These were the days of the new society. The new society stood for many things: growth, regeneration, renewal.
This meant new things to the people of the new world. After the flowering of women's rights for a few brief hundred years, women had returned to their role as the keepers of birth. The new society prized women for this sacred act. The new society required them to fulfill it. In the new society, each woman was a fertility goddess. And nothing more was expected - or possible.
The division of the sexes began as soon as children were old enough to leave the nursery and enter their separate schools. Boys went to schools that taught them skills, trades, technology, language, war and science. Girls went to a different kind of school.
The girls' schools, known as the 18's, trained young women up to fulfill their calling as mothers. It was a curriculum not only of domesticity but of indoctrination. From their first baby doll, to their "real dolls" they nurtured later on, young girls learned everything their adulthood would require of them in terms of mothering, nurturing, childbirth, childbearing. It was a simple, straightforward and relentless program that glamorized the status of motherhood. Each young girl was quizzed endlessly on her aspirations to have a family someday, her love for family, for children, and to bring children into the world. Those few whose attitudes languished were given extra support to develop their nurturing capacities, through long exposure to films of joyful mothers, mothers and children together, pregnancy and childbirth. The woman's realm.
In her 18th year, each girl's life was to change. The curriculum she had learned all her life would finally be put to use.
It was Emma's first day of her 18th year of school. She had turned 18 only a few days ago. She was now here: in the next grade. The headmistress was now speaking. The first class of the first day had begun.
"Good morning, young ladies. I am here to share some very exciting news with you. You all know the 18th year is a very special year. Now you will learn, today, what makes it so special." The older woman, severe - grey hair pulled back tightly from her stern face - paused.
"By the end of this final year of your schooling, each and every one of you will be pregnant or have given birth to your first child." She beamed at the assembly.
A shocked hush fell. There were hundreds of girls in the hall. After a moment of silence, an excited flutter of voices raised up. The girls were all talking, all at once. Emma's own heart did a flip-flop. Wow, she thought. Am I ready? She was smiling, but felt overwhelmed inside. This was news indeed.
The headmistress had gone on, dismissing them with instructions on their boarding house assignments, their daily routines, their new class schedules. All would be explained to them as the semester progressed.
Emma gathered her book bag and slung it over her shoulder. The strap dug in tightly against her large breasts. Emma's breasts were not particularly large, it was just that all girls in the new society had large breasts.
A steady diet of hormones and fertility drugs had altered the female form. Emma's breasts, like her classmates, were full, round globes that protruded enormously from her lithe frame. Her hips were wide, her rear was generously large. Each 18-year-old girl in her class had developed a form much closer to that of a highly fertile adult female, and their hormones affected them accordingly. All the girls talked of, breathlessly, was maternity clothing, pregnancy, breastfeeding, and the fears and joys of childbirth. And of course, when they would meet the man who granted them all of these divine pleasures.
Unbeknownst to the girls, there was a law in the new society. Each girl was required for her first child to be sired by her biological father. This would ensure the birth of hundreds of thousands of what was called a "double child."
A double child was exponentially more likely either to be a genius, or to be born with devastating incapacities. The new society - enormously dependent on technology- was hungry for geniuses, and absorbed the costs of producing them. For this reason, each girl's first mate- the father of her first child- would be her own father.
But the girls knew little of this. They knew in school they had been learning more about their fathers lately. Prior to this, all they knew was that fathers lived far away, and never came to the school. The girls never even knew their mothers. All they knew was school. And in school now they learned about fathers.
They watched videos of fathers and daughters taking walks together, holding hands. They watched the fathers and daughters sitting next to each other closely, the father speaking gently. They watched videos of a father pushing a daughter on a swing, the daughter their own age - 18 - wearing her school uniform, her long hair trailing as the father gently pushed her back, his hand lingering caressingly.
Emma particularly liked a storyline in one of the videos, about a father and daughter who grew closer and closer, sharing long walks on the beach, and even taking a trip to Hawaii. Emma knew something special was going to happen when the daughter was in Hawaii with her father, but she hadn't gotten that far yet in the story.
***
Within a few weeks of school starting, Emma learned that she would soon be meeting her father. She learned his name - Richard - and that she would soon be spending the weekend with him. She didn't know what to expect.
The timing seemed random to her, but in truth her meeting with Richard was carefully scheduled: she would be ovulating this weekend, her first fertile cycle since coming of age for conception.
Her teachers helped her prepare her appearance, and suggested ways she might engage and please her father in conversation. Obedience was key. She had internalized a strict code of etiquette throughout her youth that made her deferential to all men, and she knew she would not disappoint this man. But she did not know why she was meeting him - why now, what was intended to occur between them and how.
The sexual act itself was not part of the teachings of the school. Emma, like all of her friends, was deeply ignorant of the many of the most fundamental facts affecting her life.
***
Richard was waiting in the lobby of the 18's to be admitted to the visitation area and later - he knew - to the conjugal chambers. He was nervous. He ran his hand through his full dark hair, streaked with grey, and leaned his tall, muscular frame against the wall of the waiting room. His brow was furrowed.
He knew of Emma, but of course had never met her. No father in the new society was allowed to know his children. Besides, he was a busy man, the executive of a powerful government contractor, and he had compartmentalized the knowledge of his daughter and this visit. For it caused him pain.
The circumstances of Emma's birth were a profound secret that enfolded a tragedy. He had deeply loved Emma's mother. But love was forbidden in the new society. No man even knew the woman he impregnated. And so Richard's love was not only miraculous, but forbidden. The mother, Tamara, had died not long after Emma's birth.
And Richard had buried his pain for these long years, forsaking the company of the birthers at the Women's Stables.
Men were typically required to visit the Stables at least once a year to conceive a child, many men went near daily. But Richard had stopped going since his last experience with Tamara over 18 years ago-- the time she had looked at him sorrowfully and announced it would be a daughter. She had died soon after her daughter's birth, whether by sorrow or suicide, Richard did not know. Even the knowledge of Tamara's name and fate were forbidden, available to him only through the clandestine channels his power allowed.
So he never went near the Stables, had done all he could legally to excuse himself from the requirement of helping the Birthers to conceive. Instead he spent himself on a saucy concubine, one who was infertile, and so had been cast out of her school, cast out of the Stables - the respectable fate for all women - and as an outcast had more freedom than any. Bianca was skinny, self assured and wicked in bed. She had had none of the hormones, the indoctrination, the brainwashing since failing to conceive her 18th year. Those who failed to conceive were ostracized from respectable places, and Richard availed himself of Bianca's unconventional company whenever his male urges overwhelmed him.
But now he was back in the lobby, back at the 18's, waiting to meet his daughter. Tamara's daughter. He knew his heart was beating too quickly. He did not want to conceive with his own child, but even his influence could not bend the letter of the law.
He looked up. A figure was approaching him. A voluptuous girl, slim waist with delicious hourglass curves, full breasts jutting forward; long, dark, straight hair flowing behind her. Her school uniform was a tight white blouse that seemed to magnify her generous cleavage, and a short, pleated skirt that offered tempting glimpses of her thick thighs. Her eyes were dark, liquid, the long lashes lowered demurely as she walked toward him. Her soft, full lips had a sweet smile. She looked eager. Excited.
She looked like Tamara. Richard's heart stopped for a moment as he watched the youthful goddess approach him, the very image of her mother.
"Daddy?" She said uncertainly. All girls were required to address their father as Daddy. Richard cleared his throat. "Hi Emma, nice to meet you."