Wolf Country

  Sarcasm can feel like an arrow tinged with malice, sometimes.

  ‘You have no idea how much effort it takes me to–’ I stopped. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  His eyes were now piercing through me. I turned towards the entrance, and pretended to watch the group of people who had just come in. I quickly wiped the corners of my eyes. I felt as if I’d just been opened up from head to toe with a giant scalpel.

  On the terrace, men in immaculate white shirts and perfectly tailored suits, were deeply engaged in discussion. Women in halter-neck dresses and wide-brimmed hats chatted and sipped at cocktails. I was wondering whether their conversations were as heavy as ours, and the trendy appearances merely disguised something more profound. Or were they exactly what they seemed to be? This feeling of being a spy among my own kind was new to me. I’d never experienced this, not until I met Philip.

  After some time, I spoke.

  ‘Next time maybe we could go to Sunday Mass together.’

  He didn’t even try to conceal a grimace.

  ‘I wouldn’t waste our time together there. I almost never go to Mass. My father calls it the mass of the masses who are in a huge mess.’

  I smiled.

  ‘Neither do I, but once a month I have to. The extra money is a big help.’

  Suddenly his voice deepened.

  ‘Do you know why they give you that extra money?’

  ‘I suppose to encourage us to buy.’

  ‘Yes, in part, but there’s more to it than that.’

  The severity of his voice made me put my drink down. Unintentionally I leaned closer, as if he was about to share a secret.

  ‘Brainwashing is far more effective with a crowd,’ he said with a sinister calm. ‘The more often you go, the more you’ll become like them. In the long term, you’ll be spending far more this way than in isolation, and you’ll be less likely to complain.’

  ‘So how do you keep your Right To Reside if you’re so careful about what you spend?’ I asked.

  ‘I save up for countryside visits.’

  ‘I wish I could afford them more often.’

  ‘Getting to the countryside costs a fortune for a reason.’ His eyes were sparkling and he leaned closer to me.

  ‘But it’s worth it, for my own sanity. I don’t mind living more modestly during the rest of the week.’

  ‘When I was a teenager, my dad took me to the north, to the Peak District,’ I said. ‘That was my first time in the countryside and I’ve never felt that free. So I know the feeling.’

  Suddenly I remembered the bloody corpse carried on a stretcher out of the woods and I shivered. He noticed my change of mood and I shared my sad experience.

  ‘Luckily I’ve never seen such things. You must come with me one day, Alice. Trust me, there’s nothing more uplifting than walking across the open fields on a summer’s day, with your ID Phone off, free from all this.’

  ‘Aren’t you afraid?’

  ‘Of the wolves?’

  ‘Of the authorities. Your tracker can show them the frequency of your visits.’

  Finishing his drink, he put the glass down on the table.

  ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of. What can they do, really? I work hard, I consume. As a Mid Spender I’m a useful member of society. You’re welcome to join me next Sunday.’

  ‘That’s when I planned to go to Mass. I wonder what will happen if I don’t.’

  ‘I don’t think that is the question here. The question is whether you’re ready to give up on Mid-Spender comfort to experience something extraordinary.’

  His smile transformed him; I could swear, for just a moment, that he was carefree.

  ‘Where would we go?’

  ‘There’s a beautiful lake in Somerset, which I visit regularly. You have an area of a square mile before you get to the fence. The peace and quiet is otherworldly. It helps me clear my head.’

  ‘The exact opposite of what Sunday Mass does,’ I said, broodily.

  ‘You know what?’ he said. ‘Let me show you something. Once you’ve finished your drink.’

  I downed my drink in one gulp and stood up.

  We were out in the busy street, and I wanted to ask him where he was taking me, but I couldn’t shout loud enough over the hustle and bustle, the invasive adverts and the tooting of e-trolleys. On the crowded monorail, we both kept quiet. We left the city centre, travelled past a suburban high street and then got off at Hampstead Monorail Station.

