| THE LORELEI SIGNAL |
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| Written by Sara Backer / Artwork by Lee Kuruganti |
| The Green Balloon a fable |
Rinjie stood at the lake's edge waiting for the Island to surface. The crowd was mostly twenty-year olds like
herself but there were a few forty and sixty-year-olds and one weather-beaten twig of a woman who must
have reached the age of eighty. Rinjie sneaked a glance at Cormack ahead of her. He looked as poised and
smug as he did in Numbers Class, confident in his ability to solve for X. If anyone could find out in advance
what initiation consisted of, it would be Cormack. He probably had several scenarios planned, with
contingencies, while Rinjie, so nervous she could barely swallow, hoped she could watch someone else go
first.
Of course, Rinjie and her friends had speculated about what happened on the Island that rose out of the lake
only once a year. Most thought initiation would be like school; they would have to answer difficult questions
correctly. But storytellers told initiation tales of boys who had to prove their strength or wit, like pushing an
iron-beast through a bog or guessing the riddle of the Sacred Nine. Girls, on the other hand, tended to have
to prove endurance instead, by finishing an unbearably boring task like shelling a barn full of sora nuts. In
books, there were older, more disturbing tales about girls who had to escape the snapping jaws of a monster
or, worse yet, kiss one.
Each year, Rinjie and her friends watched the town’s twenty year-olds come out the same doors that took
them in. The initiates were confused for awhile, no doubt because whatever occurred on the Island could only
be remembered on the Island. Everyone knew the joke about the man who was so curious he re-initiated at
age forty just to find out what he'd done at age twenty. Few adults actually did that—it was too risky,
changing the course of your life at forty or sixty. It was important to get it right the first time.
"Here we go," said a forty-year-old man behind her.
Rinjie saw Cormack swiftly take a diagonal step toward the bridge, vying to be first in line. Her shoulders
were bumped by others passing her. She struggled to stay in the group and not get left behind.
The wide sturdy bridge to the Island acted as if it were hinged to the shore. When the wood planks began to
emerge on the reedy edge of the lake at dawn, the community knew the Island was rising. By mid-morning,
they could spot the round roof, like a steel disk floating in the middle of the lake. No one could determine
what the Island was made of, but it pushed up as the initiates gathered by the lake, a cylinder as large as
the professional stadium, with seamless walls. At noon, the top of an arch of a solid gate appeared. It was
now nearly one o'clock, and as the bottom of the gate door floated up, the final plank of the bridge clicked
into place with a resounding boom. The crowd cheered, and Rinjie was pushed into the throng as initiates
hurried onto the bridge.
"It's coming back to me," the forty-year-old man said excitedly. "I remember."
"I don't," another forty-year-old grumbled. "Not that it matters. Anything's better than what I got. Anything."
"I bought something…yes, that was it. I bought a motorcycle. It cost fifteen credits," the first man said. "I
thought it would take me to the South Continent, but it only got me drunk. How was I to know?"
"Yeah, now I'm starting to remember," his friend said. "I bought a mask. I won't make that mistake again."
After a moment of reflection, he added, "Curtains. That's what I should have bought. The Jyana wouldn't have
seen me."
Rinjie felt she had eavesdropped on important clues. Before this moment, she wasn't even sure how the
credits given to her on her birthday were used. She would have to take her time and choose her purchases
thoughtfully, she resolved, keeping in mind she might be required to make a virtual trip to the South
Continent or hide from a creature that had been extinct for centuries.
The gates opened to the crowd of initiates. Rinjie was propelled forward by the others, but when she entered
the Island, they dispersed in seconds, leaving her on her own. The Island was much like the Harvest Fair held
at the stadium, with concentric rings of small booths broken by diagonal paths the way a pie was sliced. She
saw Cormack turn to the left, as if he knew exactly where to go. As she debated whether to turn right or left,
a balloon seller came at her, so close she stumbled a step backward.
The balloon seller was a wiry old woman with red dye on the ends of her gray hair. Her sunburned face
displayed a prominent bandage bridging her nose. "Red, yellow, blue? What'll you have?"
Rinjie looked around, but saw no one else to go first. She stalled. "Um, do you have a green one?"
The woman smiled, and a false blue tooth stood out where an eye tooth should have been. "Got a plan for a
green balloon, do you?"
"Well, no," Rinjie answered. "I just like green."
The woman deftly unloosed a single strand from her bunch. "You don't need to give me a reason, girl, just a
credit."
Rinjie hesitated. She had twenty credits, one for each year of her life. If one balloon cost an entire credit,
would she have enough left to buy provisions for a journey or camouflage to elude a Jyana? She wanted to
do this right. Her next chance at initiation wouldn't come until she turned forty, and forty seemed so old. What
was the point of starting your life then, when love and beauty and adventure couldn't possibly matter?
"Maybe I'll buy one later," she said to the vendor.
"You'll never see me again," the woman stated. "You want a balloon or not?"
"An entire credit seems expensive," Rinjie ventured.
