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Asher hoped.
He hoped that Jonas remembered the morning that he had dashed into the classroom, late as usual, arriving breathlessly in the middle of the chanting of the morning anthem. He had remained standing to make his public apology as was required.
“I apologize for inconveniencing my learning community,” Asher had said, watching the grins of the students. He then focused on Jonas’s recognizable smile, the one of unconcealed amusement. A lapse of thought brought him guilt for not thinking of Fiona as well, but he pushed it away. Fiona wasn’t in their learning community, after all, so it was only logical, and therefore correct, to think of Jonas.
“I left home at the correct time, but when I was riding along near the hatchery, the crew was separating some salmon. I guess I just got ... distraught,” said Asher, searching for the correct word, “watching them. I apologize to my classmates.”
Despite his caution, the word choice had been incorrect in the end. He stared as the Instructor wrote “distraught” then “distracted” on the instructional board.
Still, he was just happy for the laughter — especially the discernible ring of that familiar laugh, enveloped by the others yet still standing out in the best way.
One morning, Asher recalled a dream.
The dream had been puzzling — it had been without dialogue, precedent, reason . However, it was ... prominent. He was sure of it.
He had dreamed of pale eyes.
Peculiar, the people of the community called them. Different — and who would want to be different? Everyone and everything in the community was always the same, after all. Equality above everything else. Oddities and outliers were wrong, and things that were wrong had to be expunged. Abolished. Erased.
But was it so wrong to want to keep something different?
Those were eyes he knew. Jonas’s eyes held so much depth to them, as if he were looking into the clear water of the river, down to the bottom, where hidden enigmas surely lurked. Asher remembered that when he had first met Jonas, he had noticed those bright eyes, different from everyone else’s. They were ... there was really no word he knew for that. The difference this time was wonderful, an expression so complex. He knew it was considered to be an act of rudeness to call to attention something divergent from the norm, though, so he kept quiet about his thoughts.
When it came time to tell dreams, he described the experience vaguely, purposefully lacking precision for once, though the image was vivid in his mind.
He wanted to keep something to himself, anyway.
Asher was playing catch. It was required of him, as it would help with his hand-eye coordination. A normal activity, a regular routine.
Then, something new.
“Ash?” Jonas called, a slight tilt to his head. “Does anything seem strange to you? About the apple?” He was frowning just a bit in exactly the same way he did when he was learning something new or analyzing something, or maybe both at once.
“Yes,” Asher laughed in response, crouching down to pick up the smooth fruit, which he had just dropped. “It jumps out of my hand onto the ground!”
Hesitantly Jonas grinned too, but it was an absentminded expression. Asher knew too well that he was thinking — but about what? He was left wondering.
Then, as they said their goodbyes for the day and left to their dwellings, they smiled and waved at each other. Asher paid close attention to the receding sound of bicycle wheels on the ground and the thoughts left behind, so rich that they felt nearly tangible in the air.
He couldn’t understand it, but he liked this something new.
“Hi, Jonas!” Asher called from the corner, kneeling beside a tub in the House of the Old. Fiona looked up as well, swiftly glancing at Jonas in greeting. Asher felt a little thrill followed by a short pang of ... something as Jonas greeted them, then began to help one of the Old waiting to bathe.
Asher began to help another of the Old, careful as always, but his mind was occupied as he absentmindedly took to the task. He listened and nodded in affirmation a few times whenever the man talked about a new point, but that was not all he was listening to. He observed Jonas’s conversation with the woman in the bathtub and sometimes shifted to watch Fiona, becoming more bewildered each time with the dull sting that felt as if it were swelling inside of him, somehow.
The woman that Jonas was helping lowered her voice and quietly confided a few words to Jonas, which brought out a short, humorous snicker from him. Not a few minutes later, the favor was returned — Jonas smirked humorously, eyes sliding to the side secretively, and joked to the woman, who laughed in response.
