by Katie French
Tommy grabs my arm and marches me to a plastic chair with metal legs. He plops me down in one and Bell in another beside me. Then he seems to think differently and moves her across the room.
“Watch them,” he says to Gabe.
Gabe gives him a dismissive wave of his hand.
“No. Really. Watch them.” He gives his brother a hard look.
Gabe rolls his eyes. “Tommy, do you think I was kicked in the head by a mule between now and five seconds ago? I know to watch them.”
Tommy huffs off down the hall. Gabe pulls up a chair and sits by me.
“So I was thinking, we only have a few days and I have so much to show you. You haven’t heard of Shakespeare and that’s just a crime, but then there’s fine art and the studio. Oh, and the sound stages! God, we have so much to do.” He talks a mile a minute, gesturing with his hands.
Tommy makes this feel like an abduction. Gabe makes it feel like summer camp.
“Why do we only have a few days?” I ask.
His face darkens, but he leaps past it like the other uncomfortable questions I’ve asked. “What do you like better: music, movies, or art?”
I decide to play along. “There wasn’t any music in the hospital. Or art. They let us watch old movies and TV shows, though, to pass the time.”
Gabe’s eyes widen. “Which ones?”
“Classic movies in black and white. Nothing controversial or thought provoking. Anything with princesses and romance. Cinderella. Singing in the Rain. Roman Holiday. I know every word of that one. En Español.”
His bright eyes eat up every word. And he hasn’t stared at the bandages on my face. I’m talking too much and not being guarded, but he makes me feel so at ease. I don’t look at Nanny. I’m sure she’s shooting eye daggers at me.
“Fascinating,” Gabe says, with a wag of his dark eyebrows. “We don’t have electricity, so movies are out, but we have a sound stage with props. You saw the costumes.”
“Enough,” Tommy says, coming into the room. He holds a coil of plastic cable in his hands. “She isn’t going to the sound stage. She doesn’t even need to know about the sound stage.” He grabs Gabe by the sleeve and pulls him close. They whisper heatedly until Gabe yells, “Fine!” and storms out.
What the hell have we stumbled into?
Tommy watches him leave, his hands strangling the cable coil.
After a moment, he turns to us. “I’m gonna tie you up.”
“I have to go to the bathroom,” I say.
“Really? I just… Can you hold it?” When I shake my head, he walks to the other side of the room and uses the cord to tie Bell to her chair and the chair leg to a heavy bookshelf. When he’s done, he gestures impatiently for me to follow him down the hall.
Inside what must be his bedroom—with a chipped, wooden bedframe and a bare mattress, a desk, a matching bookshelf—he leads me to a bathroom. I shoot him a curious look. “What?” he asks.
I look at the toilet. “I can go in here? Does it flush?”
He pushes down the toilet’s handle. It fills slowly with water.
“You have water here?” My throat is constricting at the thought. With all this excitement, I’ve forgotten how thirsty I am. I look at the faucet hungrily.
Tommy follows my eyes. “Oh.” He turns on the faucet. It dribbles water in the basin. My heart stutters as the precious water disappears down the drain. “Go ahead.”
Leaning my face under the stream, I suck up the water like a dog. I lap and lap until my belly is full.
He pulls back my shoulder. “You’re gonna throw it up.”
I wipe my mouth on my sleeve. “Thanks.”
He frowns. “So, are you gonna…go?”
I look at the toilet and then at him. “With you watching?”
He clears his throat. “I’ll…face the hall. Be quick.”
He turns around. For a moment, I stand there, the awkwardness almost too much, but I have to go bad. It takes me a while to get my pants down with my hands tied and even when I do, the fact that he’s listening to me makes it difficult.
“I can’t pee with you here,” I say.
Shaking his head, he takes off his cap and runs a hand through his hair. He looks like he’s exhausted but fighting it.
“Why do you have running water when no one else does?” I ask.
“I’m not Gabe. I don’t need to tell you every detail of our lives.”
