"I'm Ludivina," I say, raising my hand, performing an action I almost forgot about: that of hand-raising, that of learning in class, that of which does not happen here.
"Very well, we have orders to bring you back," says the man.
Unlike the last man, the one taken by the harden-jawed beautiful boy, this man is deeper exhausted, more wasted, dried to the hair and nail, wrinkled with time. His legs and arms look weaker. And his body thinner from the waist.
"Orders from who?" my mother interrogates, not accepting what the officer had to say.
Sergeant Vaco, read the man's pinâthe silver pin placed horizontally right over his heart, over his pocket that is over his heart. Then, above itâabove the pendant of his nameâstars, about five of them, bling in gold; and to the side of them, strips and straps that meant he had climbed up the rank-ladderâor the ladder of ranks, whatever the fuck they call it. Tucked to the bottom, running in-creases down, his shirt was hidden under the black belt given to all soldiersâeven Henry and his men had them, and the beautiful boy has them too; my mother, on the contrary, has a different uniformâstill running and badged and colored like the man's, but different colors mean different things in her woods, in her armyâwhatever type of army that is, that is.
"She is from the other side of the Wall, mam," said the sergeant. "I don't ask question. I just take the people that I need to take."
"Yes, but she's also my daughter," said my mother.
Great, we've finally publicly admit it.
Is this our first time out, for my mother and I? I don't think so. We've been out quite a lot. We've also seen men and womenâmore like childrenâdie. Thus, perhaps, we've bonded more than any mother daughter could in the time of their life, even if they tried. We've bonded out of force, of course. But I'm not going to take that back. I'm not going to change that. It's more than I could have hoped for.
But I would, in deed, trade back ever meeting my mother if it meant I could have my grandmother and Moritz back. I didn't need her in my life before, and she was not there for me, Moritz and my grandmother were, so it is only to them I owe what I am about to do next.
"I want to stay," I say.
The sergeant laughs.
The beautiful boy looks at me.
"Mam, that is not up to you."
"Then? To who is it up to?" I reply.
"We have orders to take you back and that's that," the sergeant grabs at me.
With the first tuckâwhich is all this has fucking beenâa war of tuck and roll and go emerges. I move forward, towards the sergeant. He's not as strong as Zero, or Oso, or Congo, or even Noe.
"Sirâshe has nobody left," the boy says, for me, looking at my grandmother, and avoiding to look at Moritz.
***********
"You can stay with me," my mother says, looking at me instead of the sergeant, even though she was supposed to look at the sergeant because he was the one asking for an explanation, an answer as to why he wouldâif he couldâgo back empty handed.
"I just know I need to stay and end whoever did this to them," I reply, to whoever can listen and help me, I say, looking at my grandmother and Moritz. I walk to my grandmother and kneel down.
My grandmother has always kept a pendant with her. A gold one over her neck. A pendent that kept, inside, a picture of my grandfather and her.
Before getting back up, I slowly took it off of her. I didn't put it over meâI didn't want to lose itâbut I did put it in my haversack.
"I can't go back," I say, keeping my eye on my grandmother.
"I'm sorry. You'll have to say that to the Party Prez," says the sergeant, this time grabbing at my haversack.
"Sir, please," both the boy and my mother say.
But why was he pleading? I understand my motherâalthough not that much because she did leave me at a young age, so coming to fight for me back seems ironic...but anyway, back to the boy...but why the boy?
"I'm sorry, mam," the sergeant says, ignoring the boy. "She has to go back. If you want, you can cross with me to claim her?" the sergeant then says like I'm some item that will be placed in the Lost-and-Found box for someone to later claimânot even the rightful owner (as my mother never was since birth; my grandmother was); and maybe I am an item from a Lost-and-Found boxâI mean, I am lost....and I still haven't been found.
Or have I?
I noticeâduring this time, during this conversationâthat the boy, unlike the sergeant, does not have a name badge, not even medals or stars or anything to tell me he is actually part of anything. But my mother knows him? So I guess I can trust him?
The sergeant does not take to our words and suggestion. Therefore, introduces his own: the only demand he had already said...the one where we follow him, my mother and the boy, if they want, and then we enter his Party car, and we drive with him back to the other side of the Wall where I can later find out what happens to me. That was his suggestion.
