False Hearts Read online

  One day, after the ship took off, we noticed they had left something behind on a rock. We shuffled closer. It was a piece of tech. We’d seen them using things like it—it was called a “tablet.” It wasn’t meant to be left behind. No tech was. The only machines me and Taema had ever seen were the supply ships and the droids, and almost everyone in the village stayed well away when the city folk landed. Sometimes our mom would come and speak to them, relay requests or whatever, but that was it. After the supply ship took off, others would then tiptoe down the hill, performing Purifying rituals with burning sage and whispered prayers, before they could bring themselves to take the supplies back to their homes.

  I reached down for the tablet.

  “Tila,” my sister said. “It’s forbidden.”

  I ignored her, still trying to reach down, but Taema stayed stubbornly straight. I pulled harder, until she grunted in pain, but she didn’t budge.

  “Come on,” I wheedled. “We have to turn it in to Mana-ma, don’t we? We can’t leave it here.” Really, I just wanted to hold it, at least for a moment.

  With a reluctant sigh, she leaned forward. I wrapped my hand around the metal and glass.

  “You’ll get in trouble for touching it with your bare skin,” she warned.

  “So will you.”

  “Exactly. I’ll have to be Purified along with you, and you know burning sage always makes me cough.”

  I looked around nervously. How long before people came?

  “Let’s go to the tree, first,” I said.

  “So you can look at it?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “It’s Impure,” she whispered, her brow furrowed.

  I started toward the trees and she followed, her legs stiff and straight.

  “We shouldn’t do this,” she kept whispering. “Mana-ma wouldn’t like it.”

  “Mana-ma doesn’t need to know.”

  “She knows everything.”

  I felt a little bit of guilt, but I squashed it right down.

  The tree was our favorite spot in the forest. We went to it whenever we really wanted to hide from everyone else in the Hearth. In the compound it was hard to ever be truly alone, but out in the woods there were only the redwoods and the birds. Our tree was an old, hollowed-out redwood, struck by lightning a long time ago. We shuffled inside, smelling the old smoke and damp greenness of the forest. I loved it there. When we were younger, we’d had tea parties or played cards, whispered secrets, stashed things we didn’t want to share. It was our safe space.

  I held the tablet in front of me, turning it this way and that. It felt so smooth, hard and cold. It seemed alien.

  I found a little button on the side and pressed it, and the screen came to life in vibrant greens, blues and yellows. We both gasped.

  How had the people from the city worked it?

  I pressed it with my finger.

  Words appeared on the screen: No implants detected. Use manually? Y/N.

  “I’m going to press yes,” I said.

  “You know you shouldn’t. Mana-ma says it’s evil.”

  Sometimes she drove me nuts. “For God’s sake. You can’t tell me you’re not even a little curious.”

  Taema set her mouth in that stubborn line we both make when we’re not budging.

  “If God didn’t want us to look at it, it wouldn’t have been left there,” I tried.

  “It’s a test. That’s what Mana-ma would say.” She bit her lip. I knew she was curious, almost as curious as me.

  “Come on, T,” I said, my voice singsong. “We’ll just take a quick look, then we’ll turn it in to Mana-ma. She never needs to know we took a peek. We’ll learn just a little more about the world outside.”

  We’d spent hours tossing possibilities back and forth about what the rest of the world was like—even if my sister was far more interested in the rules of the Hearth than I was, always quoting the Good Book to me when I broke a rule. When I plucked my eyebrows: God created us as he wanted us. In his eyes, there are no flaws. To change your body is sacrilege. When I said I wished we could leave behind the Hearth and go to a city with proper skyscrapers, whatever they were: God has laid out his plan for us in the glory of nature. When I complained about going to the meadow with the rest of the Hearth: One must Meditate to remain Pure and open to God’s gifts. Over and over, even though we both knew it was all an act. Behind closed doors, she wanted to know what the world was like, just as much as I did.

  Taema sighed.

