The Circle (19 page)

Mae was distracted by the bracelet.

“Mae?”

“Yes. That sounds great.”

The bracelet was beautiful, a pulsing marquee of lights and charts and numbers. Mae’s
pulse was represented by a delicately rendered rose, opening and closing. There was
an EKG, shooting right like blue lightning and then starting over. Her temperature
was rendered large, in green, 98.6, reminding her of that day’s aggregate, 97, which
she needed to improve. “And what do these do?” she asked. There were a series of buttons
and prompts, arranged in a row below the data.

“Well, you can have the bracelet measure about a hundred other things. If you run,
it’ll measure how far. It tracks your standing heart rate versus active. It’ll measure
BMI, caloric intake.… See, you’re getting it.”

Mae was busy experimenting. It was one of the more elegant objects she’d ever seen.
There were dozens of layers to the information, every data point allowing her to ask
more, to go deeper. When she tapped the digits of her current temperature, it could
show the average temperature for the previous twenty-four hours, the high and the
low, the median.

“And of course,” Dr. Villalobos said, “all that data is stored in the cloud, and in
your tablet, anywhere you want it. It’s always accessible, and is constantly updated.
So if you fall, hit your head, you’re in the ambulance, the EMTs can access everything
about your history in seconds.”

“And this is free?”

“Of course it’s free. It’s part of your health plan.”

“It’s so pretty,” Mae said.

“Yeah, everyone loves it. So I should ask the rest of the standard questions. When
was your last period?”

Mae tried to remember. “About ten days ago.”

“Are you sexually active?”

“Not at the moment.”

“But in general?”

“Generally, sure.”

“Are you taking birth control pills?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. You can move that prescription over here. Talk to Tanya on your way out, and
she’ll give you some condoms for the things the pill can’t prevent. Any other medications?”

“Nope.”

“Antidepressants?”

“Nope.”

“Would you say you’re generally happy?”

“I am.”

“Any allergies?”

“Yes.”

“Oh right. I have those here. Horses, too bad. Any family history of illness?”

“Like, at my age?”

“Any age. Your parents? Their health is good?”

Something about how the doctor asked the question, how she so clearly expected the
answer to be yes, her stylus hovering above her tablet, knocked the wind out of Mae,
and she couldn’t speak.

“Oh honey,” she said, and bringing her arm around Mae’s shoulder and tilting her close.
She smelled faintly floral. “There there,” she said, and Mae began to cry, her shoulders
heaving, her nose and eyes flooding. She knew she was getting the doctor’s cotton
coat wet, but it felt like release, and forgiveness, and Mae found herself telling
Dr. Villalobos about her father’s symptoms, his fatigue, his accident over the weekend.

“Oh Mae,” the doctor said, stroking her hair. “Mae. Mae.”

Mae couldn’t stop. She told Dr. Villalobos about his soul-flaying insurance situation,
how her mother was expecting to spend the rest of her life caring for him, fighting
for every treatment, hours on the phone every day with those people—

“Mae,” the doctor finally said, “have you asked HR about adding your parents to the
company plan?”

Mae looked up at her. “What?”

“There are a handful of Circlers who have family members like that on the insurance
plan. I would imagine it’s a possibility in your situation.”

Mae had never heard of such a thing.

“You should ask HR,” the doctor said. “Or actually, maybe you should just ask Annie.”

“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” Annie said that night. They were in Annie’s office,
a large white room with floor-to-ceiling windows and a pair of low couches. “I didn’t
know your parents had this insurance nightmare.”

Mae was looking at a wall of framed photos, each of them featuring a tree or shrub
grown into a pornographic shape. “Last time I was here you had only six or seven,
right?”

“I know. Word got out that I was some passionate collector, so now someone gives me
one every day. And they’re getting filthier all the time. See the one on top?” Annie
pointed to a photo of an enormous phallic cactus.

A copper-skinned face appeared in the doorway, her body hidden around the corner.
“You need me?”

“Of course I need you, Vickie,” Annie said. “Don’t go.”

“I was thinking of heading to the Sahara kickoff thing.”

“Vickie. Don’t leave me,” Annie said, deadpan. “I love you and don’t want us to be
apart.” Vickie smiled, but seemed to be wondering when Annie would end this bit and
let her go.

