by Eliza Taye
They walked several streets to the grocery store in silence. The neighborhood changed into a bustling area with several small shops and businesses down the row.
April stopped in front of a small shop with a sign above it which read: Garamound’s Grocery in big thick letters. “There are several grocery stores in the area, but this one is my favorite. I know the owner personally. His name is Harold Garamound. If you show him you’re an honest person and willing to pay up when you can, he’ll let you get food on credit when you’re low.”
April leaned in closer to whisper in his ear, “But don’t go spreading that around. He doesn’t like people to know. He offers it to them only after seeing whether or not they’re worthy, but he’ll offer you the same courtesy if I vouch for you.”
With a smile and nod toward the door to the store, April walked inside.
Garrett followed her and started scanning the shelves. The grocery store differed from the ones he was used to in the Decided sector. Instead of aisles of fresh produce, he saw several rows of canned goods. The choices were limited compared to the variety he remembered in Decided stores.
Gulping, he perused the aisles searching for foods he liked. Checking the bread aisle, he looked for soven but didn’t find any. In fact, the entire bread aisle was only half full and consisted of a single type of bread.
“Find anything you like?” wondered April, watching him closely.
“Um, I’m just looking right now.” Garrett flashed her a quick smile and returned to perusing amongst the food and canned produce.
Someone else entered the store and April once again moved close to whisper to Garrett. “How much money did you earn today?”
Garrett’s heart began to pound at her nearness. It felt like several long minutes before the man who’d entered the store passed out of earshot. Trying to steady his pounding heart, Garrett replied, “Fifty trecins, but I had to spend ten of them to ride a transporter home.”
April nodded thoughtfully. “So you have 40 trecins left. In that case, I’d suggest you buy items that will last the longest. You’ll have to bring your own lunch to work. Otherwise, you’ll be forced to pay the exorbitant prices for food in the cafés or restaurants in the Decided sector. That is if you’re permitted enough time to eat lunch at one of those places.”
April began walking down the aisles, plucking items off the shelf, and placing them into his arms while explaining, “Bread is good because it’ll go far, but will spoil if you don’t eat it fast enough. If you have enough room, leave it in the fridge to keep it cold. Cheese, butter, and some canned vegetables will work too.”
By the time April was done adding food to his arms, Garrett was baffled by her wealth of knowledge on how to keep him feed with the least number of items. Although, he realized she probably knew only because she’d had to do it for herself and her mother before.
“Garrett,” April eyed him expectantly.
Garrett snapped out of his musings. “Yes?”
“That’s about all you can afford for today. You should hold back at least five trecins for an emergency.” April lowered her voice as she spoke.
Garrett looked down into his arms at the food there. For 35 trecins, he couldn’t buy much, but it should last him for a few days. “All right.”
When the two of them got to the register, Garrett eyed a sandwich on display to his left. His stomach growled as if to remind him that he hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast yesterday. Reaching for the sandwich, Garrett realized the price of it was three trecins, but for an additional two trecins, he could make it a meal with a drink and chips. It would be all the money he had left, but the gnawing in his stomach wouldn’t allow him to think of anything else.
“You should get them. You’ll be paid tomorrow, and you shouldn’t have any additional expenses today. Just try to save some trecins when you can,” advised April, her eyes a little sad.
Garrett glanced over at her ashamed that she had to see him like that, but another growl of his stomach had him reaching for the sandwich, chips, and drink. Placing it all on the counter, Garrett paid for it and left the store without a trecin to his name.
Out on the street, there was a table with chairs where fresh food purchased at the store could be eaten. Garrett sank into the chair and tore open the sandwich, taking a huge bite and swallowing it down with satisfaction. “Oh my, this is so good.”
“Yeah, I bet it is.” With concern, April asked, “When was the last time you ate?”
Garrett swallowed more of the food before responding, “Yesterday, right before the Declaration Ceremony.”
April nodded in understanding. “That’s a long while. You’ll have to be more careful. If you hadn’t been well-nourished before today and they’d given you a hard labor job, you could have passed out from lack of energy.”
Garrett almost choked at the realization that the two jobs he’d been assigned that day weren’t considered hard labor. It meant there were jobs worse than those. “Yeah, I’ll be more careful from now on.”
“Good.” April sat with him in silence as he finished his food.
Garrett gobbled up his sandwich and chips, lost in the ecstasy of consuming his first meal in well over a day.
Chapter 25
Opal sat outside the apartment complex, her nervousness increasing as she waited longer and longer for Garrett to appear. Still, she didn’t want to enter the building and start asking around for him, either. Tapping her forefinger against her kneecap in impatience, Opal scanned up and down the street searching for Garrett.
Frustrated and not knowing what else to do, Opal stood and decided to go home. The transporters would start reducing their lines soon and she didn’t want to have to walk all the way back. Thinking of Alvin, she wondered if she truly had been conned by him.
Brushing off her bottom from where she’d been sitting on the ground, Opal raised her head to start walking back. She began mentally mapping her way back through the winding pathways Alvin had shown her when she saw the outlines of two people approaching in the distance.
