There is a hint of a flame in the old man’s eyes. “What on earth are you doing?”
“I’m teaching her a healthy fear of guns.”
“Well it seems you’ve done a good job of it. Now put that barbaric thing down and don’t you ever fire it at an innocent person again. I think some introductions are in order before we threaten our guests.”
“They aren’t guests until they’re invited.”
I inch toward Daniel when I notice that the man doesn’t deny his uncle’s accusation of threatening me. Distracted by the conversation before them, the others in the circle either don’t notice or don’t care, and let me pass without hindrance. Daniel subtly breaks away from the old man and meets me halfway through the room. I take his arm, half for my own sense of security and half because I still don’t trust him to stand on his own.
“Every innocent person who comes through our doors is a guest, Nicholas. We’re fighting the government here, not the Population. You don’t threaten somebody who’s not a threat to you.”
“I’ll decide for myself who’s a threat and who isn’t. Do you know how much of the bronchodilator I had to use for her? She’s got asthma as bad as any of us, and she resisted the inhaler so long that she could barely get enough air in for the medicine to take effect. Selfish people are a threat to our community.”
The old man strides across the room and pulls the gun right out of Nicholas’ hand. He is met with no resistance.
“Fear is a selfish emotion. I’ll give you that much. It only allows you to think about yourself and perhaps those closest to you. But you can’t blame someone for feeling it, because we all have at some point in our lives, if not every day. Now leave these poor children alone.”
I turn to Daniel and mouth, “children?”, but he responds with a knowing glance, a warning. The convenient misconception that appears to come with our size is working in our favor here.
The old man kneels before me, though it puts him a full head shorter than me, and asks, “What’s your name, sweetheart?”
An old instinct, born of years of alternation between mischief and subsequent punishment, seals my mouth shut automatically. With a name comes an identity, and with an identity comes a reputation, but a pseudonym is a clean, new start. Which did Daniel choose? I pause, hesitant to make the wrong choice and shatter what little trust we’ve managed to gain.
“You don’t have to be afraid. We’re not going to hurt you.”
I tighten my grip on Daniel’s arm and he responds with a comforting squeeze. I can’t help but glance toward him, trying to read my answer in his face. At my prolonged hesitation, he recognizes what’s wrong, and before the tension of the room forces a response out of me, he begins to murmur, “Her name is –.”
“Mira,” I interject. In a heartbeat, my decision is made.
The old man grins amiably and nods in appreciation, while Daniel beside me grants a half-smile of support, whether or not he approves of my choice. Some in the room still glare at Daniel and me suspiciously, but a few of them have begun to smile.
And then, very suddenly, something in my head shifts. The world spins, my knees meet the floor, and six pairs of hands reach out to catch me. I feel myself sinking into deep, lovely sleep, where nothing in my life – not the Governors, not hunger, not even this strange new world with all of its strange new secrets – can ever reach me. And as the light fades from my eyes, I hear the old man above me gently say, “It’s good to meet you, Mira. We’re the Americans. You’ll be safe here with us. Welcome to Champaign, and welcome to the Library.”
The People You Love
A knock at the door.
James waits a few seconds to hear familiar footsteps hurrying down the hall to answer it, to hear Io’s voice addressing whoever it is who has come to call.
The knock comes again. Still no Io.
When he hears Ruth’s heavy, arrhythmic strides instead, he rolls out of bed. Maybe something interesting is happening, maybe something to break the monotony that defines his every day. Voices grow more distinct when he opens the door to his bedroom, and as he swings it wide, he recognizes a faint flap of a small sheet of fabric falling to the floor on the other side. Something to come back to later, once he has investigated whoever it could be at the door now.
“Well, there’s no need to apologize,” Ruth is assuring someone. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation. She was very ill yesterday. Perhaps she was going to get breakfast and passed out somewhere along the way. Have you checked all of the monorails? And the cafeteria?”
“We’ve scoured the entire city. I don’t want you to be worried, Ruth. I just want you to be aware of the situation. Did she mention anything to you about leaving?”
Now more than ever James can feel his blindness, and old anger flares up, a fire in his chest. The voice is familiar, but without a face to match it he can’t quite place its owner. The injustice of it strains his tolerance and control, and he grips the corner of the wall with a shaking hand to steady himself.
