Subjection (5 page)

My master hasn’t given me any indication of what my future will be, now that the Peace Day Celebration is over, but the tablet gives me hope. Even more, the fact that he is specifically choosing to invest in my training makes me think that he really might keep me instead of selling me or giving me away.

But then, he might just be investing in me as a product for sale.

Over the next few days, he flashes a few instructional booklets over to my tablet, which I review carefully, in addition to watching videos of how to cook and looking up recipes.

I sigh when I first see the training materials, because they are so fucking basic and elementary, but then I realize that he must be mistaking my fear for a lack of training. As it is, I have forgotten so much of the training I was supposed to have learned at the re-education center, having spent far too much time being used for nothing but pain. I can’t blame my master for the insulting level of materials; after all, I sometimes still forget to speak or that I can move around without permission. It’s amazing how quickly one can turn from a human into an animal, and I’m rather dismayed to realize that I’ve turned into a rather pathetic sort of animal. Maybe a goldfish. No. Goldfish swim around freely.

I’m experimenting in the kitchen when I hear him attempting to place a com call, then hanging up when he receives the alert that the number is no longer in service. I hear him curse, and despite my desire to avoid him when he’s angry, I step out to where he’s sitting in the dining room.

“Sir, is there anything I can do for you?” I want so badly to prove to him that I can be useful.

He shakes his head. “I was just trying to order Thai food,” he explains. “It seems they’ve closed down.”

Thai food does sound delicious, and I found a recipe a few days ago that I’ve tested a few times. “I could make some, master?” It’s supposed to be an offer, but it comes out as a question, because I’m debating whether it’s a good idea to suggest it or not.

“Don’t bother,” he dismisses me. “Find me the brochure for the place on the East side of town.”

“You said last time that they overcook their noodles and use too much salt in their sauce,” I point out, recalling what I had overheard him complaining to Bobby about. “Although, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t salt, it was the fish sauce that made it salty.”

He raises an eyebrow at me. “Eavesdropping is your new way of getting into trouble?”

He seems to be in a decent mood, but I press against the wall anyway, clenching my teeth when I put too much pressure on my injured shoulder. I don’t know why I pull away, it’s not like I’d run away from him or anything, and he’s never even hit me. “Uh, no, master, I just… I overheard, and so when I tried to make the recipe myself, I made sure that it was better. You put the leftovers in the fridge and never ate them, so I tried them a few times and I found a recipe and I’ve tried making it, except I made sure to make it a little different than the one you had. We have the ingredients; I can make it.”

He laughs, which stings a little, but then he says, “Hell, why not. That place was pretty awful, and they took forever to deliver, too.”

“I’ll be quick, master.”

He waves me off, and I head straight to the kitchen. I have actually been learning how to cook since I got the tablet, usually when my master goes out to do whatever he does all day. It was a challenge, at first, because it was something I had never tried, but cooking reminds me a lot of chemistry: you just follow the instructions, so I took to it pretty quickly. I can’t help enjoying myself when I’m learning something new, and this is interesting and challenging enough to keep me on my toes, especially with dishes I’m not particularly familiar with. For the first time in my life I can order whatever groceries I’d like to be delivered regardless of cost or rarity, and that alone is inspiring enough for me to want to experiment.

But it’s not my mouth I want to feed, because after three years of eating terrible shit or nothing at all, I would be content eating bread every day. It’s my master I want to feed, because pleasing him is certainly in my best interest. Even if he still chooses to go out to eat all the time, I hope that showing him I can learn to cook will somehow convince him that he should keep me. Not only that, but a part of me just wants to prove to him that I can do it, that I’m not too stupid to learn how to cook a goddamned meal.

I’m pretty confident in my Pad Thai recipe, because I’ve made it multiple times in the past few days, changing and refining the flavors a little bit at a time. The other good thing about starving for years is you don’t get bored very quickly, which allows you to try all sorts of tiny changes back to back. I just got the tamarind paste in yesterday, as it was on some sort of special import list, and I feel like it really brings the dish together.

My master never told me I had a budget for groceries, after all.

So I soak the noodles, and prepare the shrimp, because I know that he likes shrimp better than chicken, and I wash the vegetables and I make the sauce, and I forget to be afraid for a few minutes as I become absorbed in my task.

I finish, placing the food into two bowls, which I carry out without a thought. I realize, about halfway across the dining room, that I probably shouldn’t eat at the table with my master, but it’s where I usually sit to eat, because I usually eat while he’s not home. I hesitate, and only the burning of the hot bowls in my hands gets me to move, depositing his in front of him before setting mine down and standing there awkwardly.

He ignores me, like the bastard he is, and pokes around at his dish critically for a moment before trying some. I tense up, like this is the most important thing in the world, which maybe it is. He tries some more before looking at me, and the fact that he’s even looking at me is shocking.

“I’m actually quite impressed,” he says, calmly, like he compliments me all the time or something. “You put that takeout place to shame.”

It takes me a moment to process it, because I’m expecting some sort of criticism or dismissal, but the words finally sink in and I smile, daring to let the tiniest bit of hope cross my mind. “Thank you, master.”

“Perhaps I’ll stay in for dinner on occasion,” he comments, and I think I might die, I’m so elated.

Okay, it’s overdramatic, but it’s how I’m feeling. I figure it’s a side effect of feeling like an absolute fuck up for so long.

“I can learn to make other things, master,” I rush to say, before the moment is spoiled, before he forgets or I forget or something is bad. “Anything you want, you can tell me, and I’ll learn, I like to learn, and I’m getting good at basic things, and I could make whatever you’d like.” It occurs to me that I’ve crossed the line from “eager” to “desperate,” but I can’t seem to stop myself.

