“Almost there,” she whispered over and over again. “Just one more mile.”
“Water, please, water,” a muffled voice whimpered.
No one else walked on the street. The wind? No, she’d distinctly heard a plea for water.
“Please, water,” the voice groaned a little louder. Something blue moved against a green lawn.
One step, then another. She eased closer to a man huddled in a blue blanket, shivering where he sat on the lawn in front of a brick house. Lights glowed inside and a curtain fluttered.
“Please, I’m so thirsty,” he begged. His thin body shook violently and beads of sweat lined the crown of his forehead. “Water . . .” He broke into a rasping cough that caved his body into itself.
Lareina reached her hand back and pulled a half empty bottle of water from the front pocket of her bag. She wanted to back away, to escape the most dangerous person she’d met all day, to return to the previous day when the fever was just a story in a newspaper, too distant to affect her. Instead she twisted the cap off the bottle and leaned down, placing it in the man’s hand.
“Is your family inside?” she asked.
He didn’t sit up, but tipped the bottle sideways and sipped slowly at the water. “I don’t want them near me.” He reached out and gripped her wrist so tight it hurt. His eyes burned into hers. “Keep them away from me.”
She yanked her wrist back with such force that she tumbled backward. He collapsed against the blanket and watched her with frightened eyes. He knew he would die, alone on his front lawn, but he didn’t believe he had another choice.
“I’m s-sorry.” She stood and backed away, glancing from the man to the imprints of fingers on her wrist until her shoes left the spongy grass and landed on solid concrete. A low clap of thunder rumbled in the distance—the storm was close.
Lareina sprinted down the sidewalk despite thick, humid air and her heavy bag slamming against her back with every other step. She hurdled tree branches without stopping and skirted corners without slowing. When the olive-green house came into view, she stopped so abruptly that she almost fell forward. On wobbling legs she approached the porch, gasping for air and forcing her feet to shuffle forward.
Thunder roared in the distance and lightning painted a shadow tree across the house. Pausing to push tangled hair out of her face, she listened to the urgent clanging of the wind chime. The front door swung open and Aaron appeared in the doorway with a relieved smile on his face.
“Rochelle, where have you been? We thought you weren’t coming back.”
Without answering, she walked into the house and let her bag slide onto the bench in the foyer, then walked to the staircase. “There’s food inside,” she said on her way up the stairs.
“Where are you going?” Aaron’s voice sounded far away.
“I’m not hungry.”
Her feet found the landing and she bounded up the last six steps into a long hallway with polished wooden floors. A tree branch outside beat against the house with each gust of wind, but no footsteps followed on the stairs. She locked herself in the first bedroom where she had left all of her stuff the day before and rushed into the connected bathroom where she slumped into the bathtub. Any trace of the imprints left by feverish fingers had vanished from her wrist.
I’ll die here, she thought. I’ll get sick and die all alone like that man, like all of those people wrapped in white sheets.
Tears welled in her eyes but she didn’t cry. Instead she stripped off her sweat-soaked clothes, letting them fall into the bathtub, and turned on the water. The shower spluttered before icy water cascaded over her. Every instinct screamed for her to escape the torturous cold, but she forced herself to remain still. She pulled a bottle of soap from a basket suspended in the shower, dumped the whole thing over her head, and scrubbed her skin until it turned crimson. Ten minutes passed before she felt satisfied that all of the fever germs had washed down the drain. After wrapping herself in a towel she washed her clothes out, hung them over the shower rod, and returned to the bedroom.
She picked up a brush off the dresser and stood in front of a mirror that hung on the back of the door, carefully untangling her wind- and water-knotted hair. Thunder rumbled loud enough to rattle knickknacks on a shelf above the bed. In flashes of lightning, she thought her lips looked blue, but despite uncontrollable shivering, she told herself she wasn’t sick. In the closet she found a large t-shirt and sweatpants. The garments hung on her thin frame, but she decided they were good enough until her own clothes dried.
Still shaking, she picked up a blanket stretched across the foot of the bed and wrapped it around herself. The pendant sat against her chest like an ice cube, but she couldn’t take it off. Thunder cracked outside, rattling the windowpane. Lareina ran to the door, reached her shaking hand toward the knob, then yanked it back.
Nick would be down there and she didn’t want to face him, but she didn’t want to be alone. The fever, the pendant, Nick, Galloway, the endless storms—she despised them all. A gust of wind slammed leaves and twigs against the window. She pulled the door open and stumbled down the stairs. A candle glowed in the foyer, casting flickering shadows on the wall. More shivering light and the comfort of human voices emanated from the living room where both boys sat on the floor with a game of Battleship between them.
Aaron looked up first. “Rochelle, are you okay?”
The room slid left, grew longer, then shorter. Her legs bent, too wobbly to hold her weight. Then Aaron’s arm looped around her, guided her across the room, and helped her sit down on the couch. When she opened her eyes both boys studied her as if she were an abstract painting in a museum. Look but don’t touch. Ask questions but never find answers.
“I shouldn’t have g-gone into the city,” she stammered.
