A new Beginning

Another object slams into the door, rattling the fake wood in its hinges. I stare at the floor between my legs. I pretend that the once white bathroom tiles is the world’s finest treasure, and that the echoing screams and the glass that just shattered comes  from the neighbors below us on the ground floor of the apartment buildings. The muscles in my back start to complain, quivering along my spine urging me to relax and move. My response is to curl up in a tighter ball, desperate to hide from the world. With no clock to determine the time, I guess I have been curled up in the small cubicle of a bathroom for the better part of an hour.

                “Raven!” my name being shouted by someone other than my arguing parents sends pin pricks up my neck and the hairs on my arms to stand on end.

                Swiveling my head up, I scan the moldy grey walls that reveal nothing. What the hell? Convincing myself that I dreamed my name being called, I rest my head on my crossed arms wrapped around my legs and blink back the sting of forming tears. 

                “Raven come on,” I hear the voice again followed by a sharp tap on the small window on the wall behind the toilet several feet up. The window I failed to remember before.

                The shock of someone outside the second story window jerks my limbs up. Stumbling over to the toilet, ignoring the stiff pain in my back and cursing my shortness, I climb to the top part of the less than shiny toilet bowl. Leaning forward, I press my face against the cold glass. Blinking several times to adjust my eyes to the darkness outside, I look for the source of the sound. That’s when a face swings, upside down, at me and the glass from the gnarled tree outside.

                I fling myself backwards, my arms doing a circling motion, and the only thing stopping my fall is my nails digging into the small frame work around the window. A small scream vibrates my throat, bouncing off the tile floors and filling the room with its sound.

                I kill it in its track and cast a glance at the door to make sure my parents failed to notice the disturbance. That’s the last thing anybody needed when those two snarl. Satisfied that they didn’t notice my scream, their steadily growing louder screams are perfect reassurance, I focus on the boy dangling by just the crook of his knees around a branch of the tree.

                Familiar shaggy dirty blonde hair falls away from his face for a change, revealing spring green eyes and a swatch of freckles across a sculptured nose. My eyes scan the rest of his body once and a heat creeps up my cheeks when I realize he is shirtless. His toned chest muscles ripple while he sways slightly from the branch, as if teasing me to watch. My eyes snap back to his face and the smirk playing with his lips shatters the shock induced silence.

                “Eric Wispak, you stupid moth- what are you doing here! Can’t you hear them screaming? And what if the Securities find you breaking curfew!” I throw my hand in the direction of the door, his eyes following idly. I throw the window open the wooden frame banging against the side of the building. I wince at the sound and curse myself for stupidity, but I stick my head out the window so I can continue lecturing him some more. The Government workers would love the chance to teach Eric a lesson, especially after last month when he lit the head honcho’s pants on fire with one of his firecrackers. My mind wanders to the Government and the Final War, but I force it back to the matter at hand.

                When he looks at me again his smirk grows into a full blown grin, teeth and all, and his shoulders shake slightly. “Yea I can hear them. The whole stinking neighborhood can. And don’t worry about the Enforces; the Government does a piss poor job at assigning people that can actually pay attention to the slums.” The light tone in his voice, and that natural warmth in it, washes away the tension between us just as fast as it appeared.

                Returning his smirk, I tuck a strand of my inky black hair behind my ear. “So what are you doing here?”

                The playfulness drops from his face and a grim line settles across his mouth. “I came to get you. Everybody is wondering how you are. Thalia in particular, but of course Riley and I do too.”

                I turn my face away and wipe at the sudden tear running down my cheek. “Hey, hey now! Don’t cry Rave. We all understand why you haven’t shown up. To lose your bro during a raid, that’s rough man. They all just sent me to tell you that you still have a home at the Shack.”

                My eyes move back to his. The image of the dingy brown walls of the Shack the five of us, I mean four, hang out at fills my head and I can practically smell the dust that used to permanently scent my clothes.

                “I know the Shack will always be my home. But my parents won’t let me out.” I look down at the ground, the brown grass an unappealing sight. A longing to hug all three of my friends together rushes through me. The muggy summer air filled with the cricket’s summer song is carried on a breeze and it licks at my face lifting a few strands of hair.

