"Dead?" Ellie asked dully.
Her lower lip began to tremble, and Benny Knuckles felt his heart melt for he was in love with her. He had fallen the moment he saw her on that first day. He was walking home for the noon meal when he spotted a Hooper limousine parked in front of 28 Mercury. Mistress Grissom was standing at the top step looking even sterner than usual. Benny followed the track of her disapproving gaze to the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life.
Ellie stepped unceremoniously out of the limo. She stood at the curb looking like a small, frightened child. A tall, ill-tempered man dressed in a governmental tunic, gruffly grabbed her bags from the trunk and tossed them onto the sidewalk. Then with the slam of the door, the limo whisked away.
When Benny entered the fray, Mistress Grissom was giving Ellie the first of what would be many lectures, preaching to her about how unworthy she was to be allowed a berth at 28 Mercury, accusing her of so many misdeeds that one might have suspected she was the spawn of a Nazgul.
Benny knew he should stay clear, keep to himself, and avoid the wrath of Mistress Grissom. He knew it would be best to leave this woman and her troubles alone. But he just couldn't help himself. She had the face of an angel--and legs that could turn the head of Iscar himself. How could a man, even a man as unworthy as Benny, resist? Without a second thought he crossed the street and picked up her bags.
Benny Knuckles was nineteen years old, six years younger than Ellie. He had lived alone at 28 Mercury since the death of his parents three years before. The boarding facility was a convenient place for Benny; only three short blocks from the Glenn Institute, where he worked as a janitor like his father before him.
From the beginning of his relationship with Ellie Lewis, Benny was realistic. Though neither he nor Ellie was blessed with a Sacred Name, he knew a guy like him could never hope to win a girl as gorgeous as her. But on that first day, his simple act of kindness had cemented a friendship of sorts. Benny was determined to nurture that friendship, to let it grow as far as it could, regardless of the dangers. But he soon discovered that Ellie Lewis was a sad, complex and amazing creature, a woman Benny found endlessly fascinating.
"Dead? My daughter is dead?" Ellie asked once again, bringing Benny back to the present. "How?"
Benny cleared his voice. "Why, you've never told Benny. You told him she had passed on, but you never explained how. Benny never thought it would be right to ask."
"And her father?" Ellie pressed, her voice rising. "What of him?"
"You've never mentioned him, either," Benny replied, lowering his head.
This was not exactly true. There were rumors, and Ellie had said something to him, something in passing, something she assumed he hadn't heard. Benny paid attention to everything that left the luscious lips of Ellie Lewis, even when the words carried a tinge of terror.
"Why don't you sit down, Ellie. Smoke a cigarette, relax."
"I don't smoke," she said absently, her eyes glued to the photograph.
Godspeed, Benny thought. She doesn't smoke? Since when? By anyone's standards, Ellie Lewis was a chain-smoker.
A loudspeaker in the hallway announced that dinner was being served. Benny had never been more thankful to hear it. Something was seriously wrong with Ellie--some sort of breakdown, and he felt that no matter what he said to her, it would have a bad result.
"Let's get something to eat, Ellie," he suggested hopefully.
"Eat?" Ellie said, as if the word was foreign to her.
"Yes, eat. You know, as in food?" Benny made a spooning gesture to emphasize the point.
Ellie couldn't remember the last time she had eaten. It might have been days ago at someplace impossibly far away. The memory of apples came to her mouth. She felt hollowness inside her, but she wasn't sure it was hunger. She looked down at the picture in her hand. The little girl looked back at her with the brightest smile she had ever seen, and both eating and Benny Knuckles were once again forgotten until she felt a firm hand on her wrist.
"Come with Benny, Ellie," Benny said evenly. "You'll feel better if you eat something."
Ellie looked at him, her pretty face a point of confusion. The rational part of her, buried deep inside for the moment, knew he was right. She should eat, regain her strength, and try to make sense of this place. But the non-rational part of her wanted to sink into a chair and stare at the image of her dead, forgotten daughter.
