The Risen Series | Book 5 | Defiance

by Crow, Marie F.

  She chuckles again. “Not yet, but you sure do keep trying, don’t you?”

  “Better me than Genny,” I reply, letting the words become more of a sigh than punctuation.

  “Why?” Marxx barks.

  Anger is good. Anger means they are safe to let me know what they really think without having to worry about how I will handle it. Anger is real, not candy-coated with a mockery of sweetness Death seems to convince us to use with someone.

  “She’s just a child, Marxx,” I reply to the angry man somewhere in the room. I believe I’m looking at his outline, anyway.

  “So was I,” I hear Margaret murmuring from the darkness.

  Paula touches something near my shoulder and the pain becomes almost adrenaline. I’m wide awake. Margaret slithers away.

  “Stay with me or I’ll let Aimes bounce you a few more times.” Paula threatens.

  I watch the outlines become a little more in focus, like someone is adjusting the knobs of my grandfather’s old television.

  “I’m just tired,” I reply to her concern.

  “Each time you take a nap you stay out a little longer,” Rhett’s voice comes from the darkness behind me, somewhere near the head of my bed.

  “Tell me about it,” I reply to his massive shadow. Rhett doesn’t need to remind me of the many intervals which seemed to never end. “So then talk to me.”

  “What were you thinking?” Lawless is close to me. His voice is velvet and it hovers right near my ear.

  “Don’t want to talk about that.”

  “Outvoted,” Marxx’s voice is still further away, holding somewhere near the door.

  I sigh. There is no way to explain to a group of men who believe that if it is not our own then they don’t matter. They do understand debt, though.

  “Genny came back on the beach because of a mistake I made. She risked her life for me. Seemed like a shit thing to not do the same.” My voice is weak and I know they find my explanation the same.

  “Why do you always have to be the hero?” Rhett is chastising me. Yet, there’s a hint of amusement mixed in there, as well.

  “Hero’s don’t need as much saving as I do. I’m more of the cliché sidekick who always lands in trouble despite her efforts to avoid it.” I point out.

  “You didn’t put in a lot of effort this time.” Marxx is bitter. He answers each response with an angry retort. I know it’s going to take me some time to climb out of the hole I am in with him.

  “To avoid trouble or land in trouble?” I ask, mostly to irk him. “How bad is it?” I ask, to fill the void of muted awkwardness due to Marxx’s behavior.

  “Well, you didn’t turn,” Aimes says, and we fall into our normal verbal volley that only the best of friends can do.

  “Turn?”

  “Into one of those things.”

  “Was I supposed to?”

  “They think so.”

  “They who?”

  “They who be in the room, your eyes can’t see.”

  “Oh…” I try to focus my sight, but it’s still just shapes and shades. I look to the shape of Paula still sitting near me. “I thought you didn't turn into racoons?”

  Paula doesn’t answer right away. She’s doing that thing where she busies herself with something in hopes of looking important enough to explain the stalling. This allows her time to pick and choose her words amid the awkward silence. “There’s been some discussion about that topic.”

  “They aren’t holding a bible, are they?” I ask, as my eyes fight to stay open.

  “Not that I’ve seen,” Paula says.

  “Should I shake her?” By the sounds of it, Aimes is already walking over before she finishes her question.

  “No,” Paula replies. “This time it’s just sleep.”

  As my eyes lose the battle to stay open, I hope she’s right. I hope I’m not about to descend to the sin-displaying darkness. I know what awaits me there when the fog clears. When I don’t hear the singing of a red-haired devil, I believe Paula.

  With a silent prayer of my own, I hold onto that belief just as tightly as Travis held on to his bible. It’s not Margaret’s song I hear from the far corners of my mind. It’s ‘Amazing Grace’ that welcomes me into this exhaustion-driven slumber. The gentle notes of the song remind me there is nothing sweet about my soul left to save. The little blonde child running through the fog in front of me assures me of it.

