Misery or Humanity, chapters 6,7,8

Before the Storm – Julia

It was hard trying to convince Blaine of anything. He was very set in his ways. I had never told my parents about him. I wasn’t really sure what they would say. And what would they think if I told them he was the one leading the revolt against the government? They would probably cut him off from me completely.

As I drove home, these thoughts tumbled around my head. He wasn’t deliberately trying to hurt me, but the way he had refused my help without really saying it stuck in my mind. I don’t know why he opposed the idea so much. If he didn’t want help, he could have just said so. But I had seen it in his expression, in his eyes. I don’t want you having anything to do with this.

I wondered if he thought I didn’t get it. If he thought I was some oblivious Elite just saying things to get in on the action. But he was my best friend, and vice versa. I should have seen that in him.

On the other side of the wall, I was met with a scene of chaos. A plume of smoke was rising from the center of town, where the seat of government was. My father went there some days when the scene wasn’t hot in New York. He had said something about going there today. And someone was burning it.

Turning sharply and receiving some loud honks from other drivers, I kept my foot to the floor all the way to the middle of town. The government building was indeed burning, with a large crowd gathering outside. There were fire trucks and ambulances, and people still jumping out of the burning windows to safety below. I parked the car, wrenched the door open, and ran to the fray of the crowd. Pushing through the press of bodies, I spotted my mother, speaking wildly to an ambulance driver.

“Mother!” I cried when I was in earshot.

She turned her head in my direction. I ran towards her and threw my arms around her.

“Thank goodness you’re safe, Julia. I was worried sick.”

“I was v-I mean, seeing some friends.” It was a narrow slip, but she didn’t seem to catch it.

“As long as you’re all right, that’s all that matters.”

I looked around, hoping to see my father somewhere. “Where’s Daddy? Did something happen to him?”

Mother sighed, looking tired. “Not to worry, Julia. He broke a leg, but otherwise, he’s fine.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. Glancing toward the building, I saw it engulfed in torrents of water. Who had the gall to sneak into the middle of town and burn down the government? It certainly couldn’t have been one of us. The Elites have everything they could ask for. Had it been Commons? The people who everybody knows they don’t get half the breaks that we do?

“Those despicable Common people. They don’t know what’s good for them.”

If I was supposed to respond to that, I didn’t. My eyes wandered, landing on someone pushing through the dispersing crowd toward us. It was Daniel Hemsworth.

“Hey, Julia,” he said as he came closer. “Hello, Mrs. Cartwright.”

“Daniel, hello. Do you have any idea who started this horrible fire?”

He shrugged, his eyes dropping to his feet. “No, but Dad says it might have been a rouge Common gang.”

Mother shook her head, turning away. “Well, hopefully, they’ll be brought to justice and it’ll be the end of it.”

An unspoken thought flashed through my mind. It’s not the end, Mother. It’s just the beginning.

After running home to shower and changing into something more comfortable, I lapsed into my regular Saturday routine. Considering graduation was only a few weeks away, the teachers had gone easy on the homework. I studied some, finals being one week out. I didn’t have to worry too much, though. My grades, as well as my mind, were in good shape. But it kept wandering back to what Blaine had said earlier. He wanted equality between our two classes, not just us all living together. That’s the way it had been a long time ago, but our parents had showed us the effects of how that turned out. But what could that mean? This place would turn into a war zone in no time.

A few weeks. If I could just convince Blaine to wait until we graduated, it might be safer. I would at least be watching it from a distance. How selfish was that? Blaine would be in the thick of it. I couldn’t watch him get hurt or killed. There had to be a way to get him to see that war was useless.

I resolved to do just that.

The Way Out – Blaine

It would definitely be dangerous, trying to get out. I wouldn’t know how to get across the wall. And Julia believed that I was staying for a while longer, thinking about this whole thing. What would she think of me when she found out that I lied to her? She’d probably never trust me again.

On this particular afternoon, I had driven down to the wall to check for any weak spots. I parked as far away from it as possible and walked the rest. Pretending to look casual, I reached the wall and began scrutinizing it. There were cracks, nothing big enough to break through. I slowly worked my way down, feeling with my hands and occasionally pressing my ear to it to hear wind whistling through. For a hundred feet there was nothing. Then all of a sudden, a weak spot. The wall crumbled near the bottom, where it looked like somebody had already tried to get through it. I kicked it and it caved in even more. Dropping to my knees, I began digging it out. I knew for a fact that the wall was about three and a half feet thick, so I laid flat on my front and inched forward into the crevice, pushing the barrier in front of me.

