Girl in the Arena by Lise Haines Read Free Book Online

full of thick, sped-up chocolate. Everything about him looks urgent as I glance over. I don’t know if he understands what’s going on with Tommy, if he understands fully, or if this is about something else, because thoughts are often urgent with Thad. I kiss his forehead. I’m trying not to cry, and I tell him to chew slowly, and to wait, just wait. I tell him everything is going to be okay.
    A low rolling chant starts as Uber seems to be giving Tommy time to concede, to pull himself together—I’m not sure what. I’d say this is not the kind of calm you want. If I were a forecaster, I’d say we’re in earthquake weather, just before it hits.
    When Thad can’t take another moment of stillness, he stands in his chair and starts to leap toward Allison, jumping up and down. As I try to restrain Thad, I look at his big eyes, his soft square face, and I imagine how much would die with Tommy. Maybe everything, everything as we know it. Then Thad gets quiet again and slumps back into his seat. I want to take his hand and run away with him but this is one of the first bylaws I was taught; number 96:
    Never leave the stadium when your father is dying.
    So I’m here when Uber raises his sword suddenly and slices off Tommy’s right hand cleanly at the wrist joint.
    I’m out of my seat, standing in the bleachers as his hand drops to the sandy floor like a chicken wing into flour. Tommy’s bludgeon flies and the bracelet I lent him for good luck launches from his arm and rolls to a stop at Uber’s black athletic shoes.
    Sixty thousand fans rise to their feet shouting:
    —UBER! UBER!
    For a moment Tommy stands there in his blood-drenched Nikes as if he’s thinking over his next move. Of course the point, the whole point, of Glad existence is to die well. And I know Tommy G. is going to die well when it’s his time. But I’m looking at Allison now, looking for something in Allison’s face to say he’ll pull through this one. That the ambulance will scoop him up and get him to the hospital in time.
    I stare into Allison’s mirrored sunglasses, where I see Tommy suddenly arch back. His chain-mail guard swings out from his hips and lashes his groin. His legs buckle, and his body drops in both halves of her.
    Tommy dies right there in Allison’s lenses.  tommy.
    A doctor steps into the arena, checks his vital signs and walks back to the sidelines. Nothing to do.
    Just then a couple of ring tones hit the air, like the sound of lone flies trapped between a window and its screen. This is what Glad culture does when a hero dies. They get their phones to ring in unison. After the first few, they all start. We have ringing in our ears now. Massive ringing in our brains, a good way to go deaf and drown out everything.
    When the sounds start to quiet, I feel my grief like blood pressure. It pumps in my chest, fills my ears, runs through my hands. It knocks at my temples to get out. I look at the sweat beaded on Allison’s forehead. I know her heart is working so fast it could rip through her chest. Mine has already torn in two.
    She says, —No. She says no as if someone’s offered her potatoes with her dinner. That’s the way she does shock.
    I say, —Seven.
    It’s a stupid thing to say even if it’s true. But everything has changed for my mother. She will be a GSA Widow till life cuts her from its belly.
    i don’t know what to do.
    I whisper this to her, that I don’t know what to do. But I know she can’t hear me.
    now .  now the whole thing hits her . I can see it. Like a high-rise set off by dynamite charges. I watch the demolition begin in her jaw. Her cheeks go slack, her nose pulls downward, her forehead creases. Her hands fly up as if to hold her brain in place. Her earrings swing back and forth. She’s wearing the tiny executioner blades Tommy gave her one Valentine’s. Allison drops into the seat next to me.  and i don’t know .
    i don’t know anything anymore . The stadium noise cranks and I realize