1

Burned

 

            “Wake up, Sybil,” my mother screeches, grabbing my arm and yanking me out of bed. “You have school and you’re going to be late.” I rub my arm where her nails dug in. I snatch my wallet from under the bed and head out the door. There’ll be a food stand somewhere along the way. Sure enough, a man is vending bagels on Riverside and Apprentice. I flip a quarter at him and he tosses me a plain bagel in return. We say nothing to each other. In a world as poor as this, no one needs the niceties when money is involved.

            I drag open the heavy door to Riverside Academy and head to class. I know better than to leave anything in the run-down lockers. Falsely named, they do not, in fact, lock at all. Students’ belongings are stolen every day, but many have nowhere else to keep their things. The stone walls have long ago lost their painted colors, now stained with the residue from leaky plumbing. The ceiling plaster is constantly falling in little bits onto the floor. Parts of the roof are gone completely, letting in rain, hail, and snow throughout the year.

            “Evers?” Shit. “You’re late. Forty-six seconds,” our teacher Grivens (last names are used in any adult-child interaction here - other than parents) snaps at me. I swallow and nod.

            “Won’t happen again,” I mutter, walking to her desk and holding out my arms, insides up. She takes the red-hot rod and presses it against my wrist. I grit my teeth. She moves it up a couple inches and does it again. After three, she lets me return to my seat. They’re all on my left arm – the hand I write with. I curl up in my chair and don’t look at anyone.

            Pain is searing through my arm for the rest of the day. I get into my last class, glad it’s almost over, and move to take my seat. This is the only class I have with a male teacher. His name is Arnes, and he’s one of the most intimidating people I know. Which is saying a lot. I never really listen in history. We’ve all heard it a hundred times. A few centuries ago, people finally opened their eyes to the real world and realized how much opportunity they were missing… blah blah blah. All his financial crap and why the government is so amazing stuff gets on my nerves. We get it.

            “Evers?” Oh great. “Stay here after class,” Arnes instructs me.

            “Fine,” I say. He glares at me, sending shivers up my spine. I didn’t know he could tell how zoned out I was. For the rest of the class I try to pay more attention.

            The other kids start to file out, no one really talking to each other, but I stay in my seat until they’re all gone. He watches me for a moment before motioning for me to come up to his desk. I sigh and do as I’m told. I know that if I don’t, he’ll activate the thin ring that every one of us has around our necks. You get it when you’re born and it grows with you, but is never, under any circumstances, taken off. During your school years, your teachers can activate them. When you work, it’s your superiors. At home, it’s your parents. The collar will give you a violent shock that stuns you for a moment or two.

            When I get to his desk, he tells me to put all my hair back behind my shoulders. I give him an inquiring look, but do as he says. He brings up the rod and presses it hard against the side of my neck. I squeeze my eyes shut tight. I know better than to cry out. That’ll only make it worse.

            “Pay attention in class, Sybil.” I freeze for a second, then take a step back, nervous. No adult has ever used my first name outside my house. First names are only used to distinguish between people who share a last name. I nod, and it hurts. Bad. He opens the drawer and pulls out a small gray square with a single button in the middle. I recognize my number across the bottom. “Do you know what this does?” Again, I nod.

            He smiles and clicks the button. I don’t have time to react before I’m on the ground, dizzy. Within seconds he has me pinned. I scream. He reaches up a hand to cover my mouth and nose.

            “Don’t. Say. Anything,” he says slowly and clearly. He moves his hand away and I stay silent, gasping for air. There’s really no point bothering to silence me. He knows as well as I do he can’t get in trouble for this. It’s perfectly acceptable now. I know from books that there was a time when it wasn’t, but I’m not supposed to have that information.

            He gathers my wrists in one hand, making my arm burn again, and pins them over my head. I close my eyes and a tear slips out. I figured it’d happen eventually. I’m sixteen, so I’ve been lucky to have gone this long without being chosen.

 

            I follow Arnes home willingly. The ring around my neck is now red, signaling that I belong to someone. My mom will be told not to expect me. Not that she cares; no one does. That’s just how things work.

            “You’ll call me Mahre,” he instructs me. His first name. I say nothing, eyes on the ground. He spins around, grabs my throat, and shoves me roughly back against the wall, his hand tight enough that I can barely breath. “Understand?”

            “Yes,” I force out. He removes his hand and I drop to the ground, already weak. He ignores me and grabs an apple from a bowl in the kitchen – a ratty, torn apart room with a single flickering light bulb. A typical North Carolina house room.

