Fearful Symmetry

by C F Dunn

  “They can do that?”

  “Yeah, sure they can,” Joel said. “Every time you use your cell for a call, to text, or browsing the web, you leave a signal that’s traceable. We – they – can listen in to conversations, know your whereabouts, who you’ve talked to, what’s your favourite takeout. Smartphones hand all that info on a plate.”

  “So I’ll simply not use it,” I said, reaching into my bag.

  Matthew shook his head. “That would register as a change in behaviour, which is as good as saying ‘I know you’re watching’, which is the last thing we want.”

  “Then… then I’ll switch the blasted thing off, or remove the battery,” I said, cross at being thwarted by something as mundane as a wretched phone.

  “Which will also alert them. Who does that nowadays? Just use it as normal, but restrict your calls to asking me to get some diapers at the store and any other day-to-day stuff. You know the sort of thing. For anything else – for emergencies – we’ll use burners.”

  “Burners?”

  “Yeah,” Joel answered. “Burner phones. They’re not registered to a person or network so are more difficult to trace. Ideal for single use – like if we have to contact each other in a hurry. But nothing else – nothing routine that forms a pattern of behaviour that can be traced to you.”

  “And damn your constitutional rights,” I uttered under my breath. Joel raised a quizzical brow, but Matthew obviously remembered the conversation he and I had shared before my trial. He clasped the tops of my arms as he bent his head to look at me directly. “Emma, we always knew this was a possibility.”

  I squeezed my fists, making my knuckles crack. “I know.”

  “Joel will replace the tracker where he found it. With any luck they will think your actions today were just those of an overanxious mother, that’s all, but we need to warn the rest of the family. If they have tags on us – whoever they are – they’ll be watching the others. You, too, Joel.”

  Unlocking his arms from his broad chest, Joel gave a sharp nod. “I’ll get on to it. We need to know who’s set this up, and if it’s one of the agencies, I’ll track it down.”

  “Can you get anti-surveillance devices? And we should establish a perimeter – something that will buy us some time if it’s breached.”

  “I know the system – uses physical sensors at the outset, with thermal cameras and GPS for accuracy, and video to confirm intrusion. Set up monitors in the kitchen and it’ll give you what you need to make a quick decision.”

  “Good.”

  “And I’ll pick up a couple of automatic weapons just in case of…”

  “No!” Matthew brought the flat of his hand against the table with a crack, making the air shake. “There will be no guns.”

  With a puzzled frown, Joel said, “Hey, I know you don’t like them, but they’ll as sure as hell be armed, and…”

  “I said no guns.”

  “Why?” Joel demanded. “You always taught us to defend ourselves in whatever way we can. You could stop ’em before they get up too close, buy that time you said you need. They’re the ones doing the attacking. They are the enemy.”

  Matthew levelled a stare at him. “And does my enemy suffer any less because he is my enemy? Killing is too easy as it is. No guns, Joel. No. Guns.”

  It looked as if Joel might push the point, but instead he lifted his hands in acceptance. “OK, sure. If that’s the way you want it.”

  “I do,” Matthew said. “It might also make them less inclined to open fire on us. Bullets are indiscriminate in whom they kill.” His glance fell on the baby, and a shiver of fear cooled my skin. “Now, there’s much to be done and we’d better get started.”

  The tension left Joel’s shoulders and he relaxed into a half-smile. “Yeah, there is. I’ll see to it.” Theo had crawled to Joel’s legs and now hauled himself upright on his wobbly pins. Joel bent to pick him up. “Hey, little fella. We can’t have your mom and dad running around the country missing Thanksgiving, can we?” He bopped foreheads with the baby, who gave his customary laugh, his eyes crinkling like his father’s and making my heart lurch.

  “As for Thanksgiving,” Matthew said, “this gives us all the more reason to gather as usual. We’ll make a show of our normality, but we’d better start making preparations.”

  Joel grimaced. “Just in case, huh?”

  “Indeed.” Matthew smiled – a tight, restrained smile. “Just in case.”

  “This is it – this is what it’s always been like for you, isn’t it? This watching and waiting and running.”

