Brandon looks doubtful. Still he accepts my decision. "All right, well, you're going to get cold. You need a jacket or an extra shirt or something."
I doubt that I have a jacket. That night they only let me pack what was in my dresser drawers. Maybe I could've packed more, but when you're faced with the barrel of a gun it's hard to remember things like coats. Still, I go to the room and dig around in my duffle to see what I did bring and find an old grey sweatshirt.
I recognize it just by touch and weight. This was my mother's old ratty sweatshirt. It was sizes too big for her and relegated to being one of those pieces of clothing she wore only inside the house and maybe for a second if she had to run to the end of the driveway to pick up mail.
This is an unexpected piece of her that somehow found its way into my clothes. My throat swells, but I don't cry. I never borrowed her clothes. One of us must have mistakenly put it in my dresser drawer with my clothes.
Brandon calls to me softly, asking if I'm ready or I've changed my mind. I toss the sweatshirt on over my head, the insides scratching at my nose but instantly warming me. It's stupid, but I do feel a little safer. Like a reminder that Mom is with me even when she's not, that I do have some part of her in me, and if she saw me now, she'd be proud of me.
We walk down the stairs to the ground floor. At night the whole place is even more sinister lit only by the faint flickering of light from the fire pits.
At the foot of the stairs, Brandon waits for me with his hands in his pockets. I stare straight at him, some dark deep part of my brain warning me that the attack happened here, just feet away from where I'm standing. It's a thought I drown out as Brandon smiles at me as if to give me encouragement. But there's also the smallest hint of pride from him and I can only guess that it comes from seeing me take such bold steps in so short a time. I wrap my arms tightly around myself, gripping the worn sweatshirt.
Downstairs, people stand around the fire pits talking and laughing. Some couples hang out on the edge of the light with their arms around each other, some kiss, some practically rubbing against each other and I turn my head away. It's not bothering anyone else, and if I stare that will only make it more obvious that I'm an outsider. Not that it isn't obvious already.
There's a girl dressed in a normal old shirt, ripped and worn, with a pair of dirty jeans. She wears no shoes, so she stands near one of the pits in the distance in front of us with her hands outstretched to absorb the warmth. Right away I realize she's another one like me and Mitchell, but she looks worse. There's a cautious weariness to her. She glances furtively at the others standing around the pit with her. They stand around drinking from glasses and old plastic cups. The man seated next to her moves and it makes her flinch just as we pass by. She reminds me of the girl I saw on the balcony that one day, and I briefly wonder if it's her.
We cross the street, no words between us. People wave at Brandon and smile. Some even call him by name and he only smiles and gives them a nod like he's one of the popular guys walking the hall. I'm not sure if it should make me comfortable or make me more nervous that he's so well known. It makes sense if he's Henri's son that people would give him a grudging acknowledgement, but the ones who greet him seem to honestly do it, not out of obligation, but just because they're happy to see him.
I glance up at him trying to get some clues in the same way he picks up so much just by glancing at me. There's a lot that I don't know about him still. Though we've talked, we haven't really talked about anything of substance, and I make a decision that I will see if he'll open up to me about his life here and his past.
Across the street, Brandon heads towards a fire pit in what looks like an old parking lot. There's a small group of people already there, and they look up at us when they see Brandon. I notice three people right away. One tall man who stands on the other side of the fire as we walk up, his bright eyes on the two of us and a smile on his lips that makes the hair on my arms stand up and brush against the inside of my long sleeves. Another tall man stands with his arms crossed behind a chair that seats a petite girl who smiles at Brandon first in greeting.
Then all of their eyes then fall on me.
"This is my sister, Paula." Brandon says it loudly to all of them without a hint of shame though I'm sure they can see that I'm not like them right away. No one says anything though. The girl sitting down pours a glass and offers it to me. Brandon is the one to politely refuse for me and when I look up at him, he smiles, "Trust me. You won't like it."
