Through the Ashes (The Light Book 2)

by Jacqueline Brown

  Quinn ran behind us, screaming and hiding as JP approached us, roaring like a dinosaur.

  Jonah stood. “May I take your bowl?” he asked, his hand outstretched.

  My heart sank as I handed it to him and he turned and walked away. JP leapt over the bench where his brother had been sitting. Quinn sprinted away and he followed.

  I lowered my head and stared at the dirt around my sandals. Why was I so honest with him? Why did I have to tell him every stupid thought that entered my mind?

  Worn shoes appeared beside my unpainted toes. “Would you take a walk with me?” Jonah asked.

  I lifted my head. He stood beside me, his hands in the pockets of his faded jeans, the nicest pair he had. The blue tie he wore hung down his crisp white shirt.

  I stood. “Okay,” I said.

  He forced a smile, but I could tell he was nervous.

  We walked beside one another in silence. The mud of the backyard gave way to the grass of the orchard. The heeled sandals I wore were hurting my feet, but I didn’t care. My mind spun as I tried to understand why Jonah asked me to walk with him.

  “I thought it would be easier to talk without JP and Quinn jumping on top of us,” he said.

  “That makes sense,” I said.

  We went on in silence. I listened to the bees buzzing and the sound of the family in the yard.

  “You don’t need to explain anything to me,” I said as the tension in the silence continued to build. “I shouldn’t have been listening and, besides, it’s none of my business.”

  “I suppose you shouldn’t have been listening, but I do think I owe you an explanation,” he said, stopping and looking at me.

  I stopped beside him, staring into his eyes.

  He lowered his head and said, “Since I can’t exactly get back to my seminary right now, I was asking Eli if he could help me continue my studies to be a priest.”

  With the words came a pain in my chest, as if I’d actually been stabbed. “Okay,” I said, trying to hide my pain.

  “Is it?” he asked.

  “What kind of question is that?” I asked, not trying to hide my frustration.

  “I guess I just wonder what you think about it.” He was studying my face.

  “Jonah, what possible difference could my thoughts or feelings make? It has nothing to do with me and everything to do with you and God, I guess. It’s a decision you have to make. A decision you have already made.” I refused to let him know how deeply his words hurt.

  “Yeah, I guess,” he said.

  I cocked my head to one side. “You look disappointed,” I said.

  “No, not disappointed. Confused.”

  “What are you confused about?” I said.

  “I don’t know. Life, I guess.”

  Part of me wanted to ask what he meant, but then I remembered the other part of his conversation with Eli. “What did Eli mean when he said you were scared?”

  “Nothing. He was wrong about it, anyway,” he said, his hands still in his pockets.

  I turned and walked back toward the house. The conversation was irritating and I wanted it to be over. “Was there anything else you wanted to tell me?”

  He stopped where the grass turned back into mud. He hesitated, then shook his head and said, “No, nothing.”

  I never told Jonah, but just as he could tell when I was lying, I could tell when he was lying. He didn’t do it often, and rarely about things of importance, but I could always tell. Part of me wanted to tell him I knew he was lying, but the rest of me knew I’d been hurt enough for one day.

  ***

  “Excuse me,” Sara said, her voice raised so it could be heard above the roaring dinosaur, “when everyone is done with their meal, could you meet me in the barn? I have something to show you.”

  I could hear the excitement and nervousness in her voice. I looked at Jonah. He shrugged, and we both turned and headed for the barn. JP and Quinn ran ahead of the rest of us.

  “Any idea what this is about?” my dad said, catching up to Jonah and me.

  I shook my head and slowed my pace to his. Jonah slowed his to match.

  Once in the barn I made my way to Talin. She stood in her stall with Fulton. She poked her head out and I rested my own against it. Jonah stepped close to me, and Fulton occasionally nudged his back with his nose. Except for Blaise and Josh, everyone was in the barn … all staring at Sara, who stood in the center of the barn, with the old truck behind her wearing its hundred-year-old canvas cover.

