People of Mars (12 page)

Melissa starts lulling
her toy. Now that she’s under the light of the lamp, I see it’s a
doll, carved in wood. But she continues to watch me.

“Distant?” I’m not
sure I’ve understood her question.

“That place up there.”
She points an imprecise spot over her.

I raise my eyes.
Obviously, I just can see the greenhouse roofing. I grasp she isn’t
referring to it.

“Earth,” she
specifies. “Is that its name?”

I nod and I give in to
the facts. That girl knows about me more than I know about her.
This thing is making me feel a little ill at ease. Or perhaps it’s
her inquisitive gaze.

“There are nine
billion people up there, aren’t there?”

I haven’t expected a
question like this. The concept of a billion is difficult to
comprehend for a child, even more so when living in a small
community. Actually, I have no idea how small it may be. I look
around by instinct, as if I’m expecting to see other people coming
out from the orchard. But there’s nobody there; it’s just a weird
sensation, the one of being watched from afar. Studied.

Perhaps I’m just
paranoid.

“They are thirteen
billions, now.”

Melissa’s gaze lights
up. “Oh …” She seems happy with the information, but at the same
time it’s like she is considering it. Maybe all she did earlier was
nothing more than repeating what she’d heard from others, but this
reaction of hers seems genuine, as if she really cares.

“Melissa, where are
your parents?” I cannot let a child grill me. Now it’s my turn to
investigate.

“Are they all
beautiful like you?” she asks me, ignoring my words. She smiles
again.

I can’t help but feel
flattered, but at the same time, for a moment, I have the
unpleasant sensation that Melissa doesn’t want to lose control of
our conversation.

“There are people of
all kinds.”

She watches me with a
quizzical expression on her face, as if she wants me to keep on
talking. The truth is that I don’t know what to say. I crack a
smile.

“Can I see your
doll?”

Melissa looks at the
doll and then at me. I guess she is deciding whether she can trust
me. Finally, she offers it to me.

I take it into my
hands. It’s a little work of art, finely carved. Surprised, I
realise its face looks just like Melissa.

I raise my gaze.

“Oh, shit,” escapes my
mouths, as I drop the toy on the ground.

Three more children
stand behind her. I didn’t heard them come in. They are fixing me
with the same curiosity in the eyes. One is a boy, more or less her
age. The other two, a boy and a girl, are younger; they are holding
hands. They are all wearing identical white nightdresses, their
faces sleepy, but their looks alert.

I feel as though I’m
being analysed. Sure, it’s natural they would be studying me.
They’ve never seen me before. Yet I perceive something morbid in
their curiosity. Whatever I’ve been given for the pain is throwing
my emotions into a turmoil. I’ve gone from euphoria to anxiety.

“She is Anna,” Melissa
explains, pointing to me. Then she lowers her gaze to my top.
“Persson,” she adds hesitantly, stressing the double S in a hiss.
“What the heck kind of a name is that anyway?”

I’m speechless for a
moment, and then I remember I have my identification tag on all my
clothes, while my country’s flag is on my sleeve. That’s why Jack
knew about my name.

“It’s … wrong.”

It makes me laugh.
Euphoria must be back. My reaction invokes disappointment on
Melissa’s face. As if caught in the act of doing something wrong, I
let my own face grow serious again.

“It isn’t in English,
but in Swedish.”

“Ah.” It seems she’s
understood, though I doubt it. But then she smiles again. I’m
surprised to be relieved about it. Her face is as friendly when
smiling as it is unsettling when serious.

I’d like to laugh
again, but I hold it back, though with difficulty. I turn to the
other children. “And what are your names?”

They smile as one, but
don’t open their mouth.

“Alexandre, Marisol,
and Sven,” Melissa replies. It seems she is the spokesperson of the
group. She is surely the smarter one.

She snaps forward,
reaching out towards me. Her sudden movement catches me by surprise
and I draw back by instinct, but she just takes her doll. She
strokes it with care, removing the dirt.