After about five minutes, I came out on the other side. I crawled out, surveying the land outside the wall. It was expansive nothingness. As far as I could see, there were no signs that humans had ever lived here. This added complications to my plan. I was hoping for a method of transportation, but considering the size of the break in the wall, that didn’t look possible.

I remembered that if I kept going, I would hit another wall. This would be New York City, which didn’t let anyone but Elites in. It was pretty much a city full of them. And it was the capital, where every Elite would go at least once in their life.

Then it hit me. There was a way Julia could help me. It wouldn’t be a big job, but it would probably be the most important part of this. I would have to tell her soon though. The deadline was getting closer.

Dangerous Consequences – Julia

May Day rolled around, and the thought of an entirely blank week of school ahead obliterated the events of the weekend. I could tell Mother was trying to let go of it also. She was usually pampering my father, who had come home from the hospital but wasn’t going to work because of his leg.

Daniel Hemsworth continued to pester me about the prom, asking me about everything. Sometimes it was “What color corsage should I get you?” or “Should we color coordinate?”

Color. It was all about the color for him. He wanted it to match the color of my eyes, which he said were the most intense green he had ever seen. Frankly, I didn’t care much for it. Prom was stupid. But Mother insisted I go with Daniel, even when I had tried to backpedal and say I panicked when I said yes. So far, none of my excuses had worked.

Today, it happened again. He caught me just before Econ class.

“Hi, Jules,”

I whirled. “Oh. Hey, Daniel.”

“So, real quick, do you think a bow tie or a necktie would look better?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Your choice. All I have to do is slap a dress on, so you pick.”

His hand tightened on my arm. His eyes had traveled to the window inside the classroom. “Who’s that?”

Turning quickly, I saw a flash of movement. Dark hair, slightly scruffy. Could that have been…?

I swiveled back around to face Daniel. “Like I was saying, why don’t you be the judge? It’s just prom anyway.”

He nodded, pecking me on the cheek before leaving. I went into class, rubbing my necklace and looking out the window. If Blaine was ditching class just to spy on me, he was going to get his butt whipped.

Going from class to class was uneventful for the rest of the day. No sign of Blaine anywhere. I was convinced that was him now. Who else could dart around that fast? Daniel made another move on me, but I pushed him away before he got too intimate. He would probably dump me after the prom anyway, so it shouldn’t matter.

Finally, when school ended I raced home. A letter was supposed to come for me today. A university letter.

Mother had already laid them out on the table for me when I got home. Harvard, Stanford, Yale, and Brown had gotten back. We were waiting on Princeton. Both my parents were sitting in the dining room across from the envelopes. I took a deep breath, sinking down and staring at the four perfectly white rectangles of paper, each with a school seal and my name and address printed neatly in the center. For me, they didn’t just hold an acceptance or rejection. They held my future.

The first one I picked was Harvard. I sliced it open with one movement, sliding the paper out.

I looked up into my mother’s and father’s eyes. “You ready?”

Both of them inhaled sharply as I unfolded the paper.

We regret to inform you… That’s as far as I got. No Harvard. I managed to suppress the rejection feeling as I threw the letter at my parents, picking up the next one. Yale. Another regret, another rejection. My heart palpitated. Where would I be? Brown. We regret to… Tears sprang to my eyes as I hesitantly picked up the last one. What would this hold? I only had one more chance, after all.

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted… There it was, in clear black and white. Stanford.

“Honey…” My father slowly raised his eyes to mine.

“I got in,” I said. “Stanford. Here. Look.”

I handed the letter to my father, and his eyes quickly scanned the page. Mother snatched it from him and gave it a glance.

“We’re so proud of you.” Mother’s voice sounded genuinely impressed.

“Congratulations, Julia, hon.” My father hugged me across the table. Mother pecked me on the cheek, giving me a one-armed squeeze.

I smiled, a warm feeling bubbling up inside. My future was safe. I couldn’t wait to tell Blaine, but what would he say?

“We’re going to have a Stanford alum right here,” My father beamed.

