The Attachment Race Read online

  Belinda joined the line which curled around the gymnasium. There were sixty or so women along with her – the same sixty she’d seen every five or six days for the exercises in absurdity. As they waited, it didn’t take long for the Upsilonians to grow bored and weary. Belinda knew she’d seen the round-faced woman just in front of her in line before, but had never known her name. Still, even without that familiarity, they were all in the same boat, this group.

  “Who is it today?” Belinda asked. “Do you know?”

  “Umm…I think somebody said the I.H.P.B.”

  Belinda mouthed the letters, trying to call up some memory of what they stood for.

  “I.H.P.B.? What…the hell is that?” she finally said.

  “I don’t know,” the round-faced woman replied with a shrug.

  “It’s the International Humanitarian Promisekeeper’s Brigade,” offered another familiar face, two spots further ahead in the line. “I think.”

  “Never heard of that one.” Several others nodded, agreeing with Belinda, one or two rolling their eyes, as this interminable exercise had long ago exhausted their understanding.

  The round-faced woman chipped in again: “Last time was the People Caring for People Society, right?”

  Some agreed, a few puzzled over the question and one woman said, “Who cares?”

  When the gym doors finally opened, Belinda had to wait. She discovered, once she reached the entrance – twenty minutes in – that there were only five couples to interview all sixty Upsilonians who remained in line beneath the afternoon sun. No bargain. She considered someone might mention that to the do-gooders and give them one more thing to feel guilty about. As her turn came, Belinda was guided to a sedate couple in their 40’s. Each wore a button with the letters I.H.P.B. emblazoned on it. They were introduced to her as Luke and Gwendolyn.

  Luke had the weak chin of a man who craved reassurance. He raised his eyebrows, leaned forward and seemed to invent a new facial expression for every different thing Belinda had to say just so she’d know how much he cared. Gwendolyn didn’t say much initially, but looked back and forth between Luke and Belinda, nodding vigorously all the time, as if the most recent words spoken mirrored her deepest held beliefs. She stopped the conversation at one point and asked Luke to take a picture of her with Belinda, doing a near perfect job of ignoring the aroma given off by the ‘poor creature’ who would soon brave the unknowns of space. She only thought to ask if it was okay with Belinda after the deed had been done.

  They raised all the same predictable questions and Belinda delivered identical, approved answers, as if it were an actual interview. When they were finished, Gwendolyn reached into a small case at her side and extracted a tiny plastic cube with a hologram of Earth inside.

  “A going away present from the I.H.P.B.” she said.

  “We saw them setting up for the Attachment Race,” Luke noted. “Are you excited?”

  It was asked as though they were much older, an experienced aunt and uncle, checking in on a visit with a teenage niece who needed advice.

  “To be honest, I have other things on my mind,” Belinda told the couple.

  “Of course, of course,” they took turns saying.

  Gwendolyn brought her hands together as if to pray, gauging what she wanted to say next.

  “I won’t insult you by saying that I understand,” she started, “but don’t let an opportunity pass you by if it comes your way.”

  “We met the men of Omicron yesterday,” Luke said, taking up the baton, “quite a few who struck me as true gentlemen.”

  “That’s right,” Gwendolyn added – she was really cooking now, “it’s not as if Earth is relocating violent criminals and malcontents any longer. So many of them are professional men. Or…they used to be.”

  “Selecting a life partner in a couple of hours,” said Belinda, “is not ideal.”

  “Sure,” Luke said finally. “Very true. Not ideal.”

  “Not that anything is ideal these days,” Gwendolyn told Belinda with an earnestness that made it seem as though they were longtime friends. “We human beings have made such a mess of things.”

  “I think it would be a lot more ideal if you’d trade places with me.”

  Belinda delivered the line straight – no indication of a joke. As soon as the words left her mouth, she froze. The sentiment, one she’d been keeping stuffed down inside herself and under control had done a quick step, slipped past her common sense and found the light of day.

