Untaken (38 page)

“So says the guy who makes
me
gut the rabbits every time!”

“You gotta learn how to do it,” shrugged Brandon. “It’s still cluttered as shit, besides. We’d just get in each other’s way.”

He shrugged his shirt off, ready for work. The sun had painted his skin a golden brown. It suited him. Made the lighter licks of brown stand out in his dark hair. He bent to toss his T-shirt on the bed, and my eyes followed the way his muscles shifted. Would his chest be hard or soft if I laid my hands against it? I studied the curls of hair at the back of his neck. What would he do if I pressed my lips there?

Laugh at me. That’s what.

“What?” He turned back to me, frowning.

I tore my eyes away. “Nothing,” I stammered.

“You should just go for a walk out in the woods or something, like we talked about. It’s gonna get real dusty up here, most likely.”

I sprang out of my chair and shoved past him. My arm brushed his. His bare skin against mine made my heart thump so hard I actually worried he’d hear it beating.

“Okay. But I’m officially watching you,” I babbled.

“What do you mean?”

“You’re up to something. You’ve been sneaking around up here the past few days. You keep telling me to go out…”

Brandon shook his head and rolled his eyes like I was being crazy, but he was a lousy actor.

“I’m just cleaning it out is all, no big secret!”

“Never mind, Brandon. I’ll go outside like a good girl. But you’d better be finished by tonight. I have stuff to do.”

“Online stuff?” smirked Brandon.

“None of your business stuff,” I told him.

“I know you’re still talking to her.”

“That’s not even true.”

“I don’t care or anything, I just want us to stay safe. We don’t need anyone knowing where we are.”

“I know that. We don’t talk about anything serious.”

Brandon laughed. “You are talking to her! I knew it! What
do
you talk about then?”

“I already told you: none of your business.” I scrambled down the ladder before he could give me the full third degree. Brandon wasn’t the only one who got to have secrets, after all.

It was going to be a scorcher again, and I was glad to escape into the dim green shade of the woods. I followed the trail down to the stream, and kicked off my shoes to paddle in the cool water. Far off in the woods, a loud bark rang out. I smiled to myself, wondering what Jake and his doggy BFF were up to today. I could kind of see why Jake loved being out in the woods so much, it sure beat the cabin on hot days like this one. Brandon would probably give himself heatstroke hauling boxes out of the attic. Even with the skylights open, it would be real hot up there by mid-morning. If he’d have let me help, we could have been finished already.

Maybe he knew. If he’d known I’ve been talking to 6_Star all along, was it possible he’d been reading my chat logs?

He wouldn’t know how. I was almost, nearly, practically ninety-nine percent sure about it.

Oh boy. If he ever knew, he’d laugh himself silly. “
Just tell him.”

Yeah, right.

I wished I had someone to talk to about this. 6_Star was fine and all, but she had more important things to worry about than some kid’s silly teenage crush. The fighting was pretty bad out her way, and scientists like 6_Star were pretty unpopular with the military guys who’d taken over. Well, not exactly unpopular. In fact, according to 6_Star, the General out there was real happy to find anyone with science or government connections, because they made really good victims for the public executions rallies. The evil scientists who knew the Space Men were coming, and did nothing to stop them.

I found it hard to believe anyone would fall for that old line, but I guess that when people got scared enough, they needed someone to blame. A scapegoat.

What I needed, maybe for the first time ever, was a best friend to talk to. Or a mom. An awful bubble of grief expanded in my chest, and I squashed it back before it could spill out into tears. Keeping active was key. Maybe I’d pick some blueberries to have for dessert tonight.

Jake and Dog had left with a pail this morning, but I knew that Jake would be back at dusk with the pail still empty, and act surprised to see it in his hands when we asked where the berries were. He was too easily distracted to help out much, but as far as I was concerned, the only job a kid that age should have was to play and grow and be happy. That’s why it made me so mad when Brandon started bringing up the Space Man crap. Jake was becoming more like a regular kid every day. His talking was getting better and better, and I’d even started him with his ABCs.