  ‘I don’t know about you, but I find it increasingly hard to cope with the pollution in the city.’ He fanned his face and inhaled deeply.

  ‘Air pollution? There are no cars any more.’

  ‘Not that kind of pollution. The pollution from the adverts, from the constant aggression and stress accumulated in the air around us.’

  I didn’t say anything, but strangely, for the first time, I felt its presence in the air.

  We walked along a wide, tree-lined pavement; the street was built up with ultramodern glass palaces that housed offices and banks. At the corner of an authentic Victorian brick building, we turned left and found ourselves in a hidden paradise. Philip’s sense of relief was evident. I had blurred memories of this suburb of London, usually referred to as the English Montmartre.

  Construction signs were up everywhere, marring the unique beauty of the place, but the jungle-like feel of it still reminded me of a fairy-tale. There was no one else there, and we let the peace and quiet envelop us. The street lamps were bent, and the old shop windows were all broken, some of them victims of arson. The local landmark, a painting of a man on the tiny bridge, painting himself standing on the same bridge, had been ruined by graffiti. Philip sat down on a nearby bench, his gaze fixed on the painting that had seen better days.

  ‘I heard this place is going down the drain due to the lack of financial support,’ I said.

  He shrugged. ‘They are going to demolish all this and add it to the High-Spender area.’

  ‘How sad it is!’ I exclaimed. ‘This must have been such a wonderful little park.’

  ‘There’s worse to come. There is talk of more luxurious High-Spender areas to be developed. Where do you think they will take the land from?’

  ‘The Zone?’

  He nodded. Suddenly his eyes were filled with sadness.

  ‘Try not to think about it.’ I put my hand on his arm.

  ‘It’s not really an option.’ He snorted. ‘I’ve been asked to design the next one.’

  ‘Oh, God. Do you have to?’

  ‘No. And I won’t. I’d rather take jobs that pay half, and still be able to look at myself in the mirror.’

  I had no idea how to console him.

  ‘Do you like it?’ He pointed at the painting on the bridge.

  ‘It’s magical.’

  ‘I think you’d look beautiful painted. You have very distinctive features.’

  ‘Ugly, you mean? I know, I hate my dimples. I’ll have them removed one day.’

  ‘Please don’t! They give your face character.’ Suddenly he was shy, like a schoolboy.

  ‘Any other gems around here?’ I asked.

  ‘What about that?’ He pointed at a bench in the distance, behind the trees. I stood up and made my way to the bench, which had something on it. As I got closer I saw what it was – a kind of group sculpture, a family. Shoes, hats, gloves and bags were held together by thin, almost invisible wires, while between them there was only empty space. Still, the way the tiny shoes of the children were turned towards the adults’, and the implied gestures of the parents’ protective hands made it feel alive.

  ‘What do you see?’ he asked.

  ‘The younger child, probably a girl, is sitting on her mother’s lap. The bigger one, a boy, is cuddling up to his father. This is one of the most beautiful things I’ve
ever seen!’

  A gentle smile lit up his face. ‘As they say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder,’ he said. ‘You fill the void with what you are inside.’

  He touched the imaginary boy’s red hat with the tip of his fingers. ‘Dad meant for it to be this way. To hold up a mirror to people.’

  ‘Your dad? Did your dad make this?’

  He nodded.

  ‘He’s an incredible artist,’ I whispered.

  ‘He’s a weak person. It took me a while to realise he’s nothing but a delusional fool.’

  ‘How can you say that?’

  ‘To me he has lost all credibility to make family-themed art.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He has always been a dissenter. He couldn’t cope with the new system; he became so disillusioned he simply left us one day. I was eleven. He chose his art and politics over us, and moved in with a community of other losers.’ The memories were now flowing freely from him. ‘My mother could never get over it, and had such severe depression she had to retire when I was eighteen. Some years later my father returned and apologised, blaming the system, as usual.’

  ‘So his suicide attempt was not unexpected at all,’ I said gently.

