St. Francis Hospital's waiting room is eerily quiet. In the Time Before is would be packed with people waiting to hear the status of their loved ones or bouncing a baby on their knee trying to calm its cries, a junkie here and there waiting to see if they can fool a novice resident into giving them pain medication, or someone whose migraine was so painful that they couldn't hardly see. Now it is just Aunt Dorothy and I sitting on the same uncomfortable plastic chairs that had been in the hospital for more than a decade and wondering how often these chairs were cleaned free of possible bacteria and bodily fluid that had dried onto the arms of the chairs.

The entirely male staff of the hospital are few, one greasy haired nurse sitting at the nurse's station and few doctors or nurses passing by, always without a patient. There are a few doctor's offices throughout the city, ones for Econowives and their families, others for more high-ranking citizens. In Gilead, God heals sickness. Doctors and nurses aren't in high demand and to go to the hospital meant that it was a matter of life and death.

"Blessed day." A nurse brings Aunt Dorothy a steaming hot cup of cheap coffee and gives me a cup of lukewarm water to sip on. Aunt Dorothy blows lightly on her coffee before taking a sip. She makes a dissatisfied groan.

I would give anything to drink coffee again, even if it was the shittiest, weakest black coffee I could find.

"Drink your water," she insists lightly. I obediently take a sip to satisfy her wishes. "God has blessed you with good health, I hope?"

"Yes, everyone in my house is well." I reply, searching for a distraction. There are no water-stained magazines laying around with the addresses torn off for me to flip through. Even if there were, I doubt that there would be any "women's magazines" with only pictures that I could look at.

Aunt Dorothy sets down her coffee and turns to me. "My dear, I am not sure that you should be here. The emotional strain if this situation could have negative affects on you and the child." The sagging skin of her throat waggles as she speaks

I nod and take another sip of water. "I'm fine." I lie. My hands are still shaking, an after-effect from the adrenaline rush of seeing Ofchris in the ambulance van. Her wounds are deep and the location of her wounds leave almost no hope that her baby will survive. I'm not so sure that she will make it either. Her blood type is rare, and Gilead doesn't exactly have blood drives or blood banks. "The Wife did it." I blurt out. I pinch the side of my face as punishment for saying this.

"How do you know that?" The old woman asks with suspicion, her eyes narrowed.

"I saw her being carried out by Guardians. There was blood all over her and she wasn't injured." I state. The memory of the Wife's crazed eyes won't leave my head. What had driven her to do that to Ofchris and her husband? Ofchris wasn't the type to have a secret affair with her Commander, then again in a majority of the cases the Handmaids didn't have a choice in the matter. Obey or be sent away or even killed for an accusation made up by their Commander as a consequence for not submitting to him.

"She will be punished." Dorothy says with conviction. Sadistically I start to wonder what kind of punishment the Wife will get. Will it be public? Will she be hanged or will the Handmaids be allowed to rip her apart the same way the men accused of killing a Handmaid or her child are? My hands twitch, aching to rip the hair from the Wife's head if given the chance.

An hour later a doctor comes to the waiting room and Aunt Dorothy stands up to meet him. "Please, sit." He says grimly. His hair is perfectly styled in place and his white coat is immaculate. There's no blood or dirt on him. Did he even see Ofchris?

"The Handmaid is in stable condition. We had enough blood here to give her a transfusion. Her wounds were very deep and located in the abdominal region. We did everything we could, but her pregnancy was no longer viable." He explains as if this were just another day at the office, completely devoid of emotion.

Aunt Dorothy closes her eyes, mourning the loss of another pregnancy.

"The damage to her reproductive system is too great to risk another pregnancy." The man stresses to Aunt Dorothy.

Oh shit. What happens to Ofchris now? She has no use to Gilead as a Handmaid now and she can't marry.

"Can I see her?" I interject before Dorothy can say anything.

"In time. She needs rest now, and as soon as she is well enough she must give testimony to the authorities on what happened tonight." The doctor explains. "If you'll excuse me."

Aunt Dorothy is visibly distraught. I want to scream at her. She has no right to react this way. This wasn't her friend who had almost been murdered and lost a child and now faces an uncertain future.

