Run For Cover (6 page)

“You bet,” I say. “Since you’re an expert at this stealth business now.” She grins.

We’re out the door and down the steps, nearly halfway to the open truck door, when suddenly I spot the truck driver. I’d forgotten about her completely. She’s been standing by the driver’s side door, laughing and watching the soldiers chase the goats, but as Evelyn and I sprint across the grass, she turns in our direction.

It’s like a slow-motion horror film. There’s nothing we can do. In another ten seconds, she’ll see us, and the whole plan will be ruined.

I
’m frantically tossing aside options in my head, but before I can do anything, Evelyn barks, “Hey, you, there!”

The truck driver sees us and looks as startled as I am. She squints at Evelyn and me. “Who are you?”

“Who am
I
?” Evelyn says with grand indignation. “
Me?
Did you really just ask me that? Who am
I
?” She gives me an outraged look. “Did you hear that? She doesn’t know who
I
am!”

I fumble to play along. “Gosh. Uh, wow. Shocking Bet your dad won’t be happy to hear about that.”

“I’ll say! He’ll be just furious! What’s your name?” Evelyn demands.

The driver is so taken aback by Evelyn’s attitude that she seems to forget she’s being bossed around by a teenager. “Gladys Cato,” she answers.

“Write that down,” Evelyn says to me, then sails on while I check my pockets, which of course don’t have paper or a pen in them. But neither Evelyn nor Gladys notices. “My dad
will
be hearing about this,” Evelyn goes on. “Imagine my own driver not having any idea who I am!”

“Oh, no, miss,” Gladys says, rubbing her short blond hair anxiously. “There must be some mistake. I’m here for these boxes. Nobody said nothing about no kid.”

“Boxes?” Evelyn says, giving them an airy look as if she’s just spotted them. “You mean you’re not my ride to Madison?”

“No way,” says Gladys. “I’m going to New York. Special delivery. No passengers.”

None that you know about, anyway,
I think. And also:
Chicago’s on the way to New York. Perfect.

“
Oh
,” Evelyn says. “Well,
that
explains that. My goodness. You’d better go tell the guy in there that you’re only here for these boxes, then. He was sure you were driving my whole family to Madison. He’ll need to see your papers and everything.” She points at the filing storage building.

“But I showed them to the other soldier —” Gladys starts.

“Doesn’t matter. That’s the hierarchy, you know? I mean,
I
should know, with my dad at the top!” Evelyn says. “You’d better hurry, before that guy leaves for lunch.”

“Yes, right, okay,” says the truck driver. She grabs her clipboard and trots off, looking flustered.

We wait until she disappears into the low wooden building, and then Evelyn and I leap into the truck and scramble through the tunnel of boxes the others have built. They’ve made a hole near the back wall, with just enough room for the seven of us to sit huddled together. As soon as Evelyn and I are clear, Ryan and
Louisa shove boxes around to fill in the tunnel, until it looks from the outside like a solid wall of boxes.

“That was awesome!” I whisper to Evelyn. “How did you do that?”

“I always thought I should be an actress,” she says, beaming. “You know, there used to be a famous improv group in Chicago. My mom told me about it. I think I would have been perfect for it, don’t you?”

“Yeah, totally,” I say, and I really mean it. For the first time, Evelyn’s actually impressed me.

“Maybe if the War ever ends,” she says ruefully.

“But what if the guy in the building says he doesn’t know anything about a family going to Madison?” Alonso asks. “Won’t they get suspicious?”

“There’s no one in there,” Evelyn says. “Hopefully Gladys will decide she needs to leave before he comes back.” She crosses her fingers.

“And now we know something useful,” I say. “This truck is going to New York. We just have to make sure we get out when we’re anywhere near Chicago.”

“How are we going to figure that out?” Maddie asks.

I shrug. “We’ll worry about it when we have to.” I’m squeezed between Louisa and Drew, with Alonso across from me, so close our toes are all touching. Sunlight from the open back door filters in through the gaps in the stacks around us. Boxes tower over us, but Ryan has stacked them so they’re braced and won’t fall on us. I hope he knows what he’s doing, because getting crushed by a bunch of canned goods is not on my to-do list for this lifetime.

On Louisa’s other side, Maddie fiddles with her messy hair bun and yawns. It’s warm and getting warmer in the truck, so I wriggle out of the army jacket and tuck it underneath me as a cushion against the hard floor. Now all we can do is wait, and that’s just about my least favorite activity.

“I wish we’d had time to find a phone,” Louisa says. She clasps her hands around her knees. “I want to call my parents and let them know I’m all right.”