In that moment, I
perceive a vibration of the ground. The children ignore it. Then a
loud puff.

“Someone should be in
their bed.”

That voice!

As I hear it,
Melissa’s jaw tightens. She’s irritated.

From behind the steam
cloud, on the opposite side of that surprising garden, where it
seems getting lost in the dark, a human silhouette takes shape
almost from nothing.

The girl casts a
furious, nasty look in its direction, then she stands up and run
away.

Following her
movement, I realise that the other three children have gone,
vanished in silence, the same way they’d arrived.

7

Only stars above her.
That was the sensation she felt while staying in the observatory of
Station Alpha.

It was used mostly as
an entertainment area, given that nobody from the crew was an
astronomer. Located on the upper floor of the building, in the
south wing, the observatory was a large circular room rising three
metres above the remainder of the roof. The ceiling was a dome of
very resistant, insulating, anti-glare glass. The same material
extended from the east, round through the south side to the west,
occupying more than a half of the cylindrical wall. There were some
positions for star observation in the middle, consisting of
comfortable tilted seats combined with a telescope. Around them
were some upholstered benches, three of which were located just in
front of the transparent wall. They allowed watching the landscape
from dawn to dusk, thanks to the partial dimming of the glass
during daytime, which blocked ionising radiations.

But it was dark now.
Small spotlights embedded under the benches threw a weak light down
onto the dark floor, leaving the view of the sky undisturbed. And
Anna, lying on a bench with her eyes blurred by tears, could barely
distinguish a myriad bright spots.

A deep sense of discouragement had taken
possession of her body, paralysing her. She couldn’t do anything
but think, but that just increased her sadness and loneliness. She
was lost. She knew she was sad for a long series of
wrong
reasons and had ended up, yet
again, wondering what was wrong with her.

A click alerted her
that the door was opening. She sat up by instinct, while hearing
the same door closing. Some moments later Hassan’s face emerged
from the darkness.

“What are you doing
here?” Frightened by the intrusion, Anna moved her legs to the
other side of the bench, as if she was preparing to escape at any
moment. She wasn’t at all in the mood to bear his persecutions
again. She had had enough of them for today.

“I was looking for
you,” he said candidly. He didn’t look menacing or, rather, he
looked less menacing than usual. But mostly tired. “If it were
daytime, I would’ve found you in the greenhouse.” He cracked an
almost benevolent smile. That was really something new. “But given
that it’s night-time, you are here.”

He’d been checking on
her, he knew her habits. The surprise made her lower her guard and,
without reacting, she let him sit down on the bench, facing
her.

“You’ve been crying,”
Hassan observed. He looked away from her for a moment. It seemed as
he was making a huge effort to behave adequately. “I’ve
exaggerated.”

In his own way, was he
maybe apologising?

As if replying to the
incredulous expression from Anna, he let a quiet laugh escape. “I’m
trying to be kind and, as you see, I’m having some difficulty.” He
contemplated her with a half smile.

She kept a straight
face for a little time, then she couldn’t contain herself. “Oh, cut
it out and tell me what you want. Or go.” He was softening her up
so that he could suddenly hit her with one of his venomous remarks.
No, this time he wouldn’t succeed in scaring her.

“Listen, Anna. I’m
talking seriously.” He was annoyed now. He stopped, as if holding
back, again. When he resumed speaking, his tone was more
conciliatory. “Let’s do five minutes of armistice, how about
it?”

She emitted a
disbelieving cry and relaxed. At once she felt overwhelmed by the
events of the day and new tears surfaced, rolling down her
cheeks.

Out of the corner of
her eye, she noticed the movement of Hassan’s hand reaching out to
her, and she froze, drawing back her head. His hand stopped mid
air. She stayed still, fixing it, as if it was something horrible,
then raised her gaze to the face of its owner.

It was in that very
moment that she saw him for the first time. Not the man reminding
her of her father and her origins she despised, but her companion
in that adventure on Mars, the person with whom she had shared her
existence for over one thousand, three hundred days since they had
left Earth, the astronaut and physician Hassan Qabbani. How was it
possible?

