The Line Book One: Carrier (5 page)

I had to do better than that.

I vowed right then, my head resting on the grey wall behind my one-twenty-a-day cot, that in the morning I’d figure out how to get a job.

I could wash dishes, even though the idea made me sick at the memory of my time in the restaurant. I could also cook, which I hadn’t done in years but had always loved doing.

I had to do something. Trying only to find a replacement, and not thinking further along in my life, was a mistake.

“You deaf? I’m talking to you.”

I hadn’t noticed, but one of the ladies was standing in front of me. It was the pony-tailed woman, Shirel. She surveyed me up and down.

“Leave her alone, Shirel,” one of the other women said.

“What?” I asked. Shirel seemed high-strung and hardly had a muscle on her body. Her cheek bones stuck out so far they looked sharp enough to cut right through her skin.

“Where you work? They hiring?” she asked.

I sat up. “Oh. No. I don’t have a job.”

“How you pay for the bed then?”

“I saved up some credits.”

“How’d you do that?”

“I was on the Line.”

Silence.

The two women who’d been talking in the dark corner of the room went dead quiet. Every eye was on me.

I waited for someone to speak, but no one did.

Shirel lifted her chin and peered down at me. “Didn’t realize they let girls off the Line.”

“They said I had a ten-year contract.”

“You lasted that long?” One woman gawked.

“Is that where you got beat up?” asked the little girl.

I’d forgotten about the condition of my face. The bruises from Lover Boy had likely faded by then to a nice shade of green. No wonder the shopkeepers wanted nothing to do with me.

“Yes.”

“What you going to do now?” asked a woman in the corner.

I debated my next words carefully. These were not my friends. Maybe telling them I was off the Line had been a mistake, but it was too late to take it back. “I don’t know.” And even if I did, I wasn’t about to share that information with them.

The woman with bright orange hair sitting next to the girl nodded in agreement. “I hear that.”

“I need a job,” I said, hoping that would spark a debate and take the spotlight away from me.

Shirel looked sympathetic. “Don’t know many places that would hire a girl off the Line.”

“Why not?” I didn’t like being the center of attention. I felt sweaty.

“I don’t know,” she said. “People talk. Say the girls off the Line are unclean.”

“Yeah, I’d tell people you’re a runaway,” said the orange-haired woman.

Shirel reeled on her. “That’s stupid, Oliv. They’d send her back to the Line with all the other runaways.”

“They won’t take me back,” I said.

Oliv leaned forward. “Why not?”

“I’m pregnant.” It was the first time I’d said it aloud. It felt like I was talking about someone else. Still, it made it seem real.

Shirel shook her head. “Damn. Thought they made sure that didn’t happen.”

I shrugged, not wanting to get specific. “It does.”

Oliv pushed her eyebrows into each other. “So they give you some credits and kick you out?”

The girl was visibly upset, but I was glad to see she didn’t burst into tears again.

“They said my contract was up anyway.” I left out the part about how I found that suspicious.

Why question it? I was free now, sort of. Did it really matter why they let me go?

The two women in the corner commented about how messed up my situation was.

“So, what you been doing this week?” Shirel asked. She sat on the bunk next to me. It creaked under the weight of her bones.

“Looking for work.”

“Where?” asked the other lady from the corner.

Several others glared at her, and she shrank slightly.

“She already said she hadn’t found a job, Gretchen.” Shirel shot her a look of contempt.

It took me a moment to realize Gretchen had been asking so she could swipe whatever job I’d found. “The markets, and a bar.”

Shirel seemed in deep thought and didn’t answer. She scratched her chin.

Oliv clasped her callused hands in her lap. “Stay away from them red-light places. You’d end up in the same boat you’re in now.”

“Yeah. Figured that out.”

“Look,” Shirel said, getting up and standing above me again. “I don’t know you, but you look like a real nice girl, and you was sweet to Evie.”

The little girl gave me a soft grin.

