Read Online Once An Eve Novel by Anna Carey - Free Book Online Page A

first. There were news reports of the disease in China, in parts of Europe. For a long time we thought it had been contained abroad. American doctors were coming up with a vaccine. Then it mutated. The virus was stronger; it killed faster. It reached the States and people began dying by the thousands. The vaccine was rushed onto the market, but it only slowed the disease’s progress, drew out the suffering for months. Your mother was trying to reach me but I had no idea. She sent emails and letters, called before the phones went out. It wasn’t until I was quarantined that I discovered the correspondence in my office. A whole stack of letters was piled on my desk, unopened.”
    I remembered that time. The bleeds had gotten worse. She went through handkerchief after handkerchief, trying to keep her nose dry. She’d finally gone to sleep one afternoon, her bedroom dark as I wandered out. The house across the street was marked with a red X . The lawn beside it was dug up, the dirt turned over where they’d buried the first bodies. The quiet scared me. All the children were gone. A broken bicycle sat in the middle of the road. The neighbor’s cat was outside, lapping at the end of a hose, as I approached the door. I’d walked in, looking for the couple I’d seen coming and going so many times before, the man with the brown hat. I remembered the smell, thick and foul, and the dust that had accumulated in the corners. We need help , I’d said, as I took a few tentative steps into the living room. Then I saw his remains on the couch. His skin was gray, his face partially sunken in from decay.
    “You left us,” I said, unable to hide the anger in my voice. “She was alone, she died alone in that house, and you could have helped her. I was waiting for someone to save us.”
    He covered my hand with his own, but I pulled away. “I would’ve, Genevieve—”
    “That’s not my name,” I snapped. I clutched the picture to my chest. “You can’t just call me that.”
    He stood and walked to the window, his back to me. Outside, the land beyond the wall was black, not one light visible for miles. “I didn’t even know you existed until I read her letters.” He sighed. “How could you be angry with me for that? They had to put soldiers at my door to prevent people from attacking me. I was one of the few government officials in Sacramento who survived. The people were convinced I had some magical cure, that I could save their families. As soon as the outbreak ended, as soon as I had the resources, I sent soldiers. I was setting up a new, temporary capital, and trying to assemble the survivors. I sent them to her house to find you both. You were already gone.”
    “Was she there?” I asked, my hands folded over the photo. I remembered her standing in the doorway, blowing me a kiss. She had looked so fragile, her bones jutting out beneath her skin. Still, it didn’t stop me from imagining that things could’ve been different. That maybe—against all logic—she could’ve survived.
    “They found her remains,” he said. He turned and came toward me. “That’s when I started searching for you, in the orphanages at first, and then, when the Schools were assembled, I looked at the rosters there. But there was no girl named Genevieve at any of them—you must’ve started going by Eve already. It wasn’t until they sent back the graduation photos and I saw your picture that I knew you were alive. You look so much like her.”
    “I’m supposed to believe all of this based on this one picture?” I held it up.
    “There are tests,” he said calmly.
    “How am I supposed to trust anything you say? My friends are in those Schools still. They’re all there because of you.”
    He walked around the table, letting out a deep breath. “I don’t expect you to understand it yet. You couldn’t possibly.”
    I let out a tiny laugh. “What’s to understand? There doesn’t seem to be anything complicated about what you’re