She nodded almost
without realising it and Hassan’s fingers reached her face, where
they gently collected a tear.

“What will become of
us?” she asked, whilst his hand lingered on her. It sounded more
like a plea than a question.

“We’ll get on all
right,” he reassured her, without the slightest hesitation. “Do you
really find it so terrible to spend a thousand days more here? Or
however many more there’ll be?”

‘
Yes.’
But instead she shook her head. “I dunno, I no
longer know anything.”

Torn between the
search for consolation and the childhood conditionings that had
guided her for such a long time, Anna let herself go and laid her
head on his shoulder. After a moment of uncertainty, he placed his
arms around her body.

They stayed this way,
in a silent hug, for a time which seemed never-ending.

Venom. That was the
word his mother had used more than once to define that kind of man.
That simple memory made her feel a stab of guilt, as if she was
breaking a tacit promise. At the same time, she was shaken by the
sense of dread and suspicion that had been instilled deep in her
soul. An unusual excitement, coming from the subtle fear of
undergoing something forbidden, took control of her. She had
already felt it and knew well where it would bring her. And once
more, she didn’t care. In fact, it was all she longed for.

She raised her head to
welcome his kiss.

Sometime later, when
their naked bodies, wrapped in the faint glow of the spotlights,
were lying joined on the carpeted floor, Anna turned her gaze to
the glass dome. Now she could finally see the stars gathering like
a myriad of diamonds on a velvet cloth.

“I knew you were
beautiful,” Hassan whispered.

This time she was
really feeling beautiful, without fear, nor rage, nor shame, nor
hatred.

And all of a sudden,
the stars became bigger, meeting her and dispersing with their
light all the loneliness.

Hassan’s hand stroked
her hair, as she rested her head on his chest, listening to the
tranquil beat of his heart. The rhythmical movement recalled the
unpleasant image of what she had seen in the gym, when he had
brushed against Michelle’s hair. For a second she considered asking
him what was between them, but then she let it go. She didn’t want
to ruin that moment of serenity. She didn’t want to discuss.

“You really are an
unfathomable mystery, little Anna.” Hassan broke the silence.

She raised her head to
look at his face. She didn’t like being called that, most of all by
him. It was as if he considered her an inferior being. But perhaps
it was so. In the end, she was just a woman, wasn’t she?

She opened her mouth
to protest, but then he smiled. “It’s me who doesn’t understand
those like you.” Replying with a grave tone was surely better than
complaining. She would not give in.

As usual, as if he had
understood everything, Hassan laughed. “Again with this story?” He
found it amusing. “Those like me? You mean, men?” He challenged
her, but with a smile.

Anna shook her head,
struggling to keep a serious expression. “What is the most
politically correct word?” She looked to the side, pretending to
think about it. “Middle-Eastern? Asian?”

“You mean, like you,”
he teased her.

And she was taken in.
“I’m Swedish!” The moment after she had spoken, she realised she’d
walked into a trap.

“And I’m from
Vancouver, which, for your information, is in Canada.”

Anna rolled her
eyes.

“If I’m not mistaken,”
Hassan added, as if he was pondering on it. “Canada is west of
Sweden, isn’t it?”

“Oh, stop it.”

And he laughed again.
Anna tried to pull back, but he held her. So she laid her head on
his chest again and turned her gaze to the glass wall. It was pitch
black outside; the external lamps were off. She felt vaguely angry,
but all the same, she stayed on him as though nothing had happened.
The truth was that she had no desire to do without that contact.
She didn’t want to feel alone again, but she’d rather have been
with someone who made an effort to understand her, instead of
making fun of her.

“Maybe you don’t
know.” Hassan resumed speaking with a serious tone. “But my mother
has got blue eyes and a beautiful head of blonde hair.”

Surprised by the
information, Anna snapped up her head and looked at his face to see
if he was being serious.

“As you see, we are
more similar than you think.”