Gilead is killing us.

I doze off, waiting for news about Ofchris. My dozing soon turns into dreams, fighting off the taunting thoughts about Ofchris that only the darkest part of the mind can conjure. I try to fight the nightmares where Ofchris bleeds out on the table, the vision of seeing her pale lifeless body being covered by a white sheet.

A young-looking nurse finally comes to wake me and tell Aunt Dorothy and I that Ofchris can see us now. I get up with a start, anxious to see my friend before the dread sets in at what will be left of my friend when I finally see her. My feet drag behind Aunt Dorothy and the nurse as we head towards her room at the end of the hall. Even in this hallway there is an unsettling lack of movement or indication of life behind the room doors.

Ofchris is in a room all by herself with no windows and ugly yellow-light beaming down on her from panel lights above. There is a machine attached to sensors on her chest and a heart rate monitor on her finger beeping soundly. Her hair is down for the first time since I've met her-it's so curly that it springs out like thick coils from her head. There are bandages on her arms and a thick bandage lumped underneath her hospital gown. An IV drip hangs from a metal rod to her left, the tubing secured by a butterfly bandage on the back of her hand.

"I lost the baby." She states unceremoniously. There is no emotion behind her words, only safely contained in the cloudy irises of her eyes.

"We know, my dear." Aunt Dorothy says, putting on her best performance of how she would react if she actually cared about Handmaids as people instead of vessels meant to procreate for our oppressors. "God has a plan." She says, as if this is any consolation for Ofchris's loss.

"Does He have a plan for me once I leave here?" Ofchris asks bitterly, refusing to look at us. "I can't provide Gilead with children anymore, which is the only reason I was kept alive. I can't marry into my family like Esther. The wife of my Commander is still alive and she tried to kill her husband by cutting off his only chance at procreation. Did they tell you why?" Ofchris hisses, uninterested in hearing any objections from me or Dorothy. "Did they tell you that the reason my Commander's wife stabbed me ten times in the stomach and chopped off her husband's penis was because he got syphilis?" She has no fear now of the repercussions of speaking this way at her rank. What rank does she have now, anyway? Then again, the truth can gain you punishment.

"No, they didn't-" Aunt Dorothy says calmly, trying to get Ofchris to control her aggressive tone. The old woman is giving Ofchris slack, but Ofchris can only be permitted to go so far until she is pulled back.

"He was going to the Underground." Ofchris says and I stifle a gasp.

Whispers of the Underground had been floating around ever since the rise of Gilead. Certain women were picked for unknown reasons to be sexworkers for the city's elite. The same elites that crusaded relentlessly for the creation of Gilead and the rise of the Republic to combat the sin rooted in women and women's bodies that soiled the nation and family values. In the same way that there were speakeasys during Prohibition, almost everyone in Gilead knew about the Underground but refused to believe it or speak of it in fear that they would be questioned about their knowledge of it or their connection to its workings. Never had I gone to the Underground, but I knew of a few women or their Commanders who did. They said that all the women had to do was wear skimpy outfits and lingerie while they sipped on champagne and other liquor on the lap of the wealthy men that frequented the Underground. I didn't know if the Underground was one location or many, maybe it was one location with many rooms for different women or different sexual acts. Hell, maybe the Underground wasn't even underground but hidden in broad daylight as a hotel or a furniture store until the lights went down.

"He picked it up there and gave it to me. We found out today when I tested positive for it." She continues, staring at the bandages on her arm. "You know what that means? The baby would be born with it too. That baby would be worth nothing in Gilead. It would be a Shredder. That's exactly what the Wife said. She said that there was no point in wasting food and resources on a pregnant Handmaid whose offspring wouldn't even be considered viable."

Tears sting the corners of my eyes as I listen to Ofchris re-tell her story of the assault. She is being punished for her Commander's transgressions. Her life is being ruined a second time by a man of the Republic. Ofchris had served Gilead well. She produced a child for her last post without toeing even an inch out of line in her behavior and didn't even protest like all Handmaids tend to do when they took the child away. She had done everything she had been asked of and still she was almost murdered for her Commander's sin.

