WE KNEW, BUT WE DIDN'T KNOW

 

 

CHAPTER NINE—UNPLEASANTRIES

 

When I reached Kathy’s room, I was in a wonderful state of mind. Everything seemed possible, even her release. She was lying on top of her blanket. Her feet looked so small and helpless in white cotton ankle socks.

I sat down on the bed and took her garnet-ringed hand in mine. “So much seems to be happening, Kathy. It’s as though everything has accelerated. I’m going to be moving into a beautiful, big flat, and I had this idea that perhaps we could live there together.”

“Are you daft, Sophie? I’ll never be allowed to live outside of a donor-recovery centre even if I live long enough to make a final donation. You know the rules.”

“But that’s just it, Kath. The rules seem to be changing so fast that no one is quite able to keep up with them.” 

I showed Kathy my tulip lamp and told her about 329 St. Luke Street and about Joe. “Don’t you think he’s too old for you, Sophie?”

“When you think about it carefully, you’d have to agree that I’m too old for him. After all, he’ll be alive long after I’m completed.”

Kathy looked at me sadly. “It really isn’t fair, is it? For me, the worst part is not having a history, a family tree. That makes us feel like riff-raff, like we’ve done something vile to deserve our function. Having no future is bad, really bad, but having no history is even worse, so much worse.”

“Kathy, I’ve been meaning to ask you. Is there anything you’d love to do, anyone you’d love to see when you regain your strength?”

“Offhand, I’d have to say no, but I’ll think it over and let you know.”

I spent the better part of the day taking care of Kathy, helping her walk to the bathroom, making sure she took her pills on time, watching her sleep. By late afternoon, I was very tired myself and I realised that I lacked the energy, the will to visit the Golds. That would have to wait. My main concern was to square things off with my flat-mates. I didn’t know how they’d take the news.

Before leaving Windmere, I stopped by the cafeteria and bought a chopped egg sandwich, an apple and a half-pint of chocolate drink. Food was far cheaper there than at the local convenience stores.

Afternoon was losing light as I walked back to my flat. I tried to keep my posture straight, but the wind was sharp and my bags kept bumping into my legs. I was cold, tired and bruised by the time I let myself in.

Mike and Lucy were sitting on the futon. I realised that I hadn’t seen them in days. They both looked like they’d been crying.

I set my stuff down on the coffee table and sat down on the floor facing them.

“What’s wrong?”

“Mike’s lost his licence,” Lucy told me in a strangled voice.

“I’m done for, “Mike chimed in. “I have to report for donor service tomorrow morning. We’ve been trying to go into hiding, but our information about that turned out to be all wrong.”

“That’s awful, Mike. I’m so, so sorry. Maybe you can get a deferral or an appeal.”

“Perhaps,” Mike said listlessly but I could tell that he had given up. I didn’t have to ask how Mike had gotten himself into such terrible trouble. I knew. He was an awful slacker, leaving for work late, reporting sick, showing no interest whatsoever in his charges. He hated his work — our work. He found it boring and depressing. He’d received at least two warnings and a written reprimand. He’d even gone to attitude counselling, but that hadn’t helped. Mike’s career as a carer was over, which meant that his service as a donor was about to begin.

“All we can hope for now,” Lucy explained glumly, “is that I’ll be permitted to be Mike’s carer. My case is recovering well, so my assignment should be over in a week or so.”

“I hope you can make that happen, Lucy. The timing is wretched, I know, but I’ve got something to tell you. It’s about our living arrangements. I found a flat, something just for myself. It’s what I want, at least for now, to live on my own. We’d be needing a third flat-mate now that Mike has to move, but if you want to stay here, Lucy, you’ll need to advertise for two.”

Mike didn’t seem to be paying attention to what I was saying, but Lucy looked at me bitterly, “Thanks a bunch, Sophie. It’s nice to know I have friends.”

“That’s not fair,” I defended myself. “You guys hardly paid any attention to me. And I understood that. You had each other and that was everything. But I’ve been really lonely, and I decided that living on my own would be good for me. This hasn’t really worked out. I’ve felt like an interloper.”

Lucy started crying, “I can’t believe this is happening. I feel like I’m in a nightmare.”

“You are, Lucy. We all are,” Mike said and he put his arms around her. I took my lamp and food into my bedroom. “Poor Mike. Stupid Mike,” but I felt only mildly sad. A few days before, I had walked by a young wounded squirrel on my way home from the convenience store. The squirrel didn’t look bloody or mashed in any other, but it wasn’t trying to scamper. It was lying near the pavement, its little eyes alert. I hoped it was merely stunned and that it would be able to save its life. I felt sadder about that helpless squirrel than I did about Mike.

I plugged the tulip lamp into the one free electrical outlet in my room, and it worked. I interpreted that as a good omen. It cast a soft, rosy glow, and made the room look inviting and mysterious. I sat on my bed and ate my sandwich quickly. It tasted so good. The chocolate drink was still cold and it went down my throat like liquid silk. Things were happening, or appeared to be happening, so fast. Everything had accelerated. My routine had definitely been fractured, and my nerves thrummed with energy. I knew I had to be very careful even while making risky choices. But that made no sense. How could I be both prudent and daring? Somehow I had to figure that out.

