by Tosca Lee
I nodded. But I suddenly wished he’d never asked me to come.
“I want us to talk freely, Wynter. I know you go to the Admitter and say the things you’re supposed to say.” He made a dismissive gesture. “But with me, I want you to say the things you would never dare tell him. And I will do the same. Because I feel like I can share things with you I can’t share with anyone else.”
“You have Jaclyn,” I said quietly.
“Yes. I do. And she’s a lovely girl. I’m so lucky. You know, we used to talk about things that would shock you.” He smiled slightly. “But Jaclyn is extremely busy with the outreach. With important work that supports the Enclave—including you. It isn’t fair to put any more needs on her. Mine or yours. Don’t you agree?”
“Yes,” I said. Because I had no choice to tell the man with absolute power over my eternal salvation anything otherwise.
He smiled then, the expression boyish. At grotesque odds with his fifty-something-year-old features, the gray in his hair. Hair that belonged to my sister’s fingers to comb through. A face that should be looking on her with eyes ready to spill secrets only her ears should hear. Secrets, I somehow sensed, that she, too, might not want to hear, better confessed to God alone.
I choked down the pie, sickened by its sweetness.
On the way back to the Enclave, Magnus’s eyes were twin smolders in the shadows of the back seat. When he looked down at my hand in my lap, I thought for a minute he might take it. Instead, he slid a finger thoughtfully across the top of my knuckles, the tip of his tongue pressed against his upper teeth.
“Isn’t Wynter beautiful, Enzo?” he asked, not having taken his eyes off of me.
I willed myself not to hear Enzo’s answer. Fled the car as they stopped to let me out at the parking lot before driving toward the warehouse.
• • •
THE NEXT MORNING at service, Magnus preached on the impending cataclysm. The coming of thousands. Why we must be ready.
“We will mortify our flesh in preparation as the cost of saving one more soul. And we will welcome them with open arms!” he said. “Because we know that the time is near when we will finally go home!”
Someone in the back shouted “Amen!” as an electric current ran through the hall. Magnus had that effect. I had felt it many times.
But that morning, I couldn’t reconcile the Interpreter of the pulpit with the man who said he wanted to confide in me. Who had fed me forbidden food claiming the principles—that he had written in his own Testament—need not apply to us.
Who else did they not apply to here? The Elders, free to mistake desire for the will of God?
But those rules had been the pillars on which I’d built my life. Nothing was plumb without them.
I tried to catch Jaclyn’s attention after service. But she was quick to extricate herself and by the time I reached the back of the narthex, she was gone.
• • •
THE ONE UPSIDE to all of the strange new deference paid me was that I finally had the leeway to visit Truly for longer than a few minutes at a time. The next day I took her to the barn to play with the kittens. Watched her chase after them and comforted her when they scratched her with their tiny needle claws. I took her to the kitchen where Rosella spared me one of the season’s first tart apples to cut up into pieces that we shared before I returned her to the children’s barrow, tugging on my earlobe in our secret sign that I’d be back soon.
Meanwhile, I was troubled. Should I go to the Elders? Even as I considered it, I knew I’d be the one condemned.
I met with the Admitter, and for once the urge to hold back was replaced with a longing to spill a truth I didn’t dare voice. It welled up inside me like panic, filled my eyes with tears until I said something or other about missing my mother. I welcomed the rebuke not to grieve. The harsh reminder of the stark canon I had been taught to call the truth. But all the while, something was crumbling inside me.
My faith.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
* * *
On December 4, the temperature dips below freezing for the first time this fall. National news covers airports turned into ghost towns. Even the commuter rail suspended service two days ago. News anchors and radio hosts report sleeping at the station as they replay viral footage of a talk show host having some kind of psychotic break on air.
I think of Truly, glad for the first time since I’ve left that she’s safe behind the Enclave’s walls. Jaclyn, too.
We turn on the fireplace, play virtual games of Scrabble with Caden and Brendan as I make stuffed mushrooms and butternut squash pot pies through the afternoon.
“Mom!” Lauren shouts a little while later. “They’re talking about the CDC team on TV!”
We rush into the living room in time to see a photo of the hospital where one more member of the Bellevue 13 has died. Lauren turns up the volume as a picture of Ken’s friend Bishop Williams appears in the corner of the screen.
A few minutes later, Caden texts that the power’s gone out in Albuquerque.
The multistate blackout takes over the news. It’s all up and down the West Coast to the panhandle of Nebraska. Being compared to something that happened in Ukraine.
“What about Dad?” Lauren asks, her expression stark.
“The field offices have generators. He’ll be fine,” Julie says. But she’s chewing her lower lip.
Within an hour new panels of experts fill every major network to discuss cyberattacks, the failure of early-warning programs, “black energy,” and point fingers at Russia, China, and North Korea in turn.
Just before 10 p.m., Texas loses power. Five minutes later, the lights in the house flicker.