  Chapter 24

  It was several days before Paula released me from her tender care. I never spoke of Chapel, again. She never asked. She explained to me I had managed to tear open the wound on my stomach and completely rip every stitch in my thigh. I also earned new stitches for my bravery.

  The brunette was kind enough to only gnaw on my flesh, leaving a nice gap for Paula to perfect her craft. My legs will heal on their own, as long as I don’t try to relive my goals of being a human serving tray. I assured her I would try my best. The only questions she wouldn’t answer were about what else happened on that beach. She finds something else to do each time and the haunted look in her eyes make me drop it, each time.

  I know Paula is watching me even now. She has a way of watching without ever having to actually look at you. Which is why I wasn’t surprised to hear her told-you-so tone after I winced upon standing.

  “Your stitches would heal much faster if you would stop trying to constantly rip them out.”

  The glance I give her explains every thought in my head before turning to stare out the window of the red brick interior building. I haven’t been able to venture far, but it’s amazing to see how these people have turned an old civil war fort into a new, thriving community. It’s almost like peering back in time, before that fate-filled morning as life moves around the courtyard. Families go about their normal days, no fear of sounds, or lurking shadows. I’m almost envious of how untouched they seem to be by what is going on in the world around them.

  Children play openly in the grass-covered yard. Their laughter is not the sounds of those who have been warned of what their shrieks of childhood excitement may lure. They are pure adornments of innocence and trust, something I thought was lost to us.

  I watch the leisure strolling style of those in the marketplace. Stands of various construction rest along the far walls. Each stand displays different items from food to clothing, even household comforts of books to linens. Things we never thought we’d miss until it was too late.

  “How do they shop?” I ask to the only person in the little house with me.

  Paula looks up from what she is doing to see what I am looking at. “They barter.”

  “Barter what?”

  “Whatever they confiscated on a trip to the mainland or whatever they no longer have a use for.” She’s watching the same display of attempted normalcy.

  “They don’t just pool it all together for everyone to use?” I wrinkle my face with the thought. “What about the elderly who can’t go to shore?”

  “There aren’t any.”

  There’s something about how Paula says that, that makes me turn towards her. “What?”

  “You’ll see.” Is all she shares.

  She hasn’t shared much of this new place in the time I’ve kept her captive. At least, that’s what I thought I was doing to her. Now, with how completely disinterested she is in those who surround us, I may have been just the excuse to avoid them.

  “What are you knitting over there?” Crossing my arms, I watch her, waiting to see if she gives any more hints.

  “The basket we are all going to Hell in.”

  Paula holds up what looks to me to be nothing more than a few rows of cotton knots, but her smile is either pride or sarcasm. I can’t really tell.

  “You're going to need a lot more rows to fit us all.” I slide my feet into my boots which look as if they are ready to wave a white flag at any moment. “Going to go find the crew and let them know we need to all start losing weight for your basket.”

  Paula shrugs. Returning
to her knitting, she doesn’t offer to join me. I was definitely the excuse.

  Various conversations envelop me when I leave Paula’s self-made prison. It almost feels as if somehow nothing has ever happened; nothing has occurred to disrupt life to a whisper-guided routine for safety and survival. I watch for a moment as April sits with a group of girls around her own age. They are playing a game I remember from what feels like decades ago with another little girl and her friends. Each girl holds in her hand a plastic replica of how adult life is supposed to look, complete with the plastic cars and house. Like a lost album, the sound of their laughter is something that should be recorded and preserved. It’s so rare to hear it anymore.

  “Hey! Helena!”

  I turn to the direction in which Genny is shouting. Part of me wants to keep walking. The other part of me, which I haven’t been able to label yet, almost becomes giddy to hear my name. That part and I are going to have a conversation later.

