Anja had never slept well, but that night was worse than usual. That night she dreamed of machines that hankered for her flesh, the coils and scaffolding that lay beneath the floorboards of the apartment building. She dreamed of wires breaking through the ceiling, snaking around her mother. She dreamed of them not crushing her to death, no, that would have been a relief. Instead they plugged into her veins, and in her dream she grasped the terrible truth that this would give her everlasting life. She dreamed of the wires coming down like rain, like a rainforest, knotting and thickening until she could no longer see the door. She dreamed she would be there forever.
When she awoke the next morning, she was covered in a thin film of sweat. She lay still for a moment, staring at the large brown stain on the ceiling, feeling the hard floorboards through the thin mattress. Her spine felt thick and twisted; her neck crunched as she straightened out. The swoosh of her mother’s blood and the thump of her heart seemed, for once, reassuring through the silence.
Anja sat up. She couldn’t wait any longer. She was lucky that no one had shown up to ask about Branko yet, but she couldn’t count on her luck continuing.
She grabbed a towel and the small basket that held her bath things, heading to the communal bathroom. Inside, a cockroach scuttled across a yellow sink. The showers at least were not too bad at this time of the day, far better than in the evenings when the drains were foamy with scum and the tiles strewn with hairs. She stepped in and cranked the hot water up.
The water came out in a slow jet, barely enough to get her hair wet. The only thing that made it bearable was the heat. It was only ever ice cold or scalding, but she liked it scalding and was thankful it was today. She felt her skin redden in patches, moving her head left and right to let the water dribble down her shoulders and hips.
She was never clean in this place, Anja thought suddenly. How could you be, with this pitiful trickle, where one half of your body was always dry? She remembered the swimming pool at Lea’s apartment, all that water in all that space, empty and looking out over the city. She thought of the showers there, the smooth, even jets that pounded her haunches with industrial strength, the multiple nozzles that emerged from the walls, the shower head the size of a dinner plate.
She shampooed vigorously, scraping her scalp with her ragged fingernails to try and get them clean. It occurred to her that there were lakes in Canada. She remembered a documentary she’d seen about grizzly bears; she was sure it had been set in Canada. The image of a grizzly bear flickered, a powerful dark shape crouching against a shining white body of water, sparkling fish trapped between strong jaws. She imagined plunging into a lake like that, glittering and jewel-like, so cold it would take her breath away. She shampooed harder. The foam ran down into her eyes and drew stinging tears.
* * *
She was the last person left in the carshare when it finally reached the Outer Boroughs. No one who would normally take a carshare would come here, which she was glad for. It meant no judgmental or prying eyes, and solitude for the last half hour of her journey. It had cost an entire day’s wages, but there was no other way to get here. Two days’ wages, if you counted the way back.
She smelled the Markets before she saw them. Roasted corn, stagnant water, an elemental, industrial tinge. And as she drew closer, the unmistakable whiff of human sweat. Here, on the outskirts of the market, people sat on the curb eating charred vegetables on sticks, and children in worn sneakers chased each other. Ahead of Anja, a lone woman in a tight knitted skirt and a ripped leather jacket leaned against a lamppost. She pulled at the ends of her hair in a way that she must have thought was suggestive, but really just looked nervous, as she called out to the men who passed her in the street. On the other side of the road, a man leaning on a stick shook a paper cup at her. The sign at his feet read: “Hungry and alone. Kidney for sale, pls inquire.”
Anja hurried on. She was close now. She could hear the shouts and the crashes, smell the smoke and the dust. Finally, rounding the corner, she was there.
The Markets were always a sight to behold. They occupied a broad expanse of low buildings, what must have once been some kind of industrial park, one of the many abandoned over the years in the Outer Boroughs. The buildings were the size of airplane hangars, their walls rusted corrugated iron or thin, flimsy brick. It was a wonder they were still standing, but standing they were.
Anja didn’t even know how large the Markets were in all. She’d never walked their entire length; she didn’t know how far out they went, how many buildings and empty parking lots they occupied.
The noise was an assault from all around. Children and hawkers shouted and squealed; wheels crunched through the dusty gravel and machines screamed. There had to be thousands, tens of thousands, millions of people there, more people than Anja had ever seen, even in Boroughs One through Five.
Anja headed east, where the largest and the oldest buildings were, where she knew the warehouses still contained rotting conveyor belts and giant complex machines that an enterprising few put to work for their own purposes. If she was going to find what she needed, this would be her best shot.
Moving through the crowd was slow going. Anja placed one hand on her waistband, where she felt the wad of cash rubbing against her skin. She didn’t stand out too much here, not the way someone like Lea would, but her smooth skin and clean clothes were enough to draw stares. Still, she thought, maybe it was a good thing. Even in the Markets, no one would lay a finger on a lifer.
Finally she reached the factories. Here the people were mainly men, in dirty undershirts and with dark smudges of oil on their cheeks. There were more stares and the occasional whistle. Strangely, though, Anja felt safer here than elsewhere in the Markets, felt that her weakness was so conspicuous that if anyone tried anything, she could rely on mob justice to save her. Besides, it was no worse than being in the diner.