I sigh. “Well, if you don’t talk, I won’t be able to pee. So you can leave or…”
He blows out a frustrated breath. “This place has been maintained by one group or another since the fall of civilization. People came here for government aide when there was still a government. Generations have worked to keep the water going, to preserve this place.”
A trickle of urine begins. Then a flood. I talk to quell my embarrassment. “How did you end up here?”
“Came from Albuquerque.”
“You grew up by me,” I say. “What was the town like?”
Tommy glances over his shoulder.
“Hey!” I protest.
He turns back around. “Sounds like you’re done.”
I go to wipe, but there’s no toilet paper so I finally just pull up my coveralls. Then I take a while washing my hands and take another long drink from the facet. He leads me back to the living room.
“Can you get my…aunt some water?” I ask.
He sets me down in the chair and starts tying me up. Bell watches carefully. I’m sure she heard our whole conversation in the bathroom. I’m sure she has an escape plan hatched, too. I just hope she isn’t planning on killing these men. Even though I should hate them, I don’t. They aren’t cruel. I get the feeling they don’t want to be kidnappers. Out here, it’s all about survival.
Gabe flies in the door wearing moth-eaten velvet pants and a coat with gold trim. He trails a green, pointed hat through the air as he strides in the room. Stopping before me, he does a twirl.
“So should we start with Henry the VI? Or maybe Hamlet?” He waves the hat at me when I blink at him. “Right. I keep forgetting. No Shakespeare. I need to bring in my compilation. Leather bound. Real leather. It was printed one hundred and forty years ago and not a page is missing. Not a single page.” He grins.
Tommy comes in and raises an eyebrow at Gabe. “Dress-up time already?” He helps Bell sip from the glass, nodding at Gabe’s outfit. “What if Prentice shows up and you’re wearing that?”
Gabe settles the hat on his head. “He can play Claudius.”
Tommy lowers the empty glass to the floor. “Go change. We’ve got work to do.”
Gabe picks some lint off his pants and sniffs. “Work, shmerk.”
“I’m sick of arguing—”
Gabe isn’t listening. His body’s goes stiff as a rod. His mouth opens once, twice like he has something to say, but only quiet, choking sounds come out.
Then he falls to the floor like a corpse.
Chapter 11
Janine
I gasp. “Gabe!”
On the floor, Gabe begins to seize, his body jerking, his muscles contracting and relaxing over and over.
Tommy drops to his knees beside his brother. “Oh God,” he whispers. “Where’s your medication?”
But Gabe can’t answer. He jerks and his eyes roll back in his head.
“Is he dying?” I ask, panicked.
“He needs his meds!” He strides over, flips out a pocketknife, and cuts through my bonds. “Watch him,” Tommy says, running to the door.
Tommy disappears, and I hover over Gabe. “Bell, what should I do?”
“Look for knives to cut this goddamned cord,” she says, straining against her bonds. “Hurry.”
I look at her and at Gabe seizing in front of me. Bell and I should escape. This is the perfect time, but what if he—
A hand grabs my wrist.
“What the—”
Gabe gives me a grin. He’s no longer seizing. In fact, he looks fine. He sits
up and adjusts his costume. “Was I convincing?”
I put my hand on my heart. “I thought you were dying.”
“Brilliant,” Gabe says, standing up. He tugs on my hands to draw me up, too. “Tommy thought so. And now we have at least thirty minutes to see the sound stage. Or the theater?” He screws his mouth up, pondering.
“What about the medicine?” I think of Tommy running out in a blind panic. He’ll be furious when he comes back to find Gabe was lying.
“I hid the medicine. It’ll take him forever to find it. Besides, it’s good for Tommy. He likes having someone to worry about. Come on.” He grabs my hand and pulls me to the door. I look back at Bell, but she’s already using this unsupervised time to work on loosening her bonds.
Gabe pulls me out of the apartment before I can say a word.
When we’re in the hallway, he puts a finger to his lips and leads me to the stairs. Down the hall, I can hear rummaging—Tommy searching desperately for medicine to save his twin who is not dying.
The guilt would crush me, but Gabe has a huge smile plastered on his face.
