met him in the rendezvous-less stretch, didn’t you?”
Laki had bent over to unbutton her boots. “It’s called the rendezvous-less zone.”
“I bet you don’t know anything about him. Did you at least get his name? You still have one more day, don’t you think you should…”
“Stop talking and help me get this thing off.”
Se-se had stood and walked over to Laki. She leaned over and started fumbling with the belt’s knot.
“Is he a friend of yours?”
Laki had sighed. Se-se’s persistence was unextinguishable. “No, I met him by accident.”
“Do you think he likes you?”
“I think he likes women. Are you getting anywhere with that?”
The knot was so tiny that Se-se had trouble holding on to it. No matter how firmly she tugged at it, it refused to come apart for her fingers.
“Did you even get his name?”
Laki had slapped Se-se’s hand. “That’s enough. I guess I’ll have to cut it off.”
Se-se had gasped. “But then it’ll be destroyed.”
“Who cares? He’s a rebel. He doesn’t care about marriage; he doesn’t care about rules. It’s just a belt to him.”
Laki had thrown off her clothing and stepped into the bathing module. She was still wearing the belt.
“Maybe it won’t come off for a reason,” Se-se had said.
But Laki hadn’t answered. The sound of water flowing had been her only reply.
As soon as Laki had stepped out of the bathing module, a tinkling sound had wafted into the room. Both Se-se and Laki had frozen. Panic flared across Laki’s face as she grabbed at her discarded cloths. She had picked up one of the cloths and hurriedly attempted to reconfigure it into a loose robe. Se-se tried to help, but she couldn’t undo the seams on Laki’s cloths. After Laki had succeeded at making the cloth flat again, she threw it over her shoulders, but it barely covered her torso.
Head-mother squeezed through the entrance of Laki’s room. Se-se and Laki kneeled. With their heads bowed, neither of them saw five other mothers enter the room after head-mother. But they had heard them. Thousands of tiny bells sewn to the mother-unit’s cloths rang out as a shimmering veil pulled them into Laki’s room. The mother-unit stood in the middle of the room, bound together by a veil that cloaked their bodies and distorted their features. Each individual woman was unidentifiable, but the force of their presence was unmistakable. The air swelled with powerful emanations of love.
No one had spoken as each of the mothers surveyed different corners of the room. Within seconds, the mother-unit could step into a room and dissect the situation that had been unfolding. The sensation of being deeply seen, disrobed of all pretenses, was so overwhelming that Laki was on the verge of swooning and Se-se began to cry.
“Stand up, children,” the mother-unit had hummed.
One mother had moved forward and embraced Se-se.
“Mothers, I am sorry for missing my training today. I know I have a lot to learn about the cloak, but….” Laki had stopped to gulp down the quivering in her voice.
“What is this around your waist?” the mother-unit had sung.
Head-mother had glided toward Laki from her position in the center of the room. The tiny bells tinkled as the other mothers moved with her in one undulating ripple.
Laki had fingered the belt without looking at it. “It is a marriage belt, but it was given to me as a gift, not as a proposition.”
“A thoughtless gift to a girl who is two days from maturation.”
Head-mother had reached out, every move an orchestra of tinkling. She palmed the belt with cloaked hands, testing its weight.
“Quite heavy, the young man is from Embankment 5?”
Se-se had perked up, thinking she might finally learn something about the mysterious giver of marriage belts. Laki was silent.
“La-Laki,” a mother had sung, “Head-mother has asked you a question.”
“Mothers, I don’t know where he lives. I only know that his name is Fogo.”
“You can’t bring a marriage belt with you into your mother-unit,” hummed another mother.
“You must return the belt,” a third mother sang, “We wouldn’t want his family coming for it.”
“You have a way to return it?” head-mother sang.
Laki had fallen silent. She remembered Fogo’s face, blank and disoriented, after their rendezvous. She’d had to remind him who she was. Why he had wanted to see her again was unclear to her, but he’d refused to take the marriage belt off her waist. He told her it was his insurance that she’d meet up with him again. Laki had no plans to renew their encounter. Marriage belt or not, she didn’t enjoy the indignity of being inconsequential, and she wouldn’t spend any time courting a repeat of the morning after.
“You must find a way to return the belt,” head-mother had sung.
On that signal, one of the mothers had waved her hand over Laki’s wardrobe portal, and her cloths had shot out on their rod. In a blur of twelve hands, Laki was quickly dressed in an outfit reminiscent of the mothers’ clothing.
As the mothers had led Laki out of the room, Se-se had run behind Laki, grasped her sister’s hand, and whispered, “I’m going to find him.”
The Laki flashing her hips and flirting with the crowd at her goodbye party was completely different from the Laki glumly heading to training in her mother-unit whites. Laki had looked ghostly and ashen in her training cloths. On the dance floor, Laki was blindingly vibrant and unmistakably alive.
Se-se was still rousing herself from memory when Laki spun around and threw herself into someone’s arms. She pressed against him quickly then wandered off the dance floor. Se-se lurched forward, afraid that she would lose Laki in the throng of revelers. As she rushed after Laki, Se-se’s foot slipped and she lost her balance. She grabbed wildly at the nearest person to keep herself upright. When she regained her balance, she realized she was draped on a stranger’s chest.
The stranger wrapped his arms around her, holding her tighter and longer than necessary.
“Don’t you smell good,” he laughed.
Se-se untangled herself, gave a grateful giggle, and turned to leave.
“Wait, is this yours?” the stranger asked, thrusting a black cloth at her. “You tripped on it.”
“Thanks,” Se-se said. She grabbed the cloth and nudged her way through the crowd. When she reached the edge of the party, she saw Laki reclining on the floor, draped across a few pillows. Se-se kneeled in front of her sister and leaned toward her. When Laki saw Se-se, she broke into a wide smile. She took Se-se’s face in her hands and kissed her on the cheek. Se-se handed Laki the cloth. Laki wiped her face and sweaty torso with it.
“Don’t bathe with it, put it on.”
“What is it?” Laki asked, stretching the cloth out to see it better.
“Your cloth.”
Laki laughed. “Thanks, sis.”
“Are you going to put it on?”
Laki wrapped it around her neck like a scarf and threw one end over her shoulder. “Are you here to parent me or to party?”
“I’m here to save you.”
Laki rolled her eyes.
Se-se grasped Laki’s shoulder. “I found Fogo.”
Laki did not react. Her expression didn’t show surprise, fear, or joy. Her face locked out all emotion and refused to even hint at her feelings. Someone stumbled over Se-se, and she crawled forward to sit next to her sister.
“Did you hear me?”
“Is he coming for his belt?” Laki asked coolly.
