Shears in hand, I slice the branches back, letting them fall in a circle around the base. Leaves tickle my feet, and I sigh. The fresh cuts smell pure and new. I inhale deeply and let this fleetingly calm moment refresh my tired soul, my shoulders tightening when I think of Pelo’s reaction in the morning. He’ll blame the neighbors. I’ll persuade him not to start a fight. “We should let it grown wild and mighty,” he would say. “Let it tower over our home… let it get out of control!” But it would only get us in more trouble. At the very least, I need our front yard to blend in, even if our family can’t.
Warm air gusts around my legs, and I shudder. This I can do. It’s a small thing, but it’s something, and it keeps us one step back from the authorities.
Tonight though, trepidation crawls up my spine and clasps my throat. Because I feel akin to the Pau Brazil tree. I’m struggling to hold it all up on my own, and I’m frightened of what I might lose if someone else starts trimming the branches.
I collect the cuttings and scatter them over the garden bed.
Quietly, I slip back inside, clean the shears, and place them back in the drawer.
When I draw back into bed, next to the man I love, I let it go. Shrug off my deceit, close my eyes, and sleep easily.
Because it doesn’t matter. He’ll never suspect me. And I don’t want to think about why.
Chapter Eight
Every day, she pulls further away from me and draws closer to him. In every way, she is her father’s daughter. Strong. Willful. Dangerous.
I watch them from the kitchen with careful eyes and a jealous heart. They have their own way of talking to each other, their own special jokes and looks. They are on the other side of a glass wall. I can see them but I can’t hear nor understand, and I certainly can’t participate.
I’ve dreaded this day ever since Rosa was chosen. It was the teacher’s way of taking pity on her, I know. He thought he was doing her a kindness. Rosa never got picked for anything. At eight-years-old, she had no friends. No one wanted to go near her because of her eyes and her father’s reputation. She didn’t seem to care though. She had Pelo. Together, they were unstoppable, a tornado made of barbed wire and birds feathers. Unlike anything in this gray town.
Pelo bends down to tighten the gray satin ribbon that holds her tangled hair from her face, and I smile. He has kept his promise. I tighten my grip on the glass I’m washing as I remember that horrible night, his unrecognizable face. Since then, our lives have eased into a much more peaceful existence. He has a job as a teacher; he comes home to me in one piece every night, at the same time. We are happier.
Rosa is his unwitting protégé though. Whatever is in him that keeps his hand stirring that pot of trouble has genetically rubbed off on her. Keeping her out of it is a daily struggle. Like him, she can’t help herself. But today could be a good day if we could just be normal. A normal family.
I snort into the dishes, the soap bubbles fizzing and leaving grimy marks around the edge of the sink.
“He’s just a man, like the rest of us,” Pelo says to Rosa, her ears soaking up every anti-government thing he utters.
Superior Grant, just a man! I wish I could shut the curtains and lock the door at his words. I watch Rosa’s little brain ticking and taking that idea in. She’s about to ask a Superior her question in front of the whole town, and Pelo is rousing up ideas that can only lead to one place—punishment.
“Pelo, don’t say things like that to her. I don’t want you filling her head with your ridiculous ideas,” I snap. Rosa’s eyes don’t leave her father’s and it all leaves me out in the cold, stamping my foot and begging for attention. He has her under a spell, and there is nothing I can do.
He straightens her coat, his eyes sliding to me for a moment, and whispers low like a secret. “Ideas are never ridiculous. Ideas are just that, ideas. Putting them into practice… now that’s when things get ridiculous.” He smirks, knowing full well he’s pushing me. Rosa swings her arms back and forth, not entirely sure what he means but caught up in it anyway. He pats her head and takes her hands, ready to leave. “C’mon, let’s get this farcical procession over with.”
I stomp my foot on the tiles, and Rosa jumps. Pelo swings around, and I get caught too. Trapped in his gaze. I waver a little but then I see my daughter staring at me, waiting. I have to be the bat to all his damaging ideas. “Pelo!”
