Taken (Erin Bowman)

died young; and, after being unable to locate her father in Crevice Valley, she assumes he’s dead. I learn a few other things, trivial really, but for some reason, they fascinate me more than her historical details. Bree’s elbows are double jointed. She has a birthmark in the shape of a crescent moon on her hip. Her favorite color is deep, rugged purple, the shade of silhouetted clouds against an evening sky. She hasn’t yet adjusted to sleeping without the sound of waves crashing on the shore.
    As the game continues, the laughter in the Tap Room becomes an infectious disease. Everyone is doing it. I can’t remember the last time I laughed so freely.
    Sometime much, much later, when we are all thoroughly giddy and a bit too gone, Bree attempts to visit the bar in search of another drink and instead falls off her stool. Polly shrieks with delight, as if this is the funniest thing, and the rest of us chuckle along in amusement.
    “I’m gonna take her back,” I tell the others. She’s had enough, and no one argues with me. It takes us longer than it should to get to her quarters. I’m dizzy myself, not terribly, but Bree keeps directing me down incorrect passageways and we have to double back with uneven steps. She clings to my neck the entire time, her weight mostly supported by my arms, and mumbles incoherent things that I know she wouldn’t be saying if it weren’t for the alcohol: how nice I am, how she’s thankful I stuck up for her with Drake, how she wishes she could go back and not be so cruel to me when I was first brought in.
    “It’s really hard discovering the truth,” she mumbles as we get to her place. “And it was probably terrifying . . . you know? How we treated you like a prisoner . . . a Forgery.” She pauses for a second and adds, “I’m sorry I wasn’t nicer.”
    “No, you’re not,” I tell her. I let go of her cautiously as I fumble to open the door. She stands wavering on the spot, like tall grass in a breeze.
    “Yes, I am. I’m sorry,” she says stubbornly. Her shirt is hanging lazily off one of her shoulders and her eyes look confused, soft blue seas. She steps very close to me, so close that her eyelashes brush my chin, and leans in, pressing her hands into my chest. I know what she wants and I pull my head away.
    “Why won’t you kiss me?” she asks simply. Her voice sounds like a child’s.
    “You don’t want me to kiss you.”
    “Yes, I do.”
    “No. You don’t.” We stand frozen in the doorway and she drops her hands to her sides.
    “You don’t think I’m pretty.”
    “That’s not it,” I admit.
    “Then why? You got a girl already? You married?”
    “What’s married ?”
    “You know—two people, with rings. Together forever.” She’s swaying again, blowing ever so gently. I think of Emma. Two people. Together, like the birds.
    “No, I’m not married,” I say.
    “Then kiss me.” Her hands press onto my chest and she leans into me again, but I pull away. It’s harder to resist her this time. There’s this urge inside me, tugging, telling me that I should follow my feelings. It’s what I always do. But this isn’t really Bree, and this isn’t really me, either. We are in cloudy bodies, foggy reflections of ourselves. We are feeling things that we might not tomorrow. And I love Emma. Emma, not Bree.
    “I can’t,” I say, taking her hands in mine and squeezing them. Her skin is warm, on fire in my palms, and the words escape me before I can reflect on them. “But if you wake up tomorrow and you still want me to kiss you, I will.”
    Bree smiles, and then bends over to throw up on my boots.

TWENTY-NINE
    THE NEXT MORNING, WHEN I report to the Conditioning Room for training, Bree is nowhere to be found. Elijah runs us through another session of torturous hell. Every muscle in my body is stiff, pulled taut like an overstretched bow. I think I may snap in two, but as the drills continue, I slowly loosen up.
    When the session finally ends, Elijah congratulates me on another strong performance, and then disappears with my father for a status meeting. I head to the Eatery for lunch but halfway there change directions and visit the hospital instead.
    Blaine is on the same bed, wearing clean bandages. He still sleeps. I stand in the doorway and stare at him. A nurse urges me on, but she doesn’t realize I’m terrified. Spending time with a person you may lose is the worst kind of torture. Blaine and I went through it with our mother.