by Pat Hauldren
“Yes. But it’s not Graham’s that’ll kill me, is it?”
“Ellery…”
“Good night, Dad.” I changed my voice to the command tone. “Hang up. TV, resume.”
Peppy music blared from the speaker in the corner competing for my attention with the video ad on the wall outside the dressing room. A mom and daughter chattered about which tie to buy the girl’s father, and now, even I knew he didn’t like stripes. The pair settled on the gold one.
I never realized how quiet the lab was; I liked the quiet.
“Are you ready yet?” I poked at the curtain.
“One sec” Will replied. A minute later, the curtain flung open and Will struck a pose. The button-down shirt had a fat black stripe down the center, and he wore a cockeyed fedora over a raised brow, complete with dorky grin.
“You’re...not serious.” I said even before I caught the shine off the enormous belt buckle.
Will tipped the hat. “You’re saying it doesn’t go?”
I shook my head. Please be joking. Sometimes I couldn’t tell when he was messing with me or whether he meant it.
He puffed his bottom lip, fat like a histamine reaction. “Aww, Ells. That’s why I brought you. I knew you’d be able to help me.”
A joke, thankfully. “You’re hopeless.” I knocked the fedora off his head. I didn’t know if I could handle walking out of the store with him like that. I knew people didn’t actually stare; they couldn’t tell what I was, but emotional responses didn’t follow logical conclusions.
He unhooked the buckle and tossed it back in the dressing room. “You like the shirt though?”
I nodded. “Looks good.”
“That settles it then.” Will snapped the tag off the cuff and waved me to follow him to the counter. He handed the tag to the clerk. “Got my approval, so I’m wearing it out.”
The teenage girl glanced between us and giggled while ringing him up. Even though Will towered over me, she could still tell we were the same age. Sort of.
Will scanned his card, and we walked out into the main part of the mall, happy to leave the snickering girl behind.
I drifted behind, letting his broad back shield me from the flashy commercials and LCD advertisements circling the hallway like sharks. Consumerism covered up any crisis with the promise of a perfect life in the form of new perfume or the latest gadget. Maybe the average person really didn’t know how we teetered on the edge of extinction only a few generations from now. The way Graham’s syndrome deteriorated tissue at the cellular level meant the disease could kill in a flare up. But worse than that, it caused miscarriage, stillbirth, and even maternal death. With the exponential increase in cases, you just had to do the math.
“Hungry?” Will asked, snapping me back to the present.
“Yeah.”
The mall had a full-sized restaurant, the one with the calorie-busting dessert case. The hostess led us to a small booth in the corner.
Will straightened the stiff collar on his purchase. “Looks mature, don’t you think?”
“I still don’t know why you needed a new shirt. Your school has uniforms. You get to wear civies, what, once a week?” I ripped a chunk off the brown bread and took a bite, soft and just a little sweet.
Will crossed his arms on the table and looked at me. “I wanted something nice for our date.”
The chunk of bread threatened to choke me. “William Gene Porter.” I chastised him. He hated that. “You know that I—”
“Wait just a minute to bite my head off okay?” He presented his palms in surrender. Will did know better; we’d known each other our entire lives.
“Explain.” I let the click in my jaw settle.
He retrieved a small package from his pocket. He placed the parcel on the table, wrapped in golden paper, complete with violet ribbon. “It’s for your birthday.”
I was wrong. He was an idiot, absolute idiot. “What’s wrong with you? You’re pretending I’m normal, that I have a future? Then you ignore that this milestone puts me at five or less years from dying. Gee, why wouldn’t I want to celebrate that?”
“Open it.”
“Don’t you get it?” The irritation sank away leaving that sick pull on my insides. About 1,750 days...don’t think about it. Why couldn’t I stop thinking?
Will sighed. “Have I ever gotten you a birthday gift before?”
I paused. “No.”
He poked the tiny package closer to me with his index finger. “Open it.”
