Among the Brave

  Trey didn’t think he had such a strong imagination.

  He could hear bits and pieces of the continuing search—someone shouting for a shovel, another man grunting as he carried a heavy trunk to a car. But no one else stepped up onto the porch. Nobody else came to look for Trey. And Trey was so paralyzed with fear that he couldn’t have disobeyed the boy’s order if he’d wanted to.

  Then, amazingly, he began to hear doors slamming, engines starting, cars driving away. They went slower now, their engines making the same letdown hum as fire trucks driving away after a fire. Trey tried to eavesdrop—he listened so hard that his ears roared. But he couldn’t tell whether the men had found whatever they were looking for or not. They were talking about women; they were talking about smoking the cigars they’d discovered in Mr. Talbot’s closet.

  “Illegal as all get-out,” one man said loudly.

  “Yeah, we’re just going to have to smoke them and destroy the evidence,” another shouted back. “I’ts the least we can do for an old friend.’

  This made the men laugh, like it was funny that any of them might be friends with Mr. Talbot. Or maybe it was that Mr. Talbot had thought they were friends, but they weren’t.

  Trey could never understand what people meant when their words and meanings didn’t match up.

  That’s called irony, he reminded himself. I don’t get irony. I admit it Okay, Dad? Are you happy now?

  He was so busy carrying on an imaginary conversation with his father that he missed the exact moment when the last car drove away. For hours, it seemed, there had been a general hubbub all across the Talbots’ property—raucous laughter, bossy shouts. But suddenly the entire area was plunged into an eerie silence. Trey strained his ears again, listening. He risked another peek over the top of the flowerpot. There were no more cars within sight or earshot. But he didn’t have to wonder if he’d hallucinated everything, because the uniformed men had left behind plenty of evidence of their visit: trampled flowers, skid marks on the driveway, holes scattered in a seemingly random pattern across the yard.

  Trey ducked out of sight again.

  Maybe the chauffeur will bring Nina and the others back now, he thought. Maybe the chauffeur knew somehow that the uniformed men were coming. And he’ll know that they’re gone now and it’s safe to come back and get me.

  Trey didn’t want to think about how the chauffeur might have known about the uniformed men. He didn’t want to think about what that probably meant about whose side the chauffeur was on. He just wanted to be rescued.

  Because if he wasn’t rescued, he didn’t have the slightest idea what he was supposed to do.

  CHAPTER THREE

  It got dark.

  Trey’s mind recoiled from calculating just how long that meant he’d been hiding behind the flowerpot. It had been early morning when he’d arrived at Mr. Talbot’s house. It was dusk now. He’d waited a very long time.

  Trey imagined what would happen if he never moved, if nobody ever came for him.

  I’d die of hunger or thirst, he thought. How long would it be before someone discovered my corpse? Maybe he’d be a skeleton by then. Nobody would know who I was.

  Trey was scaring himself. But he had to. He had to make it seem scarier to stay hidden than to venture out.

  You’re hungry now, aren’t you? he challenged himself. Aren’t you starving? You’ve got to get some food.

  But his stomach, which had become more than accustomed to hunger over the years, just said, Hey, don’t pin this on me. I can wait.

  Trey’s legs were stiff from huddling in one position for so long. He thought maybe he’d been asleep part of the time, but it was a strange sort of sleep, where any noise, any hint of movement—a bird fluttering in the sky, say—could snap him to full alertness. Still, he’d managed to dream. He’d had strange dreams where his father was alive again, and standing on the porch lecturing him. Only, in the dream, Trey’s ears didn’t seem to be working, and he couldn’t understand anything his father said. He could just tell that his father was very worried.

  “Symbolism,” Trey muttered to himself “Dreams are often metaphorical representations of the dreamer’s fears.”

  Or wishes.

  Trey gave a little half-snort of disgust at himself, that he could think about symbolism and metaphors at a time like this. He needed to think about action. He needed a plan. He shook his head as if that would clear his mind of fancy, useless words and lingering dreams and cobwebs.

  If the chauffeur and Nina and the others comes back …

  They hadn’t so far. Odds were, they weren’t going to. Ever.

