The Fall - (A Young Adult Dystopian Novel) Read online

  Chapter 6 – A Bittersweet Birthday

  It was a week before my fifteenth birthday when Brian and Lottie got married. Despite the protest of her parents and the occasional depressing look from me, they went through with it. The wedding was a grand occasion, something for the whole House to celebrate. Guests from other Houses came to visit, including my Aunt Nicki, who now lived in the House of Rowan, Uncle Rooster had brewed a new recipe beer, which was as strong as acid but equally tasty, and they’d even been witness to a calamitous thunderstorm, which was said to bring good luck to a newly married couple. All in all it was a magical day. For Brian and Lottie, that is.

  I tried to be happy for them but I just couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to mope around and feel sorry for myself, but that was exactly what I did. Nothing could budge me out of my funk. I was thoroughly miserable, thought everybody hated me, and thought my life wasn’t worth bothering with any more. Brian was with someone else now, so what was the point? I told Mother about it, and she was compassionate and gave me a hug, but I think after a month of feeling sorry for myself she began to get annoyed with me.

  “There will be someone else,” Mother had told me. She had made it sound like a promise, but to me it was just another affirmation that Brian would never be mine.

  Skye didn’t turn up for the wedding. She’d been gone almost five months by then and nobody had heard a word from her. Truth be told, everyone had expected her to be back by now, lamenting her failure over starting a House, looking sheepish and calling her adventure something to laugh about in her old age. Yet she didn’t come back. Search parties had tried to track her down, even going so far as to search the rubble of the abandoned city and the other Houses. She had popped up in the House of Rowan for a few nights, but had left again just as abruptly as she’d arrived. The general consensus was that Skye was dead. They all thought she was too young to start her own House and had either starved to death from her own incompetence or been murdered by Felum or conscripted by the Order of Power. Nobody even considered the possibility that Skye was a capable young woman, who was doing very fine on her own. I wanted to believe that. Brian believed that. I knew she could do it. I regretted not going with her every single day. It would have changed my life completely and maybe I would never have known that Brian would be marrying Lottie. Now I couldn’t join Skye because I didn’t know where she was in the world

  I told my parents I resolutely did not want to marry anybody, not yet, so they politely told all the betrothal bids their offers were terminated. I didn’t even look at the list of all those who had proposed. All I knew was I couldn’t get married, not now, maybe not ever. Most of the bids understood; some made a fuss and avoided me like I had a contagious disease. I honestly didn’t care.

  The horned bear carcass was stripped of everything. Its fur became winter coats, its fat became soap, we ate its meat, and we made soup from its bones. I keep the collar in my room and wonder constantly who it had belonged to. I blame them for my near death experience with the creature. After all, if they hadn’t beaten and starved it the thing might not have attacked me.

  As for my feelings on becoming mayor one day, they haven’t changed at all. I still didn’t want to be mayor and I resent the fact that I have wait for it to happen. I don’t want the responsibility of running this place. I want to be out there, I want to go on a journey to the outside that lasts forever. Instead I’m stuck in here, in this giant glass box of monotony, with all my failures there to torment me.

  I hate The Glass Palace.

  I’m out in one of the fields, digging up weeds. The spade is old, rusty and the handle is loose, but the work causes me to think less. I don’t enjoy it but it passes the time. Besides, spring is here and the weather is warm. I enjoy the feeling of being outdoors; feeling the sun on my face...especially today as it is my fifteenth birthday. I’m determined not be maudlin.

  I’ve spent a lot of time in the fields, or outside in general, since learning of Brian and Lottie. It’s not just because I want to keep away from him; I miss the fresh air a lot. I’d been on the outside for seven whole months while on my Journey and I still felt a little cooped up while in The Glass Palace, maybe even a tad claustrophobic. So I offer to take on job after job, so long as it takes me outside, anyway. So I’ve been digging fields; clearing up cow muck, been on another quick trek to the House of Rowan (which is how we found out Skye had briefly been there), and even helped to train a new puppy to help herd the sheep. The previous sheepdog had died of illness. We’d bought a new one from a travelling zoo. I called him Libra.

  I look up at the minarets and domes of The Glass Palace. People living in the House of Casper are fortunate. We have a steady, safe home and quite a decent way of life. If the gods decide to bring their fight anywhere near here, my home would be in ruins and everyone in it dead. I’ve seen the results of their stupid conflict first hand. I still have nightmares of the city of Leeds; half the city crushed in an instant, thousands of people smashed to paste in the blink of an eye. While I was there, trudging through the ruins, I thought I heard ghosts. They wanted me to save them but I didn’t know how.

