At the End of Everything, page 9
I still believed that. I want to believe it now.
But I tried to pray, when they kicked me out. When my so-called friends turned me away and I spent nights out in the open. When I wandered into churches in search of warmth or food or recognition. I never felt any lighter.
In that half year between my parents shutting the door on me and the police arresting me, the only real peace I ever felt was in a drop-in house in Little Rock, where I met a trans girl with kind eyes and a penchant for chaos. Mica. We only spent two days together before she disappeared to another shelter, but she accepted me. She called me Emerson. She stole clothes for me that clung to my body in all the right places. She danced around my mistrust like it didn’t exist. She helped me cut my hair. After everyone who made me feel broken, she was the first to see me whole.
That was peace. Whatever God’s light was supposed to be, it had only given me pain.
I try to pray now—in the privacy of my own room—but I might as well be talking at a wall. At the broken wardrobe. At my violin case.
If I leave now, could I bring it with me again?
My violin is the single personal possession I was allowed to keep here, against normal regulations. Presumably because the warden thought I wouldn’t be able to harm anyone—or myself—with a graceful instrument.
Jemma’s voice in my mind. The board is aware that you are a status offender, and your assignment here is suboptimal. So we’re willing to do what we can to help you with your needs. She was supposed to help me. Why didn’t she do anything to stop this?
I take the tarnished bronze saint medal attached to one of the straps and turn it over between my fingers. On the saint side, it shows a man with heavy eyebrows holding a holy book. He’s smiling. A flame is etched above his head. I trace the raised edges with my thumb.
Saint Jude, pray for us.
My dad gave me the medal the night before my audition for the St. Agnes school orchestra. Between stage fright and repeatedly messing up the piece I wanted to play and increasing dysphoria, I’d felt out of sorts for days. My parents simply thought I was worried, so the night before, my dad sat with me.
“This was my older brother’s,” he said. “Patrick gave it to me before he left for seminary. It’s time for you to have it. To remind you that you always have someone willing to listen when you worry and who won’t judge you when you do.”
I guess he was talking about Saint Jude, because it certainly wasn’t true for him.
Is this God’s plan for me? Is this my grand purpose in life?
I looked up the devotions to Saint Jude a few days later and found a prayer for hopeless cases. The lost cases. He must have known that. Maybe he thought it inspirational, but for me it was a reminder that something was wrong. That I didn’t—wouldn’t—fit, no matter how hard I tried.
And still I kept it.
I turn the medallion over and over. It’s not shiny enough to reflect the light, but the differences in color and texture are still clear.
I could leave now, but where would I go? I don’t think anywhere out there would be better than here. I don’t ever want to be denied again. I’d rather take care of myself, and this is the safest place to do so.
I stay on my knees for a heartbeat longer. My fingers on the medal. My thoughts far away. Saint Jude, pray for us.
All of us hopeless and desperate cases.
* * *
Hunter’s crew leaves Hope with bombast, like they’re staging a Hollywood jailbreak instead of walking out of the front door. At the very last moment, a ninth person joins the group. A brown boy with sad eyes. I don’t know his name, but he’s the only boy in the west wing who wasn’t part of Hunter’s crew initially. He wears his work clothes and carries a duffel bag, though it looks relatively light and empty compared to the others. Underneath his short-cropped hair, he is tense.
When he walks up to Hunter and the rest of the group, several of us stand and watch. A girl from the other wing rushes up to him and grabs his arm. “Andrew. What are you doing?” She chokes on the sentence and coughs.
“Serenity.” Andrew shakes his head. “I can’t stay here on my own. I don’t know how dangerous it is, and I—I can’t.”
“You wouldn’t be on your own, you fool.” She punches his arm. It’s all too clear her anger comes from worry too. “I’d stay with you.”
“You could come with,” he suggests, but his words hold no force, no conviction. I’m not sure even he knows exactly what he’s doing, and certainly Hunter doesn’t care, because he’s already marched through the door.
Serenity glances back at the rest of us, standing at a distance like a silent and awkward farewell committee. Her hesitation is all he needs. He slips from her grasp and walks out, shoulders slumped, without looking back.
She stands there. On her own, torn between him and here.
Until the doors swing shut.
Another girl breaks the ranks of our silent vigil and runs toward Serenity. She wraps her arms around her, and Serenity clings to her and sobs. Others begin to scatter and go back to their rooms or the recreation yard. Despite the absence of guards, all the conversations are soft and careful.
I understand why they stay. They have something here the outside won’t offer. Community. Certainty. A way to call their families. A roof over our heads. A place we’ve known for weeks or months or years. A sense of belonging. Something to desperately cling to.
Where there’s love and community, there is God. Father Michael was always fond of saying that.
But when the hallway is nearly empty and the girls break apart, Serenity gasps. Like she’s drowning on dry land and there’s no oxygen around her. She reaches for her throat and starts to cough. It sounds like she did when she choked on the words before, but when she brings her hand up to her lips, her fingers come back bloody. “Mei…” she croaks.
And then she topples over.
“Serenity? Serenity!” Mei catches the girl before she collapses and hoists an arm over her shoulders, fighting to keep her upright. Her eyes dart across the hallway and land on the two of us left here. Me and a third girl from their wing. “Faith! Help!”