In the end she allowed herself to be guided by Benny Knuckles. He found her I.D. card on the floor, and after securing the door, led her down the hall to the dining room. Along the way he consoled her in low soothing tones. Ellie couldn't comprehend his words, her shock was still too great, but she knew that this young man was someone she could trust. The thought comforted her greatly.
Except for a bank of tightly shuttered windows, Ellie found the dining room bright and cheerful. Around several round tables men and women sat eating and engaged in casual conversation. Each table had place settings for seven, she noted.
Her attention was drawn to the ceiling. From it hung paper birds of various colors and shapes twisting in slow circles in the air currents. Ellie starred at them, spellbound. It wasn't so much that they were birds; everything in this world seemed to be related to birds and the number seven. There was something about the paper, something about the crisp, exact folds that reminded her of someone...
"Ellie," Benny said.
Ellie continued to stare.
"Ellie," Benny insisted.
Ellie looked at Benny with a perplexed look on her face. He smiled tolerantly, grabbed her by the elbow, and guided her through the room.
"There go the twofers!" someone called out as they passed.
A few laughed at the joke, others didn't seem to notice. Benny glared but said nothing.
"What is this thing, twofer?" Ellie asked.
"Benny will explain later," Benny said.
"But--"
"Forget about that now, Ellie. Benny will answer all your questions later."
Along the side wall was a long, cafeteria-style serving counter of metal and glass. Benny grabbed two trays, slid them across the counter rails and grabbed two bundles of eating utensils wrapped in cloth napkin.
"What's good tonight, Midgey?" Benny asked a petite woman working behind the counter.
The woman turned at Benny's voice. She was a short, plump girl. Her face was wide and flat with dark slanted eyes. The word Asian entered Ellie's mind, a word that set off another elusive memory of another place and time. The woman offered Benny a radiant smile. It was a look only another woman would recognize. Ellie knew in an instant. Midgey was in love with Benny Knuckles. There was no doubt about it. Benny, however, seemed completely unaware.
"Godspeed, got a full menu tonight, Benny, with harvest time in the Outer Territories and all," Midgey replied. The woman smiled thinly at Ellie, a look Ellie assumed she often received. "Got to cheer people up with The Reckoning here and all." She swept her hand broadly across stainless steel containers piled high with food.
Ellie breathed a little easier. So far the room and the people in it approximated normal. Everything was reasonably recognizable, even comforting in its own weird way. At least it seemed that way until she took a closer look at the food. None of it looked even vaguely familiar. The various meats, stews, vegetables, and what might have been some perverted version of a pasta dish looked wrong both in color to texture.
"Yech!" she mumbled.
Benny ignored her comment and ordered food for the two of them, hungrily pointing out dishes that looked disgusting to Ellie. Midgey looked obviously displeased by Ellie's presence. They took their trays to an empty table in a corner. The residents of 28 Mercury watched them with leering interest, some murmuring nasty comments before returning to their evening meal.
"What the hell is this?" Ellie asked, pointing toward a particularly vile looking dish on her tray.
"Something special from Midgey she put aside for me. It's called videre," Benny replied. "It's a fish from the Great Sea. Try it, Ellie. It might help you remember."
"How could it do that?"
Benny smiled crookedly. "The word videre is an ancient word. It means, ‘to see’."
"Why is it called that?"
"Perhaps you will understand after you have tasted it."
Ellie looked apprehensively at the gray-colored fish. It looked slimy, stewing in murky, dark green gravy like a dead slug. It had an unpleasant, musty smell that reminded her of day old cabbage.
"Oh, God," she whispered.
Benny smiled. "Trust me, Ellie. It tastes better than it looks."
Trust. That was a terrible word, for trusting was something Ellie Lewis felt she had done a little too much of during her life. But trust, or more precisely trust in Benny Knuckles, was all she had at the moment. She cut off a small piece of the videre half-expecting it would squirm under her knife blade, and slid it into her mouth. She chewed it apprehensively, expecting the worse. Her eyes widened. To see... Of course...
