Lancer planted a kiss on the top of his head without a word and let him be.
Riley must have dozed off, the light coming in looking gray, dusky. He heard some clatter in the kitchen and walked in. Lancer was chopping up veggies for a salad and Clarence was stirring something in the pot. He’d never really seen Lancer cook and it surprised him that the man still had all his fingers, the way he was doing it. He walked over and snatched the heavy knife from him, catching a smirk on the man’s face.
They ate in silence, and Clarence ran the dishes to the sink afterward and was rinsing them, by the sound of it. He could feel Lancer’s eyes on him, so he nodded to him, just once, letting him know he’ll be okay with that nod, and that he didn’t care to talk about it anymore.
He poked his head into the kitchen and told Clarence that it was time to go. The boy turned the water off, dried his hands on a small towel, and followed him out of the house without a word.
They walked in silence for a long time, the kid barely making any noise on the drying leaves and branches underfoot. He smiled inwardly at that skill he never quite got, not the way this kid and Brody had it. He wished Brody was back, so he could talk to him, so he could just spill all the things that have been nagging at him lately, making him feel old; old, and useless.
“I won’t touch him, Riley—Jake…. I’m not angry at him for what he did. I know you are, for some reason, but I don’t need to get even with him. The way I see it, he had to do it, so we’re already even,” the boy said to him in a quiet voice.
Riley looked at his screen, and they still had a bit of time, so he stopped, facing him. “All right…. I don’t believe you. I don’t believe that you’re not angry at him. I think you’re doing whatever it is you’re doing because of something else, something I’m not privy to, but whatever it is that makes you okay with what Jake did to you, it doesn’t make me okay with it. I won’t have it, not in my unit. I don’t expect you to hit him or anything, but I do expect you to talk. Whatever the two of you need to say to each other, I need you to get it all out, and if you can’t be all right with each other after that, I will send one of you to Brody’s group, because what happened that day is never happening again. I am not risking it.” He said all of it quickly, the boy watching him, not moving anything.
“All right,” the kid said and walked on ahead of him, silent as a ghost.
Jake was already at the clearing, pacing when they got there, and he could tell he was afraid by the way his face was. He had a small fire going, likely because he needed to give himself something to do with the waiting. Riley stopped at the edge, watching as Clarence walked over to the kid. He thought back to what Lancer told him then, how this big boy hit Jake when he was already on the ground when he already very obviously lost, and then stood over him like that, fist raised, and he knew the boy must have been terrified and embarrassed. Knew all too well what it was like to feel so helpless and to want to run, and to not be able to….
Clarence stopped just a step away from the smaller boy, hands behind his back. “I’m not angry at you, Jake. If you are still, then do what you need to do,” he said very quietly and nodded to Jake. Riley was stunned, didn’t see this coming at all, didn’t for a second think that Clarence would somehow still feel that he owed something to this boy after he beat him like that.
Jake shook his head and dropped his eyes, his hands in tight little fists at his sides.
Clarence stuck his hand out and smiled at the boy then, Jake not taking his hand, just staring at him with a strange look on his face. “I need you to shake my hand, Jake, so that I know we’re all right. I’d rather not have to switch units and I’m pretty sure you’d rather stay here as well. We don’t need to like each other or be friends or anything, but we do need to let it go. So you can hit me or shake my hand. I’m okay with it either way.”
Jake just shook his head again, and Riley didn’t know what to do with him after that. He watched Clarence clasp his hands behind his back, not moving anything else, looking at the boy, only his face was different, tense.
He walked over to them, and grabbed Jake roughly by the arm, staring into his face. “What do you want from him?” he asked sharply.
Jake looked away, not saying a word.
“All right. As of tomorrow, you’re on Brody’s crew. We’re done!” He turned away, nodding to Clarence that they were leaving.
“I’ll switch crews,” Clarence said quietly, looking at Jake, not him.
Riley shook his head.