  If Mr. Talbot comes back …

  After being whisked off in handcuffs? Trey couldn’t quite get his mind around what might have happened to Mr. Talbot—had those men in uniform been arresting him or kidnapping him? But Trey knew he couldn’t hold out hope anymore that Mr. Talbot would be his salvation.

  If Lee shows up …

  Ah. There was a hope worth dwelling on. Lee had said he’d meet his friends at Mr. Talbot’s house. He hadn’t said when, but he would come, and when he did, Trey didn’t want to have to admit that he’d spent the whole time cowering on the porch.

  So it was shame, finally, that made Trey stand up and shake out his stiff legs. He stepped off the side of the porch, so he could crouch behind a line of bushes next to the house. Between the darkness and the bushes, Trey could convince himself he was still hiding. That gave him the courage to keep walking, following the slope of the yard downhill. The bushes sheltered him so well that he kept going, even around a dark corner.

  Then he saw a huge garage, gaping open. A dim light illuminated two gigantic luxury cars and a vacant space where a third belonged. Where a third had evidently been, until it had whisked Mr. Talbot away that morning.

  Trey stared. He felt a silly little burst of pride, that he knew enough to label this space a garage. He’d never seen one before, except in pictures. And pictures, Trey had learned in his short time outside of hiding, never did anything justice. Everything was bigger in real life. Scarier.

  Irreparably damaged. The words forced their way to Trey’s attention as though they’d been waiting for him in the garage. They were from an argument his parents had had shortly before his father died.

  “The boy’s irreparably damaged now,” his mother had screamed at his father. “Handicapped for life. He’s got no chance of ever living a normal life. Of ever thinking a normal thought. Are you happy now? Is this what you wanted?”

  Trey shut down his memory right then, wishing he’d never heard that fight, wishing his mind hadn’t recorded it so well His feet moved automatically across the garage floor, toward the door that hung open, leading to the house. His mind seemed incapable of thinking anything now beyond, Hide inside. Better hiding always inside.

  The space he entered was dark, and that was just fine with Trey. With the door from the garage still open, he had just enough light to make out a long hallway, lined with doors. The doors were all shut, or else Trey wouldn’t have had the courage to walk past them. As it was, he tip-toed.

  Either Mr. Talbot and his family were all awful slobs or else the uniformed men had totally trashed the place. The hallway was littered with clothing and pillows and other items Trey couldn’t identify without more light. He tried to step over them, but it was hard to find bare carpet to walk on. The items that were hardest to dodge were round and black and metal. They had holes in the middle—were they wheels of some sort? Why had the Talbots needed so many of them? Trey stubbed his toe on one, and it was all he could do not to cry out in pain. But he managed without a whimper.

  Hey, silent pain is my specialty, he thought darkly, almost amusing himself.

  And then he accidentally stepped squarely on one of the disks, and it rocked against another one, making a dull thud. Trey froze, waiting. Surely the sound had been too soft to attract anyone’s attention. Surely there was no one around to hear. Surely—

  A line of li
ght appeared near the ceiling, like a door opening. How could there be a door so high up? And then a figure appeared in the doorway, and a beam of light began sweeping down, down, down …

  Right toward Trey.

  Trey hit the floor, thinking he needed to dive under some of the clothing and pillows. But he only succeeded in hitting more of the metal wheels, hurting himself and making even more noise.

  The light found him.

  And up at the top of the room, behind the light, a woman began screaming.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The screaming stopped as abruptly as it had begun.

  “That’s it. I’m done with my hysterical-woman act,” a woman’s voice said. “I’m calm and cool and collected now, and ’m holding all the advantages. I’ll have you know this flashlight doubles as a gun, and I’m a good aim. So think very carefully before you try anything. Are you one of them?”

  “One of who?” Trey asked. “I mean, one of whom?”

  “If you have to ask, you probably aren’t,” the woman mused. “Good grief. The looters are arriving already.”

  The flashlight’s beam was blinding him. Trey thought of a bullet following the same path.

  “I’m not a looter!” he said urgently. “I’m—I’m—I’m a friend of Mr. Talbot’s!”

