Chapter 4
1345 Words
Chapter Four
The darkness of the storage hall had never bothered her before. But the echoing shouts from the dining room, from people who could have been a part of the riot, transformed each shadow she passed into a person waiting to attack.
“Get it together, Nola.” She grabbed cans down from the shelves.
She stumbled under their weight as she ran back to the kitchen and shoved the armload of cans onto the counter. Shouts carried from the serving room. The angry voices of the crowd drowned out Mr. Pillion. Nola sprinted back into the storeroom, reached up to the top self, and pulled down giant cans of beans.
“Nola.”
Pain shot up her leg as the heavy can dropped onto her foot.
“Careful now,” the voice came again.
Nola spun around.
A pale boy with dark hair and green eyes flecked with gold smiled at her.
“Kieran,” Nola gasped, running to him and throwing her arms around his neck, all thoughts of food and riots forgotten.
He had changed since the last time she had seen him nearly a year ago. Muscles had filled out his lanky frame, and his hair had grown longer, hanging over his ears.
“What are you doing here?” Nola stepped back, looking into his face.
“It’s Charity Day.” Kieran shrugged, his smile fading.
Nola’s stomach dropped. “Are you here for food? Are things that bad?” She thought of Kieran’s father, a man so brilliant simple things like eating had always seemed trivial to him.
A man like him shouldn’t be on the streets.
Kieran shook his head. “Dad and I are fine. I know this may shock you, but getting kicked out of the domes didn’t kill either of us.”
“Kieran—”
“Dad’s still working in medical research, but now instead of being told only to help the elite and getting thrown out for trying to help people who really need it—”
“That’s not—”
“People out here love him,” Kieran said, his voice suddenly crisp and hostile. “Out here, he saves people.”
“He’s brilliant,” Nola said. “He’s been saving people as long as I’ve known him.”
A smile flickered across Kieran’s face. “We’re doing good.” Kieran took Nola’s hand. Calluses covered his cold palms.
“If you’re doing well, then why are you here?” Nola asked. She had been in the storage room for too long. Someone would come looking for her soon.
Unless the dining room’s turned into a riot.
“I came to see you.” Kieran brushed a stray curl away from her cheek. “I don’t need contaminated food dished out by Domers.”
“The food isn’t contaminated,” Nola said, trying to ignore her racing heart and Kieran’s tone when he said Domers.
“Then why aren’t you allowed to eat it?” Kieran asked.
“Because it’s for the poor.”
“Someday you won’t be able to believe that.”
He reached across the few inches between them, sliding his hand from her shoulder to her cheek.
“I need your I-Vent,” he whispered.
“You’re sick?” The butterflies in her stomach disappeared, replaced by the sting of panic.
“I’m fine,” Kieran said. “It’s not for me.”
“I can’t give medicine out.” Nola took a step back, shaking her head. “I’m not allowed to distribute resources.”
“They have stores of medicine in the domes,” Kieran said. “I only need one.”
“If I give you medicine and they find out…” Kieran’s father was important, a savior to the domes, and they cast him out for giving away the community’s food.
I’d be banished before sundown.
“I can’t do that.”
“Tell them it was stolen.” Kieran stepped forward, closing the distance between them. “Tell them I did it.” He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close.
Nola’s heart pounded in her ears. His face was a breath from hers. His hands on her waist. The cold of his fingers cut through her sweater as he traced the line of her hips.
He pressed his lips to her forehead. “Thank you, Nola.”
She raised her lips to meet his, but Kieran stepped back, holding out his hand. Her I-Vent rested in his palm.
“You’re saving a life.”
He turned and strode away, disappearing into the darkness before the tears formed in her eyes.
Nola stood alone in the dark.
She could scream. She should scream. She should shout to the guards that an outsider had stolen dome medicine. But would they be able to hear her over the chaos in the dining room? And what if they caught Kieran? Would they shoot a tiny, silver needle into his neck?
She grabbed a few cans without reading the contents and ran back to the kitchen. Her whole class stood in the back of the room, craning their necks to look out the window.
“I can’t believe they thought they could get away with that,” Jeremy growled. He was taller than most of the class and had a clear view of the street below.
“What happened?” Nola stood on her tiptoes, trying to see over the heads of her classmates.
“After they neutralized the first guy, people got crazy,” Jeremy said. “More people started shouting. Then people were pushing to get to the food. Mr. Pillion got knocked off the counter. Then the guards took a few more people down, and everyone else just sort of ran away.”
“It was terrible.” Lilly’s voice wavered. Marco wrapped an arm around her, and Lilly turned to cry into his shoulder.
Mr. Pillion burst through the doors to the kitchen. “Everyone back on the bus, now.”
Nola turned to go back to the hall to put the cans away.
“Leave it, Magnolia!” Mr. Pillion said.
Jeremy grabbed the heavy cans from her and tossed them onto a table before grabbing Nola’s hand and dragging her back through the door they had come in less than two hours before.
Only two guards joined them as the students scrambled to their seats. The door shut, and the bus jerked forward.
Nola stumbled and Jeremy caught her, holding her close as they drove away.
Groups of people lined the sidewalk. Whether they had been in the Charity Center or only come to see what the commotion was, Nola didn’t know.
A terrible crunch sounded from the front of the bus as a brick hit the windshield, leaving a mark like a spider web in the glass. The bus accelerated as the shouts of the crowd grew.
They reached the outskirts of the city. The domes rose in the distance, shining across the river, high in the hills.
“Class,” Mr. Pillion said, holding a hand over his heart as he spoke, “our world is falling apart. It has been for a long time. The greatest trial of those who survive is to watch the continuous decay that surrounds them. As the outside world grows worse, so too does the plight of the city dwellers. We witnessed the desperation that plight is causing today. Let us not dwell on the harm they might have done to us. Rather, let us be grateful for all we have. For if our roles were reversed, I promise you each of us would be as desperate as those we saw today.” He took his I-Vent from his shirt pocket and held the silver tip to his lips, taking a deep breath. “We must be grateful for even the simplest of things.”
Mr. Pillion sat, and the students dug through their pockets for their I-Vents.
Jeremy took a deep breath from his before turning to Nola.
She stared down at her hands, willing Jeremy not to look at her. There were scratches on her fingers. How had she gotten them?
“You need to do your I-Vent.” Jeremy nudged Nola.
“I lost mine,” Nola whispered, “I—” Jeremy had known Kieran. They had been friends. But Kieran wasn’t one of them anymore. “I think it fell out of my pocket when things got crazy.”
“Use mine.” Jeremy pressed the silver tube into her palm.
Nola stared down at it. Kieran had come to find her for a tiny tube.
To save a life.
“Look, don’t be nervous about asking for a new one,” Jeremy murmured into Nola’s ear, wrapping his arm around her. “I’ll go with you. And after what happened today, I don’t think anyone is going to blame you for losing it.”
“Right.” Nola gave a smile she hoped looked real before holding the tube up to her lips and waiting for the metallic taste to fill her mouth.
- Writer
