Purity
a morality tale
The Fairweathers had always been a pioneering family, always the sort to break new ground They were the first to marry out of their race, and when the Fairweather sisters were born in a two room shack in a small northern town their name was already notorious. Their grandfather had run away from home with an Indian girl, and had borne a daughter of stunning beauty who bedded every man in town with reckless abandon. Nobody could figure out why, for she had been raised with plenty of love. No money, but plenty of love.
Her parents died in a car accident, and the two girls were born. She never knew who the fathers were. They could have been anyone. The older girl, Naomi, was clearly Indian, and striking in appearance with her bronze skin and flashing eyes. She always wore her hair long, like black silk. As she grew older she chose to 'look Indian' after finding a castoff fringed jacket in a dumpster, and all her life tied a bandana around her head. The younger daughter, Diana, had obviously come from a white father. She had large dark eyes, softer than her sister's –an engaging child, and classically beautiful in spite of the dusting of grime that covered her body.
About the time Diana started school, their mother fell prey to depression, and her nascent alcoholism took a sudden turn for the worse. The girls would return to their two room shack to find her senseless on the floor beside a bottle of gin. They washed their hands twice after disposing of their mother's empty bottles. Her example saved them, and it was because of her example that they became great.
Flat out in the next room, their mother had no idea what her daughters were doing at nights. Sharing the same blanket, the two girls innocently drifted into something that they never suspected was taboo. Naomi initiated Diana into the secrets of sex at an age when other girls felt only stirrings. She had kept her younger sister alive for years, scrounging for scraps of food in other people's garbage, always giving the best to the precious one. Naomi was passionately protective, and no one dared to bully Diana at school, even though the two ragtag children were obviously bringing themselves up. Diana knew tenderness and sympathy, and a love grew between the two girls which was something beyond love, as if they were a single soul in two bodies.
Before she was a teenager, Diana learned that what she did with her sister was forbidden, and became forever vulnerable. But she had been the protected one, and Naomi had been the protector. Diana had been the restless, shining star, and she developed ambitions beyond those of her older sister. Diana wanted to make a splash in the world, while Naomi wanted to protect Diana. And the younger woman headed for the big city, with Naomi following in her wake to make sure little sister was always safe. They left their mother on the floor with her gin. There was nothing else for it.
The little sister was not only safe, she was the toast of the town in artistic circles. For with only high school art lessons under her belt, the headstrong Diana charmed her way through every chic buffet party in town. Looks will get you anywhere in a certain network, and that network was sympathetic to two young lovers playing the field. Commissions came Diana's way, and the young women were royally set up. Neither had the faintest idea how many men they had in those years, though they never touched any woman except each other. And after much bouncing off other people they landed in a coveted situation set up for them by several friends. They got married and became respectable. They truly loved and trusted their husbands, who shared their exile from mainstream society. Each couple had two children, a boy and a girl.
Naomi was happy. She basked in her little sister's success, and she basked in the joys of motherhood. But Diana never recovered from the shock of discovering that people thought there was something wrong between herself and her sister, and the sense of entrapment remained with her. To Diana, motherhood was doubly precious because it was something she didn't have to lie about. She loved her children as other parents loved their children, with a simple uncomplicated love, and it was something she had in common with the rest of the world. She had always yearned to be accepted by all those 'normal' people who would have shuddered at what she was, and at what she did. And it was around this time that one of those 'normal' people came into her life.
His name was Seth. He existed on the fringes of the art world, since he didn't belong to the network. But he suddenly came to the network's attention when his daughter became notorious at high school. A war existed between the 'artsy' students and the mainstream. At first, Seth was not fully aware of the reason for this war, but he had always taught his children not to participate in these things. Both his daughter and his son had friends among the few on both sides who also refused to participate. Seth's children had grown up to be like their father. They did not believe in sealing off and ostracizing people who didn't fit in. There was a place for everyone somewhere. Everyone was a person. Everyone mattered.
When one of the 'artsy' students started dating his daughter, Seth knew all about the war. He knew all about why it existed, and he knew what his daughter meant to the young man who appeared at the front door in his best clothes, agreeing with everything the father said, bringing his child home on time like a perfect gentleman. Making his child happy. His child, who had put up with so much from this stupid war, who had been shunned by both sides. His child, who was now looking forward to school instead of feigning illness to stay at home. And when a friend of his child remarked that the young suitor was touchingly devoted, Seth remembered that he did not love only his own children. His heart was moved. And he did something that the silently watching network spoke of in gathering places for all those teenage years.
He did nothing. He said not a word to his wife, whom he loved. This was a big decision. It came down to a matter of what caused the least pain in the world. He said not a word to the network. He said not a word to the young man and his family. As he remarked wryly, years later, nothing was something that a lot of people ought to do a lot more often. And as the sisters said years later, nothing was much, much more than anyone else ever did. Much, much more.