                “Well that’s a given, they wouldn’t want to lose you to,” he reaches out a hand and I feel his warm fingers trace my cheek following the damp path left by the tears. Jerking his hand back, as if my skin shocked him, he says, “That’s why I’m here to bust you out.”

                I look at him now, “How the hell am I supposed to get down? We’re on the second story and in case you haven’t noticed my parents are still in a screaming match to the death. ” I take a deep breath and push myself backwards breathing the stagnant air of the apartment I have lived in my whole life once again. “It’s not like they’ll just let me walk out the door.”

                “Oh come on, it’s not like you haven’t snuck out before. And besides your nineteen now Raven, they can’t hold you hear against your will.” Eric bends at the waist his abdomen muscles tensing with the movement of the upside down sit-up. Pulling himself up the rest of the way, he flips himself so he sits on the branch he was just hanging on.

                “When I snuck out before, Seth was still alive and my parents were too busy working to notice. Now they scream all the time and rarely let me out of their sight.” My voice holds a sharper edge to it then I intend and my heart clenches. “Eric, I’m sorry. It’s just been rough sense the raid.”

                “Yea, I know, and we’re all allowed to get pissy Rave, you can’t be stoic all the time.” A soft grunt comes from the trees and I c**k my eyebrows wondering what he’s up to.

                “Ha, me stoic? Did you find a stash of Hikio somewhere?” I bark out a sharp laugh, and grin up at him in the tree. There is no way he could have gotten his hands on the extremely illegal drug from Region fifteen. “I’m like the most emotionally unstable person I know.”

                Eric’s face peeks out from the limbs long enough to say, “No you’re not, and you hide your emotions better than a rock.”

                “Whatever,” I mutter, I listen to his soft grunts coming from above for a while and then ask, “What are you doing up there anyways?”

                Eric laughs down at me, “Trying to figure out how to get you out of there. None of these branches have the right angle for me to help you down. And I won’t let you try getting out by yourself.”

                At his words the wooden frame of the window digging into my ribs becomes more noticeable and there is no way I can climb out of this window. Not only is it crazy to climb out without anything to grab on the other side. My five foot two inch height makes it impossible to lift my legs over the ledge to even try to climb out.

                “Even if I wanted to I couldn’t. I’m too short.” The words come out in a groan and I realize how much I really did want to go with him back to the Shack, that I am ready to face my friends after my brother’s murder.

                I can feel Eric’s eyes on my face through the branches as he climbs down to the branch slightly above my window, his soft laughter sounding yet again.  “You’re like a ‘lil elf you are, what with your black hair and delicate features.” Eric’s soft chuckle turns into a full blown belly laugh on the last two words, rattling him and the branch he is on. The sound of it rolls with the muggy heat waves pouring off of the ground.

                Rolling my eyes, “I do not look like a…” I stop midsentence turning my head to the side. “What’s an elf?”

                Eric materializes on the branch above the bathroom window and smiles, “I’ll tell you about it on the way to the Shack, but for now we need to figure out how to get you down.” He looks down at the ground and then down the side of the building my family and several others live in and back at me. “Whose window is that?” He points in the general area of where he is talking about since his eyes are locked onto mine.

                Without any thought as to where he was pointing I blurt out, “Mine. Why? What do you got in mind?” my heart does a miniature flip in my chest when his eyes light up with a glint. “Eric…”

                “I’ll tell you when you get there.” He climbs to the lowest branch while saying this and swings down, hanging from the branch with his finger tips. The branch had to be at least seven feet up off the ground, but his shoes dangle only a mere foot from the ground.

                Barely losing a moment’s worth of time, he drops to the dirt and jogs to the front of the other window, waving an arm at me. A soft groan slips out and I slowly climb down from the toilet, making sure to shut the window. One of Eric’s brilliant spur of the moment schemes does not sound fun to me at the moment. But in the end, like always, I find myself doing what he wants. I step into the hallway that connects the rooms to the other main part of the apartment building, which consists of a family room and an open area kitchen shorting one side of the hall’s walls.

                The entrance to the family room seems to loom larger as I edge my way towards my room. A back appears in the frame, and my heart leaps into my throat. My mother’s words, no longer muffled by the door and walls, ring sharp in my ears. “He would still be alive if it weren’t for you filling his head with lies about striking back out.”

