Envious Of Fire (Kissing With Teeth #2)

9. The Dreaming Ends.

—?—

The click comes before it’s supposed to.

Kaleb lifts his head off the pillow, squints at the door.

It’s dark, the lights in the hallway are off. Yet he hears the echoes of feet scuffling down the corridor. He sits up, clutches his blanket to his chest, stares at the door, willing his eyes to adjust. He sees nothing. Why did his door click so soon?

Then it creaks open. “1025 …?” comes a whisper.

Kaleb swings his legs over the edge of the bed, stands up still clutching his blanket. “987?” he whispers back.

“Tonight’s the night, man.”

Kaleb stares at the indistinct shape of 987 at the door, all shadow. “I … I told you I don’t think—”

“Don’t be stubborn, dude, this is our only chance. We—”

“It’s … It’s not that I’m being stubborn. I just feel like …” Kaleb sighs. “Aren’t we treated well? We’re fed. Cared for. We even have doctors when we’re sick or injured.”

“I swear, if I have to throw you over my shoulder and carry you out of here myself …”

“No.” Kaleb hugs his blanket tighter, leans against the cold wall. “I don’t want to go, and I don’t want you to go, either.”

A number of measured breaths come from 987, filling the room. Finally, he lets out a mocking snort. “You’re just scared.”

Kaleb frowns in the dark.

“You’re clutching your blanket like a baby,” 987 goes on. “You’re forty years old. You’re a grown-ass man, and—”

“I’m not forty.” Kaleb frowns. “Not yet, I don’t think.”

“1025, I’m not kidding, if you don’t drop that baby blanket and come with me right now …”

Footsteps scuffle outside. Another voice comes, noticeably deeper even when whispering. “What’s taking so long?”

“1025’s got cold feet.”

Kaleb frowns. “I never had warm feet. I … I didn’t agree to this, to any of this. 987, please, I don’t want you to be harmed. You could get into a lot of trouble if you—”

“For fuck’s sake,” mumbles the newcomer at the door.

987 changes his approach, coming into the room, stopping in front of Kaleb. He puts a hand on Kaleb’s shoulder and the other gently on his chest. “Man, we’ve been through a lot, you and I. You’re scared. That’s fine. Maybe deep down, so am I. This could go all wrong. But I can’t live another day down here wasting my life, I just can’t. I need to live for something. I need to make all my years of life count. You get me? Just remember, I will always have your back, and I will always be there for you, whether it’s here, out there, or somewhere in between …” He brings his face close. “Remember that bakery? San Diego? Can you picture it? You and me in a pair of matching bowties and suspenders, polka-dot aprons, stupid-ass hats, baking together all day long? Just imagine the aroma, the sweet and delicious aroma … Isn’t that the fucking dream, man?”

Kaleb is suddenly taste-testing sugary sweets in his mind, imagining that lovely life in intoxicating detail. Can he actually remember being in a real bakery? Is he fishing some long-lost memory out of the deep recesses of his heart?

“C’mon,” grunts the guy still at the door—Blood 77, most likely. “We don’t have time for this.”

“Well?” asks 987, apparently using compassion to convince Kaleb to join them, struggling to sound patient. “Ready to get outta here? To go and grab that dream with me? Please don’t say no. Don’t make me go out of here all on my own.”

Kaleb thinks about Raya. He thinks about playing violin for her again. He thinks about the dream that lulls him to sleep every night—as well as wakes him up like a nightmare every morning. He thinks about the pale, blue-eyed face of the angel who saved him from the fire that took his family.

Suddenly, he’s fighting back tears. “I’m … I’m sorry.”

Even in the darkness, Kaleb can see the disappointment on 987’s face. Or perhaps it’s a feeling, communicated somehow in the silence that follows his small, weak words.

“Alright,” says 987, accepting it. But then: “Sorry to do this to you.”

Kaleb is about to ask what.

