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annabelvallie · 1 month

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The Regime of Gluttony and Starvation.

a dystopian short story by Annabel Vallie.

I wonder if they know. Do they sip the golden bubbled concoction and think of every throat that spit cannot even comfort? If they pull seared flesh from polished forks do they imagine the gnashing, desperate teeth of children who claw desperately at what they call “dog food,”?

They call this city Eden. In school, we’re taught that we are safe from disease, agony, and sadness. Something everyone at this grotesquely over-decorated table knows nothing of. How can the pleasured know they are joyous when they have never been pained? How can the glutted know themselves satisfied if they have never been hungry? Eden was built on gluttony. We are told the outside world is sick. A type of illness that doesn't forgive but punishes. I wouldn’t call it sick—morbid maybe. I had learned that word from one of the novels we read in Lyceum education; the book ‘A Dark Hour’ was written some 500 years ago in a place called Vietnam. The author called the country hell on earth, a place where filth and evil are magnified. Our city’s teachers reference beyond the walls as desolate nothingness, birthed from a war that was far worse than Vietnam.

Rusted oranges and browns made the outside world. Kicked-up dirt filtered the air with a thick haze; irritating eyes that would never know tears; water was too precious to be wasted on emotion. The heavy sound of moans and comfortless cries carried with no destination, as did the smell of waste, constantly assaulting the hairs in your nose. Hot air thickened my throat, making it hard to breathe. Bodies discarded like statues haunted the breathing, similar to those on paper that piled into sunken earth. Every movement was strained as if they had to fight for the ability to take a step. Through the swarm of people, there was no end.

Barbed wire snatched a handful of skin from my thigh, making me wince. Before the sultry air could oxidise the gash, flies were frenzying on the crimson.

I had never known suffocation until the day of Matia.

“Joseph, pass the grapes please.” A short man whose jaw seemed to rest slack held out his hand, motioning to the silver bowl that harboured bulbs of green and purple. Passing it to him, I watched as he pierced the skin of a grape with pearly teeth. All I could think of was the people beyond the wall who would fight one another for a cluster of what he would consume in a short moment, not out of hunger but boredom before the main course arrived.

Praefectus Cain, the man sitting at the head of the table with a Navy Blue suit, held up his glass, motioning for silence. “Welcome, Abigail Dupont, Elijah Fournier, and Joseph Martin.” He hovered his glass in the direction of the girl on my left and the boy on my right. “We thank you for taking your position in the Imperium. We trust that after Matia today your eyes have been opened and you will continue Eden’s legacy and keep our people safe and at peace.”

The values of Eden surround love, whether that means the effort and care of a pastry or the simple act of clearing a guest’s plate. Gratitude is more important than the act itself. The way your fork and knife lie after a meal is communication and appreciation on its own. The meal was delicious if the handles were south with their blade and prongs pointed east. Lust, the overwhelming desire of another, is praised almost as highly as a perfectly smooth-shelled macaroon. Devotion is embroidered into liquor that makes your brain twist as if it were inside a dough mixer.

Here, to love is to feed, eat, indulge, and blur gluttony and greed into the same idea. Seared beef, vanilla sponge cake, caramel, strawberries that dribble at the corners of your mouth, thick shakes with colour dye, the peel of a mandarin, wishbones, salted butter, sherbert, pineapple that burns your tongue, appetisers, and hors d’oeuvres. The table shrank as plates piled from the kitchen, what used to be a pristine cotton table cloth now plates of every meal imaginable. It is a special day of course. As people began to feast I felt as though my body had conformed to a jelly-like substance, unable to move on its own, only able to react to the drunken movement surrounding it.

The next day I found myself focused on every passing person on my way to work. Specifically, I stared at how their mouths curled into smiles and eyes creased with joy. Stupidity and negligence are bliss. If they knew what was outside they too would be burdened and distraught.

A woman with blonde hair that moved like ripples around her head caught my attention. Her cheeks and lips looked to be stained with cherry juice, and she took her time letting her heels click on and drag with every step she took. At that moment I thought of how she laughed—if it was quiet and withdrawn or louder. How did she prefer her eggs—scrambled, poached, fried, or boiled? I thought about a lifetime in a minute, and during that time, I forgot about what was beyond the walls. Possibly, I could remain this way. If I mocked what everyone around me did, I might find the joy that they experienced. If I married and partied and ate would that sickening feeling I have held with me since Matia dissipate?