Faith has covered her hand with her mouth.
“We need to get Serenity to the infirmary,” Mei says, her voice strained. “Help carry her.”
Serenity continues to cough, and her rasping breath makes my bones ache. It makes me feel like I’m not getting enough oxygen either. Is this how it starts?
Next to me, Faith shakes herself. She swallows hard. “I can do that. I can do that. I won’t get sick, will I?”
Mei cringes. “I don’t know.”
I do. Saint Jude, pray for us.
Because this is what the plague sounds like. Inevitability. Serenity wasn’t there last night. She wasn’t with us. Was deciding to stay here a death sentence? If two of us are sick already, it’ll only be a matter of time before we all are.
Faith steps up on Serenity’s other side and hoists another arm over her shoulders. Mei pushes a stand of hair out of her face and leaves a smear of blood on her forehead. Her hands are trembling. Serenity’s coughs leave droplets of blood across her clothes and the floor.
Mei glances my way. “Go find Grace. Tell her what’s going on.”
The words push through the terror, and I nod. “I will.”
When they start half walking, half carrying Serenity in the direction of the infirmary, I clear my throat and add, “I’ll clean up the blood too.” It seems like a sensible thing to do. Like washing our hands. Like staying where there’s food and cover.
I don’t know if it makes a difference. I don’t know what the right choices are. I don’t know if we’ve already made far too many mistakes.
But I can’t go back. This is all I am now, and if I’m staying here amid this whole forsaken mess, I need a purpose. No one can promise us we’ll survive. The best we can hope for is to go out fighting.
Or cleaning, as the case may be.
Can we get sick from touching other people’s clothes? Can we get sick from running our hands over the same door handles? Are we doomed for breathing in the same air?
This is what plague smells like. Chlorine and sweat.
I can bleach the blood stains, but I can’t scrub away the fear.
Twelve
Logan
No one tells me what to do. I wash up in the bathroom, and then I stay outside the infirmary. Inside is too dangerous, but I cannot be without Leah. I do not know how to be. I do not want to be either.
I pace, first. Then I find a place to stand. My hands flap against my legs, and I rock back and forth on my heels. Every time I do, the soles of my shoes squeak on the floor. I stare at the dark-blue door to the infirmary.
Casey showed up at the door once before, when the girls carried Serenity Jones to the infirmary. She was quieter than I’ve ever seen her. If it hadn’t been for the trembling rise and fall of her chest, she might’ve been gone already. Mei carried her to the doorstep and pounded on the door until Casey opened up. She immediately took a step back when he helped Serenity in.
It nagged at me that she assumed Casey would stay in the infirmary. Like he made that choice once he carried Leah in, and now he wouldn’t be able to go back. He didn’t challenge it though. He simply helped Serenity cross the threshold and closed the door behind him.
When he opens the door again, he’s paler. He pulls down the cloth he’s bound in front of his mouth and stands on the threshold for a small eternity, staring at me, and at the hallway, as if to muster the courage to walk out.
I sign at him. “I can help, if you need me.” He frowns but doesn’t respond, so I continue. “You shouldn’t do this alone. I want to be with my sister.”
After a beat, he shakes his head. “You shouldn’t be here. You can’t do anything for her now.”
“Do you know what you’re doing?” I sign.
He doesn’t respond to my question. “Your sister is resting. You need to rest too. You can’t stay here all day long.”
“What does that mean, she’s resting? She looked like she was—” I abruptly stop, ball my hands to fists.
Casey rubs his eyes. “I took some of the antibiotics and gave them to her. Tylenol too. I don’t know if it’ll help, but she isn’t coughing up blood anymore. She’s…sleeping, best I can tell. Her fever hasn’t broken yet.”
“I have nowhere else to go, and I want to know if she’ll be okay,” I sign, but I don’t know if he understands me. He probably doesn’t.
“You need to stay back when I come out. And don’t—don’t go in. We need to quarantine them—us.”
“Are you sick too?” I ask.
Am I? Will I be?
“I’ll try to let you know how she’s doing, I promise. I need you to stay back.” Casey tilts his head like he’s waiting for me to acknowledge his words, even though he never acknowledged any of mine. Still, I nod.
“I’m glad you understand what I’m saying, at least.” He sucks in a deep breath then slips out to the bathroom.
I stay exactly where I am. I keep an eye on the door but don’t move. I won’t go in. My sister wouldn’t want me to—even if I do.
What would happen though? If I got sick, I would have to stay with her too. I’ve already spent so much time with her. Would it be such a bad thing? Wouldn’t it be better if we stuck together?
The minutes slip by, the opportunity opens. I could pretend I didn’t understand him after all. Everyone always assumes I don’t.
My hands clench by my side. I don’t have any other place in the world than beside my sister. But I don’t move. I wouldn’t just put myself at risk, but Casey and the others. Leah would hate me for it.
And I think I would too.
When Casey returns, droplets of water cling to his face and his hair is wet too. “You should go, back to the others or to your room or wherever you’re comfortable. I’ll stay here with your sister and Serenity.”
