The Compound (19 page)

Mom nodded. “Why don’t you take some time?”

“No, I need to—”

Reaching over Dad, she grabbed my hand. “Take some time. Even just a half hour. I’ll stay here.” I tried to protest.

“Promise me. You don’t come back here for thirty minutes.”

I promised.

Despite everything that had just happened, I was hungry. On my way to the kitchen, I heard giggles coming from one of the rooms. The salon. Inside, Lexie was trimming the little girl’s hair.

How could she be doing that when our world was ripping apart? I stepped closer, planning to give her hell.

Lexie told the little girl to sit still, and said her name. Cara.

Cara sat in a booster seat on the swivel chair, smiling at herself in the mirror. Lexie’s eyes met mine in our reflections.

My mouth opened, ready to yell, ask her how she could just be standing there like nothing was wrong.

She saw the look in my eyes. “They don’t know anything.” Her eyes drifted down to Cara. “They don’t know about worry or sadness. All they know is that life is simple and secure and every day will be like the one before it.” She looked back at me. “That’s a gift. Do you want to be the one responsible for taking it away?”

I leaned against the doorway, my throat tight.

“You’re done, sweetie.” Lexie helped Cara get down and led her over to some blocks, then came over to me and spoke so Cara couldn’t hear. “What’s going on?”

I told her the truth. “I’m not sure.”

“Then I’m going to keep helping with the little kids. It’s my routine and routine is good.” Lexie went in front of the mirror and took out her bun, letting her hair cascade around her shoulders. She combed through it and started to trim.

My eyes went to my reflection in the mirror. My own hair. I pulled it forward and let it cover my face so I could no longer see. As I pushed it back, my fingers ran through it. My hair was my shield, a wall, to keep everyone out. Or was it? Did it keep something in? My reflection smiled a bit. I had no secrets left. “Want to cut mine?”

Lexie stopped trimming. “Are you kidding me?”

I shook my head.

“You trust me to cut your hair?”

“Hell, no.” I smiled.

“Then …”

“It could use a trim.” I sat down in the chair. “And I have thirty minutes to kill. Mom’s orders.”

Lexie set down the scissors and picked up a wide-toothed comb. She hesitated, and then began.

My hair was thick, hard to comb through. “Ow.”

“Sorry.” She stopped.

“I’m used to it.”

She finished combing and started to cut, barely taking off more than an inch. She paused. “Can I ask you something?”

“I’m kind of at your mercy right now, so go ahead.” In my lap, my fingers were wringing the hair band as my knuckles turned white.

“What do you remember of me, from before? When we didn’t live here?” She started cutting again.

“Grapes.”

“Huh?”

“Frozen grapes. I hated to watch you eat them, it was like someone scratching a blackboard.”

Lexie smiled. “I loved frozen grapes. The way the cold almost hurt.” She shook her head. “I miss them. I was mad that Dad couldn’t even throw some in the freezers down here.”

I didn’t say anything.

She just stood there. “It wasn’t even that. You know what bothered me?” I shrugged.

“That maybe he didn’t stock any because he had no idea they were my favorite food. That’s what really bothered me.”

“There’s a lot Dad didn’t know about all of us. And even more we didn’t know about him.” Lexie kept cutting. I grabbed her arm. “Wait.”

“What?” She looked at me in the mirror. “You wanted me to do this. Is it too short?”

I let her go and stood up, pulling out drawers until I found what I was looking for. I brandished the electric clippers. “Use these.”

“I can’t trim hair with those.”

“Don’t want it trimmed.” I handed her the clippers and sat back down. “I want it gone.”

“Why?”

There wasn’t an explanation I could put into words. “Just do it.”

The buzzing started.

She didn’t shave my head, but adjusted the setting to give me a short cut. The hair fell off in long clumps, drifting to the floor.

When the buzzing stopped, I ran my hands over my scalp.

I felt lighter. Less burdened. And totally visible to anyone who wanted to see me.

“You look good.” Lexie smiled. “Definitely an improvement, anyway.”

When I stood, I was ankle deep in my own hair.

“Go.” Lexie took the broom from the corner. “I’ll clean it up.”

“Thanks.”

On the way to the kitchen for a quick salad, I heard a bang from the direction of Dad’s office. Mom was inside the secret lab, tearing it apart. Shattered glass lay everywhere. Before I could stop her, she shoved over a table with a grunt, spilling piles of papers on the floor.

“Mom!”

She turned to look at me, her chest heaving. Her hair had come loose and a few strands hung down in front of her face. “I have to find that clue and get you all out of here.”

She noticed my hair then, and started to say something else, then fell backward, grabbing for something to hold on to. She could only reach a small stand, which toppled onto her as she collapsed on the floor, unconscious, in a small pool of blood.

I
FLEW ACROSS THE ROOM, TOSSING ASIDE THE STAND AND
sending it clattering to the other side of the room. Mom lay on the floor.

“Mom?”

I put one arm under her legs and the other around her waist, scooping her up in my arms. Her body flopped against mine as I carried her to the infirmary and laid her down on the bed next to Dad’s.

I dug around for smelling salts and waved them under her nose.

Her eyelids fluttered. “I don’t feel so well.”

My efforts to get her to sit didn’t work. She groaned and lay back down.

“Mom, what hurts?”

Mom licked her lips. “My stomach. Really bad cramps.” She rolled a bit with the pain.

