Before Reed could look closer, Elijah slipped it back inside his shirt with one swift movement. Reed’s gaze shifted up to meet his. The other boy looked back at him steadily with no anxiety or shame, but offered no excuse.
Before they could say anything, two girls rounded the corner of the house, carrying a large basket between them. They stopped at the sight of the three on the driveway.
“Why, Reed!” exclaimed one. “What are you doing here?”
It took Reed a moment to recognize Lucy. She wasn’t the professional office girl he was used to seeing. Her golden hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and the sleeves of her faded blouse had been rolled up past her elbows. Judging by the flush of her cheeks and the water splashed on her apron, she’d just finished washing something. Funny. Professional or not, she still looked very pretty.
“Oh, hi!” said Elijah, shifting the squirming Ethan over to his back. “I just ran into him on the way out here. He came along to help out.”
“How nice!” Lucy came forward with a radiant smile. The second girl followed, obliged to go where the basket went, but she eyed Reed with obvious doubt. Lucy turned to her. “Marielle, this is Reed, the one you’ve heard us talk about. Reed, this is Marielle, Ethan’s sister.”
The girl smiled politely and murmured some greeting, but she shifted her weight and shot both Lucy and Elijah uncertain glances. She was younger than they were, perhaps fourteen or fifteen, with a slender, pointed face. Her straight hair, dark like her brother’s, fell past her narrow shoulders.
“I wish you had been here a little earlier to help us hang out the laundry,” Lucy continued gaily, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “It appears somebody ran off with all our clothespins.”
Ethan peered over Elijah’s shoulder. “Oops. Sorry. But Yijah got here!”
“And you just couldn’t wait.” Lucy patted him on the cheek. “But maybe now you can make up for it and help ’Lijah while he works.”
The little boy nodded, bouncing up and down on Elijah’s back.
“Then we’ll finish fixing the barn roof from last week,” Elijah said over his shoulder. “You can hand me my tools. Anything else?”
“Mother wondered if somebody could work on the back door,” Marielle informed him, taking the empty basket from Lucy. “The knob won’t turn again.”
Elijah nodded. “All right, we’ll start with that, won’t we?”
“Yeth!” Ethan swung his feet gleefully.
“Reed can help on the roof when you’re done with that,” Lucy added. “We’ll find something to do until then.”
Marielle led Elijah and his eager charge toward the back of the house. Lucy and Reed came behind at a slower pace.
“How did you get hooked up with these people?” he asked her when the other three were out of earshot. “I mean, why did they pick you guys out of all the kids on the Hill?”
“They didn’t pick us. We asked to help them,” she replied, rolling down her left sleeve. “We met their family through the church not long after we got here and offered to do what we could.”
“You went to a church here? I thought they were all government-controlled.”
“Most are, but not ours. It’s…” she stopped and stared at him, eyes wide. “It’s… underground. But don’t mention that to anybody, not even that it exists. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“I can keep secrets. I’m getting kinda used to it.”
“It’s not that I doubt you.” She began to work on her other sleeve. “But you have to understand that, when our group agreed to let you visit, we chose to take the risk on ourselves. We can’t ask the whole church to do that. It’s made up of old people and young couples and families with little kids.” She stopped for a second, staring at nothing, before she went back to fixing her cuff. “Our Hill kids’ group is just an off-shoot. We’re young enough to risk it. The rest of the church couldn’t without risking whole families.”
“You make it sound pretty big.”
“It’s a fair size.” She finished with her sleeve and laughed. “You didn’t think we were the only Christians in the whole city, did you?”
Reed chuckled uncertainly and changed the subject. “So you met this family, and they needed your help. Why doesn’t their dad do all this stuff?”
Lucy dropped her eyes. “They don’t have a father anymore,” she said quietly.
“Oh.” For a moment, the only sounds were their slow steps on the rock driveway. “Well, at least the kid seems to have hit it off with Elijah.”
Lucy laughed. “Yeah, he has. Ethan’s so adorable it’s hard not to like him, and ’Lijah loves kids.”
