Gated

by Amy Christine Parker

  I roll my eyes and put a little distance between us. I like it better when he’s just my friend like he used to be before we were Intendeds. Flirting like this always feels a little like target shooting. I’m more likely to want to shake his hand than I am to bat my eyes and aim for his heart.

  “Can we get going already?” Brian grumbles. He’s the first one to scramble up the ladder, pulling himself up and over the wall in one fluid movement. I can hear the dull thud as he lands on the other side.

  Marie goes next. She has a little more difficulty hoisting herself up onto the wall, but she’s still over it quickly enough to keep my fear of being found out to a minimum.

  “Your turn,” Will whispers into my hair.

  I climb carefully up the plywood. I have to grip the sides to keep from falling as it bows under my weight. The ladder ends a little more than two-thirds of the way up the wall. I have to practically do a pull-up to get myself up on top of it. It takes me a few tries, but finally my feet find purchase between the bricks and I manage to pull myself up onto my stomach so that I’m lying across the top of the wall. I feel dangerously exposed on the thin cement ledge, so I swing myself around and let my legs dangle on the other side before slowly lowering myself as far as I can before I have to let go.

  “Oww!” Brian yelps as I fall into him, throwing both of us backward into the grass. Thankfully, I land on top of his solid chest and not the other way around.

  Will’s already at the top of the wall. He’s got a rope in one hand, the end of which snakes back into Marie’s yard. He must have tied it to the ladder so he could drag the whole thing over the wall with us. We won’t be able to sneak back in without it.

  The plywood makes a scraping noise loud enough to make all of us cringe. Will leans back and pulls faster, the noise slightly louder now. Once it’s over, we can’t help hovering by the wall, looking for lights from inside Marie’s house or from people in the yard investigating. I can hear my heart thudding in my chest.

  After what feels like hours of listening so hard that my ears ring, we turn away from the wall and rush headlong into the woods. I’m grateful for the tree cover, feeling a bit calmer with every step forward. We work our way to the river. It’s not far from the development, just far enough so that we can have a little fun and not worry about being heard.

  Pioneer sometimes lets the Community go there. It’s a treat he reserves for exceptionally beautiful days. We bring picnic lunches and swim. Brian’s dad put up a rope swing. Even though there’s a pool inside Mandrodage Meadows, I like swimming at the river best. The water is crisp and smells like sunshine mixed with earth. And the noise it makes as it rushes over the rocks and slaps against the riverbank relaxes me. I can feel it soothing me now. The tension of the past two days flows out of me. I hadn’t realized how badly I needed this until now.

  Marie and I spread out the blanket and Will sets up the CD player. There’s only one CD in it.

  “Sinatra?” Will rolls his eyes at Marie and groans.

  “What? It’s romantic. And besides, be happy I smuggled any music out at all.”

  All of our music is housed in the clubhouse library. Pioneer carefully selected each CD, making sure that most every style was represented. We will move all of it into the Silo when the time comes so that we can preserve it for our children. For now, we can check it out along with the players during the day, but they have to go back each evening. I’m not sure how Marie managed to keep it for tonight—it’s nothing short of a miracle, really, but I’m glad she did. Music is a definite bonus.

  Marie and I sprawl out across the blanket and stare up at the stars. Will and Brian set the player under the nearest tree and start arguing over which song to play first. “It Had to Be You” finally drifts out of the speakers and into the air.

  “Dance with me,” Will says from above me. He offers me his hand and I groan.

  Marie giggles. “This should be good.”

  I’m a horrible dancer. It isn’t that I don’t like the music or feel the rhythm. It’s that to do it well, you have to be able to let go, get lost in the song and feel it inside you. I’m not sure I’m built to let go of anything, no matter what it is. Ever. Letting myself go is as foreign to me as thinking things through is to Marie.

  Will puts one hand on the small of my back, his thumb lightly stroking my pajama top. He takes me out into the grass. The moon silvers his blond hair, making him look almost distinguished, mature. He twirls me around in a slow circle. I grip one of his hands and the opposite shoulder so tight it has to be uncomfortable for him, but I can’t make myself relax.

