Prodigy

to cry. I cried for Ollie last night. I feel a little silly crying for my dog when the Republic killed our families, but I can’t help myself. Metias was the one who’d brought him home, a white ball of giant paws and floppy ears and warm brown eyes, the sweetest, clumsiest creature I’d ever seen. Ollie was my boy, and I’d left him behind.
    “What’d you dream?” I whisper to Day.
    “Nothing memorable.” Day shifts, then winces as he accidentally scrapes his wounded leg against the floor. His body tenses up from the pain, and I can tell how stiff his arms are beneath his shirt, knots of lean muscle earned from the streets. A labored breath escapes his lips.
The way he’d pushed me against that alley wall, the hunger in his first kiss.
I stop focusing on his mouth and shake off the memory, embarrassed.
    He nods toward the railcar doors. “Where are we now? We should be getting close, right?”
    I get up, glad for the distraction, and brace myself against the rocking wall as I peer out the railcar’s tiny window. The landscape hasn’t changed much—endless rows of apartment towers and factories, chimneys and old arching highways, all washed into blues and grayish purples by the afternoon rain. We’re still passing through slum sectors. They look almost identical to the slums in Los Angeles. Off in the distance, an enormous dam stretches halfway across my line of vision. I wait until a JumboTron flashes by, then squint to see the small letters on the bottom corner of the screen. “Boulder City, Nevada,” I say. “Really close now. The train will probably stop here for a while, but afterward it shouldn’t take more than thirty-five minutes to arrive in Vegas.”
    Day nods. He leans over, unties our food sack, and searches for something to eat. “Good. Sooner we get there, sooner we’ll find the Patriots.”
    He seems distant. Sometimes Day tells me what his nightmares are about—failing his Trial or losing Tess on the streets or running away from plague patrols. Nightmares about being the Republic’s most wanted criminal. Other times, when he’s like this and keeps his dreams to himself, I know they must be about his family—his mother’s death, or John’s. Maybe it’s better that he doesn’t tell me about those. I have enough of my own dreams to haunt me, and I’m not sure I have the courage to know about his.
    “You’re really set on finding the Patriots, aren’t you?” I say as Day pulls out a stale hunk of fried dough from the food sack. This isn’t the first time I’ve questioned his insistence on coming to Vegas, and I’m careful about the way I approach the topic. The last thing I want Day to think is that I don’t care about Tess, or that I’m afraid to meet up with the Republic’s notorious rebel group. “Tess went with them willingly. Are we putting her in danger by trying to get her back?”
    Day doesn’t answer right away. He tears the fried dough in half and offers me a piece. “Take some, yeah? You haven’t eaten in a while.”
    I hold a hand up politely. “No, thanks,” I reply. “I don’t like fried dough.”
    Instantly I wish I could stuff the words back in my mouth. Day lowers his eyes and puts the second half back into the food sack, then quietly starts eating his share. What a stupid, stupid thing for me to say.
I don’t like fried dough.
I can practically hear what’s going through his head.
    Poor little rich girl, with her posh manners. She can afford to
dislike
food.
I scold myself in silence, then make a mental note to tread more carefully next time.
    After a few mouthfuls, Day finally responds, “I’m not just going to leave Tess behind without knowing she’s okay.”
    Of course he wouldn’t. Day would never leave anyone he cares about behind, especially not the orphan girl he’s grown up with on the streets. I understand the potential value of meeting the Patriots too—after all, those rebels
had
helped Day and me escape Los Angeles. They’re large and well organized. Maybe they have information about what the Republic is doing with Day’s little brother, Eden. Maybe they can even help heal Day’s festering leg wound—ever since that fateful morning when Commander Jameson shot him in the leg and arrested him, his wound has been on a roller coaster of getting better and then worse. Now his left leg is a mass of broken, bleeding flesh. He needs medical attention.
    Still, we have one problem.
    “The Patriots won’t help us without some