The Burn (11 page)

“What was that all about?” he asks. I nod.

“Oh, just Mary being Mary. I love her, I do, but.” He
runs his hand through his hair, his lips stumbling as he feels for
the right words. He and Mary must have some kind of past together
and the current situation isn’t comfortable for either of them. I
wait.

“I can’t do it right now. She’s wanted to get back
together ever since she came back from Seattle two months ago, but
I’m not ready. She’s changed since she came back.”

He leads me up a flight of stairs. The stairs are
patched in places, but I’m amazed how intact everything is. I was
expecting total devastation. The floors need a good mopping and
waxing, but everything is decent.

“Everybody sleeps up here. Some people share rooms,
others have smaller rooms for their own. The town was evacuated
when sirens announced a bombing. Most people thought Seattle would
be safe—smaller city, nothing to protect. I guess they were right,
it wasn’t leveled. But it’s dangerous. That’s where Mary went a
year and a half ago. Said she needed something different, thought
she’d like it better. Dreams of building it up, changing it. You
can guess how that went.”

He pulls aside the thick fabric covering a window.
Above the trees the gray water of the sound ripples out. In the
distance across the water, I see the faint, irregular outline of
ragged buildings.

“Seattle,” Dave says. “There’s an important rule we
have. I don’t know who you are really, but you can help me figure
that out by how well you follow the rules.”

I nod. I can follow rules. I grew up surrounded by
them.

“The windows are covered before dusk. No light ever
escapes them.” His voice drops and his face is deadly serious.
“Seattle can’t ever know we’re here.”

He scares me. How bad can Seattle be? He meticulously
puts the fabric back.

“The country’s the place to be these days. Nothing to
loot, nothing to claim. Gangs leave it alone, as long as they don’t
think there’s anything here. The government leaves it alone as long
as they don’t know we’re here. But you probably know that, it must
be similar down south.”

This time I’m ready for questions. I nod and try to
appear understanding, though the only thing I understand is about
the city. Gaea told me it was illegal to live outside one. Gaea
also mentioned Arizona when we discussed where I should go. I’m
from Arizona. It’s inhospitable, surely I would want to leave it
for somewhere greener. That isn’t too far from the truth, really. I
can feed him lies veiled in half-truths.

He motions to a door. “Here we are. This is where I
live.”

The room is the size of a classroom down in the
colony. I half-expected to see it full of desks, but most of them
are gone. Two desks remain, used for tables and storage space. A
watcher haunts a corner of the ceiling, but just like in the
cafeteria, its lens is destroyed. I remember what Gaea said about
privacy invasions to prevent terrorism. Were the watchers part of
that? Did the survivors rebel before or after the Event?

“Want to come in?”

I nod. A mattress lays on the floor, covered with a
well-patched blanket. A candle is propped in a cup on one of the
desks next to the bed. A few yellowed books are stacked on the
floor. A small window is flung open to let the breeze waft through
the room and clear the summer stuffiness. I breathe deeply. The air
smells warm and grassy.

“It’s like you’re experiencing everything for the
first time. The rain when we found you this morning, the oatmeal,
and now this.”

He sits on the bed. “I wish I could talk with you
easier.” He clears his throat. His gaze is so intense I turn away.
I notice an old dog-eared, torn copy of
Jane Eyre
. I have
never held a book in my hands; all of our texts are digital. Mr.
Klein has some of the only physical books in the colony. I
carefully run my fingers over the cover.

“I smuggled those here. My dad found them in an
illegal library. After that ridiculous book ban ten years before
the Event—”

They called it the Event, too.

“Everyone tried to snatch up books before they were
all burned. Isn’t it crazy? Stop people reading to try to stop them
getting violent ideas. Sometimes I think it was finally about time
they blew each other up.” Then he clears his throat again and drops
his eyes. Can he get in trouble for saying such things? I
reverently place the book on top of the stack.

“I need to know where you’re from and why you’re
here.”