  “Can I have a word with you?” Rosa asks. Uncle Rooster’s long time fiancé is walking towards me. Her red hair is tied up, and her face and hands are covered with dirt. She is an avid gardener, but I don’t like her very much. She appears to sneer a lot.

  “Sure,” I say. I stick my spade into the ground and turn to her.

  “Do you ever talk to your uncle much?”

  “Not really. I don’t see him that often.”

  “I don’t like to be pushy or anything. I love Rooster, but he doesn’t appear to want to get married any time soon and I would like to be a proper wife to him. Could you do me a huge favor and sort of, well, give him a nudge?”

  I really don’t know what I can do. Uncle Rooster had instantly fallen for Rosa when she turned up three years ago, beaten and bruised. She had apparently been thrown out of her House for an alleged infidelity, which she denied strenuously. The House of Casper had adopted her with open arms, and she’d soon fallen for Rooster. They seemed like a perfect match for each other.

  “I suppose I could have a word with him,” I tell her.

  “You are a darling!” she announces, giving me a rather lingering, inappropriate kiss on the lips. She pulls away, smiles, and walks off in the direction of The Glass Palace. I’m instantly forgotten about.

  I wipe my hand across my mouth. If I’d been sure before, I definitely am now; Rosa is the type to commit infidelity. Do I really want my uncle marrying such a woman? Then again, Rooster is a forceful personality. He can handle her.

  There is an awful smell coming from the shed. I can’t describe in words how terrible it is. Is something going wrong with Uncle Rooster’s beer? Has it gone off?

  I knock on the shed door. Uncle Rooster eventually answers. His hair is a mess and the smell becomes even worse.

  “What’s that awful smell?” I ask him.

  “That, my lad, is the beautiful aroma of fermenting beer,” he tells me with pride. “Want to have a look? You can be my apprentice!”

  I grimace. “That’s okay. You seem to enjoy doing this by yourself.”

  “Let me tell you a secret; this isn’t my recipe.”

  I perk up my ears. When Uncle Rooster wants to tell you a story you listen. He has quite the bizarre imagination.

  “I found the recipe in an old book,” he confesses. He grins at me while I wait for the story to continue. It doesn’t.

  “Is that it?” I ask.

  “Don’t ever tell anyone,” he orders me. “My reputation would be ruined!”

  “Why did you tell me?”

  He seems to consider my question for a moment, before sitting down on an old log at the side of the shed.

  “Just in case Rosa and I don’t have children I want to leave my secret to someone I trust. That person is you.”

  I really don’t know what to say. I’m fla
ttered, even though I don’t know the first thing about making beer.

  He continues. “The recipe is slipped inside a book I have under my bed. The book is called “The Kama Sutra.” Don’t look at any pictures in the book; they’re very, very rude and only for adults.”

  “I’m an adult now,” I remind him.

  He gets up and walks back into the shed. He turns to me and says, “Yes. You’re an adult now. Little Ben Casper is a man. Congratulations!”

  He closes the shed door, and I’m left speechless, pondering why I’d come to his shed in the first place.

  My parents prepare me a special birthday lunch, which I’m glad to have. Mother can take the most basic ingredients and turn them into something not just edible but very palatable.

  I sometimes feel sad at family occasions. The table seems empty without Dylan and Glory there with us, even though there are still mementoes of them around the place. I spy Glory’s cuddly toy-chicken resting on the side table and next to that is Dylan’s music box. It had been found in his backpack next to his corpse and we figured he wanted us to have it. I miss them both so much.

  “You’re getting nearly as tall as me,” says father at the dinner table. Uncle Rooster is there and, to my dismay, Rosa. I can still feel her strange kiss on my lips. It makes me feel queasy.

  “Tell that to my trousers,” I joke. “I’m going to need to get some new ones from supplies soon.”

  Mother smirks. “There’s no need for that.”

  She smiles mischievously and leaves the table, stepping into hers and Father’s bedroom. After a moment she returns with a parcel wrapped in brown paper. She hands it to me.

  “What is it?” I ask, excited. I’m like a little kid again, and the thought doesn’t embarrass me one bit.

  Mother doesn’t say anything, but I know what it is and yes, indeed, it is a pair of trousers. They are exactly my size (until I grow out of them in a few months time, again) and they’re woven of a thick fabric I know to be quite rare and expensive. It’s a very generous gift.

  “They’re wonderful,” I say. “Where on earth did you get them?”

  “I found them in an old farmhouse just last month,” says Father. “I was going to save them for myself but I figured you needed them more.”

  “Thank you so much,” I say. He really is a great man and a great mayor to the House. If I have to take his place one day, and I’m not totally resigned to the fact just yet, then I hope I can be at least half the man he is. If I were, then I’d be doing a pretty good job.

