Fighting for Rain

by Easton, BB

  “In an effort to protect the law of natural selection going forward and to ensure that our population never again faces extinction due to our irresponsible allocation of resources to the weakest, most dependent members of society, all social services and subsidies are to be discontinued. Life support measures are to be discontinued. Government-provided emergency services are to be discontinued, and all incarcerated members of society will be released.”

  The entire food court erupts in outraged shouts and hushed murmurs as people try to process what the fuck this lady just said.

  “You are encouraged to resume your daily lives. Power, water, and cell service have been restored, and the images you just saw have been removed from all digital media. Go back to work. Provide for your families. Protect yourself and your community. Your government will no longer do these things for you. And should you see evidence of a person or group of persons defying the laws of natural selection, you are required to dial 55555 on any cellular device to report the misconduct. Agents from your area will be dispatched immediately to detain the suspect. The future of our species depends on your cooperation. Good luck, and may the fittest survive.”

  The monitors go black as the reality of our situation slowly begins to take hold.

  It was all just a fucking hoax.

  They invaded our dreams.

  They terrorized us from the inside out.

  They drove us insane and watched while we self-destructed.

  Then they smiled and said it was for our own good.

  I wish I could say I was surprised, but after everything I’ve been through, this just feels like a regular Tuesday. Get shit on. Get beat down. Get told it’s your fault. Then, get kicked to the curb with everything you own in a trash bag over your shoulder.

  Yep, that sounds about right.

  The only family in the room is clinging to one another for support. Offering comfort. Rationalizing that everything is going to be okay. Encouraging each other to trust in our leaders and do as they say.

  Meanwhile, the homeless kids in the back of the room are jumping up and down, cheering and waving their guns in the air, while Q stands on a table shouting, “It’s the wild, wild west, muhfuckas! Pew, pew, pew!”

  The way Rain is wrapped around me, it’s obvious which group she belongs in.

  It’s also obvious that I don’t belong here at all.

  Rain

  “Dude, this place hasn’t had power in, like, forever, right? How in the hell did they make the TVs come on?” Lamar asks from his perch on the counter, his heels banging into the cabinets below with every swing of his restless legs.

  Wes shrugs. “I dunno, man. Maybe they flipped the entire power grid on just for the broadcast?”

  I’m only half-listening to their conversation. The rest of me is busy staring at the unconscious boy behind the counter. The one with the glass shard sticking out of a bloody bandage on the side of his neck. The one I’m supposed to fix somehow.

  The one I’m going to fix somehow.

  “Rain?” Wes asks.

  “Huh?” I reply without taking my eyes off of Quint.

  “You okay? You haven’t said a word since the announcement.”

  “The announcement,” I mutter, turning to face Wes. “Is that what we’re gonna call it from now on? Like the way everybody called the apocalypse April 23 ’cause it sounded nicer?”

  Wes chews on his bottom lip like he does when he’s trying to figure something out.

  When he’s trying to figure me out.

  “I know that was a lot to process, okay? I know. But I need you to stay focused. Don’t freak out on me.”

  “I’m not freaking out.”

  Wes tosses a doubtful glance at Lamar.

  “I’m not. Maybe I just don’t feel like talking about the fact that the government just publicly patted themselves on the back for makin’ my dad try to kill his whole family.”

  Wes exhales hard through his nose and nods. “Yeah, I get that.”

  “I know he was nonproductive. He was depressed … unemployed, paranoid, mean as a snake, addicted to everything he could get his hands on … but what about her?” The prickly heat of anger in my flushed face fades as my throat tightens with emotion. “She was so good, Wes.” I picture my mama’s beautiful, frazzled, selfless face, and I want to cry. She was the most productive member of society I’d ever met. There are so many things I want to say, so many feelings I haven’t expressed yet, but they’re all too damn painful, so I cover my mouth with the sleeves of my sweatshirt and hold them all in.

  I stare at Wes’s lips, hoping the words coming out of his mouth will help take my mind off the ones lodged in my throat.

