Beggars and Choosers (35 page)

“Just twenty minutes,” Carmela Clemente-Rice said in her warm voice.
“Meanwhile, tell us how the—” and then the screen went dead as Huevos
Verdes picked up the signal, overrode it, and cut off my communication
with the GSEA.

BILLY WASHINGTON: EAST OLEANTA

The morning the President declared martial law, him, was the same
morning I found the dead genemod rabbit by the river. It was a week
after we walked to Coganville and the government people came, them, to
East Oleanta to blow up Eden. Only when Annie finally let me out of
bed, I listened hard, me, to what everybody in the cafe said about the
place that got blown up. Some people even hiked out, them, to look at
it. And soon as they described it, I knew, me, that the government
didn’t blow up the place my big-headed girl went underground. Not my
Eden.

And I was the only person in the world, me, that knew that.

Still, I wanted, me, to go see for myself. I
had
to go.

“Where you going, Billy?” Annie said, breathing hard. She’d just
lugged in a bucket of river water for washing. The government techs
fixed everything, them, but two days later stuff started to break
again. That’s when a lot of people left East Oleanta on the gravrail,
before
it
could break. The women’s bath wasn’t working.
Lizzie was right behind Annie, her, lugging another bucket. It broke my
heart, nearly, with my own uselessness. The medunit said, it, that I
wasn’t supposed to lift nothing.

“Down to the cafe,” I lied.

Annie pressed her lips together. “You don’t want, you, to go down to
the cafe again. Where you really going, Billy? I don’t want you, me,
taking no more walks in them woods. It’s too dangerous. You might fall
again.”

“I’m going to the cafe,” I said, and that was two lies.

“Billy,” Annie said, and I knew from her bottom lip that she was
going to say it again, “We could leave, us. Now. Before more duragem
gets eat away on that train.”

“I ain’t leaving East Oleanta, me,” I said. It scared me to tell her
no. Each time it scared me, each and every single time. What if Annie
left anyway, her, without me? My life would end. What if Annie took
Lizzie and just left?

But I had to stay, me. I
had
to. I was the only person who
knew, me, that the government didn’t blow up Eden. Dr. Turner was the
one that called the government to come to East Oleanta.
Lizzie
told me, her. Annie didn’t know. I had to stay and make sure Dr. Turner
didn’t find that Eden still existed and call the government to come
back and finish the job. I didn’t know, me, how I could stop Dr. Turner
unless I killed her, and I didn’t think I could do that. Maybe I could.
But I couldn’t go off, neither, and leave the dark-haired big-headed
girl who’d deliberately let me know where Eden was in case I ever
really needed it again. I owed that girl, me.

Only it wasn’t only that.

So I said to Annie, “Get off my back, woman. I’m going, me, down to
the cafe, and I’m going alone!”

Then I held my breath, me, the sick fear churning inside me.

But Annie only sighed, her, and took off her parka and picked up a
washrag. That was the wonderful thing about Annie. She knew there was
things a person was just going to do, them, and she didn’t waste her
breath arguing about it, unless of course the person was Lizzie.
Actually, the next person I expected trouble from, me, was
Lizzie
.
But
Lizzie
sat on the sofa with her library terminal, doing
her everlasting studying, her, and glancing up at the door for Dr.
Turner, ready to ask the doctor questions nineteen to the dozen.

That was another reason for taking my walk now. Dr. Turner wasn’t
around, her. For a change.

I zipped my parka, me, and picked up the walking stick Lizzie
brought me. It’s a good stick. I’d use it even if it wasn’t, because
Lizzie
brought it to me, but it
is
good. The right height and
thickness. Lizzie’s got an eye, her. When she takes it off her library
terminal and Dr. Turner.

Annie said, more gentle, “You be careful, Billy Washington. We don’t
want, us, anything to happen to you,” just like she knew I wasn’t going
to the cafe after all, just like we didn’t have no bitter fights over
leaving East Oleanta. And she put her arms around me. For a minute I
held Annie Francy, me, against my chest, her head resting just under my
chin, and closed my eyes.

“You,” I said, which was stupid enough, but then it was all right
because Annie smiled. I could feel her smiling, her, against my neck.
So I said it again. “You.”