I glance around at the others and let my eyes adjust to the firelight. The first one I notice is the girl who looks hardly older than me. She hops up from her chair and motions at it. "Uh, you wanna sit down?"
The last thing I want to do is be an inconvenience, so I refuse at first but she insists and Brandon gives me a soft nudge in the shoulder without even looking at me. He's talking to a large man much taller than himself who speaks quietly in soft grunts as Brandon mumbles questions to him. So I take a seat and hope that I can get on with my simple observations.
But I'm surprised by who's sitting near me in a chair, his hazel eyes looking away and avoiding me completely. It's Mitchell. When we walked up, he was sitting down and so he was completely obscured by the fire as we walked up. I want to ask him where he's been, but for the man standing next to him.
The man is tall and wiry. He looks young, just like Mitchell and Brandon. By the fire light, his eyes look almost purple. There's a slim chance that it's just a trick of the light, but silky blue hair falls over his forehead, and that is definitely not a trick of the light. He eyes me with one hand on the back of Mitchell's chair and right away I'm sure that he's Mitchell's caretaker the same way Brandon's mine. There's a dangerous gleam to his eyes. He watches me as if picking out all my weaknesses.
Then I remember Mitchell's words from the other day. "Brandon's a good guy. I'm sure he wouldn't ever force you to do anything you didn't want to do." Mitchell is human like me. Are there things that this man with his strange eyes forces Mitchell to do because he knows he can't fight back?
"So you're Neutral, huh?" The girl stands next to me with a glass in her hands. It's a simple question, but one that makes me uncomfortable. The blue haired man with the strange eyes watches me with the corners of his lips curling up.
The girl isn't accusatory about it, but it seems rather forward for someone like us to chat so freely in front of one of them. Put on the spot, I still don't know what to say so I just nod.
"It must suck for you to be out here then," she says.
The heat from the fire dries out my throat. I shrug. "It's not that bad really." But even as I say it, I can't help thinking about the attack I saw from the balcony.
"I'm Maria, by the way." She points to the one with the light eyes. "That's Angel. And that's Mitchell."
Mitchell gives a little nod. "We've met."
Angel smiles. "We're neighbors."
I've never met Angel before but it sounds as if he were including himself in the meeting Mitchell and I had on the balcony. I don't bother correcting him or saying anything about it. I glance down at my toes, twisting my foot and pulverizing little stones and sand grains beneath my sneaker against the blacktop.
Maria stays nearby me, almost hovering. We're quiet. Brandon and the other man stand far enough away as they talk that we can only catch their deep mummers over the crackling of the flame.
Something seems to swell between all of us. Questions meant to be asked saturate the air. Even I have questions I think I'd like to ask, but I'm no clearer on what I can or can't ask than I was on the first day.
Luckily Maria takes care of that. "So what do they say about us where you're from?"
The words blurt out from her mouth adding heat to the fire as my cheeks flush. I hadn't expected that at all, and I'm not sure how to speak honestly without insulting them and only making them mad. The three of them, Maria, Angel, and Mitchell all watch me and wait for me answer.
Brandon is still compl
etely focused on the man he's talking to. There's a serious look to his face, his brows drawn, his mouth tightly closed, and I know that I don't want to disturb him.
I clear my throat and take a swallow. "Uh, well, not much. They didn't really know much."
It's true and it's not insulting. Everyone seems to accept it readily and there's even mumbles of agreement that the Neutrals would keep their people in the dark. It insults me, and I want to argue with them, but there's no use in it. They're right anyway, and I need to know more people than just Brandon.
"So, uh, what do they say about us here?"
Maria looks up at Angel. "Oh, you probably don't wanna hear that."
That kills the conversation and I go back to grinding rocks under my toe. No, I don't want to hear. They probably think we're all flabby weaklings and compared to them, I don't exactly disprove that idea. My cheeks flame again, so hot I want to put my fingers against them, but I don't because that will only call attention to it.
