He sat up straight. “But you found out.”
“My great-grandpa found out. He graduated from MIT and was able to get a job as a janitor. After four or five years they made him an undersecretary because he knew more than most of the managers on his floor.”
“Do I detect a note of well-placed bitterness?”
“You do. And pride. And gratitude.”
“Gratitude?”
“For my great-grandfather. He’s the reason everything is as it is today. They put the pesticide and poisons in our food and water, in our wells. We drank it, we bathed in it. They were killing us and documenting how we died.”
That explained the mistrust. “Can I feel more shitty than I do right now?”
“Let’s find out,” she said. “We didn’t know about it, but the fuckers we worked for did. The white folks were told to not eat or drink anything from Rain. It was easy enough. Rain was an offshoot of a bigger town: Summerville—all the Summerville servants lived in Rain. White folks didn’t hang out in Rain unless they were looking to cause trouble.”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I do feel more shitty.” He noted her use of the pronoun we. She completely identified with her family’s history.
“My great-grandfather worked tirelessly, under their noses, to undermine them. Because nobody paid attention to a glorified janitor, he worked all day for pennies and researched all night for love. And he did it. He created antidotes. He made sure as many people as possible got them.”
“Definitely gratitude and pride. Did he get to repay the assholes?”
“Wasn’t necessary.” She shook her head. “All hell happened, instead.”
“I thought hell had already happened.”
“More hell happened.”
“Uh-oh.”
“The thing about evil is it isn’t as selective as people want to believe. There were no federal regulations in place for Summerville—because they had to be free to kill us. So, while they were actively poisoning the poor black population, they were also disregarding the health and safety of everyone else by dumping their waste and toxins into the landfill and river. Did I mention the river was Summerville’s only water supply?”
“Wow. They fucked themselves good.” Dylan thought about it. “Why am I not disturbed by this?”
“You would have been, had you witnessed it. Some pictures I’ve seen resemble a zombie apocalypse. Flesh and limbs mummifying and falling off.”
Dylan recalled the images he saw on that crazy church’s webpage. Apparently, they weren’t Photoshopped, after all. He changed his mind; he was disturbed. “I’m guessing this is why the Summerville part of town doesn’t exist any longer and why you gave me the blood-type lesson earlier.”
She had to smile. There was something about him and his attention to detail. “Yes, we’re full circle. Dioxin, and E-SBR, and VX, and all that crap solidified in their blood. Not just in clots, imagine swallowing a tire that’s eating you from the inside out.”
He didn’t want to imagine it. “Well, damn.”
“It altered their DNA. Kids were born with this toxic killing condition—still are. The pollution is in their blood, in their food, in their family tree. Anybody with family roots in Rain—or Summerville when it was here—those roots are petrified.”
“Did they sue?” He closed his eyes. “What a ridiculous thing to say.”
“Sue who? A bunch of half-dead supremacists who were okay with killing their servants, and too stupid to know they were killing themselves, didn’t leave anyone to sue. A pitchfork carrying mob tried to burn the plant down. They succeeded in causing an explosion which wiped Summerville off the map and further poisoned the land. Those who were left assimilated into Rain. Later the EPA stepped in and then stepped out again. They declared the land uninhabitable for now. You should see how they monitor the water in all the neighboring towns. They are waiting for us to die off so they can bulldoze it and put in a prison or some self-serving structure like that.”
He took his time processing. It truly was more than he bargained for. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to handle the rest. He took a deep breath. “You mentioned new blood types and special blood.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Touché.” He kissed her fingers again. “You mentioned new blood types.”
She cut him a look with sparkling eyes. “Some of us have special blood.”
It amazed him she could tease.
“My great-grandfather’s antidotes helped as much as possible, but it was an endless cycle until he realized his son—my grandfather—had built up an immunity. That led him to all kinds of discoveries. That stuff had the opposite effect on certain O blood types.”
“O, the rare one.”
“My grandfather was the only person in Rain with his type of O positive blood.”
“Fortunate.”
“Very.”
“What’s his type of O positive?”
“Predisposed to the Sickle Cell trait.”
“Still not a scientist.”
“But you are kind of silly.” She pushed against him. “He didn’t have the disease, but he was a carrier. And, he was a scientist too. He practically drained himself dry researching a way to save us. My granddaddy and great-granddaddy are heroes. They genetically engineered the family so we are all either born or modified O blood types with a chemical composite that allows our blood to break down the prettification process.”
“Holy shit.”
“Yes.”
“We are the only people in the world with magic blood.”
“Can you cure them?”
“We can keep them from dying.”
“But can you cure them?”
Her demeanor changed. He didn’t know what he said to upset her, but he wanted to take it back.
Her eyes went sharp. “Weren’t you listening?”
“What?”
“They tried to kill us. They poisoned themselves. Why is it our responsibility to cure them?”
“It isn’t your responsibility. It’s the right thing to do.” He knew it was the wrong thing to say, but he still had to say it. “What you suffered is the reason to erase the suffering of others. You forgive so you can heal.”
“Remember that rule about not doing what white people tell us? That’s a thing.”
“But, this is real.”
“And what we suffered isn’t?”
“It is, but that was a long time ago—”
“Your brother went to Limetech yesterday.”
“But they didn’t know.”
“Their lack of knowledge is our responsibility?”
“That’s not what I mean—”
“I know what you mean. We help people, Dylan. We bleed every day. But, this isn’t spaghetti dinners or winter coats we’re handing out. You can’t take organs from a corpse without consent. You can’t force a person to give up a kidney even if it’s a perfect match that will save a life. This is my family’s blood. Our life’s substance. We should pour it out because you have a definition of what’s right...according to your needs. I should hop under a microscope and be dissected for the greater good of you at the cost of me. Well, you know what? Limetech has a definition of what’s right too. It involves turning us into lab rats so they can make billions from their criminality. Some of them think it’s right to speed up everyone’s death so they can wash the contaminated blood off their hands. Which master should we serve?”