Deciding she’d wait for them to approach, she stood there patiently, her hands clasped in front of her. As they grew nearer, she recognized Garrett’s outline and the girl who’d approached him right after the Declaration Day Ceremony. They were walking and laughing together. Opal waited, resuming her nervous tap of her finger.
“Opal?” Garrett’s eyes grew wide as he saw her.
At first, Opal didn’t know what to say, but before she could say anything, Garrett gave his grocery bag to the girl and threw himself at Opal, wrapping her in a huge bear hug.
“Opal, I can’t believe you found me.” Garrett released her and then winced slightly. “I wasn’t even sure you wanted to see me after what I did yesterday.”
“Of course I wanted to see you, Garrett! We never got to finish our conversation and I’ve been worried about you ever since.”
“You were?” Garrett stared at her with wide eyes.
“Yes,” replied Opal emphatically. Turning to the girl holding Garrett’s groceries, she said, “I’m Opal. We didn’t get to officially meet yesterday.”
“No, we didn’t. I’m sorry. That was rude of me when I intervened like that,” April winced in apology before adding, “I’m April.”
“Nice to meet you, April.” Opal smiled toward her and then refocused on Garrett. “Can we finish what we started yesterday?”
April returned Garrett’s groceries to him. “I should be heading back home. It’s getting late. I’ll see you around, Garrett. You’re always welcome to drop by the library whenever you’re done with work.”
“Um, okay, thanks, April,” replied Garrett, confused.
“It was nice meeting you, Opal.” April nodded with a smile at Opal and then turned to leave.
“Garrett, can we go inside? I’ve been waiting out here to talk to you for some time.”
Garrett gulped at the thought of Opal seeing where he lived. He had a feeling she might just bur
st into tears at the sight of it, but what else could he do? “Sure, let me…um…. can you hold this?” Garrett plopped his groceries into her arms and then fought with the front door to get it open.
Opal watched as he struggled with the door before it finally opened and then led her up the two flights of stairs to his unit. Once again, he had to fight with a door to gain entry, and then he flipped on the light in the apartment, placing the bag of groceries on the table.
Opal scanned the apartment, taking in the narrow bed, dresser, tiny bathroom, small kitchenette, and a table with a single chair. The entire place was a dump and obviously, Garrett hadn’t had a chance to do anything with the place since he’d moved in yesterday. Opal inhaled a breath that was hitched with a hiccup. Based on the dilapidated exterior of the building, she shouldn’t have expected the interior to be much better, but to see the confirmation of her assumption was upsetting.
Garrett lowered his face, closing the door behind him. “Say something, Opal, I know you want to.”
Opal remained quiet, not sure what she wanted to say. A million negative thoughts flew through her mind, none of which felt appropriate to say aloud.
“Opal,” repeated Garrett, “please…your silence is worse than anything.”
“How can they make you live like this? I mean anyone in the Undecided sector. This is hardly better than squalor. I mean, look…the ceiling looks like it’s ready to fall down.”
Garrett glanced upward. He hadn’t examined the ceiling before, but he noticed she was right. With all the hard walking and noise his upstairs neighbors made, they were sure to fall through the floor someday. He’d have to be careful and sleep with one eye open to escape the debris and a falling person.
Noticing the chair in the corner, Opal walked over and sat down. “Garrett, please tell me what you were thinking when you decided to become one of the Undecided.”
For a few moments, Garrett just hung his head until he sank onto the edge of his bed. “I tried, Opal. I really tried to write my Life Plan the day before Submission Day. I even worked for hours with April coming up with ideas for my Life Plan. At first, I thought maybe I could do it…maybe I could finally write my Life Plan. But then…but then when I sat down to write, I realized whatever I wrote would be a lie. I wouldn’t desire to live the life I designed. So I felt that no matter what I did, I’d either be miserable or placed into the Undecided regardless.”
“So, you purposely chose it?” wondered Opal in astonishment.
Garrett nodded, not wanting to openly admit it. “I wrote it into my Plan. It was only one line: I wish to become one of the Undecided.”
Opal slowly shook her head. “That can’t be right, Garrett. If you only wrote one line to your Life Plan, then it should have been rejected not approved.”
“I agree with you. I thought the same thing myself when I heard the words ‘approved.’”
Opal shook her head again, more forceful this time as if she could shake away all the problems. “Wait, wait…why were you feeling so confident yesterday? You knew you’d become one of the Undecided and you were fine with it?”
Garrett grimaced and started tracing the lines on the wood at the foot of his bed. “Not fine with it per se, more so resigned to it.”
Opal pinched the bridge of her nose, squeezing her eyes shut tight. “This still doesn’t make any sense. I could see why Mrs. Steinworth was so shocked at the podium. She must have been as confused as the rest of us.”
“Well, based on the reception after she read the words to the audience, I would say I’d stunned the whole city. Word on the street here in the Undecided sector is that everyone here hates me. I’ve tried to keep my head down, especially after being talked down to by a little kid this morning.”
Opal started, coming out of her inner thoughts. “Was he a little boy with blond hair?”
“Yeah, how did you know?”
