CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER TWO
Her parents hadn’t always been this way. Once upon a time, they’d owned a small business in their little California town. They made good money, had a beautiful home, and adored their daughter. They seemed like a normal, all-American family, minus the dog or cat and picket fence.
Now, Saylor Carver didn’t understand what her family was doing. They’d sold their beautiful home in northern California and moved to the Midwest, deep in the heart of Nebraska. Her parents weren’t farmers and as far as she knew, they’d never grown anything in their entire lives.
Yet, here they were growing corn, tomatoes, potatoes, green beans, lettuce, spinach and just about every other vegetable that she never wanted to see again.
With a dozen other families, they’d bought a massive swath of land and divided it up into what her father called homesteads.
When it was time to bring in the produce, the women all gathered in the community hall, which held the community kitchen and the community meeting space and the community church.
It was basically a catch all for anything and everything. But the women gathered and would spend days canning and preserving everything they’d picked. They’d even planted fruit trees which were finally doing well, according to her mother.
Like the rest of the children, Saylor was home-schooled. She knew that not all children went to school this way because some of their online classes were taught by teachers in the regular schools. At least, she thought they were regular.
They were also allowed to participate on athletic teams with other children in the nearby towns.
They were always the ‘weird’ kids who didn’t go to school like everyone else.
Saylor didn’t care. She was off the property, talking to other children, seeing their clothing, hair, and the way their parents dressed and behaved.
By eighth grade, Saylor knew that this was not the life she would choose for herself but she also knew that if she spoke up, she could be punished like some of the other children. She’d also learned that this wasn’t just a compound or a bunch of home-schooled kids.
Where she lived, how she lived was considered a cult by the federal government. She didn’t understand how that could be true but she knew they weren’t normal in the eyes of others.
Over time, her parents had become more skeptical of the outside world, more cautious about what they exposed her to, and stricter about her time spent away from the compound. And more importantly, who she could speak to outside of the compound.
On the day she graduated from high school, her parents sat her down and told her she would need to think about selecting a husband.
“A husband? I’m eighteen years old,” she frowned. “I want to go to college and get a degree.”
“You will not leave this compound,” said her father.
“Dad, I want to study medicine of some sort. I could help everyone here if we had a doctor or nurse. I mean, I could help deliver babies, maybe I could have helped Alan Jenkins.” Her mother stiffened, waiting for her husband’s response.
Saylor thought it was odd the way they were acting but she hoped to play on their sympathies.
She knew that she was giving a convincing story because Mr. and Mrs. Jenkins’ had just lost their middle son, Alan, to a freak accident with a piece of farm equipment. Had someone been trained, according to the city doctor, he wouldn’t have died from excessive blood loss.
“I don’t know, Saylor. You’ve never been out in the world and seen what it’s like other than going into town a few times and playing soccer with the other kids. Your mother and I want what’s best for you. We think that one of the Yeager boys will make a fine husband for you.”
James and Thomas Yeager were big, strong, stupid, and mean as a den of snakes. She would never allow one of them to touch her.
“Dad, just let me do this and I’ll come back. You have my word.”
“Maybe she’s right, honey,” said her mother. “Maybe we should let her have this time to see how she can help us. She could come back here and be the doctor or better yet, the nurse. It would take less time to go to nursing school than medical school.”
“That’s right,” nodded Saylor. “It could be done in four years, instead of ten or twelve.”
“Let me think on it,” said her father.
It would be nine long, agonizing days before her father made up his mind. She knew that he was probably seeking counsel with the other fathers and families in the compound, although she didn’t know why it was any of their business. Then her answer came.
She could go to college but she had to return during holiday breaks and summer breaks.
“I promise I’ll return, Dad. I mean, Kansas City isn’t that far away,” she smiled hugging her parents. She hated that she lied to them but she also knew that if they knew where she was really going, they’d come for her.
Saylor knew she wouldn’t return. She’d secured scholarships on her own and would be attending a radiology school in Cincinnati. She lied to her parents. In fairness, they had lied to her as well.
Earlier that year, in the fall when the harvest was done and they’d canned everything they could, Saylor helped the other kids take the food to the cellars.
They weren’t cellars. She knew what that now.
They were bunkers and they didn’t just have food, they contained weapons and radio equipment she’d never seen before.
Knowing she had to pretend, she ignored all of it, biding her time until it was the right time to get away from all of them.
With a bus ticket to Kansas City, she waved goodbye to everyone and left them in Nebraska. In Kansas City, she got off, bought another ticket to Cincinnati and kept going.
That first year was the hardest for her. She wrote to her Aunt Nell in Louisiana several times but never told her the whole story, worried she would tell her parents.
Other young women knew their minds and their bodies. Saylor only knew what her parents had told her. She’d never paid much attention to the way she dressed or her hair.
“Saylor, why don’t you come with us for a girls’ day today,” smiled her classmate.
“A girls’ day?” she said with a wrinkled nose.
“Yes,” she laughed. “We’re going to get manicures and pedicures, we’re getting our hair cut and styled and then do a little retail therapy.”
Saylor knew what those things were because she’d heard them talk about them before. But she was very careful with her money and didn’t want to spend unnecessarily.
“The nails are on me,” smiled Bridget. “I promise you’ll love it.”
“And the hair salon is owned by my aunt,” said Kerri. “She’ll give you a discount.”
“What’s wrong with my hair?” she frowned.
“Honey, your hair is beautiful but we’ve heard you talk about your upbringing on a compound. You just need a good cut and style. It will be so much easier to deal with than all that hair. It gets in your way.”
“It does,” she nodded. She remembered seeing someone on television with a beautiful cut that framed her face yet was still long. “Okay. Okay, I’ll go with you.”
That day changed everything for Saylor. Suddenly, she was the girl in the room everyone turned to stare at. Her big green eyes were more pronounced with the make-up the girls had picked out for her. Her lips, full and pink, and her skin suddenly felt like silk.
When they picked out a few new dresses and outfits to go out, she couldn’t believe the difference in the way she looked and felt. But there was no one to share it all with. No one except her mother’s sister, her Aunt Nell.
They hadn’t been close when growing up, because of her parents, but as a teenager, she’d reached out more often, writing to her and e-mailing her secretly behind her parent’s backs.
In all the time at university, Saylor never went back home. When her parents wrote for her to return for the summer or for holidays, she made excuses of having classes or class projects or wanting to take additional classes to end early and be able to come home sooner.
It was all a lie.
The day she graduated from radiology school, she packed her things and headed south.
Not to Nebraska, but to a new beginning.
A place where, hopefully, her parents would never dare to come.
A place where her Aunt Nell and Uncle Sor said no one would ever find her or dare to come onto the property.
She was going to be independent, have a great job, and according to her Aunt Nell she would have the kind of family she desperately needed.