Why were they here and not at the trial? Was it all a trick? How dare they deceive them like that?! What kind of respect or honor does that show? They are no better now and no ruling would land in their favor. It was just stupid!
Tree branches were strewn along the edge of the trail. She went to find one that was a good size that she could wield. Upon finding it, she took off running again, ready to approach the attackers. Out front there was no one, but she could see between the house and the fields a pair fighting that she could only assume was Dane and Darian. He was trying to explain to Dane what had happened. Dane was arguing back fiercely. May had never heard Dane yell the way he was then.
The side of the house where the fireplace sat was in flame. Janine was covered in dirt and soot and was trying to tame the fire with surrounding dirt. May didn’t know where the kids were.
May didn’t know how the thoughts of what to do came to her head. She just did what she saw. She took that tree branch and lit it in the flames. A man came out of her house holding Gabe’s pack, undoubtedly filled with their “artifacts”. Without hesitation she sent the branch flinging around and smack into his face, embers leeching onto his skin. He screamed. She came around again. Another man, who she realized was Darian, came from behind and wrapped his arms around her arms and torso, so that she couldn’t use the weapon.
He was trying to tell her something, she stopped for just a second to listen.
“We didn’t mean to hurt anyone, or for there to be a fire!”
What kind of idiot would fall for that bull crap? May thought, still fighting to get free.
Before Dane was able to come and wrestle him to the ground, May got a heavy foot into her abdomen. She doubled up as much as she could with Darian on her back. Trying quickly to recover, May scrunched up her feet she kicked outward at the man’s face and missed. Dane came up from behind and took Darian from behind her in a headlock until he let go of her. May fell to the ground, and was having a hard time getting her balance. She could tell the burned man was having a hard time seeing out of his left eye. Careful to keep out of sight of his good eye, May danced around, throwing a few kicks into his stomach. He grabbed her hair and she kicked his leg behind the knee and he landed on his knees in the dirt, pulling her with him. Knowing it would seriously hurt her head, she wheeled around to elbow him in the face. In a wrestling match, it was clear she would lose, but since he still had her hair, something needed to be done. Using all her weight, she rammed into him and he tipped over, landing with his rib cage where the still smoldering branch had fallen.
Another scream issued from his mouth and May’s hair was finally free. She threw her body weight on him again when he tried to get up. Scrambling, so that he wouldn’t be able to grab her again, she got up and gave herself some distance. The poor disfigured man was now struggling to get up, the burns must have been taking a toll on him, because certainly May herself was not doing that much damage. When would this end? She wondered. Would it stay like this until someone gave up? This kind of fighting was desperation. As Dane would comment later that evening, “Regardless of whether we’ve seen people who have been trained to fight, it was obvious that we have no experience whatsoever.”
It was really unintelligent fighting all around. Apparently these gentlemen had no idea what they were getting themselves into. The man with the burns put up a large hand as surrender and cumbered away. Dane was in a heavy fist fight. In reality, May was more concerned about losing the house. But she knew if she could help Dane win faster he could help her put out the fire. Relighting the branch, May took advantage of the opportunity Dane created when he tripped Darian and she held the branch to his arm until he rolled away. When he scampered off toward the field, May and Dane simultaneously ran for the water bucket.
“Inside, inside, inside” May told him. The water sloshed wildly and it was hard to carry it together through the doorway. They made it to the back corner and threw it at the fire. Blankets that were strewn over the couches were used to smother what was left inside. Outside, the fire was still going. Dane brought out the blankets while May went for another shovel to help Janine smother it in dirt. The combination of both worked. May ran in the house, just in case it had started up again. So far so good. She walked back out, knees quaking.
“I gotta go help the others.” Dane said, “Where’s Janey?”
“Tatum’s. First house as you get into town.”
“Got it.” He replied as he took off running.
May looked around at the house sadly. She put her hands in her pockets and let the residue of ash decorate her hair, her lips, her clothes, her eyelashes. The hole in the house held her gaze. There was nothing they could have done to predict that.
Her mother tried the sympathy route, to let her know that they didn’t hurt the family, and the fire was an accident. May looked at Janine, annoyed. Those men deserved no excuse.
Maybe it would have been smarter to let them run on with the few things they took and saved more of the house. The more she thought about it, the more it killed her to think that they let the house be partially destroyed for some dried fruit and playing cards. It was going to make her sick if it was nothing more than that which they fought for. So repulsed by the idea, she didn’t even want to look.
Nothing good, ultimately, came out of that day. Granted, they had saved the house in decent condition. When Dane, Thomas, Samson, and Miek returned with Janey and Jonathan, they were sour. All Dane seemed capable of doing was walking around slowly with his hands on his hips and his head to the ground, sighing, rethinking, wondering. An hour or so passed as he did this before he looked at May and asked if she’d be able to sleep tonight. Truth was that she never knew when she was going to sleep. She told him that she didn’t know. He knew that by now, but May supposed it was simply because he felt like he should say something.
Jonathan sat in his usual chair, but he didn’t stay there long, which was weird, but got up to go sleep a few feet away on the floor in the farthest corner behind the oven.
