Authors: Veronica Melan
“Don’t! Don’t go there!”
-“Where are you...”
“Stop!”
Not noticing any voices and fingers, holding me back, I leapt forward with so much power, that my T-shirt ripped.
“Leave him alone, you brutes!”
I broke through the crowd, jumped to the guard, who at this moment was raising his hand, intending to hit an almost lifeless man. I grabbed his baton and tried to snatch it out of his hand.
“Don’t you dare beat him!” I grabbed the baton with one hand and with another I kept hitting him on his back.
The guard turned around and roared at me. Before I could hit him again, someone roughly shoved me aside.
“Get the fuck away from here!”
A second later I found myself sitting in the dust, shook my head, trying to recover after a blow in the ribs, and not paying any attention to the pain, I lashed out at the guards again.
“Leave him alone!” I gasped; my lungs were wheezing as if they were full of sand.
“I’ll leave you alone now!” a familiar gruff voice roared directly in my ear, and someone' spun me around. The last thing I saw was Greg’s distorted face and his fist dashing straight towards me. Then the right side of my head exploded with pain, and the world collapsed.
After a while I felt someone shaking my shoulder.
“Get up, dear, get up... Are you alive? Don’t lie on the ground. Are you here? Oh, silly you... why did you have to get involved?” The voices were fading away, vision was blurry and my eyes didn’t want to open. Eventually, scratching my palms against some small sharp rocks on the road and with someone’s help, I was able to take a sitting position. My head was throbbing, cheek was pulsating like a bomb, and the world was slowly spinning around. Probably, no more than a minute or two had passed since the moment when Greg hit me, during which time I was lying unconscious in the dust, until someone pulled me to the side.
The man was not getting beaten anymore, but the guards were still standing around him, like some hound dogs that had just strangled their prey. Their victim was no longer moaning or moving - not a human being, but a solid lump of sand, mud and blood.
Greg wiped the sweat from his face, attached the baton to his belt and continued to broadcast to the crowd.
“...and it will happen with anyone else who tries to escape from the ranch or make one step from the gate! Is that clear? Does anyone else want to try?”
The crowd was murmuring and wailing, wrapped in a cloud of terror. Someone was crying.
Greg spat on the sand, barked at the guard to take the beaten man to the infirmary and ordered the crowd to disperse.
“Get out of here! Now!”
Someone helped me to get up from the ground, and I staggered along the road towards the mansion. I couldn’t remember properly how I got back to my little room or how I fell into my bed. I closed my eyes trying not to think, feel or remember anything. I didn’t want to think about the man lying on the ground or the sounds a baton emits when it crashes someone’s bones, I didn’t want to remember about this ranch or this city or about anything bad that happens outside this room.
Will there ever be anything good in life? Or will the rest of my life always be a mix of awful events and even worse situations? I rolled on my side, pressed my fingers to my swollen cheek and started to cry.
Hulk came back late in the evening.
I heard his jeep driving into the garage and the front door opening, letting the car inside. Despite the fact that my cheek a few hours later seemed to hurt even more, I was waiting for this moment. As soon as everything quietened down in the yard, I left my room and went to the stairs leading up to the second floor. When I reached the office door I halted for a few second, listening to the voices coming from the inside, but there wasn’t any. Then I knocked.
When Hulk opened the door, I, without saying a word or asking for an invitation, walked straight in. When the light fell on my face, Hulk slowly, keeping his eyes fixed on my cheek, closed the door and walked towards me.
For a few seconds he just stood in front of me, looking at my swollen face – his grey eyes twinkling with suppressed rage, his lips were pressed into a thin line, the square corners of his jaw with all the muscles tensed up were now particularly standing out. Even his neck started to look like an interlacing of ropes.
“Greg?” was the only word he said.
“Yes.” I said calmly, “But I deserved it, so don’t worry.”
“Deserved it?” Hulk asked steadily, but it felt like some frost appeared in the corners of the room.
“I lashed out at the guards.”
“Why?”
“I was trying to stop them.”
“To stop them from what?” Hulk’s nostrils were faintly quivering, indicating the tremendous amount of effort he needed to remain unemotional. Something was telling me that Hulk was one step away from tearing everything apart with his bare hands.
“I was trying to stop them from beating up a man.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Hasn’t Greg reported it yet?” I pretended to be surprised, “the man they were beating up with five batons; the one that was lying on the ground and choking on blood and sand.”
Hulk froze. The atmosphere in the room became very uncomfortable. The tension turned into a dangerous mixture that was ready to explode with a carelessly thrown word.
The silence was pressing on my ears and nerves, whipping up my irritation even more.
“And you?” I barely stopped myself from poking my finger in Hulk’s chest.
“What about me?”
“You weren’t there! You weren’t there to stop it!” I spat the words in his face, “Why was that? Where were you?”
“I don’t have to justify myself to you.” now there was ice in the depth of his grey eyes.
“Maybe you sanctioned all this? Do you benefit from it? Or you just enjoy it? Tell me!” I knew I was crossing the line, but the wrath that’s been bubbling inside for the past few hours, was now spilling out, whether I wanted it or not.
“Why was he attacked by so many guards, while he could just be punished with points? Was it really necessary.... like that?”
“There are certain rules on this ranch!”
“Were they set by you? By YOU?” I was now yelling.
