Gray Skies (2 page)

As Sammi walked across the classroom toward Ms. Gilly’s desk, the younger children and some of the older kids had quieted until the room was nearly silent. The only sound heard had been of her padded coverall shoes skidding across the floorboards. Kids with their heads down on their desks had quickly sprung up, curious about the sudden silence; their faces frozen with an expression of awe. When she’d reached Ms. Gilly and handed her a transfer parchment, Ms. Gilly’s stern expression had broken. Her cheeks pushed up into a smile, and she’d lifted a hand to feel Sammi’s hair. Sammi hadn’t moved, or backed away, as one would have expected her to. Instead, she returned a brilliant smile to Ms. Gilly. Declan loved that, too: he’d been so impressed that Sammi wasn’t shy, or nervous.

“Aren’t you a ball of sunshine, Sammi?” Ms. Gilly had said, and that’s when the first mention of
Sammi Sunshine
sounded from the back of the classroom. Then, a second
Sammi Sunshine
had stirred the air, causing both Sammi and Ms. Gilly to lose their smiles to shallow frowns. A moment later, more of the class had erupted into chants of
Sammi Sunshine,
and an elbow nudged Declan’s side, inviting him to join in. He’d hesitated, especially when he’d seen Sammi’s trembling lips and chin. Soon after, he’d seen the first tears on her cheeks. But after another elbow nudged him, harder this time, he’d reluctantly started chanting too.

Years later, Declan still felt a pang of guilt biting inside when he remembered the hurt look that had been in Sammi’s young eyes. It was a stupid name really, but through the years, the name stuck. Yelled from time to time, the name was always met by a quick-witted remark from Sammi, some of which Declan thought were quite witty and excellent. She’d grown to become something beautiful in this gray world, and Declan was sometimes afraid for her; different wasn’t
always
a good thing.

Sammi pulled her hand free of his, jarring him from his old memories; the warm remains of her touch quickly went with her. Declan whispered a second thank you in her direction. With more writing stone in hand, Declan could write today. He could write the way he liked to: free of concerns and constraints. With a sullen feeling, he considered what he’d be doing later: cleaning the parchment, and erasing all of the new words he’d formed into sentences that day.

“Why bother writing at all?” he mumbled.

But again, tonight, his charcoal words would lift from where he had placed them. They’d mix in a flow of tepid water before running off the parchment’s frayed edges. Like so many times before, the dirtied water would carry his words down the drain, and into the Commune’s waste-recycling units. How many of his words were trapped in the filters of the waste-recycler? How many stories would forever be hidden away in a mash of recycling pulp, and communal waste, never to be seen or read by another set of eyes? He sighed away the loss, for the freedom to write the way he liked was his, at least for today.

“Attention,” Ms. Gilly commanded from the front of the classroom. Declan considered the years that the stout woman had been teaching him. There was a time when she’d towered over him and his friends, back when he was younger, and she was thinner. Still, she had a presence that had been so large in their young eyes, that often, he’d feared her, and frequently, he’d avoided her.

During Declan’s seventh or eighth year of school, his eyes had finally reached Ms. Gilly’s ears. By his ninth year of school, the unthinkable happened: he’d grown taller than her. While he liked being taller, he still felt as he had that very first year. He supposed he’d always feel that way.

It wasn’t until the year that he’d gotten sick and missed over two weeks of school that the fearfulness he’d held for his teacher changed to something else. She’d appeared in his room with concern on her face, and had brought with her a handful of parchment, and a tiny pouch of sweets. Fever wet his brow, and a heavy rattle tumbled deep in his chest. With a constant ringing in his ears, and pressure pushing from behind his eyes, there was talk that Declan had the flu. This terrified both him and his parents, for if word of the flu spread, his dwelling would come under guard. Ms. Gilly had challenged the Commune floor advisors, and had told them that they were overreacting. She hadn’t been afraid to enter Declan’s dwelling, or the nook where he slept. She told the floor advisors that she’d seen the flu first-hand, and that her mother had died from it earlier that year. Ms. Gilly assured them that what Declan had was not the flu, at all. She’d smiled to his parents, and said that her favorite student would be fine. Declan still remembered the relief on his parents’ faces.
 

