Chapter Text
Nathan keeps shooting her little worried glances out of the corner of his eye.
Sara kind of wants to snap at him, to tell him to keep his eyes on the road, she’s fine. This black eye is far from the worst she’s had, and she’s really not sure why this was the fight that finally made her call Nathan to come pick her up. Most changes in Sara’s life haven’t been climactic events, just ordinary coincidences or small choices she made without even knowing why she was making them.
But she can’t bring herself to snap at Nathan right now--dear, patient Nathan, who got in his car before they were even off the phone and drove through the night all the way from Boston to get to her. To get her out of that house and somewhere safe.
Her phone rings in her lap. It’s Will, again. He’s been calling all day. Texting, too, telling her he’s sorry, he’s so fucking sorry, if she would just pick up the phone they could work this out.
He probably is sorry. He’s always sorry.
Nathan’s looking at her again, corners of his eyes crinkled up with worry. There are deep bags under them, marks of the sleepless night. Her stomach twists with guilt. “What?” she finally asks.
“You’re sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Why didn’t you call me sooner?” Nathan asks, eyes back on the road. “I told you if you needed me--I mean, I would have come right away, I would have done anything--”
“I did call, last night.”
“But it didn’t have to get this bad, Sara.” Nathan shakes his head, his hands flexing on the wheel. “I can’t believe I didn’t know.”
It’s got nothing to do with Nathan. But she doesn’t know how to say that. How can she explain that she’s always felt like a passenger in her own life and that being with Will only made it worse?
Nathan looks over at her, and something of what she’s thinking must show in her expression, because his gaze softens and he reaches out to her. “Doesn’t matter,” he says, squeezing her hand. “Sorry. Hey, open the glovebox.”
It seems like a non-sequitur, but Sara leans forward and opens it. And there, nestled between a stack of napkins and the car manual, is a little ceramic snowman, painted red and white and green.
Sara gasps. Gingerly, she cradles the snowman in her hands and lifts it out. “I thought Dad broke them all!”
“I found this one in a box of my old stuff,” Nathan says, grinning. “I was going to save it to give you at Christmas, but then I figured…” He shrugs. “I don’t know, it reminds me of when things were good. I thought you might want to see something familiar.”
Sara holds the little snowman against her chest, looking down at it. The paint is a little faded, but she still recognizes it as Nathan’s work. An ornament she’d picked out and he had painted. “Thank you,” she says quietly. It reminds her of sitting at the kitchen table with Nathan, getting paint all over the newspaper he’d laid out, with their mom in her bathrobe smoking a cigarette and smiling at them. It reminds her of old music playing on the radio, and her big brother reaching out and smearing paint on the tip of her nose.
“Shit,” Nathan mutters. The car slows.
Sara looks up. There’s a big, gnarled tree lying right across the road. Broken branches are scattered around it, and roots stretch out from a clump of dirt at the end.
Above them, crows are wheeling through the cloudy sky. Sara cranes her neck to look up at them. One lands on a branch beside the road and looks right at her with its beady eye. They all start a cacophony of harsh shrieks.
Sickening dread wells up inside her. She grabs Nathan’s arm. “Turn around.”
He looks at her, startled. “I guess we’ll have to. Are you okay?”
She’s gripping his sleeve too hard, but something about the nails-on-chalkboard screeching of the crows is making her entire body shake. “Turn around, Nathan!”
Without another word, he puts the car in reverse and spins it around. Sara glances over her shoulder at the fallen tree receding in the distance, then lost entirely as they turn a corner. She can’t hear the crows anymore, but her heart still beats rabbit-fast in her chest. The ceramic is cold in her hand. She’s gripping that too tightly, too.
The first time they go through the town, they barely even notice it. It’s just a small cluster of houses and buildings, like the ones that are all over this part of the state. The only thing that Sara even notices are the goats standing in their pen.
The second time through, Nathan slows. “That’s weird,” he murmurs. “This town looks just like the one we just went through.”
“Just like,” Sara echoes faintly. Something’s wrong.
Two men are standing outside the post office, watching the car. The older one makes eye contact with Sara in the passenger seat, and she holds his gaze for the long few seconds it takes the car to pass them.
