Short Stories

Numbers

My name is Kaleb. When I was born, the first words I heard my parents speak were, "what's the number?"

In my world, everyone has a number scribbled on their bodies to symbolise how long they will live. Meaning- we know the exact day our lives will come to an end, almost as if we were labelled with an expiration date.

Everyone held their breath, awaiting the midwife's answer. My Mum held onto my father's hand so tightly her knuckles turned white, whimpering as they hoped for a full, long life for me "His number is...", flipping my small left arm over to reveal black cursive digits "22265 days."

I will live to be 61 years old.

On my first day of school, I sat on the swing and watched the laces of my purple shoes dangle and move about every time I pushed myself higher. On my descent, a giggling girl with unicorn clips and green eyes launched herself off the swing beside me crashing down onto the woodchips. She jumped up, wiping her red coloured knees and smiled up at me, "My name's Leslie, and I'm gonna' to live to be 87."

As people grow older, they're more taciturn when it comes to the digits printed on their bodies tending to wear jewellery or long sleeves to cover the "expiration dates." But as children, you don't tend to give the black numbers a second thought or even fathom the ticking time bombs.

Another body landed beside Leslie. A small blonde headed girl stumbled a bit on her landing, and her glasses fell down the bridge of her nose as she found her balance. "Genevieve. I'm Leslie's friend." she smiled, shaking her long curly blonde hair out of her eyes as she pushed her glasses up her nose. "I'm going to live to be 17."

As kindergarteners, we were just starting school, and everything was so new to us. Learning how to skip, plait our hair and even read, but we were very aware of the concept of numbers—that is just something we didn't need to learn to understand. Numbers were ingrained into our minds, just like the figures that adorned our bodies.

I understood that Genevieve—well, had a "bad number."

The pity must have shown on my face because Genevieve—a girl barely knew me reached for my hand and squeezed it. "It's okay," her fingers drew circles on my hand. "My mummy told me that 17 is plenty of time."

When I think about having kids of my own, that's precisely what I would say to them if they were born with shorter lives than others. What else could you possibly say? For once, their future is out of your control. No matter how you raise them, you can't change the inevitable. Nothing in the world can give you more time with those you love.

Genevieve's mothers were eccentric characters and overall genuinely amazing people. Over time I became the best of friends that friends could be with both Genevieve and Leslie —with our numbers 87,61 and 17, We became 'Prime Time Lovers.' We were all the same. Prime numbers. Odd but when we were together it felt right, it felt even. When we were all together, we equalled 166- a number that no one else could have.

Genevieve's house soon became THE spot for the three of us. Mostly, because her mums had an impressive pool and we liked to keep Genevieve close to her family as much as we possibly could. Her birth mother put Genevieve up for adoption as soon as she saw '6205.'

Most people didn't bother to get to know Genevieve because they saw no point or didn't want to grieve over her death.

The 'Prime Time Lovers.' lived life to the fullest —until the day that three would become two. Genevieve's day was just around the corner, a few weeks before our formal. We always knew her number, but it all seemed fake until we saw it marked on our calendar. Like we would forget!

The school planned early graduation just for her, the day before her number. Genevieve's mums and 'Prime Time Lovers.' watched over from the stands. When the principal called out Genevieve's name, tears welled in my eyes with both happiness and sorrow.

She deserved this day more than anyone else. Genevieve stayed up late most nights hunched over her desk; She worked hard—so hard, this affected 'Prime Time Lovers' hangouts. One week, after not seeing Geneive because she was studying for a biology exam, I got mad, and fought; After a while, my yelling died down. Genevieve barely batted an eye at my anger and just like the first day we met-she tugged my hand from my side and squeezed it. "My time in this world is limited," she said as her fingers drew circles on my hand. "I want to be the best I can be."

She became the best.

She never talked about her future ambitions, and never asked her parents to buy anything.

Every time we would mention where we'd move after school, Genevieve would leave the room. It was Genevieve's day to show the world that her time or lack of, does not determine her worth.

Genevieve cleared her throat and gripped the podium in nervousness before speaking into the microphone, receiving everyone's attention. "Like life, I'm going to keep this graduation short and sweet."

Gasps echoed throughout the hall, and she looked down at her speech hesitantly.

"All jokes aside. tomorrow is the day my number predicted my death."

"My birth mother didn't want me when I was only 1 minute old. As soon as she saw the number engraved on my arm, she got rid of me. How can I be judged of my quality of life, before I've even taken my first breath".

Silence engulfed her as she took a deep shaky breath.

"Don't look at my number with sadness, —there's no need to do so. I have lived—not for long but I have lived a life full of friendship, happiness and contentment."

A silent tear rolled down her cheek and landed on the scribbled paper causing the ink to run. Genevieve gave her mums a small smile of gratitude and love and then the 'Prime Time Lovers a nervous chuckle.

Genevieve died the next day at 10:47 am.