May was going over what was told to her about what happened in town. While Thomas was in charge, he did exactly what he was supposed to. But, before Dane could arrive and give the evidence of the theft, the decision was made, the plea of guilt was accepted as valid and all they could assume that that was precisely the goal. Thomas noticed the rush of things in the procedure, but didn’t want to assume anything was more wrong than Jonathan’s break down. So, naturally Thomas was really angry, first with himself, then with the utter unfairness of the situation. Unlike Dane, he was very verbal about everything, trying to validate himself with repeating the story and any details he could remember over and over again.
“It was like the council already had made a decision, like they had swayed them to their side before this even started!” He said vehemently. “It was fine that we pleaded guilty. That wasn’t the issue… just that they didn’t deserve it. That we could have gotten off if we knew. So, now, we have to share the things we found with them. Ugh! They would have won anyway! Why did they do that?”
“Maybe they were afraid the council of our peers would have voted the other way? Or that we would hold something back?” May suggested.
Thomas snorted and sent vicious looks to the ground. Eventually everyone told him to shut up. Now he was sitting and talking to May, while Dane was sitting silently. When Dane did arrive to testify against them, the council agreed to amend their original judgment.
“So now, they expect us to hold up our end, and just give them the artifacts we took from the city.” He added. “At least we didn’t have to resort to our second option and give away our future information.”
Dane pitched in, “We don’t have to share anything with them. We can call another council and figure that out. It was biased. I don’t think they’ll try to come back for a while – even to get the artifacts. I think they’re probably pretty embarrassed about the whole situation. I would be.”
Thomas went back to threatening
the ground with his eyes, rocking back and forth from his feet to his buttocks.
Along with recent stress, May could see another weariness in Dane. Old emotions were re-surfacing. She was concerned… no, concerned wasn’t the word, she was sympathizing. And, yes, he knew exactly what he was doing in re-visiting those feelings and what he was capable of, even in darkness. Yet, he might use a friend. Dane looked over at her and asked, “How are you?”
“Bruised, tired.”
He nodded, “Me too.” He even smiled a little. “Something seems wrong. I just realized the other day, talking to Jonathan, how much we’re missing, and we can’t even comprehend it.”
May caught his eyes for an extended period of time, as if she was trying to understand something and show her empathy at the same time, while having a conversation about an almost completely different subject. She didn’t think she was getting the message across, but said, “I feel that way, too.”
“Like what?” Thomas interrupted.
“Everything… but we don’t know really what it is and how to define it. That’s the biggest part of the problem.” Then he quoted Ellis, “It is not what we cannot see that is the problem; that’s not the worst darkness. It’s what we may see, but don’t even know that we should try.”
May grimaced thoughtfully, giving up her attempt at telepathy and zoning out at the wall, “I did a lot of reading last night, we may have the answer available to us. I still don’t know what it is… but I’m working on it.”
Thomas seemed intrigued, but wasn’t so much the philosophical type. He was the political type, the type that decided on an answer even if it wasn’t perfect because it inspired desired change. He was more like the, ‘tell me when you figure out the answer, then I’ll figure out what to do with it’ type. With May’s admission of not knowing, he got up to go inside.
“By the way, Jonathan is watching you guys like crazy.”
Holding up her hands carelessly, May replied, “As long as he’s more becoming more approachable, it’s not bothering me. I don’t even care if he heard that.”
When Thomas went into the house Jonathan came out, but didn’t sit.
He said, “Uh… I need a sleeping pill.”
“You’ve thought it through?” May asked, feeling very motherly. She wasn’t sure it was the best way to ask.
“Don’t test me right now!” He said angrily, pointing a finger. “Give me the pill!”
While she fumbled for the pill, he added spitefully, “These sickening emotions need to be gone.”
Bitterness seemed to be the bulk of his emotions. And loneliness. All he could do all day was think. May supposed that was enough to drive anyone crazy. His medicinal distractions were gone. Who knew how long it had been since he had felt normal emotions. Jonathan stared at her, as if he were delving into her soul with a fork and a knife.
Then, partially to her, and partially to himself said, “I’m starting to get what Gabe said about everything being wrong. You are creating rules.”
He stared back down at the ground hesitantly, as if he wasn’t sure he really existed, and he wanted to ask them if he did, but he was nervous. Awkwardly, he went back inside.
This was the tamest Jonathan was for a few weeks after that. There were good days and bad days and worse days. And mostly May no longer asked questions when he asked for the pills. Dane informed her that it was time he felt in control. Once and a while she’d give him a look of question, and then he’d curse and turn around, slamming his fist into something, and then proceed to drop the subject. But it was improvement.
That night after Jonathan went back inside May pulled out the little green book and handed it to Dane. He opened it, passing a skeptical look to May, and then smiled. Time to dig deep. With a book that small it was hard for both to read at the same time, but they sat as close as their bodies would allow.
The two of them took turns circling words and backing up to ask for clarification on certain parts. May hopped up after a while and she went into the house and came back out with paper. They made a chart: what Gabe thinks, what Jonathan thinks, what May and Dane think, what the book thinks.
