by Mary Gray
“Run, Izzy!” Eloise cries just as Abe slaps his hand over her mouth, and Eloise falls into his arms with a sob.
Izzy’s face pales as she sees Jonas coming toward her with his bloodied dagger. The muscles in her jaw feather slightly before she spins away from Jonas toward the food, and when he lunges for her, she leaps into the air and flips over the moat, then flips again, back onto the kitchen side. She spins for the windows, reaches the back door, and I think she’s about to open it when she seems to change her mind. She waits for Jonas to come closer before jumping into the air, kicking her legs out into a split, and connecting with Jonas’s chest. He staggers backward. Izzy sprints for the kitchen and begins flinging open drawers.
All this time, I can’t believe none of us have moved. Ana’s cowering in the corner, wringing her hands like she wants to do something, and I grapple with the skirt of my dress, trying to think how I can stop this. Marc’s glancing around, I’m guessing for a weapon, but Sal’s folding his arms with a nasty smirk on his face. He can’t really approve of Teo’s world. I hate him. The girls by the snack counter cling madly to their partners, Eloise stuffing her head into Abe’s shirt. And I’m suddenly wishing I’d trained with Izzy in cheerleading so I could help her escape.
Izzy’s found a meat grinder, a potato masher, and a spatula. She flings these at Jonas’s face, but he ducks away and lifts the dagger high above his head, and my heart’s pumping rivers of blood in my throat.
“STOP!” Marcus cries, gripping his brother by the shoulders, and the veins in my body constrict.
Jonas freezes for a moment, locks eyes with our leader, and Teo nods, causing Jonas to lower his knife. Ohmygosh. I thought Izzy was dead—I fight back the urge to throw my arms around her now, slurp up pinña coladas with her, just because we can. She’s okay. She’s going to be okay.
I glance over to Marcus, shooting him the most grateful look I can. A flicker of a “you’re welcome” flashes over his eyes. But a blur of movement causes me to turn my head. That movement is the last one I would expect, because it’s Jonas lowering his weapon straight into Izzy’s chest, her eyes bulging in surprise.
He’s killing my friend. I stare at the crimson flowing from her chest, unable to believe the location of the knife. Marcus had yelled, and Teo had nodded for Jonas to stop. I turn to Teo to see how he will deal with Jonas—if it will be his turn to die now—only to find a delighted smirk traveling over his lips.
I could puncture those lips right now. Squeeze them so tightly that blood gushes out. I want Teo to die the same ways as all the others. Get mauled alive by a lion, then stabbed again and again with a sword. By me.
Quiet splinters across the room before a high voice starts chirping, “OMG.” It’s Gwen, hair sticking out in tufts, mumbling the acronym over and over again. “OMG,” she says again before burying her face in Lance’s neck.
“Honestly,” Teo says, and almost as an afterthought he tells Jonas, “Won’t you take care of that?” He gestures vaguely at Gwen. Before I know what’s happening, Jonas steps to Gwen, places his alabaster fingers on her head, and snaps her twig-like neck. Silence fills the room again and we’re all statues. No one moves.
“Much better,” Teo sighs as her body thuds to the floor. “The acronyms were getting on my nerves.” He looks around the room and locks eyes on Lance. “Of course, what good is one without the other?”
Lance starts to move across the moat, but Jonas is already there. He reaches for Lance’s neck, the movement so quick, so unbelievably fast. Then he’s on the floor, too.
Teo breathes in like the air about him has become smooth. “It will be much more peaceful now.”
It’s impossible to breathe. My throat keeps catching on my screams and pain. I can’t look away from them on the floor, and it’s the last place I want to look. I can’t believe he did this. I can’t. I can’t. Cold fingers wrap around my wrist. I don’t look up as Teo lifts my hand high, showing my gold ring. “You must prove yourselves if you wish to earn the vaccine.” He squeezes my hand tighter and pulls me to his sinewy body. I’m forced to look at him, and bile burns my throat, tears burn my eyes as he presses his lips to mine.
There is nothing I can do to understand this night. Why would Teo go to such great lengths to build a universe of seven, only to dash it to pieces so quickly?
