by Kat Zhang
Thirty-five
We’d never been in the ocean before, never tasted the salty water as we jumped in the waves, never felt the sand shifting underneath our feet. I splashed Hally and she threw back her head, shouting with laughter. The wind whipped her hair into her face. Kitty and Jaime were searching for seashells in the sand, their backs to us. None of us had bathing suits, but that was okay. We had the whole summer ahead of us. We had the summer after that, and the summer after that, and the one after that.
The days were getting hotter and hotter. When the sun was searing and brilliant, it could almost burn away our coldest memories of Nornand’s white halls. Lyle, I thought, would love this to bits. I pushed the thought away. It hurt too much.
I sloshed my way through the surf, the bottom of our shorts dripping, our shirt plastered to our skin. The cuts on our legs had scabbed over, and the salt water didn’t aggravate them. Even the old gashes on our hand and forehead only stung a little when a wave splashed against them. They’d scar, but that couldn’t be helped.
Jackson had come with us, though he stood a good distance from the water. Unwilling, perhaps, to insert himself into our group. He waved at me.
“Having fun?” Jackson said as I splashed from the water and drew closer. The deep blue of the ocean washed out the blue of his eyes, making them seem almost transparent. I smiled, then looked away again, because he wasn’t the boy I’d been looking for.
The sun made me squint, but I found Ryan easily. He stood at the edge of the water, a dozen yards from where Hally and I had been. His shoes were still on. The wind made his hair fly up a bit in the back, and my grin grew wider, then faded.
“What’s the matter?” Jackson said.
“What?” I said. “Nothing.”
“A girl doesn’t look like that when nothing’s the matter,” Jackson said. He laughed. “He doesn’t know you like him?”
I flushed and didn’t turn to face him. “How do you know I like him?”
Jackson just laughed again.
“Well, he knows,” I said. I didn’t even have to concentrate to remember the kiss in the hallway, the warmth of his mouth, the pressure of his hands. A kiss snatched in the dark that was enough to outshine all the sun at the beach.
“He doesn’t like you back?” Jackson said doubtfully.
Ryan’s back was to us. He glanced at his sister, then turned to the ocean, the wide, gleaming expanse of it.
“No,” I said. “No, that’s not it.” Addie stirred but didn’t speak. I didn’t want to say anything, either, because how could I without sounding like I was blaming her? I wasn’t blaming her. This was simply the way things were.
“It’s not just about us, though, is it?” I turned away from Ryan and met Jackson’s eyes. He was tall enough that I had to crane our head back to look up. “Addie . . .”
Jackson’s smile drooped a little. “But Addie doesn’t have to be there.”
“Of course she does.” I frowned. “That’s the point. We’re hybrid. We’re never alone. We—”
“You’ve never disappeared and come back?” Jackson said.
I stared at him.
The sun beat down on us, hot, hot, hot.
“Never?” he said quietly. “Never made yourself go to sleep? Left Addie alone?”
The summer of our thirteenth year. I’d slipped away for hours. No medication. No drugs. Just me, wanting to disappear.
“But—” I said.
“It takes practice,” Jackson said. His eyes were gentle now. “A ton of practice, if you want to really get it down to a science. But it’s normal, Eva. It’s what everyone does. I thought you knew.”
How could we have known? Who could have told us what was normal and what wasn’t? I’d spent my whole life gripping on, terrified to let go.
Hally called Kitty and Jaime into the water, laughing as the two dropped their shells and obeyed without even bothering to kick off their shoes.
It was too much for right now. For this day. This moment. And Jackson must have understood that, too, because he didn’t say anything else, just smiled at me when I tried to smile at him. I left his side.
Ryan was still by the edge of the water.
I approached him gingerly, afraid he’d become Devon before I could reach him. But he didn’t shift. He just watched me.
“Hey,” he said once I was only a few feet away.
“Hi,” I said and stepped closer. My toes sank into the sand.
Ryan closed the last few feet. The water lapped at his shoes, at my bare feet. “You’ve been talking with Peter.”
