by Jason Luthor
Yeah. That guy? Doctor Monroe? Weird.
His thick accent makes the words spew out like the guy’s been chewing stones. “Ms. Coleman,” he starts, leaning back in his big, ebony throne. “Perhaps you would like to discuss the complexities of your home life? The domain of a young woman is always riddled with problematic interludes.”
He says this, and I look at him for a minute like . . . what? I’m actually having to focus just to decode what’s coming out of his mouth. “Yeah, uh, my home. Thing is, I’m not sure that I’m supposed to really tell you anything about that. You know, top secret and all. I’m like, mad mysterious.”
“There is no space for fear within the confines of these four walls,” he continues while his fingers adjust the binoculars smashed against his face. Literally, the lenses of these glasses make him look like he’s got fish eyes. “Neither is this room for secrets. I assure you, in my capacity as a therapist, I am assigned to assist you in all areas of your life needing adjustment. I have full knowledge of your, shall we say, uniqueness. It is not just anyone condemned to Reinforcement that manages to get out of it.”
I shiver when he mentions it. Reinforcement, the punishment where they inject Creep gunk into your veins to brainwash you, has been a recurring nightmare of mine since I found out what it was. “Well, I mean, if you already know about what happened, I guess I could maybe talk about it. It’s not exactly a happy process. You do know what it is, right? Reinforcement?”
“Of course. There are, you may have surmised, not many of my particular profession in the Tower. The brain altering properties of the Creep are not merely the inventions of harried scientists working to maintain an adequate means of controlling our less than reputable population. No, these properties have been refined, in quantity and procedure, by the endless observations of men and women of my ilk. It is we that oversee those subjected to the injections and file the reports, keeping a vigilant watch over these altered individuals. Someone, after all, must observe them to ensure they do not suffer mental breaks.”
“First, that’s super creepy. Second, I’m not sure it’s my family that really bothers me, you know? I get why they’ve been acting so weird the last few years. That’s, like, not even an issue. It can’t be that hard to figure out that the whole Reinforcement thing is what’s really bothering me. Just being here, in therapy, is a total violation of my personal code. It’s not like I think it’s bad for people to get it, but you guys talk like I need to change how I think and for reasons that don’t make sense. I’m curious. That’s all, end of story. So, no, I don’t really think I should have to come here and get my mind messed with. If I’m that bothered about this little chit chat we’re having, you can probably take a guess about how much having an injection of the Creep pumped into my veins is completely disturbing to me. That stuff goes straight to your brain. I’ve seen it, and the one thing I don’t want is to be anything but myself.”
His fingers stream through his thin beard, which kinda looks like a rat’s tail plugged into his chin. “So, it is beyond question that your greatest fear is to be untrue to what you are?”
“Yeah, I mean, makes sense, right? What’s the point of pretending to be something you’re not?”
“And pray tell, what are you?”
“Huh?”
“The question is not a complicated one. What are you? Although, in a very genuine sense, the question more closely means who are you?”
For a minute, I stare at him from across the desk while my body sinks into the chair. It’s way too real of an allusion to how I’m feeling just then. “I mean, I’m Jackie. Jackie Coleman.”
“And who is Jackie Coleman?”
“Is this, like, a rhetorical question? Is there even a right answer to this? I mean, I’m me. Jackie.”
“So, a name is all that you are?”
It’s not as if I put a lot of thought into this stuff on a normal basis or anything. I mean, I kinda take it for granted that I know who I am. “I’m . . . a student. I like to study stuff. I’m pretty big on science, like my dad. Uh, in my free time, I like basketball.”
“Those are better answers, but you’re truly only regurgitating what it is that you do. Are those things what you are?”
“Come on, dude, cut me a break here. I’m trying.”
His lips twist, and I could almost swear he’s mocking me from behind that ratty beard of his. “You’ve provided so little. Your name? A few things that you do? Those are all that define the entirety of your essence? The core of your being?”
“Well, I mean . . .” My breath sprints out of my lungs as I feel the tension clutching my chest. Why is this so hard? “Look, I mean, maybe? I don’t know. I just, I don’t think about it. I’m Jackie. I like to know the truth about stuff. That’s half the reason I’m here, right?”
Monroe leans back and weaves his fingers together in front of himself, like he’s sizing me up. “It is my belief, young Jackie, that you only have an inkling of who and what you are. That your answers show you are merely guessing at what exactly makes you, ‘you.’ Your greatest fear is being forced to be something you’re not, to betray the core of your being. However, you have so little grasp of what that is. This is, of course, not particularly unusual for a girl your age. Indeed, few teenagers have beheld more than a passing glimpse of their full nature. So, rather than being worried about being anything less than what you are, I believe you fear being unable to fulfill your potential. To be diverted, by force and violence, from the natural course that would be forged partly by the ever gnarled pathways of life’s nature, and partially by your own responses to those pathways. You wish to make the decision and have none other make it for you. Although this, once again, is human nature.”
He plucks his glasses from his face and thumbs the gap between his eyebrows, sighing as he massages the folds of skin piling down his head. “You desire to walk your own path, and you fear being forced from it. However, what that path is, and what it makes you? That story, the greatest of all and the one we each must write, is held in the unsure tips of your own fingers.”
