19
ARIEL
The van shuddered like it had changed its mind. Brakes squealed, a long, reluctant scrape that set my teeth on edge, and then we lurched to a stop. The engine coughed once, sulked, and went quiet. In the sudden stillness, rain on the roof sounded like coins dropping one by one into a jar.
The bag over my head had grown damp and close with my breath. Every inhale pulled canvas to my lips; every exhale pushed it back with the sour warmth of spit and fear. My wrists throbbed where the zip tie cut into skin, in front, thank God, plastic teeth counting out my pulse like a metronome set just a hair too fast.
A latch snapped. Cold air knifed in through the rear doors. Gray light pushed through fabric and made the darkness thin; the smell of wet gravel and diesel slid into the van and took a seat at the edge of my panic.
“Let’s move her,” a voice said. Nothing showy. Tired and professional and impatient with the idea of friction.
Boots climbed the rear bumper. A knee thudded into the floor near my hip. Hands found my upper arms, gloved, rough, absolutely sure of their right to touch. They hauled me towardthe open doors with the thoughtless care of men moving a heavy box.
The old instinct flickered in me, the one that wants to take the shape of whatever they need so they don’t decide the shape for me. Be small, be quiet, buy time. It’s a muscle I know too well. It tried to flex.
I didn’t let it.
The man on my left leaned in to guide my head out so I wouldn’t crack it on the latch. His thumb pressed the seam of the bag where my jaw sat beneath; his gloved fingers slid toward the tail of the zip tie, checking the bite to make sure I belonged to them. His skin smelled like old cigarettes and coffee that had given up on being hot.
He didn’t expect teeth.
I opened my mouth and bit down hard where glove becomes hand, where the web of his thumb is soft even on men like him. Canvas dulled the impact, but not the surprise. He swore and yanked back, the bag twisting with his fist.
“You little bitch,” he spat, voice real ugly now, his face close enough I could feel the heat coming off him through the wet fabric. He wanted eyes to hate properly. He grabbed the edge of the bag and tore it up and off like someone ripping a bandage to give pain a better look.
The world punched into me, flat gray sky, rain-struck gravel lot, the dark mouth of the trees beyond. The van’s interior swam into focus: ribbed black mat torn along one seam, a ring bolt at ankle height on the left wall, a grease spider on the floor where boots had polished the rubber. Three men inside with me, one doubled over clutching the hand I’d bitten, ridiculous with indignation; two at the doors, stances mirroring each other like a drill they’d run on an empty lot a hundred times. Another silhouette paced up by the passenger door, watchful, bored.
I didn’t think about any of it. Thinking takes edges off action. I brought my heel up like I was breaking a board and slammed it between the legs of the man I’d bitten.
It landed clean. He made that awful sound men make when they discover biology remembers things they’d prefer it didn’t. His knees forgot their job. His gloved hand, a second ago reaching for my face, curled into his belly and pulled his whole weight after it. The van’s floor shivered with the impact.
“Grab her!” one of the door men barked.
I didn’t wait for their choreography to recover. Tied hands in front, I shoved off the ribbed mat, ducked under a grabbing arm, and threw myself at the rectangle of light like it was a promise.
Wet gravel slapped my soles. My shoulder clipped the latch; stars burst behind my eyes. Momentum did the math I couldn’t. I staggered, caught myself, and ran.
“They said alive!” someone shouted behind me. A hand snatched the dangling strap of my jacket; fabric burned across my shoulder blades and then slipped free with an ugly rip. I juked; the hand caught air. A second set of boots skidded on the bumper and banged the door; someone cursed because the door tried to come back and made his shin a lesson.
A shot cracked. Too high, too wide. The noise punched the rain and made my legs move faster than lungs liked.
“Don’t shoot! Don’t,” The order cut off in a swallow of static on somebody’s radio. The quiet afterward rang louder than the shot.
The tree line grew out of gray like something the world had remembered just now. I ran for it because open ground is for men with friends. Branches beckoned and then slapped me when I got close enough. Leaves went to work on my cheeks. Wet twigs snagged hair. I threw my tied hands up to part the green before it could take an eye.
Boots thudded behind. Two sets close, a third farther out cutting a different angle. The younger one, quicker steps, a little hop in the cadence that said pride, gained on me, his breath wild and excited like a dog that hasn’t been trained. The other stayed steadier, eating distance like a man who knows how to win over time.
I pushed through laurel and into leaf-mush that tried to argue with my traction. Every step chose between sliding and sticking; I chose forward. My chest burned. Counting steadied me: two-three-four in, hold, two-three-four out. Keep the math. The math keeps you.
“Left!” the steady man shouted. “She went,”
“No, right,” The younger one corrected himself with a curse as a branch whipped his face. Beautiful. Confusion is worth ten yards you don’t have to run.
A shallow ditch yawned ahead like a mouth. It had been water yesterday; today it was a slick seam of rich mud. I didn’t try to leap it; I planted and skidded down, let momentum throw me across, scrambled up the far side on knees and elbows, came up with bark in my teeth and dirt under my nails. Hands tied meant no elegant push; I crabbed. I probably looked like a feral thing. Good. That’s harder to grab.
Behind me, a boot hit the far lip too high and took a ride face-first down the mud. The sound started like triumph and ended like humiliation. The steady man slowed long enough to yank his buddy upright, which cost him his own breath. That bought me another set of heartbeats, and heartbeats were currency.
I cut left because the instinct to obey a shouted direction is bred into people; if he said left, he wanted me to go right. Let him be wrong both ways. I ducked into a stand of young firs so tight they combed me; needles lit my forearms like fire ants. The plastic around my wrists sawed skin when I twisted. I used the pain to keep my head present.
