Майя Лунде - The History of Bees

Finally we stopped. The woman opened the door and got out, asked me to follow her.

We stood in a square, in the middle of which a once-handsome fountain was now rusting away. A statue of a bird, a crane, lay at the bottom of the pool, perhaps it had been knocked over by natural forces, or perhaps it had been vandalism. Not a single car could be heard, only the wind pounding against the buildings where roofing tiles and windows were loose, the sound of the earth’s own muscles, which slowly and inevitably were in the process of getting the upper hand, which would wipe out civilization.

The sound of voices caused me to tilt my face upwards. There were two people standing on the roof of a tall building, I couldn’t see anything but their silhouettes against the sky, and heard talking but not words. They had something in their hands, something they now dropped. Round shadows slipped through the air, away from us, in the direction of the city center. I had read about remote-controlled, flying computers before. Drones. Was this the same thing? Who were they following?

Suddenly it struck me that perhaps they had also followed me, and for longer than I had suspected. That they already knew a great deal.

“We’re going in here,” the woman said.

The building had no name, no sign informing me of what it concealed. The woman put her hand against a glass plate on the wall, each of her fingers against five points on the plate. Suddenly two large, sooty doors slid to the side. They ran on electricity, in spite of the fact that it seemed as if the surrounding area had long since been without power.

She led me into the large building. I jumped when we almost collided with a young man standing guard on the inside. I turned around and discovered more guards. They were wearing uniforms like hers and greeted her quickly. She nodded back and continued on hurriedly.

I followed her through a large hall and further on into an open office landscape. We passed people everywhere. It was unreal, after all of these weeks in the deserted city. Everyone was like the guard, soft, clean, not marked by manual labor or sun. They worked busily, many people sat in front of large screens, others in soft-spoken meetings on plush sofa suites or around conference tables. A transparent landscape. The walls were of glass, the rooms were open, but the sound did not travel far. It was muffled by thick carpets and heavy furniture. In several places I almost stumbled over flat, round vacuum cleaners whirring around the floor by themselves, and sucking up dirt that I couldn’t see.

The deterioration had not made it here; it was as if I’d come to a world that belonged in the past.

Finally she stopped. We were at the end of a hallway, in front of us was a wall, the first one I saw that wasn’t made of glass. This was of dark, shiny, polished wood. A tall, wide door that looked as if it were carved out of the woodwork. The woman knocked hard on the door. A few seconds passed; then it emitted a buzzing sound and a click, before it opened.

Wei-Wen. Was he here? Suddenly I was shaking.

“Please.” She nodded towards the open door.

I hesitated for a moment, then walked inside.

The door closed behind me. I heard the sound of the door again—the buzzing sound and a click. She locked me in.

The room was large and bright, but had no windows. The floor was carpeted here, too. The walls were covered with fabrics, heavy draperies, from floor to ceiling. Were there walls behind them? Or did they hide something else? People, openings to other rooms? Was that a tiny movement I saw there to the right? I spun around. But no, the curtain hung just as motionless as before. The discreet soundscape on the outside was an ear-shattering racket compared to the silence in here. Perhaps it was a room where no sounds were supposed to enter. Or get out. The thought caused my pulse to start racing.

There was a rustling in the fabric to my right and all of a sudden they were pulled to one side. An older woman liberated herself from the curtains. She smiled kindly. There was something familiar, the way she held her head, the tight-fitting collar. The web of wrinkles around her eyes. I’d seen her before, many times, but never in real life, and I knew the cadence of her voice before she spoke.

Because she was Li Xiara. The voice on the radio, the leader of the Committee, our nation’s executive body.

I took a step backwards in shock, but she kept smiling.

“I’m sorry we had to meet in this way,” she said softly. Her voice was more familiar than my own mother’s. “But we could no longer avoid having to speak with you.”

She put her hand on the back of a soft armchair.

“Please take a seat.”

She didn’t wait, but sat down in an identical chair opposite me.

“I know you have many questions. I’m sorry I couldn’t pick you up myself. I hope we’ll get everything cleared up.” She spoke with utter composure, as if reading from a script.

We sat facing each other with our heads at the same level.

I couldn’t help staring at her. Without the filter of media images her face was so naked. It was the unfamiliarity of having her so close, seeing her in real life.

My heart sunk. This woman… What choices had she made? What was she responsible for? The death of the cities? The situation of the young boy in the restaurant? The elderly people, left behind to die? The adolescents, no more than ghosts, so desperate that fellow human beings had become prey?

My own mother?

No. I mustn’t think about it, mustn’t let my questions, my criticism lash out, because she knew more than I did. I needed to breathe—and think carefully before I spoke.

“I would appreciate it if you could tell me why I’m here.” I imitated her manner of speaking, spoke the words as softly and gently as I could.

Her eyes came to rest on me.

“In the beginning we found you to be bothersome.”

“What?”

“Especially when you came to Beijing.” She paused. “But subsequently… We had really planned on contacting you, we didn’t want you, the two of you, to live with so much uncertainty for so long. But we just had to be completely certain first. We didn’t want any rumors circulating. At all.”

“Certain of what?”

She leaned forward in her chair, as if to get closer to me. “Now we are.”

I didn’t answer. The singsongy, calm voice awakened rage inside of me, but I got nowhere with my questions.

“And it was perhaps for the best,” she continued, “that you had to find your own way to the answers.”

I struggled to breathe, tried to stay calm. “I don’t understand what you mean.”

“You will have an opportunity to play a part in the time ahead. And we hope that you will cooperate.”

“What do you mean?!”

“I’ll get to that. First, why don’t you tell me about what you think has happened to your son? What have you found out?”

I forced myself to stay calm. She’d set the agenda, so I had no choice but to comply with it, to cooperate. What would happen if I failed?

“I believe that something has happened to Wei-Wen that has significance for many more people than myself,” I said slowly. “Or him.”

She nodded.

“And what else?”

“I believe that is why you have taken him. And that what has happened will potentially change everything.”

She waited.

“Can’t you just tell me where he is?” I was begging now. “That’s all I know.”

She was silent. Her gaze remained suspended in the air.

Suddenly it was as if everything inside me stopped, I could no longer take her calm, singsongy voice, the guessing games, the indifferent gaze and the little half-smile which was impossible to read.

“I don’t know anything!” In one jump I was right in front of her.