I was the one who got Julian out of the underground. I was the one who risked my life to sneak into New York City and save him. I was the one who got into Waterbury; I was the one who found out Lu was a fraud. And now Raven tells me to go to bed, like I’m an unruly five-year-old.
I take aim at a tin cup that has been lying, half-buried in ash, at the edge of a burned-out campfire, and watch as it rockets twenty feet and pings off the side of a trailer. A man calls out, “Take it easy!” But I don’t care if I’ve woken him up. I don’t care if I wake the whole damn camp up.
“Can’t sleep?”
I spin around, startled. Coral is sitting a little ways behind me, knees hugged to her chest, next to the dying remains of another fire. Every so often she prods it halfheartedly with a stick.
“Hey,” I say cautiously. Since Alex left, she has gone almost completely mute. “I didn’t see you.”
Her eyes go to mine. She smiles weakly. “I can’t sleep either.”
Even though I’m still antsy, it feels weird to be hovering above her, so I lower myself onto one of the smoke-blackened logs that ring the campfire. “Are you worried about tomorrow?”
“Not really.” She gives the fire another prod, watches as it flares momentarily. “It doesn’t matter for me, does it?”
“What do you mean?” I look at her closely for the first time in a week; I’ve been unconsciously avoiding her. There is something tragic and hollow about her now: Her cream-pale skin looks like a husk—empty, sucked dry.
She shrugs and keeps her eyes on the embers. “I mean that I have no one left.”
I swallow. I’ve been meaning to speak to her about Alex, to apologize in some way, but the words never quite come. Even now they grow and stick in my throat. “Listen, Coral.” I take a deep breath. Say it. Just say it. “I’m really sorry that Alex left. I know—I know it must have been hard for you.”
There it is: the spoken admission that he was hers to lose. As soon as the words leave my mouth, I feel weirdly deflated, as though they’ve been swollen, balloonlike, in my chest this whole time.
For the first time since I sat down, she looks at me. I can’t read the expression on her face. “That’s okay,” she says at last, returning her gaze to the fire. “He was still in love with you, anyway.”
It’s as though she’s reached out and punched me in the stomach. All of a sudden, I can’t breathe. “What—what are you talking about?”
Her mouth crooks up into a smile. “He was. It was obvious. That’s okay. He liked me and I liked him.” She shakes her head. “I didn’t mean Alex, anyway, when I said I had no one left. I meant Nan, and the rest of the group. My people.” She throws down the stick and hugs her knees tighter to her chest. “Weird how it’s just hitting me now, huh?”
Even though I’m still stunned by what she has just said, I manage to keep control of myself. I reach out and touch her elbow. “Hey,” I say. “You have us. We’re your people now.”
“Thanks.” Her eyes flick to mine again. She forces a smile. She tilts her head and stares at me critically for a minute. “I can see why he loved you.”
“Coral, you’re wrong—” I start to say.
But just then there’s a footfall behind us, and my mother says, “I thought you went to sleep hours ago.”
Coral stands up, dusting off the back of her jeans—a nervous gesture, since we are all covered in dirt, caked grime that has found its way from our eyelashes to our fingernails. “I was just going,” she says. “Good night, Lena. And . . . thanks.”
Before I can respond, she spins around and heads off toward the southern end of the clearing, where most of our group is clustered.
“She seems like a sweet girl,” my mother says, easing herself down onto the log Coral has vacated. “Too sweet for the Wilds.”
“She’s been here almost her whole life.” I can’t keep the edge from my voice. “And she’s a great fighter.”
My mother stares at me. “Is something wrong?”
“What’s wrong is that I don’t like being kept in the dark. I want to know what the plan is tomorrow.” My heart is going hard. I know I’m not being fair to my mother—it isn’t her fault I wasn’t allowed in to plan—but I feel like I could scream. Coral’s words have shaken something loose inside me, and I can feel it rattling around in my chest, knifing against my lungs. He was still in love with you.
No. It’s impossible; she got it all wrong. He never loved me. He told me so.
My mother’s face turns serious. “Lena, you have to promise me that you’ll stay here, at the camp, tomorrow. You have to promise me you won’t fight.”
Now it’s my turn to stare. “What?”