I needed to have a lie down, but was too untired to undress. My vinyl boots didn’t look half bad in the blushing light; the dents and scuffs looked airbrushed. I had yearned for leather boots for a long time. Leather could get aged and beat up yet manage to look beautiful nonetheless. “Not like human skin,” I thought. Now that the rules seemed to growing soft, if not lax, it occurred to me that I might be able to procure leather and suede items without much ado. I pulled off my boots, which emitted a stench of chemicals and old cheese. I could hear Mike and Lucy crying as though from far, far away. I felt a guilty tinge of relief: at least my moving out was the least of their problems. Compared to tragedy, inconvenience has no bite.

I awoke energized. My eyes, as reflected in the spotty bathroom mirror, looked rested and alert. They were actually shiny in a hard and shrewd way. “Good, “I thought. “From now on, I have to be vigilant and opportunistic.” My outfit from the previous day looked limp and felt a little soggy, but I was in no mood to sort through my meagre collection of shabby clothes. What I was wearing would have to do. I gave my hair a few vigorous brush strokes and noticed a grouping of tangles. I had neither the time nor the patience to comb the knots out, so I gathered my hair into a high ponytail. I was famished, but the kitchen contained very few edible items, so I decided to leave early and have a pleasant breakfast in the Windmere cafeteria.

The other bedroom door was closed. I didn’t know whether Mike and Lucy were still home, but I decided to take the coward’s way out. I might never see Mike again, but I was certain to run into Lucy before I moved out. But truth be told, they meant nothing to me. Who was important? Kathy, of course. Kathy, first and foremost. Then the Golds. Then Joe. Then the absentees: Carla and Miss Veronique. It occurred to me how odd it was that people, I mean real people, took the time to cultivate friendships. If they had parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents, how crowded and tiring their emotional lives must be.

I took my sweet time having breakfast in the Windmere cafeteria. I was fiercely hungry but also feverish with things I felt I had to accomplish by Thursday. After my third cranberry muffin and second cup of Ovaltine, I waited for the sole lift to the third floor. A girl was pacing with arms crossed over her narrow chest until the lift arrived. She looked harried. She was chewing on her thin lower lip and drawing blood.

As soon as the lift reached the third floor, she bolted out and ran in the same direction as I was walking. She looked pretty young to be a carer, and I speculated that this was her first case, and that quite possibly the surgery had gone badly. She raced into a room diagonally across from Kathy’s and I heard a shrill voice crying, “You can’t! You mustn’t! She’s only just had the operation last week! I’ll report this.”

I heard a calm male voice respond, but I couldn’t decipher what he was saying. By then I had reached Kathy’s door and I was fearful that the ruckus was distressing her. I hesitated on the threshold of her room as two orderlies wheeled out a wasted-looking girl on a portable hospital bed from the noisy room. The girl’s eyes were glassy and her mouth was open in what looked like a silent scream. The young carer was loping beside the cot, crying and whimpering. “You can’t!” she moaned. “You mustn’t. It’s a mistake. Do you hear me? It’s a mistake.” By then a security guard was restraining her. She tossed her head and her wild eyes caught mine. “They can’t do this. You have to report this. Glenda’s had her operation only last week! They can’t subject her to another so soon. It’s not done this way!”

The security guard was half-guiding, half-dragging the dishevelled girl toward the nursing station. I tried to erase undue stress from my face as I entered Kathy’s room.

She looked aghast. The garnet flashed like a large drop of blood. I shuddered, but said something like, “There must be a perfectly logical explanation. What that young carer said — it can’t be true. I’ll get the real story once things calm down. I promise I will.”

“What if I’m next, Sophie? What if it’s my turn tomorrow or next week or in two weeks? What if there’s been a change in policy, an amendment, and they’re not telling us because they don’t want to spread panic. I’ve got an awful feeling about this. I feel sick to my stomach.”

I embraced Kathy clumsily. With my arms around her frail back, I could feel her delicate bones. She reminded me of a bird. I longed to protect her, but I had no idea how I could. I decided it would be a bad idea, a fatal idea, to complain at the nursing station. That could draw unwanted attention to both Kathy and myself. I needed to bide time.

I withdrew from our bony embrace, and placed my hands very firmly on Kathy’s narrow shoulders. “We both have to act as normal as possible until I understood what just went on across the hall. Are you with me, Kathy?”

“Yes, I’m with you.” Panic had galvanized her. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes looked bright. “Help me get out of bed, please. If I lie around like a lazy little lamb, my next stop could well be the abattoir.”

We both smiled feebly. I pulled Kathy’s arms to help her assume a standing position. Once she was upright, however, I let go and instructed her. “Try to walk on your own. I’ll be right beside you in case you feel faint. Let’s walk to the door and back.”

