Flicker Read Free

out?
    “We have a plan so there is nothing to worry about now,” says Dad to pacify me.
    “Will you tell me?” I ask, confused that I’m the only one fearful of what no food means.
    “Enough with your questions, child.” Diane’s words are sharp and they pierce me. “All you need to know is that we have this under control.”
    “Dad, is that true? Is everything going to be okay?”
    “Lucy, you have to trust me.”
    Trust. I trust, I suppose, because there’s no other choice to make. The five people around the laminate dining room table are the only people I know. They are the only people I’ve ever seen; save for the handful of cowboys who’ve come around a few times throughout my life. If I hadn’t met those men or heard their stories, I would only know what I’ve read in books.
    “I trust you, I do. It’s just….” I stop, not quite knowing how to formulate a sentence that matches how I feel inside. My voice has grown quiet as I’ve grown older. A once full imagination has been swallowed in loneliness. My life pales in comparison to the adults around me. They have vibrancy in their authority, in the words they say, such directedness, decidedness. They know more because they’ve lived in the world I can only dream about.
    “Well, good, Lucy. We can’t have you, our unexpected child, creating a scene,” says Dad.
    I watch Diane, her eyes meet Mark’s across the table, as Dad speaks. This isn’t the first time I’ve noticed their unspoken longing when conversation turns to me, about what a surprise gift I was. I’m sixteen, not a fool.
    I asked Mom once, after I officially became a woman, though no one in the compound acknowledges me as such, why I was the only child here. Why was she the only one who had a baby?
    Below ground in the bunker was the best place to have a private conversation. She told me, but said it was best not to mention, bad blood was the term she used. I thought that was ironic given my physical state.
    Sitting in the dark, on my old bunk, she explained, “Before the blackout, the women in our compound elected to be sterilized. Diane and Shelby went in, had their procedure, securing their wombs free of children forever … in light of knowing the world they lived in was no place to bring a child. When I went in for mine, that same day, the doctor informed me I was already twelve weeks pregnant with you.”
    She stopped; her brows knit, the lines around her mouth more pronounced. I could tell she was deciding how much she wanted to burden me with.
    “I was terrified to tell Diane and Shelby. I knew they would be upset with me, for breaking the pact we had made, but I had no choice.” Mom’s voice cracked, reliving the past always did that to her, revealing the feelings she kept buried beneath her brash exterior caused her to waver in ways I wasn’t used to.
    “Lucy, when I heard your heartbeat, I knew you would be the light in my life. The days were so grim back then, and your dad and I believed the growing virus would become a worldwide epidemic. We knew our time to go below ground crept near. I knew how mad the other women would be, how your coming would put your father into a tailspin of preparation, but it didn’t matter because I was going to have you.”
    I hugged Mom on my bunk, letting her cry into my shoulders, tears I realized she kept hidden from everyone else. She spent her life not only caring for me, but also trying to redeem herself to the others on the compound because she felt like she got away with having something that wasn’t meant to be hers.
    Now as I watch Diane and Mark share their not-so-private glance across the dining room table my stomach rolls, guilty for being alive. My stomach growls louder, this time begging for food. As the bowls are passed around, I can’t shake the feeling of being lied to.
    We each have about a half a cup of beans in our stainless steel dishes, and we eat fast, not able to restrain ourselves. We’re near licking the