  “I know. But we can’t change what happened. All we can do is say fuck ’em and survive anyway, right? So, how are we gonna survive today? Do you remember your list?”

  I swallow down all the things left unsaid and force myself to answer him.

  “I … I was supposed to find soap, water, and shelter.” I take a deep breath and straighten my back. “I already found soap, and Mrs. Renshaw said that Q has water barrels, so that only leaves shelter.”

  The lips I’m staring at widen and part, revealing Wes’s dazzling smile. I don’t get to see it often, but when I do, it warms my skin like the sun, seeping into my pores and filling me with pride.

  I feel my own lips curve upward, mirroring his. I did something right.

  “That’s my girl,” Wes says with that grinning mouth, but the moment the words pass over his upturned lips, his smile deflates like a popped balloon. He didn’t like the way they tasted. This new, detached Wes didn’t like calling me his girl.

  So my lips fall flat too.

  We stand there for a minute—me staring at his serious mouth and him staring at mine—until Wes finally takes a step back and gestures with his hand toward the door. “Let’s go find you some shelter.”

  You.

  “Let’s go find you some shelter.”

  I want to take his arm as I make the short trip across the store, but I’m afraid I’ll prick my finger on the barbed-wire fence he’s building between us.

  I don’t know what’s going on with Wes, but he’s eerily quiet as we walk down the hallway. I yank on the metal gates and locked doors of every storefront we pass, but he just follows four feet behind me with his arms folded across his chest.

  The distance between us feels like it’s doubling with every step I take.

  I turn right at the fountain and head down the hallway, angry tears stinging my eyes.

  Hope momentarily chases them away when I spot an old shoe store up ahead with the gate raised. I poke my head inside and peek over the empty chest-high shelves. The vinyl benches that were once used to try on shoes have been clustered together in the center of the store and arranged like living room furniture. Carter’s dad is sitting on one with his head bowed as Carter’s mom and sister stand with their backs to me, probably telling him all about the announcement.

  “Never mind,” I whisper, slinking backward out of the store. “This one’s taken.”

  When I turn to continue my walk, I find Wes waiting for me with his back against the graffiti-covered wall outside the shoe store. His Hawaiian shirt is open, revealing his bloodstained white tank top and the hint of a gun holster underneath. His head is tilted back, staring up at one of the skylights as if it were clear enough to actually see through, and his profile is the picture of perfection. The sight of him takes my breath away, replacing it with a hollow, empty ache in my chest.

  He looks exactly like the man I fell in love with a few days ago. The one who rescued me from an angry mob, got shot for me, ran back into a burning building to find me, and buried my parents’ bodies just to help take away my pain. He looks like the man who refused to let me go when everybody else had left me behind.

  But he did let me go. He must have.

  Because this guy sure as hell ain’t him.

  “You’re not even helping me look,” I snap
, stomping past his cool exterior without stopping.

  “You’re right.” Wes’s voice is infuriatingly calm as he pushes off the wall.

  “Is this some kind of test?” I hiss, rattling the next gate a little harder. “I have to do everything on my own from now on, is that it?”

  “Nope,” Wes says from somewhere behind me. “I’m not helping ’cause I’m not staying here.”

  “What?” I turn to face him, blood thumping in my ears. “Why not?”

  That damn eyebrow goes up again. “Hmm. Maybe ’cause there’s no running water. No electricity. Maybe I don’t feel like being the errand boy for a group of crazy-ass, gun-toting homeless kids. Or, I don’t know, maybe I don’t wanna live down the hall from your fucking ex and his little Norman Rockwell family.”

  “What do you want me to do, Wes?” I turn my back on him and stomp toward the next storefront.

  “Leave. With me. Right now. We can find a new place. One with water and power and doors that lock and walls that don’t have black fucking mold growing on them.”

  I sigh, letting my hand linger on the rusty metal. “I can’t leave Quint here. You know that.”

  “So, we’ll take him with us. We could drive the Ninja back to town, gas up your dad’s truck, and then come back and get him.”

  “What about Lamar?” My voice takes on a shrill tone as a strange sense of panic washes over me.

