coming out from between them. And they had baby pictures of themselves, hundreds of them. These kids could hardly burp without some adult pointing a camera at them and telling them to do it again—as if they lived their lives twice, once in reality and the second time for the photo.
That didn’t happen to me. Neil’s collection of antique cameras was cool, but cameras that actually worked were non-existent in our house. Melanie told me that all the early pictures of me had been burnt up in a fire. Only an idiot would have believed this, so I did.
* * *
—
Now I’m going to tell you about the stupid thing I did, and the consequences of it. I’m not proud of how I behaved: looking back, I realize how dumb it was. But I couldn’t see that at the time.
A week before my birthday, there was going to be a protest march about Gilead. Footage of a new batch of executions had been smuggled out of Gilead and broadcast on the news: women being hanged for heresy and apostasy and also for trying to take babies out of Gilead, which was treason under their laws. The two oldest grades in our school had been given time off so we could go to the protest as part of World Social Awareness.
We’d made signs: NO TRADE WITH GILEAD! JUSTICE FOR GILIBAD WOMEN! BABY NICOLE, GUIDING STAR! Some kids had added green signs: GILEAD, CLIMATE SCIENCE DE-LIAR! GILEAD WANTS US TO FRY!, with pictures of forest fires and dead birds and fish and people. Several teachers and some volunteer parents were going to come with us to make sure nothing violent happened to us. I was excited because it would be my first-ever protest march. But then Neil and Melanie said I couldn’t go.
“Why not?” I said. “Everyone else is going!”
“Absolutely not,” said Neil.
“You’re always saying how we should defend our principles,” I said.
“This is different. It’s not safe, Daisy,” said Neil.
“Life isn’t safe, you say that yourself. Anyway lots of teachers are coming. And it’s part of school—if I don’t go, I’ll lose marks!” This last part wasn’t exactly true, but Neil and Melanie liked me to have good grades.
“Maybe she could go,” said Melanie. “If we ask Ada to go with her?”
“I’m not a baby, I don’t need a babysitter,” I said.
“Are you hallucinating?” Neil said to Melanie. “That thing will be crawling with press! It’ll be on the news!” He was tugging at his hair, what was left of it—a sign that he was worried.
“That is the point,” I said. I’d made one of the posters we’d be carrying—big red letters and a black skull. GILEAD=DEATH OF THE MIND. “The whole idea is to be on the news!”
Melanie put her hands over her ears. “I’m getting a headache. Neil is right. No. I’m saying no. You will spend the afternoon at the store helping me out, period.”
“Fine, lock me up,” I said. I stomped off to my room and slammed the door. They couldn’t make me.
* * *
—
The school I went to was called the Wyle School. It was named after Florence Wyle, a sculptor of olden times whose picture was in the main entrance hall. The school was supposed to encourage creativity, said Melanie, and understanding democratic freedom and thinking for yourself, said Neil. They said that was why they’d sent me there, though they didn’t agree with private schools in general; but the standards of the public schools were so low, and of course we should all work to improve the system, but meanwhile they did not want me getting knifed by some junior drug pusher. I think now they chose the Wyle School for another reason. Wyle took strict attendance: it was impossible to skip school. So Melanie and Neil could always know where I was.
I didn’t love the Wyle School, but I didn’t hate it either. It was something to get through on my way to real life, the shape of which would become clear to me soon. Not long before, I’d wanted to be a small-animal vet, but that dream came to seem childish to me. After that I’d decided to be a surgeon, but then I saw a video of a surgery at school and it made me nauseous. Some of the other Wyle School students wanted to be singers or designers or other creative things, but I was too tone-deaf and clunky for that.