Surge (95 page)

“What’re looking for?”

Sarah’s hand comes out within seconds with a handful of fabric, before she zips the bag back up. How the fuck did she do that? It must be programmed in the extra X chromosome to be able to pop shit out of bags, like it’s programmed in men’s Y chromosome to have internal GPS. A decent trade off if you ask me, because a woman can ask for directions without having reproachful looks thrown their way, and can pull freaking rabbits out of a hat. While us men have to reach in blind, hoping that we don’t come out with feminine hygiene products. Just thinking of those gives me hives.

“All set,” she says as she places the bag near the machete in the corner. Obviously, Olivia got her shit back already. I bet she threatened castration if they didn’t return it to her, because that sure as fuck would have had me hand deliver her items within seconds.

“Olivia needed you to come get some scraps?”

“Yeah,” she replies with a shrug. “For some chick named Ally. That’s where I’m going now.”

“So, Olivia’s out visiting then?” I ask, making Sarah pause in her forward movement, and squint her eyes at me.

“Why do you care?”

“I...I, um, I,” I stutter out.

“You what?”

“I want to apologize for being a dick,” I say since it’s half the truth.

“And are you going to tell her you love her?” Sarah inquires.

“Not exactly,” I begin and see Sarah’s lips purse, making her look like my dad. That reminder makes me straighten my shoulders, I won’t be like him. “I need to apologize first, get her to trust me again, and
then
I’ll tell her how I feel; because if I told her right now, she wouldn’t believe me.”

“But you’re gonna tell her, right?” Sarah asks and I can see a little bit of hope shine in her hazel eyes. I nod and have a teenaged missile nearly tackle me. “Good for you. You’re finally smartening up.” I pull back from the hug.

“Yeah, I’m getting there,” I tell her. “But part of that making it up to her, would mean leaving you here. I can’t be in two places at once, and I don’t want to leave you anywhere alone. Especially if you feel uncomfortable here, do you? Feel uncomfortable that is. I know I made a promise to take care of you, and I want to, but I feel torn; because I want to help Olivia too. And I just don’t know what the fuck to do. My head’s telling me to stay, and heart’s telling me go, I feel like I’m tied to two trains and their travelling in opposite directions...” Sarah places her hand over my mouth to stop my rambling.

“What did mom always tell us?” Sarah asks.

“Be happy,” I answer.

“That’s right, be happy,” she repeats with a nod. “Does Olivia make you happy?” I give her a firm nod. “Would you be hurt if she left, and you weren’t with her?” I give Sarah a look like she’s crazy. “That’s what I thought. Now, quit worrying about me. You’ve taken care of me long enough. Now’s your time. Do something for yourself for once in your life. Not for Dad, not for Mom, not for me, not for the group, or Olivia, you. I’ll be fine, the group will be fine, and if you’d stop battling with yourself, you’ll be fine.”

“Where the hell did you get your wisdom from, and why didn’t I get that in the DNA jackpot?” I ask and Sarah laughs. “Seriously, that brain of yours will take you places. And it looks like you’ll be training it with school.” Sarah grumbles. “Yeah, I know, it sucks. But I had to do it, and maybe they’ll teach you something a little more useful than freaking parabolas and shit.”

“Can’t I just say that I graduated already?” Sarah asks. “That I’m actually a child prodigy, and graduated when I was twelve?”

“Give it a go,” I tell her with a shrug. “I’m probably the worst guardian ever, but I’m still your brother; so if you can get outta something without being penalized, go for it.” It would be rather hypocritical of me to use a fictional wife and bun in the oven to get out of something, and then chastise her for doing basically the same thing.

“I will,” she says. “Anyway, I gotta get back.” Sarah points at me with a stern expression. “You, quit stalling and talk to her tonight. It’s the perfect time to do it, since no one else will be around, and it’ll be hard to avoid each other in this tiny cabin.” Sarah walks toward the door as she calls over her shoulder. “After all, it’s only a one bedroom.”

<~~~<~~~
~~~>~~~><~~~<~~~
~~~>~~~>

“
Quit glaring at the ginger,” John hisses at me.

“
I ain
’
t glaring at him,” I say. I move my eyes slightly to the right, to glare at the wall beside the ginger
’
s head, that way I can glare at him with my peripheral vision, while making it look like its someone else that
’s
receiving my death stare.

“Are too,
”
he counters. “Leave him alone, he’s got enough problems as it is, looking like Ronald McDonald. So, he don’t need some asshole mentally plotting out his funeral, strictly due to his unfortunate hair color.
”

“Hey, if some red headed cunt fucked you over, you’d be a little wary of them too.
”

“Fine, Hitler, if we’re gonna disgrace an entire race of people based on the color of their hair because of one criminal member in their ranks, then that includes me, too,
”
John says. “Because Kelly was blonde, and so am I. Cory, too. And Ana.”

“Who the hell is Ana?”

“Sarah’s new friend,” he answers. “Olivia introduced them during the tour. Ana’s Morales’ daughter, and she’s the same age as Sarah.” I nod my head at the information. I’m glad that someone here is Sarah’s age, because the only person that she’s had contact with that’s near her age, has been Danny; and he’s a dude, so she really couldn’t talk to him the way she would have been able to with a girl. “But if we’re going to turn our backs on people with unfortunate hair colors, then you need to go nip that relationship at the budding level, before they Romeo and Juliet it.”

“I get it, alright? I won’t glare at the ginger anymore, at least not until he does something to deserve it.”

“That’s all I can ask,” John says as he inhales a bite of his food. “By the way, when are you gonna talk to her?”

