Words Cannot Describe
By Gaeriel Mallory
NOTE: A little bit of The Giver, a little bit of Fahrenheit 451. The sad thing is that if the world (especially the United States) continues on the course it's on, this story may not be fiction for much longer...
My name is Jennifer Marter. In the world that I live in, there is no freedom of expression, no freedom of speech. There is only one religion and any who oppose it are locked away so that they will not infect others with their heresy. They are not killed, for that would be murder and murder is a sin.
If they knew that I was writing this, they would tear the paper from my fingers and burn it in front of my eyes. There are no more words, no more music, no more colors. Everything is white. They have already taken away our lives. Now they mean to take away our souls. This is my story, yes. But it is also the story of anyone who is different, who has felt the call of a Muse in a pencil or an instrument or a paintbrush. This is the story of those society does not accept, the story of those who fight. This is the story of humanity.
* * *
The room was white: the walls, the ceiling, the tiled floors, it was all white. Tables were set up in the center of the room; they too were white as were the chairs set up around them. On the table were sheets of paper and pens and pencils. Around the walls were scattered paintbrushes and buckets of paint.
We were allowed to write. We were allowed to paint. We were allowed to make music.
But we were not allowed to keep it.
Every night, after we had finished whatever masterpiece we had worked on all day, they came with their matches and their white paint and rollers and they destroyed. Stories and poetry were burned in front of their creator’s eyes. Paintings were reduced to ash. Any color that had appeared on the white walls was covered.
Some say that hell is a fiery red. They are wrong. Hell is white.
I’ve been here for over a month now. I’m labeled a troublemaker because I refuse to conform. One night, I stole a pen and snuck it back with me to my room. No one noticed. I began sneaking paper, a sheet every day. They still didn’t notice.
And I began to write.
I wrote all the stories that had been clamoring in my head but I had been afraid to write because then I’d have to watch them be diminished to a clean and acceptable pile of ash.
I wrote poetry.
I drew pictures. I’m not a very good artist, but to be able to have my pen wander freely over a paper and not have the paper destroyed gave me a wonderful feeling.
And then, one night, I decided to write my story and the stories of others around me. They might find it and destroy it but there was a chance that I would be able to hide it. Perhaps I could hide it long enough that if I am ever released from here, I could sneak it out with me. Perhaps people will read it and they will understand.
* * *
This is a world where men cannot be gods. They cannot create. Any hint of creativity is squashed down so that man would not begin to think that they are better than God. Michelangelo had thought that he was higher than God because of his great talent. Ten years ago, they had reduced his David to rubble and painted over the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.
Creativity is the root of all sin in man. Therefore, to weed out the sin, they must first destroy man’s creative drive.
They must break man’s soul.
* * *
His name was Peter. He was a musician. Every day, they gave him a flute and allowed him to make music. The first day, he had been so happy. When the Laws had come about, music had been banned and his original flute had been confiscated.
Oh the music. I remember that seeing the joy on his face had made me want to cry. I knew what would happen next.
That night, they came into the white room and they took the flute back from Peter. They then broke it and handed the pieces back to him. The sheets of paper that Peter had written music notes over were put into the metal bin and burned.
This went on for over a month. A new flute everyday to replace the one that had been broken the night before. Nothing to replace the lost music that Peter had written.
Then one morning, they found Peter lying in a pool of blood in his room. He had slit his wrists with one of the pieces of broken flute.
* * *
When did this happen? How could anyone think that to have the will to write or paint or make music is to defy God? I remember a time when this was not so.
I remember Christmases when my family would sing carols and would spend time together decorating the tree.
I remember dying Easter eggs different colors with my brother.
Colorful birthday cakes, trips to the library, arts and crafts at summer camp…I remember all these things. How could things change so much in just one lifetime?
* * *
Helen was an award-winning author. Before the Laws, she had written over thirty books, eleven of which had won various awards. I remember seeing her books on the New York Times bestseller list and buying them.
I never expected to see her here.
She was here for just under a year. We became close friends during that time.
At first, she was stubborn. She sat down in front of the typewriter in the white room every morning and pounded on it for ten hours straight. I remember reading those wonderful stories that came out of her head.
And I remember crying when they were burned at night.
And she’d turn to me and pat my shoulder. “It’s alright dear. As long as you read them and enjoyed them, they can never really be destroyed. They’re still in my head, and now they’re in yours too.”
That was at first. Later, I guess, she saw one too many of her stories die and something in her broke. The typewriter was taken over by a newcomer who churned out stories. She just sat in the corner looking around her.
She never even tried to pick up a pencil.
She was pronounced cured and was released eleven months after she arrived.
Before she left, she confided to me in a sad little voice, “It’s just not worth it. After seeing your work that you’ve put so much of your soul into just obliterated as if it never existed…it’s just not worth it. Better to never pick up a pen again then to have to go through that pain. At least the stories are still up here,” she tapped the side of her head, “and not in a pile of cinders in a trashcan.”
I never saw her again.
* * *
I’ve been here a long time, almost three years. I’ve seen people come in and their eyes shine when the see the paints and the pens. And I’ve seen those same people break down in tears when their work is seized out of their hands and destroyed.
I’ve seen people whose will had been broken and declared “cured”. I’ve also seen people who were found dead in their rooms.
What about me? I refuse to be cured. And I refuse to have my will broken. I no longer write in the white room, though. I hope that if I play by their rules that they’ll let me out.
