Smoke’s expression tightened. “How do you know we’re not Rebuilders?”
Lyle barked out a laugh. “No offense, boss, but Rebuilders don’t go out without some serious firepower. They ain’t fearless…they’re just well armed. You were a Rebuilder, you woulda shot those fuckers and then held me up for good measure.”
“Shooting wouldn’t have done much good, not even if I was a better shot than I am-there must have been a dozen of them closing in on us.”
A Beater could be felled by a bullet, but only if the shooter was using a heavy gauge and nailed the brain or the spine. Hit anywhere else, even in the heart or the gut-shots that would take down a citizen-a Beater could keep going for crucial seconds, even minutes, as it took its time bleeding out. Even a dying Beater would keep trying to claw its way toward a potential victim until its last breath left its body.
“Those Rebuilders train all day long,” Lyle said. “A lot of ’em could hit my left nut from across town with one eye shut. But I take your point.”
Smoke relaxed slightly. “I’ve had…a run-in with them myself. Don’t much care for their philosophy, but I don’t know that I’ve got what it takes to live like this, on my own, either.”
“You might say I’m not much of a joiner,” Lyle said as he settled his own large body onto the remaining chair and started going through the box. “I might be a stupid son of a bitch trying to tough it out here on my own. Me and Travers, he’s just as stubborn as me. And them Beaters getting smarter, our odds ain’t great. Only been a week or so they’ve started doing what you might call a regular patrol through here.”
Lyle took out a folded plastic bag and carefully opened it, shaking out a half-smoked, tight-rolled joint. “I been saving this sweet little blunt for a special occasion, ain’t a whole lot more where it came from, least until I figure out how to smoke me some kaysev, if you know what I mean. I’d be honored if you’d finish it up with me.”
“I…not for me,” Cass said quickly.
Lyle nodded and sparked up a lighter, a cheap plastic Bic he took from the box. “I got a little bit of Johnnie Black up there on the shelf, too, if you’re interested.”
“No, thanks. I’m, uh… I’m an alcoholic.”
There was an awkward silence, while Cass kept her features as still as she could. It was not the first time she’d made such an admission, not by a long shot. But it was the first in Aftertime. There’d been drinking in the library; for some, the days were a lot easier to take through a haze of inebriation, a notion Cass understood all too well. But Bobby had put a stop to that; he designated the men’s bathroom as a place people could go if they wanted to get drunk, there and nowhere else, and it was a testament to his power over all of them that everyone cooperated.
Cass had found the men’s bathroom easy to resist. She’d never been much of a social drinker anyway. She had liked to numb herself in solitude.
“No worries, little sister,” Lyle said softly. “I can put this away if that’s easier.”
“No, no-you go ahead.”
He hesitated, his gaze traveling to the scars on her arm. He sighed and reached out to touch them, so gently that his callused fingertips tickled. “You’ve had a rough road,” he said softly, and Cass realized that Lyle thought she’d made the scars herself.
Cass resisted the urge to hide them, to jam her hands under her legs. Instead she gestured to the box and forced a smile. “It’s fine, really. Come on, someone around here might as well get a buzz on.”
“Well, okay, if you insist. But just say the word…”
He took a deep draw on the joint, squeezing it delicately between his large, stubby finger and thumb, and held the smoke in, concentrating with his eyes shut and a look of intense pleasure on his lined face.
“That’s the ticket,” he finally said, and passed it along to Smoke.
Smoke took a hit before passing it back. “Not sure I know how to thank you for the hospitality.”
“No problem. Mind telling me what has y’all out on the streets, anyway? Ain’t any water in this block, and the raiders-no offense-but the raiders usually seem a little better organized than you two.”
Cass glanced at Smoke; he returned her gaze with concern but didn’t speak. He was leaving it up to her.
She considered not telling. Twenty-four hours ago, no one knew her story. The only people who knew about Ruthie were the others at the library, and even they didn’t know the full story, since she’d only had her daughter back for a day before the attack. Besides, there was no way to know how many of the people who were there that day were even still alive.
But what would it hurt, now, to tell the truth? The old shame that had weighed so heavily was gone now, vanished along with everything else familiar from Before. She, like all the other citizens, had been given a fresh start. True, it came at a terrible price, and there was no way to know how long they had remaining, but Cass had wasted enough in her lifetime. Or lifetimes.
She wasn’t going to waste any more opportunities. She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. The chair rocked slightly with the motion.
“I’m looking for my daughter.”
13
“ARE YOU, NOW?” LYLE ENCOURAGED HER WITH a smile as he and Smoke passed the joint back and forth. “You have a little one?”
“She’s almost three. Her name is Ruthie. She was at the library when I was…when I had to leave.”
Lyle narrowed his eyes and waited, but Cass forced herself to take a breath and let it out slowly. Lyle probably thought she’d done something reckless while she was drunk, gotten expelled from the library. Well, let him think it. The truth would only make things worse-how likely was he to let her stay, if he knew what she was hiding under her shirt? If he knew what she had been? If he were to start imagining the things she couldn’t remember doing?
“And you think your little girl’s here in town?”
Cass nodded. “We were sheltering at the library. It was two months ago. Do you ever get over there?”
“Not so much inside the place. If I see raiding parties out, I’ll go along and lend a hand. Once in a while they’ve checked up on me and Travers over there, a few other stubborn assholes like us who insist on squatting. But I haven’t heard of any kids, really. And I’m sorry, I’m not sure I would have remembered if they were talking about it-I don’t know the first thing about kids.”
Cass tried to cover her disappointment. “That’s okay. I’ll know soon enough.”
Lyle nodded. “You’re welcome to stay with me as long as you want. I reckon you’re anxious to get moving again, especially now that you’re so close, but I’m guessing the rat bastards are going to be hanging around for a while, anyway. Usually they just fuck around during the day, but now and then, like tonight, a few of ’em’ll show up trying to trick me into coming out.”
“You think they’ve evolved that much…awareness?” Smoke said, waving away the joint, which was burned almost all the way down.
Lyle took a last big puff and stubbed the spent butt out on a jar lid before he answered. “Tough to say. They don’t seem any smarter than before. If anything they’ve lost all their, you know, whadda you want to call it, their language skills. You know how they used to say little odds and ends, almost make you think like they had something going on upstairs?”
He tapped his head for emphasis, a long coil of his brown hair springing out of the elastic.
“Yes…a few words at a time, little phrases…” Smoke said.
“Yeah, that. Well, they aren’t doing much of that anymore. Now it’s all this wailing and snorting and shit, like they’re a bunch of rutting pigs. Only pigs are probably a damn sight smarter than they are.”
“But their habits-” Smoke said carefully.
“They still look like a bunch of fucked-up retards on the dance floor when they walk, and you still see them doing all kinds of freaky shit like they’re trying to remember what it was like to be human. Like I saw this one out there with a doll, taking her dress off and putting it on again. Course then it pulled the doll’s hair out. Or just the other day, here comes a couple of ’em with a wheelbarrow. I’m not shit-tin’ you, they’ve got this thing loaded up with a bunch of bricks and a watering can and I don’t know what else kind of crap…and they’re trying to wheel it