“Do you need to eat or drink something?” I ask.
I’m not feeling particularly hungry or thirsty, but we’ve been here for the better part of the day, late into the afternoon, and he might be. Meals are part of our routine.
He shakes his head. “I wish I could understand what you were trying to say. I’m sorry.”
Yeah. Me too. I eye the back of my hands because I don’t know what else to say. It’s not like he’ll suddenly understand it now. Leah is the only one who ever does. Even Granddad didn’t—he didn’t care to try. He told us once, “If one of you’s too stupid to talk, you find another way to tell me what you need. I ain’t got no time to guess.” So we did. First out of anger at his cruel words, then because it meant safety between us. Leah and I built our own language. She always understood that there are so many different ways to speak.
Casey speaks up again. “I’ll take care of your sister, Logan,” he says quietly. “I’m here. There’s nowhere else for me to go. But you can’t stay.” He glances past me, and his face softens. Some kind of intense emotion sparks in his eyes. “She can’t stay, Grace. And you shouldn’t be here either.”
I swirl around and find Grace walking up. She halts at a distance and folds her arms. She has a handful of paper crunched up in one hand. Her lips tremble, before she swallows and juts out her jaw. “Neither should you. I told you to bring her to the infirmary, not stay inside.”
“So, what would you like me to do then? Leave the two of them in a bed and abandon them?”
“Of course not, but I thought—”
“We have no medical care, in case you’ve forgotten.”
“I also know that, but—”
Casey folds his arms. “I can’t leave them here. I won’t.”
“I don’t want you to get sick, dammit! It’s the fucking plague, and I don’t want you to get sick.” Grace raises her voice, and I flinch. I push my back harder against the wall, like it might swallow me.
Casey rakes his fingers through his hair, and all the worry and anger seeps out of him. “I don’t want to either. I really would have preferred first contact to this. But I meant what I said. If this is it, the kindest thing we can do is take care of each other.”
Grace’s jaw ticks. She clenches her hands. “You remember what you said to me on my first day here? No one here truly cares about each other.”
“Well, I also said you couldn’t trust me.”
“Oh, fuck you.” Grace shakes her head, but she doesn’t seem angry anymore. Leah told me once, there are a thousand ways to say I hate you and some of them mean I love you instead.
Casey’s expressions go through a complicated journey. He crumples like he might cry, but he swallows hard and narrows his eyes. He breathes out through his mouth, and somehow, in spite of everything, he manages to smile. “I was wrong. When I told you to survive. Surviving isn’t enough.”
Grace swipes at her eyes. “Fine. But surviving is where we start. You’re not allowed to get sick, do you hear me? I don’t know how I got to be the one in charge here, but if I am, then I forbid it. I forbid you from getting sick.” She uses the papers she’s holding like a pointer, to underline her words.
“Yessir.” Casey tips an imaginary hat.
Neither of them says what I think: if only it were as simple as that. But maybe that’s not what they mean. Maybe they know that as well as I do.
Casey nods his head in my direction again. “Please take her away from here, Grace. Let me take care of them, but protect yourselves too. Please.” He directs the last word at me, and I can feel my shoulders drop, because that’s what Leah would want me to do too. Protect myself. Be careful. Even if I want to find a way to protect her instead.
Grace sighs deeply and walks past me. She pauses at a respectable distance from Casey and places the papers on the floor. “Isaiah found more information on the disease. It’s not good, but it may be helpful. I’ll be back soon, okay?”
“I’d rather you didn’t.”
“Well, tough. I want to hear how the two inside are doing, and we have to plan for how to handle this until help comes.” She steps back, toward me. “I can’t do this alone. I don’t want to do this alone.”
None of us should do this alone. But I can’t tell them that, not in any way that they would understand. So, instead, I push my hands into my pockets and wait for Grace to lead the way. Out of here, away from my sister. To be torn in half. To be useful.
Somehow, Grace understands.
When she walks back to the main area, she speaks to me in a low voice that is probably exhaustion, but it reminds me of Leah. “I wanted to stay here because it’s familiar. It’s the closest thing to home I have, and I don’t think I’m the only one. We’re all outcasts and rejects.”
I can’t deny that, no matter how much I want to.
“But I didn’t think—” She shakes her head. “If we stay here, we need to make this place habitable long-term. We need to take care of ourselves until someone comes for us, right? And that means we all need to pull our weight, like Case is doing…” She hesitates at that. “We need to take inventory of the food we have. And cook food. Do you know how to cook?”
I nod. Leah and I used to do the cooking and the cleaning and the laundry at Granddad’s. He took care of himself before we came, but once we were there, he simply decided those tasks were ours now. Leah hated cooking, but I didn’t mind it. I always liked creating stuff. And that way, at least, I knew what I was eating.
“Would you be willing to do kitchen duty?” Grace asks.
I nod again. I might as well. I just—
I look down at my hands and back at Grace. Shrug.
She follows my line of sight. “Yeah, we’ll have to figure out the best way for you to communicate with others and for all of us to understand you.”
I push my mouth into a forced smile.
Grace notices it, because she winces. “I’m sorry it’s not easier. I don’t think anyone here knows sign language.”
