The Heart Goes Last

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Cut the crap, he wanted to say. Drop the fucking innuendo. I know you want to suck my little red-hot heart.

“I need a beer,” he said.

“Work for it,” she said, abruptly harsh again. She moved her hand up his leg, squeezed.

Turban

Charmaine is called in to verify her data: sit for the retina scan, repeat the fingerprinting, read Winnie the Pooh for the voice analyzer. Will these steps re-authenticate her profile for the benefit of the database? It’s hard to tell: she’s still alone in her cell, still shunned by the knitting circle, still stuck in Towel-Folding.

But the next day Aurora from Human Resources turns up in the laundry room and asks Charmaine to accompany her upstairs for a chat. The other towel-folders look up: is Charmaine in trouble? They probably hope so. Charmaine feels at a disadvantage – she’s covered in lint, which is diminishing – but she brushes herself off and follows Aurora to the elevator.

The chat takes place in the Chat Room beside the front checkout counter. Aurora is pleased to be able to tell Charmaine that she will have her cards and codes restored to her – or not restored; confirmed. Just as Aurora has been assuring her, the database glitch has been repaired, and she is now once again who she’s been claiming she is. Aurora smiles tightly. Isn’t that good news?

Charmaine agrees that it is. At least she has a code identity once again, which is some comfort. “So can I leave now?” she asks. “Go back home? I’ve missed a lot of Out time.”

Unfortunately, says Aurora, Charmaine can’t depart from Positron quite yet: the synchronization is off. Although in theory she might move into the guest room of her own house – Aurora makes a laughing sound – her Alternate is of course now living in the house they share, it being that person’s turn. Aurora understands how upsetting all this must be for Charmaine, but the proper rotation must be preserved, with no interaction between Alternates. Familiarity would inevitably lead to territorial squabbling, especially over such comfort items as sheets and body lotion. As they have all been taught, possessiveness about our cozy corners and favourite toys isn’t limited to cats and dogs. How we wish it were. Wouldn’t life be simpler?

So Charmaine must continue to be patient, says Aurora. And in any case she’s been doing such a good job with the knitting – the blue teddy bears. How many has she knitted now? It must be at least a dozen! She’ll have time for a few more of them before she leaves, hopefully at the next switchover day, which is when? The first of March, isn’t it? And it’s almost Valentine’s Day – so, not long to go!

Aurora herself has never learned to knit. She does regret that. It must be calming.

Charmaine clenches her hands. One more of those darn teddy bears with their bright, unseeing eyes and she’s going to go sideways, right off the tracks! They’ve filled bins of them. She has nightmares about those teddies; she dreams they’re in bed with her, unmoving but alive. “Yes, it is calming,” she says.

Aurora consults her PosiPad. She has another piece of good news for Charmaine: as of the day after tomorrow, Charmaine will be taken off towel-folding and will resume her former duties as Chief Medications Administrator. Positron does reward talent and experience, and Charmaine’s talent and experience have not gone unnoticed. Aurora gives an encouraging grimace. “Not everyone has the soft touch,” she says. “Coupled with such dedication. There have been incidents, when other … other operatives have been tasked with the, with the task. With the essential duty.”

“When do I start?” asks Charmaine. “Thank you,” she adds. She’s thrilled to be getting away from the towel-folding. She looks forward to re-entering the Medications Administration wing and following that remembered route along the hallways. She visualizes approaching the desk, accessing the possibly real head on the screen, advancing through the familiar doors, snapping on the gloves, picking up the medication and the hypodermic. Then on to the room where her Procedure subject will await, immobile but fearful. She will soothe those fears. Then she will deliver bliss, and then release. It will be nice to feel respected again.

Aurora consults her PosiPad again. “I see here that you’re set to resume your duties tomorrow afternoon,” she says. “After lunch. When we make a mistake here, we do move to rectify it. Congratulations on a good outcome! We’ve all been rooting for you.”

Charmaine wonders who’s been doing the rooting, because she hasn’t noticed anyone. But like so many things around here, maybe the rooting has taken place behind the scenes. “Goodness, I’m late for a meeting,” says Aurora. “We have a whole new group of prisoners coming in, and all at once! Any further questions or points of information?”