  Joel had left us with a promise he would be in touch as soon as he learned anything, and now Matthew looked around the study as if trying to record this moment before it passed into history, like all the other moments before. The brass lantern clock I had given him as a wedding present marked the minutes before he replied.

  “This feels different. Perhaps it’s because the children are so young, or that we’re settled here. Or that for the first time in my life I have someone without whom I cannot face tomorrow.” He canted his head and gave me an odd look filled with pain and regret and longing. “For centuries I’ve searched for the reason for my continued existence in the hope I can find a cure for this life. But now I don’t want to. I want to live, Emma; I want to live for you and our children, and our children’s children. And I’m scared. God forgive me, but I am scared that something or someone will take me from you.” He looked away and, hearing the break in his father’s voice, Theo grizzled. Matthew picked him up and hid his face in his son’s baby hair, murmuring softly to him until he settled. Only then did I realize how vulnerable Matthew felt and that I – we – were the reason for that vulnerability. My heart twisted in bittersweet joy.

  “Daddy?” Rosie must have slipped into the study unseen, as pinch-faced, she now tugged at his arm. He knelt down, and held her to him. Clasping Ottery, her thumb found its way to her mouth.

  “It’s all right, sweetheart. There’s nothing to be worried about.” He kissed her hair and then her brother’s forehead, and stood up. “What have you been making upstairs? Would you like to show us?”

  “A castle,” she replied, taking her thumb from her mouth with a soft “pop”. “A castle with walls and a moat and a… a gatehouse where no one can get us. Come and see.”

  “That’s good, Rosie,” he said, his eyes meeting mine over Theo’s head. “That sounds perfect.”

  CHAPTER

  16

  Exit Strategy

  When everything you’ve taken for granted suddenly seems to be coming to an end, it brings things into focus. You develop an awareness, as if the mundane veil of the everyday slips, and for the first time, you see what you have to lose, what is at stake. Faced with an uncertain future, you cling to the familiar, while all the time noting each indicator of change – and dreading it. This weight that now fell on us – as thick as smog, and as dulling – sucked joy from our lives as we went about projecting an image of normality, and I felt so disjointed, all at sea. And yet life went on around us – hope, and light, and joy.

  “I left it over there.” Elena waved a hand in the direction of her desk. “On top of the other papers, I think. Wait, I will look.”

  “Stay there,” I motioned, and she flopped back into her chair. I sifted through the pile of articles as she watched me wearily.

  “I do not know how women stand this. My ankles, they swell, and I feel like a morzh, a… a wal-rus. Matias says I look beautiful – like his little Russian doll – but then he does not have this to carry around…” She indicated her pronounced bump. “Well, maybe a little,” she relented, with a hint of an impish smile. “He eats enough for two…”

  “Are you taking my name in vain again?” Matias asked, pushing the door open wide with his foot while balancing a cup on top of the plastic crates he carried. “Emma, sorry, didn’t know you were here, or I’d have brought you some tea.”

  I found the article, took the tea from the crate
s before it spilled, and handed it to Elena. “Thanks, but I’ll get some later. I’ll leave you two in peace.”

  Plonking the crates down, Matias wiped his forehead with his sleeve. “Don’t go because of me. We don’t see enough of you as it is, and it’s likely to be less in the future.”

  I looked at him sharply. “Why?”

  “When this little one is born, I mean,” he said, patting Elena’s stomach. She grimaced and pried herself from the chair. “I want to go the bathroom again,” she moaned. “Don’t go away, da? I want to know what you think of my article.”

  I flipped the magazine open, found Elena’s piece, and began to read as Matias stacked her books and folders into the crates. I read the first page, then the second, aware he kept throwing me glances. “Like to borrow my reading glasses?” he offered.

  “No, thanks, I’m fine.” I read on, engrossed in popular culture in Soviet society.

  He snapped the plastic lid on one of the crates and eased off the next. “Wearing contacts nowadays, then? Or have you had laser surgery?”

  “Oh, no, neither.” I pulled at my lip, thinking, and turned the page. So many similarities with my own period of history. How little people changed.