The bow slipped off with a single pull, springing from the package. I opened one end of the paper and pinched the envelope to free it from its shiny prison. Inside I found a data card and a slip of paper with a name—Benjamin Yew, 41.
“What is it?” I flipped the thin paper like it’d have a fortune on the other side, blank.
“Benjamin Yew was Sparked and he’s forty-one years old.” Will leaned closer, and the candle on the table lit his chin with an orange flicker.
“That’s impossible.”
The dancing flame sparkled over his teeth. “I heard about him a long time ago. It took me a few years, but I finally got a hold of him. He said that he signed a nondisclosure, but he didn’t care. He gave me his notes; how he reversed it. Of course, you wouldn’t live to like eighty, but you could have a real life.” He closed his lips and breathed out his nose. “He did tell me that you have to do the reversal before the final acceleration kicks off, so you gotta do it soon.”
“What?” I understood everything Will said, but none of it made sense. He couldn’t offer me the impossible. “But I...I was counting on the accelerated growth to help me break through those final roadblocks to Graham’s treatment. I projected—”
Will smacked the table, rattling the little candle and its tiny flame. “The research your father decided you had to undertake the day after you were born? He didn’t have the right to sacrifice your future. He shouldn't have made that choice for you.”
“I know, but…” I held the data card between my thumb and forefinger like a key to a future I had long since dismissed. Why was I fighting it? Instead of watching the glass coffin close over me, my prince held it open. He wanted to break my curse. Maybe I could have my own happily ever after?
Will slipped out of his side of the booth to stand next to me. “You deserve to have a life instead of a legacy.”
He swallowed, but otherwise held still, and thin creases swept across his forehead in a way I’d never seen before. Until now, he had hidden all his worry from me, that and something else.
He watched me for an answer, but my dry throat wouldn’t cooperate.
I simply nodded.
A grin sprang to his face which outmatched all predecessors, and the next moment, chapped lips pressed against mine. My instinct to pull away faltered. I let him kiss me. I’d imagined a kiss before, warm and magical like those in my cartoons.
Will’s dry lips scratched and it was messier than I’d have thought. But, it managed to steal my breath away.
The corners of the folded envelope dug into my fingers, and my racing pulse throbbed in the side of my neck the whole way home. In my hand, the information felt like contraband, and the punishment would be something worse than an early death. Really, what did I have to be afraid of?
I hurried into my apartment and shut the door so fast, the TV and lights blinked on a second after it closed. I stumbled to the sofa and opened the screen to my laptop. Come on, turn on. Load. Damn it, so freakin’ slow. The machine whirred and the landing screen appeared. Finally.
My clunky fingers dropped the card twice. Slow down. I took a breath and slid it into the port.
Yew’s files appeared, labeled and logically organized into folders the way I’d expect a Sparked to do it. He’d have saved the files before reversing it. How had his mind changed afterward? Oh, there it was, a folder he designated for post-reversal projections. I would have done the same.
File after file filled my screen with formulas and theories
. His research read like a puzzle without side pieces to set a structure, nothing I hadn’t dealt with before. I could replicate his work in my lab.
“The genetic modification of,” the voice of the news anchor caught my attention. I looked up at the TV. The female anchor smiled with her too-white teeth. “Today marks the twentieth anniversary of the advancement to corn production that solved the supply crisis.”
The male anchor continued, “Yes. The previous gene modification worked as a pesticide, but after it began to fail, crops across the nation were threatened. The updated gene sequence improved multiple desirable traits instead of limiting it to an insect repellant alone. Each corn plant today yields twenty percent more ears at a forty percent increase in size.”
A graphic for a simplified gene sequence popped up. The illustration depicted the DNA of corn, but without knowing that, you couldn’t tell the difference from the advanced diagram sitting on my laptop screen. The corn, my body, we were the same. Someone decided to tinker with our genes to make us better, to enhance desirable traits.
I shut off the TV and focused on my computer. For me, those enhancements came at a cost, one I didn’t want to pay.
