The Day They Took Our Hearts Away.

When I was a child I used to fall asleep against my father’s chest, the regular, rhythmic beat of what I thought was his heart lulling me to sleep. I thought it the most comforting sound in the whole world, and I would sleep soundly, knowing that I was safe and snug and secure. Now I’m terrified by the memory of that sound. It makes me sick.

The ceremony was to be performed tomorrow, and I was one of the five who would be subjected to it. They say it is to celebrate our coming-of-age, but I know better. I know what goes on in the House. Every year the girls and boys who’d seen 18 summers would enter that House and emerge as men and women, finally being part of the System.

The System ran everything around here. It created an ideal world. The System knew everything about everyone in it, and what it did was match stuff together. The men and women who were the most compatible were allocated to each other, producing maximum happiness and minimum domestic violence. Jobs were assigned to the people who were best suited to them, resulting in great efficiency and productivity. Those who were neither compatible nor capable were sent to sleep.

This was the fate for those disabled in accidents, or pets who had grown too old. Or those who had fallen too gravely ill, be it persons or pets. These were solutions to the mistakes of the past. In school we listened in horror as our teachers told us stories of how infectious diseases wiped out thousands upon thousands of people. This was mind-boggling stuff; we couldn’t grasp the concept of thousands of people living in close enough proximity to die of each other’s sicknesses, let alone allowing those infected to walk freely amongst them.

Our teachers told us about the enormous drain on resources old and disabled people represented. They told us what to do when (assuming we were lucky enough to be spared by disease and disability) our fiftieth summer came: enter the door at the back of the House and sleep. They liked to say that you only entered the House twice: Once at your “birth” (into adulthood that was) and once at your death. They sounded both like deaths to me.

“Jean, we can’t do this. We have to run away from this place!” Jean was the best and only friend I had. We had grown up and somehow managed to stick together despite our different backgrounds. My parents were doctors while her family ran the store. The System generally frowns upon people from different classes mingling with each other, but since we were merely children we were allowed to get away with it.

“I don’t know Henry. Where would we go? What would we do? We can’t just leave everything and everyone behind like that...” One day we had been out in the fields when we decided to take a break, and just lay down on the grass. I was busy trying to make out the shapes in the clouds when she put her head on my chest. I was startled and my mouth had suddenly turned curiously dry and my heart started thumping much too loudly, I was sure. I decided to keep silent and perfectly still, just in case the slightest movement would dislodge her. I became very conscious of my breathing and prayed I wouldn’t hyperventilate. I didn’t want to give myself away.

“Well… I don’t know. Away. That’s all that matters. Who is this ‘everyone ‘ you’re talking about anyway? Your family? What we have between us is… different, are you just gonna give it up like that?” After a few moments, she lifted her head with a quizzical look on her face. Oh damn it, I thought, I screwed up, I knew I would. Then she said “Your heartbeat, it’s different. It isn’t the same as my parents’.”

“What do you mean different? You always say that. I don’t know what you mean when you say that.” So I had to put my head on her chest, to determine if it was just me. It wasn’t. I cast my mind back to the memories of my father’s heartbeat. And then I knew. His had been too regular, its rhythm lacked humanity. It was mechanical.

“I… I don’t know.” When we were very young, we had this one day where we were to show our form teacher our appreciation for her. We were very excited about it and had made elaborate preparations for it. As the end of class approached, the cake was wheeled out and we leapt out of our seats and shouted “We love you Miss Fritz!” She recoiled as if struck a blow. She gaped for a bit and then decided anger was probably the best response. “Never say that word again. Never.” And there she stood, in her murderous rage while maintaining the stoniest of silences, until the bell rang.

“You don’t know? Hah. I don’t know what I was expecting of you, but it was definitely better than that. For all your grand notions you’re surprisingly empty. You’re just another scared kid.” We didn’t talk about it afterwards. We never did. All of us were so deeply shamed by the episode that it had become as much of a taboo as the word itself. It had scared and scarred us and we would never forget the lesson we learnt that day. And no matter how inadequate the words remaining in our vocabularies seemed we never could bring ourselves to say it again. It is funny how one forbidden word can create such a gaping hole in our ability to describe what we feel.

“Don’t do this, please. I’m scared, you’re scared. We’re all scared. But at least we have each other. We can face our fears together, everything will be alright. You have to trust me. I’ll see you by the fields at four in the morning. Don’t worry, okay?” She didn’t answer. I made my way home. The reality of my leaving this place forever didn’t set in until I started packing. It is weird to consider which of your possessions are necessary for survival. Necessary means one thing when you’re at home and your only worries are either about school or girls. It takes on a whole new meaning when you’re wondering how to survive the next few days, and more, out on your own where the things we hold dear, like money or fancy clothes, are worth nothing.

I was wracked with doubts all night. Would we be able to last more than a few days? Could we have a life outside of the place we had called home all our lives? Would we be happier than if we stayed? Would she be there?

I struggled to stay awake. It’s always the times when you desperately want not to sleep that it sneaks up on you and takes hold of you just like that. You’re asleep without even knowing it. So I paced around in the dark, making sure I was deadly quiet while doing so. I double and triple checked the contents of my bag. I looked around me to ensure I wouldn’t leave anything essential behind. In the throes of a restless night like this, it is a comfort to know that the relentless march of time never stops, no matter how slow it might seem to be creeping along. It’s still ticking away, draw strength from that.