  He took my hand. ‘I swear to you, I’ll never be like him.’ There was passion in his voice; this was not the reserved Philip I knew. ‘I’ll be able to make it in this world.’

  He gazed into my eyes with unusual intensity.

  ‘Would you like to be my partner in this, Alice?’

  We didn’t even know each other really. I wanted to ask him if this meant we were serious from now on, after just four weeks of dating, and find out what he meant by partner, and partner in what, exactly, but all I could say was: yes.

  five

  It will be a week tomorrow since I became a Low Spender. At the council I was given my new address and told to move within twenty-four hours. I fled like a wild animal, my face burning, not even looking around me on the promenade. I didn’t belong there any more.

  Nurse Vogel came over to comfort me. She had unexpectedly become a friend. After our meeting in the Dignitorium, her sixth sense had shown her I was only holding it together on the surface, while on the inside I was close to collapse. Being the kind soul she is, she says she was really worried something might happen to me and she wanted to remain in touch to keep an eye on me. She started to come over regularly, in the evenings, after work, and we chatted and drank tea in as much harmony as if we were of the same generation. It turned out there was one thing she missed about not having a Globe: cartoons. So she got hooked on them during her visits, and we watched old-fashioned cartoons, with talking animals. But later we always chatted, and I spilled my heart out as if it were a bottomless pit that could never be emptied. It’s not an exaggeration to say that she saved me.

  My new home is on the third floor of an eight-storey block in LN11, painted mint green. When I opened the front door to the flat, my eyes fell on the square little studio. Sorrow seeped out and hit me right in the face. The previous resident had left unwashed dishes in the sink. The drain was blocked and there was a stagnant smell in the air. The dirty fingerprints on the kitchen cupboard doors, judging by their size, must have belonged to a man. On the wall there was a large poster depicting a Dignitorium in North London. Its surface had been touched so many times that in places the paper had become shiny. The poster must have been torn to pieces then put back together, with Sellotape that ran across the surface like a river. Whoever my predecessor was, I hope he made it to his dream Dignitorium and is enjoying himself. I can empathise with him; after my parents retired, I also had a short period when I loved and loathed the institution at the same time.

  I have good days, but mostly bad ones. On good days I hope I’ll hear something about Philip that will give me peace of mind. I’m prepared to hear the worst, that I’m a widow, to be shattered; anything is better than this state of uncertainty. On bad days I fear I’ll never recover and my savings will dwindle away until I have nothing, leaving me with the unhappy choice between instant euthanasia or a delayed death after nine months of retirement. Or less, if they cut it again.

  What I find worst about moving to a Low-Spender area is not the act of downgrading, but the fact that I no longer feel safe. Although I know abductions are rare and that most of the victims are young people, I can’t stop comparing this place to where I came from, to the safety of the Mid-Spender area. I miss the courtyard. My high-rise building overlooks a park and playground, but anyone can go there – it’s not a community. I also miss watching my neighbours. I wonder what they’re doing now.

  When I was dismissed, I was cut off from my students and colleagues too suddenly. I stopped belonging there. It’s funny, I never thought I would miss Linda’s company, her irritating voice, her pungent perfume. I don’t even remember the last time I used perfume. Or had my hair done. I’d never imagined that one could be so isolated despite sharing the same air, the same ground beneath our feet. The only thing that comforts me is the elephant blanket, which I clutch at during the night, sleepless until I get up at 3am to find some old photos and immerse myself in memories.

  I have just understood what Dad meant when he said that the land is so priceless that we have no right to occupy it if we become disadvantaged. It was a few weeks before Dad requested the new, free semi under the new system. I asked him why we wouldn’t have a swimming pool like the Mid Spenders in the condos, and he explained that one couldn’t have everything. ‘As occupants of a house with a garden, we will be taking up more space than a family in a condo. With the swimming pool they are compensated for not using so much land. We’ll get real land, which is the most precious thing on Earth.’ He watched Sofia and me for a while then asked: ‘Or would you prefer an apartment instead?’

