The Heart Goes Last

by Margaret Atwood

  III | SWITCH

  GATEWAY

  Getting into the Positron Project won't be a slam dunk. They aren't interested in just anyone, as Charmaine whispers to Stan on the bus that's picked them up from the parking-lot collection point. Some of the people on the bus can't possibly make it into the Project, they're too worn down and leathery, with blackened or missing teeth. Stan wonders if there's a dental plan in there. So far there's nothing wrong with his own teeth; lucky, considering all the cheap sugary crap they've been eating.

  Sandi and Veronica are on the bus too, sitting at the back and nibbling on the sackful of cold chicken wings they've brought with them. Every once in a while they laugh, a little too loudly. Everyone on this bus is nervous, Charmaine especially. "What if we get rejected?" she asks Stan. "What if we get accepted?" She says it's like being picked for sports teams when she was at school: you're nervous either way.

  The bus trip goes on for hours, in a steady drizzle; through open countryside, past strip malls with plywood over most of the windows, derelict burger joints. Only the gas stations appear functional. After a while Charmaine falls asleep with her head on Stan's shoulder. His arm is around her; he draws her closer. He too dozes off.

  He's awake by the time the bus stops at a gateway in a high black-glass wall. Solar generation, thinks Stan. Smart, building it in like that. The group on the bus wakes, stretches, descends. It's late afternoon; as if on cue, mellow sunlight breaks through the clouds, lighting them in a golden glow. Many are smiling. They file in past the seeing-eye boundary, then through the entrance cubicle, where their eyes are scanned and their fingerprints taken and a plastic passcard with a number on it and a barcode is issued to each of them.

  Back on the bus, they're driven through the town of Consilience, where the Project is located. Charmaine says she can hardly believe her eyes: everything is so spruced up, it's like a picture. Like a town in a movie, a movie of years ago. Like the olden days, before anyone was born. She squeezes Stan's hand in anticipation, and he squeezes back. "This is the right thing to do," she says.

  They get off the bus in front of the Harmony Hotel, which is not only the top hotel in town, says the neatly dressed young man who's now in charge of them, it's the only hotel, because Consilience isn't exactly a tourist destination. He herds them into a preliminary drinks and snacks party in the ballroom. "You're free to leave at any time," he tells them, "if you don't like the ambience." He grins, to show this is a joke.

  --

  Because what's not to like about the ambience? Stan rolls an olive around in his mouth before chewing: it's a long time since he's had an olive. The taste is distracting. He should be more alert, because naturally they're being scrutinized, though it's hard to figure out who's doing it. Everyone is so fucking nice! The niceness is like the olive: it's a long time since Stan has encountered that muffling layer of smiling and nodding. Who knew he's such a fascinating dude? Not him, but there are three women, obvious hostesses, they even have name badges, deployed to convince him of his own magnetism. He scans the room: there's Charmaine, getting a similar treatment from two dudes and a girl. Her slutty hooker friends from PixelDust are in that group too. They've fixed themselves up, they even have dresses on. You wouldn't really spot them as pros.

  Throughout the evening, the crowd gets thinner - a discreet weeding, Stan guesses. All those with bad attitudes, out the Discard door. But Stan and Charmaine must have passed scrutiny, because here they still are, at the end of the party. Everyone remaining is given a room reservation, for later. They also get a meal voucher, with a carafe of wine included, and another young man steers them toward a restaurant called Together, just down the street.

  There's an old-fashioned tune playing in the background, white tablecloths, a plush carpet.

  "Oh, Stan," Charmaine breathes at him over the electric candles on their table for two. "It's like a dream come true!" She picks up the rose from their bud vase, sniffs it.

  It's not real, Stan wants to tell her. But why spoil it for her? She's so happy.

  That night they stay at the Harmony Hotel. Charmaine has two baths, she gets so turned on by the towels. Less so by him, Stan guesses; but still, she comes across for him, so why complain? "There," she says afterwards. "Isn't this better than the back seat of the car?" If they commit to the Positron Project, she says, they can kiss that horrible car goodbye and good riddance, and the vandals and thieves can tear it apart, because they themselves won't need it any more.

