Humanity (22 page)

“Straight forward,” I decided.

Gideon nodded, and we started moving at a
quick pace.

“Left here,” I suggested when we hit a
building.

“Back right,” Gideon said when we hit
another turn.

Together, we zigzagged through the maze.

There was a shout from behind us.

“Knew that was coming,” Gideon muttered,
both of us breaking into a sprint.

That’s when we hit the headquarters, the
entrance of which was a tall glass door.

“The keycards, quick!” I gasped, glancing
over my shoulder at the men running after us; they were several yards away, but
gaining quickly.

“Here, got it!” he said, and I understood
when the door made a click; he pulled it open, shoving me through.

More running.

“Where’s the exit?” I wheezed.

“Close,” Gideon replied, and we kept
choosing turns at random, quickly doubling back any time we hit a dead end. The
halls echoed shouts in what I assumed was Spanish, and we kept running.

“Sky!” I said, pointing through a window.
“And that door has a place for a keycard!”

“Better hope this is the right door,” he
responded, rifling through the cards for the correct key; he found it, and
pushed the door outward.

More fence was just beyond the door; we
hadn’t seen it in the dark from our perspective inside.

“Right!” Gideon ordered, and we turned
that way, running along the fence until we hit the dead end we’d hoped hadn’t
existed.

“What’s the point of this area?” I
demanded, dragging air in and out of my lungs. “There’s nothing here but grass
and the fence.

“It’s the break yard,” a heavily accented
voice replied from behind us; we turned in unison to face the dark-skinned
Mexican before us. He was uniformed, wore thick spectacles, and had a formal
hat covering his head. “Welcome to Los Estados Unidos de Mexico,” he said,
several soldiers catching up to him and stopping in their tracks; they each had
sweat dripping from their hairline, and looked at us sort of like we were
aliens. There was also the lovely part about them all pointing their advanced
weaponry at us. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

“We’re trying to get into your country,”
Gideon answered, voice hard. He gripped my upper arm with his free hand,
holding me close to him.

“I see,” the man replied, still so
formal-sounding. “Well, if you wouldn’t mind joining me in my office, I’d love
to hear about it.” He turned and beckoned us forward.

Together, we eyed all the soldiers aiming
at us, then followed along behind him; Gideon still held my arm tightly, as if
afraid that they’d force us apart.

They didn’t; instead, they herded us into
the office the man had spoken of: a small room, brightly lit with electricity,
with posters littering the walls: Spanish phrases, and images of what I assumed
was the Mexican flag.

There was also a window, taunting us with
the promise of freedom as regular Mexican citizens walked past on the dark
streets, each of them busy in their own lives – lives that didn’t involve the
troubled U.S.

“Please take a seat,” the man said,
rounding a desk and sitting behind it. “Oh, and give the men your guns.” The
last part wasn’t a suggestion.

I looked up at Gideon and he nodded; we
turned and gave a soldier our weapons, but we didn’t sit down. The soldiers
left us, closing the door behind them.

“I have a lot of U.S. citizens trying to
jump the border – usually on a weekly basis. It’s rare that they come in pairs,
though – it’s much more difficult to make it through if you have to keep track
of more than just yourself.”

Gideon snorted. “Not only that, but it’s
rare for us ‘U.S. citizens’ to form pairs at all anymore. Too difficult to care
for more than just yourself in our world.”

 
“And yet you’ve done it,” the man murmured.
“Why is that?”

“We have a different focus than most,”
Gideon replied shortly.

The man looked at me. “Where did those
bruises come from?” he asked, his gaze flickering back to Gideon before
returning to me.

Gideon had said my face looked fine, but
I knew from experience that the bruises had to have still been there, an ugly
yellow by now.

“Gideon didn’t do this,” I immediately
told the man, not wanting anyone to get the wrong impression about the
relationship Gideon and I had.

“Then where
did
they come from?”

I struggled to come up with a response
that wasn’t so personal. “Life is difficult in the U.S.; we had an encounter,
and this was the result.”

“And now you’re coming to our country to
escape all of that.”

“Of course; wouldn’t you do the same?”

The man was silent, his eyes like rock.
But somehow I thought, if I just said enough, I could convince him to let us
go. He was obviously not the type to shoot intruders on sight.

“Look, do you have a family?” I asked him;
Gideon stood tense beside me, and the man blinked. “We came here because we
want a family, and we don’t want to have it taken away from us the way our
previous families were. His family – ” I indicated Gideon, “ – and my family
were both taken from us because of the world we live in. Food is scarce, and
everyone is willing to kill on the spot in order to survive. I killed my first
human when I was six, and I was
proud
of
it. I want to have children, and I don’t want them to live like that.”

The man looked between the two of us
silently for a moment, mulling over my words. “I could lose my job if I let you
in,” he finally murmured.

My heart skipped a beat, but I didn’t say
anything; I waited.

“I understand what you want; I wanted
that, too, once. It didn’t work out – my wife died shortly after our first
child was born – but I would give anything to have another chance at it.” He
rubbed at his eyes, tired. “Sometimes I feel so weak; I have a habit of letting
you people into the country. I haven’t been caught yet, though.” He looked at
Gideon. “My advice? Get as far from the border as you can – it’ll make it more
difficult to trace your origins.” He smiled wryly. “It’ll also help me keep my
job. Here,” He bent over his desk, unlocking a drawer and pulling it out. He
handed some small pieces of paper to Gideon. Was that money?

“It won’t last long, but hopefully it’ll
help you get started.” He stood, then turned around and placed another key into
the window, unlocking it before pulling it open; the warm night air caressed
our faces, and with it came the smells of this new country. “You’ll want to get
a move on before anyone realizes you’ve left.”

