JC doesn't have to see Chris fire his gun again and again without changing expression to know that he'll be useless here. Chris could take on an army on his own, it seems. As if it's all destined; that Chris must fulfil some untold prophecy by killing his way to Justin. It'll work out, too, JC thinks. He'll see Justin's face again, see it light up with recognition and joy. One of these men will be Justin, and Chris will know and let his gun arm drop.
JC can hardly lift his gun. His legs ache from walking and tension. He's afraid. Always afraid. D keeps shooting him worried glances, and he knows they'd be better off without him.
The floor of the tunnels here is rough gravel, and it's impossible to walk silently on it. He feels clumsy.
When they've left the fourth or fifth dead body behind in the tunnel, JC decides to pretend this is just a dream. Until they find Justin, it's not real. Today never happened, he thinks, it doesn't scare me at all. Today never happened.
Since today never happened, something else did. Lance told him about his country house once. A big house down by the river, and not the river as it is when it crosses the sewer system, filthy and ill-used, but the river as it is up in the country, clean and full of fish.
He can think about Lance without wanting to put the gun to his head. It surprises him, but he figures he's simply starting to get used to disappointment. Chris always rags him about that. "How can you be so fucking surprised every time you get fucked over, man?" he said, even back in the camp, after Noop left, after Joey escaped, after Gi died. "How can you act like you didn't see it coming?"
He never sees them coming, he never used to. He doesn't want to. It would be like knowing his own death. He wouldn't be able to think about anything else.
He thinks about Lance's river, Lance's clean river, and the rose garden. He's never seen a rose garden. Lance knows all the names of all the roses. He told JC about them in his calm, deep voice, and JC listened, resting his head on Lance's chest. The clean river and the rose garden and the big, old house. Wedding china that Lance's grandmother's grandfather gave his eldest son. Old, loved things.
"Keep your eyes open, dude," Chris whispers, and he blinks and realises he's been wandering around deep in his thoughts, and they're coming to a crossroads; there are voices ahead, voices and light.
"I'm sorry," he says, but it's starting to sound so routine, like it's lost its meaning through overuse. He's so sorry about so many things, he supposes, that there isn't enough sorry to go around. Sorry I can't be more sorry, he thinks and bites his lip to stop himself from giggling hysterically. Chris turns away, and he and D share glances and nods; some sort of code language that JC doesn't understand.
That's also hard to explain; how he's been living with Chris for so long and never learned from him. Chris works so easily with this stranger; it's like they speak the same language and JC is the exchange student who hasn't learned yet and never will.
He forces himself to relax, to hold the gun in a grip that doesn't shake from the strain. His hands are starting to ache. He has fired guns before. Chris taught him as soon as they were out and could get their hands on guns. He's a pretty good shot, even. He's always had good hand to eye coordination, and when he's calm and rested he can hit a tin can at a hundred and twenty paces. Right now he thinks he might be able to hit his own foot, but that's it.
They wait, back against the wall, and someone stumbles in from the main tunnel, two men, and light falls on their faces.
Justin's face doesn't light up with the joy of recognition. Instead, he looks sick and pale and tired, and his hair is gone and his face is angular and unfamiliar. Worn. And he's leaning on a tall, broad-shouldered man who's got an arm protectively around Justin's shoulder, and Chris is pointing his gun at them.
"Chris," Justin says, so softly it's almost nothing more than an exhalation of inheld breath.
"Chris," JC says and puts his hand on Chris' gun. Justin's friend looks at him with cold eyes, like he doesn't care if Chris pulls the trigger or not; if JC wants to stop Chris or urge him on.
"Chris," Justin says again. "Chris." He's pulling away from his friend, towards Chris, and now JC sees the light in his eyes. There's no choir of angels singing Alleluia, but Justin takes a clumsy step and falls into Chris' arms, and that's the happy ending JC has waited for.
It's gonna be okay, he thinks.
He turns away to give them privacy and steps around everyone, into the bright light of the main tunnel. It reminds him, déjà-vu, almost, of the last morning in the camp. He woke up early and stepped from the darkness in the barrack out into the heat and light of the morning sun. Chris waited outside, leaning against the wall. JC turns his head to the side, slowly because he's still sure this is his memory playing with him, and sees AJ McLean leaning against the wall, thinner, older and harder than he was five years ago, but still with the same sardonic twist to the mouth.
Behind JC, someone says, "Holy shit," softly and reverently, but he doesn't know who it is. There's a chill running down his spine. He hears dogs barking somewhere, but he can't tell if it's just in his head now; the memory is strong and almost more real than this tunnel. The guards released dogs, and Chris killed two of them with a stump of wood, just beat them to death. "I hate killing animals," he said, but he killed them anyway, because the guards were on the way. JC still doesn't know just how Chris did it, how he got the upper hand against them. They were sleek, deadly animals; not at all like the stray puppies JC once saw die in a dusty yard, under the heels of bored children. That was earlier, though, not part of this memory, but it was another sunny day, hot and windless, and he walked up to them when they first brought the puppies into the yard, because he'd always wanted a dog. He was ten years old, he thinks, maybe eleven. He threw up in a bush and ran back to his barrack, and when he told Noop, Noop went and found those kids and beat the shit out of them, but the puppies were dead, and JC doesn't know who finally took away the small cadavers, but they were there for a while, all day at least, and he couldn't stop looking out the window at them. He still has nightmares about them. Funny how things stick with you.
AJ has the same expression as Chris had when he turned to JC, squinted in the sun and said; "I'm going now. You ready?"
JC thinks he's been staring at him for too long.
"Hey," AJ says. The barking of the dogs seems to be growing louder. "Can you use that thing?"
JC blinks at him and tries to follow. In his head, Chris says, again, "I'm going now. You ready?"
It's really loud now. His ears hurt. Someone's yelling, he thinks it's Chris again. "Come ON!"
AJ ducks into the dark tunnel.
The first thing they had to do, once the killing guard dogs and cutting fences and crawling through holes bit was over, was to cross a river. JC doesn't remember the name of the river anymore, maybe he never knew, and it might have been the same river as the one Lance talks about, but he's not sure. They crossed it at night. JC wasn't very good at swimming, but it was the only way they could go, and when he was on the other side, dripping and shivering, and Chris was telling him to hurry the fuck up, hurry up, he felt a little like he'd accomplished something, and a lot like he was reborn.
"I'm going now. You ready?"
"JC! Move!"
The light in the tunnel here is bright like sunlight, and it feels like there's a breeze here, too. His hair tickles his forehead. A draft, at least.
"I'm ready," JC says.
more
|
