The fan oscillates between us. Melissa reads for a while then shuts off her light.
When it’s finally fully dark in the tent I roll over, facing away from the flap, and stuff my thin pillow up under my head as much as I can.
It’s moments like this when my resolve starts to weaken. What the fuck am I doing this for? I’m completely overreacting, like a spoiled little girl. People would kill to take my place in the world. Like the people here. Ask any one of those girls out there to trade places with me and go home to a cushy teaching job where they can get fat eating bonbons and teaching the Odyssey to bored ninth-graders and they’d cut off their own arm for the chance.
A restless, dreamless sleep falls over me. It’s never really quiet in the camp. Melissa may be so straightedge she cuts herself, but somebody out there is fucking. I hear giggles in the distance. It’s like summer camp, some nights. Last month one of the girls went home after she turned up pregnant by one of the men.
It’s sometime past midnight when I hear the tent flap open. A hot breeze blows up my back, and light cuts in a thin line across the tent wall.
I freeze. Very, very slowly, I turn and look back over my shoulder. Brad just walked into our tent. Melissa is already up, sitting up in bed. She’s dumping a dress over her head. Brad just got a view of the full monty, or as close as one can get with Melissa. He saw her ankles, how scandalous.
I’m a little mad at him for so obviously checking me out if he’s with her, for her sake. I’m happy for her, though. If anyone in the world needs to get laid, it’s Melissa. She yawns, and Brad’s voice hisses in the dark.
“Quiet, we can’t wake your roommate.”
“Tent-mate.”
Brad lets out an exasperated sigh. “Come on, we don’t have much time. We’ll miss the truck if we don’t hurry.”
Truck? What truck?
As Melissa follows him out of the tent, I sit up, yank on a pair of shorts and a shirt, and tug on my boots. Something isn’t right. What truck? They can’t leave the camp. It’s against the rules.
Following after them, I hang back and hope they don’t notice my shadow from the harsh lights. They weave between the tents, making a circuitous route toward the back of the camp. When they reach the fence, Brad peels back the chain link from one of the posts and holds it for Melissa while she slips through, then heads through himself.
Frowning, I start to turn back. If they want to go fuck in the bushes, I’m not going to stop them. I just hope he’s not pressuring her into something she’s not ready for.
In the distance I hear the distinctive rattle-chug-chug of a diesel engine. It’s not one of the generators either. I find the loose section of chain link and pull it back, scratching up my hands in the process.
It makes a hell of a racket once I’m through, but I don’t think that matters now. Quickly I make my way down the hill. Behind the camp the ground slopes away sharply toward a creek where we’ve been drawing water to filter for bathing.
Down at the bottom I spot Brad and Melissa, lifting big wooden crates into a truck together. It’s a military vehicle, painted a drab brown.
As I move closer I make out the markings on the side of the crates. It’s food from our camp, food for the orphans and villagers. Why would they be stealing food?
I move closer, crouching in the tall grass along the creek bank. The water burbles softly, almost drowned out by the diesel rattle. It glows like a strip of silver in the dark. No moon tonight.
That must be deliberate.
Brad grabs Melissa around the waist and hoists her into the back of the truck.
I step out. “Where the hell are you going?”
They both look at me, and freeze.
A man I can’t see speaks in a low voice. I barely recognize the words. It’s a harsher, more guttural version of the Solkovian tongue. A different dialect.
Then it hits me. He’s speaking Kosztylan.
“Penny, what are you doing here?” Brad booms.
He looks around, like he expects someone to jump out.
More Kosztylan commands shout from behind me. I swallow hard and turn around to find a thin man with dark circles under his eyes and an assault rifle in his hands, gesturing toward me with the barrel of his gun.
A thousand scenarios run through the back of my head, all of them bad. Very bad.
“Get in the truck, Penny.”
I have a gun pointed at me. I don’t have much of a choice.
Brad offers me a hand. I take it. I flop down on one of the crates while the truck starts to move, and yank my hand away from his.
“What the fuck is going on?”
“You shouldn’t be here.”
“No shit, Brad. Start talking.”
“We’re helping take some food across the border into Kosztyla,” Melissa pipes up. “It’s for the resistance. Also medical supplies.”
“You stole them from camp?”
“No,” she says, her voice wavering.