by Anne Corlett
“Here.” Daniel went into the bathroom and came back with a pad of wet tissue, which he held out to her at arm’s length. She pressed it to her head while he pulled his clothes back on. “I’ll sleep somewhere else.”
She shook her head. “This is your room. I’ll go.”
“Where? You haven’t been allocated a room. Everyone assumed . . .” He looked away.
“I’ll sleep on the ship,” she said. “My things are there anyway.”
She went into the bathroom to get dressed. When she looked in the mirror, there was a tiny cut on the edge of her brow, wrapped in swelling and discoloration. She brushed her hair across it before leaving the bathroom. Daniel was sitting on the edge of the bed. He didn’t look up, and she almost left without speaking. But there was something inside her that felt like it was being tugged and torn, like someone taking off a bandage too slowly. She stopped, halfway out of the door.
“Can we talk in the morning?” she said.
He rubbed his face, still not looking at her. “Okay.”
She nodded, although she knew he couldn’t see it, and closed the door behind her.
CHAPTER
14
When the door closed, Jamie stood still for a moment, trying to get her bearings. There was an elevator at the end of the corridor that should take her down to the exit nearest to the landing bay. She hesitated, and then set off in the opposite direction. She followed the twists and turns of the corridor until she arrived at the elevator at the far corner. She pressed the button and waited. After a few seconds the doors slid open with a perky ding, followed by a female voice announcing “Executive Corridor.” That smooth artificial voice sent a shiver of discomfort through her. Most people were dead and dust, yet the world they’d made was still ticking along, waiting for them to figure out how to live in it.
She watched the struts and girders slide past as the glass elevator sank smoothly down the side of the building. Who had thought it would be a good idea to let everyone see the mechanics of their descent? Most people just wanted things to work. They didn’t want to know how or why.
Another ding, and that level, unaccented tone announced her arrival on the third floor. Jamie crossed the foyer to the double doors that led to the executive bar, a wide, opulent room with floor-to-ceiling windows. The bar was made of Thellum, the mahogany-like wood that was the cornerstone of Alegria’s wealth. Polished slabs from the vast trunks had been shipped back to the boardrooms and power corridors of Earth, the new colony growing steadily richer and more powerful, until it found itself furnishing its own administration offices.
The main lights were off, the only illumination coming from the dimmed strips over the bar. Outside, the city was in darkness, but through the low-glare glass Jamie could see the blaze of stars in the sky. You didn’t notice them when the city was lit up.
As she walked over to the bar, she expected the familiar craving to kick in, but there was only a dull ache where that sharp need had always bitten. She scanned the rows of bottles: wines, spirits, beer from a dozen different planets, a locked cold-crate of bottles of the much-celebrated Keplan champagne, each one capped with a digital security top. What would happen if she were to smash her way into the crate, break a bottle at the neck, and pour its contents down her throat? Would someone come running to wrestle it off her? Or were things only valuable when there were enough people around who couldn’t afford them?
She opened one of the wine fridges and took out a bottle of the expensive Kapteyn wine. As she reached up for a glass, a voice spoke from behind her.
“I’ve got whiskey, if that’s your tipple.”
The glass slipped through her fingers, exploding in a shower of splinters on the countertop.
“Fuck’s sake,” she muttered. Callan was sitting in the semidarkness, over in the far corner. She shook shards of glass off her sleeve and sucked at a fleck of blood on the back of her hand. “What are you doing?”
“Drinking.”
“I can see that. Why didn’t you say something when I came in?”
“Thought it might be a flying visit. Picking up some celebratory champagne.” He took a sip of his drink. “I can’t imagine they’ve got room service up and running yet.”
“What are you doing here?” She tipped a generous measure of the Kapteyn into another glass. “I thought everyone would be asleep.”
“Guy in charge wanted to speak to me about a couple of things.”
She walked over. He was sitting in a high-backed armchair, feet up on a padded stool. Jamie sat down on the small sofa at right angles to his seat, so that they wouldn’t have to face off across the table, like one of them was interviewing the other.
He lifted his drink. “Cheers.”
She took a swig of her wine. “Guy in charge? Who’s that?”
“Name of Buckley,” Callan said. “You know him?”
“Slightly,” she said. “He was undersecretary to one of the cabinets, I think.”
“That figures. He knows his stuff, but not much charisma. Kind of guy who spends his time running things so other people can look like they’re running things.”
Jamie almost smiled at that. “Plenty of people like that in the administration. What did he want to talk to you about?”
“The ship.” Callan swirled his whiskey. “My plans.”
“And what are they?” She found she was mirroring his movement, her wine sliding around the curve of her own glass. She tightened her grip on the stem. “Did you tell him you’re going to Earth?”
Her own words caught at her, and it took her a second to realize what it was that had caused that snag.
She’d said you, not we. She felt a flicker of resentment, irrationally aimed at Callan, as though he were the one who’d jumped to conclusions.