  ‘No, I prefer a house with a garden,’ I said.

  ‘Gardens are boring,’ Sofia moaned. ‘I want to live in a condo with a swimming pool.’

  ‘But I can’t replant my tree in a flat.’

  ‘Apartment. Not flat. No one gives a shit about your tree, anyway.’

  ‘Language, Sofia,’ Dad warned her.

  I could see she was hurt because she didn’t have an apple tree. Dad had planted one for her too on the day she was born, but it died within a year. It was only my tree that was growing and blooming and I didn’t want to part with it.

  ‘We’ll see about our new home. We’ll discuss it later,’ Dad said after some hesitation, but he never mentioned it again and we moved into the house with the garden. Since then I’ve lived in several different types of accommodation, but Dad’s words about land being the most precious thing on Earth have always remained with me.

  On my first day as a Low Spender, I called Christine and some of my other friends or I would say ex-friends. Only Christine answered the phone, the others just sent a message saying ‘Get Well Soon’ and ‘Kisses’. Christine was brief and distant and we had nothing to talk about. ‘You must be really under the weather in that horrible gloomy place,’ she said, and all I could do was nod. She asked me to show her around the flat and I rotated my ID Phone around the small room. ‘You’re kidding me,’ she said in an exaggerated voice. ‘I mean, you don’t even have space for wardrobes to store your clothes.’ I didn’t have time to tell her that I had given away most of my stuff to the Zone Distribution Centre, because she waved me farewell and hung up.

  Not having much to do, I’m in the park, just outside my block. I have time to rethink my life, the pleasures I had, the mistakes I made. I’m bathing in the early afternoon sunshine, waiting for families to arrive. To trick myself into feeling connected, though in reality it seems there is less and less that can connect me to others. I’ve come to realise Philip was right. I have thought through his words, his behaviour over the years, his resistance to starting a family, his bleak view of this society. What I interpreted as pessimism, I now see as wisdo
m; what seemed selfishness, I realise was caring. How lonely he must have been! Married to me but unable to find solace, to share the terror he felt.

  In the distance a woman, slightly younger than I am, is approaching the playground slowly, to give her daughter time to catch up. The girl has Down syndrome. They walk to the corner of the playground, to the secluded, fenced area half-hidden by the bushes. On the gate is a large non-profit sign. The first thought that runs through my head is how lonely it must be for that poor girl, having to play alone. But the wooden fence, with colourful baby animals, birds and yellow suns painted on it, will probably cheer her up.

  As I see them approaching, I turn my head away, as any decent person would. It’s not proper to stare. Of course, there are people who will not only stare but openly jeer. Fortunately, they’re a small minority.

  I, like millions in the country, regularly watch a show called Heartless, which reveals the shocking facts of how handicapped children live. It always brings tears to my eyes, and thousands of viewers call in after each show, protesting against the parents, asking for stricter measures. Money is not the most important thing, as the presenters of Heartless always take care to emphasise. These parents work hard, especially the single mothers, to support their children. They are misguided, believing that if they contribute to their child’s Right To Reside, they can solve the problem. They don’t understand that it’s not about being non-profit, it’s not about money at all.

  At the beginning of the new system, many of these children were placed straight in Junior Dignitoriums. Thousands of parents protested and demanded the demolition of Junior Dignitoriums and equal treatment for their children. Of course, this couldn’t be granted, given that the new system is based on fairness. Non-profit people can’t just exploit useful members of society; otherwise we would end up back in the old system. No one wants that. But their wishes were taken seriously and another option was introduced. Kids who will never grow up to be useful contributors can be supported by their parents, even when they grow up, so long as their families are earning their Right To Reside. If the parent doesn’t want the child or can’t afford it, the child is sent to the Junior Dignitorium. It’s like earthly paradise there, as they say in Heartless.