Famished

by Lauren Hammond

  It always felt like he was looking past me, staring directly into my soul. If he didn’t care about me, I was convinced that he was one of the best actors I’d ever seen. Even better than the ones that were in movies. Perhaps. Colin could give Brad Pitt a run for his money.

  Honestly. I’d always prided myself in being completely and totally honest with people. A person who could look someone directly in the eye and lie to their face didn’t have guts or a conscience. I had both. It was different when people who loved you did it. Yes, it was still wrong but, eventually when you found out, you knew they were only doing it because they truly cared about you.

  My mother lied to me all the time but I knew she only did because she loved me so much. Like when I was ten and we had a heated debate on Santa Clause. She insisted that he was real, telling me that if I didn’t leave the milk and cookies out, that he wouldn’t come. I knew he wasn’t real. But Christmas isn’t the same without Santa. And even though she was lying to my face, I knew she wasn’t doing maliciously.

  What Mr. Baker, Mr. Martin, and Mr. Edwards were doing was malicious. They weren’t just lying to me, they were lying and betraying an entire colony of people. The same people who took them in when they had nowhere else to go. None of us cared if that meant we had more mouths to feed. We were saving lives and that was all that mattered.

  Sulking back to my room, I couldn’t hold back my deeply-rooted feeling of sorrow anymore. My eyes watered up, tears brimming over the edges. I was so overwhelmed with emotion, I had to stop in the middle of the hall and hold myself to keep it all together.

  One tear after another, rained down my cheeks. Closing my eyes, I squeezed them together tightly, hoping to dry up my tears ducts. I let out a long sigh, and clenched my jaw as my temples started pounding and a sharp pain rippled through the stitched up gash above my forehead.“Get a hold of yourself,” I said, barely above a whisper.

  It was time that I stopped crying and showed everyone who they were dealing with. I’d been through hell and back in the last three days and came out just fine. Part of my memory was gone and I was physically broken, but I wasn’t going to let that keep me down.

  I refused to just sit back and let myself become another one of their victims. Like Mr. Baker said, “The Carver girl is too smart for her own good.” He was right about that.

  Tomorrow, I would pretend like everything was perfect. I’d put on the best act of my entire life. I’d keep an eye on Mr. Baker at all times. I’d sneak in and out of the shadows, like a creature of the night. Then, when Mr. Baker and his family were out and about, I’d march right into his room, snatch the lottery box, and put his daughter’s name inside of it.

  Chapter 16: Resurrected

  Woe to her that is filthy and polluted, to the oppressing city!~ Zephaniah 3:1

  The chatter in the mess hall died down to silence as I entered. My eyes wandered around the room, stopping at my old table. Grace beamed at me, motioning for me to join her. I smiled back and made my way over to her. Colin wasn’t here yet, if he was going to show up at all. Someone probably informed him that I was coming out of hiding today. News around here spread faster than an avalanche on a snow capped mountain.

  “So glad to have you back!” Grace gushed as I plopped down on my bench.

  I laughed. “Grace, you’ve seen me every day this week.”

  She grabbed my arm and placed her head against my shoulder. “Well, I still missed you at mealtimes.”

  Turning away, I had a hard time looking at Grace. I felt like I was betraying her just by keeping what I knew about her sister a secret. But my plan wouldn’t work if I spilled everything now.

  Last night, after I pieced myself back together, I lied awake in bed, plotting. I knew every aspect of Mr. Baker’s schedule and my plan wouldn’t have worked if I didn’t. Usually, I hated that we lived in such close proximity with all the colonists, but now it appeared that the closeness would work out to my advantage.

  In the morning, Mr. Baker joined everyone in the mess hall for breakfast. Then, after breakfast, he went into the kitchen to count the food inventory. He counted every item himself, to ensure that nothing was stolen. That took him about three hours. With this many people, and everyone contributing something, that was a lot of food to count. When the inventory was completed, he’d go back to his room and, at 11:30 he’d join everyone else in the mess hall for lunch.

  Afternoons consisted of council meetings, making his rounds, family time, and then dinner. My best shot at sneaking into his room would be during that council meeting .His wife would be in the kitchen prepping, for dinner because she organized all the meals and his kids would be having recreational time.

