by V. K. Ludwig
I watched his hand from the corner of my eyes. This made no sense. “How did she die?”
“Who knows.” He took his hand off my shoulder and shrugged, backing up by a few steps. “Just old I guess. From what I was told, she most likely just fell to sleep never to wake up again.”
He smiled. The kind of smile that looked painful to the eye of the observer, as if the facial expression revolted against the truth.
“Can you?” he asked, running a hand through his sparse hair. “Keep a secret?”
Ruth’s voice came from the staircase by the elevator, “Max, we’re done.”
I kept my eyes on Merrick, his hands rubbing across the bridge of his nose repeatedly. With nothing but a nod, I turned around and left him standing in the hallway, making my way back to Ruth and Autumn with hurried steps.
“What did she have to say about it?” Ruth asked.
I placed my finger onto my lips and gestured them into the elevator. It wasn’t until Merrick’s face disappeared that I spoke up, their eyes glued to my lips. “Kenya is dead.”
“What?” Ruth clenched her hands around the aluminum rail. “Why would you say something like that? She isn’t dead. She can’t be.”
“Her office is empty. Her name tag is gone. Councilman Merrick told me she just fell to sleep and didn’t wake up.”
It took Ruth a while to realize what I had just told her. “But I just saw her when I picked up Autumn, and she looked as feisty as ever.”
“Sometimes old people just die,” Autumn added, “even when they are healthy.”
“Yes but…” My voice trailed off, distracted by the way my stomach churned. This was too unexpected. Too close to the interview to be a coincidence. “I’m getting a strange vibe about all this. First the interview. Then Svea’s snarky comments. And now Kenya. He asked me to keep it a secret for another day before they announce it to the public.”
“Do you think that’s why they’ve been on the pyramid this morning?” Ruth asked. “Remove her name and all?”
“Maybe.” I placed my finger on my lips once more, the elevator announcing the ground floor with a ding. We stepped outside and left the building, huddling together as soon as we stepped out of the building’s shadow.
Autumn stared at the ground, avoiding my eyes, her face not the usual porcelain type of pale. It was more of a sickly kind of pale as if something was eating her up from the inside.
Shame crawled up my legs on all fours, leaving me paralyzed and unable to take proper breaths. I fucked up again, letting our differences grow into a thirty-inches thick border. We needed to talk. The mature type, with all cards on the table. And I knew just the place for it.
Chapter 19
Autumn
“I’m not saying Kenya wasn’t murdered.” I placed a steaming mug of coffee in front of Ruth, who sat cross-legged on her bar stool. “But why would somebody go through such a hassle and risk, if the person is almost a hundred years old? Why not just let it run its natural course?”
“Max thinks they killed her before she got another set of votes on her seventieth anniversary.”
I plopped myself on the stool next to her and scratched a chunk of pineapple off the crust. “Max also thinks this stuff belongs on a pizza. Clearly, something’s wrong with the way he sees the world.”
Ruth gave me a pitiful sort of smirk. “I’m sorry for what he said yesterday. I had no clue he wasn’t an approved donor.”
“Don’t mention it.” I struggled my voice into something gentle, yesterday’s brutal pain still seeping to my core. No matter how close our bodies had been, the distance between us now seemed unscalable. “I overstepped a boundary and put him on the spot. I have no clue where that shitty idea came from.”
Except that I kinda did. The program was like a fortuneteller, and I fell for the age-old trick. That cheeky boy with his hazel brown eyes would never happen — that much he made clear.
I paid a nickel for a lie.
“I slept with Max,” I mumbled it like a confession, but it didn’t make me feel an ounce lighter.
No fucking surprise.
Ruth couldn’t give absolution.
“No kidding.” She took a sip of her coffee and leaned back, her hands wrapped tightly around her mug. “Given the awkwardness between you two ever since the beach trip, I kinda figured that out.”
I pulled my knees to my chest, staring at the gap between them. “You’re not upset with me? For ruining the experiment and all?”
