The Palace Crumbles

Money

In my dreams, I can hear a child screaming. A little girl, a sob in her throat, crying out in a language that I don't know— yet I understand. I know what she's saying.

She's begging for help. She's calling my name.

——————————

When I wake, the sun is streaming through the windows onto the wooden floor. It's blinding, and I squint.

You are changing my bandages. It's the pain that woke me, and now that I'm finally conscious, it intensifies. It's a burning feeling in my side, blistering pain that sends whiteness creeping into the sides of my vision. You stroke my hair as you rub a washcloth on the wound, and it makes me feel slightly better. I offer to help you change yours, but you insist that I rest.

"I'm worried about your head," you say. "I'm not entirely sure that you don't have a concussion."

"I feel okay."

"I just don't want to tire you out before we leave." You kiss my forehead before standing back up. "I'm still here. I'll just be looking around."

After a few minutes, you return with more water and a few bags. You sit next to me on the bed, and together we share a bag of dried peaches and a cereal bar. It gives me a nice little energy boost, both from the food and from your presence.

I drift in and out of sleep until I hear you cry out from somewhere else in the house. It jolts me into action, and I'm about to spring out of bed when I hear your footsteps coming.

"Will?" I wince from the movement of sitting up. "Are you okay?"

"Yes. Yeah, I'm fine. Sorry." You run up to the bed and grab my face, kissing me on the lips. "You're a fucking genius. You saved our asses."

"What? What did I do?"

You smile and hold up a plain envelope. Inside is a large stack of $20 bills, along with four driver's licenses. All of them have different names and different faces, and they don't expire until next year.

"You knew what you were doing when you brought us here," you tell me. "You've had this ready for years. The food, the money, the IDs. I think there's debit cards in here, too. God, Hannibal." You laugh, giddy. "I mean, this has got to be at least a thousand dollars."

I watch with a smile of my own as you count out the money. I like how you make stacks of five bills, separating them by groups of one hundred so they're easier to count.

"One thousand, two hundred." You bury your face in your hands. "God, this is a life-saver. We might actually be able to do this."

"Are the IDs okay? Can we pass for them?"

"These two are the closest to us, I think." You show me two of the IDs: one shows a man with silver hair and glasses, and another shows a man with a sharp jawline and a buzzed haircut. I glance up at you with an expression of dread; I can't stand the thought of sacrificing your curls.

"I'll make it," you say, reading my mind. "It'll grow back. What matters is looking the part. And I can't look anything like myself."

"Do we even have a razor?"

You stand wordlessly and go into the bathroom. After a moment, I hear you laugh. "Jesus, Hannibal."

"What?"

"You've got an electric razor, multiple shades of hair dye, glasses, makeup...how long have you been prepping this?" You pause. "Wait, you wouldn't— never mind. It must have been a while, though."

A sliver of doubt begins to form in my mind. You're right: I thought of everything we ever could have needed. And, to be frank, this feels like overkill for something as simple as drug dealing. That is, unless we're the leaders. The bosses. But that seems unlikely.