The third time they go through the town, there are more people standing on porches or outside buildings, watching them. Those two men outside the post office are gone. Nathan steps on the gas, sending them screeching out of the little town. “Sara?” he says once they’re back between the trees, as though she might have an answer.
“I don’t know,” she says. “I don’t know.”
They go through the town a fourth time. Sara notes, absurdly, the peeling paint on the motel sign. Nathan’s knuckles are white on the steering wheel. His jaw is set with determination, like if he just keeps driving a little faster soon they will drive into a town that isn’t the exact same one they’ve been through four times now.
Just past the town, the two men from outside the post office are standing at the side of the road. “Maybe we should talk to them?” Sara suggests, just because talking to someone seems like it would be better than driving in circles, if that’s what they’re doing.
“I don’t trust anything that’s going on right now,” Nathan says, his voice low as if something might be listening. “I don’t--”
There is a loud “THUD” and the entire car lurches, then rolls to a stop. Without the noise of the road, Nathan’s rapid breathing fills the entire car. He glances over his shoulder, then looks at Sara. “They popped our tires.”
“Nathan, I don’t like this,” says Sara. Her voice is distant to her own ears.
“It’ll be okay,” says Nathan, sizing up the two men who are now ambling toward the car. The shorter one looks friendly, at least. “Just stay in the car.”
He opens the door and gets out. He’s keeping his hands in the open, and he has a neutral, placid expression. His “get-along” face, Sara thinks. The one he puts on when the situation is volatile, and he’s doing his best to keep someone stronger than him calm.
“‘Afternoon,” she hears the taller of the two men call. There's a sheriff’s star and a gun on his belt.
She pushes her door open.
“Afternoon,” Nathan says to the approaching men, cautious. “Any chance you guys can tell me what's going on?” He frowns at Sara as she comes up next to him, and takes a half-step in front of her.
“That’s actually exactly what we can do,” says the sheriff with a smile. “My name’s Boyd. I’m the sheriff here.”
“Nathan Myers,” says Nathan, shaking Boyd’s hand. “This is my sister, Sara.”
“And I’m Kenny,” says the younger man, also sticking out his hand, like he wants to make sure he’s part of this conversation. “I’m the deputy.”
Sheriff Boyd holds out his hand to Sara. “Nice to meet you, Sara,” he says as she shakes it. “That’s a nasty black eye you’ve got there.”
She’d forgotten about it. “I fell,” she lies, automatically.
Nathan shoots her a glance. The deputy looks at Boyd. Boyd scrutinizes Sara for a moment before looking away and clapping his hands. “Right. So, you two came across a tree in the middle of the road.”
“We did,” says Nathan. “Has it been there for a while?”
Kenny half-smiles, mirthlessly. “Something like that.”
“Why’d you pop our tires?” Sara asks.
“People around here aren’t used to moving cars,” says Boyd. “The two of you blazing through town at sixty miles an hour for the fifth time might have gotten people hurt.”
“The fifth time,” says Nathan, flatly. “How do we get out of here?”
“I’m sorry to tell you, but you can’t,” says Boyd. His voice is level, and Sara can see the truth of it in his face. “Let’s go back to the sheriff’s station. We can talk this through.”
Sara looks over at Nathan. She can tell by the way his jaw is working that he’s chewing on the inside of his cheek. “What about my car?” he asks finally. “I can’t just leave it in the middle of the street.”
“Nothing’s going to happen to it,” says Kenny. “No other cars are going to come down this road for at least a few days.”
Nathan looks at Sara. She shrugs. What else is there to do?
Nathan grabs Sara’s duffel bag from the trunk, and they follow Boyd and Kenny to the post office, which is apparently the sheriff’s station. A chalkboard sign next to the door says “NIGHTS WITHOUT INCIDENT: 20.” They sit in old chairs with threadbare seats, holding glasses of water that Kenny gets from somewhere in the back, and they listen to Boyd tell them about the nightmare they’ve fallen into.
By the time he finishes, Sara has her legs pulled up on the chair and her arms wrapped around her knees, like a little kid. Nathan’s sitting forward, his head in his hands.
“I know it’s a lot to take in,” Kenny says. “But it’s all true.”
