Hal hung back. He was thirteen, thin and lanky, with the same sleek dark hair and olive skin as me. He gave an awkward shrug.
“She’s all right,” he said. “Hi,” he added to me.
“Hi, Hal.” After a beat, I hugged him, too. I never knew whether he’d welcome it or not – he was at a funny age.
Not to mention that I’d left.
“Here, let me carry that for you,” said my mother when I reached for the bag that I’d dropped at my feet.
“Don’t bother, it’s not heavy.”
“No, give it to me,” Ma insisted. “You must be tired.”
“Why would I be tired? It’s only ten in the morning.”
“You work so hard, though.” She tried to take the bag from me; my fingers tightened around its handle.
“Ma, please stop fussing. I’m not tired.”
“Hal, you take it,” said Ma, and I sighed and handed it over to him.
“Fine,” I said. “Can we go now?”
A huge bronze timepiece hung over the station’s main exit. Time since the end…lest we forget, its ornate lettering read. The numbers clicked steadily, up in the millions now: the minutes since the bombs causing the Cataclysm had dropped.
As we headed towards it through the station, Ma spoke in deliberately cheerful bursts. “You look so pretty, darling. Where did you find that dress? Blue suits you so well! Why, you could be a model if you weren’t a pilot! And I know you must be exhausted, whatever you say. I don’t want you to do a single thing while you’re here.” She patted my arm.
My smile was pasted on. She’s only trying to be nice, I reminded myself. But I felt like a cat held on someone’s lap and very determinedly stroked.
Outside autos and buses grumbled past. Everything looked slightly shabby: the cracked sidewalks, the billboards advertising toothpaste and cigarettes, the overflowing trash cans. An ancient structure that was once a capitol building still stood, its dome a smoggy grey. Other buildings tiered upwards like elongated ziggurats, but were just as grimy. Many had For rent signs.
No wonder people envied Gunnison’s gleaming cities whenever a glimpse of them came on the telio.
The streetcar home was crowded, but we found three seats near each other. As the car clanged away from the kerb, Hal glanced at me. He had his hair slicked back, and wore grey trousers that were rolled up a turn or two, showing his socks.
“So what’s it like being a Peacefighter?” he asked under the noise. “You never say much in your letters.”
I heard the restrained eagerness in his voice – and saw a Peace Power comic sticking out of his back pocket. When pilots died in the comics, all you had to do was turn the page.
I tried to smile. “There’s always too much to tell.”
“You’re home for three days, though. You’ve got time.”
“Yeah, I guess I do.”
My brother’s full name was Halcyon. Our names both meant “peace”.
Ma wasn’t listening; she smiled widely at the heavyset woman behind me. “Helen, hello! Have you met my daughter Amity? Amity, say hello, this is Mrs Blackstone.”
I had to turn in my seat and smile and smile as Ma chattered away, her inflections hushed and dramatic. “She’s a Peacefighter, you know…only home for three days and I know she’s just exhausted, poor thing…but a very skilled pilot, exactly like her father…”
Ma reached across the aisle to pat my arm again and then kept her hand there, resting her fingers on my skin as she talked. Mrs Blackstone sat gazing at me with awe. The woman next to her was listening too, eyes wide, not even pretending to be doing anything else.
When Ma paused for breath, Mrs Blackstone leaned forward. “Thank you for your service, Miss Vancour. Everyone in the Western Seaboard is proud of you.”
“It’s an honour,” I said, trying not to sound stiff and failing. It was, but I could never say it and sound natural, not with people gazing at me with shining eyes.
Besides, everyone in the Western Seaboard would not be proud of me if they knew I’d lost almost thirty per cent of our main fuel source.
Russ had come to find me after I got taped up by Medical. “The team checked; there was no malfunction,” he said as I signed myself out. “You’ve got two bullet holes right through your back panel.”
My heart had dropped. I put down the pen. “Really?”
He gave a reluctant nod. “They pierced your air bottle and snapped off the nozzle – that was why you couldn’t fire. You must not have felt the hit, that’s all. It happens.”
