Kingdom of Cages(59)

“They’re gone,” said Nan Elle. “Now let me look at you.” Nan Elle pulled first one arm and then the other away from Chena’s body and turned them over, examining them. She took Chena’s chin between two fingers and pulled it left and right. Then she reached into the bath and pulled out Chena’s leg, running her wrinkled hand over Chena’s chilled skin.

“Hush, now. You only got a few bites. They’re painful but…” She looked at Chena’s face and saw how wide her eyes were, and how she shivered from more than the cold water. “There were more than a few, weren’t there?”

Chena nodded, hugging herself. She could still hear them; the strangers, the animals, the birds. She did not want to close her eyes because she knew she would see them and the ants.

“All right,” said Nan Elle, speaking more softly than Chena had ever heard before. She held up a thick towel. “Get out of there and wrap yourself in this.” She laid the towel on the edge of the tub. “The ants are all gone. I promise you. When you’re ready, you come out.” She shuffled out of the room and closed the door, leaving Chena sitting in cold and darkness, relieved only by a single sunbeam from a long narrow slit up near the ceiling.

Chena sat in the water and shivered a few minutes longer, until her breathing evened out and her throat loosened. Then, checking the floor first to make sure there was nothing crawling on it, she climbed out of the tub and folded the towel around her. It felt deliciously warm after the frigid water. She rubbed her skin and her hair as hard as she could. The cloth was harsh, but that was all. There was no more crawling. Her legs hurt in spots, but those spots didn’t move.

Chena bit her lip and stuck one leg out in front so she could see. Three red welts the size of her thumb blazed on her shin. The welts hurt, but they didn’t seem to be actually doing anything.

After a moment’s looking around, Chena realized that Nan Elle had taken her clothes. She cracked open the door and peered out into the main room. Nan Elle stood by the stove stirring something. Chena’s clothes were draped over the end of the table. She could just see that the front door was closed. There didn’t seem to be anybody else in the room.

She straightened up, opened the door, and took two tentative steps into the main room.

Nan Elle lifted her head and sized Chena up.

“Your clothes are clean,” she said, nodding toward Chena’s things.

“Thank you.” Chena snatched her stuff off the table and retreated to the bathroom to change.

When she came out again, Nan Elle put a bowl and a cup in her hands and sat her at the cleanest end of the table. Suddenly hungry, Chena ate. It was nothing but dorm cereal and mint tea, but it tasted great. She even managed to forget that Nan Elle, sitting in the high-backed chair, watched her every move.

Finally Chena drained the cup and remembered her manners.

“Thank you,” she said. “For everything.”

Again Nan Elle nodded. “You’re welcome.” She leaned forward, both hands folded on a crooked walking stick. “Now tell me what happened.”

Just thinking about it started Chena shaking again, but with Nan Elle’s eyes boring into her, she didn’t dare keep quiet. Chena told her about the people parachuting down from the sky, about the animals beginning to panic, and about the billions of ants and how the bike had almost rolled away and left her there in the middle of the chaos, and the screaming, and the hungry ants. She clamped her hands between her knees to keep them from shaking, but by the time she was done with the story, they stopped on their own and she was able to breathe easily again.

She glanced up at Nan Elle. The old woman’s eyes were closed, her head bowed over her hands. For a moment, Chena thought she was asleep. But then she saw that Nan Elle’s head was shaking and her mouth was muttering.

“The fools, the fools.” Nan Elle lifted her head and shifted her grip on her walking stick. “When you go back out, I’m going to ask you to look around for me.”

Chena shot to her feet. “Not on your mother’s life.”

Nan Elle smiled, just a little. “My mother has been dead for some years.”

Chena shook her head, hard, like she was still trying to shake ants out of her hair. “No. I’m not going back there.”

“Ever?” asked Nan Elle softly. “How are you going to run your business?”

Chena looked away and shrugged. “I will go back, just not right away.”

Nan Elle stood and walked forward until she was close enough to look up Chena’s nose. “Listen to me, Chena Trust. If you do not go back there tomorrow, you will never go back. They will have you so scared that you will never be able to make another move without their approval again.”