  NIGHT OUT

  The next day, the workshops begin. After the first one, they'll still be free to leave, they are told. In fact, they'll have to leave because Positron wants you to take a good look at the alternatives before deciding. As they have good reason to know, it's a festering scrap heap, out beyond the Consilience gates. People are starving. Scavenging, pilfering, dumpster-diving. Is that any way for a human being to live? So each one of them will spend what the Positron Project hopes - what it sincerely hopes! - will be their last night on the outside. To give them time to think it over, seriously. The Project isn't interested in freeloaders, tourists just trying it out. The Project wants serious commitment.

  Because after that night you were either out or you were in. In was permanent. But no one would force you. If you signed up, it would be of your own free will.

  --

  The first day's workshop is mostly PowerPoints. It begins with videos of the town of Consilience, with happy people at work in it, doing ordinary jobs: butcher, baker, plumber, scooter repair, and so on. Then there are videos of the Positron Prison inside Consilience, with happy people at work in it as well, each one of them wearing an orange boiler suit. Stan only half watches: he already knows they're going to sign the commitment papers tomorrow, because Charmaine has her heart set on it. Despite the slightly uneasy feeling he's had - they've both had, because Charmaine said at breakfast, with lattes and real grapefruit, "Honey, are you sure?" - the bath towels clinched the deal.

  --

  Their night outside the wall is spent in a nasty motel that Stan wagers has been tailored for the purpose, with the furniture trashed to order, stale cigarette smell sprayed on, cockroaches imported, and sounds of violent revelry in the room next door, most likely a recording. But it's enough like the real thing to make the world inside the Consilience wall seem more desirable than ever. Most likely it is the real thing, because why fake it when there's so much actual wreckage available?

  In view of the racket and the lumpy mattress they have trouble getting to sleep, so Stan hears the tapping at the window immediately. "Yo! Stan!"

  Fuck, now what? He draws back the ragged curtain, peers cautiously out. It's Conor, with his two looming sidekicks watching his back.

  "Conor!" he says. "What the fuck?" At least it's Con and not some lunatic with a crowbar.

  "Hi, bro," says Con. "Come out. I need to talk to you."

  "Fuck, now?" Stan says.

  "Would I say need if I didn't need?"

  "Honey, what is it?" says Charmaine, holding the sheet up to her chin.

  "It's only my brother," says Stan. He's pulling on his clothes.

  "Conor? Why is he here?" She doesn't like Con, she never has; she thinks he's a bad influence who will lead Stan astray, as if he's that easy to lead. Con might get him into behaviour she doesn't approve of, like too much drinking, and darker stuff she'll never elaborate on, but she most likely means whores. "Don't go out there, Stan, he might -"

  "I can handle it," says Stan. "He's my brother, for fuck's sake!"

  "Don't leave me alone in here!" she says fearfully. "It's too scary! Wait, I'll come with you!" Is this an act, to keep him tethered so Con can't spirit him away to a den of vice?

  "You stay in bed, honey. I'll be right out outside," he says with what he hopes is gentle reassurance. Muffled sniffling from the bed. Trust Con to turn up and mess with everyone's head.

  Stan slides himself out the door. "What?" he says as irritably as he can manage.

 
"Don't sign in to that thing," says Conor. He's close to whispering. "Trust me on it. You don't want to."

  "How'd you know where to find me?" says Stan.

  "What's a phone for? I gave it to you! So I traced it, dum-dum. I tracked you on that bus, all the way here. Lesson one, don't take phones from strangers," says Conor, grinning.

  "You're not a fucking stranger," says Stan.

  "Right. So, I'm telling you straight up. Don't trust that package, no matter what they tell you."

  "Why not?" says Stan. "What's wrong with it?"

  "What's wrong with it is, unless you're top management, you can't get out. Except in a box, feet first," says Conor. "I'm just looking out for you, is all."

  "What're you trying to tell me?"

  "You don't know what goes on in there," says Con.

  "Meaning what? Meaning you do?"

  "I've heard stuff," says Conor. "It's not for you. Nice guys finish last. Or else they get finished. You're too soft."