The Imperium was stationed north of Eden just past a row of oak trees that signified the end of the orchid plantation. I would park in the furthest spot from the entrance, press through a swing door that moves awfully slowly to accommodate those who wobble more than walk, and make my way through the hallway that runs through the city wall. Even though I pass through five days out of seven I cannot help but stare out the wall’s windows every chance I could. The small slits in the hallway that allowed tainted auburn light to flow through and the large painting-like glass in the central office reminded everyone of what we shield from our citizens. At lunch for an hour we sit at a stretched table overlooking Eden’s farmland and feast on whatever specials the chef had plotted, yesterday was a honeyed duck. “I don’t know what is wrong with you Joseph, this is one of the best ducks I’ve had this year and you refuse to eat more than an appetiser,” Abigaile exclaimed after finishing off the meat.

I replied softly, knowing more than one ear was listening. “My appetite isn’t as strong as it used to be. Thank you for your consideration” It was an uncommon phenomenon, a refusal of food. Not eating is the equivalent of vetoing oxygen. “I’m just going to use the bathroom, excuse me.” I stand, placing the folded unstained napkin on the cushioned chair. Taking a last glance at the quantity of people and the view of my city I continue down one of the hallways. Even though my stomach growled the idea of eating repulsed me. During the day my mouth would salivate in the hope of relief, by night when all I wanted was to binge I would finally make myself something. Tonight I may have the oysters my father brought round this morning. He works at a lease and every time I crack salt over my plate I think of him, how his skin smelt like the unfiltered water and his hands that were callus and corse from cutting open their shells.

Taking each step I find myself mimicking the women I see most days on my way here. Click, drag. Click, drag… and just as I do with every window, discarding the bathroom where I was headed, my eyes wander to the clear surface overlooking the apocalyptic world a mere twenty meters away from our utopia. Instead of continuing further, my body lurches to a frozen halt. Apparently, on the other side, they can’t see through the glass. To them, it looks like the stone pattern remains unbroken. I don’t believe that. Staring through the glass, I am met with another man mirroring myself. His eyes are tired but focused and unwavering from mine. His nose has a crease at the bridge as if it were broken, and his teeth are jagged with gums receding so highly that they could have been finger bones. What scared me the most was how hollow his cheeks were. As if scooped with a soup spoon. His face resembles somewhat of Edvard Munch’s ‘The Scream’.

Instead of taking a step forward in concern or back in retreat, I simply stared. When I felt someone lock their knees next to me, my gaze remained on the window in a competition-like fashion.

Praefectus Cain’s firm voice began, “Joseph, is something upsetting you? Are you hungry?”

Pulling my head back, feeling the muscles tense around every vertebra in a rehearsed sequence like piano keys in a glissando. I looked at him—at his round stomach, at his creased forehead, at his thin blond hair, at his tie bar with the words ‘Ab ovo usque ad mala’ engraved into the silver—before staring back at the window like a child and a cartoon film. I felt nauseated like I had just drunk vomitorium, a tiny ounce glass filled with yellow liquid that made you sick so you could go on eating. They usually have them at balls and galas. “I’m fine, thank you… Do…” My voice crackled as if a teaspoon of honey sat on my windpipe. “Do you ever think of helping them, the people out there?”

He thought, not about the answer but how to word it. “Yes, when I was your age.”

“I can’t think of how to describe it. I feel bad, sorry.

“Guilt.” The word was spoken as if he had been waiting to use it.

The word was alien: “I’m sorry, sir, I don’t know what that means.”

We remain facing forward, “It means you have morals, something only a few here hold. Knowledge is the heaviest of all burdens, even if it carries no weight.

“We have food to spare.” By then the man on the other side of the wall had walked off, his feet kicking up more loose orange powder-like dirt.

“How could you choose who receives a bounty? Every living thing is bound by fate. The people of Eden are safe from hunger because they are lucky. If we were to open our resources, what would happen? They are animals, Joseph. Unlike us, their world does not have a drop of civilisation.” Through the window, two boys ran towards a bird that had fallen to the ground. With desperate efforts, the taller one had proved victorious in the feathered corpse, and the shorter one crouched over the ground, echoing the fallen animal. “Tell me, Joseph, would they eat, or would they devour? The flesh of our loved ones would be torn from their bones and they would drink like we do red wine. These animals do not know amity, love, or kindness; we are survivors, that is what separates us.”

With a sigh, I could feel the pads of my fingers tingle with anticipation of cold sweat and unease. “Then, if being inhumane constitutes our difference, are we not the same?”

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