The Last One(46)

“Let me go!” Waitress yells, kicking. She’s taller than Rancher; he can barely hold her.

“You’ll be disqualified,” says Rancher.

“I don’t care.” Waitress’s face is painted with fury.

But Exorcist has pulled away. Something has happened that he cannot articulate. He does not want to see his anger reflected, does not want to be the cause of this near-stranger’s fury. Add to this Rancher trying to restrain her; the nobility in that short, simple man. Exorcist calms. He is sorry for his outburst, and though his apology is plain in his eyes, he is too cowardly to speak it.

Instead he says, “A woman scorned, indeed. Lesson learned,” and walks away.

His sudden change confuses Waitress, who did not see the apology. She stills, and Rancher lets her go, reddening at the thought of his arms wrapped so tightly around her. He’s pretty sure he brushed a nipple.

The sun falls and they reach the boulder. The moon is bright; the trio finds their next Clue easily.

“We can’t track in the dark,” says Rancher.

“Then what do you think we should do?” asks Waitress.

“Camp here, start out at first light.”

“But everyone is ahead of us.”

Exorcist folds into a seated position and leans against the boulder. He takes off his boots and prods his blister. “They’ll still be ahead of us if we spend all night running around in the dark,” he says. “Only then we’ll be exhausted and will probably have destroyed the tracks we’re supposed to follow.”

“Fine,” says Waitress. She can’t look at him, the pale bubble bursting from his hairy toe. “So, what, we’ve got to build a shelter?”

Exorcist slaps the rock behind him. “Bracing a windbreak against this bad boy won’t take a minute.” He hauls himself to his feet with a groan and starts collecting long pieces of driftwood, barefoot.

Rancher and Waitress exchange a look. “What’s his deal?” asks Waitress.

“I think he’s just crazy.”

“Wonderful,” says Waitress. “This’ll be fun.”

The other groups have all eaten and most of the contestants are asleep, or drifting. Banker’s arms are tucked to his chest inside his jacket. Engineer still wears his glasses and with drooping eyelids watches as moonlight bounces off the inky exoskeleton of a passing beetle. Tracker snores, at his most vocal when sleeping. Beside him, Zoo is curled in his thermal blanket, counting sheep and thumbing the space on her finger where her wedding ring should be. She times the leaps so that Tracker’s rattling breath becomes nothing more than wind rustling wool.

Only Biology is outside. She sits by a small fire with her arms curled around her legs. She misses her partner and feels very alone. She’s thinking about saying the safety phrase, but only vaguely—without intent. She’s wondering how she would leave, and if she did how long it would be before she could get a mango smoothie.

“I’d give all the rabbit meat in the world for a mango smoothie,” she says. “Or a chocolate sundae.” Her body is craving sugar so intensely her head hurts. She takes a sip from her water bottle, wishing that the water had flavor, maybe some bubbles.

Exorcist, Rancher, and Waitress build their meager shelter and huddle together inside.





11.


“My uncle said it was in the water, so he stopped drinking any that wasn’t bottled,” says Brennan. “Mom thought it was terrorists, like an invisible bomb or something.”

He expects me to respond, but I’m only listening in case there’s a Clue hidden in his tale. He’s been talking about his mother so much, too much. We’re walking. It’s midday and the weather is crisp, increasingly autumnlike. By my imperfect calculations, it must be well into September.

He grows impatient with my silence. “You were probably lucky, being lost out here for the worst of it. From when I started hearing about it and when the president went on TV, it was only like a day. Then we were all told to stay home, and I heard these rumors about some kids down the street being sick. Day after that they moved us all into the church.”

I still haven’t had my period. It’s overdue, I think.

“Aiden was off at school doing this summer program, and Mom, she said he should come home and he said he’d try, but they wouldn’t let him, and then our phones stopped working.”

I wonder if I’m supposed to know who Aiden is, then I remember that he said something about a brother. That must be Aiden, in which case he’s inconsequential—filler.

“We were there for a few days,” says Brennan. Plastic bags hang from his hands, filled with soda bottles, candy, and other junk food. He had Cheetos and a bottle of Coke for breakfast. “I was bored, I couldn’t really keep track. Then people started getting sick. I mean, there were a few sick from the beginning, but they kept them separated—in the daycare room, I think. And then there were too many, and they were everywhere, and things were starting to smell really bad because people were puking and stuff.”

I know this story. Everyone knows this story. There are no Clues here. “Was there a food shortage?” I ask. “Did some guy with a scar on his face hoard the water?”

He shakes his head, for all appearances taking me seriously. “No, there was always plenty of food—the sick people wouldn’t eat. And the faucets ran. Some people didn’t want to drink the city water regular like that, but I just kept filling up our bottles at the faucets. I mean, the bathroom sink water’s the same as the kitchen sink, right?”