Nick thrust his hands into his pockets.
Aaron leaned forward. “What happened? Are you hurt?”
She closed her eyes and saw white sheets fluttering in the wind, filling the beds of trucks, lined up and down sidewalks. Tears rushed to her eyes and she didn’t try to stop them, didn’t try to hide them.
“I saw a man dying on his front lawn,” she explained. “He needed water so I gave him mine. He grabbed my wrist and now I’m shivering and my head hurts.” Her voice fragmented into a dozen pieces, lost in the deafening thunder and wind outside.
Aaron shook his head. “You don’t have the fever. You wouldn’t show symptoms for at least two to three days after exposure.”
“But I’m so cold.” She pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders.
“How long did you stand in the shower?” He gently touched the back of his hand to her forehead. “You’re ice cold. There’s no way you’re running a fever.”
Hands twisted the clouds above and a torrent of rain crashed against the roof. Windows creaked and the house groaned.
“That man is outside in the storm,” she whispered. New tears flooded her eyes.
Nick looked down at his socks, and swayed slightly back and forth.
Aaron put an arm around her. “You did everything you could for him. Most people wouldn’t have even stopped.”
She nodded, sniffled, closed her eyes, and let her head rest against Aaron’s shoulder.
“Nick, can you go get her something to eat?”
Footsteps padded across the floor, softer and softer, until she couldn’t hear them anymore. Lareina sat up and tried to wipe tears away with the sleeve of her shirt. Aaron handed her a box of tissues.
“Are you feeling better?”
She wasn’t, but she nodded anyway. “I’m sorry about this.” She wiped her cheek and wadded the wet tissue in her hand.
Aaron smiled. “I have three little sisters. Tears don’t scare me.”
Tears had always been a sign of weakness, a reason for ridicule, an unforgivable offense until now. “Where is your family?”
“California. We didn’t have a lot of money so a year ago I went to Los Angeles to find a job. Tha
t way my parents had one less person to feed and I could send money back.”
Trying to ignore the storm that ripped through the neighborhood, she shivered and folded her legs under her. “So how did you get to Texas?”
The smile in his eyes faded and his head slumped into his shoulders a little. “For a while I was working at a hospital, or kind of training with a doctor, I guess. He died two months ago, and none of the other doctors wanted an eighteen-year-old kid with less than a high school education hanging around. They told me there were no training programs in California and suggested I try heading east. One of them felt bad enough for me that he bought me a train ticket to Houston, where there used to be a training program . . . but now there isn’t, and I’m here still trying to become a doctor.”
“What about your family?”
Aaron shrugged. “They probably think I’m dead.”
“But you could write to them.” She couldn’t imagine having a family and then walking away as if they didn’t exist.
“Maybe one day.”
Soft footsteps approached in the hall, and Nick returned carrying a dish and glass of water. He held out a plate containing a peanut butter and jelly sandwich surrounded by slices of apple.
“I can get you something else,” he offered. “I wasn’t sure what you would like.”
“No, it’s okay.” She ate while a torrent of rain pounded against the house. After finishing her dinner, she curled up on the pile of blankets she’d left on the floor and closed her eyes against the cacophony outside.
Cool air brushed her face. She walked through a gray city with gray buildings and gray trees. A white sheet fluttered to the ground, and when she looked down at the sidewalk she found it was piled so high with people wrapped in white sheets that she couldn’t continue forward. The sheets moved as people tried to kick and fight their way out, but no one escaped. Then everything around her turned white and squeezed tighter and tighter until—
“Rochelle. Rochelle, can you hear me?”
Her eyes shot open and she sat up, forcing air into her lungs. Nick knelt on the floor beside her. A crisp breeze drifted through the open window. She looked around the room trying to orient herself, then noticed the blanket tangled around her leg and frantically kicked it away.
“You’re okay, it was just a nightmare,” Nick comforted.
“Yeah, I know. Where’s Aaron?” She rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand. They felt heavy and crusty.
Nick sat down and stretched his legs across the floor. “He found a fishing pole in the garage and said he knew where he could catch fish. He told me to let you rest.”
“What time is it?”
“Early in the afternoon.” He jumped up. “You have to be hungry. What would you like? A sandwich, apple, granola bar, banana, all of the above?”
Lareina fell back onto her pillow and closed her eyes. “It’s okay, Nick, I’m not hungry.”
“You just rest. I’ll figure something out.”
When his footsteps faded, she got up, walked into the little bathroom to splash water on her face, then returned to the living room and knelt on the couch. The coolest afternoon air since April flowed through the open window. Outside were the remains of the storm: large branches littered the entire front yard and a tree had fallen across the street, pinning part of a fence to the ground.
“All right, lunch is served,” Nick announced from the doorway.
Reluctantly she turned around and sank into the couch. She didn’t have the patience to be in the same room with him or pretend that she could tolerate his sanctimonious attitude.
A sandwich, cut diagonally in half, and slices of apple filled the plate gripped in his hand. He sat down and lowered it to the cushion between them. After a moment of awkward silence, he said, “It’s beautiful outside. Feels like October instead of August.”
