Among the Brave sc-5

by Margaret Peterson Haddix

  Then Mrs. Talbot lifted the vase off the shelf and hurled it to the floor. It smashed instantly into dozens of tiny shards.

  “There,” Mrs. Talbot said grimly “They’re welcome to it. They’re welcome to it all.”

  She walked out the door and was gone.

  Chapter Six

  Trey hid.

  It wasn’t something he thought about. One minute he was standing by the door that Mrs. Talbot had just shut in his face, the next he was cowering in a kitchen cupboard. All the pots and pans from the cabinet had been thrown out on the floor; that’s why he’d noticed it. Otherwise he might have hidden in a closet or under a sofa or behind a bookcase….

  There wasn’t much room in the cupboard, and he’d begun shivering so hard — no, it was really shaking, shaking with fear — that he kept banging his elbows and knees against the hard wood around him. He could have moved to another hiding space, but that would have required more courage and will than he had after being abandoned and left in danger yet again.

  But she was so beautiful… , he thought vaguely, and then was irritated with himself. Why was it any different to be abandoned by a beautiful woman than by an ugly one?

  No, he corrected himself. Mom wasn’t ugly. She was just… defeated.

  He had never thought of it that way before. Mom had lost Dad too, after all. She’d lost her husband, she’d lost all hope — what was there left for her to live for?

  Me, Trey thought fiercely, and it was like he was answering a question about himself, not his mother. It made him stop shaking, momentarily. It made him think that he might be feeling light-headed because of hunger, not just horror.

  I am in a kitchen, he reminded himself. There’s probably food mere inches away. All I have to do is open the door of this cupboard. How stupid and cowardly was he to sit there shaking and starving instead of eating?

  Trey pushed the door of the cupboard open a crack. In the dim light that filtered in from the TV room, he could see a refrigerator. He shoved out one foot and then the other, carefully avoiding all the pots and pans on the floor. He angled the rest of his body out of the cupboard. Crouching, he reached over and opened the refrigerator.

  The sudden bright light scared him, but he reached in and blindly grabbed garishly colored cartons and containers. Then, clutching the food, he dove back into the cupboard.

  There wasn’t room in the cupboard to eat with the door shut, so he risked leaving it open. That way, he could even see what he was eating. A paper carton yielded rice and mysterious vegetables in a spicy sauce, all of which he virtually inhaled. He’d also grabbed three plastic containers of strawberry yogurt. This was harder to eat with his fingers, so he mainly squeezed it into his mouth and then licked out the containers as best he could.

  Like an animal, he thought. I’m behaving like an animal. He remembered his father’s view of animals. One night, years ago, Dad had told Trey and his mother about seeing feral cats in an alley on his way home from work. Trey was pretty young then, but he already knew Latin.

  “Feral?” Trey had said. “Like fera, meaning ‘beast,’ or feralis, ‘funeral’? Were the cats dead?”

  Dad had ruffled Trey’s hair fondly. Trey’s knowledge of Latin always made Dad fond.

  “Very good, son!” he’d said. “The word can be used in either sense. But in this case, it means ‘wild beast’ Those cats used to be somebody’s pets, but now they’re out living on their own.”

  Trey was intrigued. He’d followed Dad around the rest of the evening, asking questions.

  “How can those cats live on their own?” he asked as Dad took off his good coat — the one with only one patch on the sleeve. “Who feeds them? Who gives them books to read?” In Trey’s world then, books were as important as food. And books were more plentiful.

  “Animals don’t read books,” Dad said. “They aren’t like humans. Animals are only concerned with surviving— with eating and… and reproducing. That’s what separates humans from animals — our ability to think and reason. To do more than just survive.”

  And then Dad had exchanged a significant glance with Mom. That’s what had made the whole conversation stick in Trey’s mind. Trey hadn’t understood that glance.

  But now, remembering, he was ashamed. How ashamed Dad would be if he could see Trey now, not thinking, not reasoning, just trying to survive.

