The Revolution of Ivy

by Amy Engel

  Luckily the rear of the courthouse backs up to a small stand of trees, no other buildings visible. The last time I stood on the other side of this door, Victoria and I were watching Mark Laird and the other prisoners starting their walk to the fence. The Ivy I was then could never have imagined this day, the twists and turns my life has taken since. I glance over at Bishop, let my eyes linger on his profile. I am thankful all over again for every choice that’s led me here, to him.

  He must feel my eyes on him because he turns his head, gives me a quick smile. “Ready?”

  “Yes.”

  “We’ll be here,” Caleb says. He and Ash are on the edge of the trees, bodies tense and eyes watchful.

  Ash grabs my hand as I start for the door. “Be safe,” she whispers. “Come back.”

  I squeeze her hand. “We will.”

  I have a split-second thought that Victoria will have changed her mind and the door won’t be unlocked, but when I give the handle a yank the door swings open, and Bishop and I slip inside. At first I’m disoriented because the lights are off, and as the door shuts behind us we are shrouded in shadows. But it only takes a moment for my eyes to adjust.

  “They must be saving electricity,” Bishop whispers.

  “Or something’s wrong with the power grid,” I say. It wouldn’t surprise me if that’s something my father tried to sabotage.

  “You know your way around here better than I do,” Bishop says. “I’ll follow your lead.”

  We slide to the end of the short hallway and pause, listening. There’s no sound at all, which only makes my nerves worse. I poke my head around the corner. The hallway that ends at the cells is empty as well.

  “It’s clear,” I whisper.

  We round the corner and walk fast but silent down the hall. The door that leads to the cells is closed and I reach up, feel along the rim of the doorframe for the cell key. It’s not there. My fingers sweep frantically across the edge of the wood, my heart throbbing harder with each passing second. “There’s no key,” I whisper.

  “Here,” Bishop says, “let me.” His hand brushes along the wood, and when he’s almost to the end of the doorframe a silver key slides into view, falling to the floor before I can catch it. The sound is as loud as a gunshot to my ears, and I drop down toward the floor, frantic to have the key in my hand.

  “Someone’s coming,” Bishop says, just above a whisper. My head jerks up, and I hear the sound of footsteps approaching from behind the door to the cells. Bishop grabs my hand and yanks me down the hall, pulls me into the first open doorway and smashes us both up against the wall. There’s no time to shut the door, the footsteps already out into the hall we just vacated. I push my mouth against Bishop’s shoulder, try to muffle the sound of my own ragged breathing. Bishop’s hand comes up and curls around the back of my neck, steadying me.

  I close my eyes as the footsteps pass by our hiding place. If whoever it is glances behind him, looks into this room, then it’s all over. But the slap of his shoes against the tile doesn’t slow. I blow out an unsteady exhale as the footsteps fade. I can feel Bishop’s heart pounding even through both our coats, and the hand I have clenched around his wrist is trembling.

  “I think I may have just had a heart attack,” Bishop whispers, and I smother a laugh into his neck. It’s nervous laughter, but it still feels good to release it. Almost as good as having Bishop pressed up against me. We’ve barely had time to talk, much less touch, the last few days. “You okay?” he asks, pushing away from me slowly. “Still have the key?”

  I hold up my clenched fist. I can feel the key pulsing against my palm. This time we don’t hesitate, just slip out into the hallway, open the door to the cells and keep moving. As Victoria promised, Callie is in the first cell; the one I occupied during my time here and separate from the other prisoners. Unlike me, she isn’t curled up on the cot. She is sitting on the floor, back against the cinder-block wall, and even with her head bent and eyes closed, she looks determined. She hasn’t given up. A wave of anger washes over me at the sight of her, but I don’t have time for it now. Emotion will have to come later, once we’re all safe.

  “Callie,” I whisper.

  She looks up, her dark eyes moving slowly from me to Bishop and back again. “Ivy?” She doesn’t sound all that surprised. Her time in this cell, the knowledge of her impending death, hasn’t taken anything from her. She is as fierce as ever.