She thought briefly of Branko and wondered where he was now. Had he come to the Markets too, in search of the pills for her?
“Why the frown, sweetheart?” A man with matted, greasy hair and black fingernails called out to her. He leaned against a stall weighed down with huge nets of nuts and bolts, racks of gears that glinted dully in the sunlight. Despite the autumn chill, his chest was bare and slick with sweat.
“Hello. Where can I find the vehicles?” Anja said, trying to ignore the leer on his face.
“Vehicles! Whoa-ho. What’s a girlie like you doing looking for a vehicle?” The man turned to the stallholders around him, eyebrows raised, conspiratorial. They laughed.
Anja pressed her lips together. “I need a car,” she said.
His eyebrows shot up further, but he made no comment. “And what would you give me for it?” One of his friends sniggered.
She walked up to the man who had made the comment. At first he held her stare, a smile curling at his lips as his friends whooped and cheered. But as she drew closer, unblinking, her chin held high and her eyes cold, he dropped his gaze and crossed his arms.
“What do you want for it?” Anja said. Her cheeks burned, but for the first time in years, she felt a new strength coursing through her veins.
The other stallholders sensed the change in atmosphere. They saw the embarrassed look that flashed across their friend’s face and slunk away, turning to their customers or machines or each other, starting up other, quieter conversations.
“I was just kidding,” the man mumbled. “’Course, just joking around.” He lifted his eyes, sullen now. “We don’t get your kind around here often, is all.”
He was not too far off from Branko in age or appearance, Anja realized, this close up. She looked at the rickety stall, at the slings of metal parts and tinny cash box nailed to the countertop. She wondered if the man had a brother too, or even a sister.
“See that pink building over there?” the man said.
Anja squinted. All the buildings looked the same to her, peeling and dirty gray, but then she discerned that the paint on one of them was a faint salmon color. She nodded.
He wiped his hand on his jeans and stuck it out. It took Anja a moment to realize what he was offering. She reached out and clasped his hand gingerly. It was cold and callused, like a leather mitt.
“Abel,” he said.
“Laurie,” she lied.
“Laurie. Pretty name,” he said, but then held up his palms to her. “I mean, no disrespect. Hey, you know what, let me take you. You’ll get a better deal that way.”
Anja protested, but Abel was already asking his neighbor to look after his stall while he was gone.
“Come on,” he said.
She followed behind him as he weaved his way between the haphazardly placed stalls. Despite his bulk, his step was nimble, and she almost lost him as he picked his way through the crowd. Still, she stayed close, never straying more than three or four paces away. No one bothered her now that she was with Abel.
It was dark inside the pink building, the only light streaming in through the doorway and the holes in the corrugated-iron roof. The air was hot and stuffy, but at least there were fewer people here, and she could walk unhindered. But coming in from under the shining sun outside, Anja found herself momentarily blinded, the world a flickering, indistinct gray. She blinked and, as her eyes got used to the dark, saw that the room was filled with cars.
They weren’t like the cars she saw on the streets of the Central Boroughs, though—those were sleek pods of efficiency, yellow and uniform for the most part, stamped with the different logos of the companies that owned them.
These cars were bulbous and boxy, in so many different shapes and sizes that it made her dizzy to look at them. She had fleeting memories of individually owned cars in her childhood, but even so, the carshare companies had taken over most of Sweden by the time she had left, rolling out their yellow and gray fleets across the country.
The cars were lined up like slumbering farm animals, some creaking and groaning as dark shapes flitted about them, cranking a wheel here, polishing a mirror there. Anja looked around and realized she had lost Abel.
She approached a man in overalls leaning against the open hood of a small blue car with round headlights.
“I’m looking for a car,” she said.
He eyed her. “Oh?” he said drily.
She bristled. “How much is this one?” she said, pointing to the little blue car he was pressed up against.
The man gave her a long, lazy look. “Ten thousand.”
“Are you kidding?” It was nearly twice what she had to spend.
The man eyed her. “What’s a girl like you want a car for, anyway? Gift for your boyfriend?”
“That’s none of your business,” she snapped. “How about four thousand?”
The man’s upper lip lifted in a snarl.
“Don’t waste my time.”
Anja tried again. “Maybe not this car, but what do you have for four thousand?”
The man let out a sharp laugh. His eyes seemed wary, and they flitted about her, never quite landing on her face. He seemed to be watching something behind her, but when Anja turned around, she only saw the doorway of the building.
“Like I said, I got better things to do.” He pulled the front of his cap over his eyes, crossed his arms, and appeared to go to sleep while still standing up.
Anja moved on. Perhaps she would have better luck with someone else. There were so many cars here, so many traders, surely there was something she could buy.
But half an hour later, after talking to countless other men in overalls, Anja was on the verge of giving up. The first trader’s price, it seemed, was on the low side. No one else quoted anything below eleven thousand, some asking for as much as twenty. Some didn’t seem to even want anything to do with her, moving into the shadows as soon as she drew near.