Serious question: What the hell does that even mean?
So, yeah, after I left his office, I was a little, I dunno, disturbed.
I don’t like being told that I don’t even know myself. Then I think, that might be a clue about what I am. Whatever, it’s hard to say. I mean, obviously, or I wouldn’t be talking about this right now. Maybe he’s right, and I just don’t know myself as well as I thought. I’d say I’ll think about it, but really, I’ve done way too much overthinking today. Right now, I just want to go play some basketball, because if I don’t, I’m going to crazy from all this therapy.
Recording Three
You know how you get really excited about something, and that’s all you want to focus on, but life keeps getting in the way?
Yeah. That’s home life for me.
So, for the first time in forever, my family is acting like a family again. Which, I mean, that’s cool. It’s what I wanted, right? After I took out Creepy Sally and got made a Scavenger, all the listeners were taken out of our apartment. No more spying on us meant that meant mom could stop acting like an ultra-extreme manic depressive, and dad could actually, you know, talk to me. After years of pretending as if they didn’t care, they were suddenly free to say whatever they wanted.
Yeah. That hasn’t worked out so great.
Suddenly I’m waking up every morning and mom’s on me about remembering to get my school work done. Dad’s popping into my room asking me if I’m okay or if I got hurt during training. I get that I wanted them to be just a little invested in my life before, but now I’m having to face off with them like a wrestling tag team just to make it to my room. It’s like running a gauntlet to get to bed without having to worry about them harshing me about keeping up my grades.
Which, like, I get. I’m still technically a student until the end of the year, but I’m freaking about to head into the Deep Creep. I think I should get just
a little space considering I’m about to face off with a flood of living muscle tissue since, all things considered, that’s probably a bit higher on the priority list than acing my biology exam.
Not that my parents seem to think so.
My feet are about two inches through the doorframe when dad’s voice shoots out of my room. Almost at the same time, mom pops into view like she’s part of a magic trick. The two of them were in cahoots to trap me. Dad throws up that fatherly, concerned smile. You know, the one when your dad is having anxiety, but doesn’t want to actually say it, so he hides it with a grin? I dunno, it’s hard to describe. Anyway, they’re on me, and there’s no escape.
“Hey, Jacko,” he says as he waves to the kitchen. “Why don’t you grab a chair? Mom made something special today and I thought we could have a little family time.”
“Uh, okay. Any special occasion?”
“Do we need a special occasion to have food with our daughter?”
“No, I guess not,” I say, my nose hooked by a smell drifting from the oven. “Is that . . . meat? Are you guys cooking meat?”
Mom’s face is just dazzling as she waves us over. “Come on, baby, I know you’re going to love it. Even got my hands on some pepper and sauce.”
“What? How? We’ve been out of those for weeks, since the Scavengers never came back.”
“Same way we get everything done in the Tower, Jackie. I talked to a few people, traded a few things. Couldn’t make a hamburger without some spice.”
“Hamburgers?” Jolts run from my toes to my lips until I realize I’m salivating. Look, awkward family interactions aside, time with the parents is moderately acceptable when meat is involved. We’ve been getting by on just vegetables for way too long. Anyway, dad pops open the cabinets and starts setting the table as mom rolls out a tray of beef patties. They’re sizzling and stained red from the sauce bubbling on them. The pop of the bubbles is kept company by the scent making its way around the room.
What I’m trying to say is that they look delicious.
One thing about hamburgers in real life versus what you see in the movies is that we don’t really have buns, which I’ve only seen maybe half a dozen times. We get just enough bread, though, so mom has the burgers out and served in no time. Still, the whole thing feels like a set up. Never trust a person bringing gifts, and especially don’t trust your parents. Those burgers come at the cost of a conversation that is guaranteed to be heavily doused in excruciating awkwardness.
Dad sits across from me and digs into his food. “Just like old times,” he says as he winks at me. “Reminds me of all those days we’d go hit the baseball park and knock a few into the outfield.”
“Is it me, or did we have hamburgers a lot more back then?”
“Probably because we did. Meat’s gotten a bit more rare the last few years.”
I hold up the burger and stare at the red juice seeping out of its side. It might as well be bleeding. “How’d we get these then? Not that I want to be the Debby Downer of this shindig, but you know, I’m curious. I mean, it has been a while.”
“Well, your mother and I were just thinking that it might be time to do some trading.” A strained chuckle forces itself out from between his teeth. “I mean, you’re going to be leaving us for the Deep.”
Mom shakes her head and her hands recline on top of each other as she leans into the table. “We love you, Jacko. You know that. Things haven’t been easy since everything that happened with the Creep Incident and you meeting the Tower director.”
My burger flops onto the plate as I stare between them. “Well, yeah, I mean, it’s not exactly as if we had what you could call a ‘quality relationship’ the last few years. I get why, I mean, duh. I know better than, like, 95% percent of the people living in the Tower.” Every word I say has more impact than the kickback of the guns I’d been training with that day. “I mean, I know I’m not the only one here that realizes the living situation wasn’t exactly comfortable after you started pretending you were tripping balls on drugs and dad started acting like he didn’t know me. Like I said, I get the why. I really do, guys. But, it’s only been, what? A few weeks since we started talking to each other again?”
