Running Scared

I'm bundled up outside in a faded red, woolen coat, two scarves and a jumper that is so used and stretched, it almost passes my knees. It's stupid that I'm taking the risk but I'm waiting for Grahame outside the greenhouses.

The greenhouses are where we grow most of our food. Vegetables and fruits, all under the supervision of the Enforcers who monitor the workers that toil during the day and the evenings throughout the year to ensure that the Community is fed. Grahame works here part time, digging and planting and plucking when everything is all ripe and ready. Through the steamy glass, I can pick him out, dressed down in a thin vest and jeans, his brow furrowed and slick with sweat while he turns up a patch of soil. His bare arms are wiry but toned from the work he takes on, stronger than what his initial appearance suggests.

Out here, shivering and solitary, I've never felt more separated from him. It's as if we're from different worlds; his life is so steady, so secure, which only reaffirms my reason for showing up at the greenhouses in the first place.

To abort a child is life threatening. The laws against having children, though harsh yet necessary, have not yet sunk to forcing a woman to give up her unborn baby. The child, a product of a man and woman's lapse in sensible thinking, is never punished intentionally. Sure, we're handed over to the orphanage, made to grow up in a society that requires fear to stay alive and feel constantly starved for all of our life but never do we face judgement from those around us, or even the government. We are not our parents and as infants, we have not yet made their mistakes. We are given the chance to prove ourselves but I have failed despite my upbringing and knowledge of what happened to my mother. I still fell into the trap, for all of my family history.

So drastic actions are often taken by desperate woman who do not want to face the noose. Illegal clinics, always on the move around cities to avoid being located, are tricky to find if you actually want to. The surgery is always performed by those who have limited experience of medical care but there are whispers of successful operations, of the removal of the baby. Women free to continue on in their lives, perhaps hollow in themselves but living. The way I see it, I'm facing death either way. At least this will be my own will, with full awareness of what may happen. It seems better than sitting here, waiting to die.

If I'm doing this though, I have to tell Grahame and I think that this will be one of the most difficult things I've done. Just the sight of him stepping out into the cold for his break makes my heart sputter. He's midway pulling on his jacket when he sees me crouched between the side of the greenhouse and a factory wall, his face splitting into such a grin that I want to flee already. Why does he have to look so happy to see me?

He glances around to check if anyone is watching before ducking into the slither of space with me, squeezing into the narrow passageway so that we're shoulder to shoulder.

"Hey, you." he greets, sending me one of his secret smiles again. I know that they're reserved only for me - who else could he possibly smile around? - which makes me feel all the worse for what I'm going to tell him.

He's so close that I can smell the dirt on him and see the sweat still shining on his face, folding into the creases of his laughter lines. It's the smile that nearly silences me. He won't thank me for skirting around the issue, for misleading him with friendly conversation so before I even think about what I'm doing, I blurt out my confession in such an unsophisticated manner, with no frills or blurred implications for him to misinterpret. Nothing for him to find hope in.

"I'm going to the Cutters."

It's a colloquial term for those who grant abortions, crude sounding yet accurate. At the mention of them, Grahame grows pale, his eyes crinkling in a frown. I can't miss the acerbic note in his voice when he finally responds.

"Wow. Not even a hello. You're just going straight into it, aren't you?"

"I don't have a lot of other options. It's risky, I know that but - "

Grahame cuts my sentence short with a bark of a laugh. Humourless, void of his usual warmth. It's mocking, which is so unlike him. I realise, a little too late, that I've hit a nerve.

"Risky? Amelia, you'll die. Not only will you have destroyed our child's chance for life, you'll have taken your own. This isn't your option. You're not taking it."

He pulls me by the arm so that I stagger even nearer to him, tripping over my feet. The grip of his hand around my arm pinches but I can't bring myself to ask him to let go. He is livid.

"I'm not letting you, Amelia."

This ignites something in me. His readiness to control my choices, to command me to sit back and follow him, goes against the grain. It is not in my nature to rely on someone else because it is not in anyone's nature here. We are survivors through our own volition.

"Jesus Christ. What do you want me to do? Hang around here till they figure out what's happening to me? Let them cart me off to the prison to wait as my belly grows, knowing that I'll be put to death as soon as this - this thing is out of me?!" I seethe, feeling for the wall behind me so I can shuffle backwards. I want to get away from him.

He holds tight onto my arm. I glare up at him but he doesn't back down, meeting my determination with his own. For once, he looks affronted by what I've said and I hate that I feel shame. It's not enough though, I can't take back my words and I can't quite make myself want to.

