Inferno Girls

by Aaron Michael Ritchey

  The bracelet, though, felt comfortable on my wrist again.

  He approached me. “Can we talk?”

  “I guess.”

  First thing, he smiles at me, like he’s a desert flower and I’m a rainstorm. Or maybe it was the other way around.

  I got jittery. He hadn’t given me an adoring look in a long time. I didn’t know what to say, so I stated the stupid obvious. “Your watch doesn’t start for another hour.”

  He came up to me and took my hand. “I know. I had to see you. I tried to sleep, but the world, life, it’s all so different. I couldn’t waste the beauty of this day by sleeping through it.” His eyes seemed to snatch up my soul and suck it into him, like he was a vampire, and I didn’t just make him happy, I sustained him.

  I wanted him, more than I had wanted anything ever before; an ocean moved inside me, and I wanted to ride on its tides and into his arms. But I gently removed my hand from his and took a step back.

  I steadied myself ’cause I had a battle to fight—inside and out.

  “Micaiah, I’m glad you’re feeling again, and that you’re happy. The way you’re looking at me is melting some of the ice, but there’s still ice.” My voice faltered, and I pushed through. “I need to know everything about your past, and not just ’cause I’m curious. It’s important we don’t have secrets.”

  He nodded, then moved back. “Yes, I know. But I don’t understand what you want. You know most things already. I can heal almost any wound, I grew up in the ARK, stole the cure for the Sterility Epidemic, and escaped in a zeppelin. What else is there?”

  It was clear he’d dosed himself again. He was terrified and looked it. But he was playing games, dancing, trying to lie by telling half-truths, trying to convince me I knew the important parts.

  “Simple,” I said, angry again. And a little scared. “I need you to tell me what you are, what your life was like before you stole the cure, and how close you are to being a Vixx.”

  His face dropped. His breath came in quick gasps.

  “Let’s start with an easy one,” I offered. “Do you have a mother?”

  “No.” He looked pained.

  “How can you not have a mother?”

  He exhaled and said in a rush, “Fine, the truth? I am a clone of Tibbs Hoyt. I call him my father, but that’s not true. We are genetically identical.” His face twisted. “How can you love me knowing that? How can you want to be with me when I’m exactly the same as the man who has been hunting you for weeks and would kill you on sight?”

  “You’re not him,” I said. “You don’t have his experiences. It’s a question of nature versus nurture ... who we are is a complicated thing.”

  It was like he didn’t hear me. “Cavatica, promise me that if I tell you everything, you won’t run away.”

  I wanted to relieve some of his pain, but I had to be true to myself. “I can’t.”

  I took a step forward. He took a step back. Another uncertain movement in our fearful dance. “The truth is, Micaiah, we’re starting over, and there are no guarantees.” It was a hard thing to say, and I saw his face fall, but before he ran away, I added a qualifier. “But I’m a Christian, and it’s my job to be kind and compassionate. Don’t put your faith in me. Put your faith in that.”

  “I can’t.” An echo. His jaw tightened. “I can’t believe there’s any kind of God in this world, but I believe in you. So here it is, the truth. The ARK couldn’t solve the mystery of the Sterility Epidemic, not at first, and so the scientists had the idea that they could clone the males that were left. There were some missteps, but I was the first to emerge complete. Almost. My neurochemicals were off, but my father ...” his voice strangled, and a tear slid down his cheek. “Tibbs Hoyt didn’t think that was an issue. He thought emotions were a liability. Like what Rachel said.”

  I wanted to go and comfort Micaiah, but I didn’t dare move. This was his chance to tell me everything, and I didn’t want to break the spell.

  He closed his eyes. “They stopped cloning boys after me. I was the only one.”

  “Why?”

  “The Sterility Epidemic is based on a virus that infiltrates the male DNA and affects the male gamete. It attacks the Y chromosome, reducing the number of males at conception, but it also mutates the sex cells of the males who are conceived, which causes sterility. Every one of the cloned boys were affected by the virus, but I wasn’t. For whatever reason. My father found a way to neutralize the virus long ago, and still he doesn’t want to give it to the world. Viable cloned boys would reveal he possessed a cure. He kept that a secret, like he kept all of his bizarre experiments, top secret.”

