by Laura Pohl
“So,” he says, trying a smile. “What’s your story?”
I’m taken aback by his question, because it’s not like Brooklyn’s or the others’. He really wants to know.
“Raised by my grandparents. I’ve only seen my mom in pictures.”
“That must suck.”
“Not so much. It’s not like I can miss her.” You can’t miss something you never had.
He looks at me. “Do you ever wonder if…?”
I know where his thoughts are going. I’ve wondered this myself a couple of times in the last six months. If my mother were alive, would I recognize her? I don’t even know if she was alive before the aliens landed. She came home one day with a baby in her arms and left during the night. No one ever heard from her again.
“It doesn’t matter. She’s not really my mother, you know? If she’s out there, she’s only a stranger.” I pause. I don’t pity myself. I don’t pity my mother, either. “And if she’s dead, I mourn for her like I mourn for the rest of humanity.”
“And how’s that?”
“A little. And sometimes not at all.”
He nods, turning his gaze back to the horizon. And we just let ourselves stay there in silence, until we are engulfed in darkness.
Chapter 16
I don’t see Violet after our talk.
I don’t think she’s avoiding me, but maybe she doesn’t want to face the reality that I brought to her door. None of them do. They asked me about what happened out there, and then they promptly erased it from their memories.
I’ve been around almost all of Area 51 now—between patrol duty, the labs, feeding the chickens, and cooking and cleaning duties. It’s peaceful, and even Sputnik has gotten used to the routine, even if she does constantly try to steal my place in bed when there are twenty other bunks available. Most of the doors have been locked for safety, and Brooklyn has taken me on a complete tour of the area, including the old compound where Area 51 first started, the chicken coop, the farming grounds, and the lounge.
Almost two weeks after my arrival, I decide to spend a day with Brooklyn and Andy in the computer rooms. There are rooms and rooms filled with the fastest processors the government could afford. Brooklyn explained to me that the base’s generators were powered by nuclear energy, and they’re supposed to keep going for years without interruption.
When I enter the room, Andy and Brooklyn are engaged in a fierce game of Mortal Kombat, each trying to punch the other out.
“Hey Clover,” Brooklyn says without looking up from the screen. “Care for a game?”
“I haven’t played in ages,” I answer. I only ever played video games at Noah’s house, and he used to get annoyed because I’d get sidetracked by all the quests in Assassin’s Creed and never finish the main plot. “So this is what you guys do all day?”
“Gotta keep the radio going,” Brooklyn says with a grin. “I mean, you heard it. There could be others.”
“I heard it by accident.”
“No need to be harsh,” Andy says.
She beats the hell out of Brooklyn, who throws the controller on the desk.
“It’s on a loop,” Brooklyn says. “But I like changing the songs. I miss just listening to the radio.”
“If anyone hears the Hamilton soundtrack one more time, they’ll come all the way over here just to commit murder.”
Andy leans back in her chair. In front of her are more than a few screens showing different areas of the compound. They keep jumping around between images, and I glimpse Avani and Flint in the laboratory running some experiment, and Rayen patrolling the perimeter again.
“Can you see everything from here?”
Andy looks up and nods. “Yeah, why?”
“Just wondering,” I say. “What kind of security do you have in place? In case anyone else comes knocking?”
“It’s secure,” Andy says. “This is a secret government base. It doesn’t get more secure than that. Half of the facility is underground. We’ve got traps. We’ve got missiles. We saw you coming from miles away.”
Missiles won’t do anything. I saw the devastation in the cities, saw the news when the TV was still working. There is no weapon that will stop them. But I don’t tell them that, because it doesn’t help me accomplish anything.
“What about the Area 51 archives?”
Andy turns in her chair. “Violet doesn’t let us look at them,” she says. “It’s in the rule book.”
“So you all just do everything she says?” I lean against the desk, and Sputnik sneaks in behind me. “No rules are ever broken?”
“Rules keep us alive,” Andy says.
“Rules keep you misinformed, too,” I say. I turn to Brooklyn, sensing that she’s much more of a rebel than Andy is. “Didn’t you ever look?”
“I got here the same week that the adults came back in,” Brooklyn says. “Everyone was too concerned with not coughing their lungs out and trying to stay alive.”
“And since then?”
“Since then we’ve stayed here,” Andy answers. “Clover, did you just come here to annoy us into doing something that we don’t want to do?”
“It was an honest question,” I say, trying not to sound as annoyed as I actually am. “I’m just wondering why it’s never occurred to anyone to fight back.”
At that, Brooklyn laughs bitterly. “Fight back? Right. Clover, you’re the one who’s actually seen it out there.” She shakes her head. “It’s nothing short of a miracle that I’m alive. I’m not going to risk my life again for nothing.”
“It’s not for nothing.”
“Of course it is,” Brooklyn says, incredulity in her face. “I mean, when you were alone out there, did you fight back?”
She turns to me, and my cheeks burn. I know they’re getting redder as she stares, her green eyes defiant.
“No.”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” Brooklyn says, getting up. “You can’t come here and ask us to do something that you weren’t ready to do yourself.”