  I pressed the Y on the tablet.

  The screen stayed lit, but neither of us knew how to work it. There was nothing taught about this in the commune. We understood a tiny bit more than others about life outside the Hearth: our parents were (still are?) pretty high up in Mana-ma’s inner circle, so they knew plenty and they shared some with us. They weren’t meant to and they were sinning by doing so, but they said they wanted us to be prepared, “just in case.” So we knew that there were things called wallscreens, and flying hovercars that looked like smaller supply ships. That there were buildings made out of smooth stone called concrete. No matter how hard we tried, though, we couldn’t imagine it. Not really. So we weren’t totally ignorant about the big wide world out there—just mostly. And that chafed me.

  I rested the tablet against the inside of the tree. I had no idea what to do next. I tapped it again, but nothing happened. I knew that it was a link to the outside world, that I could learn all I wanted to, but I didn’t know how to start.

  I tapped it once more, grinding my teeth in frustration.

  “Maybe you have to speak to it,” Taema said, her voice so small. “I heard them talking to it before.”

  That was right. They’d say “tablet” first. I kept a finger on the screen. “Tablet. Search,” I tried, speaking louder.

  A new window opened, showing a blinking box. Enter search parameters flashed above it.

  I looked to Taema for guidance, but she only shrugged, the movement pulling against the skin of my chest. I rested my face against my sister’s, our cheekbones touching. My knees were shaking with excitement. Taema’s shook too, but more with fear.

  “Should I search for conjoined twins?” I whispered. We’d never seen any others. How did they live in the cities? How many were there?

  You might wonder if our condition hurt, or if it was awkward, and the answer is no. It never hurt being attached to Taema. Though I could get so mad at her I could spit—and I had before but then she’d spit back and we’d be staring at each other’s spit-covered faces and then usually burst into laughter at the stupidity of it all—I couldn’t stomp off. There was no way for either of us to have the last word on anything.

  Taema looked resolutely away. “Let’s not.”

  “Why not?”

  “Just don’t, OK?”

  I was tempted to push her, but then we’d have fought and she’d have been even more pigheaded than before. “Fine.”

  I stared at the tablet again. Please state your search terms clearly, the screen reminded us. How did it even do that? Our parents told us about the internet and radio waves, how they floated through the air. Dad said that within the compound, the internet didn’t work, but the tech dampeners only worked so far in the forest. If this place was meant to be so Pure, why hadn’t Mana-ma stopped service out in the woods, too?

  Taema’s cheekbone grazed mine. She kept trying to look away but couldn’t help herself. Even though we had the whole world at our fingertips, we didn’t know what about the world we should learn.

  That’s it. I’d start with what I did know.

  “Tablet. Search for Mana’s Hearth,” I said.

  Information came up immediately: a list of some kind. I touched the first one with my fingertip, tentatively, and more information loaded. I felt Taema turn closer to the screen. She couldn’t resist. We read, side by side.

  Mana’s Hearth—The Infamous Cult of the San Francisco Bay Area

  “What’s a cult?” Taema whispered.
r />   I shook my head, confused. “I don’t know, but they seem to think it’s bad.” I read through an origin story of the Hearth, written by someone called Tobias Diaz, which fitted mostly with what Mana-ma had told us in sermon:

  Not much is known of the secretive commune set where Muir Woods was once open to the public. The First Mana-ma was Elspeth Foley, a mistress of a prominent politician who was also a member of the Bohemian Grove.

  “What’s that?” Taema asked. We took a brief break to search for Bohemian Grove. They were a group of rich and powerful politicians who met in the redwoods at Monte Rio once a year to network while pretending they weren’t networking. Some of their ceremonies seemed a little similar to what we did in the Hearth, such as the “Cremation of Care,” where they burned a large fire to let go of their worries. We did that every summer equinox down in the meadow, though we didn’t wear such stupid outfits. After a few false starts, I managed to bring the screen back to the original page we’d been reading.

