I smile uneasily. “Josh know you’re here?” I ask. None of them answers me.
Then I hear his voice. “Welcome back, comrade.”
I turn to see Josh striding out of the hangar. The children turn to look as well. Their wide eyes follow him, but their bodies remain still, as if they’re accustomed to bracing themselves for anything. I walk across the tarmac. “What’s this?” I whisper. “A reboot of Lord of the Flies?”
Josh nudges his head to the side. “Let’s talk over there.”
We move into the hangar, my eyes smarting as they struggle to adjust to the dimness. I say, “You need some skylights.”
“Get right on that,” Josh quips and then turns toward me. “So . . . how’d the plane run?”
“Like a top.” I pause. “But there was no sign of the ARC.”
“Too bad. Guess we’ll just have to take ’er up again.”
I decide, sensing his pensiveness, not to bring up the fact that I won’t be taking her up again. Instead, I look out at the kids. The tallest boy—no more than twelve or thirteen, and thin as a stick—has picked up one of the smaller girls, wearing a pair of wraparound pink glasses and her brown hair cropped short. Josh says, “That’s Emmanuel. Holding Elizabeth, his little sister.”
“But where’d they all come from?”
“They walked. Emmanuel led them here, from town.”
“What town?”
Josh shrugs. “They don’t tell me much. It was hard enough, just getting their names.”
“Where are their parents?”
Another shrug. “Who knows? Maybe they don’t have any. Or maybe their parents thought the family would stand a better chance, splitting up.”
“Or maybe the parents starved, keeping them alive.”
“True,” Josh says. “We might be seeing more of this.”
“I already have.” I tell Josh about the little girl, Angel, we found outside the cave, and her dad I killed, who was only breaking into the community because he was desperate for food.
He shakes his head. “Sometimes I think about buffets, ya know? ‘All you can eat.’ It disgusted me, whenever I’d go there, and see all the food left on people’s plates.”
I say, “Imagine if we had it now.”
We watch the children for a moment: ten of them, and they are as quiet as mice. I wonder what—or who—they’ve been hiding from so that even their playtime’s altered.
“Any siblings besides Emmanuel and his sister?” I ask.
“Three other sets.” Josh points out two little boys, sticking grass down each other’s shirts. “Maybe four. Hard to tell. They all begin looking alike after a while.”
“They need baths.”
Josh snorts, picking at his grizzled beard. “And haircuts. They have lice.”
I pause. “Are you going to let them stay?”
“We’re a militia, not a day care. Brian and Dean have already reminded me of that, telling me the kids have to leave. I know they do.” He sighs. “It’s not even safe, having them around. But then, I think that my grandkids could be over there in Washington State, completely orphaned, and I hope that if that’s the case, then somebody will take them in.”
“Like . . . if you’re doing right by these, someone will do right by yours over there?”
“Yeah.” He swats the air. “Karma or something.”
“There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“I know,” Josh says again. “But it’s like I’ve been so focused on our militia, on survival, that I’ve forgotten what it’s like to be kind.”
Someone is pushing against my back. I lift my head and see Josh. He bends down and sets a steaming cup beside me. I groan. “That does not smell like coffee.”
“It does the trick.”
I sit up, massaging my face, numb and ridged with the pattern in the carpet. Marco, the little boy with the overactive bladder, is catching Zs on my cot. I don’t even want to think about that. I take a sip of Josh’s “coffee” and croon a remake of the old Folgers jingle: “The best part of waking up is acorns in your cup.”
“Ha, ha,” he says.
“Hey. I’m not complaining.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
I take another sip and find the acorn coffee tastes better once I get over the shock of ingesting something that doesn’t match the hot, black liquid I see. Still, the concoction can’t replace caffeine’s boosting effects, and today, I’m really going to miss them.
Josh and I spent the majority of last night trying to catch a few minutes of shut-eye in between shifts. Marco was one of three kids who wet the bed. Five had night terrors, which is no wonder, considering what they’ve been through.