I expected Kathy to shuffle, but she surprised me. She took long, healthy strides and was at the door in no time. “Let’s walk in the corridor, Sophie. I want to be seen.” We walked back and forth a number of times. I was worried that Kathy would look so strong and recovered that she might be slotted for a subsequent surgery immediately. But I tried to halt the anxiety mechanism that whirred and thrummed like a sewing machine inside my head.

Kathy and I spent a lovely day together. We stuffed our faces with grilled cheese sandwiches and an assortment of muffins in the cafeteria. Back in her room, I French-braided her hair and gave her a manicure and pedicure. I helped her change into a velvet skirt, tights and a long, slouchy sweater. Over that, I placed a Wedgewood blue poncho over her head and we spent a good thirty minutes on her pretty balcony.

“I still dream a lot about Tommy,” she confessed. “It ended so sadly for us. I would have loved to be with him until his completion, but he sent me away. With Ruth, it was different. It was a good ending.”

“Ingersoll was for girls only,” I rejoined. “We knew nothing about boys. It must have been wonderful growing up with boys around.”

“I’ve never really thought about it, Sophie. That’s just how it was. Tommy was always there, and such a misfit he was. The funny thing was that I understood without truly understanding anything at all.”

“What did you understand.”

“I understood that he must have had a reason, a real reason, to throw those temper tantrums. I’m sure that all of us sensed that something was hideously wrong, but we couldn’t identify it. And in her own way, Ruth was the only rebel among us. She dreamed of having a real job, an office job and she told us about it. We were very cruel to her when she did. We were so afraid. She dared to imagine a life with a future and we hated her for that.”

I then told Kathy about the flat and about Joe and about the makeshift little flea market. She asked me, “This Joe chap, do you trust him?”

“I don’t know him, Kathy. I’m hoping I can get to know him and trust him. I suspect that he could help me a lot.”

“With money, you mean or with connections?”

“With information. I hear things. We all hear things but how do we know if it’s misinformation or disinformation until it’s too late? Perhaps he could help me sort through all these rumours and policy reforms.”

“Are you going to tell him about what happened to that girl across the hall?”

“I don’t see how he would know anything about that, Kathy.”

“Well, you never know,” she answered and we both laughed. It felt good. And then it occurred to me that I oughtn’t to tell Kathy about new code flats and attractive men seeing as that part of her life was over and done with. On the other hand, my carer licence would expire in two years, and my life as I knew it would be over too. Oh yes, there would be months spent in post-surgery centres, perhaps even years. But I would only be getting weaker and closer to completion. My biggest fear was having to donate an eye, or even part of one. That horrified me far more than relinquishing a kidney, a lung or part of a liver. It was the facial disfigurement. I’d always been pretty and that had been an advantage. I couldn’t see myself pulling off the pirate-wench look all that successfully.

Seemingly out of nowhere, I asked Kathy, “Why do you suppose some of you were selected to attend Hailsham? I mean, it was head and shoulders better than the other facilities, at least those in Britain.

“I think it was arbitrary, Sophie. The luck of the draw and I do appreciate how lucky we were. But I doubt that there was a specific reason despite what you may have heard.”

“Rumour had it that you lot had quality, high quality, models, that your models were educated volunteers who believed in clone donorship.”

“Well what about you, Sophie? You’re a Class A Carer, and you’re awfully pretty and smart. Don’t you think that your model must’ve been a person of good stock?”

And then I told Kathy about my fantasy parents and how real they had been to me when I was at Ingersoll.

“How do you mean real?”

“When I talked about them to Sylvia and Carla, I could see them so clearly, even their gestures. I could hear their voices. I could smell Mum’s woody perfume and Dad’s fragrant pipe tobacco. And even more embarrassing to admit, I could feel their love.”

“It wasn’t like that for us at Hailsham. We never fantasised about parents and siblings and such. But for a time, I did wonder about who my model was. We all did, Ruth especially. Perhaps that’s because it was awfully boring at the Cottages. We didn’t have much of anything to do. I think, though, once we became carers, we lost interest in that discovery.”

It was a good day despite the harrowing way it had begun. As I was slipping on my buttonless pea-coat, Kathy said, “Promise me you won’t forget to speak to this Joe bloke, Sophie. I really need a little more time, not a lot, but a little, just a little. Maybe he is connected.”

“I’ll do what I can, Kath. Get some sleep. I’ll be back tomorrow, but I won’t have any news for you until Friday. We have to believe that nothing bad is going to happen to you this week, or the next, or the one after that. The centre doesn’t want to incite panic. It’ll be okay for the time being. But it’s best not to ask any questions. If an orderly or nurse says something, fine. If not, mum’s the word.”

Kathy nodded and I walked warily toward the elevator where a cluster of other female carers was waiting. They weren’t conversing. They weren’t even looking at one another. Their eyes were fixed upon the green linoleum flooring. Normally they might be chatting about food or hairstyles. When the door opened, we entered the elevator in silence but surely we were all thinking about the donor’s terror and her carer’s desperate protest earlier that day.