State lawmakers praised Maclin’s execution as a sign of Darian’s Law finally taking hold. “Today, we saw justice served for seven brave and wonderful women,” said state senator Kay Lorring (D). “They never have to fear this man again, nor do they have to fear him getting out of jail hundreds of years down the line to commit similar atrocities. What you saw today was Texas stepping to the forefront of innovation in law enforcement in the postmortal world.”
But not everyone shares Lorring’s outlook. This morning hundreds of protesters stood outside the county prison to demonstrate against Maclin’s execution, including members of the ACLU, some of whom decried the execution as the beginning of “systematic African American genocide.” Most notable among the crowd was Keisha Dunn, who was one of the seven women assaulted by Maclin three years ago.
“I believe in forgiveness, and I do not believe in this case that the punishment fits the crime,” said Dunn, age twenty-four. “I believe Jerome Maclin was a bad man, and that what he did to me is one of the worst sins anyone can commit. But I do not believe that justifies killing, particularly those who have not killed others. That is not the Christian way of doing things. I believe Mr. Maclin belonged in jail for the rest of his life, however long that may have been.”
But state legislators argue that isn’t a financially viable option for taxpayers anymore. Since the advent of the cure for aging, the state’s prison population has increased nearly 25 percent, and the growth shows no sign of abating—all while the state faces a massive deficit.
State prosecutor Alberto Vizquel says, “There are only two fiscally smart things to do with some of these prisoners: kill them or let them go. In the case of Jerome Maclin, you’re talking about a serial rapist who almost certainly would have carried on assaulting women if he had ever been released from jail. But how can you possibly imprison someone for three hundred years, or however long it takes them to die of a heart attack or what have you? How are we supposed to deal with criminals who have an indefinite lifespan? I admit this may not constitute equal justice. But we have to be pragmatic. We have to think seriously about who deserves to remain on this planet and who does not.”
ACLU chapter president Niles McCormick vehemently disagrees. “The state of Texas has just created a complete mess. I may have been against the death penalty before this, but I thought at least it made a modicum of sense: If you kill a person in cold blood, you pay for it with your life. What this execution has done is blur that line completely. Now, who the heck knows what merits death as a punishment? Do you deserve to die if you blind someone? If you take their arm off? Does intent matter? And we’re not even talking about people who have been wrongfully convicted. These are impossible ambiguities. It’s not a can of worms they’ve just opened. It’s an entire barrel of them.”
Already many states have adjusted their sentencing guidelines to prevent the indefinite housing of prisoners. Some states, like California, have instituted a one-hundred-year-maximum collective sentence, despite fiery opposition from victims’ rights groups. Maine is now tinkering with the idea of a permanent island prison, which is not expected to get financing approval. And officials in Oklahoma have considered implementing a delayed death sentence, which would mandate the execution of any state prisoner over the true age of eighty-five, regardless of cure age. The ACLU has already decried that measure as inhumane.
Maclin’s death was witnessed by his aunt, prison officials, and members of the victims’ families, though none of the victims themselves chose to attend. Maclin was given a last meal of barbecued chicken, corn on the cob, and chocolate pudding; escorted to the execution chamber; and allowed to read a statement to the families and state officials. That statement consisted of just four words: “This is some bulls——t.” Fifteen minutes later, his heart stopped beating.
DATE MODIFIED:
1/4/2031, 10:09 P.M.
“I’m not even sure this is a marriage anymore”
My sister never comes into the city. She doesn’t want to deal with traffic or parking or even taking the train, even if it’s a relatively short trip. When I spotted her at Ocean Bar, she had ordered a bottle of wine for herself and had already drunk half of it. She looked exceptionally fragile.
“You heard about Dad?” she asked.
“Yeah. Of course.”
“He give you that whole spiel about how great his illness is?”
“Yes, and I have to say he was rather convincing. I take it you aren’t so giddy about it.”
“Eh, it’s not that. In a way I’m relieved. You know I’m a worrier, obviously.”
“Me too now.”
“Right. And he’s getting up in age. I know he had the cure, but even so. It had started to weigh on me, what his fate was gonna be. And it’s just another goddamn thing. At least now there’s some measure of certainty. And he seems okay with it. So I guess that makes it easier.” She took a piece of bread from the basket, tore it, and left one half on the bare white tablecloth while she gnawed on the other. I did likewise.
“Mom helped prepare me for this,” she said. “I mean, nothing will throw me off more than when she was dying. Having dealt with that makes it easier, in an odd way. I know what’s coming. I know how I’m going to feel. It’s almost like planning a birthday party. I can forget all about the emotional aspects of the event and get bogged down strictly in the coordinating. That’s the best way to grieve, you know. To become mired in logistics.”
“He talk to you about what he wants done with his body?”
“Yeah. He wants the same thing as Mom. Donate his body, throw his ashes in the ocean when we get them back. And thank goodness for that. I heard it costs twenty thousand dollars a year to keep someone buried in a cemetery now—which is just insane. You’d think they were teaching philosophy to the corpses.”
