CUBE: Part Two

At some point I slept.

I have the feeling I was asleep for a long time, as if I fell into a deep, dark unconsciousness. But it’s impossible to tell because day and night are meaningless in my little room. The light here is constant, despite the fact I can’t see any fixtures, or switches or bulbs. I think its day two. That feels right.

I’ve decided to try the space-shower

I step onto the slight rise in the floor, look up at the square panel in the ceiling and look for something to turn, or push or, I don’t know, light up. As I move my foot feels something give, and I look down to see a panel shift slightly as I move back.

A wall shoots up out of the floor.

I panic, slamming into it in my effort to get out of that small space and shouting ‘No!’ as my body bounces off its surface. The water hits me so suddenly I scream.

It smells. Am I being poisoned? I’m trying to find the edge of that panel, my fingers scrabbling over the surface. They can’t find a gap, a purchase. I back away, into the far wall as the water falls over me. The smell is almost antiseptic, but that’s not quite right. It makes me cough, lungs jerking, body hunched. I’m trying to calm myself, but every sense in me has become prey animal, and I fold up in a corner, my eyes screwed up in fear. I’m still curled over when the water suddenly shuts off.

I hear it trickling away somewhere, unwilling to move or even open my eyes. For a moment I can almost believe I’m back in my flat, in my own bathroom, as I hear the familiar sound of water going down a drain.

Then warm air starts blasting over my skin.

I don’t know where it’s coming from. I’m still frozen, but part of me, deep within the fear, is growing a bubble of anger. And as my body dries I push myself up and stand, my legs wobbling like a new-born lamb’s. The air is quickly drying my hair, the soles of my feet. To alleviate some of my fear I start taunting my captures.

‘Would towels really be that hard?’ I shout. ‘Like, really?’

The shouting makes me feel better. I pull my hair away from my face, fingers running though it to snag out the tangles.

‘You can build a spaceship, or whatever this is, and a fancy shower, but you can’t make a towel? Unbelievable.’

As if in answer, the air snaps off. I wait for the wall to slid back down but it’s still there. After a few moments of waiting, and a bit of ugly swearing, I press the panel in the floor with my foot.

The wall slides back down obediently, and I step out.

#

That first week when we were told about 2023QF5 was the strangest of my life, and that’s saying something.

Everything looked odd and tilted. I constantly felt as if I was looking at something for the first time - a piece of toast, a tree, a leaf even. Cars and buildings looked strange. People’s faces weren’t quite right.

The prime minister immediately decided he needed to ‘spend more time with family and church,’ and scuttled away, clutching his fat pension. And most of his party promptly went on stress-leave. The deputy minister, to his credit, took over for three days, declaring the whole thing fake news and making vague references about the Russians before he too became spiritually motivated to leave.

Eventually a junior member started turning up at the pressers. She looked like she’d just slid out of a university, still damp and clutching a degree.

Her name was Bianca.

She told us to be mindful that the data on 2023QF5 was being updated constantly. A lot of speeches about working together and having hope. But we were too busy panic buying and yelling at each other in supermarket to listen. By day three it was so bad I got knocked to the floor by a large woman who wanted the can of corn I had my hand on. (I got it back.)

A lot of countries got on with rioting, looting, and setting everything on fire without much preamble. Some people sidestepped panic and confusion altogether and just went crazy. All around the world cults I’d never heard of were committing mass suicides. A government was overthrown. The religions squabbled about whose god was being righteous and over what.

Survival shelters immediately became a huge thing. Buying them, stocking them and guarding them. The Americans proudly showed off theirs and taught others how to stockpile on Youtube, and no-one laughed at them. Well, not as many as before. And of course everyone quickly split into two groups - the #Extinction and the #ExtinctionHoax-ers. Twitter kept crashing under the weight of the arguments.

But away from social media and the news feeds, most of us were still clinging to a strange veneer of normalcy. You could still eat your tea in front of the television to watch the live coverage with your plate balanced on your knees. There were still ad breaks about the specials at Coles that week. And some of us still went to work.

Like the supermarket staff that kept restocking the stripped supermarket shelves, I kept going to the office. Because I had to. Just because there was a significant chance an asteroid was going to turn me into dust didn’t mean I wanted to be homeless and hungry when it did. I wanted to be safe in my little flat. It was a shelter from the storm around me, a place I could lock up tight and keep the noise at bay. I could curl up under a blanket on my couch and drink until I fell into drunken slumber, or eat chocolate until I felt sick, since there probably wasn’t any reason to avoid sugar anymore.