She and Daniel, whatever they’d been together, it was over. But there were other decisions still to be made. If the old world could be rebuilt, it would happen here. Maybe there’d be a place for her.
“We didn’t get that far.” Callan looked out across the dark city. “He just wanted to know if I’m willing to help with the search-and-rescue plan they’re working out.” He gave her a quick glance. “So, Daniel. That’s who you were looking for. Odds have got to be astronomical. You both surviving.”
She stared at her drink. “I suppose so.”
“What happened?”
She looked up to see Callan staring at her.
“What?”
He reached over and touched her brow. Her skin prickled beneath his fingers.
She leaned back, trying to make the movement casual. “Bumped my head.”
“On what?”
“Just a shelf.”
His expression was entirely neutral, but she found herself wanting to bolster the explanation.
“I was tired, not paying attention.”
He nodded. “Must have been a shock for both of you.”
“Yes.”
“So why are you sitting down here, drinking alone?”
“I’m not drinking alone.”
“Planning on it, though.”
She took another slug of wine. “Like you said, it was a shock.”
He nodded slowly. “How come you were out on Soltaire on your own? If you’re with him.”
“Work.”
“Wouldn’t have thought you’d have needed to trek all the way out there to find work.”
There was a barely perceptible blurring at the edges of his voice. If the bottle had been full when he started, he was at least three shots down.
“Why are you so interested in my life story?” She nodded toward the bottle. “Are you drunk?”
“Maybe. But it’s a reasonable question.”
“I needed a bit of space.” She wasn’t sure which question she was answering: the one about Soltaire or the unanswered one ab
out her presence here in the bar.
“So you’re going to stay?”
She almost said yes. Yes, of course. While she’d been letting him fill the gaps in the conversation with assumptions, she’d almost forgotten the truth. She didn’t love Daniel.
“I don’t know. I . . .” Maybe it was the wine kicking in, but she suddenly thought it might be a relief to say it. “I’m not sure it’s going to work. Him and me.”
He considered this, his expression still neutral. “Situation like this, it’s got to be hard to deal with.”
She shook her head. “That’s not . . . Things weren’t right. Before.”
“So why were you trying to find him?”
“I don’t know.” That was all she seemed to have said since they’d arrived here.
She got up and poured herself another glass. When she came back, Callan nodded at her forehead.
“He do that?”
A jolt of shock ran through her. “No. Of course not. He . . .” She stopped. “We were fighting. I pushed him, and lost my balance.”
“Seems to me if two people have the energy to fight, it means there are still feelings there.”
“Of course there are feelings. We were together for thirteen years.”
“Long time. What went wrong?”
Jamie didn’t answer straight away. All her instinctive responses began with he.
He pushed me.
He didn’t give me space.
He changed.
What would Daniel say, if it were him sitting here?
She never let me in.
She wouldn’t try.
The wine had made her too honest to blame him completely, but she didn’t see why she should shoulder the whole weight. That left only the thing that should have been something of each of them.
“There was a baby.” She fixed her gaze on the distant stars. “Or there should have been. His heart stopped. Somewhere around thirty weeks, no one was sure exactly.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Why?” Her voice was too loud in the empty bar.
“What?”
“Why are you sorry?” Her chest was too full. Things were trying to force their way out between her ribs. “You barely know me.”
His gaze narrowed. “Because, despite what you seem to think, I’m not a complete cunt. Someone tells me they lost a baby, that it broke their relationship, what else am I going to say? Congratulations? Well done?”
“I don’t have to listen to this.”
“No,” Callan said. “You don’t.”
That was what she’d said to Rena last night at dinner. She breathed out slowly and took another sip of her drink.
“Sorry.”
“You could give things another go,” Callan said. “You could try for another baby.”
“No,” she said, so quickly that she tripped over the end of his words. She took another deep breath, steadying herself, and on the outbreath she let go of the other half of that tight-wound secret. “I never wanted a baby. He was the one who wanted children. Then I lost it and . . .” She ran out of coherent words.
Callan waited for her to continue, but she shook her head and took a deep slug of her drink.
“So it’s over?”
“I think so.” She gave a hard little laugh. “Funny. All the stories say that love is forever. And the songs. All you need is love, and all that.”
“There are other songs.” He didn’t smile. “Too much love will kill you. Sometimes love ain’t enough. What about those?”
“See?” She laughed again. “If even the songwriters can’t reach a consensus, what hope do the rest of us have?”
He shook his head. “The problem with stories and songs—no, scratch that, the problem with words—is that they make us squeeze all the messy bits of life into something small and snappy. All the things you feel. The times you hate one another. The times you want to tear open your skin and let the other person climb inside. All that, and only one word for it.” His smile was edged with something she couldn’t quite read. “It’s like there’s only one way of doing things. You get it right or you get it wrong. But no two people are the same. If you’re trying to follow some blueprint for what loving someone ought to be, it’s probably doomed from the start.”
“Maybe people can never fit together,” she said. “Not properly.”
“Or maybe we’ve made our expectations too big, and our definition too small. One word for being with someone. There’s got to be room in that word for everything we drag along with us, and for most people I don’t think there is.”