  All the kids under eighteen had recreation time on Tuesdays and Thursdays after lunch. I liked to spend my time reading or playing checkers with Grace. Sometimes, Frankie would talk me into playing some kind of board game with her. Candyland was her favorite. But I’d beaten her so many times, now it was boring.

  I was staring off, in a daze, consumed with my plan that I barely noticed Mr. Baker and his daughter Elise, standing before me. “It’s nice to see you, back and well, Miss Carver,” he squawked.

  Taking a deep my breath, I lifted my head. I kept calm, a bright smile forming on my face. “Thank you, Mr. Baker.” I pushed a strand of my fiery red hair away from my face. “I’m so thankful to be back amongst the living.” I emphasized on the word living.

  He nodded. “As you should be.” He turned to Elise. “Let’s go, dear.” He turned back to me. “Enjoy your breakfast, Miss Carver.”

  “I will, thank you.” My eyes followed him over to his table as he and Elise took their seats.

  Elise Baker was the same age as me. We weren’t friends. We were acquainted with each other, like everyone else was down here but, she had this arrogant, superior attitude, just like her father. I kept my eyes on her, as she ran her fingers through her honey brown hair. I wondered if she knew what her father had planned for me. No…..

  Elise was snobby, always walking around with her nose in the air, or not speaking to anybody that she didn’t speak to first, but I didn’t think she was evil.

  The table shook when Colin sat down across from me. “Hey there, Georgie,” he said kindly. “Welcome back.”

  “Thanks, Colin,” I answered with a hint of flirtation in my voice. “I missed you,” I lied. “Why didn’t you come visit me again?”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Grace smirking at me, and then she winked. I winked back at her. Soon Grace, soon, I thought. Soon you won’t want to wink at me when you think about Colin Martin. You’ll want to rip out his jugular.

  Colin fumbled with his words. “Um… Yeah…. Uh. I just thought you needed your rest. I didn’t want to intrude.”

  “Intrude?” I raised an eyebrow. “You wouldn’t be intruding.” I reached up and fanned my fingers across his baby soft cheek.

  He observed me, still tense. Then he slumped his shoulders relaxing. “I’m sorry, I should have been there,” he admitted.

  “I forgive you.” My smile was stretched wide, and I could feel the dimples rising up in my cheeks.

  He smiled back. “I’m glad.”

  Inside, I was so sick and twisted with disgust that I thought about hunching over and throwing up next to the table, but beguiling Colin Martin was a pivotal part of my plan and I wasn’t about to screw it up. If anyone caught on to my little act, I wouldn’t be able to pull it off.

  The rest of my morning passed by quickly. After breakfast, I went to the infirmary to visit May. “Look at you,” she gasped. “I’m so proud of your progress!” May was so easy to talk to. She just gave great advice and didn’t judge anyone. Sometimes, I found that I could talk to her more about certain things than I could my mother.

  “May?”

  “Yes, Georgie,” she said sweetly.

  “This is all hypothetical, but just say you found out something important. And if you told someone it could hurt a lot of people. And if
you didn’t you’d be keeping something very important from people you cared about. Would it be wise to keep it in or tell?”

  She squinted. “Are you sure this all hypothetical?”

  I nodded. “Yes.” Her eyes burned into mine. I hated doing this. I hated being like them. The ones who repeatedly lied to everyone. But I couldn’t tell her the truth yet because I hadn’t decided for sure if I wanted to or if it was the right time.

  May shifted in her seat. “That depends on the secret the person is keeping. If it‘s something extremely important you should always tell. Keeping something like that from someone a person cares about is worse.”

  “Thanks, May.” I got up and walked to the door.

  During lunch, I set the second part of my plan in motion. I could feel Mr. Baker’s eyes on me as I walked up to my mother, hunched over, hugging my stomach. “Mom,” I moaned. “I don’t feel so hot.”

  “Oh, no, honey, what’s wrong?” She frowned and placed the back of her hand to my forehead. “You’re a little warm. Do you want to go lay down for a while?”