One bite of the sandwich sent its smooth, rich texture sliding along her tongue. “What is this?”
He grinned. “Peanut butter and banana.”
She eyed the sandwich suspiciously. “That sounds disgusting.”
“You thought it was good before I told you what it was,” he teased. “Come on, you get your protein and potassium all in one sandwich.”
“You aren’t going to tell me you were studying to be a nutritionist?” She took another bite and swallowed.
“It’s something my mom used to say.” He shrugged, all lightheartedness gone from his expression. “That was my favorite food when I was a kid.”
Nick had a favorite food, and she was lucky if the adults in her life remembered to feed her.
He shifted his weight and twiddled his thumbs nervously. “Rochelle, I’m really sorry about what I said yesterday. I didn’t mean that, I just got mad and . . .”
Wind chimes clanged loudly outside and a breeze that smelled like roses drifted into the room. A ticking clock and the dripping bathroom sink combined to form a rhythmic beat. Nick watched his thumbs link and pull apart over and over. He looked remorseful, but how long would it last?
“You must have meant some of it. You’ve been suspicious of me since the moment we met.”
He sat up straighter. “That’s not true. You helped me and gave that guy water yesterday. You can’t be all that bad.”
Lareina finished her sandwich and started eating apple slices. She turned her face toward the window, let the refreshing air calm her, and waited for Nick’s judgment.
“It’s just, I grew up with really strict parents. If I had ever taken anything without paying for it, they would have killed me. I like talking to Rochelle Aumont, but hanging around Rochelle the thief makes me nervous.”
“You make it sound like I’m two different people.”
He leaned forward and light caught the bruise under his eye, revealing three shades of purple and four of blue. “Sometimes it seems like you are. You break the laws, but you do everything else right like giving me food before you left San Antonio. It’s just . . . hard for me to fit all of that into one person.”
Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Nick rubbed his hand across his forehead and shook his head.
“I think you’re a good person,” he started again, “but when I eat food you’ve stolen, I feel like an accomplice and I don’t want to get in trouble. I don’t want you to get in trouble either. I just wish the world was different.”
Finally something she could agree with. Although the apology felt a little like an accusation, she smiled. “Me too, but it’s not going to change, so I have to do whatever it takes to keep us alive.”
“But if it did . . . change,” he insisted, “then you would stop?”
“It won’t change.”
“But if it did?” He waited, his eyes staring into hers, searching for the truth.
“I would like nothing more than to never steal again.” She said the words before she had time to think about them, but they felt true.
Nodding, he extended his hand. “Friends then? I promise to stop jumping to conclusions about you.”
Slowly, she slid her hand forward and took his. “I promise to stop teasing you about falling into that pit.”
Nick laughed, a resonating peal that sounded like church bells. She leaned her head against the couch and let her heavy eyelids slide closed. Despite sleeping all night and halfway through the day, her head felt heavy and her legs ached. “I’m still tired. You don’t think I’m getting the fever?”
“No, you just need more rest.”
She wanted to open her eyes, to examine his face for honesty, to lift her head off the cushion, but she struggled against weariness pulling her into the darkness of nightmares. “What if it is . . . the fever?”
“You’re only seventeen. People under twenty-five almost always recover.”
It took so much energy and effort to gather, find, steal enough food to survive each day. “I would starve to death.” She remembered the man, dying alone while his family hid inside, and shivered.
An arm slid behin
d her shoulders, lifted her, and lowered her until her head sank into a pillow and her body rested against soft cushions. “Aaron and I wouldn’t let you starve.” The words repeated over and over in her mind as she spiraled back into sleep.
Chapter 10
Through a second-floor bedroom window, the sky glowed softly then brightened to hues of pink and blue as if someone pulled a tinted lens over the glass. Lareina sat on the window seat, knees drawn up to her chin, cheek rested against the glass. For her entire life she’d been focused on the horizon, running toward the sun, away from it, never succeeding in catching it or escaping herself. At first she didn’t have a choice and the ORI administrators moved her against her will. Then she walked to San Antonio with the hope of finding her family but never uncovered the lead to take her to a new city. Galloway forcing her out of San Antonio made her realize she’d become a victim of her own life instead of taking charge and fighting for what she wanted. If she couldn’t have the family she was born into then she would find a new one.
She needed to continue north, to Maibe and the people who were the closest to family she had ever known, but she wanted to say goodbye. It had been dark when she woke up on the couch with blankets tucked around her. Not wanting to wake the boys, she’d tiptoed upstairs and searched until she found clothes close enough to her size that they earned a spot in her bag, replacing worn or dirty counterparts. She changed into her jeans and t-shirt, now dry on the shower rod, and pulled her bag over her shoulder. Then she noticed the sunrise and sat down to watch it, to wait for Nick and Aaron to wake up, to delay her departure.
A door squeaked down the hall and footsteps padded to the stairs. She took one last look at the sprawling blue sky stretching for miles before meeting the ground. Freedom and danger. Hope and dread. Her stomach tightened.
Hope for the Best Page 8