Gregory was my chance at a better life, and I lost it. So unless a miracle falls from the sky, I’ll be doing drudge work for Lorraine the rest of my life.
I don’t actually care for market days. There are too many people all jostling around and talking too loudly. I prefer to keep my head down and slip through the streets unnoticed, but it’s impossible with all this chaos. People keep bumping into me. Getting in my way. Blocking the walkways with long conversations that really should be done somewhere else.
Impatient and exhausted, I finally reach Lorraine’s stall. All my life, she’s had the same position, selling pretty trinkets from the old world to villagers and visitors. I remember running over as a child to peer at the pretties she showcased each week.
That was back when I lived with two parents and a sister.
But eight years ago, my mother walked out after endless arguments with my father about his dangerous political leanings. She moved to a village about an hour away and found a government official to marry and start a new family with. That first year, she came to see us twice, but after that she never did. All she wanted was a safe, comfortable life, and now she has it.
She promised that she loved us, but she lied.
Less than a year later my dad, a kind, brilliant man but completely incapable of living without a woman, married Lorraine. She moved into my dad’s room, and Aria moved into the room I shared with Annabelle.
It wasn’t great, but it was tolerable until my dad died too.
No one knows exactly what happened to him, but he was an intellectual, a thinker, a dreamer. He’d been writing pamphlets criticizing certain policies of the president.
They were supposed to be anonymous, but maybe they weren’t. One afternoon, he fell down dead in the street.
Annabelle was angry at his death and even angrier at the way Lorraine started treating us afterward. My sister has always had a fire inside her that I’ve never been able to summon. Mostly I was sad and scared and anxious to smooth over the conflict.
I wanted everyone to be happy again—at least as happy as is possible in a world without our parents. But Annabelle never was. Every night, she’d whisper to me about plans she’d made for us to get away—maybe even all the way out of the Central Cities. A dreamworld where a person might not be killed for speaking the truth.
I’ve never believed such a place exists.
This life is reality. It’s not good, but there’s nowhere better. All we can do is work hard and get through with as little damage as possible.
Lorraine isn’t at her stall when I come into sight of it.Aria is, wearing another new day dress custom-made by the village seamstress. She’s a year older than me. Taller, slimmer, and a lot more striking with smooth dark hair and elegant features.
She’s not married yet either, but it’s not because no one has asked. She and Lorraine turned down man after man until they decided on Mason. He was a laborer in the Capitol for years until his parents died in an accident last year. Then he returned to the village to take over their small farm just outside the walls.
The man has never visited our house. He’s never paid any particular attention to Aria—or anyone else as far as I can tell. He’s quiet as he sells milk, butter, and cheese at the market every week. He keeps to himself. But one day about six months ago, Lorraine announced at dinner that Aria was going to marry him, and they spent the rest of the evening giggling about it.
Not my business.
If getting married means Aria leaves the house, then all the better as far as I’m concerned. Maybe I’ll actually get my room back.
And if Mason wants to couple up with a woman like Aria, then he deserves the future that comes.
He’s a decent-looking man with thick, wavy brown hair, strong features, and a big body, but he’s nothing special in appearance. He owns the farm though. A freestanding cottage and a piece of property. He sells a product that’s always in demand. Like everyone else in the cities andvillages of the Central Cities—in the middle of what used to be North America—Mason’s earnings go directly to the government, and only a portion is credited back for his use. But his portion is a lot more than most. He has a comfortable life by village standards, and it’s not surprising that every available young woman in the area has been out to get him ever since he moved back.
He could have done a lot better than Aria.
As I approach, I notice that Lorraine is hovering near his stall. She’s tittering about something—honestly, it looks like she’s flirting with him, but that’s her manner with most men she encounters—and Mason is barely making eye contact with her.
In fact, it appears he’s avoiding it on purpose.
For some reason, it strikes me as funny. I keep looking, hiding a smile as he pretends to stay busy rearranging blocks of cheese on his table.
Without warning, he glances up, his eyes landing on me. His expression changes, and I realize he must see that I’m secretly laughing at his avoidance of his future mother-in-law.
His mouth twitches just slightly, although the rest of his stern expression doesn’t change.
I snicker and drop my eyes just as Lorraine turns to see what has distracted the target of her attention.
Aria is glaring at me as I approach. “It’s about time, Teresa. We’ve been waiting all day. You better have found something decent despite all your lazing about.”
If I had even a modicum of Annabelle’s spirit, I would have snapped back about how I’ve been scouring ruins all morning while Aria spends her life sitting on her ass. But I have no spirit.