  “Yeah. I think I just need to rest for a little bit.”

  My mother pushed her tray away and started getting up. She turned to my father, half-standing, half-sitting, and said, “I’m just going to walk her back to the room.”

  My father nodded, leaning forward. “Feel better, kiddo.”

  “Thanks, Daddy.”

  My mother helped me into bed, then folded the blanket up under my chin. “I’m going to back to the mess hall,” she said. “Lunch will be over in an hour and I promised Margie Baker that I’d help with clean-up duty. Do you need anything before I go?”

  “No,” I yawned. “I think I just need to sleep. I didn’t get much last night.”

  She looked at me puzzled. “You didn’t? Why not?”

  “My legs felt funny.”

  “Describe funny. What was wrong with them?”

  I shrugged, nonchalantly. “Nothing bad. They just felt a

  little jittery.”

  “I see.” She appeared to be deep in though. “Well, do they feel alright, now?”

  “They’re fine.”

  She leaned in, brushing her lips softy against my forehead. “Feel better, sweetheart.” Then she waltzed out of my room.

  I waited. The clock above me read 12:00 pm. In ten minutes, I would hurry into Mr. Baker’s room and switch the names in the ballot box before my mother could come back and realize I was gone.

  * * * *

  The chatter from the mess hall ricocheted off the dirt walls of the hallway. Pressing my body flat against the wall, I crept passed the open doorway, careful not get myself noticed. I sucked in my breath and moved forward. The people in the mess hall were still eating and enthralled with the conversations they were having with one another.

  Making a left turn, I placed my back against the opposite wall and walked right through the open doorway of the Baker family’s quarters. “Think, George, think.” Where did he say that box would be? Silently, I replayed the conversation between Mr. Baker and Mr. Martin in my mind. Yes! Mr. Baker said there was a hidden door behind a rug on the wall.

  Observing the walls from top to bottom, and corner to corner, when I spun around to face the wall behind me, there it was. A long, crimson, rectangular antique rug. I picked up the bottom right corner, and sure enough, there was a door behind it. A massive wooden door with black,cast iron panels across the lower part and black iron bars along the upper part. It reminded me of a door that belonged in an 18th century prison. And how in the heck did he get it in here unnoticed? If I hadn’t heard about it before, I could bet my life that none of the other colonists had either.

  As I twisted the black, oval doorknob, I stopped about half-way through the turn when the knob wouldn’t cross over. Damn it! The door was locked. There had to be a spare key in here somewhere.

  I moved over to the dresser, prepared to tear through the drawers, when I heard the sound of whistling. At first it was faint, then it grew louder and louder, and I realized someone was heading toward the room. Seeing that the bed would be the only decent hiding place, I dove underneath, curling myself up into a little ball. “OWWWW!” I mouthed, forgetting the cut on my head when I dove headfirst into the dirt floor. Placing my fingers on the stitched up wound, I massaged it gently to take the searing pain away.

  A pair of feet shuffled into the room. Mr. Baker. He removed a pair of keys from his pocket, and the jingling noise from them filled my ears. Disappearing behind the rug, I heard Mr. Baker stick a key into the slot of the door and then the click on the latch of the lock. Behind the rug, I could tell he was bending over to pick up the ballot box. The shuffling sound of paper led me to believe that he was planting my name in the box.

  Just as he set the box back down, a loud blood curdling scream rang throughout the room. “What was that?” he questioned himself. Startled, he slammed the door, forgetting to lock it and was out of the room in a flash.

  When I couldn’t hear his footsteps anymore, I slithered out from underneath the bed, dragging my belly on the floor. I felt like one of those contortionists who could bend their body any way they wanted to. The only problem with that was bending like that made every bone and muscle in my body hurt.

  Once I made certain the coast was still clear, I made a mad dash for the rug, opened the door quickly and slipped inside. Flipping open the lid to the box, I quickly removed two pieces of paper. I opened the first one with Dylan Edwards name on it and put it back in the box. I assumed the second one was mine, so I didn’t check it to confirm it.

  Stomp. Stomp. Stomp. Several pairs of footsteps were heading down the hall. Shit! I was pressed for time. Reaching into my back pocket, I removed the paper with Elise’s name, shoved it into the box and closed the lid quietly.

