Bill
lay on his back, naked except for a pair of ill-fitting sneakers, hands
clasped behind his head, looking up at the clouds. The sun's rays
played through some pine trees, dappling his body with shifting
patterns of light. It was a warm afternoon in early October, and he lay
on the gentle rise behind the cabin.
There were so many things
that were totally new to him. Sunshine. Grass. Space. Beautiful,
wonderful Alison, his savior and hero, lying beside him every night. If
he ever woke in the dark, he could count on her warm soft presence.
Even in the deepest sleep, her chest rose and fell, assuring him of her
life.
His semen was his to do with as he pleased. No more
plastic cups. He could keep it to himself. Mostly he and Alison were in
hearty agreement that he should tuck it up into the far end of her
vagina at least a couple times a day. Whenever one of them was in the
mood, the other could be awakened to passion very quickly. If Bill's
organ was stubbornly limp after multiple bouts of sex, he could nuzzle
his face between Alison's legs and bring her pure pleasure with the
work of his tongue.
He remembered the first time he felt fully
recovered, as they lay down for the night. The full moon outside lit
the room as by magic, and the two of them worked slowly and sensuously
towards a coupling -- with no hurry, no fear of interruption, and no
need to part when they were done. It had been absolutely perfect, his
thrusting rising over a half hour in strength, depth and speed,
punctuated at the end by simultaneous cries of pure ecstasy. And they
had fallen asleep within minutes.
Above all what he cherished
was freedom. He could walk a mile in any direction, stay as long as he
liked, and walk back. He could walk away and never come back to Alison.
That was the last thing on his mind, but still -- he could. He was free.
Today
Alison had gone on the long trek to the designated spot to pick up
supplies from Amy. He stayed at the cabin because he simply could not
be seen by anyone. Someone who had seen one of the "Wanted" posters of
Alison might recognize her from close up if she saw her face. But the
sight of any man would be alarming and cause to notify the authorities.
Shaving his beard off would help a little, but this was a society
without razors. Shaving body hair on women was a sickness of the
patriarchy, and society was free of it now.
Bill thought he
picked up the sound of voices at some distance. This was alarming. He
scrambled down the hill away from the cabin into a hollow and hid as
best he could behind a bush. Before long, he heard Alison's sweet voice
from a distance. "Honey, I'm home!"
Bill was wary. Could someone have captured Alison and forced her to
lead them to Bill at gunpoint?
Alison spoke again in a loud, clear voice. "Where are you, dear? I've
got a surprise."
He heard her speak in a low voice and then another answered her. A
familiar voice. Amy?
He
crept around the hill to where he could get a view of the cabin, and
there he saw Alison emerge from the cabin to join Amy, who was waiting
outside. Both looked relaxed, not as if they were in the sights of an
unseen woman toting a gun. Two full backpacks leaned against the wall.
"He's not in there, but I'm sure he'll be back soon. Unless... someone
found him?"
"I'm here," he called, to Alison's visible relief, and picked his way
through the woods back to the cabin.
As
he approached, he felt a bit uncomfortable with his nakedness. Both of
these women had seen him naked and had very intimate contact with the
organs on display. But somehow the idea of being naked with either of
them didn't feel right with the other one watching.
"See who I dragged in?" Alison asked with a smile, not seeming to mind.
"Yeah, indeed! Hi, Amy. What happened? -- Actually, first let me get
dressed."
When the supplies were put away and the two travelers could relax with
their feet up, the story began.
"Well, your little wriggly things are enterprising and devious. I'm
pregnant too."
"Oh... From when?"
"I guess my calculations weren't quite right one time."
"Um, congratulations?"
"Yes, thank you."
"How long are you staying?"
"I'm
staying forever. Or at least, I can't go back to the community. I had
the genetic test, and my baby has a defect. They wanted to do the
abortion right then when they told me, but I told them I wanted to
prepare myself. And then I ran off. When my mother was grilling me
about this whole business, there was this part that stuck with me. I
can't stand the thought of snuffing out another boy, just because he's
a boy. Not that he'd suffer or anything, but still..."
"Oh, hmmmm." He thought a moment and smiled. "It's a touching vote of
confidence in my gender."
