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The Machine
James Smythe
Shortlisted for the Arthur C Clarke Award 2014, this is a Frankenstein tale for our time from one of the UK’s brightest new literary talents.Vic returned from war tormented by his nightmares. His once happy marriage to Beth all but disintegrated. A machine promised salvation, purging him of all memory.Now the machines are gone, declared too controversial, the side-effects too harmful. But within Beth’s flat is an ever-whirring black box. She knows that memories can be put back and that she can rebuild her husband piece by piece.A Frankenstein tale for the 21st century, The Machine is a story of the indelibility of memory, the human cost of science and the horrors of love.
About the Book (#u5e222e83-e52f-5a8c-b77f-86de843d54d9)
Beth lives alone on a desolate housing estate near the sea. She came here to rebuild her life following her husband’s return from the war. His memories haunted him but a machine promised salvation. It could record memories, preserving a life that existed before the nightmares.
Now the machines are gone. The government declared them too controversial, the side-effects too harmful. But within Beth’s flat is an ever-whirring black box. She knows that memories can be put back, that she can rebuild her husband piece by piece.
A Frankenstein tale for the 21st century, The Machine is a story of the indelibility of memory, the human cost of science and the horrors of love.
About the Author (#u5e222e83-e52f-5a8c-b77f-86de843d54d9)
James Smythe was born in London in 1980. Since completing a PhD at Cardiff University he has worked as a computer game writer and currently teaches creative writing. He also writes a fortnightly blog for Guardian Online. The Machine is his fourth novel. Previous novels include The Testimony and The Explorer (published by Voyager). He lives in West Sussex.
Praise for The Machine (#u5e222e83-e52f-5a8c-b77f-86de843d54d9)
‘Reminiscent of Ian McEwan at his most macabre, it is fiction that demands to be taken seriously. The Machine uses violence and unshielded emotion to precise and devastating effect, reeling the reader towards a conclusion that feels both utterly shocking and grimly inevitable’
Will Wiles, author of Care of Wooden Floors
‘A book about memory, about the impossibility of making the future match the past, and the danger of following a desire too far’
Matt Haig, author of The Humans
‘Like Ballard, Smythe understands, and ruthlessly demonstrates, the nightmare that results when our fantasies are realised. The result is at once terrifying and moving’
Sam Byers, author of Idiopathy
‘Part Twilight Zone, part Iain Banks, Smythe has confirmed he is a versatile and brilliant writer’
Nikesh Shukla, author of Coconut Unlimited
Contents
About the Book (#u9a608950-5802-55a7-b370-a7c7d5da8fcb)
About the Author (#ua2cd8c8b-6394-5f64-9ba3-eaa9cc6a66f7)
Praise for The Machine (#uba6114f6-52df-59c1-b547-ceea4d4f554c)
PART ONE (#ufe48dc8c-0336-5cfb-9d57-7894ecb179bd)
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Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract from The Testimony (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
PART ONE (#u5e222e83-e52f-5a8c-b77f-86de843d54d9)
Memory is the greatest gallery in the world and I can play an endless archive of images.
J.G. Ballard, Miracles of Life
1 (#u5e222e83-e52f-5a8c-b77f-86de843d54d9)
She opens the door to a deliveryman, and the Machine, which has come in three parts, all wrapped in thick paper. Each of the parts is too big to get through the door.
We’ll have to try the window, the man says.
She shows him which one it is, along the communal balcony. It’s already at its widest, to let some air into the flat, to try and counteract the invasive heat from outside. Still not wide enough, so the men – the first has been joined by another from the van, having just heaved another thick cream-paper wrapped packet the size of a kitchen appliance from the van, and left it leaning against the bollards – tell her that they’ll have to take the window out.
We’ve got the tools for it, this other man says.
Beth stands back and watches as they unscrew the bolts on the attaching arms, and then lift the whole sheet down. Others in the estate have stuck their heads out of their windows, or come out of their front doors to watch. Next door, the woman with all the daughters stands and watches, and her girls run around inside. The littlest one stands at the woman’s legs, clutching onto her skirt.
