If the Light Escapes: A Braving the Light Novel

by Brenda Marie Smith

  “Well, you know what I hated? That I couldn’t protect you. I wanted to shoot those guys, but I had to hide.”

  “Aww…” I reach for her, and she tips sideways into my arms. “Is this what’s been bothering you lately?”

  I feel her muscles tense up. “Bothering me? What do you mean?”

  “Ever since we went pecan-hunting…” I hesitate, biting the inside of my cheek. “It seems like you’re half-mad all the time, like you’re far away.”

  “Does it?” Her voice gets quiet. “I didn’t mean to…”

  “Is something bothering you besides being pregnant? Does it have anything to do with that guy Ray?”

  “Ray?” She pushes away from me, sitting all erect. Shit, she was softening up, and now…

  “Alma?”

  “Don’t make me tell you. Please.”

  “I won’t make you do anything. But you’d be helping me out if you told me, to keep me from imagining things.”

  She meets my eyes, and then she lets out an explosive sigh and looks past me. She’s grimacing as though she’s wrestling with a pain inside her.

  “It’s too hard to talk about.” Her eyes are pleading with me, and I watch her and wait. “He abused me, okay?”

  “Ray did? Oh, baby.” I move to hug her, but she stiff-arms me.

  “I never told anyone. Well, I told Tasha a tiny bit.” There’s a low moan behind her voice. “When our mom and dad didn’t come home after the solar thing, I thought we might starve. We had food for a couple of weeks, but then nothing. My brothers were so skinny, especially Pedro. He would just sit there, like he didn’t have any energy at all.”

  “Jesus. I didn’t know it got that bad.”

  “Then freaking Ray came along. This old guy, right? He lived in another neighborhood, but he pushed a wheelbarrow full of water jugs down our street one day. We didn’t have water, either, so I asked if I could buy some. Well, he looked me up and down and said, ‘Maybe so.’”

  I shoot to my feet. “Alma?” I’m terrified of what she’ll say next.

  “I’m ashamed, okay? Sit down.”

  I’m watching Alma sink into her shame, and I need to throttle this puke Ray. But I sit down for her sake.

  “I made him think I liked him and that maybe someday I’d give him… you know… sex.”

  My fists are clenched. I’m quivering with rage.

  “I got him to bring food and water every couple of days, and I’d make out with him.”

  She made out with him? I might have to barf.

  “But I never let him do more, okay?” She’s placating me now, and I’m ashamed I made her feel the need to. “I said it was against my religion to have sex outside marriage. I made him come and go through my bedroom window after Chris and Pedro went to sleep. We’d sit on the loveseat and make out, then I’d make him go home.”

  I’m breathing loud, nodding. I pull her head against me and stroke her hair.

  “But Pedro—” She pulls back and turns her face away. “He saw us.”

  “Oh no!”

  “I guess we woke him up, so he ran into my room. And when he saw that sleaze looming over me, kissing me all creepy-like, Pedro screamed. Then Ray yelled, ‘Get out, you little shit!’ Pedro ran to his room and wouldn’t come out for two days. I tried to talk to him, but he covered his ears. When he finally came out, he wouldn’t talk anymore.”

  “Shit, Alma. That’s terrible. Poor Pedro.” I pull her to me again.

  “It’s a good thing you guys came when you did,” Alma murmurs into my chest. She’s trembling all over. “It was getting harder and harder to get him to leave. He said I owed him, on account of all the food he gave me.”

  I want to beat Ray senseless. Preying on a hungry teenage girl, especially this girl, my girl.

  I rack my brain, searching for words that aren’t full of rage. “You know it’s not your fault, right? Anyone smart would’ve done what you did. You saved your brothers… and yourself.”

  “It feels like it was my fault.”

  “I’m sorry it feels that way.” I try to study her face, but she’s staring away. Jesus, all us broken people. How will we survive this shit?

  I knew she had a lot of pain, but this is worse than I thought. I want to take that pain out of Alma if it’s the last thing I do in this world.

  I lie awake after Alma falls asleep, having a conversation with her in my head—things I can’t say to her yet, or ever—but I want to know what she thinks.

