We, The Lucky Few

by P. S. Lurie

  ‘Where has this come from?’

  ‘I don’t know? Maybe the announcement that said all of my family but one must die?’

  ‘Let’s work this through.’

  ‘Don’t tell me to calm down.’

  ‘I didn’t? I think you’re stressed and...’

  ‘Oh so you think I’m stressed,’ Theia shouts. ‘What an insight.’ She storms out of the room.

  Of course I said the wrong thing by dismissing her fears. I’m too disheartened by the truth that there is nothing to offer her to run after her. There’s nothing I could say to make things better. Theia’s right, her situation is dire. The most disconcerting thing is that Theia never loses her temper. She’s always the rational one. I’ve never seen her blow up like this. I wish I could do something but I can’t.

  I decide the best thing right now is to give her some space. I’ll either write her a message or hop the fence in an hour or so when I come up with something to say that can help. Finding a solution for her will at least distract me from my own problems.

  Selene

  With the policeman gone I return to watch my mother, who stirs on the sofa. She rubs her eyes, as if she’s waking to a world that she has been absent from for too long and all the rules have changed. That’s actually a pretty accurate description. In her vulnerable state, she looks beautiful. I’ve never caught her unaware, when she hasn’t worn a snarl.

  She looks at her watch then looks towards the door to the living room. She calls something and I lip read. Selene.

  The scene plays out in my head: I enter the house. For a moment she shows concern then she embraces me and cries tears of relief.

  No. I enter the house and tensions grow and she pulls a weapon on me.

  I can’t take the risk. If I leave now my lasting memory of my mother will be a pleasant one. She called my name. I can leave here, imagining that she wanted me to return home. I don’t have to experience the nasty aftermath that is sure to follow.

  I could reveal myself to her, to let her know I’m safe but I make my decision; the way to ensure her own safety is to keep my distance. With my mind made up I feel a change within me. I no longer feel angry about all the years of abuse because that is behind us. I have allowed myself to be set free. She owes me no apology or explanation and I don’t need to offer her any forgiveness. I am now responsible for myself.

  If I allow my mother to be Rehoused then we no longer owe each other anything.

  So I do what is best for both of us and, before she sees me, I walk away but this time it is directionless.

  Theia

  I’ve shouted too many times tonight at Henry but his words infuriated me. I wanted to vent at him, just to have him listen. I knew there was nothing he could say to help but instead of sitting with the unbearable reality of tonight he pawned me off with nonsense. He can’t understand my situation. Neither can Melissa.

  My pen pal is Melissa. I can’t believe I didn’t recognise her. I had no idea she lived so close to me. I haven’t spoken to her since the day at the coast but she promised us to never discuss it and for all I know she has kept her word and told no one what happened.

  I saw Henry’s parents earlier tonight whilst I waited for Selene to come downstairs but I storm past them without offering niceties. I realise my mistake. I shouldn’t be here, corrupting their final moments together with their son. I’m a jerk. Henry’s going to lose his parents. I can’t believe I shouted at him. I should go back up and apologise but stubbornness takes hold.

  I walk outside and approach the connecting fence but I don’t want to return to my house. I’ll have to face my father and continue the conversation or the fight. Neither sounds like a great option in my current mood but I have nowhere else to go. Selene took the only means with which to escape.

  The unexplained whirring in the distance grows in volume but I ignore it. It’s been present intermittently for most of this evening but is now louder than ever. I reach for the top of the wooden fence and push one foot against a horizontal plank to lever myself up and over. The mechanical noise hits an all-time high and a bright light swings towards my direction until it highlights my whole body. With the worst timing I work out what the noise is, as something I thought belonged to the past.

  I’ve never seen this contraption before except for in books and that one time watching a war film on the day the Fence went up. Despite never seeing one in the flesh before, I recognise it immediately: a helicopter.

  Something throttles past my face. And then a second burst scrapes my cheek. Bullets. I’m being shot at from up high.

  I tumble and hit the ground on my house’s side of the fence. I land on my wrist and cry out as pain shoots up my arm. Another bullet hurtles past me. Someone from the helicopter is trying to kill me.

  Finally tonight, in a moment of terror, I’m able to fight the will to freeze on the spot, unlike in the Ethers’ house. I slink as close to the ground as I can without putting pressure on my hand and hug tight to the wall until I scramble behind the tree.

  The helicopter attempts to track me and the light covers the garden, moving up and down in straight lines, covering the vicinity. I was given forewarning that attempting to leave will result in death and I have broken a rule. I fear the police will be ordered to storm my house now, hours earlier than the deadline and kill us all. I have signed a death warrant for my entire family.

  There might be a way to stop this from happening. I can reveal myself and save my family but I’m not really saving them all, I’m just giving them greater odds at surviving.

  I don’t want to be remembered as the girl who got herself killed by hopping fences. All I can think about are Henry and Melissa and anyone else watching. I’m embarrassed that this is my fate. Too many people have died because of me tonight. Mr Ethers. Jason. My grandparents. I consider that I even sent Selene to face her death.

