The Testaments(32)
I’d been in tight corners before. I had prevailed. That was my story to myself.
* * *
—
Mid-afternoon produced bottles of water, handed out by trios of men: one to carry the bottles, one to pass them out, and one to cover us with his weapon in case we began to leap, thrash about, and snap, like the crocodiles we were.
“You can’t keep us here!” one woman said. “We haven’t done anything wrong!”
“We’re not allowed to talk to you,” said the bottle-passer.
None of us was allowed to go to the bathroom. Trickles of pee appeared, running down the bleachers towards the playing field. This treatment was supposed to humiliate us, break down our resistance, I thought; but resistance to what? We weren’t spies, we had no secret information we were holding back, we weren’t the soldiers of an enemy army. Or were we? If I looked deep into the eyes of one of these men, would there be a human being looking back out at me? And if not, then what?
I tried to place myself in the position of those who had corralled us. What were they thinking? What was their goal? How did they hope to accomplish it?
* * *
—
At four o’clock we were treated to a spectacle. Twenty women, of various sizes and ages, but all in business attire, were led into the centre of the field. I say led because they were blindfolded. Their hands were cuffed in front. They were arranged in two rows, ten and ten. The front row was forced to kneel down, as if for a group photo.
A man in a black uniform orated into a microphone about how sinners were always visible to the Divine Eye and their sin would find them out. An undertone of assent, like a vibration, came from the guards and attendants. Mmmmmm…like a motor revving up.
“God will prevail,” concluded the speaker.
There was a chorus of baritone Amens. Then the men who’d escorted the blindfolded women raised their guns and shot them. Their aim was good: the women keeled over.
There was a collective groan from all of us who were seated in the bleachers. I heard screams and sobbing. Some of the women leapt to their feet, shouting—I could not make out the words—but were quickly silenced by being hit on the backs of their heads with the butts of guns. There were no repeated blows: one sufficed. Again, the aim was good: these men were trained.
We were to see but not speak: the message was clear. But why? If they were going to kill us all, why this display?
* * *
—
Sundown brought sandwiches, one each. Mine was egg salad. I am ashamed to say I gobbled it up with relish. There were a few distant sounds of retching, but, under the circumstances, surprisingly few.
After that we were instructed to stand up. Then we filed out, row by row—the process was eerily silent, and very orderly—and were ushered down into the locker rooms and the corridors leading to them. That is where we spent the night.
There were no amenities, no mattresses or pillows, but at least there were bathrooms, filthy as they had already become. No guards were present to stop us from talking, though why we supposed no one was listening escapes me now. But by that time, none of us was thinking clearly.
The lights were left on, which was a mercy.
No, it was not a mercy. It was a convenience for those in charge. Mercy was a quality that did not operate in that place.
VIII
CARNARVON
Transcript of Witness Testimony 369B
21
I was sitting in Ada’s car, trying to absorb what she’d told me. Melanie and Neil. Blown up by a bomb. Outside The Clothes Hound. It wasn’t possible.
“Where are we going?” I said. It was a limp thing to say, it sounded so normal; but nothing was normal. Why wasn’t I screaming?
“I’m thinking,” Ada said. She looked into the rear-view mirror, then pulled into a driveway. The house had a sign that said ALTERNA RENOVATIONS. Every house in our area was always being renovated; then someone would buy it and renovate it again, which drove Neil and Melanie crazy. Why spend all that money on tearing the guts out of perfectly good houses? Neil would say. It was hiking up the prices and shutting poor people out of the market.
“Are we going in here?” I was suddenly very tired. It would be nice to go into a house and lie down.
“Nope,” said Ada. She took out a small wrench from her leather backpack and destroyed her phone. I watched as it cracked and slivered: the case shattered, the metal innards warped and fell apart.
“Why are you wrecking your phone?” I said.
“Because you can never be too careful.” She put the remains into a small plastic bag. “Wait’ll this car goes past, then get out and toss it into that trash bin.”
Drug dealers did this—they used burner phones. I was having second thoughts about having come with her. She wasn’t just severe, she was scary. “Thanks for the lift,” I said, “but I should go back to my school now. I can tell them about the explosion, they’ll know what to do.”
“You’re in shock. It’s no wonder,” she said.
“I’m okay,” I said, though it wasn’t true. “I can just get out here.”
“Suit yourself,” she said, “but they’ll have to report you to Social Services, and those folks will put you into foster care, and who knows how that’ll turn out?” I hadn’t thought about that. “So once you’ve ditched my phone,” she continued, “you can either get back in the car or keep on walking. Your choice. Just don’t go home. That’s not a command, it’s advice.”