Page 41 of You Weren’t Meant to Be Human

Jess says, “California’s probably beautiful this time of year.”

Crane sighs out smoke.

“Southern California, I mean. Northern California’s freezing, I’ve heard.”

She could make it. Out of all of them, Jess would be the one to survive running from the hive.

He’s not sure if she could’ve at the start—before she became who she needed to be to survive Sean and Levi, and Crane, and the worms. And it blows she had to survive those things, but the world doesn’t give a fuck, and now? She could do it.

He remembers to respond to her. Nods.

“Can I try a cigarette?” she asks. Her eyes are fixed on the cold horizon. “Does it help?”

Crane hides the pack from her in Levi’s jacket, snorting. Don’t start, it’s not worth it.

Her mouth wrinkles up. “Fine. I guess. God, it’s freezing. Do you think we could—” She shuffles a bit, tries to keep her blood flowing while she considers her words. “Do you think we could save the baby? Somehow? Like, get it away from all this?”

Crane obviously thinks the answer is no , but he raises an eyebrow at her, a request for elaboration.

“Take it,” she says, “and give it to someone who isn’t us. Hide it from the hive. Let it grow up normal. Knowing our luck, we’d probably end up raising another Unabomber.” She thinks. “No, he had too many degrees. Damn. I can’t think of any mass shooters off the top of my head right now.”

Crane won’t be raising shit, but he can’t say that.

Plus, this shouldn’t be on her. If she tries to take this baby away from the hive, who knows what it’ll do to her.

Crane can’t have that on his conscience.

Or, well, his immortal soul. If he believed in that sort of thing, which he isn’t sure he does.

He looks to Levi’s big black motherfucker of a truck, then to Jess.

Hmm.

Crane puts a hand on Stagger’s jaw and carefully extricates himself from the man’s arms. Stagger grumbles.

Crane has never been more grateful for their time together in his life when his stiff fingers spell out Levi’s name, then nudge Stagger toward the door.

Be a good boy and fuck with him, will you?

Or at least make sure he doesn’t come out here?

Stagger cues in and slips back into the gas station, and Crane starts for the truck.

The snow crunches under his boots. It’s thick and heavy and hard to walk through.

“Hey,” Jess chides. “Not too far. You’re a mess.”

Crane just gestures for her to follow him, and when she does, he produces Levi’s ring of keys from the jacket pocket.

He unlocks the truck, yanks open the door, gets up on the step-bar to look around.

The shotgun is gone from the front seat; Levi took that inside.

He checks the back next. Jess makes a quizzical noise but doesn’t stop him.

Aha. There it is. Crane’s go bag, the one that was confiscated when all this shit went down. Crane pulls it out and drops it by the back door to the gas station.

Then he clicks his tongue to give Jess a half-second heads-up before wrestling the truck key off the ring and tossing it to her.

She catches it, and her eyes widen with terror.

“What?” she says. “No.”

Crane shrugs. He doesn’t care. Get into the truck—the door’s already open, snowflakes hitting the back seat—and start driving. Get the fuck out. Levi won’t notice until the baby is out, and who knows how long that’ll take? She can be far gone by then.

She at least has to try.

“I—” She stammers for a moment. “I’m not gonna just leave you here. I can’t.”

She has to, though. He’s literally in active fucking labor, and the hive will chase this baby down to the ends of the earth. But Jess? This is her chance. Levi will be pissed about the truck, but it’s not like he can go to the cops. If she’s going to go, she has to go now, and she has to go alone.

Jess whispers, “Oh god.” He can barely hear her over the wind, the muffling of the falling snow.

Then she steels herself.

“Okay,” she says. “California.”

Crane should reach for her. Should cram his nose against her temple to wish her farewell the only way he knows how, beg her silently to speed and avoid the cops and pick a new name and get the fuck out.

But of course his body won’t let him. He feels the contraction tighten before it actually hits, and he grabs the bed of the truck, leans against it.

They’re so much harder than they were this morning.

Lower in the body. The baby’s head is a plug jammed into his cunt and it fucking hurts and he can’t even be embarrassed when that long, low moan crawls up his throat.

He drops his cigarette in the snow. He’s barely even aware he’s doing it.

He’s getting closer. It’s almost done.

Jess puts a hand on Crane’s back. “You need to get inside.”

No. She has to leave first. He tries to push away from the truck but only manages to double himself over, gasping for air hard enough it’s ripping up his throat.

The cold burns. He’s convinced the baby has tiny claws and teeth and it’s chewing through the organs holding it in place.

There’s no other reason for it to feel like this.

Jess says, “ Shit .”

Crane looks up, and.

Through the blur of pain and the snow-glare, he can’t quite make out the details of the woman walking up to them. There’s a car parked haphazardly by the shut-down pumps, a man peering in confusion at the OUT OF ORDER sign.

He can hear what she says, though. With her unmistakable northern Virginia accent.

“Excuse me? Excuse me! I’m so sorry, but the pumps are down, and I can’t get service. Do you know where the nearest—”

She stops a few yards from them. The wind whips up her graying hair. Snow sticks to her thick-rimmed glasses.

“Are you okay?” she asks.

For the first time in years, Crane is looking at the soft, kind face of his mother.