"Ofchris, you mustn't say such things." Aunt Dorothy whispers, kneeling beside the bed and placing her wrinkly hands on the scratchy sheets of the hospital bed. "I believe that your testimony is the truth but speaking it outside of these doors to anyone but us or the authorities will not change anything." Her voice isn't stern, but it is a warning, pleading for Ofchris to realize that saying anything more will only worsen her fate. "You have suffered unjustly, my girl, and I wish I could take this pain and suffering away from you, but only God can do that. You must put your faith in Himand in Gilead that we will protect you from this moment on and that those who had any part in your attack will be punished to the greatest extent of the law."

Ofchris is quiet and is trying not to cry. "What happens to me now, Aunt Dorothy?" There is so much fear in her voice that it trembles coming from her split lips.

"Because you have served Gilead so well and you have done nothing to deserve being sent to the Colonies, you will have two options: you can become a Martha, or you can come with me and become an Aunt at the Rachel and Leah Center." Dorothy explains gently, taking Ofchris's hand in hers. "You've been a Handmaid, so you know what is required of the girls at the center." Ofchris is quiet, her eyes are looking for something far away. "You don't have to make a decision now, Ofchris."

"I'm not Ofchris anymore…" she states quietly, almost with regret. She had been Ofchris for so long that the rest of her identity is a distant memory, atrophied and manipulated by the years spent in Gilead under the rules of the Republic.

"Yes, I suppose you're not, my dear Melanie." Dorothy says, the name stumbling out of her mouth as if it were sour on her tongue. "I'll go and talk to your doctors and report back to the authorities about your options. I'll leave you two alone for a while." The old woman turns her attention onto me and reminds me sternly, "She needs rest. Don't keep her from healing for too long."

It's not until Aunt Dorothy exits that Melanie turns to me, remembering that in my silent watching of her conversation with Dorothy that I have been waiting patiently to talk to her the whole time. "How long have you been here?"

"Since they put you in the van." I reply quietly, pulling up a wooden chair next to her bed and seating myself. "My husband let me come. He's not here, but…" I babble stupidly, as if my husband's presence in the hospital matters to either of us. "I'm so sorry." I sob, finally allowing myself to cry but unable to bring myself to look at her as hot tears roll down my cheeks.

"Give me your hand," Melanie instructs weakly. I do as she says, and I don't object when she takes off the gloves from my hands so she can hold them without being reminded of my position. She doesn't want the separation. "I didn't mean to sound so…rude…earlier when I said that I couldn't be like you."

"I know, I know. You have every right to be angry about it, anyway." I say, sniffling. "I feel like I abandoned you." I confess, crying harder now that I say the words that had been plaguing my conscience since I saw her last before my wedding ceremony.

"You did what Gilead asked of you. I would never be mad at that." Her voice is calm and smooth as honey, like it was when we were companions.

"I wanted to talk to you every single time I saw you on the street, every single time," I stress angrily, hating Gilead and myself because I couldn't talk to her all those times. "I thought about you every single day and I wanted to…" I can barely speak over my sobbing now. I haven't cried so hard or so openly for such a long time that I break and can't stop the emotions from flooding out.

"I know." Melanie's hand is cold, holding mine weakly. We are both quiet for a while as she allows me to cry, even though I am the one who should be comforting her as she cries. "What do you think I should do? After I leave here?" She asks, reaching for her cup of ice chips and placing one on her tongue.

"Come stay with me." My answer is out of my mouth before I even consider having to ask my husband permission or if Melanie even has a choice in where she is stationed as a Martha. "If you go back to the Rachel and Leah Center-how many other girls will you have to watch being forced down the same path of abuse and anguish like we did?" I ended up as a Wife, I think, I have no room to talk. "Another Aunt means more girls put in the Center."

"Yes, but-I could help them, too, couldn't I?" Melanie asks tenderly. "I know exactly what they're going through. I could give them hope and they could see that if something bad happens that it's not the end of the world for them. I could be a light in the darkness, Esther." I can hear in her voice that she's already halfway to a decision, and she's asking for my blessing.

