Lies (Gone #3)(76)

Her clothing weighed her down, wrapped tight around her, seized her arms and legs. Diana struggled, surprised by how hard she struggled, how much she wanted to reach the bright, sunlit surface, which was a hundred million miles away.

She came up, was caught by the soft swell, and tossed like a doll against a lichen-slicked boulder. She scrabbled with both hands as she choked. Fingernails on rock. Feet plowing crumbling pebbles beneath her.

Suddenly she was up and out of the water from the waist up. On a little shelf of rock, gasping for air.

She waited there for a moment, catching her breath. Then, she pushed on, oblivious to scrapes and rips, to a drier spot. She stopped there, all energy spent.

Caine had already reached shore. He slumped, exhausted, wet, but at the same time, triumphant.

Diana heard voices crying his name.

She blinked water and tried to focus on the boat. It was already so far away. Tyrell and Paint, standing up in it and yelling, “Get me! Get me!”

“Caine, you can’t leave us out here!”

“Can you reach them?” Diana asked in a hoarse croak.

Caine shook his head. “Too far. Anyway…”

Diana knew the “anyway.” Tyrell and Paint had no powers. They would do nothing useful for Caine. They were just two more mouths to feed, two more whiny voices to heed.

“We better start climbing,” Caine said. “I can help at the rough spots. We’ll make it.”

“And there will be food and everything up there?” Penny asked, gazing wistfully up the cliff.

“We had better hope there is,” Diana said. “We have nowhere else to go. And no way to get there.”





THIRTY-TWO


8 HOURS, 11 MINUTES




ASTRID HAD GONE to look at the burn zone. Doing the right thing.

Kids had yelled at her. Demanded to know why she had let it happen. Demanded to know where Sam was. Deluged her with complaints and worries and crazy theories until she had retreated.

She’d hidden out after that. She’d refused to answer the door when kids knocked. She had not gone to her office. It would be the same there.

But through the day it had eaten at her. This feeling of uselessness. A feeling of uselessness made so much worse by the growing realization that she needed Sam. Not because they were up against some threat. The threat was mostly past now.

She needed Sam because no one had any respect for her. There was only one person right now who could get a crowd of anxious kids to settle down and do what needed to be done.

She had wanted to believe that she could do that. But she had tried. And they hadn’t listened.

But Sam was still nowhere to be seen. So despite everything it was still on her shoulders. The thought of it made her sick. It made her want to scream.

“We have to go out, Petey. Walkie, walkie. Let’s go,” Astrid said.

Little Pete did not respond or react.

“Petey. Walkie, walkie. Come with me.”

Little Pete looked at her like she might be there and might not. Then he went back to his game.

“Petey. Listen to me!”

Nothing.

Astrid took two steps, grabbed Little Pete by the shoulders, and shook him.

The game player went flying across the carpet.

Little Pete looked up. Now he was sure she was there. Now he was paying attention.

“Oh, my God, Petey, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Astrid cried and reached to draw him close. She had never, ever shaken him before. It had happened so suddenly, like some animal in her brain had seized control of her and suddenly she was moving and suddenly she’d grabbed him.

“Ahhh ahhhh ahhhh ahhhh!” Little Pete began shrieking.

“No, no, no, Petey, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to do it.”

She wrapped her arms around him but she could not touch him. Some force kept her arms from making physical contact.

“Petey, no, you have to let me—”

“Ahhh ahhh ahhhh ahhh!”

“It was an accident! I just lost control, it’s just, I just, I can’t, Petey, stop it, stop it!”

She ran to retrieve his game. It was warm. Strange. She carried it back to Little Pete, but for just a moment her step faltered. The room seemed to warp and wobble around her.

Little Pete’s frantic shrieks snapped her back.

“Ahhhh ahhh ahhhh ahhh!”

“Shut up!” Astrid screamed, as confused and unsettled as she was furious. “Shut up! Shut up! Here! Take your stupid toy!”

She stepped back, stepped away, not trusting herself to be near him. Hating him at that moment. Terrified that the enraged thing inside her head would lash out at him again. A voice inside her rationalized it even now. He is a brat. He does these things deliberately.

It was all his fault.

“Ahhh ahhh ahhh ahhh!”

“I do everything for you!” she cried.

“Ahhh ahhh ahhh ahhh!”

“I feed you and I clean you and I watch over you and I protect you. Stop it! Stop it! I can’t stand it anymore. I can’t stand it!”

Little Pete did not stop. Would not stop, she knew, until he chose to, until whatever crazy loop that was in his head had played itself out.

She sank into a kitchen chair. Astrid sat with her head in her hands running through the list of her failures. Before the FAYZ there hadn’t been very many. She’d gotten a B+ once when she should have gotten an A. She’d inadvertently been cruel to people on a couple of occasions, memories that still bothered her, even now. She’d never learned to play an instrument…. Wasn’t as good as she would like to be with Spanish pronunciations…