Pentimento: a dystopian Beauty and the Beast (7 page)

"Yes. I do come alone here often," Iris said, understanding the many questions roaming in his mind like cockroaches. It happened to her many times. "Part of the Council's advertisement had peeled on its own due to aging, probably erosion factors, which means the building, and the Ruins, are substantially old. Natural Pentimento usually happens like that, due to nature and aging. My father's methods are a bit unorthodox."

"Which means this is what the world looked like before the Beasts came." Colton's enthusiasm peaked even more. But then he stopped atop the ladder suddenly, gazing into the grayed distance of the Ruins. "But what really happened here? What happened to the world before the Beasts came?"

"Maybe you were right about the Beasts saving us from our own doing," Iris said, although she never bought into the theory. She was open for suggestions though.

"I know that was my original theory," Colton said. "But I can't imagine humans did this," he stared up at the sky. "I mean, we couldn't have done that to the planet. Look at how we crave nature. How we wish there were real and healthy trees and flowers in The Second. We love this world. Something else happened here. Maybe the Beasts themselves did this; destroyed the world to rule it thereafter."

"Maybe they destroyed us and then felt guilty about it," Iris was just playing along, hoping the conversation might lead somewhere.

"I don't think the Beasts are capable of feeling guilt," Colton gazed down at Iris. "They took Eva."

"And many other girls." Iris reminded him.

"Yes," Colton felt ashamed. "You know, I feel horrible that I had never questioned the Call of the Beast until they took Eva. I mean horrible things could be happening around us, and we'd never care, as long as we think they won't happen to us. Then when a close one gets hurt, we suddenly realize we are so vulnerable and weak."

Wow. Iris wanted to run up the ladders and hug him now. It was childish, she knew. Absurd. And almost disrespectful to Eva. But when someone you like so irrationally adds some rational reason for liking them, that's when it really feels right. Iris didn't think Colton thought deeply about others. He may not have been that way all along, but now he cared. Iris liked people who cared.

"If we work as a team, we might find the truth," Iris said.

Colton gave her that damn stare again, as if he wanted to apologize for not meeting her before. "So why don't they mention such a place in our schoolbooks?" he changed the subject. "I'm smelling a great conspiracy here."

"If there is a conspiracy, then it's the Council who must know what happened to the world in the past."

"Tell me, Iris. How much did you peel off of this wall?"

"Not much," she said. "It's a tiring and slow process. The black light-or any X-ray instrument-only shows what has partially worn off, but never what's buried underneath. I only worked on places where I thought the words underneath seemed to make sense. If you notice, what lies beneath the Council's painting is tons of scribbling and older ads. Someone thought this wall was a great place to rant. There are parts full of weird graffiti too."

"I noticed," Colton focused the light on a part near him. "Co," he began reading a peeled part that caught his eyes. "Ca," he continued. "Co again, and then the Council's advertisement hasn't peeled off yet. What do you think that is? Some kind of message? Co-ca-co?"

"I'm suspecting the letter after it is an L, but I abandoned this part, because the word didn't make any sense to me," she said. "Co-ca-col. What could that be?"

"You're right. It's like gibberish, although someone took the time with the calligraphy of the words, making them look nice and unusually big. Maybe that was what the older government in the First United States called themselves. Cocacolton." He smirked, knowing it wasn't funny. Iris thought he was just trying to ease the tension. She'd never considered Colton funny. Hot boys usually weren't.

"That'd be silly," Iris joked. "It also isn't what I am looking for."

Colton stopped on the ladder and pointed the light down at her. "I understand. We should be looking for something that could tell us about what happened, or what the world was like before the Beasts."

"Someone must have left a clue that's hidden underneath the Council's advertisement."

"Are you saying the Council's advertisement was here to cover up the past? The history of the Earth?" Colton said. "But why didn't the Council just blow up the buildings?"

"I'm not saying this was done intentionally," Iris said. "My father told me it's a natural process through the years. Newer generations paint their graffiti and their advertisements on the older painting of generations before. Every generation marks their words on the walls of history. When time passes, the older painting sometimes shows through, like on this wall."