Ryan laughs and we all give him a startled look. “Sorry,” he says. “I’m just picturing that conversation. ‘Hey, Mom, I’m calling to say I’m okay! No, I’m not at school anymore. Well, actually I’m in an Alliance prison camp in Canada. But, you know, hiding in a truck, so everything’s great!’ I bet your parents would appreciate that.”

Louisa and Maddie giggle, and I find myself grinning, too. All right, maybe not all the guys’ jokes are stupid and unfunny.

“Shhh,” Drew whispers. “I think I hear them coming back.”

We all sit there, trying to stay as still and quiet as we can. My right foot starts to fall asleep, and my arms ache from the way I’m leaning on them, but I’m afraid to move in case something scrapes against the metal floor of the truck, or a box shifts and gives us away. The others are frozen the same way. I’m not even sure Maddie is breathing. She looks pale and terrified. Evelyn has
her pack half-open and she’s holding it like that, motionless, clutching the canvas in tight fists. Alonso and Drew both have their eyes closed, as if that’ll help them listen.

We hear the soldiers banging around the outside of the truck, bantering about the goats and the ostrich. One of them jokes that the ostrich bite on his arm should count as a war wound. Another one teases his friend about how girls are even better at running away from him than those goats were. They’re all in a good mood despite the animal escape, which would be cute if they weren’t the enemy. Unfortunately, I guess they’re so cheerful because the War is going their way, and that’s really depressing.

The truck groans and creaks as they toss in the rest of the boxes and stack them all the way to the roof. We’re pretty stuck in here now. Of course, that’s when I notice how hungry I am.

Nobody moves or says anything until we hear the back door of the truck roll down and slam shut, leaving
us in the dark. There’s a long pause. Slowly I ease my legs into a more comfortable position and rub my prickling foot. Through the walls we can hear the muffled voices of the soldiers and the truck driver. But we can’t hear what they’re saying. After a while, the driver’s door slams, and we feel the vibration of the engine starting up.

“I think it’s safe to talk now,” Ryan murmurs. “She won’t hear us over that.” It is a pretty loud engine, coughing and sputtering and roaring. With a jerk, the truck lunges forward, and we all brace ourselves as best we can on the piles of boxes around us. It’s going to be a bumpy, uncomfortable ride.

But I still feel a small glow of triumph. We’re on our way. Maybe this escape is finally taking a turn for the better. Maybe we’ll even make it to Chicago … although at this point I’d settle for getting back into the States!

Evelyn fishes a flashlight out of her pack and sets it in the center of the circle, pointing up. The light reflects off the boxes, casting a reddish glow over all of us. We all look kind of weird in the shadows, as if we’re telling ghost
stories around a campfire — something I’ve read about, but nobody I know has actually done.

“I’m
starving
,” Louisa says. “I didn’t realize it before, but it’s been ages since we ate anything.”

I nod. The adrenaline of our near misses has kept us going, but now that we have a moment to stop and rest, hunger is roaring in my stomach, too.

“Kind of ironic,” Evelyn says ruefully. “We’re surrounded by boxes of food, but we don’t dare eat any of it in case it puts us to sleep.”

“Or worse,” Alonso agrees. “Where do you think it’s all going?”

“In New York? Good question,” Evelyn muses. “I’ll have to think of all the possible targets… .”

“Does anyone have any food?” Louisa interrupts her. “I mean, while Evelyn’s, uh, thinking?”

We all dig into our packs and empty out all the food we have into a pile in the middle of our huddle. The boys are much better stocked than we are, since they were prepared for a week in the woods. I’m glad Louisa manages
not to make any snarky remarks about me rejecting their food this time around. They’ve got packets of granola, dried fruit, soy cheese, boxes of juice, nine rather squashed sandwiches, and several cans made of a weird lightweight metal, which contain vegetables and tofu chili and things like that.

All I have are a few protein bars and a box of cookies I grabbed at the Alliance cabin. Louisa must have done the same thing; she has a bunch of little bags of trail mix, several envelopes of hot cocoa, and a hilariously large jar of applesauce. Evelyn just has the sugar packets from her original escape stash. Maddie has nothing at all.

But it’s reassuring. At least we’re not going to starve right away. And we all have canteens of water, which everyone but Ryan and Evelyn remembered to refill at the cabin.

Louisa flaps a cocoa envelope between her fingers, shaking her head sadly. “Guess this is no use until we can light a fire.”

“Yeah, we’re not doing that in here!” Ryan says.

