FIVE
WE HEAD SOUTH THROUGH TOWN, passing the school and blacksmith shop and the numerous houses, including my own, that create the border of the village. Where the dirt fades away, tall grass begins, sprouting up in patches, until finally we are entering the woods. I don’t usually hunt along the southern portion of the forest. It’s marshier, and the larger game sticks to the drier areas. The ground grows soft beneath our feet as we continue, but there’s been little rain lately and we avoid sinking into the doughy earth. When we reach the coarse thicket that I know to be concealing the lake from view, Emma grabs my arm and pulls me to a standstill.
“This way,” she says, motioning to our right.
“But it’s straight ahead. On the other side of this brush.”
“I know, but the view’s better if you climb the hill.”
“View? There’s no view.”
“Trust, Gray. Have trust.” And then without waiting to see if I follow, she starts cutting through the trees and brush, no path to guide her. She holds her dress up about her knees, and I stare at her legs as she steps over fallen logs and rocks in our path. We move slowly and up a steady incline. Maybe there will be a view after all.
When we break loose from the trees, I’m nearly speechless. We are standing on a hill that overlooks the water. From this angle it appears rather small and narrow, its thinness stretching out of view beyond another crest in the land. Surrounding us are the bellflowers, tall, thick stems that grow higher than my waist. Delicate purple petals hang from each, grouped together and dancing in the soft breeze. The southernmost portion of the Wall is barely visible in the distance.
Emma leads us into the field and toward a lone rock that sits on the hillside. The purple flowers nearly reach her shoulders, but she climbs out of their grasp.
“I used to come here with my uncle,” she tells me as we get comfortable on the stone. “Almost daily. At least until . . . you know. I was nine when he was lost. I haven’t been back in years.”
“It’s beautiful from up here,” I say. “And, to be fair, it seems much smaller from this angle. I can almost understand why you called it a pond.”
“See?”
“Yeah, well, it’s still a lake. I’m just trying to be nice.”
She sighs. “Ah, yes. That must be difficult for you.”
“You know, despite what you might think, I’m not a mean person.”
“What you did to Chalice wasn’t mean?”
“That’s different.”
“It was still mean.”
“Okay, fine. I’m not inherently a mean person.”
“I’ll give you that for now.” She plucks a clump of grass and sprinkles it into the breeze.
“So why’d you do it?” she asks, looking at me. “Why were you honest about the matchup?”
I’m not quite sure how to answer the question. There are explanations on many levels. I don’t want to be a father. I hate the formality of slatings. I want her, but not if it’s forced.
“You were being honest, right?” she asks. “You’re not going to try to attack me later or something are you? I’m stronger than I look. Everyone always thinks I’m this kind, caring thing, because of my healing hands, but I can be forceful if I need to.”
“So I’ve heard.” I chuckle. “And, yes, I was being honest.”
She gives me that look again, the same one from the Clinic.
I still can’t read it.
“I hate the slatings,” she says.
“Me, too.”
“How many have you gone through with?”
“You don’t want to know.” I can count them on two hands and even though it’s been a long time since I’ve slept with anyone, the number is still more than I want to admit to her. “You?”
“Just one.” So the rumors are wrong. “You remember Craw Phoenix?” she asks.
I nod. He was lost to the Heist about a year and a half ago.
“I liked him,” she continues. “And I mean really liked him. It was so nice for that month, and for some reason I thought it would last and we’d have something. I don’t know what. It was stupid, really. I wanted to continue slatings with him, but I guess the feeling wasn’t mutual. Two weeks later he was seeing Sasha Quarters, and then he was gone completely.”
“We’re all gone eventually,” I say. “That’s half the reason I hate it, too. I don’t see the point of the scheduling and the moving around. I only have ’til I’m eighteen. I’d rather find something good, something comfortable, and stay in it.”
She gives me a half smile. “You mean be with one person? Like, beyond the duration of the slating?”
“Forget the slating. Pretend there’s no slating and there’s no rules and there’s no Claysoot and then, yes, one person. Forever. Is that weird?”
It’s quiet for a moment. I know it’s an odd question, completely hypothetical and outlandish, and for a second I think she’s going to laugh at me.
“You know, some hawks mate for life.” She bites her lip and looks back out over the water. It’s a ripple of icy silver in the earth, the valley bleeding blue into its depths.
“Really?”
“Yeah, the red-tailed ones. My uncle and I used to see them here each year. Always returning, always the same pairs together. If the birds pick one mate for life, why can’t we?”
I feel foolish for a moment. I spend hours in the woods every day and I’ve never noticed this in the hawks. Then again, I was never looking for it.
“Maybe some animals mate for life and others don’t,” I say. “Maybe we’re not supposed to be like the birds.”
“Maybe we are.”
She looks so pretty, sitting there, twisting grass between her tan fingers. I wonder if we are the only people who wish this, who long to ignore the matchups and procedures and settle into something that feels right. There I go again, thinking with the feelings in my chest instead of using my head. If we were like the birds, we’d die out in a matter of decades, once all the men were gone. I still wish it were possible though, wish I were a bird and Emma were a bird and we could fly away without looking back.
