by Keri Lake
Pushing those thoughts down as deep as I can, I focus on the delicious scent of boiled meat and spices that permeate from the kitchen. Not having eaten for most of the day, the scent waters my mouth as I cross through the gradually-darkening living room toward it.
A roiling cloud of steam drifts upward, as I remove the lid from the pot, inhaling the savory aroma of dinner. The bread I baked earlier sits wrapped in cheesecloth on the counter beside the stove. All the ovens in Szolen are electric, part of the community’s original design before the world went to hell.
I’ve made more than enough for Papa and me, and though we’ll store some away for lunch tomorrow, I’ll be sure to set aside a bit of it for Six, assuming he’ll show up.
Ladling the soup into the bowls I’ve set out on the counter, I pause at a flash of memory that strikes me. Soup ladled into a bowl. Hunger gnawing at my stomach. A scalding sting hits my leg, so hot it almost feels cold, and I jump back as the ladle falls to the floor.
“You’ve made a mess, Wren. Be sure to clean it.”
I gasp at the voice, and spin around to find Papa standing in the doorway. His graying hair and stern face, cast in shadows from the dying light, make him look angry, even if he isn’t. His voice is calm and level, much like his personality.
“Sit. Let me look at the burn on your leg.”
After setting the ladle in the sink for rinsing, I pull a chair from the table and fall into it, eyeing the puffy red above my knee, where the burn has already settled below my skin.
Crouching down in front of me, he runs his fingers gently over the markings. “I’ll put some aloe on it.”
“I’ve got some.” From my pocket, I pull the tip of the plant I broke off and hand it to him.
He grips my wrist and turns it over, to the gouges in my forearm, and those stern brown eyes lift to mine. “Bugs again?”
I don’t tell him it was brought on by a boy who failed to show up for our unscheduled meetings in the woods. Instead, I nod.
“And the hallucinations?”
“Not as bad as before,” I assure him. “They’re going away again. Anything new on the other side?” I hate talking about what’s wrong with me, so I shift the conversation to something far more appetizing.
Releasing my arm, he sets his hands on his thighs and pushes to straighten himself. “Nothing that would interest you.”
“It would. Tell me.” I slide off the chair, nabbing rags from the adjacent drawer, which I throw onto the spilled soup.
His insistence that I never go beyond the wall is a frustration with no resolution. Certainly not worth the effort of asking again, but I enjoy his stories, no matter how mundane he thinks they are. Once I’ve mopped the broth, I rinse the ladle and finish filling the bowls with the soup.
The chasing silence makes it clear he has no intentions of telling me about his day, so I set the bowls on the table and slice two pieces of bread that I set beside them. Taking my seat, I bow my head, silently giving thanks for the meal, and lift the spoon for a taste.
The meat, potatoes and warm broth fills my stomach, and I dip my spoon for another. We’re only allowed two meat-containing meals a week, to conserve what’s stored away. Tonight’s happens to be squirrel.
“I brought you something.” From his pocket, Papa pulls a string of multicolored beads, with four white in the center that spell ‘love.’ Slipping it over my wrist, he tugs his mouth into the slightest smile. “Found it in some rubble. Thought you might like it.”
“It’s beautiful,” I say, twisting it until love sits atop my wrist. “I love it.” I chuckle, and a quick upward glance shows him staring at me, serious as always.
I’ve never heard him laugh, his smile never reaches his eyes, and I suppose that’s okay. It’s gestures like these—the gifts, the gentle care of my wounds, the inquiries of my day—that I’ve come to learn are his ways of showing his care. I’m glad he’s not overly affectionate toward me, anyway—that would feel more awkward than his lack of hugs.
“Something else,” he says, slipping his hand into his other pocket. His closed fist opens, revealing a silver key in his palm, and I quickly snatch it up, twisting it in front of me.
I collect keys. House keys. Car keys. Doesn’t matter what kind. I like knowing they unlock something, somewhere in the world. I pretend they’re the keys to someone’s story—their hopes and dreams—and I’m now the keeper of it.
