The Luminosity Series (Book 1): Luminosity (15 page)

Gravity pulled me down, whispers of countless voices
taunting me, repeating the message
"hide"
until I was dizzy.
The space surrounding me was enclosing, but it was too dark to see anything. My
bones ached against the solid platform, the air cold as my body shivered. My
hands collided with a wall as I reached above me. It couldn’t have been farther
than a foot away—so close the heat from my breath sunk down to warn me. Feeling
weightless, I extended my arms outward, but they were blocked by another
barrier.

“Help!”

Fear overwhelmed me as I pressed on the walls from
every angle. Hyperventilating would work against me, but I had no control. The
piercing echoes of my screams bounced back at me until I realized… I had been
buried alive.

“Somebody please!”

My desperation to get out took over. I’d eventually
run out of air. My survival instinct was worthless, but I couldn’t let myself
give in. Not yet. Adrenaline set in as I thrashed, kicked, and shoved in all
angles at once, but the box was inescapable. My fingernails cracked against the
shallow ceiling above me. My effort would result in early suffocation. Tears
spilled down both cheeks. I had little oxygen remaining, gasping on my finals
breaths as I floated out of consciousness.
This was it. I was about to die.

Then, out of nowhere, gravity intensified. I dropped
into a free fall, the light flashing around me. Struggling to regain my vision,
I stood up from the ground. The sky was a luminous white, the sun a black hole.
I breathed the burning of aspen and pine, their silver ashes accumulating at my
feet like snow. When I twisted around, Evan appeared, his lifeless face now swashed
in sweat as he beamed ahead of me, looking as if he had just escaped a
battlefield.

“Evan, we need to run!” I shrieked, grabbing his hand.
But he remained still, as if I didn’t exist. “Hey!” I rattled him this time,
panicked when he didn’t budge, his focus mirroring defeat as his eyes swelled
with emotion. But I was just a ghost—invisible and gone. “Evan, come on!” I
tugged on his arm. But he dropped to his knees in collapse as the surrounding
horror unfolded. By now, the plume of smoke drowned me. My eyes stung, urging
me to close them as the tears streamed out in a soft trickle.

When I cleared my vision, the smoky fumes and the
noise of pans clanking continued from the kitchen until realizing I was awake. This
had been only one of the many nightmares I’d suffered from since the President’s
publication. My fears, it seemed, always had a way of sneaking in and haunting
my dreams. It was becoming tougher to decipher them.

Through the curtains, the auroras still blanketed the
sky, signaling it wasn’t morning yet. But it was too early to be awakened. In a
sudden panic, I slid my hands through my sweatshirt as I crept down the stairs,
trying to avoid their creaky pressure points. When I got into the kitchen, my
mother was fully dressed and preparing a meal.

“I was wondering when you would escape from that
nightmare of yours,” she said, pulling out an old cookbook from one of the
drawers.

“How’d you know?” I winced in confusion.

“I could hear you screaming.” She glared at me in
concern. Embarrassed, I avoided her glances as she stood behind the counter,
peeling carrots, letting their skins drop into the sink.

“I’m fine. It wasn’t real,” I said with a sigh.

“That’s good, because Andrea will be here for lunch.”

“Today?”

“She was able to bump up her visit last minute.” She
tossed me a curious glance, expecting a different reaction from me.

“When will she be here?”

“Her transport arrives around eleven o’clock. It
returns to Grand Junction at four, which doesn’t leave us much time. I figured
it’d be best to get the food prepared before the guards show up for roll call,”
she said. I tried to hide my surprise as she waited patiently for my reaction. My
anxiety about my sister’s visit came to a head. Andrea had spent the majority
of her adult life avoiding our family, even before the announcement. Something
about her sudden change in plans made me uneasy. And after what had happened at
Evan’s, I wasn’t sure how many more surprises I could handle.