  Luke and Gwendolyn eased into laughter, intent on making it clear everyone agreed it was a cute little joke. They began playing eye-tag with the nearest Watcher and wished Belinda “all the best” several times before she was escorted away.

  As Belinda walked out of the gym, a scream ripped through the low buzz of conversation. One of the Upsilon ladies leapt onto an I.H.P.B. representative, clawing at her neck. Blood was drawn.

  Once the attacker was pulled away and wrestled down, Belinda and another woman on her way out were pushed through the door which slammed behind them. Seconds later, a medic hurried past, knocked at the gym door and was pulled inside.

  Word spreads quickly: the attacker was a previously sedate young woman with a sweet disposition. Hearing this, Belinda couldn’t help but contemplate whether she’d have been capable of the same thing if Luke and Gwendolyn had continued with their “advice”.

  Peg grilled Belinda for details once she got back to the dormitory. It took half a dozen repetitions of, “I didn’t really see it” before Peg relented. Belinda took a spot on her bunk and glanced at the leg with Vroo stuffed inside. If the room hadn’t been filled with three others, she’d doubtlessly have eased her anxiety with one – perhaps two – of the pills.

  Chapter 10

  Ninety seconds of water per day was the limit. Most at Upsilon had yet to master the skill of applying a soap tablet smaller than a human thumb to all necessary body parts with less than two minutes to drench, lather and rinse.

  Top half today, bottom tomorrow. A not uncommon compromise.

  On the day before the Attachment Race, however, liquid soap dispensers with lavender-scented gel had been hung beside each shower head.

  “Use all the soap you like, ladies,” the female Watchers directing traffic on each floor of the dorms called out. Water supply ran a full four minutes for each individual – sheer gluttony for the women of Upsilon.

  Belinda took a spot along with the other nine in her shift at the communal cleansing station (two rows of five showers, face-to-face) on floor number three. She finished quickly enough to leave time for an idle pause beneath the ongoing stream. Every bit of extra water trickling down, past her feet and onto the tile floor washed away another layer of the awfulness absorbed over three weeks’ time. Upsilonians could close their eyes as if donning a protective cloak that cocooned them – if only very briefly.

  Once the four minutes were exhausted and the water flow abruptly stopped, Belinda stepped out of the communal cleansing station, received a coarse piece of fabric masquerading as a towel and dried herself. The canary-yellow of the Watchers shoved its way back into her consciousness. A reminder that the extended showers were no gesture of largesse. It was all for the Race.

  The prospect of making the women of Upsilon desirable to the men of Omicron and vice versa would have been absurd if they were milling about in slate-gray uniforms. Moreover, eye-watering stench wouldn’t help either.

  Two dozen rows of racks filled with dresses were positioned between the dormitories. Shifts of thirty women circulated among the racks, perusing the garments. They were each permitted to select one – and only one – for the following evening. It didn’t take long for the faces to go from interest and curiosity to abject disappointment. The clothing that had been wheeled into Upsilon had the cut, flair and fabrics of styles more than a decade past their prime. Mumbling between a number of the women proposed that they’d be better off with the slate-gray one-piecers.

  Belinda
wasn’t nearly as put out as some of the other women in her group of thirty. She spied Grace, several aisles across, browsing dresses with increasing anxiety, face contorted with an expression which may as well have been saying, “What am I supposed to do with these?” Peg approached it in a more practical way: when dreck was all she had to work with, she’d take hostages until a final decision could be made. One dress, then three, four and five slung over her left arm. Each had something about it that she might make work, but none were the ideal. In the meantime, as she decided on which it would be, no one else could get a shot at anything she considered a possibility. It was only a matter of time before her pile of dresses over one arm and aggressive manner got the attention of the Watchers. Told to return all but one of the garments, she tried to plead her case, but the rule was clear. She set about to putting dresses back on the racks as a Watcher trailed behind, making sure she complied.

