Needless to say we love getting submissions from our Boot Camp graduates, and the only thing we love more is accepting them. Sean Davis wrote the following piece as his weekend assignment; then he took his lumps, went home, and rewrote it before submitting it to us. In it, he poses a few elemental questions that caper around the barriers of fundamentalists, cults, and even theologians.
For old times’ sake, Viola sat at the mirror to draw her face. Thick red lines formed her mouth. She traced a thin black line for her nose. Squiggles on the sides of her head were her ears. She felt like cat’s eyes today. And the bobbed wig.
Standing, she made sure the seams of her tights were straight, that there were no wrinkles in her dress. Arthur had encouraged her to take pride in her appearance, even if she only had a lingering sense, more like a memory, of what she’d looked like before the Forming.
She snapped her makeup case shut. Gracefully, she wove around furniture, pausing to caress her favorite ottoman. The satin fabric glided beneath her fingertips and she remembered what it had been like to smile.
The sun warmed her when she exited the apartment building. The breeze riffled her dress. She wished she could see the blue sky, smell the fresh air, hear the world around her. But it was a good day to be alive anyway. Walking down the steps to the sidewalk, she skipped a little.
Behind her, she felt others there, judging her. That took the skip out of her step and she settled into a long stride. Someone followed her, but Viola ignored them. Arthur didn’t give a damn about what others thought of him and neither should she.
The nice weather made the walk to Arthur’s apartment shorter than usual and Viola considered sitting on the stoop until he came outside to check for her. Then, Viola would pat the ground next to her and he’d sit down and they’d enjoy the day together.
Viola stood outside Arthur’s building with her face turned to the breeze so that her wig strained against her scalp, and knew that she didn’t dare stay out in public with a face. The other who had followed her from her building had stopped at a distance when she’d paused, but now took a step closer. Then, two more, even closer. Its puzzled anger radiated through the air at her.
She’d drawn a face on herself. Like a whore.
Viola hurried up the stairs and pounded on the door until she felt it unlock.
Viola scrambled inside, slamming it behind her. Her stalker struck the safety glass with an open palm, once. She braced the door against her folower, but it left quickly.
Bursting into Arthur’s apartment, Viola clutched at him. The familiar texture of his seersucker suit comforted Viola. Arthur’s hesitant arms encircled her for a brief moment before he pushed her away.
She’d worn her face out in public.
Viola nodded, cupping her elbows and turning away. She’d wanted to show him that she could be as brave as he was.
Except there was a difference between bravery and foolishness. Arthur didn’t wear his face outside of their apartments.
Viola hung her head.
Arthur grasped her shoulders, then lifted her chin. What was done, was done, and no use worrying about it now. Arthur traced a finger across Viola’s lightly shaded dimple.
Wait until she felt what he’d found this time.
He bustled out of the room, then strode back in with pomp and circumstance. Viola leaned forward, but Arthur focused on the tune of the march, so she couldn’t read his feelings, except that he was excited.
She should hold out her hands.
When she did, Arthur flourished the taffeta gown he held, letting her trace her fingers across its smooth surface. Viola petted the fabric, shivering, wishing she could see its color. She hoped it was pastel blue, her favorite. She’d forgotten what most of the other colors looked like, but she still remembered that one.
No, it was white.
How did he know?
He just did. She should try it on.
Viola let the dress fall from her hands.
No. There was no point. She couldn’t see it. He couldn’t see it. Everything that had been was gone and there was no point in trying to hold on to it.
Viola went to the window, mourning the sun that she could feel but no longer see.
Arthur picked up the dress, running the lace trim between his fingers.
The use was right here, right now. It was the two of them, sharing old magazines and touching the glossy pages. Putting their hands on the speakers of his stereo to feel the vibrations the music made. Remembering what it had been like to declare their individuality through what they chose to wear, listen to, eat.
Whom they loved.
Dropping the dress, Arthur turned away.
Viola whirled, then crossed the room. Arthur tried to escape her, but she caught him, held him. She touched his face, savoring the subtle difference in texture where he’d drawn a straight line for his mouth, almond-shaped ovals for his eyes. She stood on tiptoes to touch his forehead with hers.
What she felt in such close proximity to him surprised her. He’d been on the edge of despair when he caught her trying on clothes in an abandoned department store. She’d reinvigorated him, inspiring him to hold on to his memories and take what pleasure he could in continuing to live his life as Arthur Golden instead of the faceless Form he’d become.
The skin of their foreheads started melting together.
Arthur pushed her away gently. Puzzled, she reached for him, but he stepped away.
He wanted to share everything with her, but he wasn’t ready. Not yet.
Picking up the dress, he held it out to her.
Would she wear it the next time she came?
Viola took the dress, caressing it, and left.
The next day, Viola stood in front of her door, plucking at the lace trim of the dress Arthur had given her. She hadn’t drawn her face on yet, as he’d advised her. When she arrived at his apartment, he’d already have his on, comfortable with its lines and expression, his toupee already in place. It’d be as if he were already a person and she could only become herself in his presence.
Something about that didn’t feel right.
But it was a smart precaution. She put her hand on the doorknob.
She’d slink along the streets, her head down, ignoring anyone who might pay attention to her and the gown she wore. She’d pretend, just like everyone else who might remember their own faces, but who went along with God’s decreed Forming out of fear. Eventually, by pretending, she’d forget.
Letting go of the knob, she strode over to her mirror and took out her makeup kit. After drawing her face, she felt relieved, in control, more herself than she had all morning. She’d march over to Arthur’s and show him and everyone that she was who she was and she wasn’t afraid.
