Deceit: Post-Apocalyptic Dystopian Thriller - Book 3 (Caustic) Read online

  It had been five years since she’d last felt the touch of his hands, or his warm breath on her skin. She listened to the memory of his voice, and the way he used to call out her name from across the classroom. She’d lose the sound of his voice eventually, she knew that, but she was thankful to still be able to hear it.

  Older than she was, he’d sat in the back row, giving him a clear view whenever he wanted to steal a glimpse. She’d tried to catch him staring from time to time. It had been just a game at first, but then it’d become something much more, and she’d made the decision that she’d choose him when she came of age.

  Thinking of him now, her heart got heavy, as it always did, and soon Nolan faded from her, and so too did the moment. He’d forever be in her mind; that was his resting place, not the farming floor, where she’d participated in his cleaning and passing.

  Isla’s heart thumped with pain, and the haunting memories of Nolan surfaced, seeping into her thoughts like the harbinger of death, eager to deliver a reminder of what had happened. She put her hand to her chest and shuddered, overwhelmed. Her time with Nolan had been short. Soon after choosing him, he’d died. And, since he was her chosen, she’d followed each service of the rite, staying with the mortician to witness his passing to the farming floor. She remembered the mortician consoling her. His deep voice, his gentle touch.

  “I miss you, Nolan.” She whispered the familiar sentiment. She hoped that there would come a time when she’d see his face and hear his voice without the other memories needling in like the ocean salts that tainted the air. But the two seemed forever joined, and maybe that was the way it was supposed to be. Maybe she could only remember the bad with the good. Maybe she’d been sentenced to recall the pain of how he’d died with the joy of how they’d lived.

  Isla swiped a tear from her eye, putting aside thoughts of Nolan for now. Clearly, she was alive. But how? And what was this strange room? And what was with the rested feeling? As painful and emotional as the memories plaguing her mind were, she couldn’t dismiss how utterly relaxed and alive she felt. Ironic, she thought, as she considered what she’d done to get here.

  For a moment, she didn’t want to move. A tingling feeling crept along her legs and back, and then to her arms. Soon all of her body was tingling, and she liked what she felt—she didn’t want it to stop, An almost euphoric sensation enveloped every muscle, every pore. She sighed, and then moaned, catching her lips with her finger, taken by the sudden expression in her voice. A distant concern called for her to get up and leave. This wasn’t her home; not her dwelling, not her cot. But the distance of that thought grew, and any urgency to consider it dulled until she’d dismissed it.

  “This is my home, now. I love it,” she said. Lifting her chin, she liked the sound of her words in the room. And as if listening and appreciating the comment, the bed embraced her. Unlike the cot in her dwelling, this bed held her form, pushing back, as if suspending her in the air. She stirred, welcoming the pretend sense of attachment, even if it was just her mind playing tricks on her.

  There was something else, too—not that she could put her finger on it. There was something more that made her feel different. It was life, she finally concluded, and a wave of guilt rose in her quickly before shrinking away. She felt more alive than she’d ever remembered.

  Isla became aware that her skin was bare beneath the silver sheet. Blowing out a shallow laugh, she wrinkled her brow, surprised that she’d been sleeping in the nude. She’d never slept in the nude before; much of the time she’d been uncomfortable even looking at herself naked. She blushed—but it was a good blush, a welcome one. The feel of her bare skin didn’t bother her like she’d expected. In fact, there was a sense of liberation. Freedom.

  Her thoughts went back to the Commune, and their mortician. Shame crept into her thoughts as she imagined the mortician staring down at her naked body during the rite of cleaning and passing. So strong was her shyness that she’d stayed dressed in her gray coveralls the night she had ended her life. But none of that seemed to matter now.

  With her fingers splayed, she rubbed her hands up and down the sides of her body. Exhilaration followed; she was freed from the needs or regimen of clothing. The silver sheet on her skin was warm, and absent the scratchy wool of her own blankets. She liked the way her skin felt against the strange material: sleek and fine. She wanted more. Grinning, she stretched herself, rolled onto her belly, and then back.

