Noose

      My name is Noose. My name was supposed to be Emerald, my mother's favorite stone, but that never happened. You see, while my mother was in labor with me, my father went and hanged himself. When my mother found out, she had a fit, and decided to name her newly born daughter Noose. When my father killed himself, he broke one of the rules the Society made. You can't commit suicide in the Society. It messes up their numbers.
      When my father killed himself, he left his wife and his five – no, six kids if you include me – alone to deal with the Society's harsh punishment for his crime. On top of that, we had to made a living for ourselves. To help feed ourselves and keep our small home, my three brothers work in the fields, and my two sisters took up jobs in the Society building here in our valley. My mother continued her job as a Home Healer.
      Cardinal is the oldest, and she works in the Society's building here. She leaves first thing in the morning, and doesn't come back until late at night. I almost never see her anymore. Bear is seventeen, and he works in Mr. Rune's field. Mr. Rune is nice enough, but he's getting old, and the Society would probably have gotten rid of him a long time ago if he didn't own the valley's most productive field. Airielle and Felix are sixteen year old twins, but couldn't be more different. Felix is loud, outgoing, and reckless, but Airielle is sweet, shy, and mothers me more than my birth mother does. Greene is only one year older than me, and he's already working. He takes after Bear in that silent but strong manner.
      Then there's me. Just plain old Noose. Plain old Noose who is still scared of Inspection Tuesdays. To keep the citizens in order, the Society inspects all homes on Tuesdays. The residents of the house are kept from work for part of the day, and they stand in the streets until our house is inspected.
      There's no reason for someone to be scared of the Inspections if you aren't hiding anything. About two years ago, when I was eleven or so, my neighbors' house was being inspected. Apparently the soldiers inspecting it found something suspicious, so they blew up the house. After letting the owners of the house watch everything go up in flames, they took them out into the street and they were shot. The whole family. Even the newborn baby. The Society knows no such thing as mercy.
      Once I asked my mother why they inspected the homes, but she just shook her head. Later, I asked my best friend River. He knows everything. He told me that they do that to prevent us from rebelling against the Society. The Great Rebellion happened like that. People gathered weapons and hid them in their houses, then attacked the government. That was how the Society came to be. They taught us that same thing in History every year at school.
      I'm standing outside my house now. Cardinal is next to me, and I can feel her impatience. Her jaw is sticking out a little, something everyone in our family does when they are upset. I was becoming restless myself. I was itching to get together with River and frolic in the babbling creek behind his house or climb trees in the forest behind mine.
      The Society soldier suddenly came marching down the street. Immediately everyone stood up straight and stared directly ahead. I took a deep, shaky breath as he entered my neighbor's house.  The soldiers didn't live in the valley, and they smelled foreign. The best way to describe it is that they smelled sterile. Too clean for the valley, where almost everyone worked in the fields and dirt all day.
      "CLEAR!" The soldiers shouted as they left the house next to us.
      Next to me, Cardinal stiffened as if she were nervous. She shouldn't be nervous. They did this all the time, and she was never worried. She couldn't be hiding something; Cardinal would never do that. I made a mental note to tell River. He would have the answer for me.
      "CLEAR!" The soldier shouted as he came out our front door. I turned around, watching them come out. One of the soldiers kicked over a clay pot at the doorway, and I heard Airielle gasp a little. She had been planning to give her friend that flower for her birthday.
      I made eye contact with the girl across the street from me. She was a few years younger than me, but I had seen her around school sometimes. She had dark matted hair, and wild brown eyes that darted everywhere. Her lips were a thin, pale line, and she was clearly malnourished. I wondered how their family was doing financially. They were the Hammonds, weren't they?
      "CLEAR!" The soldier at the end of the street yelled. The troop of soldiers got into formation and marched away.
      I took off.