Watch the Sky

by Kirsten Hubbard

  His footsteps slowed.

  Then he turned and headed for home.

  The sun began to set as Jory reached the family’s property. Everything was tinted pink. The farmhouse, the fields, the canyon, the barn.

  The barn.

  From a distance, it appeared ruddy gray, even in the light of the sunset. As he approached, the colors dissolved into flakes and patches, like an Impressionist painting.

  Jory remembered how he and Kit used to peel off leaves of paint and save the prettiest ones. Mom had caught them once and made them stop. “Old paint is poison,” she’d told them. “It has minerals that seep into your bones. The barn’s full of it, Caleb says.”

  “Poison?”

  “And junk. Poison junk. Stay far away from it.”

  So Jory had. Even if heartbeats under the floorboards and chalk-white faces weren’t real, plenty of real-life dangers might hide in the barn. Like snakes. Black widow spiders hunched in the crevices. He’d read a black widow bite could kill a forty-pound child. Though probably not a grown man, like Caleb.

  What kind of work did Caleb do in here?

  Jory’s old broken bike leaned against the wall, right where he’d left it. He frowned at it, then headed around to the front.

  The barn door was bound by the heavy Jacob Marley chain. When he touched the metal, rust came away on his fingertips. The windows were high up and milky white, like eyes with cataracts. Jory doubted he could see inside, even if he managed to drag a ladder to the barn without anybody noticing.

  He stuck his fingers in the crack of the door and tugged. Then he pulled. The door opened a couple of inches.

  When he let go, it shut again.

  He wedged his fingers deeper into the crack and tugged harder. The door opened three inches, four, then wouldn’t go any farther. But the crack was pretty wide. Maybe…

  He stepped closer and peeked inside.

  It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dark confusion. The barn was full of stuff. Not junky stuff, poison or otherwise. Organized stuff. On purpose stuff. Boxes. Bins. Plastic tubs with masking tape labels, stacked all the way to the ceiling.

  Jory squinted until he could make out a label on the closest bin:

  FLASHLIGHTS, LANTERNS

  A bin of lights? What in the world for? More digging? With a start, he recognized the handwriting—it wasn’t Caleb’s. It was Mom’s.

  Had she been in the barn, too?

  Jory’s arm muscles ached, but he didn’t want to let go. Then he heard a twig snap behind him. He lost his grip on the door and it shut, almost crunching his fingers.

  “Looks like we need to have a talk,” Caleb said.

  CALEB STUCK A KEY IN THE PADLOCK. Tiny wisps of rust floated away as the chain fell with a heavy thunk—the same thunk Jory had heard from his room late at night. The barn door creaked open.

  “There’s not much light in here,” Caleb told Jory, tugging a string. A weak glow filled the crowded space. He switched on a flashlight, then handed it to Jory. “Go ahead and look around.”

  “Really?” Jory glanced back fearfully, but Caleb didn’t look angry. It was hard to tell, though, with so much beard.

  “Go on.”

  Jory crept onto the threshold and aimed his flashlight inside. Bright blue plastic drums took up the most room. They had screw-top lids and spigots. The rest of the space was filled with plastic tubs and buckets and boxes, lining the walls and several long rows of shelves.

  BATTERIES: AA, AAA, D, 9-VOLT

  SLEEPING BAGS AND BLANKETS

  TOILETRIES AND FIRST-AID

  Labeled. Purposeful. Organized, saved, and stacked. Caleb must have been stocking the barn for weeks. For months, even. And Mom, too, Jory thought unhappily as he scanned more labels she’d written.

  KITCHEN: UTENSILS, POTS, SKILLETS

  EMERGENCY: MYLAR, FLARES

  DEFENSE

  Defense? From what?

  What was all this for?

  Jory aimed his flashlight down a row. He’d wondered where Mom’s preserves had gone. Now, here they were: hundreds of jars or more, filled with the careful remains of the family’s harvest. Including pickles. An entire shelf of pickles. Jory couldn’t imagine eating them all, even if he ate a pickle every day for the rest of his life.