After Sarah left to go wherever Olivia was, I returned to his cabin and moped. Yes, I moped because I’m a pitiful excuse for a man. I’m all words, but no action. The talk, without the walk. The ultimate procrastinator, and now John’s calling me on it. I’ve been staring at Olivia laugh and smile with her table full of dudes from across the
‘Mess Hall’
for an hour. I know that it’s military lingo they use here, but
‘Mess Hall’
just doesn’t sound appetizing to me. It sounds like they’re serving you mud and garbage to eat, which isn’t at all what this food tastes like. This is farm grown ingredients, along with fresh meat.

They have fucking chickens here. Real, live chickens, that they keep for the eggs; and some have the honor of having their heads chopped off, and their feathers plucked off to be our dinner. Yeah, I saw them do it, and that’s probably why I haven’t touched the meat. I know where meat comes from, but it’s different than when you used to go to the grocery store, and pick up a package of butchered meat. It’s not as if I said,
‘I pick that one, now go out back, murder it, and hack it up for me to consume.’

If I didn’t see the chicken’s untimely deaths, I would have been able to eat, but since I did; I haven’t even touched it. My tray of food is separated into divisions, a slice of dense bread, a hunk of chicken that makes me queasy, corn that’s farm grown, and mashed potatoes with real butter since they have cows. The cows aren’t butchered since their milk serves more useful purposes for us than their meat would. They also have horses to help plow the fields, so it looks like we’ve reverted back to the old methods.

“Later,” I say to John.

My eyes still remain glued to Olivia, so I see her pat the one they call Ace’s hand, and smile at him. These are just her friends, I tell myself. It’s okay for her to have friends. Good even. And I’ll have a better chance of becoming friends with these men, if I don’t stab them with my fork, which is now bent in my clenched hand. I set it down on the table, and John eyes it with a raised brow.

“Later, when?”

“Tonight,” I reply. “We’re in the same cabin, so it’ll be hard to avoid her.”

“They put you in the same cabin?” John asks.

“We’re married, remember?” John laughs.

“Yeah, I remember,” he says. “And I can’t wait for Olivia to kick your ass because of it.”

“She’ll kick my ass for many things before that,” I counter with a shrug. “But I’ll take a few hits if it makes her feel better. Not like it’ll make a difference, my whole face is either burned or bruised, so what’s another?”

“Quit your bitching already,” John orders. “You took like two hits, it couldn’t have been that bad.”

“Broken nose, asshole.”

“Oh no, does your wittle nosey have a boo boo?” John asks with a babying voice. I flip him off. “I’m sure Olivia will kiss it better, if you man up.”

“I will,” I promise. “Just as soon as I get her alone.” I jerk my chin toward her table. “Looks like it won’t be for a while.”

“All the more reason to just walk over there, and ask her to talk.”

“And have five freaking dudes take turns whaling on me for being an intrusive dick? I don’t think so. If it were one or two, I’d have had no problem going over, but with four of them, plus angry brother Cory, I don’t like my chances.”

“I wouldn’t be worried about them,” Carlos comments as he sets his tray down beside me.

“Nah, they’re pansy ass mother fuckers compared to Melly,” Oscar adds as he takes up the seat next to John. “That old witch kicked me when I called her
ma’am.
‘Do I look like some blue haired, shriveled hag with a bingo dauber to you, boy?’
I didn’t say yes, even though she is elderly, and has a mop of grey hair.”

Yeah, the twins have begun talking to me again since John let them in on my plan to apologize. They also gave me death threats if I hurt Olivia again. Take a number boys, I already got plenty of people promising to maim, strangle, stab, castrate, and snuff me in my sleep; so two more added to the pile doesn’t faze me in the slightest.

“She the one with too much lipstick on?” John asks and the twins nod. “She reminded me of Bette Davis in
Whatever Happened to Baby Jane
.”

“I’m scared that you even know that movie to reference it,” Oscar says with a raised eyebrow.

“What, my mom liked old movies,” John replies. “And everyone knows who Joan Crawford is.
‘No wire hangers, ever!’
”
John’s exclaimed the quote, so a few of the surrounding tables either raise their eyebrows at him, or give him dirty looks; like the dude whose girlfriend has had her eyes trained on John for the last hour.

“Keep it down before Macho Supreme comes over, and stomps you in the ground,” I say and tilt my head toward the territorial boyfriend. Instead of doing as I suggested, John wiggles his fingers at them.

“Hello, there,” John says. “I’m Tom, this is my boyfriend, Dick, and the twins can get a little adventurous, and like to swap in from time to time.” John looks the guy over. “I don’t suppose a big, strong man like you would be interested?” The gaping chick, and her disgusted bodyguard, immediately turn their attention back to their food. “That’s what I thought.”

“Any reason you just told them we’re a gay foursome, with some incest on the side?” I inquire.

“First off, I said the twins
‘swap,’
that means that they’re not both present at the same time for our fictional orgy,” John responds. “Second, that chick didn’t get Snakie excited because she reminds me of Bianca. Lastly, I’ve sworn off of women, since I’m cursed to have the worst fucking taste ever.”

“I’ll give it two hours,” Carlos wagers.

“Four days,” Oscar says.

“What’re you betting?” I ask.

“Cabins,” John answers. “Theirs is fucking awesome. It got this humongous jacuzzi tub that works, three bedrooms, king sized beds...”

“An 80 inch LED flat screen, and an Xbox that I used to kick Carlo’s ass in COD with,” Oscar replies.

“X-xbox?” John asks. I see him wipe a little bit of drool, when the twins nod. “And you got Call of Duty?”