Rickson told them the story over and over of how he was born because of two people in love – whatever that meant – and that his father had cut a poisoned pill out of his mother’s hip, and that’s how people had babies. But not all people had babies out of two people in love. Sometimes it was strangers, he said, who came and took whatever they wanted. It was men in those old days, and often what they wanted was for women to make babies, and so they cut poisoned pills right out of their flesh and the women had babies.
Elise didn’t have a poisoned pill in her flesh. Not yet. Hannah said they grew in there late like grown-up teeth, which was why it was important to have babies as early as you could. Rickson said this weren’t true at all, and that if you were born without a pill in your hip you’d never have one, but Elise didn’t know what to believe. She paused on the stairs and rubbed her side, feeling for any bumps there. Tonguing the gap between her teeth in concentration, she felt something hard beneath her gums and growing. It made her want to cry, knowing her body could do foolish things like growing teeth and pills beneath her flesh without her asking. She called up the stairs for Puppy, who had squirmed loose again and had bounded out of sight. Puppy was bad like this. Elise was starting to wonder if puppies were a thing you could own or if they were always running away. But she didn’t cry. She clutched the rail and took another step and another. She didn’t want babies. She just wanted Puppy to stay with her, and then her body could do whatever it wanted.
A man overtook her on the stairs – it wasn’t Solo. Solo had told her to stick close. “Tell Puppy to stick close,” she would say when Solo caught up to her. It paid to have excuses ready like this. Like pumpkin seeds in pockets. This man overtaking her looked back at her over his shoulder. He was a stranger, but he didn’t seem to want her things. He already had things, had a coil of the black and yellow wire that dipped from the ceiling in the farms that Rickson said never to touch. Maybe this man didn’t know the rules. It was peculiar to see people she didn’t know in her home, but Rickson lied sometimes and was wrong some other times and maybe he lied or was wrong with his scary stories and Solo had been right. Maybe it was a good thing, these strangers. More people to help out and make repairs and dig water trenches in the soil so all the plants got a good drink. More people like Juliette, who had come and made their home better, took them up to where the light was steady and you could heat water for a bath. Good strangers.
Another man spiraled into view with noisy boots. He had a sack bursting with green leaves, the smell of ripe tomatoes and blackberries trailing past. Elise stopped and watched him go. That’s too much to pick all at once, she could hear Hannah saying. Too much. More rules that nobody knew. Elise might have to teach them. She had a book that could teach people how to fish and how to track down animals. And then she remembered that all the fish were gone. And she couldn’t even track down one puppy.
Thinking of fish made Elise hungry. She very much wanted to eat right at that moment, and as much as possible. Before there wasn’t any left. This hunger was a feeling that came sometimes when she saw the twins eating. Even if she wasn’t hungry, she would want some. A lot. Before it was all gone.
She trundled up the steps, her bag with her memory book knocking against her thigh, wishing she’d stayed with the others or that Puppy would just stay put.
“Hey, you.”
A man on the next landing peered over the rails and down at her. He had a black beard, only not as messy as Solo’s. Elise paused a moment, then continued up the stairs. The man and the landing disappeared from view as she twisted beneath them. He was waiting for her as she reached the landing.
“You get separated from the flock?” the man asked.
Elise cocked her head to the side. “I can’t be in a flock,” she said.
The man with the dark beard and bright eyes studied her. He wore brown coveralls. Rickson had a pair like them that he wore sometimes. That boy from the bizarre had coveralls like that.
“And why not?” the man asked.
“I’m not a sheep,” said Elise. “Sheep make flocks, and there aren’t any of them left.”
“What’s a sheep?” the man asked. And then his bright eyes flashed even brighter. “I seen you. You’re one of the kids who lived here, aren’t you?”
Elise nodded.
“You can join our flock. A flock is a congregation of people. The members of a church. Do you go to church?”
Elise shook her head. She rested her hand on her memory book, which had a page on sheep, how to raise them and how to care for them. Her memory book and this man disagreed. She felt a hollow in her stomach as she tried to sort out which of them to trust. She leaned toward her book, which was right about so much else.
“Do you want to come inside?” The man waved an arm at the door. Elise peered past him and into the darkness. “Are you hungry?”
Elise nodded.