by Annie Oldham
My hand burrows in my pocket until I find the bit of red thread from the rug in the cabin. The thread I clung to like it was my lifeline to the outside world. I take it out of my pocket and show Mary.
“What's that?”
Before she can ask another question, I grab her left hand and tie a bow around her ring finger, carefully turning the loops to face her palm, so all that is visible is the finest scarlet line on her finger, almost like a paper cut.
For you and Dave.
Her eyes shine when she looks at me, and I can't believe I ever feared or pitied her. She's too strong for pity and too kind to fear.
“Thank you,” she whispers. She touches the thread with her other hand. That thread was my sanity the first night when I thought the screams would overwhelm me. But she's lost Dave, and he was her lifeline in so many ways. She needs it more than I do.
She lets the moment pass, and her facade settles into place and all her vulnerability is gone. “So what do we do here?”
Madge has been watching our exchange with careful eyes, taking it all in. There's no way she could know that Dave was a peace offering I gave up so I could remain on the Burn. No way she could know the love I have for these people we spoke of. But she's taken enough in to know there's a history between Mary and me.
“We work,” Madge says, chewing on her bacon. “And work until the agents say stop. You're in for a treat.”
Mary's eyes sharpen with the same anger as Madge's, and I know these women are cut from the same cloth. They'll understand each other perfectly. I'll just be sure to stay out of their way when they're on the warpath.
“What are you in for? Nomad like Terra?” Mary asks.
I never have asked Madge that. With the rage simmering just under the surface, I wasn't sure I was ready to face it, but I'm curious too.
Madge smiles grimly. “We were hiding from agents. We left Portland—our sanctioned city—and ran north. Funny how agents don't see that as innocently as changing residences. They see it as escaping. We found an old, abandoned town and stayed there a few nights. The agents found us there.”
Madge stops and pokes the rest of her bacon. Her lip quivers. I've never seen sorrow from her. I'm not going to like the rest of the story, and I want to tell her to stop. She can keep it as her own if she wants to, but she rushes on like a dam bursting: once it starts, it won't be contained.
“My Danny—my husband—threw himself over the kids when the agents came. He tried to keep the soldiers off them, didn't want them to be touched or harmed or to see any of what we knew would happen. But the soldiers dragged him off of them. One of them smashed his head with his stick, and he dropped to the ground. My girl screamed, and I tried to shush her, tried to tell her it would be okay. It was the worst lie I've ever told her. I could tell by Danny's stillness that it would never be okay again. I held the three of them for twenty seconds before the agents ripped them from me. 'We'll relocate them to nice homes,' they said. 'They'll be taken care of.' I didn't believe a word of it. What kids are taken care of without their mother? Then they loaded me into a truck and brought me here. I haven't seen my children since.”
I have no words. Neither does Mary. We exchange glances, and I know in that moment, when I choose to tell her about my crazy plan to smuggle people to the colony, she'll help me.
The intercom sounds again. “Yard time. You have thirty minutes.”
Trays scrape over tables as everyone scrambles to their feet. They rush their trays—some of them filled with half-eaten food—to the windows where they're cleaned. There's a buzz in the air. It's inaudible, of course; they wouldn't want the soldiers or agents to think they were happy about something, heaven forbid. But I can feel the energy tingle along my arms and tickle in my ears. For the first time since I've been here, they're excited. I follow along with them, and I'm almost bouncing on the balls of my feet when the double doors open at the end of the hall and gray light streams in.
Clouds make a patchwork in the sky. The sunshine from yesterday evening tries to hang on, shining between clouds, but still the magic of being outside works its way into all of us, even if I do rock back and forth on the balls of my feet and blow air in an attempt to warm my hands. This is the only thing these women have to look forward to. I plan to enjoy it.
I look over to the fence that separates the yard down the middle and see that the men are already there. Our overlap comes in the first five minutes of yard time, so I work my way through a tangle of women who do nothing but stand with their eyes closed and their faces tipped to the sky. As I approach the fence, my heart soars to see Jack already there, his fingers entwined in the links, waiting for me.
Waiting for me.
This doesn't unnerve me the way it would have a week ago. It's a relief to see him here, and I'm ashamed to admit I worried that he wouldn't wait. Ashamed to admit a few weeks ago I'm not sure I'd have waited for him. What's wrong with me? Of course I'd wait for him. We were partners, companions, together in the wilderness. Of course I'd wait. But what has changed? Why am I seeing him differently?
“Mind if I come with?” Mary asks, suddenly right by my side. I shake my head. No, I don't mind. Mary should be here for this, where this all begins.
Jack's eyes bounce back the pale light, and the hazel looks almost gray. His cheeks are round with his smile, and he has a bruise over his left eye and a cut on his jaw. He's surprised to see Mary, which worries me. Shouldn't he have seen Dave by now? But I didn't see Mary until about fifteen minutes ago. Maybe Dave hadn't made it to the mess hall yet before yard time.
I grab his hand, but he pulls away from me. My hand is barren without his.
“I don't think we should touch.”
I raise my eyebrows. Why? I mouth.
