by Rowan Massey
“Oh,” he nodded. “Well…you know you should be using them for blowjobs too, right?”
I leaned my head on my hand and tried not to laugh. Snot came out of my nose, and I had to use my napkin to wipe it away, which made me want to laugh more.
He just smiled and kept eating. We both ate a lot until Doc leaned back with a hand on his stomach and groaned. I copied him, and he grinned.
“Are you ready for another test?” he asked.
I really did groan then. “Yes,” I lied. “Is it harder?”
“I don’t think so. And it shouldn’t take as long.”
I nodded and stood, taking his plate and silverware to the sink with mine. That was something he usually did, so I thought I should do it sometimes. He put the empty containers in the trash, and I wiped the table off. I was proud of myself for thinking about stuff like that.
Two hours later, I’d finished the second test, and he was telling me how to call his suppliers and buy things for the lab. It made me nervous. I would sound too young. These were people on the black market, not normal businesses. I didn’t know if I was tough enough to talk to them.
But Dr. Sardana put the lists of stuff and people’s numbers on the kitchen table in front of me and handed me his phone like it was nothing. We’d gone back to the kitchen because it had the best signal. Being there was usually relaxing, but this was tense.
“Wally,” he said, “you work for me. People know about all the people close to me, including you. I’ve already told all these people last time I talked to them that I have an assistant named Wally. Just tell them who you are, that you work for me, and what you want. If they have a problem with it, bring me the phone.”
His hand clapped onto my back, and he left the room, trusting me to get the job done. I sat there and ran a finger over the words on the papers, the cell phone held tight in my other hand.
The first number seemed to dial itself despite me being way too scared to do it. It rang four times.
“Sardana, you go through your ingredients like a motherfucker.”
I took a breath and opened my mouth. It was a couple seconds before I answered him.
“This is Wally, and I work for Dr. Sardana.”
“Ah. Yeah, I heard he collected another youngster. How’s it going?”
“Fine. Um, it’s just two things.” I told him the weird names, spelling them because I wasn’t sure how to say it. He didn’t correct me, so I figured I was doing okay.
“Alright, got it,” he said. “Listen kid, don’t say um, and ask Atul how to say those words. You need to build respect in this business. But you were saying most of them right. You’re not doing too bad. Take care of that eccentric old guy of ours, huh?”
“Yeah, I do. I do everything he needs.”
He laughed and coughed a smoker’s cough. “You do, huh? Good, good. Tell him hello for me.”
“Okay. Have a nice day.”
“No, no. We’re not that polite. We just hang up.”
And he hung up. I looked at the phone and twisted my lips, not sure if I was embarrassed or if I thought it was funny. Taking everything he said seriously was probably the best idea. After taking the list of supplies down to the doc and asking about how to say things, I went back up and made the second call. The man sounded a lot younger than the other one. Almost like a teenager, so I wasn’t as awkward talking to him.
“Hey, tell me something,” he said when I’d given him the order, “Doc got anything good cooking right now?”
“He’s the doc,” I said, putting my chest out as if he could see me. “There’s always something good cooking.”
“Yeah,” he said, laughing, “you are so right. So right, man. But maybe keep me updated. If you can help me get hold of the really good batches, I’ll give you a little cut.”
I had no idea how to do that. “Maybe.”
“Cool, cool. Three days on this order.”
He hung up. I figured that meant the stuff would show up in three days so I wrote that down.
On the last call, I wanted to be the one to hang up, so I got the order done quick, no chatting, and hit the End button. I grinned to myself. Maybe I would end up being what everyone assumed I was or could be. Maybe I’d be Doc’s sidekick. Maybe I’d be the one answering the door with a gun by my side next time.
Doc would be proud of me. Impressed. I thought of the way he looked when I reminded him of his son, or when we were just laughing, and wondered if he’d looked at his son the same ways. Talked to him the same ways.
