I was in a hospital room for several hours while they took my blood and conducted a full physical. My shoulder turned out to be sprained, and I was warned to be careful with it for a while. Then came all the medicine. I explained shots to Baby and how they were a good thing, despite the pain.
“Richard,” my mother told the boy from earlier. “Do a complete workup on the child.”
“Yes, of course.” He took Baby’s hand to lead her to another room.
“Wait,” I said tentatively, the word not as forceful as I had hoped with my newly found voice. “I want to stay with her,” I insisted.
The boy smiled. “Sure. I can examine her in here, if it makes you more comfortable,” he offered. Grateful, I gave him a faint smile back. Baby looked around uncertainly.
“It’s okay,” he told her kindly.
“She doesn’t understand you. We never spoke out loud at home. She’ll have to learn. . . .” I paused, thinking of Amber whispering to Baby secretly. “I’m not sure if she remembers any English. . . . It’s been a long time and she was only a toddler when I found her.”
My mother took charge of Baby and helped her onto a hospital bed. “A lot of the children we find don’t talk at first,” my mother told me. “They’ve learned to be quiet to survive and have a hard time adjusting. We’ll put Baby in a language class and I’m sure she’ll regain her ability. You’d be surprised at how strong the language instinct is in children.” She returned to my side and hugged me close. I nodded but still wondered. Baby had never even attempted to speak.
The boy examined every inch of Baby, pausing only for a moment at the nape of her neck, peering closely at her scar. He glanced around quickly, placing her long hair back over the mark. He caught my eye and for a moment I saw he was afraid, but the look passed quickly and I wondered if it was really there at all.
“Is everything okay?” I asked.
“Of course,” he smiled, adjusting his glasses. “Do you know how she got this wound?” He motioned to her leg.
“No. She had it when I found her.” I licked my lips. I was sweating, although the room was chilly.
“Probably a dog bite,” the boy told my mother, but he called several other people over to Baby’s bed, where they all made a commotion over the scar on her leg. My mother examined it herself, taking photographs and measurements. I held Baby’s hand and signed to her that everything was going to be okay, although the attention being paid to her was making me nervous.
After they took her blood and gave her a few more shots, my mother informed us that we were in good health, if a little malnourished. “Time to go home,” she said, stroking my hair.
“Excuse me,” the boy addressed my mother, his tone surprisingly authoritative, “but I believe Dr. Reynolds wanted to complete a psyche-eval.”
“It can wait,” my mother said firmly. “I’ll speak with Dr. Reynolds tomorrow about rescheduling. Right now I am taking my daughter home.”
My mother took my hand and I took Baby’s. As we walked out of the room, I glanced back. The boy was staring at me. He smiled, but he had a worried look in his eyes. He raised his hand to wave. I nodded and smiled back, then turned as my mother led us down a corridor and outside, into the sunlight. I shrank back, but she put her arms around my shoulders and whispered, “Be strong, Amy. I’m here.”
I mostly stared at my mother’s face as we traveled in a golf cart on a short ride to her apartment. Her building was large and white and looked like every other structure in the town, which seemed more like a college campus with bland buildings and shabby, weed-infested lawns.
My mother’s apartment was a few floors up. She paused as we walked in the door, hugging me. Inside there was little furniture, but it looked cozy.
I was home.
• • •
When Dr. Thorpe comes again, I’ve been awake for what seems like several hours. My head pounds and I know that something is very wrong. I’d tried the door, but it was locked. Why did they need to lock me in? I don’t belong here. I’ve decided to refuse my medication.
“This is all for your own good. You aren’t going to get better if you continue to refuse treatment,” she tells me.
I stare at her, upset. “You’re drugging me. I don’t even remember how I got here. How is this helping?” I ask. “And why is the door locked?”
“You’ve had a very traumatic experience. It’s better this way. . . . You can’t handle everything you’ve been through. This treatment should stabilize you.”
I ignore her, focusing on a spot on the wall over her left shoulder. I hate not being able to remember, but if I concentrate, I get flashes of memories; a small man with silver hair, a toddler playing with a toy truck, a blue-eyed teenage boy with glasses and shaggy, blond hair. Baby’s smile.
I stay stubbornly motionless and eventually Dr. Thorpe sighs and puts the tray with the pills down next to the sink.
“I didn’t want it to come to this,” she says sadly. She leaves the room and I steel myself for what is about to happen. I hope I am strong enough to resist.
• • •
I sat on a couch in the living room while Baby rested her head on my lap. She’d long since fallen asleep, after I’d talked for hours about my life in the After. How I found Baby, how we survived. Now it was my mother’s turn.
“I was at the lab when it happened,” my mother explained. “We were on lockdown immediately. That’s what saved us. We had a secure perimeter, electric fences, top-notch security team. We weren’t allowed to go outside for a month. Luckily there were plenty of researchers who lived on the compound premises. We had supplies and sleeping quarters. I tried to call the house, but none of the outside lines were working.” She stared through me, haunted by her memories.