  Stan juts out his chin. That would have been the signal for a scuffle, once upon a time. "You're fucking paranoid," he says.

  "Yeah, right. Don't say I didn't warn you," says Con. "Do yourself a favour, stay outside. Listen, you're family. I'll help you out, the same as you helped me. You need a job, some cash, a favour, you know where I am. You're always welcome. And the little lady, bring her along too." Con grins. "There's a place for her, any time."

  So that's it. Con has his poacher's eye on Charmaine. No fucking way in hell is Stan falling for that one. "Thanks, buddy," he says. "I appreciate it. I'll think about it."

  "Like shit," says Conor, but he smiles cheerfully, and the two of them do the back pat.

  "Stan?" comes the anxious voice of Charmaine from inside their room.

  "Go comfort the little wifey," says Conor, and Stan knows what he's thinking: pussy-whipped.

  He watches Con walking away, with his two bodyguards; they get into a long black car, which slides off into the night, silent as a submarine. Most likely the same car he saw at the trailer park. Guys like Con who score some money always want cars like that.

  Not that Stan would mind having such a car himself.

  TWIN CITY

  The next morning they take the final step. Stan barely even read the terms and conditions, because Charmaine is so eager to get in. After all, they've been chosen, she says, and so many have been rejected. She smiles mistily at Stan as he signs his name on the form. "Oh, thank you," she says. "I feel so safe."

  Then the workshops begin in earnest; or, as one of the leaders quips, they've had the shop, now they're getting the work. They are about to learn so many astounding new things, and it will require their full concentration. Men's workshops over here, ladies' over there, because there will be different challenges and duties and expectations for each, and besides, they'll be separated for a month at a time when they're in the prison part of this project - a feature that will be explained more fully to them shortly - so they might as well start getting used to it, their first workshop leader says with a chuckle. Anyway, abstinence makes the heart grow fonder, as he is sure they know from experience. Another chuckle.

  Be a loner, get a boner, thinks Stan. A rhyme of teenaged Conor, who'd had a collection of rhymes like that. He watches as Charmaine and all of the other women in the group leave the room. Sandi and Veronica don't look back, but Charmaine does. She smiles brightly at Stan to show him she's confident about their decision, though she looks a little anxious. But then, he's a little anxious himself. What are these astounding new things they're about to learn?

  --

  The men's workshop leaders are half a dozen young, earnest, dark-suited, zit-picking graduates of some globally funded think tank's motivational-speaking program. In his past life, the part of it he'd spent at Dimple Robotics, Stan encountered the type. He disliked them before; but, as before, they can't be avoided, since the workshop classes are mandatory.

  In a jam-packed day of back-to-back sessions, they're given the full song and dance. The rationale for Consilience, its history, the potential obstacles to it, the odds ranged against it, and why it is so imperative that those odds be overcome.

  The Consilience/Positron twin city is an experiment. An ultra, ultra important experiment; the think-tankers use the word ultra at least ten times. If it succeeds - and it has to succeed, and it can succeed if they all work together - it could be the salvation, not only of the many regions that have been so hard-hit in recent times but eventually, if this model comes to be adopted at the highest levels, of the nation as a whole. Unemployment and crime solved in one fell swoop, with a new life for all those concerned - think about that!

  They themselves, the incoming Positron Planners - they're heroic! They've chosen to risk themselves, to take a gamble on the brighter side of human nature, to chart unknown territories within the psyche. They're like the early pioneers, blazing a trail, clearing a way to the future: a future that will be more secure, more prosperous, and just all-round better because of them! Posterity will revere them. That's the spiel. Stan has never heard so much bullshit in his life. On the other hand, he sort of wants to believe it.

  --

  The final speaker is older than the zitty youths, though not that much older. His suit is of the same darkness, but it looks lusher. He's narrow-shouldered, long torso, short legs; short hair too, clippered around the neck, combed back. The look says: I am buttoned-down.

  There's a woman with him, also in a dark suit, with straight black hair and bangs and a squarish jaw; no makeup, but she does have earrings. Her legs are good though muscular. She sits to the side, fooling with her cellphone. Is she an assistant? It isn't clear. Stan pegs her as butch. Technically she shouldn't have been here, in the men's sessions, and Stan wonders why she is. Still, better to look at her than at the guy.

