The Enforcers: Chapter 1
I remember not crying the day my parents died. It was seven years ago - I was nine, Shiloh was eleven, almost twelve, and they were shot in the head - that was that. Since then, we’ve been on our own; just ghosts passing through town, never staying anywhere long enough to remember people’s names or have a regular coffee order.
I don’t mind it usually, but as I walk down the street, I wonder what it would be like to have friends that aren’t related to me and that consist of a number higher than one. As I pass this bakery I like to peer into, I see a group of girls, chatting and laughing without a care in the world. Almost as if they were oblivious to the danger that surrounds them. Of course, they’re not in danger, not really, not like Shiloh and I are. Those girls, they were handed over to the government when they were born, just as they were supposed to. Their parents didn’t break the law like mine did and fall in love illegally and have two kids in hiding. No, I’m sure their parents did as they were told and got genetically paired. Then, without ever having to meet, produced an additional piece of government property nine months later.
Realizing that I’ve been standing in the window staring, I quickly turn away and continue on my walk back home. Thinking of my parents now brings back a familiar ache. I can’t help but remember their frantic movements as they hid Shiloh and I under the floorboards in the kitchen, telling us to play the quiet mouse game, which was once a favorite of mine. I see them pushing against the backdoor while the Enforcers – or better put, “the government slaves”- broke through. Finally, I hear my mother’s scream as they shoot my father and the silence that follows when they do the same to her.
I walk up to the house Shiloh and I have been squatting in the past couple of weeks. It has broken windows, a porch covered in holes, and the paint has turned into a moldy green color. Home sweet home. Shiloh still isn’t back from her scavenging trip to find food for the next leg of our journey. She’s been gone for nearly three days now – the longest stretch we’ve had without seeing each other. I keep trying not to worry because I know how much she loves to wander, but she has been disappearing more than usual lately; randomly running out in the middle of the night, coming back with bruises and scratches all over her like she’s been chased through a field of thorns.
I try to settle my mind, sure that she’ll be back tomorrow. If not, maybe I’ll go out and start looking for her. I go up to my room and curl into my makeshift bed, slowly I fall into a deep, dreamless sleep, while the ache in my heart remains.
…
I wake to Shiloh standing over me.
“Micah, come on, get up,” Shiloh says.
“What’s going on?” I ask, yawning as I sit up in my bed.
She’s too busy stuffing clothes into my worn, red duffel bag to answer me.
“Where have you been? I haven’t heard from you or seen you in days.” I say, as I get up and grab the flashlight.
No answer.
“Shiloh?” I ask as I grab her arm and see even more scratches covering her already bruised skin.
“It’s nothing, I just got caught up, okay?” she says, pulling her arm out of my grip.
I continue to watch as she throws the few possessions I have into my bag.
“Where are we going this time?” I ask. This is something familiar to me, being woken up in the middle of the night to commence the next leg of our tiring life.
“You’re going here,” she says as she takes a small note from the back pocket of her jeans and shoves it into my fist. As she does this, I wonder if she notices how clammy my hands are. It’s something she always calls me on: my perpetually wet hands.
It’s then that I pick up the sense of urgency in the room. The franticness that surrounds her movements is something I’m not used to. The note remains crumpled in my closed fist as I ask, “Just me? What do you mean? You’re not coming with me?”
“Not right away. You’ll go on your own and I’ll follow you in a couple of weeks,” she replies.
I can feel the panic rising in my chest. This isn’t how it goes; we’re a team, we do these moves together, always. Shiloh could see the fear in my eyes as the overwhelming questions became a crushing weight against my heart.
“Micah, listen to me,” she puts her hands on either side of my face and my eyes focus on hers. “Everything is going to be fine. Just do as I say, for once.” Her nails start to dig into my cheeks so deeply that if I smiled, I think she’d draw blood.
She continues to talk but the pounding in my ears drowns her out. But I can see her lips moving frantically while her eyes continue to plead with mine. Her face starts to blur and it takes every bit of my concentration to produce one word: “What?”
“Micah, focus. Everything you need to know is on this, okay?” she says as she squeezes my fist that’s clutching the now sweaty note. “Just follow this,” she says as she relinquishes me from her stare, “and I’ll be right behind you.”
“They’ve found us haven’t they? That’s what this is all about?” I stammer.
“Hey, we’re fine, okay? You just need to promise me you’ll do as I say,” Shiloh says as she faces me down with that unbreakable gaze I know so well. She has a secret. A secret that I knew I would have to wait to hear. There was no changing her mind, this I was sure of. I could beg and plead but her mind is already made up, our future is set.
“And I have to go alone?” I ask.
Shiloh looks down for a brief moment, refusing to meet my stare.
“I’ll be right behind you,” she says. “I promise.”
…
My hand is still clenching the crinkled shred of paper. I gaze up at the moon as it shines down on me from its early morning position. “Four-thirty-seven, railway tracks, Thursday” is scribbled across the page all written in Shiloh’s scribbly excuse for handwriting. Her signature ink smear staining the left half of the note; her trademark for being a lefty as she likes to say. I look down at my wrist but it’s so dark that I can barely make out the time. Four-thirty-one; just six more minutes until the train passes through.
While sitting on a pathetic wire fence, I stare down at my feet as they dangle beneath me, trying to imagine what warmth feels like. At this point I’m pretty positive that I’m frostbitten all over because my fingertips are stinging and I’m pretty sure I just lost my last useful toe. I decide right then that I will never again take being warm for granted.
Despite my best efforts, I can’t keep my mind from wandering back to Shiloh. She promised she’d meet me - wherever it is that I’m going - and I’ll just have to hold onto that the best I can. But why can’t she run with me or explain what’s happening? She hasn’t broken a promise before and neither have I - but I’m about to break one now.
I shouldn’t have come here; not without her. I should have stayed and demanded that she come with me. Just as I stand to go home and find her, a roaring whistle stops me in place. I look down at my wrist: four-thirty-seven.
The train is coming. The light is blinding in the blackness of the night. It takes a moment to realize that my legs have started running without my mind’s consent. My legs are on fire as they desperately try to gain distance on the train, my duffel bag swinging against my hips as I run. This feeling is familiar to me: the rush of a new future approaching, the wind as it whips my face while I try to keep pace with the opening of the carriage. My lungs start to burn as the cold air cuts down my throat. I push past the pain. I imagine Shiloh running alongside me as she always does; I push past the pain. I reach my hand out as the carriage approaches, preparing to grasp the cold steel and propel myself up. As I make contact with the train, every muscle in my body works together to pull myself into the carriage. My knees land on the splintered wood of the train’s floor and my body rolls forward, sinking into what feels like a body. As I look up to see what surrounds me, a pair of big, black eyes meets mine and the pain consumes me.