Quaranteen: The Loners

by Lex Thomas

Immediately.

  Lucy was supporting David, walking him gently as he winced with every step. His neck was purple, and he had a swollen eye. Lucy was so tender with him. Will remembered her sweet touch in his hardest moments of Wild-Trek, her kind words, her total belief in him. And now it was all for David.

  This wasn’t the heroic return Will had been hoping for. He turned away and stepped into the shadow of the nearest trash pile. He didn’t want to be seen by them yet. He was sure David

  hadn’t noticed him, and Lucy had her eyes on David, but Will knew Smudge was watching him, probably loving it.

  David spoke. His voice rasped from the abuse to his throat.

  It only made the Scraps listen more intently.

  “It’s been a hell of a day.”

  Nervous laughter bounced around the clearing.

  “A lot of you know about Belinda’s idea of forming a new gang, so Scraps like us could be fed and protected. I know that’s why you’re here right now. I don’t know if I can be what you need, and I’m sure things will get harder before they get any easier, but none of us should have to fight alone. The gang begins now with all of you. I am officially accepting Belinda’s offer to be your leader.”

  Everyone burst into cheers. Will didn’t make a noise.

  13

  Warm copper light splashed against

  Lucy’s bed. She watched it sparkle like raindrops on her dress. Lucy smiled. Over to her right, beyond the fort of broken school desks that carved out her sleeping area, Leonard was unfolding an emergency fire blanket. The light from a halogen work light beamed off its crinkled metallic surface.

  Lucy drew in a deep breath and let it all out. It had been nearly a week and a half since David’s escape from Varsity.

  Today, for the first time, she felt at ease. She sat up and looked at her area. She was grateful for her pillow. Old socks in a zip-lock freezer bag. She had taped it shut with an airtight seal.

  Every day here was an unending battle against stink. Lucy had scrubbed every nook and cranny around her area.

  She had to. She’d started to feel like the filth was infecting

  her dreams. Nearly every night for the past week she’d had nightmares about Brad. She was there in the booth again, trying to get away, but David never showed up. What happened next was awful. She fought with everything she had, but Brad was always stronger. Every time she woke up, shaking, surrounded by trash, she’d yearn for her old, soft bed in the girls’

  locker room. She’d never realized how luxurious her Pretty One life was compared to how Scraps were living. It all made her wonder if she’d made a huge mistake by defying Hilary.

  Lucy stretched. She opened her tattered white pocketbook and pulled out a brown glass bottle of pure vanilla extract. She dabbed a little behind each ear. From inside one of the desks she pulled a shard of mirror. It belonged to Dorothy, an ex-art Geek, who’d joined up with their group last week. Dorothy had held her own photography show in the foyer months ago, full of naked pics she had taken of other art Geeks without them knowing. She’d said she was trying to confront people with the nude human form to start a dialogue about how similar and how vulnerable all of them were underneath, no matter their gang affiliation. The Geeks kicked her out instead.

  Lucy checked herself out in the squash-shaped mirror. It was marred with gouges, but it let Lucy see enough to know whether she was walking around looking like a ghoul. Her lemon blonde coloring had faded. Her hair would be white soon. She tied it up in a high bun. There was no point in checking out her dress. She’d worn it every day and slept in it

  every night for weeks. She knew what it looked like. Bad. She put the mirror back in the desk. Her sweater was as dirty as her dress. Her fingers traced the hole where Hilary had torn off her Pretty Ones emblem.

  No, she thought. She didn’t belong with the Pretty Ones.

  Today, she was more sure than ever. It took getting out to see how unhappy she’d been in her life in the gym. Early in the quarantine, when Hilary offered her a spot in the gang, it just made sense. McKinley was a new school for her. Her family had only moved to Pale Ridge that summer. She didn’t really know anyone. It seemed like her best bet at staying safe. Maybe the other girls felt the same way, but no one talked about it. They all went along with whatever demented orders Hilary passed down from Sam. She felt she’d escaped from a cult.