“The only thing I’m upset about is that I couldn’t be there and watch.”
“What?” I couldn’t prevent my mouth from gaping. “Honey, if you ever make it to one of the clans for some reason, do yourself a favor and don’t blurt out shit like that. The guys would go nuts over marrying you with that sort of kink.”
“I am saying this from a scientific standpoint.” She slipped off the barstool. “Wait here…”
Ruth disappeared between piles of books in the corner of her living room. She pulled them toward her and grabbed behind them, retrieving a whopper, bound in purple.
She plunged it onto the fancy marble counter and opened a random page, showing a man and woman, their limbs and genitals tied into a painful looking knot.
“What the hell is this?” I flipped through the pages, each one spicier than the one before.
“It’s a book about all things sex.” Her eyes studied the drawings inch by inch, but there was no lip licking or signs of arousal. Just a set of overly curious eyes, taking in the technicalities. “When I signed up for the university, I wanted to study human sexuality with a major in sexual psychology. My skill counselor didn’t approve it, of course. Said there is no need for that sort of degree.”
I closed the book and pushed it aside. “You are too curious for your own good.”
She smiled an innocent smile, grabbed the book and buried it once more leaning against the wall, hidden by piles of approved literature. “So… was he any good?”
A giggle pushed out of my chest, replaced by a warm feeling which spread across my lungs and penetrated my chest. “He did ok.”
More than ok. What we shared that night, as fragile as it was, stole my breath. Along with my virginity. In return, he gave me love. Max gave me what I had been searching for all my life. In retrospect, it now seemed as useless as boobs on a bookshelf.
I didn’t notice when Ruth left to open the door, and neither did I realize when Max suddenly walked up next to me.
“I won’t go in for work today and took the day off,” he said, an insecure tone in his voice. “How about I make good on that promise I gave you, and show you the church?”
I grabbed my coffee mug and clung to it like to the edge of a cliff. “Um…”
“Isn’t that a bit risky?” Ruth asked. “The church has been blackzoned and with everything going on right now —”
Max held his hand up in a silencing wave. “Got it all covered. Never underestimate the scientist raised by a rebel. Wanna come too?”
Ruth’s eyes brushed me only slightly and wandered back to Max, her eyebrows giving a quick wiggle. “Somebody has to keep the vials turning at the lab, and I’m already running late. Besides, my neighbor Julie went on to a conference at one of the other districts, and she wants me to check on her plants. Just don’t get caught.”
She shouldered her bag, slipped into her shoes and headed to the door, but didn’t leave without a final remark.
“If you need inspiration,” she winked, “you know where to find it.”
She pulled the door shut behind her, leaving Max behind with a questioning look on his face. “Inspiration for what?”
“Advanced yoga positions.”
“Oh.” He scratched the nape of his neck. His other hand fell awkwardly by his side, not knowing what to do. “Well, um, I actually came to —”
I pressed my fingers onto his lips, and his eyebrows jumped up. “No, I’m the one who has to apologize. What I did was childish and I know I crossed
a line. I just wish you would have told me about it.”
“Yeah…” He climbed onto Ruth’s bar stool, hands on his lap and eyes focused on the ground. “Guess I should have. I never really talk with anybody about her.”
I let my fingers comb through his wild hair, parting it to the right and picking strays out of the way. “So that’s what all your research at home is about? Finding a cure for the disease that took your sister?”
He shrugged his shoulders as if offering it as an apology, making my insides weep for his loss.
I wanted to tell him that I didn’t care.
Tell him that it didn’t matter to me.
But it mattered to him, and as much as it tore me apart from the inside, I respected him even more for it. It’s not like we had a future anyway.
“I’m sorry for what I said.” His eyes searched for mine, and he cupped my face, letting his thumb climb across the mounds of my lips. “I used to be very reasonable and always said smart shit. But then I met you, and all that crap just spills out of my mouth. Guess I just wanted you to understand why.”
