19: Apprenticeship

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My parents frowned at me as I came in, but the strange man smiled. He was older than Mum and Dad, but younger than Grandma. Most of his very short beard was white, with just a little black in the middle; his eyes were surrounded by wrinkles; his hair was thin and stringy. The hair was held back out of his eyes with a plain grey bandanna that matched his plain grey jumpsuit. He didn’t have any armbands or badges or anything to show what he did, and for a moment I wondered if maybe he wasn’t from the treegrave, if maybe he was wearing a jumpsuit because he did external work or something and he was just here because he was my parents’ friend and it had nothing to do with me.

He stood up and offered me his hand. “Taya. A pleasure to meet you. I’m Yamin, from Administration.”

Nope. It was definitely to do with me. I’d thought I was safe since nobody came straight away, but maybe it took them a few days to notice what had happened, or maybe Turin and Saro decided to keep my visit a secret for a few days but then changed their minds.

I went to take his hand, but Mum said sharply, “Yamin was just leaving.”

He turned to face my parents again. “This could be a big opportunity for your daughter. She has a lot of potential.”

“She got it into her head to sneak off into the treegrave and now you – ”

“No, she didn’t just sneak off, you see? I’ve reviewed the footage, and yes she made a lot of mistakes, but the plan was clever. I’d be impressed seeing this from a teenager. From a seven year old – ”

“Exactly. A seven year old. My daughter has a lot of learning and exploring to do, and that is what she is doing. She’s still on the first pass of her jaunt.”

“Ma’am. Do you really think that learning how the professionals mop floors or take stock inventory is a good use of her time? I’m offering her a jaunt pass in Administration. Nobody who has this sort of opportunity turns around and decides they’d actually rather be a janitor. We can teach her everything she needs to know for a job she might actually choose to do; having her spend years milling about touring these jobs is a waste of time.”

Administration? Everyone did a bit of Administration work, doing Records or whatever, but the way they were talking made me think that he was offering me something more than that. More advanced jaunts in Administration were usually for much older people, after they’d done their basic jaunt, and something that you had to voluntarily apply for. I’d never heard of anyone offering one to a kid.

“Maybe she will choose your job. Maybe she’ll choose to be a janitor. But it’s her choice, not yours, and not mine. She deserves the opportunity no matter how much of a waste of time you think it is. This isn’t the Ironstock.”

The Ironstock was the ship my grandma had come from. I didn’t know much about it, but it seemed like Yamin did, because he raised his hands in a gesture of peace and stepped back. “You make a good point, ma’am. Perhaps I have approached you somewhat early. I’ll be back in a few years.” he smiled again at me. “I look forward to meeting you again, Taya.” And he left.

“Who was that?” I asked as the door closed behind him. “Why did – ?”

“You snuck up into the treegrave?!” Mum asked, furious.

“I needed to see if Grandma was okay! She hasn’t shown up in the treegrave, I thought that maybe some thing had happened!”

“And you didn’t think to simply ask the treegrave?”

“I didn’t want it to know I was suspicious, if it was hiding something!”

“You didn’t think to ask us?”

“You might have asked the treegrave, or someone who worked there, or something! And that would’ve warned them if they were hiding something!”

“If they were hiding – why would anybody be hiding – ugh!”

“Am I in trouble?” I asked.

“Shiproute and stars, Taya, would it even make a difference at this point?” Mum snapped. “Is there anything I can do that’ll have any influence on whether you take it into your head to do something like this again in the future? Because I doubt it. I have a headache. Your father can deal with this.” And she stalked off to her room.

I looked at Dad. “She usually gets headaches when she’s pregnant. Is she pregnant again?”

“No, I daresay this headache is entirely related to children who already exist,” he said drily. “Taya, why did you sneak off like that? Yamin said you snuck out while everyone was asleep to scout out the treegrave?”

“I took one tour that happened on blue shift,” I said. “It was fine.”

“It was dangerous.”

“Why? I go out to play and stuff during green shift all the time. Is blue shift more dangerous than green shift?”

“Can you imagine how we would’ve felt being woken up in the middle of the night to be told that something bad had happened to you?”

“Probably the same as you’d feel any time you were told something bad had happened to me, even in green shift after you finished waking up.”

Dad rubbed his temples.

“Is Mum mad at me for wanting to see Grandma?”