I examine the ridges along the edge, and run my thumb over its teeth. “This one … it belongs to a castle. With a moat around the perimeter and lush green grass. And flowers. So many colorful flowers, you’d think a rainbow touched the ground.”
“You’ve got quite an imagination, Wren.” Setting his elbows at either side of his bowl, he lifts his spoon. “I’ve gathered some Mormon Tea to begin stocking for winter.”
“I’ll make sure it’s ground tomorrow morning.”
“I’ve noticed your chores have been completed each day.” He tears off pieces of the bread, setting the small chunks on a napkin beside the bowl. “What’s the occasion?”
Humor, though, coming from him is as dry as bone.
“Boredom.” Dipping the bread into my soup, I keep my gaze focused on the steam rising up from the bowl. “I saw smoke today. North side. Looked like it was coming from the other side of the wall.”
“What were you doing on the North side?” He’s a much more refined eater than I am, spooning the soup into his mouth without a single sound.
“Exploring.”
“Not in the woods, I hope.”
“What’s over there?” I ask, ignoring his comment.
He sets his spoon down, eyes drilling into me. “Did you go into the woods?”
“There’s an electric fence, Papa. To keep us out.”
“And it does a fine job of keeping most out. But you’re not most.” Spoon in hand again, he returns to his food, eating much faster than before. It’s clear to me that he’s doing his usual hurry-up-and-eat-before-she-asks-anymore-questions thing, before he’ll sneak away into his study, where I’ll undoubtedly have to wake him to go to bed.
“Something is there. A factory. Or a hospital.”
“Stay away from the North side. Is that clear?”
“But what is it? What’s there?”
“You’re not to return. Or there’ll be consequences.”
“Is it a hospital? Is that where you worked?”
The slamming of his fist against the table skates down my spine, as it rattles the dishes and soup sloshes over the edge of the bowls.
“Damn it, Wren! Stay away! Do you hear me? That forest is no place for a naïve young girl!”
His eyes are cold and cruel, his lip peeled back into an angry snarl, the likes of which I’ve not seen on him before. It’s rare I test his patience, and the sudden remorse leaves me bowing my head in shame for angering him. I know its love that governs his harshness, his yearning to protect me. Tears distort the view of my hands set in my lap.
“Yes, Papa.”
Silence so thick I can scarcely draw in a breath lingers between us, and that’s when the first needle of frustration pokes at me. The mishmash swirling inside my head keeps the tears from falling, and my hands come back into sharp view with their retreat. I want to scream back at him, even if I’m supposed to be grateful for being one of the blessed. One of the privileged who live behind the wall that separates us from the ugly world we’re not supposed to be curious about.
He stands up from the table, leaving his bowl and spoon, but instead of disappearing as I expect, he returns with a flickering lamp that he sets down onto the center of the table. A soft caress at the side of my wrist, below the bracelet that covers my scar, brings me staring back at him, as he sits with his brows upturned. There have been few times when he’s angered by something I’ve done, and each time, he makes a point to stroke my scar.
“I didn’t mean to raise my voice. I’m merely concerned for your safety, Wren. If anything were to happen to
you …” His brows pinch together, and he shakes his head as if shaking those thoughts out of his mind. “Please do not return to those woods again.”
“Okay, Papa.” I set my hand atop of his to keep him from caressing the ruined skin there. “I won’t.”
Chapter 7
Wren
Dawn filters in through my window that faces the lush green of the carob tree outside. At the click of the front door downstairs, I roll over, staring up at the white ceiling. It’s lesson day, which means Papa will be home earlier than usual, for math and science studies. There was a time I looked forward to his teachings, but my daily explorations have tugged my curiosity elsewhere.
Okay, a boy has tugged my curiosity.
A boy I’m no longer permitted to see.
I pull the pillow from beneath my head and slam it against my face, groaning into the muffled cotton.
