metres from the bridge, hidden among the dunes, groups of Scavvies wait with their seacraft. For just one credit, they take us across the river. But they do not promise to bring us back.
The Locusts patrol the river banks, and when they catch the Scavvies they beat them up and threaten to lock them away in Savage City. But mostly the Scavvies pay a bribe and go on their way.
“They’ll put you away in Section AR. You’re not old enough to go to the clubs,” I say. Section AR is the place for attitude readjustment, for kids with problems. There, they get sorted. And when they come out, they do not have any attitude at all.
Kitty holds her head in her hands. “Buzz off, Ettie. You make me sick. Just get off my back and mind your own business.”
When Kitty says things like this it makes my chest sore. But I must be hard on her. If I am not around to watch out for her she could get hurt.
I pass her a pair of shorts. Kitty and I are the same height, but she struggles to fasten the button around her belly. And her shirt strains over her chest, where mine sags.
She grabs the water from the table by the mattress and downs it, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She squeezes one of the mango balls. “It’s too squishy. Couldn’t you have done better?” But Little Miss Muffet eats it anyway.
Kitty talks with her mouth full. Greedy for the next bite. “I’ll graduate in a few months. Then I’ll be legal and can hang out there all the time when I’m working.” She spits a piece of plastic on the floor. So there.
I do not know what it is with Kitty and the pleasure clubs. Yes, I do, actually. It is the Posh and their credits. Especially the men. They are attracted to Kitty like the filth that is drawn to the banks of the river. Always looking at her. Stroking her. Calling her “pretty Kitty”. She likes this. I wish she did not. But it is what she has learnt at school.
Kitty guzzles the other mango ball while I cover my body with sunblocker. Protecting her skin is not something Kitty has to worry about too much. Her skin is the colour of roasted corn. She does not burn like me. I have Posh skin. Pus-coloured flesh.
There is a familiar whistle outside the door, and I let Handler Xavier in. He has plans for us today. I hope it is not more beach. My skin is raw from yesterday. Sometimes, if I hope for something hard enough, it happens. And other times I hope, but there’s nothing. It gets a bit tricky so I wear my don’t-care mask and wait for Handler Xavier to call the shots.
“We need to stay off the beaches for a couple of days. The monster scam worked lovely yesterday, but we can’t do it again soon,” he says.
One day people will get wise to it. They will realise that nothing lives in the sea. That the only monsters are the ones in our minds, growing fat on stories told by the Mangerians. Stories to keep us in the ghetto, away from the cities across the seas that survived the big drowning after the conflagration.
“Use this.” Handler Xavier hands me a tube of sunblocker. “The old stuff won’t protect you.”
It is not like he cares when I burn. But if people do not see my eyes he says I can pass for a Posh, and that could be useful in the game.
I smear the sunblocker on my face and arms. It smells of plastic. Everything smells of plastic in Slum City. When I breathe, I smell plastic. When I eat, I taste plastic. And when I sweat, my skin is coated with abnormally shiny beads.
“So, if it’s not the beach, what’s it going to be?” I am hoping it is the parade. Then, after gaming I can give the handler the slip and go to the Tree Museum. Let it be the parade. I hope so. No, I do not.
I love trees the way Kitty loves mangoes. There is a forest that survived the burnings, it is at the museum in Mangeria City. I used to save my credits and visit the museum and stroll among the trees, looking for the magic faraway tree. I had read about this tree when I was a lot younger. I did not know if it was still alive or if it had been chopped down in the olden days to boil someone a pot of soup. If it survived, though, I would recognise it.
I would find that tree and it would take me up the ladder to the place where Moonface and the Saucepan Man lived. I would disappear into the Land of Treats with Jo, Fanny and Bessie, and eat exploding toffees.
Lots of credits later, I still had not found the tree. When I stopped being a dead-brain, I realised that the magic faraway tree never was. Just a bunch of hocus in a book.
“We’re going to work the parade today,” Handler Xavier says.
Bingo!
“Kitty and I will handle the parade with a couple of the others, while you do school, Ettie.”
See, I said bingo too soon. It is my own fault for wanting it too badly. Handler Xavier searches my features. I give him my yippee-I’m-going-to-school face, even though school is hideous, right up there with flies and plastic. And even though I do not like Kitty gaming without me.
“But Kitty hasn’t done school for days now. They’re going to notice and ask questions.” I shake my head like this bothers me, as if I care about people sticking their noses too close to the game.
“I cleared it with the scholar warden last night. I told him Kitty’s down with sun sickness.” Handler Xavier sucks in my concerned face. “But it’s good that you’re being careful, Ettie. You’re sweet. A real team-player.”
As sweet as the plastic taste of sunblocker on my fingers.
Kitty wipes a wand over her eyelashes. She smoothes her hair and fixes it with the clip she has forgotten to thank me for. She gives the sliver of mirror a smile. One of the smiles she has learnt at school. It is a pretty trick that makes men look at her. It makes me want to smack her face. No, I do not. Of course, I never could.
The handler peers out the window. “It’s going to be a hot one today.”
Black clouds are massing on the horizon. But they do not signal rain. It only rains before the middle months. These clouds tell me a floater is coming. Burning slicks of oil from the olden days, which still haunt the seas.
Sometimes the wind drives the floaters back out to sea, but on calm days they stay close to shore, brooding, until the Scavvies brave the fires and drag them away. When the slicks lurk on the shoreline, the sky is dark for days, and you cannot tell if it is day or night. Except when the sun’s face burns a hole through the smoke.
I grab the nose shields from our box of possessions and give one to Kitty. It will not block the taste or allow us to breathe better. But it helps filter the poison and stops your nose clogging up.
I leave them both and fly off to school. I take the second star to the right, straight on till morning. I am on my way to Neverland with Wendy and Michael and John. Far below me, the taxis, packed with traders, cross the river to Mangeria City. I swoop over the taxi Pulaks, flying high to dodge the arrows of the Lost Boys. Higher than the trees in the museum. As high as the magic faraway tree, where Dame Washalot hangs out her huge panties before tossing the dirty water.
Dodge those arrows, Wendy. Dodge that soapy water, Jo, Fanny and Bessie. “Watch where you’re going,” a Pulak shouts. I step off the road and into a gutter full of muck. I clasp the shield over my nose and keep my eyes on the road as I trudge to school.
Children loiter outside the education centre and wait for the scholar warden and the teachers