I don’t care what is on the outside. I will risk it—do anything to escape. I don’t know how I loved this man. I wish I could undo it all.
Teo. Oh, Teo. How could you murder my friends?
I hurry back to my house and curl up in bed, pulling my knees to my chest. Marcus, please come tonight. I know it’s against the rules, but you managed it before. Please tell me you have an idea about opening the fence. I will do anything to sail from the Gulf, to beyond, with you.
But instead of fingers, raindrops knock at my back door. They pelt, shower, trickle in indifference to Teo’s world. It’s the sound that fills my ears as I drift to sleep.
That night, I dream of leaving Elysian Fields for the very first time. There’s a radiant field of wheat just past the fence, but I never actually see myself cross over—the dream picks up from the other side. The field of wheat matches my flaxen hair, and not only is the color of my hair golden, but my clothes are, too. That’s when I see the others, dressed precisely the same way: Marcus and Ana, and because it’s a dream, Izzy and Bee. The others are there, too, laughing about the “love potion” and Bee’s attempt to strangle the lion with her bare hands.
In the very middle of the field, when we’re fully hidden by the wheat, vials of insulin drop from the sky. When I reach up to grab one for Marcus, Teo cries my name. But we’re too far away. We run deeper into the field, drifting away from his voice, and he doesn’t follow because he can’t see.
17
I don’t understand why Teo brought us here in the first place. Why would he build Elysian Fields, fix a budget, and continue to add to the dead? Did he start construction before the Living Rot broke out again? He must have. Too much had been built when we arrived for it to be a last-minute plan. But he couldn’t have been the only one to have known about the return of the Living Rot. Surely, the news would have told us if it was back. Or maybe Teo swept us away before we could hear.
There’s a knock at the door, and groggily I find my feet. Maybe that’s breakfast, but Jonas has never knocked before, just left the basket. Crossing the length of my pristine hardwood floor, I ease open the front door. It’s overcast today—I’ve never seen Texas so consistently gloomy in May, like God knows to weep—and with this darkened day, dense humidity moves about me.
On my porch sits the usual basket, but this time a note is attached, which makes my stomach clench. Notes remind me of Izzy. And now she’s dead. Dead. One minute I was planning another drink of pinña coladas, and the next, I was looking at the bright crimson flowing over her green dress. She’s gone. And there’s nothing I can do. I wish I could cheat time and help her plan a party that would impress Teo enough to let her live.
Gripping the note in my hand, I move to the kitchen table and open the folded note written in a foreign scrawl:
Dear female resident:
To better prove your devotion to us at Elysian Fields, please stand outside by your front poplar tree at 10:00 am for a one-on-one session with your partner. The men will be permitted to cross the street to your yard for precisely one hour.
May you prove your faithfulness like never before.
The Consortium of Elysian Fields
I spin around to look at the clock on the wall: 9:30 am. I only have half an hour. I’d been hoping to spend time with Marcus, though I knew it probably wouldn’t happen. That time we spent together was exactly what I needed to clear my head. I sincerely hope he isn’t seeing Cleo when he’s searching the fence. Maybe my meeting with Teo will be over soon and I can meet up with Marcus again.
Thirty minutes. I had better take a shower and don the Persephone persona Teo likes. Prove my faithfulnes
s like never before? I’m not sure what that means, but this is precisely the moment I need; if I’m lucky, I can swipe the remote I’ve seen him use from his coat.
* * *
At three seconds to ten, I brush through the door, my pink dress fluttering behind me. I bring a blanket for us to sit on, though it’s really to hide the remote, should I get my hands on it, and urge my shaking legs to move toward the poplar tree where Teo patiently waits on the grass.
“Persephone.” He reaches out for me as I approach, and I try not to scowl at those death-inducing hands. “Impressive foresight.” He nods at the blanket in my hands. Good, he simply thinks it’s to sit on. Together, we stretch out the blanket, a throw I found in a linen closet, and gingerly, I kneel down. I’m not ready to focus on Teo yet—it’s almost impossible to look at him when I know I need to get the remote, so I look to the other couples on the road. Abe, one house away, sits next to Eloise and places a dandelion in her hair, and I try seeing around them to the next yard, then remember it’s vacant because Izzy and Tristan are no longer there. The yard beyond them is empty, too.
