I carried her forward, away from the neighborhood filled with houses, her weight heavy on my shoulders. Even as she weighed me down, though, she was still, unquestionably, my strength.
Chapter 22 – Candace
The world was slow to reappear; my mind was fuzzy, but I felt certain that Gideon’s arm was what wrapped so tightly around me, hugging me to him. How could that be? I had left him behind. I would never see him again.
Sorrow overwhelmed me once more. And yet I felt so safe.
A groan escaped my lips, and he shifted slightly. I kept my eyes tightly closed, dreading the moment I had to face reality.
“Gideon?” I meant for it to be a murmur, but it sounded like a croak.
“I’m here, Candace.”
“Where are we?”
“We’re in some trees just outside of an urban area; I thought you might like some new clothes.”
I shook my head, eyes still closed. “Dead people don’t need new clothes. Gideon, why are you here? I don’t understand. Did he kill me? But that would mean you’d have to be dead, too, and I was so certain you’d live. . .”
“I’m alive, and so are you. And he’s not going to kill you. He’s never going to touch you again.” Emotion rose up in his voice, thick: pain and fury, all rolled into one.
Finally, I opened my eyes. I twisted around to look at him, even though my entire body hurt when I did so.
There he was: brown curls, deep eyes – all of him, right down to the last freckle. His jaw was set tight.
“Gideon,” I whispered, lifting a finger to touch his cheek. A swell was rising up inside me, rushing forward; I started crying.
“Candace,” his arms tightened around me, holding me to his chest.
“I thought I’d never see you again,” I blubbered, my tears soaking into his shirt. “What happened?” The last thing I could remember was pain – searing pain – and I immediately blocked it out.
“I found you, and then I killed him.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.”
“You’re leaving something out; it couldn’t have been that simple.”
“It was that simple – I didn’t care what I had to do. I wasn’t going to lose you, no matter what it took.”
“But what happened?”
“You really want the details?”
I thought about this, realizing the truth. “No,” I murmured.
“Right. How about some water?” He lifted a bottle to my lips; I raised my head and swallowed as he carefully poured the liquid down my throat.
“This is different,” I said, wiping my mouth. “You’ve never had to baby me like this before.”
“You’ve saved me plenty of times; it’s my turn to save you.”
“Are my clothes pretty messed up?” I asked, my thoughts going to the beginning of the conversation.
“Not that we plan on seeing anyone, but I thought your face and neck would get plenty of stares without anyone having to notice your clothes.”
At these words, I finally looked down at myself. My clothing was ridden with blood-stained holes. Horrified, I asked, “What does my face look like?” It wouldn’t have mattered if I’d died with all sorts of cuts and bruises, but how was I supposed to live looking like this?
“It doesn’t matter,” he replied. “They’re just bruises; they’ll go away.”
“I bet the cuts won’t, though,” I muttered, peering down my shirt at the mottled flesh that was my chest. “Those’ll scar.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he repeated, pulling my hand away from my shirt.
“But I’m not going to look very pretty when we finally . . . well, when you finally see me.”
“You think I care about that?”
I forced my eyes closed against the new torrent of tears that threatened.
“Candace, those scars might deter other men from raping you – which is a blessing, I’d say – but I’m going to think you’re beautiful no matter what.” His hand cupped my face, and I reopened my eyes to meet his; they were earnest and full of emotion – love. “You are mine, and, if anything, this proves it more.” He leaned toward my face and kissed me, gently, as if he thought I’d break.
I kissed him back, severely wanting to feel his love for me. And, most surprising, I wanted him to want me. I deepened the kiss.
He groaned, then kissed me harder. He kissed me over and over again until I was dizzy, and then he let me go, pulling me back into him.
“It’s been a while since either of us ate, I think,” he murmured, holding me. “Not since the bear before you left for the medicine.”
“How long has it been since then?”
“Three days, roundabout. It was a little hard for me to keep track of time when I first started the antibiotics.”
I’d lost track of time, too. I’d lost consciousness at several intervals.
“Anyway, I want you to lay here while I go catch a fish from the river, and then I’ll come back and we’ll eat.”
“You can fish?” I asked, surprised. “You’ve never fished before.”
“It’s impossible not to catch a fish in this river right now. I think it’s mating season, or something.” He pulled away from me, standing. “Just wait here, okay?”
I nodded in agreement, then he disappeared.
Loneliness crept in on me, so quick in his absence. And the memories. . . I clenched my eyes closed against them, and only opened them again when Gideon returned. He held a fish in each hand.
He set them aside and started a fire, then roasted the fish whole. He helped me sit up, then handed me a plank with flakey bits of the fish laid out on it. We ate.
“So, new clothes after this?” I asked, chewing.
“Yes, if you want.”
“What will we do after that?”
“Whatever you want. We could return to the grove?” The suggestion was hesitant, because the grove would no longer be the safe place it had felt like before. It would no longer be home.
“How about Mexico?” I suggested.
“Mexico,” Gideon echoed, his voice sounding hollow.
“I think we could both use a fresh start.”