He just nods his head toward a soldier patrolling the perimeter. “They're watching. I noticed that two days ago when we were all out here for the announcement. They're always watching. I don't know if it's to discourage relationships between men and women or what their reason might be, but they watch. We shouldn't do anything too close.”
I nod and step back. I gesture to my own left eye, and his fingers gingerly touch his face. He winces.
“Just a little disagreement between inmates.”
The nomads who were after us; it has to be.
Jack nods. “Yes, it was them. They seemed to think that beating me now would be some kind of justice for escaping them in the woods. The soldiers took care of it though. I don't think they'll bother me again. I never thought I'd be grateful to anyone running this place, but now I am.”
Now that I know he's fine, I need to tell him who I am. I need to start the ball rolling toward this insane plan of mine. It's essential I tell him now. It's not the way I wanted to do it. I would rather have done it in the cabin, under the blackberry brambles, in the gas station, anywhere that I could have studied him longer, taken the time the truth deserves, been able to at least put a hand on his.
I study the dirt between our feet and the fence. There's no easy way to take away all the lies I've told. They weigh on me now. They never weighed this heavily when I was around Dave. But knowing how much Jack has trusted me, I can feel the burden of it pressing down on me, wanting to bury me. Mary sees the change and takes a step away from us. I've got to give her that. She knows how to read relationships.
“What's wrong, Terra? Are you okay?”
I laugh. I must look so sick to him. I feel sick. My stomach is churning, threatening to show me that the bacon is even worse coming back up. I shake my head and take his hand.
“Terra, I don't think—”
But I shake my head at him again, my eyes wide. This is important, and he sees it on my face. He quiets and lets me hold his hand, but he angles his body to shield us from the soldiers.
I lied about Arizona.
This doesn't surprise him. “Lots of people lie about where they're from.”
I'm not from the Burn.
“What's the Burn? Is that what you
call Arizona? It makes sense with the heat.” He gives me a half-smile. That smile makes me sad.
The Burn is what colonists call land.
He drops my hand. “Colonists?” The thoughts race across his face and weave through his eyes, puzzling what I could possibly mean.
Mary's not far enough away to be out of earshot. At the word “colonists,” her head snaps up. She's doubly alert now. She knows the truth, and she is surprised I'm telling anyone else.
“It's true then, what they say about the colonies?” Jack says.
I nod. I guess it is. I honestly don't know what they say besides the few snippets Mary's told me and what Madge and Jane talked about at the reclamation site. Mary steps back to us.
“Terra, what are you doing?” she hisses. She glances at the soldiers patrolling and the one soldier in the guard tower. There are no agents I can see, and they scare me with their silence more than the soldiers do with their guns.
I grab her hand and hold it so Jack can see what I write. I have a plan. It's crazy. Might work.
But Jack's not ready for that yet. His eyes hold the hurt I was expecting, but actually seeing it is completely different. What I wasn't expecting was the way it would affect me. It almost bowls me over to know that I could hurt him that much. How can I jump immediately to plans and dates and logistics when he's just had the wind knocked out of him?
Wanted to tell you sooner.
He shakes his head, trying to brush away the shock. “I know you did. That night in the gas station, right?”
I nod. His next question cuts me more deeply. It's a question I'm not entirely prepared for because I still haven't sorted out what he means to me, why things have changed.
“Why not before then?”
I shrug my shoulders, helpless. He always thought I was brave, but really I was a coward.
He turns from me, and as he does, my knees wobble. He walks away, and I brace myself against the fence. Mary puts a hand on my arm. Then Jack stops and turns back to me. The wind fingers through his hair, and he looks so much like he did that day next to the Puget Sound when he told me he'd come with me.
I'm so sorry, I mouth. I don't know what changes his mind, but he hesitates for a moment before walking toward us, and his face is guarded. He doesn't light up for me anymore.
“Not much time left,” Mary says, and I panic, remembering what I had to accomplish here.
I want to bring people to the colony.
Both of them are so stunned that if I didn't feel like I'd just been punched in the stomach, I could almost laugh to see their identical expressions: jaws gaping open and eyes wide.
I can get a sub.
They do nothing but blink at me.
I'm not sure about escaping, but I'll try.
Mary is the first to compose herself.
“You're right. It is crazy.”
I nod. The craziest thing I've done so far. Crazier than lying in a field of corn under burning UV lamps, crazier than allowing my mother to mutilate me, crazier than going on a thirty-mile hike in boots that don't fit. I laugh, though. I've definitely done crazy, and I think I can handle it.
“We'd need help,” Jack says, and I see the look in his eyes. It's the same look he gets when he sees a patient and knows he can help: it's just a matter of coming to a diagnosis. He's right. This could heal people. But that look is not for me anymore, it's for the people we could save. It sends a shiver through me that splinters my heart. I ache now.
Then the intercom sounds. “Men, report to your work hours.”
The soldiers file along the fence, herding the men back into their building. A soldier makes his way toward us. We have no time left.
Two weeks, I write.
Jack and Mary nod.
Chapter Eleven
Two weeks is going to both fly by and drag on forever. I hate the feeling of time being completely out of my control. There's so much to do between now and then, so much to plan for and take care of. It will take forever because I feel like I just might be marching myself and those who come with me to our doom.
