sj mcmahon writes

I take a good long pull on my vent pipe. It’s customary once you finish your shift. Helps your lungs get accustomed to the compressed air, before you venture outside. 
It’s a cleaner hit than the air in the facility. They have these huge filters and pumps that push the air around for us all, but is largely recycled. It’s not like you can draw air in from outside. So, we end up rebreathing each other lung waste, mixed in with a portion from the air towers that every building has these days. 
My shift was extra long today. I need the money. Buying the portable compressed air is becoming ever more expensive. Plus, my landlord has put up the rent for the slum I live in. Says it’s to cover his own air costs, but we all share the same source in our tower block, so I can’t see why it would cost him so much more. Especially as he’s making all of us pay the extra. Typical money grabbing type. 
I still can’t wait to get back to my apartment though. My body aches and my head is heavy today. 
Work was tough. 
We try to manage the chemicals as best we can, but really, we aren’t making much of a difference. 
You still can’t step outside without wearing a full compression suit. 
Not that there’s much reason to go out anyway, apart from the necessary journeys for work and food. 
There is not much to see in the murk that blankets the streets day and night, other than the harsh outlines of the many new buildings that cover the city. There had to be a rush to build them all, to make sure there was enough spaces, inside, for everyone.
You might occasionally catch the blurry haze of someone’s light, high up on one of the tower blocks, but you’ll never get invited in. We keep to ourselves outside of work. We have to. It’s not safe any other way. 
I recheck my suit. Yes, all is secure. Another drag on my vent pipe and I’m ready to make my journey. 
To leave the warehouse you must wait in the antechamber. The doors behind you have to be fully shut before the one to the outside world will open. Letting the outside in would be a danger. Plus, our bosses would be furious at the cost of the clean-up such an action would require. There are warning signs to check the doors. If you know what’s good for you, then you heed them. You need to signal to the watching camera when you ready to leave. A thumbs up will suffice. 
Then a small door will click open. It always makes me think of the door Alice looked through when she peered into Wonderland from the rabbit hole. It’s so small, I have to bend double to clamber through. Yet there’s no wonders at the other side of this door. Far from it. 
Outside, today is the same as every other day. 
Despite my suit, I feel the temperature dip as I step out on to the street. 
The atmosphere is dense. It’s like my visor has been smeared with something greasy. No matter how hard I try to clean it, visibility remains blurred. It takes a little adjusting to each time you venture out. The grainy, peppered air always has the quality of the last hour before dawn. 
I set off walking. A steady pace. It’s something you need to think about. Whenever you need to go out, a judgement is needed as to how much air you need to carry for the journey. The canisters are bulky and heavy, so it’s important to gauge this as accurately as you can. 
I’ve taken this route many times though.
From the facility, I pass by an open patch of land. I imagine this too will soon be built upon. I can see the vague outlines of tall buildings at the far side of it, but the land itself is flat and devoid of any features. 
There is little sound, other than the smudged noise of my trudging feet. Heard through the suit, it’s like having a blanket pulled around your ears. Any tiny noise is strained for. Any heard, other than my own footfall, are mysteries never to be resolved. 
I reach the corner of the flat land and cross a path to walk down a narrow alley between two tall substantial walls. I presume they are solid. I can’t actually see. It’s so much darker in the alleyway. The heavy air presses around me, fog like. I look to my feet as I walk. What I presume to be white lines, which show as grey in the dim light, point the way forward. It is safest to follow them, to avoid time delays and accidental misdirection. 
Eventually I am spat out of the alley, to reach the railway line. I know I must turn right along it, to ensure I make it to the platform. There I can safely wait for my train home. 
I pass no others on my journey and the platform is also devoid of life. Only those that need to be outside are. We all ensure we stay indoors as much as possible. It has been so since ‘the incident’. The authorities warn regularly of the threats that chemical laden air brings and we do our best to heed the warnings. 
At first it wasn’t the case. People would defiantly endeavour to carry on life as they had known it. This soon ended when bodies fell on mass in the streets, their faces stretched in death masks of discomfort and surprise. Now everyone believes the propaganda we are fed, or at least abides by its doctrine. 