  “It’s me,” I say. I step forward and grasp the cell bars. “You have to hurry. We’re getting you out of here.”

  Callie doesn’t waste time asking questions. She shoves herself upright with no hesitation. I unlock her cell door and push it open. Callie pauses for a moment on the threshold, looks at Bishop. “I’m surprised you went along with this.”

  Bishop’s eyes are calm, but his face is stiff when he answers. “Thank your sister. If it were up to me, we wouldn’t be here.”

  That’s the first time Bishop has said flat out that he doesn’t agree with what we’re doing. Or at least that he would never have done it had the decision been solely his. Instead of making me angry, his words make me grateful that despite not agreeing with me, he was willing to do this, put aside his anger at my sister in order to help me.

  Bishop turns and I follow him, Callie bringing up the rear. “We’re going out the back door,” I tell her over my shoulder. “Follow me.”

  “Okay,” she says. “Just go.”

  I have a million questions I want to ask her, about our father and what’s happening to Westfall, but they’ll have to wait. Bishop is almost at the door leading back into the hallway when I sense sudden movement behind me. Before I can react, I’m flying forward, crashing into Bishop. It takes me only a second to register that Callie shoved me, but it’s all she needs, her hand closing around the gun at my waist and pulling it free.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Bishop and I turn, his hand on my upper arm, where he’s clutched me to keep us both from falling over. “Callie,” I breathe, the air in my lungs icy with fear. And understanding. “What are you doing?”

  She’s pointing the gun at Bishop. Her hands don’t shake. Her eyes don’t move. “Put your hands behind your head,” she says, voice hard.

  “Callie.” I take a step toward her, and her gaze doesn’t leave Bishop as she says, “Don’t move, Ivy. Or I’ll kill him right now.” I freeze. It feels like even my heart stops beating.

  Bishop raises his hands slowly, laces them behind his head.

  “Get on your knees,” Callie says.

  “No,” I say and the word sounds more like a moan. “No.” My hand falls to the knife at my waist and I yank it free, grip the hilt with sweaty fingers. Callie registers the movement but doesn’t comment. She isn’t close enough for me to lunge at her, so she doesn’t see me as a threat. Even if I were right next to her, she still probably wouldn’t fear me. Fear is a learned response, and I’ve never given Callie a reason to feel it.

  Bishop sinks to his knees, his eyes on Callie. His face is unreadable, but I can see the tension in his shoulders, know he’s waiting for a chance to act.

  “What are you doing?” I ask her again. “We came here to help you.”

  For the first time since she took the gun, Callie looks at me. “I’m doing what you couldn’t. What you wouldn’t. Did you think you could just make it all stop, Ivy? Did you really think you could change the outcome? This is the way it was always going to end. He’s going to die, one way or another.”

  “You don’t have to do this,” I tell her. “We don’t have to do everything Dad wants us to. Not anymore. You can make a different choice, Callie. You can be someone different.” I repeat the words Bishop said to me once. “No one controls who we turn into but us.”

  She shakes her head, eyes back on Bishop. “This has nothing to do with Dad. This is what I want to do.”

  I don’t know if what she’s saying is true or if a lifetime of my father’s lessons has shifted something inside her that can never
be shifted back. But I do know I won’t stand here and watch Bishop die. “I’m not going to let you murder him, Callie.” The knife in my hand feels like it weighs three hundred pounds, like it’s already carrying the weight of what using it will mean.

  “Yes, you are,” she says. “Because you don’t have any way to stop me.” She looks me over, head to toe, something close to hate in her eyes. “I still don’t understand why you care. Did he tell you he loves you? That the two of you are meant to be? Is that all it took? God, Ivy, you’re so predictable.” She barks out a laugh. “Did you honestly think we’d all walk out of here and go live happily ever after somewhere?”

  “No,” I say. “I never thought that.”

  Callie’s hand tightens on the gun and my arm tenses, fingers coiled around the knife hilt. “Please, Callie,” I say. “Please, please, don’t do this.”

  “I can’t believe you’re actually begging for his life,” she says, mouth a sneer.