He was right, but the disappointment almost knocked the breath from me. “Well, thanks for telling me,” I said finally.
Russ gripped my shoulder. “Hey, you got it down, kiddo,” he said quietly. “That means a lot. At least we can challenge the wait-time.”
On the streetcar, I reminded myself that nothing would change for the Western Seaboard until after the appeals court heard my case. If you got your plane down after a defeat, it meant the other pilot hadn’t totally bested you. You could appeal for time off the standard five-year wait before your country re-fought the issue.
Three years off, maybe. Four, if I was lucky. No matter how bad things got for people as a result of my loss, at least it wouldn’t last for very long.
Ma kept talking to Mrs Blackstone. I gazed out the window as she confided how difficult it was when Truce died, but Amity had been such a help – and now, of course, she was a hero just like him—
“Oh, honestly,” I muttered. My hand twisted at my skirt. Ma’s ability to rewrite history drove me crazy. It also made me nervous; I think she really believed what she was saying. Already, the vague idea I’d had when I booked this leave that I could share my feelings about Dad with her – and maybe even about Stan – was receding.
The disappointment tasted sour. Why did I ever expect anything different?
“Remember the night I got arrested?” I asked Hal, lifting my voice.
He glanced up from his comic. “Sure,” he said.
“It was after we moved here from the country, remember? I hated it here, and I was still upset over Dad – I got into a lot of trouble for a long time.”
Hal looked confused. “I know all of this,” he said.
Mrs Blackstone hadn’t. She was more agog than ever.
Ma tried to laugh. “Amity! You weren’t arrested.”
“I was. For shoplifting.”
“Darling, don’t exaggerate. It was a misunderstanding,” she added to Mrs Blackstone. “The store was so apologetic afterwards.”
“The store wanted to press charges. I almost got sent to a juvenile detention centre.”
“But how can you be a Peacefighter if—” started the stranger next to Mrs Blackstone. Her cheeks reddened as she realized she’d butted in.
“It didn’t matter,” I said. “I told them everything in my admissions interview. They accepted me into training school anyway.”
“Madeline helped,” said Hal.
“No, she didn’t,” I said sharply.
Madeline Bark, an old friend of the family, had been a Peacefighter with my father and was now a high-up in the World for Peace. “I didn’t even tell her I was applying,” I said to Hal. “I wanted them to let me in on my own merits, or not at all.”
“Well I never,” murmured the woman.
Ma managed an Isn’t that cute? chuckle while looking daggers at me. “But tell me about George,” she said to Mrs Blackstone. “Didn’t I hear that he’s going to need surgery, poor man?”
I propped my chin on my hand with a sigh and stared out at the passing buildings, feeling like I was ten years old again. I started to say something to Hal, then stopped short. “What’s that?”
We’d entered Ma’s neighbourhood, with its familiar once-genteel buildings, now as run-down as the rest of the city.
Hal looked up. “What’s what?”
“That.” I pointed, chilled. Where a florist’s had once stood, there was a sign showing the swirlin
g red-and-black Harmony symbol. The lettering read: Birth Charts Cast, Destinies Explained.
“Is there an astrologer here?” I gasped.
Hal turned a page of his comic. “Sure, there’s lots now. I guess people are interested ’cause it’s in the news so much.”
“It’s in the news so much because Gunnison’s a maniac,” I said curtly. “And why’s his symbol on the sign?”
We were long past the astrologer’s now. Hal blinked at my vehemence. “Isn’t it just a good-luck symbol? Ying and yang, or something?”
“Yin-yang, and it hasn’t been lucky since Gunnison took it over.”
The streetcar clattered to a stop and Ma rose. “This is ours,” she said to Mrs Blackstone. “So nice to see you! Say hello to George for me.”
“I will, and it was certainly a privilege to meet your lovely daughter.” Mrs Blackstone beamed at me as Hal and I got up – but I could see her wondering about the shoplifting.
After that red-and-black swirl, I’d almost forgotten it.
