Connie Willis - Spice Pogrom

“Speaking of thnoring,” Hutchins said. “Okee said to give this to you.” He handed her a flat metal disk on a short chain. “You wear it around your neck.” He opened the odd-looking clasp and moved around behind her.

Chris caught a glimpse of metal under his shirt collar. “When did he buy this?”

“This morning. He got up early and went out to get rolls and coffee for breakfast.”

“He went out by himself? What else did he buy? A set of encyclopedias?”

Hutchins fastened the chain. The disk came right to the hollow between her collar bones and seemed almost to stick there. Chris tried to pull it out to see what was on the back, but the chain was too short. “What is this thing?” she said.

“There’s an earplug thingee that goes with it,” he said, and dropped it into the palm of her outstretched hand.

“My mother says we should have stuck cotton in our ears and stayed right where we were last night,” Bets said. “She says possession is nine tenths of the law.”

“Did you put her up to this?” Chris said to Hutchins.

“Not me. It’s not a bad argument, though. Go ahead. Put it on.”

Chris looked warily at the smaller round disk and put it in her ear. “Mr. Okeefenokee didn’t go out again, did he?”

(No,) Hutchins said. His lips didn’t move. (He’s in the bathroom. And after breakfast .,. Oh, that reminds me.) He dug his hand in his pocket and came up with a handful of crumpled yen. (I had to get money out of your purse to give Okee for the rolls and coffee. This is your change.) He handed it to her.

Chris looked at the little girls, but they had their heads together over the movie magazine again.

(After breakfast he’s going back to bed,) Hutchins said, still without opening his mouth. (He says our talking kept him awake last night.)

She jammed the yen in her pocket, still watching his mouth and wondering if the thing around her neck was some sort of ventriloquist’s device. “What is this thing?”

(Okee called it something that sounded like “the Everglades,”) Hutchins said. (It picks up subvocalizations and amplifies them so any other person similarly equipped can hear them. Go ahead, say something. Under your breath. Your lips don’t have to move. In fact, all I do is think the words.)

(He said our talking kept him awake?) Chris said cautiously under her breath, her hand on the disk.

(Yep. He said tonight we were supposed to use these, which means he wants me to stay here tonight. And besides, if I spend the whole day moving out, I can’t keep an eye on Okee. He’ll probably end up buying a steam calliope.)

(You’ve done a great job of watching him so far,) she thought. (When did he buy these subvocalizers?)

“I don’t know,” he said thoughtfully, and she could tell by the way the little girls looked up from their movie magazine that he had spoken aloud. It hadn’t sounded markedly different from when he used the subvocalizer, only a little farther away.

Molly and Bets were watching Hutchins suspiciously. “Well, I don’t know either,” Chris said, as if they had been carrying on a rational conversation, “but I’d say his time in the bathroom is definitely up.” She tapped on the bathroom door. “Mr. Okeefenokee, your time is up.”

He opened the bathroom door and came out, his wispy hair wet and practically invisible. His body looked even lumpier than usual under his Japanese yukata.

Hutchins ducked in. “You could have traded platheth with uth,” Molly shouted after him. “We have a holo-interview thith afternoon.”

“You are wearing your thuwevrherrnghladdis,” Mr. Okeefenokee said, nodding and smiling. It did sound like “the Everglades.”

“Yes, thank you. It’s lovely.” She put her hand up to the disk.

“Have you and Hutchins talked alone?”

“Yes.” She looked at Molly and Bets, but they were immersed in their movie magazine again.

Bets was pointing at a picture. “It does look a little bit like him,” she whispered to Molly. “See how lumpy he is.”

“But what about his batheball cap? Thpielberg alwayth wearth a batheball cap.”

“Good,” Mr. Okeefenokee said. His mouth straightened out and his cheeks turned bright orange. “Now you can get married. Have closing. Hahnahmoon.”

Both girls looked up.

“No! I mean, talking alone isn’t enough.” She wished Okee were wearing one of the subvocalizers so they could discuss this privately, but he didn’t seem to be.

(People have to know each other a long time before they get married,) she thought at Okee, but he only smiled at her.

“People have to know each other a long time before they get married,” she said aloud. “They have to…” She hesitated, trying to think of a word that he might understand.

“Thyeeth talking about theckth,” Molly said wisely. “And if you athk me, they’ve already…”

“Nobody asked you,” Chris said. “Why don’t you two go find somebody else you can get evicted?” She shoved them out the door.

“Theckth?” Mr. Okeefenokee said.

Chris tried to think what she could tell him. She couldn’t just say people had to love each other. “Love” was far too nebulous a term, and he’d already heard Charmaine say she loved Sony and her job and the fans painted on her ath. “Last night you were thinking about your wife, weren’t you?” she said, watching for any sign of understanding. To her surprise, he stopped nodding. “And it made you sad?”

“Yes,” he said solemnly. “Sad.”

“And you wished you could talk to her and see her and be close to her.” She put her arms out and brought them back again toward her and hugged herself. “Close.” “Closing,” he said.

“Not, not closing. Close.”

“Hahnahmoon?”

“No,” she said. “See, when two people love each other, they want to be as near each other as they can, and they…”

“Wife,” he said, “sad,” and screwed his face up.

“Oh, Mr. Okeefenokee, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you,” she said, but she was too late. He let out a wail like a fire engine.

“What did you do to him?” Hutchins said, coming out of the bathroom.

“He misses his wife,” Chris said.

“She probably told him about sex,” Bets said. She and Molly came back in.

“What did thyee do to you?” Molly said, patting Okee awkwardly on the back.

“You can have our turn in the bathroom if you want,” Bets said, her forefinger stuck in one of her dimples. “We don’t really need a shower.” She held out her shower bottle to him.

Okee stopped wailing and looked at the little girls, an expression on his face that Chris had never seen before. She had no idea how to interpret it, but at least he had stopped keening.

“Here. You can have my rubber duckie. Hith name ith Tham,” Molly said with a sickeningly sweet smile.

Okee continued to look at them for a long moment and then took the yellow duck and the shower bottle and went back into the bathroom.

(How did you do that?) Chris said wonderingly.

(I told them that if I were Spielberg, I’d disguise myself as an alien and do secret screen tests.) It was disconcerting to be watching him grin while he was talking to her. (I thought it might improve their general deportment.)

Chris looked at Molly and Bets, who were whispering about something, curls and hairbows bobbing. “Okay, but we’ll have to hurry,” Bets said, and they ran out of the hall and down the steps. “He’ll be out of the bathroom in a few minutes.”

“You don’t suppose they’ll try to kidnap him and hold him for ransom?” Chris said.

“I hope not,” Hutchins said. (What we talked about last night… have you noticed Okee having trouble understanding any other words?) He had gone back to using the subvocalizer even though there was nobody else left in the hall.