“Baggage,” Jamie said. “You mean all our baggage.”
He grimaced. “You could call it that. I just think it’s . . . us. The things that shaped us.” He tilted his head, meeting her eyes. “But no. I don’t think two people are ever a perfect fit. Too many bits have been snapped off along the way. And people always think they can fix you, if you just let them in on the secret of what it was that broke you in the first place.”
“So what happened to you?” she said, the wine sharpening her recklessness.
“What do you mean?”
“If we’re all broken, what broke you?”
“There you go,” he said. “You’re asking that question like there’s a one-word answer.”
“Okay,” she said. “Tell me one thing.” It was definitely the wine. She could feel her inhibitions just starting to blur.
He looked at her for a moment, his face blank and closed. Then he sighed and rubbed at the back of his neck. Jamie suddenly wondered what he would do if she stepped behind him and pressed her fingers into his shoulders, kneading the tension away.
“You really want to know?” he said.
“Yes.” Maybe it would distract her from that unsettling image.
He drained the last of his whiskey but kept hold of the glass, twisting it in his hands. “I had a brother. He was disabled, severely autistic, with some other problems. When he was eighteen and I was sixteen, we came out from Earth with my parents. It was during the first of the forced emigrations. The worst thing was that my parents wanted to go. We lived in one of the most crowded parts of St. Louis, Missouri. They thought it might be better. A new start.” He laughed, a dark, hollow sound.
Jamie felt a hard jolt of understanding. The early colonies had an ugly history. Whole settlements had been lost.
“I was in the homeland protests,” she said.
He gave her a sardonic look, his gaze flicking toward her ring finger.
“I left because of it,” she said, stung. “I came out here on the Phoenix, one of the protest ships.”
“And landed on the capital, where you finished up living with a member of the administration and working for the ministry of whatever it was you did. You really stuck it to them, didn’t you?”
“At least we tried. And the program did eventually stop.”
“It would have stopped anyway,” Callan said. “They’d gotten rid of enough undesirables by then.”
“At least we tried,” she repeated, with a little more heat. “What else could we have done?”
“Nothing. I’m not blaming you. It’s just . . .” He made a vague gesture. “I don’t know. Sorry. Not your fault.”
“No, I’m sorry.” She felt clumsy and stupid. She’d done what people always did and tried to make a connection to someone else’s story. “It felt like doing something at the time.”
“Doesn’t matter now, I suppose.”
“I guess not.” Most of the people who came out on those colony ships were dead, along with those who’d enforced the program, and those who’d protested against it. “So what happened?”
He didn’t answer for a long moment. Jamie wondered if he’d changed his mind about sharing the story.
“The ship wasn’t well stocked
,” he said, eventually. “There was rationing, fights over who should be prioritized. This was one of the first colony ships, remember. Trip took a month when it would be less than two weeks these days. Anyway, things went wrong pretty fast. Maybe we’d have worked it out, but then there was an outbreak of cholera.”
“Christ. You were on the El Doradao.” The Plague Ship was how it had become known.
He nodded. “You know the story. Not enough vaccine. People died.”
Everyone knew the story. The fledgling settlement had disintegrated into chaos, and the administration had been forced to send a salvage team in to deal with the outbreak and restore order. They’d saved maybe half the settlers, but it had taken years before Thetis was anything approaching a fully functioning colony. It was spun, of course, as these things always were. Greedy settlers, unable to self-govern. But the truth had seeped around the edges of the administration whitewash, staining the early days of off-world settlement.
“The overseers had to manage the distribution of the vaccine while waiting for backup supplies. They decided to prioritize adults. They decided it was better to let the children take their chances, rather than finishing up with a whole lot of orphaned kids needing care. All of those over eighteen should have been vaccinated.” He refilled his glass and took a good-sized mouthful before continuing. “Except they wouldn’t give my brother his dose.” His tone was level. “My parents gave us their doses. They told me to look after him if the worst happened.” He smiled, a cold twitch of his lips. “The worst happened. It generally does.”
“And you looked after him.”
“I looked after him.” Another sip of whiskey. “For a while.”
“Must have been difficult. You were very young.”
“It was. But not in the way you probably think. He wasn’t like Finn. He could barely speak. He had a breakdown if anyone looked at him for too long. Violent outbursts. I never even knew if he understood who I was. I never knew if he felt anything for me, or if I was just another part of a world he couldn’t cope with.”
“What happened?”
Callan sat back in his chair, stretching his legs, as though the story were some ache that could be eased. “We managed. I found work, did all right at it. I had better schooling than most people around me. My mother was a teaching assistant before we left Earth.” He smiled, a proper smile, although one that was edged with sadness. “She had no problem knocking an education into me.” The smile faded. “Then I was offered something much better. Good pay, good prospects. But it was shipboard, and I couldn’t take Ed with me.” It was the first time he’d said his brother’s name. “They’d set up a facility by then. A residential home.”