This World We Live In (The Last Survivors, Book 3) (15 page)

"It's a shame you couldn't find your aunt and uncle," I said. "Alex told me about them, how you could have stayed there while he worked in the oil fields."

"We didn't want to live in Tulsa," Julie replied. "I'd have been stuck taking care of my cousins. You think Gabriel cries a lot? He's nothing compared to them. And Alex'l be much happier in a monastery than he would be in an oil field."

"Monastery?" I said. I don't think I've ever said that word before. "Alex wants to enter a monastery?"

"Didn't he tel you?" Julie asked. "I thought Alex told you everything. I thought maybe he'd like you so much, he'd change his mind."

I almost burst out laughing. The last living boy in America drops into my bedroom only he wants to be a monk. I think that pretty much sums up my life.

"He doesn't like me that much," I said. "And he never told me."

"It isn't what he used to want," Julie said. "Before.

He wanted to be president of the United States. And I bet he could have been. He's so smart and he worked al the time. But after we left Carlos, Alex said he'd take me to the convent and then he'd enter a monastery. There's a Franciscan one in Ohio that's stil open. I'm never going to be a nun, though.

I'l stay as long as I have to and then I'l come back here. If you're gone, I'l try to find you."

"We won't be going anytime soon," I said. "Mom 147

doesn't want us to leave, and since Dad and Lisa and the baby can stay at Mrs. Nesbitt's, there's no reason for them to go, either."

"People leave," Julie said.

I knew she was right, even though I couldn't picture us leaving anytime soon. "If we do go, we'l let you know," I said. "I promise you that."

"And I promise you, you're going to freeze without a coat," Charlie said, approaching us. "It may be the middle of June, but it's freezing out here."

"Not freezing," I said, grateful y taking my coat from him. "It's definitely above freezing."

"You're right," Charlie said. "It's got to be at least forty." He laughed. "I used to hate hot weather," he said. "Just breathing made me sweat. But now I think about hot summer nights and everything I would give up for one."

"What?" Julie said. "What would you give up?"

Charlie laughed again. "I don't know," he said.

"Not any of you and I don't have anything else. I guess I don't have anything to barter."

"I used to think there'd stil be stars in the sky,"

Julie said. "In the country, I mean. We used to spend summers in the country with Fresh Air Fund families, and there were always stars. I had a postcard once of a painting with big crazy-looking stars."

"Starry Night," I said. "Vincent van Gogh painted it. I saw it in a museum in New York. You're from New York, aren't you, Julie? Did you ever see it?"

"No," Julie said. "But I've been to museums. I went on a school trip to the Natural History Museum once.

We looked at the dinosaurs for hours."

"The dinosaurs are gone," I said. "Just like the stars."

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"The stars are there," Charlie said. "Hiding behind the ash clouds, but they're stil there."

"I don't believe in anything I can't see," I said.

"You don't have to see God to believe in Him,"

Julie said. "You can feel Him and la Santa Madre and the saints. Like you can feel the sun, even though we can't see it anymore."

"I can't see the stars and I certainly can't feel them, so I've given up believing they're there," I said. "As far as I'm concerned, they no longer exist."

"Look at it this way," Charlie said. "Do you think there's life on other planets?"

"Yeah," I said. "And I hope they're having a better time of it than we are."

Charlie laughed. "Okay, then," he said. "Picture Princess Leia on her planet, or a Klingon, or some eight-eyed thing with four brains. And whatever it is, it's outside on a hot June night, looking at the ten thousand stars in its sky. Our sun is one of them. It can see our sun better than we can, and it has a name for it, like we have names for the stars. But Princess Leia doesn't know we're standing here looking up to where the stars used to be. Does that mean we don't exist just because she can't see us?"

I had never thought about that before: al the life on al the other planets throughout the universe as al the other planets throughout the universe as unaware of our lives, our suffering, as we are of theirs.

I wondered how many teenage boys there were out there and how many of them planned on becoming monks, and I laughed.

Charlie laughed with me and Julie did also. We were probably al laughing at different things, but that was okay. We were alive, we were together, and somewhere in the June sky there were stars.