“Of course not! Io isn’t like that!” Ruth argues, her voice rising high with indignation. “If she has disappeared, it’s not by any wrong she’s done. Are you sure you didn’t have anything to do with it? As I recall, the two of you never did get along very well.”
Sensing that Ruth is stoking this man’s temper, James emerges from the hallway to come by her side. Without missing a beat, her arm links in his, uniting them against a common, if unidentifiable enemy.
“Hello, James,” the man addresses him smoothly, and James feels his stomach begin to sink. The man’s next words confirm his only suspicion. “Now, you’ve grown up in these six years, haven’t you?”
“I wouldn’t know,” James begins, and Ruth squeezes his arm tighter in warning, but he ignores her. He’s been waiting years to say these words. “I haven’t seen my own face since I was seven.”
Mack doesn’t respond right away, but James can feel his stare, scrutinizing a face raw with the emotions behind it.
“Perhaps,” he finally says, “I could come in and we could sit down for a while and talk. Being the people Io spends the most time with, you may have some clues or information that you aren’t even aware of.”
Without waiting, Mack makes his way past them into the room.
“What happened?” James finds himself blurting out as soon as they’ve reached the couch, curiosity outweighing the displeasure he feels at having any sort of conversation with this man.
“Io seems to have disappeared. We’re almost certain it was intentional.”
Now James’ heart joins his stomach, plunging to the floor. He hates how difficult it is for him to control his voice. “Intentional? You mean she left us? On purpose?”
Mack’s voice grows heavy. “That’s what it looks like.”
“Nonsense!” Ruth snaps. “You have no evidence of that.”
James finds himself hoping that Ruth’s right, but she could just be doing it for him, to make him feel better. Could Io really have abandoned them?
“I can understand that you’re upset, Ruth.” Mack’s voice grows closer and James imagines that he has just reached out and taken her hand. “I don’t want to believe that she would leave you either. You two are the closest thing she has to family. But Io has always been something of a rebel. She always was a bit unstable.”
James is already on his feet by the time he realizes how much this man’s judgment is irritating him. Neither Mack nor Ruth move to stop him as he turns back toward the hallway. He wants to be deaf to these words and numb to their meaning. If only he had lost his hearing instead of his sight, then it would be so much easier. Then Mack could never have planted these awful doubts about the only person who made his childhood bearable, the person who protected him from the monsters in the perpetual darkness, and who never stopped loving him in spite of his anger once he got older. But maybe that isn’t true anymore. Maybe she has finally had enough.
As he tries to shut the door b
ehind him, James feels it catch on something on the floor, the small sheet of fabric wedged in the crack between the door and the ground. In fury he casts it off to some unknown corner of his room, desperate to be rid of it and never find it again. Io must have dropped it the last time she did the laundry. Now it’s just another painful reminder of how she has abandoned them.
But a few seconds later, James finds himself navigating across the mess of his room to retrieve the fabric. Even with his blood boiling, his brain followed the sound it made when it hit the wall, and in only a few seconds he holds it once again in his hands, feeling its strange form: woven loops and fraying edges. When he lays it out on the bed and kneels beside it, his fingers just barely trace out a pair of shapes. A big heart and a little heart. A big sister and a little brother.
A teardrop falls from his face and soaks into the fabric beside his hand. She’s gone, but she stills loves them. It only makes it worse, that much harder to understand. You don’t leave the people you love, so why did Io?
“What’s that you have there, James?”
Before he has a chance to stuff the fabric into his pocket, Mack is standing somewhere just behind him. He rushes to conceal it anyway, and Mack’s silent suspicion pulls the air tense.
“Something Io gave you? To say goodbye?” he questions, stepping closer. James refuses to turn around.
“I think you and Ruth need to come with me.”
The front door opens again, paired with the pounding of heavy, resounding footsteps, and in a few seconds two pairs of hands take hold of James’ arms and shoulders from behind.
“Take them to the foundation,” Mack commands in an unfittingly soft voice. “I’ll be down soon, once we’ve decided how to go about this. And remember: they are traitors. Don’t be afraid to treat them like it.”
Be Thou My Vision (The Population Series) Page 20