The balloon seller leaned to compensate for a gust of wind pulling at her wares, and shrugged, standing
slanted. "It's the price, girl. No bargaining allowed."
Rinjie looked at the large green globe broken apart from the cluster of colored balloons. "Does everyone buy
a balloon?"
"Some do, some don't."
Rinjie took a fortifying breath. "Then I won't."
The woman narrowed her eyes. "Are you sure you won't need a balloon?"
Rinjie wavered. She thought she saw her friend Cormack several booths ahead, waiting in line at a stand that
sold books. Cormack was sensible; a book was likely to give you helpful information for whatever your
initiation would be. But the green balloon appealed to her, and the old woman had raised doubt in her mind.
How could Rinjie be sure she wouldn't need a balloon? "I'll take it," she said, tearing a credit ticket from her
birthday roll.
The woman pocketed her credit. Grinning, she placed the string end of the balloon on the crown of Rinjie's
head, right where her auburn hair parted in the middle. Then she stepped back and let go.
"Hey!" Rinjie complained, empty-handed.
The balloon seller pointed up.
Rinjie tilted her face, expecting to see her green balloon drift up to the Island's high metal ceiling. Instead, it
hovered over her. She stepped to the right. The balloon followed. She ran a few meters away. The balloon
matched her pace and remained directly over her head, though the string was too high to grasp.
"It's yours, now," the woman said. "Good luck." She lunged forward and bounced with her balloons, vanishing
from Rinjie's sight.
Rinjie made her way to the book stall. She saw Cormack leave with a book tucked under his arm, but when
she reached the same spot, the books were gone. Instead, a sharp-eyed man stood, tattooed arms akimbo,
in front of a gleaming rack of knives.
"Hey, girl, don't pass up your one and only chance for a high quality self-sharpening butcher's knife! Check
out this blade." He placed a green melon on a thick wood block and whacked it. Two pale orange halves
jumped away on contact. "Three credits!"
"No, thank you." Rinjie hurried past him, proud of her resolve. She couldn't spend all her credits on the first
things she came across, but as soon as the stand was behind her she had second thoughts. A knife, a basic
survival item, certainly more useful than a balloon over her head. She turned around…the knife seller had
disappeared.
She recognized a man whose picture had been in the news recently, a gray-haired bookkeeper who had shot
his own son in the act of stabbing his wife. His wife had died, his wounded son had been imprisoned, and he
himself had been deemed innocent in court the day of his sixtieth birthday. This man was weeping over a box
of paper clips. "Whatever this brings me," he whispered to himself, "I won't go through a glacier again."
A fit of dizziness affected her. Go through a glacier? How could anyone prepare for that? It wasn't fair that
she had to make her purchases before she knew what she'd have to do. There was no way to choose wisely,
with so many stalls and vendors and only one chance to decide what she wanted. Rinjie wanted to see all the
possibilities before plunging in, but this couldn't happen. Even as she steadied herself and tried to think of a
plan, another vendor accosted her.
"Windows! Windows! Get your window here!" The tall man had window frames slung over both shoulders,
shallow and wide, plain and ornate. "Plate glass, stained glass, double hung, you name it, all for five credits!
Get your win—"
"Wait!" Rinjie cried out, panicked at the thought of missing out on a window. She selected a tall, skinny
window with eight panes and a latch. The window man took her credits and strapped the window onto her
back. She didn't feel any ropes or tape, but she knew the window was with her. Would it help her solve a
riddle or shell sora nuts? No: a window was useless. She should have bought a book, like Cormack.
She searched again for the book store, rejecting row boats, cactus plants, stainless steel flatware, cubic
yards of gravel, furnace repair kits, and ostrich hide cowboy boots. She couldn't find the book stall, and time
was passing. People were already gathering at a gate that led to the next phase of initiation. She would
have to spend her remaining fourteen credits quickly.
As she headed toward the enormous doors, she thought she saw Cormack again, this time buying a rifle. A
weapon! It hadn't occurred to her that she might have to kill something to become an adult. Too late: the gun
seller was across the marketplace, impossible to reach in time. Rinjie thought of practical all-purpose items:
clothes, tools, food, water. Odd that she had seen no food at any stall. And she hadn't come across anyone
offering motorcycles or masks.
She spent four credits on a leather jacket and even as the seller handed it to her, felt herself getting pushed
into the group to the next set of doors. She had ten credits left. Struggling to stay on the outer edge of the
crowd, where she still had a chance to purchase something, Rinjie called out to a computer seller a few
meters away. But the computer seller packed up her wares, deaf to Rinjie's pleas. The stalls had closed, now,
and Rinjie was getting pulled into the throng.
"You!" Rinjie cried to the last vendor passing on foot. "I'll take whatever you have for ten credits!"
The vendor stopped, and scratched his tan bald head. "I have a clarinet for nine…"
"Sold!" Rinjie threw him her roll of credits.
"I can throw in a box of reeds for ten."
"Do it." Rinjie was pulled farther from him.
He hurriedly handed over the clarinet and tossed her a package of reeds. "Good luck with your life!"
