“It’s Sunday, 2:10 AM. The weather is cool and a few stars peak out through the clouds. It would be a fine night except my hands burn, my back aches, and I’m exhausted. I just finished 12 hours of washing dishes at the Jubilant Restaurant and I want to get home to bed. I’d like to say to bed with my wife but she left me when I was first convicted. I shout out, “Change, you damned light! I’m tired of waiting. Change now!”
“Stop daydreaming!” said Mr. SummerCloud. “You’re talking to yourself out loud again.”
I’m standing waiting to cross Juniper Street, the first block I’ve got to cross to get home to my apartment. I’ve pressed the Walk request button eight times in the past ten minutes. The red and green lights for the cars changed twelve times but the ‘”Do Not Walk” sign is still on. There are few cars this late at night but I don’t dare jaywalk against the light because there are camera’s everywhere recording everything I do and say. To most people, being caught jaywalking would go unpunished but officially it’s a minor crime. I’ve agreed to obey every law, no matter how trivial, on penalty of death. “You’re the one who suggested I promised to obey every law, didn’t you, Mr. SummerCloud?”
“No, I urged you to take the prison sentence. Much safer.”
“Yes, I remember now.”
As I wait, my worry increases. I’m only allowed an hour to get home and ten minutes have already passed. My mind starts to wander back to this afternoon’s twelve-block walk to work. If I hadn’t had to wait for the Walk lights to turn on, before I got my ankle bracelet, four days ago, I could have easily walked the twelve blocks in under twenty minutes. My job starts at 2 P.M. Today, I started walking at 1:15. Forty-five minutes should have been plenty of time.
Right outside my building is the first intersection I needed to cross on my way to work. I kept pressing the Walk request button but the Walk light never comes on. Finally, about seven minutes later, an older woman, pulling a wire-shopping cart came up and pushed the Walk request button. Ten seconds later the Walk sign lit up. She started across and I followed maybe five seconds later. I wanted to cry out, “Please walk towards my restaurant or I’ll get stuck again,” but I didn’t dare. She turned off to the right. That’s the way to the food market.
I was then stuck waiting at the corner of Lilac Street. I’d pressed the walk request button several times but nothing happened. There was a purple lilac bush blooming there. When I grew up, my family had three lilac bushes that bloomed at the same time, purple, white and red. Each had that entrancing lilac fragrance but each scent is subtly different. I loved walking back and forth noticing the slight differences. I wondered if you could make three different perfumes from them.
Back then, I’d cut their flowers for an ancient, wrinkled woman, Mrs. OldGold, who lived by herself. We’d often chat. She would talk about what she called “the good days before the Revolution.” I knew I shouldn’t listen but she was so old and senile that I felt sorry for her. No one else noticed or talked to her. Before the revolution, her father owned a large farm that employed twenty-seven people. He was liquidated, of course. I repeated the Revolution’s three golden rules to her: “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one. The Party defines the needs of the many. Obey the Party and thrive; disobey and die.” I told her, with what I then believed was loving honesty, that her father had put his needs over the needs of others, so his death was for the common good. I kept waiting for her to ask why my family had eleven servants and five cars. I had a good answer. My father was third in command of the Party during the Revolution. He advanced the needs of the many and received his just rewards. Sometimes, when I said it was good that her father was executed, she’d shed a few tears. I’d leave before she would start to cry. Someone might notice I was talking to an undesirable.
“Stop daydreaming!” screamed Mr. SummerCloud. I looked at my watch and twelve more minutes had passed. I was going to be late for work again. I pushed the request button again. Nothing. A teenager was walking towards this corner. I could almost hear her thoughts as she saw me: “Lazy bum. Maybe he’s a criminal.” She pushed the Walk request button and ten seconds later, the Walk sign lit up. I walked a little slower than she did so that I didn’t frighten her. We walked across and then got to Crimson Street. She turned off to the left. I hit the request button several times. Nothing.
The three stores on the corner of Crimson Street are long abandoned. A rancid odor oozes out of one store. It’s so strong that the whole area stinks of corruption and death.