  She’s standing a bit away on what resembles an attempt at a football field, mid-pose with one foot resting on a soccer ball to secure it from the other teens around. They are annoyed and are waiting for her to mentally return to the game. As if me looking right at her wasn’t enough to convince her she has my attention, she’s waving frantically in my direction. I mentally whisper to the giddy part of me to shut up.

  “Yeah?” I don’t wave back, but thankfully, it’s enough to make her stop hers.

  She kicks the ball to a nearby teen, letting the game continue without her as she heads my way. “Can we talk a moment? Now that you’re able to?” she’s shouting as she heads towards me. Little does she realize this totally negates my ability to answer ‘no’ without looking like more of an ass than I really want to upon my first day of release.

  “Sure.” I shrug standing firmly planted just in case I need to make up some medical excuse to escape. I’ve learned to always leave an out when someone asks if they can talk. It’s just safer for everyone if I have a clear exit plan with my mood swings.

  The overhead sun plays across her young features. It toys with the many thoughts she is having, and wearing, across her face. She is almost practicing the words, running them through various filters before she says them. Obviously, that’s a skill I’ve never learned.

  “What all have they told you?” She’s beside me now, but looking beyond me at something she’s pretending has her attention. She’s hiding her gaze in some further object with the hope of disguising any emotions attached to the question. That is a skill I’ve learned well.

  “Nothing.” I shrug, again. “I remember something about proving I hadn’t turned, but that’s really it.”

  She makes a soft noise of agreement before continuing. “You don’t know about Ginjer?” Her eyes are on me now. “Or, Terrance?”

  I hesitate. I can hear the carousel music faintly start. Somehow, I know I’m about to add a few more horses.

  “No.” I don’t look away from her eyes. For once I’d like to see the truth and not just feel it rip my heart into smaller fragments of what is already left of it.

  Hugging herself, Genny doesn’t look away, either. “Dolph couldn’t make it to her in time. He tried, but he couldn’t.”

  She doesn’t need to fill in the blanks for me. We both know we’ve seen enough to understand what she isn’t saying, or maybe not willing to say, yet.

  “Terrence?”

  I can hear the music playing a little louder. Part of me already knows the answer to what I have asked. Part of me has blocked it for my own protection, but like always, I’m about to ruin it.

  “When we saw you being overtaken, a few rushed the beach, but it was Terrence who made it to you.” She looks away now. It makes it easier to hide whatever may be in her eyes. “He shot the ones he could and dragged you back to where the others were waiting.” She pauses. I know by the gaze she is not in this place right now. She is back on the beach reliving that moment. “He could have made it, but he just stood there. Collin kept telling me not to look, but I couldn’t look away. It wasn’t slow like yours. They didn’t attack one-by-one. They overtook him as a force, breaking him apart before he fell. Sometimes, I can still hear his screams.”

  Her voice trails off, hitting the highs and lows a survivor will fall into when retelling the horrors.

  “They blend with your mom’s?” It’s a bold question I ask.

  “No,” she says, turning to look at me. “But they do with yours.”

  I can feel the air rush from my lungs. It’s as if she has physically hit me, but I can’t understand why I’m reacting. Until just recently, I didn’t even know a mother other than Carol. There’s no reason for her words to hit some hidden part of me, but they do, they really do.

  Something must have shown on my face. Genny looks away again, but she doesn’t apologize.

  “Do yours blend?” she asks me.

  “If I’m lucky.” My answer confuses her, and she turns back towards me. “Otherwise, I get a personal reminder of the things which have happened. When it blends, it’s just one giant blur of torment. When it’s a personal tour…”

  “…it’s torture.” Genny finishes for me.

  I nod. I don’t have to fill in the blanks for this, either. All this time I’ve allowed myself to think I’m alone in the depth of suffering I drown in. Somehow, I almost felt better for it, more prepared to handle the things others can’t or won’t do. I’m not. Everyone is just handling it differently, and defiantly, in their own ways. Aimes had said as much in the truck one afternoon but seeing it raw before me on such a young face, I know I can’t fool myself anymore. I’m not special. My nightmares aren’t rare. They are just pages to the many tomes around me we have all privately written upon our souls.