He met my eyes over the food, his expression unreadable. After a minute, he said, “You’re serious.”
“Yes. I’m serious. If we had crossed the border when you wanted to, you wouldn’t have been shot, wouldn’t have gotten infected, and I wouldn’t have made that trade for the medicine. I don’t want anything like that ever happening again.”
“We might not be much better off in Mexico,” he pointed out. “We have no idea what that country’s been up to in the last quarter of a century.”
“That’s not the way you saw it when you were planning out how we were going to jump the border a week ago.”
“I didn’t almost lose you a week ago.”
“I didn’t almost lose you a week ago. You wanted Mexico then. Why don’t you want it now?”
“I do want it now. I just can’t believe you’ve changed your mind. I thought it’d take years to convince you.”
“Well, I have changed my mind. When do you want to go?”
He looked into my eyes, then leaned forward and traced my cheek with his clean knuckle. “To start a family?” he asked.
“If and when we find somewhere safe to stay. And it might have to involve interacting with other humans.”
“Agreed,” he said.
I raised my eyebrows. “You’re up for that?”
He leaned back and started eating again. “I’m up for anything when it comes to you, darling.” He winked at me, eyes sparkling.
He seemed much perkier than earlier, but it might have just been the fish.
~ * ~
“He’s on duty,” Gideon whispered. “Are you ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I replied, and we each broke into a sprint for the fence.
It had been three weeks since we’d agreed to jump the border, and those three we
eks had been filled with more than a few doubts. After we’d rested a few days, we’d walked back to the border, Gideon cutting strips of rubber from cars as we went. He worked with the rubber at night, melting and shaping it over the open flames to create pieces that we could form to our shoes, as well as pieces that we could wear on our hands like crab claws.
Once we had reached the border, we waited for the man who liked to lean back and smoke with his eyes closed. Gideon had previously memorized the shift-change schedule so that, even if it was the middle of the night, he’d be ready to watch and see if the man came on duty.
Almost two weeks passed with no sightings of him, and Gideon was getting more than a little antsy.
“He was never gone like this when we watched before,” he told me.
“We only watched for seven days,” I pointed out. “We’ve been watching for another two weeks now; is there anyone else who would be a good choice?”
He roughly shook his head. “No. He’s the only one who relaxes like that on the job.”
“Then maybe they fired him.”
“Maybe.” It wasn’t a very comforting thought.
However, the very next night, he appeared.
“Watch for the searchlights!” Gideon warned in a loud whisper as we ran, and I jumped back just in time to miss one.
It was a long sprint, but we made it to the fence, Gideon right ahead of me.
“You okay?” he gasped, touching my chin in a quick swipe before pulling out the rubber.
“Fine,” I murmured, though I was still sore from my stab wounds. Those healing injuries mattered little at the moment – I was trying to ignore the fact that we were about to climb into a vicinity while almost completely blind to the layout and weapons. I quickly pulled on my own rubber shoes and handholds, then started climbing a pace before Gideon.
I was pretty sure my head start was just because he was watching me to make sure I was doing okay, but I went ahead and let it fuel me forward.
He reached my side halfway up the fence, even though I was certain his leg had to be throbbing; he was set on getting to the guard before me, somehow convinced he’d do a better job at pointing his gun, or something.
He got to the top of the fence and hopped over the edge of the watchtower. I heard something hard hit the floor, a grunt, and then the sound of whispers. I pulled myself up and in, unsure of what I would find.
Gideon had the man’s arms twisted behind his back, and was holding his gun to his head. The man’s chest was pressed to the wall, and he was looking over his shoulder at Gideon.
“Got your gun on him?” Gideon asked me. I nodded, and Gideon pocketed his, pulling out some rope and wrapping it around the man’s wrists. “He doesn’t speak English,” he muttered, securing the knots before shoving the man around to face forward, then pushing him down to the ground. He pulled out some extra fabric from his backpack and shoved it into the man’s mouth. “I think it’s going to be too difficult to get him out of his uniform without communication, so we’ll just have to go without.”
“I hadn’t ever been convinced of the use the uniform would do us anyway,” I replied, watching as he searched the man’s pockets, bringing out a few plastic cards; he held them up to the light.
“You think these are keys?” he asked. “I think keys were going in this direction before the economy collapse, but I can’t be certain, since I hadn’t been born yet.”
“If those are all you can find on him, then they’re probably keys,” I agreed, looking around the room. The man’s lit cigarette had burnt itself out on the metal floor, right next to where his high-tech gun lay. I didn’t touch the gun; we wouldn’t have any idea how to work it.
Other than the metal bowl we stood in, and the gun, the watchtower had no other features.
“Ready to go?” I asked.
Gideon was busy hog-tying the soldier for another moment, but then he stood and met my eyes.
“You’re doing okay?” he asked.
I rolled my eyes. “Gideon, I appreciate your concern, but we both know I’m fine – all healed and ready to go, and I can handle anything you can handle.”
“Just checking,” he replied, then headed for the ladder.