“It was clear by then that the Floraes had taken over.” The people in New Hope called the creatures “Floraes,” short for Florae-sapiens, what the remaining scientific community had named them. “There weren’t many people left out there, in the cities and rural areas. Maybe one in a million survived. We’d been in contact with the military research division at this university and decided this was the best place to relocate. That was nearly six weeks after the first Florae sighting. I . . . I ordered a search team to look for you before we left.”
She paused and gazed at me. “When they said the electric fence was intact, but you weren’t there, I was sure that you went with your father to the farmer’s market that first day. If you were outside, you wouldn’t have had a chance.” She began to tear up at the memory and I couldn’t help but cry too. How did they miss me? What was I doing while they searched the house, gathering cans . . . pilfering books? If I’d only been home that night I could have avoided years of fear. I could have been here, with my mother. But then, where would Baby be?
My mother continued through her tears. “Researchers in the private sector with facilities on the college campus were working on a stealth helicopter for the army. You would have been picked up in one.” I nodded, instantly understanding that this had to be the ship. “It was incredible. They were developing a silent technology just when we needed it. Hover-copters. We could go out to other secure facilities and bring survivors here. We could remake society.
“After a while we sent out patrols, to check on the Floraes, to see how many were left, what they were doing, how they were surviving. But the patrols weren’t just finding Floraes; they were finding people, living out there in silence, just like you. We started a program to integrate them into our systems and it’s worked amazingly well . . . although, you were the first to ever pull a gun on my assistant.” My mother shook her head at me, incredulous.
“He was going to take Baby away! I didn’t know what was going on yet,” I explained.
“Usually we send post-aps to an orientation to clarify things and ease people in, but you were classified as hostile, so you were going straight to your psychological evaluation. You should have been handcuffed and you definitely should not have had a gun.”
She was no longer amused.
“That woman, Kay, took one of our guns away as soon as she captured—I mean rescued—us. I was fighting with her. I think she assumed we only had one.”
“It doesn’t matter what she assumed, she knows that she should search everyone, even children,” my mother said firmly. Her tone again pulled me back to my memories of her, how she was always the stern one. She sent me to my room when I was bad as a child and it was always my dad who let me out after she went to work.
“You know, it scared the hell out of us, that hover-copter thing and the secret agents in their black suits. We thought they were the aliens, a new kind sent after the first.
My mother blinked at me. “You thought the Guardians were aliens?”
“They don’t exactly look human. What are those black suits they wear?”
“It’s a protective fabric. . . . They scared you?” she asked, concerned.
“Yeah, I mean, if you’re looking for survivors you might want to write something on the side of the copter like ‘we’re here to rescue you, don’t try to shoot us’ or even just a symbol that everyone knows, like a peace sign or smiley face or something,” I said.
My mother put her hand on my head and stroked my short hair. “We’ll certainly take that under consideration,” she said. “You know, I thought about you every day, Amy. I had the security team bring me a photo album from the house. Would you like to look through it?”
“I would, but I’m exhausted.” And the memories were still too much.
“You and Baby can sleep in Adam’s room,” my mother told me.
“Who’s Adam?”
My mother took a deep breath and sighed uneasily. “He’s my child, Amy . . . your brother.”
“Oh.” It was too weird. “How old is he?”
“Two.” She held my hand. “He’s two years old.”
I stared at the floor, suddenly furious. “You didn’t waste any time,” I mumbled.
My mother sighed. She took my head in her hands and made me look into her eyes. “It’s not how it seems. I know you’re exhausted now. If you want to get some sleep, I can explain everything tomorrow.”
“Do, um, I have a stepfather?” I asked, feeling shaken to my core. My face burned.
“No . . .” My mother shook her head. “There’s only me and Adam.” She put her hand on my cheek. “And now you.” She looked as if she was about to cry again.
I didn’t want to see her sad. “Can I meet him?” I asked, the bitterness gone from my voice.
At that my mother’s face softened. Her smile, still so beautiful. “Of course,” she told me. “He’ll be back from school at five.”
I was quiet for a while, thinking about all I’d learned. “Mom, do you miss him?” I blurted out before I could stop myself. Her head snapped up. She knew who I meant.
“I miss your father every day,” she said quietly.
My eyes stung. I desperately wanted my father to be remembered.
“But no matter how much it hurt me to lose your father, it was only a tiny fraction of the pain I felt when I thought you were gone.”
The tears rolled down my cheeks then. I leaned into my mother, hugged her tightly. She kissed the top of my head and wiped my face with her hand before wrapping her arms around me again.
“If you want to get some sleep,” she said, “I’ll stay here while you and Baby rest.”
“I think sleep would be good. We’ve had to take in a lot today,” I said, which was the understatement of the century. I put my face in my hands and massaged my temples. In one day everything I knew about the After had changed. I didn’t think I could handle much more.
• • •
When Dr. Thorpe returns again a few minutes later, she is trailed by a couple of large men wearing all white. I stay still, my eyes open but unfocused.
The orderlies approach my bedside, where I continue to lie motionless. As soon as they are close enough, I jump up, hitting the nearest one in the nose with the palm of my hand. Blood squirts all over my clothes and splatters the bed.
