Imprisoned (36 page)

“Why didn’t he sell it?”

“I think he’s hoping his wife will change her mind.”

“But won’t he be mad that you let us take it?”

“You bring it back when you can.”

Her generosity staggered me. The bike must have cost thousands of dollars and she was willing to let two virtual strangers—strangers on the run from the Enforcers—take it with the request that we bring it back.

“Of course,” Billy said.

I knew he was sincere, but he had no idea that where we were going, there would be no coming back. Assuming we succeeded. In the back of my mind I still worried that I had to go through the tunnel on the same date I’d come through—November tenth—but desperately hoped I was wrong and that the date didn’t matter. Pushing aside that worry, I looked at the joy on Billy’s face and felt fresh hope sweep over me.
We could get to the tunnel tonight.

“Let me just go get the key.”

The moment she left, Billy turned to me, a huge grin on his face. I’d never seen him so happy.

“So, you know how to drive this thing?” I asked.

“Yes I do.”

“Good.”

Mrs. Duncan was back a minute later. “Here you go.” She handed the key to Billy. “It has a full tank of gas.” She paused. “Now, I don’t know where you’re going, but I do know of a few people who would be willing to help you if you need it.”

She handed me a small piece of paper with two names written on it, along with a phone number next to each name. I slipped it into my back pocket. “Thank you.”

“One more thing,” she said, then she handed me two twenty dollar bills.

I stared at the money, feeling guilty that I was considering accepting it when I didn’t know if she could afford it, but also knowing we would absolutely need it.

She must have read my mind because she said, “Now don’t you argue. I know you can use it.”

I felt tears of gratitude for all that she was doing for us—a pair of fugitives that she’d barely met. “Thank you so much for your generosity.”

She smiled. “Like I said before, I don’t agree with what has come of our government and I don’t think it’s right that they make people leave their families at their own expense to force them to lose weight.” She squinted at me. “That
is
what happened to you, right?”

“Yes.”

“Are those F.A.T. centers as bad as I’ve heard?”

I had no idea what she’d heard, but what I did know was that the experience I’d just been through had been much worse than I would have imagined. If someone had told me that the F.A.T. centers drugged teenagers into submission, and had games where you fell into pits filled with live spiders, I would have laughed, thinking they were teasing me. But as I knew all too well, it was completely true.

I looked at Mrs. Duncan and nodded.

She reached out and stroked my arm, which made me think of Mom, which in turn made me anxious to get going and get home.

 “The helmets are over there.” She pointed to a nearby shelf.

Billy helped me put mine on, then he put his on. “You’d better wear the backpack,” he told me as he took it off and handed it to me.

I secured it onto my back and watched him get on the bike. Even through his faceplate I could tell he was grinning from ear to ear. I climbed on behind him and held on to his waist.

He turned on the engine and revved it. “You’re going to want to hang on tighter than that,” he yelled over the noise.

“Bye, Mrs. Duncan,” I shouted. “Thank you again.”

She just nodded.

I wrapped my arms around Billy’s waist and we surged forward and out the barn door. We hit the street a moment later and turned north. I’d never been on a motorcycle before but found the speed exhilarating—especially since I knew every mile we covered brought me closer to home. We decided to get on the freeway—we figured we’d be less conspicuous there than on the back roads—and made much better time than we could have dreamed of on the bicycles.

It was just after one o’clock when we left Mrs. Duncan’s and as the miles flew by beneath our feet, we eventually came to the exit for Fox Run. When I saw the sign saying it was the next exit, my eyes filled with tears. This is where my journey had begun and I was thrilled beyond words that I was back.

Billy exited the freeway and we zoomed down the off-ramp, stopping at the light at the bottom. “Where to?” Billy called out.

“Left.” Though I didn’t have a good sense of direction, I was certain how to get to the entrance to the forest by my house. I guided Billy to my street and we parked in a space between houses. I remembered the woman who now lived in my house and hoped she wouldn’t see me, fearing if she saw me she would be all too happy to call the Enforcers.