  “Just let me lead you, okay?” he whispers, his eyes strangely soft in the moonlight. The way he’s looking at me makes me shiver. There’s a hunger to his gaze. He pulls me closer, his chin resting lightly on my hair. I concentrate on not stepping on his feet so I don’t have to think about how close he is to me.

  “Not a complete disaster. Good, Lyla!” Marie calls over Brian’s shoulder. She looks perfectly content. Once Brian finally slimmed down and muscled up, she fell for him hard. It shows in the way she looks at him now.

  Marie and Brian are dancing too. I watch as she moves in his arms. It’s hard not to watch her when she dances. She’s beautiful. I mean, she’s not exactly unattractive when she’s not dancing; it’s just that right now she’s mesmerizing. If it wasn’t almost the end of the world and if we didn’t live in Mandrodage Meadows, I know she would be studying dance full-time somewhere with a proper teacher, not memorizing the old ballets and Broadway dance numbers that Pioneer has archived in our library. I wonder if she’s ever sad that she’ll never get the chance to dance the way she’s obviously meant to—on a stage in front of hundreds of people. I’ve never asked her about it. Regret is a given here, the price of survival. No one wants to dwell on it.

  “Glad you came?” Will asks, pulling me in closer.

  I nod into his shoulder. “I think so, yeah.” There’s a strange kind of magic out here by the river. It’s muddling my thoughts, making my mind drift into a current of what-ifs. What if my family never moved to Mandrodage Meadows? What if I didn’t know that the world is ending? Would I be here with Will or Cody?

  I’m so caught up in my own thoughts that at first the high-pitched scream of our Community’s emergency siren doesn’t register. But then the meaning of it hits me like a cold blast of river water.

  This is it.

  The end.

  And it’s early.

  “We have to get back. Now!” Will yells.

  My heart is so icy all of a sudden that it hurts. How could we have been so stupid? The world spins around me. The stars seem way too bright. Can we make it back in time?

  None of us speaks. I rush to gather up our blanket. My hands are shaking so hard that at first I have trouble picking up the thin fabric, separating it from the grass.

  “Just leave it and move!” someone says, but I can’t make myself stop trying to pick up the blanket and I don’t know why.

  Will’s next to me in a flash. He’s yelling at me to go. I can see his lips moving, but the alarm seems to be sounding off from inside my chest now. It’s all I can hear. Will jerks me to my feet and we sprint toward the trees. We leave everything behind us, including the ladder we used to get out. My breath is so shallow now that I’m lightheaded. I try to take a deep breath. Fainting is not an option, there’s no time.

  “Head for the front gate,” Will barks as we run.

  The alarm is one long, uninterrupted howl. It hasn’t ever gone off like this before—not in the middle of the night without a practice drill scheduled. It’s only supposed to go off if the last days begin early—if Pioneer is somehow wrong about the exact date. But we should still have three months. Can his visions be that far off? I try to hold in the sob struggling to escape my chest. I’m not ready, not yet.

  We are still almost half a mile from the gate to Mandrodage Meadows. I feel like my legs are breaking down, like any minute I’ll lose all
my strength and go boneless right there in the middle of the trees. But even if that doesn’t happen and I manage to keep running, if we all manage to keep running, we might not make it. If they close the shelter door before we get there and this is real, they won’t reopen it—not even for us. We will be locked out, left to die with the rest of the world.

  My breath is coming hard. I can’t keep pace much longer. Will takes my hand and starts to pull me along. I can’t match his long-legged stride, but he pulls me anyway, forcing me into a jumping run.

  Marie is screaming, her face white with panic. Brian is pulling her along just like Will pulls me. The tall grass is making shushing noises as we run through it. For some reason the noise and the running strike me as funny—like Will and I are suddenly part of a life-and-death three-legged race against Marie and Brian. I feel hysterical laughter bubbling up in my throat. This can’t be real, can it?