First, I need to send the message. I squint up between the clouds. It's amazing how even a day like today can seem bright, especially now that the spark I felt in the truck has blossomed into flame. I have a plan; I am going to act; I am trying to save others.
I look at the sky, trying to imagine where those satellites are that Gaea watches so intently. They're out there, circling the earth in ever-decreasing orbit. I wonder when they'll just fall from the sky like meteors. I'm sure there will be more to replace them—Gaea can't be the only one who wants to keep tabs on what's going on down here.
Mary's standing two feet away, her eyes hard. I know from the way she said, “You're right. It is crazy,” that she thinks it's the most insane idea ever, but that she's also willing to try it. Her hard eyes don't speak to me of mistrust, but thoughtfulness, her way of puzzling this out. What I'm about to do will probably look even more insane. I look down the fence. The soldiers march away, focused on getting the men back into their building. The soldier left on the women's side leans against the fence, one foot propped behind him. Almost bored. I'm safe for a moment at least.
Gaea, I mouth, praying that she's watching me, that she hasn't stepped away from the monitor bank right at this moment. This is one time her obsession will pay off. If you're watching, I need help. A sub for seven passengers. Fourteen days. Midnight.
But then I falter. Where? Where is the rendezvous point? I snag Mary's hand. Closest shore?
Mary's brows knit together. “The harbor,” she finally says.
That's it?
She shrugs. “I don't know what else to call it. There's an abandoned airport right on the edge.”
That will have to be enough. The harbor, the abandoned airport.
That's all I can do. I hope that my suspicions are right: that she watches me as much as she can because, despite it all, she's still my mother.
“That's it?” Mary folds her arms over her chest. If it had been four months ago, I would have said it was because she was angry or dissatisfied. Now I read it as concern that there's more that needs to be done.
Now we plan.
We walk back toward the cluster of women.
“You said a sub for seven. Who's coming?”
I point them out. Madge. Kai. Jane. You. Jack. Dave. Then I hesitate. I've never felt more unsure about anything. Me.
“You're sure? You don't look sure.”
I shake my head.
“Well, I guess you have two weeks to decide.”
Two weeks to decide whether or not I regret my decision to come to the Burn. Two weeks to decide whether or not I can cope with the blackness of ocean all around me after I've felt the sun and the wind. After I've been free. I look around: soldiers, chain link fence three times taller than I am, coils of barbed wire like snakes waiting to strike, agents who hate me for a reason I have no name for. Am I free?
“Take your time. It's a big choice.”
Two weeks to see if Jack will ever trust me again.
Mary's rubbing the thread on her finger, and an uncertain smile plays at the corner of her lips. She watches the last of the men disappear into the building.
Dave?
She shakes her head. “I didn't see him. That doesn't mean he's not here, though.”
No, it doesn't, but I worry that he wasn't out here with the rest of them and that Jack didn't mention him. Jack. Will he ever really look at me again? I chafe the sides of my arms. I'm cold remembering the way he looked at me like he was seeing me for the first time and what he saw was almost . . . repulsive.
I told him the truth, and now that hangs between us like a guillotine.
“You okay?” Mary asks.
I nod.
“You're not. That's the same look on your face the night I . . . ”
She can't finish, and she doesn't have to. I know which night she's talking about. The night she confronted me with Jessa's letter. The sadne
ss floods her eyes as she thinks about what she did to me. If I stayed at the settlement, I might have wound up here anyway, but I know she thinks it's her fault I'm here.
You didn't make me leave.
She laughs and shakes her head. “I may as well have, and you know it.” She looks at the pathetic grass trying to fight the cold as it's trampled under our shoes. “I'm so sorry, Terra.”
I know.
She grips my arm tightly and I wince, but she doesn't let go. “I don't think you do.”
It's okay, I mouth.
Her eyes are tear-filled again. “I just wanted to fix everything, the way I wanted to fix Seattle. I couldn't do anything for that city, and I see that now—how hopeless it was. But I could fix what was wrong with me and Dave. I could fix that.”
I know.
She releases my arm and puts both hands over her face. “I'm so scared, Terra. I'm scared why he wasn't out here today.”
Jack would have said something.
She drops her hands, and her eyes are red. “He would, right?”
It's little comfort because I know how quickly the agents can take you away. Dave was born in the settlement. He had no tracker. They were rough with me, but I didn't take any damage because I've learned from Madge and Jane how to play the game. But Dave? Would he fight back, say something, get riled up? He could be in solitary confinement right now. I shudder, but quickly try to play it off as a shiver. I can't let Mary see my doubts.
She's moved on, trying to set aside the pain for now, focusing her mind on something else. But still she strokes the thread tied around her finger.
“How are we doing this?”
Madge and Jane. They've been here longer. They might know something.
“Well, let's figure out how to talk to them.”
This proves trickier than Mary's simple sentence.
The next two days are filled with cannery work, medical exams, agent questions, meals, and time alone at night in my cell with Jane and the screams. Jane and I both sleep on the top bunk now. We spend the few minutes we have of twilight gazing out the window and dreaming before we pull the pillows over our heads for the anthem.