Taken By Surprise

by Jessica Frances

  Chapter Twenty-Seven – The Anger

  Saturday, April 14th

  We all sit in silence as we eat our breakfast. Rose appears to be furious with Will and me so we both keep silent. I don’t really know how to apologize and feel too tired to try right now. Will has gone back to being his quiet self and I know I have to find a way to thank him for making sure I was protected yesterday.

  Stan is in a bad mood and makes us all run the circuit five times before he lets us stop to stretch. It’s obvious most of his anger is aimed at Will and me today. When Charlie stops to help me up after I trip on one of the hoops, Stan yelled at him to let me go. Will is forced to wear a weight suit, adding an extra sixty pounds to his run, even given his broken shoulder which has already started to radically heal from yesterday.

  After our warm up, which is enough to leave me wanting to die, Rose and I are paired up to fight. Will and Charlie are told to keep running the circuit. I again have been given no training. I’m not sure if any of us have been given training. Although Will seems like he is a natural.

  Stan puts on some music and I feel it vibrating through my body. The noise makes my head ache, but it feels so good to hear music again that I ignore the pain. I focus on Rose and see the anger over her face. Charlie went easy on me yesterday and I had only hit him because of a fluke. Rose won’t be going easy on me. I will not be beating her.

  “Go!” Stan yells over the music and I see Rose throw a punch that I’m too slow to duck completely out of the way from. She hits me in the shoulder and I stumble several steps back. Rose moves with me and flicks out her leg to swipe mine off the floor. I fall to the side, hitting the mats hard.

  “Get up,” Rose snaps at me.

  “Rose…” I groan finding my feet and trying to steady myself.

  “Just hurry up.”

  “I’m sorry. We weren’t trying to leave you behind.” I duck as she takes another swing at me. “Please, Rose, I’m sorry, okay?” I take several steps back, getting closer to the edge of the mat.

  “Did you ever think I might want to come outside with you guys?” Rose kicks my knee and I gasp in pain. “Did you ever think I might feel hurt being left inside this hell hole?” Rose pushes me to the ground where I hit the back of my head on the mat.

  My vision swims in front of my eyes as pain shoots through me from being hit in the same spot as I’d been last night. I vaguely notice the music is shut off and the lights are out. The large window displaying the dark grey skies outside keeps the room alight, although it’s not a lot of light.

  “Did you ever think that your little stunt might hurt our chances of getting out of here?” Rose hisses quietly as she stands over me. I see Stan pull her back and then strong arms help me to sit up.

  “Are you okay?” Charlie’s voice is right next to my ear and I feel his warm breath hitting my neck. I stop breathing, noticing how close he is to me. I try to force myself to lean away from him, however a large part of me doesn’t want to lean away at all.

  “Yes.”

  “Are you sure?” He half lifts me to get me standing and as much as I don’t want to, I end up leaning on him heavily when my head starts to ache more.

  “No”

  “Muscles, go get the doc,” Stan calls out.

  “Zoe, I’m sorry. I—” Rose looks upset and she holds her hands up as if to surrender.

  “What the fuck is your problem, Rose?” Charlie shouts at her and I wince at being so close to him.

  “Shut up, Charlie. This has nothing to—”

  “Just get over it. So Will and Zoe went outside, big deal.”

  “Just because you don’t care your little girlfriend screwed up, doesn’t mean I shouldn’t care, either.”

  “Will you two just cool it?” Stan yells at Charlie and Rose.

  I feel Charlie’s body tense as he obviously keeps in whatever else he wants to say to Rose.

  Harold comes in then and Charlie helps me sit on the window ledge while Harold checks me out. The music eventually comes back on as do the lights. Charlie calms down as he and Rose are both sent away to their rooms to cool down. Stan is angry with us all again and Will is still made to run the circuit. I have a feeling he doesn’t really know how to punish Will with his superhuman strength. After Harold clears me and tells me no more physical activity for the rest of the day, I’m made to sit and watch Will run. Martha comes in a few minutes later and has a hushed conversation with Stan before leaving again. I imagine she’ll be holding some sort of peace talk between Charlie and Rose.

  Rose is incredibly scary and her reaction to me may have been harsh, but she is right. Will and I had been selfish to go outside. We didn’t properly consider what it would do to our chances of getting out of here. They might beef up security now.

  Stan leaves lunch in the gym for Will and I to eat alone and I take the opportunity to talk to him.

  “Thank you for yesterday.”

  “It was my idea to go outside, not yours. Rose should be angry at me,” Will says quietly.

  “I think she is angry at you, too. She’ll get over it.”

  “You think so?” His voice reveals his stress and I realize he actually does care. He doesn’t want Rose to be mad at him.

  “Yeah, she just needs to cool off. I’ve got hopefully some good news for her later. I’m trying to thank you here, Will. Charlie told me you carried me up here, that you wouldn’t let anyone hurt me. Thank you for looking out for me.”