Then he is grabbed at once, wrapped up in his own blanket he’s clutching, and flung over a shoulder. The movement is so fast, he can barely process what’s happened until he’s already being hauled out of his cell. His second attempt at protesting is quickly and efficiently silenced when something is stuffed into his mouth—a rag, a sock, a part of his blanket, it is a mystery. He is wrapped so tightly that he can’t move his arms, hanging over 987’s shoulder, his face beating against his captor’s back with every hurried step. He can’t see where they’re going, can’t see who’s with them, knows nothing.

When light finally touches his eyes, he discovers only part of his face is covered by the blanket. Where are they? Perhaps closer to the cafeterias? The showers? They move fast down the corridors, changing directions, Kaleb sometimes picking up a hissing of words from someone nearby. Has everyone gathered already? 77 and his muscled friend 100? The loud 303 and his girlfriend 304? Did anyone else come into the plan, too?

Suddenly he is set down on his feet, yet 987 keeps him held closely against him. Kaleb tries to spit out the unidentified gag, but 987 presses a hand over his mouth, says, “It’s for your own good, man, I’m telling you, I’m doing this to save your life.”

Kaleb glances forward. They’re in front of the elevator.

“Also, you’re too light,” adds 987. “You’ve gotta eat more. Don’t worry, you’ll eat plenty at the bakery. My brother’s twice your size, you’ll love him. He makes this yummy sweetbread …”

The elevator opens, and there stands a nurse, arms crossed, her smirk triumphant. On the floor before her, another nurse, male, knocked out, small gash on his forehead, hair a mess. Was he against the plan? Did the plan involve knocking him out so the others could pass? Was any of this explained yesterday in the pipe room and Kaleb just wasn’t paying attention?

Next, he’s pulled into the elevator, 77 following, then 100 squeezing in after, nearly pressing Kaleb to the wall with his big wide back. He can’t see who else piles into the elevator before its doors shut and the chamber starts moving.

He turns to look at 987, beseeching him with his eyes, but 987 only keeps his hand over Kaleb’s mouth, an arm wrapped tightly around him, holding him in place. “What’s with 1025?” whispers someone in the front, annoyed. “Forget him, just stay focused. The second that door opens, remember …”

The elevator stops sooner than expected. Soft light from a weak light bulb pours in from outside. “Quick, quick,” hisses a voice. Kaleb finds himself lugged along like cargo. “You sure this is the way?” someone hisses out. “Just follow the nurse,” whispers someone else, “and hurry.” 987 keeps his firm grip on Kaleb, pulling him down a dim, long hallway, hospital-like in appearance, the air strangely cold, sterile, nearly stinging the nostrils. The walls are pale green. The floor is slightly reflective as they pass through pools of light coming from the occasional bulb in the ceiling. Is this where the lucky lower-numbered go every other week to give blood—a visual reprieve from the grey corridors below? Even the smooth, polished floors are kind to the feet, practically soft in comparison to the cells.

Despite his limited vision, Kaleb drinks in the sight with wonder. How lucky the lower-numbered are, to experience new and interesting environments up here, to see the house above, to know anything but the grey monotony of below.

But these gifts don’t feel right. Kaleb doesn’t deserve them. They are stealing these pleasures, breaking every rule, ruining their good standing.

The gag loosens on its own, drooping low enough to free Kaleb’s mouth. “987,” he finally says, choked, mouth dry.

“You okay?” whispers 987 back. “Hey, don’t be scared. I’m not scared. I’m excited. You feel that exhilaration in your heart yet? You feel how possible everything is becoming?”

Indeed, Kaleb’s heart pounds in his ears, but he isn’t sure yet whether it’s with excitement or dread. If they are caught, what will happen to them? Will they be deprived of food for a day? Confined to their cells? Made examples out of for the rest of the Bloods? Kaleb doesn’t want to test how creative such punishments from the gods and goddesses can be.

“Please,” begs Kaleb.