  “I’ve been working on a sort-of project for the last month, and I finished it last evening. I couldn’t wait any longer to tell everyone,” she said, practically bouncing with excitement.

  “What sort of project?” Charlotte asked, her voice full of joyful expectation.

  “I think I’d rather show you than tell you.” Her voice was giddy. She pulled the sheet from the truck and placed a metal rod into the front of the grill.

  “Jonah, would you mind helping me?”

  He stepped forward.

  “When I tell you to, will you turn this lever, like this.” She demonstrated, putting her left hand on the rod and turning it clockwise. He nodded.

  Sara opened the door and sat in the driver’s seat. She pushed and pulled various levers. “Okay, you can turn it now,” she said.

  He looked at her, then at me, and turned the lever. The truck began to vibrate and bounce, the engine loud. It was running. A machine was alive.

  Sara honked the horn and slowly inched forward. I jumped back. We all jumped back. Charlotte pulled JP and Quinn tight against her body. I stood with my mouth open, watching Sara drive out of the barn. Jonah looked at me and I closed my mouth. From my spot beside Talin, I watched Sara drive around the yard. It was not as smooth as one of our modern cars, but it was moving and at a speed faster than we could walk.

  Sara returned to the barn, slowing and eventually stopping and turning off the truck. She sat, triumphant, looking at us through the small glass window. No one spoke.

  “How in the world?” Nonie asked, amazed.

  “It’s mechanical, not electrical. The light didn’t affect it, just a century’s worth of sitting,” Sara said with pride in her voice. I was proud of her too. First, running water, and now, a car. She was a genius and I was honored to be her friend.

  Quint stepped forward, holding Quinn in his arms. “How did you fix it?” he asked.

  Quinn reached out and touched the hood, as if checking to see if it was imaginary.

  “The design is simple,” Sara said. “We studied it in one of my first mechanical engineering classes. Ordinarily I would have had it working in a few days, but generations upon generations of rodents decided to call the engine home. I had to take the whole thing apart, clean it out, figure out a way to repair the damaged pieces, and put it back together again. Plus, I had to raid the van for oil and gas and anything else I could use.”

  Josh and Blaise came running into the barn. “What’s going on?” Josh said. He still wore his wedding clothes and she was in a worn pair of jeans and a T-shirt.

  “We heard a car horn, looked out the window, and saw Sara driving the truck,” Josh said.

  “This is incredible!” Blaise said, touching the car and exchanging a glance with Quinn, as if they both were saying “It’s actually real.”

  JP seemed to have no problem accepting it was real; he climbed into the driver’s seat and pretended he was driving a race car, making squealing and crashing sounds every few seconds.

  Sara rested her hand on the hood and faced Blaise. “I’m glad you’re here, because this affects you and me the most.”

  Seven

  “How does it affect me?” Blaise asked.

  Sara was trying hard to stay calm. “I’m going back,” she said, her voice bursting with excitement.

  “Back?” Blaise tilted her head in confusion.

  “For our families. Yours and mine,” Sara said, bouncing onto her toes.

  “Wait. What?” Eli
said, his eyebrows pulling together. “You want to go back to your families?”

  “Yes. I want to find them and bring them here,” Sara said, joy flowing from her.

  Her words were met with silence as I watched the faces around the circle try and understand the magnitude of their meaning.

  My dad started shaking his head from side to side. “No … no!” His voice wavered from fear. “You don’t understand what it’s like.”

  Sara looked at my dad. “I understand the risks involved, but it’s my mom and sister. You walked all the way here from DC. You have to understand my need to be with them. To bring them here, to keep them safe.”

  Her voice was less enthusiastic, but just as confident and without a hint of fear. I knew then that she didn’t understand the risks. She focused only on her desire to be reunited with her mom and sister. She hadn’t thought about what it would take to get to them.

  “Do you think we can make it? To my parents, I mean,” Blaise asked, sounding as though she was afraid to hope.

  “Sure, why not?” Sara said with excitement.

