She vanished just as the year ended. Mama was just the latest but if she was here or not, nothing changed. Seven in the morning had me in the kitchen, scrubbing dismally at a pan, sleeves rolled to the elbows and listening carefully for the next ringing alarm. Would it be from upstairs, rousing Mickey and Sid from their sleep? Would it be from outside, where the black mast rose from the overgrown tuft of grass that grew wild in the garden. Papa had always taken care to beat the grass into submission, short, uniform in length, but Mama had been allowed to turn a swath of the land into a vegetable garden.


An image sprang, unbidden, into my head of myself, Mickey and Sid gathering around it with rib-cracking laughter and ear-to-ear grins, pretending that it was the helm of a pirate ship. We had never seen one more than what the compulsory programs showed on the pro-screen that sat in our living room. But we had liked to imagine what a real ship might look like. I dreamed of one once. Sid, Mickey and myself would gather around the pole and, being the eldest, I got to be the Captain. In lieu of a proper hat, a plastic crown would be placed atop my head by my ‘first mate’ Mickey and I would ‘take the helm’, placing my hands around the power box that sat at the base of the pole. Barking orders, my brother and sister would run to and fro around the garden, trampling the fresh grass, pretending to man the ship I was pretending to steer.

We’d been forced to stop when a neighbour, Mrs Jameson, had spotted us through a gap in the fence and froze us with the force of her screams. She had ordered us to stop, to get away, to never touch that box again.


We had all gotten so scared by the abrupt disruption of our fantasy, Sid had burst into tears and we ran back inside. Me carrying the still sobbing Sid in on my back.


The next day, Mama had given Mrs Jameson an earful and the two had loathed each other since.


That was before papa was taken away.


Every ten years, the oldest in the family. First Papa… now Mama…


Soon… it would be my turn.


It was compulsory.


Compulsory… that was a word I’d had to learn young. Duty… tradition… illegal… unlawful… compulsory.

What had all these big words found their way into my head, been made to come forth from my mouth? Once it had all seemed so bright and innocent. A pole could turn our garden into a pirate ship, my bed could have been a castle guarded against dragons and housed brave knights and the rug that had once laid in the living room, long since washed to bare threads, could have taken us to foreign lands, ones that had never seen the League


The League.


What a joke.


“Sissy… Mama’s gone…” Sid’s voice came from the doorway, and I realised that I must have missed the sound of the alarm.


“I know… Do you want eggs for breakfast? We got some new ones yesterday.”


Rubbing at her eyes, Sid asked, “The brown ones?”


I could only grin. Of course that would be what Sid wanted. “Brown as mama’s eyes. Just the way you like them.” I held up one of the eggs to show her and her eyes light up. It was like the sun had come out from behind the clouds.


“Go and wake up Mickey, he’ll want to have some as well.” I ordered kindly. Ever loyal to a fault, Sid snapped a salute and trotted off back upstairs, her bare feet pattering against the bare floor. When it was still this early in the morning, you couldn’t pay Sid or Mickey to wear shoes. Even when it was time to leave for Meeting, getting them to wear their shoes was a trial and that was nothing to say about keeping them on during the proceedings. Mama had threatened, more than once, to tape their shoes on if they kicked them off again.


Once the two were sitting down around the table, each with a pile of steaming scrambled eggs on their plates, I sat down before them and took in the sight of them. Mickey was fourteen, Sid was twelve… What were they going to do when I vanished? Mama had been taken in the night, Papa, in the afternoon. When would I be forced to go?


Had I done enough to make sure that they would be alright? Had there been any point? Perhaps I should have just surrendered to the inevitable. In truth, would there be any point? I would vanish sooner or later.

“Daffy, eat!” Mickey ordered, the sound of his voice making me grin. He had a tooth gap that whistled whenever he spoke and it did funny things to my heart whenever I’d hear him try to say my name. Words had never come easily to him nor had he completely understood how to say my name properly so I was ‘Daffy’. Sid had been renamed ‘Si-Si’ and time had rolled on. One might have thought that Mickey was 3 or 4 with how he talked but his height, reaching my shoulder, would swiftly prove them wrong.