It was hard to decipher. Basically they were doctors because it talked about them healing people all the time. It was impossible to decide the time length of the healing. There was no way it could be instantaneous. Almost an entire chapter seemed beyond their comprehension, except when it talked about the ‘way of life’. This was the basis for the rest of their conversation. Was there a ‘way of life’? Or many?
Did it mean denying everything they wanted? Or re-defining everything they wanted?
…
Too much information was flooding their brains. Dane stared at the page for a few minutes straight, totally lost in thought – May stared at the ground. Neither of them noticed until they came out of their stupors. The book slipped between Dane’s fingers and he groaned, putting his hands on his face as May often does. He tipped over and landed in fetal position with his head on his arms in May’s lap.
May leaned back on the house, “Did it really just take you being willing to slip into that darkness for him to cooperate?”
“It was my last resort.”
“I’m sorry you’re hurting.” She said with a small squeeze on his bicep.
“I just watch him die, over and over and over again. Oh, God, I would give anything to forget. I wish I could just forget.” After that, he didn’t say more on the subject.
Before he fell asleep they decided that even though it was a new experience to have enemies, they had friends somewhere in all the cities. That was reassuring. They talked about the possibilities of continuing warfare. So many unknowns, though many of which were highly unlikely. They still kept watch, just in case.
“All things considered, good fighting today.” He smiled, but a different smile than usual, and turned over so he was facing her.
May laughed, “I can’t believe we won.”
“Me either.”
They turned at the sound of the door. Miek came out, caught their eyes looking ashamed, and then seemed stuck where he was. “I tried. I can’t do what you do. I just can’t.”
May looked kindly, but concerned, she didn’t have to say anything before he knew what she was thinking.
“Why is it bad? I don’t get it…” He looked down at the dirt.
May shrugged, “I can’t explain… Sometimes our chains aren’t metal.”
Miek kicked the brown grass uncomfortably and kept walking. Miek hated to disappoint her. May’s eyes followed after him.
When Miek was a fair distance away, Dane put one hand on May’s distracted face and used the other hand to push himself up. Dane kissed her lips once, gently, and again. His gentleness was requited, simply. Their sun-dried lips were coarse, but how sweet a relief it was in this moment of need, when pain could be so persuaded, and exhaustion rendering love so effortlessly.
Chapter 14
Cool air whispered against their cheeks, slipping between their lips. Dane slowed the kisses, but kept his face near hers. The way his hand drifted down her cheek to her neck told her how tired he was.. His eyes were poised on hers for a few minutes.
It seemed not even a minute later he was asleep, laying back down on her lap.
May’s mind went back to the events of the day and she knew she’d be up all night. Reaching for the fallen book from the dirt, she read again from the little green book.
However, not even the book could command her attention right now. Thoughts encompassed her. Even if they could put this into logical information… what were they going to do with it? What were they thinking would happen? They’d set up their own campaign? Preach from the green book? Write their own dissertations and change the world with theories? No. There was something really wrong with the way Jonathan and Gabe try to go about it. Frustrated with everyone and their choices, it just seems like, if you could start over with proper teachers, the right organization… wouldn’t it work? But what was the righ
t way? Maybe that was the trouble, the two hadn’t figured out the right way.
Only one book existed in their world right now about people’s right to choose. Most everything else was explaining what specific rights they wanted to choose, and how to get there. But, that concept was one that May found fascinating, and now that she met Gabe and Jonathan – men who had the choice to start the world over; choice seemed vital. How could you have a choice if nothing was good or bad?
She found herself wondering when she could sit down with Jonathan and get those definitions. Interpreting on their own through inferences or root words was proving to make sense in most cases, they just wanted validation and more history behind it… what was the application and could they use it now?
These thoughts would almost kill May by the end of the next few weeks. Tiredness became so painful. For the next two weeks there wasn’t a moment May dared ask Jonathan for help. A few days passed of him asking for more pills than May thought was healthy. She tried to be patient and if he’d had a particularly good day the previous day, she showed a little mercy. Mid-week the third week he sat down next to May at dinner and attempted to participate in regular conversation. This wasn’t his first attempt, but it was his most successful. They suspected at times that he was not as much accepting this way of life as he was anticipating the moment he could steal back his syringes and start the world over. At other times it was almost offensive to consider that. The awkward thing about it was that his views weren’t changing, just his ability to express it.
Sleeping pills were his biggest vice. Somehow he could even manage now with only one anxiety, one claustrophobia pill and one bipolar pill a day if he had could sleep. In this way, May felt like she could empathize. Exhaustion made coping with everything harder.
Dane had been reading the book now in between harvest shifts. After a week he handed it back to May who pulled it out for study one time at the table, forgetting entirely that they were hiding it from Jonathan. This sent him into a fit. May rolled her eyes at his first protest, being disappointed in herself, but was also just frustrated that this was still an issue; still had the wrath of Jonathan to cope with; still were walking on broken glass.
The GOD Box Page 23