Josh, meanwhile, sat at the air traffic control center’s desk with Elizabeth, Emmanuel’s little sister, who was too frightened to go back to sleep. He held her against his chest, his stocking feet resting between two of the computers, and told her stories about his childhood as the son of an oil engineer. Josh never lived in one place for long, and before being sent to a military academy, he got to explore all the world’s major sights: the Great Wall of China, Leaning Tower of Pisa, Eiffel Tower, the Incan temples of Peru. He described each in detail, using more hand motions than a pantomime. I listened to him drone on and on until the little girl’s head bobbed forward, the short sides of her dirty-brown hair brushing her face.
Josh didn’t move from the chair after she fell asleep. He just stayed like that for a long time, staring out at the stars suspended above the runway strip, and I wondered if he was again worrying about his own grandchildren and hoping that, just as he was comforting Elizabeth, someone might be kind enough to comfort them.
Josh says, interrupting my sleep-deprived daze, “Where can we take the kids?”
Standing up, I glance east through the center’s windows, the rising sun like an orange tack, pinpointing the direction where Mt. Hebron Community would be. The Lost Children, as I’ve begun to think of the kids, fell asleep once it got light—switching from restlessness to REM so abruptly, it was like someone had flipped a switch. This made me realize the reason they’d had such a hard time going to sleep was because they’d been sleeping during the day and traveling at night. Emmanuel must’ve deduced that the roads and woods would be safer to travel, concealed by darkness. How he fed and protected so many children boggles my mind. I am overwhelmed, and they’ve only been part of my responsibility for less than a day. “I don’t know,” I murmur in reply to Josh. “Can’t take them to the community. They’re barely able to take care of themselves.”
“There’s nowhere else?”
“Not really. Unless Sal has some connections.”
“Who’s he?”
“She,” I correct him. “Sal’s a friend. She took Angel with her down to some camp.”
“You know where it is?”
“No. But I could find out, and then bring the kids back if it looks promising.”
Josh sighs, glancing over at Elizabeth, who is sleeping on his cot while still wearing her wraparound glasses. Like me, he slept on the floor. “That little girl, right there,” he says. “She just wrecks me, Moses.” He sniffs and turns away. “I want us to do right by her. And them.”
I smile at him, a cutthroat federal air marshal with a heart of gold. “We will,” I promise. “We have no other choice.”
Moses
THE CAMP’S LOCATED inside the old fairgrounds. The rusted, curlicue entrance gates are reinforced with new barbed wire and beefy-looking guys, toting attitudes as overblown as their guns. They pat me down more thoroughly than post-9/11 TSA, removing my pistol from my holster, my knife from my boot, and then making me remove my boots themselves.
“Can I keep my pants?” I ask as I hand over the boots. They don’t crack a smile, so I try a more straightforward approach. “What are you guys going to do with them?”
Thing One tags my boots and lines them up on a crude shoe rack outside the gates, like I’m about to enter a grown-up playgroun
d.
Thing Two hands me the tab. “Nothing. It’s in case you want to do something and run.”
“But I can leave, right?” I ask.
Thing One nods. “Just don’t lose your tab.”
“Or . . . I might what? Get high heels?”
Thing One’s face stays the same, but I see the skin pleat around his eyes. Just a little. But Thing Two is all business. He holds up a piece of paper, sketched with the face of a young man. MISSING, it reads, along with the name Alex Ramirez. “Have you seen this guy?” he asks.
“Nope,” I say, hoping this isn’t the ARC soldier Leora killed.
Bracketing either side of the driveway, the fairground’s grass portion is fastened down with tents formed from branches and different-patterned blankets and tarps. I imagine, if viewed from above, the campsite would appear like a patchwork bordered with green. The families watch me from their campsites, dispersed with no pattern or plan. They are circled around small fires and bring spoons up to their mouths with such speed, it’s like they’re expecting someone to steal the utensils along with the food. I nod at them. They don’t nod back, but continue watching me with wary, territorial eyes. The whitewashed buildings to my left and right—where it looks like auctions and fund-raisers were once held—are filled with men.