Of course, there are rumours of subversion. Underground groups who remain steadfast in their denial of ‘the incident’ and its fallout. But in essence, trapped inside out suits, our buildings, breathing in our metered, manufactured air, we are all in some way living an underground life. 
I wait on the silent platform. 
A LED message flashes across the display screen above my head. My train will be three minutes late.
If life were as it had been, this would have no significance. Three minutes would pass in a flash. A checking of my messages or social media would have seen me through it. A song played into my headphones would have easily spanned that gap in time. 
But now, these days, three minutes matter. 
We all make our own assessment on the volume of air we each need. Cost and weight are factors, as I have told you, but the judgement remains your own. I am thrifty by nature. This means I carry only just enough air to see me from my workplace safely on to the train, where I can grab a boost, before exiting again to make the further short journey to my tower block and the safety of home. 
A worm of panic has started to stir in my belly. Those extra three minutes has awoken it. 
There are government notices everywhere. Reminders. 
“Be safe, be sensible, comply”
“Carry sufficient air for your journey”
“Plan ahead or lose your head”
“Do not listen to rumours”
“Your government is here for you”
“A life lost is productivity lost”
“Visions are a distraction from productivity”
“Don’t be a liar, don’t aspire”
“Stay on track and breathe”
“Inhale, exhale, repeat”
The messages are ever present. I have no excuses.
The worm is now fully awake and has uncoiled itself from its nest, releasing fear within me. It splits itself to crawl, on mass, through my limbs like dreadful shivers, turning my stomach, as it flips and flays in me. The worst of it is that I know I am breathing harder. Heavier, deeper. Sucking in that precious compressed nectar through the vent pipe at a dangerous rate. I can’t stop it though. Panic of not having sufficient clean air, is creating that very potential threat.
I curse my own stupidity, as my mind begins to swim and I slump to my hands and knees on the station platform. 
Squeezing my mouth and my eyes tight shut, I attempt to steady myself. Slow the pace of my own self-inflicted demise. 
How long now until the late train arrives?
I open my eyes to try to read the display once more. I cannot see it. I cannot see the station at all. It’s not that all has gone black. I have not left the platform. I still feel it’s hard concrete beneath my hands and knees. 
No.
I see something astounding. An echo of a past life maybe. A ghost vision of what was, what could still have been, if life had not been so altered. 
Before me, as clear and real as anything could be, is a green park. It stretches languidly, a luxury of green grass, beyond which there is a dense richness of tree cover. The air is clear and bright. A blue sky embraces the tree tops. 
Birds. 
There are birds here. I cannot recall the last time I saw such a creature, or heard the beauty of its call. 
People are here too. Families. Together. Walking, playing, laughing, but together. 
This is not allowed for us. Adults live solo in the tower block apartments and children are housed, together, in institutions. It’s for their safety and ours, we are told. 
But here, in this dream, they mix, freely, joyfully. 
Such sweetness is hard to take. The urge to release my visor, allow it to flip up, so that I can breathe in fresh scents is almost too much to resist. 
I marvel at the verdant scene playing in to my dazzled eyes and yet it fills me with a sickening fear. A feeling so heavily weighted within me, it seems to be instinctive. 
Agitation and guilt consume any pleasure initially felt. I know I must not believe in any of this illusion. None of it can be real. The authorities warn of such apparitions. That they are not to be trusted. That you should never reach into them, never allow them to take you over. 
Suspicion has been drummed into each of us and it leads me back, away from what must be a delusion, back it my senses. 
The train has finally arrived. It cuts an odd feature, setting a line across the ghost park’s lawn. The dull throb of its engine vibrates through the suit, through me. It chimes it’s leaving song. Four notes to say it will depart soon. Board now or miss me.
I know I must move. It is my only chance. Heavy of limb, I drag my body, on hand and knee to the closest carriage door. My head feels as though it has swelled to fill my helmet, my eyes bulge against their lids. With a final effort I pull myself inside the train. 
It’s door slides silently behind me, before clicking firmly into place. 
I have no strength to climb into a seat, so simply push my vent pipe into the attachment on the nearest one to me. 
I could weep as it hisses the release of recycled air to me. I draw on this greedily, thankfully.
Outside the train windows the park fades from me, growing ever more distant.   
I inhale, exhale, repeat. I comply.  

© SJ McMahon 2020