Jen stared at him for a long, silent moment then touched his hand. Cantril closed his fingers around hers.
“What do you want to become in space when you get there?” he asked.
“You mean what do I want to be when I grow up?” She laughed. “I don’t know. I’m starting to think I might do more good here, with you and the others.”
Suddenly Cantril clenched her shirt and pulled her close, facing him.
“You listen good, Jennifer Cable. You get a chance to go to space, you fucking go! Too damn many of us don’t have chances or choices. Some of us do but we don’t know it till too late. Any single one of us who got the same chance you do we fucking take it and piss on everybody else!”
She twisted free and pushed him away.
“Because I want something from you,” he said. “I didn’t know what then, but I do now.”
“What could you possibly want from me?” She heard the anger in her voice.
“I want a promise. I want you to swear that you’ll get out of here. You’re going to get out of this ghetto shit-heap and never look back.”
“Did you ever think that might be exactly the problem? People leave and don’t come back?”
“Would you want to? Back here? What for?”
“To change it.”
He snorted. “You can’t. I can’t. People keep trying, but it’s like there’s some law of conservation of shit that keeps everything the same.” He shook his head. “Time for debate later. Right now, the safest place for you is back at that school of yours.”
The polyversity looked like a city in miniature with its turrets and lights. A sanctuary. Jen felt as though she had been on a long journey and now she had come home.
“Impressive-looking place,” Cantril said.
“Have you ever been inside?”
“No. Looks like a prison, in a way.”
Jen did not agree. School in no way resembled the jail she had been in, except in the procession of corridors. She said nothing, sensing that Cantril would not really understand. They continued on in silence until they reached one of the A Level entrances.
“I go in here,” Jen said.
Cantril sighed and looked skyward. After several seconds he smiled at her. “Remember your promise.”
Jen fumbled for her ID. She didn’t have it. In frustration, she searched her pockets again knowing it wasn’t there. Finally she just stared at the blinking display. A sudden grunt and a sound like a heavy sack hitting the ground came from behind her. Jen turned and saw Cantril sprawled on the pavement, Warren standing over him. She pounded on the door. Warren grabbed her arms and yanked her away.
Warren unlocked the apartment door, kicked it open, and hurled her onto the hallway. The door clicked shut and then there was silence. Jen stared at the pattern of grain in the dark wood floor.
Warren stepped toward her. Jen caught her breath and did not move. She closed her eyes, waiting. Warren walked by her and on down the hallway. Jen looked up and saw him heading for the kitchen.
She heard the refrigerator door, the delicate rattle of bottles in racks, the rubbery slap as the door shut. Warren popped the tab on a can of beer and reappeared in the doorway. He stared at her and took a long pull on the beer.
He walked up and squatted before her. He drank again, his face unreadable. She refused to cry, clamped down on her fear with grim determination, and said nothing.
“You filed a legal separation request,” he said. “I found out last night. That bitch from the school did it on your behalf. ‘Institutional privilege,’ she said. It’s not binding yet, ’cause you ain’t signed anything, but she’s got a police alert out lookin’ for you. They say they can take you away from me. Separation. That’s cold, Jenny. Real cold.” He sighed and held up the can. “I’m drinking again. See that?”
Confused, she frowned and started to ask why he was drinking. Then she realized that he was blaming her, that his disgust was for her. Emotions competed inside her. Resentment, pity, anger. Not one of them sufficient to really define the bitter moil of feelings twisting inside her.
“All my life,” he said, “I’ve worked my ass off. I’ve been killing myself for you! What do you do? File for separation!” His mouth twisted.
She thought he was about to spit at her. Instead he lunged for her. She tried to jump out of reach, but he seized her shoulders. She screamed. He slapped her. She screamed again.
“Shut up!” He threw her against the wall. The wind left her lungs and she gasped. He dragged her down the hallway to his bedroom. Panic jellied her core. “You want a separation?” He kicked the door open. “Separate yourself from this!” He shoved her into the room.
Melissa sat up in the bed. Her eyes were open, staring straight ahead. Jen blinked, started to say something, then saw the pool of red in which her mother sat. The sheets were soaked. Jen staggered.
Her father grabbed a handful of her hair and pulled her head back.
“Don’t scream,” he said in a hoarse whisper. “No point. She won’t hear you.”
He let her go and walked back into the kitchen. She heard him get another can of beer.
Jen looked at the body. She felt far away, not really connected to what was happening. She tried to remember her mother alive, talking and moving, but it was a blur, an abstract of life. Her mother existed parenthetically around Warren, in partial context. Jen found it curious that what she saw now would probably be the clearest memory she ever had of her mother. Melissa’s life had been informed by the vacuity of her husband’s presence. The less Warren did, the faster Melissa had hustled to make him appear the core of their family. Warren had often grown tired and angry at her constant moth-like fluttering. It appeared that he had finally pinned her to the wall, turning her into the display he had always wanted her to be.
My mother is dead, she thought; this is real, this has happened. The safe distance between her mind and her world had closed. She threw up. When she straightened and wiped her mouth, though, the panic was gone. Jen went into the kitchen. Warren sat at the table, a beer in his hand, one of his beloved pamphlets open on the table.
