NINETY-SIX HOURS IN, seventy-two to go.
I kept meticulous count, but even so I couldn’t believe it had been only four days. Sleep deprivation gnawed at the edges of my sanity. I walked around in a constant state of tension, my jaw tight and my hands clenched.
The eight of us left developed a schedule for showering so that we each got one shower per twelve-hour period of “daylight” while still allowing breaks in between so people could use the toilet. We imposed a ten-minute limit on ourselves, not to save hot water—that was gone for good—but to keep the toilets free as much as possible. Then there was a schedule for exercise. There was no worry about who would make dinner or do dishes—that was all done for us—but there were scuffles over whose turn it was to play with the sole deck of cards, who took longer than their allotted time to shower, who had left the bathroom a mess or left their dirty clothes on someone else’s bed.
True colors began to show. Boris, who the week before was only aggravating, became a bully inside the SLH. Even Pratima, usually even-keeled, snapped at me when I reached across her at the breakfast table, and Mitsuko could jump on anyone if she was in the wrong mood. Emilio and Anton, the peacemakers, were constantly trying to put out the little fires that erupted between people pushed to their breaking point.
Luka kept to himself and remained cordial. I tried to follow his example.
The sleepovers centered around my bunk stopped. I was glad. It was the only way I could deal with never having any privacy except for ten minutes a day in the shower. Each of us drew farther apart, becoming little islands unto ourselves.
It was surprisingly easy to forget about the outside world. Before long, I stopped even thinking about it.
During the day, we were so busy, I could distract myself with the work; even if it was mind-numbing and often pointless exercises, it was complex enough to need my full attention. I dreaded the nights. I would lie awake listening to the combined sleeping sounds of all the people I was stuck with, trying to force my tired brain to stop churning, waiting for the midnight disturbance that was sure to come. It seemed useless to try to sleep when I knew at any moment we might be jerked awake. Mitsuko, Emilio, Luka, and I agreed to take turns responding, but eventually Mitsuko stopped getting up, and Emilio was so out of it when he woke that he was useless. So it was me and Luka, mostly, taking turns dragging ourselves out of bed.
I fought to stay awake, knowing as soon as I closed my eyes the alarm would blare, but it was late in coming that night. Mission Control had established a pattern and then had broken it. One more thing that was getting under my skin.
I couldn’t stand it anymore. I got out of bed as quietly as possible and made my way toward the kitchen. There was no food there, only packets of water you had to suck out of a plastic pouch. But I took one and sat at the kitchen table, my bare feet already tingling cold.
I sat scrunched with my knees to my chest, keeping my toes off the metal. Beethoven was still playing in a whisper over the intercom, a piece so mournful it was as though all four instruments were crying in harmony. I felt numb to it all by now, with only a vague sense of homesickness.
Bleary-eyed, I hardly noticed the shadows moving in the other tube until a human shape emerged out of the living quarters.
I jumped to my feet. The shadow stepped forward, over an emergency light, which illuminated him from below.
Luka.
He just stood there, quiet, looking as surprised to see me as I was to see him. “Can’t sleep?” The words escaped like a breath, unintended. “Everything okay?”
“Yes.” His voice was a baritone murmur. And just when I thought that was all the answer I’d get, he added, “And you?”
“Yeah. I’m fine. Just waiting, you know. For the . . .” I spun my finger in the air, indicating the sirens. “You know. The ‘emergency.’ What are you doing up?”
A corner of his mouth tightened, like he was considering whether or not to tell me. “Pacing,” he admitted. I flashed on what Mitsuko had told me sometime before—that Luka was the type to keep his emotions bottled up until they exploded. Was I witnessing the foreshock? His whole body seemed tense as a violin string. Even his fingers drummed against the top of the metal chair in a restless cadence.
I gave a nod, and the silence between us was filled with the music of mournful strings and a shared understanding. We were both trying to cope with the stress in our own ways.
He gestured toward the empty living quarters, and we sat side by side on the couch in front of the screen, shrouded in darkness.
Then he turned his eyes full on me and it felt like everything froze. “I never thanked you for saving my life. Back in the wetlands, when I fell into the creek—you pulled me out. I did not thank you then, but I have been grateful to you ever since.”
For some reason I stood up, like I meant to do something in response, but wasn’t sure what. “You would’ve done the same.”
“Yes, I would.” His eyes held an unreadable emotion. “But not for that reason.”
“For what reason?” I was too tired to be dealing with this.
“If you had gone into the water instead of me, I would have also tried to save you. But not because I had expectation of help in return.”
“What? You think I saved your life so you would owe me a favor?”
His face changed suddenly, shadows rearranging, light reflecting the whites of his eyes. “No. Not at all. I’m sorry, my English . . . I’m sorry. Please, forget I said anything.”
“Is that what’s bothering you?” This was as close as I’d come to piercing the veil around Luka. As I tried to understand, wishing my enhanced eyesight was just a tad bit more superhuman so it pierced the darkness and read all the details of his features, he broke his intense gaze and looked away. And even in the shadows I could see how open his countenance was—more vulnerable and raw than I’d ever seen, well, anyone.
His voice was so quiet, the music nearly covered it completely. His tone changed, his words coming slowly and hesitantly. “Do you ever feel, even when entirely surrounded by other people, that you are utterly alone?”
A cold hand clenched around my heart and squeezed. “You’re not the only one,” I said quietly. And then, because it didn’t feel like it was enough to simply say the words, I reached out and put my hand on his shoulder.
He glanced up at me, seemingly taken aback. I let my hand drop. But then his face changed into an almost-smile, grateful and surprised, and I felt better for having done it. “Thank you, Cassie.”
I awoke in my bed with harsh pseudo-sunshine in my eyes, startled and disoriented. The others were ambling around their morning routine, getting the breakfast trays, waiting on the bathroom.
I couldn’t even remember going back to bed, and yet somehow I’d overslept. Even with all the commotion and the lights on. Nobody had even tried to wake me.
Not until I zombie-walked into the kitchen did I realize there had been no alarm last night. Unless I’d slept through it. Which also didn’t seem possible.
Had last night even been real?
The memory of reaching out in the darkness to touch Luka’s shoulder felt too real to be a dream. And it was definitely not something I would ever dream.
At breakfast, he gave no outward sign of our midnight meeting. No acknowledgment, not even a smile.
Maybe I really was losing it.
As the day wore on, I convinced myself that the midnight conversation with Luka had been a figment of my imagination. He was pleasant but polite to me, not overly friendly.
The remaining time passed in a blur of routine, until we were a day away from freedom. I hardly slept at all. Sometime tomorrow they were going to let us out, and it seemed like every fault in everyone in this tube with me had been magnified a hundredfold. I hated every snore and grunt of every sleeping person. I hated the air I had to share with them. I hated their breathing noises and their combined body heat drifting over me, which may have been a construct of my own imagination but was annoying anyway.
My impatience was a living, breathing, seething thing.
The thought of that hatch door opening, running out of there and breathing fresh air, was both wonderful and awful. I couldn’t let myself think about it very long.