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Her voice raised in pitch. “Mole! I will shoot her!”
Isaiah spoke calmly from behind the trunk. “Who’s gonna drive the car, Cassa? You? Maybe I should try it.”
Cassa realized the futility of her stance. She couldn’t possibly shoot me yet. We were six hours from Saint John and the OPT, and I was the only one who could drive the car.
But she could kill Isaiah.
She shot out of the car. I fumbled with my seatbelt for an instant before following her. My view of Isaiah was blocked by the open trunk.
Kip realized what Isaiah was up to before I did. But he was all the way in the front of the car, trying to pry open the hood. And Isaiah was nearly to the trunk.
I figured it out when I saw the look on Kip’s face. He bolted towards Isaiah, who had just ducked behind the open trunk. I threw open my door, slamming it into Kip’s hips. It barely slowed him down, but it was all the time Isaiah needed. He emerged from behind the trunk holding the rifle.
Cassa leveled the gun at Isaiah’s heart. I threw myself at her, making contact as the shot went off.
“Hoo, now,” said Isaiah. I breathed out. It had missed him.
I scrambled to my feet, but Cassa was faster. Her gun squared with my face. I froze, halfway to standing, and lifted my hands. But I knew it wouldn’t matter. She wore her hatred as plainly as the features of her face. In that moment, she wanted me dead more than she wanted the car to run. More than anything.
A second shot rang out, deeper and more hollow than the first, rattling back and forth between the trees on either side of the interstate.
Cassa hit the ground, face up, and didn’t move. Red splotches blossomed over her shirt. Isaiah stepped out from behind the trunk. He had a steady grip on Meghan’s rifle.
Kip was quick, but I had always been quicker. By the time he started moving, I had pried the gun from Cassa’s fingers and pointed it at Kip.
I hazarded a shaky glance back at Isaiah. From the look of it, he was well aware that his shot had hit its mark.
My attention turned back to Kip, whose hands were raised and whose face was marked with defeat. He stepped back, knowing already that we weren’t going to shoot him unless he tried to get back in the car. Neither of us spoke to the other. I guess we had already said everything there was to say.
We left him there, on the side of the interstate, with Cassa’s body. Even after everything that had come between us, I knew I’d never recover the piece of my soul that stayed with them.
It was a long time before Isaiah spoke. “Thank you,” he said. “For stopping her. And for bringing me.”
“Thank you, too. You know.” I gestured at the shrinking forms of Kip and Cassa in the rear view mirror, as though Isaiah could see me, or them.
“It’s nothing.”
His words hung in the air. We were quiet for a few more miles, and then Isaiah spoke. “Charlotte.”
“Yes?”
“Maybe I do want out after all.”
Isaiah leaned back in his seat. He looked content, comfortable. Too comfortable, if I’d understood him correctly.
Which I pretended not to. “Out of what?”
“This. All this.”
“Meaning…”
He tilted his head up and touched the roof of the car with one long finger.
I sighed. “Meaning we’re going to Boston.”
He smiled. “If you’ll take me.”
I stared at the road, saying nothing, calculating the miles and hours in my head. After a long moment, I turned the car around.
Six (#ulink_bfd3ec99-2da1-5da2-acba-5c53ccc1c3b9)
The car door slammed shut, and I blinked at the harsh white of the sidewalk in front of Isaiah’s home.
He was already at the front door. He’d dealt with Cassa almost single-handedly, and he’d had no problem directing me to his house, so I couldn’t figure why it struck me as bizarre to watch him find his way to the front door without me.
It wasn’t his blindness. In juvy, he’d moved with an easy confidence. It was magnetic. Other people sought him out, and when they walked together, they matched their pace to his.
But he was different here, in this moment. He looked out of place. His confidence had dissipated, and only determination filled its place. He was slower, relying heavily on his cane. I watched it sweep over the path to the door, making more passes than usual. I wasn’t fooled for a moment. He could have found his way without it. Then he reached forward to knock on the door, and I felt his shame, his brokenness, as he’d put it, and understood.
It sucks to knock on the door of your own home.
I continued to stare as a small curtain shifted to reveal a face. The curtain froze, then swished back into place. Long moments passed before the door finally cracked.
A young man stepped onto the porch and regarded Isaiah with frank distaste. I regretted leaving our weapons in the car, but Isaiah had insisted.
The man shook his head. “So they let you out.”
Isaiah cleared his throat. “Something like that.” He seemed younger, suddenly. He’d always been, to me, one of the oldest souls in juvy. Full of wisdom and easy laughter. But all that was gone now. He was exposed, vulnerable. Childlike.
“And you came here.”
“Abel. I just want to see Mom.”
“There’s nothing for you here, Ise. Leave us be.”
This must be Isaiah’s brother. The man who’d blinded him. They stood there like statues, but I wanted to scream. “He can’t leave, not now. It’s the last—”
Abel looked at me. My jaw snapped shut, and I stepped back inadvertently. But his words to me were softer than I expected. “It’s too late for him. You can stay, if you need a place to be. But Isaiah is not welcome here.”
Isaiah let out a long breath. For the first time since I’d known him, I saw his youth. Really saw it. His cheeks and lips were full. His hands were smooth against his cane. The lines on his forehead would have disappeared if he’d relaxed his face.
When he spoke, his voice was small. “Just let me see Mom. Just tell her I’m here.”
Abel’s face hardened, and I lay a hand on Isaiah’s arm. I knew that look, and I could guess what was coming next. The door opened a hair further, and the gun sliced into view.
Abel cocked it, so that Isaiah knew it was there, and spoke through tight lips. “Get out. Last chance, Ise.” He’d stopped just short of aiming the barrel at his brother, but Isaiah couldn’t have known that.
Isaiah’s hands lifted in surrender, then jerked back to his side. “No.”