The streets were empty when she exited her apartment building. She hunched her shoulders up to her outlined ears and hurried along the street. When she rounded the corner onto Arthur’s block, she stopped short. A crowd stood outside his building, clogging the sidewalk, stairs, and entryway.
It couldn’t have anything to do with Arthur. He never went out in public with his face on and always dressed in the same clothes he’d been wearing when God had re-Formed humanity. He was perfectly safe, she was sure.
Viola hoped to be able to sneak through, but someone stepped away from the crowd. It was the same one who had followed her yesterday, and one other.
She stumbled, turning in midstride. The two matched her pace, their strides longer. As they neared, she felt their thoughts more clearly.
If she wanted to act like a whore and paint her face, they’d treat her like a whore.
Viola shifted her weight forward so she could run in her heels. Specific thoughts faded to general feelings of anger, frustration, and hate, except for one last thought, seeming to answer why they didn’t chase after her.
They’d wait.
Viola ran back to her building, slamming through the doors until she stood, her weight against her apartment door, trembling.
It was only a coincidence that the man who had followed her the other day had been with the crowd outside Arthur’s building. Had to be.
Viola wished that she could still use a telephone. She’d gotten a new cell phone three weeks before the Forming and still had a landline at the insistence of her mother.
Pacing back and forth, she had an idea. Picturing Arthur in his apartment, reclining in his favorite chair, his feet up on a footstool, she tried calling out to him. His apartment was eight blocks away, but maybe if she shouted, she could . . .
She tried, cupping her hands around the lower half of her face, out of old habit. She stood against the wall she thought was closest to Arthur’s building and tried. As she fretted back and forth around her apartment, she slowly accepted that the return calls she thought she heard were only wishful thinking.
She should go back. Take some kind of weapon. Part the crowd and rush in to save the man in distress.
She had a set of kitchen knives and some heavy, blunt objects, but nothing like a gun.
It would be the first time since the Forming that she’d heard of people being killed, and she would be the one killing them.
Abandoning that plan, she pressed her fists into the sides of her head. There must be something else, another way.
Except there wasn’t. Because of him.
She assumed that he’d been a man, the one who chased her and called her a whore. In the erosion of his identity and individuality, his hate had remained. She wondered who he’d been before the Forming, what kind of life he’d lived, whom he’d cared for, if anyone.
He waited for her.
So she stayed in her apartment, pacing, fretting, and calling out to Arthur, hearing nothing in return.
The fourth day, Viola sat down at her mirror and touched its smooth surface lovingly, perhaps for the last time. Instead of ruby lips, she drew a straight, pale line, remembering the times she’d clench her jaw and press her lips together. Plucking the black wig from the stand, she adjusted it on her head until it felt right.
Exiting the building, she held the skirt of her gown so it wouldn’t trip her on the stairs and hitched her purse up on her shoulder that she’d loaded with a paperweight. She paused, wanting to appear defiant to anyone who might be around, but then she hurried toward Arthur’s.
The two others who had waited for her came out from a building across the street and followed her. Viola quickened her pace.
Whore.
One of them snatched at her skirt and she whirled, swinging her purse. It hit the other across its head, knocking it back. Its buddy lunged at her, but Viola sidestepped and kneed it in the stomach. Before it had hit the ground, Viola started running.
Rounding the corner of Arthur’s block, Viola collided with him and they both stumbled to the ground. She clutched at him, then jumped up, trying to pull him after her. They needed to get inside, but he wouldn’t come. His grip on her wrist tightened.
Snatch and Buddy came around the corner. Others crossed the street toward Viola and Arthur, more emerging from his apartment building.
Viola needed to see and understand. God had been right. He had unified the world.
But she still remembered her face. And his.
He had not drawn his today.
Viola twisted away from him, but by then, it didn’t matter. Other hands caught her, held her. Arthur smeared the lines of her eyes, nose, mouth, the squiggles of her ears. Another plucked the wig from her head, threw it to the ground, and stomped on it. Others tore at her gown. Her purse disappeared from her hands.
Snatch stepped up to her and put his hands on her hips. Viola struggled against those holding her, jerked back and forth, but Snatch pulled her to him and slapped his smooth pelvis against hers.
Their skin melted into each other’s and she had the sense, for just a moment, of smoldering anger directed at everything and nothing, without reason. Then that slipped away.
Another plunged Viola’s left hand into its chest and she was afraid of a dim room at the end of a long hallway, then that feeling faded.
They crowded closer to her. Their arms wide, bodies pressing tighter, their skin melting together and enveloping Viola.
A cacophony of emotions and images buried her, threatening to dissolve her in this mass of formless humanity. She held on to what it had meant to have eyes that could cry, a mouth that could smile, and all the wonderful and horrible smells and sounds that had faded into the background for all those years before the Forming.
She remembered and she wouldn’t let that go.
But the world had attained peace.
Crime had stopped.
Petty dramas had ceased.
People lived without identity because once a person was something, another was not. Groups formed and ostracized others. She had done that by hiding away.
God had corrected his worst mistake.
She could see that now.
As the sun’s light touched the mass of humanity the next morning, forms began pulling away. First one at a time, then twos, threes, and droves, leaving only two.
The one helped the other up, patted it on the shoulder, then went up the stairs into the apartment building.
The one remaining stood, trembling. At its feet lay a wig. It picked the wig up, its texture intoxicating, its meaning gone. Raising a hand to its blank face, it thought it might remember something. Then that, too, faded away.