In The Afterlight

“I told her to leave,” I said hoarsely. “It’s my fault.”

“It’s not your fault,” he said softly. He pushed the hair sticking to my forehead out of the way. “She made the choice to leave. She was doing what she thought was right, just like you and me.”

“I can’t lose her, too,” I told him.

“I know,” he said. “She’ll make it, though. You’re right, she won’t give us up. Of course she won’t. Conner is smart, she’ll figure out a way to survive and get back to her kids. That’s how she is.”

She and Jude and who else? Who else would I have to lose before this was over?

“Kansas HQ is probably already on this,” he said quietly. “We don’t have the means to go get her, but they do. It’s a lot of agents to lose, and good ones at that. I’ll see if I can find out if they have something planned.”

He turned us slightly to the right, reorienting my line of sight toward the door, where there were at least ten kids watching his progress, varying degrees of worry on their faces. I tried to take a step, but now that my muscles were still, it was like they had seized up.

“You gotta stand up and walk, Gem,” he said quietly, turning his back on them. “You have to walk out of here. Not just for them, but for yourself. Come on. You have to walk out of here on your own two feet.”

So I did. Each step made my feet scream in pain where they rubbed up against the edge of the tennis shoes. I looked down to where bright red stains were spreading across the white cotton socks.

I kept my hand on Cole’s shoulder, trying to hide how heavily I was leaning on him as we made a left down the hall instead of heading right to go downstairs, where the bunk rooms were. I didn’t have the energy to protest as he opened the door to Cate’s old room and turned the lights on.

I managed to stay vertical until the small bed was in arm’s reach; by then, my knees had had enough. Leaning forward, I tried to untie the shoelaces but my hands were shaking so badly Cole had to tease the knots out for me. He clucked his tongue at the sight of the socks as I peeled them off, but said nothing.

“I ruined it, didn’t I?” I asked. “The other kids won’t trust me.”

Cole shook his head. “All they saw was someone upset over losing someone they love. No harm, no foul, as the saying goes. Will you cut yourself some slack before you literally run yourself into the ground? Take care of yourself so you can help me take care of them, all right? That’s the deal, and it starts tonight, right now—with you staying here and sleeping for at least seven hours.”

“But Clancy—”

“I can deliver the Little Prince’s meal for one night,” he said. “Do you honestly think you could handle him right now if he tried to take you on?”

“Take someone with you,” I said. “Have them watch from behind the door to make sure he doesn’t try anything.”

“I’ll ask Vida.”

“Chubs would be better.”

“You got it.”

I spread my legs out on the bed in front of me as he stood up, too tired to argue, too tired to do much beside watch him go. Just as he turned out the lights, I said, “Tomorrow. I’m going to find Lillian Gray tomorrow. I’m going to take care of it.” Of everyone. And when this was over, I’d be the one to go find Cate. I’d save her the same way she saved me.

“Atta girl. I have no doubt.” He stopped in the doorway, turning back. “There’s someone waiting for you. Do you want me to let her in?”

I nodded.

It was Zu. Cole shut the door behind him, and I could just make out the edges of her dark shape, outlined by the faint glow bleeding into the room from under the door. She pulled the thin top sheet up over me, finishing with a kiss to my forehead.

And that—not the video, not imagining what they would do to Cate as a prisoner—that tender kiss was what brought the tears to the surface.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean to make you worry. She took care of me...and I never treated her as well as I should have, and now she’s gone, and doesn’t know that I’m sorry. They could kill her....”

I felt her hand around mine, squeezing in reassurance. I know, I know. She used her other hand to smooth the hair away from my face.

“You lost someone,” I said, my voice sounding rough to my own ears. “The guy who helped you get to California. Will you tell me about him? Not what happened to him, not if you don’t want to talk about it, but what he was like as a person. Would that be okay?”

My eyes had adjusted to the darkness well enough to see her nod, even if I couldn’t read her expression.

“What was his name?”

Zu picked up the same small notebook she’d been toting around for weeks. I closed my eyes, listening to the faint scratch of her pencil against the paper, only opening them when she tapped my shoulder with it. She reached over and switched on the light on the dresser so I could read it: GABE.

In the single second before she turned the light off, I saw tears caught in her lashes. The expression on her face knifed clean through my heart. I would have done anything, anything, to take the weight of that pain off her shoulders before it crushed her into dust. But I knew better; there was no real relief from it. You just had to be willing to let the people around you serve as supports, and take their share of it when it seemed too much, too heavy, to hold on your own.