In later years Seth was criticized for doing nothing at a crucial time in his daughter's life. "What about your grandchildren?" people asked. To which Seth replied that instead of the grandchildren in his integrated family there would have been two sets of grandchildren in two unintegrated families, one set living free of care and the other fraught with difficulties. If the grandchildren he might have produced were carefree at others' expense, he saw no virtue in that.
His critics thought that Seth should feel responsible for the fruit of his own loins, and let the rest of the world take care of itself. People like the Fairweather sisters should not reproduce, they said. At a time when such people comprised a third of the population, it was a serious issue whether there should be more reproduction or less, but in any case Seth's mind was made up. He disliked the idea of pampering one portion of the population at the expense of another. This man had a past of his own, a bad start which few people now suspected, and he had been treated as chaff often enough, dismissed as a hopeless case with behavioural problems. He knew what it felt like to be one of the people who didn't count.
The relationship did not work for Seth's daughter. It was a learning experience. When Seth's son arrived at high school, he followed much the same pattern as his sister. Seth told his children that if they wanted to start afresh he would put them in an entirely new situation, one in which nobody knew them. All they had to do was say the word and he would come through for them.
But they never said the word, and seemed none the worse for their indulgences. Their lives had been far easier than their father's. He had been a genetic investment to his parents, and had learned to despise people who wanted children for no better reason than this. Before meeting his wife, Seth had been violently abused, thrown out of his parents' house, raped, beaten, and generally despised for his difficulty at looking other people in the eyes, which was typical victim behaviour.
His wife was the only person who had ever loved him, and his gratitude to this wonderful woman was absolute and unconditional. She put up with his endless fights in the neighbourhood, for he disapproved of the way other people brought up their children –the parents, that is, of both warring factions at the high school. When you are betrayed by your parents, your paradigms are shattered, your mind is blown wide open. And Seth was not like other people. His wife knew this and loved him for it, loved him with eternal devotion. But she had to live with all that this meant. Seth was content to avoid a subject she seemed unable to handle. She had no right to control their genetic line. It did not belong to her any more than it belonged to him. She seemed unable to see things as he did, to see things as they really were. But this was not as challenging as being abused by one's parents, rejected, raped and beaten.
And not as challenging as being in the network, where Naomi and Diana were busy planning their children's lives, for indeed they had to plan if they loved their children at all. Diana created quite a stir when she moved into Seth's neighbourhood. There was talk about how certain citizens didn't approve of her nephew dating Seth's daughter. It seemed odd, since Diana had become a paragon of respectability.
The sisters had long ago picked their mother off the floor. The invalid was nursed quietly in back rooms and was taken on family outings amid a throng of protectors. The network loved the sisters for this. Diana's charisma and Naomi's striking beauty had caught everyone's attention, but it was their spiritual triumph that had won everyone's hearts. Uninitiated onlookers asked themselves how anyone could disapprove of Seth's daughter linking herself to such a lovely family. But others shook their heads slowly.
Seth's wife refused to believe there was anything wrong, and the budding romance took its slow and faltering course without interruption. The two sisters had a high regard for Seth's wife. They knew that he loved her for good reason. She was a person of delicacy who nodded politely at the sisters' remark that they wanted their children brought up away from the party scene. This was good enough for her, it seemed.
It was not long before Diana's son began to exhibit symptoms of emotional disturbance. Her daughter was stable, however, taking up with Seth's son. Everyone remarked on the coincidence that her cousin was dating his sister. Obviously the families were very close. And yet the sisters seldom spoke to Seth and his wife. Contact was carefully kept to a minimum. Naomi's daughter remained single, but seemed perfectly content. Diana's son became the talk of the town with his numerous escapades, until one day he burst forth with all his mother's breezy charm, and his troubles were over. Everyone was much relieved.
Years passed. No one grew any younger. Grandchildren appeared. Seth and his wife took the time to travel. Diana and Naomi mourned the passing of their mother. And then Seth's wife went into a decline. The network watched with interest as the sisters took long trips with their husbands, who eventually left them. The two women were distraught.
Seth's wife lingered, but her husband's days were numbered. The sisters left his deathbed, took an elevator to the top of the building, climbed onto the roof, clasped each other by the shoulders and plunged to their deaths. Seth's wife died not long afterward, and was buried beside her husband. The network embraced the grandchildren, and eventually their line was absorbed. For it is seldom that anyone on this planet truly loves someone who is not his child. The war closes in, and his good intentions are in vain, because he acts alone in a world where each family takes care of itself.
return to mainpage
