I HATE FEELING this way. As I walk away from Mack’s place I can feel that horrible fluttering in my chest like a swarm of flies is trapped behind my ribs. I used to dream about them inside my chest, laying eggs in my heart and the maggots chewing their way through it until my chest burst open. The only thing that drowned out their buzz was my screams as I woke. I haven’t had that nightmare for a long time. I fear that will change now.
I try to focus on the health kit’s tiny orange light indicating the analyzer is still at work, to think about an improvement to the membrane I’m testing on the outside of my house, to focus on the feeling of my toes inside my shoes and the sound of the soles against the crystal path, but nothing calms the swarm. Something terrible is going to happen. I need to go home. I need to—
“Ren, is Mack okay?”
Nick’s voice makes me cry out and I nearly drop the kit. I clutch it to my stomach as he approaches. He looks concerned, but also excited. Something unusual is happening and he thrives on being the first on the scene.
“Mack?”
He’s looking at the health kit. “I saw someone help you carry him into his house. Is he hurt?”
Either he caught the briefest glimpse of the back of us or he’s trying to trick me into lying. I can’t handle this. I don’t know what to say.
Now he’s frowning. I’m not usually caught out so easily. I haven’t had a chance to get my head straight.
“He . . .” I look at the kit to avoid his eyes. He means well, I remind myself. He doesn’t realize I find his interest irritating. He probably believes he’s being personable and caring about the community. I think he’s overcompensating.
Then I feel guilty. I’ve defended Nick so many times when people have grumbled about him. In the early days of the project so many people treated him so badly I felt shocked to the core. It made me realize I lived in a bubble, a world where all the people I interacted with every day were highly intelligent and accepting and had evolved past so much of the bullshit that still plagued swathes of society. When Nick arrived, having bought his place with an obscene amount of money, these highly intelligent people treated him with sneering disdain and open hostility. It reminded me that we’re still apes. Still evolving.
“Is it bad?” he asks with a hushed voice and takes a step closer.
Don’t touch me, I think as he reaches a hand toward my shoulder.
“It’s—”
A sound behind me makes him look past my face and his hand drops to his side. I see confusion in his expression and twist to see Mack hurrying out of his house. Shit.
Mack’s head is down and he’s marching swiftly toward the central Dome with his hands in his pockets, whispering to himself. I check the network and see his status as “busy—private.” He’s either having a private conversation with someone else or dictating a message. He prefers to use voice rather than the v-keyboard. He laughs at me when I use mine, saying I look like a poor mime trying to look like I’m playing the piano. I never rise to the bait though. It may look stupid but at least people can’t lip-read or listen in. There are at least a hundred or so people in the colony with augmented hearing good enough to eavesdrop on him now if they chose to. Luckily Nick isn’t one of them.
“Oh, he seems fine,” Nick says and looks at me pointedly. He wants to know who the third person was.
“Yeah, Mack’s okay,” I say.
Why is he going to the Dome? He goes there only for group meetings and there are none scheduled for today. As soon as I think that, I get an icon in the top right of my field of vision asking if I want to check.
“Ren, what’s going on?”
With a glance to the upper right I select the option and the schedule appears to float over Nick’s jacket. There’s a new entry. But before I have a chance to check it, an urgent message arrives, the icon for that larger and flashing in the way I find so annoying. Nick looks away and I suspect he’s got one too.
I open it. Obviously from Mack. I didn’t anticipate the content though, nor the fact that he’s sent it to every member of the colony.
Fellow citizens, I apologize for the hour and the urgent tag but there’s a need for a colony-wide discussion of an event that occurred this morning. It seems there were survivors of the tragic accident that happened during Planetfall. The child of one of those survivors has made it to us and has asked to live with us at the foot of God’s city.
The envelope icon has started to flash in the corner of my vision. It does that only when there are more than ten unopened messages.
That child is Lee Suh-Mi’s grandson. His name is Lee Sung-Soo.
“God in his mercy!” Nick exclaims moments later. He must be at the same part as me.
If you have any concerns about Sung-Soo, or objections to his joining us, I want you to follow the protocol for any colony-wide issue, namely contacting your group leader, who will bring them to the council meeting I’ve scheduled in ten minutes. Apologies for not giving more notice, but this is just as unexpected for me as it is for you and I think it’s imperative we deal with any concerns as soon as possible, for Sung-Soo’s sake. The meeting will be open on the public stream and the public tag for this topic is “Newcomer.” Sung-Soo is not connected to our network.
