Goodhouse by Peyton Marshall

the flaming building, even through my partially closed eyes, I could see the man’s composed, almost bored expression. His thick white hair was slicked back like a helmet. And then this man was walking toward me, feet crunching in the frosty grass. He was humming to himself, a little tune I didn’t recognize. He stood there for what felt like a very long time. There were little metallic clicks as if he were checking his gun. It was probably no more than fifteen seconds, but it seemed interminable. I imagined I was dead. I am grass. I am air , I thought. But I was glowing with life, waiting for some treacherous limb to twitch, half wanting to stand up and fight. If it had to happen, if I had to be shot, then I wanted it to be done already. I wanted to be on the other side of the experience—away from the dying. I am empty , I thought, I am empty , and when the proctor beside me groaned, the man fired into him. I was the frost on the lawn. I was the night itself. I was nothing at all.
    And so I was simultaneously lying in the grass and fighting my way through the hallways in the Exclusion Zone. There was a breath on the back of my neck, and even when I spilled out into a lighted room, I was blind. I was everywhere and nowhere, dimly aware of guards cheering behind some sort of wire cage. But I was fighting the men in red masks. I was fighting my way back into the burning building, racing up the corner of the dormitory and into the janitor’s closet. My friends were all still alive and I could get to them. I was stronger than time, stronger than fact. I would open the walls, splinter the windows. This was a rescue mission, and my terror gave me the strength of two, and any person in my way was just a door to blow open. It was not until several guards pinned my arms and pushed me flat that I saw where I was. I saw the body I was fighting, the one that now lay very still. I saw the blue-inked tattoos, the shaggy hair, and then I saw my mistake.

 
    PART TWO
    THE SAFEST PLACE TO BE

 
    SIX
    I don’t clearly remember leaving the Exclusion Zone. Several guards subdued me even though I’d stopped fighting; one of them hit me hard on the side of the head. I do remember being carried outside through the night—I remember hearing Davis shout at someone, his voice tense and angry. At one point I opened my eyes and saw Tuck beside me, lying on a stretcher in some kind of triage facility. It was tiled like a shower. Machines loomed above me; a plastic bag dripped saline into my arm.
    â€œThey’re both stable,” a voice said. But when I opened my eyes again, Tuck was gone. A pile of blood-soaked bandages and cut-open clothes had been heaped onto the stretcher. A female nurse—a woman with short red hair and a bright blue stethoscope around her neck—leaned over me.
    Time passed in fragmentary images. I faded in and out. Water stains like rust-colored flowers bloomed on the ceiling tiles overhead. The clock above the door had a broken hour hand that twitched as it pointed to the number 6. At one point, Ian sat on the end of my bed. He was still in his pajamas, telling me some story about how he’d covered the doorknobs with Vaseline. He left muddy footprints on the floor, and I worried I wouldn’t be able to clean them before they were noticed.
    When I finally came to, it was evening. I could smell the faintly salty, meaty stench of cafeteria food. My door was open, and Bethany stood beside me. At first I thought she was another hallucination, but her hand felt warm on my arm. “Wow,” she said. “You look like a cobbler. I mean, your face does. Have you had cobbler? I think peach is best, but not made from canned fruit.”
    â€œWhat are you doing here?” I said. “Where am I?” But my mouth felt thick and the words ran together. She was wearing a white lab coat that was much too big for her. The sleeves were rolled and the name Dr. A. J. Cleveland was