The Liar's Daughter by Megan Cooley Peterson

Author:Megan Cooley Peterson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Holiday House
Published: 2019-09-30T16:00:00+00:00

It’s been weeks since our tutor came to the house. The books Father wrote for us to study gather dust. We haven’t watched anything, haven’t made dessert, haven’t caught frogs.

We’ve been helping Thomas and the men build the fallout shelter.

The men work all day, breaking only for lunch. They’re around Father’s age, all of them lean and muscled.

So far they’ve dug a large hole in the ground, about twenty feet by twenty feet, and at least ten feet down. They hacked apart half our garden. I wanted to scream at them to stop, but I know Father ordered them to do it. I have to trust in his reasons, even if I can’t see his plan all the way yet.

Most nights the men sleep in their tents, but sometimes they’re gone from dusk to dawn. No one knows where they go or why when they disappear into the woods.

We know better than to ask.

Cas, Carla, and I spend our mornings carrying cement blocks from a pallet to the hole. Thomas and the men lower them down one by one as they build the shelter’s walls. Thomas says a cement truck is scheduled for the day after tomorrow, and that we need to hurry.

The little ones play like always, but they watch us with worried glances. Beverly Jean’s nightmares have flared up again, the one where the house is on fire and no one can get out in time. It’s been so long since they plagued her. Most nights, she climbs into bed with me.

“Lunch!” Auntie Joan yells out the kitchen window.

I wipe my face with my shirt, and it comes away smudged with sweat and dirt. I want to sneak off for a quick dip in the lake, but my eyes drift to Cas, and I’m embarrassed all over again.

Inside, Auntie Joan and Auntie Barb have made two plates of bologna sandwiches. The men take most of them. After I hand out what remains to the little ones, there’s not enough left for me, Cas, and Thomas.

“I’ll make a few more,” I offer, but Auntie Barb grabs my wrist as I open the icebox.

“Food’s tight right now,” she says, her grip like iron. “I’m under strict orders to ration it out.”

I jerk my arm away; red marks bloom on my wrist. “But those men took two apiece.”

“They’re working for the good of us all.” She wipes a bit of mustard from the corner of her mouth. “A couple of crates of fruit arrived last night from the main compound. You can eat that. But you leave that garden alone!”

Thomas stares at Auntie Barb, balls his hands into fists, and shoves past her out the back door.

Cas and I follow. My stomach feels hollow, hunger cauterizing it, and I sit on the bottom step and drop my head between my legs.

“Dizzy?” Cas asks.

I nod. It’s because I haven’t eaten for a few hours. Lately, that’s been happening more often.

Beverly Jean sits next to me. “Here, Pip. Eat mine.” She’s only taken a couple of small bites of her sandwich.

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