  When an absent pain gripped her arms, she was reminded of how she’d died, or how she thought she’d died. Her smile turned bitter. She’d expected to be dead, and she’d expected an end to her mourning for Nolan. She’d waited through the years that they would have had together to start a family. She’d waited until the anniversary of his death. And on the eve of the day when her time to have children was over, she’d ended her life. Although, if she was really in this room, alive, then she’d failed.

  Another sharp ache cut into her, piercing her left arm this time. She clenched, and pulled her fingers into a fist around her wrist. Hands trembling, she pulled her clutched hand up to her chest and peered down over her bosom. A menagerie of images juggled in and out of her mind: images of what she’d done. More pains pushed into her, causing her to gasp. Isla hesitated before lifting a finger, expecting to see blood pulsing from beneath the secret she’d been hiding. With the blood, there’d be regret; her life would pour from her, carrying with it remorse for what she’d done. How could she ever repay those whom she’d hurt?

  Swallowing against the thickness in her throat, Isla lifted her fingers, and suddenly saw images of her mother and father standing next to the mortician, holding a cleaning cloth and the bowl of water with the decomp salts. She shook these images from her mind and released her hands.

  There was nothing. The violations she’d prepared her eyes to see were gone. Confusion circled her thoughts, and there was an eerie sense that what she’d done had been a dream—but she knew that couldn’t be the case. No dream had ever been that vivid, that real. Moving her fingers to touch this skin that lied to her, she couldn’t find what she knew should have been there. The scars she’d expected to see remained hidden, the imagined pain was gone. Her confusion turned to a broader concern as she searched both arms and recalled the exactness of what she’d done. The details, the motions, and the count, always the count: exactness was what she was best at. As the Commune’s research and development lead for all things relating to structure preservation, nobody could run the compounds, resins, and epoxy labs like she could.

  A soft a breeze took her attention. The sound seemed to emanate from the artwork on the wall. As Isla settled her eyes on the image, she pulled the blanket against her body and let the bed hold her. In the painting, she saw a desert: sands sweeping across the crests of a hillside, stray grains that tumbled and fell, all resting beneath the light of a white sun. Isla’s breathing slowed, deepening, as she studied the artwork. With each breath, the breeze pushed and pulled the white sand between the desert hills.

  When the lights above her door fluttered a new sequence of colors, she knew it was time to go to her lab and start working. After all, what good was attention to detail without adherence to a schedule? Swinging her legs over the side of the bed, she shook her head, wondering how she could know where to go. How could she know anything? But she did know. The lights told her where she was. She was home now.

  Knowing this, Isla pulled her arms tight against her chest, and was suddenly afraid. Not because she didn’t know where she was—but because she didn’t know why.

  3

  James Sundref peered up at the executive guards and nodded. Their faces remained unchanged, void of expression. How many times since his promotion to four bands had he offered this simple gesture? How many times had he been ignored? After all, he was an executive, and that should command a certain level of respect, shouldn’t it? James shrugged his meaty shoulders and supposed the guards just didn’t care who he was.

  He gave a glu
m look to the balcony’s ledge and a feeling of calm washed over him. In a moment, his final career advancement would take him to the top of the ledge—where he’d leap to his death. He imagined himself perched atop it, his round frame trying to balance itself in the moment before jumping. Just how far down is it to the courtyard? He quickly dismissed the question, knowing that it didn’t matter, that he had to go through with it. There were no more options.

  James paused, thinking of all the lives he’d affected in the Commune, the largest community in the region. How many? he wondered. All of them? The number he saw in his head was daunting, and the guilt pressed down on him. Before he could take another step, he heard the curious turn of the guard’s head. James immediately realized what he’d done. Standing in front of the executive entrances was not permitted. Well aware of the rule he’d just broken, he pulled in a resigned breath and moved on. James knew all the rules. He knew them because he’d written most of them, just as he had written his final Commune rule earlier that morning.

