Page 83 of The Compound

Tom was at the door. It rattled, but didn’t open. “Open the door, Lily; there’s nothing out here. It’s fine.”

But was I even sure that I had the number of weeks right? Had it really been a week since Becca told Sam the date? How long since Sam had gone? Forever; forever!

“Open thedoor,Lily,” he repeated. The door rattled again. Behind me, the cabinet stayed where it was. He cursed loudly. I heard his footsteps move around the house, toward the back door.

Becca had left yesterday. Was it yesterday? No, two days ago. And we had gone without water for two days. Three days? Two days. But how long before that? Did Tom know what day it was? Had he seen Becca’s record, or had he kept his own?

I heard the back door handle shake, and Tom’s heavy tread around theoutside of the house. He was checking for open windows. I heard him go to the downstairs bathroom window—closed—and then the other spare room—closed.

I shot to my feet. The window in Tom’s room; I hadn’t checked it. I ran as quickly as I could, my feet loud on the wooden floors. His lamp was on in the corner, and I could see the top window, just slightly ajar. When I got to the window, I screamed: there was a figure in the window, covered in blood. But it was me, it was only me, my reflection catching me by surprise. I must have touched my face with my bloody hands; there were smudges of scarlet across my face. My arms, too, as I reached up to close the window, were covered in lines and streaks of blood. I had cut my left leg on the barbed wire in my hurry, and there were small rivulets of blood there, too. My hands had only just stopped bleeding.

The handle of the window was high up, and I stretched toward it, my fingers reaching, reaching, when Tom appeared on the other side. His face was twisted in rage; mine, I could see, was open with shock. I could almost reach the handle to close it, but not quite. If I turned to get the chair, Tom would have time to open it further and wrestle his way in before I could stop him. He seemed to realize the same thing at the same time: he jumped up, his fingers brushing the bottom of the window but not quite finding purchase. I scrambled onto the windowsill, pressing myself close to the windowpane and grabbing the curtain rail so I wouldn’t fall. I grabbed the inside handle on the window just as Tom got hold of the frame. I pulled, hard. His hold was slipping: he wedged his hand in, but I pulled harder, crushing his fingers, and he screamed in pain and removed his hand. The window closed with a resounding bang.

“Let me in now, and I won’t hurt you, Lily. I want to live peacefully together, I promise.”

I stared out, my reflected face clear and pale before me, his shadowed and out of focus. Suddenly, his face came into focus as he leaned close against the glass. His hand slammed against the window with enough force that I flinched. “Let me in!”

I examined the glass, looking for cracks, but it had stayed intact. “Do the challenge and I’ll let you in. You say your answer, then I say mine.”

I tried to look past my face and see his instead. I couldn’t make outmuch. He spat at the window, right between where my eyebrows were reflected.

He stepped away and disappeared into the night.

—

I sat bythe front door, Tom’s knife resting in my lap. I thought maybe fifteen minutes had passed, possibly more, since I had locked him out. I could hear him walking around the house, banging at the boarded window and trying to budge the front door. I tried to tune him out as I did my calculations. I was sure I could do it if I was at ease and had some paper. But I jumped at every noise and kept getting up to check on the windows. In the struggle with the gray room’s window, my right hand had started to bleed again. I couldn’t keep the numbers in my head, and eventually wrote out the sums in my blood on the floor.

The problem, of course, was that I was bad at math, and he was good at it. The task catered to him—but hadn’t the last one, the race, been suited to him as well?

It was possible that Tom knew exactly how long it had been, but I thought that he wasn’t sure, otherwise he would have suggested that we do it right away. How many days were in November? Every time my mind reached for an answer, my hand itched for my phone.

Suddenly, I heard Tom shout out. He was, I think, somewhere near the side of the house, by the patio. He shouted again, louder, wilder, and I resisted the urge to get up. This would be the difficult part.

“Back!” he yelled. “Get back—get back!” Suddenly he was banging on the blocked front door, just inches fromme.

“Let me in! Lily, let me in! There’s something out here! Lily, open the door! Lily! There’s a—I can’t see, but there’s something out here! Let me in—let me in!”

I could feel the door shaking, but the cabinet was large and bottom-heavy and the barricade held strong.

“Answer the question,” I shouted. “How many hours until Christmas?” My voice was not as steady as I wanted it tobe.

“There issomething out here!”

Silence fell for the space of a couple of heartbeats. I heard a crash, andthough I had promised myself that I wouldn’t look, I found myself rising from the ground and crossing to the living room. I kept the light off, and watched from the corner. Tom had broken apart a chair, and had one of its legs in one hand and the seat in the other. In the dark, two eyes glowed.

“Get back!” he bellowed. “Back!”

It advanced on him, its front paws crisscrossing. Tom was panting; I could hear his breath sawing through the distance between us. I could see that it was a four-legged animal, some kind of wild dog, perhaps a coyote. It paused, not taking its eyes off Tom. He was standing by the table, under which I had hidden chunks of meat. I thought that it probably wouldn’t attack, only wanted the meat. But Tom was adjusting his grip on the leg of the chair, and he was leaning forward, his breath leaving him in white puffs. The creature slunk forward, just an inch or so, and Tom struck out, slashing the air in front of it. Even with a wall between us, I could hear thewhooshof the chair leg as it cut through the air. The animal moved closer still, crouching low to the ground as if ready to spring, and let out a sharp growl. In response to the animal’s growl Tom let out a shout, and lunged toward it once more. This time his aim was true, and the chair leg hit the coyote with an audible thud. The animal moved with devastating speed, and I saw its teeth flash, but not much else. Tom’s piercing cry broke through the night. I pressed myself against the window, and saw that the coyote had sunk its teeth into Tom’s hand. He seemed frozen, lost in the pain for a few moments, until he brought the chair leg down on the coyote’s back. It howled and moved away, but kept its teeth bared, a low snarl spilling from its mouth.

Tom had dropped the seat, his makeshift shield, and was brandishing the chair leg in his uninjured left hand, making a wild noise in his throat. It was then that the second coyote appeared at the other’s flank. The newcomer turned its head to look directly at me. Tom’s head twitched around to follow its gaze; when he saw me, he turned his head fully, keeping his body facing the animals. The fear on his face wasn’t pleasant to see—but it wasn’t unpleasant either.

“Let me in!” he shouted, his voice a frenzied rasp. “Let me in!”

His hand was mangled and bloody; but then again, mine were, too.

“There’s meat behind you,” I called. “Under the table. They don’t want to attack you. They just want the food. Throw them the meat and get away from there.”

The coyotes had moved no closer, but the second one was growling now, too. Tom’s head snapped back toward them.

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