  Matias had ceased sorting and stacking. He nodded slowly. “Yeah, I noticed you don’t seem to have sight problems any more.” I fumbled and dropped the magazine. Matias cocked his head. “You OK, Emma?”

  “Yes, fine. Why do you ask?”

  “You seem a bit twitchy – Matthew, too. Only, Elena and I… we wondered whether everything’s all right between you. Demanding job, marriage, kids – it can get on top of you.” He continued when I didn’t answer. “Must be tough teaching Rosie at home – not much time to yourselves. You can talk to ol’ Uncle Mat if you ever need to – expert in all things extraordinaire in the bedroom department, if you know what I mean.”

  “Has Matthew said anything?” I asked, bending to pick up the magazine from the floor, and buying thinking time.

  “No, but then he never does, which is why I thought you might.”

  “Oh.”

  “He seems more edgy and he’s upped the pace in the lab again – everyone’s feeling it. He’s really pushing to get this project finished. I’m guessing something’s on his mind. Not seen him like this since, well, since that trouble you had, you know, when you went back to the UK to recover from the attack. He was devastated when you left, Em, like his whole world had collapsed.”

  My throat tightened at the memory of the pain I’d unwittingly caused. I coughed lightly to loosen my vocal cords. “No, we’re fine, really. The project’s important to him, Matias. You know what he’s like – can’t rest until it’s done. I’m sure it’s nothing more than that.”

  “If you say so.” His voice softened. “Just remember, if you ever need someone to talk to…”

  The words blurred on the page in front of me. Don’t cry; for goodness sake you mustn’t cry. “Yes, thanks.”

  “Because you two are the closest thing we have to best buddies. I mean it, Emma; we don’t want to see you fall apart.” I felt his hand on my shoulder, heard the concern in his voice, and I wanted to tell him, I wanted to share the burden. But I couldn’t; it wouldn’t be fair. They had their lives to lead and deserved to do it in ignorance and peace, no matter what happened in our own. Blow, I’d miss them.

  “Hey, it’s all right.” He put his arms around me, a little awkwardly at first, and then more firmly as he felt me shake. “I don’t know what’s going on, but I don’t like to see my friends in trouble. If you need anything, you know where to come, don’t you?” He held me at arm’s length, his rumpled face kind. “Promise me?”

  I sniffed, not meeting his eyes, and nodded to placate him, and hearing Elena’s voice greeting a student outside her door, quickly reassembled my features into a smile. “I must go and leave you to it,” I said, swiftly kissing her cheek as she came in. “Great article, by the way. And thanks, Matias.” I squeezed his arm as I passed.

  “Don’t you forget now,” he warned as I collected my things.

  “I won’t,” I said.

  “Good afternoon, Professor.”

  I looked up from my laptop. “Aydin, hello. Didn’t you get my message about this afternoon’s tutorial?”

  “Evet, but I wanted to see you, if you have moment. I have had response from government. They say I am to be granted citizenship after all.”

  I surprised him by flinging my arms around him. “That’s brilliant news – the best. Now you can complete your doctorate without interruption. Oh…” I stopped as a thought struck me.

  “Professor?”

  “It’s nothing; it doesn’t matter.” But it did. Who would supervise his thesis, if not me? It had taken him years to get this far and he had only narrowly missed being deported. “I’m sorry, Aydin.”

  His face drew into a frown. “I do not understand…”

  I opened my mouth, but decided my news would spoil his special day. Telling him about our plans to move could wait until after Thanksgiving. “I’ll tell you another time. Nothing to worry about.” I smiled. “Are you celebrating your new status?”

  “Of course! It is Thanksgiving and I have much to be thankful for. You will have celebration too?”

  “We will.” I switched off my laptop.

  “How is my little gül? And Theo?”

  “Very well, thank you, and Rosie’s mulberry tree is twice as tall as she is. I’ve made you some jam, as I promised. We had loads of mulberries; it’s been a good year.”

  “That is good,” he beamed. “I think your fish is looking after you.”

  Fingering my fish that dangled ever-present from my keyring, I said, “Yes, it is indeed.”

