Page 58
“I knew you had a sense of humor.” She shoves my shoulder lightly.
“I watched The Handmaid’s Tale and then read the book.”
She studies me, still grinning. “Okay, but because a girlfriend forced you to, right?”
“Nope. Watched it by myself.” I scan the horizon, realizing I’m not paying close enough attention to our surroundings.
“And now we’re all living it.” She sighs softly.
The tattooed black X marks slashing over the backs of her hands were a punishment from New America. It’s what they do to women who use birth control.
“No real man would ever do what they do to women,” I say, disgusted.
She gives me a tentative look. “I saw the tattoo on your back,” she says. “When I visited you back on the island.”
I look away, checking in all directions for threats. I knew she came to see me when I was sedated and recovering after being tortured on Island Three, but I didn’t realize my back was exposed to anyone. It makes sense, since I had open wounds from all the whipping in the dungeon. The New America flag I was forced to have inked on my back to show my loyalty when I was working undercover for Ingrid Voss is on my back. It’s covered by scars now, which is fitting.
“Cattails,” I say, eager to change the subject. “How many do you need?”
“A lot. And we have to dig them up; I need the roots.”
“Where’d you learn about the bark and the cattails?”
She takes a tote bag from her pack to fill with cattails. “Have you heard of the Ebers Papyrus?”
I take a hunting knife from its sheath on my waist and squat down. “Let me; I can dig them up with my knife. And I haven’t heard of that, no.”
“It’s an ancient Egyptian scroll written in hieratic, which is pretty much Egyptian cursive. It’s sixty-five feet long and filled with treatments for common medical issues. I studied it as a kid and it had willow bark as a pain remedy. It was Briar who actually showed me how to make the tea, and she told me about the cattails, too.”
I pass her a handful of cattails. She’s looking from side to side, that crease between her brows back.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know. I had a feeling someone was watching us before and I feel it again.”
“Are your spidey senses tingling, or is it just a feeling?”
She smiles. “My spidey senses? No. It’s just a weird feeling. Maybe it’s because we’re out in the open where there’s no cover.”
“Do all Egyptian kids study the sixty-five-foot scroll?”
She takes another bunch of cattails from me. “I don’t know. One of my tutors made me learn all of it.”
We fill her bag with cattails, and it’s only about a half-mile walk to several black willow trees. I scrape off plenty of bark and Amira adds it to her bag.
“How have we spent every minute together for more than two weeks and I just now found out you were a combat medic?” she asks on our walk back.
“Never came up, I guess.”
“No. You’re cryptic. Almost all the time you have this layer of impersonal armor on.”
I arch a brow. “Impersonal armor?”
She nods. “You know a lot more about me than I know about you.”
It’s been a long time since I told anyone anything about myself I didn’t have to. My job, and then working undercover, required that I only disclose certain things, and it was a mindfuck when those things were lies.
“What do you want to know about me?”
