The Moon Dwellers (21 page)

And then Cole a
nd Tawni a
re at my side, grabbing a shoulder each, backing me away from
the semi-circle of gawkers who
have
formed to watch the
painfully lopsided fight.
It i
s ov
er before it ever really starts
.
A fast fight is a good fight,
my father always used to remind me during my lessons.

Tawni ta
k
es my hand and pulls me over to my stoop.
I close my eyes, dip my head into my hands, start trembling.
My whole body i
s
shaking, like a virulent flu has
attacked my
insides
all of a sudden, giving me a bad case of the shakes.
I don’t think I’ll ever get used to the rush of adrenaline that comes with extreme violence.
I am no kind of adrenaline junkie, am not addicted to it, don’t crave it.
Although I’m prepared to engage in violence when I’m forced to, I don’t particularly like
confrontation.
Unfortunately
,
confrontation seems to like me quite a lot.

The last time I
fought in the yard—when I victimized those two guys’ legs and sent a message
to the rest of the inmates—I’
d cried afterwa
rds, in my cell, alone.
I’
d never wished more to have my parents with me, to comfort me like a child, to hold me and tell me everything was going to be okay.

This time, however, I have Tawni.
I’m not crying this time, but I am
distraught, exhausted, both mentally and physic
ally.
She wraps an arm around me, pulls me close, ho
ld
s me.
Normally it would be
a bad idea to show such weakness in front of the
rest of the “guests
,
” but I don’t care.
We are leaving and I will
never look back.

My thoughts a
re interrupted by Col
e.
“How’d you do that?” he says
.

“Preemptive strike,” I say
simply, my voice muffled through my hands.

“No.
I mean, where’d you learn t
o fight like that?” he persists
.

“I told you I know how to fight.”

“But where’d you learn it?”

“My father taught me,” I say
, opening my hands and raising my head.
T
awni i
s still holding me, and where it had felt go
od a second earlier, it now feels weird, I think because it i
s
such a public place and Cole is watching.
I gi
ve her an awk
ward look and she seems to get the message and releases me, but continues
sittin
g close to me
,
which i
s fine.

Cole i
s looking at me with those st
rong eyes of his.
Clearly he is perplexed by me.
Now I feel like the puzzle.
But I’m not really.
It is simple: my father was
taught how to fight by his father, my grandfather
,
and
he taught me
.
Growing up, he never le
t me rest on the fact that I am
a
girl.
Not in the world we live in.
He said everyone will
need to know how t
o fight eventually given what i
s coming.
I
’m not sure
what he meant by that.

I was a good student and loved our training sessions together.
He was hard on me, but I didn’t mind.
I just knew I wanted to spend time with him and it was as good a way as any to do it.
I remember the day he told me I was ready.
I didn’t understand.
He said he had taught me everything I needed to know.
I didn’t feel ready.

My father i
s not a violent man.
He told me never to use what he taught me except to defend myself
or others
.
Never be the initiator, neve
r the aggressor.
Including my most recen
t
fight in the Pen, I’ve
only fought three times
in my life,
outside of training
.
I have
n’t lost yet
, unless you include the skirmish with the man-giant that Cole pulled me out of
.
But
I don’t, that was hardly fair.

Although I had a good teac
her in my father, he said I have
a natural t
alent for fighting.
I would tell him
I got it from him, but he
always counter
ed
that I
inherited my talent from my mom.
I n
ever understood that.
My mom is the least violent person I kno
w.
With the exception of the night she was taken, I have
never seen her so much as lift a foot to squash a bug.
When
I asked her about it, she just shook her head and said
, “Your father has a big mouth sometimes, Adele.
He’s the fighter, not me.”
Like my grandmother, my mom i
s not a natural liar, so I could tell there was something she was holding back
, but I never had a chance to find out what
.

Cole looks like he i
s about to ask me another questio
n about my fighting, but I wave
him off with a hand.
“I’d really rather not talk about it right now,”
I say.
I am
glad
when he does
n’t push it any further.

To his credit, he does
n’t
so much as mention fighting
the rest of the afternoon, or th
e evening for that matter.
The last day in the Pen seems
to sprout win
gs and fly away.
I think it is because I can’t wait to get out of this
dump.