In a year, he’d have forgotten all that junk Doc and Terry said, and if
he
didn’t know there was anything different about him, how would anyone else be able to find out?

I arrived back at the cabin as the hot day started to fade into a dreamy gold twilight. I’d managed to tie my plaid shirt into a kind of a carrying bag, and it was filled with sweet-smelling berries. The juice had stained it all to hell, but it was frayed to rags anyway, and way too small for me. All I wanted was to get inside before anyone could see me in my too-tight, yellowed old tank, but of course, Brandon was sitting out on the front step waiting for me. He gave me a wave, his eyes flicked to the front of my shirt. Right where the big grass stain was. Just perfect.

“I was wondering where you got to,” he said.

“You told me to go out. Is Jake back yet?”

A loud yap from inside the kitchen answered my question.

“Quiet, Dog!” said Brandon. “I made them wait for you. You’d think I was torturing the pair of them with the looks I’ve been getting.”

“Wait? For what?”

“You’ll see,” grinned Brandon. “Take a seat with Jake, I just need to turn the lights on.”

“Lights?”

“Aw, shit. Well, pretend to be surprised, okay?”

I followed him inside, then Brandon bustled away up the attic ladder as I dumped my berries into the sink, then took a seat next to Jake, who was fidgeting about in his chair at the kitchen table. Dog lay beside him, whining under her breath.

“Has he had you waiting here for long?” I asked. “Chill out, you’re going to wear a hole in that chair if you don’t sit still.”

Jake smiled at me, but it was a feeble smile. Poor kid looked miserable. Pale and nervy. I sure hoped he wasn’t coming down with anything. Whatever Brandon was cooking up, it had better be worth it.

“I knew he was up to something, with all that sneaking around,” I said to Jake. “Do you know what the big secret is?”

“No. Jake was good! Just playing in the woods. Nothing else. It’s not a secret!”

“Okay, Jakester, calm down.” I patted his head. “If Brandon wants to keep his dumb secret, then fine. Seriously, it’s all right.”

I tried to interest Jake in the bats that swooped and careened outside the open kitchen door. Usually, he was crazy to learn names for new animals, but this evening, I could hardly make him look at them. He just kept on staring at the woods. Dog was acting buggy, too, whining and running around us in circles, until I was tempted to tell them both to go outside and knock themselves out, and let Brandon wait. He was making
us
wait, after all. When Brandon finally called down to us, I was about as antsy as Jake and Dog were.

“Come on up! Be careful, though, it’s kind of dark for the first bit.”

Brandon was crouched at the top of the ladder up to my room, shining a flashlight down.

“What the hell?” I asked. “Did you fuse the lights up here? Brandon, I swear, if you screwed up my computer—”

“Relax! It’s…it’s atmospheric, okay?”

“Real atmospheric…broken necks by candlelight,” I muttered as I groped my way up the ladder. Jake followed, leaving the dejected Dog to whine down below.

“Okay, shut your eyes. Both of you,” said Brandon.

“Really? It’s dark as ass anyway, what difference will—”

“Just do it,” Brandon interrupted impatiently.

I wanted to argue with him some more, but he grabbed my hand and gave it a squeeze and all of a sudden I couldn’t remember what I’d been about to say. A door creaked open as Brandon led me forwards.

“You can look now.”

I opened my eyes and gasped, clapping my hand over my mouth.

“Lights!” Jake squealed.

“Lights” was an understatement. Strand upon strand of Christmas tree lights were wound around the roof beams. Even with half the bulbs fried, it looked like a universe of stars going supernova to eyes that were more used to the feeble flicker of the gas lamps.

“I know it’s kind of a dumb idea,” said Brandon, “But I just thought…”

“It’s great,” I breathed. “It’s really great. This must have taken you forever.”

“Just a little low-grade sneaking around.”

It seemed incredible to me that the whole world used to have this much light in it after the sun went down. Brandon had propped a pair of old mirrors over by the open skylight and they threw the light back until the room felt alive with little dancing points of fire. The attic had been cleared of all the old boxes and swept clean.

“Is that…?”