He sighs like he’s being strangled, as if I strangled him. His expression is one of annoyance and crushed spirit. “All right, all right. I’ll behave,” he says, holding his hands up like I’ve put a gun to his chest. He surrenders.
We walk out of the door. Me in my long skirt and blouse, the colors as drab as the walls we follow, Rosa in her uniform, and Pelo wearing a grey shirt with a bowtie. I want to ask him to take it off, but I get the sense he needs this small act of defiance, so I leave it.
I’m exhausted already, and we’ve only just left the house. But that’s what it’s like being with him and raising his child. Always.
The sun gasps long and loud, sucking the warmth from the air and inviting the wind to chill the people collecting in the streets. We’re all heading for the same place. The center circle. We take our time because no one likes to go there. This may be a slightly ‘happier’ occasion, but the circle always drudges up memories of past torture, past death. It’s a threat in stone.
Pelo swings Rosa’s arm and makes her laugh. People glare at them both. I grasp at her other hand and rip her away from him. He doesn’t resist me, just hangs his head and looks at his feet as we trudge towards the next gate.
Rosa drags her fingers over the concrete, lagging as I drag her forward.
When we arrive at the circle, it’s already packed full of nervous citizens. I have to negotiate with a policeman to take Rosa to the front of the crowd so she can sit with her class. I watch her tiny form swallowed by the people and draw in an unsteady breath. Then I look to the sky and plead, Please let this go smoothly.
Pelo’s hand claps over my shoulder, and he jiggles me once. “I’m going to go get a better view. Do you want to come?”
I shake my head. “I’ll stay here so she knows where to find us when it’s over.” I roll my eyes. He never thinks of these things. He would just disappear into the crowd and leave her searching for us. He nods and disappears before I can ask him to stay put.
I hug myself against the cold and my own dread. Voices carry through the crowd. Curious eyes wait for the Superior to land.
The murmur of the crowd is quickly silenced when a chopper flies overhead and lands carefully and perfectly without a bump, in the circle. Policeman pace threateningly back and forth around the boundary, twirling batons in their strong hands as people can’t help but crane their necks to see Superior Grant himself. I have no desire to see him, my thoughts are too swaddled in worry, so I let others push past me until I’m almost at the back of a sea of people.
A woman elbows me and I stumble, my back thudding into someone behind. I turn, my body squashed up against a man’s. A rich laugh sails over my head, and I glance up into Paulo’s kind eyes. “You all right, Esther dear?” he says, his hands running down the lengths of my arms. I shiver and color clouds my cheeks. As I reach up to touch the flaming hotness of them, he chuckles.
“Paulo!” I exclaim. “Sorry, I didn’t see you. I mean, I didn’t know you were here.”
He smiles. “No need to be sorry.” His head flicks from side to side. “Where’s your husband?” he asks.
I’m all jerky, awkward, and much too close to him. I gesture over the heads of the people. “Pelo went to find a better view. Our daughter, Rosa, is asking Superior Grant a question.”
He arches an eyebrow and his jaw seems to tense at the mention of both of their names. “And you?”
Flustered, I whisper, “I needed to stay put so she could find me after it’s over.”
“Yes, well, that’s sensible.” His fingers are tapping a rhythm on my arms. A steady rhythm.
&nb
sp; I nod in agreement. “Yes. Yes, it is.”
The crowd hushes, and I turn around. My back still pressed into Paulo. He grazes the tip of my elbow, and I redden to deep crimson. But there’s nowhere to go.
Superior Grant strides from his helicopter. From here, he looks regal, proud. I can’t see his face clearly but I imagine it to be strong, commanding. He moves closer to the rim of people and disappears from view when he bends down to talk to someone.
Everything seems normal until it’s not. Very suddenly, I see my daughter, held up in the air by a policeman. I want to scream, I want to push through the crowd to get to her, but Paulo’s hands are around my waist, his fingers digging in like hooks. He whispers in my ear, “You’ll only make it worse. They won’t hurt her.”
