Authors: Abigail Collins
Roma fetches the first aid kit while I make myself comfortable on the couch. Fray settles in, pressed against my side, his head in my lap. He’s been so strong today, but I can tell that his bravery is starting to crumble. He’s beginning to realize – as am I – just where our parents’ passing will leave us. We can’t stay here forever.
“This will sting a bit, dear,” Roma says, sitting down beside me and opening the bright red box in her lap. She pulls out a few wads of gauze, a large bandage, and a needle and thread out of her pocket.
When she pulls the piece of metal – which is embedded deeper than I had thought – out of the front of my shoulder, I gasp and have to bite my lip to keep from crying out. I can taste blood on my tongue. More scrubbing to do.
Roma cleans the wound, stitches it up with her sewing needle, and layers gauze and bandages over it to staunch the blood flow. I am in pain the entire time she is tending to me, but I try not to let it show. So many others have suffered far worse. It’s selfish for me to accept pity for something so insignificant.
“That should do it,” Roma says, packing up the remains of the medical supplies into the first aid box. “Just try to keep it clean and don’t move it around too much. I can take the stitches out for you in a few days.”
“Thank you. I owe you.”
Roma stands up and puts one hand on her hip, the other swinging the box by its handle. “Don’t even think about it. You’re our guests. We
want
you here.”
My heart beat drums in my ears. I don’t want to be here. I want to be at home, eating my mother’s homemade soup, clipping articles out of newspapers, sleeping in my own bed and knowing that when I wake up my parents will be in the kitchen waiting to greet me. Instead, I will wake up here tomorrow morning, and I want so badly not to.
Crissy’s father, Andon, returns from the fields late into the evening. His hands are covered in calluses and blisters, and his face is a deep tan color from the sunlight. There is dirt under his fingernails, and the slouch in his posture is all too familiar to me. My parents came home looking much the same, with windswept hair and muddy clothes. But they were never unhappy, because they could be together all day. I wonder how Crissy’s parents feel, being separated for so long each time he leaves and she stays.
Dinner is a somber affair. Roma is a wonderful cook, and she prepares a casserole that would have made my mother envious, but my stomach is so knotted that I don’t eat much. I can tell that Crissy and her parents all want to ask me about what happened this morning, to recount each detail from my own perspective. They are on the edges of their seats, but I have nothing to offer them. My mouth feels dry. Words won’t come out.
“You don’t have to talk about it,” Roma says, after we’ve all eaten in silence for a few minutes. “And we won’t pressure you to. There are some things you should be able to lock away, forget about. But we’re here for you if you do decide you want to talk to someone.”
Crissy voices her agreement, and Andon nods stiffly. My face feels hot, but thankfully my skin is dark enough to hide the red rising on my cheeks. I am embarrassed and grateful. But I still can’t say anything.
“Thanks a bunch,” Fray says, filling the silence that I cannot. This is the first time he’s spoken since we arrived. “Everly says we can’t go home. Can this be our home now?”
“Fray, you can’t just ask someone that,” I whisper, finally finding my voice. “We can’t expect that from them. This is just temporary. You know that.”
Roma coughs and I look up. She’s got a sad smile on her face that reminds me so much of my mother that it hurts.
“This can be your home, Fray. Yours too, Everly. If you’ll accept our invitation to stay.”
“That’s very kind of you,” I begin. The room feels so hot all of a sudden. I wish I could sink into my chair and disappear. “But we can’t just – ”
“
Please
,” Fray interrupts. “Everly, please. We can’t go home.”
There are tears in the corners of my little brother’s eyes. I can’t say no to him. He’s the only family I’ve got now – it’s my responsibility to ensure his safety and happiness.
“Okay,” I tell him. “We can stay.” I look at Andon, who has yet to offer his own opinion on the matter. “As long as you’ll have us.”
Andon smiles, and the gesture surprises me. “The more the merrier.”
After dinner I try to help clear the table and wash the dishes, but Roma refuses to let me. Instead, she draws me a bath and lays out clean linens and blankets over the mattress in what is now Fray’s and my bedroom.
I look around. The walls are white and spackled, and there are no pictures hung up on them. The room looks almost untouched, and I wonder if Crissy’s family has ever had guests stay with them before. I suddenly wish I had spent less time packing my clothes and more time packing more important things. I didn’t even think to bring a photograph with me. I don’t even have a picture of my parents to hang on the wall.
The bath feels amazing. It loosens up my tense muscles and relaxes me. I wash my hair and scrub my palms, underneath my fingernails, along my neck and jaw-line – anywhere blood has touched me. I watch droplets of red water roll off of my hair when I wring it out. My body aches, even though most of my pain is not physical.
I stay in the water until my fingers and toes look like prunes. The air feels cold on my bare skin when I get out, and I dry myself off as quickly as I can. I only brought one pair of pajamas, so I will have to remember to wash them in the mornings if they are dirty, so that they will be dry by night time.
I feel more content after my bath, more comfortable with my situation. The shock of my parents’ deaths has worn off, leaving me tired and depressed. But I am clean, and dry, and safe, and so is Fray. That will have to be enough for now.