“Girls,” Julie says. “Go fill the bathtubs. And make sure you charge your phones.”
• • •
KEN CALLS THE house from Boise that night.
“Hey, we saw you on TV!” Julie says and switches the speaker on. “Well, not you, but Bishop.”
“Alas, he’s far more photogenic,” Ken says. “What’s the power situation there?”
“Still on. We filled up the tubs just in case,” Julie says. “Lantern, flashlights, and batteries are on the counter. Everything’s charged. Don’t worry about us. Are you keeping warm?”
“Warm enough.”
Julie updates him on the boys and local news, which is all about crowded conditions in local clinics and the hospital where staff has been stretched thin for days—especially after a rumor that they were able to test for the new dementia, which turned out not to be true.
“There is no test,” Ken says, sounding irritated. “There won’t be for a long time. And by then, anyone sick now will already be dead!”
Julie blinks, startled to silence by the edge in Ken’s voice. He curses softly—a thing I’ve never heard him do—and takes a deep breath.
“Sorry,” he says. He sighs. “We’ve been trying to reconstruct where the first patient of the Bellevue 13 might have acquired the disease. Do you know how many places a person goes in the space of a month? Work, the gym, friends’ houses, grocery stores, church, movie theaters, restaurants, the mall . . .” He drifts off.
“You sound like you need sleep, Dad,” Lauren says.
“I will, promise. But now, Julie? Girls, there’s something I need you to do.”
“What’s that?” Julie says, sounding worried.
“I want you to load the RV with all the food and water you can. Food, water, sleeping bags, cash, jewelry, anything else we could trade if needed . . .”
“What? What for?”
“You need to get away from Chicago.”
“Ken, you’re scaring me,” she says.
“Load up the RV. Leave before dawn. Promise me.”
“And go where?” Julie demands, her voice slightly shrill.
“Just—get out of the city. Head south.”
“That’s the other direction from where you are!”
“I’ll catch up.”
“All
the public announcements are saying to stay home. You just told all your employees to stay home!”
“For once would you just do what I say?!” he shouts.
I cut her an alarmed glance. I’ve never heard Ken like this before. By the startled look on her face, neither has she.
“I’m sorry,” Ken says as the house lights flicker.
A second later, they go out.
“Julie?” Ken says. “You there?”
“I’m here. We just lost power.”
The house seems strangely larger than even a minute ago, the air eerily silent.
“Listen to me,” Ken says. “Load up the RV with all the food, as much water as you can—everything you’ll need. Tomorrow morning, when people wake up without electricity, there’s going to be a run on gas. People are already lining up for it here. A bunch of them are going to leave the city—or try to. I need you to get out now. Okay? Go south. Get somewhere warmer. Try not to run the generator more than you have to—”
“Why can’t we just go to my mom’s?”
“Because we don’t know if she’s sick or not.”
Julie barks a laugh. “My mom hardly leaves the house and has been crazy for years. I’ll take my chances with her over strangers in the wilderness any day. Or am I missing something here?”
He sighs. “You’re right. I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.”
“It doesn’t get much smaller than Jeffersonville, Illinois,” she says with a slight laugh.
“But I mean it, Julie. If your mother is so much as flushed or even looks like she could have a fever—”
“Why can’t we just stay here and lock the doors?” Lauren says. And I know she’s thinking of her boyfriend, whom she’s texted incessantly since the school incident.
“No. You need to get away from the city.”
“What about you?” Julie asks.
“They’re transferring us to the CDC. I’ll join you as soon as I can. But for now, leave early. I’ll be in touch. And don’t stop for anyone by the side of the road.”
We’re quiet as the call clicks off. Julie’s still for a moment, then she gets up, follows the glow of her phone screen to the counter, and turns on the camp lantern. It illuminates the entire kitchen. Grabbing a flashlight, she walks through the kitchen toward the garage.
Lauren’s gaze follows her mom to the mudroom. The minute the back door closes, Lauren springs to her feet. “I’ve got to say good-bye to Riley. Can I come over, say I’m helping you pack?”
“No!” The last time she “crashed out” at my place and walked the half mile to his house, she came back drunk.
“I have to say good-bye to him,” she says, practically in tears. “I haven’t seen him for eight days!”
“And you won’t tonight,” I say. “It isn’t safe.”
“Everyone’s fine at his house!”
“No.”
She stares at me a moment longer, then slides her phone out and marches to her room. A few seconds later I hear her in tearful conversation.
I leave her alone to say good-bye. Not that she won’t be talking to him every hour we’re on the road.
Inside the separate garage, the RV door is open, the overhead light on. Julie sits in the driver’s seat, staring out the wrap-around windshield.
I pause outside, flashlight trained on the steps between us. “Julie?”
“It’s funny,” she says softly. “I’ve never heard Ken raise his voice.”
“He seemed pretty worried.”
She looks down and nods. With a sigh she gets to her feet.