"But you couldn't have spent all this time and not found something interesting," Colton noted. "What was the spot you found and think means something that makes sense?"

"Actually, I did find one sentence. Come down here," Iris said, and Colton did. She took the black light from him, and pointed it at a part of the wall that was eye-level to them.

"What the freaky deaky holy mushrooms is that?" Colton squinted. Iris almost laughed. "Oh," he scratched his head. "It's something Cody likes to say. I figured if I am going to start investigating things, I'd say it." Colton escaped his embarrassment by staring back at the words on the wall.

The words showing from underneath looked like they had been written by hand. Probably with some spray. It was an incomplete sentence. A long one:

“
Human always see what the ...”

Colton read it and stopped. The rest of the sentence was buried under a drawing of a huge green credit card, part of the Council's advertisement. Colton gazed back at Iris. "Why this sentence?"

"I don't know," Iris shrugged her shoulders. "It's just a feeling I have. I mean 'Humans Always See What The…' What? It's such a strange statement. I have this deep inner feeling that it means a lot."

"I have no idea," Colton tried to rub some dust off the sentence with the palm of his hand.

"'Humans Always See What The...' and then?" Iris repeated, thinking.

Colton scratched the back of his head and let out an awkward laugh. "I don't really know. But I know why the sentence in this Pentimento caught your attention."

Iris watched him in silence.

"This sentence feels like it has to do something with Pentimento," Colton explained. "The idea of Pentimento is that you can find an older image of something underneath the newer one. It has a lot to do with seeing, and so does this sentence."

"I think you're right," Iris said. "I might have overreacted to it. It could be nothing," Iris lay her back against the wall. "I'm sorry. I know you really want to know what happened to Eva."

"I do," Colton said. "But how about you? Why are you doing this?"

Iris tried to keep her mouth shut. She wasn't going to tell him that she'd wished for his girlfriend to be taken by the Beasts, even if it was just a slip of the tongue. "I don't know," she said. "I guess since I was exposed to the Pentimento idea, I always wished there was more to this life. Also, and this is something I don't think you could relate to, I always felt like a stranger in a strange land in this world."

"Who told you I don't feel that way?" Colton leaned forward and placed his palm on the wall, right next to her head. His gaze freaked her out again and again. He was too close this time. She hadn't thought he'd be. "I've always felt like a stranger in my own body. I mean, I am a product of what others think of me. Colton, the hunk. Loved by girls, expected to win at sports and dress so cool everyday. Something here about you," he shrugged. "I mean about the Ruins," he switched his gaze to the wall.
Way to go, Colton, she thought. Comparing me to the Ruins.
"I know I hated it when I first stepped into it. But now I suddenly fell in love with the Ruins. With all the gray shades hovering above it, it feels likes a real place, where I could be who I want to be."

"So you're not disappointed I couldn't be of much help?" Iris wondered. Did this mean she could see him again?

"Are you kidding me," Colton took some steps back and raised his hands in the air. "With all those possible Pentimentos here, we'll keep on looking until we know what happened before the Beasts came..."

Suddenly, Iris could hear a faint low hum droning somewhere. She exchanged worried looks with Colton, hoping the slugs hadn't found them. But it wasn't the slugs. It was a faint sound coming from The Second itself.

"It's the horn," Colton said, his face tightening. "Why aren't our phones beeping?"

"There is no signal in the Ruins," Iris said, pulling his hands. "We have to go back now. It's only been a week since..." she couldn't say 'Eva.'

"We can't let this keep happening, Iris," Colton said. "I wonder which girl has been chosen this time."

Iris headed home later and ate dinner with her father, who still took care of her dead mother's vacant chair. Iris saw the placemat was there, and a fork and a spoon, and an empty plate. Her father wasn't crazy. He just did it out of respect to his deceased wife. Once in a while, Iris would catch him staring at the chair, wondering if her mother's ghost sat there with them.

Charles hadn't been as talkative since his wife died. He'd even abandoned his basement hobby since then, as if there was no point of searching for the truth, if he couldn't share it with the love of his life. Iris respected that and ate silently.