  “I’m not begging for his life,” I tell her. “I’m begging for yours.”

  For a single moment I see uncertainty flash through Callie’s eyes, the tiniest shred of doubt, and I hope it’s enough for her to reconsider, to make her lower the gun. But her gaze flickers back to Bishop and her eyes ice over again. “Isn’t this where you jump in and make the noble sacrifice? Tell her not to kill me to save you? Isn’t that the way it works in fairy tales? The prince falling on his sword?”

  Bishop doesn’t answer her, just shifts his eyes to mine. We stare at each other and I know Callie is wrong. He won’t say those words to me. We are beyond that point with each other. He knows, in a way no one else will ever understand, how far we are willing to go for each other. And he knows that no matter what words are, or aren’t, spoken, if I have to kill my sister to keep him alive, then that’s what I will do.

  Instead, he looks back at Callie. “You always underestimate her,” he says. “It’s a mistake you’ve made Ivy’s whole life. It’s a mistake you’re making now.”

  “Shut up!” Callie says. “You don’t know anything about me. You and your family, you took everything from us. Now I’m taking everything from you.” She glances at me. “Maybe once he’s gone, you’ll be able to remember what really matters.” Her finger moves on the trigger.

  I don’t even think about it. The room goes silent, like a bomb’s gone off and knocked out my hearing. My vision pinpoints to the single spot on Callie’s chest, the vulnerable target right in the hollow of her rib cage that Ash told me about. I raise my arm and send the knife flying, hard and straight and true. I don’t wish for it to be a direct hit; I already know it is one. Sound returns in a rush, flooding in as the knife sinks into Callie’s body with a wet thwacking sound. She gasps in a choking breath, stumbles backward, the gun still clutched in her hand. Bishop is up on his feet before I can move, snatching the gun from Callie’s limp fingers. She doesn’t try to take it back, just looks down at the knife handle protruding from her chest and then up at me. She drops to her knees, falls over to her side with a guttural moan.

  “Callie,” I say, skidding across the floor to her. I land hard on my knees, barely feel the sting of contact with the cold tile. “Callie.”

  She rolls over onto her back, stares up at me. Her hand is wrapped around the knife handle and before I can stop her, she bares her teeth, her lips white and shaking as she yanks it from her chest, lets it clatter to the floor. That’s what makes it real to me: the smell of her blood bubbling up from the gaping wound, the sound of it rushing out of her body, the color of it, more black than red. Not the kind of blood you see when you skin your knee or make a shallow cut. This is dying blood.

  “Oh, Callie,” I whisper. “I’m so sorry.”

  It takes her a moment to find the breath to speak, and even then her words are weak and thin. I can hear air whistling from her chest. “I should have known,” she says on a thready whisper. “I should have known you’d choose a Lattimer over us.”

  I take her bloody hand in mine, but she yanks it away, surprising me with her strength, even now.

  “You’re just like Mom,” she says. A tear slips down her cheek. “We were so close to having it all.” She sucks in air, her chest heaving with the effort. “It should have been ours.”

  “Callie.” I grab her hand again, and again she pulls it away. The third time, though, she leaves her hand in mine. I don’t kid myself that this means she’s forgiven me, or even that she loves me. It only means she no longer has the energy to resist. Her eyes flutter closed and her chest rises and falls so slowly I can count to ten between each movement. Every time I think it will be the last. My breath is sobbing out of me, but there are no tears. I’m a husk now, dried to bone.

  Bishop shifts, slides down to sit sideways behind me. “Ivy,” he whispers, voice heavy with sorrow. He presses his forehead against the top of my spine, wraps his arms around my waist.

  “Remember,” I say to Callie, “remember when we were little and we’d build a fort in your bedroom? We’d hide under there and you’d tell me ghost stories? And sometimes”—my exhale shudders out of me—“you’d braid my hair. I always liked that.” I take her hand and press it against my heart. “I wish we could have loved each other more, Callie. I wish we’d learned how.”

  Callie doesn’t respond, doesn’t open her eyes or squeeze my fingers. Her face is waxy now. Her lashes dark against her snow-pale skin. Her chest rises. Falls. Rises. Falls. Does not rise again.

