“Fruits of Our Labor” imagines a society rocked by parthenogenetic birth

Chapter 1: My Body, My Choice
2049

A sea of bodies surged through the streets, carrying signs and chanting slogans. Their mass, all raised fists and centuries of righteous rage, love, fear, and hope, flowed through the capital. As they passed, people cheered and joined them. As they passed, people jeered and cursed them. The sun shone on them a warmth so validating, it seemed even the universe supported this moment. And in this sun, they smiled radiantly, knowing the tide of history was finally at their backs.

They were women, mostly, but men marched too. The younger generation wore white shirts plastered with pop art of the newly confirmed Justice Amelia Ginsburg, whose vote everyone expected to be pivotal, while the older generation wore faded shirts of the justice’s great grandmother, Ruth, because their memories stretched further, and they knew when to honor the dead. They carried American flags and believed it might one day live up to its ideals. As they marched, they sang out in unison.

“My body, my choice!”

“My body, my choice!”

“My body, my choice!”

Police saluted them or raised their fists in solidarity. Their departments had long since become primarily women. A firestorm had swept the nation in the previous decade, a new wave of feminism, a new concerted effort to replace the seats of power. In just a handful of years, they smashed the glass ceiling and began the dismantling. They became business leaders, top doctors, and police chiefs. They became law writers, power brokers, and queen makers. 

On nearby streets, counter protestors swarmed and seethed. They wore American flags, bastardized with thin lines showing their particular allegiance, and bright red hats. They carried a lifetime of patriotism, patriarchy, and toxicity with them. They carried signs, too, but their messages were divided. Some protested to stop an affront against God. Some were there to protect traditional family values, or more importantly their roles in it. Others were there only because their political zeitgeist had told them to be angry about it.

They were not loud, they did not cause a scene. They saw the police that lined the streets and knew they were not on their side. They experienced the fear so many groups had felt before them. The powerful were not there to protect them any longer. This did not cause self-reflection, but fueled their hate. They hated the day and the blinding sun, and they hated the movement, and as they marched to their destination, their hate grew.

Both groups moved toward the Temple of Justice. On separate trajectories, they were funneled down side streets, through different traffic patterns, and wound up on opposite sides of a large metal fence. They could see each other, but there would be no mingling today. Barricades surrounded the historic building, preventing either group from getting close. So, they stood in that brilliant sun, on the steps of a landmark case, and chanted, and sang, and raised their signs.

Police in riot gear watched the entire demonstration behind the expressionless gaze of reflective face shields. Batons and tear gas canisters glinted in the sunlight. They were impassive, unmoving, observing. They were heroes, and villains, and everything in between.

Amongst them were news reporters. They captured video on large tripod-mounted cameras, and raced to the front of the crowds to capture still shots of spittle flying, veins pulsing, fists raising. They took to the skies in helicopters and drones, ingesting all the sights of history in the making to regurgitate it for their viewers.

The energy grew like the tide, slowly creeping toward an inevitable conclusion as the sun climbed higher in the sky. Weeks of analysis had said that the votes were there, that the measure would be upheld. That the infant legislation, passed into law only months ago, and challenged immediately by several states, would survive the day. And, in doing so, set a precedent.

The hush started organically among protestors on both sides. The embers flared like a wildfire, spreading through hushed words, shared phone screens, and silent tears until their fervent prayers grew into a deafening silence. And then, from somewhere among those gathered, a megaphone was lifted.

“Today, freedom wins! Today, choice is left to the people who make it, and not decreed by our government. Today, Parthenogenetic Birth is legal across the country!”

The crowd, dutifully silent until the end, erupted.

Chapter 2: The After
2049

Samara watched the protest from hundreds of miles away, as did so many other women. As did the world. The light from a cheap flat screen splashed across her dark skin, danced in her hazel eyes, and shimmered against the twin tear tracks that lined her round face. She watched history unfurl, and felt a knot of pride in her throat, the swell of happiness in her chest. When the verdict came in, she watched as the roars of jubilation swept across the crowd, and the dam broke. She sobbed into her hands. Great fat tears that spelled happiness, joy, freedom, and relief spilled across her palm. The world, for once, worked out as it should. As she cried, her curly black hair bounced and brushed against her shoulders. 