  “We made a great haul today,” someone said.

  Lucy peeked her head around the cluster of desks and saw Mort limp through the basement doors, backed by the twins.

  They wove their way through trash piles to the heart of the camp, which was hidden behind the largest pile in the room.

  They each carried trash bags and dumped the contents out on chairs for the other Scraps to see. Mort’s bag contained food. Both the twins’ bags contained dirty laundry. Belinda, bucket in hand, scooped up an armful of laundry. Will poked through the food and held up a bottle of vinegar with a puzzled look to Mort.

  “Vinegar? Seriously? What, does the military think we’re pickling eggs in here?”

  Lucy smiled. Thank God for Will. He’d been there for her every day, reminding her of stories from their trip in Utah together. He was so sweet. He helped her remember that before the Pretty Ones, she was a girl who was adventurous, who liked to laugh, who thought for herself. It had all been so easy to forget. She was so attracted to Will back then, but he never made a move.

  A kick ball rested on the ground near Will, inside the chalk outline of a four-square court. Nelson had found the ball in the trash. He’d organized a four-square tournament that had really helped to bring people together. The only precaution was being sure not to make too much noise when they played.

  That went for every aspect of their life down here. They’d managed to keep their little camp secret so far by hiding in the boiler room whenever the Skaters rolled in and dropped their trash at the end of their runs. The Skaters never had any reason to venture this far back into the trash.

  Lucy stepped out of her quarters. So far, she’d opted out of group activities like kick ball because she just needed time to herself after what had happened with Brad. She could only get away with that for so long. It was time for her to join the gang. Belinda was washing a sweater in a mop bucket. She wrung it out. Lucy approached her.

  “I can hang stuff if you just want to wash,” Lucy said.

  Belinda ignored her, hung the sweater on a turned-over chair, and turned back to her sudsy bucket of gray water. Lucy bit her lip.

  “Would that help at all?” Lucy said.

  Belinda slapped down the wet laundry in her hand with a huff.

  “Or . . . not?”

  “A little late now, don’t you think?” Belinda said.

  “Late?”

  Belinda grumbled down into the bucket, “Just because the little princess finally wants to help—”

  “Excuse me?”

  Belinda looked up and jutted her jaw. “You heard me. Just because David thinks you’re so special doesn’t mean we do

  . . . Pretty One.”

  Lucy was mortified. This was worse than she’d expected.

  She wanted to say something to defend herself, but nothing came. She was sick at the thought that everyone thought she was slacking off. She should have been working harder to build friendships.

  “Hey, Haunches, you got a problem with Lucy?” Will said.

  Lucy turned to see Will. He wore a cocked sneer, and his eyes were squeezed to slits. Something about the way he was holding his head, his shoulders back, made Lucy notice how muscular he was now. He had a nice body. Belinda must have

  noticed too, and she backed up with a startled whinny.

  “Will, don’t. . . . It’s okay,” Lucy said.

  “No, it’s not okay. You’re trying to help,” he said, and turned to the rest of the room. “Hey, listen up, anybody that’s got a problem with Lucy has a problem with me. Got it?”

  “Will, stop . . . ,” Lucy said with a blus
h. She tugged on his sleeve, and he put his arm around her and gripped her hip. It felt good. The rest of the Scraps stared at her.

  The door to the Boiler Room swung open, and David stepped out. Lucy felt hot all of the sudden. She smoothed out the wrinkles in her dress.

  “What’s going on?” David said. He looked perturbed.

  “Nothing,” Lucy said. “It’s fine.”

  She didn’t want him upset with her.

  “He called me Haunches,” Belinda said.

  David looked at Will and sighed, “What are you doing?”

  “She’s trying to freeze Lucy out of the group,” Will said.

  “Hey,” David said, projecting his voice for everyone to hear.

  “Let’s try to get along, okay? All we got is each other. So let’s make it work.”

  David clapped his hands and strode back to the boiler room. Will walked after him, taking Lucy’s hand and pulling her with him.

