Puddles

“A puddle of mud is not a body of water!” June insists.

“Is a swamp a body of water?” I counter.

“Yes.”

“A muddy puddle could technically be interpreted as a very small swamp.”

She snorts. “By who?”

“Me, of course.”

Our training sessions often dissolve into banter like today. We're meant to be studying for a preliminary test to enter the Keeper Trials, where we may compete for the sole position of Conlectus’ ruler. The Trials occur approximately every eighty years, assuming that the current Keeper is in good health. They're timed for the end of the Keeper's life, but allow ample time to pass along guidance and wisdom to his successor.

To qualify, participants must have a clean health history, be between the ages of fifteen and twenty-one, and not have any major behavioral infractions. June and I fit all the criteria due to vegetables shoved down our throats, strategic pregnancies, and strict parenting ensuring our eligibility, though we fall slightly on the older end of the scale. It's not uncommon for civilians to plan their children's lives around the Trials in hopes of elevating their status beyond the rags we're all born into. Well, not all of us. Those with good connections to the Keeper and his or her council get to enjoy exclusive benefits, whether it be hilltop estates or private tutors or even just food on a regular basis. It creates an interesting social dynamic around the Trial times. Each family raises their children to beat every other child in the Trials while simultaneously trying to maintain an amicable relationship with each other in case someone else wins instead. That way, they too could gain benefits even if their child doesn't win. Does wonders for the kid's confidence. Totally.

June and I grew up in a small community of families who ‘support’ each child's learning. Sometimes they truly are helpful, but beneath it all is a desperation for their child to win, or to observe what the good, smart kid is doing and force it on their own. We, along with a few other kids, grew up together facing the same expectations, same lessons, same everything. Many of us grew resentful of each other, but there's little to be done when our only chance at freedom and independence are these stupid Trials and whatever comes after. If one of us wins: instant upgrade for us all. If none of us wins: we stay right where we are, the only collateral damage being our mental health and sanity. Both are expendable.

So we sit together now, drilling each other on content for the written portion of the exam. Or at least we were. Now we're debating the definition of a body of water and whether a muddy puddle qualifies as one.

She's scowling at me, a playful glint in her eyes. We were some of the only kids here who didn't instantly hate each other. We find this whole setup quite funny, actually. Out of the thousands of participants, who's to say that this little circle will produce the next Keeper? We're rivals, but also friends. We study together, of course, in case there's some chance we could improve the lives of our families. But we've given up all real thoughts of success. It's harder for failure to let you down if you never expected to succeed.

Besides, ambition can kill. So I avoid it altogether.

“Come on, let's actually study,” she grounds herself, the mirth gradually leaving her eyes.

“But what if there's a multiple choice question about muddy puddles? What do I put then?!” I exclaim hastily before the mirth fully disappears.

“Guess, then.” She smirks.

“That's a terrible strategy. Remember our very first testing lesson? When we were four? The very first thing we learned is that you must never guess on a question. Getting an answer wrong is even more shameful than not answering it at all.”

“At least if there's four choices then you raise the chance that you get it right from zero to twenty-five,” she shrugs.

“I'll tell Teacher Aspen that.”

We argue some more before scrambling to collect our materials and appear busy when we hear one of the mothers pass by our door. A few hours pass before we're too tired to continue. The written portion is tomorrow, after all. There's not much we can do the night before. So we lay with our upper bodies splayed across the wooden desks, entering slumber in a perpetual position of studying.

*

The test wasn't too complicated, covering a variety of topics from science to math, culture to history, morality to ‘opinion’ questions that technically aren't graded, but rather taken into consideration if there are too many who pass the test to admit us all. Morality and opinion questions are the simplest. You just put the most boring answer if it's multiple choice, and write answers that mirror the current Keeper's policies if it's a free-response question. After all, he was chosen as Keeper, so they must like his ideas. Logically, they'll like mine too if they're the same as his.

The news comes three days later with a knock on the door. I'm already dressed, wearing my nicest clothes to greet the man who stands on the porch. I give him my most practiced-natural smile, as if I had been casually lounging around wearing my favorite clothes instead of pacing and adjusting my hair for the past hour in anticipation of his arrival. June teased me, telling me I looked more like I was waiting for a girl to visit home for a date than waiting for the most important news of my life. As if we're allowed to ignore our Trials preparation in pursuit of love. Hah.

I open the door to a stout, balding man with an envelope in hand. I stand up straighter as he not-so-subtly inspects me, his eyes tracing my body from head to toe before finally settling on my face.

He grins stiffly, and I wonder for a moment what he sees in me. A bright young man, brimming with potential? Or a kid from the slums who will likely never amount to anything in his life? My gut tells me it’s the latter, even before he opens his mouth to speak. When he does, though, my smile falters in disbelief.