  “What does it matter now, anyway?” he mumbled. “I’m a dead man.” He tugged at the collar of his coveralls, trying to make room for the fatty folds around his neck. Choking back his breath, he shivered against the coolness of a light sweat on his skin. He shook again, knowing death was waiting for him.

  When he reached the ledge, he realized for the first time just how high the executive floors were. His stomach immediately went to his throat, and he heaved in a breath that shuddered with fear. For a moment, his insides flipped, and he tried to commit his mind to the jump that would end his life.

  Yet, maybe there were options. Maybe he could exile himself? But the idea of fending for himself outside the safety of the Commune made him laugh. He chuckled as he imagined a fat man running in the fog while Outsiders chased him down. Leaping from the executive floor was an easier death. It was quick and painless… he hoped.

  Janice Gilly’s face came into his mind, and his laugh abruptly ended. His smile turned down into a frown as he considered how he’d broken their bond. Choosing was forever, and while she’d chosen him, James had decided to become an executive instead. Even after their time to have a child had expired, she’d wanted to continue their lives together. He could have stayed with her. He should have stayed with her. But his work—his mistress—had called to him, lied to him, told him half-truths about the good he would do in the name of the Commune. Without a child to raise, leaving Janice was just the easier thing to do. But easier for whom?

  Regret followed and he shut his eyes, welcoming the darkness. He considered how there was more to blindness than just the absence of sight. He’d been blind to what he’d had with Janice, blind to the outcome of his ill-fated decision. It was just a promotion. He could see that now, but it was too late. It had been too late for a very long time. James wondered if maybe she’d forgotten about him? He hoped that she had, and that the pain he’d caused was just a mere thought, a fleeting memory.

  He could see the faces of those who had died as a result of his actions. But, of course, someone in his position knew they weren’t just dead. It wasn’t that simple. He’d come to learn that small fact, and had wished he’d known less. There were secrets behind the doors of the executive offices, and he’d had his fill of them for one lifetime.

  James gripped the ledge, his soft pudgy fingers scraping against the coarse resin that was meant to protect. He looked briefly at the dimpling in his palms before taking hold again. It never had to be like this. He winced, and then tried to lift himself up onto the small divide that separated life from death. At once he felt himself begin to struggle. Blood rushed into his face, and sharp lights streaked across his eyes. He coughed a flood of air from his lungs, gasping, and finally dropped back to his feet. Turning away from the ledge, he began to cry. How pathetic had he become? He couldn’t even lift himself.

  From the corner of his eye, he saw that he’d roused the attention of one of the executive guards. Lifting his hand, he swiped at the sweat rolling from atop his head, and waved.

  “Indigestion, is all,” he explained. “I’ll be fine in a minute.”

  The guard stared a moment, motionless, before turning back to stand at attention. James forced himself up and around and leaned over the ledge. The courtyard far below him was nearly empty. A few children ran around, playing chase with one another, their parents gathered into small circles, trading stories or gossiping. He enjoyed watching the children run freely in the courtyard. The child-tethering rule he’d authored that morning wouldn’t have been enforced yet. The children were free today, but in a week that would change.

  A lot of things were going to change. More than one new rule was being passed, and his hands were on all of them.

  A quick death would anger the upper executive levels once they’d found out what he’d done. James let out a deep, gratifying sigh and smiled. They would have wanted him exiled from the Commune. The weaponized flu they’d given him to use would be too merciful, too quick. They would want him to suffer at the hands of the Outsiders, or starve on the black sands of the beaches, eating salt-gnats and drinking seawater until his insides burst.