Unlike other families, Charles wasn't worried about his young girl turning seventeen. Parents in The Second spent an overly-anxious year when their daughters reached that age. Zoe's parents were like that. The fear for their child's safety oozed out of their eyes, thinking their daughter didn't notice it. “Being a teenager sucks,” Zoe would say. No wonder she was so anxious to attend Vera's birthday when the girl only bullied her in school. Eighteen was like going to heaven, being freed from a death sentence, and even splitting up one's cocoon and finally becoming a butterfly.

But if families were that worried, they got to celebrate their child's freedom once every week. And today was such a day, because another girl had been chosen by the Beasts. One girl's misery was all other girls’ happiness in The Second--and probably for at least five more days. A Call by the Beasts never came sooner than five days of the last summons.

"I escaped school today, daddy," Iris said, not looking at him.

"And why do you feel the need to tell me?" Charles breathed into the soup. He was neither angry nor happy. He was just there, unsure of what to feel about the world.

"Hmm...I just thought it'd be better coming from me, than from the school's principal."

"The school stopped informing me a while ago, since I never replied," he said.

Iris thought her father was the best in the world, although he seemed a bit irresponsible lately. She thought he didn't believe in the system, just like her, and so he preferred not to interact with it. To just be there, a clown in the circus.

"I know I am supposed to be happy that you're not yelling at me for skipping school like Zoe's parents," Iris said. "But sometimes I am afraid you’ve given up on me."

Charles dropped the spoon and faced her. He tried smiling in an assuring way, but it came out weak and fragile. "I will never give up on you," he cupped her hand into his. "I will fight dragons for you."

"Dragons aren't real, dad," she smiled. She loved how he still talked to her as if she were ten. Frankly, she missed the feeling of being ten, where mysteries and dangers were just happy imaginations filling her mind. Now, she was growing up in the real world, where everything was so real, it cut through the flesh sometimes.

"Then I'll fight the Beasts," he pulled his hand back and drank the soup straight from the bowl. "Sorry, Gabrielle," he nodded at her mother's chair. Her name was Gabrielle-Suzanne, and she would have never allowed it.

"Sorry mother," Iris followed, and drank straight from the bowl as well. Her father burped after. Iris sucked at burping. She couldn't do it.

"Now I can slay dragons and Beasts for you," he wiped his lips with the back of his hand. Iris laughed so hard, her stomach ached a bit.

"So what was her name?" Charles's face changed suddenly. Iris knew he was asking about the girl who'd been chosen today. Her mouth twitched, remembering the scene, watching her cry herself to death as she walked toward the ship of light.

"Elia Wilson," Iris said, lowering her head with respect. No family liked to talk about the Brides at dinner. No one even talked about the Brides after they were gone. Her name wasn't even going to be mentioned in the electronic paper's obituary the day after. Being the Bride was even worse than death itself. A member of society, a girl, has just vanished from The Second today. She hadn't even left any Pentimento behind. Her name would even disappear from records in the years to come. It was the Law of the Beast: We'll give you all you need to live the metallic dead life you've asked for, and we will take one girl full of life every now and then.

All Iris could think about now was Elia's family, sitting at some dinner table, asked to pretend their daughter never existed. It was against the law to protest, mourn, or even question. In fact, many people embraced the idea that the Call of the Beast was a savior for humanity. That one girl had to be sacrificed for some holy wisdom that made no sense. There was this old story that a woman prophet had descended upon Earth centuries ago, to show humans the right path. A woman who was believed to have been a descendent of the Beasts. But humanity, in its denial for all good sent to it, refused to believe in her and hung her on a cross to die. Unknown to them, the woman had been killed and elevated back up to the Beasts, to wash over the sins of humanity. And that's why the Beasts take a girl in their Call, as a remembrance for humanity's unkind actions of killing the lovely Lady Jesus. Theories and stories were a dime a dozen, the truth was the one story never told.

"Elia Wilson," Charles said the name as if reciting a prayer. He flipped his phone on, and looked up her name and address. "Got it." he said. "You want to do this?" He asked his daughter.