Rolling her eyes, Opal explained, “He’s the one who showed me where you live. Charged me ten trecins for it.”
Garrett almost laughed. He wouldn’t have put it beyond the kid to have done that. “I’m sure he did. I had a kid charge me for information when I first came here, too. It must be a thing.”
“Wait, what do you mean when you first came here? You mean you’ve been here before yesterday?”
Garrett froze, not realizing he’d just revealed his secret forays into the Undecided sector to Opal.
“Garrett,” pressed Opal.
“I came here when I was first trying to research The Council. I thought they’d have old books of information that our library didn’t. That’s how I met April.”
“Oh, so she works at the library?”
“Yes, she does,” admitted Garrett.
“How often had you visited her? You two seem to be getting close.”
Garrett studied Opal’s face, trying to discern whether she could tell he liked April or not. After the whole incident with Miranda, he guessed she wouldn’t be too keen on him falling for someone again. She always said he was attracted to clingy girls he’d soon tire of, which only caused trouble for both him and the girl. “She’s helped me out a lot. She’s the only one in this entire sector who doesn’t hate me.”
“Do they really hate you, Garrett?”
Garrett harrumphed. “Wouldn’t you hate someone who had the potential to be whoever they wanted to be and then chose not to? Especially if you’d lost that chance?”
Opal stared down at the table and muttered, “Yeah, I guess I would.”
“See.” Garrett looked out the tiny window above his dresser, not wanting to look at Opal.
After allowing several seconds of silence to pass between them, Opal asked, “So what was your first day like?”
A darkness passed over Garrett’s eyes as he remembered his first day as an Undecided. “It was harsh, Opal. I had no idea the misery the Undecided live in.”
Opal nodded solemnly. “I’ve been coming here routinely for the past three years and even I didn’t know it was this bad. I had never entered anyone’s home before. Other than what I’d seen on the way to the shelter, I haven’t been exposed to this much of the Undecided sector before. It’s…”
“Grim,” interjected Garrett.
“Yes, I’d have to agree.” Opal raised her head to look at Garrett. “Do you wish you could take it back? Redo yesterday?”
Garrett gulped, staring down at his hands in his lap, then glancing up to meet Opal’s wondering eyes. “Yes…I wish I could, but the problem is, I don’t know what I would have done differently. That’s what scares me. I still wouldn’t have known what to write in my Life Plan.” With a puff of fake laughter, he added, “I guess that’s why they call us the Undecided.”
Opal sighed and then stood to walk over to sit next to Garrett on his bed. It sank and groaned as her weight added to his. “All right. Spill it all out. It’s no one else but us here.”
The corner of Garrett’s mouth drew into a weak smile as he recounted his day. “I couldn’t get any sleep last night because of how loud my neighbors are and the creaking of this building every time someone breathes, let alone moves. They assigned me to my first job of the day two hours before I needed to be there. I had to walk all the way from here to the Decided sector entrance and then after that, I had to pay 15 trecins just to take a transporter to the job location.”
“First job? I thought Undecideds were given one job for the entire day.”
Garrett shook his head. “No, they are assigned jobs for a specific period of time and if they don’t do the job well enough, they only receive half pay.”
Opal’s eyebrows raised and her eyes went wide. “Half pay?”
“Yes, and it gets worse. They only pay three to five trecins per hour which means you can’t afford to take the transporter every single day or even between jobs. You could run out of money before the day is up. We do get paid every day, which is nice, but I see that it’s necessary because if we don’t, we can’t eat, ride the transporters
or pay for anything else.”
“Woah.” Opal waited expectantly for Garrett to finish his tale.
As he spoke, Garrett rambled off in a torrent about what his day was like in detail. The more he described it, the more animated he became, throwing in how much injustice the Undecided faced on a daily basis and how every day of their existence was a dreary drag on for life. Opal listened with increasing interest, shocked at how much she didn’t know about the Undecideds.
“And worst of all, we never get a day off. We work every single day and it’s at least ten hours a day.” As Garrett had become animated with his speech, he’d stood and started pacing, but now he fell back down onto the bed, exhausted. “I just don’t know how they do it, Opal. I don’t think I can make it through tomorrow, let alone the rest of my life.”
Opal’s heart broke for her friend. She didn’t want him to be forced to live like this, but she didn’t know what to do to save him. There was nothing she could do to save him. Declaration Day was over and no one could undo a Life Plan once it had begun. “I know, Garrett, but you have to find a way.”
Garrett cradled his head in his hands. “I know I will, Opal. It’s just that there’s nothing to look forward to. Only stress and anxiety. What kind of job will they give me tomorrow? Will it be enough to pay for the things I need? Will I be able to ride the transporter or will I have to walk? It’s a lot to deal with.”
Opal wrapped Garrett in a sideways hug, wishing she could do more to comfort him. “I know, Garrett. If there’s anything I can ever do to help you, let me know. Were you able to keep your interwave when they forced you to move here?”
Garrett nodded, pulling the interwave from his pocket. “It’s one of the few things they let me keep. Otherwise, there’d be no way for them to tell me which job I’d have next.”