  In the next row, he found tubs with their names.

  KIT

  ANSEL

  JORY

  His name. In Mom’s handwriting, like all the others. But this one struck him the hardest.

  “You can take a look, if you want,” Caleb said.

  Hesitantly, Jory peeled back the lid of the JORY tub. He aimed his flashlight inside, fearing what he’d find.

  “…Underwear?”

  “And socks,” Caleb added. “And other clothing. But yes, underwear. The normal kind, and also long. Extra insulated. We don’t know how cold it’ll get down there.”

  Jory stared at him. Down there?

  Down there.

  The sick feeling began in Jory’s chest. It spread into his stomach, his arms and legs, every single finger and toe.

  Because he knew. Down there, underground, beneath the surface of the earth. In the hole they were digging nightly. A giant hole in the ground that wasn’t for finding things, or hiding things.

  It was a hole for hiding them.

  “So we’re digging a bunker,” Jory said.

  They’d carried the pair of Adirondack chairs to the edge of the canyon. The sun had vanished, and the pink sky had deepened to blue-violet.

  “A shelter,” Caleb said.

  Jory opened his mouth. But for once, he had no questions. Fear and confusion took up too much room. He clasped his hands in his lap so they wouldn’t shake.

  Shelter.

  Bunker.

  Down there.

  “I remember when I found this farmhouse,” Caleb said. “Listed online, among all the other houses for sale. It didn’t look like much in the pictures. Run-down, although I knew I could repair it. Nothing in the fields but rotting pumpkins. But I had my heart set on this area: city to the west, desert to the east. Not isolated, but just secluded enough.

  “The moment I took a walk out here—the moment I saw the farmhouse and the barn and the canyon and the fields in real life—I knew. That it would be a safe place for us. For me and my family, someday. No matter what happened.”

  Caleb looked over at Jory. His eyes were grave. “Do you trust me?”

  “I…” Jory trailed off.

  It was a question Caleb had asked countless times. Usually, Jory said yes without thinking.

  This time, he thought.

  He’d always known Caleb had secrets. Secrets from Jory. Secrets from Kit. Secrets from the rest of the world. But this? This was a secret larger than Jory ever could have imagined. Larger, and more terrifying.

  And what if it was just the beginning?

  What else might Caleb be keeping from Jory?

  “I just…” Jory tried to keep his voice from trembling. “How long has Mom known? About the—about the shelter?”

  He’d almost said bunker again. He wasn’t sure where he’d gotten the word—probably when he was researching tunnels online. It was an angled word. An angry word. One that made him think of wars and bombs that blotted out the sun. Toxic gas and clouds filled with invisible poison. Alien spaceships clogging the sky.

  “A long time,” Caleb replied. “Ever since last year, around when you started school again.”

  Is that one of the reasons they’d sent him back to school? To get him out of their hair while they made preparations? “Does Kit know?” Jory asked.

  “We haven’t told her anything. Though even if we had, it’s not like she’d be able to tell anyone.” Caleb smirked with his eyes.

  Jory looked away. Kit still hadn’t spoken to anyone other than him. “But…why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.

  “It wasn’t the right time. But now it is. I’m going to tell you the truth.”

  All of
a sudden, Jory wanted to smash his face into the crook of Mom’s arm, the way Ansel did. Except Mom was sleeping. Night was looming.

  And the answers he wanted—the answers he needed—were right here.

  “All right,” Jory said nervously.

  “When I was a soldier,” Caleb began, “the superior officers didn’t tell us much. Innocence encourages trust, and trust breeds obedience. With knowledge, however, come questions. As I’m sure you’ve begun to discover.”

  But I’ve always had questions, Jory thought.

  “I know you remember the story about the enemy ambush in the alley,” Caleb went on. “When my superior officer ordered me to stay and fight—but I hid, and he was killed, along with all the others?”

  Jory nodded.

  “I never told you, but the story didn’t end there. The surviving officers jailed me. Because I hid instead of fought, because I valued my own life, they put me behind bars. For almost two weeks. They mocked me and laughed at me. They spit in my food.”

