Into that good night

      They were chatting in the laundry room, waiting for the dryers to stop, when the young man came in. Anneke sized him up and decided she didn’t like the look of him- in his fancy suit and shiny shoes he reminded her of a black beetle. Never mind how his "trust me" blue eyes and perfect white teeth looked. She tightened her lips to cover her own gaps. With all the ease and poise of a born salesman, he chatted winningly about the weather, then asked her age. Hearing that she was just 60, he smiled, tapped his nose secretively, then handed her a small handbill and a free packet of pain tablets. He worked the same slick charm on Elsha, then, with a cheery wave and a conspiratorial wink, he sauntered out the door. What was that all about?

    Anneke read the leaflet with its large print blurb and untraceable email address at the bottom and gave a snort of disgust. What did he think she was, stupid? She crumpled it up and threw it in the bin.Elsha was scanning the print with the aid of a magnifying glass. When she noticed  Anneke’s disapproving glare, the older woman slipped it into her pocket.

     ‘You’re not thinking of contacting that creep, are you? You know about this scam, don’t you?’ Anneke asked, her voice trembling with annoyance.

     Elsha thrust up her chin. ‘Sounds like a good idea to me,’ she answered defensively. ‘I’m 64, but I’m pretty well. I could do with a few more years. Why not?’

     ‘Because I heard about it on my seniors chatline,’ Anneke explained patiently. ‘They do the rounds of apartment blocks, talking to people like us. They promise that for a fee, we can receive an altered microchip implant to falsify our real age. Lots of poor gullible old dears have spent their precious savings in hopes of having some extra years of life, only to find that the operation didn’t replace their chip at all. For the quick time it takes to knock someone unconscious and cut a small slice in one arm with a razorblade, these con men are raking the money in. What a lousy way to make a living, robbing the elderly! Don't know what has gotten into young people these days! Aren't they at all grateful for all we did for them?’

     ‘What’s the point anyway?’ she vented angrily. ‘If you get sick, there’s little need to prolong things. Not these days, with no medical care. Dropping dead's the best way to go, I reckon. Quick and unexpected. No agonising about when your time’s coming up. A few more fake years are no use if you can’t even get a doctor after you’re 60.’

     ‘That’s why my brother and his wife did what they did.’ Elsha said. ‘ They were 59. Nothing wrong with them. Used to the good life. Just plain scared, I guess of getting old and sick and having no money. Spent all their savings on a big trip and a good meal. Then booked into the euthanasia clinic and got done, before they had anything at all to suffer. I couldn’t do that, myself. Something’s bound to come good just after, and you’d miss it, wouldn't you?’

     Anneke agreed. She wasn’t going to give up and admit defeat. ‘Do not go gentle into that good night’ was her motto. How did the poem go? "Rage, rage against the dying of the light…" She was tough. She’d last a while yet.

     Elsha sighed as she folded up a shirt and added it to her stack. ‘Not exactly the way I thought I’d be spending my retirement,’ she remarked as she smoothed out the folds of a sleeve. ‘We’d planned a world trip, eating out at restaurants, enjoying some time together relaxing after all our hard work. Who’d have thought the super schemes would all go bust! Investing so heavily in that failed lunar holidays project did it for ours.’

     Anneke nodded. ‘For us it was insurance collapses – our fund invested too heavily in health insurance, and all those lawsuits just gutted them.’

     There was a thoughtful silence. Here they were, in a basement with drab walls covered  with large print signs and cheap armchairs. The tables to sort washing on were in need of a repaint. Not the ideal retirement at all. There were no pensions any more, no nice retirement villas and golf games, no social security payments.

      Oh sure, the retired were still valued for their skills -with all the able-bodied adults of 2040 flat out covering the varied needs of the modern workplace, retired parents became very handy domestics. Retired Inc. kept a database of elderly clients seeking a home in exchange for domestic work. So, in justice to the future of the young, the retired did as well as they could on their savings or by working for their offspring until 65, and then were euthanased. A generous age really, seeing many did not live that long, and others were really sick by then. Most people had one medical complaint or another by 60. Some chose to go early. With so many old people, there wasn't money to treat them all. Hence the new law and the new way of life, or should that be death?

      There was that group of ex-army men and their wives who had resisted early on, run away to hide out in the hills. They weren’t to know - nobody did in the beginning - their chips had Global Satellite Positioning. The police tracked them in no time. Most died in the firefight. She shuddered at the memory.

      ‘Seen Lila lately?’ she asked, determined to get back to more cheerful topics.

      ‘No, but she’s sure to be with one of her kids,’ Elsha replied. ‘She was always so religious, had about four or five kids if I remember right. So now she goes on little holidays from one to the other, and they buy her stuff and take her on outings. One’s a dentist, and one’s an optometrist, so they look after her that way for free.’ She looked at the magnifier in her hand. ‘Got her bread well buttered, Lila has. Surrounded by love. She’ll never die lonely, that one.’ She folded the sheets, and put them in her basket.

       Her head came up with a sudden thought. ‘Did you hear about Marietta?’ she asked in a hushed tone, giving Anneke a sidelong, questioning look. She was eager for gossip, knowing how close Marietta and Anneke had been.

      ‘Yes. I did.’ Anneke pressed her lips tight together. She could not bear to say more.