“It sounds fucking crazy,” Nathan says, voice muffled by his hands.
Boyd chuckles. “Trust me, I know.”
Sara looks out the window. Two women about her age are walking past, one of them laughing. Another woman is carrying a big basket of what looks like onions over to the diner.
Monsters and talismans and a town where no one can leave. It’s unbelievable. Sara’s head hasn’t quite caught up. But her gut believes it.
“It’s normal if it takes you a little while to adjust,” Boyd says. He’s watching them both carefully. “You may not believe all of it right away. But you saw for yourselves that you can’t get out by road--so all we ask is that you follow the rules of the town, the rules that help us take care of each other and keep each other safe.”
Boyd proceeds to explain the rules: the sharing supplies, the food rations. When he explains the Box, both siblings sit up a little straighter. Of course there was going to be a catch behind “we all help each other here.”
Nathan’s chewing on the inside of his cheek again. “Have you ever used it?” he asks.
“Never had to,” Boyd’s elbows are resting on the desk, and he’s looking right into Nathan’s eyes. “And I hope we never will.”
“Do you have many problems with people not following the rules?” Sara asks.
Boyd’s gaze slides over to her. “There was a…disagreement, a couple months back.” Behind him, Kenny snorts. Boyd goes on. “Some people didn’t agree with some recent decisions, so they split off. They’re living up at Colony House now, the big house on the hill. We still share some resources, but they mostly keep to themselves.”
Every word in this explanation is loaded with missing context. “Well, what happened?” Sara asks. “Don’t you think it would be better for everyone to work together?”
Boyd half-smiles. “We’d still help them in an emergency, of course, and they’d still help any of us.”
“Probably,” Kenny puts in.
Boyd ignores him and goes on. “Look, you’re right, Sara. It’s important that everyone here works together--that’s how we survive. But sometimes working together means knowing when to work alongside each other, separately. We’ve got a lot of people cooped up in one town. A lot of opinions. The important thing is that everyone stays safe.”
There’s a pause when he finishes talking. “That’s diplomatic,” Nathan murmurs.
Kenny snorts again.
Boyd sighs. “Look, are you two hungry? You’re probably hungry. Let’s go over to the diner--food will help everything you just learned sink in.”
It comes across more as an order than a suggestion, so Sara and Nathan both stand up. She bumps her shoulder against his, shooting him a questioning look. You okay?
He gives her a shaky smile. His face is pale.
Sara looks down at her phone as they follow Boyd and Kenny out of the sheriff’s station. Still all those missed calls from Will--but no new ones, not since they saw the tree.
She switches the phone off.
Sheriff Boyd peels away from the group, saying he has to take care of something and he’ll meet them later. Kenny takes them over to the diner, which is apparently run by his mom. “Lots of people cook in their own homes, but if you ever don’t feel like it or if you want to be around other people, you can come here.”
“Does it cost anything?” Sara asks.
Kenny laughs, pushing open the door. “We don’t use money here.” He smiles at her. He has a nice smile. “One of the few things I almost like about this place.”
Kenny’s mom also has a nice smile, and she brings them both big bowls of some kind of soup Sara has never had before. As soon as she smells it, Sara’s stomach growls. When they’d stopped for lunch a few hours ago, she hadn’t been able to bring herself to eat more than a few bites. She gets through half the bowl of soup before she even pauses for breath.
Kenny introduces them to some of the other people who are hanging out at the diner--Tom, who apparently somehow runs a bar, and John, an older man who introduces himself as a farmer. Everyone in the diner and everyone walking by outside keep craning their necks to look at Nathan and Sara.
“Does everyone here have a job?” Nathan asks Kenny as they sit back down after shaking hands with Tom.
“Pretty much,” says Kenny. “There’s lots to do to keep us alive. Everyone helps out.”
Nathan nods, picking up his spoon. Sara can tell he likes the idea of this. He likes having something to do.
Sheriff Boyd comes into the diner a few minutes later. There’s someone new with him--a beautiful woman, about Nathan’s age, with curly black hair cascading down her back. They’re talking intensely about something as they approach, but as they come through the door, the woman looks right at Sara and gives her a big, blinding smile. “Hi!” she says. “I’m Fatima.”