“Yes, yes, I’m going to.” My pile was considerably smaller than theirs but that suited me fine. I stuck my fork into my eggs but the pale yellow didn’t appeal to me after I’d woken up to see Mama be marched off. Casting my mind around for something else to talk about, I settled on the only thing I could think about.

“Don’t forget that we have Meeting today. You need to wash up. Remember the rules.”


“Clean, quiet, meek, mild,

These are the proper ways to be a child.” Sid intoned, yawning, a crumb of scrambled egg sticking to the corner of her mouth. Mickey clapped along with the song that had been drilled into our heads from the moment we were able to comprehend words.


Hearing those dull, learned by heart words made my chest squeeze. It just wasn’t fair.


By the time I had finished, my eggs had gone cold, but I knew better than to waste food. Somehow, someone would always know if I did and the glares pressing down on me would sting less than if I had eaten them hot enough to burn my tongue. I directed Sid and Mickey upstairs to get dressed and sat down at the table, closing my eyes just to take in the sounds around me. It was just enough to make me feel less alone.


The soft creaks of the floorboards upstairs… the echo of Sid and Mickey’s voices… my breathing…

drumming my fingers… the creak of my chair… the sounds of the birds outside… Proof that the world was alright. That we might find ourselves on the other side of this. Those faint, cheeping bird songs… more than anything, they were what brought me solace. Reminding me that there was something of the world I knew once upon a time still lingering in existence. Long before the League had risen.


If I cast my mind back to all those years ago, I remembered waking up early in the morning, so early that the sky was still that delicate greenish blue. Creeping downstairs, I turned on the T.V to see someone giving a speech. I didn’t understand what the person was saying, just that their words were loud, and they repeated a lot of it.


Borders…


Righteous…


Tariffs…


Penalties…


Purify… That was the last word I remembered clearly before I found the remote and switched over to a channel that would turn from infomercials to cartoons in ten minutes. I knew that if I could keep the volume down enough then I’d have the whole morning to watch whatever I wanted.


I had never realised just how fleeting those days would turn out to be. The day the League came into being, Mickey had been born, and my world had turned upside down. Before I had to attend Meetings, help Mickey and Sid into their brown shirts and black shorts and Sid’s ankle-length skirt, fasten the tie around Mickey’s neck before I could put on my own uniform. Before we had to wait for the Men to come to our door. Before Papa and Mama vanished.


The walk to Meeting was quiet, the only sound allowed was the clicking of our shoes. If we spoke, the Men would take the switches they carried on their belts and strike us. Once for every word we said. There was me at the front, being the eldest of the children who lived on my street, leading the others organised in birthday order from earliest to latest in the year, feeling like the goat who led the others to slaughter. Mickey was in the middle of the herd; Sid was towards the back. It had taken me, Papa and Mama weeks of repetition and practice to get him to accept being away from us. Papa would pretend to be a Man; Mama would lead us around the living room in a circle, spacing us out with chairs and if Sid would speak up, Papa would tap the back of his knee, too lightly to hurt but with a hard look that got the point across.


Quiet.


Clean. Quiet. Meek. Mild.


Entering into the Meeting Hall, we filed down the aisle that laid between the pews, walking in step past Mother Tabitha to atone. We all called her Mother, but she wasn’t a parent to anyone. We lined up by street and one by one, we all received a lick from the stick that never left her hand.


“For your crime.” She would intone after each smack.


I took mine without making a sound but the boy behind me, younger by a year and shaking so hard I could feel it through the floor, shrieked as the stick came whistling through the air. I couldn’t turn around to see, nor did I dare try to sneak and peek, but the silence that lingered as the echos of the cry slowly disappeared was suffocating, as if Mother Tabitha had been struck dumb by the sound.


