Keys to the Sun

"Is it going to be tomorrow? They said tomorrow, didn't they? The scientists. They said it was going to be tomorrow."

"No, Rocky, you dummy. How many times do we have to tell you? It's the day after tomorrow. They've been saying that for a year. Why can't you keep anything in that extra large head of yours?"

The words, and the tittering laughter that followed, echoed up to where Summer had wedged herself between the maintenance platform and the struts that held the powerful grow lights. She looked down to see them through the lush branches of the fruit trees below her, or at least, the tops of their heads. Bill and his cronies, Sasha, Alice, and poor dumb Rocky. They were so loud, she hated it when they came into the Garden Room. She imagined their toxic laughter poisoning the entire food source.

"Where is she, the sneaky little bitch?" That was Alice, with her high-pitched, nasal voice.

"She's probably off getting dirty with that creep, Jesse." Sasha, her voice raspy and low.

A metal clang rang out, and an echoing noise of frustration. Probably Bill, kicking a metal table leg with his work boot.

"No!" Bill's voice boomed in the large domed space. "She is mine. That idiot janitor had better keep his fucking hands off of her."

"Like he'd even know what to do with her." Alice again, followed by the tittering laughter of both the girls, and Rocky's slow "huh huh huh" just a few seconds too late.

Their voices grew distant, their footsteps fading as they moved away to search for Summer elsewhere. She sighed. She should go back to her apartment, her shift was over hours ago.

When she had been assigned a job as a Garden Room tech two years ago, at age eighteen, she had felt immense relief. Working in the gardens felt like her last refuge, the only place in all the domes where she still felt Earth's influence. Here things grew organically, and sometimes ran riot. The farmers' efforts to keep things orderly were only semi-successful. She breathed deeply the scent of the soil, the damp greenness of growing things: fruits, vegetable, nuts and grains. The Garden Room smelled like Earth, and it was a welcome respite from the cold, plastic and steel efficiency that made life on Venus possible. The explosion of colors, the reds, yellows, purples, even the greens and browns felt like real life compared to the alien jungle outside. In daylight it was a colorless tangle of thick vines and vegetation, with never enough sun to give it a hue.

Lightning flashed and Summer followed its forking branches through the glass panels of the dome. She watched it almost every night, trying to learn to love its beauty. The bright branches of electricity that streaked across the black sky. The distant and broad flashes of light, like a strobe, that illuminated the layers of clouds, shades of gray against black, layers that billowed back and back, filling the atmosphere as far as the eye could see. It was the same kind of lightning she remembered from her life on Earth, except that here, on Venus, it was relentless and never-ending. A constant in the night sky as well as during the day. Just like the rain.

"God, I fucking hate the rain," Summer whispered to herself.

It was easier to ignore the rain at night, when she came to watch the lightning. She could concentrate on the patterns of bright light against the dark clouds, watch as the storms beat against black twisting vines and thick, strangely shaped trees.

But during the long hours of the day, the rain tormented her as she worked. The Garden Room was it's own immense dome, one of the largest in the complex of glass domes and underground structures that sheltered human life on Venus. In gray daylight, the endless pattering drops, the rivulets that ran down the thick glass of the Garden Room dome pressed on her like a hanging weight.

.

The battering tattoo of rain was a constant no matter what she did. Working, eating, sleeping, it was a drumming that followed her, even into her dreams, until she imagined the sound was trying to get inside her, to make her heartbeat match its own rhythm, to own her.

"Two days. Just hold on for two more days," Summer told herself. They had predicted it. They were sure. The scientists, her father, they had all but promised.

In two days the sun would come out for two hours. She was going to go outside for the first time in five years, since she had arrived on this nightmare of a planet. And nothing was going to stop her.

****

"Whoo-hoo! I have arrived! Make way for the birthday boy!" Bill's voice was louder than all the others in the crowded cafeteria, as usual.

Summer hunched over her dinner of leafy greens and dwarf fruit salad, in an attempt to make herself invisible. But she could envision how brightly her blonde locks stood out amidst a sea of dark hair, and she knew it was impossible. If Bill wanted to notice her, he would.

