Doris Lessing - The Memoirs of a Survivor

I think that all this time, human beings have been watched by creatures whose perceptions and understanding have been so far in advance of anything we have been able to accept, because of our vanity, that we would be appalled if we were able to know, would be humiliated. We have been living with them as blundering, blind, callous, cruel murderers and torturers, and they have watched and known us. And this is the reason we refused to acknowledge the intelligence of the creatures that surround us: the shock to our amour propre would be too much, the judgement we would have to make on ourselves too horrible: it is exactly the same process that can make someone go on and on committing a crime, or a cruelty, knowing it: the stopping and having to see what has been done would be too painful, one cannot face it.

But people need slaves and victims and appendages, and of course many of our 'pets' are that because they have been made into what we think they should be, just as human beings can become what they are expected to be. But not all, not by any means; all the time, through our lives, we are accompanied, everywhere we go, by creatures who judge us, and who behave at times with a nobility which is… we call it human.

Hugo, this botch of a creature, was in his relations with Emily as delicate as a faithful lover who is content with very little provided he is not banished from the beloved presence. This is what he had imposed on himself: he would not make demands, not ask, not be a nuisance. He was waiting. As I was. He watched, as I did.

I was spending long hours with him. Or I sat at the times when the sunlight was on the wall, waiting for it to open, to unfold. Or I went about the streets, taking in news and rumours and information with the rest, wondering what to do for the best, and deciding to do nothing for the time being; wondering how long this city would stand, eroded as it was in every way, its services going and gone, its people fleeing, its food supplies worsening, its law and order consisting more and more of what the citizens imposed on themselves, an instinctive self — restraint, even a caring for others who were in the same straits.

There seemed to be a new sharpness in the tension of waiting. For one thing, the weather — the summer had come hot and dry, the sun had a dusty look. The pavement opposite my window had filled up again. But there was less interest now in what went on out there: the windows held fewer heads, people had become used to it all. Everyone knew that again and again the street's edge would half-empty as another tribe took off, and we acknowledged with mixed feelings the chance that had chosen our street as a gathering place for the migrations from our part of the city: parents at least knew what their children were doing, even if they did not like it. We became accustomed to watching a mixed lot of people collect along the pavement with their pathetic bits of baggage, and then depart, singing their old wartime songs, or revolutionary songs that seemed as inappropriate as sex songs are to old age. And Emily did not leave. She would run after them a little way with some of the other girls, and then come home, subdued, to put her arms around her Hugo, her dark head down on his yellow coat. It was as if they both wept. They huddled together, creatures in sorrow, comforting each other.

The next thing was that Emily fell in love… I am conscious that this seems a term inappropriate to the times I am describing. It was with a young man who seemed likely to lead the next contingent out and away from the city. He was, despite his swash-buckling clothes, a thoughtful young man, or at least one slow to judgement; an observer by temperament, perhaps, but pushed into action by the time? He was, at any rate, the natural guardian of the younger ones, the distressed, the forlorn. He was known for this, teased for it, sometimes criticised: softness of this sort was superfluous to the demands of survival. Perhaps this was why he appealed to Emily.

I believe her trust in him was such that she even thought of taking Hugo out to the mob for another trial, but this must have gone from her to Hugo, for he felt it: he shivered and shrank, and she had to put her arms around him, and say: 'No, I won't Hugo, I promise I won't. Did you hear? — I promised, didn't I?'

Well, then, so there it was, she was infatuated. It was 'the first love' of tradition. Which is to say that half a dozen puppy loves, each one as agonising and every bit as intense and serious as later 'adult' loves had passed; this love was 'first' and 'serious' because it was returned, or at least acknowledged.

I remember I used to wonder if these young people, living as they had to from hand to mouth, who would never shut themselves off in couples behind walls unless it was for a few days or hours in a deserted house somewhere, or a shed in a field, would ever say to each other: I love you. Do you love me? Will our love last? — and so on. All of which phrases seemed more and more like the keys or documents of possession to states and conditions now obsolete.

But Emily was suffering, she was in pain, as one is at that age, as fresh as a new loaf and loving a hero of twenty-two. Who had inexplicably, even eerily, chosen her. She was his girl, chosen from many, and known as such. She was beside him on the pavement, went with him on expeditions, and people felt pleasure and even importance when they called to her: 'Gerald says…' 'Gerald wants you to…'

From pain she would soar at once to exaltation, and stood there beside him, flushed and beautiful, her eyes soft. Or fling herself down in the sofa-corner, to be by herself for a bit, or at least away from him, for it was all too much, too powerful, she needed a respite. She was radiant with amazement, not seeing me or her surroundings, and I knew she was saying to herself: But he's chosen me, me… and this did not mean And I'm only thirteen! That was a thought for people my age. A girl was ready for mating when her body was.

But these young people's lives were communal, and mating was far from being the focus or pivot of a relationship when they chose each other. No, any individual consummations were nothing beside this act of mingling constantly with others, as if some giant rite of eating were taking place, everyone tasting and licking and regurgitating everyone else, making themselves known to others and others known to them in this tasting and sampling — eyeing each other, rubbing shoulders and bodies, talking, exchanging emanations.

But while Emily was part of this communal act, the communal feast, she was at the same time feeling as girls tradi — tionally did. She wanted, I knew, to be alone with Gerald: she would have liked that experience, the old one.

But she never was alone with him.

What she wanted was inappropriate. She felt in the wrong, even criminal, at least very much to be blamed. She was an anachronism.

I did not say anything, for our relations were not such that I could ask, or she likely to volunteer.

All I knew was what I could see for myself: that she was being filled over and over again with a violence of need that exploded in her, dazzling her eyes and shaking her body so that she was astonished — needs which could never be slaked by an embrace on the floorboards of an empty room or in the corner of a field. All around her the business of living went on, but Gerald was always at the heart of it: wherever she turned herself in some task or duty, there he was, so efficient and practical and busy with important things, but she, Emily, was possessed by a savage enemy, was raging with joy and grief. And if she betrayed what she felt by a wrong look or a word, what then? She would lose her home here, among these people, her tribe… And this was why she had so often to slip away indoors, to creep near her familiar Hugo, and put her arms around him. At which he might give a muffled groan, since he knew very well the use she was making of him.