At the End of Everything, page 21
I hate you.
Fuck.
I’ll miss you.
Twenty-seven
Logan
Today is the first day Isabella leaves the infirmary. She sits on a chair, and Casey and Josie carry her into the garden. She’s growing stronger. She can speak a few words. She can’t manage more than a few steps on her own. But she’s sitting up, wrapped in blankets, and everyone shows up to watch her breathe in fresh air again for the first time since she fell ill. We keep our distance. I lean out of a window. Some of us peek out of doors. Khalil and Riley stick to the garden shed to give Isabella her distance. Everyone wants to be present.
The sight of it is magical. One girl, on a chair, in a garden. We stare at her like someone uncovered a treasure chest or a magic sword. Isabella is paler than she’s ever been, and she’s fragile. She’s lost her hearing, and no one is quite sure if it’s permanent. She wasted away during her illness, and Casey told us it would take a long time for her to recover.
Leah is wasting away too. I want to see her sitting here in the chilly winter air. I want to see her up close. See her breath form clouds. Casey says she wakes up regularly now, though she’s fragile, and she’s struggling with her memory and her speech. She doesn’t even have to speak at all. We’ve always found ways to communicate without words before. I just want her here. Or be with her.
But Isabella’s presence means there’s hope for her and Xavier.
No one has died since Saoirse. It’s been four weeks since Josie and Saoirse first came here, and no one else has fallen ill.
Despite the cold, fresh, green plants are popping up amid the straw-covered vegetable beds. The feathery, bright leaves of tiny carrots. Fluffy clouds of kale. It’s not much. It’ll be months before we’ll be able to feed ourselves. It’s barely enough now for a scarce meal, but it lives. My stomach growls at the sight of it.
I turn away from the window and grab my backpack to meet Grace outside the gates. At first, she and Sofia did the hunting and scavenging, but at the turn of the year, Mackenzi suggested we change the work schedule. Unexpectedly, Isaiah was the first person to back her up. With no internet or working phones, he asked for Mackenzi’s job of “fixing and cleaning things,” while he kept building his collection of files and thoughts. Mackenzi joined Sofia hunting. It’s the only attention anyone’s paid to New Year’s. Food is our main priority right now. Keeping the plague out matters only if we don’t succumb to hunger.
Both Riley and I asked to help Grace with her scavenger runs to Sam’s Throne, and so we’re alternating. Today, it’s on me. I need it.
I’m happy for Isabella, but it’s hard to see her sit up and smile. It’s far easier to follow Grace along the now-familiar path through the woods, where the trees look stark and cold. It’s easier to walk the mountain path with a comfortable silence between us and the quiet where I know myself.
When we near Sam’s Throne, and the light around us turns a burnt orange, a familiar nervousness settles in my stomach. That bottomless pit of not knowing what we’ll find on the other side. Or perhaps the gnawing is hunger too. The traps didn’t produce anything yesterday or the day before, and we’ve all but run out of our own supplies. Every successful trip into town gives us enough food for a day or two at most.
I nudge Grace carefully. “What do we need?”
Nia helped her to learn my signs. Enough to get by.
She frowns. “Food. Information. An updated map. Food.”
I pat the pocket with my copy of the map and the pencils I brought. Since Grace asked me to draw a map, we’ve been updating it with notes about abandoned houses, plague crosses, and more. It helps us figure out which houses to avoid and which houses to enter. None of us want to accidentally break into a house where someone inside is ill. Especially now that we may have managed to keep the plague out of Hope.
“I don’t know why some of us fell ill and others didn’t. Maybe there’s a good reason for it, but I don’t want to gamble that it was anything other than luck,” Grace says.
I can’t—I don’t want to imagine any of us carrying the plague back to Hope.
“I also don’t know how we’ll get information,” Grace admits, “but I’d like to know what’s going on in the rest of the world.”
“How?”
“One of the oldest houses, maybe? The ones we know have been emptied? We can try to see if any of their computers will work. They usually have better food stocks anyway.”
In many of the newer houses, hunger has taken hold too. Or other thieves have.
I pull a face, and she raises her hands. “I know it’s not ideal, but I don’t know what the best alternative is. We can’t very well walk up to people to ask them what’s going on.”
I raise my hands to sign then think better of it and pull the map out of my pocket. I point at the store and the area around it. It has a post office somewhere in the vicinity, probably a town hall too. Central gathering points. We can’t be the only ones angling for information.
Even the school or the church, from a safe distance. If we—
Grace shakes her head. “No, too dangerous. I don’t know if I can talk us out of another confrontation with Store Guy. Or anyone else for that matter.”
I nod. “I understand.”
I don’t agree, but I understand. And Grace won’t be able to see the nuances in my signs. The hesitation that must show on my face.
“We’ll start with food and go from there. Once we have a good house, I’ll do the runs, and you map the street, okay?”