I sit down on the corner of his bed, carefully as far
away from him on there as I can be. This delicate moment could ruin
me. I’m not ready to let it go now. I motion for a piece of paper
and a writing utensil. He scrounges around for a few minutes.

“We only use these to record what we hear on the
radio. We try to use these sparingly, but I think now is a good
time.”

He hands me a yellowed piece of paper and a stubby
pencil, and I put the paper on the desk and write.

“Arizona? You’re a long way from home. Well, that
explains the sunburn.”

I nod.

“But why’d you leave?”

I write again.

“The desert?” He laughs. “Yeah, I bet. You came to
the right place then.”

I smile along with him. This is easier than I
thought.

“Did you come by yourself? Does anyone else know
you’re here?”

There it is again—that seriousness. The fierce
protection of the settlement, but from what? I remember the men
Dave killed yesterday.

I’m not sure how to answer. Is it believable for a
girl like me to travel alone? Did people do that here? The citizens
are required to live in cities. I come from the outside. Dave lives
on the outside. But could I have traveled this whole way without
getting caught? The pencil hovers over the paper. Dave sits
expectantly, his face neutral, not betraying a good answer. I
scribble furiously, and my stomach drops with the lies I weave.

“Your mom died, so you decided it was time to leave?
There were a couple others moving on too, so you traveled with them
to northern California, then left them to come up here?”

I hope it’s believable. His eyebrows furrow. I want
to use one of my fingers to smooth out the furrows, to assure him
I’m not a threat, but I clutch the pencil tightly. I still need to
learn where I fit in here.

“But why come all the way up here by yourself? It’s
so dangerous traveling alone.”

My heart pounds as this story races further away from
me, almost out of my control.

A fresh start. I just needed to get away. I felt
suffocated. I almost got caught, but I slipped away.

He studies me for a long moment; then his posture
relaxes and he leans back on his hands.

“I can relate to that.”

My shoulders slump in relief.

So who are you?

“I guess that’s a fair question.” He runs his fingers
through his hair. “My dad was the unspoken leader of this
settlement. When he died a year and a half ago, that just kinda
passed on to me, unfortunately.”

He does have the natural bearing of a leader, and
people obviously look up to him, but he’s so young. I remember my
dad telling me I should try public office as a vocation. I can
completely relate to the being-somewhere-you-don’t-want-to-be
thing.

“One of these days I’ll ask you what happened to your
mouth, but we’ll save it for later. Do you want to stay here with
us? Is this far away enough from whatever you were running
from?”

I almost jump off the bed in exaltation. I pump my
head up and down, not even trying to hide my smile.

He laughs. I don’t care that he’s laughing at me. He
just gave me what I’ve needed for so many years.

“I guess that’s settled. We’ll figure out where you
can stay in a little bit. In the meantime, there’s your pack.”

My pack. I forgot. I whirl to it and carefully open
the flap to make sure everything is in place.

“Don’t worry. I had Jack bring it straight up here.
No one touched your stuff. You’ll have to learn to trust people
more here. Don’t trust outsiders. Listen to me, I’m a hypocrite. I
honestly don’t know why I trust you. We’re wired not to. That’s why
Mary is the way she is. But here, we’re family. And if people think
you don’t trust them, they’ll get upset.”

I can trust them. But I’m sad because they shouldn’t
trust me. I’m nothing but lies. But I will do my best to be
everything else to them I can. Whatever work they do, whatever help
they need is all I can do to repay them.

“Now let’s go. There’s work to be done.”

Back downstairs, fifteen of the group put on wide
brim hats and grab hoes and rakes from a closet just inside the
huge double doors that lead outside. They laugh and chat, and Dave
falls in among them. I hang behind.

“They’re going to check the crops. I’m actually on
farming duty today too. Want to come?”

I laugh. Agriculture of all things. I may not have
enjoyed it in the colony, but it’s a job I’m half capable of. The
tools are more rustic than what I’m used to, but I’ll manage.

“Sorry about the primitive stuff. We didn’t want to
sign up for fuel rations for farm equipment. One more way for the
government to take notice.”