Something tickled my face. I reached my hand up, and it was wet. I expected blood. One of my cuts wasn’t so healed after all. But it was water. I looked up at the ceiling but didn’t see a spot, but my eyes were blurry and teared up like when I’d eaten the spicy curry. I blinked and more water fell down my face.
This was crying. I hadn’t done that since my mom took off and I went to the field with Spitz for the first time. Why? Did spicy food bother you for hours after you ate it?
“Wally? What happened? Was someone rude to you?”
I still had the phone in my hand, and Doc took it from me and poked around at the buttons.
“It went fine,” I said, wiping my face. “I don’t know what…what this is. Sorry.”
His head tilted again, and he looked down at me with worried eyes. Something forced my face into a crush of expressions that felt unfamiliar. It was getting worse. My nose was getting fucked up again too. Doc sat next to me and put a hand on my arm, squeezing it a little.
“Tell me why you’re crying.” His voice was softer than it had ever been before, which made my face feel worse. Something felt strange inside me like a bad pulling. I wiped at my face and shook my head.
“I’m not crying. I don’t know. I think it’s the spicy food.”
“You ate more of it?” he asked.
I shook my head. “What are we doing next? Going to the field?”
“Wally, think about it for me. Can you do that?” He rubbed his hand on my arm.
Think about the way it felt to cry? Why I might cry? Doc’s son? Being Doc’s new son…
I stood up and made a wide path past Dr. Sardana. I went to the hall bathroom and shut myself in. The mirror seemed like it was invading my privacy—like being in a crowded alley—and I didn’t look right at my reflection. People in movies and TV washed their faces when they got upset, so I turned on the tap and cleaned my cheeks and eyelids. I took a drink out of my cupped hands and dried my face on my shirt.
Nothing was making sense, and I didn’t like any of it, but I couldn’t hide in the bathroom for long so I went out and found the doc still sitting at the table in the kitchen, just waiting for me. I stood near the doorway but didn’t walk through.
“I guess I thought about some sad things and just cried by accident. Sorry,” I said.
Doc seemed to be thinking it over. “Sad things? You’re feeling sad?”
“No. I never feel sad.” I was a little irritated. He was always trying to prove I wasn’t as happy as I said.
“But thinking about something sad made you emotional, and you cried.” He pointed at the chair next to him, and I went and sat. I wondered if this meant I’d failed. How bad was it for his assistant to cry for no real reason? If he thought I was too weak, I’d be fired. The idea of it made me feel that bad pull again. And then I thought about the money, which didn’t seem like much compared to failing Dr. Sardana.
“It’s fine to cry. Most people cry sometimes,” Doc said. “You’re just not used to it.”
“Must be a pretty bad batch,” I said. “You should go back to an older batch.”
He was quiet for a moment.
“Maybe you have something there. Answer one question, Wally. It’s very important.” His finger was pressed onto the table, like he was holding something down. “Do you feel something other than happy?”
“Other than happy?” I repeated, because there was no way for my head to go there.
“Go ah
ead and think about it.”
“No.” My head twitched at a crazy angle, and I didn’t like it. I rubbed my hands up my neck and into my beanie.
“What does that mean? You won’t think about it?” he asked.
I didn’t want to look so nervous. I held onto the seat of my chair and didn’t answer, didn’t move. I wished he would stop. There was nothing to tell him.
The pull. It wouldn’t leave me alone.
Dr. Sardana scooted his chair close, put his arm around my shoulder, and hugged me to his chest. He smelled clean, and his arm was strong, unstoppable. He was pushing the pull.
“Whatever it is,” he said, “I’ll try to help.”
You already helped. No, I mean, I can help you. Work. You don’t need to help me.
Nothing came out. No words were okay to say. But it didn’t matter. He wasn’t upset with me. It was fine. My muscles loosened up, even in my face, and he patted my back, not letting go, just waiting.
“I’m sorry…” I said, and it came out whispered. “Your son, um…”
“Okay, okay. Thank you.”
I straightened up and had to get tears off my cheeks again. I used my sleeve.
