Fierce September (14 page)

My thoughts exactly.

‘I wish we could go out!’ I said. Too much time shut up in the Centre was frustrating enough; Willem’s seeming not to care about Hera’s warning only made it worse.

Silvern poked a finger into my ribs. ‘Why? So you can go and hunt down the baddies? Tie them up and throw them in the sea?’

‘Just go out. Anywhere. To do something. Work. Anything.’ I took in a shuddering breath. ‘This is driving me crazy.’

She patted my head. ‘You were crazy already.’

I laughed as we ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time just for a change.

A
ND SO THE TENOR OF our lives changed drastically for the second time in as many weeks. Those of us who were left behind chafed at not being able to help, not being able to take part. We who were so accustomed to being active, to doing hard physical work, became bored, even tiring of watching the movies available to us. The only physical occupations we had were cleaning our rooms and cooking the emergency food rations stored in the Centre. Preparing the meals required little time, thought or skill, because all we had to do was add water to dehydrated concentrates, stir and heat.

Several times a day my stratum ran up all sixteen flights of stairs to get some exercise. Others took up the idea too, so that for most of the day we could hear the sound of pounding feet throughout the building. We would stand on the roof with the wind whipping us while we watched the changing colours on the hills and the clouds travelling across the sky. Birds soared and floated. I took Hera up there often and we’d lie flat on our backs watching the birds and the clouds.

The news from the outside world worsened. More and more people were becoming ill. The seventy-year-old woman in Invercargill died. The husband of one of the Auckland couples was expected to die. There was news too of people recovering from the sickness, but there was no news that the researchers were any closer to discovering how it was spread. We didn’t speak about the hate campaign against us. It was harder to bear that than it was to bear the waiting.

By the time the pandemic was a week old the blame had settled firmly on our shoulders. No matter how often the officials said that the disease had broken out only four days after our arrival and that all previous pandemics had had longer incubation periods, the accusations continued to pour through the internet, and over the interactive radio stations and television channels.

Dad chafed against the confinement, the inactivity. Several times a day he’d say, ‘I wish …’ Then he’d look at Mother, Hera and me, and apologise.

‘It’s all right, Zanin,’ Mother said. ‘I feel the same. Activity would be better than this.’

But Willem didn’t call on any more of us to work Outside.

On the twelfth day of the pandemic the news came that the disease was definitely bacterial, though it didn’t appear to be spreading in the normal way. It seemed that the time between infection and falling ill was six days instead of the eight or ten of the previous pandemics.

‘So the first cases contracted the sickness two days before we arrived.’ Bazin shook his head. ‘That’s too small a margin for people to be convinced that we didn’t bring it.’

Leebar snapped off the television. ‘Let’s not watch any more than we need to.’

After that, the only time we watched the news was when all of our people gathered together in the big dining room to listen to the daily updates. Always there was an interview or discussion about how the disease might have started, where it had come from. And each time somebody would mention the people of Taris. It was clear that most of the country believed it was our fault. I thought they were glad to have a villain to point at.

‘We’re the scapegoats,’ Grif said when I mentioned it to her.

‘The what?’ I asked, but all she did was smile at me and stroke my face.

I looked up scapegoat on the mini-comp:
a person or
thing that is made to bear blame for others
.

We were scapegoats without a doubt.

By the end of day thirteen the televised map plotting cases of the disease showed a rash of red scattered across the whole country. Not everyone who fell sick became mortally ill, but the figures were chilling.

‘One in five,’ Mother whispered. She looked around the room. ‘How shall we bear it?’ She lifted Hera onto her knee, wrapping her arms around her.

Hera struggled. ‘Down! Play with Merith.’

She ran over to Merith and dragged her under a table. Roop put out a hand to snatch her daughter back, then she let it drop.

Early the next morning, Willem called us to a meeting. We knew straight away that his news would be grim. I could sense all of us, even the small children, bracing ourselves for what was to come.