987 huffs, already annoyed. “We’re not going back. Keep moving, 1025, I swear …”

The ones ahead come to an abrupt stop, Kaleb stumbling into the back of his friend. 304 points, wrinkling her face as she whispers: “Hey, what the hell? The elevator …”

“What?” 100 comes forward. “So? There’s more than one. Probably several.”

“It’s the same fucking elevator we came from,” she hisses back, then smacks her boyfriend 303’s arm. “Did we just run around in a circle?”

“How could we?” 303 asks. “We’ve only ran straight ahead after making a single left turn. The hallways don’t bend.”

The nurse from the elevator steps forward with confidence. “It’s just ahead,” she insists. “Don’t be deceived. I work up here more often than any of you. The House is made of illusions. It is meant to trick us. But it cannot trick us if we know the way.”

304 frowns at the nurse, then peers back at everyone else. “You guys sure we can trust this?”

303, appearing embarrassed by his girlfriend, comes close to her, his voice sweetening. “Of course, 4, why wouldn’t we? She wants out of here as badly as we do.”

“She’s got privileges up here as a nurse,” 304 goes on, not caring to sugarcoat her words in the least, “motivation to stay, to be useful. Why would this privileged nurse with a privileged life be so keen to get out of here? Let alone to help us? What if she’s working with them?”

77 rolls his eyes and looks away, mutters, “For fuck’s sake.”

“It’s a pact we all made,” 303 reminds her, “us versus them, humans first, always. She knows. She takes our blood. She—”

“She’s never taken my blood,” says 304. “Never even seen her until today.”

“ 4 …” pleads her boyfriend.

The nurse patiently crosses her arms. “It’s up to you. Come with me, or head back now. But the further we go, the less easy it will be to return. The House will try to trap you, especially if you’re on your own. I’ve seen it happen myself.” The nurse’s thin lips twist as she studies each of them, one at a time. “You have to make your choice now.”

303 takes his girlfriend’s hands, leans in close. “Remember what we’re doing this for. Remember our promises. Please.” He lowers his voice to nearly a squeak of desperation. “ Please .”

Silence persists between them as the tension prickles in the air. 987’s foot bounces in place, anxious. 100 and 77, the stoic ones, keep exchanging increasingly irritated looks.

Kaleb sighs. In the tiniest of voices, he asks himself, “Is it really so bad, living here?” When he looks up, he finds with a start that he’s captured everyone’s attention. “Sorry,” he says in a panic. “I … I just meant—I mean, they’ve been good to us.”

“Not this again,” groans 987, mortified.

The harsh-faced 77 stares down Kaleb with eyes that could peel him down to the bone. “Good to us?” he snaps. “You think your ass is staying at some five-star resort? Good to us?” He steps forward. “They bit my mother’s face off, right in front of me. They bit off her face and drank from her skull, laughing. I can still see the blood in their teeth. 100?” he then says with a thumb at his wide, muscled friend. “They stole his baby straight out of her crib, sank teeth into her belly, sucked her dry like she was nothing but a goddamned nectarine and tossed her lifeless remains aside, then came after him next. Good to us?” His eyes rage, as if he would spill tears were there any left.

“They killed my parents,” says the nurse simply.

304 glances at the nurse heavily, then adds, “My childhood friend Anya.” She says no more. “I witnessed a murder,” adds her boyfriend, his eyes going far away, as if reliving it. “One of them got to someone in an alley behind the bank. Didn’t even know the guy, but I was a witness. The next thing I knew …”

“We’ve all got our stories,” says 987. “The point is, man, we’re prisoners here, prisoners without sentences, and it’s time we take our lives back into our own hands.”

“But they …” Kaleb shakes his head. “They never hurt me. I didn’t witness any murder. I wasn’t attacked. Actually …” He lowers his eyes. “My house was on fire … and they saved me.”

His words bring all the others to silence.

When he looks up, he finds the nurse staring at him in an especially unique way, squinting, studying him with interest. It only seems to be her reaction that Kaleb notices, not the others.

