Love's Escape

The outside world was unknown to her, but she could see a glimpse of it through the window in his room. She wasn’t even supposed to be in his room. She knew it and he knew it too. If they were caught together, it would probably be their demise. No soldier was ever supposed to have a civilian anywhere near their room. A glimpse of the outside to a civilian was too risky. They could be tempted to flee and this world was set up to keep the social elite safe about twenty years ago during World War III. The thing is, it wasn’t meant to be made into a whole new world originally.

This world was constructed inside caverns that were all connected throughout the Midwest of the United States. The government constructed a small, shelter-in place type of world for the social elite in order for them to survive during the war. Basically, these caverns were constructed into mini cities complete with housing, stores, banks, libraries, school, hospitals, etc. Whatever you could need was thought of. Supplies were shipped in through the military. The elite were supposed to stay until after the war was over and then they would be taken back into the outside world to live normally. Before entering back into the outside world, the government needed to make sure there was no lingering radiation or anything left behind that could be harmful to human life. This is where things went a little different than previously planned.

When the third World War ended and the all clear was given from outside sources, the head of the new world did not release that information to the civilians. He was the only person in the new world who actually knew that the outside world was, indeed, habitable again. The head of the new world was a five star Army General who seemed to enjoy his new taste of power in the new world. He quickly noticed that all civilians looked to him for hopes of freedom to the outside world and instead of granting them freedom, he slowly stripped their rights away without most of the population even noticing what was happening to them. He would tell them that it was too dangerous to even look at the outside world due to radiation from the bombs. He had them genuinely fearing for their lives if they came into any contact with anything or anyone from the outside world.

Soldiers had strict rules to abide by in order to keep the civilians' fear level growing so they would have no want to ever attempt to leave the new world without clearance from their leader. When they would leave to get supplies from the outside world, there was a huge process each person and item brought in would have to go through in order to be allowed in. Soldiers could not mingle with civilians under any circumstances. If caught even having small talk together, you will have to face any repercussions determined by the leader. Having a civilian anywhere near the soldiers' living quarters was unthinkable. So much so, that no soldier or civilian has ever attempted it; that is until now. The leader had put a lot of effort into keeping these people under his reign for twenty years so far and he did not have any plans to change things anytime soon. If he found out that Gemma was in Private First Class Nicholas Young’s quarters, there is no telling what he would do to either of them.

Civilians were also warned not to fraternize with the military. They were told they could catch something from the outside world if they even spoke to them for longer than twenty seconds. Scare tactics were definitely used repeatedly throughout the past twenty years to keep the civilians under his control. Gemma was different from the other civilian women, though. She was curious. She had been told numerous stories from her grandfather about the outside world. Most of her childhood, Gemma would sit and daydream about the sky and the ocean. What they would be like to see in person. She needed to know, but knew there was little to no hope to ever experience any of that.

Private First Class Young was very attracted to Gemma from the first time he had seen her. He was relocated from the far south of the new world up to the northeast side of it. His first day there, he had decided to grab a coffee at the cafe on the way to his quarters. During the walk back to his new place, he tripped over something and the coffee flew up in the air and back down on him. That caused him to take his shirt off. Clothing was what helped the civilians determine who they were allowed to associate with. Gemma was walking up the street at the same time, but not looking at where she was walking being too caught up with her book. She ended up walking directly into Nick. Nick was in awe of her. She had what seemed like a glow radiating from her. Gemma apologized to Nick stating how clumsy she was and they started to talk. They had such amazing chemistry between them. Nick didn't want to leave, but Gemma had to go since it was almost curfew time so the two parted ways.

Nick would from that point on keep an eye on Gemma and they would pass small notes to each other once she had seen he was a soldier. Surprisingly, Gemma didn’t look at Nick differently when she found out. It didn’t change who he was and she knew that she thoroughly enjoyed his company. Gemma was never one to follow the rules, so Nick being a soldier didn’t deter her one bit. The two became extremely close and, eventually, Gemma would start to sneak off into Nick’s living quarters to see him. They started spending so much time together that Gemma’s family started to question her whereabouts. That still wouldn’t stop Gemma from seeing Nick. She would just lie and say she was working a new job. Gemma made sure to always have an excuse for her long absences.

Nick wasn’t as cool as Gemma when it came to the anxiety aspect of things. He knew in his mind that sooner or later someone was going to find out what was happening here. Even if they didn’t, then where do they go from here? Nick was falling in love with Gemma and he was certain that she was the one he was supposed to spend the rest of his life with. That really didn’t mean much considering they could never live a life together publicly, be married, or have children. Nick really wanted all of those things. He knew it could never be possible. They weren’t even supposed to be speaking, let alone falling in love. He decided he needed to express his concerns to Gemma.

