Matriarchy – a short story.
I was eight when I realized something was different about me. I was ten when I asked my auntie why I wasn’t allowed to go to school with the girls. I coulda done a lot of things to change the way I live now. I coulda made the Change, I guess. It’s the only way to avoid gettin’ stuck in a job I don’t want. “Praise your enlightenment,” my auntie would probably say, with a smile on her thin, pale lips. She’s an old, traditional woman. Hates men talking back to her—or trying to stand up to her at all. She always has rude words about grown men. “They’re horrible wastes of space. I say we should just euthanize half of them and have the rest donate their fluids for reproduction. Having to share with them is nearly impossible.” I always thought how could she stand saying things like that to me—her nephew. I asked her once; …show more content…
The leaders of the city will put all us fifth grade boys in a room and they give us a choice: agree to get shots that will block our change into men so we can sooner or later become girls, and then continue going to school, or we can refuse the Change, and get two choices of who we wanna be: breeder or father. Breeders’ jobs are to sell their sperm to women who want babies—girls with wives, girls whose husbands can’t get them pregnant, that sorta thing. Most of the time, gay guys or guys who don’t wanna be married become breeders, ‘cause it’s the only legal way they can stay unmarried. They got to donate once a week or the cops’ll knock on their door and throw ‘em in jail till they fulfill their duty and either marry a woman or donate. Fathers are dads, but that was probably obvious. They get their names on the list o’ guys who want wives, and then they get picked by some lady and they get married and they live in her house and have her babies and stuff. Girls get to pick how everything works out. We don’t get much say in the matter but it don’t seem to bother
I was eight when I realized something was different about me. I was ten when I asked my auntie why I wasn’t allowed to go to school with the girls. I coulda done a lot of things to change the way I live now. I coulda made the Change, I guess. It’s the only way to avoid gettin’ stuck in a job I don’t want. “Praise your enlightenment,” my auntie would probably say, with a smile on her thin, pale lips. She’s an old, traditional woman. Hates men talking back to her—or trying to stand up to her at all. She always has rude words about grown men. “They’re horrible wastes of space. I say we should just euthanize half of them and have the rest donate their fluids for reproduction. Having to share with them is nearly impossible.” I always thought how could she stand saying things like that to me—her nephew. I asked her once; …show more content…
The leaders of the city will put all us fifth grade boys in a room and they give us a choice: agree to get shots that will block our change into men so we can sooner or later become girls, and then continue going to school, or we can refuse the Change, and get two choices of who we wanna be: breeder or father. Breeders’ jobs are to sell their sperm to women who want babies—girls with wives, girls whose husbands can’t get them pregnant, that sorta thing. Most of the time, gay guys or guys who don’t wanna be married become breeders, ‘cause it’s the only legal way they can stay unmarried. They got to donate once a week or the cops’ll knock on their door and throw ‘em in jail till they fulfill their duty and either marry a woman or donate. Fathers are dads, but that was probably obvious. They get their names on the list o’ guys who want wives, and then they get picked by some lady and they get married and they live in her house and have her babies and stuff. Girls get to pick how everything works out. We don’t get much say in the matter but it don’t seem to bother