Hollow, I turn back to Teo, not believing this is how I must live. Pretend to love a man who sops up his boredom with the lives of my friends. His head tilts up a few inches, the lids of his eyes soaking in the sun’s rays, which is an odd sight, since I would never think of Teo sunbathing. He’s almost glowing in the sunlight, and I have to force down a feeling of wonder at that bronzed skin. Teo is poison, I repeat to myself.
“Persephone,” he says, and I haven’t repeated that thought long enough. How am I going to get my fingers on that remote? “May I tell you a bit more about our home?”
I nod. Yes, Teo, tell me—what possesses you to murder on a whim? “Please.”
A casual smile plays on Teo’s soft, round lips. I don’t understand how he can be so serene. It makes me wonder if he was born that way, or if he picked up his cruel nature from his dad. I could believe that.
Staring up into the sky, Teo starts explaining something, and I can’t tear my eyes off his black coat. He must be sweltering. But it’s okay with me. If I can just scoot close enough, I can slip my fingers inside his coat, retrieve the remote, and conceal it beneath the blanket.
“While studying at Dartmouth,” Teo says, “I enjoyed a literature class or two.”
I shift a leg toward him so it’s easier to lean toward his coat.
“My favorite dealt with mythology,” he continues. “Did you know, for instance, that Hades segmented the Underworld into three separate kingdoms? Asphodel, Tartarus, and Elysium, or as some call it, Elysian Fields.”
I stiffen, my knee brushing the bottom tip of his coat. I thought the subdivision name was one he’d plucked from a community he’d liked. Like Chisholm Trails, or Marine Creek. This can’t be good.
“A surprise to you?” Teo asks me.
Of course it is. But I limit my reply to, “Yes.”
Teo clucks his tongue as he runs his fingers over the bark of the poplar tree. It reminds me of the other tree he touched in Elysian Fields—the mulberry behind Ramus’s house. I start shaking, and it’s stupid because it’s maybe ninety degrees. Or maybe I could use this. Say I need a bit of comfort and ask to borrow his coat.
Teo must see my twitching fingers—how I keep pulling on the short fibers of the blanket—because he says, “It frightens you. My dear Persephone, there is nothing to cause fear. Elysian Fields, as written in legend, is for the heroic, the virtuous, those who deserve a place to rest.”
So what, the others weren’t worthy? Just because they didn’t know what “proving themselves” means to him? But I collect my fingers on my lap and force them not to twitch. “I see,” I say, not moving my eyes from the spot where my knee’s touching the smooth fabric of his coat.
Teo drops his hand from the poplar tree and shifts his gaze to me; I look away.
“What the common man does not understand,” Teo says, “is the nature of Hades. Most consider him gross, evil, but that is not true. Hades of the Underworld was a god like the others, but consigned to live in a different place.”
I just need to grab him around the head and lock lips. That’s the only way I’m going to get close enough to that remote, and distract him from feeling me take it if he does have it with him. But I can’t make myself do it, I just can’t.
“In fact,” he’s saying, “mythology teaches us that his role was not evil, but passive. Maintaining balance. And that is what I have promised myself to do here.”
I can’t help but look up to his smiling face. What is balanced about killing kids? I try to see down the houses to catch a glimpse of Marcus, but he’s too far away. But I want to see Marcus, I need to see Marcus, because with these twitching fingers of mine, I need someone to make them lie still.
Teo’s watching me—his eyes bore into the side of my face—probably noticing how I’m so far away, so I take a deep breath and force myself to look back at his sallow face. “And what about your number seven?” I force myself to say. “Now you are down to five.” Surely he can see he’s possessed.
Teo chuckles, a low rumbling laugh in his throat. Leaning forward, he loops a piece of my hair around his finger and says quietly, “Oh, Persephone. How pleased it makes me, knowing you and I think alike.”