"They will help with the bodies," the sergeant says, only looking at Moritz and my grandmother.
When he said that, a few youths in his party, wearing the colors of the other side of the Wall, wall themselves up, behind the sergeant, towards Moritz. Those that got closer to him are coveredâI mean closer to Moritzâin white, plastic body suits. Those you'd see when someone doesn't want to get themselves dirty, for whatever reason. They were also carrying bags. There's about three of them that approach Moritz. I can't see with the dust in the air and the lights hanging and the building, that's half destroyed to pieces with bullet holes and other machine-gun affects...but I can see it.
Over the face of the youths working for the sergeant, a plastic, clear visor was visible from my stance, my distanceâthe area to see was big enough to fit a hand in it. One of the youths had dark, blue eyes. The one closest to me didâI could see that much when he would move around near us.
After a few went over to Moritz, more youths walked in, about another four in the body, white suits, and those walked into our room, over to our grandmother.
"Is this, Miss Dolores?" one asked. He had a notepad with him, and a pen ready.
"It is," my mother replied.
The youth checked off the paper over his pad and nodded to the youths in white body bags like him.
"And that there is Mr. Davis?" he then asked, looking at Moritz.
I looked at Moritz with the youth...and replied:
"It is."
"Very well," he nodded to the other youths that were already halfway out the door with Moritz in a bag, carrying him, where all they didâonly about twoâwas turn around and wave to let us know that they heard us, and would then expect, no reprimand from the sergeant, as they carried their jobs as expected.
"Come on, then," the sergeant insisted, "their families are waiting," he then said, looking at Moritz.
But Moritz was already gone, he was already out the door.
**************
Outside, Moritz was, in a van, in a car, maybe in black, resting in the back, rested face-up (hopefully), looking up, wondering what happened, how it happened, and why it happened.
But what he should know, is that it was all my fault.
And what hurts me, is that he was picked up, like my grandmother, and taken, just like a trash pick-up, as if there no better than that: trash.
Just like that, they were gone with the youths in white body suits. They were simply part of a simple process the Party thought they had invented for themselves. A process of a quick stop, a get-off, a pick-up, and then, a dumping. Then, they were on their way for the next one without ever looking back at the stories they were dumping, the white-bodied youths.
So why do we use the same routine for the scene of a death; why do we treat those we love like trash?
Moritz and my grandmother are not trash. And I'm going to see that I tell whoever had them picked-up that we can't have trash resemble the end for our loved ones...or even strangers. For this, these type of acts and ideas, should be sent-off with the utmost distaste.
"Okay. I'll go," I succumb to saying to the sergeant after seeing how my grandmother and Moritz can just be put into bags like nothing.
How do I know where they'll go?
How do I know that they'll get to a proper burial where people that also loved them can say goodbye to them? There is only one way to know: to go with them.
And maybe I will: sooner rather than later.
"Very well," said the sergeant.
"What are you doing?" my mother said, asking more than saying.
"Yeah," the boy agreed.
"You all can come with me," I reply, "but I'm going to see that they get a proper burial, even if that meansâwell, whatever that means."
"You'll probably go to jail," says the boy.
"Yeah," says my mother, agreeing back.
"Yeah? Well I feel like I've been in one since I got here; I've felt like an inmate the second I've been with them," I say, looking at Luviel and Oso and Congo and other Catz.
Screw you to hell, sends Luviel, before being escorted out and into a car with Moritz and my grandmother.
"I've been in hell all along," I mutter back to Luviel.
"I'll go too," says my mother.
"Yeahâyou and your people might want you to go," snickers the sergeant, sniggering, devilishly.
"I'll go too," then says the beautiful boy. But why?
"Whatever. I don't care." says the sergeant.
Will a poor man's treasure, always be a rich man's trash?
************
To cross to the other side of the Wall, with my motherâwell, that thought alone made me flutter inside, it gave me a sense of hope, a sense of hope in the sense that maybe we would actually get to spend normal days together, not tortured in here, not wondering when a bullet would be put right through our head, in between our eyes, or anywhere, killing us; maybe we can live as regular mother and daughter do in a world more developed than this one, on the other side of the Wall.
After figuring out the small traveling-buddy fiasco with my mother and the beautiful boy, the sergeant waved us over, outside. He didn't actually wave us. His youths more like escorted us out to make sure none of us would run.
