Resist

10

The stairwell just sat in silence, stunned in my case, as I stared back at Jack. After several moments, Nessa broke in. “Estelle, are you okay?” she asked again.

“What happened?” I asked, finally pulling my gaze from Jack to her, turning my back to the boys.

“Well Sicily woke up and you weren’t in the room and we were debating looking for you when we heard you yelling.”

“I was yelling?”

“Yes,” Sicily said, moving up next to Nessa. “Essie, who’s Ivan?”

I gulped, my eyes stinging at the sound of his name. I averted my gaze from them, quickly sneaking a glance over my shoulder again to check the landing. I was hoping the boys would all be gone; I didn’t want them to see me cry. It was hard to hear my brothers’ names, even after six years. But they were still there.

“No one, I just had a bad dream,” I said quickly.

Sicily looked like she wanted to push it but Nessa shot her a look and they both backed off a bit. “Okay well why don’t you come back and sleep in a bed,” Nessa suggested with a smile. I was grateful for their kindness up to this point but it was aggravating me that they seemed to be treating me like a child right now.

I stood up anyways, wanting to go sleep in the bed as lumpy and old as the mattress may be. Sicily cleared her throat as I turned and was met by the wall of people in the doorway.

“Oh yah so we’ll be back off to bed,” Will announced not so subtly, picking up on her hint. He turned, ushering the other boys out before him. I didn’t get another look at Jack, he was out of sight too quickly but somehow I knew he still was wearing the same expression.

The boys went to their rooms, muttering sleepy goodnights as they returned to the sleeping quarters. We made our way back to ours, my stomach knotting when I saw the door thrown open, the room obviously left in quite a hurry.

“How loud was I?”

“Boomingly loud, we heard you no problem from our room and as you saw you woke other people up,” Sicily told me. “But seriously, who is Ivan?”

I guess she thought now that we were alone I would share. Too bad for her I still wasn’t. I just shook my head as I peeled back the blanket, tossing myself down and pulling the quilt over my legs, my back to my roommates.

Sicily and Nessa woke early, needing to be down to the kitchens to make breakfast. I woke with them, seeing no reason I couldn’t get up and start helping at an early time too although I was completely exhausted. My nightmare had stolen any restfulness from my first bought of sleep and the second had only been a few hours long.

“Do you think I should try and help in the kitchens again?” I asked Nessa as she laced up her boots. Seeing her doing so reminded me that I still needed new ones, mine falling apart worse now than the day I had gone searching for some and ended up here.

“If you want or you could go talk to Gavin and figure out what he actually wants to assign you to do, like once you’re settled in and healed up.”

I decided to go see Gavin, not wanting to spend a ton of time with Sicily and Nessa looking out for me. Just in the room this morning it seemed like they had been watching me closely, seeming to think I would begin yelling or crying at a moment’s notice. Why couldn’t they just pass of the incident as a bad nightmare? People had those all the time and brushed them off upon awaking, why weren’t they assuming I would be the same way?

We parted ways at the bottom of the stairs, the walk down them an awkward reminder, and I headed to the room at the very end of the hall, opposite the dining hall, weaponry, and ward.

“Come in,” he called as soon as I knocked. I opened the door to step in, surprised by how much stuff was in the space. And it was truly just tons of stuff. It looked as though supplies from raids had been being tossed in the corner for ages, things The Recovery had stolen but not yet found a use, boxes and crates labeled with paint, all stamped with Xavier’s insignia, showing from where they had been taken. There were also shelves of books and papers, an attempt to organize this resistance although it didn’t look very organized; books were stacked, teetering, and papers were shuffled about, the corners not matching up in stacks or even remotely close.

And on one side of the room, Gavin was sitting at his desk, missing several drawers and the chair sagging, pouring over a map with small ink X’s scattered around.

“Ah nice to see you Essie,” he greeted when he had looked up. “What brings you here?”

“I just wanted to talk to you about my use here,” I told him, getting straight to the point so as to no waste his time.

He nodded, waiting for me to add more.

“Well once Eden says I’m healed I of course will need to contribute. It seems that all your women work in the kitchens and do sewing however and I honestly don’t care to do that, and I can’t.”

“So you want to fight?” he said, seeing exactly where I was going with this.

“Yes, I do.”

“Well I’ll tell you now that everyone here is trained, even minimally, in fighting. Sicily and Nessa, although they don’t go on raids or anything, both know how to defend themselves. But I see what you’re saying and I myself understand; when I was young I would have never wanted to sit by and let others be the proactive ones.”

Was he agreeing to this? I had rather assumed that in this anti-feministic world I would be asked to help cook anyways. “So are you saying you will train me to go on raids and fight?”

“Yes, once you’re healed we will have you try out weapons and prepare you for that type of work.”

“Thank you Gavin!” I gushed.

“No problem at all, I know you’ll put your full heart into it and you will be an asset here so I would be a fool to say no.”

I smiled as I backed out of the office, Gavin turning his head back to the map and letting out a deep sigh. I wondered for a moment what he was stressing about on that piece of paper.

I stepped backwards out the door and turned, running into a something very solid and unbudging. I got a sense of déjà vu, turning my head slowly to discover if my suspicion is correct.

And it was. Jack was standing, arms at his sides, looking down at me with a slightly bemused expression. But only slightly, he still didn’t seem to show emotion that much, apart from yesterday flying and last night on the stairs.

“You really need to start looking where you’re going when you are coming out of doors,” Jack told me, a smile in his voice. But he returned to being dead serious as I closed the door with a soft click.

I went to walk past him, I assumed he was about to head into the office, when he spoke again. “Hey Essie, are you okay? After last night and all?”

“Yah,” I said, throwing a fake smile on my face. “I’m fine.”

Jackson didn’t look like he bought it and opened his mouth to protest but the door opened beside us.

“Oh Jack, I thought I heard your voice,” Gavin said. “Get in here, we need to plan some things.”

Jack looked back at me again as Gavin disappeared into the cluttered office, assuming he would follow.

 “Bye Jack,” I called as I walked away down the hall, turning and not looking back at him. I heard his feet shuffle into the room and the door click shut again and I breathed a sigh of relief. Somehow, I felt myself getting more attached to this strange boy and I didn’t like it.