Night fa
ll
s.
Not that it mak
e
s
things look any d
ifferent.
Outside the Pen it i
s still
the dull gray that it always is.
Inside the Pen it i
s still fluorescent white, painfully bright in most areas.
Tawni
and I walk to our cells for what I hope will
be the last time.
After a quick and kn
owing sideways glance, we push
through ou
r respective doors.
As I close it, I insert
the plastic square between the bolt and its hole.

Ten min
utes later the speaker announces lights out and I hear the lock click.
It sounds
different than most nights—not the hollow click announcing my nightly imprisonment, but a duller
thwap!
that confirms the plastic has
done its job.

The
waiting i
s painful—each
fifteen
-
minute interval drags on until I am
straining to hear the
clap
of the guard’s footsteps on the
gray-
painted stone flo
or.
By the third guard, it feels like an hour has passed since the last guard
clipped past my cel
l.
That’s when I start
worrying.

At first it i
s just a na
gging voice in my head that says something i
s
n’t right
.
But soon it beco
me
s a shouting that says
th
at the guard’s
patrol pattern has been altered, that someone kno
w
s
about our attempted breako
ut, that even now they a
re handcuffing the wayward gu
ard who took our money.
Perhaps it i
s already past mi
dnight.
Perhaps the fence is still
charged and ready to shock
us into oblivion when we touch
it.
Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

I try
to think about my family to take my mind off of
my nerves.
I desperately want
to see them again
.
For the past few months I have
done my best to forget them, letting their smiles fade from my memory like a hunting bat drifting into the gloom.
Elsey, with her contagious optimism and
proper way of speaking.
My mom, with the heart of a lion and an abundance of compassion.
My dad, the fighter, quick to smile, slow to anger.
My rock, my hero.

The fourth guard co
me
s
.
Eleven o
’clock—if the patrol pattern hasn’t changed.
My mind i
s re
lentless, and soon my heart joins
in the fun, hammering in my chest, striving to pound its way thro
ugh my bones and skin.
But I am
handling it.
Barely.

Until my lungs decide
to join the party.

My breaths start
coming in ragged heave
s, short and choppy, until I am gasping for breath.
It i
s like my whole body—all its parts, intern
al organs, and nerve endings—decide
to mutiny at the exact same time.

That’s when I lose count.
I ca
n
’t remember if the last guard I
heard
was
the fourth or the fifth.
I am thinking fifth, but I ca
n’t
be sure.
When the seventh—or is it the sixth?—guard goes by, I know I have
t
o play it conservative.
This is one time I ca
n’t be late.

So I block
out all my kooky, mutinying bo
dy parts and start
counting.
I put every last ounce of concentration and brain power into keeping count, maintaining a steady rhythm, treatin
g the act of counting like it i
s the most complicated math problem.

Right on six
hundred, I pull
my door op
en and step
into the
dim hallway.
Ten seconds pass and Tawni still has
n’t emerged.
I think I must be too early.
It i
s probably eleve
n-forty and the next guard will
be coming
soon—the guard that should have
trigge
red my counting.
But then I have
a
very bad thought.
What if I am too late?
What if I
mis
sed two guards passing and it i
s really twelve-ten n
ow?
What if Cole and Tawni
waited for me, and when I didn’t come, carried on the plan without me?

Tawni’s door creaks
open, and lik
e a shadow, she emerges
.
I
ta
k
e
a
deep breath and approach
her
.
“You count slow!” I hiss
.

She raises
her wrist, displaying the digital numbers on a wristwatch.
11:55. “Sorry, I f
orgot I had this,” she whispers
.
“I guess you got excited and counted
too
fast.”

I don’t know why the twelve o’clock guard cho
o
se
s
to come down the hall at that moment
.
It’s possible he i
s just bored, choosing to start his circuitous route through the complex a few minutes early to pass the t
ime.
Or perhaps Tawni’s watch i
s slow, as w
ell as my counting.
Maybe he i
s right on time.
Whatever
the case, all of a sudden he is here and we have
nowhere to hide.