Pam and David never showed up at the office. No-one rang or came to their scheduled appointments. I told myself I was holding down the fort until things became clearer, that I would be rewarded, but on Friday my pay failed to go in, and when I rang both Pam and David’s number I was told they were no longer available.

I drove out to their house in a blind fury.

Pam had invited me over for a barbecue when I first went to temp for them. It was a way for her to show off her noisy offspring and give me a little speech about how they were a family business, that they hoped they would be able to call on me on a casual basis when Heather and her banana bread returned.

Wrong move, Pam. I curved around two men fighting near their dented cars in a quiet, tree-lined streets, took a few wrong turns and finally pulled into their driveway. They lived in neat, suburban luxury. Paved pathways, green lawn, double garage. I glimpsed a pool in the backyard, a plastic tricycle tipped over next to the flower bed. I banged on the door even as I noticed the silence, the dry leaves that had gathered on the doormat. From across the driveway a mop of salt and pepper curls appeared above the dividing fence, followed by a pair of bright eyes.

‘They’ve gone to their beach house!’ the neighbour shouted, louder than was necessary.

It took a while to sink in. For a moment I honestly thought they’d just gone away for the weekend, because who wouldn’t?

Then it sunk in. They’d done a runner. Because, who wouldn’t?

‘Fuck!’

I screamed it. The word rang out across the street. I kicked at the door. Once, twice, three times.

‘Everyone’s gone. Everyone’s leaving. Where? I don’t know. Like rats jumping ship, right into the ocean. Plop, plop.’

I realised my new friend was slightly drunk. She dropped out of sight suddenly, and I heard a very small thump.

‘Are you alright?’

‘I’m fine, dear! Just fine and dandy! Come in for a drink!’

I left her to it and drove back towards the city, through roads full of chaotic traffic. I saw more than a few vehicles with belongings strapped to roof racks, kids’ faces peering out from stacks of boxes and suitcases in the back seats. Caravans and campervans and trailers. There was a mass exodus towards the centre of the country, rumours of inland sanctuaries. These nomads talked of tsunamis and violently rising sea levels, as if they just had to ride out some bad weather with bottled water and canned food.

I tried to tell myself that I was free now. I could do whatever I wanted. I could travel and see the country. I could go backpacking. I could follow the nomads. What did I have to lose?

I had a little over two hundred dollars in the bank.

Every time I stopped at a set of lights I broke down and cried, driving home through a veil of tears and snot.

#

I’ve drunk half a flask water and eaten half a block of food, with no side-effects. Apparently, my captures don’t want to poison me. Which is nice.

I’m cross-legged on the bed, staring out of that window, staring at the far-away Earth. It’s in the same spot it’s been since I’ve woke up here, so at least I know we’re not moving, that I’m not being taken further and further from my home. That comforts me a little.

But I’m exhausted from fear. My throat is rubbed raw from the constant shouting. I put the flask and the rewrapped block of food aside, curl up and close my eyes.

You are flying towards the Earth, I tell myself. Your spirit has left this place. You are going home . . .

I’m winging my way through that cold expanse of space, towards the promise of Earth, barrelling my way through the atmosphere until I reach white, fluffy clouds. And then . . . my feet are landing on green grass. I’m surrounded by trees, and flowers, and the hum of bees. A nearby stream flows with clear water. I sit on the bank and let my feet drop into it, and hear the splash. The sky is a calm, light blue, filled with the sound of bird song, and a breeze sweeps over my skin.

I imagine this scenario over and over. I don’t get tired of it. I tell myself I will stay here until there was no more of me left to dream.

#

My landlords doubled the rent.

‘You can’t do that!’ I shouted. But I was shouting at an email. I rang the office. The response was the same you got from everyone then. Flat and cold. They could do whatever they hell they wanted, and they knew it.

I didn’t sign their new lease within the twenty-four hours they asked me to, so my current one was terminated. Just like that.

I didn’t pack because I had nowhere to go. I curled up on the couch, my arms wrapped around myself as I tried to hold it together.

