The System

“Was Ainsley really crying?” Ethan asked after a moment.

Darla nodded.

“She doesn’t say a word to me,” he mumbled, grasping. “I tried to engage. Tried to talk,”

Darla blew air through her nose and rubbed her left eye with her hand. “They’re good people, Ethan. I told you before. Good people, who were given one chance to survive…and that chance involved saving you.”

“They didn’t have to take the vials.”

“Then you’re dead. And they’re dead. And Teddy and I are alone with Joey and Spencer? No thanks. That sounds like the world’s worst sit-com.” Darla tried to crack a smile, but Ethan remained stone faced. “I’m begging you to find something good here and even if you can’t…don’t take it out on the people who are caring for you. Okay? Is that too much to ask?”

That assessment of his behavior didn’t sit well with him. “You just think I’m a whiner?” he asked and Darla shrugged a reply.

“Yeah, I guess,” she answered eventually. “You’re also a survivor. So, start acting like one.” Then she turned and walked to the door. “I’m going to go to the park with Teddy. When I get back, we’ll get everyone to help move you downstairs. Then you can pick an MRE for lunch. We were unaware those things were important to you. So, it’s a plan?”

Ethan nodded. Discouraged, he was still willing to concede. How often would Darla need to save his life before he could show her gratitude? He opened his mouth to speak, and then closed it. Then he sniffed. “I don’t know how to be,” he finally said.

“Don’t you think we get that?” Darla answered in a soft voice.

“I miss my family,” he said.

“Me too.”

Ethan slumped back down to the bed. “What if they never come for me? What if Lucy didn’t make it? What if they think I’m dead? What if they’re dead? What if this is it?”

“Sometimes in life we suffer great pain alone. And sometimes we suffer great pain collectively. You, Ethan King, are not alone. What makes you think your worry and pain is bigger than anyone else’s? Because it’s yours? I’m older than you, wiser perhaps. Take it from me, kid, there’s no one in this house who isn’t suffering a great deal. All of our wounds are unimaginable. So, when I tell you to shut up, I don’t mean to tell you stop hurting. I’m just saying, shut up. We see your lost leg, your worry about your family, and we raise you a dead wife, lost mothers and fathers, friends, and for Doctor Krause and Ainsley? A husband, father, and three brothers. And it doesn’t stop…then you go outward…it’s endless. The loss. It’s endless.”

Her speech was silenced by Teddy’s eager calls downstairs. She looked out into the hallway, her hand on the doorknob.

“I get it,” Ethan answered.

“I know you do, Ethan,” Darla said and she wiped her eyes. “I know you do.” Then she shut the door behind her and Ethan listened as she walked purposefully down the stairs. He stared at his textured ceiling and tried to find images in the splotches and splatters. Then he closed his eyes and sent out a prayer: Let my sister get to Nebraska. Let my family be safe. And have them come for me. It has to better there. It has to be better than here. Just get me away from this place. Get me out of Portland.

CHAPTER EIGHT

The female nurse swooped into the room, unhooked Lucy from her monitors, unshackled her ankles, and handed her back her laundered and dried clothes. Lucy stared at the bundle of fabric; she brought them up to her nose and inhaled deeply. Unlike her mother’s powerfully perfumed laundry detergent, her clothes just smelled clean—void of the body odor, dirt, dust, and any other stench acquired on her four-state trek.

Her grungy white underwear sat on top. And it wasn’t until that moment she realized that someone must have pried them off of her while she was unconscious. Nurse or doctor, it didn’t matter, she felt such shame that her cheeks turned hot.

“Go ahead and get dressed, sweetie,” the woman said and nodded toward the clothes. Then she spun on her orthopedic shoes and left Lucy alone.

In the privacy of the room, Lucy slipped out of her gown and let it fall to the floor. Then she hurried into her underwear, her bra, still warm from a dryer—a luxury Lucy hadn’t realized how much she missed—and then her pants, shirt, and her sweater. Completely dressed, she sat back on the bed, and waited. Her feet dangled off the edge of the bed and she held her hands in a ball on her lap.

There was a knock, then the door slid open, and the nurse reentered.

“Your parents are here,” she said and then stepped out of the way to let Maxine King’s imposing self through the door first. Her dark brown bob was combed into place; she wore an unfamiliar teal shirt, dotted with sequins along the collar, and black pants. Lucy drank in everything about her mother; her eyes, her arms, dotted with patches of chicken-skin that Lucy used to pray she’d never inherit; the freckles on her nose, and small the mole on her neck. She began to cry.

“Lucy! My Lucy! Lucy!” Mama Maxine shrieked. Tears streamed down her face as she flung herself toward her daughter, scooping her up into a crushing embrace, her nose inhaling Lucy’s hair, now dry and frizzy. “I can’t even believe…I can’t…I’m so…you’re here! You’re finally here.”

The nurse exited quietly.

“It’s not the Seychelles,” Lucy said, her chin trembling. “Oh Mama, Mama.” Lucy reciprocated the hug and refused to let go, clasping her hands together behind her mother’s back and nestling her head into her mother’s chest, the sequins pressing into her forehead. “What happened? How did all this happen? What is this place?” she asked, not moving an inch.

“Shhhh, shhhh,” Maxine whispered. She kissed the top of Lucy’s head and rubbed her hand along her back. “Sweet Lucy Larkspur…it feels like years. I can’t even tell you…I don’t know where to begin. You’ve missed so much. And—”

Lucy pulled back and wiped her eyes. “There’s a boy…”

“Grant. We’ve been told about him, yes.”

“He’s my friend, mom. He’s in trouble.”

A look of worry flitted across Maxine’s features, but Lucy couldn’t tell if it was concern for Grant, for Lucy, or for something bigger. Maxine looked like she wanted to speak, but instead she glanced back to the door, where a shadow lurked in the doorway. Her mother’s non-reply was glaring. When had her mother ever paused for injustice? When had she stayed silent when a child or friend needed her help? Lucy felt panicky.

Something had shifted.

She opened her mouth to protest the lack of outcry, but when she started to speak, no words formed on her tongue.

The shadow moved and crossed to their duo; a big hand came out and tousled Lucy’s tangled mane.

“Hey beautiful girl,” Scott King said to his oldest daughter. He choked back his emotion and reached in around his wife to join the hug. He wore a white lab coat; and underneath, a suit and tie. His salt and pepper goatee was trimmed, the cleft in his chin visible underneath the shadow of whiskers; and as he leaned in for an embrace, the hair scratched Lucy’s face and she bristled under the touch. She looked up and locked eyes with her father—his brown eyes were soft, kind, and hurt. For the first time, Lucy realized how young her father was; even his crows-feet and the web of wrinkles across his forehead seemed out of place. He wasn’t this all-knowing beacon—he was just a man.

“Dad,” Lucy said and her voiced cracked. She looked everywhere but his eyes. Without answers, her dad felt like a stranger.

“You’ve had an adventure,” her dad said like a statement. As if he had any idea of the real adventure. “But I knew you’d find the clues—”