  Will veers off to the left, leading us to the front gate. We make it there just as the siren hiccups and almost dies. Will sucks in a breath and slows. We all freeze. I feel as if the sound of the alarm has been controlling our motion. For a moment I hope it really is a false alarm, but then the siren winds back up again. We stop at the guard station just long enough to figure out that no one’s in it. Everyone is already inside the high walls of our development—either on their way to the thick steel door of the Silo or already deep inside the underground cement structure itself. Still Will rattles the station door’s knob, tests it to see if it’s unlocked.

  “Leave it, there’s no time!” Brian yells.

  “The gate’s closed. We need to get it open if we want in,” Will yells back. My heart stutters the way the alarm just did. The station is supposed to get locked up tight before it’s abandoned. We can’t open the gate if we can’t get in and hit the button. I close my eyes and silently will it to be unlocked, but it isn’t.

  Will roars and kicks at the door until it slams open. He runs inside. Pioneer will not be pleased that he’s destroyed the guard station door. But then again, does it really matter if we never need it after this? I shake my head. I can’t think straight anymore.

  The large iron gate screeches on its track. We don’t wait for it to open all the way or bother hitting the button that shuts it again before we slip through. The entrance to the Silo is on the other side of the development. We have at least another mile to run before we’ll even be close. My heart pounds in my chest and I put my hand over where it sits under my skin, hoping to somehow calm it. Marie slows and comes to stand beside me. I’m pretty sure that she’s thinking about the distance too, because she starts to cry.

  “We can’t make it.” She sobs between ragged breaths. “It’s too far. Oh, God, we’re gonna die.” No one tries to comfort her, because she’s right. We are out of time. As if in confirmation, the siren wheezes. Stops. This time it doesn’t start again and suddenly everything is still.

  “No, do you hear me? No!” Will shouts at the sky. He turns and runs toward his house, then disappears inside. We watch him leave and then Brian sort of shivers and puts his arms around Marie. She collapses against him, utterly hysterical now. I wrap my own arms around myself and spin in a circle to try to keep from screaming. My eyes rest on trees, houses, yards, as if somehow focusing on them will calm me down. What do we do now? Seventeen feels too young to die. I need more time. We all do.

  Will’s garage door rumbles open just as I’m on my fourth spin. He erupts from the dark space behind it in his father’s golf cart and swerves to a stop in front of us.

  “Get in!” he barks. I slide in next to him and Brian throws Marie onto the backseat before climbing on himself.

  “Hold on!” Will yells as he stomps on the gas pedal and we start to pick up speed. The golf cart can only go twenty-five miles per hour, but it’s fast enough to almost throw us off as we whip past the center lawn where the greenhouse, lake, and picnic tables are. Still, it’s not fast enough to make my heart quiet or to make Marie stop screaming. I grip the tiny rail pressing into my thigh and hope that I’ll be able to stay put, that we’ll get to the Silo in time.

  “Go faster, you stupid piece of crap!” Will hollers.

  We’re halfway through the development now, almost to the stables. Some of the animals are in the fields beyond it. Several of the horses lift their heads as we pass. Their ears are flicking back and forth like they can’t figure out what all the fuss is about. I give them one last long look. I wish I could find Indy, put my hand on his nose, and feel his steamy breath on my fingers one more time, but it’s too late for that now. My eyes are wet with tears, but I don’t bother to wipe them away. Will slams on the brake and we throw ourselves out of the cart and toward the clump of apple trees that disguise the entrance to the Silo.

  Will makes it to the door first. It’s set into a low hill in the center of the trees. I don’t have to catch up to know that it’s already locked up tight. Will’s head is in his hands and he’s on his knees in the grass. Brian and Marie come up behind us. When they see Will, Marie loses what’s left of her composure. She runs up to the reinforced steel door and pounds it with her fists.

  “Let us in! Please, let us in! Don’t do this!”

  She screams and pounds and none of us say a word. They can’t hear her. To the people beyond the door, we are already dead.

  If a man is too confident in his salvation, he’ll lose his passion for it.

