I don’t even know if we’re heading in the right direction, but I pretend that we are to the others. I don’t want them to lose hope.
The metal collar around my neck is causing me sores. It weighs down heavily on my shoulders, making every step more painful than it needs to be.
Behind me, Molly stumbles along, propped up in the middle of Ryan and Ben. Her leg has become infected. There’s nothing we can do. Just like Rose’s arm back on the boat when we were floating in the Hudson, Molly’s leg will turn gangrenous and eventually kill her. I haven’t given up hope yet, but it’s certainly starting to wane. Sometimes when I look back at her, I can’t even tell if she’s still alive, and I start to wonder if it’s her ghost limping through the desert with us. Maybe we’re all dead. We’re all ghosts walking through purgatory.
Charlie stumbles to his knees for what must be the hundredth time. I pick him up, silently, and set him on his feet again. He doesn’t say a word, just whimpers his distress. Then once more, we trudge onward.
Watching Penelope and Jack deteriorate is just as painful as watching the children struggle. The dehydration has hit them both hard. Ryan’s taken to carrying Jack in a pouch across his chest, like he’s a newborn baby. For the first few days he whined, but he’s been quiet for a while now.
Penelope is still walking, but only just. Bree doesn’t have enough strength left in her to carry the dog, even though she’s small. Penelope seems to understand; she doesn’t complain, but I can tell she’s suffering and would love to be carried. We all would. Losing the bikes was the worst thing for all of us.
Charlie stumbles again. This time, when I go to pick him up, I find my arm muscles aren’t strong enough. I fall forward too and land in a heap on the ground.
Bree falls to her knees beside me. “Brooke,” she pleads, nudging me. “Get up. You have to get up. We have to carry on.”
But something about my stumbling seems to spread to the others, as though it’s an invitation that they too can give up. Ben unlinks Molly’s arm from round his shoulders and together, he and Ryan set her on the ground. Then they both slump down themselves, their tired eyes barely able to stay open.
“No,” Bree cries, her voice choked. “We can’t give up. We can’t.”
My tongue is swollen it’s been so long since I last spoke. “Let’s just have a quick nap,” I say.
“NO!” Bree screams. But her own voice is faltering. She can only just about croak out the word.
Realizing it’s futile to protest, she lies down next to me, resting her head against my splayed out arm. Penelope lies down too, and finally lets out the pained whimper she’s been holding in for days.
“Are we going to die?” Bree whispers in my ear, stammering on her tears.
I try to shush her, to calm her down. I want to tell her that we won’t die but I know it’s a lie. We can’t go on any farther. My legs won’t support my weight. The best I’d be able to do is crawl, but my arms are too weak as well. The only thing that could save us now is a rainstorm. Maybe with a bit of hydration we’d be able to make it another mile or so. Maybe Houston is just over the horizon. But we’ll never know, because the rain will never come.
I stare up at the unforgiving sky. It is a beautiful blue, the sun a blazing yellow, but between them they signify death. I find myself secretly praying someone dies and draws the attention of vultures. Then we’d be able to shoot one and feast on it. But I feel ashamed almost as soon as I think it. It’s better that we die together rather than live with that guilt.
“Do you really think Dad is still alive?” Bree says.
Her voice is floaty and sing-songy, as though she’s becoming delirious.
“Yes,” I reply.
“Do you think he still loves us?”
I let my heavy eyelids close, the scorching sun burning the tender skin. My mind has gone back to another place, to the time when my dad left for the army. I’d come home to find him and Mom arguing about it. He’d hit her and I’d been so filled with revulsion I wouldn’t say goodbye to him. He’d told me through the door that he would always love me, no matter what.
“Of course,” I say to Bree.
She doesn’t respond. When I look over, I see that her eyes are closed.
“Brooke,” I hear Molly say.
I manage to heave myself to my elbows and look back at her. She’s holding her bad leg and breathing rapidly. Despite the heat, her face has completely drained of color. She looks like she’s at death’s door.
“I need to tell you something,” she stammers through the pain.
“What?” I say, squinting against the glare of harsh sunlight.
“The crash,” she gasps. “Zeke and Stephan… survived.”
My heart hammers in my chest. “What do you mean?”
Tears streak down Molly’s cheeks. “I’m sorry. I lied. I knew you’d never leave if you thought there was a chance we could save them.”
She’s shaking her head so frantically, making her matted ginger hair fly all over the place. She licks her parched lips. I can’t help thinking that she’s using the last ounce of strength left in her to make this confession. It’s as though she’s trying to atone before she dies, to rid herself of sin just in case she’s about to meet her maker.
My grief is all consuming. It hurts so much my stomach aches. It’s more painful than the blisters, than the gnawing starvation. It’s more painful than the car crashes and the arena fights, than the snake bite and the slavers’ whips.
I fall back against the hard, cracked desert ground, feeling completely defeated, and let my eyes close.
CHAPTER TWENTY
“Brooke. Brooke, wake up.”
My eyelids flutter open. I’m flat on my back on the parched earth. I can’t feel any pain at all; my whole body is comfortably numb.
There’s a blanket of stars above me. I squint, trying to work out who it is standing before me. But it’s impossible. The person is nothing more than a silhouette.
“Who are you?” I manage to say.
My voice is no longer parched. My tongue isn’t swollen, nor are my lips dry and cracked. But it’s still hard to get my words out. It’s like I can’t move, like I’m more than just numb, but paralyzed.
“It’s me,” the voice replies.
But I can’t place it. It sounds like a hundred different voices in one. I can’t even tell whether it’s a man or a woman.
I don’t know whether I’m dead or alive, awake or dreaming. All I know is that the pain has gone. I’m filled with peace and tranquility. My eyelids are so heavy, I could easily just fall back to sleep.
The person reaches out and touches my cheek with their fingers.
“Don’t fall asleep, Brooke. Not now. Not yet.”
As I finally place the voice, my heart clenches. Because it belongs to Rose. I can’t make out her features in the darkness, I can only conjure a memory of what she looks like.
“How did you get here?” I stammer, confused by her presence.
“You brought me with you,” she replies, touching my heart gently. “I’m in here.”
As her hand presses into my chest, I realize that it’s not Rose sitting beside me anymore. It’s Flo.
“Thank you for looking after him,” she says. “For taking care of Charlie all this time.”
“Flo?” I stammer.
“I don’t blame you, Brooke,” she says. “You did everything you could for me.”
She reaches down and presses a kiss to my forehead. But as she straightens up, it’s no longer Flo. It’s my mom looking down at me.
Disorientated and slightly panicked, I try to shake my head. My heart is fluttering, my breath coming in short, anxious gasps.