I nod again. With the map still in my hands, we cross into town, and I immediately begin to mark the changes. The houses with new plague crosses, the houses with shattered windows, the houses where light is still burning. Grace and I stick close to each other, trying to not attract attention as two girls wandering a mostly deserted ghost town. She continuously scans the streets too.
When a dog barks, she pulls me behind a tree before either of can pinpoint where the sound is coming from. Two streets down, a door opens and closes, we both freeze. Later on, I grab her sleeve and pause her when I’m certain I hear the squeaks of bike wheels. My heart continues to hammer in my throat even when no bike ever shows up. The shadows around us lengthen.
“Do you think children still ride their bikes here?” I sign at Grace.
She frowns. “I’m sorry, Logan, I don’t know what half those signs mean.”
I shrug. “Never mind.”
One house has a wind chime hanging from its porches, and its eerie melody crawls up my spine.
Eventually, we find one of the houses on our list. It’s dark and empty, and the white slash across the door is faded away. The door swings back and forth on its hinges.
“Fuck,” Grace whispers. “Someone may have cleaned it out.”
I edge closer and glance in through the window.
“How does it look?” Grace whispers.
I catch a flash of color on the living room floor. A pink-and-purple dollhouse, with doll-size furniture spread out in front of it. It even has a tiny cup on a tiny table, like someone was playing with it only hours ago. I turn back and swallow hard.
“Logan?”
I sigh. “It looks empty.”
She steps up next to me regardless, and she breathes out hard when she spots the play set. “Oh.”
Yeah.
“I hope they left for somewhere safe.”
“I hope they’re alive.” I try not to think about it too hard, because it’s the only way I can keep going. Leah and I used to play with a dollhouse Granddad had in his attic. He once let slip that it was our mother’s.
“I hate this,” Grace mutters under her breath. She pushes her hair back and sets her jaw. “I’ll go in to search for food. You go update the map, but don’t stray too far.”
She doesn’t wait for a response, but instead she dashes into the house. And I’m grateful she’s gone. It’s easier to lie with signs, but I’m still a terrible liar.
I don’t want to update the map. I want to keep going, now more than ever. I want to know, I need to know that the rest of the world is better than this.
I understand Grace’s hesitation. We can’t bring the plague back to Hope. But we can’t forget the rest of the world or be forgotten either.
So I pull up the map and my pencil and walk the street like I’m taking notes, but when the house disappears behind the trees, I put them back and keep walking.
We’re nowhere near the school, but our map has grown after nearly a dozen runs. I’ve been studying the quickest route while we walked here. I walk from streetlamp to streetlamp. I know where I’m going.
The main street is as empty as the town itself, with everyone keeping to their houses. Locked down, or following a curfew that we’re unaware of, or simply afraid. The store is boarded up now, and the post office a few doors down is too. It means I have to keep walking.
Until a low whistle echoes against the store fronts.
I freeze and push myself against the closest wall, already scanning the streets for escape routes.
“Hey, psst.”
Twilight has made way for dim nightfall, and I can’t figure out where the sound comes from.
Then someone moves from the shadows.
“What are you doing out?” A girl’s voice, soft. She sounds unthreatening, but I can’t be certain.
She steps into the light, and she’s my age, perhaps a little older. She has long black hair, light skin, worried eyes. She holds her hands wide in a gesture of goodwill. Her clothes are dirty but whole, and she wears a jangling bracelet around her wrist. I drink in her presence. It’s so strange to see someone outside of Hope that my brain latches on to every single detail. The mismatched shoes. The slight scars on her forearms. The hint of sadness in the lines of her face.
She keeps a careful distance. “Are you okay?”
I open my mouth. I try to dislodge my jaw and shape my tongue around the right words in an effort to answer, but like so many times before, the words exist in my brain, but I can’t speak them. I cannot will them into being.
She takes a step back. “Are you sick?”
I shake my head.
“Are you alone? Are you a survivor too?”
Nod.
“Do you need a place to spend the night?”
I hesitate. I don’t. I want to go home when I’ve got what I need, but does it look weird if I say no?
As if she read my mind, she says, “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. Quite a few of us have no one—have no home to go back to, and I don’t want to make you uncomfortable. If you need shelter, the town hall is set up for us lost and lonely.” She points down the road, to the right. “It’s a bit chaotic, so I usually walk around until I’m tired, but they’re good people. They may even have some food rations left for you. They try to divide those as equally as possible.”
I try to not look confused.
“We’re all we have now, right?” The girl can’t suppress the sorrow in her voice, but I hardly notice it.
I hold my hand over my heart. “Thank you.”
Before she can say anything else, I step out of the light and into the shadows. She mutters something. I don’t listen. My heart hammers. I follow the route she pointed out, and my feet march to the beat of her most important words.
Food rations. Food rations. Food rations.
She might just mean they rationed food like we have, but if the town has actual rations… Could we get them too? It would mean the world. The winter. Our lives. Grace will hate me for disappearing on her, but this information would make up for that.
We wouldn’t have to steal from dead people.