  I mean, Ray’s a camo guy. So, what does that make the camo guys? A pack of pedophiles and thieves? Are they murderers? Okay, Alma was seventeen when Ray abused her, so maybe he’s not technically a pedophile, but it was wrong and he knew it, and it’s so fricking abusive. He’s scarred her for life. She has an astounding ability to deal with it, but I just want to hurt him.

  He wanted her back, too, didn’t he? He was all flirty at first, but when she didn’t do what he wanted, he got threatening, and he gave both of us that steely-eyed once-over. He did walk away without causing a bunch of shit, but my gun was more ready to fire than his was, and he doesn’t fool me. He could come back for Alma anytime. I don’t want to let her out of my sight.

  Alma probably won’t want it, but I’d like someone with a gun to be near her every minute of every day.

  When I open my eyes in mid-afternoon, Alma’s watching me sleep. She kisses me until I’m good and awake. I’m still raw over what that fuck Ray did to her. I don’t know how she’s lived with it. I want to do something for her, to make her happier.

  “Hey, Alma. What if we move Chris and Pedro in with us?”

  “They don’t want to move in. I asked them again the other day.”

  Shit. Now I’ve caused her more pain. “I’m sorry. Why don’t we go ahead and tell the family about the baby, so you can have more support?”

  “But they’re your family, not mine. What if we tell them and they don’t care?”

  “If they want me in their family, they have to take you into their hearts. You’re part of me, the best part of me.”

  This gets a smile out of Alma, like maybe she’s relaxing after sharing her secret. I hope it’s a relief to her that she doesn’t have to hold those toxic memories inside anymore.

  We kiss for a while, and then we start getting dressed. Alma says, “I’ll decide in the next couple of days how to tell them.”

  “You’re the one who’s pregnant. You can decide everything about it.”

  I’m trying to be upbeat for Alma’s sake, but I’m stifling my urge to go after Ray, and shooting that guy is also eating at me. I should’ve killed him or not shot him in the first place. Grazing him just pissed him off, and I’m crazy-worried about what he’ll do now. Why did I have to fire a warning shot so close to him?

  I pull on my boots. The top stitching’s coming loose from the soles. I’ve still got some sneakers, but they’re worn-out inside and won’t last much longer either. I don’t know how we’re gonna get more shoes. Lots of people have big holes in their shoes, like Milo, for instance.

  “Damn it,” Alma says. “My pants are too tight.” She’s trying to zip her jeans, but I don’t think it’s gonna happen.

  “That’s another reason to tell, before you start showing up in cold weather wearing tent dresses.”

  “Oh, you!” Alma digs out a pair of stretchy pants and wrestles with them until they’re up where they belong. Then she pulls on her hoodie, so I pull on mine. Mine needs elbow patches, but Alma’s looks pretty good. She doesn’t wear out her clothes and shoes as fast as I do. She’s all dainty but also strong. I mean, her thighs! Man, I love her thighs.

  We go down the street to the composting toilet and take turns in there, and then we come back home and wash our hands.

  It’s eerie and empty in the house. Alma stares around, like she’s looking for Nana.
You get used to relying on people like Nana and Tasha, and when they’re gone, it fucking sucks.

  No one’s making dinner. No one brought in water or chopped firewood, either. Where are they? I hope they’re not sulking in their separate corners. Moping around and letting the darkness take us over the way it’s always trying to do—that shit will end us.

  Yep, we’ve got to tell them about the baby to give them a reason to get up in the morning and work so hard. Because the way we have to live with so much danger and people dying—it’s depressing as fuck.

  I start a fire in the patio grill, and then I get Alma gallons and gallons of water from the rain barrels, which takes a while, since the barrels are low again. I chop a pile of firewood, and then I follow Alma inside, where she’s got potatoes spread across the counter.

  I offer to help her cook, but she says I’ll be in her way. And I would be, like a broken cog in her food factory.

  I stand behind Alma, rubbing her belly, snuggling into her backside. She stops washing potatoes and leans into me. No one else is around, so I run my hands over her full breasts.

