The Freshman Ch. 30

"I like what they're preaching at the Temple because I see it in my own life. I mean...they do have a very strong idea about what's wrong and what's right. What's wrong is to inflict needless suffering on any living entity, and what's right is to try to make the world a more pleasant place for everyone and everything around you. They teach that a damaged soul is what destroys and hurts, while a soul on the right path of life does the opposite, makes everything better, or at least strives to make everything better. If your soul is damaged, then you will be a constant source of misery to yourself and everyone else around you."

"Like my dad."

"Yes, Jason, like your dad. From what I've heard about him, his soul is about as damaged as they come. Well, anyhow, to answer your original question, why did I convert? I think the thing that got me was the Clergy's view of the Afterlife. What the Danubians believe is that upon dying, you have to come to terms with the way you lived, and just as importantly, the way you were as a person. You face the Creator, you hold up a mirror that you're buried with. In that mirror you see your soul for what it truly was when you were alive. You see the Absolute Truth, the full truth about the path of your life. Every question you ever had gets answered. And then, except for the truth, there's no absolutes, no black and white, no Heaven and no Hell. Instead what you have is an afterlife in which your soul faces the consequences, good and bad, of everything you ever did. I like that idea, because it means that you have to take responsibility for the way you live, day to day, minute to minute. What's done in your life is done, there's no praying and just hoping it will go away. You do something, and the Creator will hold you accountable. All you can do is hope you can learn, and try to behave better in the future. A pretty strong incentive to do your best, don't you think?"

"Yeah...a bit scary, when you think about it."

"Not at all. It's very empowering. You can't make excuses to the Creator. You are responsible, and that's all there is to it. I pray a lot, but for the future, not for the past. I can't change the past, and I will face the consequences of the past when I die. However, I do control what kind of person I will be in the future. That's what I need to worry about. That's where I ask the Creator's help."

A middle-aged couple passed them in the darkness. They were as naked as Malka Chorno and wearing collars, but Jason and Cecilia noticed the collars were not typical criminal collars. Instead they were smooth and lacked the prisoner's ring.

"That couple's performing pubic penance," explained Cynthia. "I can tell, because those collars are from the Temple, not from the Ministry of Justice."

Cecilia knew about public penance, but Jason did not, so Cynthia explained it to him. In some ways penance was like a criminal sentence, but it was a sentence a person imposed on himself instead of having it imposed by the Ministry of Justice. The goal of penance and a criminal sentence were similar, to strip away as much as possible from the person's old life to allow him to start building a new one. As Cynthia put it:

"The Church considers penance important for anyone who wants to make any kind of change in their life. Penance places you on public display. The idea is that the public stripping of worldly items from your body will help you to strip the worldly contamination from your soul. You're also humbling yourself in the eyes of society, because a person performing penance has the same legal status and duties as a convicted criminal. You put on the Temple collar and expose yourself to everyone around you. You are announcing to the world 'I don't like who I've been up until now. I want strip my soul and rebuild it, because I need to change. Until I can clean my soul, my body will remain uncovered.'"

"Cynthia, I'm kinda curious about something. Did you ever perform penance?"

"Yes. I wore a Temple collar last summer for a couple of weeks before I converted. I'm planning to do it again after the trial. This time it's going to have to be more than a few weeks. I might be wearing a collar for several months, but I haven't decided how long yet. When the time comes, I'll talk to the Priest who swore me into the Church and see what he thinks."

"But...how come you're gonna do it now? Did you do something wrong?"

"I have my reasons. I can't really explain them, but it's important to me. I'm just waiting for the trial to be over, and then I'm getting collared. I have some issues I got to settle between myself and the Creator."

Cynthia's explanation profoundly affected her two companions, for very different reasons.

Jason was heartened by what Cynthia had told him. He desperately wanted to mark the end of the person he had been, and the beginning of the person he wanted to become in the future. He wanted to break from his past and demonstrate to himself and the world that he could be someone else than who he had been before he entered college. He did not want to be the helpless son of a wealthy American corporate sociopath. He wanted to be someone different, someone he could actually respect. Would performing penance give him that break he needed to separate his new life from his old one?

Cecilia, meanwhile, suddenly felt horribly guilty about wanting to use a Danubian religious practice to pursue a sexual fantasy with Jason. Now that she understood the philosophy of the Temple and the seriousness of public penance, the thought of using it to make Jason into her personal servant seemed offensive, to say the least. She felt that if anyone needed to perform penance, it was she, for having such a sacrilegious thought, not Jason. An idea began forming that over the next several weeks would grow, crystallize in her mind, and ultimately force her to take action. She would need to confess to a Danubian Priest her secret fantasy of abusing public penance and accept the consequences.