♦  ♦  ♦

Three years older than I, my sister was a gentle soul,
much like my mother. Physically, she resembled me—dark-haired, thin, and of
decent height, but our personalities were much different. She was reserved,
withdrawn—a person more worried about the way the world perceived her. She was
the obedient one, the easy one, one who would never break the rules, remaining
neutral to keep the peace. But when she stood before me after those four soft
taps on the door, I sensed something was different. Something had been ripped
apart inside of her, like me. Now, her shoulder-length hair framed her pale,
ghostly face. And her skeletal frame put an emphasis on the darkness below her
eyes. As she forced a soft smile, I assumed the news wouldn’t be good.

“Andrea!” My mother reached out to hug her, rushing toward
her in a tremble of tears. I clicked the door shut behind them after she pulled
her inside, observing as they embraced. “Come in. Make yourself comfortable.
I’ll go get us some tissues. Lunch is almost ready. Aubrey, why don’t you take
her to the guest bedroom. She can put her bag in there,” my mother said, swiping
the tears away as she left us standing together.

“Hey Aubrey…” Andrea said, turning toward me as she
worked up the nerve to speak again. After leaving on bad terms with her, I still
had little to say.

“Hi,” I replied as she tailed me into the bedroom.

“It’s good to see you. I’m glad you’re both alright,”
she said, placing her tote bag on the bed. I sighed.

“Why did it take you so long? Do you realize how much
time you wasted being upset with her? You have no idea how damaged she still
is…” I said. Without expecting it, Evan came to mind.

“I know, I know. But there’s a lot you don’t
understand,” she defended.

“So why did you come? You didn’t have to travel all
the way down here just to tell us you’re disqualified,” I said bluntly. Andrea
shook her head in frustration.

“I get that you’re still upset. But please let me take
all this in first. I don’t have a lot of time with her,” she begged. My eyelids
fluttered in a familiar disappointment.

“Fine,” I snapped, treading back out of the bedroom,
avoiding the anger on the tip of my tongue.

The silence lingered as we entered the kitchen, too
busy noticing the uncertain energy in the room, I assumed. Andrea studied my
mom’s face. Afterward, my mom glanced at me, as if she was trying to distract
herself from the obvious conclusion I was still upset.

“I prepared a stew with the vegetables in the garden.
I hope that’s okay with you, Andrea,” my mother said, interrupting the hollow tension,
on a desperate quest for reassurance.

“That sounds great.” Andrea gave a faint smile.

After sitting down to eat, the silence grew awkward as
the three of us peered at one another between a series of sips, slurps, and
chews.

“So Aubrey, why don’t you tell Andrea and I what
you’ve been doing at the hospital? You haven’t said much about it,” my mother
asked in her usual soft voice, trying to get me to open up.

“That’s because I don’t
want
to talk about it.”
My focus beamed across the table in dread, recalling my incident with Charlie.
She eyeballed me in suspicion, roughly swallowing a stream of water flowing
from her glass to her throat. Andrea’s eyes darted back and forth, waiting
anxiously before my mother spoke.

“Did something happen?” she asked, setting her glass
down and clearing her throat.

“Mom, please…” I groaned. Andrea stared at me. They
waited for me to speak as I gave them a returned glance. “I’d just rather not
talk about it.”

They glared at one another as I fought to control my sarcastic,
infuriated expression, focusing on my plate, lifting my spoon to take another sip
of watery broth.

“Well, I’m glad you were lucky enough to be assigned
to labor duties. I was afraid you wouldn’t have work here when you left,”
Andrea said. I tensed up as she continued her quiet slurping. My mother
glowered at me as I tried to forget her comments. “Have you sought any
treatment for your PTSD yet?” Andrea asked in concern. I winced.

