Joanna Kavenna - The Birth of Love

*

‘Would you like some more wine, sir?’ the waiter was saying in his ear. He nodded and held out his glass.

‘How is the lamb?’ said Sally.

‘Very good,’ he said.

They were speaking quietly, and the talk continued around them. She put her hand on his arm again. ‘You do look pale, Michael. Is there anything else you would like?’

‘I wish I had done everything much better,’ he said. ‘I wish I had …’

‘It’s important to sustain a sense of humour about all of this,’ said Sally. ‘It’s a sort of game. Not the work, the work is very important. But the launch, this, the business surrounding you. That’s a sort of game. It can be fun, even.’

‘Yes.’

‘If you are too worried about what people think of your work, you will only be disappointed,’ she said.

‘I am not disappointed,’ he said. ‘I am …’

She waited politely, with her fork raised.

‘ … in shock,’ he said.

*

Then the waiters came and began to clear the plates away.

*

‘Michael, what will you do after this?’ said Alice Mortimer.

‘Perhaps … I would like to go on holiday,’ said Michael.

They smiled at him, laughed a little.

‘Are you working on another book?’ said Roger Annais.

‘I don’t have any ideas at present. I have been … well, it has been hard to focus on my work …’

‘Of course it has,’ said Alice Mortimer. ‘I remember that, you feel you have to test the water, before you start again.’

‘We need more wine,’ said Sally, holding up her hand. ‘We really should have another drink.’

*

Michael looked down. They had taken his plate away. He had hardly touched the food, he had merely drunk the wine. So now his head was thick with wine and if anyone wanted to speak to him this afternoon, he would be drunk.

*

He would pass the rest of the day stewed in wine, and tomorrow — perhaps tomorrow — things would be different. It was an irony that after all these years of hoping for an audience, of imagining that was what he needed, he found these people so bemusing. He longed for the privacy of his room, where he sat for years without anyone noticing. Unsullied, immaculate in his obscurity and failure. The river coursed along beneath him, dragging everyone else along. He saw them dragged along each morning, surging towards the Underground, and he thought of them being poured into London, into their offices. And then they flooded home at five and six and seven o’clock, short and fat and tall and broad, conveyed by the current, subject to its force. He surveyed everything from his tower and thought he had escaped it. He surveyed them from the safety of the shore. He had been voluntarily beached for years. And now, somehow, he had been dragged in. Here they all were, these people who swam with the current and he was there too, but they were swimming along, buoyant and accustomed to their state, and he was drowning even as they spoke to him.

*

The waiter was putting something down in front of him. A crème brûlée, perfectly glazed on top.

*

‘How delicious,’ said Sally. ‘Dessert wine, anyone?’

‘Down the hatch,’ said Peter Kennedy.

So Michael Stone lifted his glass and received another splash of wine.

*

Everything had been soured by that phone call. It was the peculiar tone in his brother’s voice, something almost police, when for years James had treated him as if he was pathetic, unspeakable. Polite and yet cold all the same, as if hostilities were off for the time being, while their mother declined, out of some sort of warped notion of decorum — yet he did not want to have to think about James, or his mother. They always made him feel anxious about things he had previously enjoyed. Even his childhood had been nervous, because of his mother’s godliness and determination, because she always had so much to say about even the smallest things. She ordered the world so convincingly, classified everything as either ‘good’ or ‘bad’. He couldn’t believe she had really changed. Things were better when he ignored them, but then the chilly voice of his brother had intruded, making him uneasy again. It made him think of an ancient patriarch, some ogre of his childhood, standing in judgement, far above him. He saw himself clambering towards this venerable prophet — perhaps he was on a mountain, by a stone temple. Michael saw himself struggling up to the peak, approaching with his head bowed, and there was the old sage, swinging his hoary locks towards him, saying, ‘You have done wrong. You have done everything wrong and for this wrong you must be punished.’

*

As he had always done, in childhood and even in adult life, Michael felt uncertain, guilty even, found himself saying, ‘But what is it? Just what is it I have done?’

Transcripts of interviews with members of the anti-species conspiracy of Lofoten 4a, Arctic Circle sector 111424

Part 1, 10.00–11.55 a.m. 15 August 2153 Interview with Prisoner 730004

At time of commencement the prisoner will not disclose her real name.

I do not understand. Just what is it I have done?

Prisoner 730004 you are aware that your crimes against the species are very grave and you stand under a charge of conspiring against the Genetix and thereby against the survival of humanity?

I am aware of the charges but I do not understand what I have done to merit them.

The Protectors are very disappointed with you. They perceive that you have behaved in a reckless manner, dangerous to all. What do you say to this?

I am sorry the Protectors are disappointed. Yet I remain confused about the nature of my offence.

They regret to inform you that while they seek to assess all matters reasonably and dispassionately, your case and that of your co-conspirators must be considered a crime. We are appointed to discuss with you the precise nature of this crime and to relay information to the Protectors on your behalf. Do you understand?

I do not really understand, no.

Could you firstly explain how you came to be living in Lofoten 4a, Arctic Circle sector 111424, in the Restricted Area?

You mean on the island?

Lofoten 4a, Arctic Circle sector 111424, yes. Can you explain how you came to be living there?

We were living in the land of our mothers and fathers …

Correction, for ‘mothers and fathers’ the record will read egg and sperm donors.

… Generations were born and lived their lives there. We merely wanted to be at home.

You were not happy with your accommodation in Darwin C?

Naturally I should have felt fortunate. In our perilous times, Darwin C supplied me with everything I should need. I had my allocated role in the struggle for the survival of the species. I had my own small room which is called a space. A regulated lamp which functioned from nightfall for a regulation hour, during which time I could arrange my clothes for the following day, pull my bed down from the wall. I had a thin window with a view of all the other towers. I took my meals in the collective dining centre, like everyone else. I washed in the collective hygiene centre, and I received my daily allocation of drinking water. On Sunday mornings, I was granted three hours of relaxation time. I liked to read in the collective data hall. Despite all this, I became aware that Darwin C was not my home.

But you had lived there all your life, is that correct?

Yes, my parents were taken there before I was born. They were removed forcibly from their home and taken to a space on the twenty-eighth floor, sector 1125, Darwin C. My mother was harvested and then sterilised and I was the product of her Genetix treatment. As you know in those days it was the custom for Genetix children to live with their parents.