Claire Zorn - The Sky So Heavy

‘I’m, um, looking for Libby Streeton.’

I’m expecting him to say she’s not here, but instead he glances around and points at a group of people up the far end, near the screen.

‘Over there,’ he says.

The officer hurries away and doesn’t see the tears that begin to well in my eyes. I feel so overwhelmed with joy and relief that it’s all I can do not to laugh out loud. I weave my way through the people toward the familiar, willowy figure in the black suit. She stands, arms folded, while two men in uniform speak, pointing at the screen.

‘Mum!’ I say, blowing any hope of cover I had. She doesn’t hear me. ‘Libby!’ I call. She turns and the face that greets me is nothing like I remember. Her pale skin sags over jutting cheekbones. She stares at me with dark, lifeless eyes, blinks, then turns back to the two men.

‘Mum? Mum, it’s me.’

She turns again, closes her eyes for a moment, opens them again. I watch her check the name badge on my chest and turn away again. I am next to her now. I put my hand on her shoulder. The two men with her stop speaking and stare at me.

‘Mum, it’s me, Fin.’

She looks at me. ‘Fin?’ Her voice is a whisper. ‘Is that really you?’

I nod, not really understanding how a mother could not recognise her own son. She excuses herself and steps away from the officers, I follow her. She stands, looking at me with an expression close to fear.

‘Mum?’ I can’t hold onto the tears. They roll down my cheeks. She reaches out and tentatively touches my face.

‘Findlay? Is that really you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Oh God.’ She wraps her arms around me. ‘Oh my God.’

‘Mum, it’s okay. I’m okay.’ I expect her to cry, but she doesn’t. She pulls away from me.

‘Where’s Max?’

‘He’s okay. He’s safe.’

She glances around nervously. ‘Come with me,’ she says and I follow her into a small room. She points to two plastic chairs. ‘Sit, sit. Are you thirsty? You look thirsty.’ I sit. She takes a bottle of water from a slab of pallets and hands it to me. She sits in the other chair and clutches my free hand while I drink.

‘You don’t know how many times I’ve thought I’d seen you,’ she says. ‘Every tall, dark-haired private has been you. When you called me Mum I thought I was hallucinating. I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be sorry.’

She looks at me and I am almost frightened by how old she seems. ‘I sent people for you and Max, but they said you weren’t there. Where is your dad?’

I explain about him and Kara. When I tell her that we have been fending for ourselves she puts her head in her hands. ‘It’s okay,’ I say. ‘We’re staying with a whole bunch of people in—’

‘Don’t,’ she cuts me off. ‘I can’t know that. You have to understand, I can’t know.’ She closes her eyes. ‘I would have to tell them. Bring Max here. I’ll organise accommodation for you.’

‘There’s actually four of us, we sort of teamed up with two others to come down here. It was horrible, Mum, there was no more food coming in and they’ve set up barriers to stop people coming down to the city—’

‘I know, Fin.’

I feel stupid. Of course she knows. And then I start to wonder whether the dead look in her eyes isn’t just from what she’s seen, but from decisions she’s made, things she’s done.

‘I can’t help them.’

‘But they’re kids, Mum. Noll has no one left, his parents were over there when the bombs went off. And Lucy has left her family behind, back in the mountains. You know she can’t go back there, Mum. Please. She’s really… important to me.’

‘Fin, darling, I know but I can’t help them. I’m sorry.’ She stands up. ‘Bring Max back here, I’ll have something organised.’

‘Mum.’

‘Fin, look at me. I want to help them. They’re children, of course I want to help them. But this—’ She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. ‘That screen out there, it’s showing footage captured by a drone sent into the region where the blasts were. There’s nothing left. It’s thousands of miles of dust. Whole countries have been obliterated.’ She opens her eyes and I can see that she’s holding back tears. ‘The atmosphere’s choked. Electricity substations the world over have been crippled by the temperature drop and the carbon in the atmosphere, there’s no more fuel being refined, therefore no transportation for the little food that the world has in reserve. Long term, crops will fail,’ she continues. ‘Resulting in worldwide famine for those that survive the next twelve months. Fin, we have to make decisions about what portion of the population we can sustain… I can’t just… I can’t even know their names, I can’t do this if I know their names.’ She takes another deep breath and squares her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry. I can secure you and Max, but beyond that my hands are tied.’

I have no words. I stare at her. This is not what I had imagined. In the brief moments where I had dared to envisage actually finding her I had pictured her sweeping Max, Lucy, Noll and I off to safety, to a haven of inventive strategies for preserving society. What they would look like, I don’t know. Wind turbines, cycle-powered generators, communities living off mushrooms grown in the dark, I don’t know. I hadn’t imagined this calculated surrender. In all those hours spent wondering how the powers that be could do this to people, their own people, I never imagined her as being complicit in it all.

She grips both my hands in hers.

‘Go,’ she says, ‘and get Max.’

Noll is sitting on the ground where I left him. As I cross the road he gets to his feet, picks his backpack up and puts it over his shoulder.

He reads the expression on my face. ‘You didn’t find her.’

‘No. I did.’

‘Really? You look… shattered.’

‘Probably ’cause that’s how I feel.’ I pull my bike up from where I left it lying on the pavement.

‘Why? What happened?’

I stand, holding onto the bike like it’s the only thing that’s keeping me upright. ‘She wants me to come back with Max.’

‘And? What’s wrong?’

I feel the pressure of tears behind my eyes. ‘She says she can’t help you and Lucy. This whole thing is completely fucked and she’s part of it. She’s working with the military to keep people out of the city. She’s onboard with letting half the fucking population starve. If it really even was her. She has the same name but that woman was not my mother. I’m…’ I push my fingers through what’s left of my hair, scrunch my eyes shut. ‘I’m really sorry. She’s… I’m sorry.’

I get on the bike and start to pedal. Noll is behind me. ‘Fin, stop. Talk to me.’

‘What’s there to say? I’ve got a safe haven for me and my brother, but sorry, you can’t come? You reckon it’ll be that easy with Lucy too?’

Noll smiles.

‘Why are you smiling? What is wrong with you?’

‘Fin, you found her. You’re going to be okay, you and Max.’

‘Do not be all Zen about this, Noll. I’m not going to be fine. I’m not bloody going.’

‘Yes, you are.’

‘No, I’m not. Not without you and definitely not without Lucy.’

‘You have to, Fin. Did you really think she’d be able to save us all? I knew the moment we got to the border, when we first met Matt, I knew then it wasn’t going to work out that way.’

‘Then why come with us?’

‘Well, I’m still better off in the city, aren’t I? Fin, it’s okay. Take Max back to your mum.’

‘It’s not fucking okay! You’re going to starve, Noll, if you don’t get caught first. And I can’t leave Lucy, I would never, never get over that. No matter how long I live.’