It’s 77 who sighs, breaking the silence. “There’s no time for this shit. Come on, guys, let’s fucking move. The window’s closing. Now or never.”

304 glances at the elevator again, her eyes heavy, then sighs and gestures impatiently at the nurse. Her boyfriend smiles, relieved. Soon, everyone is moving again, the nurse leading the way with 77 next to her, his harsh face creased and sweaty. It appears Kaleb’s protests have been entirely swept aside in favor of the group’s decision to continue with the escape plan. With a growing sense of despair, he watches as door after door passes them by, all the doors the same, all the walls. When yet a third identical elevator is seen, the nurse pushes them onward. The fourth elevator comes, and everyone knows better than to ask.

Kaleb’s foot catches something, he trips, flies to the floor, his arms still bound to his side by the blanket so tightly that he can’t stop his own fall. He winces in pain as he struggles to rise from the floor, his right knee having taken the impact.

“Up, up,” 987 hisses, not wanting to fall behind. “Let’s go.” Twice Kaleb tries to stand, but the blanket catches his feet and causes him to tumble back to the floor. “What’s with you?” 987 helps him by unraveling the blanket from his body and flinging it aside, likely figuring it to have served its purpose in forcing Kaleb’s choice to leave. “We gotta go. Move your legs, go, go.”

“My knee,” Kaleb groans, limping.

“Ignore it, fucking ignore it, this is the rest of our lives we are running toward, let’s go!”

But as 987 and Kaleb hurry forward, they find the rest of the group farther ahead than expected. Kaleb tries to keep up with 987, but his knee causes him to run at a greatly diminished speed, and 987 seems unwilling to race ahead of him. “Guys, we are coming, slow down!” 987 whispers as loudly as he can, but the only one who peers back is 303 at the tail, appearing more annoyed than concerned, and not one of them stops.

It isn’t long before they fall too far behind to even see the others. “They’re just up ahead,” says 987 encouragingly. “Keep moving those feet, fast as you can. We’re about to come up to another fake elevator.”

But instead of an elevator, they find themselves arriving at an intersection they haven’t yet encountered. Every hall looks the same—poorly-lit, avocado-green walls, and reflective floors that catch every stray bit of light. Everything is eerie suddenly. Whatever beauty and wonder that Kaleb saw earlier is gone.

“I caused us to fall behind,” sighs Kaleb.

“Nah, don’t worry,” 987 insists. “I remember the directions from what 77 said last night. There’s a staircase. It leads to a loading bay, where the nurse is supposed to open a hidden door or something.”

“It’s my fault …”

“This way,” decides 987, and the two head down a hallway.

Unlike before, the farther they go, the less familiar things become, until suddenly Kaleb can’t determine whether it’s a hospital they’re navigating, or an abandoned shopping mall, or a warehouse, or an old haunted house. The walls are no longer green, but Kaleb can’t properly say what they are. Blue? Purple and white? Pale yellow? The ceiling is sometimes so low, Kaleb fights an instinct to crouch, then sometimes incredibly high.

“Hey, look!” 987 points ahead. “See that? Stairs!”

“We can still turn back,” says Kaleb. “Just head back there, back to the elevator, it’d be so easy …”

987 faces him, at once turning harsh. “I am not going back. I would rather fucking die —”

“Don’t say that! You’re one of my only friends here. I just want things to go back to how they were, when we were all—”

“Happy?” 987 grabs Kaleb’s face and brings it close, voice tender again. “I want us to be happy, too … and that’s why we have got to get the fuck outta this place—together. San Diego. The bakery. Our dream.” 987 throws an arm over Kaleb’s back. “Lean on me, man. Let me help you up the steps.”