He rolls his eyes at me. “Sit down and eat before it gets cold.” He kicks out the chair a little bit, pointing. “Not that you should probably be sitting at the table with me, but I’m not particularly inclined to care at the moment. I suppose it’s what I get for being gone so much; you pick up bad habits.”

I sit, feeling smug, and ignoring the “bad habits” comment. I am inclined to believe that if he were really bothered by it, he would order me to sit on the floor or in the kitchen or something.

We eat in peace, and I look over at him for just a moment, enjoying how happy he is with something I made, and I feel this painful longing to stay with him. To belong to him. To be safe and valued, even if only because I make noodles better than the takeout place on the East side.

“It means a lot to you that I keep you, doesn’t it?” he asks, like he’s read my goddamn mind.

I turn away, look at my food. “Yes, master.” I can’t bring myself to say anymore, because if I start to speak, I’ll end up begging, and if I beg and he turns me down, I might kill myself. I can’t take the thought of going back to a brothel again.

“I
had
planned on selling you, when I bought you,” he states, still calm. I guess he can be calm; he’s not the one whose life gets passed around like a used hov-car. “I even thought I might give you to Bobby or something, he certainly seemed interested enough, and I have no idea what to get him for his birthday.”

I force myself to remember it’s not that bad, Bobby seems friendly, and it’s not a brothel. Hell, my master isn’t even
nice
to me, I just want to stay with him because I’m comfortable and he hasn’t hurt me, yet. “Yes, master,” I force the words out of my mouth. Nothing more. No begging.

“We’ll see what happens,” he says, and I’m strangely comforted. “Like I said, you need to brush up on your training, but you made a good impression. Besides, I’m keeping you at least until I find out what kind of curry you make.”

Chapter 5
Re-Education

I wasn’t always so desperate to be owned. There was a time when I was sure I would succeed in life, when I thought there was no chance I would ever be a slave.

That all changed so quickly.

From the time I was little, it was clear that I was the one who was going to succeed. The first to walk, the first to talk, the first to take the trip out the birth canal, although I fortunately don’t remember that. I was always able to one-up my twin brother, Abriel, even when we were born, even if only by eight minutes.

The differences grew as quickly as we did. By our first birthday, I was starting to get a grasp on language. My twin’s name was the first word I ever spoke, while crawling around the living room and demanding my mom’s help whenever Abriel started crying. As the stories and videos show, I seemed almost unable to be content when my little brother was upset. By three, when our parents bought our way into one of the most competitive preschools in town, I had learned how to write my name, and Abriel’s, and was eager to get a better understanding of the mysterious world of letters and numbers.

We didn’t know it at the time, but this sort of success would determine our futures. At night, our parents watched the news while we played, and the stories of the world’s dangerous overpopulation and the new diseases that were defeating even the most cutting-edge technology faded into mere background noise. We had no idea that we were part of the next generation of children who would be thrust into a system designed to curb that population and solve those problems, selecting the brightest of the population and pushing them toward even higher levels of critical thinking and achievement.

Abriel, to put it nicely, was “below average.” That was the term the psychologist used, anyway, when she had the conference with my parents and Abriel and me, after trying to chase me out of the room. Bri-Bri and I were only eight, and there was no way I was letting that woman talk to Abriel alone, not after she made him cry the first time with blocks and pictures and things that were too hard for him. Anyone who messed with my brother messed with me, and I considered myself quite a force to be reckoned with. My parents always did say that I excelled in temper tantrums and defiance along with everything else.

The scary psychologist, who was actually quite nice to me, explained that “below average” was why Abriel didn’t talk until he was almost two, why he still read the books with more pictures than words, and why he preferred to color and play with our puppy more than read books and solve puzzles like I did. She explained that Abriel would continue to struggle in school, and that it might get harder as he got older. She explained to my devastated parents that Abriel would have to study a lot and have tutors and take remedial classes to catch him up for the Assessment.

When I was eight, all I really knew about the Assessment was that it was the last thing you did as a child. I understood, vaguely, that it was like a test, but I didn’t know what it was about, and it bothered me more that nobody would tell me. I considered it a personal offense to not be told things. All I had learned about the Assessment was that you had to be “good” on it, and that people who weren’t were Demoted, but I didn’t know much about what Demoted was either, just that you didn’t want it to happen to you.

After the psychologist told us about “below average,” our parents spent a lot of time looking worried around Abriel and having “adult conversations” that they wouldn’t let me listen to. I heard the word “Demoted” whispered so many times that I finally snuck into their room one night, snatched my dad’s tablet, and looked up what it meant, and what the Assessment was all about. Some of the words were too big for me, and others just didn’t make sense, but I got the general idea, and I had never been more worried about anything.

That was the night I started waking Abriel up and teaching him.

Our parents found out, weeks later, and they tried to dissuade me, but my wails and shrieks and temper tantrums convinced them otherwise. Instead, they appealed to my quickly growing logical side and set up an hour before bed every night for me to teach my brother everything I possibly could. I started by teaching him exactly what the Assessment was and what being Demoted meant.

Sadly, I think I learned more from those sessions than he did, and my parents must have realized that, which is why they let it continue for so long. Looking back, it horrifies me that they used one son to further the development of the other, but it was just the way things were done. Even the play dates that our parents arranged for us were focused on learning and achievement; both our parents and the parents of other children seemed eager to use each other as stepping-stones to get a competitive edge. I was the child they had hoped for, my quest for knowledge and new skills never ending, but I wouldn’t leave my brother behind.