In a Handful of Dust

Lucy was about to say that was fine, but the words were stuck.

Vera watched her closely. “That’s not what you’re meant for. Life’s got more in store for you than dying to prove a point. This conversation is one I’ve been meaning to have with you, but I never thought it’d take the deaths of so many for me to talk to you about life.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean maybe this is your chance to break free, to get out and see the world beyond this little place. I know there’s good out there; I’ve seen it. It’s not all hardship and strangers the way Lynn thinks. There’s more to life than a water source, and I’ve prayed you’d get to see that before you settled here.”

“A water source is pretty damn important,” Lucy said.

“It is,” Vera conceded, “but it’s not the only thing there is. Take this chance for what it is, Lucy. Get out of here. Don’t live Lynn’s way, or Stebbs’ way, or even my way. Live, and go find something new.”

Underneath the weight of fear in her stomach, Lucy felt a quiver of excitement, something that had long lain dormant. It reminded her of days in Entargo, her tiny fingers pulling back the curtains even as Neva protested, so that she could see the streets below, teeming with people she had yet to meet and the endless possibilities of what could happen that day.

“So you promise me you’ll keep your distance from Carter when you’re talking, and you keep that promise,” Vera said, bringing Lucy back into the present.

“I promise,” Lucy said, her voice stronger than she felt.

Vera disappeared into the trees and Lucy stood alone in the dark, her shoulders trembling. A stick snapped and she jerked at the sound, her pulse racing.

“Lucy?” Carter’s voice sounded thin and unsure. “You there?”

“Carter?” she called out, and heard the rustle of dead leaves underfoot as he came near. “Over here.”

He emerged out of the dark, so changed from the boy she knew that she had to resist the urge to run to him. His eyes were sunken and red-rimmed, his shoulders slumped, and his hands shook as he leaned against a tree for support.

“Your grandma said I can’t come closer than this maple,” he said.

“I’ve got a line in the dirt over here telling me what to do,” she answered, and he smiled a little.

“That’s just like you, to have a line.”

She laughed. “We really did it this time, didn’t we?”

“And here I always thought Devon was teasing when he said I’d be the end of him.”

Her face fell. “It’s not your fault, Carter. You didn’t know.”

Carter slid to the ground by the maple, his feet dangling over the bank. “What’s Lynn always say? It is what it is?”

“It is what it is,” Lucy agreed. “And it sucks.”

“That’s two different ways of saying the same thing,” Carter said, and a silence fell between the two of them while they both waited for the other to say the inevitable.

Lucy cleared her throat. “Lynn told me about your mom, that she… she…”

“Sold out on me?” Carter tossed a stick into the stream, and they heard the splash without seeing it. “Big surprise there.”

“I’m sorry about it.”

Carter shrugged. “Vera said you and Lynn are leaving.”

“Yeah, she thinks…” She paused, measuring her words. “Did she tell you it might be me?”

“She said so, but I don’t believe it.”

“Why not?”

Carter looked at her across the space dividing them, his gaze so intense she felt her pulse jump. “I can feel it in me, Lucy,” he said, his voice barely audible over the swaying tree branches. “Sick or not, I feel it. And I feel the weight of all those dead little kids on me.”

Lucy thought of Lynn, who had held her and sworn she had nothing to feel guilty about, her own conviction burning bright enough for the two of them. Carter had no one, and she was forbidden from comforting him. The silence between them had grown thick, and she didn’t know how to break it.

“So what are you going to do?” Carter asked. “Where are you going? South?”

Lucy shook her head. “Lynn said the only thing we’d get away from in the south is the winters, and we’d be giving up more than that by leaving the pond. I guess a long time ago my uncle Eli told her California is still, you know… normal.”

“Normal, huh?” Carter smiled and threw another stick into the creek. “What’s that mean?”

“Eli told her because they’d built a bunch of desalinization plants to make ocean water drinkable, so they weren’t hurt bad by the Shortage.”

“A drinkable ocean? That’s a lot of water.”

“And no winters, from what Stebbs and Grandma say.”

“Sounds like heaven.”

“It could be,” Lucy said. “But getting there’ll be hell. There’s a lot between me and it.”

“And I’ve never known you to back down,” Carter said. “The only thing bigger than the world is fear, Lucy. Don’t let it get the best of you.”

“What about you? What are you going to do?”

Carter stood up and stretched, his long arm muscles gleaming in the white moonlight. “Oh, I figured I’d find some old ugly hermit somewhere, spit in his mouth, and see if he gets sick.”

“That’s a great plan, buddy,” Lucy said.