“It was my fault, all of it, so it’s only fair that I leave. I’m okay with it. You need to let me do that or you need to let me leave Reston. You don’t have any kind of choice about it now,” Clarence said very quietly, and he looked at him in such an adult way, he flinched.
“All right,” he finally said, truly hating Jake now, but knowing, too, that he had to let them do what they needed to do, and that in the end, he couldn’t make either of them do something they weren’t okay with. “You’re walking back with me,” he said softly, and then turned and glared at Jake. “I don’t want you leaving this clearing for fifteen minutes. Put out the fire before you go.” He took Clarence by the arm and walked him onto the trail.
“Don’t be too hard on him, Riley. He’s only doing what he needs to do. I think he is embarrassed around me, only he can’t say it to you or to me, can’t undo what he did. He’ll be alright.” He didn’t know what to say, so he stayed silent.
They were almost in the city when the boy stopped and looked at him, his face hard. “I am sorry for all of this, Riley, I truly am. I told Lancer that it was okay for him to tell you what he knows days ago. I thought he had. That’s his business, for why he didn’t…. I did something when I was a kid, something that cost me everybody I loved. Didn’t mean to do it, but I’ve been on my own after that. I learned to do things to make it that I wish I hadn’t. Jake… I think I scared him, is all. I meant to, at the time. Just didn’t think it would be as bad for him, but I don’t know anything about him, how he lived. What I’m saying is he has his reasons for how he is with me, something that likely doesn’t have anything to do with that fight, something that’s his alone from before. You’ll need to figure out what it is. Maybe he’ll talk to you or Telan, I don’t know, but I know he won’t talk to me, and I can tell from the way he looks at me that he truly hates me. I can’t stay with you for that. It wouldn’t be right for him to have to live with whatever I remind him of every day,” Clarence said evenly, and he turned back on the trail and started walking in that silent way he had.
The boy stopped at Lancer’s door and looked at him, a small smile curving his lips. “I used to draw when I was very little. Mom told me I was rather good for my age, too, but I didn’t care about that. I’d just always see something that I needed to put to paper, you know, something I needed to draw, so I could remember it. I’m not sure why it was important to me to remember it then, never thought about it before. I haven’t drawn anything in years, and for the first time today, I wanted to again. I think I’ll be alright, is what I’m saying,” he said, and then ran into the house, leaving him more puzzled than he remembered being in a long time.
Ams kissed him softly on the cheek, wrinkling her nose at the stubble on him, her eyes looking at him softly, the way she always did when she could tell something was off with him. He looked around their little house, much tidier now that Ams was back, and it hit him. All the walls were bare. No pictures of any kind, just clean white-washed walls, interrupted only by a broken shelf he planned on fixing someday that for weeks now had been leaning on a wall in the living room, marking it gray from all the symmetrical shadows.
He remembered the paintings they had in the old tiny shack of a house he grew up in and wondered for the first time where they came from, wondered who made them and if they, too, did it to remember things they didn’t want to lose. He wondered if they were still there. It’s been over eight years since he’d set foot in that place. He’d have to wait for Br
ody to come back, and maybe, they could take the flier to Waller, just the two of them and Loren to fly the damn thing. He needed to know if that house was still there, boarded up and empty the way it was the last time he saw it, needed to know if it was there at all….
And he needed to see those paintings again, and maybe, if he was very lucky, bring them home.
11
Colton
Clarence, September 19, 2244, Reston.
He was used to resentful looks by now, but the way this girl stared at him was pure hatred and he never wanted to see that again. Telan brought her with him the first time he came to see him in the Med wing after Jake broke a few ribs in him. He hated being in this room, hooked up to whatever was dripping into him from the bag over his head. If it wasn’t for Lancer accidentally catching him clutching at his ribs, he wouldn’t be here now, but he couldn’t be angry at him for it. He would have likely done the same thing…. He was just coming out of a shower carrying his clothes with him when he dropped a sock and leaned over to pick it up, only he couldn’t stand back up quickly enough. Lancer caught him as he tried to slide up the wall and screamed at him for being an idiot, and he couldn’t say anything from all the pain, so he let him.