            Standing in a corner, I watch quietly. I don’t know what I’m expected to do. So I stand and I wait until he’s done with the apple and walks over to me, grabbing my hair in a fist and pulling me with him. He drags me into a room with no door and throws me down onto a “bed’ of old pillows and dirty sheets on the floor in the otherwise empty space. Mahre leans over me, his breath right in my face, and presses his lips to mine, forcing his tongue in my mouth. I squirm. I don’t want him anywhere near me. It’s just instinct. I feel the shock around my neck course through my body, making me limp. My fight is over. For now.

 

            School is dreadful the next day. My collar’s red, so everyone knows I’ve been chosen. The rumors are already flying; most of the school knows it’s Arnes. When we walk into his class, everyone goes silent and watches the ground. Throughout class, eyes dart at me then quickly look away, as if they’re ashamed to be in class with me. Many of the other girls have been taken too, so I don’t understand why I’m so much of a big deal.

            “Sybil,” a voice calls emotionlessly. I look up from my place in the run-down hall where I’m eating some stale crackers for lunch. A boy I don’t recognize is approaching me. I get up to walk away. I’m sick of being teased.

            “Wait up,” he says, gently taking hold of my elbow. It tingles where he’s touched it, and I pull it away. I’m not used to other kids getting close to me. “I’m Ellic,” he informs me. “New here. The headmaster told me to find you, and that you’d show me around.”

            I eye him carefully. People never do anything unless it’s for their own good, or they’re instructed to. Not in this world, in this time. I’ve heard other things in the books I’m not supposed to have, but I don’t know how much is true. Maybe none. The government says things have always been this way; people function better as a whole if they don’t feel things. Especially love. It’s the one word we’re forbidden to speak. That doesn’t matter much, since no one believes in it anyway. Most of us aren’t even sure what it is. They just tell us it can destroy us. It’s just a fear tactic, though. It doesn’t really even exist. Those who could feel things died out because they simply couldn’t win the “survival of the fittest” contest.

            “Yeah, whatever.” I lead him down the hall, and I can feel him watching me. Guys often do. It couldn’t possibly make me more uncomfortable. I don’t want what they want. My long, straight, black hair falls in front of my shoulders and over my back, short bangs over my forehead. My eyes are an absolutely piercing emerald, unnaturally so. My skin is light but unblemished, except for the small, crescent-shaped birthmark on the side of my neck. I’m thin, but not frightfully so.

            “Um, thanks,” he says when I’m done. My eyes widen and I turned around.

            “What did you just say?” I ask, incredulous. I hadn’t heard that word outside of my books. He stutters.

            “Nothing. Sorry. Zoned out,” he replies, before hurrying away. I narrow my eyes but say nothing as I turn and head ‘home.’

 

2

Blind Leading Blinder

           

            I keep flashing back to meeting Ellic in the hall. There was something very strange about him. Something that made me uncomfortable.

            Mahre is gone most of the day, so I am pretty much left to my own devices. I sit on the couch and tried to figure out what it was that was different about Ellic. For one, he’d been polite to me. He’d held doors open, said thank you…. I close my eyes and sigh. No use thinking about it too hard. It’ll only confuse me more.

            A hand covers my mouth and nose before I notice there is anyone near me. “Don’t move,” the voice belonging to my attacker whispers. I swallow. I feel a prick in my neck and become aware of myself growing tired and limp before the world shuts down around me.

            I wake up slowly, feeling very weak. Something had been around my wrists and ankles, chafing my skin raw – I could feel that – but it isn’t there now.

            “You’ve been out almost a day,” a voice speaks. My eyes snap open. Ellic meets my eyes. I knew he was weird, but this was just obnoxious.

            “What the hell is this about? Why did you kidnap me?” I demand angrily.

            “I didn’t, Sybil. I honestly don’t know who did, or where they are now. They were unconscious when I got you out of there,” he says. His voice sounds strange. I can’t identify it, but there’s something other than apathy there. I’ve never heard a tone like that before. “I was worried,” he admits. I inch away, panicking. Doesn’t he know anything?

            “Shut up!” I hiss. I’m freaking out. He reaches out and wraps my hand gently in his. My mother used to do something similar when she’d drag me along as a child, though her grip was rough and painful; his is soft and warm.

            “No one’s going to hear what you say here. It’s safe, I promise.”  I hesitate, swallowing. He sits on the edge of the couch I’m lying on and drops my hand.

