HABITAT

By Charles Deemer

 

            Tommy was doing his homework when his mother, Ann, entered the room.

            “Granddad isn't back?” she asked.

“No.”

“I hope he's all right.”

            “Is he late?”

“He's old and forgetful.”

            She turned to leave.

“Mom? Did the sky used to be blue?”

            Ann studied him before replying. He was a smart kid, thank God, likely to qualify for college in seven, eight years -- that soon! Where did the time go? And where did he come up with these questions?

Tommy went on. “That's what Jeffrey said at school. It didn't used to be gray all the time. It used to be blue in the daytime and black in the nighttime.”

“Yes, but that was a long time ago.”

            She returned to the kitchen, and Tommy went back to his homework. A moment later he heard his granddad’s voice, booming in over the intercom.

“Unseal the hatches! I've returned in one piece!”

Tommy raced to the electronic latch on the wall. He pulled it vigorously, releasing the door lock on the ground floor of the apartment building. This done, he glanced toward the kitchen, wondering if his mother had heard that Granddad was home. Tommy was hoping to have some time with him alone before his mother gave the old man another chore to keep him busy.

By the time Granddad came through the door, Tommy almost had given up on him. Sometimes the old man got invited in for tea by the widow on the first floor and never made it to the elevator until much later. Today he came in right on time, still wearing his protective clothing, even the gas mask, shuffling in like a man who’d just inspected a nuclear disaster. He carried a large plastic bag, which Tommy knew contained the groceries for which his mother had sent him to the market. Granddad set the plastic bag on the floor and began removing his protective clothing.

            “Mom was worried about you,” Tommy said as Granddad struggled to step out of the over-pants, which were made of a synthetic fabric that looked metallic. “She said you were old and forgetful. I knew you'd be right back.”

            Granddad peeled off the mask, his face scrunched up as if in pain. He shook his white hair and stretched his mouth, then said, “Oh, you did, huh?”

            “Jeffrey at school said the sky used to be blue in the daytime and black in the nighttime.”

            Hanging his mask on the rack near the door, Granddad said, “That it did.”

“Really? I can't imagine it.”

“I'll tell you something else you can't imagine.”

            Before he had a chance to begin, Ann stepped into the room.

            “Where have you been? I've been worried sick.”

            Granddad hung his over-suit on the rack.

            “They were out of instant beef,” he said.

            He pulled a smaller plastic bag from the large one on the floor, set this one down and pulled another even smaller plastic bag from it, and from this he lifted up the paper bag that contained the groceries. He handed it to his daughter.

            “The day you stop worrying about something or other,” he said, “is the day I call the doctor.”

            Ann said, “You know we're overdo for an alert. What if it started while you were gone?”

“It's this afternoon, as a matter of fact. That's what the grocery clerk told me.”

“How does he know?”

“His mother works for Atmospheric Security.”

“Well, thank God you're back then.”

Ann carried the groceries to the kitchen.

            “What else I can't imagine?” Tommy asked as soon as his mother was gone.

            Granddad looked at the boy as if he couldn’t recognize him.

“What?”

“You said you'd tell me something else I can't imagine.”

“What were we talking about?”

“How the sky used to be blue and black.”

Granddad’s expression filled with delight.

“Ah, yes. The sky. Sunrise! Sunset! You can't imagine how beautiful it was. First, the slightest hint of silver light at the horizon, then—“

“What's the horizon?”

“Where the sky meets the land. You could see it then. When the sun climbed to the horizon, the sky would become red and orange, it was spectacular! Poets wrote poems about it.”

“Do you know one?”

“Not by heart. But I'll find one. I remember the rosy-fingered dawn. That's how an old Greek named Homer described it. Once, before your mother was born, I was camping out in the desert--

“What's camping?”

“We used to sleep outside in a sleeping bag.”

“You'd be dead the next morning.”

“It was safe then. I was always up at the crack of dawn camping, brewing coffee on the camp stove, the eastern sky as orange as fire. There was this one time, silhouetted against the flaming sky, came a black-V moving along the horizon, a flight of geese going somewhere, off to find food maybe. What a sight it was!”

“What are geese?”

Granddad studied the boy, as if judging whether or not he were serious. It was hard to remember exactly what he would know or not know. The planetary climate had undergone such extraordinary changes over the many years of his life.

“You know about birds?” he asked.

“We don't study extinct species until next year. Jeffrey said they could fly.”

“Birds were something else. They came in all shapes and sizes.”

“What about geese?”

“It's a kind of bird. They all hop around on two feet and have wings and fly. In the morning, even right in town, if you had a tree outside your bedroom window, the morning

would be blessed with birdsong. Birds loved to hang out in the trees.”

“They could sing?”

“They chirped, which was called singing. Hundreds of them, all chirping up a storm. What music they made!”

            Ann hurried into the room.

“I just saw an announcement on the Vid,” she said. “The alert will be starting any time now. We might as well get ready so we don't have to rush around.”

They all stepped toward the rack near the door, where all the protective over-suits were hanging. There was urgency but no panic in their movement. This was a routine they had done many times before.

            Tommy said, “Granddad was telling me about the blue sky and sunrise and birds.”

“Quit pestering your granddad,” said Ann. “You're just trying to get out of doing your homework.”

“I wish I could've been there to see all that,” said the boy.

Granddad smiled. “The sky used to be a sight to behold.”

“Maybe they'll come back,” said Tommy. “The birds, I mean. Do you think so, Granddad?”

Ann grabbed the boy’s shoulder and squeezed it.

“I want you in your protective suit this minute, young man!”

            Granddad waited until Ann had released the boy, then said, “I don't know if they will or not, Tommy. I have an idea but I've been wrong before.”

“What's your idea?” Tommy wanted to know.

Ann said, “Oh, Dad, I forgot to tell you. The Andersons have been approved for the Moon Colony. They're so thrilled.”

“I'm moving to Mars when I grow up!” Tommy announced.

“You're not moving anywhere unless you keep doing well in school,” said Ann. “They'll assign you to Maintenance Control right here on Earth.”

Tommy had heard this so many times before that he easily ignored it.

“Granddad, what's your idea about the birds?”

“Oh, I'm just an old man. It doesn't matter what I think.”

            All three were now in their protective over-suits, needing only to put on their masks to be dressed for the alert. Ann gestured to the door that led to the basement.

“Down to the shelter, young man. Now! Come on, Dad.”

At the basement door, she picked up the red marker that hung by a string near the calendar. She circled the date of the alert, as she always did: May 3, 2103.

“Dad, you coming?”

            “Right behind you.”

Granddad waited behind while his daughter and grandson climbed down the stairs. He was still thinking about Tommy’s question about the birds. It was something he often asked himself, or rather used to ask himself, before the only answers that made sense to him became too depressing to dwell on. No, the birds would not be back. The human race had missed the opportunity to save them a long time ago, while they still were struggling for survival in the rapidly changing habitat. He had come to the conclusion that sometimes there were no second chances in the universe. There were times when it was now or never, when you had to act to change things at once or accept the consequences. One of those times had come and gone, and there was nothing anyone could do about it now. The Earth sky would remain gray forever. It was a depressing realization, of course, but nothing else made sense to him. He hoped he was wrong. After all, what did he know? He was just an old man. He was an old man who missed the blue sky, the sunrise, the birds. His opinion mattered to no one.