Puzzled by his comment, Rinjie caught the case and came abruptly face-to-face with a gatekeeper.
The gatekeeper blinked, tugging at the collar of her gray uniform. "Okay, girl, let's see what we got here: one
balloon, green; one window, latching; one leather jacket—nice jacket you got there…"
"Thanks," Rinjie whispered, trying to peek between the hinges of the gate.
"—one clarinet with…we'll call 'em accessories, okay?"
"Okay."
"Sign here." The gatekeeper thrust an inventory list at her.
Rinjie signed, her hand trembling.
The gatekeeper looked at her name. "Rinjie Weston? Age twenty?"
"That's right."
"Wait here while I get the manager's approval." The gatekeeper flashed a phony smile and stepped into a
boarded-up guard house beside the massive wooden gate.
Rinjie looked at the solid gate. What came next? Would she have to journey to a far place? Would she have
to solve a difficult problem? Would she have to escape from an ugly, loathsome creature?
"Oh! You have a green balloon!" The voice behind her was faint and quavering.
Rinjie twisted her head. The words had come from the lone eighty-year-old, a slightly stooping woman worn
thin and hard. Few people lived to reach eighty in this country, much less to re-initiate at that late an age.
The woman gazed at the balloon over Rinjie's head, her wrinkled mouth working on air, her gray eyes cloudy,
but intelligent. "I looked all over for the balloon seller. I couldn't find her."
"I'm sorry," Rinjie mumbled, deciding the old woman was touched. It stood to reason only an insane person
would go through initiation in her last years. What was taking the gatekeeper so long? The line had seemed
to move quickly until it was Rinjie's turn.
"I was twenty once," the old woman stated. "I wanted nothing but love and adventure."
Rinjie began to get uncomfortably hot in the full sun. She didn't want to hear this woman's life story. She
wanted to start her initiation before she got too nervous and afraid.
"I spent all twenty credits on a lovely ruby necklace," the old woman continued. She sighed. "But it only
brought me thieves."
Rinjie wasn’t sure what to say. The old woman was matter-of-fact, not self-pitying. "I'm sorry," she repeated.
"I tried again at forty," she went on. "At that time, I was determined to be practical and chose a diploma and
a three-piece suit."
Rinjie waited. A trickle of sweat crawled from her hair to her collar. The gatekeeper still didn't return. Finally,
Rinjie asked the eighty-year-old, "What happened?"
"Well, it got me a good job—at least the pay was all right—but I developed breast cancer. I certainly wasn't
prepared for that. So I went back at sixty to get an herb garden, and came out with a trampoline. I went
broke, lost my husband, and got arthritis."
Rinjie was unsettled by the casual way this tiny woman summarized her horrible life. "Why did you come
today?"
The woman smiled ruefully. "Why, I came hoping for balloons!"
"You can have mine," Rinjie offered. "I don't really need it. I think."
"No, dear, it doesn't work that way," the woman said. "You can't give away a choice you've made. But I will
tell you, after all these years, I have learned a thing or two about what truly is important in life. If the balloon
seller had come my way, I'd have spent the whole roll on balloons." She showed Rinjie her roll of twenty
credits, unused.
At that moment, the gatekeeper returned. "You've been cleared, Ms. Weston. Congratulations on your coming
of age." The gatekeeper pulled a lever that opened the heavy gate…to the same bridge over the lake where
she had come in.
"But…what about my initiation?" Rinjie asked.
"That was it," the gatekeeper said.
"I don't have to outwit a dragon? Or run a race?"
"Nope. Just live out the consequences of your choices. Goodbye."
Rinjie hesitated, reluctant to leave. What kind of life would she have with a clarinet, a leather jacket, a
window, and a balloon?
"Get moving," the gatekeeper said. "No exchanges, no returns."
Rinjie stepped forward. Her purchases vanished as she crossed the threshold.
She joined the line of people walking over the bridge. Halfway across, she became confused; she was headed
in the wrong direction, with the Island behind her. Her parents and older brother waited with other families
on the bank of the river, smiles on their faces, wearing their good clothes for a celebration. Was her initiation
over?
When she entered the Island, the sky had been cloudy. Now, it was blue. Even though she knew no one
remembered initiation, she felt disappointed—and a trace fraudulent—not to have even a dream-sense of
passing a test or trial. She reminded herself that what mattered was she had done it, and she was on her
way to love and adventure. No one would call her "girl" any more.
Before joining her family, on an impulse she didn't understand, she looked up into the sky. There was only a
green balloon shooting upward, higher and higher, until it was too high to ever come down.
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Sara Backer discovered she had been writing science fiction when one of her
stories won a prize in the L. Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future contest XIII.
She has also published a novel, American Fuji, and is a poet whose work has
appeared in Poetry Magazine, Southern Poetry Review, Poetry Northwest and
others.
stories won a prize in the L. Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future contest XIII.
She has also published a novel, American Fuji, and is a poet whose work has
appeared in Poetry Magazine, Southern Poetry Review, Poetry Northwest and
others.