  But Dad, you never did tell me who took care of those cats, he thought resentfully.

  Trey squashed the three yogurt containers and put them in the paper carton that had held the rice and vegetables. Bravely, he inched his way over to a trash can and threw away the garbage. Then he scurried back to his cupboard and pulled the door shut behind him.

  Okay, I’m thinking now. What am I going to do?

  He felt drawn in so many different directions.

  “Stay hidden,” the boy in uniform had said on the porch. Why? Why hadn’t the boy reported him? Could Trey trust his advice?

  “I’ll do my best to help you,” Trey had promised Mrs. Talbot. Was that promise void now because she’d left?

  “I’ll tell Mr. Talbot everything,” Trey had promised Lee. But now Trey couldn’t even remember where he’d left the papers from Mr. Grant’s desk, the ones he’d wanted to show to Mr. ‘Talbot

  “I’ll watch out for Lee,” Trey had promised Mr. Hendricks before leaving for the Grants’ party yesterday— had that been only yesterday? It felt like a century ago.

  Mr. Hendricks. Of course. Why hadn’t Trey thought of him sooner?

  Mr. Hendricks was the headmaster of Trey’s school. He’d been in a horrible accident as a young man and lost the lower portions of his legs. So he used a wheelchair to get around. Last night, when Trey and his friends had witnessed a murder and were terrified of the muscular killer, Trey hadn’t even thought of going to a disabled man for help.

  I’m sorry Trey thought, as if Mr. Hendricks could overhear his thoughts. You’re so much more reliable than Mr. Talbot Smarter, too.

  All Trey needed was a phone. He’d have to be careful what he said — the Population Police tapped the phone lines — but he could speak in code. And then Mr. Hendricks would have someone come and pick him up, and Lee too when he arrived. It was that easy.

  For a moment Trey thought about waiting in his cupboard until Lee came — let Lee make the phone call. Let Lee figure out how to make “Come get us immediately!” sound innocuous and dull to phone-tapping listeners. Let Lee take care of everything.

  But as familiar shame washed over him, Trey thought, No. I have to do this. Mrs. Talbot had warned that someone from the new Government might be taking over the Talbots’ house. What if Trey dallied and waited for Lee, and then the Government captured both boys — because of Trey?

  I can do this, Trey told himself. He’d never actually used a telephone, but he understood the process. He could call information, ask for Hendricks School… The only hard part was getting the courage to leave his cupboard.

  Maybe there’s a phone in the kitchen, Trey told himself. Maybe I won’t have to go very far at all.

  That thought got him out of the cupboard. He picked his way past the pots and pans yet again and crawled along the floor. His cupboard — he was thinking longingly of it as “his” now — was under a counter smack in the middle of the kitchen. He circled this island, staring up at every counter and wall. Sometimes phones hung on walls, didn’t Trey?

  It was hard to tell, because the counters were covered with a blizzard of papers, hiding the walls from view. A closet hung open, with an avalanche of boxed food thrown out on the floor. Trey resisted the urge to stop and scoop some spilled cereal into his mouth.

  See, Dad? he thought. I’m not an animal.

  He worked up the courage to step into the TV room, where the lights were still on.

  The curtains are drawn, he reminded himself. You’re still safe. No one can see you.

  He circled the room, stepping over broken glass, ripped-up pillows.

  He fou
nd the phone on the floor, under a couch. He pulled it out easily — the hard plastic receiver, the curly cord, the—

  Nothing else came out from under the couch. The curly cord had been cut.

  Against all logic, Trey held the receiver up to his ear anyway He listened to the sound of dead air, of no connection whatsoever to the outside world.

  Desperation made Trey brave. He searched the entire house. He found four more phones and a computer modem.

  All with severed cords.

  Holding the last phone in an upstairs bedroom, Trey began whimpering, exactly like a wounded animal.

  Lee, it’s all up to you now, he thought. Come quickly. Oh, please, come soon.

