Page 3

CALE

The day guard paced the hall, wringing his hands as he waited for Eben to relieve him. I guess even the guards were afraid to be forgotten here. A loud, familiar echo boomed through the hall. The guard sighed and stormed toward the iron gates. I sat on the cold floor, anxious to see his face. Something between Eben and me had shifted. Under his light, I was no longer a prisoner. I was a friend. The word didn’t feel like enough. Maybe the stories he’d given me meant nothing. Maybe it’d been a way for him to get close to someone. The loneliness of this place was permanent, it was easy to see it in his eyes. But what if we’d stayed like this? What if nothing ever changed? Would that be enough? Him on one side, and me on the other. The trust I’d had for him bloomed beneath my skin, and I couldn’t stop the warmth from sinking into my chest. I wanted more. I wanted to know what he was like before Elysium, before the pandemic. I wanted to sit beside him as his equal, at a bar or a diner, sipping coffee or beer and earn the laugh lines around his eyes, make him smile, feel a smile on my own lips too, knowing that once we left, the night would only get better. The thought drained the heat from my chest, twisting painfully inside my rib cage, making it difficult to take a deep breath. Those days were gone. Those days could never be.

My heartbeat matched the sound of heavy footfall as it neared my cell door. An orange glow crept along the wall, and I closed my eyes, praying to a god I didn’t believe in anymore that it wasn’t a stranger, that Eben hadn’t been sent away too.

“Cale,” he whispered, and I exhaled, an impossible smile lifting at the corners of my mouth.

I reached up and touched my lips. The rarity of relief spread through my limbs as I stood.

“I’m here,” I breathed and walked to the cell door. “Why were you late?”

He handed me an apple and I took a bite, the sweet juice almost too much.

“Lux…” He shifted the candle in his hand, illuminating his features in a way I hadn’t seen before. This close I could see the lack of sleep around his eyes. The weariness. The fear. “I’m being deployed.”

“When?” My voice cracked, every ounce of relief slipping through my fingers as the apple fell from my hand.

“A month.”

Maybe I’d be dead in a month. Maybe I’d be free. But at least I wouldn’t be alone. Not yet.

“A lot can happen in a month,” I said. “The militia could fail. The NEA could take control.”

“Shh…” he hissed, his eyes wide as he turned to look down the hall. “Captain… Dorel… they’re dead.”

“Dead?”

He swallowed and nodded. “Lux is sending as many men as he can…” Eben’s eyes locked on mine. “If the prisoners refuse to fight with the militia, refuse to join them, they’ll be killed.”

My spine straightened, a furious storm building inside me. “I’d rather die an honorable death then spend one minute in a traitor’s army.”

“I’m not asking you to fight.”

“Then you’re here to kill me?” I asked, lifting my chin, rising to my full height.

My voice did not waver this time.

Eben clenched his jaw and shook his head. “No. I’m here to offer you a third option.”

“And what’s that?”

“Run… with me.”

The warmth that had abandoned me returned once more in my chest, and spread, its fingers finding a grip on my heart.

“Eben, I—”

“Think about it… we have a few weeks to make a plan. I can gather supplies, store my rations and—”

“ Eben .”

“Cale, I know it might—”

“I’ll run with you, Eben. I’ll fight… with you.”

“O-okay.” He rubbed at the center of his chest. “Okay.”

We were quiet, our mingled breaths an offering to the prison’s ghostly silence as we stood like wraiths ourselves. We had both died here tonight. The men we used to be. Reborn again inside this small moment. Inside a promise. It felt like hope.

Eben moved, or maybe it was me, it didn’t matter once his trembling fingers were entwined with mine, the warmth of his skin sent a shock up my arm. Linked between the barrier of my cell, as if the cold iron bars didn’t exist for us.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said, his eyes falling to my mouth.

“The right thing…” I sucked in another greedy breath as I squeezed his hand. The touch overwhelming and everything and not enough. How long had it been since I’d been touched? Real, intentional, heat burning and perfect. The corners of my eyes burned too as my eyes met his.

“What about the others?” His Adam’s apple moved slow and hard. “It’s like you said… what kindness have I shown them?”

“We can make a plan… save as many men as possible.”

Eben reached for the bar with his left hand and rested his forehead against the door. “I only have keys for the east sector.” The heat of his words brushed my cheek. His eyes closed and I wanted to touch his face.

This was real. He was real.

“Then we’ll do what we can.”

I squeezed Eben’s hand, and he opened his eyes. This close, even with little light, the tiny specks of gold inside his dark brown irises revealed themselves to me. His lashes were thick and long and blinked back at me with a mix of longing and hesitation.