“You really are nothing like him,” Emma says. It pulls me from my thoughts and I find her staring at me, again with the same inquisitive look I can’t read. “Like Blaine,” she clarifies.
“I know, I know. He’s kind and responsible, and I’m reckless. He thinks things through. I react.”
“Yeah, I know, but I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. Maybe it’s good to just react, to not overthink everything. If we were wild and free, like the birds, you’d survive. Blaine probably wouldn’t. He’d be too worried with pleasing everyone and making everything fair.”
“Sounds like I’m pretty selfish.”
“No, that’s not what I meant.” She wrings her fingers anxiously. “I’m trying to say that I think doing what you feel can’t always be easy, but at least you’re being true to yourself.”
“It’s okay, Emma, you don’t have to try to make me seem like a better person. You don’t have to justify why it’s all right to spend time with me.”
“No, I’m not . . . ,” she says, frustration on her face. “Dammit, Gray, I’m trying to say I admire you for what you said about the slating, that I agree with you, that it’s not crazy to want to be like the birds, but above all, I’m trying to apologize for how I’ve judged you all these years. You’re different from Blaine but maybe not in a bad way. Maybe in a very good way, and I’m only seeing it for the first time.”
She’s staring right into me with those eyes of hers, dark orbs as large as walnuts. Something in my chest surges. Suddenly it is very warm.
“You want to go for a swim?” I ask, jumping from the rock. As much as I want to be near her, I need distance. It’s those words. What do they mean? Earlier today she despised me, thought me wicked for hitting Chalice, and now she admires me? All because I follow those feelings in my chest?
“Swim?” she asks. “Right now? It’s not even that hot out.”
“Suit yourself,” I say, tearing away from her and running down the flower-filled hillside. When I reach the edge of the lake, I turn back and can see Emma gazing down at me, perplexed. She’s probably still trying to figure out why her kind words sent me running.
“You coming?” I yell back up the hill. She shrugs her shoulders and then hops from the rock.
I pull off my boots and strip down to my drawers and am in the water before Emma is even halfway to the lake. The cold hits me savagely, biting at my lungs. It’s refreshing, though, and I feel like I can breathe again, Emma’s words falling aside as I kick into open water. I’m floating on my back, staring up at an impressive mass of clouds forming overhead, when something splashes beside me. I twist over and see Emma along the shore, tossing pebbles in my direction. She has waded in up to her shins, the hem of her white dress gathered in her arms.
“Are you coming in or not?”
She shakes her head. “It’s too cold.”
“Wimp.”
“Oh, please.”
“Well, you are.” I swim in until I’m close enough to the shore to splash her with a well-placed kick. Water catches the front of her dress and her face goes wide with shock. It probably feels like ice to her.
“Oh, you’re going to get it,” she shouts.
“How? I’m already in.” I swim back toward the lake’s center.
She’s fuming. She tugs her dress up over her shoulders and throws it aside before running and diving headlong into the water. She’s the better swimmer and catches up quickly. With a strong kick her hands are on my shoulders and pushing me beneath the surface. I’m too busy admiring how her undershirt clings to her body to prepare myself for the dunk. I resurface, sputtering and coughing.
“Who’s the wimp now?” she asks. Her hair is wet and stringy, pieces of it clinging to her neck. It looks dark in the water, nearly as black as mine. I lunge at her, but she’s too quick. She darts away, slipping underwater and resurfacing behind me, where, to my embarrassment, she dunks me again. We continue like this for a while, me always trying to catch her and she easily avoiding my attacks. When I finally surrender, she’s dunked me four times and eluded me seven.
“Fine, you win,” I admit as we climb out of the lake. “But I would slaughter you in an archery match.” I pull on my pants and use my shirt to dry my hair.
“You hunt daily, Gray. That’s hardly fair.” She’s turned away from me, pulling her dress on. She shakes out her wet hair and braids it back.
“It doesn’t have to be fair to be true.”
“Fine. Teach me,” she retorts.
“Really?”
“Yes, teach me how to shoot and then we’ll have a match.” She spins to face me. There are wet patches where her dress meets the curved parts of her body.
“Okay,” I agree. “Start tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow.”
We walk home in silence. I try to figure out what it all means, Emma being so nice, so playful. The last time the two of us got along so well was when I was six.
“Today was actually a lot of fun,” I tell her as we approach the outskirts of town.
“Yeah,” she agrees, “like being a kid again.”
We cut down a side street and head for the Clinic. Up ahead I can see Maude and Clara sitting outside the Danner sisters’ house.
“Emma, take my hand.”
“What? Why?”
“Just take it.” I reach out and grab hers before she can argue. Her skin is soft and delicate, unlike my callused hunting hands. I spread my fingers between hers and squeeze them lightly as we carry on. My chest heaves ever so slightly. As we near Maude, I watch how her eyes linger on our entwined hands and I flash her a devious smile as we walk by.