I nodded, smoothing out the letter and reading it over again. I would have to pay tuition, and of course all the fees that went with college entrance. But that wasn’t the hard part. Me, Julia Edith Cartwright, a Stanford graduate? I couldn’t believe it. I grinned just thinking about it.

After a celebratory lunch, I skipped upstairs and called Blaine.

“Blaine here,” His usual way of answering the phone was comforting, in a way.

“Blaine, it’s me. There’s something really important I have to tell you.”

“Well, hello and how are you to you too, Jules,”

“Oh, shut up.”

I could hear the smile in his voice. “You’ve always been so direct, Jules.”

“Right. What I wanted to tell you was that I got into Stanford. I found out when I got home today.”

“That’s great. Congrats.”

“Thanks. How about you? Anything new?”

He took a deep breath before answering. “The wall. I found a weak spot.”

Here we go. This again. “So you still want to leave, huh?”

“Jules, you could help me.”

I rolled my eyes, flopping back onto the bedspread. “Come on, Blaine. You know I can’t. I’m an Elite.”

“No, no. They won’t let anyone through except for Elites. I was thinking…”

“Oh, heavens, Blaine. No.”

“Jules, stop. Just hear me out. I want to sneak past the wall, but there’s no way to get everyone out. I thought if they saw you leaving, they wouldn’t suspect anything. If it was me, they wouldn’t let me get through. But…”

“Blaine, please. Stop this. I thought I told you that this thing you’re doing, it’s useless. War against the capital is useless. Even against us wouldn’t help.”

After a long silence, he said: “No. It’ll be fine. You don’t know what’ll happen.”

“We’d be living in a war-torn place, Blaine.”

“That’s not true.”

“Yes it is, Blaine. Can’t you see? Remember what happened during the first war? Entire cities were wiped out.”

“It wouldn’t happen this time.”

I sat up, gripping my necklace so hard it hurt when it dug into my hand. “You should know, Blaine.”

That’s when he flew off the wall at me. “Know what? Know that I’ll never have a chance to go to college? Know that I can’t get a respectable job? Know that whatever I do, I’ll always be branded as ‘Common’? Know that while I’m laboring in Common land, you’ll be going to college, getting what you need to be successful? You have no idea what it’s like, Jules, day in and day out.”

I heard the pain and anger in his voice. “I may not know, Blaine, but I understand.”

“No. You don’t. Elites think they have it all, but they don’t.”

Hot tears gathered behind my eyes. Why was he saying all of this? “Blaine…why…”

He plowed forward. “They don’t have understanding, they don’t have trust, sometimes I wonder if they even have hearts.”

The tears came in torrents after that. “Blaine…you…you know me, though…you can trust me…”

Blaine was silent on the other end. Then, a couple minutes later, the dead tone.

I attempted to bite back one sob. What did this mean? Was he already gone? Had I lost him forever? I threw down the phone, trying hard not to cry, but it was less than successful. The dam broke, and I couldn’t stop until the tears ran dry. Afterward, I fell back onto the bed, lying there in the yellow afternoon light. The silence wrapped around me, enveloping me in its peacefulness.

Mother knocked softly on the door a couple minutes later. She must have heard me.

“Come in,” My voice seemed unusually gravelly.

“Julia, darling, what’s the matter? You were crying like your heart would break, dear.”

I sat up, knowing I was a sight. In that moment, I had no idea why that thought had occurred to me.

“In a way,” I said, trying to keep my voice even. “It is already.”

Her expression changed from worry to concern in an instant. “Has something happened between you two?”

I was bewildered for a second. Then slowly, it dawned on me. Daniel. That’s who she thought of. Should I tell her about Blaine? How we had been friends since we were very small? How we had known each other back when class didn’t matter? No. I would have to explain the entire thing, and I didn’t feel up to it at the moment. So I made up an excuse.

“We had a fight. Nothing big,” I added quickly as her face changed again. “And we didn’t break up. Just my emotional side coming out.”

“It must have been big enough to have you reduced to tears like that. A Cartwright never bawls, Julia. We bear pain and tragedy stoically. You know that.”

“Sorry, Mother. I guess I’m just being a drama queen.”

A fleeting smile crossed her face. “We all have it in us hon. Life would be boring without it.”

She pushed herself away from the dresser and gave me a light kiss on the forehead before exiting, shutting the door softly behind her.