            “Don’t you have to go home or something?” I ask. He replies with a grim look.

            “I have nowhere to go. No one to go to.” There is a long pause here. I cannot think of anything to say. “You have it, too, don’t you?” He asks abruptly.

            “What?” I say, bemused.

            “The ability to feel. Emotions. Joy, as the sun rises in beautiful colours. Despair when something goes horribly wrong.”

            “No,” I protest. “You’re wrong! And I have to tell them…. You can’t say things like that!” I’m verging on hysterics. He reaches out to clutch my hand again and calm me down.

            “I’m sorry. Breathe. You don’t have to tell anyone anything,” he comforts me. Suddenly, I know his tone. It’s only instinct; I have nothing to compare it too, but I’m sure. Care. He cares what happens to me.

            The word itself seems unfamiliar, even just thinking it. He’d said ‘I’m sorry.’ This puzzles me. I’ve read that, but never heard it said. It’s polite to say when you’ve done something bad, but I’m not sure what exactly what it is as an emotion.

            “Where am I?” I whimper. It’s too dim to see anything around me. He hesitates.

            “Where I live. It’s an old building.”  Here he pauses. He seems nervous. “An abandoned library.”

            My eyes go wide, and I struggle to sit up. “Are there still, you know… books?” I ask, excited. I don’t care that this is forbidden. This could give me every answer I’ve ever wanted. He nods, smiling.

            “A lot. The government doesn’t know this place exists, and if they find out… well, I think you know.” 

            “They’ll kill us, and destroy all of it,” I murmur. “I’m not going to let that happen.”

            I slowly get off the couch, placing my bare feet on the carpeted floor. He keeps my hand in his, and leads me gently, one step at a time, to one of the shelves. He pulls out a flashlight and switches it on, illumining the spines of dusty old tomes. My eyes open wide with amazement as he pulls one out.

            “You should read this,” he says, handing it to me. “It’s hard to figure out at first, but you’ll get used to it.” I take it in my hands and brush some cobwebby dust off the front. The title reads Romeo and Juliet: A Play by William Shakespeare.

            “You have Shakespeare?” I gasp. He grins at me. I’ve heard the name mentioned in high regards among the few books I’ve actually managed to get my hands on, all of which I’ve read at least five times. I go to tuck it in my bag, but he stops me.

            “We’ll read it together. Here. Okay?” He asks. I nod enthusiastically.

            “Who else knows about this?” I inquire.

            “Just us. No one else is like us, Sybil.”

            “You keep saying things like that. What do you mean?” I’m confused and a little freaked out.

            He sighs. “How to explain this…. You and I are the only ones left, that I’ve ever met, who still know how to feel things in our hearts. Who can still tell what they really want, what they love.” This time, I don’t cringe in fear when he says that. If someone were listening, they’d have turned us in by now. “We actually care about other people, even when they don’t care back. Think about it. If you saw someone attacking someone else, what would you do?”

            My answer is automatic. “Try to stop the fight. What else could I do?”

            “Do you know anyone else who would even pause to watch?” he points out. My lips part. I’ve never actually thought about it. “Exactly. Doesn’t this world feel somehow empty to you? Look around-” he moves the flashlight around the enormous room, with its beautiful wooden arched ceilings, patterned carpet, and shelves upon shelves of worn volumes. “Do you see this? This is forbidden. This is viewed as… what is it viewed as, Sybil? I can’t say it’s seen as wrong, because no one even understands right and wrong anymore. This should be open to everyone. Everyone ought to have the chance to feel: to love, to want, to cry. There’s so, so much this world is missing; they are blind, not in the eyes, but in the soul. And the worst of it is how blindly they follow the blinder. All of them are capable of caring, they just don’t know how. The eyes of their souls is what has to be opened, and this is all that can do it.

            “When people first started all this madness – and that’s what this is, Sybil. It’s madness. When people started this, they knew what they were doing. The government lied to everyone. Slowly but surely, every body became more and more distant from its soul, gradually losing the ability to love, to rejoice, to mourn, to miss. This made an easier population to control, giving the leaders all the power they could ever have asked for. Those leaders’ children were the last chance. If they’d had the courage to speak up, they could have stopped this. But they didn’t, and with them died the last hope of saving the human race from its own mindlessness. By now even the highest class of leaders is under the same spell of numbness as everyone else.”

            I’m silent for a moment when he’s done. This is the history they leave out, but I’d pieced it mostly together anyway. Having Ellic confirm it, however, chilled me.