* * *
George and Barbara were a husband and wife writer team. They refused to bow to the new Laws and attempted to subvert them. Their new books were published via a black-market publisher. When the government shut down the publisher and burned all the books, they also arrested all the authors on its publishing roster.
George and Barbara were sent to this rehabilitation facility in hopes that they would be cured of their creative impulses and become productive members of society.
Barbara went mad within two months and was sent on to a mental institution.
George tried to break out but was shot by a guard and bled to death.
* * * * *
I was a writer. I wasn’t a very prosperous writer; I only had one short novel published and a handful of stories. My pride and joy was, and still is, poetry—reading it, writing it…I broke down and cried when the government declared poetry anathema and had a huge book burning.
The libraries, already bare of fiction, was forced to relinquish their poetry books. Citizens turned in Whitman, Poe, Frost, Dickinson, Wordsworth, and Keats…all went to feed the fire. “Poetry is a subversive form of communication, full of hidden meaning and subtle undertones that are dangerous to society.”
I, and many others, hid our fiction and poetry behind walls and under floorboards. And later, we hid our non-fiction as well when that too was outlawed.
And then the raids began. I was caught.
But not only did they find my books, they found my writing. So I was sent to rehabilitation.
* * *
The first time I saw the white room, my eyes jumped to the paper and pencils. When they told me that I was allowed to write whatever I wanted, I grabbed a pen and started writing. I couldn’t believe that they allowed us to freely express our minds.
And then night came and so did they with their matches.
I fought back, pleaded with them. Please! Let me keep just one! I’ll never write anything else!
The other inmates looked at me briefly and then looked away. They all knew what I was going through and they were ashamed because they wouldn’t—couldn’t—fight back. They knew what would happen—absolutely nothing. The papers were ripped from my fists and the matches flared. The burning sheets were tossed into a metal bin and the smoke rose.
They said nothing. Just stared at the fire to make sure that it had destroyed everything within before they ushered us to our rooms.
* * *
I’m to be released. According to them, because I haven’t picked up a pencil or pen and tried to write anything, I was cured.
I’m going to try and sneak out my writings, especially this.
While telling everyone’s stories, I’ve realized just how central creativity is to the humanity. Without it, we are a sterile race.
I’m going to submit this to a black-market publisher who will publish it. Hopefully, people will read it and begin to understand. And maybe things will change, go back to the way they were before the Laws.
* * *
The sun. I couldn’t remember the last time I had seen it without a window between it and me. The guard handed me a bag with my clothes in it. The papers were hidden against my body. I prayed that they wouldn’t crinkle and give me away.
“Here you are. All cured and ready to rejoin society.” The guard actually smiled. First time I had seen any of them with an expression on his or her face. I smiled and nodded back.
I walked past him. Almost there…almost to freedom. I could see the gate in front of me.
My papers were tied around my waist. I felt them slipping. Please! No! I walked a little faster, hoping I can get past the gate before any of them fell out.
A lone sheet slipped out of my shirt and fluttered to the ground. I glanced down and saw that it was only poetry.
“Hey, wait a minute!”
I wrapped my arms around my waist and ran. I heard a gunshot and felt a pain in my shoulder. I ignored it and kept running.
They tried to close the gate but I was past it before they could. I kept running. I heard other bullets but they missed me. I ran.
I don’t know how long I ran. I lost a lot of blood; I knew that. I stopped briefly once to tie up my arm. I had to keep going. There was a friend who lived around here who had connections to the black-market publishing industry. I had to get him my papers.
I found the door. Please let him still live here. I knocked.
No answer.
I knocked again.
Nate answered the door, his hair in disarray. He stared at me. “Jen? What are you—You’re bleeding!”
He helped me in and shut the door. “We have to get you to a doctor--“
“No. No doctors,” I gasped out. “They’d send me back. Can’t go back. Won’t go back.” I fumbled for my papers under my shirt.
“Here…” I shoved them at him and noticed that they were stained with my blood. They were still readable though. “Get this published. People have to understand…”
“What? Understand what, Jen?” He glanced at the papers and then back at me. “Did you write this while you were in rehab?”
I nodded. I had lost a lot of blood and was feeling very weak. “People must know what’s happening. What they’re doing to us.” I gasped. “Promise me—Promise that you’ll get those to a publisher. That you’ll make sure they’re published.”
Nate looked at me for a long minute. “I promise. But we have to get you fixed up.”
“No doctors.”
He nodded. “Okay, no doctors. But we have to do something or you’ll bleed to death. It hasn’t stopped.”
“We have to leave. They’ll find us. They’ll track me. They know that I had writing. They will find me and put me back in that place…” I had started to cry softly.
Nate put his arms around me, mindless of the blood. “Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be fine. We’ll just go underground for a while. That’s all.”
We were leaving when they found us. We ran. Nate still had my papers but they didn’t know that. They were after me.
“Run, Nate! Keep your promise!”
He looked at me and saw the look in my eyes. He nodded slowly. “Good luck.” He ran.
I stood my ground. I had gone peacefully once before. I wasn’t going to go peacefully again. The first man I rushed and slammed my head into his gut. The second got a knee in the groin. That was as far as I got before the others closed in on me. I still fought back though.
I saw the first fist heading for my head and I felt it hit. I didn’t see the others, but I did feel them. After a while, I didn’t feel anything at all.
My last thought was that I would never have to see that white room ever again. I had broken free of hell.
--fin--