  “That’s it? She was a total bitch to Lucy,” Will said.

  David grabbed Will’s arm and pulled him into the room.

  Lucy stumbled along with him. The door shut behind her. The

  giant industrial boiler took up half of the room; a tangle of pipes led off the top and sides of it and reached across the ceiling. Raw heat pressed in all around Lucy.

  “Do me a favor, Will,” David said. “Just play nice. We need a hundred and ten percent from everybody right now, and if you’re calling people bitch, it’s gonna fall apart.” David looked pained. He massaged his jaw. She wanted to massage it for him.

  “It’s going to fall apart because we live in a trash pit, man,” Will said.

  “I’m working on that.”

  “Maybe it’s just better if me and Lucy split.”

  “No,” Lucy said, a little more forcefully than she meant to.

  She couldn’t leave David. It made her nervous to be far from him.

  “But they don’t understand you,” Will said. “They’re calling you a Pretty One, and you’re not. They’ve got no respect. It just makes me want to—”

  Lucy put her hand on Will’s arm to calm him.

  “It’s okay,” she said, then looked to David. “I can change their minds. This is where I want to be.” Relief eased the wrinkles in David’s forehead. He gave her a little nod of thanks and focused on his brother. It warmed her to know she’d done well by him.

  “Don’t bail on me yet, okay?” David said. “I can still make this work. If we can bring in more Scraps like us, we’ll have

  something. You’ll have a gang, man.”

  “You gotta pick up the pace,” Will said, and then turned to Lucy. “Let’s go.”

  “Bye,” Lucy said to David before she followed Will out the door.

  “Bye,” he said. They held eye contact until the door closed between them. Whoa. She wondered if the look meant that he secretly wished she wasn’t leaving. The idea that they could be more than friends made Lucy’s stomach flutter.

  Every head in the camp turned and stared. Mort and Nelson were in the midst of stashing the new food out of sight. An idea gave her a little rush.

  “Will, I know what we need to do,” she said, gripping his hand in both of hers. She jumped a little, getting herself excited. When Lucy moved to Pale Ridge, she’d been bummed about being in a new town, in a strange house. She didn’t like her new bedroom, but it was that first meal with her family that made the place feel like home.

  “We need to get out of here,” Will said. “I was serious in there. If just you and me went back to the elevator, we’d be fine on our own. You don’t belong in this nastiness. This is David’s thing.”

  Lucy frowned. “Will, you just promised your brother you’d stick by him.”

  “I didn’t promise anything.”

  “He’s your brother. He loves you. You promised. And we’re

  not going anywhere.”

  Lucy eyed a large sheet of plywood.

  “Help me with this,” she said, and pulled him toward it. Dorothy, the ex-art Geek, pushed her stringy hair off her face and poked her little beak of a nose toward them.

  “I’ll help,” Dorothy said.

  “No, thanks,” Will said.

  Lucy gave him a soft punch and waved Dorothy over. “We’d love it.”

  David paced in the heat. He was slick with sweat. He hadn’t left the boiler room since he’d spoken with Will and Lucy.

  Thank God for Lucy. She was the only thing keeping Will here, and David knew it. He’d tried to thank Will for saving his life several times over the past week and a half, but it didn’t seem to make a dent. Everything David did seemed to piss Will off.

  This boiler room was hell, but he couldn’t leave until he came up with a plan. Nothing changed the game like a good strategy, but he’d been racking his brain for too long. It wasn’t just Will; everyone was starting to get anxious. He knew what they were thinking when they stared at him. If David’s our leader, then when’s he gonna lead? What’s the next move?

  David had no idea.

  He didn’t even know how they were all still alive. Everyone seemed to believe that the fact that Varsity hadn’t attacked this whole time meant that no one knew they were down here,

  or that Varsity was scared of David. David didn’t buy that. He knew there was no way Sam would let things end like they had in the quad. Every day that Sam didn’t attack, David grew more wary. What was he up to?