Some warning bell starts dinging inside my chest. I turn around to look at the gate and see it’s been closed behind me. One of the guys strides to the sliding door of the FFA/4-H building and leans against it, smoking a handmade cigarette while scoping out the premises.
“Need something?” he asks.
“Yeah.” Pebbles from the lane prick the soles of my bare feet as I walk closer. “I’m looking for someone. Her name’s Sal. She’s the niece of Mike Ramirez. The, um—” I’m at a loss as to how I should describe his shady business dealings—“boss man.”
He nods and gestures loosely down the lane. “She’s over there,” he says. “Working.”
My face remains blank, but inside I’m wondering what kind of work she could be doing, surrounded by all these characters. I’m relieved when I approach the cleared area and see her running some sort of outdoor café. This is where I imagine the farmers’ market used to be: the vendors gathered round like brightly dressed gypsies, displaying—from the backs of earth-friendly vehicles or under kiosks that protected the items from the sun—goat soap, bird feeders, unpasteurized cider, organic baked goods, and coolers of grass-fed beef and MSG-free jerky.
Picnic tables are now set up, and Sal’s grilling cuts of red meat over an open fire—her dark hair bound by a white kerchief bearing the same checked pattern as the material tied around her waist. Colton is nearby, raking dirt into a mound with a fork. His features have sharpened. A lot of his baby fat has been chiseled away, either because he’s walking—and also probably running—or because he’s not getting enough to eat. But at least he’s with his mother.
“Sal!” I call.
She looks up, her brows stitched together, pulling her face into a frown. But her default expression doesn’t change when she sees me. She just sets down the tongs she’s using to turn the meat and wipes grease on her apron, the gesture adding more streaks to the palette of stains.
She walks closer and nods. “Moses.”
“Hey.” I smile.
She turns to the side, chafing a hand on the back of her neck. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see if you’re settled.” I pause when I see her look. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing,” she says. “I just don’t think that’s why you’re here.”
“I have been wondering about you, Sal. I hated that you wouldn’t let me bring you and the kids into Liberty.” I pause, wondering how to begin. “But, uh, you got room for more?”
“More kids?” She laughs when I nod. “You think I’m, like, a patron saint of orphans?”
I grin, folding my arms. “Well, aren’t you?”
Her eyes widen. “Um, no.”
I say, “You took Angel in.”
“That’s different. The community didn’t want her around. I know a little of how that feels.” Sal glances over her shoulder, and for the first time, I notice the girl from the cave, washing clothes against a piece of corrugated metal framed with wood. “Angel told me her dad was hiding in the woods ’cause some guy wanted to take her as payment for a debt.”
I grimace. “Who?”
Shrugging, Sal rolls her eyes. “I know nothing for sure, obviously, since her dad’s dead, and Uncle Mike’s not about to tell me a thing. But I think it might’ve been him.” She glances around again, and I see her squinting toward the buildings, as if scanning for a face. “That’s why no more kids can come here. I feel it’s all I can do to keep Angel safe.”
I gesture to the steaks, sizzling on the grill, and to the men waiting inside the buildings, like they’re eager to get up to nothing good. “He involved in this too?”
“Yeah,” she says, clearly annoyed. “His men bring food; I distribute it to the people staying here, and to the ones staying at the warehouse, and the kids and I get to eat what’s left.”
“Where does he get it?”
“Who knows? It comes like that.” She gestures to the sacks leaning against an outbuilding. “The families get rice and beans. The meat is for the gang.”