  Chapter Seven

  Lee didn’t show up. Days passed, and Trey waited patiently, but he heard no doorbell, no knock at the door, no cheerful voice calling out, “Heyl Where is everyone?”

  Dimly, Trey knew he should be grateful that nobody else showed up either — no more men in uniform, no family newly authorized to steal the Talbots’ house. But it was so hard to wait, always wondering what had happened to his friends, to Mr. and Mrs. Talbot, to the entire country.

  The head of the Population Police is in charge of the Government now, he reminded himself. What do you think’s happening? Peace and joy and happiness?

  Most of the time, Trey felt the same near-panic he’d experienced barely a year earlier, waiting for his mother to return from his father’s funeral. He’d been too griefstricken and bewildered then even to read, and he kept trying to imagine his life without Dad.

  Will Mom take over teaching me Latin and French and Greek? he’d wondered. Will she talk to me in the evenings instead of glaring resentfully while I study? In between his bouts of anguish, Trey had felt almost hopeful, imagining Mom finally taking care of him — loving him — like mothers did in books.

  It’d been beyond his imagination to think that she would get rid of him.

  Now, wandering aimlessly through the Talbots’ huge house, Trey kept wondering about Lee.

  Has he forgotten his friends? Has he forgotten how badly he wants to make third children free? Or is he too scared of the new Government to show his face in public again?

  It was this last question that worried Trey the most If even Lee was scared, then Trey should be terrified, petrified, frightened out of his wits.

  Sometimes he was.

  On the third day, the electricity in the Talbots’ house went off. It happened at dusk, just as the lights that Trey had left on — one in the TV room, one in the basement— had begun to seem cozy and threatening all at once. In a split second Trey lost the lights, the refrigerator’s hum, the heating system’s purr.

  Cautiously, he stepped over to a window and peeked out. The whole neighborhood had gone dark — every huge house on the Talbots’ street had been plunged into blackness.

  Every single one of them looked dead.

  Trey moved to the back of the house, to a window in the TV room. Only one small house stood behind the Talbots~ It was dark too, but as Trey watched, he saw dim, flickering lights — candles? — spring to life inside, throwing shadows around tiny rooms.

  A woman stood at the back door of the small house, and a boy came up beside her. He said something to her, and she nodded. Then the boy scampered out the door, across the yard, and into another building — a barn? — off to the side.

  Trey blinked. Maybe his eyes were playing tricks on him. Maybe the uncertain light had fooled him.

  Or maybe the boy was someone Trey knew. Not Lee— Trey would have instantly run out of the house, screaming with joy, if he’d thought it was Lee. No, he thought the boy he’d seen was Smits Grant, the boy Lee had taken to safety.

  And wherever Smits was, Lee had to be too.

  Didn’t he?

  Chapter Eight

  Trey began thinking very strategically.

  First, he ate as much of the food from the stopped refrigerator and freezer as he could, before it spoiled. He drank nearly a gallon of milk, gobbled down a frozen dinner, forced himself to swallow a pint of ice cream — a delicacy he’d never had before, but that seemed cloyingly sweet after the first two bites. He ate it anyway.

  Then he set up a lookout station beside the TV room window. If the boy wasn’t Smits, Trey didn’t want to reveal himself. But if Smits and Lee had been staying in the house behind the Talbots’ the whole time. well, Trey wanted to get over there as soon as possible.

  The boy stayed in the barn for a very long time.

  When he came out, it was too dark for Trey to see anything but a shadowy shape. Disappointment bit at the back of Trey’s throat, but he forced himself to sit still and wait and watch some more.

  The boy went into the house, where the candles were still glowing in the windows. Maybe with the candlelight, Trey would be able to see— Somebody drew the drapes.

  Trey was so frustrated that he kicked over one of the few coffee tables that the uniformed men had left upright.

  But after a little while, the boy came outside again— Trey was sure it was the same boy He stood in the doorway of the house and seemed to be saying something over his shoulder, to someone Trey couldn’t see.

