Geoff Ryman - The Child Garden

‘But liede. Song of the Earth, concert singing. Don’t just give up!’ Milena apprehends the waste.

‘Why not?’ asks Rolfa.

‘Because you’re good,’ says Milena, disappointed, looking away.

‘I quite like the idea of going to Antarctica,’ says Rolfa. ‘It’s not all ice. There are some places that are so cold that water has never fallen there. It’s a desert, freeze-dried, just rock and gravel. My mother was in the desert once and she found the corpse of a walrus. Perfectly preserved, nothing to rot it, really. Three hundred miles from the sea.’ She pauses. ‘Well. I am the walrus.’

‘What does that mean?’ asks Milena, bleakly.

‘No one knows how it got there.’ said Rolfa. ‘And walruses can’t make music’

Milena finds that she has to sit down. She sits down and screens her face. She wants to protect her face from Rolfa, from the fact of her standing there.

‘Rolfa,’ she says without looking at her. ‘Everyone says that the Comedy is a work of genius.’

‘Really?’ says Rolfa. ‘Who orchestrated it?’

‘The Consensus. But it is your basic music’

‘Then let the Consensus take the credit,’ says Rolfa. ‘They’ve taken everything else.’ And a sputter, a kind of laugh.

Milena finds anger. Anger she can understand and cope with. ‘Rolfa! You always let yourself be defeated.’

Rolfa stands looking at her, and the eyes, turning back the anger, seem to say, don’t mistake. This is a different Rolfa. Don’t tell me I am easily defeated. Her eyes narrow and she decides to sit down.

She sits down, and leans forward on the beanbag to make a point. ‘I appreciate your efforts,’ she says. ‘But you must understand that everything has changed for me.’

She leans back and seems to relax. She expands. ‘It was quite strange for a while, becoming someone else. But I rather like it now. Father and I get on rather well. I’m his star girl. Revamped his accounting system. I came up with a system of time-sheeting. Everyone’s time is costed. Time is money. May not seem much to you, but I’m proud of it.’ Rolfa shrugs in place, a bit like a boxer.

Perhaps Milena looks bleak. She is staring at the floor, unhappily. This seems to exasperate Rolfa.

‘I’m not that interested in what happens to the Comedy, Milena. It was not seriously written to be performed. I’m impressed that you’ve been able to get it on. But,’ again the sputter. The sputter performs roughly the same function as the shudder-chuckle once did, though the sputter is more purely indignant. ‘But the Comedy is hardly going to be anything new to me.’

‘Was it hard to adjust?’

Rolfa raises her hands behind her head and seems to muse, as if considering something impersonal. ‘It was rather strange, I suppose, yes. I could never be sure which bits had been lopped off, or what would grow back in their place. I positively terrified Zoe and Angela for a while. Called them stupid moos. I found I could not stand women for a while. I had a few drinking buddies, men mostly, and from time to time, rather unexpectedly, I found myself fancying them. It would always be terribly, terribly unexpected, because until just before then, I rather identified with them. They said that it was rather like having one of their mates suddenly make a pass. None of them ever took me up on it, of course.’

Milena is looking at her wrist. She is looking at the Mice crawling in and out of her skin, patrolling, still asking: where is Rolfa? Where is Rolfa? She wants to put both her hands around Rolfa’s wrist, feel the warmth and the silkiness of the fur. It’s starting. The love is starting, again.

‘It was fun wasn’t it?’ says Milena. ‘Those three months.’ Milena’s voice is pleading, frail.

‘Oh yes,’ agrees Rolfa, somewhat dismissively. ‘Long time ago now. I seem to recall spending most of my time in a daze in that room of yours. I got horribly demoralised. Sorry about the mess.’

‘I didn’t mind,’ whispers Milena.

‘I should have done,’ sniffs Rolfa.

‘Are you tidy now?’

‘Try to be,’ says Rolfa, almost snapping.

I’m calling to you across a very wide, deep canyon, and the wind is blowing the words away. The wind is blowing you away.

‘Are you going to see your mother?’ Milena asks. She coughs. ‘In Antarctica?’

‘Oh yes. You and her became friends didn’t you? Allies against the Family.’ Rolfa smiles. She has bright new teeth. Fangs. ‘It’ll be nice to see old bag. I feel a bit guilty really. I haven’t written her or anything.’

Milena feels her mouth go thin with disapproval. Only the fact that Hortensia might call herself an old bag has stopped her being very angry.

Rolfa sees the expression and sputters, and shakes her head.

‘Your mother is very nice person,’ says Milena. ‘I was wondering how she was. I haven’t heard.’

‘Neither have we,’ said Rolfa. ‘She’s gone quiet on us. I expect she’s been on a binge.’

The letter in its sealed packet has not yet been written. But you know already, Rolfa, that The Family has decided Hortensia is to come back. You just think it’s none of my business. You are smiling, with your new fangs.

‘When are you off?’ Milena asks.

‘Oooh, about three weeks.’ The conversation is flagging. There is too much and therefore too little to say.

‘Do you… uh… have a boyfriend now then?’ Milena asks. Trying to sound casual, her voice trails off into high, forlorn question.

‘No,’ says Rolfa, abruptly.

The destruction is complete. Neither of us have anyone. The director begins to feel horribly alone. Her life is her work. Somehow the memory of Rolfa has always been there, in the work, in the music, in the very sound of it, to keep her company. The work and the fact of Rolfa’s living presence, somewhere hidden in the vastness of London, has made the connection seem real. The Comedy had made it real. But the artist is not the work. And this Rolfa was not the artist.

‘Rolfa. I’m very, very sorry.’ Milena says, meaning, I’m sorry I destroyed you.

‘Don’t be sorry for me,’ says Rolfa, moving her shoulders as if punching something. If anything, this new Rolfa is far more masculine. ‘Don’t ask this Rolfa to be sorry, this Rolfa wouldn’t exist without what happened. Wouldn’t go back to being the old Rolfa for the world. What? All that moping about? All that dreary nonsense, writing, rewriting, pinning your hopes on nothing. What would have happened to that Rolfa in the end, eh? Dead drunk at the Spread, that’s where she’d be.’

‘Or writing another Comedy.’

This Rolfa sighs, rising and falling like the sea. ‘Or writing another Comedy, yes. But all that’s gone now.’

‘It’s as if you died. It’s as if I killed you.’

‘Oh don’t go getting soppy on me, woman.’ This Rolfa sulks. ‘Can’t stand sop anymore. What’s the use of it?’

‘You feel it anyway. You might as well face it.’

‘Yes, but there’s no need to draw it out. That’s what I find with opera now, the people just stand there drawing it out. Takes them two hours to say goodbye to each other. I mean, what’s the point?’

‘If they have things to say…’ Milena doesn’t finish. ‘I… I have time to go to a kaff, if you’d like some food.’

Rolfa’s smile has gone queasy. She’s frightened that I still fancy her, she wants to avoid that. She’s come here to make a clean break.

‘No, I’ll be getting back home to eat,’ said Rolfa, and slaps the beanbag. She reaches for her hat and puts it back on.

She probably thought about not telling me at all.

‘Thank you for coming to see me,’ says Milena, going cold herself.

‘Well,’ says Rolfa generously. ‘Old time’s sake, you know. Sorry I caught you while you were so busy.’