Kaleb limps by his side, every step lanced with pain, every thought twisted with worry. When they reach the wide stairs that seem to stretch on countlessly, he can barely keep up as the steps meet his feet. He tries to hop on one leg, but he’s out of breath from all of the running and can barely keep balance. “Come on, you got this,” says 987, yet the faster Kaleb tries to move his feet, the less they cooperate. His knee throbs, never once letting him forget its pain. “One more step. Up, another, yeah, good. Another, let’s go, let’s go …”

“Just go without me,” begs Kaleb. “Please. I don’t—”

“We’re not doing this song and dance again,” cries 987, at once losing his composure, whispers giving away to shouts. “It is so fucking close, our way out, our lives waiting for us up these steps. What was that earlier?” he asks suddenly, turning on his friend. “Telling everyone that you were saved from a fire? That they saved you from a fire? What the fuck was all of that about? Why would you say that shit to them?”

“Because it’s true. My house burned down. My family died in the fire. I would have, too, but … but one of them found me, an angel with the kindest eyes … and he saved my life.”

“Saved you? You call this place ‘saving’ you? Wake the fuck up, man. How do you know they didn’t start the fire? Some of them cook their meals first, get what I’m saying?”

The idea horrifies Kaleb. He looks away.

“Move your fucking feet. Hop up these stairs with me. I’m not leaving you behind and—Y’know what?” He crouches down and points at his back. “Get on. Piggyback. I’ll carry you.”

“Please …”

“I’ll fucking carry you.”

Kaleb spots a shadow somewhere far behind them, down the strange hallway. It is gone the second he sees it.

If Kaleb keeps hesitating, he’ll be the one responsible for 987 not finding his dream, he’ll be the reason they are caught, and he will never, ever forgive himself.

So it’s now panic, not compliance, that drives him to obey his friend. Kaleb shuffles quickly, locks his arms around 987’s neck, and lets himself free from the ground. His friend rises up, lifting him with ease, thanks to Kaleb’s small frame.

He doesn’t see the shadow again.

Did he see it at all?

Upward they go without speaking, making their ascent as quickly as they can manage. When at last they reach the top of the stairs, it opens to an enormous space, all the walls, floors, and ceilings shiny and bluish in hue, like a gallery constructed of nothing but mirror. Scattered throughout the space are tall, thin pillars, the reflections of which make the room look like an enormous spiked object—a maze of glass trees.

Kaleb slowly slides off 987’s back, hobbles to his side, stares out at the vast expanse of glassy wonder. It looks less beautiful than it should, instead inspiring fear. It’s like a dream, an eerie dream in every direction, soundless, airless, unreal.

“Did we … lose them?” asks Kaleb, the question making his already heavy heart sink deeper as it leaves his lips.

“No. They’re just up ahead, I’m sure of it. Chill.” 987 looks to the left, to the right. He takes a step one way, second-guesses, then head the other, stops yet again. “Up the stairs … archway … big blue room …” he mutters to himself, his words scattering through the mirrors. Kaleb peers over his shoulder down the stairs. The shadow still isn’t there. “The fuck is the big blue room? Is this the big blue room? What archway?”

With his heart thumping heavily and his knee panging with alarm, Kaleb parts his lips to ask another question. What comes out instead, completely unprompted, is: “My name’s Kaleb.”

987 continues muttering to himself for half a second, stops, turns his head as he belatedly hears the words. For a moment, their plight is entirely forgotten. “Nico,” he then responds, as if just now remembering.

Kaleb smiles. “I took you for more of a Bruce. Or a John. Or maybe even a Chuck.”

Nico chuckles, shakes his head, then gives Kaleb a punch in the shoulder. “You don’t remember? I let it slip one day. You’d think I just crapped my pants, the way everyone went silent.”

“Everyone’s scared to break the rules.”

“And now look at us, breaking all of them. There’s no one else in this place I’d rather break them with than you, 1025—Kaleb, I mean. Yeah, that’ll take some getting used to.”

“You can stick with 1025 for now, if you prefer.”

He considers that. “Yeah, until we get the fuck outta here.”

