The Morality Act

I knew I shouldn’t have done it. It was a small kiss. A peck. Nothing harmful, but I could feel my heart thumping and knew he could too. How will I explain this to him when I get home? Should I say I was running to catch the bus? Or climbing stairs? Maybe I saw something traumatic?

It was at that point I realised I was grossly overthinking the entire thing. I felt my locket thumping constantly and I never think twice about it. Well sometimes I do if it goes on for a while, but this was a second. A kiss that didn’t linger. No one saw us. No one would know. I would. He would.

_________________________

The complexities of a marriage are profound. But since the Morality Act 2102, they increased by magnitudes. It was only two years ago I laid there taking in my surroundings with immeasurable fear but hoped that I was still making the right choice.

The blinding surgical light blaring overhead with the nurses counting their instruments had started to give me cold feet. You’re in too deep, there’s no turning back. Tom’s doing the same thing in the next operating room. It’s ok, it’ll be fine. She kept repeating that thought for what seemed like hours, but in reality as she kept glancing at the large digital clock on the wall, the red LED bulbs reflecting a mere three minute change in time.

Finally, the consultant surgeon came in, indicated by the rest of the staff’s attention sharpening and his hands, freshly washed, dripping, suspended in the air in front of him, fingers pointing vertically.

“Good morning, Gwen!” he said cheerily. “Are you ready?”

“Yes, I am,” I replied hearing my voice shake uneasily as I spoke. Once again, trying to coax my mind into submission, well knowing that I was in no way ready and was absolutely terrified.

I saw the surgeon putting his gown and gloves on and thought about the inherent risks involved. 150 years ago 55% of marriages ended up in divorce. But I love Tom. There is no way he would want to hurt me, no matter how easy. Then the doctor began explaining exactly how it works.

Picking up a small cylindrical ring with an interlocking clasp, the consultant unclipped the clap and held it in his palm and crouched down to my height level. I leaned my head to his side, hearing the polypropylene cap swishing against the headrest.

“So Gwen, the heart, as I’m sure you know, produces the largest electromagnetic field of any organ.” I didn't in any way know that but I was not going to let him know that. “You have given us the date and time of your wedding ceremony right? When is it again?”

The nurse interjected with “Sunday June 11th, at 4PM.”

As soon as she stated that information, with great authority I might add, I realised I had in fact not given any information on my wedding date, nor time. Maybe Tom had? I’ll have to ask him later. But either way it was correct Sunday June 11th at 4PM. That was the time that we were to be wed…till death do us part right?

The surgeon continued. “So when the officiator hears you both say ‘I do’ he will enable this little device called a cardiac magnetometer,” he said flexing his fingers in sequence around cylinder. He pressed a tiny button at the corner of the clasp and a small blue light started flashing. “This will provide a live recreation of your heart rate to your partner.”

“I’m sorry, how will they see my heart beat?” I asked.

“They won’t see it,” he replied. “Your partner will feel it. And you will feel theirs.”

“How?”

“Through this,” he replied. Closing his hand around my magnetometer he stood up out of his crouching position and brought what looked like a small jewellery box toward me. He got down on one knee and opened the box in an ironic way that made me think he does this with every engaged patient before their marriage surgery. “This is your locket,” he said. “When you put it on you feel Tom’s heartbeat against yours.”

“That’s romantic”, I said. “But why do I need this?”

“In case he cheats.”

“What? Why?!” I heard my own volume rising unintentionally.

“If he does, you just open the locket here,” he said demonstrating a small hinge and opening the heart shaped locket he showed a bare inside. “Now your right thumb please.”

I could feel the nurse taking hold of my arm at the wrist and just above the elbow, pressing into my flesh with an assertiveness that I could feel was anything but optional. Reaching my right arm over my body she grabbed my thumb and placed it on the surface of the inside of the locket. Behind the blackness of the flat back of the necklace I could see a tiny blue line running up and down reading my thumb’s imprint from the top to the bottom and back again. After removing my thumb the plain black surface flashed green.