We creep down the stairs and out the back door. I remind myself to use this as an escape planning session. I feel guilty for leaving Bell, but if I can plot the lay of the land, it might be useful. Still, I can’t help but marvel at the beauty here. It’s evening in Santa Fe and the temperature is warm and delightful. It’s cooled down and a nice breeze blows. And with the campus spreading out before us, I can see why people would’ve wanted to keep this place alive. Some of the landscaping has run amok, but tall trees still march in even rows along concrete sidewalks. Here and there, sculptures like the one we saw when we pulled in rise up in weedy lawns. The art is beautiful, and I marvel at a world when people made beauty just because they could. What an honor to forge something spectacular to signify you were here. You existed.
I think of the child growing in my belly.
“This way,” Gabe says, jogging now, the excitement on his face making him look boyish again. He tugs my hand. “Hurry.”
I try to hurry, but I’m weak and dehydrated despite that glorious drink in the bathroom. Gabe doesn’t seem to notice my faltering steps or my labored breathing as he tugs and tugs me toward a long building painted terracotta red. The brick sidewalk is cracked in places and stuffed with weeds in others. I trip along as fast as I can.
Gabe starts tour narration in midsentence. “Tipton Hall. Not the best theater on campus or in the city, but it’s been the least damaged. The Forum lost half the east wall in a terrible storm fifteen years ago, but Tipton’s still intact.”
He glances back at me. I wonder if he’ll notice my labored breathing and stop, but he doesn’t even blink. He pulls open the glass door and slingshots me inside. I stumble into the dim entryway and put my hands on my knees to catch my breath.
Gabe comes in and rummages around in a dark alcove for something while I try to slow my breathing. He comes back with a glass lantern. With the strike of a match, the dim entryway lights up. He pulls me to the big double doors and opens them.
Before us is a theater with rows of curved seats all angled toward a stage. In the dark, the cavernous space makes my skin crawl. Our movements echo back to us in the silence. I’m scared and thrilled at the same time.
Gabe continues the tour. “So many plays have been put on right here. Even during the fall of man, small groups of survivors would stage plays here for those remaining. Some have carved their names into the dressing-room doors. Remind me to show you. The ad-hoc president in 2042 has his name in there.”
We walk down the sloping aisle toward the stage. Cobwebby beams and big, canned lights dangle above us. On the stage, chairs and tables are still arranged like a play is about to begin. Gabe tromps up, his feet thudding on the stage floor, and plops in one of the chairs. He gestures for me to sit.
I sit and gaze into the dark depths that lurk behind the stage. What in the world am I doing here?
Gabe stares into the flickering candle, his face suddenly grave. “I will wear my heart upon my sleeve for daws to peck at; I am not what I am.”
“Hmm?” I ask.
He looks up at me and throws on a smile that doesn’t meet his eyes. “Othello. It’s a play about trying to survive in a world that despises you.”
I wrinkle my brow.
“How about this one?” He locks me with his eyes. “Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight! For I ne’er saw true beauty till this night.”
My skin burns. I can’t meet his eyes. What am I doing here with this boy and my heart pounding?
“Do you know I never got your name?” Gabe plays with the lantern clasp. “What is it?”
I can feel a blush burning up my neck. “Janine.”
“Janine,” he repeats, making swirls on the lantern’s glass. “Like music.”
I flick my eyes out to the rows of seats. I can’t help but feel we’re being watched.
“Janine,” he says, reaching for my hand. He turns my wrist over and begins tracing my ahnk brand with his fingertip. The sensation sends tingles shooting up my arm, warming my whole body. “Were the Breeders cruel to you?”
I watch his finger dance on my skin. For a moment, I can’t think of anything else. “The Breeders are cruel to everyone,” I mumble.
He pauses and lets his fingers run over the barely healed burns on my palm. “Why did they burn your face?”
His fingers on my new flesh are like nothing I’ve ever felt before. I watch him, trying to stay perfectly still. “They didn’t burn me.”
“Who did?” he whispers.
I bite my lip. When I don’t answer, he stops tracing my skin.