  As a woman, Elspeth Foley had no chance of ever becoming a full member of the Bohemian Grove, and she was not sure if she wanted to. She began her own commune a few years later, and recruited several prominent relatives of the very same Bohemian Grove members who would not accept her. Over the next few decades, she gradually recruited more members and closed them off from society, until, by her death, it could only be considered a cult.

  When one Mana-ma perishes, she will have already chosen and groomed her successor. There have now been eight Mana-mas, with the current one in power for the last thirty-five years. They were settled in the Mojave Desert, by Chimney Rock, but after the Great Upheaval they moved to the redwood grove across the bay from San Francisco.

  Mana-mas often have a husband, who is called the Brother, as they are meant to be a Brother to the whole community. They are not actual siblings. The current Mana-ma’s Brother died around twenty years ago, though this information is difficult to verify, and she has not taken another.

  Many rumors have circulated about day-to-day life in the Hearth. Some say they perform animal or human sacrifice, but that is entirely unsubstantiated. The Hearth does ban any technology invented past 1969, or the Summer of Love. They live the same way that the original Mana-ma lived in the First Hearth. Every Mana-ma has said that the first commune was perfect and it shouldn’t change. Their houses have electricity, they play antiquated record players, but there are no computers, and definitely no implants. The Hearth believes that to alter oneself in any way is sacrilege. They avoid modern medicine, relying instead on natural herbs from the earth. No make-up, no flashy fashion, no waxworked features at flesh parlors.

  What we do know is that in the decades since the Hearth started, barely anyone has ever left. It is rare for a cult to remain stable for so many years. A decade ago, after complaints of curious people trying to sneak onto the grounds, the government constructed a large artificial swamp around the perimeter, making the former site of Muir Woods technically an island. With several thousand members, the commune is largely self-sufficient, but must order in some supplies from outside. Within the grounds, people will occasionally disappear, and no one knows where they have gone. Some claim that Mana-ma kills them herself, though again, is this only sensationalism?

  “The swamp is artificial?” Taema asked.

  “That’s the question you ask after reading that?” I said, incredulous. “This thing accused Mana-ma of being a murderer!”

  “That’s just another rumor. People don’t go missing. They die of natural causes and rejoin the Cycle.” She sounded so matter-of-fact, so certain, and I was jealous of her.

  “I don’t get it, either. People die out there, too, don’t they?” I couldn’t help but think: what if they didn’t? What if out there people lived forever? Did I want that?

  We looked through other links about the Hearth, but none of them seemed as close to the truth as that first one. People writing about us wondered how the Hearth was funded, for our “tawdry wares” and “paltry produce” weren’t nearly enough to keep us going. Talk about rude. We worked as hard as the others on those stupid quilts and things, and I wouldn’t call them tawdry. We helped pick the mushrooms from the greenhouse and send them to the mainland, and it wasn’t easy picking for hours on end.

  They said that Mana-ma brainwashed us all, twisting our minds to her will, forcing us with drugs until we knew nothing different. I looked at Taema out of the corner of my eye. How nervous she was even being near the tablet, yet unable to look away. I should have believed the Impure technology was evil, too. Why didn’t I?

  Other sites said that everyone within the Hearth was there because they were twisted and ugly, with missing limbs and scars and other blemishes. I thought of my friends and family, me and my sister. None of us were ugly, were we? Physical beauty was not something we really dwelt on in the Hearth. It wasn’t important, as God made us all perfect and we had to only trust in His judgment and continue trying to be the best people we could in this world.

  I searched for “flesh parlor” next. They showed before and after photographs of people who had changed their faces. In the after pictures, it was as if they’d erased what truly made them look like … themselves. It was all generic, with no defining characteristics.

  I swallowed, feeling Taema stiff and hurt beside me. That seemed … wrong. Wicked. Like Mana-ma always said about the outside world.

  And what would they think of us, out there? What would they do?

