MARTians

Contents

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Acknowledgments

Sexual Responsibility is boring.

It isn’t Ms. Brody’s fault. She’s a good teacher. She switches channels at appropriate moments, tases students who need tasing —
zizzz-ZAAPPP!
— and she only once got stuck in the garbage can beside her teaching station. She was a teeny bit weepy that day, but no drunker than normal, and I’ve wondered more than once what made her sit in the trash bucket, barely big enough around to jam her rump to the bottom, her arms not quite reaching the floor and her legs in an awkward, toes-to-the-ceiling position. It is to our credit that none of us took advantage of her predicament to behave badly. When she waved her arms and shouted, “Get out! Get out!” we did exactly that. And no one picked up her Taser, either to turn it on her in revenge or to wreak amusement on friends and family later.

I’m concerned that today might be a rerun of that episode. Ms. Brody’s red, shiny face is more red and shiny than I’d like to see. I believe she might be crying, although she could be using the toilet tissue spooling out of her purse to mop sweat from her brow rather than tears from her eyes. It is hot in here.

This place, Room 2-B, has been my location, Monday through Thursday, during the hours 9 to 16, for the past two years and six months. That’s 2,939.5 hours, including at least 419 hours spent on Sexual Responsibility. I fully expected to spend another one year and six months (1,762.5 school hours) in the same place. If you are checking my math, you should know that I’ve factored in five weeks of school vacation per year and time absent for bathroom visits and food purchasing as allowed. You should also know that I’ve checked and rechecked my calculations, because I’m bored.

Other students have other hobbies — like violence or using their phones for self-surveillance. I just sit here and do math in my head. I’m good at math, especially ratios and percentages. Those are the foundation of responsible consumer citizenship. Without them, a person can’t begin to be a comparison shopper or make adequate use of coupon doubling.

The first morning I was here, Room 2-B was filled to capacity: two students per desk with standing room only along the walls. The room was full of noise and color then, like the pet department at AllMART and for much the same reason: many live things were all being shelved in the same place. Just as it is appropriate to keep Siamese fighting fish in plastic cups for $7.99, it is appropriate to keep the lot of us here, in Room 2-B, where we learn not only Sexual Responsibility but also Communication, Math, Corporate History, and Consumer Citizenship. Or those of us who remain learn those things. Desks now outnumber students, what with dropping out, moving away, and — though no one talks about it — ending up dead. I’ve calculated the rate of loss. There will be thirteen of us left on graduation day.

Ms. Brody spools out another yard of tissue. If I knew how many yards of tissue she has stashed, I could predict the future with accuracy. I could tell you if she’s going to run out of tissue before she runs out of tears.

The giant screen at the front of the classroom brightens alive, full of the looming face of someone we all know and trust, at least in a telepresence way, our Governor. Sexual Responsibility always starts with the same prerecorded message reminding us of our pledge to be responsible citizens. My lips start moving around the familiar words. But it’s out of sync. This isn’t the recorded lesson. The Governor’s appearing live, in real time on the education network. Words crawl along the bottom of the screen: “portant announcement * Important announcement * Important announcement * Important announc”

I don’t see Ms. Brody touch the volume control, but suddenly the Governor’s voice is booming from the speakers. We are all paying attention now, except Ms. Brody, and maybe me, a little bit, because I notice Ms. Brody is focused on the wad of tissue she is crushing in her hand. But really, at this point, the message is so loud we can hear it multiplied and mushified as it rings out in every classroom and spills into the halls. It would require discipline and effort not to hear what the Governor has to say:

My brain does the math: impossible. This message must be intended for another classroom, another school. We here in 2-B have another year and a half before we are fully educated and ready for the future.

Ms. Brody grabs the volume control and spins the dial until there is only the faintest fanfare of the music that accompanies the ad.

“Abernathy?” says Ms. Brody, and the first of my 2-B classmates squeezes between the crowded rows of desks from the back corner to the front. He stands beside Ms. Brody’s teaching station while she points to her touch screen. Abernathy checks to see if the content has transferred properly to his phone. When he turns to leave, the door is blocked by a security marshal in black body armor. Abernathy knows the drill. He leans his forehead against the wall and puts his hands behind his back so his wrists can be zipcuffed together. Even though it is awkward for him, Abernathy flips the whole room the bird as he leaves. His heart isn’t in it. He’s just doing it because it would be impolite not to say good-bye.

As Zoë Zindleman and also numerical ID 009-99-9999, I am accustomed to being the last called forward. I don’t mind. I see the advantages. Alphanumeric reality has spared me some flu inoculations and many exceptionally bad lunches. Even better, I have plenty of time to myself. It may look like I’m waiting patiently in line, but I’m actually thinking about whatever crosses my mind.

So I sit and wait to take my turn with Ms. Brody, my turn to graduate, ha! Imagine that.

Exciting.

Wow.

Imagine me, a graduate.

I do try, but it doesn’t work. The signal has been disrupted; the screen in my head where I watch my life happen is frozen, pixilated, blank, and blue. Months of days have just been clipped out of my life so the future can happen right now. Knowing what to imagine career- and aptitude-wise is ordinarily covered in the last year of the curriculum, which has been canceled. I don’t know what to expect. Anything could happen. It’s much worse than that time when there was a live mouse in the refrigerator. That was unexpected — but it didn’t really change the whole future, just the tiny slice of the future spent opening refrigerators and knowing that a mouse might jump out but probably won’t.

This? This changes all 1,762.5 hours I was going to be in school. It changes all of the hours that were supposed to happen forever.

That is a very uncomfortable thought, so I’m going to stop thinking it.

I focus on the seeping leak in the ceiling at the back of the room. It is a good distraction. For one thing, it’s more interesting than the continuous looping advertisement for Unicorn Uni. For another, that drip means something to me. It’s been a part of my life for two years. I remember the day the ceiling tiles collapsed in the back of the room. The spongy slabs spurted wet goo all over the room. That disrupted our learning. We got formal texts of apology from the School AdMin, which included time-sensitive bonus discount points to be used on our next purchase from the GnüdleKart Express, which meant “free lunch” that day.

I wonder if we will get any bonus discount points or special coupons as graduation gifts. I hope so.

“Masterson?” says Ms. Brody, and Bella Masterson, the girl all the girls want to look like, stands up and walks to the desk at the front of the room. She is an amazing walker, Bella, and she knows it so she provides us, her audience, with time to appreciate her skill.

I know Bella’s name, but she doesn’t know mine. She is always called before I am. It is the natural order of things. And I am more interested in her than she ever could be in me. That is also the natural order of things.

One at a time, the remaining students of 2-B proceed to their individual appointments. Ms. Brody keeps spooling the toilet tissue out of her purse and dropping soggy little wads into the trash bucket. One at a time, the brown drops fall from the ceiling and splash the empty desks at the back of the room. I wonder how many drops have fallen since the leak first oozed along the third-story bathroom pipes and down, through the ceiling of Room 2-B. I can calculate that, although I will need to estimate. My answer will probably be correctish but not accu-price accurate.

I am the very last student in Room 2-B. I step forward to Ms. Brody’s teaching station.