  “You’re not a bizarre experiment,” I said.

  “I am.” He found the strength to open his eyes and look at me. “Which is why I hate telling you this. I know it will change how you see me, but you’re a Weller. And I’m learning you and your family can’t be stopped once you start something. In some ways, it’s unnerving.”

  He went quiet, and I thought he was done, but then he continued. “I grew up in the lab of a secret ARK research facility not found on any map. They accelerated my growth ... it hurt. I was in pain, but part of pain is emotion, and I didn’t have that. I hurt in a vacuum. They kept me medicated over the worst parts, and then reduced the dosage while analyzing me at a microcellular level. I didn’t have a childhood. Only pain.”

  It was something that Wren might’ve said. Growing up was hard enough with the good times—Christmas, birthdays, sleepovers, and friends. But Micaiah had missed out on all that. Actually, so had Wren.

  I stepped forward, closing the space between us. He didn’t retreat. I took another step—but keeping my distance, like trying to coax a scared squirrel to eat from your hand.

  He spoke in a shaky voice. “Tibbs wanted a son to inherit his empire, and he chose me. It made sense. He could drum up some story about an affair, and suddenly I’m his son. But I made a deal with him. I wanted emotions. I wanted to be human, like in the stories, Pinocchio, all the sci-fi videos, all of that. Looking human and not being human is impossible, and I’d see the joy in the scientists, little things, and I knew I was incomplete. So they came up with a chemical solution. They used the Cuius Regios as test subjects, gave them emotions, so they could give them to me. The Vixxes, however, were different. I was like them until I started the medication. Then the world opened up. But I knew I’d never be a real boy. I’d be a puppet, always, dancing on strings.”

  He turned away and lost it. Sobs stormed through him, and I rushed to hold him. He stiffened at my touch.

  “No! I’m a monster!” He shoved me away.

  Don’t push a Weller away. We don’t react well.

  I grabbed his arm hard. “That’s crapperjack. You didn’t choose your life, just like I didn’t. We’re given what we’re given. You’ve decided you want to be more than a puppet. That makes you better than a lot of the people I’ve met. That makes you good.”

  He eased my hand off his red, pinched skin. His eyes showed his agony. “But I can lie so easily, and the way I was before, I didn’t care about any of you. I only cared about what you could give me. I only cared about my own self-directed imperatives, to get the truth out into the world and spit in my father’s face. To show him that while he created me, I am not his creation. I’m alive, and I’m going to make him feel my life. No matter what.”

  No. Those were our words. Our covenant.

  I corrected him. “Those three words have nothing to do with Tibbs Hoyt or the ARK. They are about us. You and me.”

  I paused to let those words sink in. Then I said, “You were afraid I’d run when you told me the truth. I’m still here. I’m not afraid. I’m not repulsed. I’m still in love with you.”

  He placed my hand on his face. His cheek was warm, wet with tears, alive and suffering. A lot of the time, sad to say, being alive means feeling pain we’d rather not. He’d chosen to feel when so many people I knew had chosen the opposite. They used drugs or love or
violence to run away from the pain that living brings. He embraced it. He took medication so he could feel everything, including pain. I couldn’t imagine the courage that took.

  Yes, the truth made things hard, but that’s truth’s job, to shake out the fantasies and lies, ground us and remind us that we are small, but there is a larger intelligence to the universe, and we can’t trust the lies, only the truth.

  “Anything else you want to know?” he asked, smiling. “Peaches are my favorite thing to eat, but you knew that. My favorite book is The Lord of the Flies. And I really like the Blade Runner series. You can understand why—human, but not human.”

  “So you really will tell me everything?” I asked.

  He nodded. “I want to love you.”

  I laughed a little, kindly. “And I want to be loved.”

  He bent forward, and we kissed softly. I hadn’t tasted him in days. I didn’t just kiss him with my mouth, I kissed him with everything I was and would be.