I pulled against him, and he was obliged to step backward. “We’re leaving. We’re leaving, Isaiah.”
Abel nodded at me, and I put my full weight into dragging Isaiah off the porch. “Come on. There’s a step down here.”
Isaiah stumbled, and for a moment, he allowed me to lead him. But halfway off the stoop, he stopped. I tugged harder, not caring that he could stumble. Everyone had a gun these days, but Abel was ready to use his. I could almost have understood him, at the time. He wanted to protect his family for as long as he could.
It was a few seconds before I realized that Isaiah wasn’t moving any more, no matter how hard I tried. He might as well have been an oak tree, for all the good it did me to pull on him like that. Another moment passed, and I gave up struggling.
I looked at Abel, wide-eyed. There would be no consequences for shooting us. We’d just done the same to Cassa, after all.
I kept a hand on Isaiah’s arm, so he’d know I hadn’t left him, but it fell to my side when he uttered his next words.
“I found the Remnant.”
Abel snorted. “You’re too old for this. I’m too old for this.”
“He did,” I blurted out before thinking. “He found them.”
Some small muscle twitched in Isaiah’s neck, but he stayed steady. Abel looked at me, unconvinced, and I summoned every ounce of steel I had. I could not afford to flinch. “You knew he would.”
“That’s just some story people tell.”
“They’re real, Abe. It’s gonna be a whole new setup up there. Let me see Mom, and I’ll take you with me.”
“What about Mom? You’ll take her, too?”
Isaiah hesitated. “It doesn’t work like that. Just you and me.”
That was smart. If he’d promised to take everyone, Abel would never have believed the lie. Isaiah was back to form.
Abel glanced at me. “And the girl?”
I gave him a convincing smile. “Obviously. Why do you think I’m with him?”
His doubts were smattered across his face, but the Remnant was more than anyone could resist. The gun disappeared behind his back. His face remained tense. “I’m warning you, Ise. I’m done with your games. You play me, you’ll regret it. It’s not too late to make you regret it.”
Isaiah’s shoulders relaxed. I allowed myself a breath.
That was when the impossibility of my situation hit me. Something slippery swirled in my stomach, and I felt sick. I couldn’t stay with Isaiah and his family, or I’d miss the OPT. But I couldn’t leave, either, because Abel would know we were lying, and Isaiah would pay for it.
I told myself that I didn’t have a choice, that it was his decision to come here. But deep down, I didn’t know if I had what it took to walk away.
For now, at least, I still had time before I had to act, time to find the smart move. I could play this out. I willed the slippery thing to hold still for a little longer.
I squared my shoulders, and noticed Isaiah doing the same. “You can keep the gun out, Abe,” he said. “I’ve gotta get something from the car.”
“Like hell you do.”
“Like I said. Keep the gun out if you like. That way, we understand each other.”
“Maybe we don’t.”
But Isaiah was already halfway to the car. I shrugged at Abel, pretending not to understand the warning in his voice, and casually placed myself between Isaiah and the gun.
Isaiah popped the trunk a moment later. As I expected, he came out with Meghan’s rifle. What I didn’t expect was where he aimed it.
At me.
“Step aside, Abe. I’m a fair shot, most of the time, but I’m not as sure as I used to be.”
I floundered, trying to figure out the play here, and felt the slippery thing in my belly harden into stone. Surely Isaiah would never tell Abel about my starpass. Surely.
“No.” The word escaped my lips before I thought it. “Isaiah. Don’t do this.”
“I can take one person with me, little bird. And it’s not you.”
I shook my head, confused. I glanced back at Abel in time to see him pull his gun again.
“I got her,” he said.
“No need,” said Isaiah. “Get in the car, Char. Drive away. I’m only gonna say it once.”
It was the way he said my name that finally tipped me off to his plan. He had never called me Char. It was an act.
Abel spoke. “We don’t have to kill you unless you get stubborn. So you better start moving.”
I stole one final glance at Isaiah before I started running.
He almost seemed to return my gaze. “Thanks for the ride, sweetheart.”
Another phony name. It was the perfect move. He was saving both of us, in a way I never could. So it made no sense to me, in that moment, that my heart was breaking.
I shut the door and powered on the car like a robot.
It wasn’t until I turned the corner, never to see him again, that I realized we never said goodbye.
Seven (#ulink_b9dc4847-d407-5a3b-9c35-d941696e4549)
I made it to Calais, Maine, in record time, not that I knew much about what constituted regular time. Maine wasn’t the type of place where girls like me tended to take road trips. Every so often, I’d think about how much time I had left, before the gate closed, and the blood would pull away from the tips of my fingers, leaving them slightly blue.
Whenever I passed a town, or a deserted shopping mall, I tried to fit it in my head that in a few hours, they wouldn’t exist anymore. They’d be gone. Space debris.
I couldn’t picture it, no matter how hard I tried. There were no cars on the road, and most of the cops were up in space already, so I pretty much floored it the whole way. As soon as I got to Calais, however, traffic materialized out of nowhere, and I screeched to a stop. I was still seventy-five miles from the launch site in Saint John.
It took me a good ten minutes to realize that traffic was going nowhere. Everyone on this side of the continent wanted to be in Saint John right now, including me. A lot of people, like Meghan, had chosen to spend their remaining hours in the comfort of their home. People who had no shot at getting on board, due to age or disability. But a lot of people would try to get on the OPT at the last minute, whether or not they had a ticket. People like me. And the OPT wouldn’t let them, and their cars would stay in the road, and I would never get there.
I needed a plan B. I jerked the wheel to the right and steered the car through the shoulder and toward the nearest exit ramp, which was also blocked. “Car!” I shouted, activating the system.
“Good afternoon.” The reply was cold, even for a robot.