She’d felt her anxiety grow in the weeks leading to this moment. Like the blade of a guillotine about to fall, she felt the weight of the world poised, ready to divide history in two. The before, and the after. Hiding it from James made the tension unbearable. She shouldered the risk of discovery and disappointment as she stayed awake into the pre-dawn light, reading news articles on her aging phone. She finally fell into an anxious dream the hour before his alarm went off.

He didn’t even know why she’d stayed home today. A rushed excuse about the take-out from last night, which she’d then repeated to her boss at the museum, bought her a day off. It felt foreign at first, as she paced their sweltering third-story apartment and listened to the ineffectual whine of the air conditioning unit. She was studious, though, and cleaned the apartment as she listened to the opening preamble to the all-day broadcast. It was the same analysis she’d read in the weeks leading here, but there was comfort in hearing the words repeated. 

“Likely to be upheld.”

The words bounced around in her head as she tidied, as she vacuumed, dusted, and took out the trash. 

The before, and the after.

As opposed to the usual slow turn of the political machine, the bill originally passed the house and senate rapidly. Pundits had expected a lengthy revision process, but the authors stripped it down to the bare essentials. It was a statement, a beacon to women’s rights, and both sides of the aisle saw it for what it really was: death to a political career if someone voted against it. The tide of history was already visible to those paying attention, and you could either swim with the current or stay still and be crushed. The vote was nearly unanimous.

Of course, it helped that women had taken over a majority of the seats on both sides of the aisle. The generation prior saw a shift in the balance of power. Not that all of them were supporters of the PG movement. There were still plenty of traditional-birth supporters, but they were all supporters of women’s rights, of the ability to choose.

And then the legal challenges had come in. She’d felt each of them in the knotting of her stomach, in the tension that grew between her shoulder blades. They’d come from states still led by men, from protectors of that most sanctimonious union. And then the weeks of hesitation as the public had waited to understand which of the challenges the highest court would hear. Daytime television had been consumed by analysis, with legal experts called in and battle lines drawn. The black hole of political discussion had spun, pulling everyone into its orbit. 

These past weeks had been hell with James. He’d come home, covered in grease and dirt from the shop, and sit on the couch glaring at the television. They’d always had different politics, and for the most part, it had been fine. She’d only challenged him a few times. Nights when she was younger and drunkenly brazen. Nights when she was wanting to pick a fight, to change him. But there was an anger in him she didn’t like to provoke, so she learned to leave those topics alone. She’d seen the results of poking and prodding enough growing up.

When the march began, she’d hurried over to the television so she wouldn’t miss a moment of the broadcast. She didn’t know why she was so invested in the outcome. Not then. There was no great drive in her to be a mother yet. She had a relationship with a suitable partner, and it was drifting toward long-term entanglement. But, the allure of making the choice on her own, of her body alone producing her own offspring, pulled to her. And the thought some powerful man would take her choice away made her feel a rage so visceral she wanted to scream, and punch, and spit. It made her want to tear their world apart.

And then the vote came in, and after weeks of buildup, there was finally a resolution. The tension between her shoulders eased, the knots in her stomach untangled. She cried. She closed her eyes and imagined herself there, surrounded by the joy of those powerful women. She felt a connection unaffected by distance or time. She saw herself holding a baby of her own, a daughter who would grow to be a powerful woman. She felt her world changing, the meaning and direction of it shifting inside her.

She thought of her own mother then. They hadn’t spoken in a decade, since Samara had left her home at eighteen. A decade since she’d stopped standing up to the endless string of abusive men her mother brought home. A decade since Samara had given up on saving her mother and tried to save herself instead. Was her mother watching this same broadcast? Did she wish now that she’d raised her alone? Or did she see it all as unnatural, an affront to the God she prayed to?

The door slammed shut behind her and pulled her from her thoughts. She spun around on the couch to see James standing in the entrance. He was tall with close cut brown hair, wrapped in lean muscle, but hunched. A natural byproduct of wrenching on cars for years. Grease smudged his light skin and clung under his clipped nails, no matter how long he scrubbed at them. His blue eyes were wide with anger.

“Turn that shit off,” he said, voice low, rage billowing outwards like smoke from a fire.

She arched an eyebrow in response.