  “He could ride in the back with Quint.”

  I turn and walk past the next entrance without stopping. The gate is up, but it’s obvious somebody’s been living in there for a while now. Maybe a few somebodies. Clothes and mattresses and beer cans and random, mismatched patio chairs are strewed around like confetti.

  “What about Mr. Renshaw?” I ask, quickening my pace. “He’s hurt too.”

  “You can make all the excuses you want. I know the real reason you don’t want to leave.”

  “Oh, yeah? What’s that?”

  Because I’m too scared. Because I’m too sad. Because no one is trying to rape or rob me in here. Because nothing in here reminds me of home.

  When Wes doesn’t say anything, I turn to find him watching me with that emotionless expression on his filthy, beautiful face.

  “You think I want to stay because of him?” I snap.

  Wes raises one eyebrow as he nonchalantly chews on the inside corner of his mouth.

  “Oh my God. I have friends here, Wes. I have a—”

  “Family?” His tone is smooth as ice, but his eyes are hard and accusing.

  “No … a purpose. I can help people here. I feel safe in here. Out there …” I shake my head, thinking about what’s waiting beyond those doors. “Out there, it’s nothing but Bonys and bad memories.”

  Wes opens his mouth to reply as I yank on the next metal gate. I brace myself for the impact of his words, but instead, my ears are assaulted by the sound of squealing gears when the gate jerks to life in my hands.

  The rusty metal squeaks and shimmies as it rolls up to the ceiling, revealing the hollowed-out interior of an old Barnes & Noble bookstore.

  My mouth falls open as I step inside. “Oh my God. This used to be my favorite place in the whole mall.”

  It’s dark inside, but there’s enough light from the skylights in the hallway to see my way around. The checkout stands are to the left of the entrance, right where I remember. The coffee shop, or what’s left of it, is to the right. There are rows and rows of empty shelves in the center of the store and dust-covered tables lining the main aisle.

  “I remember Mama bringing me here for story time when I was a kid,” I continue, talking more to myself than to Wes. “They had a train set right back there, and these little stools that looked like tree trunks, and”—I gasp as my eyes climb up a wooden ladder in the far-left corner of the store, leading up the trunk of a cutout, cloud-shaped oak tree—“a tree house!”

  I sprint down the main aisle, looking for signs of life between every row of shelves. When I don’t find anything except for trash, standing water, and the occasional forgotten book, I head over to the children’s area.

  Please don’t let anyone be up there. Please, God. Please let me have this one thing …

  I reach out with a hopeful hand to grasp the ladder, but Wes beats me to it. Taking the rungs two at a time, he climbs to the top and shines his pocket flashlight into the wooden shelter. Then, without a word, he clicks it off and hops back down, landing before me with a graceful thud.

  “Well?”

  “Well, what?” His face is unreadable, but the air around him is charged.

  “Any runaways living up there?”

  “Nope.” Wes props his elbow on the ladder and leans over me, causing me to tilt my head back to make eye contact. “It’s all yours.”

  “You mean, ours,” I whisper, frozen to the spot by his icy stare.

  Wes shakes his head. Slowly.

  Panic shoots through my veins as I realize what he’s saying.

  “Don’t go.” I shake my own head, much faster, as sudden, uncontrollable tears blur my vision. “Please. Please stay here with me. I can’t do this without you, Wes.”

  “Yes, you can.”

  “I don’t want to!”

  I step up onto the bottom rung of the ladder and place my hands on Wes’s shoulders, so that we’re eye-to-eye. “Remember yesterday? We were just like this. I was on the ladder of my tree house, and you were on the ground, and the sun was setting over there”—I point one hand in the direction of the hazy, sunlit entrance—“and I told you I loved you, and you said you loved me too.”

  “You thought the world was about to end.” Wes’s tone is condescending and doubtful, but his hands on my waist are begging me to make him believe.

  “So did you.”

  “I meant what I said.”

  “So did I, Wes. I still do.”