  Belinda had yet to take one dress off the rack. She’d decided that whatever she ended up choosing would be green. Her favorite color. A reminder of the hue she’d be unlikely to see very often – if at all – once removed from Earth. Without picking any of the offerings up for a closer examination, she began tapping her finger on each green dress she passed. “It could be you”, she thought with each touch. In turn, the dresses began to whisper back. All other sound receded – the complaining and bickering of women around her – and a one word response from each green candidate she passed: ‘Soulmate’.

  The whispering grew louder with each successive touch: ‘Soulmate’. A ridiculous word. One which hadn’t been part of serious vocabulary in decades.

  Soulmate.

  An old-fashioned word. Something of value in Earth’s past. Consigned to the heap of terms that were looked upon with derision and arrogance. Soulmate. Unicorn. Magic. Wish.

  Belinda heard the word used once as a child at a family gathering. Someone said ‘soulmate’ with an air of mockery. The young girl asked her uncle what it meant.

  “It doesn’t mean anything, sweetie,” Belinda’s uncle replied.

  “Then why not use a word that does mean something?”

  “Because it’s fun to look back on the way people used to be. The way they used to think it was important.”

  “What did they think was important about it?”

  “It was…well, a sort of…” the man struggled with a way in which to explain it to a nine year old. “Darling…come here.”

  Belinda’s aunt was pulled from conversation with other relatives. Perhaps she could clarify – woman to woman.

  “Belinda asked what soulmate used to mean. I can’t…what’s the best to way to put it?”

  “Oh…” the aunt said, eyes glazing over at the unexpected request. “It was… let’s see. If you had one person in the entire world that was just right…well, let’s say, just made for you. If there was one person with whom you fit perfectly…to the exclusion of, I suppose, all other people...”

  She paused, trying to decide if that was correct.

  “Something like that. Your perfect person. Think of it that way. Isn’t that ridiculous? That’s why the song is so much fun!”

  And now, in the compound of Upsilon, among dresses which should have long ago been scrapped, the word assailed Belinda. Why now? She’d dated men over the years – once discussed marriage. But the thought of ‘soulmate’ hadn’t intruded on her consciousness since childhood. Was this from the Vroo? Did she need more? Had it finally turned her brain inside-out?

  The nearest dress – a brown thing with an odd flair in the sleeves – did not speak to Belinda and she took it rapidly from the rack, moving on to select a pair of shoes. She took deep breaths, trying to settle her stomach and cool her head. Peg was arguing once more with a Watcher for having multiple selections in her hands at one time, but Belinda didn’t bother to look. She walked away from the racks as fast as her feet would take her.

  Cold water had been set up on a table beside one of the dormitories, well away from the chaos of the dresses. The shade in which the table stood drew Belinda – as did the fact there was no one else there at the time with whom she might have to construct awkward, unwanted chat.

  Dropping the brown, low-heeled shoes she’d picked beside the water table, a burst of dust kicked up and sullied them slightly. Belinda didn’t truly care for the sake of the Attachment Race, but being too conditioned to take care of things in her possession, she set her dress carefully on the table – clear of the water – and bent down to dust the shoes off against the leg of her uniform. Far from a perfect cleaning, she resigned herself to the mediocre result and stood up again to find Clame standing close by.

  “Nice choice,” Clame said, nodding at the plain, brown dress. He rubbed the fabric of the thing between his thumb and forefinger.

  Belinda didn’t speak. She scooped a cup of water and began to drink.

  “Didn’t take you long to find it. Do you have your heart set on attaching tomorrow night?”

  A direct question from a Watcher. Belinda was required to respond.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Some ladies haven’t decided. I heard a few of them talking: said that if they knew where they’d be headed without an attachment, it might help them make a decision on linking up.”