Asher had a burning desire to hear what he had said.
At the end of volunteer hours, Asher was jittery, head full of thoughts as he and his friends exited the House of the Old. He straightened his leaning bicycle, which was slumped to the side as always. Yes, it was improper, but that was just how he was — unruly and always a little less than straight — though he knew he would have to correct those habits sometime.
Jonas and Fiona pulled their perfectly aligned bicycles from their respective ports, accidentally brushing their forearms, exposed by their rolled-up sleeves. As usual, the sound of an announcement blared only a few seconds later:
“Please stand by for a community announcement,” said the monotonous voice through the speakers scattered throughout the community. “Citizens are reminded that it is impolite to touch community members outside your family unit. Thank you.”
Fiona startled and released a nervous laugh, and Jonas practically leaped back, nearly tripping over his own bicycle as his large pale eyes widened just a sliver. He averted his eyes anxiously as the female quickly looked over at Asher, then back away again. Asher only stared back at both of them bemusedly, noticing that the unfamiliar ache had returned before he had realized.
“I heard about a guy who was absolutely certain he was going to be assigned Engineer," Asher murmured thoughtfully as he and Jonas ate their midday meal, "and instead they gave him Sanitation Laborer. He went out the next day, jumped into the river, swam across, and joined the next community he came to. Nobody ever saw him again.”
Jonas laughed oh-so-recognizably. “Somebody made that story up, Ash,” he said, turning upward from his food. “My father said he heard that story when he was a Twelve.”
“I can’t even swim very well,” said Asher only half-humorously as he eyed the river. “My swimming instructor said that I don't have the right boyishness or something.”
“Buoyancy,” Jonas corrected him, readjusting his grip on the standard eating utensil and continuing to eat.
Asher exhaled — incorrect pronunciation again — and instead found himself blankly staring at Jonas, turning away when Jonas looked back at him. “Whatever. I don’t have it. I sink.”
“Anyway,” Jonas pointed out, “have you ever once known of anyone — I mean really known for sure, Asher, not just heard a story about it — who joined another community?”
“No,” Asher admitted reluctantly, doubt seeping through his tone. “But you can. It says so in the rules. If you don’t fit in, you can apply for Elsewhere and be released. My mother says that once, about ten years ago, someone applied and was gone the next day.” Then he chuckled. “She told me that because I was driving her crazy. She threatened to apply for Elsewhere.”
“She was joking ,” emphasized Jonas, planting his elbow on the table and placing his chin on his hand. Asher mirrored him, leaning in a little.
“I know. But it was true, what she said, that someone did that once. She said that it was really true. Here today and gone tomorrow. Never seen again. Not even a Ceremony of Release.”
All Jonas did was shrug, staring off into the distance behind Asher now. “How could someone not fit in?” he said offhandedly, as if to himself. “How different did they have to be?” Asher didn’t answer Jonas, but he responded mentally, though it wasn’t much of an answer as it was a comment.
There’s no one else like you, yet you fit in just fine.
“Asher.” The Chief Elder lifted her voice to make the official announcement. “We have given you the Assignment of Assistant Director of Recreation.”
She clipped on Asher’s new badge as he stood beside her, beaming with a mix of relief, anticipation, and pride. Then he turned and left the stage as the audience cheered. He almost felt as if he could hear the distinguishable sound of ... never mind.
When he had taken his seat again, the Chief Elder looked down at him and said the words that she had said now four times, and would say to each new Twelve. Somehow she gave it special meaning for each of them. “Asher,” she said grandly, “thank you for your childhood.”
Now that the moment was over, Asher listened carefully, counting down each number from four — his own number — to his friends’ numbers. Fiona, eighteen was next, followed by Jonas, who was nineteen.
Fiona was externally serene, as she always was, though Asher was sure that she was not as calm as she acted. In a moment, she was Assigned to be a Caretaker of the Old — a perfect Assignment for her, anyone could say with certainty.