"You're
the reason. I mean... Alison tells me the two of you are a committed
couple, and I know what we had is all over and done, but just seeing
you as a person -- it changed everything. My mom even explained that
was the reason for degrading you men so much -- so women wouldn't mind
aborting male fetuses. The hard-liners didn't even want to let girls or
women ever see men except for a very few of the most fanatical
Dworkinists. My mom had me doubting it when we talked, but I know men
aren't evil."
Bill nodded and paused. "It will be good to have you."
Alison
addressed him. "I'll say, especially since you can't go anywhere. And
since we're going to have babies. And since Amy is a trained midwife."
"Oh, really! That could be really important."
Amy said, "I'm due first, of course, but hopefully I can teach you two
enough of what I know to get us through it alive."
Amy
had run off with a backpack and a half of stolen food, but it still
wouldn't last terribly long. The three of them had to find more. And
the first step was for the two women to explore far and wide collecting
information. The need to find a reliable supply was urgent, for their
need for supplies would be acute when the women got to mid-pregnancy
and even greater when the babies arrived. Hiking long distances would
become difficult as they neared the end of the pregnancies. The
countryside was covered with abandoned settlements, of course, but they
would not contain any significant food stashes. Wild plants wouldn't
last them through the winter. They figured their best hope was to
explore around the edges of existing communities and see if they could
find any rebels or discontents on the periphery.
Alison was
hiking in a wide circle around Mother Earth, a major community. She
spied a farm with four or five buildings, abandoned judging from the
overgrown state of the fields. But as she watched she saw a woman
emerge from one house and sit on the steps. Alison approached
cautiously until she was 50 yards away.
"Hello," she called softly, and when there was no reaction she called a
bit louder.
After
her fourth attempt, the woman stood up quickly, obviously alarmed. She
dashed inside. After a minute or so, she emerged with another woman.
Alison decided she would have to take her chances, so she approached.
"What are you doing here?" asked the second woman.
"I'm exploring. And you two?"
"We live here, at least for now."
"This doesn't look like it's part of a sanctioned community."
"No, it doesn't, I agree. What are you doing wandering? We guessed you
were not from the police."
Alison smiled. "Hardly. I have my reasons for wandering out here alone."
"As do we. What's yours?"
Alison
decided to use Amy's reason, which would be more palatable than having
sprung a full-grown adult male from captivity. "My baby has a genetic
defect, and I just couldn't face the idea of aborting it, somehow."
The two women looked at each other and nodded. "Welcome to the club. Us
too."
All three smiled and relaxed. "Is it just the two of you?"
They nodded. "And you?"
"I
have a companion -- another woman in the same situation. We live some
distance from here. But we're trying to connect with others."
"We've thought of that, but it seems risky. What's your thinking?"
"There's
strength in numbers. And it seems we'll all be in need of a babysitting
coop." They all smiled at that. "But we also need to find a reliable
food source."
The two others looked at each other. "That's not a
problem we have. Mother Earth is a major farming community, and we have
friends on the inside. They'll keep us supplied indefinitely. Do you
bring anything to the table?"
"Well, my friend is an experienced midwife."
The second woman smiled. "I think we might work out a deal."
The two women were named Tara and Violet.
Amy, Alison, and Bill picked up stakes and moved to another abandoned
farm only a couple miles from them.
Amy, Violet and Tara sat relaxing, with no urgent business at hand.
"I still don't get why you don't want to all move in together," said
Violet. "Here if this is better, your place if it's not."
Amy had been waiting for this conversation. "Have you thought about the
future? After the babies are born?"
"Not too much. What do mothers ever do? Raise their babies."
"But they're going to be boys, right?"
Violet and Tara nodded.
"What do you know about boys? Have you ever met a boy? How is a boy
going to live in this society?"
"I
took care of a baby boy," said Tara. "One we were raising to sell:
David. He was so cute! I couldn't tell anyone that, though. The leaders
kept reminding me that appearances were deceiving. He might seem cute
now, but the seed of evil lurked inside him and would blossom hideously
at puberty. And she's right, of course. But still, I couldn't help
imagining David as I thought about the abortion, and I just couldn't go
through with it."
"So, what happens when your boys get to puberty?"
"We'll figure out something," said Violet.
