Chapter 26
A list of Gebre’s lovers, as told to me over breakfast before the singing-in of the dawn:
Enkh – the first love, a wild and passionate thing that both parties knew would last for ever, and which in fact lasted precisely nine and a half weeks, during which time they discovered both the joys and the inconveniences of sex before splitting up over furious commtext.
Rehtod and Nesusa – Rehtod was brisk, blunt to the point of rudeness, and firmly believed their number would never be called.
Nesusa was gentle, kind, with a gift for making everyone around him feel safe, seen, heard.
He was the last of his family still on Adjumir, and every job he took seemed to end with his colleagues being called to Exodus, leaving him behind.
He swore he didn’t mind, and Rehtod declared they didn’t care, and they ended up joining a group of numberless who had decided that the entire supernova business was just an Assembly trick, a conspiracy led by a secret cabal that the people of Adjumir were simply too blind to see.
Mahwa – she had been taught the binding arts of her islands, and liked the way Gebre’s body reacted to her skills.
Gebre liked that in Mahwa’s hands there was no illusion of agency, but te had to entirely let terself go and trust in the one that bound ter, beg when te was told to beg, be quiet when te was told to be quiet, even when te shook with the urge to cry out.
By then, Gebre felt sure that ter number would never be called, and Mahwa said she didn’t care either way, and their relationship fell apart when Mahwa was offered a place on a slowship, the Light of Hadda, which Gebre knew was a deathtrap and which flight Mahwa took anyway, into the dark of the uncertain skies.
There were others, of course. As the years ticked down, Gebre found terself craving simple sexual pleasure more, and meaningful companionship less.
Encounters were brief, sensual and, as much as could be contrived, without consequence.
Those whose numbers had been called, off-worlders, even the occasional Pilot, who should be mad, might be a monster – they were ideal.
Temporary, enjoyable, then gone. After all, what was there to say, now that the end is shining in the sky?
Better simply to enjoy, to be enjoyed, to let go and give in.
In this way, Gebre drifted towards the end of days, bouncing from lover to lover, and never once, not for a single moment, permitting terself to love.