I sniff and wipe away a lingering tear with my free hand. "I'm not an authority of the Republic. I can't and I won't tell you what to do. Yet…what if you become an Aunt and it's not as good of a life as you think it can be? What if they blow out that light you're trying to bring, and you become one of them? You know what it's like in this world. Try as I might, I know that I'm already a different person than I was before I became a Wife. You have to be like them to survive."

Melanie grows silent, mulling over my words. "I'll think about it. Go home and rest."

I let go of her hand and stand up to press a kiss on her forehead. "Praised be."

"May the Lord open."

It's nearly daybreak when I finally go home. The stillness of the air intensifies the uncomfortable silence shared between the driver and I, roused unhappily from his sleep to retrieve me. His eyes are hooded and dragged down by tiredness, but my eyes are open wide, fixed on the front lawn three doors down from my own that appears unaltered as if no atrocities had taken place only hours earlier. I realize that what contributes to the uncomfortable stillness of the new morning is the absent Guardians at every corner of the street. I always assumed that Guardians were stationed at all hours, that they are Gilead's eyes even when its peoples' eyes are closed and dreaming of a life far away from here.

The driver unlocks the door for me, since I cannot possess keys, and mutters something of a goodnight to me before he retreats to his makeshift apartment shared with the Marthas in the lower level of the brownstone. The front room is tinted blue with the early morning rays of sunlight beginning to break through the darkness, dripping past the drapes and pooling on the floor. My husband is sleeping uncomfortably on the couch with a newspaper in his lap, his arm is poorly propping up his head atop the armrest. His coffee brown hair is disheveled and hanging limply in tendrils that have grown too long to be acceptable for a man of his rank in the public eye. I think it looks better this way. I pluck the paper from his lap and set it on the side table along with his pens and a framed bible verse. Gingerly, I brush away a strand of hair that covers his eyes and tuck it behind his ear. I feel him stir then and his fingers come alive, wrapping around my wrist slowly, his eyes still closed. He pulls my hand against his cold cheek and makes a satisfied sound as my palm cups the curve of his jaw.

"Is she alive?" He questions, his voice low and raspy.

"Yes, she's alive." I reply re-assuringly. I rub the pad of my thumb over his skin and he turns slightly to kiss it, as if he were still asleep and dreaming. "You should go to bed."

Daniel groans and kisses my thumb again. "Stay down here with me. I don't want to move." He requests without even a flutter of his eyes-he is only as conscious as he has to be in this moment.

I nod, even though he can't see it, and take off my shoes so my swollen feet can breathe and that the dirt from the bottom of them doesn't scuff up the upholstery. Daniel rotates the lower half of his body until he is settled and I can rest my head on his stomach. The weight of my belly tugs at the skin on my side uncomfortably but I am so exhausted and in need of company that is free from mortal danger that I don't care about the discomfort. I slip easily into a dreamless sleep, Daniel's soft breathing a lullaby to my ears.

Lena finds us in the morning and wakes us up with a disapproving tone. I groan as Daniel rotates his body and rubs my back, encouraging me to get up and rest more in my own bed. I saunter upstairs and into my bedroom in a daze, sleep still weighing down my limbs and dragging me onto my bed. When I wake again the sunlight has flooded my bedroom and Peggy has brought breakfast to my bed. She has brought me eggs this morning. Peggy must have used our rations for me.

"What time is it?" I ask groggily, running my hands through my knotted hair.

"It's almost ten o'clock, ma'am. I thought you'd want to sleep after your long night." Peggy places a breakfast tray next to me, since it can no longer sit above my stomach anymore.

"Thank you." I say half-heartedly.

"If I have permission to ask about what happened last night ma'am…" Peggy waits for me to object, but I mumble a quick noise telling her she can continue as I shovel eggs into my mouth. "Is the Handmaid alive?"

"Yes, she is alive and well." I respond drearily at being reminded of the previous nights events so soon after waking up.

"I saw you getting into the van with her. Were you two companions before?" I nod and take a sip of water as Peggy steps closer. "I spoke to the Marthas of that house. They told me what happened."

"For the sake of my friend and your friends, I suggest that whatever you are about to tell me doesn't leave this room." I warn quietly and nod my head towards the door, indicating to Peggy that she should close it. "What did they tell you?"

