Thumped

by Megan Mccafferty

  “Harmony and Ram would have seen this coming,” I say.

  “How?” Zen says, eyes ablaze.

  “It was just like herding cattle for the slaughter.”

  harmony

  “HAVE YOU SEEN THEM YET?” I WHISPER.

  “No,” Jondoe replies softly.

  “Do you want to see them?”

  “I’m scared.”

  “Me too.”

  But I know I must.

  I can’t make this decision without seeing them first.

  melody

  A DOZEN OF THE HUGEST MEN I’VE EVER LAID EYES ON ARE closing in on the Aero. All are in black and masked, so you can’t blame me for letting out a scream when one of them gently—even politely—taps on the glass to get my attention.

  “I told you the U.S. government has been experimenting with half-human, half-cyborg hybrids!”

  Zen seriously can’t stop with the conspiracy theories, even in a crisis.

  The largest one taps again. “You need to come with us.”

  “I think I recognize them! I think they’re part of Jondoe’s security team!”

  “Are you sure? How do you know? I’m not going with them!”

  “One of these guys could pick up this car and crumple it under his armpit if he wanted to.”

  “That’s not making me feel any better about opening this door.”

  “There’s no point in hiding if they’re going to get to us anyway. And I really think they’re with Jondoe. Besides, what other option do we have?”

  And for what might be the first time in history, Zen has nothing.

  We open the door and immediately one of the bodyguards lifts me up and carries me through the crowd that has quickly assembled from its hiding spot on the other side of the building. I scream, but I can’t even hear myself over the roar. I’m blinded by the paparazzi glare and can’t see what is happening to Zen—or myself, for that matter.

  I’m put down onto a hard surface. By the time my eyes readjust, I realize I’m in the back of one of the off-roaders that cut us off and one of the bodyguards is in there with me.

  “Wait! The birthcenter is that way! Where are you taking me?”

  The bodyguard takes off his mask, and what’s underneath is even more intimidating. Every bone in this man’s face looks like it’s been broken at least twice and crudely put back together as some sort of cubist sculptural experiment.

  “To the nearest juvenile detention center,” he says, flashing a police badge. “You’re under arrest.”

  My self-defense reflexes don’t stand a chance against a bruiser like this.

  Yes. That’s what I’m thinking as he pulls my arms around my back and clamps down the handcuffs. That all the Krav Maga training my parents paid for—like everything else, apparently—was a total waste of my time and their resources.

  harmony

  GRACE PUSHES A WHEELCHAIR INTO THE ROOM, ALL SMILES. It’s a birthday of sorts for her too. She’ll never have to toil away in anonymity ever again. She’ll build a whole second career out of being the caregiver who delivered the most famous twins in the world. This is the greatest day of her life.

  “Harmony wants to see them,” Jondoe says, before adding, “I want to see them.”

  “We’ve already cleared this floor for your privacy.”

  Grace has a hard time taking her eyes off him. He’s got a magnetic quality that makes him unlookawayable. But that’s not really him, that’s just his image. I’d like to think that the Jondoe I’ve seen—the one who cut my hair, the one who coached me through my labor pains this morning, the one who took control of the transport, the one who keeps squeezing my shoulders reassuringly, the one who is all the more interesting for his imperfect unpredictability—is the real him.

  I hope that he’s gotten a chance to see me for who I am too.

  Grace swoons as Jondoe effortlessly scoops me out of the bed and sets me down in the wheelchair. She does her best to resume a businesslike air as we make our way down the hall, where two burly guards are standing on opposite sides of a long pane of glass.

  “They’re in there,” Grace says, gesturing toward the window, which is low enough for me to look in without getting out of the wheelchair.

  And there they are.

  Two pink, pinch-faced slumbering bundles.

  The twins.

  I don’t cry. I thought I would cry. With joy, with sorrow. But I don’t cry. I just . . .

  Look.

  One bundle yawns. The other crinkles her tiny nose.