Anja balled her fists and bit her lip. A wave of frustration rose in her chest. She couldn’t leave here without a car—what if the officers came tomorrow? The thought of going back to the apartment and trying to fall asleep that night, waiting with dread, gave Anja renewed resolve.
“Laurie. Laurie!”
It took Anja a few seconds to react. It was Abel, waving at her from across the room. She carefully picked her way over the ground strewn with various car parts and junk.
“Laurie, this is my friend Jerome,” Abel said, brandishing an arm proudly.
The man next to him was small and slight, coming up only to Abel’s shoulders. He wore a neat checked blue shirt, buttoned to the collar. His eyes glowed faintly in the dim warehouse, and Anja could just make out a smattering of freckles across the tops of his cheeks.
“Hello.” Jerome nodded but didn’t offer his hand. He looked at Abel. “So, anyway,” he said gruffly. “What kind of car?”
“I don’t care—just something that can get me around. I’m going on a long trip.”
“Okay. Well then, you’ll want something that’s not too much of a clunker. How big do you want to go? Any passengers on your long trip?”
Anja paused. She hadn’t thought about how she would place her mother in the car. Or how she would get the car back to her apartment, since you could hardly just drive into Manhattan like that.
“Yes,” she said quietly, “One passenger. She’ll—she’ll just need the backseat, though.”
“Ah,” Jerome said. “Motion sickness?” he asked knowingly. “How much you want to spend?” he said.
Anja’s heart sank. Still, she had to try.
“Six thousand,” she said.
But Jerome didn’t laugh in her face, he didn’t do a low whistle to the side or walk away. Instead, he nodded.
“Six thousand,” he said. “Okay. I think we can find you something.”
“Really? No one else would sell me anything back there,” she found herself saying before she could stop herself. It occurred to her that this was not the best negotiating tactic.
“Oh, girlie,” Jerome said. Anja winced, tried to ignore it. “Laurie, is that what you said your name was? Well, you can’t just walk into somewhere like this and hope that someone’s going to give you a fair price. Especially when you look like you just stepped out of the Ministry.”
“So—” Anja paused.
Jerome raised an eyebrow. “So why am I helping you?” He looked over at Abel. “Ask my friend over here.”
Abel examined a loose bolt on the floor with his toe.
“Anyway,” Jerome said, “I assume you’re paying cash?”
Anja nodded.
Jerome stuck his hand out. Anja eyed him. “Show me the car first,” she said.
He let out a long-suffering sigh and stared at Abel again. “Fine,” he said.
Jerome brought them to the very back of the hall. Anja saw that bricks were coming loose in the wall and pinpricks of sunlight shone through. She looked about herself, up at the tin ceiling and at the crumbly pillars with cars and goods stacked about them. It was a wonder the whole structure didn’t all come crashing down.
“There,” Jerome pointed. “Best part—it has a sun roof.”
It was less car and more van. Raised on four large wheels that came up to her waist, the car was boxy and glaring, and to top it off, it was red.
“That’s—” Anja started. Both men were standing with their thumbs hooked into their waistbands as if they didn’t care, but their eyes were wide and expectant. “Perfect,” she ended.
She pulled the cash out of her front pocket. Their eyes barely widened when they saw the thick wad in her hand, and Anja was reminded of an urban legend that the Market traders were actually the richest men in the whole city. That they secretly visited pay-per-use private clinics and extended their lives past the Ministry-sanctioned numbers, at an exorbitant cost. But when she handed Jerome the money, he snatched it from her in a way that told her he was no secret millionaire. He counted the cash slowly under his breath, tongue sticking out between his teeth.
When he was done, he grinned. It was the first time Anja had seen him smile, and it made him suddenly look twenty years younger. From his back pocket he pulled a ring of keys that was as large as her head. He sifted through them, picking out one identical key after another, finally plucking one out of its loose tag. He handed it to Anja.
“Here you go,” he said. As she took it, a thought seemed to strike him. “Can you even drive?” he said.
Anja gave him a withering look.
“Okay, okay,” he said.
“Well, thanks,” Anja said, truly grateful.
“Hey, no problem, Laurie,” Jerome said, elbowing Abel in the ribs.
“Look,” Anja said. “My name’s not really Laurie. It’s Anja. Anja Nilsson.”
Abel held out a hand. “Nilsson. Like the opera singer?”
Anja’s stomach squeezed. “Yes,” she said. “Do you know—have you heard her?”
“Are you kidding? Love that shit,” Abel said. Jerome nodded vigorously, pulled out his tablet and tapped its face.
The aria that poured forth was scratchy and jolting. Jerome shook his tab.
“Sorry, not the best signal here,” he said.
But despite the jolts and echoes, her mother’s voice was unmistakable. They were silent, all except Jerome, who was humming along. Standing in the crowded Markets, huddled around Jerome’s tab, Anja felt with a sudden clarity what she had to do.
Her mother would not have wanted some doctor up in Canada to do it.