“Fine,” Annie said. “I should go, too. But I can’t. So go.”

Vickie’s face disappeared.

“Do I know her?” Mae asked.

“She’s on my team,” Annie said. “There are ten of us now but Vickie’s my go-to. You
hear about this Sahara thing?”

“I think so.” Mae had read an InnerCircle notice about it, some plan to count the
grains of sand in the Sahara.

“Sorry, we were talking about your dad,” Annie said. “I can’t understand why you wouldn’t
tell me.”

Mae told her the truth, which was that she didn’t see any scenario where her father’s
health would overlap with the Circle. There was no company in the country that covered
an employee’s parents or siblings.

“Sure, but you know what we say here,” Annie said. “Anything that makes our Circlers’
lives better …” She seemed to be waiting for Mae to finish the sentence. Mae had no
idea. “… instantly becomes possible. You should know that!”

“Sorry.”

“That was in your intake orientation. Mae! Okay, I’ll get on this.” Annie was typing
something into her phone. “Probably later tonight. I’m running into a meeting now,
though.”

“It’s six o’clock.” She checked her wrist. “No. Six thirty.”

“This is early! I’ll be here till twelve. Or maybe all night. We’ve got some very
fun stuff happening.” Her face was aglow, alive to possibility. “Dealing with some
juicy Russian tax stuff. Those guys do not fuck around.”

“You sleeping in the dorms?”

“Nah. I’ll probably just push these two couches together. Oh shit. I better go. Love
you.”

Annie squeezed Mae and walked out of the room.

Mae was alone in Annie’s office, stunned. Was it possible that her father would soon
have real coverage? That the cruel paradox of her parents’ lives—that their constant
battles with insurance companies actually diminished her father’s health and prevented
her mother from working, eliminating her ability to earn money to pay for his care—would
end?

Mae’s phone buzzed. It was Annie.

“And don’t worry. You know I’m a ninja with stuff like this. It’ll be done.” And she
hung up.

Mae looked out Annie’s window to San Vincenzo, most of it built or renovated in the
last few years—restaurants to serve Circlers, hotels to serve visitors to the Circle,
shops hoping to entice Circlers and their visitors, schools to serve children of the
Circle. The Circle had taken over fifty buildings in the vicinity, transforming blighted
warehouses into climbing gyms, schools, server farms, each structure bold, unprecedented,
well beyond LEED.

Mae’s phone went off again and again it was Annie.

“Okay, good news sooner than expected. I checked and it’s not a big deal. We have
about a dozen other parents on the plan, and even some siblings. I twisted a few arms
and they say they can get your dad on.”

Mae looked at her phone. It had been four minutes since she’d first mentioned all
this to Annie.

“Oh shit. You’re serious?”

“You want your mom on the plan, too? Of course you do. She’s healthier, so that’s
easy. We’ll put both of them on.”

“When?”

“I guess immediately.”

“I can’t believe this.”

“C’mon, give me some credit,” Annie said, breathless. She was walking briskly, somewhere.
“This is easy.”

“So should I tell my parents?”

“What, you want
me
to tell them?”

“No, no. I’m just making sure it’s definite.”

“It is. It’s really not the biggest deal in the world. We have eleven thousand people
on the plan. We get to dictate terms, right?”

“Thank you Annie.”

“Someone from HR will call you tomorrow. You guys can work out the details. Gotta
go again. Now I’m really late.”

And she hung up again.

Mae called her parents, telling her mom first, then her dad, and there was some whooping,
and there were tears, more praise for Annie as the savior of the family, and some
very embarrassing talk about how Mae had become a real adult, how her parents were
ashamed and humbled to be leaning on her, leaning so heavily on their young daughter
this way, it’s just this messed-up system we’re all stuck in, they said. But thank
you, they said, we’re so proud of you. And when she was alone on the phone with her
mother, her mother said, “Mae, you’ve saved not just your father’s life but my life,
too, I swear to god you have, my sweet Maebelline.”