  “I should have seen that guard coming. I knew they were getting closer to us, I just didn’t think they would hurt us.”

  “I was pretty distracted, too. The rain on my skin felt amazing.” I smile and close my eyes, picturing the rain hitting me all over.

  “I wish it had lasted longer. On the street, I used to hate it when it rained, but right now, I’d give anything to feel it again.”

  “You lived on the streets?” I ask him, not wanting to believe that’s true.

  Will looks away from me and back at the sandwich in his hands. He shrugs at me in reply, but his eyes don’t come back up to reach mine.

  “I don’t understand. If Stan has been watching us for so long, why didn’t he get you sooner?”

  Will shrugs again and I feel my anger growing towards Stan and P.A.G.E. They allowed a kid to live on the street and for what? Why did he deserve that?

  “We’re going to get out of this place soon and we’re going to get a nice house to live in and you’ll never have to live on the streets again,” I promise him quietly, mindful of being listened to.

  “It’s not really so bad. My best friend lived on the streets, too. He saved my life.”

  “Really? What’s his name? Won’t he be worried about you missing?”

  Will clears his throat and I get the feeling that whatever he’s about to say, isn’t easy for him.

  “Gavin. He had a heart attack and died when the man with the gun came looking for me.” Will keeps his eyes averted from mine.

  “I’m sorry, Will. That’s horrible.”

  “Yeah.” Will looks haunted and I resist the urge to reach out and hug him. He doesn’t seem like the type of person who’ll appreciate something like that. The boy I had seen laughing in the rain yesterday was only a kid, right now he’s back to looking like an adult.

  I don’t push him for much more conversation following that. After we finish our lunch I go back to watching Will run the circuit. I feel like my punishment isn’t really one at all, but Will hasn’t even broken a sweat which makes me think his punishment isn’t really much for him, either.

  Stan comes back in after it’s completely dark outside and our reflection is the only thing I can see in the large window behind us. The gym is cold since any heat is sucked into the glass and I’m shivering in my t-shirt.

  I go to my room to shower and warm up before Martha comes to get me for dinner. She shows us all several books and DVDs that she received today for us and insists that after eating we have a movie night to
gether. Her exact words are to “keep the morale up” between us. I feel Rose’s roll of the eyes without having to look up and see it. None of us bother to argue with her about it, though, and we watch two movies on the couch with her. Over the course of watching both movies, it becomes extremely obvious that she’s frustrated with our lack of excitement over the DVDs.

  Feigning tiredness, we’re allowed to go to bed early after the second movie ends and

  I signal for everyone to follow into my room, which I’ve dubbed the room for our escape meetings. When Charlie shuts off the power, I still feel worried someone might hear us speaking so I whisper.

  “I saw a laptop downstairs when Will and I were heading outside. It was partly hidden and I don’t think anyone saw me see it. I think there’s a good chance we can get to it again.”

  Rose’s eyes light up. “Finally, some good news!”

  “I really am sorry, Rose, that we hurt your feelings. We didn’t mean to do that. Clearly we weren’t thinking and we won’t do it again,” I apologize for both Will and me.

  “I’m sorry, too, about knocking you over. I overreacted.”

  “You don’t have to apologize for that, I know you didn’t mean to hurt me.”

  “Guys, someone is coming,” Will hisses.

  I watch Will and Rose rush off towards my bathroom and I get one quick glance at Charlie before he rushes in and kisses me. This time, we’ve gotten more notice than before. We don’t have to make a decision of what to do and so, unlike our two-second kiss from before, this one lasts longer. My hands snake their way to Charlie’s neck and I almost forget that the only reason we’re kissing right now is because someone is coming. He wraps his arms around me and pulls me flat against him and I groan into his mouth. He uses the opportunity to trace my lips with his tongue. We both lose ourselves in the moment so when a knock on my door comes, I actually feel surprised.

  Martha pops her head in as Charlie and I slowly pull away from each other. I’m breathing deeply while my heart beats wildly in my chest.

  “I hoped this wouldn’t be what I would find in here. I’ve spoken specifically to both of you about this.” Martha’s eyes bore into mine and I look away, unable to hold her gaze. “At any rate, Zoe needs her rest if she is going to be able to come back to training. So, Stan and myself would appreciate it if you could please try to restrain yourself for one night.” Martha closes the door a little harder than necessary and a sigh of relief escapes my lips, knowing she isn’t looking at me anymore.

  “That was close,” Rose whispers from the bathroom. She and Will both come out and I peek outside my door to make sure the coast is clear before Will and Rose leave. We whisper that we’ll talk about the laptop tomorrow.

  “About that kiss…” Charlie begins, but he seems lost for words.

  “It’s okay, I understand. I’m going to get ready for bed. See you in a bit?”

  Charlie nods and leaves for his room.