  —Pioneer

  Once Marie gives up and stops pounding, the world settles into an eerie quiet, holding its breath. I’m not breathing either. I don’t think any of us are. I look up at the sky, search for some sign of smoke or fire or both. What’ll happen first? Solar flares? Pioneer’s never been very specific about what exactly will kick things off. Maybe it’ll be the earth. It could shake and crumble and erupt all at once like a bomb that folds in on itself rather than out. A minute goes by. I clench my fists and try to be still so I can listen.

  No one talks.

  No one moves.

  Two minutes.

  Still nothing happens.

  I’m sweaty and chilled and panicked to the point of immobility. What do we do? There’s no place to hide out here that’ll be safe. Our only option is sealed off and just beneath us. It’s maddening that we’re this close, but we might as well be one hundred miles away for all the good it does us. I need to move, run out into the field, to do something, but I can’t. There’s nothing we can do now. Nothing.

  “Please God, please God, please God.” I’ve been muttering these words under my breath without really realizing that I’m doing it. They startle me. I’m praying and it isn’t to the Brethren. It’s like a reflex reaction that I didn’t know that I had. In my panic, am I hoping Noah’s god will take pity on me, since I’m pretty sure that Pioneer won’t? But don’t I already know how Noah’s god answered the prayers of those left outside the ark, those wicked unbelievers? He let them drown. And it makes sense. They disobeyed his command. If Noah’s god exists, why would he take pity on us?

  My pleas should be to the Brethren. We’re their chosen people. At least we were before today. But maybe we aren’t anymore.

  “What d-d-d-do we d-d-d-do now?” Marie stutters in between wails, her face contorted with fear.

  “I don’t know. I … I tried, but … I don’t know,” Will says, more to himself than to her. He sinks down onto his knees and puts his face in his hands. “Why?” he hollers at the ground. “Why?”

  “I can’t die. Not like this. We’re supposed to be inside. They left us. They just left us,” I mumble, but no one’s listening.

  Marie’s crying gets louder and she starts shaking. Her tears collect along her chin before they drip onto her shirt. She looks up at the sky and opens her mouth to say something more, but she can’t get the words out, she’s hiccupping and crying too hard.

  “They have to know that we’d be close by. Why couldn’t they’ve waited a few more minutes? Nothing’s even happening yet. They could’ve let us in.”
Brian glances at the entrance to the Silo, but there’s no hope in his face. He knows that his questions don’t matter anymore. We all want a different answer than the one we’ve got. We want a way to make things okay.

  Will lets out a hard laugh. “You think so? What’s Pioneer’s first rule? Huh? When that door shuts, it doesn’t open again for five years until the Brethren come for us. For any reason. We all knew that.”

  I can’t look at any of them. I want to blame each of them for this. Marie convinced me to break the rules. Will and Brian made that stupid ladder. I didn’t even want to go in the first place. If we’d been where we should’ve been—in bed—we’d be safe right now. These thoughts settle into my chest and expand until I’m afraid that I can’t keep them to myself. But what good will it do to start yelling at them now?

  Marie is sniffling loudly. She’s cried herself out for now. She’s leaning into Brian and he’s holding her arms with his hands as if he can keep her from falling to pieces this way. Will isn’t holding me and I don’t want him to. What I want is to run, or grab Indy and race out onto the prairie, try to get ahead of the destruction, but I don’t know which way it’ll come from. So I stand still and wait.

  Bang!

  Every other minute or two, Will kicks or pounds at the door. There’s no rhyme or reason to what sets him off, but each time he starts back up, the rest of us jump.

  “Could you quit doing that?” I finally snap, because if he doesn’t stop soon, I might go crazy.

  Will shoots me a look and I stiffen because now I’ve managed to direct all of his anger at me instead of at the door. He shouts, “What should I do? Give up? Just stand here and look stupid like the rest of you?”

  “Ease up, Will,” Brian warns.

  “No, I’m not gonna ease up. Unless you have a better idea—in which case, I’m all ears. Tell me what you think we should do.” He glares at Brian and then at me. When his eyes meet mine, his face softens just a little.