  Jory felt a fierce rush of loyalty. “They didn’t!”

  “They did. They treated me like trash—when they remembered I was there. Fortunately, most of the time they forgot about me. They spoke candidly. As if they were alone. And I listened.”

  “What did they talk about?”

  “The enemy,” Caleb said.

  Jory swallowed. “The enemy you were fighting in the war?”

  “Yes, they spoke of that enemy. But not only that enemy. They also spoke of an enemy in the sky.”

  “The sky,” Jory repeated. “Like…in airplanes?”

  “Maybe,” Caleb said.

  Jory glanced upward. A cloudless dark had fallen, and the stars shone. He remembered his talk with Alice and shivered. “You’re not talking about…about…” Aliens, he thought, but he couldn’t make himself say the word.

  “All I know is there are enemies. I’ve been seeking information about them ever since—books, underground publications, radio programs. Every one of them agrees. The enemies are real. And they’re everywhere. Above us. Around us. On every side—even our own side.”

  Jory hadn’t thought anything could sound worse than aliens. But this did. “On our own side? Like…like who?”

  “Government Officials,” he said. “Superior officers. Anybody in a position of power. The higher up, the deeper the evil goes.

  “Officials don’t care who’s underfoot when they stomp around, fighting battles and wars over prideful nonsense. There are always wars, and always enemies. And they’re not only enemies to each other, but also to the common man. To kids and their parents. To families. To you and me, and to your mother and brother. And to Kit, too—especially to Kit.”

  Caleb looked at Jory meaningfully.

  “Mom already told you?” Jory asked in a small voice.

  “She said you took Kit for a walk, and she tripped and fell in the road.”

  “I was only trying to show her…” Jory began, then shook his head. No excuse would be good enough now. At least he hadn’t told Mom the whole truth, about Alice and the swings. “I’m sorry,” he finished.

  “That was stupid, Jory. Stupid, and dangerous. Of both of you.”

  “It wasn’t Kit’s idea.”

  “Only because she never has any,” Caleb said, which made Jory frown. “She still knows better—you both do. You never know who might have seen her. And how that might have affected the safety of our whole family.”

  Jory thought of Alice again. Tugging on her shoelaces. Shoving back her cuffs. Talking about stardust and existential crises, which he still didn’t entirely understand. “But…not everybody’s a danger.”

  “No, not everybody. Most people aren’t. But the problem is, we don’t know who from who. Officers don’t always wear uniforms. Officials don’t always wear suits. The enemy isn’t everybody—but it could be anybody.

  “That’s why I’ve taught you to trust no one. If you assume every person you meet might be dangerous, that they might want to put your life in jeopardy—then they’ll never surprise you. There can never be a surprise attack.”

  “There’s going to be an attack?”

  “I’m sure of it. Any day now. The signs are unmistakable.”

  The fear spun in Jory’s chest again, spiraling into his throat. He squeezed the arms of his Adirondack chair.

  “What are we going to do?”

  “What we’re doing already.” Caleb swept his hand across the canyon. “Look how far we’ve gotten, Jory! Think about what we’re creating. A place for us to stay safe, no matter what happens on the outside. Where we can take care of ourselves, for as long as it takes.”

  “How long will we be down there?”

  “Not very long.”

  For the first time since they sat down, a tiny spark of hope flickered to life in Jory’s middle. “But how long, exactly?”

  “We’re planning on three months.”

  The spark died in a blot of darkness. Three months. Three months in that hole. Jory had been hoping for a few days. A week at most.

  He didn’t realize he was holding his breath until Caleb whacked his back. “Breathe,” he said. “Breathe. I don’t want you to worry—we’re going to be fine. We’ll make sure the shelter’s comfortable. It’ll feel just like home. And our stay there will pass much more quickly than you think, I promise.”

  “But—but if there’s really a…if there’s really an attack…” Jory took a deep breath. “What will the world look like when we come out again? How bad will it be?”

  “Not bad,” Caleb said. “Better.”