It was true. I’d started joining his meetings with his friends, listening in on what it meant to be hybrid and free and fighting in this country. Asking him if what we’d heard about the countries overseas was true. If they were really thriving, really sending us supplies.
It was. They were.
The other children’s faces still haunted our dreams. Bridget. Cal. Shunted off to another hospital. Another institution. Stuffed into another uniform.
But that was what Peter and the others were working on. Destroying the institutions. Freeing all these children who were abducted from their homes. Whose families could never speak of them again.
We were a part of that now.
“Ryan!” Hally shouted. She laughed, waving at us. “Eva, what are you doing? Get over here.”
Ryan grinned at me. I smiled back. He took my hand and pulled me deeper into the water, the waves pushing and pulling us, back and forth, back and forth.
“Your shoes—” I said, laughing, but he didn’t stop. He laughed, too, and I felt lighter than I’d ever felt before. Full of sunlight and air and clouds.
I closed my eyes, my hand tight in Ryan’s. His grip oriented me just like it had that day so long ago when I lay blind and immobile on his couch—frightened and confused and under everyone’s control but my own. I let the sunshine soak into my skin.
Addie was warm and radiant next to me, making up half of us. But I—I was Eva, Eva, Eva, all the way through.
Acknowledgments
After ten minutes of staring at a blank page, I suppose it’s time to take the plunge and begin. It’s hard to know where to start. Getting a book to readers is very much a team effort, and so many people have worked together to wrangle What’s Left of Me between covers and out into the wild. If I named each and every one of them, the list would take me months to draft and you days to read!
So with many apologies to those I cannot credit by name, my unending thanks go out to . . .
. . . My parents, first and foremost, for loving me so much, for being forever there when I need them, for telling me I am capable of accomplishing whatever I dream of.
. . . Alyssa G. and Kirstyn S., who were the very first people to see a word of What’s Left of Me, reading pages as I wrote them. Your encouragement drove me to keep going, even when all of us should have been studying for IB exams. J I once jokingly told you guys you’d be on the acknowledgments page if this old story ever got published, and hey, it did, and hey, here you are!
. . . The ladies of Publishing Crawl, who are the best writing buddies (and most wonderful friends) anyone could ask for. Huge thanks to Savannah Foley and Sarah Maas, especially, for reading at least four or five separate drafts of What’s Left of Me apiece, sometimes in less than twenty-four hours, and never letting your patience fray.
. . . All the other wonderful people who read early drafts of the book for me, helping me wrestle the story into a semblance of what it is today. Thank you for your notes and your support. I’ve so appreciated each and every one of you!
. . . My agent extraordinaire, Emmanuelle Morgen. I don’t know where I or the Hybrid Chronicles would be without you! I’ve so loved worki
ng together and look forward to many more years. A big thank-you goes to Whitney Lee, too, who allowed the Hybrid Chronicles to hop across oceans and see publication all around the world.
. . . My fabulous editor, Kari Sutherland, and the rest of the team at HarperCollins Children’s. Thank you all so, so much for everything. Kari, your insights and suggestions, comments and critiques made What’s Left of Me such a stronger story.
. . . And last but not least, a certain Ms. V. Patterson—who possibly does not remember me, but whom I recall fondly—for being my first introduction to any sort of professional writing, for guiding a twelve-year-old through submitting short stories, for not telling me I was too young, and for convincing me I had something to offer the world.
About the Author
KAT ZHANG is an avid traveler, and after a childhood spent living in one book after another, she now builds stories for other people to visit. An English major at Vanderbilt University, she spends her free time performing spoken-word poetry, raiding local bookstores, and plotting where to travel next. WHAT’S LEFT OF ME is her first novel.
You can read about her travels, literary and otherwise, online at www.katzhangwriter.com.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.
Credits
Cover art © 2012 by MAXIME QUOILIN
Cover design by ERIN FITZSIMMONS
Copyright
WHAT’S LEFT OF ME: THE HYBRID CHRONICLES
Copyright © 2012 by Kat Zhang
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
ISBN 978-0-06-211487-7
Epub Edition © JULY 2012 ISBN: 9780062114891
12 13 14 15 16 CG/RRDH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FIRST EDITION
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