  The woman actually laughed.

  “Right. You expect me to believe George has friends his wife has never met?”

  Wife. So this was Mrs. Talbot?

  Trey dared to relax a little. If this woman was married to Mr. Talbot, she wouldn’t turn him in to the Population Police. But how could he convince her to trust him?

  She shone the light away from his face momentarily—checking, Trey realized, to make sure that he wasn’t holding a weapon. He held up his hands slowly, in what he hoped would look like the international sign of surrender and goodwill.

  “So, friend, what are you doing here?” Mrs. Talbot asked, returning the flashlight beam to his face. “Why did you show up today, of all days? And why didn’t you just ring the doorbell, instead of sneaking in through our basement?”

  “Oh, I did!” Trey said frantically. “But then I saw Mr. Talbot being taken away, and I was scared, and I didn’t think anyone was here, and, see I was coming from the Grants’ house—” Trey was just babbling now. All his skill with words seemed to have abandoned him.

  “The Grants?” Mrs. Talbot interrupted. Something in her voice caught a little. “Oh, thank goodness! Why didn’t you tell me right away? I was so scared…. I should have known the Grants would find out what happened and send someone to help me. What a relief!”

  “Uh, ma’am?” Trey said. “The Grants are—” He stopped. Even he could tell that this probably wasn’t a good time to inform her that Mr. and Mrs. Grant were dead, that it was their murders he had witnessed the night before, their deaths that had sent him running to Mr. Talbot for help. She seemed to think he was going to help her.

  What if everyone is just looking for someone else to save them? he wondered. It was a strange thought, and didn’t seem to fit in his mind. It didn’t match up with anything else he knew.

  But Trey didn’t have time to analyze it, because suddenly Mrs. Talbot switched off the flashlight and switched on a giant overhead light.

  “All this darkness is giving me the creeps,” Mrs. Talbot said. “And who needs it, if you’re from the Grants?”

  In the light, Trey could see everything. The disks that he’d knocked together were weights, meant to be attached to barbells. Rows of weight-lifting apparatus lined the far wall, but they’d all been torn apart. Pulleys hung oddly, benches were ripped from the frames—the room looked like a cyclone had hit it. Trey looked away, up a long staircase. Mrs. Talbot was standing at the top.

  And Mrs. Talbot was … beautiful.

  Trey had seen very few women in his life. If he didn’t count girls, he’d actually known only one: his mother, who’d had frown lines etched around her mouth, worry lines carved into her brow, disappointment mirrored in her eyes. Trey’s mother had worn shapeless dresses and mismatched, holey sweaters, one on top of the other, in a constant battle to stay warm. It seemed like she’d always had gray, lifeless hair; Trey had even wondered if she’d once been a gray-haired little girl.

  Mrs. Talbot’s hair was red—so bright and vibrant Trey was almost surprised he hadn’t been able to see it in the dark. Her face was smooth and unlined. Even the fright of finding an intruder in her basement had apparently only given her skin a healthy-looking glow. And her body had curves…. Wasn’t she somebody’s mother? Mothers weren’t supposed to look like that, were they?

  Trey blushed, but couldn’t stop staring.

  “So what do the Grants want me to do?” Mrs. Talbot was saying. “I can be ready to leave in five minutes. I already have the car packed. How soon do they think they can get George out?”

  “Ma’am?” Trey said, then blushed all the harder because “ma’am” seemed much too matronly a term for this woman. “They didn’t—I mean—I can’t—”

  Mrs. Talbot’s hand seemed to tighten on the flashlight.

  “Did the Grants send you to help me or not?” she said sharply.

  “I want to help you,” Trey said. “Honest I’ll do my best. But—I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

  Trey felt the weight of his words settling on his shoulders. It was like he’d lifted one of the barbells lying by his feet. He’d just promised to help Mrs. Talbot—what would that mean? And if he was going to take responsibility for her, where was it supposed to end? Was he also responsible for helping Mr. Talbot? For Nina and Joel and John? For Lee and Smits?

  It was so much easier to think only of his own needs, his own life. But how could he not help?

