Malorie turns. He is standing beside her. His shoulder rubs against hers in the doorway.

“I can’t do it, Tom.”

“I wouldn’t ask you to. But I can ask myself.”

When Malorie looks him in the eye she knows he is serious.

“Tom.”

Tom turns to face the others in the dining room.

“I’ll drink it,” he says.

“We don’t need a champion,” Don says.

“I’m not looking to be one, Don. I’m thirsty.”

The housemates are quiet. Malorie sees the same thing in their faces that she’s feeling herself. For as scared as she is, she wants someone to drink it.

“This is insane,” Felix says. “Come on, Tom. We can figure something else out.”

Tom steps into the dining room. At the table, he looks Felix in the eye.

“Lock me in the cellar. I’ll drink it down there.”

“You’ll go mad from the smell,” Cheryl says.

Tom smiles sadly.

“We have a well, right in our backyard,” he says. “If we can’t use it, we can’t use anything. Let me do this.”

“You know who you sound like?” Don asks.

Tom waits.

“You sound like George. Except he had a theory.”

Tom looks to the dining room table, set against the window.

“We’ve been here for months,” he says. “If something got in the well yesterday, it probably got in there before.”

“You’re rationalizing,” Malorie says.

Tom answers her without turning to face her.

“Is there any option? Sure, the river. But we could get sick. Real sick. We don’t have any medicine. All we’ve had so far is the water from the well. It’s the only medicine we’ve got. What else can we do? Walk to the next well? And then what? Hope nothing got into that one?”

Malorie watches as, one by one, the housemates acquiesce. The natural rebellion in Don’s face gives way to concern. The fear in Olympia’s eyes turns to guilt. As for herself, Malorie doesn’t want him to do it. For the first time since arriving at the house, Tom’s role, how integral he is to everything that happens here, is blinding.

But instead of stopping him, he inspires her. And she helps.

“Not the cellar,” she says. “What if you went mad down there and destroyed our food stock?”

Tom faces her.

“All right,” he says. “Then the attic.”

“A leap from that window is a lot higher than one from down here.”

Tom stares into Malorie’s eyes.

“I’ll make a compromise,” he says. “The second floor. You gotta lock me somewhere. And there’s no place down here.”

“You can use my room.”

“That room,” Don says, “is the very one George used to watch the video.”

Malorie looks back to Tom.

“I didn’t know that.”

“Let’s do it,” Tom says.

He pauses, just a moment, before passing Malorie and entering the kitchen. Malorie follows. The housemates file in behind them. When he pulls a glass from the cupboard, Malorie gently grabs his arm.

“Drink it through this,” she says. She hands him a coffee filter. “I don’t know. A filter. Who knows?”

Tom takes it. He looks her in the eye. Then he dunks the glass in the wooden well bucket.

When he pulls it out, he holds it up. The housemates stand in a semicircle around it. They stare at the contents of the glass.

The details of Felix’s story chill Malorie all over again.

Carrying the glass, Tom leaves the kitchen. Jules gathers some rope from the kitchen pantry and follows him.

The other housemates do not speak. Malorie places one hand on her belly and the other on the counter. Then she lifts it quickly, as if she’s just put her hand in a deadly substance.

Contamination.

But there was no water where she put her hand.

Upstairs, the door to her bedroom closes. She listens as Jules ties the rope around the doorknob and fastens it to the railing of the staircase.

Now Tom is locked in.

Like George.

Felix paces. Don leans against the wall, arms crossed, staring at the floor. When Jules returns, Victor goes to him.

A sound comes from upstairs. Malorie gasps. The housemates look to the ceiling.

They wait. They listen. Felix moves as if he’s going to go up there. Then he stops.

“He must have drunk it already,” Don says quietly.

Malorie steps to the entrance of the living room. There, ten feet away, is the foot of the stairs.

There is only silence.

Then there is a knock.

And Tom yells.

Tom yells Tom yells Tom yells Tom

Malorie is already moving to the stairs, but Jules passes her.

“Stay here!” he commands.

She watches him climb the stairs.

“Tom!”

“Jules, I’m okay.”

At the sound of Tom’s voice, Malorie exhales. She reaches for the railing to steady herself.

“Did you drink it?” Jules says through the door.

“I did. I drank it. I’m fine.”

The other housemates are gathered behind her now. They begin talking. Quietly at first. Then excitedly. Upstairs, Jules unties the rope. Tom emerges from the bedroom holding the empty glass before him.

“What was it like?” Olympia asks.

Malorie smiles. So do the others. It’s funny, in a dark way, right now, asking what drinking a glass of water was like.

“Well,” Tom says, descending, “it was probably the best glass of water I’ve ever had.”

When he reaches the bottom he looks Malorie in the eye.

“I liked the filter idea,” he says. When he passes her, he sets the glass on the end table with the telephone. Then he turns to the others. “Let’s put the furniture back in order. Let’s put this place back together again.”

sixteen

On the river, Malorie feels the heat of the midday sun. Instead of bringing her peace, it reminds her how visible they must be.

“Mommy,” the Boy whispers.

Malorie leans forward. Her palm is pierced by a splinter from the oar. This makes three.

“What is it?”

“Shhh,” the Boy says.

Malorie stops rowing. She is listening.

The Boy is right. Something moves on land to their left. Sticks break. More than one.

The man in the boat, Malorie’s mind screams, saw something on this river.

Could it be him? Could he be out in the woods? Could he be after her, waiting for her to get stuck, ready to rip off her blindfold? The children’s?

More sticks break. It moves slowly. Malorie thinks of the house they’ve left behind. They were safe there. Why did they leave? Is the place they are heading going to be any safer? How could it be? In a world where you can’t open your eyes, isn’t a blindfold all you could ever hope for?

We left because some people choose to wait for news and others make their own.

Like Tom used to say. Malorie, she knows, will never stop being inspired by him. The very thought of him, here, on the river, brings her hope.

Tom, she wants to tell him, your ideas were good.

“Boy,” she whispers, paddling again, fearful that they are too close to the left bank, “what do you hear?”

“It’s close, Mommy.” Then, “I’m scared.”

There is a moment of silence. In it, Malorie imagines a danger only inches away.

She stops paddling again, to listen better. She cranes her neck to the left.

The front of the rowboat connects with something hard. Malorie shrieks. The children scream.

We’ve run into the bank!

Malorie jabs a paddle at where she thinks the mud is but she does not connect.

“Leave us alone!” she yells, her face contorted. Suddenly, she longs for the walls of the house. There are no walls on this river. No cellar beneath them. No attic above.

“Mommy!”

As the Girl screams for her, something breaks through the branches. Something big.

Malorie jabs the paddle again but it only breaks the water. She grabs the Boy and Girl and pulls them close.

She hears a growl.

“Mommy!”

“Quiet!” she yells, pulling the Girl even closer.