  Our tongues met, our mouths came together perfectly. We broke apart as I lay back on the rooftop. He took off his shirt, and every muscle tensed in the sunshine. A breeze cooled me for a minute, and I realized we were both sweating. Him above me, between my legs, and me below. I touched his belly. He shivered.

  Could I do it? Could I have premarital sex? Adultery was such a sin, but our bodies wanted it, wanted it as much as air and breath. He dropped down on me, and I opened my legs wider. We had jeans on, but I could feel him as he ground into me, his mouth latched back onto mine, as we tried to breathe, as I tried to remember my chastity.

  But I needed more of his skin. I drew a hand down the snaps of my shirt and they all came undone, pop, pop, pop. Our skin touched, our sweat, our smell, and his hands went low and touched me between my legs—the pleasure shocked me. It felt so good it hurt, and I grabbed his hand. Before I knew it, I was crying.

  The history of us crushed me—us, the truth, his skin and kisses and body, his hard, wanting body. It was all a celebration of our breath and the symphony of sweat and heartbeats. And the beauty of it, the power, overwhelmed me.

  He held me while I cried and kissed away my tears. He was crying, too. A lot of boys didn’t like to show emotions, but he did ’cause he had chosen them. Like he chose to tell me the truth.

  His body pressed against me, but I couldn’t do more.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

  “For what?” His face filled the sky—the whole world, his face.

  “For crying,” I whispered. “For having to stop.”

  He let out a breath and smiled. “We can go slow. I know this is a lot to take in, and I was surprised that you, um, that you let me go that far.”

  I grinned. “Yeah, took me by surprise, too.”

  He looked down at my breasts in my brassiere, and I got shy for a minute. I was lying flat, so they weren’t very much to look at. And I’d lost a lot of weight. Of course, I lost it up top first.

  “You’re gorgeous,” he whispered.

  I pulled him back against me to avoid his gaze and so I could collect myself. I’d never imagined this would all happen to me. Maybe that’s why so many women chose to be a part of the New Morality movement and cling to their chastity. Better to turn it off than to always be on, wanting.

  We lay like that, and I looked at the clouds moving across the blue, blue sky.

  “You are a real boy,” I whispered, “as real as I am. And you aren’t a puppet or a monster or any of that. We are who we want to be ... who we choose to be.”

  “Thank you,” he murmured.

  “And thank you right back,” I said to him, to the world, to the universe, to God. I felt so connected to everything right then, safe and at peace.

  Until Wren found religion. Poor timing, if you ask me.

  Chapter Eleven

  No one sees the deer in the woods

  We don’t get rain, only storms

  Torchy’s Bar is closed for good

  ’Cause God’s not in Texas anymore

  — LeAnna Wright

  (i)

  GROWING UP IN BURLINGTON, every Sunday, Wren fought church like a demon drowning in holy water. Sharlotte and I didn’t mind going ’cause it was a good excuse to go into town, talk with our school friends, and generally have a good time. We’d pack a picnic, get on our horses, brushed and clean, and ride into town. We’d hear Mass, stand up, sit down, kneel, and sing the closing song. Afterward, the whole town would hang out in the park and eat, play Frisbee, football, maybe even scrape together a good ol’ all-American baseball game.

  Horses nibbled the grass, ladies flounced around in their best dresses, and all of us kids would change into our normal clothes to play, laugh, fight, make friends, lose friends, hit the winning run, or snatch a Frisbee out of the air.

  But not Wren. She’d battle Mama all morning, saying she wasn’t going to church, or she’d go but only if she wore jeans. Sharlotte joined in the battle, would beat Wren if she had to, or help Mama wrangle Wren into a dress. Wren would show up to Mass, face black with hate. And after, she wouldn’t stay for the picnic but would gallop home. Or she’d hang out with the bad kids on the east side of town or wander out into the wilderness of the empty plain.

  I’d watch her go off on her horse, Delia—a stupid, foul-tempered mare that Wren liked to goad into running too fast and jumping ravines she’d barely clear. Mama said her bad daughter deserved an equally worthless horse.

  I’d feel so sad for Wren. Always so alone, always getting beat by Sharlotte or yelled at by Mama.

  So later that day, when I woke up in the thrift store to Wren in a dress and demanding Pilate say Mass, I couldn’t quite believe it.