  An earthy scent came to him in a pleasurable whiff. He’d always loved the smell of plant life rising from the farming floor. Yet today, the farms struck a grim note. With the redolence came images of his being alone during his cleaning and passing. An unsettling notion came next: that nobody would be with him as he was passed to the farming floor. He thought of Sandra Chambers and her daughter Hadley, and the executives that had attended their cleaning and passing. He was supposed to have gone, too. He’d tried to go. Biting his lower lip, he thought of how he’d stood just out of view, just far enough to still hear the boy, Declan, grieving for his mother and sister. He’d stayed and listened until the completion of the rite and then the passing of their bodies. He’d stayed, but was never seen.

  Sandra Chambers knew, too. She’d known what the upper-level executives were doing. Now it wouldn’t be long before everyone knew. She wasn’t supposed to know, James reminded himself. She was just a junior executive. Innocent. She would have never known what was really going on if it weren’t for his carelessness. Her finding out was his fault. A rush of guilt hit him, knotting his gut as he leaned into the balcony ledge, overwhelmed.

  It was just supposed to make her sick. I used the exact amount. Shaking his head, he regretted his naivety and the storm of lies he’d been so willing to trust. Why did I listen to them? He leaned harder against the ledge, feeling it pressing into his middle, threatening to take his breath. She was only supposed to get sick: sick enough to miss the meeting and the vote. The damn vote. And why was her daughter with her? James felt a cramp in his heart, and for a moment he was certain he was going to keel over before he got the chance to jump. He imagined dying on the balcony, his heart exploded in his chest. His thoughts returned to Sandra’s daughter, Hadley: another innocent victim in the mess he’d created, a bystander who drank from the same cup as her mother. Sandra’s death and the death of her daughter were both his to bear, and the guilt was his to die with. And maybe that’s what fueled the guilt faster, hotter. Death would douse those flames.

  As he stood there, paralyzed with guilt, his gut spilling over the ledge, he spotted activity below. A balding man stumbled through the collection of children playing in the courtyard. The man shuffled his feet past the huddled parents, waving once, then falling. Recognition struck James, and it nearly brought him to his knees: the man was Richard Chambers, Sandra’s husband, the father of Hadley and Declan. Executive guards were already approaching Richard, eager to remove the intoxicated sight from the Commune’s courtyard.

  I did that to him, James thought. I broke that man.

  James shook off a tear as an unnatural calm came over him. He huffed out the air in his lungs. He was ready. From his front coverall pocket, he pulled a small index card and turned it over so that the rows of numbers were facing him. He pushed his finger across the imprint of inky black
and squared glyphs, studying them.

  “This is what started it all!” he shouted, and snapped his head over to the executive office entrance and the guards standing there. They turned in the direction of his voice while he ripped the index card in half. The sound and feel of the shredding rushed through him like a climactic release. Ending what he’d started, and knowing his time was coming, James tore into each new half, eager to finish. He tore the halves again and again before throwing the pieces from the balcony. The executive guards were approaching him now, uncertainty and confusion replacing their normally blank expressions.

  It was time.

  The muscles in his arms quivered under the strain of his weight, and then began to shake as he desperately pushed himself onto the ledge. He was crying, and a mix of running sweat and tears needled his eyes, but it wasn’t due to the thought of what he was about to do; it was because of the misery he’d caused Sandra’s family, and for the regret he felt at losing the love of his life. He’d broken his bond with Janice Gilly, and for what? Who had he become in the years since he’d been with her? What was his contribution? Rules? Janice had contributed. As a teacher, she’d influenced and mentored her students. And maybe subconsciously it was to compensate for the lack of having children, yet even so her work was admirable: righteous and pure. He’d instead spent his time learning things he didn’t want to know, and writing rules to uphold them.

  As he got feet under him and began to stand, he was no longer crying—he was laughing. And as he stood atop the ledge, balancing with his arms outstretched, he heard the rapid pummeling of feet hitting the balcony floor, and the hollering of the guard’s voices as they shouted at him to get down. After all, standing on the balcony ledge was against Commune rules. He’d written that rule too.