‘The situation is desperate.’ As always, his voice was calm, but his whole body was tense and his eyes dark with sadness. ‘So many are sick now, or else they are quarantined. If you still want to help, please come and see me. We need replacement workers in essential services such as transport, hospitals and emergency crews.’

I was the only one in my stratum not to leap to their feet. I just sat where I was, staring at Mother who had stood up. ‘Mother! You can’t! What about Hera?’ And me. What about me if you die? I would care for Hera, of course I would, but …

Willem called out, raising his voice above the hubbub. ‘Only those eighteen and older, please.’ He sent a quick smile at Marba who was closest. ‘We may need to use you younger ones, but not yet.’

He also said that one parent must stay in families where there were young children. Mother was to stay; Dad was to oversee one of the big gardens to the north of Wellington. The spring planting had to be done if we were to have food after the pandemic had passed.

My grandparents hustled us up to our apartment. Grif and Danyat comforted Mother. ‘Courage, my daughter,’ Grif said. ‘We’ve known this would come.’

Mother tried to smile. ‘I know. It’s probably easier to be helping than just to be stuck here, waiting. But I will miss him …’

None of us spoke of what else we knew would come. In fact, it came sooner than we’d imagined, for only one day later, on day fifteen, my grandparents were called to nurse the sick at a facility in Levin, not far from where Dad had gone. We hugged them as they left, and tried not to cry. Hera put her hands on each of their faces as they kissed her goodbye. ‘Hera loves you,’ she said to each of them.

‘We’ll speak to you every day,’ Danyat said. He touched Mother’s cheek. ‘Try not to worry, my daughter.’

‘We won’t always know what shifts we’ll be on,’ Leebar said, ‘so don’t panic if you can’t get hold of us sometimes.’

I wanted to go with them. In some strange way their departure was worse than Dad’s. Dad would come back. He’d be out in the open air, he was my father – invulnerable. But my grandparents were no longer young and all four of them were leaving together. How could we bear it?

‘We will take all the care possible, Juno, dear girl,’ said Grif. ‘You look after your mother and sister.’

It was as if she were exacting a promise from me. I searched her face, but she wore her enigmatic expression.

‘Yes,’ I promised. ‘I will. Of course I will.’

They walked out the door and were gone.

Mother and I didn’t speak for several hours. We were too shocked. Hera was subdued and whimpering.

Every evening of those dark days, all those left behind met in the dining room to share news from family members away fighting the pandemic.

Galla and Elden reported that Vima spoke to them briefly each afternoon as she was feeding Wilfred. ‘She looks exhausted already,’ Galla said, her face worried, ‘but she’s well. Wilfred’s well.’

Then, one evening, Galla and Elden didn’t come to the dining room. The request had come for more people to nurse the sick in the hospital in Wellington. They had answered the call, as had five other couples of their generation, Marba’s parents among them.

Dad spoke to us every morning before he headed out to the gardens. He was well – we could see that in his face and in the way his eyes lit up when he spoke of the work. ‘I love it – being out in the weather. Even in the rain.’

‘Do the other workers blame you for the pandemic?’ I asked him once.

‘Some of them do,’ he said. ‘There’s been a bit of unrest, but nothing too bad. Nothing to worry about, I promise.’

He didn’t say more, so of course we worried.

We spoke to at least one of my grandparents each evening too. ‘We’re fine,’ they said. ‘We’re taking every care. Try not to be concerned.’ But it was impossible not to. All of them looked weary, though it seemed they were happy to be working.

Mother was pale, her face strained. Sometimes she would come to the roof with me and Hera, but not often. It was as if she couldn’t bear to look Outside.

The pandemic was twenty days old. Ten people had died, fifty-three were critically ill and new cases were being reported daily. Each morning we woke with dread in our hearts until we heard from Dad that he was well. And each evening my mother asked my grandparents for reassurance, though she found the long wait through the day until we heard from them unbearable.

‘Can you send us a message in the mornings as well? Just tell us you are all right,’ Mother begged Grif. ‘That’s all we need to know.’

