Brave New Love (12 page)

Four of those, and the rest of the bed was filled with covered five-gallon tubs: white plastic, the high-grade kind you use to ferment beer in. And that’s what was in the ten they
checked.

“Welcome home,” one chica maybe my age said. Grudgingly, but she said it. She walked ahead to guide us into their main camp.

Didn’t take her long. A few minutes and I saw firepits, and picnic tables set together in parts of circles, tarps strung between trees over platforms, a handful of big tents. We pulled up
next to their playground as the sun was barely beginning to wonder was it time to set. The chica banged on our hood twice, then nodded and scowled at us. Aim nodded too and shut off the
ignition.

The kid opened the truck’s passenger door. Aim and I looked at each other in silence. Then she grinned. “I guess we’re there yet!”

Maybe it was the other littles on the swings and jungle gyms that got through to him. He slid to the ground and walked a few steps toward them, then stopped. I got out too and slammed the door.
Didn’t faze him. He was focused on the fun and games.

“What have we here?” A long-haired dude wearing a mustache and a skirt came over from watching the littles play.

Aim opened her door and got out, too. “We’re a day or so early I guess—Amy Niehauser and Dolores Grant.” I always tease Aim about how she ended up with such a
non-Hispanic name, and she gives me grief right back about not having something made-up, like “Shaniqua” or “Running Fawn.” “We’re from Kiona. In
Pasco?”

Dude nodded. “Sure. Since Britney was bringing you in I figured that was who you must be. I’m Curtis. We weren’t expecting a vehicle, though.” He waved a hand at the
truck.

Britney had hopped up on the bed again while we talked, lifting the lids off the rest of the plastic tubs. “Likewise!” she shouted. “Look at this!”

Aim and I leaned up over the side to see. Britney was tearing off cover after cover. Sure enough, the five tubs furthest in were all at least three-quarters full of thick, indigo-blue liquid
with specks of pale purple foam. I had never seen so much Likewise in one place.

Curtis lost his cool. “What the hell! We told you we don’t allow that—that—” He didn’t have the vocabulary to call the drug a bad enough name.

“No, it’s not ours—we stole this truck and we didn’t know—” Aim tried to calm him down. She tugged at the tub nearest the end. “Here, we’ll help
you pour ’em in the lake.”

“You seriously think we wanna pollute our water like that?”

“Look, I’m just saying we’ll get rid of it. We didn’t know, we just took this truck from some dudes acting like cowboys on the other side of the bridge, the little
dude’s big brothers, and they had a few friends—”

That got Britney’s attention. “They follow you?”

“Not real far,” I said, breaking in. “Since when we took this we left ’em on foot.” And they hadn’t shot at us more than once—the fuel explained why.
“They ain’t the only trouble you got for neighbors, either—I’d be more worried about Mercer Island if I were you than them bridge dudes—or a load of Likewise we can
dump anywhere you want.”

“Right.” Curtis seemed to quiet down and consider this. “Yeah, we’ll dig a hole or something . . .”

No one had proved a connection between Likewise and all the adults talking about living Otherwise, then disappearing. No one had proved anything in a long time that I’d heard of. But the
prisons where it first got made were the same ones so many “escaped” from early on, which is the only reason anyone even noticed a bunch of poor people had gone missing, IMO. News
reports began about the time it was getting so popular outside, here and in a few more countries.

Some of us still cooked it up. Some of us still drank it. How long did the side-effects last? If you indulged at the age of sixteen would you vanish years later, as soon as your brain was ready?
Could you even tell whether you went or not?

The ones who knew were in no position to tell us. They were Otherwise.

Britney went to report us to the committee, she said. A pair of twelve-year-olds came and showed us where to unload the fuel drums. I helped Aim lower the rolly from the bed—how had I got
it up there on my own? My arms were gonna hurt bad when the adrenaline wore off—and she handed them the keys. They drove to the bunker with the Likewise for the sentries to watch over.

Aim had to head back to the playground after that. The little dude seemed thoroughly recovered: he’d thrown off his jacket and was running wild and yelling with the other kids like he
belonged there.