Shirel continued, “So I’m gonna give you some free advice, see? Get the hell out of Central. Head to South sector, or maybe West. They’s got some nice places out there that are always looking for girls to work. As, like, washers and maids and whatever. Maybe you can find one of them communes that help with the baby. They have them out in West. Or work for a rich family in South. They’s usually good to their people. Just don’t do anything stupid, keep your nose clean and don’t tell nobody you’re off the Line. You might get lucky. Sometimes they run ads in the bulletin. You should check those out.”

“How she gonna get a bulletin without a job to pay fo’ one?” asked the other woman from the corner.

“She said she had credits saved up,” barked Shirel. “Ain’t you paying attention?”

“And how she gonna hide where she from? The moment they run her prints, they’ll find out,” said another.

“I don’t know,” Shirel scoffed. “That’s for her to figure out.”

“I’ll go,” Gretchen said to me. “Wherever you go. I’ll go with you. We could be a team!”

Shirel waved her hands in the air as if fanning away a fly. “Go to hell, Gretchen. They’s don’t want no washed-up hag like you. They’s want young pretty things like her. Besides, you’d just screw it up by swiping from them, and you’d be right back here with the rest of us losers.”

Oliv shook her head. “Isn’t that what you did, Shirel? Steal from rich people?”

“Shut up, Oliv.”

Fresh tears wetted Evie’s large blue eyes. “I want to go! Can I go too?”

Her large doelike expression made me think of Peni, and I had to look away.

Gretchen frowned at the girl. “Don’t be stupid, kid.”

Oliv put a hand on the kid’s shoulder. “And how’d your mother find you?”

Evie buried her face into her grey pillow. “But I hate it here. I don’t think she’s coming back.”

None of the women spoke. It seemed they agreed. To their credit, nobody voiced it aloud.

“I’m not kidding,” Shirel said to me. “You need to move on. There ain’t nothing here. Look in the bulletins for jobs in South or West. Sometimes they send the travel orders ahead so you don’t have to pay for a sector transfer. Or you can bribe a guard. It’s better than sitting around Central and starving to death.”

She had a point. Maybe the reason I couldn’t find work in Central wasn’t all my fault, but the sector’s fault too. It made sense to move on. Nothing was really holding me here. But to leave, I needed travel orders, and that meant applications at Auberge headquarters, interviews with the security forces, and the very idea of it caused me to panic.

What if they said no? What if they changed their minds and sent me back to the Line anyway?

Still, Shirel was right. I had to try.

It was a plan, albeit a weak one.

But it was something.

The more I thought about it, the more it frustrated me. I’d wasted nearly a week watching the waitress and had gotten no further in solving my many mounting problems. After checking out the bulletins tomorrow morning, I decided I’d talk to Margo that night and see if she would take my place on the Line. Then, I’d start the process of getting my travel orders and go to West sector. The idea of a work commune didn’t sound horrible. I was strong. Picking crops was hard, but I was willing to work. The women in communes took turns watching the children while the others picked crops in the fields. That would be helpful. I could have a job, keep my kids safe and be free.

Other women did it. Why couldn’t I?

But first, I had to find a replacement in Central or this was all for naught. It would be almost impossible to find a replacement in West and then get travel orders back to Central to drop her off. It was most likely I’d find a replacement among the starving and desperate of Central, then I could go to West and start over.

I wanted to slap myself for not considering this sooner. I needed to be smarter, and so far, I hadn’t been.

I gazed up at Shirel and tried to smile my thankfulness. Given her behavior toward Evie and her advice toward me, out of all the women in the boarding house, she seemed the most solid.

Even if she did appear as if a stiff wind could knock her off her feet.

“You’re right,” I said to her. “Tomorrow I’ll start looking for work in West. Thanks. And I really mean that. Thank you.”

Oddly, that made Shirel frown. She nodded and went back to her bed and sat down.

I had the sudden urge to tell Peni all about my new plans and my new family growing within me. So many times I’d rolled over in my sleep chamber and talked to her through the walls. But then I realized Peni wasn’t there beside me like she always was. She was still on the Line, still taking appointments, still imprisoned in my old life.

I turned my attention back to the ladies in the boarding house. It was less painful.

Oliv begrudgingly patted Evie as she cried into her pillow. Gretchen glared at me like I was a freak. The snoring woman by the door snorted and rolled over as the cot creaked beneath her.

