It
is a warm summer day. Layers of wispy clouds do little to
obscure the sun, for once. These temperatures are rare in
Ireland—but all the more treasured for it. The air carries
wondrous scents of flowering things and the promise of tree
fruit in autumn: apples and pears and plums now ripening,
the unborn ghosts of their nascent aromas already filling
the orchard slopes.
Railway
tracks
border the green area, with rows of brick houses beyond.
Farther still, to the north, are the tall chimneys of an
industrial area nearer the city, and on the left hand looms
the dark shape of the Black Mountain that overhangs western
Belfast. A train rattles by, its wheels screeching, the
commuters gazing with longing at the paradise that is lost to
them a few seconds later. In the midst of the city the
allotments bloom. Tired brick and old streets have given way
to a space between the walls where determined gardeners have
staked a claim and worked the land.
Even
now there is a harvest of other crops, the summer vegetables
and early fruit. The little girl stoops, reaches into a tangle
of leaves, and twists a strawberry from its socket with a
pleasing pop. Her sharp eyes watch to confirm what her
fingers have already told her. When she brings it out into
view, it is intensely scarlet and fills the palm of her small
hand, a thing of beauty with a drop of juice barely clinging
on at the recently detached summit. She breathes its essence,
warm and ripe, a storehouse of sunshine and satiety, the
secure anticipation of how it is going to feel on her tongue
as she savours it and her tastebuds explode with simple
happiness.
She
bites into it, but something is wrong. It’s not really there.
Her mouth is vacant, no matter how she tongues it.
“Mariah!”
The
whisper infiltrating her mind, but she must resist, hiding
away in her soul’s secret place.
A
spark of the synapses. Realisation slowly dawning on her…
“Wake
up! We’ll be late.”
She
groaned. Yes, something is very wrong. Very wrong with
the entire world, where nothing grew any more, least of all a
strawberry. She defied alertness a moment longer, trying in
vain to recapture the aroma of that fruit, but the effort only
awakened her brain even more. She was not a little girl, she
was not in the allotments, and the allotments didn’t look like
that any more.
There
was a tug at her shoulder and she finally came upright with a
grunt and shook her dazed head to clear it of sleep. She had
been dozing in the cafeteria, face smushed on forearms with
her nose in the gap, leaning on the table. The cafeteria might
not be worthy of the name these days, but dining tables made
passable headrests for snatching a few winks.
Liam
shook her shoulder again, peering at her from under his thatch
of red hair. “Wakey-wakey. You trying to get us in trouble?”
She
surveyed the empty room with its rows of benches. Only young
Jonesy was visible, cleaning up on the other side of the
servery hatch. Poor kid, by rights he ought to be growing
more, but who could grow in times like these? She smiled at
the painfully skinny boy and blinked hard.
Unsteadily
she
got to her feet, refusing Liam’s proffered hand. He continued
to hover, though she didn’t want his support. A thought formed
itself, that Liam didn’t have to get himself in trouble—why
was it always “us” with him anyway—but a glance at his earnest
eyes told her it was pointless. He was inexplicably determined
to stick by her.
Together
they
strode out of the eatery and across the narrow gap between
buildings, into their workplace. Just before they stepped
inside, a stray ray of sunshine burst through the clouds as a
puff of wind caressed them.
Mariah
sighed. The rest of her dream might have been a fairytale, but
the weather was a perfect match. Such a beautiful day to be
stuck in the “office”.
It
barely fit the definition at all. Only a tin-roofed
concrete-block shed with a few ramshackle old computers and
desks that had all been repaired so many times they were
hardly recognisable. Cracked monitors still served above dusty
processor towers whose fans sounded like the death-rattle.
Broken desk legs had been replaced or simply shored up with
whatever stick-like item had been to hand. Years of rain had
stained the porous floor just left of Mariah’s yet-unbroken
chair that she was very glad of, beneath a rusty spot in the
roof. She was well-practised in avoiding its trajectory on wet
days—and also well-practised in staring at the hole, analysing
its spread from season to season. Through the worst of last
winter she had finally placed a bucket on the floor to catch
the drips, but one day she’d forgotten to take it home and in
the morning it had vanished. She didn’t have another.
Despite
all
this, it was the Northern Department of Farming Statistics,
and they were bonded to it for a plate of porridge each noon.
Unless of course the Senate authorities saw fit to transfer
them somewhere else, which might happen at any time. This
wasn’t such a bad place to work, was esteemed and sought-after
because it did not involve physical labour in the grain
processing plants or few remaining fertile fields. People
joked that office workers would become fat and lazy.
Mariah
knew the reality was different: nobody could be fat on these
rations.
The
department manager raised her eyebrows when they entered the
building, and she tapped her bare wrist. Mariah made for her
desk, trying to look contrite. They wouldn’t get in
trouble—the manager knew Mariah and Liam were her most
conscientious workers, and they’d still get much more done
than anyone else even if a few minutes were shaved off their
time.