  The guy begins by saying they should call him Ed. Ed hopes they're feeling comfortable, because they know - as he does! - that they've made the right choice.

  Now he would like to give them - share with them - a deeper peek behind the scenes. It was a struggle to get the multiple permissions needed to set up the Positron enterprise. The powers that be did not decide easily; more than one policy guru's ass was on the line (he smirks a little at his own daring use of the word ass), as witness the howling when the scheme was first announced in the press. The spokesmen, or rather the spokespersons - Ed glances at the woman, who smiles - have braved a lot of indignant screaming from the online radicals and malcontents who claim that Consilience/Positron is an infringement of individual liberties, an attempt at total social control, an insult to the human spirit. Nobody is more dedicated to individual liberties than Ed is, but as they all know - here Ed gives a conspiratorial smile - you can't eat your so-called individual liberties, and the human spirit pays no bills, and something needed to be done to relieve the pressure inside the social pressure-cooker. Wouldn't they agree?

  The woman in the suit glances up. What's she looking at? Her gaze sweeps over them, calm, cool. Then she turns back to her cellphone. Without a phone himself, Stan feels naked: they'd had to turn in their cells at the beginning of the workshop. They've been promised new ones, but those will work only inside the wall. Stan wonders when the new ones will be issued.

  Ed lowers his voice: serious stuff coming up. Sure enough, on comes a PowerPoint with a slew of graphs. The financial big guns have concealed the true statistics to avoid panic, he says, but a shocking 40 percent of the population in this region is jobless, with 50 percent of those being under twenty-five. That's a recipe for systems breakdown, right there: for anarchy, for chaos, for the senseless destruction of property, for so-called revolution, which means looting and gang rule and warlords and mass rape, and the terrorization of the weak and helpless. That is the grim prospect staring everyone in this area right between the eyes. They've already noticed the symptoms for themselves, which is - he is sure - why they saw the desirability of signing in.

  What can be done? Ed asks, wri
nkling his brows. How to keep the lid on? Which it was in the interests of society at large to do, as they would surely agree. At the official leadership level, ideas were running out fast. There is only so much manpower and tax revenue that can be devoted to riot control, to social surveillance, to chasing fast youths down dark alleyways, to fire-hosing and pepper-spraying suspicious-looking gatherings. Too many once-bustling cities are stagnant or derelict, especially in the northeast, but other states are being hard hit, especially where long droughts have taken their toll. Too many of the disenfranchised are living in abandoned cars or subway tunnels or even in culverts. There's an epidemic of drugging and boozing: suicide-grade alcohol, skin-blistering drugs that kill you in under a year. Oblivion is increasingly attractive to the young, and even to the middle-aged, since why retain your brain when no amount of thinking can even begin to solve the problem? It isn't even a problem, it's beyond a problem. It's more like a looming collapse. Is their once-beautiful region, their once-beautiful country, doomed to be a wasteland of poverty and debris?

  At first the solution was to build more prisons and cram more people into them, but that soon became prohibitively expensive. (Here Ed flicks through a few more slides.) Not only that, it resulted in platoons of prison graduates with professional-grade criminal skills they were more than willing to exercise once they were back in the outside world. Even when the prisons were privatized, even when the prisoners were rented out as unpaid labour to international business interests, the cost-benefit charts did not improve, because American slave workers couldn't outperform the slave workers in other countries. Competitiveness in the slave labour market was linked to the price of food, and Americans - who remain goodhearted despite everything, stray-puppy-rescuers every one - here Ed smiles indulgently, contemptuously - weren't ready to starve their prisoners to death while working them to the bone. No matter how much the prisoners were vilified by the politicians and the press as filthy dregs and toxic scum, still, heaps of stick-legged corpses can't be hidden from view indefinitely. The odd unexplained death, maybe - there has always been the odd unexplained death, says Ed, shrugging - but not heaps. Some snoop would make a phone video; such things can escape despite the best attempts to keep things under hatches, and who knows what sort of uproar, not to mention uprising, might result?