It was Jonas’s turn next. But, then —
“Twenty,” said the Chief Elder. “Pierre.”
The call of “Nineteen, Jonas” never came. Jonas had been skipped. Had he misheard?
As Asher looked around him at the other new Twelves, he saw that he had heard correctly — the others were, too, gaping up at the stage in bewilderment. Pierre looked stunned as he absently walked up to the stage, his face perfectly mirroring those of the startled audience.
“She skipped him,” Asher breathed to the equally shaken Twelves sitting nearby, the trepidation finally catching up to him. What did this mean? Had Jonas done something wrong? Did he ... not fit in? What was going to happen to him? Fear crept up Asher’s throat, accompanying the prospect that something bad could happen to Jonas.
“I know,” she said in her resonating voice, normally vibrant and gracious yet sounding as if it could be more than intimidating, “that you are all concerned. That you feel I have made a mistake.”
She smiled. The community, relieved from its discomfort very slightly by her benign statement, seemed to breathe more easily — at least, Asher did ... and Fiona as well, he was sure. It was silent now.
Asher saw Jonas look up.
“I have caused you anxiety,” she said. “I apologize to my community.” Her voice flowed over the assembled crowd.
“We accept your apology," they all uttered together, the standard phrase echoing with the rush of voices.
“Jonas,” she said, looking down at him, “I apologize to you in particular. I caused you anguish.”
“I accept your apology,” Jonas replied shakily, looking as if only his instincts supporting him as he slowly rose from his place. He sounded as if he wasn’t sure of what he was supposed to do, movements uncertain and unfamiliar.
"Please come to the stage now.”
Reassuringly she placed her arm across his tense shoulders.
"Jonas has not been assigned," she informed the crowd, and dread replaced Asher’s thoughts.
Then she went on. “Jonas has been selected.”
Asher blinked, questioning. What did that mean? He felt a collective, questioning stir from the audience. They, too, were puzzled.
In a firm, commanding voice she announced, “Jonas has been selected to be our next Receiver of Memory.”
Asher had known from the start that something had been different. Something good.
Though he still didn’t understand fully what that meant, when the crowd chanted Jonas’s name, he chanted too.
That might have been the first time he really noticed it.
Asher pulled his bicycle upright, placing the special folder that he had received into the carrying compartment on the back of the bicycle.
“Ash!” Jonas called. “Ride back with me?”
“Sure.” Asher smiled, his usual grin, friendly and familiar, but he wouldn’t like that he hadn’t hesitated. He felt like he was making a difficult decision when really it happened daily. “I ...”
“Congratulations,” he said instead.
“You too,” Jonas replied, a shadow of a smile on his face. It morphed slowly into what was more of an imperceptible grimace as he noticed the hesitation. “It was really funny, when she told about the smacks. You got more applause than almost anybody else.”
They started on their bicycles, careful to avoid those who swerved a little too close to them.
“Congratulations, Asher!” someone called. Then that pause again. “You too, Jonas!”
Asher and Jonas responded with congratulations to their groupmates. Jonas waved to his family, and Asher did the same with his own. Then they rode together to each of their dwellings.
Jonas’s dwelling came first. The two had mostly been exchanging only small jokes and unimportant remarks when they arrived.
"See you in the morning, Recreation Director!" Jonas called, dismounting by his door as Asher slowed, then continued on.
"Right! See you!" Asher called back, feeling once more that he was making an unreasonably important choice. Again, there was just a moment when things weren’t quite the same, weren’t quite as they had always been through the long friendship. What if things changed? What would happen then?
Asher released the dangerous curiosity.
Ever since the training for their Assignments had begun, Asher found that Jonas seemed more angry.
Jonas had been more blank and untelling at first, then calm, then upset. Now he was acting more strangely.
"Asher," Jonas said one morning, "look at those flowers very carefully." They were standing beside a bed of geraniums planted near the Hall of Open Records. He put his hands on Asher’s shoulders.
