Escape from Eden (6 page)

The Reverend stood, pushing himself up from his throne. “Have someone watch her.”

Thaddeus, who had been charging toward me, paused. “May I suggest she stay with Grizz, sir?”

“Yes.” The Reverend grinned. A wide, callous grin. “With Grizz.”

* * *

I heard the rhythmic thumping sound before the jungle opened up into the clearing. Thaddeus walked behind me. He hadn’t spoken since snagging my arm and dragging me through Edenton to an unlit path I’d never been down before. I’d never needed to in the six years I’d been in Edenton. Because it led to the cemetery.

Thaddeus’s flashlight cut a swath of light across the dark path. My shadow, walking stiffly, stretched out and made its way over the knotted roots and fallen leaves, then into the clearing. There was no breeze. Heat radiated from the surrounding jungle. Thaddeus reached down and opened a rusting iron gate set into a concrete threshold. Headstones poked out of the ground like crooked teeth. In the flickering torchlight, two figures stood, one shoveling, the other standing, arms folded, watching the other with disinterest.

“Grizz!” Thaddeus called.

Grizz’s hulking silhouette lumbered over. He hitched his gun strap over his shoulder and jerked his chin at us.

“You said eleven, right?” Grizz asked Thaddeus. “The kid’s digging the fifth one now.”

In the distance, Gabriel sunk the shovel into the earth and threw the dirt into a pile. Clots of soil tumbled down the mound, scattering on the ground.

“Only five so far?” Thaddeus said, shining the flashlight in Grizz’s eyes.

He held up his hand to shield his face. “Yeah, but the ground’s soft. He’ll have them done soon enough.”

“Here’s another to help.” Thaddeus blinded me with the flashlight. “Mia needs to reflect on her actions during Bright Night. Give her a shovel and put her to work.”

Grizz shrugged. “Okay. Come on, Mia.”

“Wait,” I said, looking at Thaddeus. “You’re going to make me dig their graves?”

“Yes.” He handed me to Grizz and turned back to the path. “Oh, and Grizz,” Thaddeus called over his shoulder, “why don’t you help dig, too? We’ll need to bury the bodies soon. We can’t leave them on the beach in this heat.”

Grizz cursed under his breath, but not loud enough for Thaddeus to hear. “No problem,” he said.

Gabriel looked up as we approached, wiping his brow with the shoulder of his shirt. “Grizz, you didn’t tell me we’d have visitors. I would have made tea.”

“Shut up.” Grizz handed me a shovel. “All the graves are outlined with spray paint. Start digging here.” He pointed to an orange rectangle painted on the patchy ground.

I glanced at the shallow, open graves lined up next to the one Gabriel was digging; beyond them I saw the gravestones of Edenton residents long since gone. I didn’t recognize most of the names, except for Eduardo, Enrique and Angél’s father, Edenton’s original fisherman. It had been a while since anyone had died in Edenton. The milky-white marble of the headstones remembered who and when, but not how. I was glad for it. I didn’t want anyone to remember how these eleven people died.

“Mia,” Grizz said, snapping his fingers.

I blinked. The weight of the shovel in my hands made everything that was happening so real. “I don’t know if I can do this, Grizz.”

“I’ve seen you train,” he said. “You can lift weights, you can dig a damn hole in the ground.”

“That’s not what I—”

Grizz cut me off, thrusting a pair of work gloves in my face. “Dig. I’m going to get another shovel. If either of you moves from this spot, I will hunt you down myself, got that?”

“Promise?” Gabriel asked.

Grizz slumped visibly and sighed. “You are exhausting, Gabriel.” He pulled up one of the torch lights wedged in the dirt and walked away, leaving us to dig.

“Why can’t you do this?” Gabriel asked once Grizz was out of earshot.

I stared down at the shovel, the dull metal blade against the rich dirt beneath my feet, and wondered whose body would be buried in this grave.

“Doesn’t matter,” I said, stabbing the shovel into the ground. It sunk into the dirt easily enough, but with each thwack of the blade, I counted in my head to eleven, then began again.

Gabriel watched me for a few moments. “You knew them? The ones that died?”

“Of course.”

“Grizz told me about it. He sounded like, I don’t know, almost proud about how clever the Reverend was. The Flock learning a lesson in greed and all that shit.” He paused, regarding me with a thoughtful expression. “You know what the Reverend did was screwed up, right? Stuff like that doesn’t happen in the outside world. Well, it may, but there are investigations and people get caught and go on trial for murder.”

