Before he could speak, I said, “We’d better fetch the others.” He shook his head and got up. I suspect he found my behavior frustrating. I did too.
We didn’t need to get up. We could hear them crashing through the trees, not even trying to be quiet. Deshi burst through first, looking at us like he had caught us doing something inappropriate. I gave him a scowl for his insinuation.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
They all looked panicked and breathless. Clara stumbled up behind them, lagging. I was annoyed by the fact that they let her fall behind. Once they all stopped talking at once, I could hear what had sent them barreling through the forest. The familiar sound of chopper blades cutting through the air sounded unnatural under the canopy of the trees. It started quite far away but slowly the noise increased, until all we could hear was the brrrrr of the aircraft. The trees were swaying. The birds had stopped singing. We all dove down and hid under bushes, rocks, or whatever we could find. I grabbed Clara and shoved her under a sage bush. Searching for a place to hide, I could see Joseph calling me over to him. He was squashed under a rock ledge near the water’s edge. I saw a fallen branch, between them both, and pulled it on top of myself. Being small, it covered my whole body quite well, my grey uniform blending into the rocks around us. I curled up. From the air, I would have looked like a rock that a branch had fallen on. Out of the corner of my vision, I could see Joseph rolling his eyes at me. It was catching.
The craft hovered temporarily, sitting in the air like a giant dragonfly, but after a few minutes, it veered northeast. I breathed a sigh of relief—we all did. At least it was heading away from where we were going.
That was the first day we saw the choppers. From then on, they were our constant companions.
The choppers were unrelenting. Always drawn to our position, like flies to rotting carrion. There was no pattern to follow. Sometimes one would come in the morning and that would be it. Other times, three or four would come at different intervals throughout the day. We decided we would walk alongside the tracks, rather than on them, so that we had time to hide when we heard them coming. What I was unsure of was whether they were looking for us. They never hovered over one place for very long. They always veered off to the northeast eventually. As far as Alexei knew, there was no settlement out that way.
We all developed our own methods for hiding. Clara dropped and rolled under a bush. I always pulled something over me. Alexei and Apella always wasted time looking for a place big enough to hide them both. Joseph and Deshi went for whatever was closest. We started to get into a rhythm, warning each other when one of us heard them coming. It slowed us down a lot though.
Water was no longer a problem either. We knew what to look for, and once we did, we found there were bountiful streams meandering through the woods. They cut through the land, like shards of a shattered mirror, beautiful and strange water plants poking out around the banks. Alexei even managed to catch us some fish. He squatted over the water, watchful, eyes darting impossibly fast. The fish zipped in, out, and under rocks, like they knew. Poised, he waited for his moment and snapped, quick as a whip, pulling a fish out with his bare, shaking hands. Joseph and Deshi had a try. It was hilarious to watch them. Most of the time they both ended up in the water, laughing and pushing each other over. I tried too but my balance was so off I couldn’t squat over the water for very long. It just irritated me, so I gave up.
It was also nice to be able to wash. I don’t know why it made such a difference, but I felt so much better after I had bathed. Clara and I would walk down to a stream before dinner. Wash ourselves and clean our hair. We rinsed out our clothing and letting it dry in the sun. Clara would braid my hair in all sorts of odd configurations. I let her, but wished I had a mirror so I could check that she hadn’t made me look too ridiculous.
She pestered me about Joseph constantly. Pulling my hair back with her thin fingers, she asked, “So what are you going to do about him?”
“About who?”
“Really, Rosa?” I could sense her eyes rolling at me behind my back.
She pulled my hair back sharply. “Ouch! Not so hard”
“You’re not being very fair to him. Have you even thanked him for rescuing us?” she said in that motherly tone.
“Save your mothering for that little monster you’re carrying,” I snapped.
“Hold still.”
“Ouch!” Clara’s fingernails were digging into my scalp.
“Oops, sorry,” she giggled, returning to her girlish self.
That night I returned to the campfire and Joseph and Deshi fell backwards off their seats with laughter. Apparently, I looked remarkably similar to an octopus. I touched my head, eight chunky plaits protruding from it at different angles.
“Thanks Clara,” I said, frowning.
“Oh, come now,” Clara said between fits of hysterical giggling. “I think you make quite a beautiful octopus.”
I smiled, shaking my head around, my tentacles bashing into each other. I felt like she was peeling layers off me, stripping back the roughness. Shining her faith into me, and airing out the darkest corners.
Once, Clara pulled just the front part back into two thin plaits, letting the rest of my hair fall down around my shoulders, placing tiny, white, star-shaped flowers around my crown like a wreath. When we returned, Joseph stood. He looked stunned. I worried she had made me look stupid again. I went to pull it out. Joseph put his hand up, “No, leave it. It looks… it looks good.” Now he was blushing.
The group mostly ate from the box but I preferred to eat what I could find in the forest. I discovered I had absorbed quite a lot of information from my time at the Classes, and I enjoyed foraging for food.
At night, the non-pregnant members of the group took turns taking watch. We always camped under trees that would be easy to climb, in case the wolves returned, but we never heard from them again. I wondered whether the choppers had scared them off. Then again, we had walked quite far. We may have managed to get out of their territory.
Clara was so slow. She said she felt good. But to me, she looked ill. That thing seemed to be dragging her lower to the ground. I was very worried about her. My foot was healing well and I didn’t need help to walk anymore, so I insisted that Joseph help her and carry her when he could. When I did stumble, Deshi was kind enough to offer a shoulder to lean on.
Deshi was a good friend to Joseph, and even though there would always be a slight unease between us, he helped me when he could. We were starting to be friends. If anything, we had a mutual interest. I don’t think he resented me; maybe he was just a little sad.
Clara seemed like she must only be days away, judging by how long we had been out here and my vague memories of them saying she was thirty-six weeks when she had her ‘scare’. I resolved to speak to Apella about Clara’s condition and what we needed to look out for. I had only a vague idea what labor would be like. It was not something my mother ever talked about, but I was sure it would be painful. And without the normal facilities, it was going to be very challenging and probably dangerous.
As we were walking, I decided to catch up with the spindly couple and talk to Apella. I had barely said two words to her since my rescue, so the surprised look on her face was expected.
“I need to talk to you about Clara,” I said directly. She nodded.
“How long do you think she’s got to go?” I asked.
“It could be today or a week from now, any day really,” she said calmly.