I have my doubts, but I obey. I stand still and watch as she’s shaken like a bag of apples, bile rising in my throat, dry panic clutching at my bones.
The crowd steps back from the action, the spectacle she’s made, and now all I can see is the back of some woman’s head. Her long, blonde ponytail whipping in front of eyes.
“What the devil is he doing?” Paulo exclaims, looking over the crowd from his taller position.
“What? What, Paulo? Can you see what they’ve done with Rosa?” I ask desperately. I scratch up his chest like a scurrying animal. He glances down at me with an irritated expression.
“Pelo has her. It’s fine. She’s fine,” he says, finally releasing me. “They’re over there,” he mutters, pointing to the low wall that borders Ring One.
“Thank you,” I say to his incensed face. He releases me and I stream through the crowd, grabbing onto shoulders and shoving people aside to get to her. I shouldn’t have let Paulo hold me. I should have helped my daughter. I curse my own weakness and give thanks for Pelo’s courage.
I can see their faces. She looks shaken but unharmed.
I stop dead when Superior Grant’s voice carries out over the crowd through a megaphone. It’s an odd sound. Twangy, rubbery, and impatient. He says something about taking away peoples’ children, a one-child policy, and the crowd becomes agitated. He says he’s going to take them tomorrow, and my heart starts pounding. I use the stunned shock surrounding everyone to move more quickly towards Rosa and Pelo. Because I can feel it—it rocks under my feet and surges up my legs. I’m only a few meters away, but I’m miles too late.
Pelo reacts.
Chapter Nine
I’ve always watched the willful from afar. I’ve never wanted to be part of it. To be pulled into the sky to change the weather. But today, I will swap places with them. I’ll call the lightning down. I’ll do what I must to protect my child.
I know she’s listening, so I do my best to be quiet, but I’m furious. I’m a flapping, angry bird in a glass box, feathers flying. My hand aches to slap him for the first time in years. I don’t understand why he would do this—why he would put her in danger like this. There’s that and the even more disturbing fact that she’s becoming so much like him. I realize that this has to stop. Now. That I have to stop it before he gets her killed.
And it kills me.
I can actually feel my heart slowing and shriveling inside me as I say to Pelo, “You have to leave.” Because I know now that my love for him is not enough. That if he loved me as much as he said he did, this would have never happened. I’m not strong enough to hold him down, and I shouldn’t have to.
He stumbles back like I’ve thrown a rock at his chest, his face a whitish green.
“What? Why?”
I laugh bitterly. “Are you serious? You saw what she did, what she said to a Superior. A Superior! Your influence on her is too strong. And what you said… my God, Pelo, did you even think about what might happen if you got caught?”
He pumps his wiry arms, approaching me carefully. “C’mon. It wasn’t that bad. She got away with it, didn’t she?” He just doesn’t get it, and he never will. That’s the problem.
I step towards him threateningly. “This time, Pelo. She got away with it this time. She won’t be so lucky next time.” My hands, my whole skeleton, are shaking because I’m so sure of what I need to do and I don’t want to do it.
“Yes, but she’s a child. She’ll learn to control herself.” He’s pleading now. He can sense the change in the air, the weather clouding around me and leaving him hanging.
It’s over.
I try to speak calmly. “Like you? You can’t control yourself at all and if I don’t separate the two of you, she’ll be taken away early. That, or she’ll end up dead.”
He is getting more upset. “Yes, exactly like me. I’m still here, aren’t I? You’re being absurd. She needs her father.”
I shake my head; my lips feel bruised and so very tired of the same excuses. They harden with resolve and say, “You’re wrong.” I take both his hands in mine. Tears spill down both our cheeks as the words I finally have the will to say come pouring out. “She needs her mother to protect her.”
A cracked sob sounds from his chest, but I see the fight in his eyes. I see that he won’t just go. He straightens and pulls back from me, two tightened fists slamming his sides.