"What’s the matter?" Asher asked uneasily, tensing as he slightly turned his head to look at Jonas. "Is something wrong?" He reluctantly moved away from Jonas’s hands, watching as they slowly lowered.
“No, nothing. I thought for a minute that they were wilting, and we should let the Gardening Crew know they needed more watering.” Jonas sighed, turning away. Asher felt as if he had disappointed him greatly, but he didn’t inquire, though he wanted to fix whatever had just happened.
Soon the standard announcement blared:
“Please stand by for a community announcement. Citizens are reminded that it is impolite to touch community members outside your family unit. Thank you.”
That might have been the second time.
For Jonas, it wasn’t anger anymore, Asher began to notice. Rather, it was ... fear? Resignation? Something in between, something indescribable.
“Asher!” Jonas must have spied Asher’s bicycle leaning against a tree at the edge of the playing field. Nearby, other bikes were strewn about on the ground. On a holiday the usual rules of order could be disregarded.
He skidded to a stop and dropped his own bike beside the others. "Hey, Ash!" he shouted, looking around.“Where are you?”
Asher was, in fact, hiding with a few others, playing the common game of good and bad. They would pretend to shoot, hide, and shoot again. If they were hit, they would fall to the floor limply as a sign of their defeat.
Tanya, a female Eleven, staggered forward, falling to the ground after a call of false shooting noises from an unknown hiding spot. Asher took this as his cue and jumped out from behind the particularly thick tree where he had been hidden, imitating the sound of a gunshot. He aimed an imaginary weapon in his hand, darting from behind one tree to an-other. "You’re in my line of ambush, Jonas! Watch out!"
Asher kept his eyes on Jonas as they all darted around him. He was oddly still, unreacting to each shot they fired. Eventually, the children left. The only ones remaining were Asher, Fiona, and Jonas.
“What’s wrong, Jonas? It was only a game,” said Fiona, glancing between Jonas and Asher anxiously.
“You ruined it,” said Asher, only disappointed. He didn’t understand what was causing Jonas to act this way, but he wanted it to stop.
"Don’t play it anymore," Jonas pleaded, an unreadable visage apparent on his face.
"I'm the one who's training for Assistant Recreation Director," Asher pointed out, frustrated but trying not to appear angry. "Games aren't your area of expertness."
"Expertise," Jonas corrected him automatically.
"Whatever. You can't say what we play, even if you are going to be the new Receiver." Asher looked warily at him, just realizing how he might have transgressed the rule against rudeness. "I apologize for not paying you the respect you deserve," he mumbled, taking note of how warm yet uncomfortable he felt.
"Asher," Jonas said tentatively. "You had no way of knowing this. I didn't know it myself until recently. But it's a cruel game. In the past, there have — "
"I said I apologize, Jonas," blurted Asher almost defensively, quickly shutting his mouth afterward. Something in his head was telling him that he didn’t want to hear it, that hearing this was going to change something for the worse.
Jonas sighed as if he were very tired and had lived a little too long already."I accept your apology, Asher," he said wearily. Had Asher’s tone come off too harshly?
"Do you want to go for a ride along the river, Jonas?" Fiona asked, poking at the bubble of tension in the air. A tiny stream of hope trickled through Asher’s thoughts as Jonas turned to her. His stare lingered on her face for a moment, then he shook his head.
This just left Asher and Fiona to begin riding on their bicycles. A curdling sensation laden with heavy disappointment settled in Asher’s stomach, and this time the sensation was familiar.
Fiona nervously sent a grin his way, genuine and soft, unlike his own absent smile, more automatic than out of happiness.
Asher had been dreaming.
He received a mission from the Chief Elder, who had instructed him to “Lose Jonas.” Then, he was piloting a large drone and chasing Jonas into Elsewhere.