            “Then why aren’t we… blind?” I whisper. He glances away.

            “I don’t have the answers to everything. I can only hope that we’ll find them in time. Anyway, you should get home.” Ellic chokes out this last word as if it tasted bad. “It’s beyond wrong, how they treat girls. It’s not fair.” I glance into his eyes, shocked at his words.

            “Excuse me?” I ask. I didn’t hear him correctly. What he just said was beyond against the law. “You’re speaking against the Law!”

            “Shh. Calm down. Screw the Law, Sybil. What you know in your heart is so much more important.”

            “I’m scared. And you’re not helping. They’d do horrible things to us if they knew what we were talking about!”

            “Then we’re going to have to stop them,” he replies placidly. My breath catches.

            “No. You can’t be serious. Are you insane?” I start getting hysteric. “Let me go!” He stands silently and waits for me to stop freaking out. When I finally do, he looks me in the eye.

            “How did the Earth begin, Sybil?” he asks abruptly. I’m surprised by the question.

            “Um, the big bang. Everyone knows that. Why?”

            “What was before that?”  he challenges. I pause. I’ve never thought about that.

            “Nothing, I guess.”

            “Then how did it happen?” he continues. “There had to be something, right? Something that wanted our world. Something that cared.” I truly don’t see where he’s going with this. “I have a little something for you.”  He turns around and pulls open the drawer of a desk and pulls out a thick, leather book that looks like it’s been opened and read from about a thousand times. Faded gold lettering over the brown cover reads, “The Holy Bible” in fancy script. It’s simple over all, but somewhat hypnotic.

            “It’s a difficult read,” he warns me. “But definitely worth it.” I nod. This time, he lets me place it in my bag. “Now go on. Don’t be late. You can come back sometime soon, okay?” Again, I nod, speechless, and head out.

           

            I try to get back into the house quietly, expecting Mahre to still be finishing things up at work. Unsurprisingly, I’m not that lucky.

            “Where the hell were you?” Mahre growls furiously, grabbing my arms tightly and throwing me against the wall. I fight back tears; they would only give him satisfaction.

            “Studying!” I protest. “With the new kid. He’s smart; I figured I could get answers off him.” It pains me to lie like this, but I have no choice. It’s perfectly legal for Mahre to injure or even kill me. He glares at me furiously but starts to lower the gun he’d been holding against my forehead. My heart begins to slow down. But it shouldn’t have been so relieved. He pulls the trigger and tearing pain fills my chest. I brace myself against the wall, refusing to cry out or even lose my footing. I will not give into him.

            “You don’t do a damn thing without my permission. Understood? Ever!” I’m trying so hard not to cry or give myself to unconsciousness.

            “Understood.” He shoves me down and kicks my left side, where he’d shot me, for good measure before walking away.

            I find some first aid materials in the closet and start taking care of myself. The pain is overwhelming, but I can handle it long enough to tie something around me and slow down the bleeding. Soon after I do so, the agony drags me into unconsciousness.

            I’m silent the next day. First period passes by, most of the class ignoring my bandages and blood-stained clothing. No one even seems to notice until lunch. I usually eat under a tree outside where no one can see me. Today, Ellic finds me there.

            “Hey,” he says with a smile. I avoid his eyes. “Were you okay getting home yester--” He freezes, seeing my clothes and attempt at self-medical assistance. “No. God, please, no. I’m so sorry. I’m such an idiot.” Ellic drops to his knees next to me. I’m not sure what the second word he’d said was, but I ignore it. I don’t care much right now.

            “It’s not your fault,” I say. I surprise myself. I want to comfort him. I want him to be happy.

            “Yes it is, and you know it.” He then proceeds to do a few very strange things. He touches his forehead, chest, left shoulder, and right shoulder, then closes his eyes and starts whispering something I can’t quite make out. The last oddity he commits involves wrapping his arms gently around me like a blanket. He pulls me close to him, protectively. Some deep instinct compels me to do the same, resting my head on his shoulder.

            “I’m sorry,” he whispers.

            “It’s okay,” I assure him.

            “We’re going to get out of here. You and I, we’re going to find a way out. I promise.”

            I don’t argue with him, even though I know it’s risky. I’ll do anything at this point.

            “I bet you I can get that collar off. It may hurt, though.” I tell him I don’t care. He nods thoughtfully. “All right. We’ll figure it out.”

            As he gets up to walk away, I watch him, and start to get this strange fluttery sensation in my chest, like nervousness but in a good way. A very good way.