Several trays clattered on the long metal lunch table, making her jump. She tried to slide down in the opposite direction, but someone slid in next to her.

"Summer! Don't you want to wish me a happy birthday?" Bill smirked from across the table, so of course it was the minions, Alice and Sasha, squished in on either side of her, trapping her.

"Happy birthday," she mumbled into the remnants of her salad.

"I'm twenty-one today, you know what that means, don't-cha, Earth girl?" Bill pulled a rectangular, transparent key card from the front breast pocket of his coveralls and tapped it on the table.

Summer knew. Bill had a Key card and code, which meant he could override the lock of any room (with the exception of the residences) for as long as he was inside it. When he used his Key to lock a door, only his Key could unlock it.

Summer looked up into Bill's wide, pale face. He kept his hair cut close, like the military men of Earth. His eyes were so dark all she saw was pupil. He was predatory and mean, and for some reason she didn't understand, he couldn't leave her alone.

"I'm going to enjoy spending some private time with you. We should get to know each other better. A lot better." Bill's laughter had a sharp edge to it. He flicked his tongue at her in an obscene gesture.

Summer's stomach clenched. Twenty-one year olds with Key cards were a custom in the domes of Venus. Space was limited, privacy was at a premium. All residents lived with a parent or an adult roommate, until they found a spouse, at which time they were given their own living space. When a resident turned twenty one, they received a Key, and could use it to ask anyone over the age of consent, and still single, to spend time with them in any room, behind a locked door, whenever they wanted. It was a decades old tradition, revered throughout the Domes.

"I could say no." The words hung there for a long moment, like a bad odor, and Summer wished she could cram them back into her stupid mouth. Why was she antagonizing him?

Bill's laughter choked off. He leaned across the table towards her, his eyes narrowed, angry red blotches over his cheekbones.

"Listen, freak. You want to break custom and say no to me? The Commander's son? Try it. I hope your dad doesn't care too much about his position in the weather labs."

Summer lowered her head again, silent.

"So ..." Bill drawled. "I've got some time right now, Earth girl. What's say you and me break in this Key of mine?"

Summer balked, but Alice grabbed her arm with a tight grip. The others at her table were either indifferent or amused. She'd find no help there. Her glance swept the large room, with its stainless steel appliances and rows of metal tables filled with diners. Everywhere she looked was cold efficiency. She'd never felt so friendless.

She sensed a presence behind her.

"There you are, Summer. Garden supervisor is looking for you. You'd better go. Now."

Jesse.

She turned and looked up at him over her shoulder but he was trading hard stares with Bill.

"Bullshit," Bill sneered. "You're just trying to keep your little girlfriend here from some fun with an actual man."

Jesse shrugged. "All I know is what the boss lady told me. Sounded pretty serious. You wouldn't want to interfere in any way with the Commander's first Sun Day, would you, Bill?"

Bill frowned, considering. He thrust the Key into his pocket and pushed back roughly from the table.

"Fine. Another time, Earth girl." He flicked his tongue at her one more time before sauntering off, Alice and Sasha trailing behind him.

Summer started to follow Jesse towards the Great Rotunda and the Gardens, but he steered her towards the residence levels instead.

"The supervisor wasn't looking for me, was she."

"Nope," Jesse smiled.

Summer's stomach fluttered. Jesse was a mystery to her. He was her age, twenty, and was born here in the Domes like almost everyone else. But he was unlike the people of Venus, with their dark hair, dark eyes and pale skin. His hair was light brown with dark copper streaks in it, like an old Earth penny. His eyes were dark blue, like the ocean. His skin had a dusky hue. When Summer looked at him she felt sand under her bare feet, heard shouts of laughter over roaring waves, felt a too-hot sun on her skin, a sun that had grown in the sky to doom an entire planet. Summer looked at Jesse and saw home. It hurt a little, to be around him, but she was drawn to him, regardless.

"Thanks." She paused at the metal railing of the stairway to the residences. "Jesse? Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"Has anyone ever used their Key on you?" Summer blushed furiously.

Jesse laughed. "I wasn't expecting a question like that. But yes."

"And you were ok with saying yes? I mean, it wasn't just for ... talking?"

"It wasn't just for talking. I was ok with saying yes. If I hadn't been, I would have said no."

