Pasha Malla - People Park

What are you doing, she said. What have you done.

Done?

Done!

Ah. To tell you the truth, I thought this would be amusing. I didn’t know that it would be — that it would be, well. .

Well what. A disaster?

You think it’s that? May I ask, Mrs. Mayor, what you think existed here before us?

Where does it go, this tunnel.

Oh, don’t worry. For certain, we are totally alone.

Yes, but where are we. Where is here.

Such a question. Have you considered that perhaps this place does not exist even now. Perhaps it never has? Perhaps we never have.

I exist! Aren’t you talking to me?

Yes! Such sagacity, such simple truth. You exist in your words, and I in mine.

The rocking stopped. The stillness and darkness were absolute. Everything pitched outward into oblivion. When Raven spoke next it was in a whisper: We do indeed exist, all alone down here, wherever we are. We’re unique in that, Mrs. Mayor — so dreadfully unique, you and I.

DEBBIE WOKE to cricked pain through her body, a stiff neck, her left leg numb from foot to buttock. All night she’d bounced from dreams into waking panic. She unfolded herself from the beanbag chair and on creaking limbs hobbled to the Room’s rear window and parted the curtains.

Dawn was breaking over the lake. But something was wrong. It took a moment: the breakwater was submerged, waves swept all the way to shore. The water, level with the piers’ edges, was starting to trickle over. From below came a pocking, suctiony sound — surf slopped up against the building’s underside.

She found the Hand sleeping on the floor of her office.

Hey, said Debbie from the doorway, we’ve got to get out of here. There’s flooding.

The girl stretched, yawned, blinked, so innocent and girlish that Debbie looked away with a flash of guilt — it was too cute, nothing she was meant to see, this gentle kittenlike awakening before that hard mask came growling down.

The door slammed: Debbie was left staring at a poster about how to build community. She moved to the main room, where the twins slept head to toe on the couch. Their eyes fluttered open and regarded Debbie, hovering over them, with suspicion.

We have to go, she said. The lake’s flooding.

The office door opened, the Hand padded to the bathroom. A swishing sound — puddles splashed into the Room. She followed behind, kicking water in front of her.

See? It’s flooding, Debbie repeated. We should leave. I want to help you.

With a snort the Hand turned to her friends. You hear that? She’s going to help us. How? Teach us to glue macaroni to a paper plate?

Debbie glanced at the gallery wall, at all that macaroni glued to all those plates.

No, said the Hand. We don’t need help. Let’s go.

She led the twins to the door. But she couldn’t figure out how to unlock it, so Debbie stepped in, the Hand stood by stiffly as she flipped the catch. None of the three youngsters acknowledged Debbie on their way out — but on the sidewalk they stopped short: a Citywagon idled in front of Crupper’s store. A Helper got out, leaned on the roof of the car, called, These kids with you?

Me? said Debbie.

Yeah, they yours? We were getting ready to grab them.

What do you mean, grab them?

We’re doing sweeps. There’ve been. . incidents. So we’re scooping anyone suspicious — nonresidents, whoever, just taking people to the Galleria to ask them some questions.

What sort of incidents? Debbie stepped boldly in front of the Hand and the twins, hands on hips. You don’t have anything better to do?

The guy’s tone remained lethargic: If they’re with you, don’t worry about it. Just doing what we’re told. Then his expression changed. What about you, you local?

Me? said Debbie. She shrank a little, then gestured to the Room: I work here.

Sure. But are you from here.

Of course I’m fuggin from here, said Debbie.

Oh. Well make sure you have your papers ready, we’ll be doing sweeps all day. And we’re still working on the power out, but the trains’ll be up again soon. Good lookin out! He saluted, got in the car, and drove off.

Debbie turned to the Hand. Well, she said, maybe we can help each other after all?

The Hand stared back. Her eyes were savage. From the back of her throat came a gravelly sound, rising up — and she spat. A fat wet glob smacked Debbie in the chest and clung there like a mollusc. Debbie’s arms floated down to her sides, a faint whimper sounded between her lips. One of the twins laughed. The Hand shook her head, gestured to her two friends, and they moved off up F Street at a jog, down an alley, and Debbie was left listening to the swish and plop of waves slapping underneath the Room.

FTER PASSING through the phalanx of Helpers that ringed the Galleria, Kellogg, Pearl, and Elsie-Anne found the end of the surnames N — S queue at the south entrance. Noticing the other legal guardians — some alone, some in anxious-looking pairs — eyeing Elsie-Anne covetously, perhaps even in a predatory, kidnappy sort of way, Kellogg sandwiched their daughter tightly between him and Pearl. Watch out now, he whispered.

From their eyes drooped purple sacks, the skins of spoilt plums. As had many of these parents, the Pooles had spent all night dealing with Residents’ Control before being directed downtown just before dawn. For reasons unexplained, a number of young people and nonresidents had been rounded up and detained in the Galleria’s upper floors. There was a chance, the Pooles were told, they’d find their son among them.

I have to pee, said Elsie-Anne.

Soon as we’ve found your brother, Annie, said Kellogg. He’s got to be here.

Real bad, Dad.

This is no one’s fault, okay? Sometimes stuff just happens.

Pearl blew her nose, tucked the tissue into her sleeve. The line edged forward, the Pooles took a half step into the mall.

Day was breaking over the city. Honey-coloured blades of light sliced between the skyscrapers, the streets flushed pink, the pigeons were up and clucking. More people joined the line. The Pooles moved into the Galleria, the doors closed, and everything outside was gone.

Here we go, said Kellogg. Closer and closer. Gip’s going to be so happy to see us!

The mall smelled of nothing. The air was stagnant, the lighting jaundiced. The N — S queue snaked in a slow trudge by Citysports and Bargain Zoom and Horizon Systems and other shops of various merchandise and services, Kellogg whistling tunelessly and Pearl groggy and distant while Elsie-Anne cupped her crotch.

From each quadrant of the mall four such queues (A — G on the north side, H — M to the east, T — Z west) converged in the Galleria’s foodcourt, where a glass ceiling admitted a crosshatched quadrilateral of daylight. Here at four desks sat Helpers, each with a Residents’ Control registry open before him. By the time the Pooles were a dozen spots from the N — S desk, the morning sun gleamed merrily down into the mall and Elsie-Anne had buckled into a pelvic-focused hunch, knees locked, purse dangling off one shoulder, head bobbing to some inaudible, mictural rhythm.

From the middle of the foodcourt, escalators cycled in opposing ellipses, hypnotic to watch. Pearl watched. The foodcourt was a grid of empty tables and chairs. The unattended restaurants wore slatted masks. Security cameras shot the scene from domed bulbs in the ceiling. No one was eating. No one was shopping. The Galleria, normally packed on Super Saver Sundays, had been repurposed into what some agitated parents had started calling the Kiddie Fuggin Jail.