The Leftovers (16 page)

They set off in pursuit, but lost sight of the vehicle when it turned right at the end of the block. Laurie’s hypothesis, based on nothing more than a hunch, was that Grice was probably headed to the Safeway for some kind of nighttime treat, blueberry pound cake or butter pecan ice cream or maybe a slab of dark chocolate studded with almonds, any one of the many, many foods she found herself fantasizing about at odd moments throughout the day, usually in the vast famished interlude that separated the morning bowl of oatmeal from the evening bowl of soup.

The supermarket was a brisk ten-minute walk from Russell Road, which meant that if she was right and if they hurried, they might be able to catch up with Grice before he left the store. Of course, he’d probably just get back in his car and drive right back home after that, but there was no point in getting too far ahead of herself. Besides, she wanted Meg to understand that Watching was a fluid, improvisational activity. It was entirely possible that Grice wasn’t going to the Safeway and that they’d lose track of him altogether. But it was just as likely that, while searching for him, they’d bump into someone else on the list and could shift their attention to that subject. Or they could stumble upon some wholly unforeseen situation involving individuals whose names they didn’t even know. The goal was to keep your eyes open and go wherever you’d be able to do the most good.

At any rate, it was a relief to be on the move, no longer hiding in the shrubbery. As far as Laurie was concerned, the exercise and fresh air were the best parts of the job, at least on a night like this, when the sky was clear and the temperature was still above forty. She tried not to think about what it was going to be like in January.

At the corner, she stopped to light a cigarette and offered one to Meg, who recoiled slightly before raising her hand in a futile gesture of refusal. Laurie jabbed the pack more insistently. She hated being a hardass, but the rule was absolutely clear:
A Watcher in Public View Must Carry a Lit Cigarette at All Times.

When Meg continued to resist, Laurie jammed a cigarette—the G.R. provided a generic brand with a harsh taste and suspiciously chemical odor, purchased in bulk by the regional office—between the younger woman’s lips and held a match to it. Meg choked violently on the first drag, as she always did, then released a small whimper of revulsion after the fit had passed.

Laurie patted her on the arm, letting her know she was doing just fine. If she could’ve spoken, she would’ve recited the motto both of them had learned in Orientation:
We don’t smoke for enjoyment. We smoke to proclaim our faith.
Meg smiled queasily, sniffling and wiping at her eyes as they resumed their walk.

In a way, Laurie envied Meg her suffering. That was how it was supposed to be—a sacrifice for God, a mortification of the flesh, as if every puff were a profound personal violation. It was different for Laurie, who’d been a smoker throughout college and into her twenties, only quitting with difficulty at the beginning of her first pregnancy. For her, starting again after all those years was like a homecoming, an illicit pleasure smuggled into the grueling regimen of privations that made up life in the G.R. The sacrifice in her case would have been quitting a second time, not being able to savor that first cigarette in the morning, the one that tasted so good she sometimes found herself lying in her sleeping bag and blowing smoke rings at the ceiling just for the fun of it.

*   *   *

THERE WEREN’T
many cars in the Safeway lot, but Laurie couldn’t rule out the possibility that one of them belonged to Grice—he drove a nondescript, dark-colored sedan, and she’d neglected to note the make, model, or license plate—so they headed inside to search the store, splitting up to cover more ground.

She started in the Produce section, circling the fruit to avoid temptation—it was painful to look at the strawberries, to even think their name—and hustling past the vegetables, which looked so impossibly fresh and inviting, each one an advertisement for the doomed planet that had produced it: dark green broccoli, red peppers, dense orbs of cabbage, damp heads of romaine lettuce, their broad leaves held in place by shiny wire bands.

The Bakery aisle was torture, even this late in the day—just a few stray baguettes here, a sesame bagel and banana nut muffin there, leftovers bound for tomorrow’s day-old bin. A lingering odor of fresh-baked bread permeated the area, mingling with the bright lights and piped-in music—“Rhinestone Cowboy,” oddly enough, a song she hadn’t heard in years—to induce a kind of sensory overload. She felt almost giddy with desire, amazed to remember that the supermarket had once seemed painfully dull to her, just another obligatory stop on the mundane circuit of her life, no more exciting than the gas station or post office. In a matter of months, it had become exotic and deeply affecting, a garden from which she and everyone she knew had been expelled, whether they knew it or not.