That sickly, rancid stench is what I remember most about my Time of Troubles. It was the brutal combination of sweat, dirt and intense fear. It’s not like the odor of exercise; it’s more pungent, stronger, older, and more metallic. It smells like evil. Five of us were sitting blindfolded, on a platform with dunce caps on our heads. Our hands were tied behind our back. “Confess you traitors,” yelled the mob. “Confess or we’ll kill you.” A few people threw stones at us. One hit me in the forehead. Blood dripped down to my mouth and I could taste it.
“I remember that time vividly,” said Mr. SummerCloud. “Everyone had lost the ability to see their own cruelty and the capacity to question themselves. Did you think of yourself as a hero?”
“Yes, at first.” I remembered how my questioner asked me to confess my crimes. I said proudly that I hadn’t committed any crimes and that I was a hero for telling the truth. Then he explained to me the methods he used to get confessions. I heard screaming in the background.
He had me take off my shirt and raise my arms. He put a burning cigarette out in my left armpit. He lit another cigarette and said, “That was an appetizer. I won’t put the cigarette out next time. I’ll hold it there and puff. If you don’t talk, I have many other, even better treats in mind. Have you ever heard someone scream when their balls are crushed? We can go on for days. A few people hold on for a week before they die or crack. Do we really need to continue?”
“No. I’ll confess.”
“You see how merciful I am. I gave you an easy choice. You should thank me.”
I gave him a weak “thank you.”
They sent me to a farm, as a slave, for rehabilitation. No pay, no rest, little food. “It was horrible,” I told Mr. SummerCloud.
“I remember but you received two small blessings. You got in better shape and you quit smoking.”
Mr. SummerCloud was right. It would have been a hard, good life, except for the constant hunger and endless fear of re-arrest. I was lucky. When I got out, I found out that my father had been tortured and liquidated. I couldn’t believe they’d liquidate such a great man. I thought of my old neighbor, Mrs. OldGold, and her father. How could I have told her that his liquidation was a good thing? I wanted to apologize to her but she was long dead.
“Stop daydreaming!” yells SummerCloud, as I continue to wait. “Here comes a woman walking with a young girl. If you smile she might help you.” When she gets close to me, she frowns and steps to the side, to keep me at a distance. She presses the walk request button. Fifteen seconds later, the Walk sign is illuminated. I cross after her and try not to look in her direction so she won’t think I’m following her. They go two blocks in my direction and then turn off to the left.
I was stuck on Jewel Street. Mr. SummerCloud reminded me of my Diamond period. “Rehabilitation is more precious to a prisoner than a diamond is to a lover,” he said.
After seven years on the farm, an official told me, “You’ve been appointed to head the Department of Sanitation in Meadow Lark City.”
“Why me? Why now? I know nothing about sanitation.”
“We just discovered that you are the child of a hero of the Revolution. Why shouldn’t you have a wonderful job? You’ve been working in the dirt. Sanitation is the perfect job for you.”
I’ll never forget my first day in charge. My every potential desire was anticipated and instantly fulfilled. If someone even thought I wanted something done, they’d do it. I found it both intoxicating and frightening. I asked Mr. SummerCloud, “What if they did what they only thought I wanted and it turned out wrong? Would I be held accountable?”
“Stay calm,” said Mr. SummerCloud. “At the current time, a Party official, who obeys his boss, doesn’t need to worry about what his underlings do or think. Just do what you’re told.”
I looked at my watch and I was already late for work. The man who lives in the apartment next to mine walked up. I asked, “Would you please walk with me to my job?”
“How far is it?”
“Five blocks.”
“You can walk that on your own. It will only take a few minutes.”
“The Walk sign never turns when I push the button.”
“You’re crazy. It always works. Let me show you.” He pressed the request button and about twenty seconds later the Walk sign came on.
As we crossed the street, I said, “It works for you because you’re not a political prisoner.”
“Stop talking nonsense. There are no political prisoners. It’s all in your imagination.”
“I can show you my ankle bracelet. The light request switches detect it and won’t turn on for me.”
“Stop being absurd.” We walked straight toward my work, never waiting more than thirty seconds to cross the street.
“Told you it’s easy,” said my neighbor. “You only have one block to go.”
