shrug.

  And suddenly Kwan was there with Sunni, and the women gave each other a quick hug. And Ken and Siao and the girls were all hugged in turn.

  “Well!” sighed Kwan. “We’re all here.”

  “Not all of us,” said Mae.

  She thought of Sezen, Kai-hui, Mrs. Tung, Old Mrs. Kowoloia. Someone’s car radio was pumping out Balshang Lectro.

  “Ah,” Kwan said. “Indeed.” The song faded away and a Talent raved over and over the Air was coming, it was Air day, and the air was 27 Air degrees.

  Food came up on legs—the Pin children brought Mae plates of food. People straightened her collar for her.

  Young Miss Doh approached, still yearning for love. “This is your day,” she said to Mae.

  “We are all so lucky!” said Mae.

  “Lucky? Kizuldah?” said Young Miss Doh.

  “We are high up, so we have rain and do not live in a desert. Our people had to fight to stay here, you know. This was the most valuable place.” Mae looked up at the ruined hills. “We were cut off from all the madness until the very end.”

  Mae looked at Miss Doh and saw that she did not feel lucky, cut off high in the hills, but it was important that she acknowledge. “We are the last, you see,” said Mae. “The last human beings. After tonight, everywhere, we will be different.”

  The Teahouse had a new awning, and tables and chairs laid out on the new pavements. The men played cards or dominoes; some of the women knitted. Mae felt a constant churning like illness in her belly. Suddenly she felt sick and sagged slightly.

  “Let’s sit, shall we?” Sunni suggested.

  Mr. Ali stood up and offered a chair. Mae settled, still holding Siao’s hand. Kwan seemed to flicker like a knife being sharpened. She shot a glance at Sunni, and Sunni stood up to fetch something or someone.

  “I wonder…” Mae began. There was too much to wonder about: Where Joe was now and what he was doing; what Sezen would have done with Air if she had lived; what would happen to Mae’s village after Air.

  Suloi pulled up a chair, then Mrs. Pin, and Mrs. Doh. With a sound of scraping chairs, the Circle was suddenly gathered. Out came the clay pipes and tobacco. Siao leaned back and shared his cigarettes with Kuei.

  The chat was light and distant, about Soong Chang, who was to wed one of the Pin boys. Mrs. Pin must be excited. Had plans proceeded? Siao stood up and craned his neck, trying to catch someone’s eye.

  “I shouldn’t have had anything to eat,” said Mae. She put down her plate.

  The food was simply fire, raw on her ulcerated stomach.

  “Ooh. All this excitement,” she said.

  Sunni came back with Mrs. Kosal. “The new toilet in my house is now working, Mae, if you should need to use it.”

  As if on a signal, Siao, Kuei, and Kwan were on their feet.

  “Come on, Mae darling, you should see how Mrs. Kosal has been able to restore the house.”

  Mae chuckled. “I just need to use the toilet.”

  Mrs. Hoiyoo was also there, suddenly. Kwan’s sister had become a much better friend since the night of the Flood. For some reason she had a towel.

  “We all want to see the new house,” said Sunni. “Better than sitting around waiting for eleven o clock.”

  On the radios all around them, Yulduz was singing about Fate, and the fate of the nation being like the fate of a person.

  So they dutifully admired the paint on Mrs. Kosal’s wall, and agreed that there was no trace of damage now, and Kwan drew Mae off into the loo.

  “It’s 10:40,” warned Mrs. Kosal. Her smile shook.

  “Don’t be frightened,” Mae said to her.

  Kwan and Sunni gasped in mock approval at the modern toilet. “Oh, they have done so
well—look at this!”

  “So convenient and hygienic,” said Kwan.

  “Hot water,” said Sunni, in approval.

  “I’m going to be sick,” Mae said shyly. She wanted them to leave.

  “Poor darling,” said Kwan, and would not leave her. She patted Mae’s back. She looked at Sunni, and Sunni suddenly darted away.

  “I’m all right,” Mae said.

  “Is it moving?” asked Mrs. Kosal.

  Mae flung herself forward and Mrs. Pin’s delicious fish salad shot whole and glossy out of her mouth.

  “There,” said Mae. “That’s it.”

  Sunni, smiling, stuck her head around the doorway. “Can we come in?” she asked brightly. She prized the women apart, and Ken Kuei blundered his way forward and then settled, relieved. Siao stood respectfully behind him.

  “Ach,” said Mae, “all of you. Mrs. Kosal’s new toilet is not more fascinating than the Air. Come on, all of us, or we will miss the show.” She looked at Kwan. “I feel better, really.”

  This time her two men took hold of her, one on each arm.

  Mae asked, “Kuei, what about the girls?”

  “They are fine; they are with their cousins. You just think about yourself for once.”

  Outside the house was a crowd of people. They stood in silence, turned away from the screens, the car headlights, the radios and the food. They faced the Kosal’s house, waiting for Mae.

  “She’s fine,” Kwan said to them all, in a singsong voice.

  “And Mrs. Kosal’s toilet is very modern,” said Mae, which brought a bit of a chuckle.

  Hatijah came forward with a paper boat. She had started to wear black trousers, like her daughter. “Mrs. Chung-ma’am,” she said. “Have you made a wish?”

  “Oh, no! I’ve forgotten,” said Mae, and took Mrs. Ozdemir’s arm in gratitude.

  “Hurry up,” said Kwan. It seemed that the entire crowd bustled Mae forward, to their little stream.

  Since the Flood, the gully was steeper. Their little stream was walled, channeled to the edge of the square, where it dropped away as a waterfall. Mae was supported as she knelt down beside it. The fire in her belly moved again.