He didn’t remember how he got to this room, didn’t remember anyone putting needles in his arm or whatever else they did, but he suddenly wasn’t in pain anymore, probably because of whatever was dripping into his veins. He just hoped he wouldn’t have to stay here for too long, didn’t think he could take it. He glanced down and saw bandages around his ribs and a tall shadow by the far wall looking very much like Lancer’s, and he didn’t want to fight with that man, so he closed his eyes and forced himself to sleep. He woke up to Telan squeezing his hand gently, and then he saw her, the girl, and he had to turn away from the way she looked at him, knew what that look meant, and he didn’t want to see her after that, only he couldn’t find a way of saying it to Telan that would be all right.
The kid spent most of his free time with her, so he let him be, always finding an excuse for why he didn’t want to go swimming with them or just running through the woods. Mostly, he just told him that he wasn’t healed enough yet, but he didn’t think Telan believed him.
He was thinking about all of that when he heard a branch break behind him. He turned, the girl’s eyes on him. She was alone and it scared him. He got up from the rock he was sitting on and faced her. The girl walked past him and plopped down right by the water, not looking at him, and told him to take a seat. He crouched next to her, eyes trained on the small ripples, waiting, feeling on edge.
“I remember you,” the girl surprised him by saying, and he could feel her staring at him again.
He shook his head. There was no way they’d ever met before.
“You were in Colton for a little while. It took me forever, but I remember you from back then. How you wouldn’t talk to anybody and how the other kids always took your stuff and beat you, and called you ugly names, and you wouldn’t say anything or fight them. I tried to give you some of my food once, but you just looked at me strangely, like you were about to cry, and then you ran and I remember feeling bad for it like it was my fault that you did that….”
He shut his eyes, an image of a tiny girl with dirt in her hair and bruises on her face coming into sharp focus, an image he never wanted to see again. It hurt so unbearably bad when she did that, the kind of hurt he didn’t know what to do with, so he ran, because he couldn’t tell this girl about her, about Shannon, couldn’t tell anybody.
He felt his eyes well up and then the pressure of the girl’s hand on his arm and he jumped up, turning away from her, embarrassed. He heard her move and knew she was standing in front of him, but he didn’t dare lift his eyes to her.
“I’m sorry, Clarence. I didn’t mean to upset you. Please, look at me. There is something else I need to tell you,” the girl asked, her voice soft.
He squeezed his jaw tight and looked at her, needing to just get it over with, needing for her to go.
“Trevor, the boy who was in charge there, he is here too, only he isn’t like he was then. He’s decent. I don’t know if you believe me on that, but he really is. I don’t know if he’ll remember you or anything, but I didn’t want you to not know if you see him… wanted you to be prepared,” she whispered, turned around, and ran back, soft-footed, not breaking any branches now.
He sat by the water staring at nothing for a long time, thinking of this girl when she was just a little kid, and hating himself for not helping her then, for not fighting this other boy who beat her. He remembered that too, remembered how that big red-haired boy slapped him around, and the other kids, even her, and how he hated him for it but didn’t have it in him to fight; didn’t know how to yet. And he suddenly wanted to find him and beat the shit out of him for all of it, lash out at him for the bruises on the girl’s face.
He found him easily enough in the large building most of the recruits who were single lived. He spotted a mop of red hair from the door. Trevor was sitting at a small table in the dining room, next to a tiny kid. His heart clenched. He ran over to them, hoping this kid didn’t have any bruises on him and not trusting that he didn’t. He looked the little kid over and he seemed fine, only he stared at him with fear in the strange green eyes. Trevor threw his arm over the boy, as if to protect him from something, leaned in and whispered something to him, stood up, pointing to the door, and just started walking. He followed him out of the building and across the street to where the trees started and then a tiny clearing just beyond the edge of the city.
