How to be Alone

Chapter Six: Anna and Ryan

The soldier's body's smoke blows past my face, gently caressing my arms. I fall to my knees, laughing hysterically. That was so funny it hurts my ribs to laugh!

Quickly, I run over to behind one of the trucks and watch from afar, reappearing, excited to see what he does.

I cover my mouth and sometimes vanish for a second because I can't hold in my laughter. Once he was done spinning in place, his gun raised to the horizon, he booked it back inside. As soon as it's safe, I cup my hands around my mouth and call to him.

"Ryan's dad!" I shout. I can't remember his name. Oops. He raises his head and looks around. "Over here!" I yell again. It's sort of a whisper-shout, not really yelling.

He looks over and his brows furrow. He clambers to his feet, looking once inside the camp, then scurrying towards me.

"Lila? Where is Ryan?" He asks me. His round glasses and short blonde hair makes him look so young. Like Harry Potter kinda, but only kinda.

I nod towards the camp. "They're in there somewhere."

"Where? Why?"

"The box you took a picture of?" I try to remind him. He searches his memory for a second.

"Right?"

I think to myself for a second about what I'm about to say. "There are human parts in them," I tell him bluntly.

Ryan's father smiles for a second and then loses it, sort of like an initial moment of disbelief. "No joke, eh?" He says.

I shake my head and say no.

"Shit. Is that why they took Ryan?"

I nod.

"Shit!" Ryan's dad looks around. "What happened to the soldier?"

I think for a second. What should I do? Should I just... vanish? Would that explain it well enough, so that I could start making my way into the camp? What should I say otherwise, if I don't do that?

"I scared him off," I said.

"Okay, but what actually happened?"

I shrug. Not worth the time to explain. I just need to get in there and do something, and do it now.

"I'm going to go in there now and try to get them out. Don't tell anyone, okay?" I say, bringing a finger to my lip.

"What? Are you fuckin' nuts?" He asks. I vanish.

The camp is a quiet calm. The sound of wind brushing through the crowning trees fills my ears once more, but again there are no animals, no life to speak of. No movement. Not even a breeze on my legs now.

It feels desolate with the silence. Tents line either side of this path through the middle, and a small pop-up building lies at the very end. I make my way there, the short, gray, wooden building. It resembles a convenience store in shape and size, and a prison in shade and construction.

The door to the entrance is missing, and in place of it is a wall of busy smoke. Like Terry's car was smoke as it drove, I assume this means people are rushing in and out constantly. I step inside. There's a desk to my left and beyond it is a hallway stretching to either side, filled with doors and rooms all the way down.

The environment looks busy but it doesn't at the same time. Pages litter the plasticy-wooden floor, and it's still just as silent as it was outside.

I approach the doors and found my hand, smoky, could not create any friction against the handles of the doors. I peek inside one of the doors. It's a cell. I look at the one adjacent, and it's another cell, cluttered with so many papers and files. I peek into another and my heart nearly jumps from my chest; a deep maroon shirt, tattered and dirty, lay motionless on the ground, crumpled and wrinkled almost into a pyramid. It's Anna's shirt, I think.

Bending down, I try to scratch the pages off of the ground but all I can manage is a nudge, like a slight breeze merely kissing them. While initially it was just the way it was, now it's starting to really irritate me. Like a dream where you try to scream but you can't, no matter how hard you try. It just comes out like a whimper.

I slap the page on the ground, and nothing. I keep smacking the floor, harder and more quickly, but nothing happens; I don't feel anything, and the page barely moves. I take a moment and pause, then slam my fist, punching the wood, but still, nothing. I feel nothing. I stand up and punch the metal door, and nothing. I run my body into it, and feel like a wave crashing into the shore—there's a little take and a lot of give, pushing my body away from the door.

They're in there. I need to get inside. I think, I try to think of some way, somehow to get inside. I feel the people, the soldiers, moving around all around me. I can't just reappear. What if they realize what I'm here for, and try to hide them. I can't risk that. If I'm in there, though, I won't be seen. I can hide with them.

In a spurt of motivation, I throw myself at the door again, diving up and through the window. The window, made of a grate with no glass, had only take, no give, letting me fly through. When I land, it's like when a bucket of water splashes into a tub. My body, a cloud of smoke, washes up and ricochets off the wall like a wave against a rocky cliff. I lay on the ground and feel nothing now. Just my own breath as it expands and collapses my chest. Then, I reappear.

It's so loud. People are yelling, boots are thumping throughout the building. A hand grasps my shoulder and I spin, taking their wrist and pulling it off, but it was Anna. She sat there without a shirt on, just a thick woolen sports bra and her pants. Then I notice how hot it is. It's so hot.

I have a million questions, and don't say any one of them. "Where's Ryan?" Is all I say.

"I'm here," He says, reaching his hand out to touch my knee. I'm afraid. I didn't notice before, but now, looking into their tired eyes, their muddied and soot-coated faces, I'm truly scared. I don't even know what to say right now.

"Are you here to get us out?" Anna asked. I didn't answer her.

"What did they do?" I ask. They don't answer.

"I wasn't sure what happened to you," Ryan says. "They didn't bring you back with us. We never saw you."

I looked at him. It's because they tried to kill me, I say. Not aloud. I don't think I need to say it out loud. "I'm sorry," I say.