“Have him watch you from a distance,” suggested Mr. SummerCloud. “Then he’ll see that the Walk sign will never come on.” I made this suggestion to my neighbor.
He rolled his eyes and said, “I don’t have time to waste on such silliness.”
“Please,” I plead. “You think I’m crazy. It won’t take you more than two minutes to find out if I’m telling the truth. Stand back and watch me hit the Walk request button.”
“Not today,” he said. He walked with me to the last cross walk, pressed the button and the Walk sign came on. I heard him say under his breath. “What a nut.”
When I got to the restaurant, I started washing dishes. In came my boss, Miss BrightSmile. She’s only about twenty-five and until today had always greeted me with enthusiasm. “Late again?” she asked.
“The Walk lights were against me.”
“I wish you wouldn’t make such a strange excuse. I’m afraid it’s the third day in a row.”
“I’ll start even earlier tomorrow. I promise.”
“Please do. I was asked if you came in late. I told them no but they might come here and check for themselves.”
“Thank you. It won’t happen again.” I went to wash the dishes, worried about the future and wondered who was checking up on me and why.
I enjoyed my job. No one bothered me. It was rewarding to know we serve good food to so many people. I enjoyed the smooth flow of work. The warmth of the water on my hands was so pleasantly sensual but by the end of the day, my skin wrinkled and my back ached.
I could smell the vegetables cooking with the sharp spices and hints of meats or fish to make our signature soups. “It smells so good,” said Mr. SummerCloud. “Even I wish I could eat some.”
“Now you’re being absurd.”
The succulent odors made me feel starved. I got a large bowl of soup for dinner plus I got two tea breaks with a pastry and tea. Every few hours, Miss BrightSmile checked to see that I was getting the dishes and pots done. There was never a problem with my work.
“Why don’t you make nice to Miss BrightSmile?” asked SummerCloud. “She lives on this block and might invite you to stay with her and then you won’t have to worry about being able to walk home.”
“She’d never do that.”
“She won’t if you don’t ask,” said SummerCloud. I ignored him.
My twelve-hour shift ended at 2 AM. ““Stop daydreaming!” You have to hurry. Its already 2:17 A.M,” Mr. SummerCloud reminded me. I was only allowed one hour to get home and I’d been waiting for the Walk sign for over ten minutes. Usually, late restaurant customers were going in my direction but tonight I hadn’t seen another person out walking.
As we waited, Mr. SummerCloud asked me, “Tell me again why you publicly questioned the government’s new Sanitation policy. I never suggested that.”
“My boss, the Mayor, told me the policy would ruin the city and it was my duty to stop it by speaking up. He said he’d have my back. That’s why I gave that speech and wrote to the newspapers.”
“You never learn, do you? He was setting you up.”
“But you told me to do what my boss requests.”
“Not if he’s doing something his boss disapproves of.”
“How would I have known that?”
“I admit, I put you in a very difficult situation,” said SummerCloud.
“Now you admit it. You never took any responsibility before.”
“Let’s say we both failed to anticipate the results.”
I started to remember what happened next. It was all done so quickly. I was pushed into a car and taken to a small, windowless room to appear before a magistrate named Mrs. NeverLaughs.
As soon as we walked in, SummerCloud said to me, “She’s a torturer.”
She had an unlit cigarette in her mouth. “Slandering the State calls for the death penalty.”
“Yes, Mrs. NeverLaughs,” I said. “I know that but … ”
“Silence,” she shouted. She calmly lit her cigarette, drew in a deep breath and blew smoke rings. “I’ll make you a generous offer. Plead guilty and you’ll get the choice of either 25 years in prison or taking a special kind of probation. If you choose probation, you’ll be released but you must obey even the smallest law on pain of death. We’ll get you a job washing dishes.”
Mr. SummerCloud whispered to me, “It reminds me of giving an old horse the choice between being sent to a glue factory or having to pull a cart all day long without food or water.”
“I’m not a horse.” I said out loud.
“Who said you’re a horse?” demanded Mrs. NeverLaughs.
“The Party can’t make money selling horses to make glue,” said SummerCloud. “But they do execute criminals, harvest and sell their organs. Have you any idea what a heart, lungs, kidneys, eyes and liver go for? You’re fifty years old. You might not survive twenty-five years in prison but at least you won’t face execution.”