“Sometimes, I think the world is too cruel.” He looks out across the sea of empty seats. “I’m not post-apocalyptic material. I was made for a time when this,” he points at the stage, “was commonplace. When people sat in the dark to escape into fantasy worlds for the night.” He stares out as if he could see the past. “To sip wine. To taste the finest cuisine.”
“But you get to live in such a lovely place,” I say.
His eyes narrow as if he’s displeased I’ve broken his trance. Then he sighs. “If my brother would let me enjoy it.”
“Your brother seems…harsh.” I feel a tinge of guilt. He wiped Bell’s mouth after he gave her a drink. Is that harsh? Houghtson was harsh.
Gabe swirls his finger in the dust. “My brother means well. He can only see survival. But I don’t want to survive. I want to thrive.” He puts his head on his arms. When he lifts his head, his eyes trace over the bandage on my face. “You really are quite striking.” He trails a finger down my unburned cheek. “What does the other side look like?”
He reaches for the covering, and I reel back. “Don’t. Please,” I say, standing up.
He watches from the chair. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“You didn’t,” I say, easing myself back in my seat. “It’s sensitive.”
He sighs. “Aren’t we all?”
The theater doors blow open, startling us. We jump out of our chairs as Tommy and Bell stumble in. Bell is a wild, thrashing mess, and Tommy’s doing his best just to hold onto her. She’s a wild cat, kicking and scratching. He shoves her in an aisle seat and draws out the knife.
“Look what you’ve done!” he shouts at Gabe. Then to Bell, “I’ve never cut a lady before. But I will.” He points the blade at her.
“You loathsome dirt eater! You stinking hairnet piece of garbage! You don’t have the balls!” Bell lurches up. Tommy turns to stop her.
It happens so fast I almost don’t believe it’s real. Tommy’s knife blade sinks into Bell’s side up to the hilt.
Bell gasps. Tommy lets go of the knife and backs away as his face floods with shock. “I didn’t…”
Bell looks at the blade buried in her side. “Well, shit.”
I run to her as fast as I can.
A giant ring of blood has already formed around the knife hilt. “Oh my god.
Oh my god,” I say. I flutter around, useless, staring at all the blood.
Tommy meets my eyes. “I wasn’t trying to. You saw. She came at me.”
When I give him my coldest glare, he clams up.
I fall to my knees beside Bell. She stares at the knife and the bloodstain spreading around it.
“What do I do?” I look at the knife hilt. How long was the knife? Three inches? More?
Bell licks her lips. “Don’t pull it out.” Her voice sounds faint.
I grab her arm. My hands are trembling. “Stay with me. I don’t know what to do.”
She nods and licks her lips again. “Hopefully, it missed…my goddamned stomach.”
I whirl on Tommy. “How could you?” Anger burns through me. I could claw his face into shreds.
Tommy turns from me to Gabe. “This is your fault! I go to get medicine for my dying brother and when I get back, the room’s empty and I find her trying to steal the van!”
“It’s my van, you cow turd,” Bell says weakly.
Tommy grabs Gabe’s arm. “Call Harpy.”
Gabe shakes his head. “I think he’s out of town.”
Tommy doesn’t let Gabe go. “Then call Prentice.”
Gabe looks stricken. “Now?”
“Yes, now. He’ll get someone here to fix this. Call him.”
Gabe fingers the collar of his coat nervously. “He won’t be happy.”
Tommy narrows his eyes. “No, he won’t be. But how do you think he’ll feel if he finds out we let one of his captives die without calling?”
Captives? I look between both men. “Who’s Prentice? What do you mean we’re his?”
Neither man will answer or meet my gaze. Tommy grabs Bell by the arms and pulls her up. They stagger to the door.
“Call him,” Tommy says at the door. “Or it’ll be worse later. And make sure the burn victim doesn’t escape in the meantime.”
I feel slapped. The burn victim?
Gabe looks at me and sighs. “What a first date, huh?”
I glare at him. “I’m going with my aunt.”
He shakes his head. “Let Tommy handle it. I need help calling Prentice.”
“She needs me.”