  Charlotte’s head lifted, the fear and anger radiating from her body was so intense it caused my own body to shake. “Sure, why not? I can think of at least a hundred reasons why not and they all involve you getting hurt.”

  “Sometimes you have to take risks, Mom,” East said, her arms folded. She was examining the truck.

  “And sometimes you have to recognize when a plan is utterly flawed and just walk away from it,” Charlotte answered.

  Blaise hesitated and then said, “I’m going with her.”

  “I will be beside you wherever you go,” Josh said, nuzzling in close to Blaise.

  The cuteness of their earlier vows of love was now just irritating. He was agreeing to follow her to an almost certain death.

  Quint spoke, his voice calm but firm: “We understand your need to be with your families, but trust us when we say your parents wouldn’t want you to go to them. They would never want you to risk your lives to help them.”

  “Never!” Charlotte echoed, shaking her head.

  “That’s not fair to say,” Blaise replied. “You don’t know my parents. You don’t know what they would or would not want. If you were suffering and Eli or Jonah or East could help you, wouldn’t you want them to?” Heartbreak and anger mixed in her eyes.

  “Do your parents love you?” Nonie asked. There was a gentleness to her voice that no other voice had.

  “Yes,” Blaise whispered.

  “Then we know them enough to know that, above all, they want your safety. Every night of their child’s life a parent prays, and for those who do not pray, they hope for the safety and happiness of their child. Every morning, that is the thought they wake up to. So while I have never met them, I know them. They do not want you to risk your life for them,” Nonie said. Tears were filling her eyes as she placed a wrinkled hand on the back of her great-granddaughter.

  Eli placed his own solid hand on his grandmother’s shoulder, offering her silent support and, no doubt, prayers.

  “But don’t you see? My sister is there too,” Sara said, sadness replacing the earlier exuberance. “It’s not just my mom. Besides, they don’t know we’re safe. They probably think we’re dead.”

  “You will be dead if you try to go anywhere near DC,” my dad said, with a forcefulness to his voice I hadn’t heard since before the light. “You will die. If not before you get there, then soon after.”

  In some ways it was good to see a glimmer of his strength returning. I knew he was right; everyone who went on this quest would see death in one way or another.

  Sara’s eyes burned with defiance. “Then I will die! I’m not leaving my mom and sister to God knows what.”

  “Have you not realized that they’re probably already dead?”

  Dad’s words were callous. A glimpse of the man who raised me. My anger surged.

  My voice shook with anger: “You have no idea what you’re saying. You have no idea what the world out there is like. None of us do. Sara and Blaise love their families. They can’t abandon them. They need to do what they need to do.” The words shot from my mouth, fueled by old resentments for the man who’d thought only of himself for eighteen years.

  “Bria, calm down and be logical,” Dad said.

  Heat rose. These were the words my father spoke whenever he thought I was being too emotional. But the truth was any emotion was too much for him. He was most comfortable when I was a robot devoid of feelings. My life had been spent learning to stuff my feelings inside, to not deal with anything, to pretend I was fine when I was dying inside. I was done living life the way he wanted me to. I was done hiding from myself.

  “I’m going with them,” I said, the words driven by rage, by hatred for the man who ignored me for eighteen years.

  “No!” my dad roared.

  Quinn buried her head in Quint’s neck.

  Talin snorted her fury toward my father. She didn’t understand the words I’d spoken. She only knew the anger he aimed at me.

  Jonah stared at me with a look I didn’t understand. Eli stared at him with a look that was clear. It was disbelief, though I had no idea why. It didn’t matter and I couldn’t allow myself to think of Jonah right now.

  “Count me in,” East said with a hint of cockiness.

  Charlotte gasped and Quinn’s head lifted, her eyes staring at East.

  “What! This is ridiculous! No one is going anywhere!” Charlotte said, her hands resting on JP’s shoulders, clearly trying to fight the urge to scream as my father had.

  “East, there is no reason for you to go,” Quint said, his voice firm, his arms wrapped tightly around his granddaughter.