I walk over and see the fifty-pound sacks are stamped with the letters ARC. My stomach turns as this riddle starts falling into place, as seamlessly aligned as Tetris pieces. “Sal,” I murmur, returning to her side. “You and these families have got to get out of here. ARC stands for the Agricultural Resurgence Commission. They’re an organization of some kind who have sent soldiers out to pillage the countryside and force refugees into work camps.”
“Look around you,” she says. “Nobody’s being forced to stay. And I sure don’t mind working if the kids and I get shelter and food. Besides—” Sal looks at the ground between her feet, bare the same as mine, making it difficult for her to run—“where are we going to go if we don’t stay here?”
Leora
I’m beating rugs—the weight drooping the clothesline—when a gradual expansion of sound sweeps toward me from the gate. Holding the broom, I turn, squint through the spiraling dust, and see Moses walking into our compound. Dirty children are following behind him in two straggled rows. Another, older, man draws up the rear. A shotgun is cocked loosely over his arm, so I’m unable to tell if these children are in the midst of being protected or imprisoned.
I meet Moses’s eyes through the settling haze. He holds up his hand in a greeting or a signal that he will soon explain. But I am the one who must explain. To distract myself, I look away from him toward the newcomers. The children have clustered together and are peering around with trepidation, like they’d much prefer to be outside the gates. Jabil steps down from the watchtower. I know my fiancé well enough to notice the unease ironing the narrow line of his mouth. He stares at the children and then at Moses, as if trying—and surely failing, as I have done—to understand why they are here.
Jabil signals to Moses, and the two men walk down the path toward me. The white-haired man, meanwhile, sets down his gun and opens a canvas sack I didn’t notice him carrying. He loosens the drawstring and takes out two chickens—Ameraucanas, judging by their falconlike heads and the rooster’s showy, calico plumage. Anna leaves our pitiful yard and picks up the hen before it has the chance to squawk. Her rag baby is sprawled on its back by my feet.
Wanting to neutralize any potential altercation, I lean my horsehair broom against the exterior of the cabin and look at the men as our three paths intersect. “May I join you?” I ask.
Jabil glances at me, his insecurity apparent. Moses smiles and says, “Sure.”
The men separate, opening a space for me between them, and we walk down the narrow pathway toward the outskirts of the compound. “Where are the children from?” I ask.
Moses glances over. “No clue. Josh said they just showed up at the
airport in Kalispell.”
“Are they orphans?”
“Seems like it.”
Jabil says, “They can’t stay here. We have neither food nor room.”
Moses nods. “I know that. Josh and I talked it over and decided that if you help these kids, we’ll help you expand the compound and bring in food quarterly.”
“Decided?” Jabil says, his eyebrows raised.
“Relax.” Moses smiles again. “Nobody’s trying to usurp your authority.”
But Jabil doesn’t respond, merely opens the hidden door that leads to the garden. I file through first, the men following behind me.
Closing the door, Jabil asks Moses, “How would you bring in food?”
“We’re growing a garden,” he says. “We’ve got chickens. We’ve got men who can hunt.”
“How do you know it’d be enough?”
Moses sighs, knifing fingers through his hair. “It’d be enough, all right? And it’ll sure be more than you’re gonna get on your own, without helping these kids out. Besides, it’s not like I wanted to come here. I first tried taking them to Liberty, where Sal’s staying, but it looks like the camp down there’s part of the Agricultural Resurgence Commission.”
“The—the ARC?” I stammer.
Moses glances over, my secret between us. “Yes. Looks like Mike Ramirez is their middleman. The people are already congregated. They can go in and out now—” he shrugs—“but there’s barbed wire around the fence and a lock on the gate, so I say it’s a matter of time.”
“Did you warn Sal?” I ask.
Moses nods. “I don’t think she’ll let herself believe me. It’s easier, staying right there.”
Breathing through my panic, I stride over to the garden and crouch to hide the fact that my legs are suddenly weak. I let the tilled soil sift through my fingers in an effort to soothe myself. The cocoa-like powder falls away, leaving bits of stone behind.
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