Gods of Anthem (31 page)

Just me.

And then, Jeremy kisses me.

Though it’s not the shock to my system as I’d dreamed, more like slipping into a warm bath—subtle and slow at first, like a handshake—and I wait for him to return to his sanity.

But he doesn’t.

So I eagerly kiss him back. And the spark grows from its place where I’d all but stamped it out; it bursts into flames—a brush fire in the middle of the Sahara, a volcano erupting to burn away every idea of love I’ve ever known.

This … could not be imagined. It alters fundamental thoughts I’d had about this type of connection. No rationalizing it, this insane sensation of complete chaos. You happily throw yourself into it, even if it’s the most idiotic and unreasonable feeling in the world.

Love being just … love.

Just me.

Just him.

And he’s kissing me harder and faster with his hands on my neck and back and face…. Earnest, meaningful kisses that, by the quickened breaths in between, are surprising to him as much as to me.

And when he finally pulls away, I still cling to his hoodie to keep from losing my knees.

Doubt follows.

“Liza,” he whispers, and I brace myself.

“Yes?”

“How will I be brave?”

My shoulders sag, and my heart breaks a little to hear the terror in his voice. I come to my senses. “Jeremy, you don’t know any other way to be.” Then, I whisper against his mouth in a new boldness, “And I’m right here. Always.”

His smile and mine, they slowly bend together, fused at the lips.

He turns to leave, yet pauses. Jeremy Writer is conflicted. Over me. My heart leaps. Selfish to notice, but oh-so-good to feel. His insane quest is momentarily on hold for this girl, right here.

He snags my arm, pulling me to his ropy, muscular body. And Jeremy brands me again, this time so hard my toes curl and my skin prickles. He marks me in ways that won’t soon be forgotten, if ever.

Very few people ever get kissed like this.

That much must be true.

A throat clears behind us, and we break away guiltily, though still smiling.

Crystal stands in the doorway, and my smile falls to realize. But she doesn’t look angry, or jealous … well, maybe a tad jealous, but mostly happy for Jeremy.

“It’s time,” she says, and the way she regards me, the strangeness since the zombie fight, is felt only momentarily before she masks her face.

It’s like she can’t figure me out, but at the same time, she’s amazed at what I’d managed. It feels good.

Jeremy nods, then leads the way, shoulders set, chin up.

Following, I try to ignore the wisdom in the meaningful look Crystal gives me. She knows Jeremy better than us all, it would seem.

Careful,
her eyes say.
Careful.

Jeremy’s
voice echoes across the sea of people. With a clear
thunk
, he adjusts the microphone, then stares out at what must be quite a sight. People—all kinds, colors, beliefs, ideals—stand outside the velvet ropes of the Authority, ready for him to say what’s next.

One night, Jeremy ranted on the roof for hours before turning to me, looking utterly terrified. “I won’t be made useless!”
he’d said.

And he meant it.

Now, at the podium, a kind of sureness overtakes him. Maybe it’s the effect of his view, or maybe it’s just normal for a man on a mission, but his face transforms into a thing of beauty.

“Peasants of the Authority,” he calls into the dead of their silence, “we beseech each and every one of you, in this war, this united fight—and it is just that: a war. When I look around, I see allies, families born into oppression, brothers related to me by more than blood … because we are chained by poverty now—poverty of the mind, and worse, poverty of the spirit. Robbed daily, though not simply of our wares. It is a mental holocaust we must fight, and together, I tell you, we can win.”

Some murmuring of agreement begins, but is quickly settled back into quiet.

“Silence…?” he says. “It is silence that imprisons us. When nothing is said, everything is agreed to, falsely. But I tell you, a man, a woman, with no voice is despair, a sister with no influence is asleep, and a brother with no honor is already dead. Slavery has no gender, no race, no class.” Jeremy sends me a sidelong glance. “We are no greater than the zombies outside of our walls, and it is time to wake up!”

The crowd cheers.

“The Authority has said: Dream! But in truth, they mete out our destinies in tiny rations; they’ve said how far we can go, how long, and where. Aspirations are useless, because to aspire, is to reach. Dream, they say, but not too big. Laugh, they say, but not too loudly. Love, they say, but not too hard.”