  Taema and I didn’t speak to each other. We read as fast as our eyes could speed across the text, looking up words we didn’t recognize, nudging each other gently when we could scroll down.

  We spent hours in that tree. Taema said she’d had enough and closed her eyes, going to sleep. But I kept reading and learning, and appreciated that even if she was afraid of it all, she wouldn’t rat on me.

  So much of it I didn’t understand. At first, I didn’t want to believe it. I mean, this was all I’d ever known. I wanted to believe that maybe the outside world was lying, making it all up for some reason. For money, probably. Mana-ma said that was all people out there ever wanted. Money and all the evil they could buy with it.

  But deep down, I started thinking about all the ways she treated us and the others. All the things she made us do. Outside wasn’t perfect. I’d never expected it to be. I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe, just maybe, life didn’t have to be like it was in the Hearth.

  * * *

  I stuck the tablet in the bottom of our bag and slung it across my shoulder. The movement woke my sister. I knew it was dangerous to take it back to camp, but I also didn’t want to leave it out here. I didn’t know much about technology, obviously. If it rained in here, would the water break it? I knew that could happen with things like the record player.

  Taema was quiet as we slunk back to the town center with our rocking gait. My arms were around her waist, and hers were around my shoulders. She felt guilty. Both because she’d let herself be close to something Impure and because she knew that we wouldn’t be giving it over to Mana-ma. We wouldn’t mention it in Confession. I’d get in trouble, and so would she by default. I’d put her in a shitty situation, and I should have felt worse about it than I did.

  After reading those articles, I felt like I was seeing everything with fresh eyes. I’d seen a couple of photos of cities as we searched on that tablet deep within the forest, and they seemed so unfamiliar compared to our trees and single-story houses. But to hear Mana-ma talk about it, San Francisco and the rest of the outside world was a vast cohort (yes, she actually used the word “cohort” in everyday conversation) of corruption, abomination and filth.

  Now I knew what so many people out there thought of our church, our town hall, our little houses all in a row. Our tidy allotments, or the fish smoking over an open flame. Nathaniel, a boy our age who was missing a leg, waving a hand to us as he turned the meat.

  I tugged my skirt straight. Simple homespun. Taema and I made the dress ourselv
es—everyone did, but sometimes they swapped or inherited hand-me-downs. Not us, of course.

  I shouldn’t care what they thought. They seemed more like aliens than other humans.

  Yes, I knew what aliens were. My parents had two pulp science fiction paperbacks, smuggled in when they joined the Hearth as teenagers. My parents loved the Hearth and believed in it, but my dad couldn’t bear to leave them behind. He found a logic loophole for himself—they were both editions from the Golden Era of sci-fi and therefore pre-1969, and the far-fetched futuristic tech in them was just fantasy. I’d found them a few years ago: The Stars My Destination and The Voyage of the Space Beagle. Again, Taema had been annoyed at both me and Dad, convinced we should turn them into Mana-ma. Again, my sister had stayed quiet as I read long into the night, turning the crumbling yellow pages delicately. I’d loved escaping to those other worlds and dreaming about life on other planets.

  Our planet was this small: 1,000 acres of redwood forest. I couldn’t stop thinking about its past, laid out as it was on the tablet. How it used to be somewhere called Muir Woods. How the swamp was created to keep people out.

  Or maybe to keep us in.

  After we left, Taema and I hardly ever told people in San Francisco that we grew up in Mana’s Hearth. When we did, they usually looked at us the same way the supply ship people did. As if we were unnatural. Aberrant.

  I hated that look. It made me feel trapped. Made me want to lash out.

  I’ve written this all down to show what the Hearth was like from the inside. I know you’re all as curious as the rest of them. I’ll keep telling you about life in the compound, and I won’t tell you lies—whether you believe that or not. I can only tell you what it was like ten years ago, since we haven’t been back. We’re not allowed, even if we wanted to go to that godforsaken place.