A Brutal Design by Zachary C. Solomon

Author:Zachary C. Solomon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FICTION / Alternative History, FICTION / Dystopian, FICTION / Literary
ISBN: 9781941360828
Publisher: Lanternfish Press
Published: 2024-01-30T00:00:00+00:00

SEVEN

LEAVING THE ARTWORK left me with an enormous sense of longing—as if torn away from the love of my life—and I walked heavily across the desert back into town. Workers were already arriving at their factories, but I walked against the stream and got on a bus back to Duma once the commuters had all filed out. I was hardly thinking about my placement, my assemblages; I was much too manic with excitement to sit on my stool and fidget with pipes.

When we got back to Duma, I hopped off the bus and headed to the housing area where Erich lived with his private garden. I couldn’t remember which house was his, so I killed time with my hands in my pockets, kicking at the gravel on the path. People walked by occasionally and I smiled at them or averted my eyes. I didn’t like loitering. Loitering felt criminal. I thought back to Erich telling me you can do whatever you want here. What I wanted to do was loiter and kick rocks. So that’s what I did. But I couldn’t kick the feeling that I was being judged for it.

Eventually, he appeared, sweaty from some kind of manual labor, a dark cat’s face of perspiration on his white t-shirt. He had a hand towel wrapped around his neck. He was walking down the lane toward me but hadn’t seen me yet. I watched him wipe the sweat from his forehead with the towel before I yelled his name.

“Zelnik, is that you?” he called.

“It’s me!” I called back. I met him halfway and we shook hands in the shadow of a cypress tree.

“What brings you here?”

“I’m looking for Miriana. Do you know where she is?”

Erich seemed troubled for a moment. Then something snapped and he beamed at me. “Sure, sure,” he said. “Let’s talk over here.” I followed him up the gravel path toward a cutaway in the trees that provided a bit of privacy. A single plastic chair, covered in tree gunk, sat in the clearing. He dragged it into the sun and sat while I stood. “What do you need to talk to her about?”

“I’ve just come from the desert!” I said.

Erich shot back in his chair. “You what?”

“The desert! Miriana’s work out in the desert. The officer’s büro. It was incredible,” I said. I wasn’t sure why he was so nonplussed. It was simple. “May I speak with her? I must speak with her about it.”

“Hold on a minute, Zelnik,” he said. “You were out there this early?”

“I spent the night there,” I explained. Saying that seemed odd, but it felt true. “The way the sun hits it in the morning. Sunrise over the kommandant’s office. It was breathtaking.”

“You spent the night? You’re crazy, man.”

“I missed the bus back to town.”

Erich laughed. “Crazy, man. You are not the Zelnik I remember.”

“I’m some version of him,” I said. What did Erich remember about me that I didn’t?

Erich stood, the plastic creaking beneath him. “Have they not given you a placement yet?”

“They did.

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