And then it was time to leave. The night air seemed to have a sharp taste in my mouth. The glow of the streetlamps seemed to have an otherworldly tinge to it. There was a sort of desperate clarity to everything, as if my brain were highlighting what I was leaving behind in a last-ditch attempt to stop me.

“Henry.” My heart soared, the last flight it would ever take, though I didn’t know it yet. “I can’t do it. I can’t forsake everything I’ve got here to go on this wild adventure with you. This is ridiculous, it’s madness.” I think I had always known what her answer would be, although her appearance here, now, had given me something that was almost hope.

“Hah. And you called me scared? Look at you. Terrified of the unknown. Clinging on to the familiar just because that’s all you’ve ever known. You’re gonna let them rip your heart out just because you’re afraid. You... you’re just like the rest of them. You make me sick.” I turned away from her and stared into the field and tried to hold back my tears. I didn’t know how to be angry and cry at the same time.

“Let them rip my heart out? No, Henry, that’s what you just did.” And she walked away. I still didn’t turn around. I wanted very badly not to care, but I did. I wanted to turn around and chase after her and tell her not to go and that I wish we could be back on that field and feel her head resting against me again. I wanted to shout “I love you” at her departing figure but even then, even right at the end, I couldn’t.

I stood there, shaking in my futile anger. Anger at myself, at Jean, at the whole damned System. It felt like there was a lump at the back of my throat and it was like there was something with clammy hands holding my heart in its grip.

I swallowed to clear the constriction in my throat. I took a step forward. I stopped. I couldn’t do it. Not alone. I turned around and I started walking. To the House.

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Okay that took me 2 whole long sittings to finish. I always wanted to write about people having their hearts removed so that they would no longer be able to love. I didn't know what form it'd take and I certainly didn't expect it to be like this, but I am quite happy with it! I started that first bit of dialogue today and by some magic inspiration decided to go with a sort of flashback kind of sequence, and I thought that worked out pretty well.

I think it's quite obvious the difference in styles from the first half and the second, the first bit looks pretty boring actually haha. If I had tried to finish it the first time around I'm sure it would have ended up alot worse than this. I'd have tried to squeeze in various explanations here and there, and it would probably have been mostly ill-fitting. This way, I got to dabble with a few other themes as well, which I like to do.

There's that little bit about class and social inequality. The System would never have allowed them to stay together. The liquid nature of necessity. The way our fear of the unknown makes us accept the mundane. The contrarian nature of sleep (hehe). How people say painful words they sometimes don't even mean, but never retract them nonetheless. How our fears stop us from saying the most important things. In the story it was fear of the System, in the form of the teacher. In real life it may be the fear of rejection, or maybe non-reciprocity.

I quite enjoyed writing this really. Especially the flashback bits where I tried to fit the memories with what was actually being said, like a jigsaw puzzle. A pleasing sort of symmetry, if only to me!

I don't know if Henry goes back to the House to go through with the operation or if he enters the back door to die. The best thing (I think) would have been for him to still runaway but I didn't think that was at all likely. The next best thing then would be for him to actually die rather than accept the operation, cause that's the worst death of all. A life dictated by a computer system. A life without passions or love.

The whole story is actually heavily inspired by a series called "The Tripods". The original idea about heart removal was my own but the setting and the coming-of-age ceremony etc. was pretty much stolen from the series. The names Henry, Fritz, and Jean(-Paul in the Tripods) are a tribute to the books. It's an amazing children/young persons series and I remember almost crying while reading the last scene with Henry hehe. That's why he gets to be the protagonist.

That episode with the teacher, however, I think has its roots in Never Let Me Go. Something about the oppressive environment of the school or sth.

One thing I regret with the story is that the House isn't quite as ominous as I wanted it to be. It's supposed to have a very dark feel and exert its influence a bit more, so that that last line would be much more effective. Oh wells. But I don't know how I'm supposed to do it and I'm not keen on reworking that whole first half just because I think it sucks compared to the second. If this was a movie then it could be this omnipresent feature in the background or sth eh? Can't word-ify that without being painfully obvious about it though, it has to be a subtle thing..

Anyhow. All in all a satisfactory literary experience for me, I hope it was that to you as well. Pretty long too, running into 4 pages of my Word document, my word! The word count trumps that of my essay by more than 2x (1635 vs 682) wts, so I reckon I need to be ALOT more hardworking doing my schoolwork hehe.

Time for a short nap (at 8.30 in the morning, yes) before dreaded school later. I think my body is very confused when I sleep any earlier than 1 or 2 in the morning, and thinks I'm just taking a nap instead. Slept at 9.30 and woke up at 2.30 sigh. Which means I've been awake for 6 hours and so a faux/pseudo-midday nap is definitely justified!

I'd ask for some feedback (cause I haven't felt quite so good about a story in a while) but I'm a little reluctant as well (cause I haven't felt quite so good about a story in a while, so what would that signify if I received negative ones!) so... wtv I'm off to sleep now!