I stiffen in his grasp, tell my hand to move inside his coat for the remote, but he’s watching me, and it’s impossible in the position I’m in. With my luck, the remote’s on the other side, anyway.
Teo’s waiting for some sort of acknowledgement or something. I stretch my lips tight, not really remembering what he just said, so I offer a blanket statement. “You’re right.”
“There is a secret, my love,” Teo says, crisscrossing his legs to lean in to whisper into my ear, “that you cannot tell.” His familiar scent of Listerine and smoke washes over me, thrilling me for maybe a microsecond before I squash that pathetic part of me. He has a secret. The naïve part of me believes he’s going to pull out his remote and offer that I help run things for a bit.
His ebony eyes smolder, and it’s like I make him nervous, because he looks away from me to the tree. I never knew I had that effect on him. It’s good, though; it means he still believes I don’t see us being apart.
“Before,” Teo says, “I was misguided. Believed there to be a perfection, a godliness regarding the number seven—”
“There’s not?” Teo has never admitted an error in the past.
“Oh, no,” he says, licking his lips. “There is a far greater majesty in another number.” He breaks off a piece of bark. “Have you any idea what it is?”
I shake my head, staring at the bark in his hands. Now I very much doubt that he’s pulling out his remote.
“Three,” he says proudly, as if he’s announcing the number of his sons, but I am distracted by three black ants marching, as focused and uncaring as Teo is. “I gave you the hint, you know, when I said Hades kept three sections in his kingdom below.”
I want to curl up, cover my head. He’s taking lives, dropping us like we’re already dead. When he kills us, it’s like he doesn’t feel anything. That’s what psychopaths are, right? People who do horrendous things and don’t feel a thing.
Well, there you have it. My first love, kiss, and obsession is a psychopath. And I thought my mom’s boyfriends were bad.
“And so, my dear Persephone, I need your help, much like Jonas once needed mine.”
The air is a thick gulf of water pressing down on my head. “Jonas?” He seems like the last person to need Teo’s help. His kung fu moves made it look like he can take care of himself.
Maybe I could say I’ll help him if he lets me take charge of the remote. Flutter my eyelashes and remind him of that time we spent in his room.
But Teo spreads his lips in a patronizing smile. “One detail at a time, my love. Let us not say too much.” He pats my head like I’m a child, and I wonder if people with psychopathic tendencies think everyone is below them.
“I suppose,” Teo says, “it will take you some time to accept the fact that I do make mistakes.” I choke a little, but I coolly swallow down my spit, because Teo would not understand me laughing right now.
Petting the blanket like it’s made of satin, Teo goes on. “I was blinded by the number seven; I hope you can accept that. But will you forgive me? Help me determine the most faithful three?”
How can he think I would do that—list who he kills next? Panic tightens in my chest, and it’s like Teo can see it, because his eyes narrow. I force myself to nod, my mind reeling. Maybe this is the way I can save the rest. If I can convince Teo to force those he doesn’t want to leave, and if I can get them the vaccine, they might stand a chance. It would take a lot of persuading, but if I could help them escape Elysian Fields, maybe they could find a refuge from the Living Rot somewhere else.
But Teo’s waiting for an answer, and I have to be as convincing as possible. If he discovers my plan to give everyone he’s brought here a free ticket to the outside world, he won’t be happy, so I force my voice to sound as unfeeling as possible. “You should kick them out.”
Teo narrows his eyes, and they become two black slits in the daylight. “And why would you say that?”
Perspiration trickles down my back; this is when the convincing starts. I need to be logical, and see things his way. I need to save everyone. Not the way I failed Bee and Izzy, Gwen and the boys, too. I narrow my eyes like I saw him do and speak as callously as I can. “Didn’t you say Elysian Fields in the myth was only for the pure? Those who don’t deserve to live here should be ostracized from our society. To let them die in this place would mean an honorable death.” Yes. They might evade the sickness. Get to the Gulf. Maybe I should convince him Marc should go, but I want Marcus to stay.
Narrowing his eyes again, Teo says, “I find it interesting that I asked you who you thought should leave and you offered how the disfavored should go. I shall remember this. You seem to be fixated on the thought.”