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June 13

Moving day.

Natural y it poured.

Mom stayed in and watched over Gabriel while the rest of us lugged stuff over to Mrs. Nesbitt's.

Food, blankets, sheets, the clothes we've been sharing with everyone else. Lots of books.

I didn't believe it until Dad came back for Gabriel.

But they real y are gone. Even if it's just down the road. There are only five us now, and it's so quiet.

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***

Chapter 12 June 15

Lisa came over this morning, distraught.

"Alex says he's taking Julie away tomorrow," she said. "Miranda, you're the only one he listens to.

Please talk to him."

I don't know where people have gotten the idea that Alex listens to me. Matt listens to Syl and Jon listens to Julie, but that seems to be where the listening ends.

Stil , I told Lisa I'd give it a try.

I walked outside to where the guys were chopping wood. "I was wondering if I could borrow Alex for a few hours," I said, nice and casual y. "I'd like to do some house hunting, and Mom doesn't like me to go alone."

"Good idea," Matt said. "Alex, you don't mind, do you? You and Miranda had great luck last time."

"Sure," Alex said. I get the feeling chopping wood is one thing he isn't going to miss at the monastery.

We walked back to the houses and got our bikes.

It was as warm a day as I could remember, almost muggy, and we biked slowly.

"No country this time," I said. "Let's do Fresh Meadows instead."

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"Al right," Alex said.

Wel , that was easy. Maybe he was in an agreeable mood. Or maybe he didn't like looking at half-eaten bodies any more than I did.

When I was a kid, I used to fantasize about living in Fresh Meadows. It's at the other end of town from us, five or six miles away, and it's where the doctors and lawyers live. Or lived before everything happened.

"These are nice houses," Alex said as we climbed our way through an already shattered window. "The rich kids lived here, huh?"

"No one was rich in Howel ," I said. "But the richer kids lived here."

"I like your house better," Alex said. "It reminds me of home. Al the people stepping over each other.

We were pretty crowded."

I pictured Alex and Julie and Carlos living in a filthy tenement, with everybody yel ing in Spanish and hitting each other. "Where was that?" I asked.

"West End Avenue and Eighty-eighth Street," Alex said.

There went my tenement fantasy. Actual y, there went most of my ideas about Alex and Julie and where they came from. It costs a lot more money to live on West End Avenue and Eighty-eighth Street than it does to live in Fresh Meadows.

I guess Alex sensed my surprise. "My father was the super," he said. "Not much salary, but they let us live in the basement apartment, by the laundry room and the furnace."

"Oh," I said. "No wonder our house reminds you of home."

Alex laughed. "It's better than I made it sound," he said. "It was a nice apartment. But crowded and noisy."

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We walked through the house together, taking whatever pickings we could find. I taught Alex the cosmetic bag trick, and he admired the travel-sized shampoos and soaps. We went through three houses that way, al of them previously ransacked, probably more than once. But each had a little something we could use, and we both enjoyed the quiet and the nice furnishings.

"No food today," I said. "No misers in this neighborhood."

"No," Alex said. "The rich don't starve."

"Are there special places for rich people, do you think?" I asked. "Did you ever see any?"

"There are safe towns," Alex said. "But they're hidden. Even Carlos couldn't find one."

Syl had mentioned trucks going to safe towns.

Truckers must know where they were located even if the Marines didn't.

"We're safe enough where we are," I said. "We have food and shelter. Julie would be safe, too, if you let her stay with us."

"No," Alex said. "We're leaving tomorrow."

"But why?" I cried. "Charlie's staying. He's no more a part of the family than you are."

"Did you hear yourself?" Alex asked. "That's exactly why Julie has to go. No matter how much you say you love her, she isn't a part of your family.

She's Carlos's sister and mine, not yours."

"Carlos isn't here," I said. "We are. You could be, too. You could both stay with us."

"No," Alex said. "Carlos told us what we should do, and we're doing it."

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"You real y wil make a great monk," I said. "You have the obedience thing down pat."

"I have no idea what kind of monk I'l be," Alex said. "Or even if the order wil take me in."

