Мариам Петросян - The Gray House

“I'm not giving him the sandwich,” she says.

I voice agreement. Of course we shouldn't give Tubby any sandwiches. Nothing exists for him now except the fire. Anything we can give to him will immediately end up in it, because no dinner can possibly approach the happiness of feeding another, especially if that other is Fire, a powerful deity of whose actual power Tubby is only dimly aware.

So that he wouldn't get upset because of the fire dying, Ginger tells him about the embers. How they're beautiful too—“like little red stars,” she says, and Tubby nods, affirming the similarity.

“I’ll make you another fire tomorrow, just like this one,” Ginger promises.

“Why are you doing this?” I ask. “He might get used to it.”

Ginger doesn't answer. So let him, I hear in her silence. I will bring him here every night, and make fires for him. Let him feed wood chips to them and sing. It's no use thinking about the time when I won't be able to, when there won't be any “here.” That's the last thing I want to think about right now.

“haven't you tamed enough people, Gingie?” I say.

There's nothing but tenderness in my question, I understand her too well. I understand how it must be impossible—not taming when you love being loved, when you acquire little brothers for whom you are then responsible to the end of your days, when you turn into a seagull, when you write love letters on the walls addressed to someone who never would be able to see them. When, despite your complete certainty that you're ugly, someone still manages to fall in love with you, when you pick up stray dogs and cats and chicks who fell out of their nests, and make fires for those who didn't ask you to do that.

She gives me a quick glance and looks away. Because I too am one of those who was tamed long ago. I'm lucky that I didn't end up helplessly and hopelessly in love, needing constant care. That the responsibility for me has been partially shifted to Mermaid, who in a certain sense has managed to outgrow Ginger. But still I'm one of us, of those who are forever under her tattered seagull's wing.

She leans toward me and we embrace, touching foreheads over Tubby's head. Just for a moment, then she shifts away.

“You're mad because of Noble,” she says. “But I can't ...”

“I'm not mad.”

“And Smoker ...”

“Oh, forget it.” I laugh.

She doesn't care how many people witness her fights with Noble, doesn't care who Blind is with if he's not with her. It's all the same to her whether she's clothed or naked, a girl or a boy, she's a social animal, the kind that is best adapted to life in the House. Smoker is right at least in that—Ginger is a monster, like many of us. Like the best of us. I’ll be damned if I'm ever going to hold it against her.

She nods and gets up. It's almost dark, and the embers are barely smoldering. Tubby must be cold. He fidgets in his romper, grunting quizzically.

“We're going,” I say. “We're almost gone.”

Ginger puts him on my shoulders. We don't have to tie him down, he's used to riding on someone's back and usually holds on very tight. She picks up the coat and the backpack and stamps out the last remaining embers.

Tubby coughs significantly.

“Yes,” Ginger says. “I remember what I promised you about tomorrow. But this place needs to rest now. To cool down.”

We walk in the dusk, keeping to the strip of pavement that looks lighter than the surrounding trash. Keys and coins jangle in Ginger's pockets. Now that the fire is gone I can see that it's not completely dark yet.

Tubby gently paws my face, mumbles something, and then, uncertainly, launches into a song. Must be the song of this evening. But unlike Tabaqui's songs on similar occasions, no one will ever understand this one.

On this Saturday the physicals are mandatory for all, so the line to the Spiders' office stretches all the way back to the Sepulchral landing, and even spills out onto the stairs. We spend so much time in it that Logs manage to haul in blankets and hotplates from the first floor, pitch a camp on the landing, and make at least two rounds of tea before the tail end of the throng slithers inside the Sepulcher.

Once inside, life immediately becomes boring. Can't smoke, can't boil water, can't even talk loudly. Many doze off. Birds lose themselves in a poker tournament, Elephant parades his toys on the linoleum, Noble and Ginger fight and make up, Jackal picks apart a bread roll and stuffs the pieces under the cabinets—for the Sepulchral sprites.

“It's a mystery how, with an attitude like that, people here are afraid of graduation,” Smoker says. Feeling my stare, he turns and adds, “You are conditioned to make do with so little, wherever you may end up.”

It's a confrontational statement, but no one thinks to argue.

We've been depressingly nice to Smoker ever since this morning.

The line keeps shortening. The white plastic chairs, on which no one ever sits on general principle, mark the stations of our journey. When we're one chair away from the office it is suddenly announced that Smoker is staying in the Sepulcher.

No explanations, which is the way it is customary with Spiders. They just send for his things and we're left wondering what could have happened to him in the time since the last physical, that all of us have overlooked. If it were anyone else but Smoker we would have left a scouting party in the Sepulcher to wait for information, but Smoker was going to be taken away by parents in any case, so we don't protest or make a scene, and return to the dorm.

At lunch we have this stupid argument about wheelers and their abilities. Tabaqui considers those abilities limitless and attempts to persuade us that legs are, if you think about it, a completely extraneous part of the body. That allegedly the only people who need them are soccer players and runway models, and everyone else only makes use of them out of habit. And that once humanity finally comes around to augmenting itself through complete motorization of the lower extremities, this bad habit is going to die off by itself.

Humpback and I mount a halfhearted defense. We like legs, we’re fond of them, we don't wish to have them motorized. Lary mutters something that mentions sour grapes.

Tabaqui, scandalized, challenges all present leg chauvinists to a contest of speed, tightness of turns, and forward thrust.

Noble says that after a contest like that we're all going to end up in the Cage. Those of us, that is, who aren't going to end up in the Sepulcher.

“Et tu, Brute?” Tabaqui whispers, defeated.

After lunch we witness what Jackal terms “The Great Exodus.” There's nothing great about it. All that happens is that some successful test takers, most of them Pheasants, are released to their parents. The House, however, is good with imbuing any event, however insignificant, with pomp and grandeur.

The first floor is cordoned off beyond the reception area. The role of the sentry falls to R One. Logs immediately crowd in front of the barrier with the intent of storming it and getting to the other side. Black Ralph holds the gate. The other counselors are busy shuttling their charges, along with the luggage.

A skinny girl named Lenses arouses an almost universal admiration. Her worldly possessions take up three huge suitcases, two duffels, and a plastic bag. Jackal declares that he finally found a true soul mate within these walls, but ah! too late, too late, and his heart is now broken forever.

After her burdensome luggage has been delivered, Lenses starts squeaking that she forgot to pack her favorite jacket. Three Reptiles, girl counselors, are sent to retrieve it, and each of the three bears an expression that unequivocally promises Lenses bad news. There's no trace of the jacket. Lenses screams that she's not going anywhere without it. Logs burst into applause. Finally the “sweet girl” is hauled bodily, by Shark personally, to reception, and after that nothing more interesting happens, apart from young Pheasant Sniffle crying hysterically and Hound Laurus delivering a farewell speech where he calls all of us shitholes.