She shakes her head and walks out of the room. I chew on the inside of my cheek as Andy adjusts her glasses and looks over at me.
I let out a sigh and sit in Brooklyn’s chair.
Andy hands me the controller and changes the game to Galaga. She starts firing on insects as fast as they appear on the screen. I try to play along, but my fingers aren’t as quick on the controls. Andy’s solidarity is the silent kind, as if she doesn’t know how to finish the conversation, either.
“It’s not your fault,” she finally says. We both keep our gazes fixed on the screen. “Violet told me you asked about the plan.”
I look over at her and meet her blue eyes. “And?”
Andy shrugs, turning back to the screen. “I mean, what do you expect? We’re just a bunch of teenagers. We’re not some superhero force destined to save the world. We’re just conserving our energy.”
“But we’re not alone,” I say. “That’s the difference. Together, we can do something.”
“There were seven billion of us,” Andy says, her voice neutral. “We still dropped like flies.”
It’s the way that she says it that gets me. It’s the way that they feel like there’s nothing worth fighting for. That we can’t make a difference, because the others couldn’t.
The difference is I am alive—we are alive.
The rest of humanity isn’t.
Chapter 17
I can’t fall asleep that night. After a while, I give up on the notion entirely and sit up in bed.
“Still have nightmares?” a quiet voice calls out in the dark. I turn and see Rayen, curled up in her bunk bed with a book. A small reading light is clipped to the cover, dimmed so as not to wake the others.
I nod, my vision blurred.
“Yeah. Happens to all of us,” she mutters
, nodding her head toward a shelf in the corner. “You can pick a book, if you want. Helps pass the time.”
I look to my side and see Brooklyn’s messy black hair. She sleeps soundly, her breath even. In, out, in, out. I get up and pad softly to the bookshelf. Andy turns in her sleep, shifting from one side to the other, probably plagued by nightmares, too. Avani’s head is covered with blankets, like some kind of protective shield.
There isn’t a wide selection of books to be had—mostly crime novels and old sci-fi classics, none of which really interest me. I pick a book at random, only to see that it’s a Star Trek novelization. I grimace, sliding it back onto the shelf.
“Holy Saint Barbie of Rainbow Skittles.” Andy looks up. “Just choose one.”
“Shut up, Andy,” Rayen tells her. Andy shakes her mousy hair, trying unsuccessfully to go back to sleep. “That’s Andy’s way of swearing. We’ve all picked it up.”
“I tolerate the light, but not conversation,” Avani hisses from her bed, uncovering herself and pulling her blankets away from her body. She wears a white nightgown that looks like it must have been handmade back in the 1920s.
I try not to roll my eyes. I pick another book and see that it’s a Jane Austen novel, lost among all the other lowbrow titles. Criticizing society feels especially pointless now, but I think I can appreciate Austen’s irony more than I can stomach hopeful depictions of benevolent aliens.
I take it back to my bed, but by now, it’s clear that nobody is going to be able to go back to sleep. The only one who’s still sleeping soundly is Brooklyn, who is snoring with her mouth hanging open.
Rayen slams her book closed, setting it on her bedside table. “What now?”
“Sleepover party?” Andy suggests with a huge yawn. “We could watch a movie.”
“You have movies?” I frown, but then I remember that they have everything here, since they’ve stayed hidden and have their own power generators.
“Of course we do.” Andy rolls her eyes. “This isn’t the barn you grew up in.”
Rayen and Avani both throw her a nasty look, as if warning her against something. I raise an eyebrow.
“What? Brooklyn did say she had a farm. Or something. Who cares?”
“Yeah, it was a farm,” I say, my voice icy. “But we still had Netflix.”
I try to shrug the whole thing off, but there’s something about this need to be accepted into this new group, this need to fit in, that annoys me. I came all this way because I didn’t want to be alone. This is what I’ve wanted for so long—someone else on this planet besides myself. But now that my prayers have been answered, there’s still a part of me that would rather go back to the way it was. Me, Sputnik, and the road ahead.
Avani tries to calm me down, saying, “I’m sorry. Really. We know that you’ve just arrived and you’re still adapting to a new situation. It’s hard.”
Brooklyn shifts, the noise finally waking her up.
“Well,” I say, trying to control my temper. “Yes, it must have been so hard for you all to have to adapt to having nice things, like hot meals and movies and talking to your besties every day.” My tone turns especially nasty at that last phrase.
Avani and Andy look at me, shocked. But I didn’t make it all the way here just to keep my mouth shut.
“Clover,” Rayen says, eyeing me like I’m a wounded animal. “That’s not what she meant.”
I don’t want to bite back any of the bile rising to my throat, any of my disgust. I can’t just forget the fact that they were all sitting on their asses while the world was blown to bits.
“I don’t care what you all think of me,” I spit. “The difference between me and you is that I survived out there. I’d like to see you all try.”
Shoving myself back under the covers, too tired to go on like this, I ignore their outrage and my anger and try to sleep.
* * *
The next morning, I make my way through the silent corridors. When I enter the messroom, everything goes quiet.