Hulk gnashed with his teeth and pointed at the door.
“Go away.”
“Go away? Is it that simple? Is everything in your life that simple?”
“I said – go away.”
“You are... a monster!” I exploded, feeling the tears pouring down my cheeks, “You have not done anything to prevent it! You have done nothing to help him!...”
“Get out!!!” roared Hulk.
I shuddered, wiped my wet cheeks and walked to the door with my back stiffed.
“He died, you know? He died...”
When the office door closed, Hulk clenched his fists. After standing motionless for a few seconds, he forced himself to relax, came to the wall, leaned on it with his hand and closed his eyes. His whole body was aching from the tension and the silence after all the shouting was devastating. He was the only one who knew what was really going on at the ranch and he must keep it in secret by all means, even if it costs him everything. Even her.
Hulk walked over to the bar and poured a glass of whiskey. After he drank it in one gulp, he filled it up again and only then allowed himself to sink into a chair.
As he lit up his cigar, his hands were trembling.
She knew there may never be a better moment for this than now.
Yesterday, Greg finally brought the key; bastard - he was dragging it out for so long! Jenny would still be upset, if it wasn’t for all the events that suddenly joined together into one picture - the picture she really wanted to see. Oh, no! Now she was no longer getting upset - she was thrilled. For the first time in a long time Jenny was truly happy.
How cool that yesterday Shereen got right in the middle of the scuffle with the guards! It wasn’t just good timing - it was perfect! Now, when she was so upset and angry with Hulk and his people, everyone will believe that she is guilty, without even trying to get down to the bottom of the truth. Jenny was certain about that. The situation will be interpreted as blazing, hard and fast revenge - Shereen’s revenge for the unjust rules at the ranch and for being punched by Greg.
Jenny smiled wryly.
Who cares about these pathetic dregs of society? They all deserve to be here; they all deserve to be punished with hard labour and beatings! Why was there any need at all to stand up for one of them? Jenny seriously doubted that people could act out of so-called noble impulses. Everyone knows - it's a cruel world where everyone tries to do the best they can, and only those who are aggressive enough to snap up the biggest piece of pie could survive.
Now it was time for Jenny’s great, poisonous and thought through revenge. Oh, yes! The anticipation has lasted for far too long, but it was well worth it. When she is finished with Shereen, Jenny will live in the mansion - it’s all been set up for a while now.
Sitting on the steps, beside the barracks and squinting from the bright morning sun, Jenny was scrolling through every detail of her cunning plan again and again.
The arson must happen tonight; she couldn’t wait any longer and had to execute her plot quickly and according to the circumstances. So, come midnight the warehouse with everything that’s been harvested for the past month, will be set on fire. It is a pity that the barrels with berries will get demolished too - her neighbours put so much effort into picking them, but there is nothing can be done to save them since the berry yield is kept under the same roof. So, when the wooden barn goes up in flames, the fire will spread onto the women’s barracks, which are located close by - Jenny was pretty sure that women will have enough time to evacuate the buildings. Jenny has to make sure that she is not the one who smells the smoke first, it must be someone else - here she will have to rely on her luck. But it wasn’t that important.
What was the most essential thing was to bring an empty gas canister to Shereen’s room and remain unnoticed. And before that Jenny must steal some of the clothes that the bitch wears all the time and damage it in the fire. The burnt clothes will become that strong evidence when it comes to finding the offender.
It wasn’t too much of a problem to steal a t-shirt - that could be done tomorrow afternoon when Shereen is out to do her business at the quarry and later on Jenny will lure her out of the room under the false pretences that too have been carefully planned. It would even better if the guards discovered some other Shereen’s belongings somewhere by the burnt warehouse and think to themselves - what could that be?
Jenny frowned, pondering. There wasn’t much time left and there was still so much to think about... Meanwhile the sun was climbing higher and higher up in the sky and it was time to go to work - everyone else was already doing their job at the berry plantation.
Jenny reluctantly got up from the steps, feeling the sweat rolling down her back and picked up the gloves, which Shereen bought for all the women some time ago so that they don’t scratch their hands on the thorny bushes. Well, well, this puritan thought about every bloody worker at the ranch. But it’s OK. Soon everything will change. Very soon.
The time till noon was passing slowly, it was hot and stuffy, but Jenny was not complaining - she was picking the loathsome berries, not listening to what the others were chatting about. Her thoughts were constantly shifting from one subject to another, but the general idea was the same - today’s arson. The canister with petrol, which she had stolen from the garage the other night, was securely resting in between the thick corn stalks. That part of the field won’t be harvested any time soon as the cobs were still unripe and there was no risk that it would be discovered. Jenny pinched a lighter from Greg a long time ago which was now lying in her pocket, just in case. She couldn’t leave it in the barracks - there was a chance that the women would notice and remember it which could potentially serve as evidence against Jenny.
She must also be very careful with the petrol so that her clothes don’t soak up the its smell, but even then, it’s highly unlikely that nobody would pick up on it when it all kicks off. Jenny is only going to slip outside for a minute to have a pee and when she comes back the warehouse will be on fire. All her neighbours usually sleep soundly and nobody wakes up when someone goes out to the toilet - she made sure of it enough times. Even though there was still some risk (you could never avoid the risk completely in this sort of game) Jenny didn’t worry too much.