After hearing Nick’s worry, Gemma, still gazing out of the window in Nick’s room, suddenly sprung to her feet and exclaimed, “We are leaving! Tonight!”. Nick quickly threw his hand over her mouth in hopes that no one heard her yell. As he did that, he whispered into her ear, “If only we could.”. Gemma had quickly devised a plan to escape out of the window together and face the outside world together. Nick was hesitant at first, but then decided to think about her plan for a while. “We are going to need everything from my savings and yours. That means we have to wait until at least tomorrow when the banks are open. They have none of those banks in the outside world. I can send a message to my cousin and have him wait with transportation for us. Once outside, we will need completely new identities. They will be looking for us both, together or not, so we need to dye our hair and go as far away from the Midwest as possible.”, Nick explained to Gemma.

Gemma was in shock! She didn’t really think about any of those things. She just knew that she needed to be with Nick. Her heart told her not to worry and just wing everything, but Nick had valid points. Being disappointed that Nick was so adamant about waiting a whole day before they can freely be together, Gemma passively agreed. She knew deep down that Nick was just trying to do things with both of their best interests in mind. She was just sick of hiding and sneaking around. She wanted to walk down the street holding hands and go out on real dates with each other. In a way it made sense that Nick would be more practical than Gemma. She needed someone to balance her and Nick did that in a way that nobody else could.

Later that night, Gemma was trying to prep with as little things as possible for the next night’s escape into the outside world and freedom with Nick. She knew she had to take only extremely important things in a bag that wouldn't look suspicious at all. She knew she had to cover her tracks too. With that in mind, Gemma decided to tell her sister about plans to sleepover a friends house the next night. She knew that if she named her best friend, who recently moved into her own apartment, her sister wouldn’t question it one bit. In fact, the only questioned she did ask were if she could see the apartment too and were any boys going to be there. The only way to make this all believable would be to stop over there as if she were staying over and then suddenly leave sick to go home. That would be the perfect time for her to run over to Nick’s place and they could make their escape. Gemma actually began to surprise herself with how much planning she began doing in order to be with Nick. That was enough to prove that she really did love him because Gemma had never planned anything in her life. She was so excited that she could hardly sleep.

Nick had packed his bag with all his basic necessities and sent the message out for his cousin. He was so ready, but so scared at the same time. As he laid in bed, gazing out of his window, he thought about how he would propose to Gemma once they made it out to Florida. He had set it up for his cousin to meet his uncle over in Virginia and then his cousin would leave the vehicle with Nick and Gemma and the two of them would drive it down to Florida where his uncle had already set up somewhere for them to stay in Miami. He couldn’t stop thinking about walking along the beach with Gemma and when she least expects it, dropping to one knee and officially asking her to be with him forever. Gemma brought out the soft side of Nick. She was the chaos he longed for in a way. He knew it the moment that he first laid eyes on her.

The next morning, Gemma and Nick both went to their banks and withdrew everything they had in all of their accounts. Gemma’s bank thought nothing of it. After all, the social elite are a fickle bunch and do the oddest things with their money. Plus, it’s no secret that they have money all over in different financial institutions, so it wouldn’t seem out of the ordinary for someone to withdraw everything and close their accounts. Nick’s bank was a little different. Soldiers didn’t spread their money around because they didn’t have nearly as much as the civilians in here, so when Nick went to withdraw everything and close out his account they got suspicious. The teller went to whisper to the manager. They both looked at Nick for a few seconds, before the manager told Nick to come chat in his office. He started asking why Nick decided to close his accounts with them and asked if there was anything he could do to make him stay with them. Nick made up a whole story about a family member opening a new institution that he wanted to support and after what had seemed like a full on interrogation, Nick finally had his money and was on his way back to his place to get ready for Gemma’s arrival.

Gemma was in what had seemed like an entirely different world for the rest of the day leading up to the time she was supposed to leave for her sleepover at her best friend’s new apartment. She had a sudden feeling of panic that she had never felt before as she realized that she would never hear from or see any of her family again. As she said goodbye to her sister, she hugged her extra tight. So tight that her sister exclaimed, “God, it’s not like I won’t see ya tomorrow, weirdo.”. Gemma laughed as she went to find her parents to say goodbye. She, of course, couldn’t find them anywhere. She never could. Remembering that fact, she suddenly didn’t feel that panic anymore and walked out of what she knew as her only home for the very last time.