"They told me that it was the Commander's wife who did it. She called her husband and the Handmaid into the living room and attacked them right then and there. She…she severed her Husband's you-know-what." Peggy clarifies softly, pointing at her groin. "Apparently, the Commander had been going to the Underground and passed something nasty onto the Handmaid and the baby. Is it true?"

Which part? "If I tell you, you have to promise not to breathe a word to anyone. Not to Lena, not to the driver, no one. If you do, I can't protect you or your sources from punishment for gossiping." I cringe at the words coming out of my mouth. They don't sound like my own. Everyone knows that the Marthas always have the best gossip, and for that, we let them get away with it. They are our sources of information most of the time.

"I promise." She says, coming closer.

"It's true. That's what the Handmaid told the authorities and me. I don't know what's being done with the Commander or the Wife but both of them are going to be punished at the fullest extent of the law." I say, parroting what the Aunt had said with half the amount of fervor.

"Is the Wife going to be hanged?" Peggy hisses incredulously.

I chew on a blueberry before I answer. "The baby died as a result of her actions, so I imagine that yes, she will be."

A knock on the door springs Peggy upright into action to answer it. Daniel is standing on the other side of the door, and Peggy bows her head. Daniel gives me a disapproving glare, knowing that we had been gossiping about the events of last night. "Peggy-don't share any of what my wife has told you and get back to your chores, please."

"Yes sir, right away." She says, scrambling out of the room. I hear her turn on the sink and prepare a cleaning solution for the floors, the strong aroma of bleach wafting through the air.

"Everything is true, I take it?" Daniel asks, shutting the door with his heel.

"It depends on what you've heard."

"I was standing outside of the door about a minute after Peggy closed it, so…"

"Eavesdropping?" I ask teasingly, crossing my arms over my chest.

"She's a Martha, they always have the best gossip around." He shrugs and walks over to my bed, kissing the top of my head. "How are you this morning?"

"Praised be." I reply dispassionately, wiping my lips with a napkin as Daniel sits across from me in a fresh change of clothes. How is 'praised be' a legitimate response to that question?

"Good good good." He fires away, cracking his neck obnoxiously. "Do you need me to stay home today?"

I shake my head. "No, but I did want to ask you something."

"Shoot." He replies, raking a hand through his unkempt hair.

"Ofchris-er, Melanie," I correct myself, "Has the option of becoming a Martha or an Aunt after she recovers in the hospital. I was wondering if she could come here and work for us as a Martha?"

Daniel clicks his tongue. "We already have two Marthas. I don't see any way for the Republic to justify why we need another one, even if she is your friend." I frown and Daniel sighs. "I can control only so much. You know that." He looks at me with pity. I hate that. "Oh, and I've just decided that I'm going to stay home today anyway." He adds casually.

"It's a Saturday." I state dryly. What does he want, a medal?

"I know it is but there is a lunch I got invited to go to and I hate those things. The men always make jabs at my being an actor and are going to talk about what happened last night exclusively if you ask me."

I didn't. "Okay."

"You know what we could do…" he continues, biting his lip. "We could walk around the neighborhood and get some fresh air, say 'hi' to some people…"

I smirk. "You want to show off your incredibly pregnant wife?"

Daniel holds up his hands. "Look, if we make everyone green with envy, that's their sin to pray forgiveness for, not ours." He laughs gently. Does he even pray? I wonder.

"Alright." I agree, stretching out my arms. "I'll get washed up. I should be ready to go within the hour."

"Perfect!" Daniel beams, placing another kiss on my forehead. "I love that we think alike!" He says, striding out the door with way too much gusto for ten o'clock in the morning.

Do we think alike?

I take my time in the bathtub. It's harder getting in and out of it now. My swollen stomach sticks out above the water like an iceberg. Water used to pool in my belly-button but now it sticks out oddly like a snooze-button on an alarm clock. I poke it with wonder and laugh to think that maybe the little monster feels it and realizes that he needs to wake up and get out of the warmth of my body. There's not much time left now.

