Page 25 of Beacon

I giggle at that. “Do you mean Lydia? Or Marianne?”

He pauses. “Huh. Guess it works for either one of them. At least the one came to her senses eventually.”

“Yeah.” My mind is doing a ramble made up of Jane Austen characters and Mack and the world we live in now. Finally I say, “I guess we’re kind of back there again.”

He turns his head to look at me. “Back where?”

“Back in a world where the choices a woman makes about her man determine her well-being and safety. We can’t make it on our own anymore.” He doesn’t respond, but it feels like he’s thinking about the words, so I add, “Chloe was telling me that just a few weeks after she lost her grandpa, Jimmy blurted out a request for her to be his woman. And that’s why she moved in with him. They weren’t in love or anything. She needed a home and a man, and he offered that to her.”

“They seem pretty good together—at least back before I left.”

“They are good together. They’re really happy now. She made a good decision. But I can’t help thinking about what might have happened to her if Jimmy wasn’t the man he is.” I sigh. “I’m probably not explaining it right.”

“No, you are.” His tone has changed. “I get what you’re saying. And you’re right. It’s hard for a woman to be without a man anymore, but it’s not impossible. You’ve done okay, haven’t you?”

I make a face and roll on my side to face him. “I guess so. It doesn’t… it doesn’t always feel like I’ve done as okay as I wanted.” I reach out to touch his face briefly before I pull back my hand. “And the truth is I never would have gotten nearly this far without you. I’d be dead a hundred times without you.”

I don’t know whether my words touch him or not, but there’s the slightest flicker on his face. He gives a small shrug. “We all need help. Men too. No one can make it in this world on their own.”

Because of the quiet mood shaped between us, I don’t point out the obvious irony. The fact that Mack is trying todo just that—live in this world on his own, by himself in this isolated cabin.

Instead, I say, “I don’t know. Maybe I was as foolish as Lydia. But I thought… I wanted…”

“To stand on your own. Without a man. I know, Anna. I’ve always understood it.”

I’m unexpectedly emotional, but I swallow back the tears. “It sounds kind of ridiculous to hope an apocalypse might give me the opportunity to finally learn how to be strong. But I did hope that. I saw all these other women—women like Maria and Rachel—who can hold their own in any situation, who can fight to save themselves and the people they love, who don’t fall apart no matter the pressure—and I wanted that for myself.”

Mack clears his throat. He sounds almost careful as he asks slowly, “Isn’t it possible… isn’t it possible that what you see in them isn’t the whole story? Maybe they don’t always feel strong themselves. Maybe they aren’t as different from you as you’ve always believed.”

“Maybe.” The topic feels too big for me to fully process right now. It’s like a tidal wave in my mind.

“Maybe other women look at you and wish they were as strong as you.”

I give him a shaky smile. “Thank you for saying that, but I can’t imagine anyone would.”

“Then maybe you need to widen your imagination,” he says lightly. “Or else see yourself more clearly.”

Twisting my features in an attempt to control emotion,I reply, “Mack, I’m trying not to cry here, and you’re not helping the situation.”

He gives a couple of those breathy huffs. “Sorry about that. I’ll do better.”

I smile at him. He doesn’t smile back, but his eyes are softer than they’ve been since I arrived in this cabin four days ago.

I’m not sure when it happened, but he’s closer now to his old self—his real self. He’s not there all the way. It still doesn’t feel like that fire that always blazed inside him, the one that cast its warmth on everyone he knew, has been reignited. But at least he’s not the mean, scowling stranger he was at first.

“Are you going to keep staying at New Haven?” he asks after a minute.

“I don’t know. I can’t really figure out what I want to do.”

“You can join back with Maria. I’m sure she’d love to have you. That might help you feel strong again.”

For years, Maria has led a group of women who travel throughout our home region and surrounding areas, helping those who need it and fighting to rescue people in trouble—primarily other women and children. I was part of her crew for a long time, and I enjoyed the camaraderie and how much I was able to learn from them. But it never truly felt like the place I belonged. I left, then joined back, and then left again.

“Yeah, I’ve thought about it, but I really don’t like the constant travel. I want… I want a home.”

“Well, make a home for yourself. You could move to Halbrook or somewhere like that. Some of those towns are stable enough that you’d be safe even by yourself. You could get a little house, and there’s all kinds of work you’d be qualified for. You’re skilled enough now you could do guard duty if you wanted. Or they could probably make a space for you to teach eventually, if you want to go back to doing that.”

“Yeah. Esther’s actually been nagging me for months now. They need someone to teach advanced writing and literature to the older students at the school. There aren’t a lot of them right now, but there’s a big group of ten- to twelve-year-olds and even more younger kids since folks are finally having babies again.”

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