Sunday morning the deserted lab welcomed me as always, and this time I needed the solitude. I slid a stack of papers to the side to make room for my laptop. It felt like a secret. No one forbade me from saving my life. I shouldn’t have to hide it, but I kept glancing to the door, afraid someone would walk in.
I rolled my shoulders and cracked my neck. Ignore it, time to get started. Like following a recipe, I pulled ingredients from the fridge and copied the steps in Yew’s files. Each reduction of the serum required precise measurements, spectrographic analysis, and, of course, a trip to the centrifuge.
After two hours, I held the last vial in my fingertips. It needed a fifteen-minute spin to separate the precious ingredient that could return my altered genes to normal, the way they were meant to be. I’d lose my computer-like intelligence, but I’d gain a body that wouldn’t fail me. Nothing could undo the damage already done, but I’d at least double, probably triple, my life-span. Time to live.
The centrifuge hummed and the seconds crept by. Instead of pointless waiting, I could use my last minutes as a Sparked to help with Graham's. I retrieved Friday’s samples from the incubator and set the first one under the lens. The microscopic dancers twitching instead of waltzing. The pair that had healed looked less damaged than the others though still plagued by a few maroon specks.
I swapped out samples and the next had a similar story to tell. The swirling pattern of cells mesmerized with its own kind of beauty—repetitive, predictable, but also alive. Living patterns, changing...like the twisting double helix of DNA. The diagrams of my genes and the modified corn only changed because people altered them. Those alterations had consequences.
A needle-sharp pain pierced my forehead. The lines of thought connected; data and images sped through my mind faster than ever before. I grabbed my head, reeling from this swarm of thought.
The pain vanished as fast as it had arrived. In my mind, the problem behind Graham’s shrank into something solvable. Answers, or at least paths to answers, had formed. I logged into the lab computer and started taking notes before I forgot. Page after page, I pulled in research from other labs and investigated original leads. Within an hour, I’d compiled most of the relevant information, and that burst of energy ebbed away. The easiness of thought seemed to fade into the background, and I had to push hard to work through materials that minutes ago came easy.
A faint beep called my attention. The serum finished separating fifty minutes ago, and I hadn’t noticed. I moved through honey to reach the machine. Languid steps and weighty arms forced me to pull the vial in slow motion.
I held the two-toned solution, the transparent yellow on top the key to my future. My life.
Behind me, the lab computer and microscope held unfinished research. That burst I’d felt must have been the beginnings of the final acceleration of my brain. Will had been right; I didn’t have much time to take the cure. I had to take it now, before it really started.
I filled the syringe with the serum. Now, I must take it now. Otherwise I’d lose everything. I’d never feel Will’s dry kiss again, see the future...love.
But, that initial burst of growth opened my mind to possibilities I’d never examined before. If I was right, if the alterations to our food supply had mutated our genes over time, then the way to combat the damage became more complex than anyone knew. If it went unsolved, millions would suffer. Maybe someone else could crack the problem, but it’d take them longer. People would die in the meantime. If I had that amazing ability, I could solve it. I was close...the answers hung just beyond my fingertips. All I needed was a boost.
Saving those lives wasn’t my responsibility, right? I heard Will’s urgent voice; he didn’t have the right to sacrifice your future. He shouldn't have made that choice for you. Maybe my father didn’t have the right to sacrifice for me, but now I owned the choice. Will gave me the choice.
The TV had been tuned to the local channel for the morning newscast. The blonde anchor finished joking with the weather guy and read the headline from the prompter. “The first trials of Graham’s Syndrome patients has promising results.”
A picture of me popped up, one from a few years ago. The girl with the bright skin and thick hair was a far cry from my reflection now.
The anchor continued, “Dr. Ellery Bale’s breakthrough treatment stalls the disease completely, and those affected can live normal lives. Dr. Bale’s research also uncovered the hazards in our food supply, and last Thursday she received an honor to recognize...” The voice faded into the symphony of sound around me, humming, beeping, and the breathy rhythmic whoosh of the pump.