Tara
said, "I heard a theory that if you raise a boy right, he won't get
violent. That it was all part of the patriarchy. I know that's not what
Dworkinism says."
"True. And I agree they might be wrong about
that. But are you willing to chance it? In 15 years or so, your son
will go through puberty, he'll be stronger than you. What's he going to
do? Are you going to sell him at auction?"
Tara looked at her indignantly.
"Right, I didn't think so. So is he going to go off on his own?"
"No, I figure we'll just live in a community."
"So you're willing to live with a grown man? The same kind who are kept
locked up for sperm donors today?"
"Yes, I guess we are. Grown men who we've raised every step of the way
to be gentle and kind."
"Do you think any men today are gentle and kind?"
"No," said Violet at once.
"At least you couldn't ever be sure," said Tara. "There's a reason they
keep them locked up."
"You
know, my mother was one of the founders, or among that first group at
least," said Amy. "She told me a very interesting story about why we
raise boys alone in cages. We need women to think men are disgusting
worthless animals, or else -- we wouldn't be willing to abort the male
fetuses."
Both women looked surprised.
"Whoa," said Tara. "It didn't work with me -- because I'd seen a little
boy as a person... Makes sense."
"What would you think if a man showed up here one day?"
"I've got a knife," said Violet.
"You think that would keep him at bay?"
"Probably
not, if he was determined. That's one of the things we give up out here
is the safety of a community. Against all kinds of dangers. Fortunately
there are no men on the loose."
"Alison and I knew the sperm donor in our community. I was in charge of
him for a while. He was really a pretty nice guy."
"How could you tell what he'd do if he was loose?"
"Well, we did a sort of experiment. First, I had sex with him."
"No!"
"You're kidding! You let him rape you?"
"It
was through the bars of his cage. You know, like doggy style. And you
won't believe it, but it felt really good. I came to love it. That's
another heresy to Dworkinism. But it's true. He always did just what I
asked. It's really an experience, I assure you."
The two women
looked skeptical. Violet said, "So you were safe, because he was still
behind bars. I mean, he could rape you, but I guess you could always
get away?"
"Right. And then I'd heard that sometimes women who
have trouble getting pregnant might have more success if they actually
had sex with a man the old-fashioned way. So some of the desperate ones
came and stuck their butts up against the bars and got raped. Seemed to
work for a few of them."
"Ewwww!" said Tara with a nervous laugh.
"But
Alison took it further. Alison trusted him. Alison played cards with
him and talked with him and then she let herself into his cell and they
did it in there. And she loved the sex too. And he loved it. They saw
each other every few nights."
The two women were spellbound. "What happened in the end?"
"I've
only got to the middle," said Amy with a smile. "As I said, I was his
handler -- his name was Bill. And I discovered them, and made them
stop. She had unlocked the door! All he had to do was knock her down
and take off. It really freaked me out."
"So you both liked this guy and wouldn't abort your male fetuses..."
said Tara.
"To
that point we'd been keeping the new fertility technique quiet. Just a
very few desperate women knew, ones who were lawbreakers too. Then news
got out somehow. Our community leaders found out. And then the shit
really hit the fan. They got me out of my job in a hurry, and they put
in this woman who's really sadistic. She'd been in charge of our
previous man and he killed himself, and this woman was halfway through
starving Bill to death."
"Then what?"
"Then Alison sprung him. Torched the jail bars in the middle of the
night."
"Is he still on the loose?"
"He's
not 'on the loose'. He lives with us. He's a normal person, just like a
woman. If we're all going to move in together, he comes too."
Violet and Tara looked at each other uneasily.
Amy
sighed. "Except he's not really like a woman. He's got a beard, and
he's tall and strong and has a deep voice. And his penis, plunging in
and out..." She shuddered, smiled and her eyes looked into the
distance. "The biggest mistake I ever made was not trusting him. If I'd
been the one who dared to go into that cell with him, and if I was the
one who sprung him in the middle of the night, he'd be in love with me
now instead of with Alison. But she saw something I didn't, or took a
risk and got lucky, or whatever, and now she's got him and I don't."
Amy emerged from her reverie. "Though I'd appreciate it if you didn't
tell them that last part."