My mum died when I was seven. The Family Court packed me off to a pair of abusive alcoholics, otherwise known as my aunt and uncle. I was out of there at sixteen, working part-time at McDonalds and living in a share house. I rented a loft bed in the front hallway. It was awesome. My share house buddies became my family and I lost touch with my school friends.

A year later some of us flew to a new city, and this time I got a full-time job at McDonalds and half a room. I was going up in the world.

It wasn’t until I turned twenty that I realised how shit my life was, how fast it was going nowhere. And my friends were less fun now, because by then they were hopelessly drug addicted and unemployed, and I’d started to stick out a bit. I refused to give up my ‘rubbish job’ - their words - and stay up all night with them. Instead I’d scream at everyone in the early hours as they partied because ‘I have to go to work in the morning!’ Sometimes they stole from me. One of them stabbed me. It was with a fork, but still . . .

By then I’d gained enough status to occupy the tiny sleep-out at the back of the house. Only newbies slept in lofts. One night I lay awake listening to them, wondering what it was I was holding onto so tightly. I had a sense of floating in dark water, trying not to sink out of sight but having nothing to hold onto. I knew I had to get out of there, but I was scared to be on my own.

Somewhere in that sleepless night I wrote ‘If not now, when?’ in blue pen along my wrist. I told myself I was brave enough to make choices, even though I didn’t believe it because my self-esteem was in the toilet. But I kept telling myself that as I rolled onto my side and pulled the pillow over my head.

That week I signed up for a course in admin work. I pictured myself wearing skirts and having nice hair and working a nine to five job and having my own little flat, while I studied on my real career at night.

I was more maladjusted than I gave myself credit for though. I earned the Doesn’t Play Well tag early. But I tried, I really did. And I signed up with an employment agency, and I even got a really cool case worker who would take me out for coffee and tell me that I just had to trust my new life and go easy on myself and stay the fuck away from your old friends because real friends don’t stab you with forks, Rachel!

My first job was a temporary one, and that quickly became my thing; the ability to slot in quietly and not annoy people with questions about the photocopier. I got my little flat. I learnt to budget. I bought a few nice things that made it a home. I was becoming. I felt a new, fledgling life under my bones. I grew potted herbs on my kitchen windowsill and started to think about studying at night.

Now here I was, on the couch of the little flat I had worked so hard for, my arms wrapped around my ribs as I rocked, because I was losing it all, before the end of my very small life.

#

The other world, the world of my prison, is rudely intruding on the more peaceful one I’ve constructed for myself. A world where I sit with my feet swishing about in the slow-moving stream, hearing a rustle and turning to see Marshmallow, plump and furry, running towards me. There are figures behind him, laughing and calling my name. I want to jump up and run over to them . . .

But I’m hungry and I need to pee again.

I sit up and a wave of dizziness sweeps over me. I feel faintly sick.

I eat, and drink, and take a shower, stepping in and pressing the panel with my foot like I’ve been doing it my whole life. I only jump a little as the water hits me. I stand in that warm, stinking water and scrub myself with my hands, trying to bring myself back to life. I wash my hair. When the shower shuts off and drains away I stand here as the blowing air dries me and the walls, trying to breathe through the panic. I don’t know if I’ve lost my mind (maybe there was no asteroid maybe I’m in a mental health unit right now) or if I’m some weird government experiment. Perhaps I’m being watched right now, by a bank of evil scientists standing behind a two-way mirror.

Maybe there’s no-one here at all.

Somehow that thought is even more terrifying, the idea I’m out here, floating in space, by myself.

The food. The water. Left for me. A bed to sleep on.

Through my paranoia I let slip thoughts of hope. I’ve survived. And it’s not like I’m anyone special, which means others must be here as well. Maybe whoever is in charge of this place is just busy, with all the survivors . . .

I’m in dark water again, searching for something to hold onto.

As the panel snaps down I feel a fierce need to do . . . something. I won’t curl up on my bed again, feeling sorry for myself and trying to disappear. I go out into my small living space, and I start a yoga routine.

Naked space yoga, in front of a window’s view of the stars, is a hell of a thing.