  I decide right there and then to stop being so lachrymose. Skye is out there living her life, and making her dreams come true. Brian and Lottie are happy. I have no choice whether I want to be mayor or not, why fret about things that I can’t change?

  I’m about half way through dinner when I notice that Rosa is making eye contact with me. At first I think she must have something in her eye, and I’m about to ask if she’s okay when I suddenly remember her request. I dislike her now even more than I ever have, but Uncle Rooster loves her, and supposedly she loves him. Who am I to stand in the way of their happiness?

  “So when are you and Rosa getting married, then?” I blurt out.

  A deathly silence descends upon the table. Mother and Father look at each other; Rosa pales, and Uncle Rooster drops his fork on the table. I realize I didn’t mean to say it like that. The words just seemed to shoot out of my mouth. I should’ve worked up to it in a subtle way. Rosa will kill me.

  Rooster clears his throat and says, “I have been thinking about it.”

  Rosa’s eyes light up. “You have?”

  He mumbles for a few seconds, making us all wish we were in another room completely, until Rosa abruptly stands up.

  “I’m tired of waiting, Rooster!” Rosa cries, but with crocodile tears. “I want to be your wife, and if you don’t want to be my husband then I’m going to have to leave The Glass Palace.”

  “A week tomorrow,” says Rooster.

  Rosa glares at him with spiteful eyes. “What do you mean?”

  “We will get married a week from tomorrow,” says Rooster. His eyes have intensity in them; they show a little bit of fear, though I can swear he almost seems happy. “Is that good enough for you?”

  “I guess it will have to do,” says Rosa. She screams her delight, literally, and jumps into Rooster’s lap, kissing him all over the face like a slathering dog. It’s nauseating but it does make me realize that Rosa does indeed love my uncle, despite how I feel about her.

  “Congratulations,” says Father. But the happy couple is oblivious. They only have eyes for each other.

  After lunch I try my new pair of trousers on in my quarters, humming all the time. I have a tiny mirror, which was rescued from the bathroom of a demolished house, and I look at my reflection. They look good on me. The trousers are probably over five hundred years old but they still feel new. If Brian could see me in these trousers he’d realize he’d made a terrible mistake, dump that cow Lottie, and marry me instead.

  “As if,” I mutter.

  This time, though, I shrug the self-pity off quite quickly. I shove my feelings about Brian deep inside, determined not to let them interfere with my life any more, and go to visit him. There is something I have to do.

  Lottie answers the door when I knock. She appears a little tired and she has dust bunnies stuck to her dress but she seems to glow with a happiness that instantly gives me pangs of jealousy. I just smile and ask her if I can see Brian for a minute or two. She lets me in.

  “I’ve been giving the place a woman’s touch,” Lottie explains, showing me around like a posh hostess. The quarters are sparse but they’re slowly filling up with bits and bobs like cushions and a table with a white frilly cover on it. I can see they are Lottie’s influence. Brian doesn’t seem like the frilly type. “Brian had the place looking so dull and lifeless! And you’d never believe what this place smelled like! All man sweat is very nasty.”

  I’m sure Brian’s man sweat smells quite pleasant.

  Push those thoughts aside.

  Lottie flings some long sheets of fabric into my hands. They are the color of blood. “What do you think of these new drapes for the walls?”

  “Drapes?” I stammer. “I’m not sure.”

  Lottie sighs. “I’m not sure about them just yet either, but I hate the color of the walls in The Glass Palace. I was hoping to speak to the mayor about putting up more drapes about the public corridors and access ways, just to brighten things up a bit. So what do you think of these?”

  I hesitate. “They’re very red.”

  “Brian likes red and so do I,” says Lottie, as her husband comes in from in another room. She whips the drapes from my hands. “It doesn’t cost much to make your place look nice.”

  I agree with her, though in fact nothing costs us a penny. We don’t use money, not like they did in the old days. She certainly has better taste than her parents. They seem to like their living space to be one big ocean of brown. Upon witnessing a quickly hidden grimace, I assume Brian doesn’t want red drapes covering his walls as much as his wife does.

  “Have you got anything in blue?” Brian asks, looking at the red fabric like it might explode in his face.

  Lottie shakes her head sadly. “I asked but there’s nothing in storage. Sorry.”

  Mother told me somebody had brought back some turquoise fabric just the other day. Do I dare say anything? No, I better not. It’s their marriage. I have no right to interfere.

  Lottie seems like a different person now she is married. I don’t want to say anything just in case it upsets her but she appears to have taken on her mother’s persona. Is that what marriage does to you? Turn you into your parents? While I don’t mind turning into my father, the thought worries me. He can be very grumpy at times.