“I understand.” I really did. Even with those annoying tears rolling up my tear ducts, and the hairline cracks across my heart. This has been nothing but an experiment gone too far.
Sure, I lost my heart to it. Right along with my virginity. But hey, at least I got to experience love and heartbreak all at once. Not everybody wore that title as fancy as I did.
I gave a confident nod. “I got off before you came, remember?”
I sure did.
Remembered how he inched inside me.
Remembered his hard cock stretching my tight walls.
Not to mention how his cum spurt all over me in several massive jerks.
His stare wandered to my lips, and I swallowed hard before I continued. “Chances that something happened are slim. Back home we have protection in case a couple isn’t planning on getting pregnant. Doubt we’ll find that kind of stuff here, so we better don’t repeat it.” Creepy how my body revolted with shivers against my wise and mature words.
“Not really sure how I feel about that,” he said in a low and husky voice as if he meant it, but didn’t. Heat waves swept over me like high tide, and the way his eyes caressed my breasts didn’t help. At all. But I had to let this go.
No matter how he drove up my pulse, how he made my heart clench, how he made my pussy drip, I had to push away from him and… holy fucking shit his hand darted around my neck, pulling me in for a kiss.
He let his tongue taste my lips, making my knees buckle and leaving me behind too weak to control myself. Too weak to even care.
He smelled like morning-Max: a fresh shave, a hint of mint from the hygiene pod and way too clean not to be licked.
I ran my lips along the side of his neck, placing kisses here and there, and fumbled with the waistband of his pants.
He placed his hands onto my arms, gentle but determined. “We can’t risk it. I would hate myself too much if you ever had to experience —”
“Shhh.” I gave him a fiery kiss to shut him up. “We won’t, I promise.”
I slid off the barstool and let my hand wander into his pants. His cock already waited for me, rock hard, giving an eager jolt.
I leaned over and let the tip of my tongue run along his shaft.
“Oh shit!” He clenched one hand into the bar stool. With the other, he cupped my chin and gave a tug. “What are you doing?”
“Am I doing it wrong?” I pulled away from his hand and let my tongue twirl around his cockhead. Before he could dart for my chin again, I slung my lips around the ridge and took him in until he hit the back of my throat.
“Fuck!” He gave a thrust with his hips making me nearly choke. “I have no idea what this is, but if you’re doing it wrong, then I don’t wanna know what it feels like if you’re doing it right.”
I came back up and wet my lips, only to repeat the tongue twirl followed by his cock fucking my mouth. Guttural moans escaped him, his mouth gaped wide open in a mix of lust and disbelief. A tiny amount of pre-cum settled on my tongue, its salty taste making my pussy swell and my head go dizzy.
He grabbed my hair, leaning back and pushing my head down with each stab of his cock. “Autumn,” he warned, but I kept going. I licked and sucked him until all his movements stopped, except for the jerks coming from his cock, emptying himself inside my mouth.
He stared at me from wide eyes, his chest heaving as if he had done all the work. To make a silent statement, I swallowed his load like champagne, the slight sweetness sending tremors between my legs.
“But what about you?”
“Don’t worry about it.” I walked over to the sink, swished water through my teeth and splashed some in my face. “Maybe you can repay me while we watch a movie?”
He pulled his pants back up, giving me an innocent look. “I wouldn’t know how.”
“Three days ago you didn’t know how to fuck, but we still managed.”
He got up and pulled me into an embrace, his hand massaging through my hair. “I wanted to take you somewhere special today. Remember the church I mentioned?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Get dressed, and I’ll take you there, but you can’t wear your own stuff. Put on one of Ruth’s dresses, that way we won’t draw too much attention.”
I slipped into a pale green linen dress, put my shoes on and left my jacket behind since it was a sunny day. We took the tram, silent other than the innocent small-talk, and I followed Max to a not-so-nice area less than a hundred feet from the station.
