Air (or Have Not Have)

She made Mae look as if she had come direct from the fields. Who was more of a fashion expert now?

Sunni's face was a mask of a smile, and she gazed at each of the women, and gave them a nod.

'I assume it is all right for me to come as well, Mrs Wing-ma'am.' She did not even look at Mae.

Kwan smiled and said that all were welcome. 'Mae is doing helpful work for all of us.'

Sunni sauntered among the rows of cushions, nodding gracefully to each of the women. 'I will be round later with the fabric I promised you.' She folded herself neatly onto a cushion and sat next to her ally, Mrs Ali. Elegant, dignified, they gazed about them as if from a great height.

Sezen showed up with her boyfriend, to whom Mae took an instant dislike. His face was frozen into a sneer and there was a tattoo on his neck. Mae had Sezen's notebook ready to give back to her. 'I'll talk to you about it later,' said Mae, and Sezen, for no very good reason, turned to her boyfriend with her mouth open as if aghast at bad behaviour.

More women came in clumps of friends, chattering and laughing. Mrs Mack came alone. All the Pins came together. Mae's sister Soong Se came with Ju-mei's wife, who had been born a Soong. As they arrived, misgiving-doubts overtook Mae. Could she really talk to so many people?

Mae was torn between different impulses: one towards elegance, one towards directness.

'Hello. I am very pleased to see you all here.'

The women murmured hello back. Exactly as if they were in school and Mae was teacher. This surprised her, made her shy, made her retreat into peasant bluntness.

She tried to start as she had started with Mr Ken, but it came out muted and flat. 'When we go on Air, this is what they all know. So we need to know it too, to keep up with them, okay?'

The TV would not go on. Mae realized that the TV had always been on when she arrived. Here she was, a teacher, and she could not switch it on.

'It's asleep,' said Kwan. The ladies laughed, not knowing that it was an actual word.

'Wake,' said Mae, shyly.

Up came the five pens of Air.

Mae felt Sunni behind her, looking for every mistake. 'What the Test did is change everybody's mind. It made the inside of your head look like the inside of a TV.'

Mae was taken aback when the women laughed again. 'So. You have these five pens inside your head now. Air imitates TV. So learning how to use the TV will help learning how to use the Air.'

'I use it to breathe,' said Mrs Ali. She was looking in a conspiratorial way at Mrs Sunni-ma'am. More chuckles.

They wanted this to be jolly, like a ladies' tea party. Mae found she was too shy in front of so many people to be relaxed enough for that. She was exposed to an enemy who had perhaps brought allies.

'Now you will also use it to think,' Mae said to Mrs Ali. It sounded like a rebuke. Sezen's boyfriend gave an ugly squawk, and he whispered something rude that made Sezen giggle and hiss at him to be quiet. Sunni's eyes were on Mrs Ali, and very slightly she shook her head.

Mae pointed to the screen, which was showing the familiar Air Format. 'You will see that you already know how Air works.'

'Oh good, we can go now,' said Sezen's boyfriend. Sezen hid her mouth and laughed.

'Each of these four areas contains different things. The section called 'Help' is the one we cover today, because this is where information about 'Info' is kept. Open 'Help.' '

Up came a list of options. Mae could not read it, but she knew it by heart. 'This shows all the things the television can do, how to make the TV work, how to find things that we want to know, what to do when things do not work.'

Mae turned to them. 'Is there something any of you want to know?' They sat. Sunni sat looking down at her new dress, adjusting the scarf into a perfect position.

'Mrs Haseem-ma'am, perhaps you would like to learn how to print a leaflet.'

'I have already printed a leaflet,' replied Sunni, her face a mask of a smile.

'Good, then we need not do that,' said Mae. Her eyes said: That is what I wanted; you will not learn it from me.

Mae wanted to humiliate Sunni in public. Her gut moved her forward. 'There are many things the TV can do. Perhaps I can show you how to use it to design special clothes in a special way. Sezen? May I use your drawings?'

Sezen sat up and blinked. 'Uh. Ah. Okay?' Her boyfriend laughed at her, and she hit him. Mae trotted forward, feeling short-legged, and took the notebook.

'Scan,' Mae said, and held up the book in front of the little camera eye sitting on top of the TV. It took a moment. 'If this was an egg, I would now go and wash the bowls and come back later.' The homely touch made most of her audience laugh.

Then Mae pulled the camera round. 'Now, please scan Mrs Haseem-ma'am.'

The audience was onscreen, and Mae touched the screen image of Mrs Haseem, to select her.

'You see, we live in new ways already. Sezen has been looking at new kinds of clothes for modern people. What the TV can do is show us what such clothes will look like on real people. So they can see themselves if the fashion suits them. We will show modern fashion on Mrs Haseem.'

The young people spurted laughter. Mae had seen a department store in Tokyo do this. If they could, she could.

The machine whirred. Kwan's face was held still, but its smile was spreading. Slowly.

'What the machine is doing is building an image of Mrs Sunni-ma'am. This image will be complete and can do many things. Though it might take some time to make.' She glanced at the screen. The TV whirred to itself.

Mae was stuck for something to say. 'So. Let's start to make our new clothes for new people.' She murmured to the TV, 'Multitask.' The machine did not understand. 'Multitask,' Mae said again.

Sunni raised her voice, very slightly: 'Not everybody follows your orders, Mae.'

'Indeed not, Mrs Haseem-ma'am. I am not in a position to give orders.'

A new window opened with the image of Sezen's jacket. Mae told the machine it was to be a jacket and Sunni's size, which she knew from ordering her dresses. Mae called up textures, she called up colours.

'Oh!' gasped Mrs Pin, as the drawing of the jacket suddenly inflated into something that looked almost real.

Mae stuck in the knife and twisted. 'The advantage is that you do not need to visit the City to see fashion. You do not need to have Talents come and visit to parade clothes that look good on them. You can see what clothes look like on you.'

'It might have been better manners,' said Sunni, looking pained. 'To try it on yourself.'

Mae sniffed. 'I have just come from working in fields. I no longer care what I wear.'

She started on the jeans. Black jeans with handcuffs at the belt.

'Every business will have to change. Even farming, even water, all of it will change because of 'Info.' That is why I want you to be ready.'

The jeans were made, in Sunni's size.

'A different hairstyle for you, Mrs Sunni-ma'am?'

Beautiful, spiky, cropped, slicked.

'We can give you a whole new look.'

Mae went back to the newly computed image of Sunni. You could paste on the designs, and the person could stand up and turn and see the clothes as if they really wore them.

Mae did not know the command. She knew how to paste images, but the images were flat and dead.

The command she needed was an English word. Mae could not remember it. She searched her Air-scarred mind. She felt what she called the root, the thing that was reached back into Air. 'What is the thing I need?' she demanded.

The whisper was slight, as slight as the moment when you remember. Mae saw a sign that looked like it was made of red and yellow blocks: 3-D. Mae remembered the funny seesaw sound of English. She really did not know if this was going to work, but if it did, the village would talk about nothing else.

'Tree dee com poo tay shon.'

Pause.