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The group returned to the spot where Kim and Malka Chorno had been praying to find Kim standing by herself, looking out over the East Danube River. Kim was in a quiet, reflective mood, but seemed quite happy to see her companions return. The four Americans made their way back to the Temple and then out to the plaza in front, where Kim pointed out the café where her husband had worked during his sentence.

"It's weird, how your mind plays tricks on you. Every time I pass that place I think I'm gonna see Sergekt with his waiter's tray, and of course he hasn't worked there since we finished our sentences."

Kim suddenly became less reflective and more upbeat.

"So, how tired are you guys?"

"Not too bad."

"OK, then let's get these robes off and I'll take you over to the Socrates Club."

The four Americans briefly returned to the Central Police Station to allow Kim and Cynthia to get out of their prayer robes and put their street clothes back on. However, they would remain dressed only long enough to take a trolley to the Socrates Club, the famous criminals' haunt that was the core of the entire Danubian music scene. Then everything, jewelry included, would have to come off.

The four Americans surrendered their possessions at the cloakroom and entered into a world unlike anything Jason or Cecilia had ever seen. There were hundreds of naked bodies on the dance floor, seated at the tables, and just running around with pitchers of beer or bowls of deep-fried vegetables. Kim found an empty table and ordered a large bowl of vegetables, which tasted something like salted Tempura, and a pitcher of very weak Danubian beer. It was amazing to see how at ease the Lee sisters were with their bodies, and of course Jason, who fit right in. Cecilia felt uneasy because her dark skin drew a lot of curious glances from the European crowd. The Lee sisters drew less attention because everyone in the room knew who they were.

Shortly after they sat down, a young criminal who obviously liked Cynthia joined the Americans. He invited her to dance, leaving Kim and Cecilia to converse at the table. Kim talked at length about the club and its history, as well as her own time as a criminal when "Socrates' Mistresses" was just starting out. She added that the band would perform here the following weekend, and of course Jason and Cecilia were invited.

Kim's husband Sergekt Dolkiv showed up, kissed her, and shook hands with Jason and Cecilia. Then, in Danubian he asked his wife to dance, leaving Cecilia and Jason with no choice but to get up and dance as well.

They danced slowly to a very sad-sounding song coming from the stage in a language neither of them understood. They were dancing naked, in a room of about 400 other naked young people, all of them criminals or ex-criminals, in club that was legendary for its music throughout Europe. They were in Europe's most isolated country, with no hope of being able to leave anytime soon. And yet, already, on their very first night in Danube City, there was a "normal" feel to their lives, in spite of the strangeness of their situation.

Cecilia had come into the club with a woman she idealized, only to realize that Kimberly Lee was a very ordinary person in a very ordinary marriage with an ordinary Danubian. The Lee sisters were both flawed young women whose most important contribution to Cecilia and Jason would be their friendship. Friendship was good enough for Cecilia. She and Jason would need some decent friends to get them through the difficult times that lay ahead.

At about midnight the four Americans and Sergekt Dolkiv got dressed and left the Socrates Club. Sergekt and Kim accompanied the others back to the hotel, but then got on another trolley to go home. Tomorrow was another day with a very full schedule. Cynthia went back to her own room, while Jason and Cecilia decided to go down to the hotel swimming pool.

The water looked very inviting. As they entered the pool area they noticed a sign written in various languages, including:

Danubian: "Negátutk odyáckt nad pisinúkt tatúk. Jáku: $ 1,000."

English: "Clothing prohibited in swimming pool area. Fine: $ 1,000."

Spanish: "Se prohíben los vestidos de baño en la piscina. Multa: $ 1,000."

Obviously their days of wearing swimming suits had ended.

Jason and Cecilia took off their clothes and slipped into the empty pool. The swimming lessons had to continue, no matter where they were. He spent a long time encouraging her to become more daring when taking her feet off the bottom. Finally, Cecilia surprised both herself and Jason by swimming the entire length of the pool unassisted. They were making excellent progress with at least one part of their lives, keeping Cecilia alive in the water.

After swimming, the couple returned upstairs. Although she was desperate for sex, that night Cecilia was not in the mood to have Jason spend the normal session with his face between her legs. She didn't even want a massage. Instead she briefly massaged him, and then assumed his favorite position on the bed, on her elbows and knees with her bottom turned up and on full display. She wanted to present herself and submit to him. He entered her and, as usual, thrust until both of them were gasping from exhaustion and pleasure.

Later, when he fell asleep, she got up and opened the curtains of the hotel room. For a very long time she stood at the window, looking out at the moon as it slowly sank westward over the river.

She quietly hummed Kim's song "The wall that divides my soul". Now there were two walls that divided her soul, the one that separated her life in New Jersey from the one in Chicago, and the wall that separated the life in Chicago from the one she was starting in Danube City. There was one important difference, however. However hard this second transition might be, she wasn't facing it alone.