  Pilate tried to reason with her. “Wren, I can say Mass here in the thrift store where it’s safe. Well, safe-ish.”

  Micaiah was on the roof, taking watch. Thinking of him and what we’d almost done made me tingle all over. Then I was drawn back into the fight.

  Wren was insistent. “It’s forty-five minutes, Pilate, quicker since it’s only communion for the four of us. Please.”

  “This is not the time,” Pilate argued. “We have to get in the canoes and get down the river before the moon rises.”

  But if we did, Rachel wouldn’t be able to find us. I loathed the idea of leaving her, but I didn’t see any other way. Darn, I was learning Pilate’s terrible lesson on leaving people behind in order to complete a mission.

  Wren stopped talking and stood there, staring at Pilate. Then she said in a quiet voice, “Are you a priest, or aren’t you?”

  “It’s Thursday!” Pilate yelled back.

  “Are you a priest, or aren’t you?” Wren repeated.

  Pilate flung back his head, eyes squeezed closed, and sighed. “This goddamn collar is a lot of fucking work.”

  His f-word didn’t upset me ’cause, for one, I’d heard him say it before, and for two, I was still wondering why my sister wanted Mass when we needed to keep running.

  Pilate gave in. “You win, Wren, but Mass is going to be quick, and then we’re getting on those canoes and getting out of here.”

  Wren nodded and smiled, bobbing her head. She spun on me. “You weren’t thinking of wearing jeans were you, Cavatica?”

  “I thought you didn’t believe in God,” I said. “And I thought you hated church. And really, you’re commenting on what I’m wearing? Really?”

  Wren gave me a toothless smile. “I know, I can’t explain it. But I want this to be perfect. Can you change for me?” She turned back to Pilate. “Don’t worry. I’ll go on ahead and find us a hideout in the church, so in the unlikely event the ARK soldiers do search the town while you’re saying Mass, we’ll have a place to go. Okay?”

  Pilate and I looked at each other, then at Wren, then at each other, and back again.

  We both nodded.

  Wren snapped her fingers, clapped her hands, and strutted out the door.

  “Has she gone crazy?” I asked Pilate.

  Pilate l
et out a long breath. “I’ve seen this happen. People change and go looking for a god wearing concrete underwear. Sinners trying to be saints. Probably be better for everyone if they stayed sinners who loved Jesus, but I have to say, I didn’t see this coming.”

  “I’ll go put on something more formal,” I said, baffled over Wren and church.

  On the racks of clothes, I found a skirt and matching top. It wasn’t New Morality, but I’d always been more Catholic than New Morality anyway.

  I went to help Sharlotte get ready to leave. She sat on an old twin mattress in the back. She’d pulled up her nightgown and was staring at the stump of her leg. A line of prickly black stitches curved through the skin in a grisly grin. While the edges of the wound ran red, it didn’t look infected. She was healing nicely.

  “Hey, Shar, get this. Wren wants—”

  She cut me off. “I heard. And I ain’t going to church. You can’t make me.”

  Wren had said those same words, every Sunday, for the twelve years I’d lived at home. I assume she’d said them when I was a baby, so in my lifetime, that was roughly six-hundred-and-forty-two times—fifty-two multiplied by twelve.

  “You can’t stay here,” I said. “The ARK soldiers might come, and we have to stay together.”

  Sharlotte laid back down and turned to face the wall.

  I sat and touched her hair. “Please, Shar, please. I know you and God are prolly not on speaking terms, but it’ll be special. I think that’s why Wren is all excited to do it in the church and for us to dress up.”

  “Wren is a day late and a dollar short,” Sharlotte spat. “If she wanted church with the family, she had her chance. Sixteen years of chances. Now her chances are gone.”

  “Not yet,” I said quietly. “’Cause we’re all still alive. I know you won’t do it for Wren, but will you do it for me?”

  Long seconds fell. I waited.

  “Fine.” Sharlotte turned. A single tear dripped down her cheek. “It’s all empty, Cavatica. Me, the world, heaven, nothing is there. I’m a hollowed-out tree where not even spiders would go.”