The next three days were infuriating. Every morning we fought our way to the front of the breakfast line to get paper cups of rice. After breakfast, we’d wander over to the vehicle depot. Twice we saw the mechanic, Chet. Once he came over to the fence and talked to Darla for a while, speaking in some foreign language that might best be named “Diesel Truckish” (or should it be “Diesel Truckian”? Whatever). Every afternoon we stood in the Baptists’ food line, but they always ran out before we got to the front. We saw Georgia every day, and every day she had the same news for us: nothing. Colonel Levitov hadn’t told Director Evans anything about the wheat, and the Baptists couldn’t go get it without trucks and support from Black Lake. Keep praying, Georgia said.
Prayer is all well and good, but I wanted to do something. Darla looked thinner every day, and she’d been slender to start with. I felt as if we were being hollowed out from the inside, so our skin might soon collapse, leaving only a papery husk to mark our passing. I figured my backpack could hold enough wheat to keep us both alive for a month or more. If something didn’t change soon, I planned to try climbing the fence, razor wire and guards notwithstanding.
The next day, our sixth in the camp, something did change. Not long after breakfast, the camp’s loudspeakers came on with a hiss. At first I ignored them, but when I heard Darla’s name I tuned in. “Edmunds report to Gate C immediately. Darla Edmunds, Gate C.” I glanced at her and saw her shrug.
When we got there, the gate was closed. Chet was on the far side, chatting with the two guards.
“Did you call me?” Darla asked Chet.
“Yeah, that idea about using brake master cylinders as control valves on the dozers? You want to try it?”
“Try it?”
“Sure, I had road ops tow in four pickups yesterday. We can scavenge the cylinders off them. I’ve got all the tools we need and a full shop… so, you in?”
Darla was quiet a moment. Thinking, I figured. I said, “You should-”
“What’s it pay?” Darla asked.
“Pay?” Chet said.
“Yeah, you want me to help fix your dozers; I ought to get paid, right?”
“I guess so, but getting a job at Black Lake is really hard. I’d have to go to the colonel, and I dunno if-”
“I don’t need money. I want three square meals a day. For me and for Alex. And I’ll fix as many dozers as you want me to.”
“Um… I can feed you when you’re working. Maybe two meals. But if I let you take food back into the camp, I could get fired. Couple a guys caused a riot that way two weeks ago, giving food to girls through the gate. And I only got authorization for one assistant.”
Darla was quiet a moment. “No. If we can’t both eat-”
“Do it!” I whispered. “We’ve got a lot better chance if one of us gets enough to eat.”
“You sure? It doesn’t seem-”
“I have to get back to work,” Chet said.
“Okay. Two meals. One before work and one after, every day. And I start after the camp breakfast.”
“Come on, then.” Chet opened the gate.
Darla gave me a peck on the lips and trotted through the gate after Chet. I watched as they walked across the administration compound and through another gate into the vehicle depot. I kept watching until they disappeared inside a huge canvas tent that served as a garage.
It was strange, being alone. There wasn’t much to do; Darla and I had already visited the latrine trench, refilled our water bottles, and gone through the breakfast line that morning. I’d spent almost every minute with Darla for the last five weeks; being separated was. .. uncomfortable. It felt a bit like being naked in a room full of clothed people. Not that I’d ever done that, but I imagined it’d feel like I did right then.
I found a spot out of the wind where I could crouch beside a tent and still see the vehicle depot. I spent the rest of the morning and the early afternoon there, watching. When it was time to line up for the yellow coats’ dinner, Darla still hadn’t emerged from the garage. I was getting a little worried, but there was nothing I could do, so I crossed the camp diagonally to try my luck with the food line.
My luck held: bad, same as always. The food line dispersed even quicker than usual. There were three hundred, maybe four hundred kids between me and the last one who had gotten anything to eat. The only kids short enough to get fed looked to be eight or nine. Obviously nobody had gotten any wheat off the barge yet. The Baptists’ food supply was getting smaller, not bigger.
Georgia wasn’t there, either. There were two yellow coats organizing the line, but one of them was new. I caught him as everyone was leaving and asked about Georgia.
“Don’t know if I’m supposed to say anything about that.”
“Come on. She’s a friend.” When I said it, I was only trying to get information, but then I realized it was true.
The guy shrugged. “Where’s the harm? She went home.”
“She didn’t tell me she was leaving.”
“It was a sudden thing. Some kind of dispute with Director Evans.”
“About what?”
“That’s all I’m going to say. I’ve got to go help clean up.”
I trudged to the vehicle depot. There was no sign of Darla there, so I walked to Gate C, where she’d met Chet that morning. She was standing a few feet outside the gate, waiting for me. There were grease stains on her shirtsleeves and a big splotch of oil on her jeans. I didn’t care. I wrapped her up in a tight hug.
“Let’s go to the tent,” she said.
“Okay.” I took her hand and we started walking. “How was it?”
“Not bad. Chet’s not much of a mechanic. He didn’t even know to open the bleeder valve when you’re draining brake fluid. He didn’t get the line clear, so when I pulled the first master cylinder, I got oil all over myself.”
“I wouldn’t have known any of that stuff, either.”
“You’re not getting paid to be a mechanic.”
Nightfall was at least two hours off, but there were two people in our tent when we got there. They seemed to be asleep-resting, I guessed. We ignored them and shuffled to the back, where we knelt side by side, facing the corner. Darla reached down the front of her jeans. She didn’t need to unbutton them to accomplish this, which reminded me how much weight she’d lost-weight she couldn’t afford to drop. She pulled out a crumpled plastic package and surreptitiously passed it to me.
I glanced at the front of the package. Something was written there, but it was too dark in the tent to read it. I ripped off the top of the package. An intoxicating scent wafted to my nose: chocolate. Saliva filled my mouth, and I felt a little dizzy. I hoped the other two people in the tent were sick; maybe stuffed-up noses would keep them from smelling that heavenly aroma. I ate a piece-the first chocolate I’d had in seven weeks. Somehow it tasted even better than I had remembered.
The bar had been crushed to crumbs in Darla’s pants. I poured myself a handful of chocolate and threw it into my mouth. I ate like a starving beast, but then again, I was starving. I wasn’t a beast, though. I stopped myself before I’d wolfed it all and offered some to Darla. She put her lips against my ear and whispered, “No. Eat it all. I had one already. I’d have smuggled them both to you, but Chet was watching me too closely. Sorry.”
I snarfed the rest of the chocolate and licked the inside of the package. Then I licked off my hands, which gave the chocolate a gritty, sulfurous taste. I stuffed the wrapper into my pocket. I’d find a place to bury it later.