“I’m pleased to inform you that you have been selected for the highly selective Keeper Trials, and we will be leaving promptly for the venue after you have collected your belongings. That is, if you deem anything…necessary. The facilities will take care of your basic needs for the duration of your stay.”

If that dead flicker of hope hadn’t revived itself so suddenly–if I weren’t staring at him in awe, pinching myself aggressively–I may be offended by his assumption that there aren’t things I want to bring, or I may point out the redundancy of his first statement. Neither of those two are the case, and I’m left here standing like a dummy as he prattles on about the luxurious amenities of the Trials, and as I hear my mother’s muffled shrieks of joy from the room over. Holy crud.

My mind is infiltrated with visions of myself wearing the Keeper’s robe, of Mother lounging on one of those fancy velvet sofas, of June and her family living comfortably nearby on acres of land reserved solely for them. I want to shut these fantasies down. This means nothing. Nothing whatsoever. No promises, no hope, no disappointment.

“Hey–hey. Are you listening? I do not have the time to repeat myself,” he frowns, causing creases to form and smush into each other above his eyebrows.

“Yes!” I clear my throat. “Yes, I am, thank you.”

He eyes me skeptically. “Right, then. Then as I was saying, use this time to gather any personal items, say your goodbyes, and we will be leaving momentarily.”

Nodding, I turn around. Gosh, I wish June were here. She had to go home in case she was also selected, so all that’s left in my quaint, impoverished home is my mother peeking out from her room. My father is no longer with us.

We exchange quick goodbyes, Mother urging me along without anything from home.

“You’ll have better stuff there, anyway. Now, go make us all proud.”

Alright then.

As the car speeds away from my rundown complex, I wonder if anyone else made it. If our circle turned out to be worth any more than just me. I shiver at the latter possibility. If it were really just up to me…

No. It’s not. No expectations. No promises, no hope, no disappointment.

We pull up to a secluded cabin hidden deep in the woods. Well, a cabin that stands at the height of a four-story building, with glass windows displaying fine wooden art within its walls and comfortable-looking lounge areas with plethoras of books resting beside each seat. Outside, there's a crowd of contestants standing outside the door, almost all of them much more finely clothed than I am. Except one.

“June!” I race out of the car before it can brake properly, my bald chauffeur shouting as I sprint to her.

Her body stiffens as I crash into her, then relaxes into a laugh.

“Moros! Be careful, or you’ll knock me out before we even get started!”

I’m interrupted before I get a chance to respond by a spindly, elderly man who clears his throat, glancing at us distastefully. We straighten as he begins to speak in a velvety, coarse voice.

“Now that all the contestants have arrived, we are going to commence the first test of the Keeper Trials’ final rounds. While I acknowledge that you have all worked diligently to reach this stage, the Keeper is allowed no rest between his duties, so as his potential successors, you shall not either.”

We’re herded into a testing room not unlike the one I took the preliminary test in, seated in rows with a familiar-looking paper resting on the desks in front of us. The text across the top is as follows: Keeper Trials Preliminary Test. What?

“We will be conducting a retest to ensure that all applicants qualified from their own ability, and that all preparatory knowledge was retained rather than discarded after the first test’s completion. The Keeper must retain information far beyond the span of just a few days, so you must also. Time starts…now.”

Instantly, heads duck down, pencils scribbling furiously on paper. There’s no time to contemplate what he implied with his statements, and I wonder if it was meant to throw us off. The test is mainly the same–a few numbers changed, some phrasings rearranged–until the final question. It’s written like a riddle, presenting an oddly-specific situational dilemma about how to revive a man who drowned in a frozen lake accompanied by a math problem beyond anything we could have been taught in schools or by tutors. I place down my pencil, straining my eyes as if the answer were hidden somewhere in the blank spaces. Sighing, I lean back in my chair until I notice a strange inscription on the ceiling above. It says:

150: 5.1128, AICR techniques.

Slowly, I lower my head again, scanning the question. The answer written on the ceiling sounds…plausible. I wouldn’t know how to answer it otherwise. So I write it down.

The test ends shortly after, and I convene with June in the narrow hallway outside the room. We lock eyes before hers travel upward, and she cocks her head. She saw it, too. My index finger raises to meet my lips, a warning to stay silent. She nods.

We’re led to our rooms, where I perch on a bed that could house half of my complex, surrounded by intricate decorations of carved wood, a pleasant yet artificial breeze wafting through the massive space. To my right is a mahogany wardrobe adorned with pristine uniforms, more crisp bathrobes than I could ever use, and enough shoes to accommodate a lifestyle of changing pairs thrice a day. To my left is a spacious bathroom of terracotta marble from floor to ceiling, containing a toilet with different heat settings, a gold-clad shower set, and a bathtub that I think could be classified as a swimming pool. All signs of meaningless opulence. Ones that will surely be taken from me in time.

