World in Tatter Ch. 19

The storm raged most of the night, not letting up until the wee hours of the morning. Not long after we got to this place, I dozed off, but I couldn’t sleep for long. A couple hours at most. I woke up shivering on the floor, clothes still completely soaked through. However, when I come to, I realize Alice is no longer by my side.

I kinda freak out for a moment before I hear her rustling around in what I assume used to be the pantry. Looking around, I realize that Alice has gotten a small fire going at the other end of the room. She must’ve found something dry around here to start it with. I slowly drag myself from the cold floor, my clothes sticking to every inch of my skin.

“Hey, Al?” I mutter through chattering teeth.

“Hmm?” Alice rounds the corner of the pantry door, into the faint flickering light. What surprises me though, is that she’s stripped down to only her undergarments.

I’ll be honest, it catches me off guard. “I, uh, I just, uh.” I stumble, “I just wanted to let you know that I’m awake.”

“Oh, good. I took the liberty of digging out your spare clothes. They’re hangin’ up by the fire. I doubt they’re dry yet, though.”

“Oh. Uh, yeah, great.”

“You should take those clothes off.”

“Wait, what! Wh…why?”

“Because they’re soaked? What’s gotten into you?” Alice squirms, suddenly getting self-conscious, pulling her arms around herself trying to hide. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she’s probably blushing.

“Oh, right. Duh. Nothing, just groggy.” I didn’t mean to stare, honest. I didn’t even realize I was until she said something. When I do, you know, realize it, I avert my gaze and start peeling off my layers of drenched clothes. Once I wring out and hang up my clothes, I join Alice around the warm fire. “You should get some sleep. I’ll stay up, keep watch.”

“Nah, I’m alright. Not really tired.”

“You sure? We’ve had a long couple of days.”

“I’m good. Really. If you want to, you can go back to sleep.”

“I don’t think I could.” An unexpected shiver runs down my bare back. “It’s a little too cold in here.”

The two of us sit quietly by the fire, the only sounds are the hissing of the flames and winds whipping just on the other side of the wall. The smell of the smoke is strange. It’s like old oil mixed with something I can’t quite place. Unfortunately, the little fire Alice set in a bowl on the floor isn’t enough to warm up the room. It really doesn’t put out much light either, just enough for us to see a few feet around us. At this rate, our clothes won’t ever get dry.

All of a sudden, I remember my mom’s journal. I start to panic. Grabbing my bag, I start frantically digging through it, searching for one of the last artifacts I have from my mother’s life. It’s not here. Pretty much everything has been pulled out.

When she notices my agitation, Alice reaches behind her, grabbing a dark object off the floor. “Looking for this?”

Squinting my eyes, I can just make out the shape of the leather-bound tome. Relief washes over me as I rush to her, snatching the book from her hands. Without so much as another word, I flip the journal open, checking to make sure it is undamaged. When I do, I find that…miraculously, the book appears to be bone dry. I don’t understand how, but for once, fortune is on my side.

“I found it in your bag. Wrapped up in some clothes. It must be pretty important.”

Once I sit back down and can calm my breathing, “It…It was my mom’s…her journal.”

“Oh.” The two of us sit for a moment. I stare at the book clutched in my hands. But feel Alice’s eyes on me. “You still haven’t told me what happened to her. Or your dad.”

“It’s hard to talk about.” Honestly, just thinking about it hurts like hell. Even now, five years after…what happened…I’m not sure I can talk about it. I mean, for this long, I haven’t even talked to Rachel about it. I don’t think she would understand. As for Alice, how would she look at me if she knew the truth?

Sitting there looking at the journal in my lap, I feel myself begin to shake. When a drop falls onto the leather surface, I suddenly feel the tears flowing down my cheeks and the burning in my eyes.

Alice must’ve also noticed, because she starts to get a little squirrely. She’s always been a bit uncomfortable talking about emotions. “We don’t have to talk about it now…I was just curious is all.”

“It’s not you. I want to tell you…I just…”

“It must have been pretty bad.”

“Yeah, you could say that.” I take a few deep breaths, calming my nerves to stop the shaking.

“You really don’t have to tell me.”

“You deserve to know. They were like your family too… I just haven’t talked about this to anyone. Not even Rachel.” I pull myself together, swallowing back my tears, forcing down the lump in my throat.

“What about Jason?”

“Not really. Not since it happened.” After a moment to gather my thoughts, “It happened about a year after we left Atlanta. We were somewhere north of Denver, south of Cheyenne. Slaver territory, but we were trying to avoid the cities. Originally, we’d packed enough food and supplies to get us most of the way back, but there was an incident. We were trying to cross some river. A bridge gave out. Rachel and I were already on the other side, but the wagon tipped over and dumped a lot of our provisions. Mom, Dad, Jason and I spent hours salvaging what we could, but we still only had enough to make it a couple more weeks.

“When we started getting low, Mom and Dad realized someone was gonna have to go scavenging. They found us a cave up in the mountains to set up camp. It was well off the roads and they tucked us pretty far inside so we would be out of sight no matter what, and they left. Mom, Dad, Jason. All three of them. They were gone for a few days, leaving me to look after Rach.

“When they got back, my…my Mom wasn’t with them.” I pull my knees up to my chest, setting the journal down in front of me.