“Why?” Jen asked.
Warren looked up at her. He shrugged. “She wanted a divorce. After everything we’ve been through, she wanted to leave me.” He shook his head and looked baffled. “I told her, I said that it wasn’t right, wasn’t natural. She wouldn’t listen. Said she already had a lawyer and was filing the papers.” He drew a deep breath. “That wasn’t right of you to hit Jerry on the head like that. What with everything else, I figured you’d make for that damn school.”
“You just murdered my mother.”
Warren frowned. “Till death do us part.” He raised the beer in mock toast and upended the can. He scowled at it and tossed it aside. He went to the refrigerator for another.
Jen shivered and tucked her hands in her jacket pockets. Her right hand encountered something hard and cold. She wrapped her fingers around it.
There was no thought, no hesitation. He opened the door of the refrigerator, and she pulled the blade from her pocket. He slid a can from its slot, and she opened the blade with a simple push of her thumb. He closed the door, and she took a step toward him.
He turned.
Too quickly. He bounced the can off her head and grabbed for the knife. She twisted, trying to bring the blade into his forearm, but he wrenched her sideways. She kicked blindly, connected and was rewarded with a heavy grunt from Warren. His grip loosened. She tore her arm away and lunged. Her arm jarred with the impact; she pulled back and wiped at her eyes.
Warren stood in the center of the kitchen staring down at the blood flowing from the stab wound in his left side, just below his ribs. Jen glanced down at the knife. Its black surface was covered by crimson liquid. She wanted to run, but the instant she considered it she knew she could not. This had to be finished now. She drew back the knife and rushed him.
She slashed this time. The blade caught him on the cheek and continued do
wn, across his chest from clavicle to ribs. Warren spasmed then lashed out with his arm. He struck her face. She spun around, lost her balance, and hit the wall. The knife fell to the floor. Warren slammed the palm of his hand into her chest. Jen flew away from him, into the hallway. Before she could get to her feet he was there. He grabbed her throat and lifted her. She gagged and scratched at his hands. Distantly, she heard knocking at the door.
His eyes bulged in rage. He took her into the bedroom and threw her onto the bed. Her mother’s corpse slid over on top of her. Jen pushed at it frantically. Warren was there then, shoving the body off the bed. Jen held up her arms to defend herself. He punched her in the stomach.
He straddled her. Reflexively, she jerked her legs up and slammed her knees into his crotch. He bellowed as he fell to one side. Jen scrambled off the bed, over her mother’s body, and to the door.
She crawled on all fours across the slick hallway floor now stained with her father’s blood.
“You fuckin’ bitch!”
She saw the knife under the kitchen table. She made for it, stretched a hand out. A hand clamped her left ankle. She kicked back without looking. The hand loosened, she kicked again, then found her footing and scrambled crab-like for the knife. Her hand closed on it just as the table was overturned.
Jen rolled. Warren loomed above her, reaching. She gripped the knife in both hands and swung it at him. The blade crossed his throat. Blood splashed her.
Warren staggered back, hands grasping at the wound. Blood flowed through his fingers.
A sound like a trash compactor filled the hallway.
“Let me see your hands!” thundered an amplified voice, too large and sharp in the small space.
Warren turned. He dropped to his knees, seemed held motionless for a few moments, then fell forward.
Jen heard boots, muffled conversation. Someone appeared in the doorway. All she saw was black armor, a shiny plastic faceplate, and the ugly shape of an automatic rifle. Then the armor stepped into the room. Behind it was another one.
“Miss—?”
Jen frowned. “Cantril—?”
“Somebody get the meds here.” The armor moved closer to her, leaned in. Jen saw her reflection in the faceplate and wondered abstractedly if she really was that small.
Snow fell. The light was flat gray and diffuse, reducing the colors of the street to charcoal smudges and murky shadows. This was the right area, the right street. Maybe. She had been searching for a few hours now. She was about to give up and return to the school when Cantril stepped out of a gangway.
“I’m flattered,” he said, grinning. “Came all this way to see me?”
“Hi, Cantril.”
“You look a lot better. Getting more sleep?”
“Starting to, yes.”
“Still heading to space?”
Jen grunted. “I don’t have a choice now. I could become a ward of the state or let Ella Preston assume guardianship.”
Cantril shrugged. “As long as you get what you want, does it matter how?”
“I used to think that way, but—” Jen sat down on a nearby stoop. “I wanted to go to the orbitals to get away from my parents. It seemed the only place where they could never reach me.”
“And now that they’re both dead you don’t know why you want to go.” He sat down next to her. “If I could leave I would. Just to get a change of scenery, you know?”
Jen smiled. “I came here to say thank you.”
Cantril held open his hand and after a second Jen took it. He squeezed gently.
“You’re coming back, aren’t you?” There was hope and resignation in his voice, but not disappointment.
“You’re the one who taught me that gravity works.”
Cantril laughed loudly. They sat together afterward in silence watching the snow trace innumerable, unpredictable, and inevitable paths through the air.
Gravity Box and Other Spaces Page 31