Page 1 of Falling with Grace

1

Grace

Sarah’s blood smeared against a small animal's sun-bleached bones where she collapsed—her cut-up feet compacted with debris much like my own. "We have to keep going."

Dirt smeared across her pale skin, and her gaunt eyes resembled Death beneath the hood of her flaming red hair.

"I can't. I'm too tired."

I jerked her arms with both hands, my depleted muscles screaming as she found her feet. "If you stop, we die." My soles ached as I dragged her over the jagged terrain, her groans filling the darkening sky.

"Come on, Grace." Maria's shoulders hunched over, her hands on her knees twenty paces ahead. Her chest heaved for breath. "Just leave her."

A bird fluttered its wings overhead and squealed as my narrowed eyes locked onto hers. "Like I left you, right?"

"Like you left the others."

She returned my glare until I dropped my gaze to her worn-out sneakers.

"That's not fair." The words tumbled out of my mouth like a dying confession.

She's lucky.

The new girl arrived within hours of our escape.

They hadn't even taken her clothes or shoes away, so it was easy for her to discard someone while the rest of us tiptoed with bare feet over cactus, jagged rocks, and old coyote tracks.

Maria had yet to experience the horrors of twisted men. Given a little more time in the confines of our hell, they would've introduced her to a world not even the devil could conjure up.

My fingers intertwined with Sarah's as we hiked the hill, my feet slipping on the baked earth, sweat dripping down my hairline and into my worn shirt.

Maria shook her head as we met up with the group of seven ahead.

"Honestly, Maria." Viola tossed her greasy chestnut-colored hair over her shoulder. "Have some sympathy."

Maria huffed at her as she turned around. "I'm never going back there, and if I have to leave the weak link to ensure that never happens, then I will."

I spun around, the balls of my feet screaming as the cuts spread wide, my lungs burning in my chest. "The only weak link here is the selfish girl who's willing to leave someone behind to die." Pressing my finger to her chest, I applied pressure until she took a step back. "We're all in this together. We either help each other survive, or no one will."

Maria's deep brown eyes darted to the group surrounding us. "I won't let them do to me what they did to you."

I let out a laugh as a heavy silence fell over us. "If they catch us, you won't live long enough to experience much of anything." I took a step away from her, shaking my head. "He doesn't tolerate anyone who doesn't conform."

The group nodded in unison, except for Maria, who planted her hands on her hips in defiance.

I glanced beyond her toward the group. "In about two miles, we will be in America." I hiked a thumb over my shoulder. "If we make it there, we have a better chance at freedom. But we can't do that if we let selfishness get in our way."

Jorge rubbed his sparse beard growing under his chin, a gleam in his eye as he put an arm around my shoulder in comradery.

We were the last originals standing, the ultimate survivors inhistwisted game of captivity.

We'd formed an unbreakable bond and became each other's pillars of strength.

He tended to my wounds through prison bars, and I, his. We offered each other comfort in the darkness through tear-streaked words.

He wasn't a brother.

He wasn't a lover.

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