I turn the corner, and the town hall appears in front of me. Brightly lit, like a beacon in the night. Yellowed light shines out through the tall windows, and the porch is lit up too. A young Black man sits on the steps. He’s humming a song and doesn’t react to my presence at all. He may not even see me, as bright as his surroundings are.
I cling to the shadows and circle around the building. Pieces of paper hang on every door and every entrance: NO PLAGUE. NO SIGNS OF SICKNESS. All of them have words scribbled on them too.
I dash closer. They’re messages from survivors who hope to find loved ones (“Elin Newberry was here. Find me, Ray.” “If Kirsty Jameson reads this, I’m sorry. I can’t stay here.”). Notes of remembrance (“Miss you, Dad.”) and grief and anger (“The government is lying to us. All of this is a hoax.”).
Underneath is another note, on crisp paper. It has an official-looking letterhead and a lot of fancy words. I glance at the header then snatch it from the door and stuff it in my pocket. It crinkles and tears, and I pause to make sure no one is reacting to the sound.
If they even heard it, that is. When I push myself against the outer wall and inch toward the nearest window, a constant hum of voices drifts out. Discomfort crawls up my spine. So many people and so much louder than what I’ve grown used to.
I find the darkest corner and glance in, and what I see takes my breath away. It’s crowded. As crowded as the school was when I first came here. People are lying side by side in the big, open room. Some are sleeping on stretchers and pallets with blankets pulled over their heads. Others are sitting up and talking or playing cards. In the farthest corner, a young boy and a young girl are bouncing a ball back and forth between them. Along one of the walls, Christmas lights are strung, though it’s well past Christmas. Almost everyone is wearing masks here too.
It’s overwhelming.
A community of survivors, like Hope. But we number just over a dozen, and I guesstimate at least a hundred people here. Together. Safe.
I hate it, and I long for it.
In the center of the room, a lonely boy turns and looks at the window. He sees me. I know he does. My heart skips a beat, and I push back, into the night. But when he gets up to walk to the door, the light catches his face, and I pause.
Andrew?
Andrew who left with Hunter. Andrew, who is one of us. What is he doing here?
I stand frozen, questions swirling all around me, and before I find a place to escape to, he steps out. He’s wearing a torn and patched-up outfit that makes me aware I’m still wearing my uniform.
“Logan?” His voice is as soft and careful as I remember. He’s fighting back a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. His hair has grown out, and he has a scar along his palm. “Are you okay? What are you doing here?”
I point at him.
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “I need a place to stay after—are you still at Hope?”
I nod.
“Is everyone okay? Did anyone fall ill?”
I bite my tongue and try to figure out how to respond to that, but he keeps talking.
“I’m glad we left, you know? Even though Hunter’s plan was a disaster. I’m the only one left. Everyone else died. Guess we didn’t leave the plague behind.”
I wince. He isn’t the only one, I want to tell him. Josie is with us.
That’s not the point, I know.
He shrugs. “At least I’m alive.” He narrows his eyes and evaluates me. There’s a calculation to him that’s never been there before. “What about you? Are you safe? Come in.”
I shake my head. Gesture at him to follow me instead. He could come back with me. He could come home to us.
His smile fades. “To Hope? Why, so I can feel locked up again?” He scoffs. “No, thanks. Never. You’d be far better off here too. We have food, although it isn’t much. The government rations everything. We aren’t forgotten. I have friends who can gather extra meals for you. Find medication if you need it. The people in charge can’t know we’re from Hope, but it’s not like you’ll say anything anyway.” He tilts his head. “We do have to do something about those clothes.”
My stomach whines at the thought of food, my head spins at the thought of medication. But something about the way he turns toward me and scans the area around me reminds me of Hunter. Andrew may not have been anything like him when he left, but he is now.
I take a big step back.
In all the time we spent together in Hope, I never saw him as violent, merely quiet and intimidating. When he smiles and his teeth bare and he follows me, I know better.
“I insist, Logan. The people here have forgotten about you. They’ve forgotten about Hope. I can’t have you wandering around to remind them.”
He reaches out and grabs for my arm. I bend backward to stay out of his reach and almost tumble over. I don’t wait for him to make another move. I won’t stay here. I won’t. I have to go back.
I push myself forward, and I run.
Twenty-eight
Grace
“What do you mean, they forgot about us?”
“Everyone but Andrew died? Are you sure?”
“How do we get food rations too?”
“How could they forget about us?”
The recreation room is a cacophony of questions and comments once Nia has helped tell Logan’s tale. Logan keeps her distance from all of us. She’s regained some color, but she still looks pale, and between signing her story, she’s picking at a peanut butter sandwich and sipping from a steaming mug of tea. She avoids the stares of the people around her. Of me.
I lean against the cabinet, arms folded over each other, and try to get my breathing under control. With every incredulous response, the pain and anger inside me grow. When Logan returned to Hope, I walked away to the privacy of my own room and punched at the wall until my knuckles were sore, equal parts furious that she left me and relieved that she was safe.
But that felt like nothing compared to this. We were left here to die.