I haven’t done yoga since the news of 2023QF5 - or Twenty-three, as we’d starting calling it that spring - had broken all our brains. And I’d only been doing it for a year or so before that. When I started it was because people who worked in offices and wore skirts and had nice hair did yoga classes, and I was invited by one of them while I was working in a larger office, before going to the accounting firm. I tried to make friends and got invited out to coffee with little groups of my co-workers. Small steps.

But now my body is stiff and groaning as I stretch. I feel myself begin to breathe harder. My breasts wobble as if they’re alarmed about this new ploy. My hamstrings feel like leather and my downward dog is so difficult I fall to my knees.

Its fucking brilliant.

I’ve found something to help take up my endless supply of time, something from my old life. And I’ve found something else, as well. I decide to tell you my story.

I know you’re not real. I make you up - my invisible audience, wondering at this nondescript person, this survivor who escaped not just the apocalypse but the planet, albeit not of her own doing. I’ll try to give you the most accurate account I can recall, one step at a time, because my memory seems to work better when I do that. And I’ll try to be brave, because . . .

There are a few things that are bothering me.

I mean, yes, I’m stuck in a strange kind of apartment in space, far away from my own planet, naked and terrified with no idea how long I’m going to be held here or even if I’ll ever escape . . .

But there’s more.

#

Because I refused to leave my flat the police eventually showed up. They felt sorry for me though. The tallest one drew me aside.

‘Look, we’ll tell them you’ve agreed to vacate within 24 hours, okay? But after that, we can’t help you. Put your stuff in storage and go stay with family.’

‘I don’t have any family . . .’

But there was no point in arguing with him. He was trying to be kind, and he looked like he hadn’t slept in weeks.

When they left I curled up on the rental-grey carpet and cried for a solid hour. I’d been crying for days, but this was different. Because I was falling through the cracks, and I knew it. There was nowhere for me to go. There were no avenues for me to follow up on, no legal help or charity that could help me. Everyone out there was crying out for help. No-one was coming to rescue us.

I knew I had to leave, but before I did I had a long, hot shower. I scrubbed myself with the last of my coconut-scented body wash, dried myself and wrapped myself in a towel, which was just as well because when I stepped into my bedroom my neighbour was sitting on my bed, tears streaming down her freckled face.

I didn’t know my neighbour very well. And I wasn’t in the mood to be kind. I moved around her and stared getting dressed, out of her eyeline.

‘They’ve doubled my rent,’ she sniffled.

‘I know. Me too.’

‘They’ve doubled it!’

‘I know!’ I shouted. I yanked up the fly of my favourite jeans, pulled on my favourite t-shirt. When I finished getting dressed I looked at my shoes. What kind of shoes are best for being homeless in?

‘I uh, heard you before. After the police left . . .’

Oh, fuck these paper-thin walls.

‘And I haven’t had anyone to talk to. I thought . . .’

‘I’d offer to double up and split the rent,’ I said. ‘But I’ve lost my job.’

‘Me too. I have a rescue cat.’

‘What?’

‘A rescue cat. What’s going to happen to him?’

‘What about your boyfriend?’ I’d been seeing him coming and going for weeks now. Blonde. Tall. Big nose.

‘He dumped me the day it happened. Ghosted me.’

‘Oh. Wow. Sorry.’

‘You lost your job too?’

‘Yeah.’

I sat on the bed and yanked on my boots as she wiped her nose. She had light red hair that hadn’t been washed in days. I didn’t know what her name was.

‘Don’t you have someone to stay with?’ I asked.

‘No.’ Despite her tears she answered with a bitterness I recognised. ‘I mean I have friends . . . workmates, mostly. I’ve rung most of them. They’ve all quit their jobs and gone home.’

‘You don’t have family?’

‘My grandparents. They’re both gone now.’

Silence.

‘I’m on my own too,’ I volunteered, and it felt strange.

‘I have some relatives nearby. They’re moving into the family home together. They say it’s going to get bad, that it’s best to stick together, so I rang, but . . .’

‘There’s no room for you?’

‘They said I haven’t been in touch with them enough over the years. They don’t know me well enough.’

‘That’s just an excuse,’ I said.

‘I know.’ She sniffed. ‘I like your boots.’

‘Thanks.’

On such small moments do friendships start.