The Rattlers’ committee met with us over dinner in this ridiculous tipi they’d rigged up down by the swimming beach. Buffaloes and lightning painted on the sides. I mean, even I knew
tipis were plains technology and had nothing to do with tribes in these parts. But, well, the Rattlers acted proud and solemn bringing us inside, telling us to take off our shoes and which way to
circle around the fire, and damn if they didn’t actually pass a real, live pipe after feeding us salads plus some beige glop that looked a lot worse than it tasted. And tortillas, which they
insisted on calling frybread.

Tina, their eldest, sat on a sofa cushion; she looked maybe Aim’s age, but probably she was older. Trying to show the rest of the committee how to run things when she was gone Otherwise,
she asked about folks at Kiona: who had hooked up with who, how many pregnant, any cool salvage we’d come across, any adults we’d noticed still sticking around. Aim answered her.

There were two dudes, one on either side of Tina—husbands, maybe? Rattlers were known for doing that kinda thing—and a couple younger chicas chiming in with compliments about how
well we were doing for ourselves. I waited politely for them to raise the subject they wanted to talk about. Which was, as I’d figured, the five tubs of Likewise.

They decided to forgive us and opted to pour the stuff in a hole like Aim suggested.

Tina had brains. “What’s interesting is that they were bringing this shipment
out
of Seattle.” She stretched her legs straight, pointed her toes up and pushed toward the
fire with her wool-socked heels. August, and the evenings were on the verge of chilly.

“Not like the whole city’s sworn off,” one of the chicas ventured to say.

“Yeah.” I had the dude that agreed pegged for a husband because he wore a ring matching the one on Tina’s left hand. “That crew up in Gas Works? They could be brewing big
old vats of Likewise and how would we know?”

The second dude chimed in. “They sure wouldn’t expect us to barter for any.” He wore a ring that matched the one on Tina’s right.

The young chica who’d already spoken wondered if it was their responsibility to keep the whole of Seattle clean, suburbs, too. Husband One opined that they’d better think a while
about that.

“Next question.” That was Tina again. “What are those bridge boys gonna do to get their shipment back?” She looked at me, though it was Aim who started talking.

We hadn’t told Claude or Dwight where we were going, or made a map for ’em or anything, so I thought the Rattlers were pretty safe. Plus I had hurt Dwight, broken at least one bone.
But the committee decided the truck was a liability even if they painted it, and told us we better take it with us when we departed their territory. Which would have to be
soon—“Tomorrow?” asked Husband Two.

Aim folded her lips between her front teeth a few seconds in that worried way she had. We’d expected more of a welcome, considering her skills. Kinda hoped she’d be able to set up a
forge here for at least a week. Were the Rattlers gonna make us miss her date with Rob? But according to the committee’s spies he was close, already landed on this side of the Sound and
heading south. He’d arrive any minute now. So we could keep our rendezvous.

Dammit.

Then I finally got to find out more on where all those corpses in the tunnel came from.

Richies, as I’d suspected. Didn’t seem like the committee wanted to go further into it, though. The dead people were who? People the richies had killed. How? Didn’t know.
Didn’t think it mattered; dead was dead. And why were they stacked up on the road all unhygienic-like instead of properly buried? Have to send a detail to take care of that. And the two fresh
ones? Tina said she figured the way I did that they were fallout from Claude and Dwight’s trip through the blockade.

So why? Well, that was obvious, too: use the dead ones as bait to catch us, alive, to work for ’em.

It became more obvious when Curtis took us to where we were supposed to sleep: a tree house far up the central hill of the park’s peninsula. He climbed the rope ladder ahead of us and
showed us the pisspot, the water bucket and dipper, the bell to ring if one of us suddenly took violently ill in the night. Then he wanted to know if we’d seen his little sister’s body
in the pile.

“Uh, no, we kinda—we had to go fast, didn’t see much. Really.” Aim could tell a great lie.

“She had nice hair, in ponytails. And big, light-green eyes.”

Anybody’s eyes that had been open in that pile, they weren’t a color you’d recognize anymore. Mostly they were gone. Along with big chunks of face. “No, we, uh, we had to
get out of there too fast. Really didn’t see. Sorry.”

He left us alone at last.

Alone as we were going to get—there were a lot of other tree houses nearby; dusk was settling in fast but we could see people moving up their own ladders, hear ’em talking soft and
quiet.

“Lie down.” I patted the floor mat. She came into my arms. I had her body, no problema. I did hurt from heaving the rolly around, but that didn’t matter much. I stroked her
hair back from her pretty face that I knew even in the dark.