  My chest starts to ache. At first I think it’s because my milk is coming in. But then I realize that it’s because I’ve been holding my breath this entire time.

  “You can go in, if you like,” Grace says encouragingly, mostly to Jondoe. I think she’s dying for the opportunity to see him holding a gorgeous baby in the crook of each muscled arm.

  “Do I have to nurse them? Because my milk hasn’t come in yet. . . .”

  Grace laughs and pats my head condescendingly. “Nurse them? Oh, you won’t be able to do that until tomorrow at the earliest.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Only the tiniest fraction of our patients choose that method of nutritional delivery. It’s standard operating procedure to give all patients a dose of Stoplac, the lactation suppression medication—”

  I interrupt her. “So I don’t have to nurse them?”

  “Oh no,” she says. “Our nutritive formula is even better than breast milk, I promise you. I thought you might want to go in and hold them since, well, they are yours to keep. . . .”

  Mine to keep.

  I shake my head silently.

  “Are you sure?” Jondoe asks.

  His voice rouses me. I’d actually forgotten that I wasn’t alone in this. That he too was seeing his daughters for the first time.

  “Harmony?” he says, talking to me but gaping at the babies through the window.

  “Please take me back to my room,” I say. “I’ve seen enough.”

  melody

  I’M NOT IN LOCKDOWN. YET.

  No, I’m in the place where underage rule breakers like me are detained until we can meet with our parents and get all lawyered up to face whatever criminal charges are being leveled against us. The Picasso-faced policeman read me my rights and informed me that the Jaydens have already come after me with two counts of “commercial procreative malfeasance.” I knew they would, but I guess I didn’t think it would happen so quickly. I thought I’d have time to see Harmony at the hospital.

  Not knowing anything about her current condition is the hardest part about being stuck in here right now. That, and having no idea what’s happened to Zen since I last saw him in the parking lot. Technically, he didn’t break any laws. But maybe they’ve got him locked up here too? As a co-conspirator? No one is telling me anything.

  It’s an airless cinderblock room furnished with a conference table and half a dozen chairs. That’s it. I think I’m supposed to sit here and reflect on my crimes. The Jaydens are just the beginning of my legal troubles. It’s pretty much a given that every corporation that has ever hired The Hotties will sue us for “negligent misrepresentation” of our brand. I’m feeling claustrophobic, but it doesn’t have anything to do with the stale, antiseptic atmosphere. This B$B is crushing me, like, literally. All I can focus on right now is how badly I want to get it taken off. I’ve tried to relay a message to my parents about where I’ve stashed the removal serum, but I have no idea if they received it, or would be inclined to do me the favor of retrieving it even if they had.

  Now that everyone knows the truth about me—that I’m shadiest counterfeiter since Surrogetting was legalized—there’s no point in dragging the belly around anymore. Well, I suppose a judge could think of a valid reason to keep it. I don’t know what the minimum lockdown guidelines are for my crimes, but there could be no crueler—or fitting—punishment than being forced to wear this mutating skinfeel monstrosity for the duration of my sentence.
>
  No one—not the police, not the administrative assistants, not the guards at the door—look at me all starstruck anymore. No one asks for my autograph or rubs my belly for luck. Everyone regards me with disgust, and these are people who deal with sketchy, down-market types all day long. To these patriotic public servants, I’ve committed what amounts to reproductive treason. I haven’t just hurt the Jaydens, my parents, or my own future. I’ve hurt America.

  I hear voices outside in the hall. I know I should be busting a clot right now. But I’m oddly at peace with the idea of facing my parents. The lies are over. And I have nothing else to hide.

  The door opens and Ash and Ty step into the room. It’s actually kind of weird to see them all 4-D in my facespace and not flat on screen. Without the benefit of professional hair and makeup, or the real-time appearance autocorrect app, they look less like the glamorous Surrogetting gurus that they are, and more like the ordinary—if hyper intensely strategic—middle-aged mom and dad they used to be. They’re alone, which is unexpected. I thought for sure they’d have their attorneys in tow.