"And have you ever been ... caught out?"

The age of consent in the Domes was eighteen. Many a passionate couple braved discovery to satisfy their passions in semi-private locations. The Gardens, where Summer worked, were a favorite spot. She felt she was tripping over randy pairs of the under-21 crowd every other day.

"Nope, never caught out."

Jesse took a step towards her, and she took a step away. Her back met the cool wall of the hallway. She wished she could melt into it.

"Why all of these questions?" His smile had faded to a serious look she couldn't quite read.

"It's just ... Bill."

"Listen to me, Summer. Screw custom. You don't have to say yes to privacy with anyone you don't want to. Not even Bill. And if he ever lays a hand on you, I will make him regret it."

Summer was taken aback by the intensity of his words. When he stepped back and ran a hand through his hair, she saw it was shaking.

She felt a real need to change the subject.

"Thanks for the books last week. That was you, right?"

Jesse's smile was all sunshine again. "It was nothing."

Even at twenty, he was a Master of maintenance and supply. He was known, unofficially, to be the person who could get you anything, for a price. After they started talking, several weeks ago, any time she mentioned a book it would appear like magic in her bedroom.

"I'm surprised you remembered. I only mentioned the Bronte sisters once, and that was ages ago."

"I never forget. I've got a photographic memory." He grinned at her. She wasn't sure she believed him. She crossed her arms.

"And how, exactly, did you deliver them?" She wasn't sure she actually liked that part.

"Let's just say I know this place better than anyone else does." He winked at her. Her stomach fluttered again. She started down the stairs before she felt the urge to ask him any more embarrassing questions. His voice made her pause.

"Hey, Summer. Be careful with those ancient tragic romances. They'll give you a skewed vision of love."

She looked up at him from a few steps down. "It doesn't matter. On Venus, love is fiction, anyway."

He said something else as she trotted down the stairs. She almost didn't hear it.

"It doesn't have to be."

****

The tiny apartment she shared with her father was two levels down and three sections over, in the western wing of the residential sector. When they had first arrived, she had naively wished there were windows in their little apartment, she couldn't believe there were no living areas topside. Now she was grateful. As she stood in the doorway of their small space, she tried to remind herself that it was impossible to hear the rain this far underground. But the drumming was still in her head, an endless, marching beat.

Tomorrow. She just had to wait until tomorrow.

Summer's tiny sleeping alcove was bare except for her bed. Everything else was hidden in the walls. Drawers for her three sets of coveralls and three sets of non-work clothes, a whiteboard that flipped to a small mirror she never looked at, shelves that pulled out for her precious books. It was all egg-shell white and stainless steel, smooth, silent, efficient.

Something on the bed, half under her pillow, caught her eye. She sat down, and tried not to smile. She should think it was creepy, but she didn't.

She pulled the book into her lap and turned it over in her hands. It was light, slim and when she read the title on its otherwise blank cover her eyes welled with tears. She held the book to her face and inhaled its dusty, old paper smell. It was the last book she had read in school, back on Earth, 'The Catcher in the Rye'.

Jesse, of course. He always remembered.

She opened the cover and read the first line. If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.

Summer held the book to her chest and finally allowed herself to smile.

She felt a strange sense of kinship with Jesse. He was an outsider here, like she was, though he had lived his whole life on Venus. And like the troubled protagonist in 'The Catcher in the Rye', neither of them felt like going into it.

So they talked about other things. Books, the colors of the Garden Room plants versus the colorless jungle outside the dome, the patterns in the lightning. They didn't talk about where she came from, or why he had been assigned to maintenance and supply when he had graduated at the top of their class.

Sometimes, there were no words. There was that time Jesse had found her sobbing in the seedling room, crouched under a powerful sun lamp. He had held her hand until she ran out of tears. Neither of them spoke of it, but the next day she had found that the LED reading light bulb in her bedroom had been switched for a daylight bulb, though they were not allowed for personal use. Sometimes she fell asleep with it shining in her face, and she dreamed of her home, and days filled with sunshine.

Summer heard the whoosh of the apartment door. She quickly shoved the book under her pillow. Her father did not find Jesse's little gifts quite as charming as she did.