But I don't need escorting,
"I know where I'm going," I say.
I'm not going to fucking run. That's Moritz and my grandmother that they have there, and I'm not going anywhere until I know exactly where they are putting them.
"We have six vehicles," the sergeant says.
And they did. I can see that much with the little light still left outside.
There are three trucks and three vans.
The vans, inside, have a plentiful of computers and chairs, and speakers, and monitors. They've been watching for quite some time now.
"By the wayâdid you all know you could save a bundle with Feico?" says the sergeant.
"What?" I say.
"Yeah, we actually use Feico."
"What are you talking about?"
"Sorryâwe get paid to say all of this shit. But you know the drill. Just get in the fucking van."
The other side sure is different than it is here. The Party is different.
"Hmm...we don't get any sponsors here, still," says the youths accompanying my mother.
My mother, still, has about six soldiers with her.
Those fighting for the party on my side of the Wall are all similar to those fighting with my mother...except for their rightsârights we don't get on the other side of the Wall.
"Sirâcan I have another Blue Bull?" asks one of the youths with the other sergeant.
"Yeah, go right ahead. You know each car has a fridge of Blue Bull," says the sergeant.
And odd reply when the youth of his only asked if he could get one, not how many fridges of Blue Bull each vehicle had.
"You all know that Blue Bull gives you -" started the sergeant.
"Yeahâwings, we know, let's just go," I finished for the sergeant.
How many sponsors do they get?
"You must not get this type of sponsorship here, huh?" said the sergeant towards my mother.
"We don't even get clean water, let alone fucking sponsors. Every day is a fight for us," my mother replied.
"Geezâsorry I asked," said the sergeant, making that same finger movement, with the circle and the eye, as the other sergeant, from here, did.
His youth laughed it off. But one of the girl youths did it with him, in the background, with nobody but me to see.
"I think we can tell by your vehicle how much different it is," said the boyâthe thick-jawed boy.
And he was right.
Look at their vehicles: of the yearânot of another year; no, made this year, no later and no sooner; new tires; the technology inside each vehicle with more tech than the Catz bar or the whole area of this side of the Wall; there is a soda machine in our backseat; there are TV's on the back of the headrests and on the windows; there are video games too; there are candy machines and popcorn machines; and there is an advert from the Party...or perhaps, this whole vehicle is an advert from the Party.
***********
"Welcome to a West Wall vehicle," the vehicle began:
You are currently headed to the other side of the Wall.
You will be entering the New World, as we like to call it.
You'll find that the residents are cleanâof disease and of clothes, and raw foods, and meats.
You will find that the children do not talk to strangers.
You will see that they do not scream or talk back.
We like to behave in an orderly fashion on this side.
Do as you are told and no more, and nobody will give you trouble.
For if you act like a child, you will be treated as such...
Then the window's voice, the one talking to us, addressed me:
"And miss Divine," it began...
To you, our main guest...
We will be expecting you in our main hall, where you will be briefed on documents for your guests and their gluten levels.
You will also be checked for any diseases or new thoughts...if you don't mind.
If you do mind, then we will need to search into your mind to see why it is that you do mind.
We hope you understand, as you have already been living here for some time now.
And we do regret, and are very sorry, to hear about your grandmother.
"Wellâthat is about it. There will probably be more when we get there," says the sergeant, raising up the glass that enclosed the two-front seats of this limo-type truck, stretched with two extra doors and tires on both sides.
Every-thing is bigger in the West. They say.
Here, on this side of the Wallâon my mother's side (and possibly on the beautiful boy's side)âpeople run and go through extreme measures and face difficult things because they have to, because in order to live another day, they have to go through all these things in order to survive; but on the other side, on my side, on the side where my grandmother raised me, people do these type of things, they swim through lakes and run miles and go through torture for millions of dollars, or moneyâthey go through it for a TV show, they do it to entertain people; perhaps that is why people hate us and our Party. People hate people from my side of the Wall because we don't have to go through obstacle-like courses for nothing...we do it for a million dollars...something everyone would want.
In the business world, I see people using high pitch, low pitch voices to sell. And maybe it's the fakeness that I don't have, that helps me avoid having to create such voices that haven't helped me save my ass from this situation.