  “Oh,” Mrs. Talbot said, and seemed to sag against the doorframe. For the first time, Trey realized that she was terrified, that she’d probably been even more panicked by the uniformed men than Trey was. This was her home, after all. It was her husband who’d been taken away in handcuffs. “Didn’t the Grants give you any instructions at all?” she asked forlornly.

  “The Grants are dead,” Trey said brusquely. It seemed like he’d be lying if he didn’t tell her now. “They were killed last night, at a party, by a man named Oscar. I was there. I saw it all.”

  Trey’s memory flashed the whole strange scene at him once again: women in glittering ball gowns, men in tuxedos hiding guns, champagne in fluted glasses, and a huge chandelier cut loose and plunging down….

  “Dead?” Mrs. Talbot repeated. “Dead?” Her eyes flooded with tears, and she sank down to the top step of the stairs. “Oh, my friends,” she murmured.

  “They owed you money,” Trey said. Amazingly, he was still holding the stack of papers he’d taken from Mr. Grant’s desk. He waved the whole sheaf of papers at Mrs. Talbot now, as though that would remind her that the Grants had not been just friends. “They owed you and Mr. Talbot two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”

  Mrs. Talbot shrugged, like money didn’t matter.

  “So many deaths,” she muttered, and Trey remembered that the Talbots’ daughter Jen—another illegal child—had died too. What if Mrs. Talbot started sobbing now, or wailing, or going into total hysterics? Trey really wouldn’t know what to do then. But Mrs. Talbot only sniffed once, in a dignified way. Then she began speaking quietly, looking not at Trey, but at the blank wall opposite her.

  “George said there was danger,” she said. “We sent the boys away to boarding school in September. Just in case.”

  Boys? Then Trey realized that for Jen to be an illegal third child, she’d had to have had siblings. They must have been brothers.

  “And George and I, we had drills. What if they come for him in the middle of the night? What if they come for him during breakfast? What if, what if, what if? I did everything right. Just like I was supposed to. I hid in our secret room. For hours. You know what I did in there? I was painting my toenails.” Mrs. Talbot looked down at Trey and grinned, ever so sl
ightly. “My little way of saying, hey, you can’t scare me. But after—after I came out, the plan was always for me to go to the Grants’ house for help. If I hadn’t checked the TV, I’d be at the Grants’ by now. And what would I have found there?”

  Trey tried not to think about the scene of destruction he’d left.

  “What did you see on TV?” he asked. “That stopped you from leaving?”

  “Huh?” Mrs. Talbot said. “Oh. Riots. They said there was rioting in the streets, so I thought, might as well wait until morning to leave.”

  Riots? Trey and his friends had seen nothing like that on their trip from the Grants’ house to the Talbots’, but it had been the middle of the night. The riots must have started during the day, after Mr. Talbot was arrested, while Mrs. Talbot and Trey were hiding. Riots, Trey thought. A strange emotion began growing inside him. Hope.

  Maybe this is it. It’s beginning. Maybe riots were what the resistance leaders had planned, to get the Government to change the Population Law. Maybe third children aren’t even illegal anymore. Maybe the riots have already worked.

  Trey’s friend Lee had been determined, for as long as Trey had known him, to change the Government, so third children could be free from hiding, free from using fake identities if they ever wanted to go out. Before Lee, Trey had had another friend, Jason, who had said he’d wanted the same thing. But Jason had been lying, and that had been enough to make Trey wonder if he could ever trust anyone.

  But maybe now, maybe with the riots … Trey remembered another fact that gave him even more hope: Mr. Talbot was a double agent Publicly, he said he opposed third children. He worked for the Population Police, a group that had been created solely to catch third children and the people who hid them. But secretly, under cover, Mr. Talbot sabotaged his employer, rescuing illegal children and giving them fake I.D.’s. Maybe if the Population Law had been eliminated, the Government had decided to arrest everyone who worked for the Population Police. So of course Mr. Talbot would have been arrested too. Maybe Trey and Lee and their other friends would just have to testify about Mr. Talbot’s true beliefs, and they’d be able to rescue him. Maybe Trey could help Mrs. Talbot after all.