“You’re one of my best students,” she’d told him. “You are so very bright, and terrific with the younger children.” She’d pecked his forehead with her lips, and had told him to get well soon, and to get back to class.
 

Declan had never forgotten that. Now, when he looked at Ms. Gilly, there was something more… something motherly about her. It had helped him, especially in the last year, when his mother and sister had really gotten sick. They weren’t as lucky as he had been; they had gotten the flu, and had died from it, just as their dwelling had come under guard for fear of it spreading. That was the second time that Ms. Gilly had visited his home. She’d held him as he cried, and told him that it was okay, and that, in time, the pain would pass.

With images of his mother and sister in his mind, his breath was labored, as he laid a hand over his heart. The pain had never passed. It had stayed with him, and on some days, he was grateful to have it. Some days though, he struggled to remember the sounds of their voices. His seat creaked as he turned just enough to look down two rows in front of him. He found the empty desk where his sister, Hadley, had sat. Part of him was relieved that her seat remained empty, but at the same time, it was concerning.

“Hadley sat there,” he whispered just loud enough to be heard. Hearing her name gave him a good feeling, leaving him content for today. Tomorrow might be different, but then again, tomorrow might be different for everybody in the world. After all, today was to be the End of Gray Skies.

“Attention, Class,” Ms. Gilly commanded again. The sound of chairs moving, and the hinged screeching and clunking of school desks opening and closing became rushed. The ruckus continued, as everyone prepared for the day, and then the noise slowed to a few stragglers before stopping. As Ms. Gilly began to speak, one last clunk of a heavy desktop made her eyes turn toward the offending sound. As she approached the source, young Rick Toomey went about his business of rummaging inside his desk, preparing a writing parchment. Ms. Gilly stared at the boy, who was unaware that he was holding up the class.
 
With her eyebrows raised, she waited for him to finish and acknowledge her. It was only when the room had completely quieted that Rick Toomey took notice. When his upturned face met Ms. Gilly’s, he blushed with embarrassment, and forced a smile as the rest of the class let out a relieved laugh. Ms. Gilly chortled once, raising her hand to her mouth.

“If you weren’t so darn cute…” she started, and then brushed her thick fingers through his hair, rustling it, before returning to the front of the class.

“Does anyone know what day today is?” Ms. Gilly’s voice sang out over the class. The room was silent again. Of course, the older students knew what the announcement was about.
 

Surely they remember
, Declan thought.
Certainly Sammi does
. Like Declan, the rest of the older students had been here for the previous End of Gray Skies announcement. They had been here with a much thinner and younger Ms. Gilly, and they had sat close to the front row, like Rick Toomey was today. They’d listened to her exciting announcement, and had watched the world history moving pictures. And they had also been here for the failure; there had been no End of Gray Skies.

“Does anyone know?” she repeated, speaking in a settled and calming voice.

“It’s the End of Gray Skies,” the class answered. A few voices trailed off, and then hushed amidst the giggles and the clapping of a few hands.

“And can anyone tell me what that means?” Ms. Gilly requested, with her voice pitched higher, as if she was holding back the need to spill the answer, herself.

Declan shrank back into his chair, thinking that if he could make himself smaller, he’d avoid being called on. To his surprise, young Rick Toomey stood up with a toothy grin planted across his face. He turned, and spoke directly to the class.

“The End of Gray Skies is when the five Oceanic-VAC-Machines will change our Earth back to the way it was.” He finished with a stern nod, and Declan couldn’t help but grin.

“Thank you, Rick. That is correct,” Ms. Gilly acknowledged, motioning for the boy to sit. “Now, who can tell me
why
? Why is this of interest to us?”