                I freeze at her words, my body refusing to move. Was she talking about Seth? She must be, only one other person I know of was killed for talking about a revolt. But he lived on the edge Region twenty three, over a hundred miles away. And it was years ago.

                “Oh come on Robin, you know that’s not true. The boy would have gone down the same path either way.” My father barks back. While he may not have shouted these words, this time, his unnaturally loud voice fills the apartment.

                She whirls around then and her chocolate brown eyes, so like my own, meet mine with fire sparking in them. “What are you doing out here?” her voice is nothing but a growl and I cringe backwards into the wall attempting to make myself as small as I can. “Well! Get out of here; go to your f*****g room.” She storms towards me and into the bathroom I just left.

                I do not hesitate to follow her command. My feet fly and I enter the room Seth and I once shared. Like every other time I have entered it, my back goes ridged at the sight of the emptiness on the left side of the room. The side that was once filled with posters of the Government issued maps and plans scribbled out on paper. Taking a shaky breath, I force my legs to move towards the window, where Eric’s soft bird whistles come in through the glass. Even a month later, the change in everybody’s personality still shocks me. Pushing the latch down and pushing the window down so it hangs down the side of the building like I did in the bathroom, I stick my head back out the window.

                “So what’s your master plan?” I whisper down to him.

                Eric looks up at me, extending his arms out in an open cradle. “Jump”

                I jerk my head back hitting my head on the frame, feeling a hard knot already starting to form. Rubbing the back of my head, I hiss out the window not sticking my head out again, “Are you crazy. You’ll drop me and I’ll break my leg or something.”

                “Just jump Rave. I’ll catch you, and then we’ll go the Shack.”I hear the heat dried grass crinkle under his feet.

                My heart thumps and I stick my head back out, making sure I hold it as far away from the seal as I can. The ground seems to surge up and roll, reminding me of the waves I saw the one time my father took me and Seth to the ocean. I got so sick that day on the small boat we rented we had to go home five hours before the return time. “No way, it’s a fifteen some foot drop.”

                “You were willing to climb through that bathroom window. And don’t you want to go see everybody else?” there is a note to his voice that surprises me and I study his face closely.

                His eyes meet mine and a smoldering intensity surges between us. The hairs stand on my arm stands on end again, but the feeling is different. “Please Rave.” Eric whispers, his voice notably huskier. “I won’t drop you, promise. Just jump.”

                I shift in front of the window, the desperate edge to his voice uprooting my nerves. “If you drop me, I swear I’ll tie you to a tree and let either the Securities or the wolves find you.” My words have the desired affect and he cringes mockingly, the familiar joking light returning to his eyes.

                Nodding he shakes his arms emphasizing their emptiness. “I can’t drop you if you don’t jump. And then there will be some disappointed Enforcers out and about.”

                Swallowing the sudden clump in my throat, I clench my fists and swing a leg over the empty window seal, straddling it. Eric shifts again underneath me, hopefully positioning himself into a better place suitable for catching a person. My arms tremble, fine shakes traveling along my muscles. I lean slightly back towards my room, allowing myself to move my other leg outside. Every single breath comes out in quivering bursts. I can feel sweat starting to bead on the palms of my hand making it difficult to hold onto the edge as firmly. I sit on the edge of my window, looking out over my home city, R424. The forth town, formed by the Government, in the twenty fourth Region.

                “Almost there, steady…”Eric mutters encouraging words up at me. I can practically feel his eyes following every twitch of my body.

                Debating on which was to jump, I finally decide on the backwards approach. I position myself so my head and half my chest are still inside my room, my hands gripping the edge with biting force. My legs, hanging outside the window, serve no other purpose than to be dead weight, sway uselessly in the slight breeze.

                “If you’re going to do it that way, make sure to push yourself away from the edge. You don’t want to get caught on the latch of the window.” Eric whispers up his voice sounding stronger now that everything is falling into place.