“You mother is upset,” he said, “because you felt you had to do all of this sneaking around to see your grandmother instead of just asking your family for help. She wants you to feel safe and supported in your home, and this is a sign that we’ve failed to make that happen.”

“I do feel safe and supported.”

“Your mother feels that your actions speak louder than your words.”

When Dad talked about Mum like this, he was actually talking about himself. “I’m sorry,” I said, to make him feel better. He gave me a hug.

“What was that man here for?” I asked.

“He wanted you to do a jaunt with Administration, even though you’re far too young.”

Just like I’d thought.

“As an apprentice.”

“A what?”

“It’s when you do a jaunt as one person working directly under a jaunt guide, instead of as a group. One student and one teacher. It’s sometimes done in second passes and more often in third passes for complicated jobs, to make sure that students get all the help and attention they need to do the job correctly.”

“Why did he want me to do that so early?”

“I’m not sure. He did claim that this sort of thing is more usual in Administration.”

“But you and Mum don’t want me to do it.”

“We don’t want you to do an apprenticeship when you should still be doing your first jaunt pass, no. Once you’ve tried a lot more jobs and been on a couple of other fleet ships, you’ll have more information to make those sorts of decisions for yourself. But if you spend all your time learning how to keep records from an administrator now, you might miss out on finding another job that you’re really passionate about.”

“I already know what I’m really passionate about,” I said. “I’m going to work in Rubbish & Recycling.”

“I wish I was still young enough to be that certain about anything,” Dad said wistfully. “You’re on babysitting duty for two months, by the way.”

“Two months!”

“You stole your mother’s security keycard! Do you have any idea how much trouble you could’ve gotten her into? If you’d actually used it, you’d be babysitting for a year.”

I opened my mouth to protest, then closed it again. I could see in Dad’s eyes that if I made a fuss, it would only get worse.

But it wasn’t fair, because I wouldn’t have been able to use the keycard even if I’d been going somewhere that the keycard was for. I’d stolen it days before going, and Mum had realised she’d lost it and gotten a new one the next day, so the one I had didn’t even work.

“Also, where’s the card?”

I thought about lying and saying I’d thrown it out, but it was best not to push it. I trudged to my room to fetch it and handed it over.

Dad peeled some of the paint back with a fingernail. “You’re going to apologise to your aunt for stealing her paint, too, and accept whatever punishment she gives you.”

“It was only a little paint!”

“Would it be okay if people took little things of yours without asking?”

“No,” I grumbled.

“So what are you going to do?”

“Apologise.”

“Good girl.”

I went to find Auntie Shorin. She was in her room, painting.

The grown-ups all have pretty different rooms. Mum’s is practical and cozy, just her bed and clothes and hairstyling tools and usually some water and snacks and maybe medicine of some kind, especially when she’s pregnant. Auntie Lia’s is full of half-repaired electronics, because she likes to take her work home. Auntie Moli and Dad both don’t spend much time in their rooms, and there’s not much in them, though Auntie Moli has a lot of pictures of the family. And Auntie Shorin’s room is her own personal art studio, with paint smeared on the walls and portraits piled everywhere and art supplies heaped in every corner. It spills out into the common areas so you always know what sort of theme she’s working on, and the theme changes all the time; sometimes she’ll be doing people or fruit or pictures of fleet ships hanging in space, or she’ll be focusing on just doing art in one colour for a while. Whatever she’s doing, her walls and bedspread change to match the art perfectly. Recently, she’s been obsessed with flowers and leaves. She was painting a pea flower on the wall when I walked in. (I knew it was a pea flower because Auntie Moli grew them in the family garden last year.)

She knew I was coming; she has a doorbell that flashes a red light in her room. As I came in, she gave me a little smile and a wave, and I signalled with my hands to ask how her art was going.

Auntie Shorin has been deaf since since long before I was born. She and Dad were in an accident together when they were seventeen and both lost their hearing. Dad had decided to get surgery to get his back, but Auntie Shorin had refused.

She told me about her pea flower painting, and I confessed to stealing some of her paint for an art project, but she just laughed and handed me a paintbrush and makes me pay her back by helping her. I’d get into trouble for not telling the whole story later, I knew, but Auntie Shorin would probably find it funny and Dad wouldn’t punish me more after already giving me babysitting duty.

I like Auntie Shorin.

What I wasn’t looking forward to was the other kids finding out. Laisor and Klei would be bad enough, but the younger ones had two whole months to tease me where I couldn’t get away from them.

It was all so unfair.

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