My mind wanders to the last time I saw him. His strong jawline. His blue eyes. His lips. A boy shouldn’t have such full and symmetrical lips—particularly one so neglected and wounded. And his eyes shouldn’t carry the weight of the sea while holding the endless blue of the sky.
Beneath the cover of the pillow, I allow my hands to drift along my throat as I imagine his lips there. A tickle of excitement shoots down my spine, and a strange sensation tingles between my thighs.
The boys here are certainly handsome and strong, but there’s something about Six that fascinates me.
He’s ruined with scars. Mute. And far hungrier than any other boy I know. But there’s grit about him. One that allows him to walk amongst the Ragers and endure the kind of pain that marks his skin—a hidden curiosity that intrigues me to no end.
Watching him eat has to be the most riveting thing I’ve ever seen—his intense focus as he holds the fruit in his palms, as if it’s his last meal. The juices leaking out of the corner of his mouth, while he devours a fig, spreading it open to the soft flesh, from where he sucks the fruit into his mouth, lapping up the sweetness with his tongue.
I tip my head back to the pitiful sighs echoing inside my head, like wind through the trees, ones he makes while eating that remind me of an appreciative moan.
Those taunting thoughts draw my hand down along my belly, beneath the sheets, until I reach the apex of my thighs. A teasing caress of my fingers across the thin cotton panties plays to the visuals of his full lips buried there.
Oh, God.
I toss the pillow from my face and kick back to a sitting position, with the wall behind me pressing into my spine. Shame has me tugging up my knees, pulling them together, as it usually does the few times my hands have wandered there, and I will myself to stamp out the dirty thoughts inside my head.
About a year ago, I nabbed a book from the library, unaware that it was erotic in nature. Once the shock wore off, I became immersed in the explicit sexual scenes, almost enthralled, fantasizing about them during chores and before I fell asleep. The curiosity drove me to seek out more of those books, opening my eyes to things I never thought about much. How a man could bring pleasure to a woman. How she could crave his touch, obsessively, in some cases. I eventually learned the way my fingers could recreate those sensations, and in moments when Papa wasn’t home, or had fallen asleep, I indulged in the visuals locked inside my head.
It wasn’t until Papa stumbled upon one of my books, and acted embarrassed to have seen it, that I felt any level of humiliation afterward. From that point on, they became a true guilty pleasure. One I kept to myself.
Like Six.
There’s something about him that draws me in—a duality that captivates me. He needs someone to care about him, to touch him gently and soothe his pain. At the same time, there’s a darkness about him that warns me to stay away.
I can’t help it, though. The wounded boy has consumed my thoughts.
I have four hours to finish my chores and head out. The north side is a two- hour hike, and I’m damn well going back today.
Promise, or not, I have to see Six again.
This joy of seeing another human being is indescribable. I’m around others all day long. At home, at the market—hell, I passed at least two dozen others on the way to these woods. But for some reason, the sight of Six’s back as he faces away from me makes me feel like I’ve been stranded on another planet for years, and he’s the first of my species that I’ve stumbled upon.
“Psst!” I whisper with a smile, but when he turns to face me, the joy fades into pangs of disgust.
His lip is split, bleeding from a center cut. A knot, the color of a ripe plumb, sits at his cheekbone, beneath his eye that has filled with blood, making him look as inhuman as the Ragers who pace behind him. The soft blue of his iris is hidden behind an oversized pupil, and I gasp.
“Six? What happened to you?” The tremble in my voice comes as a surprise, even to me. Living with a physician, exposed to patients wandering in and complaining of a random wound, or ailment, has made me somewhat desensitized to the suffering of others. Six’s inflictions tug at my heart so strongly, I curl my hands into fists at the sight of him. “Did they do that to you?”
He gives a subtle, almost half-nod and turns away from me, and I know he doesn’t want me to ask any more questions.
“I brought you some soup. And bread.”