  I stand up and brace myself on the conference table for the monumental ass-spanking I know I deserve.

  But Ash and Ty give me the shock of my life—a life that has been marked by anonymous birthparents, secret twinhood, and fake preggings—by not saying anything at all, rushing over to my side of the tiny room, lifting up my MyTurnTee, and pressing their cold hands all over my infamous ginormity.

  “Hands off!” I recoil from their touch and defensively pull my shirt back down.

  “We knew it!” Ash cries out.

  “Knew what?”

  “That Jondoe is lying!” Ty replies. “That you really are pregging with his babies!”

  Gah. This is going to be way harder than I thought.

  “No, I’m not. He’s telling the truth,” I say quickly because I’ve got more pressing concerns. “How is Harmony? Where is Zen?”

  My parents exchange knowing looks. My mother mouths, prepartum psychosis. . . .

  “I saw that! I am not suffering from prepartum psychosis because I’m not pregging! Now tell me what’s going on with Harmony and Zen!”

  My mother takes me by the hand and tries to get me to sit down, but I resist.

  “Tell me!”

  Ash lets out an annoyed groan. Any time she gives in to my demands, she feels like she’s contributing to our nation’s downward spiral by failing to live up to China’s totalitarian parental standards.

  “Well, Harmony did major damage to your brand,” she begins. “She chopped off all her hair and dyed what was left of it black. Black! She doesn’t look anything like you anymore.”

  “What? When I saw her she’d only cut off the braid. She dyed it black?”

  I’m having trouble picturing what Harmony would look like . . . if she doesn’t look like me anymore.

  “This renders our synergistic six-month re-branding initiative totally obsolete, of course,” Ty says. “All that strategizing, gone to waste.”

  “Maybe the timing isn’t so bad after all,” Ash replies. “We always knew Melody would have to make over her image after the deliveries were made, to launch herself as an independent entity, separate from her other half—”

  “Listen to you two! My twin sister just had an emergency C-section and my best friend is probably being waterboarded right now for all I know, and all you two can talk about is hair and branding?”

  What makes people so morally bankrupt? I never met my grandparents—they all took a dirt nap before I came around—so I have no idea if they raised Ash and Ty to be so famegamey and moneygrubby. Right now I’m going with Darwin: DNA is destiny. Otherwise I’m humped.

  “You need to calm yourself down right now,” Ash says. “All that stress cannot be good for the twins. I’m surprised your MOM alarm isn’t going off right now. . . .”

  And that’s when I go off.

  “FOR THE LAST MUTHERHUMPING TIME, I’M NOT PREGGING,” I shout loud enough to pene-trate the soundproof walls. “I can prove it right now! Did you get that bottle I asked for back at the house?”

  “We did,” my father says, “but we turned it over to the authorities.”

  “What?”

  My mother assumes her concerned face. “We understand that a girl at your level in the famegame moves with a fast crowd. It’s one of the risks. You get exposed to too much too soon. If you have experimented with a new controlled substance, we would be remiss as parents if we didn’t alert—”

  “It’s not a drug!” I protest. “It’s the removal serum for the Billion Dollar Belly! It’s ALTERR. Artificial Living Technology . . . no . . . Tissue! Artificial Living Tissue . . . um . . .” I struggle to remember the rest of the acronym. “Whatever! It doesn’t matter what it’s called. It’s the next-generation FunBump. . . .”

  The more I talk, the more skeptical my parents look. And I don’t blame them because I sound for seriously psycho right now.

  “I know it sounds crazy, but I’m telling you the truth. I’m mocked up!”

  Ty nods at Ash, who closes her eyes in resignation.

  “Okay,” Ash says.

  “Okay . . . what?”

  Ash and Ty nod at each other again, like a secret signal for something to begin.

