I slowly closed my eyes and tightened my lips. My right hand dropped its piece of bread and raised up tiredly to cover my tightly shut eyelids, at the same time massaging my forehead. We didn’t have enough facilities for mentals and nutsos in the city; we just let the ones with the wealthier families shut ‘em away in places like Group 26 in the CRCorp building. Yaa Allah, you never knew when you were going to run into one of these bereft cookies.
Still with my eyes covered, I could feel the man with the close-cropped white hair lean toward me on the other side. I knew that son of a biscuit hadn’t liked me from the get-go. “Get Marjory to tell you all about her raisins sometime. It’s a fascinating story in its own right.”
“Be sure to,” I murmured. In the spring with the apricots, I would. I picked up the bread with my eating hand again and opened my eyes. Everyone within hollering range was staring at me with rapt attention. I don’t know why; I didn’t want to know why then, and I still don’t want to know why. I hoped it was just that I was an oddity, a welcome interruption in the daily routine, like a visit from one of Prince Shaykh Mahali’s wives or children.
I’d had enough to eat, and so I’d picked up the tray — I’m quick on the uptake, and I’d figured out the disposal drill from observation. It wasn’t that difficult to begin with, and, jeez, I’m a trained professional, mush hayk? Yeah, you right. I slid the tray into the proper slot in the proper machine. Then il-Qurawi, having nothing immediate to do, chose to be nowhere in sight. I slumped back down between Marjory and the old, white-haired man. Fortunately, Marjory was still enchanted by her gelatin salad — the al-Qaddani moddy, a Palestinian fictional hardboiled-detective piece of hardware I was wearing, let me have the impression that Marjory was like this at every meal, whatever was served — and the old gentleman gave me a disapproving look, stood up, and moved away, toward what real people did to compensate society for their daily sustenance. For a few moments I had utter peace and utter silence, but I did not expect them to last very long. I was correct as usual in this sort of discouraging speculation.
Almost directly across from me was a woman with extremely large breasts, which were trapped in an undergarment which must have been painfully confining for them. I really wasn’t interested enough to read if they were genuine — God-given — or not; she must’ve thought she had, you know, the most devastating figure on all of Mars, and of course we understand what we mean when we speak of Mars. She wore a long, flowing, print shift of a drabness that directed all one’s attention elsewhere and upwards; bare feet; and a live, medium-sized, suffering lizard on one shoulder that was there only to extort yet another sort of response from you. As if her grotesque mamelons weren’t enough.
Oh, you were supposed to say, you have a live, medium-sized lizard on your shoulder. Now, when someone has gone to that amount of labor to pry a reaction from me, my innate obstinacy sets in. I will not look more than two or three times at the tits, casually, as after the first encounter they don’t exist for me. I won’t even glance furtively at her various other vulgar accoutrements. I won’t remark at all on the lizard. The lizard and I will never have a relationship; the woman and I barely had one, and that only through courtesy.
She spoke in a voice intended to be heard by the nearby portion of mankind: “I think Marjory means well.” She looked around herself to find agreement, and there wasn’t a single person still in the refectory who would contradict her. I got the feeling that would be true whatever she said. “I know for a fact that Marjory never goes beyond the buildings of the Mars colony. She never sees Allah’s holy miracle of creation. Does it not say in the Book, the noble Qur’ân, ‘Frequently you see the ground dry and barren: but no sooner do We send down rain to moisten it than it begins to tremble and magnify, putting forth each and every kind of blossoming life. That is because Allah is Truth: He gives life to the dead and has power over all things.’ She sat back, evidently very self-satisfied. “That was from the surah called ‘Pilgrimage,’ in the holy Qur’ân.”
“May the Creator of heaven and earth bless this recitation of His holy words,” said one man softly.
“May Allah give His blessing,” said a woman quietly.
I had several things I might have mentioned; the first was that the imitation surface of Mars I’d crossed was not, in point of fact, covered with every variety of blooming plant. Yet maybe to some of these people that was worth reporting to the authorities. Before I could say anything, a young, sparsely bearded man sat beside me in the old, white-haired resident’s seat, and addressed the elderly woman. The young man said, “You know, Umm Sulaiman, that you shouldn’t hold up Marjory as a typical resident of the Mars colony.”
Umm Sulaiman frowned. “I have further scripture that I could recite which supports my words and actions.”
The young man shuddered. “No, my mother-in-law” — clearly an honorific and a title not to be taken seriously — “all is as Allah wills.” He turned to me and murmured, “I wish the both of them — the two old women, Marjory and Umm Sulaiman — would stop behaving in their ways. I admit it, I’m superstitious, and it frightens me.”
“Seems a shame to pay all this money to CRCorp just to be frightened.”
The young man looked to either side, then leaned even closer. “I’ve heard a story, O Sir,” he murmured. “Actually, I’ve heard several stories, some as wild as Marjory’s, some even crazier. But, by the beard of the Prophet-”
“May the blessings of Allah be on him and peace,” I said.
“ — there’s one story that won’t go away, a story that’s repeated often by the most sane and reliable of our team.” Team: as if they really were part of some kind of international extraterrestrial project.
I pursed my lips and tried to show that I was rabidly eager to hear his bit of gossip. “And what is this persistent story, O Wise One?”
He looked to either side again, took my arm, and together we left the table and the others. We walked slowly toward the exit. “Now, O Sir,” he said, “I’ve heard this directly from Bin el-Fadawin, who is CRCorp and Shaykh il-Qurawi’s highest representative here in the Mars colony.”
“Group 26, you mean,” I said.
“Yeah, if you insist on it, Group 26.” It was obvious that he didn’t like his illusion broken, even for a moment. It cast some preliminary doubt on what he was about to tell me. “Listen, O Sir,” he said. “Bin el-Fadawin and others drop hints now and again that CRCorp has better uses for these premises, that they’re even now working on ways to turn away and run off the very people who’ve paid them for long-term care.”
I shrugged. “If CRCorp wanted to evict all of you, O Young Man, I’m sure they could do it without too much difficulty. I mean, they got the lawyers and you got, what, rocks and lichen? Still, you and all the others have handed over — and continue to hand over — truly exorbitant amounts of cash and property; and all they’ve really done is decorate to your specifications a large, empty space in a restored office tower.”
“They’ve created our consensual reality, please, O Shaykh.”
“Yeah, you right,” I said, amazed that this somewhat intelligent young man could be so easily taken in. “So you’re telling me that the CRs — which the corporation has worked so hard to create, and for which it’s being richly rewarded — will start disappearing, one by one?”
“Begin disappearing!” cried the young man. “Have Shaykh il-Qurawi-”
“Did I hear my name mentioned, O Most Gracious Ones?” asked my client, appearing silently enough through the door of the refectory room. “In a pleasant context, I hope.”