by Gaia Octavia
My father had decided that the threat of the raiders was finally enough to warrant us trading our small camp’s low profile and privacy for the security of living in one of the settlements, where camps joined together. While a settlement made the camps within it bigger targets for the raiders, it also offered the security of enough people to fight to defend it. And much more in the way of deterrents against the raiders when it came to defenses and the pooled resources of weapons available. But when I had been taken, my father still hadn’t found a settlement willing to take on nine more families.
Our camp wasn’t large by any means. But nine tents meant a lot of space, and nine families meant a lot of food to ask for. Sure, everyone would pull their own weight, but the initial burden was a bit steep. I was also suspicious that my father, the leader of our camp, was making the settlement leaders leery, what with his massive physical size and gruff demeanor. No one running a settlement wanted to have to question whether a camp leader was going to fully submit to them or not.
I startled when Jade dropped his pack on the ground and sat down across from me. I hadn’t heard him coming, but that was no surprise. He dug in his pocket and pulled out the flint before grabbing his pack and pulling out the roots we had foraged earlier and the cooked meat he had wrapped in a piece of fat-stained cloth. I had already dug the large can we used to boil the roots out of my pack, and he stood back up as he grabbed it.
“I’ll get the water if you want to start the fire,” he said, walking back down the incline to the stream we camped by.
I grabbed what I needed and started the fire, thinking about how, before Jade, I never would have known all the things one needed to be aware of when choosing a campsite for the night. So far, I’d noticed that he always found drinkable water first. Then he looked for a site close by that had enough of a clearing where nothing could sneak up on you without crossing a somewhat open area. Unless it was me, of course. You could cross a large, flat meadow and still surprise the shit out of me.
In addition to those requirements, he’d told me that it was always best to find a spot where there was something at your back. A rock cliff, a drop-off, or any other obstacle. Anything that meant you only had to worry about three sides of your camp, instead of the entire way around you.
“Always put your back to something if you can,” he’d said.
Though he didn’t talk much, I’d already learned more practical things from him than everything I’d learned in all my lessons back home at camp. Until we were forced to pick up and go off in search of a settlement, our camp hadn’t been one to travel. We’d loved our home. And as the raiders in the area multiplied, we’d waited until we could no longer deny that it was time to leave it behind. But we’d waited too long.
“Gods!” I yelled as I jumped, “You keep doing that to me.”
Jade had appeared once more, setting the now-full can of water down heavily beside me as I waited for the fire to reach the right height.
“Should be paying attention,” he said matter-of-factly.
Though he was right–maybe because he was right–I was annoyed he’d said anything at all.
I must have been hungrier than I thought, because as I placed the can above the flames of the fire, my stomach started to feel hot and loosed a loud grumble. Jade heard it, of course, but he didn’t say anything after his eyes looked up and settled on me for a moment. I couldn’t wait to eat and get ready to lay down.
The effort of the day was suddenly catching up to me and I felt sore and so, so tired. I stabbed at the dirt with a stick I was holding–trying and failing to busy my mind with thoughts that didn’t include food or sleep. Maybe I would just go lie down without eating. I was more tired than hungry. In fact, I was exhausted.
“I’m not hungry,” I said.
My voice sounded muffled but I didn’t understand why. I started to stand up. The ground tipped underneath me, and I fell, landing on my right side. Jade jumped up. At least I thought he did, though from my vantage point, it looked as if he’d fallen off the ground. I pushed him away when he tried to help me and used my knee to push off and stand up by myself, though I still somehow found myself in Jade’s arms when I rose.
Jade looked down.
“You’re bleeding,” he said, a look of concern lighting up his face.
I looked down dumbly at my right leg. I could see the reddish stain that had begun to spread on the side of my thigh and started to laugh at the absurdity of the situation.
“S’not blood, silly. Just buried.” I shook my head, though it just made me dizzier. “Berr-ies,” I corrected myself, speaking slowly.
Jade’s eyes widened and he looked at me.
“Show me,” he demanded.
“Over there.” I pointed, though I had no idea where the bush was in relation to where we were standing. “But I was gonna share. Was supposed to be a surprise,” I whined, “wanted to impress you.” I could hear my words slurring and I laughed again, because Jade’s face had begun to melt. “What’s wrong with your face?”
He reached down and started digging in my pocket.
“Hey!” I yelled, already forgetting why I was annoyed.
Jade looked at the red mush in his hand, which had begun to multiply into many hands, and then looked at me with his cute, little melty face.
“Fuck.”
I started to laugh again but heard myself begin screaming instead. Jade pushed me down, sending us both tumbling into the brush, which just made me scream louder. The next thing I knew, he was shoving his fingers down my throat as I screamed and vomited thick, red berry jam all over his hand–which was still in my mouth–and myself.
I closed my eyes as his fingers worked their way further down my throat and decided to take a nap, resolving that if Jade was going to be this rude about the berries, then I wasn’t going to share next time.