  But there’s a chance I can stop it. I can reveal myself and have my life ended in the next few seconds. I’ve failed, causing my own life to be taken before I could save both Ronan and Leda. How many more people will be killed because of me?

  A warning bullet hits the ground, near the centre of the garden and I know time is running out. The helicopter hovers directly overhead and the engine roars. The police must have been called by now. I can’t believe the Upperlands have functioning helicopters and they’re being used to monitor us. What else have they held back? How advanced is their society? I forget the slight possibility I may have had of ever finding out and brace myself for death.

  I pull myself up but my legs feel weak. I’m not sure I can even walk to the centre of the garden but I’ll be dead before I get that far.

  I tear myself away from the shadow of the tree.

  And then I see the figure walk out of my house. Her silhouette is radiant. She turns her head towards me. She doesn’t manage a complete smile before a bullet smacks into her. Then a second. Cruelly, the bullets keep coming, slamming into her chest before she even hits the ground.

  Satisfied with the onslaught, the helicopter hurtles off, leaving my garden to settle back into the dim light of the moon, exposing nothing but my dead mother.

  1 A.M. – 2 A.M.

  Theia

  And me. Exposing nothing but my dead mother and me.

  The silence following the helicopter’s departure is filled by the reverberation of gunshots in my mind and then I am aware that the noise of screaming is coming from me, not trapped in my head. The raucous brings my father to the back door but loiters just inside the house, afraid to come any closer. On first glance, at the sight of me standing above my mother’s corpse, it appears I have killed her. Indirectly, I suppose I have.

  The woman whose job it was to save lives is no longer of help to anyone. My eyes focus on her corpse but she takes a deep breath. She is not yet dead and I freeze as I watch her eyes attempt to meet mine but give up and rest on a spot below my chin.

  ‘Your necklace?’ she mouths, confused and disappoin
ted, then she becomes lifeless. These are her final words. She uses her dying breath to ponder the absence of the necklace she gave me.

  I feel the void around my neck and remember that I traded the necklace for fireworks. My mother will never know this or how upset I was to leave the piece of jewellery at the market. I can never explain my reason to her, that I did it for Ronan and for us to all celebrate. My mother died thinking I’d given up on her. Aware of my father watching on, I want to scream again but I choke up.

  My father is delayed in his reaction but then runs over and crouches by her side. It’s a pointless endeavour but he feels for a pulse, then he attempts to breathe life into her. He has lived passively for most of my upbringing so it’s surprising to see him act on passionate despair. Ironically, it has taken the threat of tonight, topped off by my mother’s death, to bring him back to life.

  He looks up at me with disappointment filling his eyes. ‘What did you do?’

  I stammer. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘She’s dead.’ His words aren’t just full of disbelief but nasty. Venomous and accusing.

  ‘They shot her from the sky.’

  ‘Why?’

  I realise that my father seeks to dredge up not what happened but why it happened. Regardless of who killed her he wants a motive. I muster the courage to admit what led up to it. ‘I climbed over the wall. They thought she was me.’

  In his hunched position, my father loses his balances and tips backwards. It is only a short way to the grass but his body, heavy with numbness, slams into the ground and the thud echoes against the brick walls around us. I figure that if people weren’t watching before they definitely are now and I hate that we are the latest spectacle, perhaps the first of this new day. I’m embarrassed that I so freely watched the girl killing her family hours earlier. I don’t know what to do but I force myself to stay facing away from Henry’s house because what if he saw?

  ‘She died to protect you,’ my father says.

  I’ve never heard a more loaded accusation than this and the guilt does a strange thing to me. Instead of an apology or despair or straightforward tears I spit back equally nasty words. ‘She had nothing left to live for. She didn’t love any of us.’ My father is in front of my face before I take a breath but I carry on with my provocation. ‘Maybe we’re safer now she’s dead.’

  His open palm stings my cheek before I see it coming. My father has never deliberately hurt me until tonight when he grabbed my arms and now this. The slap shocks both of us. After hearing second-hand accounts of Selene’s mother and her skewed understanding of discipline I never imagined my parents could allow themselves to do the same.

  But I deserved the hit after what I said to instigate it. In a sense, the physical pain eases my mental anguish. As my father and I stare at each other, both clueless as to what to do next, I consider that whatever my mother had wanted to do, she died saving me.

  I yearn to rewind the last five minutes and start over, for her not to come into the garden, for me to be under the helicopter’s spotlight before my mother has time to sacrifice herself. No, earlier than that. If I hadn’t argued with Henry I might have stayed in his bedroom a while longer and the helicopter would have passed overhead. Farther back in time, I should not have gone next door. But I did go, and wasn’t that my father’s fault? Shifting the blame around could continue back to the Upperlanders if my mind let it but stopping on my father as the culprit gives me the ammunition I need to attack him. ‘I wouldn’t have been outside if it wasn’t for you. You know that’s the truth. Go on, slap me again. Or punch me. Your choice.’

  ‘Shut up,’ he says, with a vociferous tone, unlike anything he has managed for years. He rubs his hand from where it must also sting. ‘What did you mean that she had nothing left to live for?’