Grif smiled at us, her face shrunk by the tiny screen. ‘Of course, dear daughter. But try not to worry and remember we love you.’

Day twenty-one, Jov was asked to work at the emergency response centre under the Houses of Parliament in the city. Sina’s hands flew to her heart, but she didn’t say anything. Her baby was due in less than a week.

Marba reinstituted the stratum meetings we’d had on Taris, so that each morning the fourteen of us met on the roof to talk. Always he started with the same questions: were our families well and did we have any idea about how we could help?

Day twenty-four, all our families were well.

Biddo said, ‘I want to ask Willem if I can help. I could do the sort of work Jov will be doing.’

‘Your dad’ll have a fit,’ Wenda said. Biddo’s mother, older sister and grandparents had already gone. ‘That would be all of you except him helping Outside.’

‘He’ll go once Sina’s had her baby,’ Biddo said. ‘He’s only stayed back because of that.’

Dreeda stared at him, her eyes wide. ‘Oh, I hadn’t thought about Sina. Trebe’s gone. Creen’s gone. There’s no one else left to assist at the birth.’

It seemed Jov’s sons were doomed to be born in unusual circumstances, and now it was Biddo’s father, who had cared for the health of our animals on Taris, who would act as midwife to Sina’s baby.

‘She won’t have her husband, her family or her physician,’ Wenda said softly. ‘It will be so hard for her.’

Marba tried to bring us back to his questions. ‘Any ideas about how we can help?’

But most of us were still thinking about Sina. ‘We can keep Sina company,’ Brex said. ‘Try to distract her thoughts.’

Marba opened his mouth, and by the look on his face was about to remind us to get back to the important issue.

‘Don’t say it, Marba,’ Silvern snapped at him. ‘Just don’t say anything!’

He shut his mouth but couldn’t hide the impatience in his face. We got up to leave. We had no ideas and we were getting on each other’s nerves.

I spoke to Mother about Sina. Her face brightened. ‘I’ll go and see her right now – ask her if she’d like to move into Grif and Danyat’s rooms. We can be her family. If she’d like us to be.’

I felt strange about it, almost as if I was betraying Vima.
Dumb
. She would be the first to say that Sina deserved all the help we could offer.

I took Hera up to the roof. The day was fine, the blue sky busy with scuttling clouds, and we lay down to watch the display. After a bit, Hera tucked her hand in mine and said, ‘Don’t want Grif to go away.’

For a second I couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. I managed to sit up. ‘She’s coming back, Hera. But not yet. She’s busy.’

She just shook her head. ‘She says goodbye Hera, love you Hera, love Juno, love Sheen. Goodbye.’

I snatched her up in my arms and held her tight. ‘I don’t want her to go either. I want her back.’ It was useless trying to tell Hera that our grandmother would be all right, that she’d come back. We sat on the roof and wept for her.

I would have to tell Mother.

Hera clutched tightly to my hand as we returned to the apartment. Mother was busy in the kitchen. She was singing, happier than she’d been since our arrival. The prospect of having Sina to care for had lifted her spirits and given her new purpose – and now we were about to destroy her peace of mind once again. She turned to greet us, saw our faces – and just stood with the colour draining from her own.

‘What? Tell me – what is it?’

Over Hera’s noisy sobs I repeated what she’d said.

With immense care, Mother set down the saucepan she was holding. ‘So. It has come.’ She came over to us, wrapped her arms around us but didn’t try to calm Hera’s weeping. ‘I think my mother knew before she even said she’d go.’

It was no comfort. ‘Why are you so calm?’ I wanted to lash out at her, to shake her, make her cry too. ‘D’you think it isn’t true? You should know better by now. It will be true, it will be.’

She hushed me as if I was as young as Hera. ‘Juno, darling. I know it’s true. When Zanin left I cried till I thought I had no tears left, but when your grandparents left I cried more.’ She pulled in a shaky breath. ‘Tonight I shall just cry for my mother. The fear has gone now. The bad thing has come upon us.’