“What’d they do with Dwayne?”

“Who?”

“Dwayne, you know, the little dude?”

Right: Claude and Dwight’s kid brother. “That what you wanna call him?”

Aim snorted. “It’s his
name.
He told Curtis. I heard him.”

My fingers wandered down to the arches of her eyebrows, smoothing them flat. “You worried about him? He looked happy on the playground. They must have places for kids to sleep here. We
seen plenty of ’em.”

“Yeah. You’re right.” The skin above her nose crinkled. I traced her profile, trying to give her something else to think of. It sort of worked.

“Why don’t the committee care more about the Mercer Island richies? That was—horrible. In the tunnel.”

I laughed, though it wasn’t the littlest bit funny. “Fail. Mega Fail—they were supposed to be protecting these people here and the richies raided ’em. I wouldn’t
wanna talk about it either.”

I felt her forehead relax. “Yeah.” She reached up and tugged my scarf free so she could run her hands over my close-clipped scalp. That was more like it. I snuggled my head against
the denim of her coat.

That was our last night together as a couple.

She only mentioned Rob once.

•  •  •

Next morning my arm felt even sorer. And my shoulder had turned stiff. And my wrist. Was getting old like this? No wonder people went Otherwise.

Aim and I woke up at the same time, same as at home and on salvage runs. “Good dreams?” I asked. She nodded and gave me a sheepish half-smile, so I didn’t have to ask who
she’d dreamed about. It wasn’t me.

What kind of universe would Aim make if she went Otherwise? It wouldn’t be the same as mine.

Curtis had pointed out a latrine on the way to our tree house. We dumped the pisspot there and took care of our other morning needs. It was a nice latrine, with soap and a bowl of water.

Down we went, following the trail to the main camp. Aim held my hand when we could walk side by side. Sweet moments. I knew I better treasure ’em.

I helped set out breakfast, which was berries and bars of what appeared to be last night’s beige glop, fossilized. Aim retrieved the rolly from where we’d left it under a supply
tarp. She cleaned the gun, which she called Walter, and shined up her tools. Soon enough she attracted a clientele.

First come a dude could have been fourteen or fifteen; he wanted her to help him fix up an underwater trap for turtles and crayfish. Then he had a friend a little older who asked her to help him
take apart a motor to power his boat. Actually, he had taken it apart already, and wanted her to put it together again with him.

Aim called a break for herself after a couple hours of this so she could go check out how Dwayne was doing. And she wanted to bring him a plum from the ones I’d collected for snacks. I
waited by the tools for her to come back. A shadow cut the warm sun and I looked up from the dropcloth.

“Hey.” A dude’s voice. All I could see was a silhouette. Like an eclipse—a gold rim around darkness.

“Hey back.”

“You’re not Amy.”

“Nope.”

He sat down fast, folding his legs. “Must be Dolores, then? I’m Rob.” He held out a hand to shake, so I took it.

Now I could see him, dude was every bit as pretty as Aim had said. Dammit. Hair like new copper, tied back smooth and bright and loose below a wide-brimmed straw fedora. Eyes large, a strange,
pale blue. Freckles like cinnamon all over his snub-nosed face and his long arms where they poked out of the black-and-white print shirt he wore. But not on his throat, which was smooth as vanilla
ice cream and made me want to—no. This was Aim’s crush.

His hand was a little damp around the palm. Fingers long and strong. I let it go. “Aim’s around here somewhere; she’ll be back in a minute, I think, if you wanna
wait.”

“Sure.” He had a tiny little stick, a twig, in the corner of his mouth. His lips were pink, not real thin for a white boy. Dammit.

“Where’s your guitar?” I asked.

“Left it back home, at the bunkers. The Herons’ll take care of it for me; too much to travel with. But I packed my penny-whistle.” He swapped the stick for something longer,
shiny black and silver. He played a sad-sounding song, mostly slow, with some fast parts where one line ended and the next began. Then he speeded up, did a new, sort of jazzy tune. Then another,
and I recognized it: “Firework.”

Aim recognized it, too. Or him, anyway—she came running up behind me shouting his name: “Rob! Rob!” She hauled him up with a hug. “I’m so glad! So glad!” He
hugged her back. They both laughed and leaned away enough to look each other in the eyes.