Stunned, the second orderly doesn’t have time to react. I crouch low and sweep his legs out from under him. My muscles seem to know what to do before I can think it. And suddenly I flash back to a gym—I’m training with Kay, a Guardian. She flickers into my mind, her expression sour, but her eyes full of kindness. In a flash as quick as lightning, her face is gone, leaving a blank void where the memory had been.
All this takes place in seconds, and the orderly I’ve tripped is still falling sideways. His head makes a loud knocking sound as it bounces against the floor. I spring forward and sprint to the door. I’m going to escape. I’ll find Baby and someone to help us, maybe the woman I recalled through my haze. What was her name again? Once I’m out of here, I’ll be able to think. My fingers are on the door handle when I feel a sharp pain in my neck. I look up to find Dr. Thorpe standing over me, flushed, a needle in her hand.
I try to open the door and run anyway, but my arms and legs have turned to jelly. I fall back, into Dr. Thorpe’s arms. She lowers me to the floor and before I black out, I hear her say, “It’s okay, Amy. You will get better. I will make sure of it.”
• • •
I woke at midnight to find Baby already up and watching me. I rubbed my face; my hand came away wet.
You were crying in your sleep, Baby told me.
Why didn’t you wake me?
I thought maybe you were happy. You cried when we found Mom today.
I shivered slightly and shook my nightmare from my head. Why aren’t you asleep? I asked her.
I can’t sleep. It’s too loud here.
I listened to the noises of the building, the buzz of the lights, the settling of wood and metal. That was all normal. We had those gentle noises at home. I listened harder and noticed that there was more. Voices from far away, sounds like a television program. There were footsteps in the hall, laughing outside. The ticking of the clock on the wall. I tried to tell Baby what all the noises were, but she shook her head.
There’s a humming underneath it all. She explained. It makes my head hurt.
I wondered what it was she was hearing that I couldn’t. We have to get used to it here. It’s our new home, I told her. I was wide awake. Are you thirsty? I asked, rubbing my neck. She shook her head no, but I went to fetch myself a glass of water. My throat was raw from talking so much.
I walked through the apartment. Out of habit I was completely silent. In the living room, I noticed kids’ clothes on the couch, a toy truck on the floor. My mother must have taken Adam to bed with her, not wanting to disturb us.
I quietly opened the cabinet doors until I found a glass and filled it with water from the pitcher in the fridge. The cool water soothed my throat and I drank it greedily. I drained the glass and filled it again to the brim. Then I brought it back to Baby in the bedroom in case she wanted some later. After I put the glass on the nightstand, I snuggled with her under the covers.
When I woke again, it was eight o’clock, and light was streaming in the window. Uneasy, I got up and surveyed the view. My mother’s apartment looked down on a smallish park area that people were walking through on their way to other buildings. The area had the same look as the structures, minimally maintained.
I closed the blinds and shivered with the strangeness of it all. There were dozens of people down there. A pregnant woman read while several children ran around her, playing. I wondered, How many people live in New Hope?
I made my way to my mother’s room, hoping to spend time with her before she left for work. I looked for my old clothes but they were gone. In their place were two jumpsuits. One was Baby’s size and was a bright yellow, and the other, larger one was red and must have been meant for me. Underneath them were two pairs of shoes, the same colors as the jumpsuits. Both pairs were way too small for me and too big for Baby. I placed them on the floor. We didn’t need shoes anyway.
I woke Baby and showed her the new clothes. She
loved the yellow color, but all I could think was how impractical it was. You couldn’t blend in; you couldn’t hide. It was like wearing a big flashing sign that said, “Come eat me.”
I buttoned up my own jumpsuit and looked in the mirror. It was big and the extra material billowed out, making me look several sizes larger than I was. I rolled up the sleeves and pant legs and resigned myself to looking stupid for a while.
My mother wasn’t in the kitchen or the living room, but I found a note on her bedroom door.
I’ll be back at eleven to show you around. You can watch TV until then. Snacks in the fridge. Love you, Mom.
My mother the workaholic, just like Before. Unnerved, I put the note on the counter and turned on the TV. Ours at home could still play videos, and sometimes Baby watched with the sound off. I flipped through the channels, finding only five stations. One had old sitcoms, another one showed cartoons, and there was even one with movies, all from Before.
The last channel was a news station, minus the slick studio feel. The “anchor,” an older man, sat at a plain metal desk with nothing but a white wall behind him. I turned up the volume, and Baby covered her ears. The man spoke directly into the camera: “Grave news today, another Guardian has lost his life while defending New Hope. We will honor his memory Friday night at Memorial Hall.”
I was startled by a death, after all my mother’s assurances that we were safe here. How often did it happen? I listened to the news for a while, understanding very little of the context.
“And finally we have a breakthrough in our post-ap research, thanks to Director Harris.” I stared at the screen as the camera panned left. My mother looked back at me.
“This is indeed a bright day, for I believe that we are close to realizing the dream that so many of us share.” This is the mother I knew, professional and commanding. “We would like to put out a call for volunteers, once again. Any interested citizens should report immediately to the clinic for suitability testing.” Suitability? For what?
In the After Page 10