  “It doesn’t get any easier, does it?” Her face is almost hopeful. There’s also a shadow of fear with what my answer may tell her.

  I don’t want to spread that shadow. I don’t want to lie to her, either. Mentally, I toss a coin. Unfortunately, it lands on truth and I ponder for a second how soon is too soon for someone to lose everything and still remain unchanged.

  “No, it doesn’t,” I tell her, aggravated it must be me to chip away at her innocence. “It doesn’t because it can’t. It can’t get easier when we grow close to new people. It means we take new risks. We will push harder each time, and each time, life pushes harder, too.”

  “The only winner is whoever is more determined to live and to live with what they have to do to keep pushing. So no, it doesn’t get any easier, Genny, until there is no one left, or nothing left for someone to give.”

  “By then it’s too late,” Genny whispers, and I know she’s speaking about the many scars life would have left before reaching such a point.

  “Then it’s too late,” I echo.

  “Is that why you dropped your knife?” She isn’t accusatory when she asks, but she’s still whispering.

  Genny is good at finding every weak link in my armor. She doesn’t quite go for the soft spots. She pokes at them, testing them and me. Aimes has taught her well.

  “Maybe,” I answer as honestly as I can. There weren’t any real thoughts or plans on the beach. The porch, that’s different.

  “And now?” Genny is watching my eyes, my face, even how I am standing for some hint at my next answer.

  “I have new risks to take,” I answer her and she almost glows.

  “Because you’re growing close to new people?” Her voice is hopeful, almost giddy and I squash the resounding mimic inside of me.

  I smile at her, letting that be my answer and she returns it.

  “Oh, one more thing?” she asks, as I begin to walk away. “Can you talk to the scary one for me?”

  “That doesn’t really narrow it down.”

  “Right,” she pauses trying to think of a better way to describe someone. “Not the really tall dark-haired one, but the other one that’s kind of like him, but worse.”

  I chew on my bottom lip to hide a differe
nt kind of smile. “Marxx?”

  “Maybe?” Genny shrugs, looking lost in a broken, sad way.

  “What’s he doing?” I don’t have to ask. I already caught a touch of it.

  “He thinks it’s all my fault.” She sounds like a child who has been chastised by her favorite person. “Like I somehow almost killed you myself.”

  “What was Aimes’ advice?” I notice her blush. I’m not the first person she’s cornered about Marxx. I didn’t think I was.

  “She says they are all just acting like a bunch of babies because they had to leave their bikes behind. Something about a limb of theirs not feeling adequate without them and I should just ignore him.” Genny answers innocently, making the innuendo sound that much more risqué.

  I smirk, tilting my head with the thought. “She’s probably not wrong but I’ll see what I can do.”

  “What do I do till he’s in a better mood?”

  “What Aimes and I used to do.” I do smile now, recalling our days at the bar. “Avoid him if you want to live or tease him if you want to break him. He can’t stay mad if you can tease him. It has to be something to which he can’t answer with a quick reply. It’s how Aimes got over her fear.”

  “I don’t think I want to tease him,” she says, as if Marxx is the very essence of some boogeyman. “What did you do?”

  “I left him alone. I wasn’t always suicidal.”

  I leave her with her thoughts to find the rest of our group. I never would have thought to describe Marxx as scarier than Rhett, but is Rhett the man we once knew? Has all of this broken the very embodiment of the nightmare we once pictured him? Has the once silent, resilient Marxx now taken that mantle, striving to become more of a demon than those who stalk us? Or, are the men so used to being one they simply fill where the other slips, a give and take of responsibilities? If that’s it, who now becomes the monster we once feared? Who now becomes the saint we are missing? Or are we all just discovering how much more we have to give before it’s too late, once again?

  Chapter 25

  “Why are you sitting on a giant cannon?”