Videre was a magical food, for it didn't possess a taste of its own. Instead, it borrowed the tastes loved by those who ate it. For Ellie the taste changed with each bite, and it awakened a deep, lusty hunger within her--and a very odd memory: The taste of a hamburger eaten at an old roadside diner with a cold beer on a picnic table next to it. They were going camping, she remembered, late May in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Except that in this memory she was a man with a wife and two young children. He was an ordinary man with a loving family, a kind and funny man, yet so achingly unsure of himself...
The memory faded as quickly as it came. In the next bite it was a piece of chocolate eaten while lying in bed next to her lover. The father of the girl, she was sure of it. He smiled at her and then faded from her sight. What had happened? What had happened?
As Benny Knuckles watched her, a tear trickled down her reddened cheek like a glistening wound. He wanted to reach out to her, but he was afraid. Had he made a terrible mistake? "Ellie, are you all right?"
Ellie looked at him, her eyes glazed with tears. "Oh, Benny," she said. "I don't know why I'm here. I’m not even sure I belong in this world."
"Why of course you do, Ellie. You were born here, raised here."
"Maybe so, but still, I don't belong."
She put down her fork. She could not eat any more. It was simply--too much. She looked at Benny her blue eyes strengthened by resolve. "Show me The Reckoning, Benny," she said. "Show me now so I will know."
"Benny can't--"
"Yes you can," she insisted. "Maybe these others can't, but I know you can."
"How would you know such a thing?" he asked defensively. "Why, you don't even know me."
"I know this. You're an outsider, Benny. Just like me. Everyone thinks you're worthless, just like me. But you know things, don't you Benny? You know things these others would never guess, don't you?"
Benny stared at her for the longest time. Ellie was right, of course. The others did consider him worthless, he without a Sacred Name, he the son of a humble janitor, as worthless as the lonely twofer.
"Return to your berth," he said. "Benny will come to you at the fourteenth unit after the others have gone to bed. Benny will come and show you."
"Thank you, Benny! Thank you!"
"Ellie, you must promise Benny you will not open your shutter. Do you promise?"
"Yes, yes, Benny. Whatever you say. Thank you!"
Benny frowned. "You thank Benny now, but will you later?"
"I don't know Benny. We will just have to see."
Her lower lip began to tremble, and Benny Knuckles felt his heart melt for he was in love with her. He had fallen the moment he saw her on that first day. He was walking home for the noon meal when he spotted a Hooper limousine parked in front of 28 Mercury. Mistress Grissom was standing at the top step looking even sterner than usual. Benny followed the track of her disapproving gaze to the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life.
Ellie stepped unceremoniously out of the limo. She stood at the curb looking like a small, frightened child. A tall, ill-tempered man dressed in a governmental tunic, gruffly grabbed her bags from the trunk and tossed them onto the sidewalk. Then with the slam of the door, the limo whisked away.
When Benny entered the fray, Mistress Grissom was giving Ellie the first of what would be many lectures, preaching to her about how unworthy she was to be allowed a berth at 28 Mercury, accusing her of so many misdeeds that one might have suspected she was the spawn of a Nazgul.
Benny knew he should stay clear, keep to himself, and avoid the wrath of Mistress Grissom. He knew it would be best to leave this woman and her troubles alone. But he just couldn't help himself. She had the face of an angel--and legs that could turn the head of Iscar himself. How could a man, even a man as unworthy as Benny, resist? Without a second thought he crossed the street and picked up her bags.
Benny Knuckles was nineteen years old, six years younger than Ellie. He had lived alone at 28 Mercury since the death of his parents three years before. The boarding facility was a convenient place for Benny; only three short blocks from the Glenn Institute, where he worked as a janitor like his father before him.
From the beginning of his relationship with Ellie Lewis, Benny was realistic. Though neither he nor Ellie was blessed with a Sacred Name, he knew a guy like him could never hope to win a girl as gorgeous as her. But on that first day, his simple act of kindness had cemented a friendship of sorts. Benny was determined to nurture that friendship, to let it grow as far as it could, regardless of the dangers. But he soon discovered that Ellie Lewis was a sad, complex and amazing creature, a woman Benny found endlessly fascinating.
"Dead? My daughter is dead?" Ellie asked once again, bringing Benny back to the present. "How?"