She didn’t breathe any easier until she turned her back on the deli counter and took refuge among the packaged foods—cans of beans and boxes of dried pasta and bottles of salad dressing—all sorts of good stuff, but nothing you had to stop yourself from grabbing and shoving into your mouth. The sheer variety of products was overwhelming, somehow ridiculous and impressive at the same time: four shelves devoted to barbecue sauce alone, as if each brand possessed its own unique and powerful properties.

The Safeway felt half asleep, only one or two customers per aisle, most of them moving slowly, scanning the shelves with dazed expressions. To her relief, all of them drifted by without saying a word or even nodding hello. According to G.R. protocol, you were supposed to return a greeting not with a smile or a wave, but by looking directly into the eyes of the person who’d greeted you and counting slowly to ten. It was awkward enough with strangers and casual acquaintances, but completely unnerving if you found yourself face-to-face with a close friend or family member, both of you blushing and uncertain—hugs were expressly prohibited—a flood of unspeakable sentiments rising into your throat.

She’d expected to reconnect with Meg somewhere around the frozen food aisle—the geographical center of the store—but didn’t get alarmed until she made her way through Beverages, Coffee and Tea, and Chips and Snacks without catching a glimpse of her. Was it possible that they’d crossed without realizing it, each one rounding the corner of the aisle the other one had just vacated at exactly the same time?

Laurie was tempted to backtrack, but she kept going all the way to the dairy case, where Meg had begun her search. It was empty, except for a single shopper standing in front of the sliced cheese, a bald man with a wiry runner’s build she recognized too late as Dave Tolman, the father of one of her son’s former schoolmates. He turned and smiled, but she pretended not to notice.

She knew she’d been irresponsible, letting Meg out of her sight like that. The first few weeks at the compound could be hard and disorienting; newcomers had a tendency to flee back to their old lives if given half a chance. That was okay, of course: The G.R. wasn’t a cult, as lots of ignorant people liked to claim. Every resident was free to come and go as they pleased. But it was a Trainer’s job to provide guidance and companionship during this vulnerable time, helping the Trainee through the inevitable crises and moments of weakness, so she didn’t lose heart and do something she’d regret for all of eternity.

She thought about making a quick loop around the perimeter of the store to double-check, then decided to head straight out into the parking lot in case Meg was making a run for it. She cut between two unmanned checkout counters, trying not to think about what it would be like, arriving back at the compound without her Trainee, having to explain that she’d left her alone in the supermarket, of all places.

The automatic doors parted sluggishly, releasing her into the night, which seemed to have gotten noticeably colder. She was just about to break into a run when she saw, to her immense relief, that it wouldn’t be necessary. Meg was standing right in front of her, a contrite young woman in shapeless white clothes, holding a piece of paper in front of her chest.

Sorry,
it read.
I couldn’t breathe in there.

*   *   *

IT WAS
way past midnight when they got back to Ginkgo Street, slipping between two concrete barriers and signing in at the sentry house. These security measures had been put in place a couple of years earlier, after the police raid that resulted in the martyrdom of Phil Crowther—a forty-two-year-old husband and father of three—and the wounding of two other residents. The cops had entered the compound in the middle of the night, armed with search warrants and battering rams, hoping to rescue two little girls who, their father claimed, had been abducted and were being held against their will by the Guilty Remnant. Angered by what they saw as Gestapo tactics, some residents threw rocks and bottles at the invaders; the outnumbered cops panicked and responded with gunfire. A subsequent investigation exonerated the officers, but criticized the raid itself as “legally flawed and badly executed, based on the uncorroborated allegations of an embittered, noncustodial parent.” Since then—and Laurie had to give Kevin most of the credit for the change—the Mapleton Police had adopted a less confrontational attitude toward the G.R., doing their best to employ diplomacy rather than force when inevitable disputes and crises arose. Even so, the memory of the shootings remained fresh and painful on Ginkgo Street. She’d never heard anyone even speculate about the possibility of removing the traffic barriers, which in any case doubled as memorials, spray-painted with the words
WE LOVE YOU, PHIL—SEE YOU IN HEAVEN.