“Agreed.” Kaleb nods ahead. “Maybe the archway is on the other side of this room.”

Nico squints. “Hmm, yeah, probably.”

“The nurse will be waiting for us, right?”

“Yeah,” decides Nico after a moment, encouraged. “Yeah, she will be, for sure.” Each whisper is a breathy tornado in their ears. “She’s at the other end, waiting for us … they all are.”

The two, now side-by-side, make their way across the large reflective expanse. As they go, the stairs grow smaller at their backs, until the top of them is no longer visible, and in every direction, it’s nothing but a dark blue, dreamlike haze.

They stop abruptly when the air splits apart before their startled faces, light blinding them—a narrow door sitting in the middle of nothing, opening in thin air.

The nurse appears, eclipsing the light, and leans against the frame of the door. “About took you long enough,” she teases.

“Oh, thank god,” mutters Nico, “I thought we’d lost you.”

“The others are ahead,” she tells him. “Be quick. Through here, you’ll find yourself in a bright hallway, then make a left. Don’t make a right—that takes you back into the House. After you go left, you’ll empty into an alleyway near the Bellagio.”

“Bellagio? You mean in Las Vegas? Las-fucking-Vegas?” Nico lets out a warm chuckle that sounds more human than he has in months. “Quite a bit of ways from San Diego, but hey, freedom’s freedom, and I’ve got thumbs ready to hitch my way home. Ready, 1025?” He glances back.

Kaleb stares at his friend. He fights a sudden urge to tell his friend to wait, yet nothing comes. Nico returns a soft smile, winks playfully, then slips through the bright doorway. Kaleb limps up to the brink, right where he resists shielding his eyes.

Then he stops. Breaths pass. Seconds tick away.

Why won’t he step through?

“I understand,” says the nurse. Kaleb squints against the brightness, remaining silent, his heart still slamming away in his ears. “It’s quite a decision, isn’t it? Your next step?”

He doesn’t look her way. Something about her tone brings him pause. “I guess I …” He finds himself choosing every word with caution. “I … never quite shared … the same feeling … as the others do … about the gods.”

“The gods?”

“That’s what some of us call them.” He scrunches up his face, barely turning his head, still not looking the nurse in the eye. “Don’t you?”

The nurse doesn’t breathe, doesn’t stir, doesn’t pull her eyes from the side of Kaleb’s face. She just stands there by the magical door, as if holding it open for him, a doorwoman.

She asks, “Is that why you aren’t following your friend?”

Kaleb lifts his eyes, half-squinted, to the brightness beyond. He can’t see Nico. Can’t hear him, either. The second he went through, he vanished from existence.

“I think I’m … scared,” says Kaleb, inching into the truth.

“Of what?”

Kaleb lifts a hand to the light, as if testing it. It feels cold, not warm. “My friend pictures this life for us … his brother, a bakery in San Diego, but … I don’t think I belong there. This is the only life I know now. My old life burned away in that fire long ago.” It’s now that he brings his heavy gaze to the nurse. “Is it too late? For me to stay? Would I be a total coward if I … if I abandon my friends and … go back?”

The nurse studies him awhile longer before answering, in a tone that sounds as crisp as crystal: “It’s never too late.”

“You wanted to leave, too,” he says. “Are you going to head out with them?”

The nurse smiles, as if finding that funny. “Of course I plan to go. There are so many reasons to leave. My beautiful life is out there, waiting for me. Food of my choosing. Friends. My family. A cushy bed. Warm showers. Are you sure you don’t want to go and see what’s out there for you, too? It’s just a trip down this hall and out a door. Easy.”

Kaleb glances into the brightness again. He takes a breath. It’s now that he finally realizes he’s certain of his conviction. “I can’t,” he decides, then turns to her again. “I want to stay.”

Her eyes burn like blue fire, showing her satisfaction. She smirks, says, “Good boy.”

Then snaps her fingers.

At once, the entire room shatters.