  “We have always expected you to perform to the highest standards,” Ash says, “but we never asked you to do anything you weren’t capable of achieving. You have always proven us right by not just achieving, but excelling academically, athletically, artistically. You have never failed at any task we’ve set forth before you.”

  “Until now,” Ty adds.

  “Right,” Ash says with a slight wince. “Until now. But would you have pushed yourself as hard as we pushed you?”

  “No way,” Ty answers.

  They’re right about that.

  “The one downside to all your success is that you aren’t equipped to deal with failure,” Ty says. “So when you put yourself in a negative outcome situation, you felt compelled to cover it up rather than disappoint us.”

  Ash and Ty clasp hands, then reach out for mine to join them in what I know from their BestEgg seminars is called the Ring of Truth. I stuff my hands into my pockets, which is very immature but whatever. I’m over this whole conversation because it’s clear to me that I won’t get any information out of them about Harmony or Zen.

  “But we’re ready to accept the shameful truth, Melody,” Ash says. “We won’t love you any less.”

  She’s looking at me expectantly, like she’s still waiting for me to make a confession.

  “I’ve already told you. I’m not pregging!”

  Ash inhales sharply. She’s losing her patience. “Your secret is out, Melody. Your friend has been telling everyone the truth.”

  “What secret? What friend? Shoko?” There’s no way she would ever sell me out. And besides, she still thinks I’m carrying Jondoe’s twins. I don’t believe it.

  “No, not her,” my mother says dismissively. “The more up-market one. The gorgeous Eurasian girl . . .”

  Ventura Vida. That powertrippy bitch.

  “What’s she saying?”

  Ash unleashes an exasperated sigh. “Why do you insist on dragging this out? She’s telling everyone the truth! That the twins aren’t Jondoe’s, they’re Zen’s!”

  “Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?”

  I guess Ventura has given up. And if she can’t hump Zen, she’ll humiliate me.

  Ty shakes his head disappointedly. “I knew your unusually close friendship with him was a problem. No guy wants to keep it platonic! Ever!”

  “We understand why you wanted to hide the truth,” Ash is saying. “But this may not be such a disaster. Zen has grown up a lot in the past year. He’s smart and does meet the minimum height requirement. It’s possible that the Jaydens may still go ahead with the deal. And if they don’t, I’m sure that there will be another couple who would be more than happy to—”

  “WHY WON’T YOU EVER LISTEN
TO ME?” I scream. “I’M NOT PREGGING WITH ZEN OR JONDOE OR ANYONE!”

  And that’s when I decide to put an end to the lies once and for all, in the most dramatic and indisputable way I can think of.

  I climb up onto the conference table . . .

  My parents are screaming for security.

  Take a deep breath . . .

  The door flies open and a bodyguard rushes in.

  Close my eyes . . .

  More screaming.

  And take a flying leap.

  harmony

  WE’RE BACK AT THE ROOM NOW, UNDER THE PRETENSE THAT I need my rest.

  “You’ll be pleased to know that the Newborn Quality Testing Service has scored both girls in the highest percentile for preemies born five weeks early,” Grace gushes with a sort of pride that would be deemed sinful even if she had been the one who birthed the babies. “They might have to stay in the hospital for a short while to get their weight up, but otherwise they’re thriving.”

  I heave a sigh of relief. At least they have that going for them. They aren’t starting their lives off at a sickly disadvantage, like Melody and me.

  “They’re small, but strong,” Jondoe says, running his finger along my cheek. “Like you.”

  “Oh,” Grace says coquettishly. “You’re not giving yourself enough credit for your half of the DNA. You are the all-time highest scorer on the Standards, after all. Thanks to you and the hundreds of deliveries to which you donated your genetic material, America just might have a shot at reclaiming its top spot in the world rankings.”

  I don’t understand most of what she’s saying, but Jondoe does. A strange look passes over Jondoe’s face, one I’ve never seen before. It’s a wary awakening of sorts, a dawning of knowledge that he isn’t quite ready to process.