I ring out my hair and notice that it looks different. My hormones have spun straw into gold despite the lackluster soaps I am provided and lack of anything resembling a beauty routine. Not that I really had one in the Time Before, anyway. I would use conditioner every few days, moisturize my legs after shaving them while always forgetting to apply lotion onto my face, and once a month I would press an ice cube onto my brow line in an effort to numb it before attacking my eyebrows with a tweezer with less-than desirable results. I can't remember the last time I shaved my legs or plucked my eyebrows. I felt lucky that my leg hair matched the hair on my head, that way if it grew out it wasn't so noticeable, but my eyebrow hair was always a shade or two darker than the rest of my hair and would grow thick on the tail but sparse at the head where it should be. As I brush my hair I allow myself to gaze into the mirror and inspect my brow-line. Stray hairs still give the tail of my eyebrow an uneven shape, but more hair seemed to grow at the head without giving me a barbaric and bushy look.

There's so many options I think to myself jokingly as I open my wardrobe to pick out a dress. I choose a loose-fitting dark navy dress made of linen with an extra layer coming down at the waist with pockets. Five large black buttons adorn the center of the torso, allowing me some control over the tightness over my bosom. The linen is gauzy and looks heavy but is light enough where it won't make me sweat in the sun. I roll the sleeves up to my elbow and decide to leave the top button of the dress undone, my breasts aren't constricted but they aren't being shown off in an un-modest way, either. The dress is very plain, so plain that it is almost ugly, but it will draw attention to my pregnant figure nonetheless. The heels I choose are ugly, without a doubt, but they are my most comfortable pair and don't contrast with my dress.

When my hair is dry I ask Peggy to bring me a magazine, one of the very few that women are permitted to "read". This magazine is all pictures, doing its best to instruct women how to put up their hair in different styles that are easy enough to do without details and words. I weave the hair at my temples into two thick braids and draw them together to make a crown at the back of my head before Peggy tries her best to follow the next instructions for the braided bun on the page. Turning my head this way and that I know that Peggy didn't twist my hair into the way that it is supposed to look, like in the magazine, but I prefer it how she did it, loose and low. She lathers sunscreen on my face and the exposed skin of my forearms and hands before clapping her hands together, proud of her work.

Poised upright on the couch and reading the paper, Daniel smiles when he sees me descend the stairs. I don't usually put much effort into my appearance, so this is a surprise for him. If he wanted to make everyone that saw us jealous, I was going to get some credit, too.

"You're prettier than the angels." Daniel gushes lovingly. "I was going to surprise you with a summer hat, but I don't want to hide your beauty." I see a hat box seated next to him, milky white with a sheer green ribbon tied around it. "I also got you these," Daniel retrieves a pair of cerulean colored gloves from his pocket and presents them to me. They are to the wrist, made of polyester lace that allows my skin to breathe while I wear them.

I'm stunned. No one has ever gifted me something without reason, and nothing so luxurious as the gloves. I can't imagine what the hat looks like out of the box. "I am grateful." Daniel hums, proud of himself, and places a hand the small of my back, leading us out the door.

In a somewhat hilarious twist of fate, Daniel is emasculated by a very heavy-set Guardian accompanying us a few paces back as we walk. Even though I am no longer a Handmaid, I am pregnant, so all necessary precautions must be taken. Daniel know this and should have expected this but is fuming with embarrassment and trying to stand taller and push out his chest to save his pride.

It is the height of summer and the heat is unrelenting. There isn't a cloud in the sky to save us from the sun's might. I try to ignore the pungent stench of the Guardian behind us who is sweating like a pig in full-uniform who didn't care to bathe or even apply deodorant before going on assignment. We see a few couples, mostly Econowives and their husbands pass us, but all of the Wives are without their husbands and in groups of twos or threes while men in black rush hurriedly through the streets barking orders into their phones. The men are usually too immersed in their task to take notice of us, but the Econowives smile politely and say "blessed day" in greeting before passing. Some of them stop to chat about the baby before the intimidating presence of the Guardian, or the awful stench of him, warns them from getting any closer and they briskly walk away. The Wives, however, cannot hide their absolute resentment towards us. They sneer not only at the blatant display of my fertility but at the smile on my husband's face as we walk arm-in arm. His smile grows wider with each interaction we have. The Wives' voices are sickeningly sweet when they ask about our health and the baby. I can see the plethora of snide comments piling up in their heads as they bare a forced smile and let out thin, shrill laughter while they listen to Daniel and I gush about how happy and how lucky we are to love each other so very much and be blessed with a baby.