At seven Mae found she couldn’t stand it any longer. She couldn’t sit still. She had
to get up and celebrate in some way. She checked the campus that night. She’d missed
the Sahara kickoff and already regretted it. There was a poetry slam, in costume,
and she ranked that
one first and even RSVP’d to it. But then she saw the cooking class in which they
were going to roast and eat an entire goat. She ranked that second. At nine there
was an appearance by some activist wanting the Circle’s help in her campaign against
vaginal mutilation in Malawi. If she tried, Mae could get to at least a few of these
events, but just when she was arranging some sort of itinerary, she saw something
that obliterated all else: the Funky Arse Whole Circus would be on campus, on the
lawn next to the Iron Age, at seven. She’d heard of them, and their reviews and ratings
were stellar, and the thought of a circus, that night, most matched her euphoria.

She tried Annie, but she couldn’t make it; she would be in her meeting till eleven
at least. But CircleSearch indicated a bunch of people she knew, including Renata
and Alistair and Jared, would be there—the latter two already were—so she finished
up and flew.

The light was fading, threaded in gold, when she turned the corner of the Three Kingdoms
and saw a man standing, two stories tall, blowing fire. Beyond him, a woman in a glittering
headdress was throwing and catching a neon baton. Mae had found the circus.

There were about two hundred people forming a loose fence around the performers, who
worked in open air, with minimal props and what seemed to be a decidedly limited budget.
The Circlers ringing the performance emitted an array of lights, some from their wrist
monitors, some from their phones, out and aglow, capturing the proceedings. While
Mae looked for Jared and Renata, and cautiously kept an eye out for Alistair, she
watched the circus swirl in front of her. There seemed to be no definite beginning
to the show—it was already underway when she’d arrived—and no discernible structure
to any of it. There were ten or so members of the
circus, all of them visible at all times, all of them wearing threadbare costumes
that reveled in their antique humility. A smallish man did wild acrobatics while wearing
a terrifying elephant mask. A mostly naked woman, her face obscured under a flamingo
head, danced in circles, her movements alternating between ballet and a stumbling
drunk.

Just beyond her, Mae saw Alistair, who waved to her, and then began texting. Moments
later she checked her phone and saw that Alistair was putting on another, now bigger
and better, event for all Portugal enthusiasts, next week.
It will be thunderous
, he texted.
Films, music, poetry, storytelling, and joy!
She texted that she’d be there and could hardly wait. Across the lawn, past the flamingo,
Mae saw him reading her message, watched as he raised his eyes to her, waving.

She went back to watching the circus. The performers seemed to be not just affecting
the air of poverty but to be living it—everything about them seemed old, and smelled
of age and decay. Around them the Circlers captured the performance on their screens,
wanting to remember the very strangeness of this band of homeless-seeming revelers,
to document how incongruous it was here at the Circle, amid the carefully considered
paths and gardens, amid the people who worked there, who showered regularly, tried
to stay at least reasonably fashionable, and who washed their clothes.

Mae, making her way through the crowd, found Josiah and Denise, who were delighted
to see her, but both seemed scandalized by the circus, the tone and tenor of which,
they thought, had gone too far; Josiah had already reviewed it unfavorably. Mae left
them, happy they’d seen her, had registered her attendance, and went looking for a
beverage. She saw a row of booths in the distance and was making her
way to them when one of the performers, a shirtless man with a handlebar mustache,
raced over to her, carrying three swords. He seemed unsteady, and in the moments before
he reached her, Mae grasped that though he wanted to seem under control, that this
was part of his act, he was actually going to run into her with his arms full of blades.
She froze, and he was inches away from her, when she felt her shoulders being grabbed
and thrown. She fell to her knees, her back to the man with the swords.

“You okay?” a different man asked. She looked up to see he was standing where she’d
been.

“I think so,” she said.

And then he turned back to the wiry sword-man. “What the fuck, clown?”

Was it Kalden?

The sword juggler was looking to Mae, to assure himself that she was okay, and when
he saw that she was, he turned his attention to the man in front of him.

It was Kalden. Now Mae was sure. He had Kalden’s calligraphic shape. He was wearing
a plain white V-neck undershirt and grey pants, as skinny as the jeans she’d first
seen on him. He had not struck Mae as someone quick to fight, and yet he was standing,
chest out and hands awake, as the circus performer assessed him, eyes steady, as if
choosing between staying in character, in this circus, following through with the
show and getting paid, and paid well, by this enormous and prosperous and influential
company, or tangling with this guy in front of two hundred people.