“You yourself,” she said, pulling away. Her chocolate brown eyes had
a tender look, them. I walked out that door like I was walking on sky.
And I didn’t feel too weak, me, neither. My legs worked better than I
expected. I got all the way, me, down to the river without my heart
racing. Only my mind, it.

Why wouldn’t I leave East Oleanta? Annie really wanted, her, to go
someplace better for Lizzie. She was only staying for me.

And why was I staying, me? Because a big-headed Sleepless girl, who
was probably Miranda Sharifi herself, might need me. Me, Billy
Washington, who couldn’t even help carry water or trap rabbits or move
Y-energy heat cones to places where they was needed. It was funny when
you thought about it. Miranda Sharifi, from Huevos Verdes and Eden,
needing Billy Washington.

Only it wasn’t funny.

I poked the end of my stick, me, in the soft mud and leaned on it to
ease my old fool’s body down the riverbank. I was kidding myself. The
truth was, it was me that needed Eden. In my head anyway. And I didn’t
really know why.

I picked my way, me, over the rocks along the river. We’d got a thaw
the last few days, and the river mud was thick as soup dotted with
patches of snow. The sun was shining, it, and the water ran high, green
and cold, rushing along like a gravrail. I saw something dark, me,
lying in some snow, and I stumped along for a closer look.

It was a rabbit. With long, clawed paws. It laid on its side, him,
on the white snow, its guts torn out. Fox prints dotted the mud, them.
The rabbit was reddish brown.

Somebody climbed down the bank behind me. I poked my stick, me, into
the rabbit and turned it over. The rabbit was brown.

“Ugh,” Dr. Turner said. “What killed it?”

“Fox.”

“Well, why are you looking so funereal about it? Surely this must
happen all the time out here in God’s country. Were you thinking we
could eat it?”

“No. Not this rabbit, him.”

“Well, if you can get your mind off the local wildlife, I have news.
The President’s declared martial law.”

She sounded upset, her. I didn’t say nothing.

“Congress has backed him up. Good old Article 1 Section 8. That big
fuck-up on Wall Street yesterday, and enough state budgets have run out
of money so they can’t afford to pay jurors, which means that even
where there aren’t food riots the judiciary has stopped functioning in
just enough states for ol‘ Commander-in-Chief Bonny Profile to declare
civil authority inadequate to— you don’t know what the hell I’m talking
about, do you, Billy? Do you know what martial law is?”

“No, Dr. Turner.”

“The President has put the army in control. To keep peace where
there’s rioting. No matter what they have to do to keep it.”

“Yes, Dr. Turner.”

She looked at me, her, sideways. I ain’t never been any good, me, at
hiding things. “What is it, Billy? What’s wrong with that rabbit?”

I said, slower than I meant, “It’s brown.”

“So? We’ve seen lots of brown rabbits. Lizzie told me she even had a
brown rabbit for a pet, last summer.”

“It ain’t summer.”

She went on, her, looking at me, and I saw she really didn’t
understand. Sometimes donkeys don’t know the most simple things.

“This here rabbit’s a snowshoe rabbit. It should of changed its
coat, him, by now. Reddish brown in the summer, white in the winter,
and here it is the start of November. It should have changed, him.”

“Always, Billy?”

“Always.”

“Genemod.” Dr. Turner kneeled in the snow, her, and studied the
rabbit hard. There wasn’t nothing to see, except that reddish brown
coat. Almost the same color as the little hairs escaping from her hat
onto the back of her neck where she kneeled down, her, in front of me.
I could of killed her right then, me, bashed her neck with my stick, if
I was the killing kind. And if I’d of thought, me, that it would of
done anybody any good.

“Billy—are
you. positive
the coat shouldn’t still be
brown?”

I didn’t even answer, me.

She sat back on her feet, thinking hard. Then she looked up at me,
her, with the damnedest look I ever saw on anybody’s face. I didn’t
have no idea, me, what it meant, except it reminded me of Jack Sawicki
when he played chess. When he was alive, him, to play chess. People
used to snicker, them, at Jack for liking chess. It wasn’t no game for
a Liver.

Then Dr. Turner smiled, her. She said, “ ‘Oh, my ears and whiskers,
how late it’s getting!” “ which didn’t even make no sense. ”Billy, you
have to take me to Eden.“

I leaned on my stick. The end of it was mucky from poking at the
rabbit. “There ain’t no Eden, Dr. Turner. The government blew it up,
them.”