  We could do this all the time if we had our own place. Someday, we should move into an empty house, but not now. Alma needs more people watching over her than just me.

  “Need anything else before I go look at the wheat?”

  “No, go on. Thank you for helping me.” Alma even thanks me for doing chores that help me, too. She seems to be coming back to herself. But I imagine the trauma of Ray will always be with her and it could flare up again anytime. I need to be strong for her when that happens.

  CHAPTER 23

  I hurry down to the park. The sun’s getting low in the west, and I want to see that wheat. It’s warmer today, and the redbud trees are turning pink, like they do in Austin when it’s almost March.

  North of the swings and the slimy swimming pool, the park’s all plowed with skinny rows and furrows, and they’re covered with green wheat—a few acres of it. Wow, it’s pretty!

  I’m nervous being alone in the park, and I forgot to bring a gun, like a dumbass. But I can’t help but walk through some furrows, brushing the tops of wheat stalks with my hand. It makes me feel energized that Alma and the baby will have what they need—new wheat before the bulk flour runs out.

  Most of us never grew anything until the solar pulse forced us to. We were city folks and pretty lazy, spending all our time on computers and smartphones, watching TV. If we’d worked as hard then as we do now, back when we had so much food and power and cars, we could’ve saved the world.

  I go back to the edge of the park and look off toward the tree line, then up and down the street where I shot the guy. There’s a splatter of blood on the pavement. I hate that I feel like an idiot for going to a park unarmed, for being afraid to check crops close to the boundary. But I’m creeped out, flashing on the guy I shot, flashing on Ray’s slimy face, and I need to get out of here.

  I’m jogging home when I see Eddie and Phil out front of the Zizzos’ house. Mom, Mazie, and Milo are with them. Phil’s got his rifle, and he heads on down the street, doing patrol.

  I stop when I get to the others, half out of breath. “Where have y’all been? Supper should be ready soon.”

  “I’ve got a surprise. Look in here.” Mazie points to a box by her feet.

  “Ooh, a surprise? Is it a good one?”

  “Of course,” Mazie says, like we never have bad surprises around here. “Aren’t you gonna look?” Mazie stares at me like she can’t believe I didn’t look last week.

  “What do you have in this box?” I stoop down and pull back the box flaps. And I’m looking at rabbits. Two cute white fluffy rabbits. Oh no. We eat cute fluffy rabbits when we can get them. Mazie won’t eat them and gets half-mad at the rest of us about it. I’m worried about Mazie having rabbits that she already loves and what their fate will be.

  “Wow. Rabbits.”

  “They’re breeding rabbits,” Mazie says. “Aunt Erin and Uncle Eddie said I can have them, and they can have babies that I’ll take care of. But I have to let you guys eat the babies when they grow up, and I don’t like that.”

  “That’s the deal we made, though, Mazie,” Mom says. “Remember?”

  “Oh, I remember. I think it sucks.”

  “It does suck,” I say. “But it’s good you’re helping breed rabbits so folks can eat them. You know we need them, Tater Tot.”

  “Still sucks.”

  “Yep. Still sucks.” I hug Mazie and then lift her into the air above my head. Mazie squeals with delight. “You’re a brave little girl, and I love you.”

  “Keno! I’m not little. I’m eight now.”

  “You’re right. You’re a brave tall girl, then.”

  “I am,” Mazie says.

  I look away, trying not to laugh while I set my brave tall cousin on the ground.

  “I’ve got a surprise, too,” Milo says.

  “Eww! Uncle Eddie, please bring my rabbits home,” Mazie says. “I don’t wanna see Milo’s stupid sucky surprise.”

  “Sure, Mazie, let’s go.” Eddie winks at me and picks up the box of rabbits. He and Mazie head down the sidewalk toward home.

  “Come over here,” Milo says, tugging on the arm of my hoodie.

  “Hey, this hoodie’s got enough holes already. Don’t make more.”

  Mom and I follow Milo to the Zizzos’ front porch. There, inside a box, is a dead rabbit with its head gone and its fur and skin peeled off. I kind of want to barf, but my mouth starts watering at the same time. Then Milo sticks his hand in the box and moves the rabbit to uncover another dead one in the same condition.