“Got any spare credits?” Gretchen asked me.

“Leave her alone, Gretchen,” Shirel barked. Then she turned to the wall.

Chapter Five

The next night at the bar I was riddled with nerves. I’d been watching Margo for a while, had even mentioned the Line to her, but this was it. It was now or never.

When I ordered my sandwich and glass of water, she hardly looked at me. As if she was bored. As if my presence had become normal. She brought my order and scanned my palm, and in the red light of the club the green gave off a sickening glow.

I gripped the rectangular unit with my other hand as lightly as possible, to stop her from walking away. As she turned to leave, I held tight. My fingers whitened against the flashing screen of the scanner.

She lurched to a stop and met my eyes.

I released my grip.

“I can get you out of here,” I said, speaking softly so Benny at the bar couldn’t hear.

The band was taking a break. The room pulsed with the quiet throb of chatting drunks. I had to be careful.

Margo didn’t blink. I could have sworn she’d stopped breathing.

“I can get you on the Line,” I said, though the words tasted bitter.

I watched her eyes—they were wide and shining. She’d heard every word. In the smokiness of the room and redness of the lights, it was hard to discern her face, but I thought I saw her cheeks flush with color.

“You could get paid,” I pressed. “Have your own room with a bed. Medical care. Food. I’m not messing with you.”

The round wooden tray she held up by her shoulder had begun to shake, and she placed the scanner up on top of it. Then, thinking better, she gripped it with both hands, lowering it to waist level.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Benny taking notice of our conversation. It took all my effort not to shift my eyes to look directly at him. Margo was holding my gaze so intently, I knew if I looked away all would be lost.

“I could take you tonight. After closing. Or right now. If you want.”

Margo’s face hardened. Her tray shook so badly she was forced to lay it on the table. Her eyes never left mine.

Benny leaned over the bar and shouted, “Hey! Margo!”

Her eyes shot over her shoulder.

I was losing her.

“This is your chance,” I whispered.

Margo swallowed hard. “Don’t screw this up for me, okay?”

“Wait. What?”

Her eyes darted to the door leading to the back room. “He has my little brother.”

“Back there?”

Her nod was barely visible.

In a flash I knew who Benny had washing the dirty jars.

“Margo!” Benny hollered. “Hey! Wassup? I got orders waiting.”

“You screw this up, and we’re both on the streets,” she sneered through clenched teeth. “You got me? Now mind your own damned business.”

“He uses him, doesn’t he?” I asked. “He’s using your little brother so you’ll cooperate.”

She didn’t nod. She didn’t have to.

“Mar-go!” Benny separated her name into two syllables, and I could tell her skin crawled.

There was nothing more to say. I felt terrible for her. She was already on the Line. She just didn’t know it. But there, in the confines of the red bar, she at least had her brother with her. I didn’t blame her for wanting to stay.

“I’m so sorry,” I said.

Margo scowled. “Fuck you!” She lifted the tray back to her shoulder, and with a squaring of her shoulders and a swift turn, she sauntered back to the bar.

I heard Benny whisper harshly to her as I got up to leave. Margo leaned over the bar in her mini-mini and placed jars of beer onto her tray. I could see her nodding in agreement.

There was no point in sticking around. She made sense now. Margo was the world’s greatest actress because she had the world’s greatest motivation.

I wished there was something I could do to help her. I wished I could run into the back room and yank Margo and her little brother out of there. But there was no place to take them that would be much different than this.

I made my way around the crowded tables but glanced back before I exited the door. Some greasy guy had his hand scanned by Benny.

Margo’s eyes followed me as I left. They looked ferocious, but I heard her fake a convincing giggle as she led the greasy guy into the back room.

I opened the door to leave. The red light from inside pierced the stark blackness of the polluted air outside. The door slammed behind me, and I felt the weight of my failure press against my shoulders.

Square one.

* * *

The boarding house was quiet. It was early morning, probably around one. Shirel snoozed alone in her bunk, and Gretchen’s leg dangled over the edge of her cot, her blackened toes brushing the dusty floor.

As I tiptoed in, Evie’s eyes popped open. She sat up in her bunk. I waved her down with my hand, but she didn’t budge. Instead, she got up and padded over to my cot.