“What’ll you tell them?” I asked, still
shocked at the luck we’d had; if this man hadn’t been the leader on duty that
night, we wouldn’t have made it.

“I’ll tell them I already sent you back,”
he said.

“Won’t they be standing outside the door,
though?”

“Naw, they all have jobs to do; they know
I can handle myself.”

“Our guns?” Gideon asked, eyes glued to
the open window.

“Confiscated. But I doubt you’ll need
them anymore. Now, get going. Please.”

I caught his eye. “Thank you,” I said,
trying to put as much feeling as possible into the statement. There was no way
I could have thanked him properly, but I hoped he could understand more than my
desire to safely raise a family – I hoped he could understand the gratitude in
receiving the potential for the opportunity.

Gideon nodded at the man, and then tugged
my hand; he climbed through the window first, then pulled me after him, lifting
me from my feet to place me on the ground.

“Good luck,” the man told us, then closed
the window, disappearing from sight – the exterior of the window was tinted,
shielding the happenings of the office from view.

I felt naked without my gun. But, as the
man had said, we probably wouldn’t need them anymore. At least, I hoped not.

I looked at Gideon; he looked back at me.
Then, together, we turned away from the building to face the street. Slowly, we
stepped forward, into the chaos, the freedom, the beauty, of civilization.

Epilogue
– Candace

My stomach heaved, and its contents came
back up, forcing me to hurl them into the grass.

“What a waste,” I muttered, grasping at
the skin of my belly.

“It’s worth it,” Gideon soothed, rubbing
my back and smoothing my hair away from my face.

“Says you – you’re not the one throwing
up. I’m telling you, this kid’s going to be an only child. I can’t do this
again.”

“What about the nine siblings we’ve
already promised him?” he asked in mock horror.

“Gone. Not happening.”

He smiled benignly as he pulled me back
into a standing position.

A woman passing us on the sidewalk
stopped, raising an eyebrow at me. “Enferma?” she asked Gideon.

He shook his head. “Embarazada,” he
replied.

“Oh! Muy bien. Felicitaciones.” She kept
walking.

“Why doesn’t anyone mind their own
business around here?” I muttered.

“Comes with living in a small farm town,”
Gideon lightly answered.

“I wish you wouldn’t be so happy; it’s
nauseating.”

The smile automatically disappeared from
his face. “Sorry. I’ll be truly morose from now on.”

I pretended I hadn’t heard this, walking
forward again. “Let’s just get home already.”

We walked along a dirt road, tall stalks
of corn growing on one side, with short stalks of beans growing on the other.
The heat on my neck wasn’t necessarily pleasant; I missed the shade of the
forests.

Gideon missed traveling in the forest,
too, but we both knew it was a small sacrifice for the ability to live in a
community without fear of being hurt.

It had been three years since we’d
crossed the border into Mexico, and it had taken nearly that long for us to
find somewhere to stay, right in the middle of the country. Hunger hadn’t ever
been an unknown concept to us, but it did happen quite a lot for us in those
first few years. For one thing, we no longer had a free hunting range. For
another, we had no money.

However, through a series of chance
encounters, we made our way to Torreon. Someone we met along the way suggested
a family with a lot of farmland who liked to rent out pieces of it to others;
the pay was a portion of the harvest. We looked into this suggestion, and found
the family to our liking.

The land came with a small shack of a
house. I had been absolutely delighted by this when I’d found out – no more
sleeping in alleyways, or hiding out in fields hoping the owners wouldn’t catch
us.

Gideon wasn’t quite as impressed, and set
to work renovating the place.

The first growing season came, and we did
okay for ourselves. It was a completely different type of work from hunting and
running and walking, but we both found that we had the stamina for it, and it
was very rewarding to see the plants grow for our work.

Now, we were walking back from the local
market; Gideon carried a basket of the things we’d traded for, and I focused on
keeping my stomach steady. We reached our little house, and Gideon held the
door open for me. I immediately walked in and laid down on the bed, not even
bothering to take off my shoes.

Gideon set the basket down, then climbed
in behind me, wrapping around me in the way that he liked. “I love you,” he
whispered into my ear.

It was so strange, the way the two of us
had gotten to this point. It had started with the death of my parents, and had
been pulled along by the interactions we’d had with others. I’d learned so much
since I’d met him: about survival, about what I really wanted to live for, and
about how any one person was a deep ocean of feelings, rationalities, needs,
and emotions. He’d taught me to see the world for the beauty that it offered,
rather than something to overcome. He’d taught me about what it meant to be
human: to do something out of desperation, not necessarily because it was the
right thing – then, to regret it and wish that another option had presented
itself.

He’d taught me how to love someone, no
matter what he might have done in the past. And, through that love, he’d taught
me how to forgive.

It was odd to think that our relationship
had started because he had killed the people most dear to me. Now, he was what
brought happiness to each breath I took – even as my stomach churned
determinedly, nauseatingly – and I couldn’t imagine my life without him. He was
everything to me. I didn’t see him for what he had done wrong; I saw that as
part of his humanity.

Back in the U.S., everyone was human, and
he and I had just been doing what was necessary for each of us to get through
one more day. Finally, though, what brought us through each day was the love we
had for each other.

My ability to forgive him? Maybe that
defined me as human, too. I still didn’t know whether it had been the perfect
choice to forgive him, but I didn’t think about that anymore. My love
overwhelmed any doubts I had, and I knew my parents would want me to be happy.

I craned around to look at him, searching
his eyes for all the pieces of him that I cared most about. “I love you, too,”
I said, and I leaned in to kiss him.