“A Christmas tree,” said Brandon. He smiled, but his ears had gone pink.

“And the boxes underneath it are birthday gifts. Two holidays for the price of one. I’d have got us a turkey for thanksgiving, but I couldn’t fine none out in the woods.”

“Brandon, what is this?” I asked.

“I told you. It’s Christmas. And our birthdays. All the good stuff that we missed out on while we were out there in the shit for a year. We made it, guys. It’s not perfect out here but we made it. And now, we get to have the good stuff again. Well, kind of a budget version of it, anyway.”

I laughed. “It’s not budget. This is amazing. I can’t believe this is what you were doing all this time!”

Jake stood beside the Christmas tree, his eyebrows drawn together into a frown.

“Tree is inside?” he asked, turning to Brandon.

“Tree is inside,” Brandon agreed. “Open your birthday present, Jake.”

Jake didn’t know what a birthday present was any more than he knew what a tree was doing inside. Brandon had to show him how to tear off the newspaper that covered the box.

At first, Jake frowned. “Breaking it?”

“Unwrapping it,” I told him. “The gift is inside, see?”

Jake still looked mystified, but he was happy to see the pile of candy bars and the comic book inside his box.

“Now, you.” Brandon looked over at me with a smile, his gaze holding mine a bit longer than usual. I knelt beside him. The sweet scent of pine filled my nostrils. Odd that we were surrounded by pines, but I really only noticed the smell now that we had one inside.

Brandon handed me a box. “Happy Birthday.”

I peeled the newspaper wrapping away carefully, trying not to tear the fragile sheets. Paper was going to be a scarce resource a few years from now, who knew what it could come in handy for later on? There was a book inside. A Shriver’s Outpost book I’d read before, but the sight of it made tears well up in my eyes. He’d remembered I liked them.

“I found it in one of the houses by the lake last week. There’s more, too.” He paused, so I looked up at him, but he frowned at the floor again. “And I apologize in advance if this is weird.”

Beneath the book was a heap of shimmering, pale blue fabric. I lifted it from the box, the silk cool and smooth against the roughness of my berry-scratched arms. A dress, beaded down the front with tiny pearls.

“I got you a whole bunch of regular clothes, too. They should fit pretty well, but I figured you might want something nice. Like, for a special occasion?”

“Like a Birthdaymas?”

“Exactly. Um, you totally don’t have to wear it if you don’t like it. I don’t know much about clothes, I guess.” Brandon stared at his shoes, pulling on one of the fraying laces.

“No, it’s really cool. I don’t know much about clothes either. It’s real pretty. I never had a proper dress like this before. Mom used to try to take me shopping all the time but…” I stopped before my voice cracked.

Brandon stared at me, his eyes the darkest brown. The little lights of the room reflected in them, and I couldn’t look away.

A knot of emotion swelled in my throat, threatening to choke me. Too many memories assaulted my mind all at once. My mom, my family, the terrible silver ships, and all of it jumbled up with the feelings I didn’t dare acknowledge for the boy who didn’t always drive me absolutely batty.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

I nodded and jumped up. “Yup! I’m going to try this on. Since it’s a special occasion, and all.”

Even with the moon shining in through the skylight in my half of the attic, I couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of me. I breathed in gulps of night air until the jumble of images started to fade—my mom holding clothes up against me in Macy’s, while Liam and Mikey whined and knocked displays over; Brandon’s dark, concerned eyes—and the thickness of emotion began to loosen in my chest. Was I okay?

I’d just have to be, that was all.

I busied myself with stripping off my dingy old tank and faded jeans, double checking that the door between my room and the other attic was closed. The cool fabric sliding down over my flinching skin caused a shiver to flicker down my body, and I slapped at my arms to fight off the gooseflesh. With the flashlight propped on the bed, I could just about see myself in the mirror. I tried to evaluate the way I looked as a stranger might. My face was dirty and my hair looked like a big, snarled, fright wig. I’d thought the dress would have been too long, a grown-up dress like this, but it was actually just a little too short, and my bare feet showed at the bottom. It was cut kind of low, and I hitched at the strap.