Soon, Gemma had arrived at her best friend’s place. They had an awesome evening together. Gemma never felt so close to her before. It started to make her sad. This was her best friend since birth. She never even thought of life outside without her in it, but Nick was her heart and she had to do this or she would forever wonder what could have been. Gemma was never the type of person to look back in regret, so she just took in whatever she could of her time with her best friend and decided she’d cherish that night forever. That helped ease the stress of leaving her behind. As bedtime grew closer, Gemma began to get antsy. Luckily, that fit in perfectly with her plan to say she was ill and leave. She went into the bathroom for quite some time and when she came out, she expressed how she wasn’t feeling well and would like to return home for the night. Then she apologized and squeezed her friend so tight that she felt as if she was going to break her and closed the door on another huge part of her life so far.

Nick had been pacing the floor of his quarters waiting for Gemma’s secret knock. It felt like forever until it finally came and she was safely in his arms ready for their escape together. “I started to think you changed your mind.”, Nick said with a coy smile. Gemma rolled her eyes as she grabbed the first sheet and started tying them all together. They planned on climbing through the window with the sheets and then carefully running the path Nick had previously mapped out for them not to be spotted by any of the outside guards that Gemma was unaware of before. He explained how important it was to stay dead silent on the way through the path, so no attention would be brought their way. He wanted Gemma to fully understand the seriousness of how she can’t make a peep because the guards are all armed and trained to kill. Then he put his fatigues on top of his civilian clothes and kissed Gemma before dropping the sheet through the window.

Nick went first to make sure it could hold his weight. Gemma followed right behind them and as soon as her feet hit the ground, they both took off running as fast as they could. Gemma was following as close behind as possible without making a sound. They finally made it to a hole busted in a huge cement wall and squirmed their way through. They had made it out! Nick then ditched the fatigues and the two met his cousin about a mile from the hole. “Right on time”, his cousin said upon the two coming into his sight. “Like usual”, replied Nick. The three got into the car and drove to the first gas station they had seen. There, they dyed their hair in the bathroom and were prepared to walk out into their new lives.

As they opened the bathroom door, there was a man there with a gun telling them to get into a van. They had never seen this man before and were extremely confused. '`Who are you?”, Nick screamed as they handcuffed him and Gemma to the inside of the van. The men, three of them now all wearing masks, laughed and locked the van up before getting in to the front and taking off. Gemma was in a complete state of shock, sitting there frozen, not knowing what to do. Nick tried to reassure her that he would fix this. That someone must have seen them and followed them there. There was no other explanation. Unbeknownst to anyone in the van, Nick’s cousin saw the whole thing and decided to follow the van while calling more people to come follow them with him. He didn’t even know who the men were. He just knew his cousin was in there.

The van pulled up to this big barn out in Missouri and the three men exited. They went inside after swiping some sort of car, but didn’t take Nick and Gemma with them. They were still inside the van. After about ten minutes, two of the men came out and got back into the van. They drove down to a big lake and got Nick and Gemma from the van. They asked Gemma how much money she had on her. Nick screamed, “Do not answer them!”. “It’s fine.”, Gemma said, “I don’t have any money.”. The men snarled in disbelief. Nick, remembering that all the money was with his cousin, replied, “Great now they’ll definitely kill us.”. Gemma knew what she was doing. “What? Ya think we come from money buddy? Boy, are you way off! Me and my old man here just stole us some hair dye from that there gas station and decided to reinvent ourselves to go rob us a different gas station.”, Gemma said to the men. Nick had no clue where she was going with this, so he just nodded. She continued, “Maybe you guys have it right though. Maybe we should just start stealing people and get money that way, huh babe?”.

The men looked so puzzled. “Wait you ain’t got nothing? Not a single cent?”, one of the men asked. “Not a single cent.”, Gemma replied, “You boys robbed the wrong couple. The ones with the money were in their car waiting for us to leave the bathroom.”. The men started arguing with each other before walking away to make a call. When they walked away, Nick’s cousin slowly crept up and freed their hands. Nick and Gemma couldn’t believe their eyes. The three took off to the car and sped away with no headlights on so they wouldn’t be seen. They arrived at the closest diner where almost all of Nick’s family had been waiting for word to come down to the barn. His cousin saw his opportunity and took it though. Nick was taken back when he saw everyone. He introduced them all to Gemma, his fiance.

“Your what?!”, Gemma squealed when she realized what Nick had said. That’s when Nick dropped to one knee, pulled out the ring he had in his pocket the entire time, and asked her to marry him. “YES!!!!”, Gemma exclaimed before jumping into Nick’s arms once he returned to his feet. “Of course I’ll marry you! That’s all I ever wanted!”, she said with such passion that Nick knew he had made the right choice. “Good. I started to think you changed your mind”, Nick said with a laugh. Gemma just rolled her eyes. She was ready to take on this new life together.