"Wait a second," I said. "You're dumping Julie with some nuns and then you're going to Ohio on the off chance you can become a monk? Are you serious?

"

"That's exactly why I didn't tel you," Alex said. "I knew you wouldn't understand."

"That's not fair," I said. "Maybe I don't understand, but you didn't know if I would. You may know Latin and calculus and how to hot-wire a car, but you don't know anything about me. I don't think you know anything about anybody except yourself."

Alex looked around at what had once been a very nice living room, now covered with ash and broken glass. "I'l tel you what I know," he said. "Everywhere there's death. You think that pile of bodies was the worst thing I've ever seen? Or the corpse with the dog beside it? That was nothing. Every day for a year I've seen worse. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out why God lets me live when so many people have died horrible, lonely deaths. People better than I'l ever be. For a long time I thought I was alive to protect Julie, but every plan I've made for her failed. Now I'm trusting in Carlos's decision. And if God shows us mercy and gives Julie the protection I can't, I'l go to Ohio and beg the Franciscans to take me in and devote the rest of my life to serving Christ and my church. That's everything I know, Miranda. Everything."

He was crying. For days I hadn't known he could smile, and now I found he could cry.

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"Stay until Tuesday," I said. "Go into town and get the food. Do that for Dad and Lisa, al right?"

He took a deep breath and wiped the tears off his cheeks. "Tuesday," he said. "What's today?"

"I'm not sure," I admitted, but then I counted back to last Monday. That's how we tel time: Monday to Monday. "It's Thursday," I said. "That's just a long weekend."

"Al right," he said. "We'l leave on Tuesday. No more arguments."

"None," I said, but I felt a glimmer of hope.

Maybe Alex real y does listen to me.

June 16

I opened one of the cans of dog food and put some in Horton's bowl. When I checked this evening, he hadn't touched it.

A couple of days ago Jon asked permission to give Horton a little bit of the shad. We have so much food in the house, Mom agreed, but Horton ended up not eating it.

He's gotten so thin. He seems comfortable, and he can get up and down furniture and laps. Sure, he mostly sleeps, but he always sleeps a lot.

I'd hoped when everybody left, especial y Gabriel, Horton would start eating again. I know he was eating a little before they came, because I fed him when Jon was away.

When Julie was in the house, Jon was distracted, and even now he's spending most of his free time with her, either here or at Mrs. Nesbitt's. But she'l be gone in a couple of days, unless Alex changes his mind, and then Jon is going to have to face what's going on with Horton.

If he can. If any of us can.

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June 17

Charlie popped in, just like a neighbor might, to invite us over for Sunday prayer service, fol owed by dinner.

Syl said yes right away and Matt nodded. Jon said he would if he could pray with Alex and Julie, and Charlie said of course, they were hoping Jon would join them.

That left Mom and me. I said yes, more for the dinner than the prayers. Mom thought about it and said she didn't have that many chances to be alone and whenever one came along, she grabbed it, so she'd stay home.

"You could come just for the dinner," Charlie said.

"It won't be the same without you."

"I'l think about it," Mom said, which we al knew meant "no, thank you."

We're in and out of both houses al day long. Julie comes over every morning for lessons with Jon, and more often than not, Jon eats supper at Dad's. Syl goes over for Bible study. Mom sends me over with something for them, or Alex comes over with something for us, and Charlie and Mom have formed their own book club. One of them reads a mystery, then gives it to the other, and then they discuss it.

But Charlie always comes over here to see Mom.

Mom never goes there. I can't decide if it's because she doesn't want to see Mrs. Nesbitt's house fil ed with other people or if it's Dad and Lisa she's avoiding. Maybe she thinks they want to avoid her. It can't be easy for Mom having them so close by, but she might think it's just as hard for them having her so near.

It's only been a few days since they moved out.

Maybe by next week Mom wil start visiting them.

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June 18

The four of us walked over to Mrs. Nesbitt's this morning, splitting up once we got there. Jon went to the parlor, where Alex and Julie set up a little chapel, and Matt, Syl, and I stayed in the kitchen with everybody else.