Billy turned off the engine and I slid off the bike. I took off my helmet, as did Billy, then I pulled the backpack off of my shoulders and eagerly took out the GPS device. I turned it on, then pulled up the directions to the tunnel. After a moment, the directions displayed. “Let’s go,” I said, grinning.

Chapter Thirty Nine

Billy took the backpack from me and I carried the GPS device as we set off into the woods. Many times we had to veer off-course to go around tangled bushes and other obstacles, but within an hour the tunnel was in sight. My heart pounded and blood rushed to my head. I couldn’t believe I was so close to getting home.

“What is this place, Morgan?”

I grabbed his hand and pulled him forward. “You’ll see.” We reached the entrance to the tunnel and I stared in the darkness. “Let me have the backpack.”

He handed it to me and I put the GPS device inside and took out two flashlights, handing one to him. I flicked mine on and stepped inside the tunnel. The light from my flashlight lit the inside much better than the matches had.

I put the backpack on and walked inside the tunnel with Billy right behind me. After a short distance I saw a burned out match on the ground and smiled. We kept going and I found match after match. I kept watch for the burned-out lantern, but knew that would be a ways down.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Billy said from behind me.

I did too. I thought about what it would mean if I succeeded. I would be home with my family, but what about the other Morgan? The one who I could only assume had switched places with me. Would she suddenly be back here? The Enforcers would be after her and she would have no clue that her life was in danger.

I felt a twinge of guilt that I had messed up her life in this world so badly, but what could I do now? I had to focus on what was best for me. But what about Billy? What if he didn’t want to go to another world? I wondered if I should tell him now—before we went through the wormhole.

What if someone brought me to another world without telling me? What would I do? What if he couldn’t find his family in my world? What if he got there and couldn’t get back here but didn’t want to stay in my world? He’d helped me so much, I had to give him the choice.

I stopped and Billy ran in to me.

“Sorry,” he said.

I turned to look at him in the light from the flashlight. “I need to talk to you.”

He shone his flashlight on the earth-covered walls. “Now? Here?”

“Yes. I need to tell you something before we go any further.”

“Okay. What is it?”

I pictured my family and how happy I would be to see them and couldn’t hold back the smile. “I’m from a different world.”

Billy stared at me for a second, then burst into laughter. He looked at me like I was insane. “What?”

The look of astonishment on his face made my smile fade. “It’s true. This tunnel leads to my world.”

Through his laughter he said, “Are you like, an alien, or something?”

I shoved him with the hand not holding the flashlight. “No, you idiot. It’s a parallel universe.”

He finally stopped laughing. “Um, don’t you think you should have mentioned this before?”

“Why? So you could mock me?”

“You know it sounds crazy, right?”

“Of course I know that. But it doesn’t make it any less true.”

“And this,” he swung his hand around, “Other world. I suppose it’s okay to be fat there, right?”

“Yes,” I said with enthusiasm. “There are people there who are overweight, but you can eat what you want and no one is dragged out of their homes and taken to F.A.T. centers.”

He spoke to the wall. “This is unbelievable.” Then he looked back at me and stared for a moment. “You really believe this, don’t you?”

“Duh. Because it’s true.”

“So when we come out the other side of this tunnel, how will I know we’re in this other world of yours?”

“First off, a big tree will be blocking the exit. Which is why I brought the ax.”

“It’s a hatchet.”

“Whatever. I brought it so we could get out of the hut that we’re going to go into.”

“A hut. Uh huh.”

“Yes. And then, we’ll go to my house. The one that you parked by. And my family . . .” Tears sprang to my eyes at the thought. “My family will be inside. Not some other family that moved in because my dad was forced to go to a F.A.T. center.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

“Do you believe me now?”

“Uh, I’m not sure yet. I guess we’ll see.”

I turned and started walking again. I saw another match on the ground. “See that match?”

He shone his flashlight where mine was pointed. “Yeah.”

“It’s from me. When I came through. And eventually we’ll see the lantern I dropped.”

“Okay.”

His agreement wasn’t enthusiastic, but that was okay. He’d believe me soon enough. We continued on and I saw several more matches, but then I stopped seeing them. They just weren’t there anymore. “The lantern should be around here somewhere,” I said, shining the light around as a bad feeling began to grow within me.