“ ‘There
is
no rabbit,” “ she said, smiling, her, in that
same voice that didn’t make no sense. ”Down the rabbit hole, Billy. Off
with their heads. You and I both know they didn’t blow it up. They
missed.“

I looked, me, again at the dead rabbit. The fox had done a job on
it. “What makes you say, you, that they missed?”

“It doesn’t matter. What matters is that they
did
miss,
and that there are things I need to know. And I’ve decided that the
only way left to discover them is to go to Eden and ask. Nicely direct,
don’t you think? Will you take me there?”

I picked, me, a place in the river, and stared at it. Then I stared
at it some more. I wasn’t going, me, to get into no argument with no
donkey. There ain’t never any way to win those arguments. But I wasn’t
going to take her to Eden, neither. She had called the government once,
her, to blow up Eden, and she could do it again. She wasn’t going to
learn nothing from me.

After a few minutes Dr. Turner stood up, her, wiping mud off the
knees of her jacks. Her voice was serious again. “All right, Billy. Not
yet. But you will, I know, when something happens. And something will.
The SuperSleepless aren’t releasing genemod rabbits that everyone can
see are genemod rabbits for no reason at all. This is a message. Pretty
soon the meaning will come clear, and then we’ll discuss this again.”

“Ain’t nothing to discuss,” I said, me, and I meant it. Not with
her. No matter how many genemod rabbits turned up.

The sun was lower now, it, and the air was getting cold. And my walk
was pretty much ruined anyway. I climbed the riverbank, me, taking my
time. Dr. Turner knew better than to try and help me.

Lizzie was dancing around the apartment, clean from a bath, waving
her study terminal. “Godel’s proof!” she sang, her, like it was a song.
“Godel’s proof, Billy!”

She was as bad as Dr. Turner with her looking glasses and rabbit
holes. Still, I was glad to see
Lizzie
so happy.

“Look, Vicki, look what happens if you take this formula and just
kind of sneak up on these numbers…”

“Let me get my coat off, Mr. Godel,” Dr. Turner said, which didn’t
make no more sense than her talk at the river. But she was smiling,
her, at
Lizzie
.

Lizzie
couldn’t hardly stay still, her. Whatever she had on
that library terminal must of been pretty exciting. She grabbed my
stick, her, and started dancing around with it like it was a partner.
Then she stuck it under her and rode it like a hobbyhorse. Then she
raised it up over her head like a flag. I knew from all this, me, that
Annie wasn’t home.

“All right, let’s see Godel’s proof,” Dr. Turner said. “Did you
access Sven Bjorklind’s variations?”

“Course I did, me,” Lizzie said, with scorn. I couldn’t take my eyes
off her. She was like a light, her. A sun. My
Lizzie
.

By the next morning she was so sick she couldn’t move.

==========

It didn’t look like no sickness I ever saw, certainly not like the
fever she’d had last August.
Lizzie
was shitting bad, her,
with blood in it. Annie kept emptying the bucket and cleaning her up,
but the apartment still smelled awful. And Lizzie couldn’t move her
legs or head without it hurting her. Annie and me were up with her, us,
all night. By dawn she wasn’t even crying no more, just laying there,
her eyes open but not seeing nothing. I was scared, me. She just laid
there.

I said to Annie, “I’m going, me, to get Dr. Turner. She’s down at
the cafe, her, watching the news about martial—”

“I know, me, where she is!” Annie snapped, because she was so
worried, her, about
Lizzie
, and so exhausted. “She’s been
there all night, ain’t she? But Lizzie don’t need no donkey doctor,
her. This time our medunit’s working.”

I didn’t say, me, that donkeys invented the medunit. I was too
scared myself.
Lizzie
groaned and shit in the bed.

“You go ahead, you, and wake up Paulie. I’ll bring her as soon as
she’s cleaned up.”

Paulie Cenverno’s been mayor, him, since Jack Sawicki was killed.
Paulie keeps the code to the clinic. I grabbed my stick, me, and set
off as fast as I could go to Paulie’s apartment building.

Outside was cold and gray but sweet-smelling, which somehow made me
feel even scareder for
Lizzie
. Halfway down the street I met
Dr. Turner. She looked, her, so tired and upset that her genemod face
was almost plain.