Page 117 of A Better World

Russell rolled down the driver’s side window, smiled pleasantly. He had a good poker face. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

Pratt issued prayer hands and smiled affably on this cold, bright day. “House check,” he answered while Sally stood beside him, glaring.

“Hmm?” Russell asked.

“Every PV resident must attend the Winter Festival. We check from house to house to make sure no one’s left behind.”

“We’re not feeling well,” Russell answered. “Linda thinks it’s something she caught on the outside. We don’t want to pass it on to anyone, especially in such closed quarters. We’re going to have to skip it.”

Pratt touched his hand to his gun. “Everyone goes to the Winter Festival.”

The police car escorted them to Caladrius Park just as the livestock trucks had finished unloading their cargo. She spotted the last of the caladrius waddling down the Labyrinth entrance. Like homing pigeons returning to their point of origin, they required no direction.

“Are we in trouble? I was assured there’d be no retaliation for my wife’s actions,” Russell said to Pratt once they were all out.

Sally sneered, fists clenched. Linda’d made her look stupid and would not be forgiven.

“No trouble at all,” Pratt answered, stepping ahead of Sally and talking before she had the chance. “This isn’t a serious event. It’s a party and it’s just for fun. We escort people all morning. As a matter of fact, we have to be off. Some of the older residents need reminders. Enjoy your time!”

The Farmer-Bowens stayed close. The line of residents descending into the entrance moved briskly. All variety of scenarios played out in Linda’s mind. They could run. But there were guards here, too. What if one of them got shot?

And Hip. Where was Hip?

They arrived at the mouth—the same entrance she’d taken on that first day they’d toured with Zach. Cyrus Galani checked their names off a master list.

“Did Hip Farmer-Bowen go through?” Linda asked.

Cyrus checked the list. “Yeah,” he said with a frown. “Looks like he was one of the first… You played a real prank on us yesterday.”

He was inside. Linda’s heart sank.

“My wife’s very sorry,” Russell said in his wheedling, pleasing voice. His gritty smile was pasted on, a kind of parody of happiness that in fact looked like misery.

Cyrus looked behind them, at Percy Khoury. His wrist wounds were freshly bandaged and he wore a bulky knapsack on his shoulders. “Look at you! Finally ready to go back to work at another festival. Thanks for keeping the shelter online. We owe you our gratitude and we appreciate you. Go on down!”

Slowly, his pack cumbersome, looking disregulated as ever, Percy descended. Cyrus signaled for the Farmer-Bowens to do the same. Linda scanned the area, trying to decide whether to flee. But what would running do when they had no place to go?

Down they went.

The Labyrinth was decorated with feathers glued into tapestries hanging from every wall. Warm heat lamps glowed every few feet. They reached a coat and bag check at the bottom. By then, the crowd was so teeming that there wasn’t any turning back.

They went through the hidden door and into the belly of the place—the shelter. To the left, the caladrius hissed and warbled from an indoor stockyard, furious at being penned in, and probably more furious at being stuck with so many of its own kind.

The Farmer-Bowens followed the crowd to the right, into a wide room where Beautification Society and Civic Club volunteers distributed uniformly sized hooded white robes. “May you always shine,” Heaven Gelman said to each person as she handed out each folded gown. “For longer than the stars.”

They dressed in communal chambers divided by age group, storing their street clothing in cubbies. The older people and the more self-conscious kids changed behind screens erected specifically for that reason. Time passed slowly, Linda’s heart beating hard. The festival lasted three days and two nights. How would she and her family possibly get through it?

After everyone was dressed and ready, Heaven Gelman spoke into a megaphone to deliver her announcement. “Greetings, Plymouth Valley! Welcome to the sixty-first Plymouth Valley Winter Festival! All residents are accounted for and all exits have been sealed. Please proceed to lunch.”

The exits were sealed?

They followed the crowd to the main reception chamber, where they found a sumptuous buffet. They’d killed most of their livestock for this. There was goat meat and cow meat and deer meat, all sliced and cooked and garnished with all the fruits she’d thought were extinct: raspberries, strawberries, pineapples, mangoes. There was so much of it that no one rushed or took double helpings.

The three of them did as expected, serving themselves and then searching for Hip. The crowd was larger than she’d realized. She’d thought by then that she’d have met everyone in this town, but she was wrong. Forty-five hundred people are a lot of people.

She roamed outside the banquet hall, was intercepted. “Party’s in there,” Sally said, her lips pulled back into a sneer.

Thinking of exits and fleeing, Linda asked: “Can I look around the rest of the shelter?”

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