“Does anyone stay there now?” I ask Alex.
“Sometimes people squat, when it’s rainy or freezing. Only the roamers, though—the Invalids who always move around.” Again he pauses for a fraction of a second before he says Invalids, grimacing like the word tastes bad in his mouth. “We pretty much stay away from here. People say the bombers might come back and finish off the job. But mostly it’s just superstition. People think the house is bad luck.” He gives me a tight smile. “It’s been totally cleaned out, though. Beds, blankets, clothes—everything. I got my dishes there.”
Earlier, Alex told me he had his own special place in the Wilds, but when I pressed him for details he clammed up and told me I’d have to wait and see. It’s still weird to think of people living out here, in the middle of all this vastness, needing dishes and blankets and normal things like that.
“This way.”
Alex pulls me off the road and draws me toward the woods again. I’m actually happy to be back in the trees. There was a heaviness to that strange, open space, with its single house and rusting truck and splintered buildings, a gash cut in the surface of the world.
This time we follow a fairly well-worn path. The trees are still splattered with blue paint at intervals, but it doesn’t seem as though Alex needs to consult them. We go quickly, single file. The trees have been shoved away here, and much of the underbrush has been cleared so the walk is much easier. Beneath my feet the dirt has been tamped down over time by the pressure of dozens of feet. My heart starts thumping heavily against my ribs. I can tell we’re getting close.
Alex turns around to face me, so abruptly I almost slam into him. He clicks the flashlight off, and in the sudden darkness strange shapes seem to rise up, take form, swirl away.
“Close your eyes,” he says, and I can tell he’s smiling.
“Why bother? I can’t see anything.”
I can practically hear him roll his eyes. “Come on, Lena.”
“Fine.” I close my eyes and he takes my hands in both of his. Then he pulls me forward another twenty feet, murmuring things like, “Step up. There’s a rock,” or “A little to the left.” The whole time a fluttery, nervous feeling builds inside of me. We stop, finally, and Alex drops my hands.
“We’re here,” he says. I can hear the excitement in his voice. “Open up.”
I do, and for a moment can’t speak. I open my mouth several times and have to shut it again after all that emerges is a high-pitched squeak.
“Well?” Alex fidgets next to me. “What do you think?”
Finally I stutter out, “It’s—it’s real.”
Alex snorts. “Of course it’s real.”
“I mean, it’s amazing.” I take a few steps forward. Now that I’m here I’m not sure what, exactly, I was imagining the Wilds would be like—but whatever it was, it wasn’t this. A long, broad clearing cuts through the woods, although in places the trees have begun to crowd in again, pushing slender stalks toward the sky, which stretches above us, a vast and glittering canopy, the moon sitting bright and huge and swollen at its center. Wild roses encircle a dented sign, faded nearly to illegibility. I can just make out the words CREST VILLAGE MOBILE PARK. The clearing is full of dozens of trailers, as well as more creative residences: tarps stretched between trees, with blankets and shower curtains to serve as front doors; rusting trucks with tents pitched in the back of their cabs; old vans with fabric stretched over their windows for privacy. The clearing is pitted with holes where campfires have been lit over the course of the day—now, well past midnight, they are smoldering still, letting up ribbons of smoke and the smell of charred wood.
“See?” Alex grins and spreads his arms. “The blitz didn’t get everything.”
“You didn’t tell me.” I start walking forward down the center of the clearing, stepping around a series of logs that have been arranged in a circle, like an outdoor living room. “You didn’t tell me it was like this.”
He shrugs, trotting next to me like a happy dog. “It’s the kind of thing you need to see for yourself.” He toes a bit of dirt over a dying campfire. “Looks like we came too late for the party tonight.”
As we progress through the clearing, Alex points out every “house” and tells me a little bit about the people who live there, speaking all the time in a whisper, so we won’t wake anybody. Some stories I’ve heard before; others are totally new. I’m not even fully concentrating, but I’m grateful for the sound of his voice, low and steady and familiar and reassuring. Even though the settlement isn’t that big—maybe an eighth of a mile long—I feel as though the world has suddenly split open, revealing layers and depths I could never have imagined.
No walls. No walls anywhere. Portland, by comparison, seems tiny, a blip.
Alex stops in front of a dingy gray trailer. Its windows are missing and have been replaced by squares of multicolored fabric, pulled taut.
“And, um, this is me.” Alex gestures awkwardly. It’s the first time he has seemed nervous all night, which makes me nervous. I swallow back the sudden and totally inappropriate urge to laugh hysterically.
“Wow. It’s—it’s—”
“It’s not much, from the outside,” Alex jumps in. He looks away, chewing on a corner of his lip. “Do you want to, um, come in?”
I nod, pretty sure that if I tried to speak right now I would only squeak again. I’ve been alone with him countless times, but this feels different. Here there are no eyes waiting to catch us, no voices waiting to shout at us, no hands ready to tear us apart—just miles and miles of space. It’s exciting and terrifying at the same time. Anything could happen here, and when he bends down to kiss me it’s as though the weight of the velvety darkness around us, the soft flutters of the trees, the pitter-patter of the unseen animals, come beating into my chest, making me feel as though I’m dissolving and expanding into the night. When he pulls away it takes me a few seconds to catch my breath.
“Come on,” he says. He leans a shoulder against the door of the trailer until it pops open.
Inside it’s very dark. I can make out only a few rough outlines, and when Alex shuts the door behind us even those vanish, sucked up into black.
“There’s no electricity out here,” Alex says. He’s moving around, bumping up against things, cursing every so often under his breath.
“Do you have candles?” I ask. The trailer smells strange, like autumn leaves that have fallen off their branches. It’s nice. There are other smells too—the sharp citrus sting of cleaning fluid, and very faintly, the tang of gasoline.
“Even better.” I hear rustling, and a spray of water descends on me from above. I let out a small shriek and Alex says, “Sorry, sorry. I haven’t been here in a while. Watch out.” More rustling. And then, slowly, the ceiling above my head trembles and folds back on itself, and all of a sudden the sky is revealed in its enormity. The moon sits almost directly above us, streaming light into the trailer and crowning everything in silver. I see now that the “ceiling” is, in fact, one enormous plastic tarp, a bigger version of the kind of thing you’d use to cover a grill. Alex is standing on a chair, rolling it back, and with every inch more of the sky is revealed and everything inside only seems to glow brighter.
My breath catches in my throat. “It’s beautiful.”