  Finished for the day, I packed my laptop and swung it over my shoulder. Andrew Marvell queried me with his sidelong glance from the print on the wall, demons leered, but God grasped Man firmly by the hand. “Don’t let me go,” I whispered. “Please, don’t let me go.”

  It felt almost pointless, braced as we were on the precipice, yet I had to behave as if nothing had changed. And it hadn’t. Over the last weeks, my students had still come and gone, I’d marked assignments, given feedback and suggested new paths of enquiry. I smiled and greeted colleagues, went to the occasional staff gathering with Matthew, where we acted out a normal life as normal people do. But I was aware all the time that we might be subject to scrutiny, watched for moving shapes within shadows, a pursuing car, until I suspected even those whom we regarded as friends might be secretly watching us, whispering, taking note. It made me twitchy.

  My back flinching like fleas, I entered the library’s central void and heard the door close serenely behind me, sealing the lies outside. My bastion against the world. Inhaling the bookish balm, I went straight to the history section as always and selected a few titles at random, spent a few minutes leafing through them, and then made to leave. Thanksgiving was fast approaching and the library was unusually busy as young minds became focused on completing assessments before the break. In the queue to check out my books, I heard a grating hack behind me as phlegm was cleared from a congested throat. Someone leaned close, enveloping me in the scent of stale tobacco and aftershave. My hackles rose.

  “Well, well, look who we have here: Professor D’Eresby. Or is it Mrs Lynes? Always said you’d end up married, with kids, and someone else’s name.”

  “Good afternoon, Madge,” I replied stiffly, reluctantly acknowledging the leathery Head of Anthropology squinting up at me. “How’s the cough?”

  “Don’t be like that, Emma, my dear. Haven’t seen much of you recently. Avoiding my company, or has Matthew been keeping you busy looking after hearth and home like a good hausfrau?”

  “And why would I want to avoid you, Madge, I wonder?” I said, unable to resist the caustic twist.

  She rasped a laugh. “Good to see that marriage to your dull doctor hasn’t blunted your wits after all. Or do you wear the trousers? I’m sure Sam would b
e willing to fill them.” Several students and at least one lecturer were taking an unhealthy interest in our conversation, and had inched closer.

  I rolled my eyes. “Give it a rest. Have you nothing else to talk about?”

  Her whip-thin eyebrows arched. “Bit touchy, aren’t you, my dear? Not getting enough sex, or is Matthew finding his entertainment elsewhere? You know you can rely on me for utter discretion.” The queue was moving forward at the pace of a doped slug. The student in front of me had mislaid his ID in one of his bags and was now sifting through each file – thoroughly – to find it. “Or perhaps he’s got you pregnant again to ensure you don’t stray.”

  This was getting intolerable. I had almost decided to dump the books and walk away when I saw a familiar figure come through the doors. To my intense relief, he spotted me at once, raising his arm and waving wildly. Madge didn’t bother hiding her displeasure. “What does the fool want?”

  I counted to three. “I don’t know and I don’t care, but I find his company amiable, informative and honest, so, if you will excuse me… Hello, Professor!” I returned Colin Eckhart’s greeting as he bumbled towards me through a group of second-year students, scattering them grousing like pheasants.

  “Ah, Professor D’Eresby! Thursday. Fifteen-hundred hours precisely. I thought you might be here.” His pedantry might once have irritated, as might his suggestion that I was predictable. Now, however, I welcomed the brown velvet jacket and stout figure others found comic. Madge eyed him with open dislike, to which he appeared oblivious. “Mrs Eckhart and I are ce… celebrating Thanksgiving. We’re having a… a Pilgrims’ Supper – authentic seventeenth-century dishes cooked on an open fire – Mrs Eckhart is an authority on historic cuisine.”

  “What an excellent idea; I’ve never thought of doing that.” I ignored Madge’s disdainful grunt.

  He pushed his glasses back up his nose. “Mrs Eckhart would like you to join us. And Dr Lynes as well, of co-course.”

  “I’m sorry, Professor, I would have loved to come, but I’m expecting Matthew’s family for Thanksgiving. I’m really sorry. Thanks for inviting me,” I said, as his face fell.