They walked in silence for a moment. At last, Reed could contain his curiosity no longer. “Lucy, do you know anything about that chain Elijah wears?”
Her smile vanished. “Why do you ask?”
“I caught a glimpse of it and couldn’t tell what it was. Do you know?”
She looked down and smoothed the front of her apron. “If he hasn’t told you, I’m sure he has his reasons.”
“I didn’t ask him about it, and he doesn’t volunteer a lot about himself, if you know what I mean. Surely you can just tell me what it is.”
She didn’t reply at first. When she did speak, her voice had fallen from its normal, happy pitch. “It’s not my place to tell you. He has reasons for everything he does, and he’ll tell you if he wants to.”
“All right then,” said Reed, a little nettled at her stubbornness. “I’ll ask him.”
She whirled on him in an instant. “Don’t you dare!”
He stepped back, stunned. Her bright face was transformed by a look of sudden fierceness that matched the fury in her voice. She was trembling, and a warning glitter flickered in her eyes… or was it the glistening of tears? Either way, it shocked Reed and left him speechless.
His astonishment must have shown on his face for she spun away, inhaling to bring herself under control. “I’m sorry, Reed.”
He remained silent and let her regain her composure. She turned back after a moment, all ferocity gone, but her face still worked with strong emotion. “I should not have said that like I did. Forgive me.” She sighed. “You have to understand that it’s not for my reasons that I won’t tell you. It’s for his sake. Talking about people behind their backs is never good, but especially not in this situation. That pendant comes from his past, and the story behind it is very personal. Don’t ask him, Reed. Just don’t. He’ll tell you if he wants you to know.” Her eyes sought his.
Reed said nothing for a moment but, at last, he conceded. “All right.”
They resumed their walk. A bird twittered in the woods. Everything else was quiet.
Reed broke the silence. “So do we actually have to do any of these chores or can we just chill for a while and call it a day?”
Lucy laughed suddenly. “Reed! It won’t be all that bad! Have you ever planted a garden before?”
And that was how Reed spent the rest of his Saturday afternoon—slicing potatoes, digging holes, filling them back in, and hammering on top of the barn roof. Lucy and Elijah found plenty to keep them all busy. Reed could think of no excuse to stop while they continued. What did I get myself into?
During his stay, he learned there were four more children in the family, all of whom still lived on the farm and expected him to remember their names. There was a Meagan and a set of twins with “L” names he couldn’t remember for sure. Another boy everybody called Matt seemed to be the oldest, but Reed didn’t care to ask. It was a relief to meet the one and only animal on the farm, a silver gelding by the name of Patton, who didn’t expect anything from him and seemed more laid back than the rest of the rambunctious brood.
At the end of the day, he was introduced to Mrs. Shelly, the matriarch—a kindly, care-worn woman with a slender, patient face and straight dark hair just beginning to gray. She thanked them sincerely for their help and hugged Lucy and Elijah. She refrained in Reed’s case, however, and sh
ook his hand instead.
When the three teens left the farm at last, Reed realized he had completely missed the biggest social day of the Hill’s week. On top of that, he had dirt on the knees of his favorite jeans, a splinter in his right thumb, and a terrible ache in his back. What’s the point? The other two might be satisfied with a hug for all their pains, but what did he get out of it? It wasn’t the afternoon he’d expected. What was Reagan going to say?
Chapter 17
“BOR-ring,” yawned Reagan, lounging in his chair with his computer on his lap.
It was warm indoors tonight. It was quiet, too, except for the lulling hum of the fluorescent lights overhead and the far-off rumble of the central heating unit.
Reagan’s remark was prompted by a dull evening following a mediocre day. Reed, lying in his usual position on the bed, grunted.
“You’d think they’d give us a little more to do around here at night,” Reagan continued, circling his finger listlessly across his touchpad.
Reed grunted again and stirred. “I guess that’s what the new rec center’s supposed to do when it’s finished.”