My bare feet thud softly against the slippery floor. Brooklyn and Rayen have their eyes glued to me, but Avani and Andy are intent on pretending that they haven’t noticed me come in.
“Morning,” I say, out of politeness.
“Morning,” Flint answers, oblivious to the tension in the room. “Sleep well?”
I don’t smile. “As well as I could.”
I sit down at the table, where they’ve set out cereal and cookies and peanut butter and even some bread that looks freshly baked. I grab some of everything, filling my mouth like a hungry scavenger. Flint watches me in amazement, probably wondering how much food I can actually stuff into my mouth at once. The girls continue to make an effort to ignore me.
I regret ever coming here.
“Who’s on patrol duty today?” Brooklyn finally asks, breaking the silence.
“Me,” answers Rayen. “Violet was supposed to be with me today.”
I still haven’t seen Violet since our conversation.
Finally, Brooklyn sighs. “Okay, Clover, what was that last night?”
Heads turn in my direction, and I catch Rayen glaring menacingly at Brooklyn. I’ve only been here for a few weeks, but I already know that Brooklyn won’t shut up about this kind of thing. It’s probably beyond Brooklyn to keep her mouth shut at all.
“Maybe you guys should tell me what it was,” I reply, taking a big bite of bread on purpose, to fill my mouth. “I got the impression that you’re the ones who don’t want me here.”
“I want you here,” Andy offers, but her comment gets lost in the void that seems to be filling the room.
“Thanks,” I mutter.
“Maybe the problem is that you don’t want to be here,” Avani says, turning her brown eyes on me, like she’s trying to psychoanalyze me. I want to spare her the frustration and tell her that I’m too crazy to be put into one category.
“Maybe it is,” I concede. “So what?”
Silence fills the room again. I realize too late that this was the wrong thing to say. It’s been so long since I’ve had to worry about what’s the right or the wrong thing to say. There’s an art to making people hear what you want them to hear, to saying the exact words that will get you what you want. Sometimes it’s about emotion, and sometimes it’s about logic. It depends on who the person is and what you want from them. Even though I’ve never had a lot of friends, I always knew how to deal with this sort of thing when I needed to.
And I know that I’ve said the wrong thing.
“So what?” Brooklyn repeats, with an edge in her voice. I’ve hurt her. I barely know this girl, but for some reason I already have the power to hurt her. “Are we really so bad that you think the outside is better?”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“People skills, Clover,” Brooklyn says. “Not very smooth.”
“It’s not about being smooth,” I say, deciding to go with logic. You can’t contest logic. You can fake feelings as much as you like, but there’s no beating pure, simple logic. “It doesn’t matter whether you want me here or not. What matters is that you aren’t willing to do anything about this situation, unless it involves acting like total cowards.”
They all stare at me, stunned, but I can see that my words have hit home. That’s what I was going for.
“We can’t do anything while—” Flint starts.
“Don’t give me that bullshit,” I argue. “Violet’s already tried. You’ve been here for six months. Six months, just sitting back, watching movies, doing God knows what, and not one of you has ever bothered to look at what’s happening outside?”
“The satellites—”
“Still work,” I say. “Or did they just fall out of the sky? You chose this. All of you did.”
I get up, my hands balling into fists from anger. This is not on me.
&nb
sp; I expected something different, and they haven’t delivered. I expected to find survivors. I wanted a plan of action, a way to make sure that surviving was worth it in the first place. That I hadn’t survived for six months for nothing.
“You don’t have to stay here,” Brooklyn says quietly.
I look each of them in the eye. I wish I could look Violet in the eye, too.
I feel their cowardice and fear and anger all mixed in the air, and a lot of unspoken words. I’ve seen it before, reflected back at me in the mirror. It’s hopelessness, the same desperate feeling that has made me raise my gun to my head so many times.
I can’t save them from it. I can barely save myself.
* * *
That night, when everyone is asleep, I get up. The other girls are breathing deeply, and the light is dim. I shove Sputnik off the bed, and she pads around quietly on the floor, understanding our need to be silent.
I pick up my bag and wait until I’m outside the room to put my boots on. Andy’s gloves are in my pocket, and Sputnik follows me down the hall. I stop by the pantry, packing up some food that won’t spoil on the journey.
I slide on the gloves and touch the fingerprint scanner. It lights up green, but as I step through the door, I hear a noise behind me.
Rayen stands there in the dark. She emerges with the moonlight and the wind that passes through the door.
“So, you’re leaving?” she asks.
There’s something about the shadowy moonlight, or maybe it’s the darkness hiding our faces, that makes me tell the truth.
“I can’t stay,” I tell her. “Not like this.”
“There’s nothing out there.”
“There’s nothing in here, either, Rayen,” I say. “Staying here or going out there, it’s the same thing. You proved that to me.”
The clouds pass, and I can see her face again. She stands still, wearing a beaten checkered shirt.
“What do you hope to find out there?”
“Anything is better than this.”
Maybe it works for them, staying here, suspended in time, just like the fate of the earth. It doesn’t work for me. If I stay here, I’ll just die faster.