The quiet is odd when shared with strangers. Brandon stands with his back to us, talking to the other man still. Maria takes a drink and Angel runs his fingers gently over a curl on Mitchell's head that keeps sticking up. The move makes me nervous for Mitchell. It's intimate and tender in its own way which only makes me worry for the things he forces Mitchell to do.
I hold my hands together in my lap, squeezing my fingers tightly. Though I still have no idea what I can say, and I don't exactly feel comfortable, I still feel a need of some sort to gather information from the people assembled here. They have no reason to lie to me, unlike Brandon who wants to protect me and keep me safe.
I glance up at Maria who sips her drink casually while looking around to avoid looking directly at me, but I know she's paying attention to me. The second I look up her eyes are on me, and I nip at my lip before I just ask. "So can I ask about the Revolution?"
Maria tenses, her fingers on her glass turning white as she squeezes. "What have they told you about it?"
Angel crosses his arms. "More importantly, what have they told you about the labs?"
I glance at the both of them and shrink back in my chair. The only friendly face turned towards me is Mitchell, but he wears a bit of pity that doesn't make me feel better. "They were run by companies, and they were illegal."
That gets a look from Angel at the very least. As I'd expected. I hold my hands tightly, my throat suddenly dry from the smoke of the fire pit wafting towards me on a cool night breeze.
"That's not exactly right from our understanding." Angel watches me with his eyes narrowed like the sharp edge of a blade. "The Neutrals ran the experiments. On their own people."
I swallow, but there is nothing in my mouth but smoke. It burns down my dry throat, wiping away any moisture left. It's a lie. It has to be. They need a reason to hate Neutrals. It's just gossip, and gossip isn't the truth. What I know I've read in history books and been taught by my teachers who were there in some form and lived through it even if they were young children at the time. And my mom who worked for the government. Wouldn't she have told me the truth if everything I was learning was a lie?
Mitchell quietly clears his throat. Behind him, Angel shifts and uncrosses his arms to lean against the back of Mitchell's chair as he speaks. "We should tell her the bonfire stories."
Maria seems to like that idea. She smiles and nods. "Yeah, that's a good idea."
Eight
"They say that it was a girl who let the First Experiment out of the lab.” Maria looks at me and her lips curve into the tiniest of smiles. "She saw him from far off and felt sorry for him, so one day she opened his cage and let him go."
In school, when we learned about the Revolution, we never really went into much detail. Admittedly, I never gave it much thought myself, but the Revolution had to start somewhere. It's an interesting idea that it started with one man who then freed the others once he got out.
Angel smiles at us. “My favorite is the one about the technician who spilled his coffee on the control panel.”
But these stories aren't real. No one seems to know the exact truth, though Angel and Maria go on sharing these strange stories about the First Experiment as if he were a real human. They even laugh as they recount some of the sillier stories, made up purely for entertainment value. Considering how many people lost their lives in the Revolution and how many people continue to die each day, I don't find it easy to laugh even as I become drawn in by all the possibilities the idea of the First Experiment presents.
"But what's the truth?" I ask them. "Is the First Experiment a real person? Wouldn't he have shared his story already?"
Maria pauses with her glass halfway to her mouth. She sets it down on her knee and looks over at Angel and Mitchell with obvious surprise. "She doesn't know?"
Mitchell has that pity look again, but Maria eclipses it by turning back on me. "You don't know? Brandon didn't tell you?"
He still stands off with his back to us, though he seems to give a little twitch as if he heard his name called. I shake my head. "Told me what?"
Maria takes a deep breath and lets it out in a huff. "Mr. Smith is the First Experiment."
I sit up straight as my gut wrenches painfully, differently from the way it reacted when I saw Gray Eyes murder the man today. This is worse. People died-- a lot of people-- as a direct result of the actions of the man who is supposed to be my father. Did my mother know this when she slept with him?
"That's why we don't talk about it. The truth I mean, if we know it at all," Maria says as she shoves her hair behind her ear. "Because it's his past."
That doesn't help make things clearer, and I give a shake of my head.