They’d been assigned a bedroom on the third floor of Blue House, which was reserved for female Trainees. Laurie normally lived in Gray House, the women’s dorm next door, where an average-sized room accommodated as many as six or seven people, all of them in sleeping bags on a bare floor. Every night was a somber, adults-only slumber party—no giggles or whispers, just lots of coughing and farting and snoring and groaning, the sounds and smells of too many stressed-out people packed into too small a space.

Blue House was highly civilized by comparison, almost luxurious, just the two of them in a child-sized room with twin beds and pale green walls, a soft beige carpet that felt good against your bare feet, and, best of all, a bathroom right across the hall.
A little vacation,
Laurie thought. She got undressed while Meg was showering, exchanging her dirty clothes for a loose-fitting G.R. nightgown—an ugly but comfortable garment sewn from an old sheet—then knelt to say her prayers. She took her time, focusing on her children and then moving down the list to Kevin, her mother, her siblings, her friends and former neighbors, trying to visualize every one of them dressed in white garments and bathed in the golden light of forgiveness, as she’d been taught to do. It was a luxury to pray like this, in an empty room with no distractions. She knew that God didn’t care if she was kneeling or standing on her head, but it just felt better to do it right, her mind clear and her attention undivided.

Thank you for bringing Meg to us,
she prayed.
Give her strength and grant me the wisdom to guide her in the right direction.

The Night Watch had gone pretty well, she thought. They’d lost track of Grice and hadn’t run into anyone else whose files they’d reviewed, but they saw a fair amount of action in the town center, accompanying people from bars and restaurants to their cars, and walking home with a trio of teenage girls who chatted cheerfully among themselves about boys and school as if Laurie and Meg weren’t even there. They’d had only one unpleasant encounter, with a couple of twentysomething jerks outside the Extra Inning. It wasn’t horrible, just the usual insults and a crude sexual invitation from the drunker of the two, a good-looking guy with an arrogant grin, who put his arm around Meg as if she were his girlfriend. (“I’ll fuck the pretty one,” he told his buddy. “You can have Grandma.”) But even that was a useful lesson for Meg, a little taste of what it meant to be a Watcher. Sooner or later, someone would hit her, or spit on her, or worse, and she’d have to be able to endure the abuse without protesting or trying to defend herself.

Meg emerged from the bathroom, smiling bashfully, her face pink, her body lost inside her tentlike nightgown. It was almost cruel, Laurie thought, draping a lovely young woman in such a dull and baggy sack, as if her beauty had no place in the world.

It’s different for me,
she told herself.
I’m just as happy being hidden.

The water in the bathroom was still warm, a luxury she no longer took for granted. In Gray House there was a chronic lack of hot water—it was inevitable, with so many people living there—but regulations required two showers a day regardless. She stayed in for a long time, until the air was thick with steam, which wasn’t much of a problem since the G.R. prohibited mirrors. It still felt weird to her, brushing her teeth in front of a blank wall, using chalky no-name paste and a crappy manual brush. She’d accepted most of the hygiene restrictions without complaint—it was easy to see why perfumes and conditioners and antiaging creams might be considered extravagances—but she remained unreconciled to the loss of her electric toothbrush. She’d pined for it for weeks before realizing that it was more than the sensation of a clean mouth that she missed—it was her marriage, all those years of mindless domestic happiness, long, crowded days that culminated with her and Kevin standing side by side in front of the dual sinks, battery-operated wands buzzing in their hands, their mouths full of minty froth. But that was all over. Now it was just herself in a quiet room, her fist moving doggedly in front of her face, no one smiling into the mirror, no one smiling back.

*   *   *

DURING THE
Training Period, the Vow of Silence wasn’t absolute. There was a brief interlude after lights-out—usually no more than fifteen minutes—when you were allowed to speak freely, to verbalize your fears and ask any questions that had gone unanswered during the day. The Unburdening was a recent innovation, meant to function as a kind of safety valve, a way to make the transition to not talking a little less abrupt and intimidating. According to a PowerPoint Laurie had seen—she was a member of the Committee on Recruitment and Retention—the dropout rate among Trainees had declined by almost a third since the new policy had been adopted, which was one of the main reasons why the compound had become so crowded.