  Belinda nodded, keeping her eyes on the rummaging of the dress racks. As Clame placed his hands on the table, resting his weight there, the water tub sloshed slightly. Belinda’s attention darted to her dress. The spilled water spreading across the table drew closer to the brown fabric – as Clame seemed to realize. But for her to reach over and move it would have meant drawing closer to the Watcher who put all Upsilonians on edge. She could already smell the aroma he left in his wake whenever passing in front of women in the compound – the musky foulness that accompanied him like a pet dog when he was assigned to their room in the morning or evening for pill drop. It would be difficult not to retch if she got even a hint more of it in her nostrils and the fear in her gut that it might never completely leave her was too great to bother keeping the shitty dress from being a little soiled by water.

  And then, in a gesture not expected of Clame, he lifted the dress from the water table and offered it to Belinda with what he used for a smile.

  “Did you know that this morning they drew up the assignments for every single woman in this compound should they choose not to attach? Your name is on there, of course. I saw it.”

  “Yes. But we’re not allowed to know…until the day after tomorrow.”

  “That’s the rule. Good reason for it. But wouldn’t you like to know?”

  Belinda squirmed and shrugged slightly.

  “Let me tell you what I have in mind,” said Clame. “Do you know the shed out on the east side? I can be there in five minutes. Say you enter…with this on,” he said, running the back of his hand along the fabric of the brown dress. “No shoes. Leave them behind. Bare feet.”

  Belinda scanned the grounds. Was anyone else watching? Might it appear to another Watcher that Clame was hovering inappropriately? Ridiculous. Watchers didn’t do anything inappropriate when it came to the internees.

  “You won’t even see me,” said Clame, continuing to make his case. Unless you want to. Just slowly slip…out of the dress. You do that for me, I’ll have word on where you’re going by dinner tonight.”

  Belinda held the dress closer to her body. She considered walking away – or running – but she feared what that could lead to. Clame leaned over a little, trying to catch her eye.

  A hand reached, grabbed hold of the brown dress and pulled it from Belinda’s clutch. It was Peg. She held the garment up and appraised it with a sour face. Over her shoulder was draped a red thing with black polka dots. It was, Belinda thought, as if Peg had it made to order.

  “You’re the first one done and this is what you picked?” Peg said, looking at the dress with some semblance of pity. She pushed her way past Clame to hold it up to Belinda and get a look at the effect. “S’cuse me,
” she said to the Watcher in such a way as to make it seem he was hardly worth noticing.

  Belinda finally let her gaze drift up to Clame. He focused on the back of Peg’s head, a stare that would have liked to penetrate her skull if such a power existed.

  “I got this,” Peg said, pulling the red dress off her shoulder. She took Belinda by the arm and steered her away from Clame, looking back to give him an obnoxious smirk.

  “Peg!” Belinda whispered.

  “He’s not going to do a thing out here in front of everyone.”

  “That’s not what I’m worried about. You just put a target on your back.”

  “To hell with him. If he wants to come at me, I’ll make him wish he didn’t.”

  Chapter 11

  The women of Upsilon stood in rows, the morning sun at their backs. Spryte climbed atop a makeshift platform in the compound with what Belinda thought was a smile on her face. It could have been a grimace.

  Beneath the feet of the assembled internees, grass had started to sprout through the gravel. Just in time, Belinda thought, for the next batch of women to come and occupy Upsilon for three weeks.

  “Ladies,” Spryte called out to the two hundred-plus. “I have what you will consider very good news.”

  Belinda couldn’t be anything but skeptical. Perhaps Spryte was going to point out that the grass had started to come back. That would be her good news, surely. And then, Belinda found herself utterly shocked at the words that came from Spryte’s mouth.

  “The announcement’s come down: Balance Driven Relocation – or, ‘forced migration’ as many of you call it – is at an end. The optimal number has been reached for planet-wide population and the space elevators will cease removing people from Earth, effective immediately. Congratulations. Every last one of you is home!”

  A cheer went up by those who weren’t seized with disbelief. Belinda dropped her head, as she felt tears coming on. The grass beneath her feet had seemed to grow a little more at the news. But something pulled Belinda’s attention upward. She turned to her right and saw none other than Claudia V. – the suicide from days earlier – holding her hands up to her mouth, eyes smiling, jumping up and down with glee.