CHAPTER THREE
⸙
JADE
Emit moaned as I covered his brow with a strip of cool, wet cloth. Over twenty-four hours had passed since I’d forced as many of the berries from his stomach as I could. I had no idea how much he’d eaten, but he’d been unconscious by the time his stomach had refused to give up any more. Since I couldn’t lift him, I rolled him onto his mat next to where we’d fallen. After removing his clothing, I built a cover over him using wood and thick layers of leaves to protect him from the rain and sun. I continued to make trips back and forth to the stream, keeping his body wet with the cool water and covering him with mud to help keep the insects at bay. I knew I had to keep his fever down the best I could, but the humidity and heat weren’t helping. And he had yet to wake up.
I was furious at myself. And at Emit. I’d told him not to eat anything without checking with me first. While the berries he’d found resembled the ones I had him collect in the past, he’d failed to notice the different shape of the bush’s leaves or the darkened center of the berries where the seeds show through. The berries we’d eaten had light seeds. Barely noticeable. The dark seeds were what made these berries so dangerous. But even without the seeds, they were nothing to mess with.
I closed my eyes, scolding myself for being stupid enough, careless enough, not to remind him of the rule every time I left him alone. If Emit didn’t wake up, how would I ever come back from that? Especially when, after being together for weeks, I’d still refused to let him in. I was so scared of him finding out the things I had done to survive. The things I’d lost. It all seemed so stupid now–to have risked so much to save him, only to lose him without ever having known him at all. The thought was terrifyingly repulsive.
I drew in a breath, unable to stop the battle of anxiety and regret warring within my head. I just about rubbed the spot where my palm met my wrist raw, against my pants. I needed to distract myself. Without thinking too much about it, I began talking to Emit. I told him all about my childhood. Even when the memories threatened to rip my heart apart inside my chest. I talked about my parents. About how much love they showed me.
I told him about my sister Marta. Who at just two-years-old, had been the most compassionate creature I’ve ever known. I told him about the time she herded a bunch of baby lystros into our tent, with their angry mother not far behind.
I laughed, wiping at my tears as I remembered how my father and I had run around like mad trying to shoo the little snub-nosed creatures out of the tent as they ran about, knocking over everything in their path. The look on my mother’s face when she’d walked into the tent had been priceless. Though at the time, I’d been afraid that she was cross with me, since I was the one who was supposed to have been watching Marta before the whole fiasco. I hadn’t allowed myself to think of those memories in so many years. And as my laughs turned to sobs, I realized that my need to secret the memories of my family away for so long had come at a deep, soul-wrenching cost.
As I sat with Emit, forcing myself to eat some of the meat left in my pack, my mind went back to that first night in the woods when we’d been too afraid of being spotted to light a fire, much less sleep. I remembered that look of hope in his eyes. The way he had quietly told me his name, letting me simply sit next to him and breathe after. He hadn’t questioned me about my reaction to his touch or if I had any plans as to what we were going to do. He had simply allowed me my silence. Almost as if he’d instinctually understood that I couldn’t have handled any questions. Of course, hours later had been another story altogether; I hadn’t been able to shut him up.
I sighed and smiled as I glanced back over at Emit. Remembering how I’d first noticed the golden flecks in his green eyes after the sun rose that first morning. The sight had almost caused me to lose my breath, which was something he seemed to be able to do to me quite easily. Emit looked more peaceful now, his breaths no longer coming in endless, ragged pants. I felt his cheek, my eyes focused on his face, avoiding the sight of his naked body.
I could almost convince myself that his skin felt a bit cooler, but I wasn’t sure if it was just because I so desperately wanted it to be, or if there had really been a change. I laid on my mat next to his. I had set it there the night before, wanting to be close so I could check on him throughout the night. Placing an arm behind my head, I looked up at the stars that were beginning to blanket the night sky as the last of the day’s light slipped from view.
Without planning to do so, I drew in a breath and began to sing the song that my mother always used to sing to me. It was something that I had done every night in my head, in secret, since the night I’d lost my family. Now, for the first time in eight years, I sang it aloud.
I sang it to Emit.
CHAPTER FOUR
⸙
EMIT
My head still ached, and my body felt like it’d been stuck under a rock for days. Still, I was glad to be leaving behind the place where I had made a complete ass out of myself. The place where I’d almost killed myself to impress Jade. I shook my head, silently vowing not to slow Jade down today, no matter how much pain it was going to cause. I had already set us behind because of my foolish mistake. We’d lost three days of travel that we couldn’t afford. And even then, it had taken me the past twenty hours arguing with Jade to get him to agree to let it only be three.
Jade moved ahead of me as we settled back into the routine of silence and drudgery. We’d only been walking for a few short hours when I felt my body screaming at me to give up and sit down, but I refused. If the man was still tracking us and caught up to Jade because of my stupidity…
I couldn’t even finish the thought.
