Across the Universe - Beth Revis [47]
These stars, these real stars, are the most beautiful things I have ever seen. The stars make me believe there is a world out there beyond this ship.
And for just a moment, I envy Mr. William Robertson, Number 100, who is floating in a sea of stars.
21
AMY
THE WALLS OF THE ROOM CAVE IN AROUND ME. WITHOUT realizing it, I have begun to pace, back and forth, back and forth, but this room is too tiny to contain me. The window is solid, thick, and cannot be opened. I begin stretching my calf muscles without realizing what I am doing. My body has decided for me: I need to run.
I wasn’t kidding when I told the doctor I liked running. I joined the cross-country team as a freshman, but what I really wanted to do was run marathons. Jason used to laugh at me—he could never understand why anyone would want to run when there are video games to play and TV to watch. The closest he came to exercise was VR games.
I smile, but almost as soon as the corners of my mouth curve up, they sink again.
I can’t let myself think about Jason.
I need to run.
The clothes I am wearing are wildly inappropriate for running: loose trousers and a looser tunic paired with thin moccasin-like shoes. I smile. My mom, at least, would be happy. I always ran in these really short, tight running shorts and a sports tank, and it drove her mad. She would say it was like I was inviting the wrong sort of attention, but I just did it because I ran better in those clothes. We had a fight about it, once, a real screaming, yelling fight. It got so bad that Daddy had to jump in the middle and say I could run naked if we’d both just shut up about it. It was such a stupid thing to say that all three of us just laughed and laughed.
It hurts to think about that now.
On Earth I had short socks and Nikes. I always ran with a wide hair band on my head and music plugged into my ears. This wardrobe has only more of the same handspun clothes. I stretch my foot—the moccasins are certainly not $200 running shoes, but at least I have flexibility. It would have to do. I braid my hair and wrap the end with a bit of string I yank from one of the more raggedy pairs of trousers.
It takes me a couple of wrong turns to find my way out, but I soon discover a large room with glass walls and a pair of heavy glass doors. It’s a common room of sorts; there are tables and chairs scattered casually around the room. There’s only one person in the room, a tall man with biceps as big as my head. His gaze devours me, and his eyes pause too long in places I don’t want him looking. I glare back at him until he turns back toward the window, but I can tell he’s staring at my reflection. I don’t breathe properly until the elevator doors close.
Seeing the way the tall man looked at me reminds me of the doctor’s warning about leaving the Hospital.
No. I won’t be a prisoner.
The elevator has buttons for four floors, and I am on the third. I force myself to remember this, to map out where my room is in my mind. I don’t want to be lost and have to ask anyone for directions.
The elevator doors open to a lounge-like room, where a heavyset nurse sits at a desk tapping information on a thin screen. My muscles are taut, ready to go. I am already running before I reach the door, my moccasins making soft pat pat pat noises on the cold tile floor.
The air hits me like a wall, and I stop a few feet from the door. It smells processed, cool against my nostrils, just like the air-conditioned hospital. I’d expected mechanical, industrial-cold air inside. That air felt natural, because it was just like every other air-conditioned house back on Earth, with that falsely cool, slightly stale feel to it. But outside... the air is still the same. This is not air that has ever felt