“The food’s fine in the house for a few more hours. Let’s get some sleep, load up in the morning. If we get up at three, we can be out of here by five.”
• • •
UPSTAIRS IN THE carriage house, I pack clothes, shoes, my prescription, and toiletries in a duffle bag from Julie’s basement, lay out my boots and coat. Gather up the cereal, crackers, and peanut butter from the counter, decide the things in the fridge will keep until morning. I don’t like the idea of leaving, either, but hey, I’ll get to meet Julie’s crazy mom.
I’ve just chosen three novels from the bookcase to take along when a rapid knock sounds at the door. I sigh, irritated. Have no idea what Lauren sees in Riley and the wispy mustache he refuses to shave.
I consider not answering, but the last thing I need is something happening to her on my conscience.
I drop the books on the chair and yank open the door, shine my flashlight right in her face.
But the figure standing there in the surgical mask isn’t Lauren or her mother.
It’s Jaclyn.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
* * *
Jackie,” I call, hurrying to catch up to her on the path outside the children’s barrow, where she had shown up, taken one look at me, turned on her heel, and left. “I need to talk to you.”
“I don’t want to talk.”
I grabbed her by the arm. “We have to!”
She whirled around so fast I thought she might slap me. “There’s nothing to talk about!” she said, eyes wild.
“Please,” I whispered, trying desperately not to cause a scene.
She hesitated, and then snatched me by the wrist and dragged me off behind the vacant guesthouse.
“What do you want from me?” she hissed, pacing in the shadows. We didn’t dare go inside or raise our voices. We both remembered the eyes.
“I didn’t do this.”
I didn’t have to say what this was. The entire Enclave knew Magnus had taken me to Garden City. What they didn’t know was that just yesterday he stopped by my desk while Magnolia was on the phone to lean over me and whisper, “You don’t know how happy you’ve made me.”
“Oh, stop,” she snapped. “You’ve always wanted attention.”
“What?” I said, incredulous. How could she say that when the whole time Jaclyn had been avoiding me, I’d been avoiding everyone else—not to mention fending off curious looks and silent questions from the other women in the Factory?
She reached back to rub her neck as though it hurt.
“Jackie, I didn’t want to go.”
That wasn’t entirely true. I’d been flattered by the attention. To be noticed by Magnus was to matter. To know that God saw you.
And then there’d been that moment when he had looked at me as though fascinated. What did it mean that the divine could not only notice but seem delighted in me?
But that was gone, replaced by something else now, including a rising tide of doubt that threatened to drown me.
“Listen to me. The things Magnus says when no one else is around . . .” My voice dropped to a whisper. “When he doesn’t know anyone is listening . . . and the people he does business with. Something’s not right.” I could hear the crack in my voice. But it was a fissure that went much deeper, into a foundation no longer whole.
“He’s Magnus,” she said dully. “You can’t expect—”
“Did you go to a café together in Garden City?”
She looked irritated. “What?”
“He said you did. Together.”
“I don’t know! Maybe once, just so he could give his lawyer a check.”
Why would he meet someone just to pay them? I saw checks go out from the office every day.
“He said you used to go for lunch.”
“Maybe it was lunchtime. I don’t remember! What’s that got to do with anything?”
“The things he says—”
“Magnus doesn’t have to explain himself to you,” she snapped. “There are a lot of things you don’t know about other people. Just because it doesn’t make sense doesn’t mean it’s wrong. If anything, it means it’s none of your business.”
“It doesn’t line up!”
She shook her head, a bitter smile twisting her mouth. “Don’t you understand?”
“No. I don’t.”
“Magnus has revelations.”
“So?” I stared at her blankl
y. Magnus had nine volumes’ worth of revelations on the shelf of every building in the Enclave.
“It just had to be you, didn’t it?” she said softly, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.
I waited for some explanation. Instead, she left me standing in the shadow of the cottage where I had once felt safe.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
* * *
I lower the flashlight. For a minute, we just stare at each other. She’s thinner than I remember, green eyes large, surrounded by shadows. Even with the mask on, I’d know her anywhere.
She’s alone, a metal carrier in one hand.
“How’d you get here?” I ask. And then: “Where’s Truly?”
She glances over her shoulder. I follow her gaze. But the street, like the driveway, is empty.
“Please let me in. I don’t have much time.”
I reach for her but she steps back before I can touch her, a hand raised between us.
“Don’t,” she says. “Move away. I’ll come in.”
Only then do I realize she’s wearing latex gloves.
Does she think I’ll make her sick?
I back up and she steps inside, swiftly shutting the door behind her.
“I saw you come out here as I came through the yard,” she says.
“Jackie, where’s Truly?”
“She’s safe. For now.”
“Where?”
“At the Enclave.”
“You left without her? Why?” Why would she do that? How will we get her out now?
“Because I had to bring this,” she says, setting the carrier down on the table. Only then do I recognize it as one of the handled bins from the New Earth warehouse.