“This isn’t going to be superdelicious when it’s cold, either,” Alonso says, picking up a can of tofu chili.

“And how are we supposed to eat the applesauce? With our fingers?” Maddie wants to know. She tries to lift the jar and pretends it’s too heavy. “Jeez, Louisa, is this food or a weapon?” I smother a laugh.

“You’ll thank me for it eventually,” Louisa says with a smile.

In the end we share the cheese, the juice boxes, and the sandwiches, which have a nutty spread on them that isn’t peanut butter. Drew says it’s sunflower seed butter, with a blackberry jam the guys on kitchen duty had to make themselves.

“That is so cool,” Louisa says. “I never got to make jam on kitchen duty! I just had to get up at four thirty every morning and chop melons for fruit salad.”

“At least you didn’t have to scrub that fruit salad off the tables later, like some of us,” I say. “Right, Maddie?”

“That was the worst,” Maddie agrees. Back at CMS, we were both assigned to the cleanup crew together, but
she never talked to me while we were working. I could tell she didn’t like me, so I didn’t bother trying to make friends. I don’t waste my energy on people who are that tough to crack, and I had Chui-lian and Rae to talk to instead, which was a lot more fun than painful small talk with Maddie. Usually she just pushed her mop around looking miserable.

From the day we arrived at CMS I got the feeling that Maddie would be a downer — she never looked happy, and all the conversations I overheard between her and Louisa seemed to be about how much she hated the school. That was the main reason I usually avoided her outside our dorm suite, but it wasn’t until Louisa admitted the truth about their ID bracelets that I started to guess why Maddie might be like that. Now I wonder if I should have tried a little harder to be nice to her.

As the truck bumps and jolts underneath us, she leans her head on her knees, her half-eaten sandwich in one hand. Her brown eyes gaze into space like she doesn’t really see the rest of us.

“How long have you lived with Louisa’s family, Maddie?” I ask her.

Maddie sighs, and Louisa answers for her. “Six months,” she says, rubbing Maddie’s back. “Ever since her mom got called up for duty. Her dad’s been gone even longer than that.”

“No word from either of them,” Maddie says. “I don’t even know if they’re alive.”

“I thought —” Ryan starts to say, and Louisa shakes her head.

“No, we’re not sisters. We lied about that so Maddie could come to CMS with me. I’m sure your mom is fine, Maddie. And you’ve got me, right? And my parents love you.” Louisa’s fingers trace her own neck, and I know she’s thinking of the locket she lost the night we escaped. It has her parents’ photos inside, and I think it was her grandmother’s. Most likely she’ll never see it again.

Maddie gives her a sad smile. It occurs to me that Maddie and I have more in common than she knows. We’re both missing family members, with no idea what’s
happened to them, thanks to this war. Maybe one day I’ll tell her that, but not now; I don’t want to turn the truck into some kind of touchy-feely healing-sharing-weeping circle.

Ryan hefts the jar of applesauce. “Hmmm. Think we could use this to play Spin the Bottle?”

We all crack up, even Maddie and serious-faced Drew. I’m sure none of us have ever played anything like that, and I can’t imagine a weirder place to try.

Instead we spend the next couple of hours playing goofy alphabet games, like the one where I say, “Chicago,” and then Drew has to come up with a city that begins with O, like “Ottawa,” and then the next person in the circle (Evelyn) goes, “Albuquerque,” and then Alonso says, “England!” and Louisa goes, “BUZZ! Cheat! That’s not a city! Disqualified!” and Maddie goes, “Wait, I’m confused. Explain the rules again?” And it’s all surprisingly funny, considering our surroundings.

I catch myself thinking that I wish my last border crossing had been this much fun. Which immediately
makes me start to worry that I’m not being vigilant enough — that having fun means that something is about to go terribly wrong.

But it’s hard not to smile when Louisa smiles, or laugh at Evelyn’s impressions of Mrs. Brewster, or joke with the guys about how terrible they are at camping. And the truck just keeps driving and driving. There’s a long stop once, which might be the checkpoint where the truck enters the States, but there’s no real way to know. We keep very still while we’re stopped, but nobody comes back to check on the boxes, and it seems like there’s no way anyone could know we’re in here.

So finally I let myself relax a little.

After a while I pull out
Julie of the Wolves
from my pack, but reading in moving cars makes me motion-sick, so Louisa and Evelyn take turns reading it out loud to the rest of us. I really like the book, but we didn’t get much sleep the night before, so eventually I rest my head on Louisa’s shoulder, and one by one we each fall asleep.