"Don't call our child a thing. How could you?"

"You're not the one who has to carry it - carry this baby inside of you for nine months. It's easy for me to hate it when I know it's the reason I'm going to die."

Everything I've been feeling since I found out I was pregnant is spilling out of me, uncontrollable like trying to hold onto water in your hands. He doesn't seem to understand that I'm coming apart.

"And I don't get a say in this? You said it before yourself - it takes two for something like this to happen. This is our baby, Amelia. Don't just throw me aside like I don't mean anything."

I grimace at what he has said because I know it's true. My only reaction is to try and escape again. No such luck, with Grahame clinging to me like the earth between us will crack open at any given second.

"Can you please stop trying to run away from me? You've heard the stories. They'll cut you open, rip you apart, let you bleed till you're dead, cold on a table, in a warehouse that only god knows where - "

"Shut up!"

Does he think I don't know this already? Does he think I'm just jumping on this idea without any consideration? That I'm taking all of this lightly?

I shrink away from him, sidling up to the wall. He advances though, grabbing my chin to force me to look up at him. His fingers brush across my jaw and come to rest against my neck; I'm aware of the throbbing of my own pulse and I resist against the urge to turn away. The Community stills lives in me, the aversion to touch. Grahame makes it look so easy, as natural as breathing. I guess he just needed the right person to show it.

"Don't go to them. I don't want you to make that choice. I don't want you to die like that."

"As opposed to being strung up for the whole Community to watch? For you to see?" I say softly.

"I'm won't let it happen. I promised I would think of a way but I swear, if you don't even let me try to get us out of this and you find the Cutters anyway, I'll hand myself in to the Enforcers."

"Grahame, don't be an idiot. There's no sense in us both croaking it - "

His forehead rocks against mine and not once does he break eye contact. It's not a romantic gesture as such, more the act of a plea. "I won't die if you won't. Deal?"

"Why do you even care?"

I'm thrown back to the day of the run, when he complained about Stanley getting too close to me. I had asked him almost exactly the same thing then as we maneuvered through the snowy streets; why did he care? He told me that he didn't and it wasn't something I had argued with because it was the obvious answer, because that's who we are, that's how we're made to be.

Now though, I see that Grahame is an anomaly. He doesn't quite fit in the way that the rest of us do; the way he volunteered for the run, asking me to help him, inviting me into his flat, laughing, always touching me.

So I guess his reply should not have surprised me.

"Because I do."

As simple as that, with such surety that it gives me cause to not doubt him. But what is this between us? What do we have? A drunken night and the eagerness to live? The latter could be said for anyone, so why exactly is he so committed to the idea of us making it through together?

A bell screams through the air, making us jump apart, signalling for Grahame's return to the greenhouses. He looks away from me, to the entrance of our small passageway but he shows no sign of leaving. His teeth are biting down on his lower lip, hard enough that I'm worried he'll draw blood.

"You have to go back to work." I tell him because otherwise, he might not.

He doesn't move. "Amelia, I can't go until you say you won't do anything colossally stupid. How do I know that as soon as I'm out of sight, you won't go running about after the Cutters?"

"It was a dumb idea, it was thoughtless. I swear I won't try and find the Cutters. I'm asking you to trust me. You have to get to work. Just trust me, Grahame."

His head jerks into a quick nod and he steps back towards the light of the entrance yet he still hesitates, something holding him here. Then, like lightning, he makes a split decision, springing to me in one leap.

"One last thing - "

His hands find my face and he presses his lips to mine, feather soft, catching me off-guard. I don't have time to react before he pulls away again. He hasn't kissed me since the night in the warehouse and for some reason, though this kiss lacks the ferocity and urgency those others had, it feels much more intimate. Living the way that we do, I had never as much as touched a man before Grahame. I blush furiously without wanting to, knowing that neither of our senses have been muddled with the consumption of Stanley's concoctions.

My eyes do not drift from his, even as his breath warms my mouth and cheeks. I can't help but wonder if he has kissed me because he thinks it's the right thing to do or because girls that he can kiss do not come along frequently or openly in our world. I make a vow to myself: either way, I will not become his emotional outlet.

I watch as he slips through the exit of our hideaway, a silhouette against the light of the day. His skill of going unnoticed allows him to weave back into a society that hasn't even realised his absence without trouble, like a ghost returning to the living.

He exists to me though and he leaves me with a parting declaration. His words linger behind long after he has gone, murmuring back to me in the dark quiet of the passage as if they are caught on the wind that whistles through the buildings.

"I trust you, Amelia. Didn't I tell you that on day one?"