During halftime the Sexton team went back to their bus, drank juice, and sucked oxygen while listening to Coach yell at them. Everything was fine. Everything was exactly as it should be, exactly as it always was.
But this time instead of winning 10–1, they won 8–2. And that was enough to put Coach in a rage.
He started the bus ride by screaming at Mike Daley, the college student who was the team’s top goalie. He should never have allowed that second goal.
It didn’t matter to Coach that the score was 7–1, with only ten minutes to play. Coach would have liked shutouts every game, except he’d been instructed to let the other team score at least once. Let them have their moment.
So Coach let the other team score, but one point was enough. Two was a show of weakness, and Daley had no business letting it happen.
Then it was Jon’s turn.
“You could have scored two more points!” Coach shouted. “Don’t give away chances like that, Evans!”
Actually, Jon had had three chances but had chosen to pass rather than go for the score. He’d never done that before. He was the team’s striker, and it had always seemed right to him that Sexton beat their opponents by as big a margin as possible.
But not today. Today it seemed like rubbing their noses in it, and he couldn’t see the point.
“You’re a friggin’ slip!” Coach screamed. “A pansy-ass grub lover. Were they your brothers, Evans? Or were they your boyfriends?”
A few of Jon’s teammates snickered. Jon would have snickered too if he weren’t the one being reamed.
“Sorry, Coach,” he muttered.
“Sorry isn’t good enough,” Coach said. “You’re off the team, Evans, if you keep playing like this. Out of Sexton, if I have my way.”
“I’m sorry, Coach,” he said again, this time in a stronger voice. “It won’t happen again. I’ll show those grubs who’s boss.”
Coach grinned. “That’s the spirit, Evans,” he said. “Sure, you’re a slip, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t a claver. And a damn good one at that.”
But sitting in the living room hours later, Jon still had a bad taste in his mouth. And it wasn’t from the bottle of potka they’d shared on the bus ride home.
Jon looked up as Lisa walked into the room. “Are you hungry?” she asked. “There’s some leftover chicken in the fridge.”
“Maybe later,” Jon said. “We ate on the bus.”
“All right,” Lisa said. “If you don’t want it, Val and Carrie can have it for lunch tomorrow. How many goals did you score?”
“Four,” Jon replied. “We won eight to two.”
“That close?” Lisa said. “I bet Coach was angry.”
Jon laughed.
“Laura called,” Lisa said.
“Didn’t she know I was out?” Jon asked. It was hard for Mom to make a phone call. None of the apartments had phone service, and no one was allowed to use the phones where they worked. There were a handful of pay phones in White Birch, and it took hours on Sunday to get to the front of the line.
“She tried last night,” Laura said, “but there were five people ahead of her when the curfew siren went off. She said Matt’s going to be there next Sunday.”
Matt lived in Coolidge, a couple of hundred miles away, working as a bike courier. He traveled all around the area, transporting letters and small packages for clavers. Sexton wasn’t on his route, but when he could, he swapped with another courier. Jon had seen him last in November, but he knew Matt had spent a weeknight with Mom, Miranda, and Alex in February.
There had been a time when Jon felt closer to Matt than to anyone else in the world. When the bad times had come, he and Matt had spent endless hours chopping down trees so there’d be firewood. The work they’d done had kept the family alive, and it had provided Jon with the opportunity to get to know his big brother. They worked and they talked, and Jon had felt grownup and respected.
But then Matt married Syl, and everything changed. And now Matt lived hundreds of miles away, and Jon was lucky to see him twice a year.
“You must be due a Sunday off,” Lisa said. “I can’t remember the last time you had one.”
Jon counted back. Ten Sundays, he thought. There were twelve men on the squad, and only eight went to each game, so no one was supposed to travel to more than eight games in a row. But Jon was the team’s best scorer, and Coach tended to forget the eight-game rule. Besides, slips were supposed to do a little more than anyone else.
“I really want to see Matt,” Jon said.
“Of course,” Lisa said. “And it’s wonderful for Laura to have all her children with her. I’m sure you can get next Sunday off.”
Jon wasn’t nearly as sure, not the way Coach had been screaming at him. But he’d have to try. It could be another six months before Matt was in White Birch on a Sunday, and it was never safe to predict six months ahead.
Most of the grubs who commuted to work in Sexton were taken by bus to the factories or the greenhouses and then picked up at the end of the workday for the ride back to White Birch. The only grubs permitted to walk in Sexton were the domestics, who did the shopping while the clavers were at work.
Clavers never walked. Even though most of the volcanic activity, caused by the change in the moon’s gravitational pull, had stopped nearly two years ago, the air quality was still bad, and it wasn’t a good idea to spend too much time outdoors. Buses ran regularly for clavers, with stops every few blocks.
Jon would have preferred to bike to school. It would take less time, and he’d enjoy the exercise and the privacy. But even though it wasn’t forbidden to bike, it wasn’t encouraged either. All the buildings in Sexton—the homes, the schools, the offices—had air purification systems, but there was no way to purify the outdoor air. So, like everyone else, Jon rode the bus.
Sarah got on the bus right as he did. Ryan and Luke were already on, but he sat next to her instead.
“How was the soccer match?” she asked him. “Did you save civilization?”
“I did my part,” Jon said. “You can sleep safely tonight.”
Sarah tilted her head toward the window. “With all the guards here, I don’t have to worry. Unless they get ideas of their own.”
“You must have had guards in your other enclave,” Jon said.
“Yes,” Sarah said. “But not as many. At least not as many on the streets. I don’t know. Everything seems darker here.”
“Everything is darker here,” Jon said. “The farther west you go, the darker the sky.”
“That’s not what I mean and you know it,” she said.
Jon glanced back at Ryan and Luke. He caught Luke’s eye. Luke pointed to the empty seat by his side. Jon shook his head.
“Is it really that different?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” Sarah said. “I didn’t want to leave. I guess I’m just homesick.”
By the time his family had left Pennsylvania, all Jon had wanted was to get away. But he supposed if you had food and water and electricity, you’d want to stay put.
He looked up and saw Ryan standing by him. “Come on, Evans,” he said. “We miss you.”
“It’s okay,” Sarah said. “Go. I’ll see you at lunch?”
Jon nodded and followed Ryan back to the empty seat. “What’s this about?” he asked.
“Tyler will tell you,” Ryan said.
Jon looked at Luke, but he didn’t say anything. They sat in silence until the bus stopped at school. Tyler and Zachary were already there.
“He was sitting with her on the bus,” Ryan said to them. “They were going to have lunch again.”