“Well, whatever happens we’ll get through it. If you need anything . . .”
She took a drink of wine and began weeping.
I tried reassuring her. “Polly, it’s gonna be okay.”
“It’s not that,” she said. “It’s Mark. He wants to convert to a cycle marriage. He wants to leave me ten years from now.”
“Oh no.”
“It’s awful. He hasn’t cheated or anything. He’s helped with the kids and been supportive of me—the night classes, the master’s degree, and all that. He’s never been anything but wonderful. And now this.”
“You don’t want it?”
She looked at me like I was a fool for asking. “Of course I don’t want it. He’s my husband, and I always want him to be my husband. That’s why I married him. I don’t care that we all got the cure. That’s not a factor for me. I love him. I was excited at the idea of seeing the kids fully grown and then having some real time with him. Traveling. Walking. All the stuff Mom and Dad did. I liked that idea. We could have even had another group of kids somewhere down the line. That’s what I loved thinking about. Now all I see is this ticking clock. It’s like he’s already left. I see him notice women on the street. He tries to hide it, but I know. It never bothered me before, because I knew he was just looking and nothing more. But now? Now it’s like seeing a dog trapped in a cage. I know he’s looking forward to life without me. I’m not even sure this is a marriage anymore.”
“What do the kids say about it?”
“We haven’t told them. They probably wouldn’t even hear me. They’d just go back to their tablets. You know they don’t want to finish high school? Jay walked right up to me the other day and told me he wanted to go to New Zealand next year. I asked for how long. And he said, oh, maybe a decade. A decade! He’s just casually tossing out the idea of a ten-year pit stop. I don’t even think he knows where New Zealand is. He just wants to go somewhere new to spend twenty hours a day pinging friends. I bet he could be there for ten years without noticing the sheep.”
“Well, that’s a big thing now,” I said. “I read about how all the college enrollments are way down and kids are putting everything off.
”
“Exactly, and who ends up screwed in the process? Parents like me. Because now I have an extra fifty years to fret over these kids getting a proper education. I’m telling you, John, it’s a train wreck. And now I’ve got my husband asking to be single again. I’m not ready for that. I’m not ready to be a postmarried person. It’s . . . it’s fucking weird.”
“Then fight for him. Tell him you want him to stay. I know when you tell me to do something, I listen.”
“It’s not so easy when every jackass at Mark’s work is negotiating cycle marriages. I’m not blaming you for that, mind you. If your bosses hadn’t invented it, someone else would have. These men are going completely bonkers over it. Last week we were invited to a divorce party. Again, weird.”
“Did you go?”
“God no! I had to shower for forty minutes after looking at the invite. I know the woman getting the divorce: Karen Welsh. She did not want that divorce to happen. So the idea that she’s going to be forced to sit there with some bullshit smile on her face, pretending it’s Independence Day? Yuck. I’d feel more comfortable at a key party.”
“See, I would have gone. At least it’s not some boring regular cocktail party. At least there’s some sort of interesting, awkward dynamic to it.”
“But these are people’s lives being ruined, John. Do you really find it so amusing? What will you say when I have to invite you to my divorce party?”
I stared down at the crumbs and little stains around my place setting. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way.”
“It’s not funny. Ten years from now, I won’t have a family anymore. I’ll be forced to start over. At fifty-four.”
“But your cure age will be thirty-five.”
“Oh, like that’ll help. You watch. Thirty-five-year-olds are about to become the new senior citizens. I’ll be the youngest old maid on earth.”
“Don’t talk that way.”
“I want the family I already have. Yes, they annoy the hell out of me sometimes, and sometimes I’d like to be airlifted out of my house and flown to Italy for a month alone, with some beefy guy named Gianni hand-feeding me grapes. But that’s what you sign up for when you have a family. That’s part of the whole package. I don’t mind that kind of angst. It’s better than starting some new, weird family every time the century turns. I don’t want that, John. I want everything I had before all this began.”
“So, what do you do?”
She finished the bottle. “I don’t know. That’s the worst part of it.”
DATE MODIFIED:
1/6/2031, 11:34 A.M.
“I don’t know if anyone will ever get married again”
Alison turned to me in bed. I gently pressed my nose against hers, so her face occupied my entire field of vision. I stared at her intently, trying to take in as much of her as I could. I studied her eyes and her cheeks and her pores, as if I were looking through the porthole of a wrecked ship at the bottom of the ocean. I wanted to see into her.
“Do you ever regret not marrying Sonia?” she asked.
I kissed her. “No. Not really. She’s happy with Nate. Our son is happy. Everything seems to have worked out.”
“Would you ever get married?”
“Is that something you’d like?”
“No, I think I’ve had enough of marriage for a little while. I don’t know if anyone will ever get married again.”
“I’d marry you.”
She laughed. “I’m not talking about one of those forty-year things.”
“No, I mean it. Real marriage. The whole thing. Forever and ever. Death do us part. No sleeping with other people, blah-blah-blah. I’d do it.”
“Why are you so certain about getting married now, when you weren’t back then?”
