Under the Stars Read Online Free

rushes over to Malik, babbling in a foreign tongue. She hugs him like his soul just left his body. I wordlessly question if it has. He regrets this—his aqua-colored eyes tell me everything his mouth doesn’t.  
    I remember Mama and Mattie, and my feet carry me to our wagon. When I open the door, Mama’s face illuminates, tears trailing down her cheeks. Mattie’s eyes are wide. I wish he’d speak. Maybe say how glad he is to see me.
    “What happened?” Mama asks; her mouth gapes open when she sees my wound.
    I hold up my hand to stop her from whatever she was about to say. “The vagabonds are dead, but so are others.”
    “I don’t want Mattie to—”
    “He won’t. I’m going to help bury them.”
    “If you need any help… I mean, I can…” She grasps for words, and I know she means well, but she’s not able to stomach this.
    I shake my head. “You should stay here with him. I’ll be back soon.” Dried blood has caked itself to the shirt I have on. It takes a small amount of peeling before I can remove the top and grab another out of our bag to wrap my arm.
    Outside, in the blazing heat, the bodies begin to stink. Putrid vapors waft into my nostrils, and lick the back of my throat.
    I can almost taste death.
    If we leave them out here without burials, the nocturnal predators will chew through their flesh and use their bones as toothpicks.
    Everyone stands back and covers their faces. Nobody steps forward to help. I decide to make the first move.
    “Does anyone have a shovel? I’ll start digging.” Looking at the corpses, I have no idea how I’m going to hollow out sand graves and dump their bodies.
    Malik steps forward with a shovel in hand. “I’ll dig. You bury.”
    “Deal.”
      The sun eyes us like a taskmaster, lashing us with its whip of blazing light. Eventually, it slides from one area of the sky to another.
    We’ve cleared the bodies, dragged them into the pit. I try to block out the images of limp torsos, blood-stained sand and the odor. Most definitely the odor.  
    “Thanks for the help,” I say to Malik. He glances at me quickly, nods, then begins to walk directly toward the vast desert. “Where are you going?” I call behind him, but he doesn’t respond. Instead, he treks a little bit further and chucks the shovel.
    When he returns, he says, “I can’t keep it with us, not with their blood on it.”
    These people are his family and friends. Without them, he wouldn’t have anywhere to go. I think long and hard about that. How would I feel if I lost Mama and Mattie? What would I do then?
    The gypsies have decided to move up the road. They don’t want to be near the blood and tomb any longer. I can’t say I blame them—I want to get out of here, too. Come morning, we’ll be gone, just me and my tiny family. Which means I’ll have to say goodbye to Malik.
    After the sun disappears behind the indefinite stretch of desert, we’re left with air that pinches and bites at our skin, even under our clothes. Darkness is feared by many, and very few have braved it alone.
    Tonight, the gypsies have decided not to celebrate with dancing, not after their terrible losses. I think they might be scared to be in the open again, vulnerable to attacks.
    Mama, Mattie and me snuggle together to stay warm, even in our wagon.
    “Tomorrow we’ll leave,” Mama says.
    I don’t want to be reminded of how good these people were to us, and how we’ll leave them behind. They’ll continue on for another journey, never fully settling anywhere. Always learning something new.
    I just pray that Mama’s right, and we’ll find Legora.
    7.
    The next morning we say our goodbyes. One of the women stitches my arm and gives me a healing herb. “Should be as good as new in a week,” she says. We thank the gypsies for their help, and then gather our belongings. Mama cries.
    “We’re closer to Legora, so we’ll be there before you know it,” I reassure her. I don’t know if it helps much, but at