“I know it’s only been a little while, Jackie.”
Dad nods as he grabs mom’s hand. This is already burning through my emotional fuel tank at a super-fast pace. “Jacko, we just want to have what every family has. We want you to come home and talk to us, not just go straight to your room. We need to hear from you because, once you’re gone, we don’t know if we’ll see you again.”
I can hear the chair complain as I slam back into it. “Guys, it’s a Scavenging. That’s it. This stuff happens every couple of months. And plus, can I just say that I completely get that you want us to be normal, but I’m not even sure I know what that means.” The moment I say those words, I know it’s ridiculously true. “I haven’t felt ‘normal’ in a long time. Yeah, ‘cause you two were such freaks. Because the whole Tower situation is unreal. And do I want to be able to, like, talk to you two? Yeah, sure, but . . . trying to have a conversation with someone you haven’t known in years isn’t what I’d call easy.”
My dad’s fingers pry his glasses from his face and he wipes at them. I can’t help but wince as I notice the slick streak on the lenses. God. Did I make my dad cry? He stuffs them into his pocket and pushes away from the table, his stomach inflating as he sucks in a deep breathe. “Things are terrible. I get it, champ. I get it. I didn’t want it to be this way. But I get it.” His hands press down on the wooden surface in front of him and he forces himself to his feet before his legs carry him off to the bedroom. “I have some research I need to catch up on.”
“Dad −” I protest, but he’s gone. My eyes slide to the dismal grey of our ceiling while my hands run down my face. “Dammit.”
“He loves you, Jackie,” I hear mom say.
“Yeah, I know. It’s not like I ever thought he didn’t. I just . . . what am I supposed to say? I feel like I haven’t had parents in years and now I’m having to adjust to all this in two weeks? Seriously?”
Mom’s lips fake a smile as leans back in her chair. “You know, he told me something the other day. Said he was real proud of you. Said he was proud you were still wearing his hat.”
My eyes, which are pinned to the roof, adjust their view to the brim of my baseball cap. “Crap. I don’t even realize I’m wearing it half the time.”
She pushes away from the table and begins to follow after my dad. “He does. He’s never stopped noticing.”
And then I’m all alone there, in the kitchen. So, I do the only thing I can do.
I eat my hamburger.
Recording Four
Ugh.
I’m speeding along on what I can only call a roller coaster of emotions right now. Seventeen absolutely has to be the peak of my angsty teenage phase, because I don’t think I can go through another year of this. The situation with the familia is basically keeping me out of the apartment, though I’m currently in the middle of plotting a way to get in tight with the parents again. It might require some honesty. Some emotion. You know, all the things I’m terrible at. God. Then there’s Tommy, who . . . I don’t even know. He’s getting borderline flirty, which is just so weird, because I thought we’d already had this convo a few weeks ago. There’s zero chance of anything happening there.
Then between my complete lack of emotional maturity, still having to go to school, and oh, let’s not forget my combat training, I’ve still got Allison. God, Allison. As if life wasn’t hard enough to navigate already. She’s the cheese to my crackers, but I feel as if we’re operating from separate towers right now or something. I guess I’d say the biggest issue is the fact that I literally tell her zip about anything going on with the Scavengers. I mean, she knows I’m one, but I can’t really give her the details about what happened on Floor 1 or what I talked to the Tower director about. I mean, not unless I want to get her arrested and brain zap
ped. Kinda not my thing, you know?
Which she doesn’t get, obviously, since she doesn’t know that if I tell her she’ll get in trouble. So, after school and out of the slim hope I could somehow avoid the incredibly uncomfortable situation that I call my family life, I pop by her place. Allison doesn’t have as big of an apartment as I do, and her room is pretty much the size of a sweatbox, but it’s chill, you know? Just a cool place. Her wall’s a sticker book just covered in posters, mostly of people I couldn’t recognize if you threatened to dump me into the Creep. They’re all musicians, but who they are and what they sing? Nope, I got zip about that.
Anyway, I’m staring at these things while I stew in her bed, when she looks over at me and cracks a smile. “Don’t feel like you need to ask before you take my bed or anything. It’s not like we’re in my room.”
“What are you talking about? I know you were going to offer anyway. I mean, it’s not like you don ‘t immediately dump yourself onto my bed whenever you’re over.”
“Yeah, but you actually have a big bed. Me?” Her eyes roll to her side as she swings a chair in her direction. “I’ve got to use this.”
“Hey, not my fault you don’t live on my floor.”
“Not exactly my fault either, Jackie. In case you forgot, we’re all assigned apartments.”
My fingers crawl over my skull as I rub at the muscles. “I know, I know. If it’s any help, I’m glad you haven’t tossed me out yet.”
“What are friends for, right?”
I’m listening, but even while I am, my eyes are scouring the walls. “Who the heck are all these guys, anyway? You seriously know all of them?”
“Oh, yeah,” she says while she nods. “I’ve been able to match up some CD covers with their faces, so I know what they all sing. You know me and music.”