Trevor stopped and faced him. He remembered how big he looked to him back then and almost laughed at how small, how scrawny he seemed now. He had him by a head and a dozen kilos. This wouldn’t be a fair fight, but it didn’t need to be. This son of a bitch never fought fair before.
“Do what you need to do, kid,” Trevor said evenly, looking at him calmly.
He shook his head and put his fists up. “Too much of a coward to fight me, now that I’m not so little?”
“No. But I have a feeling I hurt you, so I owe you. I won’t fight you.”
“You will fight me, you son of a bitch,” he screamed and shoved him in the chest.
Trevor staggered back a few steps and walked toward him again, his face still surprisingly calm. He held up his hand and slowly took his weapons belt off. He didn’t even notice it on him before. The man handed it to him and took a small step back, eyes on his. “Do what you need to do,” he said again, and he didn’t know what to do with it. He wanted to hurt him, wanted to get back at him for what he’d done, but he never imagined that he’d just let him.
Trevor waited without a word.
“I can’t … I can’t do it like this,” Clarence spat at him. He dropped the weapons bag on the grass and kicked at it, the bag barely moving for how heavy it was.
Trevor took a few steps to him and put his hands behind his back. “It’s alright, kid. Do it. But unless you plan on killing me”—he pointed at the bag on the grass—”do it quickly. There’s somewhere I need to be.” There was no fear he could see on his face, sadness maybe, or resignation as if he didn’t care if he kit him or worse and he couldn’t do it, couldn’t do any of it.
He ran his hands through his too-long hair, frustration making him want to pull on it, an old tick. He couldn’t hear the man breathing close to him, and looked at him again.
“Are we done here?” Trevor asked after a while.
He swallowed hard and nodded.
Trevor clipped the belt around his waist and then walked right up to him. “I am sorry for whatever it is I did to you. If you ever feel you need to get back at me, you know where to find me. Just… whatever you do, don’t raise a hand to me in front of that little boy,” he said quietly, turned away, and quickly walked out of the clearing without another word or a look back.
He sat down on the grass thinking of what the girl told him about this man, how he wasn’t like he used to be anymor
e, that he was decent, only he never thought people ever changed all that much. And he wondered if the girl knew what had happened to him and if she’d tell him someday because suddenly it felt important to know that. Maybe if he knew what it was, he could change how he was too, and the other boys wouldn’t look at him with fear in their eyes, and he wouldn’t have to clench his fists so hard every time somebody said something stupid about his family.
He felt a gentle hand on his shoulder and jumped up, afraid. Telan’s serious gray eyes were on him, reading him in that way he had.
“Riley is making all kinds of fish he caught at Max’s, and it’s a lot of bloody fish, so we are invited to help get rid of it. Lancer sent me to find you. That man you were here with…. He almost killed himself for what he did back then, for how he was. Shot himself in the head, only he missed by a bit. Riley saved him, carried him back from that clearing by the river. They had a trial after he got well enough and Max whipped him worse than anything, only Trevor wanted him to do it, begged him to do it. Selena told me. She was there when they did it, so she told me all of it because she felt bad for it, I think. Still does. What I’m saying is, he’s paid enough… I think we all have,” he said softly, and without asking, took him by the shoulders and started to walk him back to the city.
And he felt he had to tell him, so he’d know that it wasn’t like that for him, that it couldn’t ever be like that for him, so he did. Told him about that bloody night, the forgetting to blow out the candle, and how he could have saved them even then if he just went straight home because his runs were short back then, but he didn’t, because the sky was so very dark and he could see all the stars in it, so he stayed out looking at the damn stars. And how when he finally made it home, there wasn’t anything of them left.
Telan stopped, staring at him, not saying a word to him. He knew he wouldn’t. Nobody ever did.
Alliance: The Complete Series (A Dystopian YA Box Set Books 1-5): Dystopian Sci Fi Thriller Page 85