Giggling
emanated
from halfway along the room. It was Kitty and Elsbeth,
tittering behind their hands and peering over them at the
latecomers. Mariah didn’t know why they were tolerated when
they did so little work and often caused distractions. Silly
girls, heads full of fluff, too naïve for her to hold anything
against them.
Liam
slid into his chair nearby. “Were you dreaming something nice,
then?”
Mariah
fiddled a moment with her mouse and used it to pull up a new
harvest report for checking and processing. “Aye, that I was.
Do you remember the allotments?”
“Not
really. That was a bit before my time, and I woulda thought a
bit before yours as well.”
“I
can’t have been more than three or four. I guess it just made
such a huge impression on me that I never forgot it.” She
closed her eyes and saw it spread out before her again, larger
than life: the sunshine, the fruit trees, the humps of
leaf-swamped dirt in the strawberry patch. “It was my uncle’s
allotment. I only went there once or twice. He grew all kinds
of things…but I remember the strawberries. They were massive
and sweet and they tasted like heaven.”
“I
woulda liked to know what that was like.” Liam’s voice grew
wistful. “Before it all died out.”
There
was the scrape of a chair in the corner, and both Mariah and
Liam shot their attention to their screens.
“Enough
with
the chatter, you two,” called the boss, without bothering to
get up. This pronouncement was followed by hushed laughter
from Kitty. Elsbeth only stared openly at Mariah, her glee
evident. Mariah shot her a withering glare, to which Elsbeth
poked out her tongue. Mariah shook her head.
For
a while Mariah dedicated herself to entering the reported
figures for Farm E in County Down. The name was meaningless to
her, but it was the only official designation and might
equally have been in Donaghadee or Downpatrick. This farm had
in any case just scraped into the “acceptable” bracket of
standard results once again. Of course all the brackets had
been redefined three times last year, and what had been
labelled insufficient then might have passed now. There was no
reason to it, no reason to say this farm was doing okay when
it clearly wasn’t. Mariah could only guess that the
authorities wanted to be able to assure the public that
everything was going fine, to pre-empt unrest and looting.
Only
the human drones in Statistics knew the full truth.
This
line of thinking could only occupy Mariah’s mind for so long
before she had to drop it to avoid spiralling into total
negativity. Topics other than food—and the lack thereof—were
hard to come by. Mariah’s mind filled once more with the
memory of her uncle’s garden and the fruit that tasted of real
life, real nutrition, she knew that now. It was a wonder
people still found the strength to stand when mostly all they
got to eat was a bit of oats and maybe some wild greens, if
the rare hardy weeds that still grew could even be counted as
sustenance. She almost gagged at the thought of the dandelion
leaves she’d had to eat last night: sour, tough and nigh on
unchewable even when boiled for a full half hour, but they did
stop a stomach from rumbling too much. If she or Da could find
some, tonight’s dinner would be the same again. Or it might be
nothing at all. She’d slept hungry more times than she cared
to enumerate.
Mariah
closed her eyes for a moment to imagine that perfect
strawberry. She nodded once, rallied, then sagged. It was
there before her in her mind’s eye, a luscious red, pocked
with non-terminating seeds, and the smell—oh, that aroma would
move mountains, she was sure of it. If she could just eat this
solitary one, she wouldn’t need any dinner. Then the fruit was
in her hand and she was raising it up to her face. Her mouth
opened.
Her
teeth clacked shut on nothing.
The
sound reverberated inside her skull and jolted her upright in
the chair. She shot a glance around the room to see if anyone
had noticed.
Liam
caught her eye and grinned. She looked away; he didn’t matter.
Well, it wasn’t that he didn’t matter—it was more that it
didn’t matter if he was the one who caught her snoozing.
Then,
laughter. Oh—botheration. Mariah snuck a look towards
Elsbeth and found her head to head with Kitty as they
whispered in each other’s ears, clacked their teeth together
and burst into fresh giggles. Mariah felt mutinous. She didn’t
mind the work, but the taunting was almost too much for any
reasonable soul to bear. What was this, primary school? Well,
those girls were probably only in their mid-teens and had been
drafted just like young Jonesy, just like everyone in this
dratted place. She brushed off her anger. It would only make
her more hungry as soon as lunch wore off.
Her
focus drifted in and out through the interminable afternoon.
As quitting time approached, she checked the minutes on her
computer again and again. Finally the display ticked over to
six o’clock, the hour she’d spent all day waiting for.
As
she stood and gathered her things and pulled on her well-worn
cap and jacket, she reminisced again about the once-glorious
allotment. She’d gone back a few years ago to sate her
curiosity and see if the soil could be salvaged, but without
decaying plant matter it had turned to soulless muck.
Instead
of
that juicy strawberry, the image that now pressed itself onto
her mind was that of the same garden patch—but now dead and
with no hope of producing anything resembling a crop. She’d
wept as she’d stood in the wasteland of swiftly eroding mud
between the railway tracks, the once-green hills now brown in
the distance, the houses falling into disrepair, the cold,
damp wind whipping at her hair and clothes. She’d weep again
now if she wasn’t careful; she gulped hard and got herself
under control. Hoping for better from the allotments after the
onset of the viral terminator gene had been a pie-in-the-sky
idea anyway.
