“You can do that?” I said.
“Of course.” Noelle blinked at me as if I’d just asked if snow was cold. “How do you think we get guards? Most of them were born Extras or arrested, and they snitched their way to the top. There are rumors—”
She stopped herself, but while she focused on her hands, the way she didn’t change the subject made it obvious she wanted me to ask. So, with an inward sigh, I said, “Rumors about what?”
She immediately brightened and leaned in closer. “There are rumors even Hannah Mercer was one of us,” she whispered, touching the back of her neck and turning around enough for me to get a good view.
A scarred X ran through her otherwise unmarred skin. So she hadn’t been lying—as an Extra, she’d never taken the test that determined what a citizen was worth, and she had never been anything but an X of Elsewhere.
“But if Hannah was a prisoner, then how did she work her way up to the top?” I said, baffled. I could buy someone snitching their way toward being a guard. But the head of an entire section?
“How do you think?” Noelle gave me a meaningful look. “Being a snitch isn’t the only way to get treated nice here. It’s against the rules to have any kind of relationship with the guards, but if someone important enough likes you...”
She trailed off, and I didn’t need her to paint me a picture. Hannah had gotten close with someone important.
“Who?” I said, lowering my voice. “Mercer?”
Noelle shook her head. “That’s what everyone thinks, and maybe it’s true, but Mercer was only promoted to the Head of Elsewhere when he married Hannah last year.” She glanced over her shoulder toward Scotia’s room again, then leaned in so close that I could feel her warm breath against my ear. “No one talks about it anymore, but back when I was little, everyone used to say that Hannah had an affair with the Prime Minister himself.”
I blinked. “Daxton? You mean Hannah—”
“Don’t you two have somewhere to be?” Scotia’s voice cracked through the air, and even though I couldn’t see her behind the curtain, I knew she’d been listening to every word.
Noelle turned red. “We were just leaving.” She grabbed my arm and pulled me out of bed, seemingly unconcerned about the fact that just sitting up was enough to make me groan, let alone standing. “Come on. Are you hungry? It’s cheeseburger night.”
“Cheeseburgers?” My stomach growled, but the thought of red meat only made me remember Lila’s birthday party the night before. And with that flood of memories came the image of Benjy’s smiling face and the picture he’d drawn for me of our future together—a future we’d never have now.
Nausea replaced the hollow feeling in my stomach, and I swayed on my feet. “I’m not hungry.”
Noelle looped her arm in mine. “I know it’s hard here, especially at first, but you’ll get used to it. If you don’t want to eat, that’s okay, but at least let me show you around.”
I started to say Hannah had already done that, but Noelle dragged me out of the bunk before I could form the words. It was strange—when Benjy’s life had been in danger, used by Augusta as a bargaining chip to ensure my behavior, I’d imagined what it would be like to lose him. Not by choice, but it had been impossible to ignore that ocean of fear and darkness lingering in front of me, stripped of all happiness and hope. I’d thought it would be quicksand, the way it had been when his death had first hit me. I’d thought I would go under, and there would never be anything more than that all-encompassing grief.
But I hadn’t drowned. I was still breathing. I was still moving, and no matter how badly I wanted it all to end, life didn’t work that way. Not without a bullet or a broken neck. I was floating over that grief, skimming it with the tips of my toes, always aware of it beneath me and always in danger of falling. As Noelle led me down the snowy street, chattering on about what each day was like in this place, I focused on each breath I took. In and out, in and out, until only the crunch underneath my boots felt real anymore.
I’d never imagined it, but there was life after Benjy. And in a way, it was fitting that it was entirely new and foreign—at least now I wouldn’t have to look at anything familiar and pretend it was still the same.
Noelle didn’t seem to notice that I’d tuned her out, or maybe she didn’t care. We reached a large dingy building a few blocks from the bunker and a quarter mile from the fence. The only difference between the dining hall and the rest of the makeshift town was the smell wafting from the kitchens. It reminded me sharply of the market Benjy and I used to frequent—sizzling meats, baked bread, even the rich aroma of coffee. My stomach flip-flopped, torn between hunger and that sick knot of despair.
We stood in a winding line with dozens of others, and when it was our turn to order, Noelle pointed to a pair of cheeseburgers wrapped in foil. The cook—also dressed in red, and clearly another citizen—tossed them onto our trays, and we continued down the serving line, Noelle mindlessly piling my plate with limp, gray vegetables, something yellow that might have been fruit once upon a time, and a brownie that looked hard enough to break a window. Before becoming a Hart, I’d never been picky about food, but apparently they’d stolen that from me, too.
“Why does it smell so good and look so awful?” I said as Noelle led me through the rows of tables, most already taken by others wearing red and orange jumpsuits.