Yes, says Charmaine. While she herself has been detained in Positron, what has Stan been told about her situation? Surely he’s been worried about her! Does he know why she wasn’t there? At home. Was he told what happened? Or did he think she’d just been subtracted? Sent to Medications? Erased? She hasn’t dared to ask about this before – it might have sounded like complaining, it might have cast suspicion, it might have interfered with her chances for exoneration – but she’s been cleared now.

“Stan?” says Aurora blankly.

“Stan. My husband, Stan,” says Charmaine.

“That’s not information I have access to,” says Aurora. “But I’m sure it’s been taken care of.

“Thank you,” says Charmaine again. To demand any more answers during this delicate transition that’s taking place – this rehabilitation – might be pushing her luck.

Then there’s Max, kept equally in the dark. Longing for her! Lusting for her! He must be going crazy. But she couldn’t ask Aurora about Max.

“Could I maybe just send him a message?” Charmaine says. “Stan? For Valentine’s Day? To let him know I’m okay, and that I …” A tremulous pause on the verge of tears, which she feels she might really shed. “That I love him?”

Aurora stops smiling. “No. No messages while in Positron. You know better than that. If prison isn’t prison, the outside world has no meaning! Now, enjoy the rest of your experience here.” She nods, stands up, and bustles out of the Chat Room.

At least there won’t be much more of these darn towels, Charmaine thinks as she folds and stacks, folds and stacks. Maybe you can get a lung disease from the fluff. As she’s wheeling her completed set over to the Outtake window, there’s a sort of murmuring behind her, coming from the other women in Towel-Folding. She turns to see: it’s Ed, the CEO of the Positron Project, ushering in an older woman who isn’t wearing an orange boiler suit. On her head she has something that looks like a turban, decorated with red felt flowers.

“Oh my god!” Charmaine says. It just sort of comes out of her. “Lucinda Quant! I used to love your show, The Home Front, it was so … I’m so glad you got better!” She’s babbling, she’s making a fool of herself. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t …”

“Thanks,” says Lucinda Quant gruffly. She seems pleased. She’s quite leathery, or at least her skin is. She didn’t used to look like that on TV, but maybe it’s the illness.

“I’m sure Ms. Quant appreciates your support,” says Ed in that suave voice he has. “We’re giving her a quick tour of our wonderful project. She’s considering a new show called After the Home Front, so she can tell the world about the wonderful solution we have here, to the problems of homelessness and joblessness.” He smiles at Charmaine. He’s standing close to her. “You’ve been happy here, haven’t you?” he says. “Since coming to the Project?”

“Oh yes,” says Charmaine. “It’s been so, it’s been so …” How can she describe what it’s been, considering everything, such as Max and Stan? Is she going to cry?

“Excellent,” Ed says. He pats her arm and turns away, dismissing her. Lucinda Quant gives Charmaine a sharp glance from her beady, red-rimmed eyes. “Cat got your tongue?” she says.

“Oh no,” says Charmaine. Is Ed going to make trouble for her because she didn’t say the right thing? “It’s only … I wish I could’ve been on your show.” And she does wish that, because then maybe people would’ve sent in money, and she and Stan would never have felt the need to sign on.

Shuffle

Stan does the countdown: two more days before Valentine’s Day. The subject hasn’t come up again, but every once in a while he catches Jocelyn looking at him speculatively, as if measuring him.

Tonight they’re on the sofa as usual, but this time the upholstery will remain unsullied. They’re side by side, facing forward, like a married couple – which they are, though they’re married to other people. But they aren’t watching the digital gyrations of Charmaine and Phil tonight. They’re watching actual TV – Consilience TV, but still TV. If you drank enough beer, slit your eyes, wiped the context, you could almost believe you were in the outside world. Or the outside world in the past.

They’ve tuned in at the end of a motivational self-help show. So far as Stan can make out, it’s about channelling the positive energy rays of the universe through the invisible power points on your body. You do it through the nostrils: close the right nostril with the index finger, breathe in, open, close the left nostril, breathe out. It gives a whole new dimension to nose-picking.