Free Article 5 by Kristen Simmons Page B

civilian with a car who didn’t care about gas money.
    “You’d better book it,” Sean advised. “Once they figure out you’re gone, they’ll come looking. I won’t be able to do anything then.”
    I nodded, and though the swelling in my throat had gone down, I felt a new lump emerge. It was a terrible plan, but it was all I had. He looked at me for a long while, as though surprised that I was really considering this. I couldn’t tell whether he thought I was brave or stupid. Probably the latter.
    “It’ll be better for everyone if you just wait until you age out, Miller.”
    “I can’t wait,” I told him firmly. “Not knowing she could be in a place like this.”
    His expression was bleak. I asked if he knew anything more about my mother, and he denied it. I wondered if there was more to this than he was letting on, but as we were already on a fine line, I let it go. I didn’t have enough dirt on him to risk what he’d already offered. And ultimately, the guy with the gun calls the shots.
    So I waited.
    *   *   *
     
    ROSA returned the following afternoon. She sat beside me in silence during Brock’s session on social etiquette. There were no snide jokes, no cocky, gap-between-her-two-front-teeth grins. Her eyes, resting atop half-moon bruises from Randolph’s fist, were no longer rebellious, but bland. Vacant. She was as empty as the girl we’d seen after we’d first arrived.
    There was no question in my mind now that the scream I’d heard when I’d been in the clinic had been Rosa in the shack. When I asked Rebecca about it, she remained vague. Spooky , she called it. That’s all. But I was frightened.
    In the days that followed, I did what I could to be inconspicuous. I was polite when forced into awkward social interactions with the staff and the girls, and I followed the rules. I didn’t show my frustration or pain when my clumsy, distended hands dropped things, or when I couldn’t close my fist to hold a pencil. I didn’t attract any attention, and in that way, I let Brock think that she’d won.
    But right under her nose I gathered things, like I had when my mother and I were at our worst during the War. A cup from the cafeteria when no one saw. A washcloth from the bathroom. I began hoarding nonperishable food beneath my mattress in preparation for my departure.
    And I found myself relying on Rebecca. Though she played the rehab queen whenever we were around others, she had obviously found a way to survive. Her deception recharged my hope.
    At night, we talked, and she became surprisingly open. Almost as if I were a confidante rather than someone who could cause her a great deal of trouble by exposing her secret. Through her lens, I began to see Sean in a new light. I began to notice the way he diverted Randolph’s attention from the girls and purposefully nodded his agreement when Brock lectured on something absurdly ridiculous, like appropriate ways for a Sister to talk to men.
    To my shock, I opened up some, too. I told her some of the things I missed about my mother. The popcorn and old, pre-War magazine nights. The songs we used to sing together. How we’d never really been apart. Rebecca liked those stories. I think it helped her understand my drive to escape.
    On the fifth night, I even told her about Chase.
    I don’t know why. Maybe because she loved a soldier, or maybe because I felt the need to reciprocate some private piece of my life to her. Maybe because not an hour passed without me asking myself why he did what he did. Whatever the reason, it slipped out of me. Not the details, not the depth of what I’d felt for him, but the basics of what had happened between us.
    “They’re not supposed to date. Not unless they’re officers,” she informed me when I said he hadn’t written. “They have to dedicate their life to the cause or something. It’s a form they sign when they enlist.”
    “Sean doesn’t seem to care.” I couldn’t hide the pettiness in my