A beat of oppressive silence before Mother Tabitha let out a sound that was halfway between a scream and the squeal of a kettle boiling over and began raining down blows upon the boy. Hunching over like a burrowing animal, hands flying up to cover his neck and head, but Mother Tabitha walloped him there anyway.


“SIN!” She screamed.


“Sin! Sin! Sin! Sin!” She chanted and we joined in empty voices.


When she had exhausted herself, Mother Tabitha fumbled with the whistle around her neck, and we sank into position, covering our faces and turning around to face the pews. The boy was seized by a pair of Men and his wailing, pleading screams echoed through the hall as he was dragged away. To his credit, he didn’t go without a fight, kicking his feet, scratching at the Men’s leather gloved hands and when that didn’t work, he beat his fists against their knees. Despite this, he was pulled away into the antechamber. I wondered if we would ever see him again.


“Stand forward. Sit in your places. Say nothing.” Mother Tabitha didn’t even sound winded. Mickey and Sid

walked up to stand behind me and we sank onto the unforgiving wooden pews. I noticed their wince and had to fight to keep my eyes forward. The Preacher, silver-haired and dressed all in purple, walked in from a side room and surveyed us as if looking over a Kingdom. The sermon went on for two hours but there was only part that I paid attention to.


“Remember. It is to the great sacrifice that we give our all, that we are to maintain a strict watch over each other, that none be allowed clemency to evade the eyes of the law.” The preacher droned on, the large emblem of the League, a pair of gleaming red eyes, displayed proudly upon his chest.


I wish more than anything that I could run up the aisle from where we sat and seize it from him, tear it from his body and scream until my lungs gave out. Bring the whole place down upon these people and their self-righteous heads. Seize Mother Tabitha’s stick and beat her until she was bent and bloodied. Then I would make them truly suffer. For the masts and speakers, the power boxes, for Mama’s vegetables we’d had to hand over, the parents who Vanished, for Papa and Mama…


When the sermon was over, the Hall emptied out one pew at a time. We were in the middle, and I watched as families, some with only one parent, others with two, more than I was comfortable seeing with just children. They were guided forward and each was questioned about the sermon. Those who answered correctly were allowed through the door, and those who failed… their screams bounced off the ceiling, forcing us to fight back the urge to wince.


“What section of the charter was today’s sermon based on?” A Man asked me.


“Fourteen.” I answered and the check mark scratched on his clipboard made my shoulders settle in relief.


“How long was the sermon?” He asked Sid and my stomach dropped. Had Sid been paying attention? She was awful at that!


“An hour.” She answered, her tone blank and practiced.


“What was the Preacher wearing?” Mickey’s turn.


“His purple robe.” He answered, and I could have cried. Finally, we could go home.


But we couldn’t relax. Stepping back into the house enveloped us in the dust and old furniture and the lingering scent of Mama’s perfume. How long would it be before it disappeared like Papa’s soap smell? I had kept what was left of it in a tin under the sink and on days I missed him painfully, I would take it out to inhale the smell again, pretending that it was Papa I was holding onto again.


“What’s that whistling?” Sid asked, kicking off her shoes, only stopping to put them against the wall in a uniform position.


“Just a bird, don’t worry about it.” I instructed, pointing up the stairs. Without needing to be told, Mickey and Sid filed upstairs to change out of their clothes for lunch. I would, but only in a moment. Leaning back against the door, I let out a deep, lingering breath, feeling my whole body relax like someone had cut the invisible strings that had been holding all that tension inside of me. Papa… Mama… me…


The bomb fell on the house before I could move away, before I could call out, before I could even brace myself. Perhaps it was a mercy that way.


Before I knew what was happening, Micky, Sid and myself were dead.


We, and the rest of the world, would never know that it had been the League who had dropped it. That they didn’t care where it landed, as long as it did enough damage. Enough to justify what they wanted to do.


I would never know what that was.


The day I died came just as the year ended.