  Seconds go by as I let that sink in. Wes doesn’t say a word. He doesn’t move a muscle, but his heart is beating so hard that I can feel the air vibrating off his chest in sonic waves. His hands tighten around my middle, and his nostrils flare as he sucks in silent breaths.

  I can almost hear the sound of cracking ice.

  I force a smile even though I’m terrified and bring one hand up to stroke his rough cheek. “Hey … if I’m not allowed to freak out, then you’re not allowed to either.”

  Wes nods his head maybe a fraction of an inch. It’s so subtle that I almost miss it, but in that whisper of movement, he lets me see the real him. The one who is panicking just as badly as I am.

  “Look around, baby. It’s still just you and me … and a tree house.” I smile and gesture above my head. “Carter being here doesn’t change anything. I don’t want to stay because of him. I know that’s what you think, but you’re wrong. I want you. I love you. Don’t you see that?”

  Wes swallows the distance between us in a single step and crashes his lips against mine. When he presses my back against the ladder and invades my mouth with his tongue, I taste his relief. When he lifts my thigh over his hip and rocks against me, I feel his desperation. And when his hand slides up the back of my head and fists my hair, I feel his need.

  This isn’t a goodbye kiss.

  It can’t be.

  I raise my arms and gasp for air as Wes pulls my hoodie and tank top off over my head in one motion. Then, I dive for his mouth again. The only time I feel truly alive is when I’m kissing this man. He’s like a live wire—calm and quiet on the outside but a raging electrical storm within. One touch, and I’m rooted to the spot, lit up and blazing hot as his power surges through me. It scrambles my thoughts, blasts through all my fears, and leaves me humming and vibrating and yearning for more.

  Wes strips himself of his shirt, holster, and tank top. Then, as soon as his hands are free, they reach for me. Rough palms caress my exposed skin and tear at the clothes preventing them from touching more. Wes yanks my lacy bra down around my waist and feasts on the curve of my neck as he kneads my aching breasts.
I arch my back and cling to the ladder rung above my head as his soft, warm mouth trails wet kisses down my chest. All I can do is hold on, paralyzed by the current of pleasure flowing through me, as Wes swirls and sucks and drags his tongue over each of my tight, tender nipples.

  He places one of my feet on his thigh and makes quick work of my bootlaces. In a few seconds, both of my hiking boots join the growing pile of clothes on the ground, and Wes’s hands move straight to my zipper. I go to reach for him, but he places my hand back on the wooden slat above me.

  “Don’t move,” he growls, yanking my jeans and panties down my thighs. “I want you just like this.”

  Once I’m completely naked, Wes takes a step back and admires me. Stretched out on the ladder. Arms up. Back arched. Breasts wet from his mouth and heaving with my every breath.

  Even in the dark of the bookstore and behind that curtain of brown hair, I see the moment his eyes darken. A shiver cascades down my spine as Wes licks his full bottom lip and unfastens his jeans. I swallow as his thumbs hook into his waistband, shoving his pants and boxers down just enough to free himself, and I feel my heart sink as his hand wraps around his hard cock.

  I wanted to make love to Wes.

  But it looks like the Ice King just took his place.

  Wes’s eyes don’t meet mine as he stalks toward me. They linger on my body as he strokes his length. Even though my heart is breaking, slick heat trickles between my thighs as my back arches toward his ghost. I’ll take this man any way I can get him even if the version I’m getting isn’t him at all.

  “Fuck,” Wes hisses, snaking his hands down my sides, over my hips, and around to squeeze my full ass.

  Wes spreads me apart as he pulls my body toward him, guiding his thickness into the slippery mess between my thighs. He groans, pushing my hips away from him and pulling them right back. I hold on to the ladder with both hands as he drags his smooth flesh between my folds. His head is bowed as he watches himself disappear between my thighs.

  He won’t look at me.

  He won’t even look at me.

  “Wes,” I cry, my voice breaking with need.

  His eyes snap up, softened by surprise, and I catch a glimmer of the man inside. Reaching out with one hand, I cup his hard jaw, holding it in place so that he can’t look away.