I’m so exhausted I almost collapse into bed immediately after I enter my room, but I stop myself. I sit on the edge of the bed and unzip my suitcase.
I pull out the music box my mother gave me and set it on the nightstand beside the mattress. I wind it up, and it plays a melody that my mother used to sing to me before I went to sleep every night.
I unearth my teddy bear too, pulling it into my chest and wrapping my arms around it. In the back of my mind, I think about what the kids at school would say if they saw me holding onto a stuffed animal so tightly. I am too old to keep this with me, but I don’t care. For just a moment, I want to pretend that I am five years old again – that my mother is going to come into the room any minute and sing me to sleep.
She doesn’t, and instead I fall asleep to the sound of the music box, with my teddy bear held tightly in my arms.
Chapter three
The first three days are the hardest.
Roma tells me that I don’t need to go to school, or work, until I feel like I’m ready – the same goes for Fray. The problem is, I don’t think I will ever feel ready. What’s the point in pretending my life is back to normal when that couldn’t be farther from the truth? My parents are dead. I can’t just pretend that it didn’t happen.
I do my best to help out when I can. I wash dishes every night, with Fray at my side drying them, and launder my own clothes on days when Roma is sewing. She teaches me what she can, and from her I learn basic stitches, how to iron clothing, and how to prepare the simplest of meals. I feel good knowing that I am helping – that I’m not just a freeloader – but I still don’t think I’m doing enough to repay them for what they’ve done for me and Fray. I don’t know if I’ll ever feel like I’ve done enough.
The second night, I hear Fray crying into his pillow beside me. I can feel the movements of his body shaking the mattress. I haven’t cried since our parents died, but it’s not because I’m not sad. I’m just trying to be brave, for Fray, and I’m glad he doesn’t have the same pressure on his shoulders. He can cry, let his deepest emotions flow out of him, and maybe someday he’ll feel liberated. I don’t think I will, but I’m trying.
“Fray,” I say lightly, resting one hand on his shoulder. He’s facing away from me, but I can hear his sniffles through his back.
He sucks a wet breath in through his nose and says, “I’m sorry. I’m keeping you awake.”
I feel like a hole has been punched in my heart. He shouldn’t be worrying about me.
“I was already awake,” I counter. “I can’t sleep either.”
There’s a beat of silence, and my words trail away into the dark. The only window in the room filters in moonlight, illuminating the music box on the nightstand. It glitters like it’s made of gold.
“What are you thinking about?” Fray asks me. I can tell from the way his voice is wavering that he’s still crying, but he’s stopped shaking.
I could lie to him, but I don’t want to. He deserves to know the truth.
“I don’t know what to do. I just… I don’t know where to go from here. I can’t just pretend that our parents… that nothing happened. But I don’t know what else I can do.”
I shiver, even though the blankets on top of me are thick and warm.
“Me too,” Fray says. “What did Mommy do?”
He’s asking me what our mother did to deserve to die. The Digits, as cruel a breed as they can be, do not kill unless they have a reason to. Humans are what run the machines, work in the factories, plant crops and clean and do all of the other unpleasant things that the Digits do not want to do. We are important to them, even if it’s only to serve them. They wouldn’t kill one of us unless they were provoked.
“Mommy didn’t do anything,” I tell him instead. He doesn’t need to grow up thinking that his mother was a villain; I want him to remember her – both of them – as the wonderful people they were. “Neither did Papa. They didn’t deserve… what happened to them.”
Fray is silent after that. I can hear his breathing starting to level out, but he still sniffles occasionally, so I know he’s not asleep yet. My hand is still on his shoulder, but now it’s more for my sake than his.
“Fray?” I say after a couple of minutes.
“Yeah?”
“Here.” I pull my teddy bear out from where it is sandwiched between my chest and the pillow. I slide it over his back and into his arms. I can’t see what look his face has taken on, but I hear the shuffling of his body as he wraps his arms around the stuffed animal.
“Mommy gave that to me,” I tell him. “When I was your age. He’s helped me get through some pretty scary stuff. He’ll help you, too.”
“He will?”
Fray’s voice is hesitant, but his curiosity brings a smile to my face. He sounds like a six-year-old boy. I thought I would never get to hear that sound again.
“That’s right. He’ll keep you safe. And so will I.”
I hug him from behind, and after a minute he shifts his body until he’s facing me. His arms are still wrapped around the teddy bear, and mine are around him. In our little cocoon, it’s hard to believe that there is anything outside of these walls that would ever want to hurt us. It’s almost easy to convince myself that we’re okay; that everything that happened in the last couple of days was just a dream.
But then I wake up, and it’s still there.
***
Two days later Fray and I return to school. It is a Friday, so we have two days off after today. We could wait and return on Monday, but the longer we put it off, the harder it will be.
Crissy comes with us. Luckily, she lives only a couple of blocks away from the school. I have heard that before the Digits were created – though I’m not sure how; I have no idea what they
are
, let alone who made them – humans were allowed to drive themselves to wherever they wanted to go. Now, we have to have permission from the Council, and we must take a public transport vehicle to travel to our destinations. It is very rare for someone to go to a different city, let alone another state. We mostly only take buses to and from work and school. Leisure trips are seen as unnecessary and are almost never permitted.