“Humph! If it ever gets finished. It’s taking them forever.”
“The government at its best. Are they ever fast?” Reed rolled onto his back and rubbed his eyes. “But they’ve got until April or May. After that, I guess we start filing complaints with Connors in written form.”
Reagan chuckled. Reed rolled off his bunk and stood up, stretching. “Well, no use just lying around.” He yawned. “I’ll go see if anything’s happening on the hall.”
“And if it isn’t?”
“Then I’ll start something wild and get everybody else in trouble when Michael finds out.”
Reagan laughed outright. “Now you’re talking! I’ve trained you well.”
“What can I say?” Reed made a humble bow. “I’ll be on the hall. The room’s all yours; don’t have too much fun without me.”
He stepped out the open door and looked both ways. To his left, two shirtless boys were having a wrestling match on the tile floor amid a small circle of onlookers. To his right, the hall was empty—almost. A few pairs of feet stuck out of rooms too crowded to hold all the boys who tried to squeeze into them. Reed decided to try this direction first. He wasn’t in the mood to get pulled into a WWE match, despite his boasting to Reagan.
He sauntered down the hall, looking into different rooms and weighing his options. After passing his third open door and declining another set of enthusiastic invitations, Reed heard someone calling behind him.
“Hey! Reed!”
He turned.
Hunter had pushed his way out of the first room Reed had passed and was coming toward him. That was no surprise; Hunter usually sought him out when he was visiting on the hall.
“Hey!” Hunter caught up and fell in step beside him. “Where were you on Saturday? I looked for you all over the place, but you weren’t anywhere.”
Reed shrugged. “I went off the Hill with a friend. Why?” he added teasingly. “Did you miss me?”
“Yeah, everybody did. You’re, like, half the fun around here now.”
The serious reply caught Reed off guard. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Psh! Whatever.”
“I’m serious! A lot of people think so, especially Allie.”
Reed made an odd noise in his throat. Allie was a pretty girl from Dorm Eight, one of the social butterflies of the Hill. Everyone knew her, and she was considered a fine connoisseur of boys.
“Ridiculous!” Reed declared. He felt his face getting hot nonetheless. “Allie thinks any decent-looking male that has a face and breathes is fun.”
“Really?” Hunter shot him an odd look and arched his eyebrows. “I doubt she notices when each one is missing and asks about him.”
“Did she?”
“Duh, yeah! Her and half the other girls. But nobody knew where you’d gone. Who did you say you went with?”
“Oh.” Reed floundered for an instant. He stopped to take off his socks, balancing himself against the wall. “You wouldn’t know him. He’s not in the Dorms.” He had a strange reluctance to reveal Elijah’s identity. Perhaps it was the same reason he sometimes avoided Nathan at the factory. Or maybe he was still smarting from Elijah’s gentle but effective rebuke.
“Oh, one of the apartment people.” The disdain dripped from Hunter’s voice.
“Something wrong with them?” Reed straightened and stuffed the socks in his back pocket, resuming his slow walk barefoot.
“Oh, I just think they’re ridiculous. I don’t see who would want to move out and leave all the Dorms’ fun unless they’re flat-out boring… or have something to hide.”
Reed darted a glance at him. Hunter knew something. His mind raced for a way to convince the other boy to reveal his secret. He leaned closer. “What do you mean?”
Hunter stopped in the middle of the hall, looked both ways, and lowered his voice. “I’ve been thinking about it. I wouldn’t be surprised if the ringer actually lives outside the Dorms. It would make perfect sense. That way, he—or she—could hang out with us whenever they wanted but not have to worry about being watched the rest of the time. They wouldn’t have to deal with curious roommates, curfew, RDs, anything.”
Reed breathed a little easier; Hunter was on a different track. Still, his idea made sense. Good sense. Reed hadn’t thought about that before. The idea sank in.
“I’d be careful around those people if I were you, Reed,” Hunter warned. “You never know what they could be up to.”
Reed had to agree. He moved into a walk. “I take it you’re not keen on the Council’s spies.”