Shame and anger rose up in my throat. The Reverend had made me an accessory to murder. “I know what the Reverend did was wrong.”

Gabriel looked surprised. “Really?”

“I know wrong from right.” I stopped shoveling and met Gabriel’s gaze. “And do you know how they died?”

“Something about poison in food?”

“Cookies. Poisoned cookies.” I poked the shovel into the ground. “That I baked.”

“Oh. Okay,” he said, nodded once, and went back to shoveling.

I leaned against the handle of the shovel. “You don’t seem too surprised that I murdered eleven people.”

“You didn’t do it,” he said.

“How do you know?”

“You just told me you knew wrong from right.” He threw a shovelful of dirt on the pile. “You wouldn’t have knowingly put poison in any cookies.”

“You’re right,” I said.

“Of course I am.” He shot me a sly smile. “Like I said, I thought you were different from the rest of the Flock. Any one of them would have done it without blinking an eye. And wouldn’t feel bad about it afterward. Like you do.”

We dug without speaking for a while, the thwacking sounds from the shovels ringing through the trees.

“You want to hear another reason how I know you’re not a murderer?” Gabriel whispered.

The gate squeaked, heralding Grizz’s entrance. He trudged forward dragging a shovel behind him.

I nodded, stealing a quick glance at Grizz.

Gabriel leaned toward me. “Because, Mia, I’m a murderer.”

When I entered the dining hall through the swinging kitchen doors the next morning the talking stopped. I heard the tinny sound of silverware clanking against plates. The squeaking ceiling fans hanging from the rafters. Birds shrieking outside the open windows. But no one spoke. I grabbed a large gray bin from the cart and scanned the long tables for dirty plates. Backs stiffened as I passed. I reached between Enrique and Angél, both reeking of fish, and they gave me a wide berth, as if I were the one who stank.

Across the table from me, Juanita collected the breadbaskets. She grinned in thanks as Enrique stacked baskets and handed them to her. I tried to catch her gaze but she turned away the moment our eyes met. And she wasn’t the only one. A stack of dirty plates was shoved in my direction. When I looked down to thank Suzanne, she twisted in her seat and I kindly thanked the back of her head. I threw the plates in the bin and took bitter satisfaction at her startled wince.

Speaking out against the Reverend was like speaking out against God Himself. The Flock would outcast me for my heresy until the Reverend told them I was to be forgiven. I wasn’t expecting that commandment to be handed down any time soon.

Mama sat with Max at the end of the next table. Jin Sang was seated next to Bae John. His dark eyes were like hers, but his caramel-colored hair sometimes caused me to wonder about his father. I collected the plates at the edge of the table and Max glanced up, stealing a smile at me while Mama whispered to Jin Sang. Jin Sang’s small arms reached out and hugged Mama, giving her a consoling pat on the back. Hiding her face from me until I walked away.

I took a deep, calming breath and trudged to the corner of the dining hall with the bin full of dishes and slid it on the cart. My eyes stung, lids heavy with exhaustion. I was beginning to feel every movement of my muscles in my arms and back, the hours of shoveling until dawn taking their toll.

“Agatha needs you in the kitchen,” Juanita said from behind me, her words cold and flat.

I nodded over my shoulder at her but didn’t try to meet her eyes again. I rolled the cart through the dining hall. In that minefield of disregard, I felt the weight of a solitary gaze on me. Gabriel tracked my progress to the kitchen. He sat with the rest of the boys from his cottage, next to the empty space once occupied by Octavio. The end of his hair was wet and curled around his face and neck, like he’d showered. He didn’t smile. Didn’t nod. Simply watched me, as if flipping a decision over in his head.

What had he meant—he was a murderer? Once Grizz had returned to the graveyard, we couldn’t talk anymore. I’d spent the rest of the time wondering and stealing glances at Gabriel as he worked. If what he’d said was true though, and he was a murderer, wouldn’t he be in prison? That’s how they punished people in the outside world, wasn’t it?

I backed through the swinging doors to the kitchen, towing the cart along. Aliyah and Bridgette mechanically scraped out large frying pans over the trash cans. Dina pulled the buffet servers from the service line. Without even turning their heads, they seemed to sense my presence and immediately tensed.

“Mia,” Agatha snapped. She stood in the center of the kitchen wearing a spotless white apron. She pointed to the magnetic strip over my workstation. “Where is your chef’s knife?”

My pulse quickened. I looked over at my station. I’d arranged my knives so the empty space would be less noticeable. But they’d been reorganized, sizes descending in perfect order, a yawning gap where the chef’s knife should be.

