by Anna Carey
Page 28
As for Caleb and me . . . all I wanted was more of this. The closeness of my chin on his shoulder, his hand resting on my back, the ease of being together, our bodies speaking even in silence.
“I’ve been thinking . . . ” I said, pulling my head back to look at him.
Outside, Michael sprang off the rotting deck and into the air. “Bombs away!” he cried, leaving only a giant splash in his wake. He wiped some green muck from his face as he reached a rusty ladder. “Come on in, the sludge is warm!”
Caleb laughed and then turned back to me. “You’ve been thinking . . . ?”
“Califia,” I said, my voice thin with sudden nerves. “It seems pointless to go all the way there, now, risking our lives, when Arden and I could just live in the dugout. We’re safe here. She could help me teach the boys, and . . . ” I looked into his green eyes hopefully. “And we’d be together—”
Caleb’s face tensed. He took a step back, breaking us apart. “Eve . . . ”
I could feel every inch between us now, the space growing. Had he misunderstood? I cleared my throat. “I want to stay. I want to live at the camp, with you. ”
He rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. ” He lowered his voice as he spoke, his eyes darting outside to where the boys stood on the rotted porch, daring each other to jump.
“The King’s men are still after you. If they find us . . . the boys would be punished. And you’ll never be completely safe . . . ”
I stepped away, widening the space between us even farther. Each word hit me in the chest, banging on the door to my heart, which had curled up inside itself and gone to sleep.
He didn’t want me here.
Of course he didn’t. It didn’t matter how he said it, what words he used to explain it away. I closed my eyes and saw Teachers Agnes, her hands shaking. He didn’t want me. She looked out the window, the water running down the deep creases in her face as if he had just left her a moment ago. I was such a fool. He never wanted me.
Caleb reached for my arm but I shook him off. “Don’t touch me,” I said, backing away.
He was a man, he was always a man, with all his faults and tiny deceptions. And I had let him hold me, let my lips kiss his, given in to all the temptations. I had been a fool.
“I understand exactly what’s going on here. This was a game to you, wasn’t it?”
He shook his head, face pallid. “No, you’re not listening to me. I want you to stay, but you can’t—it’s not safe. ” He reached for me again but I dodged his hand. You want to believe the lies, Teacher Agnes had said. It is the believer’s fault for believing.
“Please—just leave me alone!” I cried as he reached for me again. My voice echoed in the empty storehouse. Charlie turned, his hand on the window frame. The remaining boys on the porch looked up.
Caleb rubbed at the space between his brows. “We’ll talk about this later, when we’re back in the dugout. I care about you, but—”
“You care about yourself,” I snapped.
His head jerked back, as if I’d slapped him in the face. Slowly he turned, climbed out onto the porch, and disappeared among the shadows of the others. The boys quietly whispered and then surveyed the pool again, leaping into the dark water.
The room around me expanded, the air cooler without him there. I sat down at the piano, tapping out a long, scratchy C. I closed my eyes as each note of Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata” rang out in the storehouse, strained and out of tune. As I approached the second theme, tears escaped from my eyes. I paused, wiping them away.
“What was that about?” a voice asked behind me. Leif came down the stairs, the wood creaking with each step. Before I could respond, he collapsed onto the warped bench beside me.
“Nothing,” I said quickly. I turned my gaze to the upper floors. “What were you doing up there?”
Leif dug his fingernails into his beer can until the metal gave way. “Just looking around. ” He tilted his head and curled his lips.
I’d grown accustomed to his presence around camp, to squeezing past him in the narrow corridors or acknowledging him with a nod. But right now, the last thing I wanted was another man to talk to. I kept playing the notes, trying to ignore him, but he pulled a paper from his pocket and set it in front of me as though it were sheet music.
My fingers froze on the keys.
“Where did you get that?” I asked. I grabbed the paper.
UPDATE: EVE WAS LAST SEEN HEADING NORTHWEST, TOWARD LAKE TAHOE AREA. TRAVELING ON HORSEBACK WITH ANOTHER FEMALE AND A MALE, BETWEEN SEVENTEEN AND TWENTY YEARS OLD. IF SPOTTED, CONTACT THE NORTHWEST OUTPOST. SHE IS TO BE DELIVERED DIRECTLY TO THE KING.
“I can explain. I’m—”
“Don’t bother. ” Leif rested his arm on the piano ledge and pulled in another sip of his beer. His black eyes met mine. “Technically I’m a fugitive, too. I’m sure the King would want me back in his camp, lugging cement blocks on my back like a donkey. ”
I crumpled the paper in my hand. I didn’t know whether to thank Leif, or to apologize. I’d moved into his camp, a stranger, put them all in danger, and lied about it. “We’re just stopping through, on our way to Califia. ”
Leif appraised me, but this time there was no judgment in his gaze, simply interest. “I never thought you, of all people, would be hunted by the King. What is it you did? Killed a guard? Held a Teacher hostage? He wouldn’t want you for just running away. ” He was smiling now, his expression playful. I couldn’t imagine being proud of killing someone, but he seemed charmed, my image suddenly textured in his view, these new shades creating an unexpected depth.
“I’d rather not say. ” I felt queasy as I thought of the City, and the man whose face looked out from that gilded frame at School.
He pressed down on the keys, hard, the notes sounding out in the still air. I shook my head. “I know about the terrible things they do, maybe more than anyone. It’s torture living like weasels underground, knowing about the feasts in the City of Sand, the resorts and swimming pools filled with purified water. And you couldn’t imagine the camps. ” He stopped playing, his gaze fixed on a clock above the piano. Moisture was trapped inside its face, and its hands were stopped at 11:11. “I had a brother, Asher—”
“I know,” I said softly. The outside sounds flooded in. The boys were running around in the woods, their voices livened by a game of tag. “Caleb mentioned . . . ” I looked out the window but he wasn’t there, only darkness.
Leif ran his fingers along the piano, tracing the grain of the wood. “Asher. It’s been so long since I spoke his name,” he said, almost to himself. “Our mother used to play the piano for us. I remember being under the dining room table with him, watching our father’s feet hanging over the couch as he read his books, and my mother pressing on those pedals. We’d take our plastic tanks and trucks and we’d battle with each other as she played. ” He pinched the tab of the can, moving it back and forth.
“Do you ever think of that, what it was like before the plague?” he said.
I could barely swallow. I remembered the way my mother and I held hands, wrapping my palm around her pinky finger as she took me through the aisles of the supermarket. How she kissed the soles of my feet, or how I sat in her closet while she changed, hiding among the dresses and pants, which held the lovely smell of her.