“Here, give me that,” I muttered to Hal, and took my bag from him as we went down the streetcar stairs.
Our brownstone wasn’t far away, right next to the fruit seller’s. Apples and pears sat in open display crates; the smell of strawberries hung in the air. It was a relief how normal it all seemed. Though I scanned the street, I couldn’t see any more of those stark red-and-black symbols.
It’s not my concern if people believe that garbage, I told myself.
Ma climbed the steps to our building’s front door and stood rummaging through her purse. “Now, where are my keys…?”
Suddenly I felt a rush of affection for her. I couldn’t remember a single time when Ma had let us into the building without first losing her keys in that bag. “Try the inside pocket,” I said.
“No, under your wallet,” put in Hal.
Ma held up her keys with a jingling flourish. “Inside pocket,” she said, dimpling. “Amity, you’re so smart.”
Our third-floor apartment had always felt overcrowded to me: full of all the nice things we had when Dad was alive, crammed now into a too-small space. I longed to throw half of it out so that I could breathe.
“Now, Amity, you must sit down,” commanded Ma once we got inside, unpinning her hat. She rested it on a small marble-topped table. “Can I get you anything? Are you hungry?”
I stayed standing. “I’m fine, Ma. Thanks.”
“A sandwich?”
“Really, I’m not hungry. I’ll just have some water. I’ll get it,” I added before Ma could offer, and went into the kitchen.
“I bet you’d like some coffee!” Ma called in brightly, like someone who’s just found the answer.
“Please stop fussing.”
“Why, darling, I’m not fussing! I just want you to relax while you’re here.” She came in and watched as I filled my glass from the tap. The gurgle of water sounded overloud in the small room. “Don’t you want some ice with that?” she said.
“No, thanks.”
“Here, let me get you some ice.” She started for the icebox.
“Ma, no. I’m fine.” My fingers were tight around the glass.
Perversely, now that she’d said it I did want some ice, but I drank my water without it. I wished that she’d scold me for mentioning my arrest. A few years ago she would have. Now she just stood gazing at me, eyes shining.
Just like Mrs Blackstone, who didn’t even know me.
When I’d finished my water she took the glass from me and washed it. “Well, I’m dying to hear absolutely everything!” she said. “Tell me all about life at the base. Have you been in many fights? We don’t see you nearly often enough, darling!”
On the train earlier, I’d vowed that I wouldn’t shut her out this time. I’d be charming, open, the daughter she’d always wanted. For once, we’d manage to really share our feelings – not just about Dad, but all kinds of things.
Yet now something in me shrank. Her avid expression didn’t seem to have anything to do with me at all.
“There’s not much I can tell you,” I said awkwardly. “A lot of it’s classified.”
Hal had drifted in. “You can tell us about the rumbles, though, right?” he said, his voice eager. “I mean, not which fights were yours – just the flying part. Please?”
“Collie’s at the base,” I said.
It came out with no warning; I’d been debating whether to tell them. Ma gaped. Suddenly it was as if she were seeing me, Amity, again.
“Our Collie?” she said.
“Yes. Our Collie.”
“But what’s he doing there?” she asked blankly.
“Same as me. He’s a Peacefighter pilot. He just arrived last week.”
Hal’s expression darkened. “Where was he all those years?”
“Who knows?”
“He hasn’t told you?”
“We’ve hardly spoken.”
“Oh, Amity!” broke in my mother. “You have given him a chance, haven’t you?”
“Of course I have. He doesn’t want to tell me.”
“You should have brought him with you,” she said.
“What?” But it wasn’t really a surprise. Ma had always adored Collie. When we used to get into trouble together, he’d be the one to sweet-talk us out of it.
“We’re more his family than anyone – we always have been,” she went on. “Oh, isn’t that wonderful, that he’s there with you now! You two were always such pals—”
I gritted my teeth. “Ma, please stop.”
“How is he getting on? What’s he been doing?”
“Didn’t you hear me? I have no idea.”