The consultant continued, “if he cheats, you open the locket and if you press your thumb inside the locket activates so to speak. The one he wears will emit a magnetic pulse that will push his heart into ventricular fibrillation; plainly speaking, his heart will beat incredibly fast. That will initially cause shortness of breath, nausea, dizziness, and severe chest pain. If it goes on for even a few minutes..." He let that pause linger, looking at me with a severe appearance that I knew the end of the sentence without him stating it. "As long as you are faithful to him and he is faithful to you this will never be a problem.”

My head was spinning. I kept asking myself how I had never realised what these necklaces meant everywhere. As long as I could remember I saw them everywhere, on everyone's necks. Every married person had one. Had I thought they were cute? Or a fad beyond what was normally socially acceptable? It was dawning on me now how serious these were. My future husband held my life around his neck…and I held his. The only thing that could snap me back into the moment was hearing the surgeon start speaking again and an oxygen mask covering my face.

“Now I’m going to count down from ten, nine, eight, you should start to feel drowsy now...seven, six, five, four…your eyes should feel really heavy.” All I wanted to do was scream, to get off the table, to call off this wedding, but he just continued counting. “three, tw—…” blackness.

Waking up I felt, for all intents and purposes, normal. There was nothing I could sense that had been done to me. I could only feel my heartrate a bit more than usual. Similar to when you walk up a flight of stairs and you can feel the intensity of your heart pumping in your ears. The only difference was it was out of step. A staccato tapping in my chest with a beat coming in between a normal heart rate. Looking at my chest I felt the warm metal. Looking around me in my hospital bed I saw the drab décor of the hospital room and a polypropylene blue curtain separating me from looking outside the room. To my right, Tom opened his eyes and had the same discovery I had made not 15 seconds earlier. I reached up to my neck to unclasp the heart locket only to drag my fingertips along the chain to no avail.

It was unnatural, even tormenting. At that moment the doctor entered and the beating stopped. “That’s what it will feel like on Sunday,” he said. I didn’t see him holding any device but he was obviously the controller.

“Why is there no clasp?” I asked.

“Because you have no need to ever take them off,” he responded without even looking up from my chart. “The Morality Act is clear. Cheating is not in the interest of your family. Your lives are in each other’s hands. Should you decide to not go ahead with the wedding you must come back to the hospital together to get the magnetometers removed. Not that you’d want too of course.” His smile was unnerving and put me off kilter. As he was exiting the room, he turned around and pause for a second.

“I should mention that activating the locket is not up to you. It’s the law. If you don’t activate it yourself both activate. We’ll know.”

I couldn’t believe what he was saying. How would the necklaces know? It couldn’t be.

__________________________

As I pushed my apartment door open something felt off. Maybe it was colder than usual. I couldn’t say in all honestly. There was just something amiss. But the flat looked fine. From the landing I heard Tom in the kitchen.

“Tom!” I called. “What are you cooking?!”

No response. Silence. Maybe he didn’t hear over the sound of the gas, water boiling and extractor fan. I walked into the kitchen to see him chopping vegetables on the island.

“Tom,” I said placing a hand on his back. “You okay? Did you hear me come in?” He stood, unaffected by my intrusion.

Stepping around his shoulder I looked at his face and watched as a single tear dragged its way along his to edge of his nose and hit the cutting board.

Lifting his face, I could see the redness of his eyes. The sadness in the contours of his forehead and his lips tightened but quivering gave me a pang of guilt and fear.

After completing the carrot he had under the chef’s knife he pulled his phone out of his pocket setting it on the counter. I took a hold of it and as I picked it up the screen unlocked to a camera image…of me. It was crystal clear. It was an angled camera shot image from my chest height. It was of me kissing someone that’s not my husband. I finally understood what the doctor meant by “we’ll know”.

…shortness of breath, nausea, dizziness…