Kenny gets up, giving Boyd and Fatima his side of the booth, and goes to join his mom in the kitchen. Fatima slides into his vacated seat.
“Hi,” says Nathan, clearly a little suspicious.
“I’m Sara,” says Sara. “This is my brother Nathan. We’re, uh, new.”
“So Boyd was telling me,” says Fatima, still smiling. “I’m from Colony House. The big house up on the hill? You probably saw it one of the times you were driving around.”
She proceeds to explain about Colony House--the shared meals, the people sleeping all together on couches and chairs and wherever they can find, the nights of drinking, the greenhouse and the rows of crops. She makes it sound like such a nice place--a real home, a place where people are happy. Listening to her, Sara can almost believe it.
Boyd sits next to Fatima, arms folded, expression stony.
“I’d give you a tour, but it’s a little late in the day for that,” says Fatima. “Tomorrow morning, maybe?”
“For tonight, you can sleep in the sheriff’s station,” Boyd puts in. “We’ve got some cots in there for newcomers, before you pick where you want to live. If you end up wanting to stay in town, someone will be able to take you in.”
Nathan clears his throat. “Do you guys have anything in the way of, like, supplies? Clothes? Sara’s got some things with her, but I wasn’t…prepared for a long trip.”
Boyd nods, and stands up. “The storage room is in the back of the diner. Come on, I’ll show you.”
Nathan gets up, and Sara moves to follow him, but Fatima reaches across the table and grabs her hand. “Wait, stay and chat with me,” she says with that brilliant smile again. “It’s cramped back there, and I’d love to get to know you a bit. It’s good for us all to know each other.”
Sara glances up at Nathan. He shrugs, although she can see his brow pinched in worry. She doesn’t want to let him out of her sight, either, but he’s only going to a different room in the same building. She settles back down and gives Fatima a small smile as Nathan and Boyd walk toward the back.
“So where were you heading before you saw the tree?” asks Fatima, her chin in her hand.
“We were going to Nathan’s house,” Sara answers, picking at the skin around her thumbnail.
“Any reason in particular?”
“Um.” Sara shrugs, looking down. She doesn’t really want to talk about the reason. She likes Fatima, likes her friendly smile and the way she talks, but she doesn’t trust her.
Fatima’s mouth dips into a frown for just a moment before relaxing back into her neutral smile. “Where did Nathan live? It’s fun to hear where people are coming from.”
“Boston,” Sara answers.
Fatima perks up. “Really? I’m from Boston!”
“Oh, really? How long have you been…here?”
“About seven months,” says Fatima.
Sara bites her lip. “That’s a long time.”
“Some people have been here a lot longer. Donna, who runs Colony House, she’s been here three years.”
“Three years,” Sara repeats. She feels cold. “And no one’s gotten out?”
“Not yet,” says Fatima. Her shoulders rise and fall as she takes a deep breath. “Boyd is still looking for answers, though. And we’re all doing our best to focus on making lives for ourselves here. That’s what I love about Colony House. It can really be so beautiful. It’s such a community. People take care of each other.”
Sara still feels numb, but she gives a strained smile. “I’m excited to see it,” she offers, which is even true.
Fatima leans forward again, resting her forearms on the table. “And you know, Sara, I want you to know something.” Her face gets serious, which makes Sara lean in too, matching her posture. “If you want to come live at Colony House, you can, even if your brother doesn’t. We do this thing called a ‘Choosing Ceremony’, where you pick if you want to live in Colony House or down in town, and each individual person picks for themselves.”
Sara’s brow furrows. Why would she want to go to Colony House if Nathan wasn’t there? “Thanks, but I don’t think I’ll need that.”
Fatima nods quickly. “I’m not saying you do. But look, I just…I just want you to know that everyone’s going to make a big deal out of the Choosing Ceremony, and they’ll tell you your choice can’t be changed once it’s made, but that’s not really true, alright? If you ever need to come up to Colony House, you can, and we’ll take care of you, you hear me? No matter what’s happening.” Her beautiful face is focused and serious. For just a second, her gaze flicks to the bruise over Sara’s left eye.
Belatedly, Sara figures out what’s going on. Fatima thinks Nathan hit her.