  I hold Callie’s hand and Bishop holds me, and in the bruised and terrible silence I am not alone.

  Chapter Nineteen

  I stumble out of the courthouse behind Bishop, my hand in his the only thing keeping me upright. He pushes through the back door and I follow. The cold air smacking into my face reminds me that this is real, this is happening. I just killed my sister. I still have her blood etched into the lines of my palms. I can still hear the whistle of her failing lungs.

  Something wet hits my cheek, and I flinch. Snow. Fat, fluffy flakes drift down from the slate-gray sky. I tip my head up and let them land on my face, melt against my feverish skin. Maybe if it snows hard enough, I can fool myself into believing I’m crying, pretend I’m actually able to shed a tear for my dead sister.

  “Ivy,” Bishop says softly.

  It takes a long time for me to look at him. When I do, he is standing right in front of me, his eyes drinking me in. “Do you think I did it on purpose?” I ask. My voice sounds like my throat is lined with sandpaper. “Do you think I wanted to kill her? Is that why I came back here?” I remember how much I hated Callie that day in the courtroom, how I longed to rip her apart. How much I wished her dead.

  Bishop brushes a snowflake off my lip with his thumb. “I don’t know,” he says finally. “Only you can answer that question. But I know you’re not a cold-blooded killer. If she’d given you an out, if there had been another option, you would have taken it.”

  Wherever Callie is now, I can picture her laughing, calling me the worst kind of hypocrite. And she’s right. Because it turns out I do have it in me to kill. I can live with blood on my hands. I just can’t live with it being Bishop’s. I don’t know what to do with my body, don’t know whether it wants to fold in on itself or fling itself outward, smash and destroy. I open my mouth, but all that emerges is a faint wail. My eyes burn, but from dryness, not tears. Bishop steps forward and gathers me against his chest, and I push my face into the hollow of his neck. My hands fist into his coat until my knuckles scream, and I think maybe if we can stay like this forever, static and safe, maybe I will find a way to be okay.

  But the world doesn’t work like that, I’m discovering; it hardly ever gives you a chance to catch your breath. As if to prove my point, Bishop stiffens, pushes back from me just a little.

  “Where are Caleb and Ash?” he asks.

  I whirl around, eyes scanning the tree line where they were supposed to wait, but there’s no sign of them. “I don’t know,” I say.

  Behind me, t
he courthouse door bangs open and as I turn, Bishop shoves in front of me, hand already reaching back for his rifle.

  “It’s just me, it’s just me,” Victoria says, hands raised partway in surrender. She glances between Bishop and me. “Where’s Callie?”

  “She didn’t…” Bishop pauses. “She didn’t make it.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “She…”

  “She tried to kill me,” Bishop says. Not lying, exactly, but subtly shifting the blame for what happened in that hallway from me to him. “You’re going to have some explaining to do, Victoria. I’m sorry about that.”

  Victoria waves her hand. “I’m not worried about that right now, and you shouldn’t be either. Your father—”

  “What about my father?” Bishop says, taking a step forward.

  Victoria catches my eyes over Bishop’s shoulder. “Both your fathers.”

  “What about them?” I ask.

  “You need to go,” Victoria says. “Right now. To your house,” she says to Bishop. “See if you can stop it. I’ll deal with this.” She cocks her head back toward the courthouse.

  “I thought President Lattimer’s house burned down,” I say. Nothing is making any sense to me. I just want to lie down in the snow-sprinkled grass and wake up to a world where today never happened.

  “Just partially,” Victoria says, voice impatient. “Bishop’s parents went back to see if anything could be salvaged.” She makes a shooing motion with both hands. “You need to go!”

  Bishop is already moving, and even as I follow him a voice inside my head is screaming at me to turn and run the other direction. Find the fence and clamber over it. The voice is telling me that hands torn to shreds on razor wire will be less painful that whatever Bishop and I are going to find waiting for us. But Bishop holds his hand out to me and instead of pulling him back my direction, I run alongside him.