My thoughts are interrupted by a faint knock on the door. I open it to find June, who pushes past me into my room.

Standing in its center, she rests her hands on her hips, her gaze wandering. “Yep, same as mine.”

I close the door, then turn to face her, mirroring her stance. “Is that all you came for? To make sure your room is as fancy as mine?”

“Of course,” she replies with a deadpan stare. “Definitely not because of that thing on the ceiling.”

“Oh. Indeed, the thing was quite interesting. I wonder if anyone noticed the thing.” I subconsciously scan the room again, but this time in search of hidden cameras. Although I don’t notice any, I still think it would be better to speak subversively. June seems to agree.

“I don’t think anyone else did. I overheard the others debating the answer, and one girl just wrote the word ‘impossible’ as hers.”

“You mean to say you were eavesdropping.”

“Obviously.”

We sit together at the edge of my bed, leaving a foot of space between us. She leans back onto her hands, an easeful expression gracing her features. She normally bears a hardened demeanor around others. She thinks it’s better to wear that mask, to have an extra layer shielding her from the world’s danger so that it’ll hurt less when she’s ‘inevitably’ attacked or harassed or betrayed. She removes her mask around me.

“I still can’t believe we both made it. Us, from that little circle of families…”

Mentally shaking myself out of my thoughts, I relax onto my hands, too. “Yeah…I guess all that late night studying paid off, huh? And all of Mother’s scoldings and those weird vegetable concoctions…”

She laughs, facing me again. I study the ebony hair draped across her forehead, traveling down to brush her shoulders but not quite reach them. She claims that it’s more practical like that. Her azure-colored eyes are framed with the beige rims of her glass, her sight having diminished from reading late at night. The Keeper Trials don’t care for vision problems as long as they’re rectified by glasses or other devices. So that’s her only ‘imperfection,’ but I think her glasses sit perfectly on the bridge of her nose, making her look softer and stronger at once.

Maybe I’ve been staring at her too long. Her face flushes and turns away from me.

“I hope that one of us wins,” she starts. “The other would be set for life.”

“Yes…the other definitely would.”

We continue chatting, ignoring the redness of our faces and the way we can’t quite look each other in the eye. At nightfall, we make camp in my room, spreading blankets and pillows across the floor to sleep on. It’s more familiar than the too-large bed. We’re used to sleeping at our desks, after all.

“Goodnight, Moros,” she whispers into the darkness.

“Goodnight,” I whisper back, then so quietly she could never hear me (and I pray she doesn’t), “my love.”

*

Days stretch on, and there’s an eerie lack of action. Meals are delivered, books are read, boredom is cultivated. The only sign of progress in the Trials is the silent dismissal of contestants, one by one sent away for no apparent reason. It’s all the rich participants, and I wonder if they made it this far because of their heritage. June and I alternate between our rooms, and it’s a day spent in mine that we’re finally summoned.

“Congratulations,” the spindly man, Edmund, announces. “You two are the finalists for the role of Conlectus’ Keeper. You were the only ones to correctly answer the final question of the test. The others either performed significantly worse on the retest or were caught cheating, marking their elimination and great shame to their families. All such participants were stripped of their land, resources, and wealth as they were sent to the desert edge of the realm in a public display.”

I force my gaze to remain forward, no matter how badly I want to look at June. That newly-born seed of hope from before blossoms, growing wildly until it sprouts vines that encapsulate my heart, clenching it hard. We’re informed that our performance will be evaluated before being considered once again, then sent away.

In the quiet of my room, I finally allow myself to contemplate possibilities instead of denials. It could be me. Unless they find out about the writing on the ceiling…I jolt upwards. June has never been a good liar, and never has to lie on ‘morality’ questions. She’ll want to confess. And the inscription is still there…

Hope and ambition and cruel logic overtakes me as I enter her room that night, right after washing the testing room’s ceiling clean. It’s all rooted too deeply in me, controlling me, and yet I have no desire to break free. I do it when her back is to me because I can’t bear to see her face when it happens. I wonder for an instant if this is our intended finale. Our families would have been exiled anyway, all because of your loose lips. One of us has to prevail. Your family can still benefit from this. Even without you.

This is how I become the Keeper.

Standing over her body, the jagged glass of a bottle in hand.

Looking over the blood spilling out of it.

Unknowing that it’s all a test, or that this isn’t June.

Whispering, “if a muddy puddle isn’t a body of water, June, then how about one of blood?”