“You’re bleeding.” I grabbed some extra sheets and
towels from the linen closet and spread them under her on the bed as best as I could.

She lay propped up on some pillows, holding her stomach. “Ohhhh.” Her face was pale.

“You shouldn’t have done that. I’ll find the clue.” My words spoke what I wanted to be feeling, but I wasn’t. All I could think was that she had to be okay, I couldn’t do it without her. I could not be responsible for all of us. I wasn’t up to it.

Not even thinking, I reached to loosen my hair, put up my wall. But my hand found only the back of my head, which was covered with soft prickles.

I held my open hand in front of my eyes. My wall was gone. It didn’t matter whether I felt up to the task or not. Our lives depended on me. My fingers curled into a tight fist before releasing.

“Mom?”

Her eyes shut. “Hurts.”

My hand touched her arm. “Cramps?”

“No.” She grimaced. “Worse.”

It was crucial to figure out for sure what was wrong with Mom before I would know how to help. If I could. By paging through the index of one of the medical books, I found what I was looking for. I quickly scanned through descriptions of pregnancy complications.

Mom sighed. “I know what it is, Eli. I had it with Terese.”

I looked at my mother. “What happened?”

Her eyebrows rose. “Nothing. They put me on bed rest.”

As I glanced over at Dad, I noticed a syringe on the bedside table. A small bottle of the sodium nitroprusside sat beside it. I picked it up. Empty.

“Mom?”

She looked at the bottle in my hand and raised her eyebrows a bit. “I had to try. He may be our only way out.”

Lexie walked in. She rushed to Mom’s side as soon as she saw her face.

I explained what was going on. Then I looked at Mom. “So you’ll stay in bed until I get us out of here.”

She tried to get up. “I need to …”

With a gentle touch, Lexie pushed her back. “No, we can do it. I’ll help Terese with the babies. I already told her Dad was sick. I’ll tell her you’re just … just hanging out with him and getting some rest.” Lexie looked at me. “And Eli will figure out how to get us out of here.”

She was the last person I expected to be confident in my abilities as a savior.

Before she left, Lexie kissed Mom on the cheek. And she whispered to me,
“Can
you get us out of here?” She didn’t wait for an answer.

Mom stared at the ceiling. “This puts a kink in things.”

“No, we’ll take care of everything, really. You need to lie still.”

She sighed. “Eli? I like your haircut.”

I picked up her hand and held it between both of mine. Although touching someone still felt like a struggle, so strange after so long without the sensation, it was becoming more normal. Maybe I needed to get used to it. If we got
out of here, we would all have to get used to normal again, whatever that might be. Normal again, to me, would be to touch someone, without having to summon up courage.

“Mom, what did the doctors say when this happened before?”

She didn’t answer right away. “It wasn’t that big a deal, really.”

“Did they tell you it could happen again?”

“Yes.”

“And that wasn’t a problem?”

“Even on bed rest, there was a chance it could have been bad enough that they would have to do an emergency C-section. That’s what they told me. They also said …”

“What? What did they say?”

Mom leaned back again. “Because I was getting a bit older, they recommended that Terese be my last baby.” I felt my heart in my throat. “Did Dad know that?”

“Of course.”

“And he let you have more babies? Down here, with no doctors?” I didn’t need the answer.

She shut her eyes.

I covered her with a blanket and left, careful to be quiet as I closed the door.

Out in the hall, I leaned against the wall for support. I had to figure out what
turducken
meant. Was it the clue? I needed to find out. Fast.

For the first time in six years, I did not have all the time in the world.

TURDUCKEN
.

I tried it as a password in the computers. Even tried to figure out a numeric code that might be attached to the sequenced letters, starting with the basics: each letter’s position in the alphabet.

Nothing. Everything I tried seemed too easy.

I knew what I had to do. Terese and Lexie were in the kitchen, eating. “Reese, we have to tell you something.”

Lexie looked at me with wide eyes, shaking her head.

Terese looked from one of us to the other.

Lexie spoke first. “Mom’s not feeling well. She’s in bed for a few days.”

Terese’s eyes widened and she set down her fork. “Is she okay?”

I tried to keep my voice upbeat. “Yeah, she’ll be fine. We’re going to get her help soon.”

Terese’s eyes narrowed and the corners of her mouth turned down. “You’re lying to me.”

If I was ever going to prove I wasn’t just out for myself, I needed to start somewhere. “We aren’t lying.”

Lexie waved her hand from behind Terese, trying to get my attention.

I ignored her.

Lexie’s shoulders slumped.

I continued, “Reese, we aren’t lying, just not telling you everything. I got through to Eddy on the Internet. At least I think I did.”

She just stared at me.

“Reese, you were right. About everything. Eddy is fine. Gram, too. It’s a long story. They thought we were dead all these years. They’re going to try to find us. Try to get us out.”

“Father did it.” She didn’t even blink. She just knew.

That jolted me a bit. “Yeah.”

“I told you so.”

“Yeah, you did. I’m sorry I didn’t believe you. Truly sorry.” I put a hand on her arm.

Her eyes slowly tracked to my hand on her arm.

I moved my hand away from her. I didn’t remember the last time I’d touched her. Maybe I never had.

She looked up at me. “Can we go home?”

“I hope so.” I forced a grin. “And now we need your help. We have to find the code for the door in order to get out, okay? I think I found a clue. I mean, Dad actually told me this word and I think it might be the clue.”

Lexie wiped her chin on her shoulder. “What’s the clue?”