Doc sighed so big I could feel the wind of his breath hit me. I was scared to look at him.
“I have a batch that I made in secret. It might be what I’ve been looking for.” Doc leaned onto his elbows to get into my line of sight, and I lifted my face. His look was hard, like when he’d held the gun. “Would you like to try it tonight?”
“If you think it’s good. What about Spitz and Fiona? I still need to go buy theirs. Will their batch be good?”
“Fiona? I thought she wasn’t a fielder.”
“She got thrown out by her dad.”
He nodded. He knew how these things went.
“I’ll give you three. I don’t think you’ll get the crawls, and if I’m right, it’s the safest batch I’ve ever formulated.”
“Why is it a secret, then?” I asked. Doc and his mysteries.
“I was trying to work up to it. Trying to figure out exactly how it might effect the users. After last night’s batch, and your reaction today, I think it’s time.”
Chapter Eight
The night seemed loud, and I hated the lights that the volunteers kept bright. I’d never hated them before, or took much notice, but they were like knives through my vision, making me feel half-blinded. I’d left Spitz and Fiona wandering away slowly, hand in hand, as if they would die if their noses were more than three inches apart. Fiona didn’t have her usual badass attitude. She was quiet.
Doc had interviewed them about their day, and it turned out Spitz had gotten weird emotions too. But maybe he was just reacting to the miscarriage. Fiona still hadn’t taken fielders for the first time, so she was a mess. She looked exhausted, miserable, relieved, and in love all at the same time. It was like she’d gotten much older than us overnight. Maybe Spitz looked a little older too.
On the way to the field, Fiona had taken my hand. Spitz had her other hand, and we walked that way until we got to the dancers. It was strange but nice that she wanted to be close. Me and Spitz had been family for a long time, but now me, and Spitz, and Fiona would be family.
After the interview, Doc had taken me aside and told me he wanted a lot of details after we took the special batch he had for us. Now, I had the pills from that batch in my pocket.
A crash of electricity hit the side of my face and zoomed into my brain through my ear. It was gone as fast as it came, but I was rattled and nauseated. I told myself it couldn’t be what it felt like, despite the terror boiling up inside my chest. I kept walking through the crowd. Lots of new fielders, despite all the drops. I made angry faces at all the tourists to distract myself. They were just fun to mess with.
I’d been looking for bloody faces and hadn’t seen a single one. It was the same batch from yesterday. People were dancing fast.
When I spotted Nando, he had his back to me. He had a red rag tied around one bicep and so did Rydel, who smiled and waved at me when I passed him.
“Nando!” I called. He turned and looked at me for a split second before turning back to his buyers. They were haggling. God, he looked pissed. Not at me, hopefully, but in general. Maybe he had a bad time at the tarping. I walked in a wide half-circle around him, giving him space, but looking him over for any busted body parts. He looked fine. It was kind of shitty that he wasn’t looking at me, but I wasn’t going to push him. He’d seen me trying to say hi, so I decided to go back to Spitz and Fiona to dance.
“Wait,” I heard him snap in a deep, loud voice. “Wally. Stay put.”
He still hadn’t looked at me. I wandered over to a tree where a couple of tourists were drinking and being noisy. I leaned against it. Automatically, I let my pack drop to the ground and protected it between my feet. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. Dr. Sardana’s many faces kept popping into my head—hard, soft, irritated, focused, distracted, smiling. I didn’t want to get obsessed with him, but I was. Instead of thinking about Fiona finally having the happiness that fielders had, or about Nando, I was thinking about Doc getting interesting data. I would try to make sure we danced where he could see us, in case we did something interesting on his new fielders.
A hand pressed against my throat. I grabbed the wrist and twisted away. But it was Nando. I tried to punch him in the gut for being an ass, but he blocked me easily and grabbed my sweatshirt, pulling me in close.
He kissed me.
