Mindy McGinnis - In a Handful of Dust

“What do you mean?” Lucy asked, her sudden clench making the stick jump in her hands.

“That water?”

“The stick wants to hit you and I’m stopping it.”

Ben smiled, whether he thought she was funny or because he enjoyed getting under her skin she didn’t know. “I mean she’s one-sided. She wants her gun, and she wants to shoot things, and that seems to be about where her interests stop.”

“Well, she’s good at it,” Lucy said, repositioning the stick and walking away from Ben.

“You ask questions about the garden, and our people. You want to know how we manage, but all she wants to do is get her gun and move on.”

“Yes, she does,” Lucy agreed. The stick leapt in her hands, viciously jabbing downward, but she felt no rush of pride. “Here.”

Ben planted a flag, eyes still on Lucy. “What if she wants to go, and you don’t?”

“What about it?”

“Would you stay?”

“I don’t…” Lucy looked off into the distance at the blue mountains not unlike the ones Lynn had nearly died getting across, all because Lucy had asked her to. She dropped her stick and glared down at Ben, unsure how he could look so smug when he had to look up to meet her eye. “Lynn and I go together or we stay together. End of story.”

“That’s a shame.”

“What do you care?”

Ben dropped his armload of flags to the ground. “I wouldn’t say I care. It’s obvious you like it here and your mom doesn’t. Did you mean what you said about finding us a clean source of water and moving on?”

“Yes,” Lucy said, taking the bottle of water Ben handed to her from his backpack.

“Because that’s what she wants, or what you want?”

The odd-tasting water slid down her throat, coating her tongue with the residue she could never quite wash away. But it was water, and two weeks ago she would’ve licked puddles off the hot road to save her life.

“I don’t know,” Lucy said, handing the water back to Ben.

His smile was honest, and it nearly made his awkward face handsome. Lucy smiled back, unable to help herself. “You almost looked like your dad there for a second.”

Ben rolled his eyes. “Better than my mom.”

Lucy dried her palms on her jeans before taking the stick back up. “What’s she look like?”

“Bailey’s my mom.”

“Bailey? The nurse?”

Ben sighed and re-shouldered his backpack. “Oh, I know. How did such a little shrimp of a guy come out of Bailey and Lander? It’s a genetic joke that gets trotted out for a laugh all the time, so go ahead and have your giggle.”

“I wasn’t thinking that so much as… ugh,” Lucy said, turning red for reasons that had nothing to do with the heat.

“Well, yeah, there’s that too,” Ben agreed, falling into step beside her with his armload of blue flags. “But my dad can’t exactly be picky, you know? He had a kid with Nora and that didn’t turn out so great—”

“Wait, Nora’s daughter was Lander’s?”

“She told you about that?”

“Yeah.” Lucy looked away, answering the tiny vibe the earth had thrown her. “Here.”

“There was nothing I could do,” Ben said stiffly as he planted the flag.

“So she was your sister then?”

“Half sister, yeah,” Ben answered as they veered away from the smattering of blue flags waving behind them. “Anyway, after Rachel got killed by the lion, Dad started showing me how to manage the garden right, measure the acid in the dirt for the different vegetables and make sure they each have the proper sun exposure. It’s not an easy thing, if you want to do it right.”

Ben was swept away in the surge of importance as he talked about his duties, and Lucy let him go on through the next two flags before asking a question. “So was your dad hoping he and Bailey would be able to…” She trailed off, unable to finish the sentence politely.

“Make a big, healthy baby?” Ben asked, his eyebrows raised in two mocking points. “Maybe. That or by then he’d realized Nora wasn’t going to be having any more kids and he realized it was Bailey or bust.” He giggled at his own joke, but Lucy didn’t join in.

“What do you mean? Surely there’s someone else willing to…”

All humor slid from Ben’s face as he looked at her. “You seriously didn’t know? Jeez, Lucy, open your eyes. How many women have you seen around here?”

A cold tremor passed over Lucy despite the heat, and her witching stick jumped even though there was no water beneath it. “I thought…” Her words gave out as her mind jumped back to Lynn’s first shooting session from on top of the hotel. People had littered the streets, staring up at them with their eyes shaded. But none of them had been women.

“Thought what?”

“I don’t know. I guess maybe that they were out… you know, just doing things.”

“Doing things?” Ben laughed outright. “You’re something. No, it’s been Bailey and Nora for a long time. Then here comes your mom into town with her long hair and her birthing hips—”

“You can’t be serious,” Lucy interrupted. “Lander wants to get Lynn pregnant ?”

“Sure, why do you think he’s the one that’s sitting with her while she’s shooting? You really think he doesn’t have better things to do?”

Lucy looked to the city, shading her eyes against the glare and searching for the flash of the rifle among the thousands of panes of glass. “He wouldn’t force her, would he?”

“What, rape her? My dad? Nah.” Ben dismissed the idea with a wave of his hand. “He likes to get people to do what he wants, not make them.”

“No danger of that then,” she said. “Lynn’s not interested.”

Ben reached up and awkwardly patted her on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, I don’t like the idea either. I might be small, but I’m still my dad’s son. And right now, I’m the only one he’s got. I’m hoping he’ll realize you turned out small, and kinda stupid too, so he’ll give up the idea of making a baby with your mom.”

“Well, let’s hope so,” Lucy said through gritted teeth, and swept her stick across the sand. The rush of surprise and anger was sending tremors through her skin, making it impossible to listen for the quiet pull of water.

“Oh, and speaking of rape,” Ben said casually, taking his backpack off again. “I have something for you.”

The stick jumped in her hands, and Lucy rested one end on the sand. “You are the worst person in the world to try to do this with,” she said.

“Sorry,” Ben mumbled as he dug in his pack. “Here, these are for you and your mom.” He handed Lucy two black rectangles with prongs at the top.

“What’s this?”

“Push the button on the side,” Ben said.

She did, and a bright-blue arc of light jumped from one prong to the other. The rectangle buzzed in her hand and Lucy yelped, dropping it to the ground. “What the hell?”

“It’s electricity,” Ben explained. “Nora and Bailey carry them too, although I don’t think any of the men would ever consider touching you while my dad forbids it.”

Lucy toed the black object in the sand mistrustfully. “So it shocks people?”

“Yeah, anybody gives you trouble, you— ZZZZZZ —” Ben imitated jerking motions. “Zap ’em. It’s really pretty neat. Catch a turtle and I’ll show you how it works.”

“I think I’m okay,” Lucy said, putting both in her own backpack. She picked her stick up and looked behind them at the handful of blue flags spotting the desert. “We should keep going.”

“Dad wanted us to place all of these,” Ben said, looking doubtfully at the pile still at his feet. “We should stick some in random places.”

Lucy shook her head. “And then people would be digging for no reason. I can’t always be sure what I find is a solid bet, but I won’t set people looking where I know there’s nothing.”