“How? They denied me any access to care
and
medication.” I rolled an eye, my mother delivering me a pitied reaction that
only sparked my difficult attitude. Overwhelmed by the swift rate of the
conversation, I took a much needed drink of water to calm myself. But the focus
on me became too much. “So are you going to tell us why you came here?” I
blurted out, slamming my glass of water down hard on the table, directing my
attention to Andrea. My mother gave me a scolding glimpse. “That is why she’s
here, isn’t it?” I asked. They both paused.

“You’re right. I’ll just—I’ll just get to the point.”
Andrea blinked away the onset of tears. All at once, the shame and guilt on her
face made her a victim to my bitterness, and in the seconds leading up to her
confession, I wished I hadn’t been so harsh. “The reason I came down here today
is because… well, it’s because I’m pregnant,” she said in a breathy, choked
voice as the spoon she held up to her mouth trembled between her weak fingers.
She glared at the table while her announcement absorbed into the air. My mother
stopped chewing and swallowed. Then, everything in the room got quiet. I set my
spoon down, clanking it hard against the bowl. She interrupted the toxic silence
again with a shame-stricken, raised voice. “But I didn’t come here to be
pitied. All I ask is that you forgive me for being so distant the past few
years... because I may not see you again after this. They’re going to find out
sooner or later. I just needed to say I’m sorry… and that I love you guys, no
matter what happens.”

My mother was stunned.

Nauseated by my partially chewed vegetables, I covered
my mouth with my napkin, spitting into it before ejecting myself from my chair.
I was certain I’d throw up.

“Aubrey…” my mother scolded. But it was too late to
stop me. I had already made it halfway down the hall.

♦  ♦  ♦

With my head bolstered against the stony vanity
cabinets, I floundered clumsily on the floor next to the toilet. After several
moments and a few deep breaths to reassemble myself, I opened the door to the
bathroom silently. As I peeked around the corner, whispers cut through the
emptiness of the dining room. I crept toward the hallway, sliding myself against
the wall, eavesdropping on the two of them.

“I’m sorry I let things go between us for so long. We
didn’t mean for this to happen. Marcus is ashamed… and I don’t know what I
should do,” Andrea whispered.

“It’s okay... we’ll figure this out. I won’t allow
them to take my grandchild away from me,” my mother said, the nausea returning
when I heard the words exit her mouth.

“Look, mom… ever since you told me about dad, and what
he did… I’ve been terrified to come back here. I’ve been paranoid of being
found, especially after they took his compass from me. But mostly, I’ve been
scared for you. And I still am,” she said.

“I understand... I just—I wish I could have tracked
him down, at least. Nowadays they’re making it impossible to get any
information about anybody on the outside,” my mother said.

“How has Aubrey been handling things back here? She
seemed more curious of dad when she left. Is she okay?” Andrea asked.

“I don’t know what to do to help her, Andrea. She
doesn’t talk to me. And now she’s sneaking off. I overheard she’s in some
trouble with the hospital, but she hasn’t confronted me about it. I was hoping
by you being here it would help her open up,” my mother sighed with a worried
face.

“Have you told her yet?”

“No...”

“You need to tell her. Or else she’ll never know who
she is.”

I stopped, allowing the confusion to settle as I stood
there, curious of what they were talking about. When I observed them finishing
their conversation, I tiptoed back out into the dining area before they noticed
me. My head throbbed as I struggled to make sense of it.

“What are you not telling me?” I asked in hesitation.
Andrea glared at my mother, and that’s when the nausea thrashed in the pit of
my stomach. The room got silent again, the anticipation keeping me on edge as I
took a seat.

“Aubrey… it’s—”

“We have to hide your sister,” my mother interrupted
hastily, pushing the chair away from the table as she flung up from the table.
I blinked, letting out a breath of disbelief. Our minds remained at a
standstill, the entire room transforming from a quiet calm to a disturbing roar
of anxiety.

“What?” I asked in alarm.

“I’ve been meaning to tell you both… The previous
owners built a secret cellar on this property. We’ll hide Andrea there during
roll call and the inspections. But we must be careful,” my mother said.