I shrug. The equipment’s not a big deal, but I don’t
think I should ask about the rest of it yet. He talks about the
government like I should know exactly what’s going on.

Dave grabs me a hat from the closet and plops it on
my head. It falls over my eyes. “Perfect fit. Let’s go.”

I fall in step beside him and we walk into the
sunlight. The rain clouds clear to faint wisps in the distance.
Despite the heat, everyone wears longs sleeves and pants. It
reminds me of the radiation suits. But they aren’t confined to
sight behind visors, and they aren’t temperature regulated. A
single drop of sweat trickles down the valley my spine makes in my
back. It’s real. Everything here is real.

“Ran out of our government ration of sunblock a month
ago,” Dave says. “We’re hoping for another supply drop soon, or
we’re all going to be crispy. Jack says we’re low on meds as
well.”

Now it is too real. They only get medicine when the
government rations it out?

We walk a few hundred yards to a huge patch of green
plants with small, heart shaped leaves. The first of the workers
are already moving up and down the messy, irregular rows, plucking
plants from the ground. Why aren’t the rows neater? It would make
tending the field easier.

“We’re weeding today.” Dave takes his canteen off his
shoulder and sets it next to an empty row.

I’ve never picked weeds before. We don’t have them in
the colony—there aren’t random seeds in the air or sown in the
fields from years ago that could suddenly germinate. Weeds just
don’t happen there. I stare at the field.

“You’re from the desert part of Arizona?”

I nod.

“You probably don’t have a lot of farming experience,
huh?”

I shake my head, mystified about what I’m supposed to
do here.

“No worries. I’ll show you.”

He kneels down and shows me a plant different from
the others.

“We’re growing oca tubers. So anything that’s
different from this,” he shows me a big handful of the foliage,
“just pick it out. Carefully, so you don’t disturb the roots. These
tubers are one of our staples during the winter, so they’re
precious. Treat them that way.”

I nod and kneel down. The mud squelches against my
pants, and I feel the moisture on my skin. So much like the time I
went onto Field #3 without my suit. I reach down and pull a weed
out. In the moist soil, it comes free easily in a big clump of
weed, roots, and dirt.

“A little more gently next time,” Dave says. “We
don’t want to take all the dirt from the field.”

I put the weed in the bag sitting between us. Dave is
already several feet away from me, making his way through the row.
I set to work.

The sun rises high overhead, and the sweat trickles
from my hair and into my eyes. I wipe the sweat and rub dirt across
my face. My hands ache. They’re raw from pulling the rough weeds. I
always wore gloves, and my hands are too soft for this work. I grit
my teeth and bend to another weed, digging softly to loosen it from
the ground without disturbing the tubers.

I sit up and look down the row. Dave is a hundred
feet from me and shows no sign of stopping. I flex my fingers.
Someone laughs.

“Hard work the first time, isn’t it?”

Nell kneels down beside me. Her shirt sleeves are
rolled once, so her wrists show. Her hat perches on her silver
hair, and a faded purple ribbon blows about her face.

“I’m getting too old for this, but I do love
gardening. Those hydrangeas by the school were my idea. I thought
it brightened it up.” She offers me her canteen, and I take a long
drink of warm water.

“I had to fight for them, of course. Anything too
cultivated looks suspicious from the air, and we do get fly-overs
every few weeks.”

That explains the irregular oca rows. Neat rows would
be too conspicuous from the sky. But I still don’t understand why
exactly they’re hiding. What would happen if the government found
out they’re here?

“I remember the first day Red and I came to the
settlement. Forty-six years ago. We found each other near Seattle,
both of us running from the city, or what was left of it. It wasn’t
so bad at first. The government used trackers to be sure everyone
got equal rations.” She shows me a white, wrinkled patch of skin on
the underside of her forearm. “I cut it out the day I left. The
trackers were becoming a way for them to know where every person
was at every moment. When I found Red, he protected me, and we
wandered together, hoping to find something better. We came here
and have been here ever since. There were only five others here
back then, and they hadn't yet settled down in the school.”