Out of habit, I took off my shoes and put them under my pillow.

“I want to go with you,” Evie said.

She had her shoes in her hand as if we were leaving right then, and she’d combed her greasy hair so it stuck to her scalp like glue. I was already emotionally exhausted from the scene with Margo, so my patience was razor thin.

“I’m not going anywhere yet,” I grumbled. “Go back to sleep.”

“But you will. Can I come too?”

“I can’t take care of you.”

“I could be your maid,” she said. “When the baby is born. I could babysit it when you go to work. All I want is food and a place to stay. That’s a good idea, isn’t it?”

I had to admit it wasn’t a bad one. But at this point I had no idea how long it would be before I found another replacement. That could take a while. Then there was still the task of finding a job and obtaining travel orders. The plan I’d been so excited about just the night before had crumbled in my fingers.

“Look, Evie...” I started.

Her hands shot to my shoulders. “Don’t leave me here. I hate it here. I can’t stay.” She shook me back and forth.

“Shh!”

She lowered her voice but still whispered with desperation. “You must bring me with you.”

“I can’t,” I said, peeling her hands from me. “At least, not yet. I have to finish some things first. Just, look, give me a few months. Okay? Wait until I get settled. Then I can send for you.”

I realized the moment I’d said it, it was the wrong thing to say.

Evie’s face capsized under the weight of her pent-up emotion. To her credit, she cried in complete silence.

I was just like her mother. Abandoning her all over again.

My oath to never do that to anyone was crushed. It hadn’t taken me long to fail.

“Then take me to the Line,” Evie pleaded. “I can’t sweep for Mr. Coleworth anymore. He’s...he’s...doing things to me, and I don’t want him to. I’d rather go to the Line.”

“Doing things? You mean, like...?”

Evie put her little hand on her crotch and squeezed, nodding.

“You’d be doing the same thing on the Line,” I said. “It’s not a good idea.”

“It’s got to be better than what Mr. Coleworth is making me do. Anything is better than that.”

“No, it’s not.”

“Fine,” Evie said, sticking out her lower lip and crossing her arms across her tiny chest with a snap. “Then if you won’t take me, I’ll go myself.”

“No! Evie, listen. Maybe if you go work at the factory with Shirel or something.”

“They don’t hire kids, dummy.” She rolled her eyes at me.

“All right, then go find a different job.”

“There aren’t any other jobs. Why do you think my mom left?”

“Well, there has to be another choice, because going to the Line is not the answer.”

“There
is
no other answer. Don’t you get it?” She was crying again. “He’s not paying me. He feeds me once a day, does things to me, then pays for another night here, and I have to go back just so I have someplace to sleep. At least on the Line I eat, have my own bed. Yes, I’d be doing the same thing, but there I’d be taken care of. Here, nobody takes care of me. Nobody...” Her voice trailed off. She sniffed loudly and wiped snot on the sleeve of her dress.

I wanted to take care of her. And Margo. And Margo’s little brother.

I honestly did.

I wanted to save them all.

But the realization that I had to take care of myself first, and my own children, was never more clear. And so far, I was doing a pretty awful job of it.

“You’re not old enough to go on the Line,” I said, trying to end the discussion. “Think of something else.”

“I’m twelve,” she lied.

“Like hell you are.”

“Do you think they really care?”

She had me there. “No. I can’t do it. Just...go back to bed. We’ll figure something out in the morning.” I was stalling, and I could tell she knew it. But I didn’t know what else to do.

“I’m going anyway.” She stomped to her cot and curled up.

“No, you’re not!”

She didn’t answer. She turned her back to me and stayed still.

I watched her for a few minutes, waiting for her to continue the argument. “Evie!”

She ignored me. After a minute or two, her breathing softened to regular and slow intervals. I hoped she’d fallen asleep.

This was crazy. Taking an unpaid prostitute who I thought loved sex to the Line was one thing. But taking a ten—or eleven-year-old girl so she could escape her molester was something different.

How had it come to this?

There had to be a way to help Evie without messing up my own plans. I just couldn’t think what it was.