  I begin to explain about Dr Jefferson but I force myself to stop. What good would it do? As I pant to catch my breath I work out what happened. Whilst I was next door she spoke to Dr Jefferson for a final time and heard him die or his murderer conveyed that information. With nothing to lose, my mother lost sight of her life and walked into the line of fire. I have my answer. She loved him more than us. Saving me was just a ruse.

  I will never tell my father. He may have struggled to keep going with us through the past decade but he’s never abandoned us. He deserves to think the best of his wife, which as a result means he has to think the worst of me. ‘Nothing,’ I say. ‘I meant nothing.’

  ‘Theia.’ He knows there is more but I hold my ground. He glances at my cheek, which burns against the bitter air. I put my hand to it and wince more than it deserves. The pain in my wrist from falling over the fence is greater but I don’t let him know that. I use the pretence of pain to walk towards the house, away from him, as if I am his victim, but stop when I see Ronan. My brother stands in devastated silence, tears streaming down his face and I hope he didn’t misconstrue what happened, that I was not the murderer here. My father can hate me but I don’t want Ronan to think badly of me.

  I can’t explain without bursting into tears about the final memories of my mother and brush past Ronan, leaving my father to pick up the pieces.

  Henry

  What just happened? I shielded my eyes from the helicopter’s beam that flooded the room and my worst fear came true when I heard the shots. I couldn’t make out anything from the window until the light settled once more on Theia’s garden. The blasts buried deep into the grass until they locked onto a target whom appeared from nowhere. I cannot fool myself that she is alive as the helicopter moves off. I grip the windowsill to maintain my balance Theia ran from our fight into death.

  I cry out but there is no one to hear me. My parents, as they have for the majority of the night, stay away from the edges of the house, deeming it the safest place, as if external influences are their biggest worry. As if the real danger won’t likely come from within.

  If I hadn’t spent the earlier part of the evening retching up the little food I have eaten I would be sick again but I gag and nothing comes up. Then I see a second person reveal herself from behind the tree, a blind spot to the shooter in the sky. My eyes settle on her figure, her hair, her clothes and it is clearly Theia. My relief feels misguided when this means her mother is dead.

  I watch on, not knowing what I’d do if Theia glanced back and caught me. It seems unfair to invade on her tragedy but I can’t tear myself away. I don’t hear their argument but Mr Silverdale hurries into the garden, bends down over his wife, then rises and slaps Theia’s face before she has a chance to flinch. I don’t condone his actions but he is looking for someone to blame. Theia may have drawn the helicopter’s attention but he is wrong to accuse her; it is the Upperlands that are guilty.

  There’s nothing I can do to intervene that would help. I can shout at her father and threaten him with violence but then what? Staying in our houses was the rule and I’d only be putting myself at risk by communicating with them or going over there. He needs some time to process this. It’s not for me to reprimand him. Or console him.

  A horrible thought runs through my mind that at least this lowers the competition for Theia’s survival by one person but I bat it away as quickly as it dawned on me.

  I pick up the pen. It’s safest to communicate with Theia this way. I’m in no rush so I’ll wait here and Theia can respond when she’s ready. The only problem is that I stare at the blank paper but I have no idea what to write.

  Selene

  I have to remind myself that, in this uniform, I am the apparent threat to the families I pass by but I keep slipping into the mind-set that I am a wild animal on the run from its hunter. I was fortunate the policeman outside my mother’s house wanted no trouble but the next could be bad news and I have no desire to thrash it out. I just want to be left alone, which I suppose is what everyone would choose in hindsight between either the announcement or silence from the Upperlands. And then I remember that silence only means a slow drowning over the coming months.

 
My concern above any encounters is about where to go next. My mother will spend the rest of her life not knowing what became of me but her consolation is that she will live, having probably the easiest pathway to Rehousing of anyone tonight. I leave my street and turn towards the direction from which I came, purely out of habit for my usual route, but I can’t return to Henry’s house; it wouldn’t solve anything and I’m not sure I could fight the temptation to work my way back inside. The Fence is likely teeming with guards, stopping any last-ditch attempts to scale it. I may return at sunrise but only out of curiosity about what will happen. There are a few communal buildings in the Middlelands that do not serve as housing. The hospital, but people are always there. The school, although I can’t imagine that I will find anything of interest. I could hide there but the fractured memories of my childhood deter me.

  I settle on the market. It may provide shelter but there should be some products worth ransacking. I have no qualms about stealing stock that have will be off bounds come morning. It’s likely many of the stall owners are already dead.

  I realise I have forgotten something obvious. As long as my gender doesn’t betray me, this uniform will give me right of way into the Upperlands after the cull is finished. It’s too risky to loiter at the Fence but if I can stay alive until morning that will be my best bet. I can figure out what to do after that once I’m inside. I reconsider my plan. The market is known for attracting the homeless at night whereas the school is locked up outside of its opening hours. It would be safer to hide there until morning.

  I stick with my first instinct. I’m parched and more likely to find water at the market. It’s not far from here. As for staying alive until morning, I’ll have to see what the rest of the night holds.