Desire.

Or maybe it was a projection. Maybe I was already dying, and this had all been some dream, some hopeful dream to ease my suffering.

But he didn’t let go of my hand or look away. This was real. He was real. Eben held me in this limbo, where the air between us crackled with everything we both refused to say.

I’m scared to want you.

Don’t be afraid.

Kiss me.

“I brought you something,” he said, and let go of my hand, the moment drifting away with the warmth of his touch.

I rolled my fingers into a fist to conserve his heat.

“It’s not much…” Eben pulled a small parcel from his pocket and handed it to me. He’d wrapped his gift in an old newspaper, and I rubbed my thumb across the soft paper, gazing down with wonder at the worn words, attempting to read them as my eyes blurred with gratitude.

“Well, open it,” he said, a smile on his lips. “I might’ve stolen a few of the items, but I figured it was worth it.”

It.

Me.

I was worth it.

I ripped through the paper and chuckled at the contents.

“Are you trying to tell me something?”

He rubbed at the back of his neck. “It’s not right… the way they treat prisoners. I wanted you to feel… more… I don’t know. Human, I guess?”

“Human,” I whispered.

“The baking soda works like toothpaste when it’s wet, and if you chew the mint leaves when you’re done, it kills the aftertaste.”

I sniffed the small piece of soap. Cedar and lye. Just like Eben.

My throat ached and I could barely speak. “T-Thank you.”

EBEN

He lowered his eyes, trying to hide the unshed tears I hadn’t missed. Cale rubbed the soap with the pad of his thumb, his fingers long and fragile. He swallowed and breathed and swallowed again.

“Before… everything,” he said. “My mother used to grow mint leaves in her garden. She said it kept the spiders away.” Cale’s lips broke into a sad smile.

“Was it true?”

“I think so?” He lifted his gaze. His smile was gone, replaced with trembling lips. “My… my…” Cale sighed and shook his head.

“Tell me,” I urged.

He looked down at the small gifts and back at me.

“My boyfriend found a spider web once… near one of her plants. So maybe it wasn’t true.”

Boyfriend.

I schooled my features, trying for a calm I couldn’t maintain.

Boyfriend.

The need I’d thought I’d seen in his eyes earlier. Had I not imagined it?

“What happened to him… to your boyfriend?”

“He’s dead.”

“I-I’m sorry.”

He searched my face. “The virus… When Seven died, I thought it was so unfair… but now… I realize he was the lucky one.”

The lucky one.

I didn’t want to understand him. I didn’t want to think about never having met Cale or having this small amount of something good in all of this terrible darkness.

But I understood.

I did.

And it hurt.

“Sometimes I wish I would have died… I wish my lungs would have given out.”

“Sometimes?” he asked as I stepped closer.

“There were times I didn’t think I could make it through any more pain.” I smoothed the tip of my finger over the tattooed number on my wrist.

“If you were dead… you wouldn’t be here…” Cale gripped the bar. “And if you were dead, I might be too. Is it selfish for me to think that?”

“No.” My hand shook as I lifted it to his face. He leaned into my palm, his eyes on mine. “I’m selfish too…” I said, barely able to catch my breath as I moved my hand to his waist. “Come here.”

The bars between us made it next to impossible, but as my lips pressed against his, I could pretend we were someplace else. He reached through the bar and grasped my shirt, pulling me as close as he could. Cale’s lips were dry, but soft and willing, and I would have taken a bullet right then if it meant I could die feeling like this. Like me. Like before everything had been turned upside down. Like the man I’d hoped I’d become. Alive and warm and free. He licked my lips, and I opened for him, tasting apples on his tongue. I tugged on his belt loop, a desperate attempt for more, to be closer, and he groaned.

Breathless, we broke apart, the dark and dank surroundings a slap in the face. Cold reality. I shoved away from his cell, my heart tripping over itself as I looked around, but we were alone.

“I… I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Cale’s cheeks were pink, his chest heaving as he touched his bottom lip.

He was more alive than I’d ever seen him before.

“We have to be careful… if anyone had seen. I wasn’t thinking… it’s been—”

“Too long,” he finished for me.

I dared to close the distance between us again, his kiss still tingling across my lips, and I took his hand in mine. “I’ve wanted to do that since the first night I saw you.”

“We have to get out of here,” he said, his thumb trailing along the lines inside my palm.

“We will. I promise you. I’ll do whatever I can.”

I didn’t know what I was to him. A ticket out. A person to trust. But he was important to me. There wasn’t shit left in this world to fight for. But I found myself desperately wanting to fight for him.