I fought against my desperate need to rest and started counting my steps. It wasn’t that I gave a shit about how many steps I was taking. In fact, I usually started back at zero after reaching one hundred. It was just a way to busy my mind with anything but the endless agony that was flooding my body. I kept my eyes focused solely on the ground before me, keeping Jade’s feet within view. I was still mortified from waking up a little over thirty-six hours ago, naked, with my arm slung around Jade’s abdomen and my head pressed to his chest as he slept next to me. It’d taken a while for the scattered memories of the many hours beforehand to fall into place.
I remembered setting camp and being excited about sharing the spoils of my first solo forage, but beyond that, everything seemed hazy and confusing. Little snippets were still returning. I remembered feeling ill and then lying in the brush with Jade’s weight pinning me down. I’d been screaming. A flash of Jade covered in my vomit had me closing my eyes in complete mortification.
Gods.
Had I really told him I’d meant to impress him? I hoped to hell not.
As I continued walking, I thought about the other pieces that had returned to me but wasn’t sure if they’d been bits of memories or dreams. Jade talking, laughing, and then the sound of soft sobs followed by the sweet sound of him singing to me.
It had to have been a dream.
Suddenly, I felt a pair of hands grasp my shoulders a moment before I slammed into Jade’s chest. A feeling of warmth seeped into my arms under his touch, causing me to gasp. I don’t know if Jade felt it too, or if he just wanted to get his hands off me as soon as possible, but he quickly let go.
“Sorry,” I mumbled.
It seems I wasn’t done making a fool out of myself in front of him. Maybe I never would be.
“Who’s Sheena?” He asked abruptly, startling me from my thoughts.
“What?”
“Sheena. You called for her when you had a fever.”
Was that a hint of jealousy in his voice? It made no sense for it to be, but the fact that he was holding his breath while waiting for my answer had me wondering if Jade hadn’t liked whatever he’d heard me saying.
“My girlfriend,” I answered quietly.
I found myself wanting to clarify that she had been my girlfriend, though I had no fucking clue why. And it was a lie. Technically, it’d been over three months since I’d last seen her–the night I’d left my camp–so I had no clue as to what we were anymore. But when I’d left, it had been to show my family, and hers, that I was perfectly capable of providing for myself and for Sheena. I hadn’t even made it twenty-four hours before the raiders found me and forced me on that long march back to their camp.
So much for that.
Jade stepped back, his eyes setting themselves on everything but me. Then he turned around and kept on walking. I sighed and began to follow him once again, trying not to get lost in my thoughts once more, which only meant that my body now had my full attention as it set to torture me into submission. I figured we still had hours of walking ahead of us and I had no idea how I was going to manage it, but I lost the thought as Jade slowed down until we were almost side-by-side.
“What’s it like?” He asked.
“What’s what like?”
I was clueless as to what he was talking about, or why he was even talking to me, but found myself eager to keep it going.
“Having a girlfriend.”
Jade looked as mystified as I was by his line of questioning. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized just how much he didn’t know about life. Instead of answering him, I asked a question of my own.
“How old were you, Jade? When they took you?”
He was silent for a long time. It was only fair, I hadn’t answered his question either.
“It was my eleventh birthday.”
He still hadn’t looked at me, and I could feel the shame rolling off him. I was surprised to learn that he was almost a couple of years older than I was. I would be eighteen in a few weeks but had just assumed by his small frame that he was younger.
I supposed it was more than just our physical differences that’d had me assuming as much, but I wasn’t willing to think about that right now. I wanted to tell him that he had no reason to be ashamed of anything that had happened to him, but I knew that nothing I said would change anything. Or make it any better. It was quiet for some time after that.
Too quiet.
“When’s your
birthday?” I asked.
“I don’t remember.”
Jade’s answer had been so quiet that if I hadn’t been standing so close to him, I wouldn’t have heard it. I felt a stab of pain at his answer. He’d had no one to celebrate his birthday with since he’d been eleven. Whatever had happened to him that day had ensured he would never celebrate it again. There was something so deeply wrong about that. Of the birth of such a strong, beautiful person going uncelebrated. I found myself wanting to change the subject before I thought too hard about it.
“It felt good,” I said. “I mean, having a girlfriend. It felt good having someone choose me to give their love to.” I paused, not really knowing how to say what I meant. “I don’t mean just physically. The kissing was great and all, but it was the fact that she chose to care about me when she had no obligation to…”
I shook my head, unsure of where I was even going with this. “I guess it felt good not to be alone anymore.” But that didn’t sound right either. “My family loves me, don’t get me wrong. And I know I’m never alone while I have them. But–”
I ran my fingers through my hair, wishing I hadn’t even tried to start explaining what I meant when I really had no idea how to.
“I guess it just feels different when someone who isn’t obligated to care about you in any way somehow, inexplicably does.”
I left it at that, feeling foolish enough as it was. Jade had stopped walking and was staring at the ground. Without even thinking about it, I lifted my hand to his chin. I didn’t touch him. Instead, I slowly used the closeness of my fingers to force his head to lift until our eyes met.