  David tripped over his laundry bucket. The dirty water splashed onto his browned sneaker. He’d thought the laundry business could be a trade for the whole group, but it was a miserable failure. Will and David had barely eked out a living doing laundry before. There just wasn’t enough business to spread the profits between fifteen people and have it be viable. The pathetic amount of food they’d managed to get in the past week and a half was proof of that. On top of it, they couldn’t keep running a laundry service out of a dump. Everything smelled worse on the way out than it did on the way in.

  There was no trade in McKinley that wasn’t already accounted for. And if the fifteen of them tried to fight in the upcoming food drop, Varsity would take them out in five minutes.

  David’s stomach growled at him. His neck was still sore from the attempted lynching. He tried not to think about how he was as hungry and afraid as the others. Maybe more. He couldn’t be. He was the one they were depending on. He had to be fearless.

  He heard the excited voices of his gang outside the door.

  Then there was a knock. David stared at the door. Maybe they would just go away if he didn’t answer.

  “David? It’s Lucy. It’s dinnertime.”

  “Uh . . . that’s okay. I’m not hungry,” he lied.

  “Oh,” she said. “But Will and I have a surprise for you.” Shit. A surprise. Only an asshole turns down a surprise.

  “Okay . . .”

  He opened the door. The stench of curdled trash bit the inside of his nose. Lucy was wearing a scarf over her nose and mouth, but he could tell by the crinkles in the corners of her eyes that she was smiling.

  David did a double take as he stepped into the camp. No one was around, or so it seemed at first glance. A brand-new structure stood behind the largest trash pile—a twelve-foot-long tent made out of black garbage bag plastic. Conversation emanated from the tent.

  “You ready?” she said, and reached for David’s hand.

  “Everyone’s inside. Now, when we go in, be quick. So far, I’ve managed to keep the smell out.”

  “Then I guess the twins aren’t in there.” Lucy laughed. It made him feel a little better. She pulled apart the layers of hanging black plastic, and they ducked under it.

  Inside, everyone sat around a plywood table. The only light came from three flashlights, sitting pointed up, like a candle centerpiece. One had a weak set of batteries, and it flickered like a dying flame. If hobos had banquets, this was what they’d look like. The others quieted upon David’s entrance.

  Nelson stood and salut
ed him. Leonard tugged on Nelson’s sleeve, signaling him to sit back down.

  Everyone watched as David took a seat at the head of the table. Lucy sat to his right. Will had positioned himself at the other end of the long table. As a result, he was barely visible to David, just a pair of eyes in the darkness.

  David breathed in deep for Lucy’s benefit. He was amazed by the legitimate lack of stink. Instead, there was a distinct, familiar scent.

  “Is that vinegar?”

  Lucy pulled down her scarf and said, “We used it to scrub everything clean.”

  David looked down at the place setting before him. His plate was made from the square cover of a binder. An anarchy symbol and other ancient classroom doodles were scrawled onto it in ballpoint pen. A spread of crackers and a few cuts of salami were scattered over it. He took a deep breath, then looked to the gang.

  “Hi, everybody,” David said. “Um . . . I guess, first, I want to thank Will and Lucy for putting together this dinner—”

  “It was Lucy’s idea, not mine.” Will said abruptly.

  “Well, all the same, I think it’s just what we needed. Right?” There were a few nods, but for the most part, the faces he saw echoed his fear. They wanted answers. A state of the union. He had to tell them that he didn’t have a clue.

  “Anyone have any news?” David asked.

  “A Skater threw his trash bags at me yesterday,” Nelson volunteered.

  “I think we might be losing trades because we smell bad,” Mort said.

  “No shit,” Will said.

  “Do we have more food coming in, ’cause I might want to save this if we don’t,” Dorothy said, looking at her plate.

  “Well . . . ,” David said.

  “What are we gonna do, David?” Will said. It was more of a challenge than a question. David stared down the length of the table at his obnoxious brother. Will was leaning into the flickering light now. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m sick of living like a rat.”