He felt his fingertips glide over the smooth screen, peering through the clear visor as the drone shot through the air. He heard the soft woosh of the drone as it slowed, coming to a hover as Jonas turned around. Asher’s eyes flicked over to a nearby drone pilot, checking to see that the pilot was occupied.
“Jonas,” he whispered as he pressed the button to activate his microphone. “What are you doing?”
“Asher, please, let us go,” pleaded Jonas, cradling a newchild in his arms. He took a step backward, squinting desperately up at the drone’s camera.
“I can’t,” said Asher quietly. “I’m supposed to ...”
“To what?” Jonas’s tone was challenging, still laced with caution.
“To Lose you.”
Jonas hesitated, taking yet another step backward away from the drone as he shook his head in tiny increments. “Asher, if you are my friend,” — then a pause — “if you ever were my friend, can you please somehow trust me? Trust me now.” His face began to give, less tense, and his knees bent just a tiny bit.
Then he ran.
Jonas sprinted, and Asher immediately began to chase after him with the bulky drone, concentrated as he took in the details jumping up onto the screen with practiced focus. He watched Jonas leap up rocks, then begin to dive for cover as he knew what was going to happen.
He was too late, however, as the drone’s hardlight net poured from the bottom, latching onto its target. Jonas was pulled up and trapped to the underside of the drone where cargo typically went, the newchild still firmly grasped in his arms.
Slowly, Asher flew the drone over the rushing seafoam green waters of the nearby river, and with a tightness in his chest, took a shallow breath. He observed the area silently, mentally gauging the small waterfall at the rock ledge, though the rush in his ears was loud and blaring.
“I do trust you, Jonas,” he breathed. He pressed two buttons in order and slid up the switch displayed on the screen, blankly reading but not truly processing the words as they appeared:
CARGO RELEASING
Jonas and the newchild plummeted toward the water, disappearing all too quickly underneath the rising foam of the turquoise stream.
As Asher returned the drone, the Chief Elder appeared at the corner of his visor — augmented reality glasses, he realized now, not just a visor.
“You found him,” she said, her tone unreadable.
“I did,” responded Asher, voice equally matching in evenness.
“For the good of all of us, I beg you,” said the Chief Elder, barely audible, “finish this.”
Asher only stared straight ahead at the screen, piloting the drone with an external display of emotionlessness that came too easily. It was almost as if the fresh turmoil stirring within him wasn’t there at all.
“It’s finished.”
— But that hadn’t happened.
He had received no such mission from the Chief Elder. He wasn’t Drone Pilot — there was no such role in the community, anyway. There were no drones. None of that had happened.
Then why did it feel so real?
“Jonas?” called Asher through the crowd of people waiting for the beginning of the Ceremony of Ones. “Jonas?”
He must be with his family or the Receiver of Memory — well, the other Receiver, Asher concluded as he found a seat in the audience. He sat quietly, politely clapping, as he continued to search for Jonas, first checking with Jonas’s family unit, then attempting and failing to get a look at the Receiver. He was mostly sure that Jonas was with the Receiver, however, so the search was unneccessary, but he really just wanted to see him before the Ceremony began.
His “mostly sure” turned out to be incorrect.
Jonas was gone, and no one could find him. They had looked everywhere, and soon enough it was clear that he was Lost.
Lost, like that little boy Caleb who had fallen into the river.
Lost, like in that dream.
Asher didn’t remember the Ceremony of Loss that followed. All he recalled was a blank, almost dreamlike sensation as chants of Jonas’s name rose in a crescendo, then slowly faded away again. A new feeling.
He couldn’t understand it, but he knew for sure that he didn’t like this something new —
But he wanted to have hope. Asher hoped — that was just what he did — that just like in that dream, Jonas was not really Lost yet. He had believed in Jonas in the dream, and so he would now.
This was the third time that Asher would notice it — that sensation that had become so familiar, like an old friend returning home.
It might have been the final time.
Asher hoped so.
Asher hoped.