“It’s got to be around here somewhere,” I said, keeping my voice steady on the lie. It wasn’t exactly a lie. Gabriel still had it, so it was around here. Somewhere.

Bridgette turned back to her frying pan, her mouth half-twisted with satisfaction.

A flush of anger heated my cheeks. I shoved down the rage and faced Agatha.

“Find it,” she said. “Those are expensive knives. We can’t just be leaving them about!” She threw an open palm at the cart. “Load the dishwasher and then I have a new assignment for you.”

I sighed inwardly. I placed the dishes I’d collected in the washer and set it for a two-minute cycle. When I turned back around, I caught Aliyah, expression wrought with pity, flicking a glance in my direction. I ignored her. I didn’t want her pity. I didn’t want Bridgette’s vengeance. I didn’t want Agatha’s wrath. But it all swarmed around me like flies.

“Now,” Agatha said, hitching her hands on her waist. “The traps need to be cleaned.”

“Traps?” I asked, and heard a snicker from Bridgette. “The grease traps?”

Agatha shot Bridgette a warning look. “No, Mia. The rodent traps. Once we’re finished in here, you’re to empty the traps from around the kitchen and the trash bins in the back. After lunch service, you need to take the carcasses and burn them.”

“I … what?” I glanced around the room, at those dark and shadowy places under the counters and behind the refrigerators. “Isn’t there someone else who does that?”

Agatha’s eyebrows lowered, three creases appearing between them. “Excuse me? Are you implying that you’re too good to clean the traps?”

“Uh, no, I didn’t say that—”

“See here, young lady,” she said, pointing a bony finger at me. “I’m not sure who you think you are, or what you think you have been put on God’s Green Earth to do, but it is to serve the Reverend and the good people of Edenton. You are going to clean out those traps. You are going to burn those carcasses, and you may end up doing it again if you don’t watch what comes out of that smart mouth of yours, understand?”

I nodded, fighting back the score of angry words I wanted to scream in her bitter, haggard face.

“Girls,” Agatha said. “Get this kitchen cleaned up quickly. It’s going to take Mia a couple hours to collect and empty the traps. And I want them cleaned out of here before we begin lunch service.” She curled her lip. “I don’t want those disgusting things anywhere near my food. We don’t want to serve any contaminated food,” she eyed me, “do we, Mia?”

* * *

The acrid, smoky smell clung to me as I pushed open the door to my cottage. Inside, the bunks were made, blankets pulled tight over the mattresses, and the other girls’ aprons missing from the pegs on the wall. Except for two. Mine and Lily’s.

Fading sunlight edged through the blinds, enough that I didn’t bother turning on the light. The fan circled overhead, wafting down the stink of my hair and cooling the layers of sweat and smoke coating my skin. My gray dress was streaked with black, and, I noticed then, dried blood. I checked myself for cuts or scrapes, but found none, and ripped open the dress from the neck, peeling it off of me. I wasn’t going to pull that thing over my head. I emptied the deep pockets, throwing my ID tag and a burned stick wrapped in plastic onto my bed.

In the bathroom, the sink still had pooling water around the edges of the drain. So I hadn’t missed the girls by that much time. I was relieved to not have to face them—even if it was just until dinner service was over. Agatha hadn’t wanted me anywhere near the kitchen in my current condition, and I was thankful for it. I’d been granted an hour to shower and dress and I planned on using all of it, if not a little more.

I twisted the shower on and stuck my hand into the stream of water, knowing I’d have to wait for it to get hot. I went back in the bedroom, and eyed Lily’s bunk. Someone had made it. I touched the blanket, and wondered who would fill that bunk next. Would she come and go as quickly as Lily had? I shook the thought away. Lily had died, not escaped. And death wasn’t preferable to living in Edenton, was it?

I snatched the stick off my bed, unwrapped the plastic I’d snuck from the kitchen, and grabbed my sketchbook from the trunk. After I erased a patch from an old drawing, I scratched the end of the stick onto the paper, and watched the charcoal scrape across the surface. The color was rich, no reflection in it like the lead of the pencil.

It wasn’t until I noticed the steam pouring from the bathroom that I really looked at the image I’d drawn. Gabriel stared back at me, the way he’d looked last night. Face half-draped in shadow, the light of the torch outlining the strength of his jaw, the straight line of his nose, that cherry-skin indentation on his bottom lip. I liked looking at him, I realized. The way he spoke, the way he moved. Was that normal in the outside world? Because it didn’t seem normal in Edenton.