  Trey dared to open the TV room window, just a crack. If he couldn’t see, maybe at least he’d be able to hear something. If only it was Lee’s voice…

  Faintly, Trey heard someone call out, ".. too late in the year for fireflies.”

  And the boy in the doorway called back, “No, it isn’t. I see one. There!” And he pointed at a tiny gleam of light hovering near a bush by the barn.

  Trey couldn’t tell if the voices were Smits’s and Lee’s; Trey were too far away And besides, Trey’s ears weren’t working too well — every sound he heard right now was distorted by his hopes and fears.

  He’d have to go out there and see for himself if the boy was really Smits.

  Daringly Trey reached over to a full-length glass door beside his spying window. With trembling hands, he unlocked it and slid it open. Then he took a deep breath and stepped outside.

  The night air felt cool and menacing on his face. Trey grimaced and reminded himself that he had the cover of darkness to protect him, that he was in no greater danger outdoors than he’d been while cowering inside the Talbots’ house.

  You’re probably even safer now, he told himself. You could have been trapped indoors if someone dangerous showed up.

  Trey could think that — but he couldn’t quite believe it. Outdoors was always scarier than indoors, no matter what.

  Inching forward, Trey kept his gaze fixed on the boy. He was running around his backyard now, chasing a tiny pinpoint of light that flashed off and on. Trey reached a line of trees that separated the Talbots’ yard from the boy’s. Trey squinted, trying frantically to tell if the boy was Smits, but against the lights of the house, the boy was just a dark silhouette.

  Wrong angle, Trey thought As long as the boy’s between me and the light, I’m never going to be able to see him clearly. Same principle as a solar eclipse.

  Pleased that his knowledge had been useful for once, Trey crept toward the barn and crawled behind a bush. Now he was closer to the light, but there wasn’t enough of it to illuminate the boy’s face, no matter where the boy was in the yard. Suddenly the boy dashed right past Trey’s hiding place, and, without thinking, Trey reached out and grabbed him.

  The boy screamed. Trey slapped his hand over the boy’s mouth, whirled him around, and held him against the side of the barn.

  “Smits!” he hissed into the boy’s ear. “Are you Smits Grant?”

  The boy began to shake his head violently Trey moved his hand back a little.

  “No! I’m — I’m Peter Goodard! I’m — help!”

  Trey clapped his hand over the boy’s mouth again. No matter how much he denied it, the boy was Smits; Trey had finally recognized the voice. Now Trey just had to get Smits to recognize him.

  “Smits! It’s okay. It’s me — Trey I’m just looking for Lee�
�”

  Out of nowhere, a fist walloped the side of Trey’s face. He lost his balance and crashed through the branches of the bush, plunging straight to the ground and pulling Smits along with him.

  “Hey Peter,” a deeper voice said from above them. “This punk bothering you?”

  Trey looked up at the dark figure looming over him. Somehow, not being able to see the boy’s — the man’s? — face made him even scarier.

  “Anybody messes with Peter, you’ve got to answer to me,” the voice continued.

  Trey huddled in terror on the ground.

  “No, no, you don’t understand,” Trey pleaded. “I know Smits. Or Peter — whatever he’s calling himself now. I just want him to tell me where one of my friends is. Smits, come on, you’ve got to remember me….”

  Trey could see that the person standing over him was rearing his fist back, ready to punch Trey again. Trey flinched, waiting for the inevitable pain, and Smits tried to squirm away Trey managed to keep his hand over Smits’s mouth until the last minute when he let go just so he could protect his own face with both hands.

  Then Smits called out, “Wait, Mark! Don’t hit him! This really is a friend of Lee’s. And a friend of mine.”

  Trey dared to peek out between his fingers. The hulking figure above him — Mark? — had relaxed his fists.

  “A friend? Why didn’t you say so sooner?” Mark growled.

  “Trey had his hand over my mouth and I couldn’t talk,” Smits said matter-of-factly.

  Great, Trey thought I almost caused my own death by muzzling Smits. He felt totally drained suddenly Aftereffects of an adrenaline surge, he told himself.