“What is this place? It’s like stepping into an entirely different world.”
“Remember when we talked about the Drainpipe? This is where the nonconformists live. Mostly religious coo-coo's like my dad and those who are excluded from the Newgenics program.”
“Like you?”
He turned around, his jaw tense and his eyes sad. “Uh-huh, like me.
Too compromised to contribute to our future.”
I followed him along a dark alley, the bite of disinfectant barely covering the stench of urine and shit.
We stepped through a wrought iron gate, covered in thorny vines, leaving the Drainpipe behind us. Cobblestones turned into a thick cover of moss, tickled by the sun and shaded by massive oak trees.
My eyes wandered to the stone building, small but entirely intact from the colorful windows to the gables, leaving me breathless and with a twitch in my chest.
“This is the Chapel of St. Godwin.” Max pointed at the bell tower. “Rumor has it the bell had been brought here from Rome after a pope blessed it. Not sure if that’s true since there isn’t really any documentation, but my dad is quite fond of that story.”
He pushed his hands into his back pockets and strolled toward the massive wooden doors, leaning his shoulders against them until a creak told him to stop. Arches held windows in all sorts of colors, telling stories of roses, white doves and people with a halo surrounding their heads. One door opened, letting out a whiff of century-old incense, mildew, and dust.
I stepped inside, immediately caught by the artwork above us. My heart beat so fast, turning my vision into a near-blur. That he brought me here meant the world to me. “Max, this is absolutely stunning. How come the colors are still so —”
“Vibrant?” He pointed at his arm. “I can still feel my tennis elbow, although it’s been years since I squeezed myself underneath that ceiling. We restored as much as we could until the council blackzoned the entire chapel. Newgenics and religion don’t mix well.”
I couldn’t help but stare at him, and the way his mind had drifted off into a time long gone. His face looked troubled, his shoulders overloaded with thoughts and doubts.
For the first time, I understood his burden.
He grew up a rebel.
Lost his sister to cancer.
Was born again a scientist.
And now he had made love to a rebel of a different kind. One from beyond the wall. The t
hought of it made me want to vomit, but with the holy water font by the door being the only option, I struggled it back down.
“Show me.” I shook him from his thoughts. “Show me how you pray.”
I climbed into one of the white church pews, neatly arranged in two rows of six, and sat down. He hesitated, raking a hand through his wild-again hair. “I don’t know, I… I haven’t prayed in a very long time.”
I patted the hollow sounding wood beside me. “I am not asking you to pray. Show me, and I’ll do all the praying.”
He hesitated some more, his eyes darting around for someone to come to his help. But nobody came, and he kneeled down next to me facing the modestly empty altar, the expression on his face stern. I lowered myself onto my knees, my eyes searching for the obligatory crucified Jesus. Instead, I found only a shadow where he must have once hung.
Max folded his hands. So did I.
“What now?” I asked.
“Now you pray,” he said. “In silence. Reach out to, you know, god, and tell him about your sins. Your fears. Your hopes. Ask him your questions. Ask for guidance.”
We stayed like that, in utter silence.
Me praying.
Him staring at me praying.
After a while, my breath steadied, leaving behind a feeling of calm. Everything became clear. Well, or at least my questions became clear. Did Max love me? Would he come to back home with me? But the most critical question wasn’t for Max. No. It was for myself. Would I be happy with him, even when it meant he wouldn’t want to have a child?
Max shot up from the pew. “Did you hear that?”
“What?” I jumped up as well. “Was I supposed to hear God? Because I honestly didn’t —”
“No,” he grabbed my hand, “I mean the voices coming from outside the church. We have to hide somewhere before —”
I held back a scream, my heartbeat roaring inside my ears.
Lazy creaks echoed through the chapel, and Max pulled me behind him like a secret agent. We scurried between the pews toward a small side room. He pushed me behind him into the corner, placing his body in front of mine like a protective shield.