“Different people. I love you more than I ever loved Sonia.”
“Ah, but how do you know you won’t find someone after me who is even more appealing? How do you know that I’m the apex of what you’re looking for? That you can’t love anyone out there more than you love me?”
“Because I know. There’s no one else out there but you. I know it.” I sat up. “Is this some sort of test?”
“No,” she said. “I’m genuinely curious about this. You loved Sonia, but you were afraid that at some point you’d stop loving her. You wanted a chance to find someone even better, particularly given your pleasant looks and your ability to remain ageless, right?”
“I guess. But I don’t think I thought it out as articulately as you have. I just didn’t want to marry her.”
“But why? You loved her.”
“I guess I knew I’d stop loving her at some point.”
“How can you really love someone if you know it’s got an expiration date?”
“Because most things fade,” I told her. “I’m old enough now to know that sometimes I go really gaga over someone or something but that eventually the euphoria wears off.”
“That’s what I’m curious about. I’m wondering if now the euphoria’s always going to wear off. I had a friend once whose parents were genuinely in love. I mean, wild about each other. Even when they were fifty, they were still kissing in public and giggling and doing all those things. It was disgusting, but it gave me hope. It made me think, yes, this whole big love ideal is really out there. It can really happen to people.”
“What happened to them?”
“They divorced a year ago. No warning. Just over, like that. It all came apart so easily. It made me think, Jesus, everyone’s gonna grow bored of each other now, and everyone knows it. That’s so odd. Because here we are, in bed. We’re happy, right? Are you happy?”
“Oh, I’m ecstatic.”
“Me too. But I can’t seem to settle in the moment right now. There’s always that strange new vanishing point on the horizon. I can’t get it out of my mind. I can’t stop worrying that . . . that love is bullshit now.”
“You’re not going all mopey on me, are you?”
“No. I just want to be able to believe in something.”
She ran her hand over my scar. The plastic surgeon said the procedure would wipe out the birth brand entirely. But I can still see it there, barely discernible in a little speed bump. No one will ever notice, except for me, which makes it doubly haunting. It’s a thin bubble of tissue, a membrane that appears to be in constant danger of bursting wide open. The doctor said the slight swelling would reduce over time. I almost want the trolls’ handiwork back.
Alison glided her fingertips along the bubble. She looked up at me. The thing that had never changed about her, in all this time, was her genuineness. Cynicism was still something completely alien to her. She wasn’t asking me these questions because she was growing bitter. It was because she was fearful. She wanted to see good things in the distance.
“Love is not bullshit,” I said.
“You can’t know that. No one can. There are things that will happen that you can’t possibly expect. Maybe love could survive them when the end of your of life was only decades away. But not now. Not with centuries ahead. Not when everything is so fucked up.”
“But everything’s always been fucked up. Since the dawn of time. That’s why people find each other. For comfort. For shelter. They find their own little crevice in the world, shielded from all the horror. We can do that, Alison. When I got cured, I didn’t know why I was doing it. I just knew I wanted it. But now I know. I know precisely why I want to live forever. It’s you. Things may be fucked up and may get even more fucked up. But it never has to touch us. Ever. We can find our little niche, and we can hide there. We can find our own little perfect slice of eternity. We can. That’s everything. The rest doesn’t matter.”
“It doesn’t work that way. You can try to avoid the world for as long as you can, but it will find you.” She tapped my scar. “The world will come for us.”
“Then let it. Love is not dead, Alison. Not in this room. People have been getting married for a very long time. Even before the cure, a life
time was still a hell of a commitment to make. And that was back when you knew the person you loved would grow old and ugly and sick. That won’t ever happen to us, Alison. We don’t ever have to fear that.”
“But how do you know that isn’t why people love each other to begin with?”
I climbed on top of her. “It’s not that I don’t know. It’s that I don’t care. Because right now I’m enjoying myself way too much to give a damn.”
DATE MODIFIED:
3/4/2031, 8:06 A.M.
Afternoon Link Roundup
◗ The U.S. Army desertion rate has increased over 104 percent in the past year alone. (The New Yorker)
◗ Detailed analysis of why Russia finally invaded Ukraine yesterday. (Lisbian)
◗ Users in tiny Santa Claus, Indiana, are finally getting a Wi-Fi signal, giving the National Satellite Wi-Fi Initiative 100 percent coverage. (IndyStar)
◗ Betty Hathaway, star of the latest Guys and Dolls revival, was murdered by her understudy, who was apparently not interested in an eternal apprenticeship. (Dora Smith’s feed)
◗ Senator Conrad Kenny (D-MA) has proposed reducing the number of allowable dependent-child tax credits from two to zero. (C-SPAN)
◗ A census study found that only around thirty-five million true organics remain in the United States, many of them sick or elderly. (USA.gov)
◗ Oil prices soared over $1,200 a barrel after a leaked memo from an Exxon executive divulged that only 1.2 billion barrels of oil remain in the recently tapped Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. I thought that sounded like a fair amount. I was incorrect. (Washington Post)