She sighed and patted her hair into place. “Such a good-looking boy,” she murmured. “He was like having a second son all that time. I used to feel so sorry for him…his own family just didn’t seem to care, and he was so bright and able…”
I refilled my glass and drained half of it in a gulp. “Well, I’m sure he still is. If that’s any consolation.”
“Maybe over lunch you can—” Ma broke off then, looking fretful. “Lunch! Oh, I almost forgot; I need to get us some carrots to go with the roast beef. I know how much you love my glazed carrots.”
I couldn’t work up the energy to protest. “Do you want me to go?” I asked resignedly.
“No, no, of course not!” Ma was smiling as she went back into the other room and put on her hat again. Watching her inspect herself in the mirror, humming, I knew she could hardly wait to tell people about Collie. She could claim that she was practically the mother to two Peacefighter pilots now.
After she’d left, Hal poured himself some water, too. He opened the icebox and popped some ice out of the metal tray.
“So…Collie, huh?” he said over his shoulder.
Yes. Collie. I rubbed my forehead, thinking of all the times that I’d seen Collie around the base these past few days. Once or twice our eyes had met. Collie always looked as if he wanted to say something, but neither of us had.
I forced a smile.
“Hey, want to hear about my fights?” I said to Hal.
So I told Hal some stories about flying, making them as exciting as possible. Peacefighting was exciting. Battling other pilots with speed, power, my own skill – why was it so hard for me to share this with my little brother, when I was so proud of following in our father’s footsteps?
I didn’t know. It just felt as if only telling him the enjoyable parts was a lie.
We were in the living room, sprawled on the sofa; Ma hadn’t gotten back yet. Hal’s eyes shone as he listened. “I’m going to be a Peacefighter too, just as soon as I’m old enough,” he said. “According to my chart—” He broke off with a guilty look.
I straightened. “Your chart?”
Hal chewed his lip. “Um…”
“What chart? Your birth chart?”
“Ma had them done,” he said finally.
I stared at him.
“Don’t tell her I told you.
I’m not supposed to know.” He twisted on the sofa and pushed aside the heavy curtain behind it. Sunlight ventured in like a stranger. “Over there,” he said, pointing.
At first it was the same view as always: a dingy courtyard shared by four buildings. Then I saw the sign on one of the windows opposite – that Harmony symbol again, with lettering underneath: Madame Josephine: Astrologer, Fortunes, Dreams Explained.
“Oh,” I said faintly.
“Ma goes there a lot,” Hal said. “I’ve seen her when I’m playing stickball. Here, look.” He went to an antique bureau that sat against the wall and tugged open one of its heavy drawers. When I followed, he passed me a large envelope labelled Vancour Family.
Sketched lightly on one corner was a circle with a jagged line through it.
I frowned, wondering what it meant. Then I opened the envelope and slid out four circular graphs, each divided into twelve pieces and littered with spiky characters. There were charts for me, Ma, Hal…and Collie.
My fingers tightened as I stared down at Collie’s name. Hal shifted his weight. “I, um…guess Ma was trying to find out if he was okay,” he said.
“Yeah,” I muttered. Despite myself, my eyes went to my own chart. It was as indecipherable as the others.
Hal pointed to my chart’s centre, where there was a square with an “x” through it. “That’s called a ‘Grand Cross’,” he said.
“A what?”
“Grand Cross,” he repeated. “It’s pretty rare. You’ve got four planets in opposition, which gives you lots of challenges.”
“Wha-at? How do you even know this?”
“I’ve been reading up on it. The library has plenty of—”
“Hal.”
“What? It’s interesting. See, Collie is Leo with Gemini rising,” he added. “That means he’s outgoing and good with people. And you’re Aries with Sagittarius rising, and that means—”
I jammed the charts back in the envelope. The circle with the crooked line vanished from view as I shoved the envelope away in the dresser again. “Hal, come on,” I said testily. “It doesn’t mean anything at all. ‘Madame Josephine’ is a complete charlatan.”
Broken Sky Page 7