Beautiful Blue World (2 page)

I DREAMED OF SUMMER.

Sun bright, woods green; Megs smiling and sparkling, skipping along with her hand in mine. The way we spent all the best days, headed to the stream, shoes and socks forgotten.

The war forgotten.

But Megs pulled away from me suddenly and started wailing.

“Megs?”

She didn't seem to hear me. She kept screaming.

“Megs!”

I couldn't shout loud enough for her to hear me; the sounds caught in my throat.

Then it was dark.

I wasn't in the woods anymore.

I was in my room.

It wasn't Megs wailing.

Sirens!

I hauled my sisters out of their bed.

Kammi hurried down the stairs in front of me; Tye, only five, remained limp and drowsy and confused. I scooped her up, her head drooping on my shoulder as I rushed downstairs.

We found our coats and shoes at the front door, hung on hooks and lined neatly in a row, the way we always left them.

Father hurried down the stairs, straightening his green street-patrol uniform.

“Why are you wearing that?” I asked, shouting over the sirens. “It's not your night.”

“Everyone from Street Safety has to report if the sirens go off.”

He met my eyes in the dark.

If he didn't go, he could be fined. Or imprisoned. Or worse—taken to the border to fight. Even though he was older than most soldiers. Even though he was our father and we needed him.

Mother appeared behind Father, her face tight as she looked away from him to her girls, counting us in one glance. She met my eyes, too, but only for a second.

We were to go to the Hellers' basement to await the catastrophe.

Father was not.

“Be good, Big.” Father brushed his nose lightly against my ear.

I used to be Little, a long time ago, before Kammi came, but since she was born when I was four, I have been Big. When Tye came, Kammi became Middle. Little, Middle, Big.

He added, “You're
all
my Littles. Always.”

Then he was gone, out the front door.

Up and down the street, people raced across footpaths and yards.

Megs's mother, Mrs. Swiller, ran toward us, a baby and a toddler on her hips, two more little children running with clasped hands behind her, struggling to keep up.

“Where's Megs?” I stopped.

Mother lifted Tye from my arms. “Let's go, Mathilde.”

“She'll be right behind us.” Megs's mother said it like she expected it, not like she had checked.

But I would. I wouldn't go down into the cellar without Megs.

Especially not if we were going to have to live there
forever.

Aerial engines roared above us.

“Mathilde!” Mother yelled from the basement doorway.

The engines roared louder and I looked up as aerials appeared in the searchlights.

Great winged, flying machines of metal. Built for war.

Orange and black striped their wings.

Black for Tyssia, orange for their recent union with Erobern.

Our enemies.

Come on, Megs.

“Mathilde!” Mother yelled again.

Come on,
Megs! You promised you would be here with me.

I counted the aerials, the moments….

One, two, three…seven, eight…

Where was she?

Why wasn't her mother waiting, calling her like my mother was calling me?

It would kill me if Megs didn't make it, but another glance at Mother told me that
she
was going to die, right now, this instant, if I didn't get under cover.

So I ran to catch up with Mother, my heart seeming to tear.

But before I reached the door, a hand was in mine. A dark braid swung into view as someone hurtled ahead to drag us into the basement.

Megs had made it.

A single candle stub burned in the center of the bare cement floor.

“But that's it,” Mrs. Heller announced. “You should have brought your own candles.”

The three Heller children lay on a mattress on the floor, cozy and sleepy, not having had to run outside to get here, still feeling safe in their own home, even if it was the basement.

Our mothers hadn't gotten us mattresses. Maybe they hoped it wouldn't be long. Maybe the aerials would just fly overhead quickly and we'd be back home in a few minutes.

Like a fire drill, like Megs had said. No real fire.

Megs's brothers and sisters huddled in a nervous heap around their mother, squishing like the sleeping family of kittens Megs and I had discovered in a hollow tree in the woods. Mother had Tye in her lap, having eased her into her coat, and Kammi sat next to them, her hand in Mother's, though she sat up straight, wide awake.

I let go of Megs for a minute and went over to Mother. I squeezed her other hand. “I'm sorry.”

