THE ISLAND WAS FROZEN AND DRY. THE COLOR OF NIGHT wasn’t enough to hide the dim flicker of windows that let Charlotte know it was safe to call out from behind the trees.
She had left James behind; he couldn’t have come if he wanted to. The fever had taken over his body, and he was pulsing with sweat and blush—a ripe strawberry ready to burst. She missed her strawberry vines in the greenhouse. The glass windows reflected small light and she wanted to step inside to visit her old plants, to surround herself with a verdant aroma, rustic potatoes, and sweet fuchsia. Life wasn’t some fantastic journey, a coloring book that took them through the world together, marking each city and country they visited with a vibrant blue or green, rather than the all-encompassing white that smothered the world in freezer burn. Charlotte hadn’t seen a paper book in ages, let alone a coloring book. She fashioned a bed made of stolen blankets and left James covered, stripping him down and laying more blankets over him.
He had spent the first night shivering while she pressed ice to his forehead. Snow shouldn’t melt that fast when someone touches it, she thought, otherwise Charlotte would have palmed the snow over every inch of the island just to get a glimpse of the ground below. When she touched James he stopped giving into the impulse to tremble; she stripped down and pressed her body to his beneath the blankets. She brushed her sweaty hands over his greasy hair. His heat kept her warm. His eyes were closed; he probably didn’t know she was there, didn’t know she held him, touched him, caressed him, that he warmed her in the disturbing cold. She needed him in her life because she needed someone to keep her going, to tether her to this crusted earth, something to look forward to every day. Elise had lost that and Charlotte would be out of luck if she couldn’t wake up every day and find a reason: the greenhouse, Autry, James, anything she could help that in turn helped her. It was part of the routine: open your eyes, get the fire started, make breakfast, find a project, fix something, cook food, hunt, stoke the fire, search the island, listen to the dogs in the distance, stare at the mountain as little as possible, stoke the fire, cook more food, go on a run, guide people to the outlier, stoke the fire—don’t let the fire go out.
The settlement was quiet. Charlotte examined the angles of a particular bush. The branches needed to be placed in a way that looked natural to passersby, but unnatural enough for Charlotte to notice they had changed. She had to wait, and waiting led to more thoughts she didn’t want. She contemplated what her life would have been like if James hadn’t let Elise leave the kitchen with that stupid knife. They all could have been cozy in the settlement, James standing in front of everyone with a story on his mind and their attention on him, some tale about the earth’s humble beginnings or why the sky danced, even though the Northern Lights had disappeared some time ago. It wasn’t a seasonal phenomenon; how had they disappeared after Elise died? As if she were the reflection of all the light left on earth, now all the night sifted through the excess light to create nothing more than distant lifeless starlight, or worse, the tormenting light of a full moon in the dark.
Charlotte stood behind the tree and waited, hidden from the smattering of kids who came and went through the square. She kept herself from yelling out to Autry as the little girl stepped from the greenhouse, apparently having taken over the responsibilities of growing food in Charlotte’s absence. Charlotte would know Autry even bundled up like a marshmallow, from the dangling hair that came out from under Autry’s beanie, to the way she walked with her hands clasped together with something tight in her fists, like hope, unwilling to let go. But Charlotte pressed her lips to the tree bark instead, unable to call out, keeping herself hidden in the forest like a secret everyone already knew.
“It’s too soon,” Tic-Tac said. “You were here a few days ago. They’ll find out.”
“Don’t act like they don’t already know,” Charlotte said.
“I meant about me,” he said. He leaned against another tree hidden in the shadows from the lights beyond. He looked older . . . not older, but sadder. It had become the same thing. Slight wrinkles formed around his eyes and mouth, soft enough to be hidden from most people but detailed enough for Charlotte to see them.
“I need medicine,” she said.
“You look fine,” he said. “I’m sure you don’t need any—”
“It’s for James . . . ”
Tic-Tac stood straight. It wasn’t enough to have pulled James from the water; there was a draw to James Abe had never seen. Tic-Tac was too much of a hero to not help, even when he made it sound as though he couldn’t. James never thought of himself as a hero, she knew, but he saved more lives than he would ever know. He had saved all of them. Or at least he tried, Charlotte thought. Before they had left the settlement, Charlotte heard children cry; some people would get annoyed with the whimpers and tears, but Charlotte listened with a fast heart and wet cheeks. It was a reminder that their life continued, that they survived and she had helped. They followed James straight to the end of the world and he never even knew it.
“What’s happened to him?”
“He’s sick. He has a fever. He won’t make it.”
“If you thought it was tough before . . . we’re on lockdown when it comes to most stuff. I can’t get medicine out of here, especially now. You heard what they did to Rachel.”
“What makes you say that?”
“You’ll have to figure out another way.”
“How’s Autry?” Charlotte looked to the greenhouse as if Autry would be there, hands clasped together, locking the door behind her.