I made mental note to ask Shirel in the morning. She seemed to know things and had helped Evie before. Hopefully she could come up with something, because I had no ideas. All I had was some credits.

Credits.

Maybe if I gave Evie some of mine, or got her out of Central. I could buy her transfer orders, get her a job in that commune Shirel had mentioned. But I didn’t know if the transaction would be approved by the Line, or if I did that for her, would I be giving up my only chance to get myself out of Central.

The only thing I could think, after asking Shirel, was to get a bulletin first thing in the morning to check the job listings. Then I could ship off Evie, find another replacement and join her later. That was the best I could think of.

And it all had to happen before the babies were born.

Six months and twenty-one days left.

It was an awful plan. And I knew it.

My vision faded. As active as my mind swirled, my body was spent.

I lay on my cot and tried to think some more, of a better idea, but I drifted off to sleep.

* * *

The next morning I awoke with a start. Shirel and Oliv were yelling at each other, again. Gretchen chimed in every now and then, adding nothing of worth.

It took a moment or two for me to fully awaken before I managed to understand what they were saying.

“You don’t know?” Shirel pointed a sharp finger into Oliv’s chest.

“I’m not her mother. How the hell would I know?”

“Yeah, Shirel. How the hell would she know?” Gretchen asked.

“Shut up, Gretchen.”

“She talked about sweeping, that was all.” Oliv sat on her cot and slipped on her ratty shoes.

“Maybe she went to work early,” Gretchen offered.

I glanced at Evie’s cot. It was empty.

I gasped aloud.

Shirel reeled on me. “You know where she’s gone?” She pointed her finger at me now.

“I hope not.”

She had no patience for my cryptic answer. “What?” Her face had gone an odd shade of pink. “Come on. Either you know, or you don’t—spit it out!”

“I think she’s gone to the Line.”

Oliv’s mouth dropped open. Gretchen actually smirked, and Shirel looked stricken.

“You kidding me?”

I told them an abridged version of my conversation with Evie the night before.

“And you let her go?” Shirel shrieked.

“N-No,” I sputtered. “I told her to wait. That’d we talk about it this morning. I was going to ask you—”

“Stupid!” Shirel spat, and she kicked the leg of the cot to her right. “And you thought she’d actually listen?”

Oliv shook her head in disappointment and stood. “What a dumb kid. She’s wrecked now.”

Gretchen shrugged and turned to leave. “Oh, well. You tried.”

Shirel was the only one who seemed aghast. “We have to stop her!”

Gretchen waved Shirel off and went out the door, no doubt to try to be first in line at the recycling factory.

Oliv raised an eyebrow at Shirel. “Look, it was her choice. Nothing you can do about it. Sounds to me like she thought it through.”

“She’s ten years old!” Shirel turned a brighter red.

Oliv shrugged and went to the door. “What are you going to do? Bring her back here? You can’t take care of her. You don’t have enough to feed yourself! Why do you think her mom took off? Don’t get me wrong, I agree it sucks. But we can’t save her. She’s on her own and she’s made her choice.” With a final glance at me, Oliv left.

Shirel looked ready to pummel her, so it was probably best she had. After a few moments of labored breathing, she turned her fiery eyes back on me. “I’m going after her. You coming?”

I could think of a million reasons why I didn’t want to, but I knew this was my fault. “Okay.”

* * *

We walked several blocks down 14th Street and turned right on Avenue X, headed straight to the Line. Shirel led. I think she knew I didn’t really want to go.

At the prospect of returning, my bones felt electric. Shaky.

It was like walking back into a nightmare, not that I knew what those were. I hadn’t dreamed in years.

As we got closer and closer, all my newfound emotions boiled over, bubbling hot vapor under my skin. Toxic fumes seeped from my pores, poisoning the world and those around me and covering me with the sticky, smelly sweat of panic.

I was about to reenter hell.

Torture.

Pure, untethered, emotional torture.

Suddenly the brightness of the sun was too bright. The pavement under my feet was too hard and dirty. The grotesque air of Central grew too thick to breathe.

When we got to the Line door, I froze. My skin went clammy. My head lifted off my shoulders as if full of helium.

I wanted to vomit, just to release the pressure inside me.