Hunter snorted. “I’ll go further than that. I hate the Council!”
The statement carried every bit of feeling that could be fit into the four words. Reed glanced at him, shocked. No one ever dared to say something like that out loud. But Hunter kept going, his passion rising with each word.
“All they do is boss us around and keep us tied up with all these stupid rules and lockdowns! I can’t stand being under somebody’s foot like this. I don’t need them, and I could do way better on my own!”
Reed wasn’t sure what to say. He couldn’t deny that he sympathized deeply with Hunter’s feelings, but he could hardly believe his friend’s brashness. His hatred made him far too reckless. Caught up in their conversation, the two had ceased paying attention to the hails coming out of the many open doorways they passed. But, as they neared the end of the hall and their discussion, Hunter stopped abruptly. “What’s that smell?”
Reed, who hadn’t been paying much attention, inhaled deeply and then wrinkled his nose. The scent was ever so slight—hardly noticeable, in fact—but it was very odd. “I don’t know. I’ve smelled it down at this end before. Somebody said it was something in the attic.”
The explanation didn’t satisfy Hunter. He continued sniffing, turning his head in all directions. “It smells almost like something burning.” He walked back and forth, intently following his nose, and then stopped before a closed door. “And it’s strongest right here.”
Reed joined him and breathed in again. It was stronger now, and it did smell like something burning but with a hint of something sour and musty. It was beginning to seem vaguely familiar. His brain groped to identify it, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on what it was.
Hunter was eyeing the door, one of the few closed on the hall. “Hmm… I say we go in and see what’s happening.”
Reed offered no objections, and Hunter turned the handle (knocking was obsolete on the hall) and pushed. The door didn’t budge. He put his shoulder to it and leaned with all his weight. Reed joined him. Slowly, it began to swing back with an odd sliding noise. As it opened, the smell rolled out to meet them in an overpowering wave. Its strength registered instantly with Reed. It was an odor he had often smelled in the less-frequented places of his high school back home. The door opened just wide enough for both of them to see into the dim room.
>
A fog filled it from floor to ceiling, turning objects within to hazy shapes that floated in the mist—ghosts of chairs, desks, beds. There were people, too. Half a dozen boys drifted in the swirling sea like figures in a bizarre dream. They lounged on the beds, chairs, and nightstands, thin wisps of smoke curling from their lips and the rolls in their fingers. They seemed completely unaware of their visitors until the reeking billows set Reed coughing. One look at the dull faces and reddened eyes that turned toward the door showed what kind of vapors filled the room. Another glance revealed why the door had been so reluctant to open: towels stuffed in the crack and piled on the floor to keep smoke from escaping into the hall. Through watering eyes, Reed recognized several faces from his hall and the neighboring dorms. A few, though, were strange. All stared at them wordlessly. Hunter was the first to break the silence.
“So… whatchya guys doing?”
There were low, murmured replies. One of the group spoke up. “Catchin’ butterflies, o’ course.”
Slow laughter slithered out of the haze. Reed decided to try a more effective approach. “Don’t you know you could get caught? You’ll set off the fire alarm in a minute.”
The boy nearest the door stood up, fishing in his pocket, and produced a small battery. “We’ve taken care of that.” His voice was low and gravelly, almost more of a growl. He was one of the few Reed didn’t recognize. “Everything’s fine. Why don’t you guys join us? There’s plenty to go ’round.”
A murmur of assent rose from the rest of the room, but Hunter shook his head. “No, thanks, I’ll pass this time. But where’d you guys get the stuff?”
“Why does it matter?” the boy said. “If you want some, take it. That’s all you need to know.”
Hunter shrugged. “All right. Just don’t let Michael catch you. Old Connors would roast you alive if he found out.”
“I bet he would.” The boy eased himself back onto his seat on the nightstand. “But he won’t find out. He’s been trying, and he can’t.”
“Well, he won’t hear about it from us,” Hunter assured him.
When Stars Go Out Page 11