  “I’m not letting them have all the fun. Plus, if it was Mom and Quinn,”—her voice broke—“or you and Mom out there by yourselves, I would want some help,” she said.

  “You can’t leave!” Quinn screamed, turning in Quint’s arms.

  “The truth is none of you know your families are still alive. You’re risking your lives doing something your parents would never want you to do!” Charlotte said, her voice and body shaking. She pulled Quinn from Quint and swiftly left the barn.

  East swallowed hard and leaned against the truck to steady herself.

  Sara’s expression for the first time showed that she understood what she’d done and what she was asking of us.

  My father’s eyes were pleading. “Bria, your family is here. I am your family. Charlotte and Quint are your family. This is where our life is.”

  With his return to the man I now knew, my anger faded and I realized I agreed with him. I didn’t want to leave this place. We were safe here. We had food and even running water. My father was here. Jonah was here. My mother and brother were laid to rest here. I would be happy to be here the rest of my life. But I had to go.

  “I know you don’t understand,” I said, trying not to cry, “but Sara, Blaise, and Josh were my family when … when you weren’t able to be. They were there for me every moment of the last three years and I will do everything I can to help them find their families.”

  “I know I failed you,” Dad said. “I know I wasn’t there for you when you needed me—or anytime, for that matter—but I’m here now and I am begging you not to leave me, to leave us.” He gestured to where Jonah stood.

  Jonah’s eyes were red. His hands were stuffed in his pockets, like they’d been when we walked through the orchard. I knew that was only moments ago, but it felt like a lifetime. He chose what was right for him, and though I wanted him with all of my heart to choose me, I admired him for having the strength to walk away from the path that others had chosen for him. I knew his family wanted us to be together, I knew they didn’t believe he should be a priest, but he knew what was right for him and he wasn’t afraid to make that choice. Though, looking at his face, I could see it was difficult, perhaps more difficult than I would ever know.

  I looked away from him. My friends were watching me,
wondering what I would choose. I could see in their eyes that they would never try to make up my mind for me. At every other point in my life I was too weak or maybe too scared to make the big decisions and instead allowed others to do it for me. I aborted my child because the guy who impregnated me told me to. I went to Columbia because my father thought it was best. I dated Trent because he wanted me to and I eventually just gave in. I realized now that I’d stayed with him for the same reason. I was done giving up, done handing my life over to someone else.

  I turned back to my father. Tears welled in my eyes. I bit my lip and shook my head.

  My father stumbled backward. “Then, I’m going too,” he said, tears spilling down his cheeks.

  I sucked in air. “The truck might get us there, but …”—I tried not to think of how soon it would be taken from us—“at some point we’re going to have to walk and you can’t do that.”

  “I can, I’ll keep up.” His voice sounded young, like a small child begging to come along. I felt the ache in my chest; my heart was breaking.

  Quint placed a hand on his shoulder and shook his head. My father’s hopeful expression fell. Between them, JP stood leaning against his father, his lip quivering as our eyes met. I pulled my gaze away. I could not think about leaving him.

  “You can’t leave,” my dad said, his voice soft and broken, the tears streaming.

  I took his hand in mine. His tears filled the space between our palms. I lifted my right hand to his face, my thumb stroking his cheeks, trying to dry his tears. I could see the gentleness in his eyes, the man who existed in my memories. The man who loved my mother.

  “I promise you will not lose another child,” I said. “No matter what it takes, I will come back to you.”

  We held each other as we cried, each of us knowing the choice I had made would forever change our lives.

  Eight

  Sara was confirmed two nights ago. It was an emotional ceremony. Sara cried throughout, saying it was because the Spirit moved her. She often talked in a religious way that made no sense to me, but everyone else seemed to get it, so I didn’t bother to ask. Her tears were joined by Charlotte’s and Nonie’s. They said they cried out of joy, but I knew they were lying. They were happy she was joining their faith—that part seemed true enough—but her confirmation marked the beginning of Easter. We would be leaving the day after Easter.