Wilder Girls - Rory Power Page 0,14

to tell them what to do, and it’s more than I thought I’d have to carry. But I have to remember that for all the rules that have fallen apart, there are new ones, stronger and more rigid than anything we had before. Nobody goes past the fence—that’s the first rule, the most important, and now I’m one of the girls allowed to break it.

I give the nearest girl a smile that I hope is mature and responsible and then hurry out of the room, still feeling the stares. Welch said to meet her so I go, along the south corridor to the storeroom, where I find her taking inventory.

“Hetty, great,” she says. She looks so tired, and for a second I’m grateful. The Tox doesn’t hurt her as badly as it hurts us girls, but at least between flare-ups, we can count on a moment or two of peace. “Come and help me for a minute.”

She dumps a stack of blankets into my arms, and I hear her counting softly. I drop my forehead against them, make sure I’m breathing slowly. I think the stitches over my eye have opened up.

“We’ll probably go out again tomorrow or the day after,” Welch says, taking the blankets back from me. “Yesterday’s shipment was small, so with any luck they’ll supplement it.”

The best we can hope for is some extra food, and maybe a blanket or two. In the early days there was more. Contact lens solution, so Kara didn’t have to wear her glasses. Insulin for Olivia, and Welch’s birth control, to manage her hormones. But they stopped coming after a month or so, and even Headmistress couldn’t get them back. Left Kara without her lenses, Welch without her pills, and Olivia dead.

“So where do I meet you?” I ask. “And what do I bring? Is it—”

“I’ll come fetch you.” Welch gives me a once-over. “Make sure you’re getting some good rest. And try to avoid displays like that fuss in the main hall, if you would.”

“Tell that to Reese,” I mutter.

“Oh, sorry,” I hear from behind me. I turn, see Taylor shifting from foot to foot in the doorway. At first I think she’s here to give me a hard time about taking her spot on Boat Shift, even though she’s the one who gave it up, but she’s focused on Welch.

“Didn’t mean to interrupt,” she continues. “Welch, can I catch up with you later?”

A look passes between them—quick, almost nothing, and gone before I can pin it down. “Sure,” Welch says lightly.

Taylor ducks down the hall. I stare after her, trying to spot whatever the Tox did to her. Nobody’s sure what her flare-ups have left her with, not even the other girls in her year. Whatever the changes, they must be hidden under her clothes.

“Remember, Hetty,” Welch says as she finishes tallying the blankets. I snap back to her. “Rest and hydration, and no fuss. Away with you now.”

Out in the corridor I’m just in time to see Taylor disappearing into the kitchen. Welch wouldn’t tell me what to expect past the fence, but Taylor might.

I follow her, sidle into the kitchen to see her kneeling by the old fridge, one arm wedged behind it.

“Um,” I say, and she jumps, free hand flying to her belt where she used to keep a knife during her Boat Shift days.

“God, Hetty. Make a noise, won’t you?”

“Sorry.” I inch closer. “What are you doing?”

Taylor glances over my shoulder, still holding herself coiled and tight, and then smiles a little. I watch the tension drain out of her. She sits back on her heels and pulls a plastic sleeve of crackers out from behind the fridge. “Want a snack?”

Hiding food is strictly forbidden. A few girls tried it near the beginning, and it wasn’t the teachers who came down hard but the rest of us. Boat Shift took them outside to have a talk and left them bloodied in the courtyard. Taylor, though—she’s earned some leeway. I can’t imagine anybody punishing her.

“Sure,” I say, and sit down next to her on the checkered tile. She hands me a cracker. I feel her watching me as I take a bite. “Thanks.”

“I put these here sometime last summer. Figured one of you girls would’ve found them by now.”

“Nobody’s gonna look back there,” I say. “Too many gross cobwebs. And, like, mice or something.”

Taylor scoffs. “When was the last time you saw a mouse around here?” She swallows a cracker down in