“What laws could I possibly break washing dishes?” I asked SummerCloud.
“There are tens of thousands of laws. Most of them you never even heard of. You’re bound to break at least one.”
“Stop talking to yourself and make up your mind,” demanded NeverLaughs.
“I can’t face prison. I promise to obey every law.”
It suddenly started raining and I didn’t have an umbrella or jacket. I ducked into a store’s doorway. It was the Madrigal Clothing store, my ex-wife’s, JulySun’s, favorite. Once, she took so long shopping here that I started walking around outside. She came out wearing a sheer blue blouse with gold trimming. She’d taken off her bra and her twin sweet pebbles were showing. We rushed home as fast as we could go. It was heavenly.
“Stop daydreaming!” said SummerCloud. “She left you when you were arrested. She’ll never come back now that you have a death sentence over your head.”
I noticed that I still had about 35 minutes before I broke my curfew. I couldn’t just wait there. I had to try something. The Walk sign heading to my apartment was off but the one going parallel to this street was on. I could go there and then try the Walk sign on that corner going towards my apartment. I ran and quickly pressed the request to Walk signal towards my apartment and wait. Nothing.
The city doesn’t go on forever. The cameras and Walk signs ended about a mile down this block at the edge of town. Every sign in the direction out of town showed Walk. Of course they did. That way, I was getting further from my apartment. I started walking as fast as I could. I was huffing and puffing. SummerCloud was breathing normally. He never tired. Fifteen minutes later, I was beyond the edge of town where the Walk signs and surveillance ended.
“I’ve done it! Mr. SummerCloud.” I quickly walked down to the cross street my apartment is on. I just needed to walk up this block for a mile and I’d be home. It was a fifteen-minute walk and I had twenty minutes to do it.
Mr. SummerCloud tapped me on the shoulder and asked, “How naive are you? There will be Don’t Walk signs all the way to your apartment and now we’re back in the monitored area.”
I got to the first one, pressed the request button but the Walk sign didsn’t turn on. I tried the one going further from my apartment. The Walk sign was on. I was trapped. I sat down on the concrete sidewalk, exhausted. Hours passed. Eventually, I saw a cab and at 7:58. I got to my apartment building.
The concierge asked me to give an account of my movements. “You left work at 2 AM and you took almost 6 hours to get here. You left the surveillance grid. Where were you and who did you talk to?”
I wanted to shout, “Leave me alone. Why do you care?” but instead I said, “The walk signs were malfunctioning last night. I couldn’t jaywalk so I had to wait for a cab.”
“The authorities will look into your explanation.”
I was thinking of my promise to get to work on time. “It’s Sunday. Do you think your son could walk me to work? I could pay him.”
“That’s very generous of you but he’s in class all day.”
“He doesn’t have school on a Sunday. Are you refusing because I’m a political prisoner?”
“We both know there are no political prisoners.”
“Please. It’s really important to me.”
“Absolutely not.”
I went to my apartment, set an alarm, lay down and fell asleep. I dreamt I was walking on a narrow path through an impenetrable jungle. A lion appeared behind me and started walking slowly in my direction. Up the path, there was a deep pit with poisoned sharpened stakes on the bottom. I was paralyzed. Should I jump in the pit and hope I might make it out or hope that the lion would turn back?
I screamed and woke up. My door was open. Someone was shaking me. “Come with us,” she demanded.
“Am I under arrest?”
“Of course not. Just come quietly.”
I was blindfolded. We drove for about twenty minutes. When my blindfold was taken off, I was in a small, windowless room with two chairs. It smelled of sweat and urine. I sat across from a burly man, who introduced himself as Mr. LeadWeight. He had a quiet pleasant voice. He smelled intensely of ginger and honey.
He took out a pack of cigarettes and offered me one. I said, “I don’t smoke.” He lit one and said, “They calm me down and can be very useful. Your record says that one was put out in your armpit once.”
I didn’t answer.
He showed me photos of myself crossing the streets on my way home. Each one had the time on it. “It’s clear you violated your curfew. That’s a crime.”