The need to correct this misconception is so urgent that it overcomes her mistrust. “My husband hit me,” Sara says.
If Fatima is jarred by the change in subject, she doesn’t show it. Sara has to pause and take a breath. “I called Nathan and he came and got me out. That’s why I have a bag and he doesn’t.” So simple when she says it like that, sums up all the chaos and fear and relief of last night in two sentences. “Nathan wouldn’t ever hurt me, not ever. You don’t have to worry.”
The wrinkles in Fatima’s forehead smooth out. “Well, good. I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“Thanks,” says Sara, meaning it. Now she’s imagining a situation where she did get trapped in this monster-filled town with Will instead of with Nathan, and it’s making her feel shaky. It’s nice to know that people like Fatima would have tried to help.
Fatima reaches across the table and squeezes her hand. “I’m proud of you for leaving.” Her smile is kind, but she sounds sad.
The sheriff and Nathan emerge from the storage room. Nathan has a small bundle of clothes tucked under one arm, and the energy between them has shifted. The sheriff looks a bit more relaxed. Nathan’s still being get-along-Nathan, but he looks a little more amped-up. Sara shoots him a questioning glance. He slides into the booth next to her and gently bumps her with his elbow. She shifts her weight so that she’s leaned against his side.
“Are we all good?” Fatima asks, chin in her hand.
“We’re good,” the sheriff confirms.
When everyone has finished eating, Fatima goes back up the hill toward the big house, and Sheriff Boyd takes Sara and Nathan back to the sheriff’s station. There are cots set up for them in a room that was probably once an office, right down the hall from the room where Boyd sleeps.
“I’ve got to go ring the bell that lets everyone know it’s time to get inside,” Boyd says. “You two make yourselves comfortable, and I’ll be back in a few. Then we’ll lock up.” He takes a bell from on top of the cabinet and walks outside, leaving the siblings alone for the first time since arriving in this town.
Nathan touches Sara’s elbow. “Are you okay?”
Sara nods. “Are you?”
He starts pacing, rubbing his hand over his face. “Do you think this is real? Everything, what they’re saying?”
“I don’t know,” Sara admits. “I don’t see why they’d lie. And even if they are, how would we test it? I don’t think it’s a good idea to risk it.”
“Yeah.” Nathan stops and stands at the window, arms folded tightly across his chest, staring out at the quickly emptying street.
“Hey,” says Sara, and holds out her arms to him. He lets her pull him into a hug. “At least we’re here together,” she says, resting her head on his familiar shoulder.
“Yeah,” says Nathan softly. He doesn’t relax.
When the sheriff comes back in, he locks the door, then starts drawing the shades on the windows. “Leave one open?” Sara asks suddenly. “I want to see.”
Boyd looks at her for a moment, gauging her, then nods.
All three of them gather at the window and watch as night falls. For several long minutes, nothing happens. Everything goes quiet. Lights switch on inside the buildings they can see.
Then there are people outside, walking calmly down the street, looking up at the houses around them. They just look like ordinary people--a woman in a plaid shawl and a headband, a man in a milkman’s uniform--but the sight of them sends a shiver down Sara’s spine. It’s something about the way they move, the way they look at their surroundings. She feels like a mouse watching a circling hawk.
“Christ,” Nathan murmurs next to her. “That’s them?”
“Yup.” Boyd is staring fixedly out at the people in the street, his brows drawn together.
The woman with the headband turns her head and looks right at the three of them. She makes eye contact with Sara and smiles, lifting her hand to wave. “Welcome to town!” she calls, audible even through the glass. “You two look like you’re going to love it here.”
Sara grips the windowsill so tight it starts to hurt.
“Let’s shut the blind,” says Nathan, his voice low and strained, and Boyd reaches up and pulls the blinds down.
As he does so, Sara hears a whisper that sounds like it’s coming from right behind her ear. It’s too quiet to make out the words, but she whips her head around, looking for the source.
“Sara?” Nathan asks. “You okay?”
“Did you hear that?”
“Hear what?” asks Boyd.
The whisper comes again, low and insistent, like the buzzing of a fly. Boyd is looking at Sara through narrowed eyes.
Sara drops her gaze. “Never mind. It’s nothing.”