Ms. Gilly’s eyes crawled across the room, searching for someone. Her hand lifted, and jabbed at the air, as if counting the number of students in the class. Declan was familiar with what she was doing: if someone didn’t volunteer soon, she’d decide who was going to answer. She’d likely pick from the older children, and this wasn’t going to be a short answer. Declan began pushing back against his chair again. This time, he pushed until he heard the frame moan and creak, catching Ms. Gilly’s ear. When she turned to the sound, her eyes settled on him, and her finger stopped bouncing in the air. He sighed with a simple resignation. Ms. Gilly grinned, satisfied with her selection.

“How about you, Declan? What can you tell the class about the End of Gray Skies? Wait…” she paused with her finger in the air, as though plucking words from it. “Actually, I want you to first tell the class about Gray Skies. What happened?”

Silence; Declan hesitated, and didn’t say a word. When he felt a tiny jab on his back, he knew that Sammi was most likely laughing silently in bliss. She punched him again, hard enough this time to bump him forward. He heard Sammi’s mock laugh, while she landed another bump of her hand. Declan leaned forward, and then stood.

“Come up here, so that everyone can hear you,” Ms. Gilly said, slapping her open hand against her hip.

“Go on,
Dicklan
, go on, now,” a voice from the back row teased.

“Don’t mind them,” Sammi comforted. “Go ahead, you’ll do fine. You always do.”

Sammi was right, Declan knew it. But nerves played in his belly, and made his steps feel wobbly. When his mouth went dry, and his throat turned scratchy, he thought to go back to his seat. Maybe he could complain of a stomachache, or a headache. When he stopped and turned back, Sammi shooed him with a wave of her hands. Declan forced away the reluctance, and pressed forward until he found himself facing the class. Over the last ten years, he’d sat in every row and probably every desk in the classroom. He knew every corner, and every chip, crack, and scratch on the blackboard. He could name each turned up edge, and warped floorboard, and could even point out the pitted nails that were losing their grip on the wood. He knew everything there was to know about the room, yet the classroom looked different when standing at the front. It always did.

The youngest of children sat in the front row, twiddling their fingers and hands, while looking at nothing in particular. One child stared at Declan with an absent look on his face, as he made noises by clapping his hand against his open mouth. Older children lined up in each row behind the first. The oldest students sat in the back rows, including Sammi. And though he was a little older than Sammi, he liked that she sat behind him.

Sammi caught Declan’s eyes, and delivered a wide smile, and encouraging nods of her head. Even from where he stood, he could see the bounce of her red hair as she gestured her support for him. He smiled back, but it quickly faded when another voice teased from the back row. Ms. Gilly fired off a rapid set of claps to silence the class.

Once everyone settled again, Declan began to tell the tale. Any trepidation or nerves that had juggled his insides went away. He didn’t feel the anxiety tugging at him; his legs felt firm, instead of rubbery and loose. He spoke to the class, as though he were writing one of his stories. This time, the words wouldn’t end up trapped in the filters of the waste-recycler. With his voice, and through his words, he showed the class what had happened. It was a sad, but good story.

When the young children in the closer rows shifted in their seats, and he saw their expressions changing, he knew that he had them hooked. It wasn’t quite the fairytale that his mom used to put him and his sister to bed with, but it was their history. It was who they were, and what their world had been centuries before. He felt himself begin to relax, as the story unfolded from his lips.

“Nobody knows exactly what happened. Nobody really knows what happened at all. Hundreds of years have passed since the massive Oceanic-VAC-Machines were built to fix what was broken. Five of the machines were built: one for each of the oceans. Over twenty years, thousands of people from all over the world worked together, communicating, building, and testing. They were going to save the world.

“Whether the world actually needed saving might never be known. Some speculate that the gigantic machines were built to transform the oceans into a new energy source, feeding the world’s growing hunger for energy. Some believe that the machines were created to fix global warming, while others thought the use of the ocean could fix the Earth’s ozone layer.

“Turning the machines on took months, but within just a few weeks’ time, the converted ocean seawater rose high enough above the surface, fixing whatever was broken, or so they thought. But it also made the Earth’s air heavy; too heavy. The machines were left on. The scientists expected Earth’s atmosphere to absorb, and to adjust, and since nobody could see a problem, nobody was alarmed. But the air continued to grow denser.