Violet
and Tara stood side-by-side, notably pregnant, at the front of the
shell of an old abandoned church. They sang "Pomp and Circumstance"
with nonsense syllables, not particularly tunefully.
Amy (very
pregnant) and Bill (not in the least bit pregnant) walked down the
aisle arm-in-arm. Waiting at the altar was the very pregnant Alison.
When Amy and Bill reached Alison, Amy tearfully kissed him on both
cheeks and handed him over to Alison, and the two stood as a couple for
the ceremony.
Violet said, "Repeat after me... I, Alison Entwistle, do take you,
William Lake, to be my lawful wedded husband..."
Alison repeated the ancient words after her, phrase by phrase.
"To honor and cherish..."
"To honor and cherish..."
"In sickness and in health..."
"In sickness and in health..."
"As long as you both shall live."
"As long as we both shall live."
Tara led Bill through his part.
"I, William Lake, do take you, Alison Entwistle..."
The vows they had agreed upon were the same.
"To honor and cherish..."
"To honor, cherish and obey..."
Everyone looked at Bill.
"To honor and cherish..." corrected Tara.
"To honor, cherish and obey..."
Bill
looked around. "Hey, she saved my life. She gave me life when I had
nothing. Perhaps my bow to Dworkinism..." He looked thoughtful a
moment. "But not really. It's my choice." He looked at Alison tenderly.
Tara nodded and began again. "To honor, cherish and obey..."
"To honor, cherish and obey..."
"In sickness and in health..."
"In sickness and in health..."
"As long as you both shall live."
"As long as we both shall live."
"You may kiss the groom."
Alison threw her arms around Bill's neck and pulled him down, over her
huge belly, and kissed him passionately.
Bill
patted little Isaac's back as he finally stopped crying, his jerky
irregular breathing giving way to the slower pattern of sleep. Bill
tiptoed out to join the women assembled.
"Hopefully they'll all stay down for a little while," he said.
The
women present were Amy, Alison, Violet, and Tara, along with the newer
arrivals Molly and Wanda. Asleep in the back rooms were five babies.
The oldest was Amy's boy Thomas, ten months. The next was Alison's
daughter Addie, nine months. Andrew was Violet's, not quite nine
months. Victor was Tara's, nearly eight months. Isaac was Molly's child
and the youngest of them at four months. Wanda was due in two weeks.
News
of Violet and Tara's decision had passed by word of mouth through
Mother Earth with its 2,900 inhabitants. Molly and Wanda had decided
that they too would not abort their male fetuses and had run off to
join the small band of outcasts.
Amy spoke. "Violet, tell them all what you heard today, just to make
sure we're all on the same page."
"Nancy
just found out she's carrying a boy, and she wants to join us. And she
says that it's getting more and more common, women confiding to each
other that they don't think it's right to have an abortion. Some talk
about running away, though I doubt most would have the courage."
Amy
said, "But they're all waiting to hear the results of the genetic test,
right? No one's saying, 'I'll go even if it's a girl'."
"Right."
"We're
all happy here, right? Things are going pretty well. We've learned how
to reclaim fields well enough to get decent crops -- nothing like
Mother Earth, of course. We are harboring a despicable, inferior,
dangerous human being but everybody thinks he's OK."
Everyone smiled at Bill. Alison got up and sat in his lap, curling up
against his chest, eliciting more smiles.
"We
have four boys and one girl. If all goes well with Wanda and Nancy,
we'll shortly have six boys and one girl. If Nancy's information is
correct about women thinking more and more about running away, we could
soon have a dozen boys and one girl. I take it everyone sees the
pattern here."
Violet said, "Right. It's like voting with our feet. Dworkinism will
fall."
"Maybe
eventually, but think it through. We're an illegal settlement. No one's
paying much attention to us. But what happens when the news gets back
to the Central Committee that there are a hundred women with a hundred
sons living just a couple miles from Mother Earth? They'll think ahead
to a time when there are a hundred young men in their late teens or
early 20s. There will be more women and some younger boys, but it
doesn't change the picture. What are these young men going to do?
Remember, Dworkinism may have a lot of propaganda in it, but the real
history is clear too. I know it from my reading: gangs of young men are
dangerous."
Tara said, "We'll raise them right. They'll be loving, kind boys."