  EVERYTHING SEEMED DIFFERENT NOW THAT JORY KNEW.

  What.

  And why.

  But he couldn’t think about why too long. The thoughts came with too many question marks. Dark, ominous ones that seemed to hover above him. For now, he decided to keep his eyes on the ground. To concentrate on digging.

  And digging.

  And digging.

  Digging with a purpose.

  As Jory steered an empty wheelbarrow through the tunnel’s opening, he thought again of the tunnels he’d researched online for his social studies project. Basements and cellars. Subways and sewers. Entire villages burrowed in the earth, where people lived by choice.

  But those people used bulldozers and dynamite. They didn’t even call it digging—they called it excavation. And even in the times before bulldozers and dynamite were invented, people dug in teams of dozens, hundreds, or thousands. Never, ever in teams of five.

  Make that four, since Ansel didn’t count.

  “Ten scoops today,” Mom had told him.

  He’d scooped up small mounds of dirt with his red plastic shovel, counting loudly. “Fee,” he’d yelled. “Faw.” When he’d gotten to ten, she’d helped him into another empty wheelbarrow so he could sleep, his grimy hands tucked under his chin.

  Jory shook his head. Every time he stepped inside the tunnel, ducking and squeezing to fit, stooping along until it widened into the main space, he thought: impossible. Impossible to turn this lopsided, suffocating cave into a bunker—a shelter—that could contain them comfortably. The family and all that stuff in the barn.

  Let alone a place that would feel like home.

  Alone underground, Jory leaned against his half-filled wheelbarrow, inhaling the damp, earthy air through his bandana. Tall stacks of two-by-fours sat in the space’s center. He’d helped Caleb carry them down just last week. Beside the stacks, there were heaps of stones Kit had sorted. Flat stones, round stones. Big stones, small stones. Neither of them had known their purpose, or asked. They’d just followed Caleb’s orders, like always.

  Like the whole time they’d been digging this giant hole—which actually wasn’t that giant, when Jory thought about it. Not like the tunnels he’d read about. Or the bunkers.

  Was it really that much safer down here?

  Jory jammed his shovel into a corner and scooped up another pile of dirt. Then he heard a scuffle in the tunnel and pau
sed, letting the dirt slide back into the earth. He aimed his flashlight and found Kit.

  “Hey,” he said.

  She wiggled her fingers in reply. Jory had told her about the bunker earlier that evening, but he wasn’t sure if she quite understood. Or if she’d already known.

  In the dim light, she looked skinnier than ever. He had no idea how she carried her enormous shovel, let alone dug with it. But that night, just like every night, she never seemed to tire. Despite her bandaged knees—which had to be sore—she worked at the same rate as always. While Jory always felt he couldn’t bear to dig another shovelful. Now, more than ever.

  “Onward and downward,” he said.

  As Jory pushed the wheelbarrow into the night, he had another realization: if we never finish the bunker, we’ll never have to use it.

  For an instant, he felt hopeful.

  But then he saw Caleb. Standing a few yards up the slope, a pickax in his soldier’s hands. Jory saw his eyes, pockets of dark under his hooded brows. His broad shoulders, not slopey in the slightest. The way he stabbed his pickax into the earth with gusto, with urgency. With fury.

  Caleb believed.

  He believed everything he said.

  As deeply as anyone could believe anything.

  When Jory thought back over the nights his family had spent in the canyon bottom, each seemed like the night before. They piled up like a heap of stones and dirt, innumerable and endless. Until the night they broke into the water main.

  That’s when everything really began to change.

  Instead of leading the family into the canyon that night, Caleb had gathered them in the patio. “I saw a sign this evening,” he said gravely.

  Five dead birds, all in a row: two sparrows, a robin, and two blue jays. Just lying there on the road. He had been the only one to see them, though—he’d decided to bury the birds without waking the family.

  “But the meaning was clear,” Caleb said. “The time is drawing near. We need to make sure all our plans are rock solid. All our preparations are concrete. All possible emergencies are accounted for. And that means ensuring we have enough water—by diverting water from the city’s pipes.”