Benny cleared his voice. "Why, you've never told Benny. You told him she had passed on, but you never explained how. Benny never thought it would be right to ask."
"And her father?" Ellie pressed, her voice rising. "What of him?"
"You've never mentioned him, either," Benny replied, lowering his head.
This was not exactly true. There were rumors, and Ellie had said something to him, something in passing, something she assumed he hadn't heard. Benny paid attention to everything that left the luscious lips of Ellie Lewis, even when the words carried a tinge of terror.
"Why don't you sit down, Ellie. Smoke a cigarette, relax."
"I don't smoke," she said absently, her eyes glued to the photograph.
Godspeed, Benny thought. She doesn't smoke? Since when? By anyone's standards, Ellie Lewis was a chain-smoker.
A loudspeaker in the hallway announced that dinner was being served. Benny had never been more thankful to hear it. Something was seriously wrong with Ellie--some sort of breakdown, and he felt that no matter what he said to her, it would have a bad result.
"Let's get something to eat, Ellie," he suggested hopefully.
"Eat?" Ellie said, as if the word was foreign to her.
"Yes, eat. You know, as in food?" Benny made a spooning gesture to emphasize the point.
Ellie couldn't remember the last time she had eaten. It might have been days ago at someplace impossibly far away. The memory of apples came to her mouth. She felt hollowness inside her, but she wasn't sure it was hunger. She looked down at the picture in her hand. The little girl looked back at her with the brightest smile she had ever seen, and both eating and Benny Knuckles were once again forgotten until she felt a firm hand on her wrist.
"Come with Benny, Ellie," Benny said evenly. "You'll feel better if you eat something."
Ellie looked at him, her pretty face a point of confusion. The rational part of her, buried deep inside for the moment, knew he was right. She should eat, regain her strength, and try to make sense of this place. But the non-rational part of her wanted to sink into a chair and stare at the image of her dead, forgotten daughter.
In the end she allowed herself to be guided by Benny Knuckles. He found her I.D. card on the floor, and after securing the door, led her down the hall to the dining room. Along the way he consoled her in low soothing tones. Ellie couldn't comprehend his words, her shock was still too great, but she knew that this young man was someone she could trust. The thought comforted her greatly.
Except for a bank of tightly shuttered windows, Ellie found the dining room bright and cheerful. Around several round tables men and women sat eating and engaged in casual conversation. Each table had place settings for seven, she noted.
Her attention was drawn to the ceiling. From it hung paper birds of various colors and shapes twisting in slow circles in the air currents. Ellie starred at them, spellbound. It wasn't so much that they were birds; everything in this world seemed to be related to birds and the number seven. There was something about the paper, something about the crisp, exact folds that reminded her of someone...
"Ellie," Benny said.
Ellie continued to stare.
"Ellie," Benny insisted.
Ellie looked at Benny with a perplexed look on her face. He smiled tolerantly, grabbed her by the elbow, and guided her through the room.
"There go the twofers!" someone called out as they passed.
A few laughed at the joke, others didn't seem to notice. Benny glared but said nothing.
"What is this thing, twofer?" Ellie asked.
"Benny will explain later," Benny said.
"But--"
"Forget about that now, Ellie. Benny will answer all your questions later."
Along the side wall was a long, cafeteria-style serving counter of metal and glass. Benny grabbed two trays, slid them across the counter rails and grabbed two bundles of eating utensils wrapped in cloth napkin.
"What's good tonight, Midgey?" Benny asked a petite woman working behind the counter.
The woman turned at Benny's voice. She was a short, plump girl. Her face was wide and flat with dark slanted eyes. The word Asian entered Ellie's mind, a word that set off another elusive memory of another place and time. The woman offered Benny a radiant smile. It was a look only another woman would recognize. Ellie knew in an instant. Midgey was in love with Benny Knuckles. There was no doubt about it. Benny, however, seemed completely unaware.
"Godspeed, got a full menu tonight, Benny, with harvest time in the Outer Territories and all," Midgey replied. The woman smiled thinly at Ellie, a look Ellie assumed she often received. "Got to cheer people up with The Reckoning here and all." She swept her hand broadly across stainless steel containers piled high with food.
