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By Max Masen
The three of them find a barn to sleep in for the night after running across an open field and fearing a spotlight would turn on and expose them. They run until their shoulders feel like giving out from the weight of their packs and until their lungs and calves feel ready to rupture from the excursion. They make it unnoticed to the opening of the barn and find a group of three horses have already taken up residence in the barn. They're all asleep and don't seem to notice the three of them entering. Tim finds a lamp in the corner of the barn and lights it. It exposes the rest of the area in the barn, mainly just a lot of hay laying on the ground, perfect to lay up against and to sleep in.
John clears out a space in the hay and presses his body deep into it. He doesn't feel comfortable in it and tries pawing at it continuously to make it more fitting to his body but it doesn't work. Julie comes over close to him and makes her bed in the pile next to him. She whispers to him, “Ever sleep in a barn before?”
John, tired and agitated, replies, “Yeah, just under different circumstances. You?”
“Same.” She turns her body to stare up at the ceiling of the barn. The wind from outside blows lightly on it but hard enough to make the roof creak, a sound that is unsettling enough to Julie that makes her not want to think about sleeping.
Tim stares out the window of the barn. He starts to feel paranoid and his head darts quickly from left to right. He starts to feel that they were followed and can't stop looking for any signs to prove that they were. He finally gives up and walks past Julie and John with a defeated expression clinging to his face. “What's for dinner?” he asks unexpectedly.
“You want a granola bar or applesauce?” Julie asks after rummaging through her pack.
“Is both an option?” Tim asks jokingly but he genuinely hopes she will say yes.
She hands him both and rests her head back against the hay. She tilts her head to look back over at John again. He reluctantly looks at her also. Tim looks down at both of them, an annoyed expression growing on his face.
“Where’s your family at?” Julie asks John. She puts one hand under her chin to appear more attentive.
“Back in Oregon. They’re safe there. We don’t think anything that’s going to happen will reach that far. Not if we can take the Capitol quickly,” John replies, sounding like a fervent robot.
“Does that include wife and kids?” Julie asks, hoping her answer isn’t too intrusive.
“No, it doesn’t.” John takes his eyes off of her and fixes his eyes on support beams across the barn. He picks up a pebble on the ground beneath him and tosses it at the support beam. “I never was that lucky.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” A smirk forms on Julie’s face.
“And you? A husband or kids back home?” John replies, feeling it as a formality more than actually wanting to know.
“Nope, never was that lucky either,” Julie replies and slides in a little closer to John. “Not through lack of trying though.”
“What time are we leaving in the morning?” Tim cuts in loudly and startles the two others a little. “We should start considering when would be best to head out. There’s going to be patrols out here looking for us.”
“Relax, Tim,” John says with heavy annoyance in his voice. “They don’t know we’re here. They’re not going to be looking for us this far out.”
“Still, maybe it’s best if we get a good night’s sleep. We have to make sure we have enough wits about us to get to the next point. If any of us is too tired they might muck this up before it even gets started,” Tim says, hoping he’s convinced them.
“Yeah, whatever,” John says back dismissively and waves off Tim. Can’t have somebody dictating my bedtime.
“You tired?” Julie asks John quietly. She tilts her whole body to John’s side and has both of her hands tucked under her head.
“A little,” John replies, a yawn coming out of him unexpectedly. “Maybe more than I even realized.” John and Julie both laugh and Tim hears them from across the barn. “How about you?”
“No. I don’t think I’d even be able to sleep if I wanted to or if I was even tired. I can never sleep when I have a big day ahead of me.”
“We have a lot of big days ahead of us,” John says reflectively. He rolls over and looks up at the ceiling of the barn. “I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“About what?” Julie pushes her eyebrows together questioningly.
“That we’ve made a huge mistake and that we’re not supposed to be here. What if this isn’t worth it? What if he’s already dead or we can’t get to him in time? What if they torture him and get everything out of him before we can even get there? Then it’s all over and that’s all on me. We’ve already had one mishap. They weren’t supposed to know about the plane. Maybe Tim is right. Maybe they do know we’re here.” John sprawls his body out in the hay upon finishing his short speech.
Julie pushes her body up to look over John’s face. She takes a short and quick breath in and pushes it out. “Look at me, John.” He turns to face her just slightly. “None of this is your fault. It’s not your fault Peter was captured. Do you understand?” John reluctantly nods. “You can’t control what happens and where. We’re all in this together. We’re all a team. We’re going to get Peter back as a team. We’re going to bring him home as a team. And we’re going to survive whatever comes after that as a team. Do you understand?” John nods again, a smile starting to form on his face.
He looks back up to the ceiling and quietly replies, “Thanks.”
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