Mitchell softly speaks. "People don't talk about another person's past here. It's sort of become taboo here. You don't ask about their past either. When a person is ready and wants to, they'll tell it to you."
I think back on all the conversations Brandon and I have had. I had assumed that he wasn't asking about my past because he knew it had to be painful for me, and maybe in a way it is that. Maybe that's exactly why they don't talk about pasts, especially the pasts of others.
Brandon turns then and comes back to join us, but he doesn't smile. It's like some innate sense of his picks up on the change in the air. I want to ask him about everything they've said, but not when we're sitting in front of everyone. He seems to pick up on it though as his eyes meet mine and his hand falls on my shoulder.
"You okay?"
He speaks quietly to me, and I'm ready to say something when I catch the movement of someone walking towards us.
It's nothing more than a shadow, a tall and thin shadow. When he's close enough I catch the glint of his green eyes. At the sight of me, he smiles, and my mind boggles. Already disturbed by what I've possibly learned tonight, I'm even more disturbed by the attention of this man who walks through the cold dark in a tee shirt that doesn't fully cover the dark tattoos on the tanned skin of his arms.
Brandon notices that I'm looking just past him and he turns, a hand still on me. He gives a nod in acknowledgment. "Hey Alex."
Though he's very tall, his face is smooth but for the beginning wisps of a moustache under his nose. I get the feeling that he's not much older than I am.
Maria groans. "Oh Alex. Don't you have dinner to catch?"
"I already ate." He grins at her. I have a feeling that there's something of a joke in there, but I don't quite get it.
Brandon puts his weight on his foot closest to me. "This is my sister, Paula." His words are even, still I think I catch a hint of stress at the "my sister" part which surprises me. "Paula, meet Alex."
Up close, his eyes are bright. They absorb the light and shine brightly as smiles. He looks at me differently than the others do. The others have looked at me more as a curiosity than a person. It's only now that Alex's eyes fall on me that I realize that. He takes in all the details in a way that doesn't feel dirty or obscene. Still it is strange to be the center of such scrutiny so I look aw
ay.
A bit of air passes between the teeth of the man who had been standing off from the group talking with Brandon. It catches my attention, and I look up only to see him eyeing Brandon before nodding his head towards another shadow stalking towards us. The light barely illuminates him, but with each step he becomes clearer, and I recognize him just as Brandon tenses beside me.
It's Gray Eyes.
"I'll be right back." Brandon doesn't look at me as he steps away, taking large steps to meet Gray Eyes. The quiet man who brought it to Brandon's attention joins him, leaving me alone with Angel, Mitchell, and Maria again, this time with Alex added to the group. I glance at the rest of them, their eyes also on Brandon as he walks away, though they don't seem nearly as concerned as I feel. This man who I've decided needs to be avoided, a true danger of the sort I've been warned about my entire life, keeps on appearing at the edges of my new life. It's not enough to just avoid him.
I turn to Maria first. She's the closest to my age and so I hope that she'd be the one who'd honestly tell me. "Who is that?"
But she's not. Angel crosses his arms again, his friendly smile from earlier gone. "That's the second in command."
Mitchell glances up at Angel and I can almost see him gulp. "He's supposed to be the leader. That's why he's usually with Mr. Smith."
That might explain why he's always around. Is it possible that Henri is sending him to keep an eye on me?
Brandon still talks to Gray Eyes. The light reaches to his back but leaves their faces in shadows. They don't speak with much movement so it's difficult to tell what is exactly going on. But Gray Eyes attacked someone earlier, so if he's wanting to talk to Brandon, it can't be a good sign.
"Is Brandon in trouble?"
The others share looks amongst themselves. Maria steps forward a bit to stand closer to the fire pit and look me directly in the eyes. "Wait, he didn't tell you about him?" She points over towards Gray Eyes.
I shake my head. Except for earlier, Brandon hasn't really been around when Gray Eyes was around. And even then, Brandon only came after the incident, so there were other things to talk about. "No. Why would he have?"
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