I freeze. When the mine is dried up and dead, they blow the “overburden”—the mountain itself—so they can excavate the little bit that’s left.
“They killed my father’s brothers and sisters. Four of them. So he took four miners. But it wasn’t me, Will,” Ennor says. I wonder how she looks when she’s sad. “It wasn’t me any more than it was you who killed my people.”
“It was still your kind.”
“And it was still your kind.”
“I’m not like them,” I say, though I feel ashamed as I say it. They’re good people, they’re my father’s people. I should be so lucky, to be like them, to be like my father. “They aren’t evil, Ennor.”
“Maybe we’re more like each other than them.”
I press my lips together, start to agree, but I can’t get over the image of my father walking out of the mine. Five days without food made him look gaunt, he was weak; Roth’s head was covered in dried blood. They were the lucky ones. I think about the cry of relief and sadness and joy from my mother’s lips as she ran to him. All because of the Knockers.
I can’t escape the image just yet. I duck through the doorway and go back to my station.
Ennor is no more responsible for killing miners than I am for killing Knockers. I know that. It takes a few days for my surprise and horror to fade, though, for me to stop wondering what would happen if I made her terribly angry, for me to stop cringing when I see miners spit onto the mine floor—does that count as disrespectful? Is it only a life for a life, or are the Knockers less tolerant now? I feel like a child torn between two parents—the miners, yanking me in one direction, and Ennor, yanking me in the other. I’m not sure if I’m more like either. I’m not sure what I should do.
But I know this much, at least—I don’t want Ennor to be mad at me. Not because she’s a Knocker, not because I’m a miner, but because she’s my friend. I don’t want to stop talking to her over something that happened more than a decade ago. So I buy her flowers.
It is very, very difficult to sneak a bouquet of roses, even a small one, into a coal mine. I shove them down my shirt and wince, wishing I’d purchased the de-thorned variety. I walk with a strange step as I try to keep the water dripping from the stems from running down my pant leg. The sound of the pink-and-white cellophane the grocery store wrapped the flowers in is thankfully masked by the fans in the retreaters’ area. I snake around the pillars and finally duck into our cavern for the first time since we fought.
“I brought you something,” I say as I enter, and am suddenly painfully aware of how ridiculous I sound. I feel like I did in high school, showing up to pick up my prom date: dressed strangely and like my tongue is too heavy for my mouth. I don’t hear her, and my helmet light is still on—I don’t like it; it feels like I’m exposing something sacred. I reach up and turn it off as I speak again. “Ennor? I’m sorry I left.”
Silence. I sigh, look down. Maybe her temper takes longer to settle than mine. Maybe I should even be afraid that I’ve disrespected her, and the mine could close in on me. I’m not, though. I don’t think Ennor would hurt me, any more than I would hurt her. I kneel to place the flowers on the ground, an offering that hopefully she’ll find later—
Her hand slides down my forearm. I slowly rise. She reaches for the bouquet in my hands; the cellophane wrapping crinkles in response.
“Flowers,” she says as if it’s a prayer. “Like you have above.”
“Yes.”
She takes the bouquet, and for a moment, only the quiet crackling of the cellophane tells me where she is.
“They’re exactly like my mother told me about. Before she died.”
“Your mother is gone?” I ask. I hear the delicate sound of her touching the rose petals one by one.
“I barely knew her. She wasn’t like the rest of my family. She was like you.”
“A miner?”
“A human.” Ennor’s voice drops to a whisper. “I think it’s her blood that makes me sometimes wonder about the above.” She says “above” like it’s another world, and I suppose it is, just as much as the mine is another world to me.
There is a long silence.
“I’m sorry your father was trapped,” Ennor says. “I’m sorry people died on both sides.” She sounds tiny, fragile.
I exhale; it feels like someone has lifted something heavy off my chest. “I’m sorry, too. He’s gone now. He died two years ago.”
“How?”
“Black lung.” The name of the sickness always sounded like a pirate ship to me when I was little—back when I imagined the miners as magicians. The magicians and pirates battled over the coal, and in my games, the magicians always won. In real life, the pirates are the coal dust, years of it, building up and taking over until you can’t breathe. An ally turned murderer that spent eleven long years killing my father. I slide down the cavern wall to sit.
The cellophane crinkles; she’s growing closer—yet I still jump a little when she slides down next to me. She sighs, places her hand—wet from the bouquet—in mine. I feel her shifting and suddenly she’s leaning against my shoulder. Her hair spills down; I can just barely feel it through my work clothes. I want to touch it, I want to touch her face and imagine what the curves of her cheeks look like. She’d do it to me—she’s never afraid to touch me.
I wonder if it’s because she can see here, where I’m blind.
For weeks, things are better. Things are wonderful, even. Ennor and I share secrets, but we also play games, we make up stories, we are ridiculous and happy and I miss her when I’m gone. I miss someone I’ve never even seen, and I don’t care that that’s strange. I finish work in record time; I get more done in a day than I used to get done in a week because I want to spend every extra moment with her.
And for the first time, I don’t hate being a miner. Maybe being a miner is a fair price to pay for being with her.
“You seem to be in better spirits lately,” Roth tells me one morning, slapping me on the back as I pull my work clothes out of my locker. Both of us are already covered in a fine layer of coal dust, even though we haven’t been inside yet. It was the same way with my dad—I used to think it hid in his skin, coaxed out only with time, showers, and occasionally Vaseline to get it out of the corners of his eyes.
“I guess,” I say, shrugging and trying not to smile—it’ll only lead to more questions.
“Keep it up, whoever she is,” Roth says, eyes sparkling like diamonds in the middle of his dusty face. “She’s good for you. And she makes you a better miner, like your mama did for your daddy.”
Ah, so that’s why he’s looking at me so closely—like he’s trying to see underneath my skin. Trying to see if somewhere deep under there is the miner and the man my father was. The gold deep at the core. I still don’t think it’s there—in fact, spending time with Ennor has made me more certain than ever that my core is different. I look away, unable to take his eyes on mine any longer.
Roth sighs, then buckles his helmet. “It was a good mine. Took nice care of us. I always get a bit teary, seeing them go,” he says.
“Go?” I ask, freezing with my helmet half latched.
“The retreaters are knocking out the last few pillars today. We start the new mine tomorrow. It’s been on the calendar since the first of the month,” Roth says, eyebrows raised. “Did you not see it?”
“I guess I wasn’t paying attention,” I say, trying to control the panic in my voice. I have to warn Ennor. She could die. I take a step away, and my foot feels heavy, weight suddenly compounds on my shoulders.