  “Two rabbits? They’re so big. That is crazy-good!”

  “The Zizzos have gobs of rabbits right now,” Mom says. “They said it’s time to get rid of a bunch so they can breed more. We can probably get a couple more next week.”

  “Are other neighbors getting rabbits? I don’t want to take more than our share.”

  “Every family got one or two, depending how big the family is.”

  “Did Jack get one?” I ask.

  “Probably. We’ve been over here all day, cleaning hutches while Harvey and Kathy butchered rabbits out back.”

  “That’s gruesome,” I say. “Glad I didn’t have to do it.”

  “I wanna learn how,” Milo says.

  “Do you?” Mom draws back from Milo and stares at him, a little flabbergasted.

  “Someone’s got to.” Milo shrugs.

  Milo’s volunteering to do something gross? I don’t want to make a big deal out of it. That could embarrass him out of doing it.

  I just say, “Cool. Why don’t y’all take the rabbits home to Alma and help her cook them? I’ll go see if Jack got any and if he wants to eat with us.”

  Jack brought us deer meat once, back at the beginning of this new screwy life, before the deer around us were killed off. No way I’m leaving him in the dark about rabbit meat. I freaking love Jack, and I miss him.

  I hurry to his house. Wood smoke’s coming from his backyard, so I run around there. He’s standing and staring at the smoking grill, all spaced out.

  “Hey, Jack.”

  He shakes himself. “Keno. What’s up?” He looks at me kind of dead-eyed, like he’s scared I have more bad news for him. The news I gave Jack about Nana was the worst news of his life.

  “Hoping you’d come eat some rabbit with us.”

  “Nah. Y’all eat it. You need it.”

  “But we have two big fat rabbits, Jack. The whole neighborhood got rabbits. There’s plenty for all of us, including you.”

  He still looks unsure, so I add, “We miss you. We never get to see you anymore.”

  “Do you? Miss me?” he asks with a crack in his voice. His eyes are a little brighter but also teary.

  I don’t know if I should lo
ok away or hug Jack or pat his shoulder or what. None of those seems right for how he feels.

  “Mazie will want to show you her breeding rabbits.”

  “Mazie’s gonna breed rabbits?” he asks. “But she never wants us to eat them.”

  “She and Mom made a deal. I don’t know the whole story. Don’t you want to come hear it?”

  “I do. It’s just—” Jack’s eyes glaze over, then he turns away. I know he’s thinking how eating dinner with us won’t be the same without Nana, how nothing is the same without her, how there’s a big hole in his life and in his heart that he doesn’t know how to fill. Because nothing can replace Nana. Nothing.

  He sighs. “I just built this fire. I hate to waste it.”

  “I get that. But aren’t you kind of wasting it anyway, over here cooking for one guy, especially when we have all that food at our place? It’s not like the leftovers will keep.”

  “You got me there.” Jack turns toward me again, wiping his eyes with the palm of his hand. “Let me lock the house and we’ll go.”

  “Good… Great.” I just want us to give him some love. It’s the only thing that can help you get over losing the love of your life, or your sister. Not that you ever get over it, but it helps a ton. That and time. Maybe eons.

  Uncle Eddie’s cooking the rabbits in two oblong steel pans on top of the grill when Jack and I come into our backyard.

  “Hey, Jack,” Eddie says. “I was going to roast these lovely rabbits on a spit, but then I thought, why waste the fat?”

  “You can fix biscuits and gravy with that fat in the morning.” Good, Jack’s making small talk. “Should I come over and show you how to make ’em?”

  “Yes!” Eddie and I say together. We all chuckle, even Jack.

  “Especially the biscuits you make,” I say. “I love those things.”

  “I know you do.”

  Jack keeps talking with Eddie, and I go inside.

  “How you doin’, Alma?”

  She’s stirring potatoes that she’s got mashed up with the skins off and everything. She’s putting salt and pepper and garlic in there. Little green flakes are all over the potatoes.