Gawpers, the first man says. Always wanting to know what we’re up to.
The deliverymen don’t know what’s inside the packages. They’re just paid to deliver them. Beth wonders if she’s going to be able to assemble it herself, or if she’s better off asking them for help. Slip them a fifty, they’d probably stand around with her for an hour and figure it out. She doesn’t know how easy it will actually be: if there will be wires, or if it’s just a case of plugging the pieces together. The man she bought it from said it would be simple. They struggle up the stairwell with the first piece, stopping to mop their brows. They still wear dark-blue overalls, in this weather, and their now-sweaty palms leave dark-brown prints on the paper wrapped around the Machine’s pieces. The first piece makes it through the window maw, twisted in the frame as if this is one of those logic games. Manipulate the pieces.
Right, the first man says. Where do you want them?
In the spare bedroom, Beth tells him. She indicates it through, pointing the way past the living room. The room is light and airy – or as airy as it can be nowadays – and decorated like it’s a master, with an expensive-looking bed. Wallpaper not paint, with a different dado rail, a thick yellow colour contrasting with the impressed patterned cream of the walls. The room looks untouched, like nobody’s ever lived in it. The bed is made, the sides of the duvet tucked in below the mattress. There’s potpourri on the dresser in a simple golden metal dish, but not enough to stop the faint smell of dust. The sunlight, through the window, hits the dust, a cone of it floating in the air.
Anywhere?
By the back wall. I’ve cleared a space for it. She rushes past, ducking down in front of him, making sure that the space is still clear, then helps him lower the first package.
What the bloody hell is this thing? the man asks.
Exercise equipment, Beth tells him. That’s an answer suggested by the man who sold the Machine to her. In his email, he told her that he would write that on the form for the collection, and on the customs form. He was French, and Beth had had to translate his email using the internet, only the occasional word making her stumble. Still, she got the gist.
Jesus, the deliveryman says as he puts it down – the French seller has marked the packages with arrows, showing which way up they’re to be carried and stored – and stretches his back. He’s wearing a thick black harness around his waist, which he pats. Lifesaver, he says. They make us wear them now, for the insurance. We take them off in the van, when we’re done. Fucking hot though, wearing this along with the rest of the get-up. He stretches again, more exaggerated this time. His friend shouts from the window, where they see he’s positioned the next piece – this one long and thin at one end, bulbous and clunky at the other, meant to stand tall, taller than any of the people in the flat – halfway through the window. He’s straining to hold it up. Beth sees that the arrows (marked with thin, shaky writing that says THIS WAY UP) are horizontal. She wonders if that’ll affect it in any way.
Come on, the man says, can’t hold it. The other one takes the inside end and they work it through.
Same place? the first removal man asks. Beth nods, and then he asks for something cold to drink, which she prepares – iced tea, in the fridge – as they both struggle with it through the tight doorways and narrow corner into the room. She’s got two glasses on the side ready by the time that they’re done with that piece, but the first man – clearly the superior of the two, older and wiser and with a company t-shirt on under his rote blue overalls – waves them aside. Last piece, then we’ll have them, he says. Beth watches them both at the van, which they’ve parked at the bottom of the estate, by the bollards that prevent cars driving right up to the buildings themselves. They look at the last piece, which is nearly the same shape as the first, only somehow wider, more unwieldy, and they both laugh. She knows that they’re talking about what it is. Speculating. They’ll know it’s not exercise equipment. They’ve handled exercise bikes before. They do this for a living, and the wool can’t be pulled over the eyes of those who will know the weight and shape of an exercise bike or a rowing machine. She watches as they finally heave the last piece up between them, up the stairwell and into her flat through the window space. Their sweat drips from their heads and onto the concrete slabs, and the Machine.
It needs to be a certain way, she says. Would you mind? They shrug, and she tells them. The pieces have been labelled with numbers showing where they connect, drawn on the outside of the wrapping.