Amy said, "So we'll all just farm together? And the boys will live as
bachelors?"
"Some might be gay."
"A few. But men at their best like to settle down and get married. Who
are they going to marry?"
"Addie will be a very popular girl," said Violet.
Alison lifted her head long enough to say, "Yeah, well, her mother's
going to have a shotgun."
"They could marry us," suggested Molly.
"We're going to be in our 40s or older."
Molly offered another idea. "We can have more children, if Bill's
willing."
Wanda groaned as the boy in her tummy poked her flesh out visibly with
some limb. "More?"
Alison
lifted her head again. "The deal is that anyone who wants to try for a
new pregnancy should see me. At my command, Bill will produce semen
which I will deliver to you in a small plastic cup."
"Sure we can't convince you to deliver it into a tight, hot, wet,
fleshy cup?" asked Molly seductively.
Bill smiled. "If my wife commands it, I would be willing."
Amy said in a stage whisper, "Willing, ha! I've seen you in action..."
"That was when I was a bachelor," Bill replied and looked fawningly at
Alison.
Resuming
her leader's role, Amy said, "But remember, half of the children we
make out here in the wilderness will be boys too. So maybe there are
120 boys and 20 girls -- it's still a really unstable situation. And I
don't think the Dworkinian authorities would stand for it. Consider
also that the bigger a community gets, the more women will hear about
it and the more will want to join when they find they've got to abort
their boy."
"So what do you suggest?" asked Bill.
"I've
been away for a month, as you know. I've been scouting. There is
perfectly good land a couple hundred miles from here, in a bowl in the
mountains. Isolated. I think we should move there. Very soon."
"But what will the other women do?" asked Violet.
"I
don't know. Maybe they'll come out and when there are enough of them
they'll take off for some other place. Maybe they'll stay and we'll get
to find out what the Central Committee will do."
Violet said, "I
think you're borrowing trouble. Who knows what the future will bring?
Any number of things could happen in the mean time. Like the old
religions preached -- you help the needy in front of you; you don't
wait until you can solve the whole thing."
"I'm thinking of the
people in this room and the babies back there," said Amy, gesturing.
"These are the people in front of me that I want to help."
"You don't know the women at Mother Earth. We do," said Violet.
"I know you do," said Amy. "We're not an indivisible union. We never
made any promises to each other."
"Would you go by yourself?" asked Tara. "Just you and Thomas?"
"No, there has to be a critical mass."
Amy looked around and there were no other comments. "What are your
thoughts?"
"I'm staying," said Violet.
No one else jumped in.
"I
think for me it all depends on what Bill does," said Molly. "I mean, I
know he's married to Alison, so it's not that part. But having a source
of sperm makes a big difference somehow. That's the only way we'll get
girls."
Amy smiled to herself. "Bill?"
"I will do what Alison wants to do."
Alison asked him, "If it was up to you, what would you do?"
"I
am an inferior being. My only purpose for existing is to produce
sperm." The others laughed, but when Bill didn't join in they quieted
quickly. "I'm grateful to be alive and grateful for what I have, which
is more than I deserve." He looked around. "You realize that's what I
was taught. That's what I believed the whole time I was growing up."
"Dworkinism sucks," said Molly softly.
"That was then, this is now," said Alison. "I hereby set you free, O
Genie! You decide as you will."
Bill
smiled at Alison. "I will still do what you decide," he said. "Which
includes going if you stay, or staying if you go, however sad that
would make me. But you want my opinion?"
"That's the idea," said Alison with a touch of exasperation.
"I think we should go."
Amy said, "And you, Alison?"
"Going,
of course." When the others looked at her, she explained with a grin,
"I was going to make him go anyway, I just hoped he'd see it my way."
"So, a show of hands for who's going?" asked Molly. She raised her hand.
Amy's
hand went up, followed by Alison's. Seeing her hand go up, Bill raised
his. Tara hesitated a moment, with a sidelong glance at Violet, and
then raised her hand. Wanda said, "I don't think I'm up for a long
journey."
When she heard of the choice, Nancy left Mother Earth
ahead of schedule and joined the migration to the north. Just Violet,
Andrew, Wanda, and the bulge in Wanda's belly stayed behind.