3

Till this Night

            I have Arnes’ class first today, so after that I ditch. No one would notice me. I meet up with Ellic about a mile off campus and we head to his place.

            “I know how to get the collar off, you know,” he informs me. For some reason, this doesn’t surprise me. I’m not really sure there’s anything he doesn’t know.

            “If that were possible, plenty of people would have done it already,” I argue. He smiles mischievously at me. “Oh, no.”

            “But no one cares about anyone else, and you can’t do it yourself. See, the second party must get a hold of the remote, because the person whose collar the remote is connected to cannot touch the remote without a violent shock. But I can. And I can disable it, and remove the collar.”

            I look at him like he’s crazy. He’s sure talking like it. But, before I can stop myself, I give him my consent. This would be all I needed to get out of this place.

            He smiles widely and slips out before I’m able to say anything. He’s going to do it now? I sit down at one of the desks and pull the Holy Bible out of my bag. I stare at the cover for a moment before flipping it open and reading from the first sentence I see.

            Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing. For waters shall burst forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert. The parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water; In the habitation of jackals, where each lay, there shall be grass with reeds and rushes. I scan over a little further to: But the redeemed shall walk there, and the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with singing, with everlasting joy on their heads. They shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.

            Now, I stop. This could be it. With the release of books, Ellic and I would have to spread this. Something just tells me that. I’m not sure who the Lord is, but he seems like a good guy. I get the impression he wants to help, and that he’s out there somewhere. But if so, why hasn’t he done anything yet?

            Ellic had told me specifically to read the beginning. So I do. I open to the very beginning of all of it. It’s about someone – more like something – much bigger than we, called God. God is full of power and he created the whole world. Ellic had told me not to take everything literally; a lot of it was metaphorical. But I understood. God created the world, though probably through the Big Bang. It was empty and dark, and God made it full and brilliant. God brought light to a place of constant night. Maybe it’s not too late to do something like that for our world, but, of course, on a much more minor scale than creating a universe.

            After flipping through for a while, one particular phrase sticks out. With God, all things are possible. I’m not entirely sure I believe all this God stuff, but I want to. And it won’t hurt to try it out, right? He gave his son, part of himself, for all of us humans to have eternal life with him. And his son was totally cool with that. I wonder if I could sacrifice myself for one other person, let alone the human race. Rough though my life may be, dying terrifies me more.

            Right then, my collar gives a light buzz and a mechanical voice says, “Deactivated.” I grin and reach up to unclip it; it comes off easily.

            “Thank you so much!” I exclaim as Ellic enters the library. He smiles.

            “My pleasure.”  I start to wonder if maybe it really is. He seems to… like me. Not only accept my existence, but enjoy it. At this moment, I come to the realisation that I feel the same way about him. I want him to be around me. To be my friend, I think the books call it.

            “Can’t they track my collar’s recent locations?” I inquire nervously.

            “Nope,” he replies happily. “It’s all been erased. You’re safe here.” An overwhelming sense of relief surges through my body. It’s unfamiliar. For the first time, I’m really free. I can do anything I want to. I can do something totally crazy. But I don’t. Instead, I sit down to read Romeo and Juliet with Ellic.

            The time passes extremely quickly, but I have nowhere to be anymore. I do feel safe here, with Ellic. It might not make sense, logically, but I feel like he can protect me from anything. My mind wanders back to my earlier train of thought. I do believe I would die for Ellic, if no one else. Why? I wonder. It doesn’t make sense. I really haven’t even known him very long.
            “‘Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight! For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night,’” Ellic reads aloud. There is a second’s pause as he glances at me, a pensive look on his face. The carpet suddenly becomes very interesting to me. He clears his throat lightly and turns back to reading. As it starts to dim outside, my stomach begins to sound annoyed with me. He closes the book, sticking a scrap of paper in to mark the page, and goes to find a bit of bread and fruit for our dinner. Not long after, I fall very much asleep in my chair.

            I wake up in a warm, soft bed. A real bed, with a nice mattress and everything. Not the ratty, torn up old ones we had at my house. I scrape the sleep crust out of my eyes and wait for them to un-blur. Beside me, open wide, is a door, opening into a large closet full of clothes and shoes and such from long before my time.

            I find myself wandering in before I stop to think about it. My fingers trail across satin nightdresses, pretty fur coats, and leather boots, as well as simple things like jeans and tees. Almost none of it is still worn, but I still recognize most of what I find.

            “The entire back side of the library was used as a boarding house long ago,” Ellic’s voice speaks behind me. Not one to be startled, I calmly turn around. “A girl about your aged lived here, as you can see.”

            “Thank you,” I reply softly. He really is a blessing. I wonder if maybe God is watching out for me after all.

            “Of course. You’re the first person I’ve met who’s still really, truly human inside. I want to make sure that stays the way it is. And letting that twisted son of a--” He clears his throat. “Letting him hurt you would only take that away from you, Sybil.”

            “You really think he could take that from me?” I ask, shivering. Something about that… well, it was a close call.

            “The human mind can only take so much before it snaps. Yes, he would have broken you eventually. But, Sybil, that’s not going to happen, okay?” He seems very sure of this, so I decide to believe him. It can’t hurt.