His shoulders slouch, as if he’s reluctant to give in to his hunger, but that’s the thing about starvation. It’s hard to ignore. Even where pride is concerned.
I open the bread wrapped in cheesecloth and pass it to him through the hole.
Our hands touch when he accepts it, and he recoils.
I don’t move, the proffered bread still in my palm, and he reaches for it again, allowing his fingers to brush my skin. With my forehead pressed into the wall, I close my eyes, focusing on his touch, until it disappears. The phantom stroke of his finger tickles my palm as I reach into my pack for the cup of soup that I’ve stored in one of the many empty pickle jars Papa keeps in the pantry. Nothing is discarded if it can be used.
The glass jar just fits through the hole that’s about six inches from the ground, and again, Six steals the opportunity to touch me. As he accepts the soup with one hand, another gently holds my fingers, tugging my hand through the hole, until I’m elbow deep and pressed against the concrete. Unable to see his ministrations, I allow him to explore my fingers, taking in the heat of his breath against my knuckles as he drags his mouth and nose over my skin. The sensation dies away as he releases me, and I pull my arm back through, rubbing the place where he touched me, before I kneel down to watch him eat.
He gulps back the broth with a moan that almost sounds like Mmmm. He finishes it off faster than I expected and pushes the jar back through to me, this time without touching my hand.
As his jaw works the bread, my eyes are drawn to another scar below his collar that disappears beneath his shirt.
“Can I see your scar?” I ask, hopeful that the question doesn’t scare him off. “The one at your neck.”
He pulls the collar of his shirt away, tipping his head to show me yet another grisly cut that extends across the base of his throat, just above a silver band there.
I try to imagine a reason for the wound, but the careless pattern of his stitches tells me there is none, and the knots twisting in my stomach are the first pangs of fear that these are the marks of sadism. That whoever has done this isn’t truly a doctor, because doctors don’t leave careless marks like that. Doctors aren’t supposed to hurt patients.
Rolling onto my back, I twist away, to keep him from seeing the agony of my intrusive stare and the tears welling in my eyes at the sight of his pain. How could I possibly cry for a stranger, when I hardly cry for those I know well? Just last week, Papa told me Mrs. Sanders passed away. The older woman was ill for many years, a regular patient of Papa’s who often stopped in for some of his herbal teas.
Yet, I felt nothing and silently chided my coldness.
The emotions that Six brings out in me almost don’t feel
real. Like I’m tricking my brain, somehow, and this is a test to see if I still have a heart. That I’ve not become so detached from humankind.
It is real, though. His suffering breaks my heart.
As I lie on the forest bed, my gaze catches on the heavy branch of the sycamore overhead—the way it falls short of the wall, as if it’s been cut away, so as not to hang over the edge. Obviously meant to keep those on the other side from getting in. But it’s close. Close enough to tie a rope onto for tossing over the wall.
The urgency beats through me, and I twist toward the hole, where Six peers through, at me.
“Listen to me. I’m going to get you out of there.”
He backs away from the hole, shaking his head.
“Six, I can do it! There’s a tree on this side. I’ll tie a rope and toss it over the wall.”
Still shaking his head, he gives a quick glance back toward the guards.
“Tonight. Can you meet me out here tonight? The electricity will go out, and no one will see us. Promise me you’ll come out here when the sun goes down.”
Rocking back and forth, he rubs his skull.
“Promise you’ll be here.” I push my hand through the hole, offering my palm. “I don’t want them to hurt you anymore, Six. Promise me. Shake on it.”
Rough skin brushes over mine, and when he squeezes my hand, I smile.
“I’ll come back for you.”
Chapter 8
Wren
A chill climbs my spine while a fire burns in my lungs, as I run along the narrow road that leads to the North side of the community. I’ve heard the night Mediators are so stealth with stalking after criminals and those who try to breach the wall, that an unwitting vagabond like me wouldn’t even know she was being hunted down until it was too late.