Ellie breathed a little easier. So far the room and the people in it approximated normal. Everything was reasonably recognizable, even comforting in its own weird way. At least it seemed that way until she took a closer look at the food. None of it looked even vaguely familiar. The various meats, stews, vegetables, and what might have been some perverted version of a pasta dish looked wrong both in color to texture.
"Yech!" she mumbled.
Benny ignored her comment and ordered food for the two of them, hungrily pointing out dishes that looked disgusting to Ellie. Midgey looked obviously displeased by Ellie's presence. They took their trays to an empty table in a corner. The residents of 28 Mercury watched them with leering interest, some murmuring nasty comments before returning to their evening meal.
"What the hell is this?" Ellie asked, pointing toward a particularly vile looking dish on her tray.
"Something special from Midgey she put aside for me. It's called videre," Benny replied. "It's a fish from the Great Sea. Try it, Ellie. It might help you remember."
"How could it do that?"
Benny smiled crookedly. "The word videre is an ancient word. It means, ‘to see’."
"Why is it called that?"
"Perhaps you will understand after you have tasted it."
Ellie looked apprehensively at the gray-colored fish. It looked slimy, stewing in murky, dark green gravy like a dead slug. It had an unpleasant, musty smell that reminded her of day old cabbage.
"Oh, God," she whispered.
Benny smiled. "Trust me, Ellie. It tastes better than it looks."
Trust. That was a terrible word, for trusting was something Ellie Lewis felt she had done a little too much of during her life. But trust, or more precisely trust in Benny Knuckles, was all she had at the moment. She cut off a small piece of the videre half-expecting it would squirm under her knife blade, and slid it into her mouth. She chewed it apprehensively, expecting the worse. Her eyes widened. To see... Of course...
Videre was a magical food, for it didn't possess a taste of its own. Instead, it borrowed the tastes loved by those who ate it. For Ellie the taste changed with each bite, and it awakened a deep, lusty hunger within her--and a very odd memory: The taste of a hamburger eaten at an old roadside diner with a cold beer on a picnic table next to it. They were going camping, she remembered, late May in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Except that in this memory she was a man with a wife and two young children. He was an ordinary man with a loving family, a kind and funny man, yet so achingly unsure of himself...
The memory faded as quickly as it came. In the next bite it was a piece of chocolate eaten while lying in bed next to her lover. The father of the girl, she was sure of it. He smiled at her and then faded from her sight. What had happened? What had happened?
As Benny Knuckles watched her, a tear trickled down her reddened cheek like a glistening wound. He wanted to reach out to her, but he was afraid. Had he made a terrible mistake? "Ellie, are you all right?"
Ellie looked at him, her eyes glazed with tears. "Oh, Benny," she said. "I don't know why I'm here. I’m not even sure I belong in this world."
"Why of course you do, Ellie. You were born here, raised here."
"Maybe so, but still, I don't belong."
She put down her fork. She could not eat any more. It was simply--too much. She looked at Benny her blue eyes strengthened by resolve. "Show me The Reckoning, Benny," she said. "Show me now so I will know."
"Benny can't--"
"Yes you can," she insisted. "Maybe these others can't, but I know you can."
"How would you know such a thing?" he asked defensively. "Why, you don't even know me."
"I know this. You're an outsider, Benny. Just like me. Everyone thinks you're worthless, just like me. But you know things, don't you Benny? You know things these others would never guess, don't you?"
Benny stared at her for the longest time. Ellie was right, of course. The others did consider him worthless, he without a Sacred Name, he the son of a humble janitor, as worthless as the lonely twofer.
"Return to your berth," he said. "Benny will come to you at the fourteenth unit after the others have gone to bed. Benny will come and show you."
"Thank you, Benny! Thank you!"
"Ellie, you must promise Benny you will not open your shutter. Do you promise?"
"Yes, yes, Benny. Whatever you say. Thank you!"
Benny frowned. "You thank Benny now, but will you later?"
"I don't know Benny. We will just have to see."
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