The
day had started to cool towards evening, although the sun
wouldn’t set until some time after the ten o’clock curfew.
Mariah did up the buttons on her patched and quilted coat:
sure it looked funny, but it kept her warm through a good part
of the year. Winter was another story, but it was a long way
off. She’d have to add another layer of patchwork to the
inside before then, and some extra padding if she could get
hold of it.
The
office workers moved in a gaggle towards the door. “Just a
moment,” said the boss, and heads turned towards her. “Kitty
and Elsbeth. A word, if you don’t mind.”
In
the alley, Mariah unlocked her bike from the rail fence and
looked around for Liam. He seemed to have disappeared—his
wheels were still here so he couldn’t be far away. Mariah
caught herself and smiled faintly. He’d been behaving like a
lovesick puppy and while she’d gotten used to having him
around all the time and being so attentive through the working
day, she wasn’t sure she had the sort of feelings he obviously
had for her. There were far worse options, to be sure. Perhaps
she’d end up with him after all…If so, she’d try to talk him
out of having children, bringing them into such a messed-up
world where even their ma and da wouldn’t be certain of
feeding them properly each day. Look at how poor Jonesy was
suffering. No, she didn’t want her child to live like that, a
wage-slave before his ninth birthday, and still not enough to
eat.
She
blinked and shook her head. That was clearly too far for her
mind to wander, where Liam was concerned. She was firmly
decided that nothing could come of it, not with the way the
world was. Still, against her better judgement, she delayed
swinging aboard to head home, pretending to check the tyre
while her other workmates said their farewells and left.
Sure
enough, a short while later came the pounding of feet. Liam
skidded round the corner of the building. “Oh good, you’re
still here.” He approached, one fist closed, but not tightly.
“Uh, here. This is for you.”
At
his gesture she opened her palm and stretched it out. He
loosened his fingers, dropping a single strawberry into her
hand. It was the size of her thumbnail, fringed with pale
green beneath its crown of leaves—but a strawberry!
Aghast
with delight, she met his gaze. “How—where did you get this?”
Liam
pointed his thumb back over his shoulder. “Found it in one of
the alleys.” He stuck his hands in the pockets of his ragged
jeans and dipped his head, clearly pleased at her joy.
Mariah
nodded. She wouldn’t ask him to reveal more than that. Such
secrets were personal, especially since the plant would likely
keep growing and produce more fruit if it had been lucky
enough to root itself into living, nutrient-holding soil. Liam
needed to keep that to himself.
She
lifted the berry to her face—so much like she’d been dreaming
of—and inhaled deeply. The scent was faint but unmistakable.
She closed her eyes a moment and felt herself transported back
in time. Then the facts slapped her back to the present.
Liam.
Gave her a gift. A most precious possession. That must really
mean…No, no. She couldn’t let him do this. “Liam, don’t, this
is too much.” She looked up from the tiny fruit into his
crestfallen face.
Slowly
he reached out with both hands and closed her fingers over it.
“I want you to have it. Really.”
Something
within
her stirred at his touch, an unexpected awakening. The dream
was no longer important. If Mariah accepted this gift, she’d
be encouraging Liam in his feelings for her. But he wasn’t
letting her open her hand. He just stared at her with those
burning emerald eyes. How could the colour green burn? She
didn’t know, but she did know it was the exact colour of those
lush strawberry leaves from long ago.
When
he finally broke contact, he grabbed his bike and sailed off
before she could stop him. He didn’t look back, but stood up
on his pedals and gave it his best speed, swiftly vanishing
from sight around the corner.
“Liam,”
she
called, but he was gone. She stood alone in the street,
clutching a strawberry that must be protected at all costs. If
it had been growing wild, its seeds might even be viable.
Mariah looked down at it. What had the world come to, that
such a small thing should carry such significance? It even
served as proof irrevocable of a young man’s love.
She
would deal with Liam later. Somehow. For now, she had
strawberry seeds to nurture, once she got them to a safe place
and figured out how best to coax them into germination. It
wouldn’t be easy, but she had to try. Had to.
Two
late leavers came giggling out of the office. Great. Just her
luck: Elsbeth and Kitty, of course. Perhaps the boss had been
lecturing them. They stopped and looked Mariah up and down
with great exaggeration, then traipsed away down the alley.
Their whispers and peals of childish laughter assured her they
were unlikely to be an actual threat to this great treasure
with which she’d been entrusted, as well as unlikely to have
listened to anything the boss had said, but she was still glad
the strawberry was well hidden in her cupped hand. Who knew
what sort of a big deal the young troublemakers would have
made out of it.
When
they were well out of sight, she wrapped it in a clean hanky
and tucked it into a section of her bag where it couldn’t be
damaged.
Taking
care to ensure it kept its safe position, she mounted and rode
away—slowly at first, then gathering speed. The lowering sun
for a second turned even the ugly industrial area to gold, and
Mariah’s solitary figure with it.