Fuck, he was kissing me out in public with all kinds of people watching, and they would all know we had a thing going. Something weird had definitely happened. I pulled back.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
He gave me a crooked grin. My face got a little slap that didn’t hurt, and was more like a pat. It gave me a thrill. I felt it as a heat all the way down to my toes.
“Look, I want you to wear this,” he said. He was wearing a gold chain with flat links. He took it off and looped it around the back of my neck, hooking it closed where he could see what he was doing, then pulling it around so the hook was in the back. It felt warm from his skin. I touched it and didn’t know what it was supposed to mean exactly. I was more interested in why he was acting so weird.
“You’re mine,” he said. “Understand me?”
“You mean we’re boyfriends?” I asked.
“Yeah, but a real couple. No fooling around shit. You’re mine now.” He wasn’t blinking. He looked serious most of the time, but now he was dead serious. The light shone on half his face. I had the insane thought that the other half could be doing anything without my being able to see it.
“Good,” I said, “but are you okay?”
He stared at me, looking tense. His hand went around my throat again, covering my tattoo, and he stepped closer to me until we were as close as we could get. We kissed hard. Something desperate went into it from both of us. My lips felt bruised, and he sucked on my tongue, raking his teeth over it. His fingers went tighter around my throat. My guts were shaking around under my skin.
“Break it up a second, Nando. C’mon.” Rydel said somewhere near us.
Nando broke the kiss and ran his arm across his mouth but kept a hand on my neck so I’d stay put. He stared over at Rydel without blinking.
“I mean…” Rydel waved a hand towards us, obviously a little freaked about the way Nando was acting, “…they’re tarping everybody. What if they recruit him because they see you together like that? Really want to get all attached?”
Nando left me and went and shoved Rydel hard in the chest. Rydel was bigger, but he staggered backward, almost hitting some girl.
“What if they don’t even tarp him and treat him like a girl?” Rydel said. He looked at me, and his lip curled in an expression that confused me. Worried? Pissed?
“He has me now,” Nando said, his uneven jaw clenched. Hot air pushed through his teeth, making me think of a grizzly bear. “And he already has the doc watching his ba
ck. So fuck off. He’s mine now. I’m not changing my mind.”
Fuck. Why would he do this if it was going to get me into a mess? I didn’t understand his gang stuff, and I felt lost. I backed up and twisted away from them. I grabbed my bag off the ground.
My teeth were starting to grind and the world wanted to tilt sideways, dragging me with it. I was having withdrawals. But that was crazy. It was too soon. I had to go dance. My eyes squeezed shut for a few seconds. I heard Nando come up behind me, but he only tucked the chain into my shirt.
“Don’t let it get you jumped. It’s real gold. Put it like this. It’s fine here, but I’m afraid you’ll forget when you leave.” His voice wasn’t so angry, but he was still tense.
“I’m gonna stay with Spitz and Fiona tonight,” I said, and turned around. “I mean, for real. We gotta go far from here and make sure she doesn’t feel freaked out because she’s not used to things yet.”
“Yeah, I get it,” Nando said, and I turned to face him again. “I, uh…I gotta…tonight. Big night.”
“What?” I didn’t understand.
“It’s the big night. I don’t know everything and couldn’t tell you anyway.” He glanced around. People were pretending not to look at us, but they were whispering. Rydel had a short line of buyers going, but kept glancing over at us. “Down Riverside might be messy. Ask around before you go to work. The doc will understand. He’s a good guy around kids and all.”
A big gang fight by the river. We’d had some of that years back. “Are you gonna be careful?” I poked his chest, but kept my hand there beside his gun holster. I looked at it and hoped it was a good gun; maintained and safe.
He huffed. “Sure, as careful as a guy can be.”
I took his hand and put his fingers against my neck again. I pressed them against my skin, and he looked at me like he was ready to fuck me right there. I was so dizzy, but trying to hide it. I closed my eyes for a second when a flash of lightning went through my brain again.
“You’re my first boyfriend,” I said. “Don’t die because, you know, we still need to have more fun.”