We stayed up all night, drinking cheap wine and eating macaroni and cheese for dinner. In the morning we packed what we could carry. I had a backpack and a small suitcase. Amy - that was my new best friend’s name - had two suitcases and a cat carrier. Her cat’s name was Marshmallow, a big ball of white and smudged-grey floof. Marshmallow crouched unhappily in his carrier as we put him into my hatchback and drove to Pam and David’s house. We broke in through the laundry window, and moved in.

#

I’m feeling a little better about things.

I’ve had ‘lunch.’ And I did anther yoga routine. My muscles feel warm and fuzzy.

But there are still a lot of moments to fill, a lot of time I find myself staring into space (ha ha). The panic is never far away, or the questions that are crowding my mind, now that I’ve stopped screaming them at the walls.

I’ve been pacing and bouncing on the balls of my feet. Now I’m doing a handstand, my heels resting against the wall, blood rushing downwards as I stare at the Earth and its lovely patterns. I wish I had a book to read, my phone, an iPad. A piece of paper and a pen. Two rocks to bang together. Something. I don’t know how long I’m going to be able to hold out for.

#

By the time spring warmed into summer Amy and I had adjusted to life in suburbia.

We spent hours lying on the pool loungers, pleasantly drunk and watching Marshmallow prowl around his new home. We started saying things like, ‘It might miss us,’ and ‘It will probably miss us. Space is so big, right?’

And it was true. The percentages on our survival seemed to change daily, depending on what news channel you watched, what scientist you listened to, which tweets you believed. But there was always a chance.

We had a daily routine; in the morning we’d drive to the supermarkets to scrounge up what we could. In the afternoon we chilled by the pool. In the evenings we locked up early and stayed indoors.

The electricity was still on. Pam and David had left behind a few bottles of wine. There was food in the pantry and freezer. And neither of us had ever had a pool before. It was glorious.

In the world beyond our temporary home we had what Amy called a shoestring government. It turned out Bianca was made of more stoic stuff than I’d given her credit for. She surrounded herself with an equally resolute and impossibly young-looking staff. They gave daily pressers. They reiterated that nothing was certain, that we had to ‘see this through, together.’

I would have voted for her if the world hadn’t ended.

Life then was both terrifying and strangely wonderful. When you stop taking it for granted a lot of things cease to matter, and other things take its place. I would dive into the pool and marvel at the way the bubbles would curl around my body. We ate weird meals, like packet rice and stale bagels, and enjoyed them because we knew things were slowly getting worse. We watched movies and read books and got happy-drunk, dancing around the pool to music I can’t quite remember. The neighbours left us alone on the unspoken proviso that we would share what we had when asked; half a loaf of bread here, some frozen or canned vegetables there.

At the same time it was getting scary out there. People would literally fight you for a packet of pasta in the supermarket, or try and rob you as you left. As soon as the sun started going down gangs of people would be out roaming, in cars or on foot. It was better in the burbs, but even there I remember how everyone would chase their kids inside as the sun lowered, blinds drawn, doors locked, cars tucked into garages. There were no dog walkers or joggers after five, just an eerie silence, punctuated by the occasional bird call.

Life was just how it was. And I’m glad we had each other to watch our backs.

Then Dorothy showed up.

#

Something has happened.

I was remembering chlorine, and the six-pack of vodka cruisers we’d found at the bottom of the pantry and how Marshmallow’s purrs felt against my chest, when my prison gave a slow, shuddering jerk.

My brain is screaming. I’m frozen.

All around me there’s a loud humming. My first thought is that I’m about to die. It’s a common thought. Perhaps I’m about to be jettisoned from whatever this room is attached to. The band of evil scientists or aliens are bored of me. I’ll drift out into space and starve to death.

Besides the hum I keep thinking I hear other noises, strange clicks and the sound of machinery, but my heartbeat is so loud in my ears it’s hard to be sure. I’m just sitting here, as still as a rabbit caught in headlights. Then I notice the Earth has moved.

I run over to the window, panicking for real now. That small blue and white world has sat in the top right corner for as long as I’ve been here, but now it’s in the centre, so high up I’m frightened it’s going to disappear altogether, and I press my body against the glass, my eyes wide, drinking it in as I pound the flat of my hand on the glass and shout, ‘No, no!’

I can’t have the Earth disappear.

I can’t my only view be of that cold blackness outside.

My breath catches in my throat. The Earth is moving. How is it moving?

I’m in idiot. The Earth isn’t moving.

I am.