The Rebels (on break)

Chapter 2: Added Family or So I Thought

Ringggg!!!! I nearly fell out of my seat as the bell rang releasing our group to go eat lunch.  Wow, you're paranoid I thought as I stuffed my plethora of books into my army green camouflage messenger bag. I lazily slung it over my shoulder and hiked up my too-big-for-me pair of beige cargos and left the classroom to find Shannon and Eddy impatiently waiting for me outside the door.  "Why are you like always the last one out of the classroom? Like come onnnnn we haven't eaten in like a trillion years!" Shannon whined.

"Shan, it's been precisely 4 hours since we ate breakfast, come on" Eddy was always trying to combat Shannon's exaggerations.  I kind of thought he had a thing for her, but I definitely wasn't going to mention anything to him about it.  Eddy had this calm, cool persona, and I could tell that if something like that was said to him, it would ruffle his feathers and it'd be awkward.

"Whatever Eddyyyy" Shannon cooed.  The same thing could be said about Shannon with the whole crush thing, but I'm not sure there either.  Shannon used to like Eddy like 3 years ago, but who knows if her feelings for him came back, or maybe they didn't go away. Whatever.

As we were walking down the passage towards the lunchroom, I saw Zach up ahead glooming along next to his locker.  Zach was about the only somewhat good thing that happened by adding select 15 year olds into our group this year.  Although lately I was second guessing myself on that thought.   

Zach and me have known each other for a couple years. He was 15, almost 16 and I just turned 17 so we're just over a year apart.

About 4 years ago, a fourth of the city was destroyed.  In the middle of the night, like 2:45 in the morning, the city alarms sounded.  We all bolted up in our beds and looked outside at the city lights being on.  That was a shock as the lights outside go off every night at precisely 10 o'clock.  That's how we knew it wasn't one of the drills we had monthly.

So we all hurried out of the house, me, my now 11 year old sister, Mel, and my parents. (My sister was 7 then.) As were standing outside on the street, everyone was chattering about what could be wrong since nothing seemed to be going on in our quadrant.

Birchwood is split into four quadrants and what had happened was that quadrant four was basically all on fire.

We had been standing outside for about 5 minutes when we finally smelled the smoke.  Then we knew what had to be going on and people began to get quiet with worry as we thought it might be the government's doing.

The reason that was suspected was because about a week before the fire, quadrant four had had rioters in an uproar about something like pay for jobs or something.  And since our government doesn't like people to "go rogue", that was why this suspicion was on a lot of our minds at the time.  Some thought the fire had been the government's way of punishing the quadrant for its "behavior".  But that night over the alarm system, they announced that it had been a serial arsonist and that's all.  They said the person behind it was taken care of.  Ironically it had apparently been the man who had led the riot a week before who supposedly had started the fires.

I woke up right at sunrise that next day and had thought I could still smell a tinge of smoke in the air.  As I was contemplating my sniffing abilities, the alarms went off again but shorter and they had a message following them.  At 9:00 AM this morning you will all report to the Common House for a meeting about what occurred last night and what will be done about the survivors. Thank you citizens, and for your sake everyone must be at this meeting.

The way this message had been worded had kind of scared me a little, not because I knew someone in quadrant four, (Shannon lived in 2 and Eddy lived in 1, I lived in 3).  But I didn't like the word survivors, and it told me that a lot of people must have died.

It turned out that of the 500 people that had lived in quadrant four, about 275 people had died in the fires that spread through all the homes.  As shocking as learning that more than half a quadrant died, it wasn't that shocking when I thought about the tall apartment buildings that only had one stairwell in the middle with no fire escapes, that was the most common form of housing over there so it did make sense.  It also happened at night so maybe the people woke up when it was too late.

"Citizens, there are approximately 225 people that survived the fires that tore through quadrant four last night and they are now homeless as their dwellings have been burnt to a crisp.  As the rebuilding for this remaining population is going on, these people will be turned over to everyone in the intact quadrants.  We will split the 225 people up evenly by family that's left among the 3 remaining quadrants and we will have a raffle to determine which dwelling each quadrant four family will be placed in for the duration of the rebuilding period of quadrant four. Thank you citizens!" That was what one of the mystery government officials announced to us that morning.

That is how I met Zach.  My family was selected to temporarily house his family of three.  When the meeting concluded, my family of four then escorted Zach, his sister who was my age, Leah, and their mom back to our dwelling.  The walk had been extremely uncomfortable as we were bringing strangers into our home.  But immediately as we entered our home, the mom went over to my parents and hugged each of them saying, "Thank you so much, I know you're basically being forced to take us in, but I'm very grateful."

From that moment on, my parents and their mom, Ellen, became very close.  It had been awkward for me especially in the beginning though because of how close we all were in age, except Mel.  I felt like I needed to become friends with them since they were staying in our home.  I had also been unhappy about having to give up my room and sleep in Mel's room during their stay so the three of them could sleep in my room.  In the beginning I had just been being nice to them because I had to be.  But as time marched on, I began to almost think of them as my own family. 

As things progressed, Leah and I became like sisters since we were the same age and it was great.  I even started hanging around Zach too when Leah was out or busy since I was only a little over a year older than him.  We clicked well and became pretty good friends fast.  He confided in me and we would talk about everything together.  He was having a tough time after his father was killed in the fire and I was kind of his go to person to talk to as he told me he didn't have that great of friends.  Eddy and Shannon, and even Leah occasionally, would tell me that Zach liked me "like that", but I dismissed and denied it as I didn't want things to be weird between us and I really cherished our friendship.

Zach, Leah, and Ellen stayed with us for about a year.  When the announcement had came that all the residents of quadrant four should pack up and report back to their square for assignments, we were all kind of sad about it, as we really enjoyed each other being around all the time.  I could also tell as well as Leah, that Zach seemed the most upset about it, and I couldn't help but blush when Leah told me it was because of me.

So that day they packed up and went home to find a new dwelling all ready for them.  Me and my family worried that it would be a"new dwelling, new start" philosophy for them, but that wasn't what happened.  We all got together all the time and my friendship with Leah and Zach was the same as it had been.  Everything between us was great until the disease.

Obviously we were all devastated when Leah was taken from us.  I remember watching with tears in my eyes as I had to watch two of my best friends be pulled away from me that day. 

When I got home from school that day, I went to call Zach so we could cope together because he had to feel the pain I felt or more, it was his sister, but he didn't answer.  I tried calling the whole first month, but he had shut down.  He wouldn't talk to me, and I was hurt.  After a month he started to come around and would talk to me, but barely.  I couldn't understand why he would shut me out like he was doing, because I loved Leah as much as him.  And the worst part was that outside school, I saw him with other friends and that told me he only chose to ignore me. I had originally thought that he just wanted to be alone because of Leah, but this disproved that idea. When people started to get released and Leah hadn't been one of them, I was distraught.  Even though Shannon had been alright, it only eased the pain a little.  And the situation with Zach was even worse.  The minimal talking we had been doing went to nothing at all. 

That's why today when I passed him in the hall I was shocked as he meekly looked me straight in the face and murmured, "Hey El."

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