Her breath seemed too fast, too shallow. She gave me a thin smile. Not quite ready to forgive. But she loved me. So much it could drive her crazy. It was plain as the cement floor. But also as something prettier.

The sky. It was plain as the sky. A crystal-blue sky.

I leaned in to kiss her cheek.

“We're all here now,” she whispered. “You can go sit with Megs.”

I nodded.

But we weren't all here. Father wasn't. I knew she felt that, too, though she wouldn't let herself say it.

There were no fathers with us. Mr. Heller, like Megs's father, was a few years younger than mine and had also been sent to fight. Nobody who'd been sent to fight had come back. I'd been relieved Father was too old, but what was the difference? He'd been separated from us anyway, and we might never see him again.

I joined Megs sitting against an empty stretch of wall.

“What took you so long?” I asked.

She shrugged.

We told each other everything; why couldn't she answer me?

“This isn't so bad,” Megs said. “If there was more light, we could study or read or draw or something. It could be like a sleepover.”

She meant to help me feel better. But pretending it was a sleepover wouldn't make me forget that Father was out there, somewhere. In danger. I didn't dare explain with Mother and Kammi listening. I didn't want them to worry even more.

The rumblings of aerial engines increased, as if dozens flew over all at once. Then came thuds and pops. With each burst, the house rumbled above us.

I looked up at the ceiling. Mother let out a long, strained sigh.

Was this basement too shallow, too?

The thudding, popping bursts grew closer together. Louder. Overlapping.

The pops shook the ground. We jumped.

Depending on who jumped first, Megs and I would give the other's hand a squeeze. Twice we squeezed too early, waiting for the jump when no pop came. We both giggled.

Probably not the best time to do that.

Mrs. Heller erupted. “Fighting right over our heads now, aiming to kill us all.”

Mother shushed her. “You'll frighten the children.”

“I'm getting mine out of here, quick as I can.” She nodded toward her children. “You'd best do the same. Sign your oldests up for that test. Maybe that's the way out.”

My eyes met Mother's.

The posters had appeared a few weeks ago:

CHILDREN AGES 12–14

SERVE YOUR COUNTRY NOW!

SIGN UP FOR THE ADOLESCENT ARMY APTITUDE TEST AT YOUR SCHOOL!

We were children age twelve, me and Megs.

We hadn't spoken of it. Not me and Mother, not me and Megs.

What did the army want children for?

Mother held my gaze, then said to Mrs. Heller, “Do we know it's better?”

“They could be teaching them to fly aerials. The lighter the bodies, the better. But maybe they're just going to keep them safe, deep underground, so when our whole world is gone, there will be someone to remember it. Make those smarties memorize all of history.”

The whole world, gone?

“Anything would be better than sitting here,” Mrs. Heller said.

Mother was still looking at me.

The candle puffed out suddenly, and I was glad.

But Megs's grip on my hand had become a little looser.

The second round of sirens—the all-clear—sounded about two hours before dawn, and we trudged home to our beds. The air outside had a thick, sour smell, the sky an orange glow.

The aerials were gone.

They had been replaced with shouts, and wailing; not mechanical sirens, but human ones.

Mother hurried us inside. She didn't even let us pause to hang up our coats.

“Can Father come home now?” Kammi asked.

“Go to bed; he should be here soon.” But a new crease across Mother's forehead said that she had no idea when, or whether, to expect him. Normally he'd be home by seven a.m. But with that strange glow in the sky…that smoke…the shouts and cries…

Tye was still sleeping as I lay her in her bed.

“Can I get in with you instead?” Kammi whispered.

“Course.”

We climbed into my bed with our coats on. The room was cold, and my sheets felt crisp as I covered us.

“Will we see Father again?” Kammi whispered. I knew she didn't want Mother to hear.

“I think so.”

“Was that…bombing?”

“I think so.”

“Other places have been bombed. I've seen them in news pictures.”

“That's true.” My mind had always struggled to understand the black-and-white newsprint photos; it looked like they showed the empty shells of buildings.

“But here was always safe. We were always safe. Father was always safe.”

“Shh…shh…” I ran my fingers down her face, smoothing her hair back, wiping hot tears off her cold cheeks. “It's okay now. It's okay. You can sleep.”