Now, Jeremy’s looking right at me. Avoiding Crystal, I stare straight ahead, cheeks heating.

Jeremy closes his eyes for a moment, waiting for quiet before he turns his back to the audience. In one smooth movement he pulls his shirt over his head to show three long scars from neck to rump. Lines are revealed, each several inches wide, as if someone had stripped off the skin so deeply they could never have healed without thousands of sutures.

A gasp ripples through, and some of the men nod as if they’ve seen this before. The Authority must have done this to Jeremy during his purging. A tarantula tattoo sits on his right shoulder blade.

He returns to the microphone, purple eyes somber.

“When you find you cannot contain yourself any longer and you imagine things beyond the walls they’ve built for you, constructed to imprison your desires, and when your heart is filled with impossible things, then, I say, you have achieved true independence. Our Anarchy is not simply a battle of flesh and blood; it is a war of the mind. The time is always now to declare your freedom!”

Again the crowd cheers, making the rafters shake.

“The Authority says that Anarchy is the devil. But I say that a man who’s both an anarchist and a patriot has been ordained by God himself!”

The roar is deafening. People stomp so hard, I worry they’ll send out guards.

“To talk of history, of how it was,” Jeremy goes on, “is the lament of the poor man, of those who cannot see the riches deep within. Inside the child’s mind, what we beat away, and on these dark streets, the urchins have more gold than all of you. Why? Because they go out at night, while you are in at curfew, hiding. If we seek the truth, we are never broken!

“These!” He lifts his hands. “These are your liberators! Against all Authority!”

“Against all Authority!” the Skulls yell back.

And Jeremy pounds on the microphone. “Against all Authority! Against all Authority!”

Then, the crowd begins to chant it, over and over again, each time a little bit louder, until the lights flicker high above.

Jeremy walks me
home in silence. Together, we’re lost in our thoughts. For me, I’m memorizing every nuance of our kiss. For him, this is the wake of his new treaty. The Skulls and the rogue army, side by side. Kiniva has agreed—more than agreed—they’re friends, and he’s promised, if the citizens rise, he will, too.

This is a small victory, but well won.

Crystal had even squeezed my shoulder and looked me deep in the eye with a “thank you” written across her sharp features and a hint of surprise that I’d enjoyed.

When Jeremy walks me to my door, I turn suddenly shy again. “You were wonderful,” I tell him.

“I was okay.”

“Okay? You single-handedly made the uprising international. And you gave people something they haven’t had in such a long time.”

“Pretty words?” he says.

“No.” My hand finds his cheek. “Hope, Jeremy Writer. You gave them hope.”

He lays his hand over mine. “I was greatly inspired.”

“How so?”

Jeremy tugs me into his arms and places his head on top of mine. “Because you still see the good in people. After everything you’ve been through, you give people more chances. You find the parts of them they most want to be and you bring that out. If I was great at all tonight … if I was able to make some change … it was because you believed I could.”

I’d stay like this forever, but he pulls away and says, “Will you play something for me?” And he touches my chin when I tuck it in, and smiles down. “I’ve resisted up until now, because I worried that if I watched you make music, I’d never want to risk anything ever again; that I’d want to just leave this place and find somewhere where you could play and I could write.”

My smile is soft; it feels like the smile of a woman on the verge of more than a simple crush. “So why did you change your mind?”

Jeremy grins. “Because life’s too short to give a damn all the time.”

Out
of all of my musical works, one’s already on my mind for Jeremy. A romantic thing of medium tempo, but when I play it, it comes to life and sparkles like dew on the morning grass of the old world.

This, I play on the piano gifted to me by the very voice of the Uprising, and the boy that I’m feeling the edge of love for.

I’ve played it before, just in practice. But tonight, for him, I’m a spirit. Anything else is too tangible.

Jeremy watches me a breath away, and we share the space like two people telling secrets while I squeeze the sweet music from my fingertips. My mind slips open to him like a flower, though only through the music, leaving my mystery intact.