I turned my face and a hard feeling prickled down my throat. Then I noticed the oxygen mask had been replaced with medical tape strapped over my mouth; they’d intubated me again last night. Like a reaction, I half-swallowed and I shuddered against the uncomfortable stab of the invading plastic tube.
When I had decided to fight for Graham’s instead of my life, I knew this was coming. Nothing could have prepared me for the helplessness. I thought that when regular people die of old age, their minds blur and turn the scratchy prison of a bed into a comforting cloud. Not me. Like my thoughts, the Spark sharpened my senses. I felt everything and understood even more, like I could feel my different organs function slower until they began to fail altogether.
“Morning Ells.” Will walked in and saw the headline posted at the bottom of the TV with my pretty portrait. “So, you’ve seen the story. I thought it—” He frowned when he noticed my equipment change.
“They had to tube you again?” He scraped the metal chair over the tile to my bedside and sat. “Are they gonna come soon to take it out?”
That had been the routine the last two times. I’d recovered strength enough, and the nurse came to take it out so we could talk. I swiped my fingers over the tablet mounted just above my hand and a lovely voice spoke for me, “Probably not.”
Will nodded, full of a bright smile he’d faked plenty of times. “Turn off the audio. It’s not you and it sounds weird. I can read the text just fine.”
I tapped it off and typed out. “Okay.” And then, “Thanks for the orchids. I love them.”
“Pretty flowers for a pretty lady.”
“You’re a dork.”
He smiled.
I wished I could, too. Instead, the tube restricted me even more. I couldn’t really move my head without that awful reminder snaking through my throat.
“What do you want today? I could read. There’s that video game you like to watch me lose.”
“Let’s just talk.” Then I tapped a quick :-).
“Okay,” he replied and then held his chin to pantomime how deep he thought. “Since you’re not using the creepy voice, I’ll do most of the talking. Let’s start with how terrible dinner went last night.” He star
ted in on a crazy story, probably made up for entertainment value.
I twitched a smile against the tape. Will’s visits made the whole situation bearable. The first time I landed in the hospital, the grudge he held for almost a year disappeared. I hadn’t seen him since the day the acceleration started, and then he knew I didn’t use his gift. If he had been sad then, I couldn’t tell. Mostly, he radiated anger. But the next time I saw him, when he had rushed to my side...all that had vanished.
When they admitted me for good, Dad used to visit every day. The worse I got, the less he came, which was fine with me. Will came instead and he managed to make me feel better, something my father never did. All my dad saw in me was his own guilt.
“Ellery?”
My eyes opened, Will hanging over with ten additional creases in his face. I’d fallen asleep again.
“Sorry. Your story is riveting, I swear.” I tapped an extra sarcastic emoticon. :-p.
My little joke didn’t budge his frown.
“It wasn’t your responsibility. Someone else would have figured it out without you, ya know.”
Why did he choose now to get mad at me again? I thought he dropped it. “I made the choice. My sacrifice.” I let my finger hover for a second. I should say it. “What is a life without a legacy?”
“One you live, Ells.” Will sighed. “And yeah, I get it. It was your choice. But you made a choice for me, too.”
No, I hadn’t. I was the one dying, but I saved thousands of lives and potentially prevented more damage to the genome. I didn’t sacrifice for nothing.
I forced the weight of those damn heavy eyelids open again. “I saved a lot of lives.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Will’s Adam’s apple bobbed and the faked smile curved over a shaking lip. “You did. You changed the world.”
Pulled down by lead eyelashes, I let my eyes close again. I still heard Will shifting next to me, his breath added to the careful orchestra of my machines. Soft pressure touched my forehead, the warm oval of Will’s kiss. But it wasn’t dry. The wet streaks curved down and into my ears where I heard his cracked whisper, “In some ways, you’re really not that bright.”