The Loneliness of Distant Beings

Chapter Seventeen

I have a mess duty that afternoon but obviously I don't go, obviously I just stay in my berth and lie there and pretend I don't exist. I open my eyes at one point and Grandpa is standing there, hat in his hands, looking at me, then up at the ceiling, then down at me again.

I don't know what he says. Stuff. Things. Blah, blah, blah. I only really tune in when I hear him say, 'You've never been very good at hiding your feelings, Seren,' and as he sits on my bed he sighs, clasping his hands between his knees. It seems like for ever until he carries on, 'Our reality is we don't have the luxury of leaving these things to chance, of living like animals. We are not animals. We are essentially a military operation and we must run like one, whether you like it or not. And the breeding programme is just a duty that we have to fulfil, like any other.' He sighs. 'That being said, I feel it pertinent to point out that, while I appreciate you're upset, you should know that your own choice for yourself would have been highly unsuitable in any case.'

I wake up then. 'What does that mean?'

'Did Technician Suarez ever tell you why, having completed his Service more than a year ago, he still hasn't married his life partner?'

'Annelise wanted to do her medical training first.'

He smiles. 'Seren, there is no reason for a married woman to put her career on hold, until she decides she is ready to join an appropriate breeding cycle. That's not the reason.'

I swallow the tightness in my throat. 'So what is?'

'Technician Suarez is not permitted to marry, until he finishes his Correctional programme. He was involved in an incident of grievous violence, two years ago. He has not yet completed his rehabilitation.'

'An incident of grievous violence?'

'So he didn't tell you?'

And I cover up for him: 'Yeah, no – he did. Of course he did.'

To which he just raises an eyebrow. Then, after sighing through his nose, hard, 'You know, I look at you sometimes and all I see is Grace.'

He very rarely talks about my mum, if ever, so I hold my breath, wait, watch the way he frowns down at his clasped hands and stammers a bit before he starts to speak, in a way that is utterly unlike him. 'You . . . you . . . ' He clears his throat. 'You're just like her, in so many ways, and I don't want you to go down the same road she did – unable to accept things the way they were, questioning everything to the point that she couldn't even see all the precious blessings she had.' He touches my cheek with the side of his thumb then, just once, and I swear it's the first time I remember him touching me in forever.

And it is right then that my pod chimes in a call and when I check the screen it is Dom, and my grandpa just watches the way I check it and don't answer and of course he knows, and so he says, 'You have to put this behind you now, Seren,' taking the pod from me and squinting at it before clearing the call. 'I suppose I hardly need remind you that, apart from anything else, interference with the breeding programme is a criminal offence. And it carries particularly severe penalties for those with a previous transgression on their record.'

He stands then, pushing on his hat.

'I am telling you this because I love you, and I don't want you to get hurt.'

He leaves my pod on my shelf as he walks out.

Dom is working second session at the moment so I message him to tell him I'll meet him at View after he's finished and eaten. I set my alarm to wake me up but as it turns out I am not asleep anyway when it buzzes under my pillow. I'm still awake, have been for hours, even though it's some way into third session by now, when I'm supposed to be asleep. I pull my clothes on in the dark and sneak out of my berths. All the passages are pretty much empty except for people in ones or twos heading to or from their shifts. At one point the night shift of circuit runners drum past me and a few raise a hand. Funny how quickly things can seem like they belong to a different life.