“Scared,” Tic-Tac said. “Everyone is.”
“Why hasn’t he come for us?” Charlotte asked.
“He knows where you are but he just lets it go; he keeps saying that our food is running low.”
“That’s what all the new kids say. They tell me that’s what urged them to leave in the first place; food couldn’t keep them here anymore because you were almost out.”
“Except we’re not. There’s so much left. But not medicine. There’s a limit.”
“You think I don’t know that? I wouldn’t ask—”
“Unless you really needed it. Right.”
A distant howl made Charlotte uncomfortable. She heard James make those noises when he passed out on the ice, face down, arms splayed open. He had a big grin that made Charlotte want to leave him there in peace; if it had been another day, one where Phil and Cheryl hadn’t come to her, frantic about dogs and James going nutty, she may have let him lay there in that awkward afternoon, breathing in the icy dust. Even in his sleep he howled, grin slapped on him, naked beneath the blanket, close to Charlotte without any knowledge of how he felt when she kissed his neck and said “I love you,” words she hadn’t said since her parents died to anyone other than her stuffed walrus, Franklin.
“While I’m here I might as well get some food too.”
“Of course,” Tic-Tac said. He rolled his eyes. “Tell me how she is.”
“You saw her a few weeks ago,” Charlotte said. She could see her breath sit between them with each word.
“These days a lot can change in an hour, let alone a few weeks.”
“Sarah’s fine. She misses you. She wanted to come but I—”
“Good, she shouldn’t come. It’s too dangerous.”
“You boys say that far too often. You think we can’t take of ourselves?”
“I don’t want to be the reason she gets caught.”
“You wouldn’t be. She’d be the reason because she wants to see you, not because you want her to come. Boys are kind of stupid.”
“I’m beginning to realize that,” Tic-Tac said. The distant howl broke up their conversation, followed by a clamor of pots from the kitchen.
“They check every dishwasher now. Makes everyone nervous. I need to go soon.”
“I know,” she said.
“No,” he said. “I need to go with you.”
“Soon, hopefully, you won’t have to.”
Tic-Tac stepped back into the small light of the settlement. Charlotte stayed behind the tree and waited for his call when he set the bag of food and medicine aside. The first time she came, she worried more about wild dogs than the repercussions. The more she made the trek, the more she felt comfortable with the wild and less comfortable with what would happen if she were caught. Dreams of standing in the dome with a plank of wood tied to her back while Abe drove his fists into her stomach and cracked her face replaced the nightmares of her parents’ death. When Abe started to punish people he thought were helping the outliers, Charlotte wanted to give herself up to protect anyone else who might be next . . . but she wanted to survive more.
The far bushes rustled. It was the sign the bag was in place. She counted to five hundred and checked the area. She went to grab the bag. She looked inside and waded through cans of vegetables and fruit cocktail, along with fresh apples. How many times was she told not to accept open goods from strangers on Halloween? Stories of candied apples filled with razorblades had spilled out of her mom, and now Charlotte had to almost beg for them, wishing they were covered in chocolate or sugar. She kept pushing cans and fruit aside, looking deeper until her entire head was inside in search of the medicine. At the bottom she found a black sock; she assumed it was dirty but she could never tell with black socks. In the sock was a small collection of white pills, around ten, enough to help James get through the worst of it. Once again the evening sky filled with something more pressing than her worry about the dogs—the possibility of losing her boiling boyfriend to some sickness that could have been beaten by a bowl of chicken soup.
“Are you taking us?” a weak voice asked. It belonged to Daron. She had spent the last months of Charlotte’s time in the settlement making deodorant. This wasn’t the first time Tic-Tac hid refugees with the food. Charlotte couldn’t turn her back on them, not after what she had seen, heard, thought, dreamed—not when all anyone wanted these days was to turn back the clock to before they feared more than just the cold.
Charlotte’s nightmares of her parents’ car crash continued to haunt her. The less comfortable and more occupied her mind, the more meager the nightmares. It was a positive in a frozen sea of negatives. Everyone wanted to turn back the days, but no one would ever agree upon the distance, leaving them all to wallow in an assortment of misery, just not their current struggles. She never told James she led packs of people to the boat; she kept the secret to protect herself because she knew James wasn’t wrong about new faces and the dwindling score of the settlement, because of Tic-Tac, because of her.
“Tonight is—” Charlotte said.
“Please,” Daron said. “We can’t be here anymore.” Two other faces Charlotte didn’t recognize nodded along.
“Be fast, be quiet, and just follow.” Charlotte took the bag and turned into the forest.
“We’re going in there?” It was a boy’s voice, as weak as Daron’s but filled with fear.
“There’s no other way to go.”
“There’re dogs in there,” he said.
“Take your chances one way or the other.” Charlotte grabbed Daron’s hand. “Hold tight and close.” Daron grabbed the boy’s hand who grabbed the final girl’s hand and they crept through the closed forest together under the canopy’s shadow.