We climbed down without incident, though it was fifty feet of open air in Mexican territory. The yard was dark, and no one would have expected crossers to come over the fence so quietly.
“I think we’ve got about thirty seconds before the next soldier walks past here, based on the regular routine, so we need to choose a direction quickly,” Gideon told me, eyes bouncing from one corner of the yard to the other. “He’ll come from there,” he said, nodding to the right.
The yard before us seemed to be a maze of warehouses. We needed to get to the other end, and were likely to hit a sort of main headquarters at some point. Also likely was that someone would spot us, and then we’d have to really run for what we hoped was the exit. Our chances were not good.
“Straight forward,” I decided.
Gideon nodded, and we started moving at a quick pace.
“Left here,” I suggested when we hit a building.
“Back right,” Gideon said when we hit another turn.
Together, we zigzagged through the maze.
There was a shout from behind us.
“Knew that was coming,” Gideon muttered, both of us breaking into a sprint.
That’s when we hit the headquarters, the entrance of which was a tall glass door.
“The keycards, quick!” I gasped, glancing over my shoulder at the men running after us; they were several yards away, but gaining quickly.
“Here, got it!” he said, and I understood when the door made a click; he pulled it open, shoving me through.
More running.
“Where’s the exit?” I wheezed.
“Close,” Gideon replied, and we kept choosing turns at random, quickly doubling back any time we hit a dead end. The halls echoed shouts in what I assumed was Spanish, and we kept running.
“Sky!” I said, pointing through a window. “And that door has a place for a keycard!”
“Better hope this is the right door,” he responded, rifling through the cards for the correct key; he found it, and pushed the door outward.
More fence was just beyond the door; we hadn’t seen it in the dark from our perspective inside.
“Right!” Gideon ordered, and we turned that way, running along the fence until we hit the dead end we’d hoped hadn’t existed.
“What’s the point of this area?” I demanded, dragging air in and out of my lungs. “There’s nothing here but grass and the fence.
“It’s the break yard,” a heavily accented voice replied from behind us; we turned in unison to face the dark-skinned Mexican before us. He was uniformed, wore thick spectacles, and had a formal hat covering his head. “Welcome to Los Estados Unidos de Mexico,” he said, several soldiers catching up to him and stopping in their tracks; they each had sweat dripping from their hairline, and looked at us sort of like we were aliens. There was also the lovely part about them all pointing their advanced weaponry at us. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”
“We’re trying to get into your country,” Gideon answered, voice hard. He gripped my upper arm with his free hand, holding me close to him.
“I see,” the man replied, still so formal-sounding. “Well, if you wouldn’t mind joining me in my office, I’d love to hear about it.” He turned and beckoned us forward.
Together, we eyed all the soldiers aiming at us, then followed along behind him; Gideon still held my arm tightly, as if afraid that they’d force us apart.
They didn’t; instead, they herded us into the office the man had spoken of: a small room, brightly lit with electricity, with posters littering the walls: Spanish phrases, and images of what I assumed was the Mexican flag.
There was also a window, taunting us with the promise of freedom as regular Mexican citizens walked past on the dark streets, each of them busy in their own liv
es – lives that didn’t involve the troubled U.S.
“Please take a seat,” the man said, rounding a desk and sitting behind it. “Oh, and give the men your guns.” The last part wasn’t a suggestion.
I looked up at Gideon and he nodded; we turned and gave a soldier our weapons, but we didn’t sit down. The soldiers left us, closing the door behind them.
“I have a lot of U.S. citizens trying to jump the border – usually on a weekly basis. It’s rare that they come in pairs, though – it’s much more difficult to make it through if you have to keep track of more than just yourself.”
Gideon snorted. “Not only that, but it’s rare for us ‘U.S. citizens’ to form pairs at all anymore. Too difficult to care for more than just yourself in our world.”
“And yet you’ve done it,” the man murmured. “Why is that?”
“We have a different focus than most,” Gideon replied shortly.
The man looked at me. “Where did those bruises come from?” he asked, his gaze flickering back to Gideon before returning to me.
Gideon had said my face looked fine, but I knew from experience that the bruises had to have still been there, an ugly yellow by now.
“Gideon didn’t do this,” I immediately told the man, not wanting anyone to get the wrong impression about the relationship Gideon and I had.
“Then where did they come from?”
I struggled to come up with a response that wasn’t so personal. “Life is difficult in the U.S.; we had an encounter, and this was the result.”
“And now you’re coming to our country to escape all of that.”
“Of course; wouldn’t you do the same?”
The man was silent, his eyes like rock. But somehow I thought, if I just said enough, I could convince him to let us go. He was obviously not the type to shoot intruders on sight.
“Look, do you have a family?” I asked him; Gideon stood tense beside me, and the man blinked. “We came here because we want a family, and we don’t want to have it taken away from us the way our previous families were. His family – ” I indicated Gideon, “ – and my family were both taken from us because of the world we live in. Food is scarce, and everyone is willing to kill on the spot in order to survive. I killed my first human when I was six, and I was proud of it. I want to have children, and I don’t want them to live like that.”
Humanity Page 21