A flash appears bottom right, indicating a new trending tag. I don’t have to look it up to know what it is. Interesting choice of word. Would I have picked the same one? It’s less loaded than “survivor” or “stranger” but has a subliminal effect of assuming he’s going to stay. After all, Mack didn’t pick “visitor.” Nor “guilty reminder,” but that would just be stupid.
I’m sure lots of people will be keen to meet him. He’s had a very difficult journey and I ask that people respect his need for the time and space to recover. We need time as a community to take in the news and resolve any issues we may have before he’s introduced to everyone. Thank you for your understanding. I’m in the Dome now but ask you to discuss this in your groups and direct any questions to your councilor rather than my private stream. Thanks, Mack.
When I pull my attention from the message, I notice Nick staring at me. “So that’s who it is,” he says and looks at Mack’s place.
“Aren’t you group leader this month?”
He nods and realizes he can’t just go and bang on the door. He has to go home and be available to anyone who wants to speak to him in person as well as online. He leaves and I set the health kit down at my feet before calling up the v-keyboard.
Thanks for the heads-up, Mack.
I don’t expect him to reply; he’s probably being inundated despite his request. But he does.
We couldn’t keep it a secret. I saw Nick poking his nose in and had to make a call on it. We knew we would have to tell everyone eventually. Come to the Dome. I want you here, you were with me when we found him.
He knows I hate meetings. No.
Ren, don’t be a pain in the arse.
People are going to realize he’s in your house. I’m going to stay with him in case he wakes up. I don’t want to get involved in the politics. That’s your bag.
I could do with some support.
You’ll be fine. Give me access to your house. I want to keep an eye on him. Look, Carmen is already coming over. You want her banging on the door to wake him up when we’re not there?
There’s a pause. I can see her talking to Nick, having intercepted him on the way home. It’s going to be everywhere in less than—
A door opens behind me. “Ren, is the grandson at Mack’s place?”
Mack?
I’ve given you access. Keep up with the meeting, in case I need some info, OK?
I pick up the health kit as the v-keyboard disappears and hurry over to Mack’s place, pretending I can’t hear ten different people calling my name. I shut down my stream and my in-box. I just can’t handle being connected right now.
I press my palm to the side of the door and the house “tastes” me. I can hear footsteps as the door opens but I don’t turn around. “It’s being discussed at the meeting,” I call over my shoulder and let the door close behind me.
Ignoring the knocking, I put the health kit down on a nearby table and look at Sung-Soo. Mack has taken his shoes off, eased his legs up onto a footstool grown out of the moss and covered him with a blanket.
The moss looks inviting, so I take off my shoes too and let my feet sink into its cool green softness. The knocking eventually stops and I make sure the windows are still set to privacy before making my way to sit near him.
The only sound is our breathing. I watch him sleep, feeling . . . everything. No, not everything. I don’t feel relaxed and I don’t feel hopeful. Watching someone sleep can be the hardest thing in the world.
I’m back at the hospital in Paris, watching Suh sleep. There are monitors and wires and beeps that serve to remind me that her rest is anything but normal. I cried a lot. I talked a lot too, hoping she could hear me, clinging to some romantic notion that the sound of my voice would somehow call her back into my world.
We were just flatmates then. I already loved her, of course, but no one else knew back then. Not even her.
Watching someone in a coma is a special kind of prison made of love and hope and despair. Sometimes other people come and sit in the prison with you, but you can’t have a real conversation. You can talk about coffee or what the sleeper did or didn’t do and what that might mean and what the doctors have said, but nothing else. People who don’t know the rules learn fast. For those who have no words left for one another there are magazines more than thirty years old, relics of a paper age kept for this kind of prison where no one is allowed to get online and talk about their vigil.
And you’re always alone there, even if other people are sitting around the bed and watching the comatose with you. There’s nothing to say after the daily update and so you’re left there in your private little hells, unable to leave in case they wake up when you weren’t there.
So you talk to the sleeper when there aren’t any other visitors and you pray and you cry and you sit there, numbed, for hours until one day they either slip away completely or open their eyes and give you the only key out of the prison.
I sat with her for two months. I lost my placement and I nearly lost our flat, before Dad intervened when he realized what was going on. That was back when he wasn’t angry with me. That was before the cancer too.
I blink and look around Mack’s living room to remind myself I’m not back in that prison again.