"Summer!? Are you here?"

Summer found her father, Matthew, in the kitchen alcove, making a sandwich. She measured the level of stress he was under by the way he held his shoulders.

"Dad. I don't know how you can eat that." She shuddered at the thought of her father's nightly "sandwich" ritual. Slice of pressed protein, lettuce leaf, nut flour "bread". So gross.

He turned towards her, chewing a big bite with relish.

"C'mon, hon. It's just like a ham sandwich back home. If you close your eyes, and dream you are eating a ham sandwich back home. Mmmmm ..." Matthew demonstrated, his eyes screwed shut in concentration.

Summer had to laugh. For his benefit at least. He was under a lot of stress, with his work in the weather labs.

"Are you sure you're not hungry? Let me make you something."

She eyed his sandwich suspiciously.

"Dad. I'm fine. I ate dinner after my shift."

"With protein?"

She made a face. There were no animals living in the domes on Venus. There were things, flavors that soy just shouldn't try to mimic.

"What about the nuts, the nut butter? It's just like peanut butter. You love peanut butter."

It wasn't just like peanut butter. Everything on Venus was a pale imitation, literally, of anything it tried to be. Including the sun. Especially the sun.

"What about tomorrow, Dad? Can I go out with you?"

Matthew sighed. She knew what he saw when he looked at her. A pale imitation of who she was meant to be. Skim milk skin, washed out blonde hair, faded blue eyes. She was the Venus version of the daughter he was supposed to have.

She watched, hopeful, as he pulled his hand across the stubble on his cheek.

"Summer, we've been through this. I have to go out early. Make sure it's safe."

"I could go with you. I'll help."

"It's been seventeen years since the skies cleared. The air will be just this side of breathable. I can't risk it. You should be going with friends, maybe a boy. What about the Commander's son? I hear he likes you."

Summer shuddered. "He's a pig."

"It's been five years, Summer. You have to make some friends. You have to learn to get along. This is our home now."

"Earth is our home. I don't know what this place is."

Matthew slumped, his shoulders rolled forward.

"Go out tomorrow with your group, as planned. I'll find you when we're all on the outside."

He attempted a smile, but the lines on his face wouldn't join up the right way.

"It will be good to see you in the sunshine, after so long."

Summer watched him make his way slowly to his sleeping alcove. She wished she could tell him she understood why he had brought her to this terrible, storm swept planet. She knew the guilt pushed on his shoulders like the extra weight of too much gravity. But every time she looked at him she felt the loss of Earth like little pinpricks against her skin. As much as she loved him, she didn't think that feeling would ever go away.

Sleep was hard to embrace that night. There were too many conflicting emotions fighting to rule her mind. Sadness, anticipation, nervousness. She took deep breaths, tried to calm her mind. She finally gave up, left her father a note, and made her way back to the domed windows of the Garden Room.

****

It was late. The lights in the domes had dimmed in their nighttime cycle. She crept toward the doorway of the seedling room adjacent to the gardens, in near darkness. She had done it hundreds of times over the past five years, she would know her way with her eyes closed. She paused at the door to listen for footsteps or voices, but all was quiet in the farming sector.

So quiet that she almost screamed when she approached the great domed windows near the herb garden, and a figure moved in front of her, outlined in a flash of lightning.

"Hey." His voice was quiet, she couldn't see his face.

Summer's first thought was that it was Bill, that he had found her after all, but no, Bill was never quiet. Or alone.

She shuffled a few steps back, her hands groping for the flashlight hooked to her belt.

"Summer, it's me. Sorry if I scared you."

"Jesse," she whispered.

Her heart beat a little faster. She was grateful for the dimmed light in the room. It was easier to ignore the copper gold glints of his tousled hair, the stubble on his cheeks and chin, the ocean blue of his eyes.

"Can't sleep?" he asked.

Summer sighed. "I wanted to see if the rain was letting up. If the lightning could show the clouds thinning at all. My father tells me the science is solid, but what if tomorrow doesn't happen?"

"I wanted to see the rain slackening, too. But it's not, as far as I can tell."

They both stared out at the storms, at the black jungles of Venus being whipped by high winds and the relentless rain.