                I respond by letting out a terrified breath of air. Swallowing hard I try to get rid of the lump in my throat. Swelling my arm muscles I prepare to jump backwards. I’m about to push myself backwards when my hands slip from their sweaty grip sending me falling through the air. My throat muscles work to produce a scream, but all that comes out of my mouth is a breathy squeal. Air rushes around me for what feels like eternity.

                My eyes are squinted tight and I thrash through the air, my hands searching for something to hold. I slam into something hard. The pained groan doesn’t come from me either. Then the night air is filled with soft laughter. “You should see your face!”

                I snap my eyes open and glare up into the smiling face hovering over mine. Opening my mouth to let loose the verbal lashing building inside, “-I promised I’d catch you. And it’s not my fault that you slipped so don’t try and kill me with your eyes.”

                The boyish look on his face and the fact that I am still alive sends me into a burst of giggles. “Fine, you live to see another day.” I laugh again and then a stray thought flashes. “Hey, what’s an elf?”

                “What? Oh! They’re little magical people that can do stuff with trees and stuff like that.” I c**k my eyebrows at him.

                “And how does that make me look like an elf? Just because I’m short...” I trail off, I become increasingly aware of the fact that he hasn’t set me down yet. His warm arms are wrapped gently around my body.

                The last person to hold me this close was Viktor. My heart squeezes. It’s been a year since he was taken away because of the Draft. A year since I ruffled his unnaturally red hair, and kissed his…

                I stuff the painful thoughts away. The Government has taken a lot from me but I won’t let it ruin me.

                “Oh, they’re not just short. The guy who wrote the book said-“

                “You found more books?” I can’t help but squirm and bounce, the previous thoughts shoved out of my head, forcing him to put me down. Once my feet are on the solid ground I bounce even harder.

                “Yup, I finally deciphered that clue the Librarian left in the book by George Orwell. There was a whole stack of books behind that old marble statue. A tiny hidey hole. Who would’ve guessed?”

                The librarian guy was a guy before the Book Confiscation. After the Final War, or what the elders of our town call world war three, the Government took away all of the old books, the ones published before the year two thousand and fifty.

                All the books were taken to secret compounds around the world, where only high ranking Enforcers can get in. They said that the old books tainted our thoughts, produced violence filled thoughts. Of course there are more books now. The art of literature just as powerful as it was in the past, but the new books are extremely boring, not a single thought provoking concept in any single one of them.

                We discovered the first stash of old books when the four of us, plus Viktor at the time broke into the closed up library. Viktor fell through a rotten floor board, stumbling onto a pile of books. His ankle was twisted and he wasn’t able to walk for a week. But he said he didn’t mind since he got to read them. He became particularly attached to the novel, 1984. Claimed it was just like the society we lived in, just written over a century ago.

                None of us expected the letter hidden in that book, a letter from the Librarian as he liked to call himself. He told us of things, of all the books in the world, and how it pained him to see them ripped from the public’s hands. So he hid, not himself, but the books. A dozen of them hidden under the feet of the searching Enforcer’s.

                “So how many did you find this time?” I whisper.

                We both whisper, and step lightly. The apartment building I live in is the close to the middle of town. Crumbling buildings line either side of the roads, their dull brown or grayish tan color representing the depressed air they give off. Several streets lead off in either direction. Before the war, and even now the city sprawls in either direction. But its dead silent on the streets. Security Enforcers strict about the curfew rule. Nobody out of their homes after eleven. I can hear the familiar hum of the Hover Cars zooming above our heads however, several hundreds of feet up in the air. I know even farther up are the Hover Planes are zooming back and forth, ten times faster than that of the its lower counter parts.

                “At least ten good ones, the others look like mice or some moths got to them.”

                We reach the alley that leads us to other walk ways similar to this one and start down it. Every so often we would have to cross a street crossing. We would stop and stick our heads out on either side checking to see if it was all clear. I think about the books Eric found. What could be inside them? I haven’t ever even heard of books written about elves.

                I turn to ask Eric another question, and come face to face with his chest, with him slamming me against the wall behind us. I try to squirm out from his iron grip muttering angry curses into his hand covering my mouth. With as much force as I can, I slam my heel into his toes, smiling smugly at the pained groan. Eric presses me harder against the wall, crushing me between the two.

                “Shut up and stop fighting, Enforcers are coming.”