Aftertime

and Pensacola and Fort Worth and China Lake and Everett, loaded with their secret freight, tested and developed and grown in a dozen different locations across the U.S. Paul Palmer hadn’t even bothered to conceal the fact that he was reading from the teleprompter: “Full-spectrum nutritional mass,” he’d intoned. Code name K734IV, later shortened to K7 and then kaysev. Protein, calcium, vitamins, fiber.

“They could have been lying, though,” Cass said. “They obviously never tested it. I mean…if they had, they would have figured out about the blueleaf before they went and dumped seed over thousands of square miles.”

“Cass…you should know. Blueleaf’s only in California. At least, it was, unless it’s drifted.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard that,” Cass said, remembering Sammi’s story. “Only that’s just one more rumor. The only people who know are the pilots who dumped it, and even they don’t know what was in the seed mix.”

“No,” Smoke said quietly. “It’s true. Travis was the only base that went for it. Even China Lake turned it down, but they were doubling back over the same flight patterns as Travis so it didn’t matter.”

“How could you possibly know that?”

Smoke was silent for a moment, not meeting her eyes. “Because I was working in Fairfield at the time. Practically right next door to Travis. I used to drink with some of those guys.”

“But-wouldn’t that be confidential? Why would they open up to some guy in a bar?”

Smoke’s face darkened and his mouth went tight. “It was more than just a bar conversation. We were…friends. And I guess they needed to talk, when they got back from taking the kaysev up. Those guys were career pilots- that’s what they knew. Who they were. They knew it was the last flight they were ever going to take. So yeah, they talked.”

Cass thought about what he was saying. It was tantalizing to think there was part of the world-part of the country, even-that was still free of Beaters. A place where people didn’t live in constant terror.

But there was something off about Smoke’s story, about the way he wouldn’t look at her, at the barely concealed emotion in his voice.

“How would the pilots know what they were flying?” she demanded. “I mean, the military’s never been known for transparency. I would think something like that would be-what do you call it?-need-to-know. Especially if there was disagreement about what exactly they were going to distribute.”

Smoke shrugged. “Look, I only told you because…well, I thought it might give you hope.”

Cass didn’t believe him, but she wasn’t ready to let the conversation drop. “Why are you still here? If you’re so sure blueleaf’s only in California?”

“It’s way too unstable to try to make it out of state now. That’s got to be a hundred miles, most of it over- mountain.”

“Sammi told me other people have done it.”

Smoke laughed bitterly. “Yeah? What she told you was that other people tried. I met that guy. The one she’s talking about. Tried to talk him out of it, but he was determined, was one of those new roaming prophet-preachers. I bet he didn’t make it twenty miles up the road on foot.”

I did, Cass thought darkly. She’d made it farther than that, alone, with nothing but her wits.

Although she’d had Ruthie to live for. Maybe that had bought her survival.

Smoke seemed to have lost any interest in the conversation. He reached for her plate and Cass didn’t stop him; she allowed him to scrape the last of her meal onto his own plate and collect her empty bottle.

“I’ll take care of the dishes,” he said. “I’ve packed for both of us. We’ll leave in an hour or so. There’s wash water in the courtyard, if you want it. Women use it after dinner, then the kids. Men wait until morning. This is your chance-they’re expecting you. They’ll have supplies for you.” He hesitated. “I told them you were shy. That you’d want to keep your undershirt on, your underwear.”

He was gone before Cass could object-or thank him.

08

CASS FOLLOWED THE SOUND OF LAUGHTER, staying to the long shadows under the eaves. She’d already decided that if either Sammi or her mother were in the courtyard, she’d retreat without showing herself. She’d done enough damage to the fragile network of relationships in the school.

But the four women clustered around the makeshift tub were strangers. The tub was really more of a giant trough composed of sections of white plastic pipe that had been capped off and propped up on a pair of sawhorses. It had been filled with water that steamed in the rapidly cooling evening. A small fire crackled in the hearth a few yards away, a neat stack of burning madrone branches giving off a spicy, pleasant smell. Several pots of different sizes simmered on the grate above, and Cass guessed they poured the boiling water into the tub to keep the communal bath warm, and to replace what sloshed and splashed out with their movements.

Two of the four women were naked except for plastic flip-flops, and one of them held a nearly new bar of soap. The naked women washed, passing the soap back and forth. One of the other women was undressing, hopping from foot to foot as she stripped off her clothes and tossed them into a pile. The fourth woman had put her clothes back on and was toweling her hair. She was telling some sort of story that had the others cracking up, but when they noticed Cass approaching they all went silent.

“I’m sorry,” Cass said. “I didn’t mean to… Smoke said I might be able to wash. Except…I, um…”

“We have extra towels,” the woman who was undressing said, offering a tentative smile. “I brought two. I wasn’t sure if you… It’s pretty casual. We keep the water hot for a couple of hours and people just show up whenever.”

“Some people, anyway,” one of the naked women said. She was a well-built girl in her early twenties who didn’t seem the least bit self-conscious about dragging her soapy washcloth up and over her wide thighs, her rounded stomach. “Some folks, I don’t think they’ve had a bath since they got here. They get kind of unfresh, you know what I’m sayin’?”

She gave Cass a friendly wink as her companion flicked her with her own washcloth. “Not everyone’s as comfortable strutting around buck naked as you,” she scolded, grinning. “Forgive Nance here. She’s got no manners.”

“I, um…” Cass said, swallowing. “Is it okay… Do you mind if I don’t…uh, if I keep…” She hugged herself tightly, battling her warring desires to keep the evidence of her attack hidden, and to wash her filthy body.

“It’s okay,” the first woman said gently, handing her a small towel and a folded washcloth. They weren’t terribly clean, but Cass took them gratefully. She set the towel on the ground and stripped out of her overshirt and pants before she could change her mind, keeping her eyes downcast, and then approached the trough wearing only the nylon tank and panties that she’d been wearing beneath her clothes all this time. There were only a few scars on the backs of her thighs, and they had healed to barely distinguishable discolorations, but the gouges on her back were still raw and obvious. She knew this from tracing them with her fingers-the undeniable evidence that she’d been torn at by Beaters.

But there was more to her discomfort. It had also been years since she had undressed in front of another woman, and she felt her skin burn with shame as the others watched her.

It was different with men. She’d been with so many; she’d stopped counting one weekend when, by Sunday, she couldn’t remember the name of the one she brought home Friday. She hadn’t been self-conscious-hadn’t been conscious of anything, really, other than the driving need. Not a hunger for the coupling itself, but a need to beat her pain and confusion into a thing that could be contained again, could be put away far enough in the depths of her heart that she could keep going. Keep living. To get to that place she had to use her body, to show and undress and flaunt it, all of which was done without a second thought.

But now she felt hot shame color her face as her nipples hardened under the tight shirt, exposed to the evening chill. She had no bra-what would these women think of that? Cass didn’t know what to make of it herself-on the day she woke up, when she stumbled to her feet and tried to work the kinks out of her mysteriously abused limbs-she’d gone to tug at her bra, a habit of decades, and found it wasn’t there.

Cass hooked her thumbs in her socks and pulled them off, tossing them on the pile. There was nothing more that she could take off.