Mending the fence is my first priority.
While I’m still on alert, something tells me this will be a routine, unchallenging sort of patrol. The air doesn’t taste like an ambush, so I head for a large hole, one that’s directly behind the showcase home. At one time, this particular house hosted tours, and couples and families streamed in and out. It’s the nicest house in the entire development, staged with furniture and high-end interior design. And yet? Something about it feels malevolent—again, hope tinged with despair.
Perhaps that’s because around back, near a basement egress window, there’s a fissure. Or normally, there’s one. Today, I can’t even detect a seam or my handiwork in repairing it. Typical.
At the fence, I attach my umbrella to the quick-release strap and sling that over my shoulder, cross-body. Then I pull a set of pliers and some wire from my backpack and set to work.
Agent Darnelle touches the fence. His fingertips light upon the silver links and send a tremor through the metal.
“Do the repairs help?”
“They don’t hurt.”
My mother always said if the fence goes, we all go. That’s not something you confess to the man who holds your job in his hands. Neither is this: Every April, my mother mixed up a concoction on the kitchen stove, one of herbs and oils and one specific—and most crucial—ingredient.
Her blood.
She then would paint random spots on the fence with the mixture. This April, I did the same, except with my blood instead of hers. At the rate I’ve been repairing holes, I doubt it did any good.
We make our way through the development. I need to repair that gap by the cemetery, but I really don’t want to. The tear in the chain link is large and angry, almost like it’s taunting me, the hole nothing but a row of jagged, silver teeth. Worse, Agent Darnelle’s skepticism shadows me like a third presence. He’s not impressed.
I stop our trek and glance around, letting my gaze soften, letting the barricades I’ve built in my mind ease.
Nothing.
Agent Darnelle pulls out his phone. He taps away, a schoolmaster frown gathering on his brow. “I was led to believe that this area contains the main fissures in King’s End.”
“It does.”
“Are you certain?”
It takes all my willpower not to roll my eyes and spit out a sarcastic reply of: Well, I live here, don’t I? Wouldn’t I know? Then again, the Screamers aren’t simply silent today; they’re absent altogether. I wouldn’t believe me.
“I see that there hasn’t been an official site survey since 1991. Perhaps things have changed since then. You should put in a request for a survey team, assuming…” He trails off as if something has caught his attention, but his unspoken words make my heart pound with trepidation.
Yes, assuming I pass my examination. Assuming I’ll be the permanent post agent here. Assuming I even want someone—or rather, someone else—from the Enclave poking around in King’s End. Which, by the way, I don’t.
“Agent Little, I think I’ve seen enough here for today. It’s time we headed back, run you through some paces. I scouted out the green where I found you yesterday?—”
“I need to finish here first.”
Again with the skeptical eyebrow. “I really think you’re?—”
I know what he’s going to say; the air is filled with his displeasure. “I’m not avoiding my examination.”
“Aren’t you?” He casts a look around, holds out a hand like he’s searching for raindrops.
That last hole remains, the one I must repair, even at the risk of failing my examination.
“Please?” I point toward the far end of the development. “Let me fix that?”
Maybe it’s my voice. Maybe it’s because it’s suddenly devoid of its sarcasm. Or maybe it’s the hole in the fence. Because it looks like a gaping maw with jagged teeth. Agent Darnelle stares at it and, after a moment, nods.
I take the path behind the last row of houses, not caring if he follows. These particular buildings really do resemble skeletons. On windy days, the frames creak and moan, the sound pitiful, as if they mourn for the families that will never live in them. Today, in the still air and bright sun, they strike me as even sadder. Agent Darnelle cranes his neck, surveys the space, and then halts as if he feels it, too.
“It’s so empty,” he says.
“Yes. I know.”