      Poor Marietta… Anneke had been distraught when she heard. The body was found dumped in the canal. ‘Strangled’ was the verdict, but there was not much effort shown in pursuing the murderer. Anneke had her suspicions, though there was nothing she could safely say. She’d seen the bruises when Marietta visited on her day off; she’d had a bit of money tucked away too. A house in the country even, though she was too frail to live in it herself. She’d left it to her son in her will. Her son had such a small apartment… it seemed he’d waited and put up with her as long as he could, and then...

     Thank goodness her own dear Helga and Tomas were not like that.
 
     The dryer beeped, startling her out of her thoughts. She opened the door, took out armloads of washing and packed them into her basket. The whole conversation had started one of her headaches. She finished her work in silence, trying to ignore the pain. With a half-smile to Elsha, she left.

     Now for those stairs. Many a time she had wished they lived on the ground floor, but the third was more secure, and had better views.

     Anneke strained to carry the huge basket of washing for her daughter’s family. It was the least she could do to manage the housework while they earned a living to keep her. They’d housed and fed her husband Ferdy too, giving them both a little room in their apartment until he’d had the stroke and been unable to speak or feed himself. It had been necessary for him to be euthanased of course - society could no longer afford to have anyone who would present any sort of burden – but the close reality of it had jarred her. Of course, euthanasia had been tacitly allowed in the Nederlands for years now, first voluntary of course, but now it was mandatory and worldwide. Those who objected were really too old to put up much resistance. If they got too noisy about it, they might just get a spiked drink or a doctored packet of pain pills, and that would be that. She didn’t want to go that way.

     Encumbered by the basket, she had trouble seeing her way. Her feet gingerly felt for the next step. The headache didn't help either. There was no use complaining. Nothing to do but grin and bear one’s pain and face facts. It was just too expensive to look after the elderly these days, now that they made up half the population, and there were so few younger workers to pay taxes to support them. Some docs would take seniors on the sly, but some also took bribes from the children to give the wrong injection. Euthanasia had killed the palliative care industry. All the old could do was take a few vitamins or some painkillers and then hope for the best. When she got up to the apartment, she might just take a couple of those free pain tablets. They wouldn’t be doctored if the con man was waiting to hear from her.

     Anneke hoped that she could manage the house, shop, cook the meals and mind her grandchildren for a good few years yet. The government had recently allotted Helga and Dirk another two children, seeing they had such high IQs and certified healthy genes. They would be well compensated for their trouble; the family would be given a house rather than a unit, and a holiday to the destination of their choice.

      Strange, Anneke thought to herself as she huffed her way up the second flight of stairs, how times  change. In my day, we were only allowed a maximum of two children. The government was terrified about overpopulation. It was legislated in 2010 that all women be sterilized after two births, and most of us were happy to do so, seeing we could pursue our careers uninterruptedly. She herself worked until 30 then had one boy, one girl, Helga and Lenz, tested early and guaranteed genetically healthy of course. A bad time to be a second boy or girl embryo, although some preferred only boys or girls, most liked a pigeon pair. Gave them everything, and they grew up expecting the best.

     However, the long predicted overpopulation had never eventuated - in fact the reverse had occurred.  Barely enough people for the workforce even with the masses of migrant workers they brought in. There had been no great desire on the part of the average working woman of Helga’s generation to have any children at all, until the government made it financially worth their while to bother. Of course it was understood. Helga, already a mother of two at the young age of 30, could not be freed from her important career to care for the 2 extra children the Government needed, so her babies were culturing in artificial wombs. It would be Anneke who would in all practical aspects, become their real mother for the next 5 years until she died, when another retiree would gladly take her place.

      Anneke carried her load up another few steps. Her throat was dry and her heart was pounding. She stopped for a rest on the landing below the third floor. Her head felt dizzy. Gripping the iron railing, she urged herself on mentally. Hang on, old girl. You can do it. Nearly there. She took another step and another, feeling oddly faint. Nearly at the door, just reach out one hand to punch the door release security code. Then you can dump the washing and go have a lie down.

      The children were inside the apartment busy with their com-games. She could hear the surround sound of the V-real scene even through the security glass. The blare of the sim-blast phasers and the Mars Quest theme music was so loud it made her ears ring. A wonder they haven’t gone deaf. She would have liked to protest sometime and ask them to turn it down, but the children liked to feel that they were really in the scenario. It was so good really of Helga and Tomas to have her there at all, so she didn’t make any waves.
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      With so much occupying their growing minds, there was no chance of calling out to either child to open the door for her. Balancing the basket awkwardly on one hip, she reached out again for the door release panel.

      Now that fool dog was sniffing around her feet, barking and growling. It would trip her up one day. ‘Get away, Bozo,’ she ordered the dog. ‘Bad dog, sit down!’ Stupid robot dog. Sometimes the children programmed it to nip her ankles, overriding its memory circuits so that it would not recognize her voice. They thought it was funny. She backed away from the door, and looked nervously down past the basket to see what the dog was up to. She felt a sharp pain as it sank its metal teeth into her ankle, and staggered back, struggling to keep her balance.

      All went black.

     Death is neither kind nor thoughtful at times. It takes someone on that long holiday without good-byes or even time to plan. No time for instance to arrange a replacement housekeeper or cook, which can be a real inconvenience for the bereaved family when they are working full-time.

      When she arrived home from work, Helga found Anneke at the bottom of the stairs, the washing scattered around her. None of it had broken her fall. Her head was cracked like an egg on the concrete landing, and her headache was gone forever.

      The dog had thoughtfully shredded the washing for her.

© Anna Casey 2004