  “What can I do for you?” Brian asks.

  If he is a little distant with me, I don’t blame him. While he doesn’t know how I feel about him, he has
noticed I’ve tried to avoid him these last five months and when we do speak I’m always a little off with him. I think he just assumes we blame each other for Skye’s departure. Well, my paranoia tells me he blames me. I could’ve stopped Skye and we both know it. I could’ve tried anyway. When Skye sets her mind to something not even an earthquake can shift her.

  I wonder where Skye is now. Is she really trying to bring together the House of Skye, recruiting family members and bossing everyone around? Or is she dead?

  Brian and Lottie are staring at me, worried. My mind must have wandered off while thinking of Skye. They probably think I’m an idiot. I have to say something quick to cover my embarrassment.

  “Rooster and Rosa are getting married next week,” I say. This isn’t what I’ve come for! Why did I tell them that?

  “That’s nice,” says Lottie, her lips curling in distaste. “Rosa is a...wonderful woman and I’m sure your uncle and she will be very happy.”

  “It’s okay, I don’t like her either,” I admit.

  Lottie and Brian give each other a look that speaks volumes. I read it to mean they have something distasteful to tell me, probably about Rosa.

  “It’s not that we don’t like her,” says Brian. He is going red faced, and on him it looks so adorable. “Now don’t tell Rooster or anything. She inappropriately felt my behind at my wedding feast.”

  “She’s a harlot!” screams Lottie with rage. “Not that we don’t wish her and Rooster well, it’s just if she ever touches my husband in that way again I’ll give her a good thump.”

  “She avoids us now,” says Brian.

  I have to push back the delicious image in my head of feeling Brian’s bottom. The mere thought of it makes me flush, makes me feel tingly.

  What am I really here for again?

  “There is something else I wanted to ask you,” I say nervously.

  They wait for me to continue. My throat starts to feel dry. Should I ask them for a cup of water or try and get this over and done with as quickly as possible?

  “I want you to teach me how to use the bow,” I ask.

  Brian looks dubious. “I’m not sure you’re ready.”

  “I want to do this. I’m ready.”

  Brian sighs. “You haven’t been quite yourself lately.”

  “I’ve had a lot on my mind.”

  “You’ve got a lot on your mind, yes. I don’t want you to go and hurt yourself by firing an arrow into your foot or something.”

  “I wouldn’t do that,” I retort, feeling a bit silly. “Not intentionally anyway. I’d be careful.”

  He appears to have genuine concern for me. He doesn’t want me to hurt myself. He’s never actually said he doesn’t like me in that way, though. What if he doesn’t want me to get injured because he...STOP KIDDING YOURSELF!

  “I need to do this,” I tell him.

  Lottie is dusting a shelf, with one eye on us.

  “I’ve been wallowing in self-pity for too long now and I’m sick of it. I know you blame me for Skye leaving. I saw her leave and I could’ve stopped her, but I didn’t, and it’s my fault she’s gone.”

  “It’s not your fault,” says Brian. His compassionate words make me want to grin. “You could’ve tried to stop her, but it would’ve done no good. We were going to lock her in her quarters and keep her there until she saw sense and decided to stay. She would’ve hated us for that. Either way she would leave. I think letting her go was the best thing to do. At least this way she doesn’t hate us.”

  So he doesn’t blame me. I was wrong. I feel like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. He doesn’t blame me!

  “All I want to do is look to the future now,” I go on. “I want to learn to use the bow. I enjoyed it when we went out hunting that time with the bear. I thought I could be good at it. I’m excellent with the slingshot and I’m sure I’ll be the same with the bow.”

  Brian contemplates my request. I think he’s trying to scope out my intentions. Am I completely serious about wanting to learn to use the bow? He’d offered before, a few weeks after Skye had left, and again a week or so later, but I’d been cold with him, maybe even rude. I give him the most serious look I can bring up, a look that tells him I am confident and eager to learn.

  “Okay, fine,” says Brian. “We’ll start tomorrow morning.”

  “Thank you,” I say, smiling, feeling well for the first time in months. “I promise you won’t regret this.”

  “Brian is an excellent archer,” brags Lottie, bursting with pride. “He’s been teaching me!”

  “She’s useless,” Brian jokes. At his wife’s outraged look he pulls her into a kiss and she giggles. “But I love her for it anyway.”

  I blush, stare at the ceiling, anything to avert my eyes from such a sight. But I sneak a look anyway, and my heart almost bursts. Brian is so happy. I mumble a goodbye, promise to be up bright and early, and head for the door.

  “And happy birthday by the way,” Brian calls out as I leave. I don’t feel very happy, not by a long shot, but I feel I’ll get there eventually.