“Turn that shit off, please,” he said, and rolled his eyes, breaking the tension in the room. He reached down and removed his heavy, steel-toed boots. “Heard enough about it all day today. People couldn’t stop blabbing ’bout how amazing it is.”

She turned off the broadcast and watched his reflection on the blank flat screen. 

“It’s historic, James. The world’s changing—”

“Yeah, it’s changing, and I don’t like where it’s heading one bit. Straight down the drain, if you ask me!” His boots off, James started walking through the apartment. 

“I cleaned today,” Samara said, whirling around. “Go take those damn greasy clothes off. And take a shower while you’re at it!”

He rolled his eyes again, but smiled at her. “Yeah, yeah. Alright,” he remarked as he trudged to their bedroom.

It was his smile that had charmed her years ago, when she’d taken her car, an aging Honda always reeking of fuel, to the shop he worked at. His smile lacked any hint of self-consciousness, like he’d never doubted he deserved to be happy. It made his face beautiful, and free. She wanted to feel that way too.

He’d smiled at her again when she came to pick her car up. In low tones, he’d told her how he’d done some extra things that “needed doin’,” but didn’t charge her for them. Then he asked her out.

“Will ya start on dinner? I’m wasting away here!” James called back from the bedroom.

Dinner consisted of reheated jambalaya—the staple of all displaced southerners. It was simple, bold, and hearty. They both preferred it that way. Samara poured in fresh broth, and as she watched the mixture warm in the skillet, she thought over the march again and what it meant for the future. Was it really, like some scientists said, the end for men?

She flinched, and then relaxed when James wrapped his arms around her waist from behind, his freshly showered scent wafting over her. He burrowed into her, kissing her neck. 

“You feelin’ better, then?”

She wracked her brain. She had no idea what he meant, and then remembered the lie that gave her this day of freedom. “Yeah, just a twenty-four-hour thing. Bad takeout maybe?”

She felt him nod, his chin resting on her shoulder. It felt nice, being wrapped up and held. She closed her eyes and leaned into the comfort.

“You know I love you, right?” he purred. “I just get frustrated by the world, is all.”

For a moment, she remembered a time when she did know that. When they were younger, and he was more sweet than sour. And she let herself believe it again. 

“Yeah, I know it.”

 James squeezed her again, and she leaned into him. She knew he wanted to sleep with her tonight. It had been a while, and she could feel him growing hard against her. 

She usually enjoyed sex with him enough, but hated the awkwardness of turning him down more. The hurt look on his face in the dark of their room, the anger that curled his lip. With her eyes closed, she imagined James as someone without the hate that bled through him. As someone she could be completely open with. As someone she desired. 

It helped.

The world had gone to sleep around her, but her thoughts continued to spin. After dinner, and the sex that followed, James had turned off the lights and slept. She stared into the darkness and dreamed of children.

In the shower, she imagined that one of James’s sperm had made it through, had somehow broken down the wall of her birth control, found an egg, and buried into it. Animalistic terror coursed through her. It wasn’t the panic of pregnancy, though, but a revulsion at being invaded, at being taken over by this thing from someone else. From James.

She wondered if she’d feel differently about another partner. Was this a reaction to how she felt about James, or how she felt about being impregnated in general? She imagined all the happy images on the television during her childhood. Happy mothers lovingly growing babies inside of them, in love with being pregnant and in love with the partners that made them so. Was there any part of the dream that was real? Or had experiences always been different from the story they agreed to tell afterward?

She lay in the dark and thought about children. About her own children, made by herself, produced through some magic of biology that wasn’t fully understood. A fully conscious decision involving no one else. And it seemed to her, the images in her head better fit the cinematic dream she’d been sold. 

A heat grew in her chest. She wanted to make that choice. She wanted a child of her own, not from anyone else. It felt wrong to have these thoughts while lying next to James as he slept. She knew he was against it. He believed it was not the way the world was supposed to be. 

Knowing how he felt only made her want it more.

She knew there were women who pretended a child came from their partner, when they’d created it themselves, just to keep them happy. She’d read on the news that some husbands now demanded tests to prove paternity. It was the newest cause for divorce when partners found out the children weren’t theirs.

She shook her head in the dark. There were rumors some women got pregnant just by thinking about it enough. She didn’t want that consequence. Not yet, not really. She grabbed a sleeping pill off the nightstand and let it pull her into a dreamless sleep.

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