6

Nigel fell in, screaming. He obviously expected to be hurt badly, but his fall was really only about two feet. He lay there on the hay we put out for new arrivals, probably thinking he was shattered, or maybe he thought he’d died and this was the afterlife. Barlow disabused that fantasy in his own, coarse way.

“Hey, buddy, you shouldn’t lie there all night. There might be others coming through, and you don’t want to get stepped on.”

I was watching Nigel closely, before I knew he was Nigel, of course. I saw him stop breathing for two heartbeats, and I watched as Barlow’s words sunk into his brain. He turned carefully towards us, there were three at that time, and I saw his eyes were blue. I imagined I could see the wheels of his thoughts turning as those blue eyes scanned us, trying to make sense of what had happened to him. Sitting together, we surely defied all reason.

Barlow was massive and only half dressed. He had been the third through, and Cat and I had quite a shock when the giant, shirtless, sweaty man appeared, axe held high above his head. Cat screamed and the axe slipped through his shaking hands to drop behind him. We thought he’d brought us here to slaughter us, but it turned out Barlow had been splitting logs when he, himself, had been taken.

Cat was a tomboy whose boobs were an embarrassment to her and surely the talk of the town from which she came. She said she was fifteen and her clothes said she was a boy, but her huge rack disagreed with both. She had been the second through, so closely behind me I hadn’t had a chance to wander away.

And I sat between the two of them, on the log Barlow had dragged over so we could watch the entry point. Nigel’s blue eyes landed on me and stuck. I smiled and shrugged. I was, after all, quite a sight in my wedding dress.