"I think Mrs. Sunil almost gave herself a stroke trying to be nice to us." Daniel whispers with glee into my ear. We aren't doing anything wrong by taking so much pleasure in the displeasure of the Wives and couples who see us, but we know we should, which makes us feel that much more deliriously defiant and entertained by it all.

The sidewalks near the center of town grow more and more busy, but not outright congested as they used to be in the Time Before. The Marthas smile and nod at us before bowing their heads and returning to their shopping or their gossip while the Econowives and Wives choose to only say "blessed day" in passing instead of subjecting themselves to an uncomfortable conversation with us.

I feel unstoppable. We are unstoppable. Until I see the Handmaids.

They walk together closer than before, with so many of them grouped together that the Guardians flanking them looked like their entourage. Wings set in place securely and heads lifted only slightly higher than usual, I can tell by their slow and languid movement that they are discussing the events from the night before. When they see me, I stop smiling and slow my pace until Daniel nudges me to move forward. The Handmaids alert each other of my close proximity and in the split second that I have eye contact with one of them I mouth the words "she's alive" and place a gloved hand over my heart. In the moments that follow, the Handmaid lowers her head and quickly echoes what I said to the Handmaids nearest to her, and them onto the others. Four other Handmaids gaze up at me and place their hands over their hearts in return, thanking me for letting them know about Melanie.

"Old habits die hard, huh?" Daniel comments, bringing my attention back to him. He saw me watching the girls in red swarm a produce cart but didn't see me speaking to them silently, I hope.

"We were all sisters." I reply rounding the corner to the street with the garden shop, the city's government hall, and the post office. I miss them, I yearn to say, but saying it won't change anything. Daniel can't just arrange a tea party for me so that my former sisters in red can come to the house and talk to me after so many months of being separated. They are in a lower rank than me now.

Hearing the ache in my voice, Daniel unlinks his arm from mine and wraps in around my waist. "You have Jane, don't you? She's a good friend to you. I uh," he clears his throat, "I know that I wasn't showing my respect to her before, but I am grateful that she is so devoted and loyal to you. You're happier when you spend time with her." Daniel is right, Jane is a great friend to have, but it's no consolation for the sisterhood lost.

Commanders and men in black and grey pass us, leaving the Republic's city office. There's a man barking the latest headlines near the entrance of the building, holding up newspapers with headlines in thick, bold lettering. Another man is shining shoes right beside him. They work as a team; a man buys a paper and then reads it while he gets his shoes shined. No one greets Daniel by name-he may be in the same rank as the men in black but in social circles he would know more of the men in grey who work at the theater with him.

I stop and tilt my head backwards as far as I can to gaze at the building. It has a different name now, but it would always be known as a skyscraper. It was the most recognizable building in the city, among others, and years back they installed a thick-glass box near the top of the tower where people could take pictures with the skyline or, in my case, look down and think about what a horrible death it would be if the thick glass broke and you feel hundreds of feet to the ground. When the Republic finally conquered the city, they took over the building to prove their power and to claim the city as theirs.

When I turn my head back and start to walk forward, I see a man in grey exiting the building. He is short and lanky with salt and pepper hair, a dull and quickly fading black at the top and pure white at the temples. The nose is thick as a beak and crooked a little bit at the bridge. There's a patch of skin at his throat that doesn't match the rest of his skin, the color of toast after being out too long in the sun.

Daniel shakes me a little bit and asks, "What? What is it?" Smiling and following my gaze towards the sea of black and grey near the doors, he sees who I am looking at. The man's eyes land on me and he does a double take before stopping in his tracks and staring at me, his face going white. "Do you know that man?"

"Y-yes…" I utter breathlessly, my voice shaking. I knew every single feature of his body and almost none of them had changed, yet it was as if up until this moment I had completely forgotten about them and seeing it unlocked a memory that had been buried deep in my mind. Gilead does that to you.

"Who is he?" Daniel asks urgently, suddenly hyper-aware of our surroundings and waiting to alert the Guardian of danger.

"He's…that's my father."