But I didn't sleep until her breathing slowed and I was sure that she had gone first.

MY EYES FELT GLUED
TOGETHER,
but I didn't try to go back to sleep.

No, something had woken me.

The kitchen was warm and smelled of coffee and milk.

My arms wrapped around him, my face pressed against his.

“Father!”

He laughed, setting down his steaming mug to hug me. “How'd it go, Big?”

“Fine. How did—” But I caught sight of Mother's face and sat down at the table for my tea and toast.

Kammi appeared in the doorway and flung herself at Father like I had, but she stayed in his lap, even though she was eight years old, and Mother, smiling, brought over Kammi's plate and mug and set them at Father's place.

Tye showed up last and asked, “Why am I sleeping in my coat?”

And, despite everything, the rest of us laughed.

But as we got ready to head out the door to school, Father drew me aside. “Take Kammi down Heldig Street; don't go any farther east than that.”

“Why?”

“Some of the streets that way got hit. I don't want her to see it. Just head west, not east.”

“Okay.”

“Promise now?”

I nodded.

Dust—or ashes?—lined Father's clothes. His eyes looked puffy and tired.

How
had
his night been? What had he seen? What had he done?

I pressed into him in a tight hug, first getting a whiff of that odor from the bombing, then searching out the smell I knew. The post office, where he worked during the day—paper and sealing glue and cedar sorting boxes. I found it, breathed in deeply, and relaxed.

“Be good, Big. Don't forget which way to go.”

“I won't.”

Kammi's wooden soles slapped the frozen gray cobblestones as she hurried up the street ahead of me, though she turned around to look back every minute or so. Her bare knees between her skirt and kneesocks grew red and then white in the cold; her braids swung loose from her scarf.

I was curious about what had happened east of Heldig Street, but I wouldn't break my promise to Father.

Though he'd only said not to take Kammi there. He hadn't said anything about not going there on my own later.

“Mathilde!” Megs caught up with me. “I was worried that they'd cancel school.”

“Mother and Father seemed to think we were still having it.”

“I hope we are. I hope the school wasn't hit.”

We continued up the street in silence for a few more minutes, past a closed bakery and one that was still open, though the window was half empty; past a cobbler who had doubled the size of the sign that said
REPAIRS
; past a butcher:
MEAT TODAY—WHILE IT LASTS
!; past the bookshop that hadn't been repainted in years, the books themselves crumbling and yellow.

A lot of people were out, but they didn't look like they were on their way to work. Some wore blankets around their shoulders instead of coats. They leaned against houses or on steps, holding steaming tin mugs. They all looked lost. Was it—was that man's hair singed off?

There were children, too. Why didn't I recognize them? They were from my neighborhood. But their eyes were big and scared, their faces smudged with gray dirt.

Kammi, several yards ahead, skipped along, not noticing these things.

We passed a poster:
TAKE THE ADOLESCENT ARMY APTITUDE TEST
!

“Megs?”

“Mm?”

“What do you think they'll have the children do?”

“They'll probably find them places to stay.”

“No, not these children. The ones who take the test.”

“Oh. On the test? Or…after?”

“After.”

“I don't know.”

Aerials buzzed low overhead. We looked up to see our own blue-green crest markings on them.

A whole fleet of aerials, heading east.

To our borders.

Or perhaps beyond them. Into the expanding lands of Tyssia. We had been at war for a year already, though our borders had held. But with Tyssia joined with Erobern, we had to defend thousands more miles. Soon the only safe place in Sofarende would be up north, along the Cairdul Sea. Tyssia and Erobern didn't have access to the sea.

We walked in silence for a few more minutes, and then she said, “They wouldn't send children to the front lines. They wouldn't.”

Nobody would bomb children in their beds, either.

At least, I used to think nobody would.

Megs kept her eyes straight ahead, her mouth set tight.

An
I love you
for her caught in my throat. To say sorry. That I hadn't meant anything.

That I just didn't want anything to happen to her.

She turned and squeezed my hand, looking much more like her normal self.

“Don't,” she said before I could speak. “I already know.”