Raven raises her eyebrows when she sees me. My mother gestures to her, a motion of resignation, and Raven turns back to Colin.
“All right,” he’s saying. “Like we talked about last night, we move in three groups into the city. First group goes in an hour, does the scouting, and makes contact with our friends. The main force doesn’t budge until the blast at twelve hundred hours. The third group will follow immediately afterward and head straight to the target….”
“Hey.” Julian comes up behind me. His eyes still have a puffy, just-awake look, and his hair is hopelessly tangled. “I missed you last night.”
Last night, I couldn’t bring myself to lie down next to Julian. Instead I found a free blanket and made my bed out in the open, next to a hundred other women. For a long time, I stared up at the stars, remembering the first time I came to the Wilds with Alex—how he led me into one of the trailers, and unrolled the tarp that served as its ceiling so we could see the sky.
So much between us went unsaid; that is the danger, and beauty, of life without the cure. There is always wilderness and tangle, and the path is never clear.
Julian begins to reach for me, and I take a step backward.
“I was having trouble sleeping,” I say. “I didn’t want to wake you.”
Julian frowns. I can’t bring myself to make eye contact with him. Over the past week, I’ve accepted that I will never love Julian as much as I loved Alex. But now that idea is overwhelming, like a wall between us. I will never love Julian like I love Alex.
“What’s wrong with you?” Julian is watching me warily.
“Nothing,” I say, and then repeat, “Nothing.”
“Did something—” Julian starts to say when Raven whirls around and glares at him.
“Hey, Jewels,” she barks out, which she has taken to calling Julian when she’s annoyed. “This isn’t gossip hour, okay? Shut it or clear out.”
Julian falls quiet. I turn my eyes to Colin, and Julian doesn’t try to touch me or move closer. The sky is now streaked with long filaments of orange and red, like the tendrils of a massive jellyfish, floating in a milk-white ocean. The mist rises; the earth begins to shake itself awake. Portland, too, will be stirring.
Colin tells us the plan.
Hana
On my last morning as Hana Tate, I drink my coffee onto the front porch, alone.
I had planned to take a final bike ride, but there is no hope of that now, not after what happened last night. The streets will be crawling with police and regulators. I’ll have to show my papers, and field questions I can’t answer.
Instead I sit on the porch swing, taking comfort in its rhythmic squeaking. The air is morning-still, cool and gray and textured with salt. I can tell it will be a perfect day, cloudless and bright. Every so often, a seagull cries sharply. Other than that, it’s silent. Here there are no alarms, no sirens, no hint of the disturbance last night.
But downtown, it will be different. There will be barricades and security checks, reinforced security at the new wall. I remember, suddenly, what Fred told me once about the wall—that it would be like the palm of God, cupping us forever in safety, keeping out the diseased, the damaged, the unfaithful and unworthy.
But maybe we can never be truly safe.
I wonder whether there will be new raids in the Highlands, whether the families there will be once again displaced, and quickly dismiss the concern. Lena’s family is beyond my reach. I see that now. I should have seen that always. What happens to them—whether they starve or freeze—is none of my business.
We are all punished for the lives we have chosen, in one way or another. I will be paying my penance—to Lena, for failing her; to her family, for helping her—every day of my life.
I close my eyes and picture the Old Port: the textured streets, the boat slips, the sun breaking loose of the water, and the waves lapping against the wharves.
Good-bye, good-bye, good-bye.
I mentally trace a route from Eastern Prom to the top of Munjoy Hill; I see all of Portland spread vastly below me, glittering in new light.
“Hana?”
I open my eyes. My mother has stepped onto the porch. She holds her thin nightgown close to her body, squinting. Her skin, without makeup, looks almost gray.
“You should probably get into the shower,” she says.
I stand up and follow her into the house.
Lena
We’ve moved to the wall. There must be four hundred of us, massed in the trees. Last night, a small task force made the crossing, to prepare last-minute for the full-scale breach today. And earlier this morning, another small group—Colin’s people, hand-selected—got over the fence on the west side of Portland, close to the Crypts, where the wall has not yet been built and security has been compromised by friends, allies, on the inside.