I glance up at him and let his face burn into my memory. I let myself feel the regret, the resentment of having to do something I don’t want to do, wash over me and fall to the floor. “I want you out of the house tonight and if you don’t leave willingly, I’ll report you to the police.” The words burn like acid as I say them. “I know every stupid, illegal thing you’ve done, Pelo, and I will tell them.”
His expression falters and then falls as he stares at me as if he doesn’t know who I am. I gulp for fear that he’ll see right through me, that he’ll know I’m bluffing.
“You wouldn’t do that,” he says, shaking his head in disbelief.
I turn my back to him so he can’t see the doubts dancing in my eyes. “You’ve given me no choice.”
Chapter Ten
Strange as it seems, I’m proud of myself. I did a strong thing, the right thing. And even though Rosa hates me for it, I know she’s safer. I gave up love for her. I hope one day she will understand my sacrifice.
But I miss love. I miss the comfort, the safety of having him with me.
I fear I can’t do this on my own.
We’re down to our last tin of food, and we still have a few days before I get paid. I browse the aisles of the grocery store, looking for something I can buy for a few coins. Something out of date. Bright labels grin at me. There’s nothing.
Rosa grips the trolley, her big eyes searching for someone. She won’t find him. He’s gone. Disappeared from our lives just like I asked him to. I touch my chest gingerly. The hole in my heart is scar tissue now. It doesn’t ache as much, but it’s never going to close.
I surreptitiously sweep a can from the shelf. It hits the ground, and I wait for a noise to cover me stomping on it to make a dent. I can ask for a discount if it’s dented.
A man clearing his throat startles me and I straighten, kicking the can under the shelf. I sigh and my shoulders slump. I won’t be able to reach it now.
When I straighten, Paulo is staring down at the two of us with sympathetic eyes. It’s a nice feeling. It wraps me in a warmth I’ve been craving. It’s an outstretched arm offering friendship, a place to shelter, and I want to take it.
He pats Rosa on the head sweetly and draws me in with his dark brown eyes and welcoming voice. “Esther, let me help you.”
Afterword
I want to address Esther’s situation. It’s a pretty common one and a hard one to contend with. The idea that sometimes love can be damaging is a harsh realization to come to. But it happens. And we don’t always deal with it in the best way.
I want to tell you there’s no right way. There’s just summoning strength.
People say find the strength, but I want to say, you can’t find something that’s not lost. Strength exists in all of us. We just have to choose how and when we use it.
So to the peo
ple who feel trapped and absorbed by a powerful person and want to make a change: Use your strength, it’s right there inside you, always has been.
Also by Lauren Nicolle Taylor
The Woodlands Series:
The Woodlands, Book 1
The Wall, Book 2
The Wounded, Book 3
The Wanted, Book 4
The Willful: Novella, Book 5
Paper Stars Novels:
Nora & Kettle, Book 1
Hiro & Kite, Book 2
Breaker & the Sun, Book 3
About the Author
Lauren Nicolle Taylor is the bestselling author of THE WOODLANDS SERIES and the award-winning YA novel NORA & KETTLE (Gold medal Winner for Multicultural fiction, Independent Publishers Book Awards 2017). NORA & KETTLE received a starred review from Booklist magazine. She has a Health Science degree and an honors degree in Obstetrics and Gynecology. She is a proud Hapa, living in the lush hamlet of the Adelaide hills with her husband and three children.
Thank you for reading The Willful; I hope you enjoyed this book!
Want to be the first to know when I release new books? Here are some ways to stay updated:
Sign up for my email list so you can find out about new releases.
Like my Facebook page.
Visit my website: www.LaurenNicolleTaylor.com
And if you have a moment, please consider leaving me a review of The Willful. Reviews are like potato chips; you can't ever have enough of them. Thanks for reading my book!" ~Lauren Nicolle Taylor
If you've enjoyed The Woodlands Series we recommend you also check out Nora & Kettle by Lauren Nicolle Taylor. Enjoy this exclusive excerpt here.
The Willful Page 4