  The footsteps were so loud that they drowned out the sound of my own breathing. There was no way I could get out of here without a member of the Baker family seeing me. I set the box down on the ground and slowly began backing up.

  People were moving around the room, and I prayed that Mr. Baker wouldn’t open the door. Keys jingled again, like the bells on Santa’s sleigh. Then I heard the key scraping against metal and a click. Fuck. Mr. Baker locked me in his damn closet.

  Backing up more, I expected to ram into a wall, but was pleasantly surprised when I noticed a short, rectangular path. “Hmm,” I said to myself. “What are you hiding in here, you sneaky weasel?” I followed the path about eight feet, coming to a stop at the end of it. To my right was a long cemented ramp that stretched diagonally at twenty-four feet, at the least.

  Curious, I climbed the ramp, only to discover that at the top of it, there was another ramp. Then, when I reached the top of that ramp, surprise….Another ramp.

  When I had climbed all three of them I made a mental note that if I saw one more ramp I was going to scream at the top of my lungs. So, I was extremely happy when I finished walking the last ramp and noticed a twelve-foot metal ladder with two bolted metal, hatch-like doors above it.

  Excited, I practically ran up the ladder, climbing two rungs at a time, until I reached the top and had to push to open the metal doors. The entire adventure through Mr. Baker’s closet was intriguing, like a haunted maze that used to be put on in the cornfields around Halloween. I couldn’t wait to see what was waiting for me through the metal doors.

  The first time I pushed, the doors wouldn’t budge. I tried again. Nope. It wasn’t until the third time that I was able to push the doors open and pull myself up out of the hole I was in.

  Standing up, my eyes bugged out as I examined my surroundings. I marveled at the twenty television screens that were perched along a shiny silver wall. I gasped at the beautiful, black marble flooring—so clean I could see my reflection in it.

  And I shook my head in disbelief as my eyes followed the twenty-foot long control panel that stretched along the bottom row of the televisions screens.

  This place was like a dream. Even thou
gh it reminded me vaguely of a government lab, I thought the only kind of interiors I would see for the rest of my life were, dirt walls and cement floors. My mouth gaped open, the last time I saw anything like this, earth was still earth. Where did Mr. Baker get all of this stuff? And what was he using it for?

  Still mesmerized, I spun around in a circle, then came to a halt. I wasn’t alone. Someone or something else was in the room with me. Afraid to turn around, I peeked over my shoulder and gawked at guy who couldn’t have been more than three years older than me. His shoulders were broad, his build athletic. He had deep, dark chocolate colored brown hair that was a bit on the long side. The color of his hair suited his almond complexion. He got closer and closer.

  I spun all the way around. Our eyes met and locked. I lurched closer, not breaking my gaze. Until he was about three feet away from me and I saw them. I saw his eyes. His dark blue, mixed with voodoo purple, violet eyes.

  He cocked his head to the side and crooked me a smile, his perfect sharpened teeth fully visible, dimples rising up in his cheeks.

  I picked my feet up one at a time, every memory of the day I met him resurrecting, hitting me like a slap in the face. No….

  Not him.

  I couldn’t stay here. I had to save myself. So I took off running.

  Chapter 17: I’m Starving

  Hast thou found me O mine enemy?~1Kings 21:20

  He caught me by my shirt tail, twisted me around, and pressed his body into my back. I tried to slap his hands away but he gripped each side of my waist and held on tightly. Violet eyes. From now on, any time I thought about violet eyes, they would be associated with the word death. Chills of terror spread throughout my body as the warmth from his kept me from freezing. His lips were inching closer and closer to my neck and my knees started to tremble.

  Then, he leaned in, close to my ear, his lips almost brushing against it . His hot breath against my neck made it tingle, and goose bumps appeared on my arms. I winced, preparing myself for the moment, where his teeth sink into my skin and rip the flesh away. I moved forward slightly and he pulled me back, wrapping his right arm around the front of me. Then he whispered into my ear,“Dinner,”he breathed.“It’s so nice to see you again. Did you miss me?”