“But the Walk signs were malfunctioning.”
“We’ve checked. The Walk signs are working exactly as designed.”
“Designed to make me break the law?”
“Absurd accusation. That’s not the only thing. You deliberately walked out of the city to where there are no cameras. Leaving the city without permission is also a crime. Why did you do it? Who were you talking with?”
“I was trying to get home. It was the only way the Walk lights would let me go.”
“Not that false excuse again. You clearly broke many laws. To claim the Walk signs malfunctioned when they work perfectly is a sign of insanity. I’m sorry but it’s clear you violated your parole. As agreed to by you, we’re going to have to execute you. You should be thankful that we do it humanely by lethal injection.”
“Stop daydreaming!” I shouted out.
Mr. LeadWeight replied, very calmly and quietly, “Neither of us is daydreaming.”
“I want to appeal.”
“I’m sorry. There’s no time for that.”
“Ask him for three wishes,” suggested Mr. SummerCloud.
“He’ll never agree,” I said.
“Do you realize that you talk to yourself out loud?” asked Mr. LeadWeight.
I didn’t answer. After a short pause, Mr. LeadWeight asked, “What won’t I agree to?”
I was strangely calm and accepting of my fate as if I had had a long, dreadfully painful, untreatable, terminal illness that had suddenly taken a sharp turn for the worse. My doctor assured me there was no hope but that I would have an easy, pain free death. “Can I make three last requests?”
“I’m a kind man. I’ll grant them if they’re reasonable.”
“Tell me. Are you going to harvest my organs?”
“That charge is a slur against the state.”
“When you grant last requests, you must tell the truth.”
“Well then, yes. We’ll harvest and sell your organs. Not to do so would be a crime against the many.”
“Tell everyone who gets my body parts that I give them as a present.”
“Agreed. We’ll say these parts were donated by an anonymous donor.”
“My second wish is that you drive me to my work and let me enjoy one last day there.”
“Why?”
“One well used day is more valuable than ten years of wasted time.”
“You have to promise you won’t tell anyone what’s going to happen to you.”
I promised. “My last wish is that you let me write up a history of my life and put the manuscript into a library. Maybe someone will learn from what I’ve gone through.”
“We’ll file what you write in the library of the Bay Leaf Facility For the Criminally Insane. The doctors there might find it useful. The public is not allowed in that library.”
“Couldn’t you put them in a library of my choosing?”
“That’s not reasonable.”
I had a great last workday. Mr. LeadWeight told them it was my birthday. We had a party when the restaurant closed. Miss BrightSmile hugged me and asked why I had never told them that I was such good friend with Mr. LeadWeight? I just smiled.
After work, I was driven to the Bay Leaf Facility For The Criminally Insane and given five hours to write. I couldn’t think of what would be useful. Do I tell my story? Do I write philosophy? I just couldn’t decide.
I asked Mr. SummerCloud what he would write.
“It depends …” he began to say.
I cut him off. “Yes, it depends. That’s the key. I don’t have much time, let me write about the three golden rules and what the phrase ‘It depends’ means to them.’”
I started writing. “Rule One reads ‘The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one’. I say, it depends on what you mean. A better rule would be, ‘The needs of the many need to be balanced with the needs of the few or the one.’”
As I wrote, I asked Mr. SummerCloud, “I wonder if anyone will learn anything from this?”
“To learn one has to doubt that one already knows the whole truth. Doubt is a rare and unpopular virtue. Not one encouraged by the Party.”
Mr. LeadWeight came into the room. “Times up,” he said.
“I still have four hours left.”
“You’re writing nonsense. Why write anything more?” Mr. LeadWeight took the page, crumpled it into an ashtray, flicked his lighter and burned it. We drove for about an hour and stopped at a large guarded warehouse. Mr. LeadWeight showed the guards some papers. We went inside and he led me towards a door that said “Recycling.”
I paused before I went through the door.
“What are you waiting for?” demanded Mr. LeadWeight.
I embraced Mr. SummerCloud and walked through the door alone. I believed that Mr. SummerCloud was the only person who will definitely miss me when I’m gone. The last thing I heard was Mr. LeadWeight saying, “That insane man just embraced the air.”