Billy shone his light around too.

I walked back the way we had come, thinking maybe I had missed it, but I didn’t see it. But I did see the beginning of the matches again. “Maybe someone else found it and picked it up?”

“That sounds reasonable,” he said.

But deep down, I had a very bad feeling. I didn’t say anything and kept walking, on the lookout for any clue I had come through there before. Finally we came to the end and I saw the ladder that led upward. I looked up and saw that the space I had come through—the space that had been open the last time I’d been here—was closed.

The bad feeling increased, but I forced it down, my hopes overriding any doubts. “We need to get through there.” I pointed to the square that would need to be removed.

Billy scaled the ladder and pushed against the square, but it didn’t budge. He looked down at me. “Are you sure you came through here?”

I didn’t like his logic—it only confirmed the fear that was growing inside me. “Yes, of course.”

He climbed down, took off the backpack, unzipped it, then removed the hatchet. He set the pack on the ground and climbed back up the ladder. He swung the hatchet at the wood and it didn’t take long for him to break through. Light from the space above trickled down to us. He kept working at the square until it was open enough for us to climb through. “Do you want to go first?” he called down to me.

“Well, you’re already there, so go ahead.”

“Okay.” He hoisted himself through and disappeared from view. Then he poked his head back down. “Your turn.”

I slung the backpack over my shoulder and climbed up the ladder, my heart racing at what I would find. A moment later I reached the top.

“Hand me the backpack,” Billy said, his hand extended.

I gave it to him and he pulled it through, then he reached down and helped me up. The moment my head was through, I saw that the hut was intact—no tree had crushed the door. The bad feeling swelled to a crescendo.

“I thought you said a tree had fallen on this place.” Billy smiled tightly, like he wanted to placate the crazy girl in the room, but couldn’t hide the obvious truth.

 I opened my mouth to speak, but a thick knot had formed in my throat as my hope that I would be reunited with my family faded, and the distinct possibility that I was still in Billy’s world began seeping into my gut. I swallowed several times, trying to gain control of the hysteria that was just beneath the surface. “There may be an issue with dates.” My voice caught as I spoke.

“Dates? What do you mean?”

“Well, you see, when I came through it was November tenth. And now it’s what? The end of September?”

“Yeah? So?”

“Well, maybe I have to come back on the same date. November tenth.”

“Are you sure?”

I couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. “Of course I’m not sure,” I shrieked, making Billy fall back a step. “I don’t know that much about parallel worlds, okay? For all I know, we’re in a completely different world now.” I found it hard to breathe but somehow I kept talking. “Maybe in this world they just kill you if you’re overweight. Or, or, maybe in this world it’s okay to be fat, but you aren’t allowed to live past the age of twenty.”

“Morgan, calm down.”

“Calm down? How can I calm down?” An overwhelming feeling of despair flooded me and I wrapped my arms around my stomach and fell to my knees. Sobs tore from my throat as the stark reality pounded through my head.
I was still in this world. Dad was still locked in a F.A.T. center. Hansen still wanted to kill me. Billy and I were fugitives in this world. On the run. Just two kids with zero resources.
Distraught beyond all reason, I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. I felt Billy’s hand on my shoulder but it didn’t help. The only thing that would help would be for me to be with my family. In
my
world.

“Hey. Morgan, hey. It’s going to be okay. You just have to come back here in six weeks, right?” He paused, but I didn’t answer. “I’ll help you, okay? I’ll make sure you get back here at the right time.”

My tears slowed and I turned my head. “You will?” I hiccupped as my sobs subsided. “You believe me?”

He hesitated. “Sure. Yes.”

I knew he didn’t really believe me, but was probably afraid of what I would do if he said so. Slowly, I managed to get myself under control. Then, despite what my gut told me, a whisper of hope pricked my mind. “Wait a minute. Maybe I’m wrong.” I stood and wiped the tears from my cheeks. “Maybe I
am
back, but it’s just September here too.” My voice lifted as I warmed to the idea. “Yeah, that would explain everything. That’s why the cover was on, and that’s why the lantern wasn’t there.”