“Was she…?”

“I don’t really know for sure. Dad was pretty much incoherent. Jason was bleeding. Neither one of them was saying much. After quite a bit of pushing, I was finally able to get something out of Jason. He said that they were attacked. Slave traders, he suspected. He said they got shot at and had to run.

“My Mom got separated from them in the chaos.” I feel the tears welling up gain, but somehow my voice stays solid. “Jason…said she was hit…killed… but they weren’t able to go back.”

“But you said…”

“I know what I said.”

“So, you don’t think she died?”

“I don’t know. My Dad didn’t think so. He kept trying to find her. We spent weeks there. We never stayed that long in one place. Dad went out most nights searching. It drove him crazy. He barely ate. Never slept. He just kept insisting. We couldn’t stop him, and you better believe we tried. Jason was sure she was gone. Maybe he just needed to believe it…needed us to believe it…

“But if she was alive then, she’s probably gone by now. You know how the slave trade is here. Over there, it’s worse. Much worse. I can’t tell you how many times I saw people beaten. Even killed for disobedience.

“Even if she was alive…even if we could’ve found her…What could we do? We would have gotten ourselves killed. I think Jason told us she was dead so we wouldn’t join our Dad obsessing over her. I just took Jason at his word for a long time. Tried not to think about it too much. I guess the thought of abandoning her was too much. Thinking of her as dead made it easier, I guess. Especially after seeing what it was doing to Dad. Trying to find her was destroying him. Besides, I had Rachel to think about. Dad was in no state to care for her, and Jason already had his hands full with Dad and me.”

“That’s…I don’t even know what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything. It was a long time ago.”

She takes a few minutes to process everything I’ve told her. I admit, it’s a lot to take in. I lived it, and sometimes I can’t process it. “I can’t help feeling like there’s more to that story. Where’s your Dad?”

I lay out on the concrete floor, using the cold to focus my mind. Honestly, it’s the only thing keeping me from tearing up again. After a silence that seemed to last an eternity, “I killed him.”

“What?!” Alice’s breathing suddenly changes. I roll over onto my side to face her. Looking in her eyes, I see her go through a series of emotions. Disbelief, anger, but mostly confusion.

“A couple months after Mom… My Dad…he barely ate, rarely slept. He drank a lot. He spent all his time looking at maps and trying to figure out what happened to Mom. It was early morning, hours before sunrise. He was making a lot of noise, and woke me up. He was drunk. I was stupid. I went in to confront him. To try to get him to get some rest.

“I had my knife on me like always. One he gave me for my fifteenth birthday.” I reach over where Alice piled the gear from my back. “This knife…When I walked into his tent, he didn’t even acknowledge my existence. Not at first. He was freaking out. Throwing stuff around, breaking things.

“I tried to stop him.” On those words, my voice breaks, and tears drip off my nose. “He attacked me. He kept hitting me and hitting me.” My body shakes uncontrollably. I pull my arms around me, trying desperately to keep from falling apart. “Before I knew what happened, he collapsed on top of me. There was blood everywhere. All over me. I freaked out and pushed him off.

“My knife was sticking out of his chest. I must’ve drawn it on instinct. I had to stop him. He was going to kill me. He didn’t even recognize me. He just kept screaming, ‘You’re one of them! You’re one of them!’ It was like he was having a nightmare, but his eyes were wide open. I didn’t have a choice. I didn’t have a choice…”

Alice doesn’t say anything for a long time. She just stares at me, disbelief and horror in her eyes. I suddenly feel very exposed. I lie there staring into the dancing flames of our meager campfire, the dark memories of my father’s fate weighing heavily on me.

“That…that’s horrible. Steven…I…”

I hold up my hand to stop her. “I’ve been living with this for five years.” Strength slowly returning to my voice. “You’re the first person I’ve really talked to about it. I mean, Jason knows what happened. He showed up right after and took Dad’s body away, but after that night, neither of us brought it up again.”

“Does Rachel know any of this?”

“No. Jason told her that he ran off into the woods. That he was attacked by animals. I’ve never been able to tell her the truth. I can’t bring myself to. I don’t think she’d ever forgive me. I mean, how could she?” A humorless chuckle escapes me. “I can’t even forgive myself.”

After a moment of awkward silence, I feel a shiver run down my spine. Realizing how cold I’ve gotten, I get up off the hard floor and cross over to where my spare clothes are hanging up. Luckily, the shirt and pants are completely dried out from the storm. I don my clothing, but that exposed feeling doesn’t abate.

It’s not long before we hear the storm start to subside. The winds begin to let up and rains slow. If it weren’t still the middle of the night, I’d say we should start our search for the others. As it stands, the outside world will still be in chaos. Trying to navigate it in the dark wouldn’t do us much good. Even so, we should still be ready to get going at first light.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

A deafening knock comes from the main door. Quick as lightning, Alice throws her clothes on before pulling two of her daggers.’

BANG! BANG! BANG!

I rush to Alice’s side, grabbing one of the pistols by my pack.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

Alice takes up position behind the door, poised to unlock the deadbolt. I crouch down next to the rusted old stove, taking aim at whomever is on the other side.

On the silent count of three, Alice throws the latch and kicks the door outward.