Unplugged

by Donna Freitas

  I went to the mirror and stood before it, the surface smooth and silvery like water, like someone had recently cleaned it.

  I stared and stared.

  There was a familiarity in the wide mouth I saw there, the small nose, the curve of the jaw. The cheeks had a rosy flush and the lips were full, the skin smooth, the same golden tone people had after they downloaded the Caribbean Vacation App. It was the eyes that told me the truth, however. I zeroed in on their blue color, like the sky in my name. Almond shaped. I would always recognize those eyes. I ran a finger down my cheek and the girl in the mirror did too.

  “That’s me,” I whispered, watching how the words happened on my lips.

  I hadn’t seen my real face since I plugged in. Until the dream last night I hadn’t really wondered what I looked like, whether the appearance of my body would be that much different from the virtual self I was used to at home.

  It was.

  Similar enough that I recognized myself, but different all the same.

  It’s strange how the real body can make a person seem . . . changed.

  There was nothing wrong with my face. Nothing extraordinary about it either. It was just a face, like any other. I was just a girl, like any other. And the dream was just that: a dream. A strange one, but still a dream.

  Quickly, so quickly it passed through me like the faintest of breaths, I wondered how anyone would want to disown the body, be liberated from it. But to be released from the burden of the body was the mark of total transcendence at home. What I used to believe everyone in the Real World aspired to as well.

  I turned around and walked back into the hallway. This time I went through the ornate set of doors I’d noticed before, wanting to see where they led.

  Soon I was in a ballroom. Whoever used to live here must have once worn those elaborate gowns in here, while people drank and ate and gossiped and fell in love until the wee hours of the morning. The opulence of this place was stunning. Filigreed moldings, once painted gold but now tarnished and falling apart, lined the walls and fixtures. The air smelled vaguely sharp and sweet, like the remnants of spilled perfume. The scent seemed fitting, since I was sure elegant, perfumed ladies once twirled across this floor, leaving trails of jasmine and lilac in their wake as they danced. A great chandelier had crashed in the center of the room, a mountain of glass rising up from the floor. The heap of crystal was taller than me, its round metal top bent inward, five thick broken chains dangling from it helplessly. The ceiling was far away, maybe three stories up. Painted across it were frescoes of angels cavorting with women and men. Hands, feet, the tail of a cloak or the tip of a wing had peeled away.

  I thought of Inara again.

  If she were here, she’d wish for an App that would let her fly up and examine the scenery above, studying the angels, just as she would have wanted to try on each and every dress I’d seen in the other room. The lump that had earlier formed in my throat seemed to lodge in my center, squeezing against my heart.

  I missed her.

  But now she hated me.

  Other thoughts jostled for attention. My mother, my sister, my reasons for being in the Real World. A pale glow seeped across the floor to my right, spilling from the edges of four tall brocade curtains that cloaked the enormous windows. The sun. It must be rising. To my left, I could see the outline of a series of boarded-up glass doors. Tiny triangles of soft white light spilled through their gaps, sending dusty rays across the room.

  The outside.

  Finally.

  I rushed to the doors like someone was chasing me, pulling and pulling at one of the wide wood panels with my hands, trying to rip it free. A long, sharp splinter broke from the edge, stabbing deep into the side of my finger. I yelped, jumping back. My breaths came in ragged gasps as I stared at the wooden needle piercing that tender flesh, watching as blood bubbled up around it and turned it black.

  I closed my eyes and yanked at the splinter.

  “Yuhhhhh,” I screamed, the pain of it thick and throbbing. I pulled the splinter out and tossed it onto the floor. I went into the next room and grabbed a sheet from one of the chairs. It dragged behind me as I returned to the boarded-up door. Using my teeth, I tore two strips from it, wrapped them around my hands to protect my skin, the blood from my finger dotting the fabric.

  No matter what I did, the door wouldn’t budge.

  I went to retrieve a long iron poker I’d seen a few rooms back, lying next to a stone fireplace that took up an entire wall. The metal was heavy and cold as I carried it. I wedged it between the board and the outside door, pulling on the end. The nails groaned and squealed against the force. Then there came a great crack. All but the very edge of the wood broke away.

  The door was comprised of a series of small rectangular glass windows, blackened with layers of dirt. One of the panels at the bottom was broken. I crouched down on my hands and knees, bending my head low.

  Air.

  It tickled my skin, a million tiny hairs on end all across my arms. I closed my eyes, letting it rush across my cheek, the wind winding gently through my hair. I inhaled, long and deep. The tangy smell of salt, of seaweed, hit hard.

  The ocean?

  I opened my eyes and took another breath.

  Yes. It had to be. I knew that smell, knew it from the Apps and from my dreams, from the time I was small and my mother and sister and I spent our days by the sea. The smell was like its own strange memory, one without words but still powerful. All this time with the Keeper, I’d been next to the ocean, this place I so longed for in my heart that it seemed to sing to me in my dreams. I peered through the opening in the glass, wanting evidence of the sand and the waves, but from this crouched position, it was difficult to see much. There was grass, though. I saw the beginnings of what looked to be a lawn, wild and unkempt and moving in the breeze. It led up to a series of steps and some sort of white marble esplanade that extended all the way to the door. Vines grew across it in places, cracking through its surface. I held my breath and tried to listen, hoping to hear the waves, but there was nothing. Just the shhhh of wind across the grass.

  I got up, brushing the dirt from my hands and knees. Once I passed through this door I would be in the world. I would be able to search for my family, to find Adam and even Lacy if I needed to, and Rain—I would find him first, so I could make him tell me what the Keeper wouldn’t. Everything I wanted awaited me just a few steps away. I closed my eyes. Gripped the knob.

  But then I thought about the cuts and bruises I’d gotten when I unplugged, the intense dream I’d had before waking up here. A crowd. A cliff. A dive. A boat. The long splinter I’d removed from my hand caught my eye, and I thought of the dagger I’d plunged into the heart of that guard. And the blood, all that blood that spilled from his body.

  Then Rain. Rain Holt pulling me from the sea.

  Pulling me toward him.

  I took a deep breath. It had all seemed so real. Too real to be a dream.

  I tried the door. There was a crack, and I could hear the wood shift, feel it break free. I pushed my whole body against it with all the force I could manage. It opened, and a pale glow fell across my face. Before I could decide otherwise, I slid my body through the narrow space.

  18

  The real world outside

  AT FIRST I was blinded.

  The early-morning sun was a fiery round circle edging up along the horizon. My head swam like someone had spun me around, enormous bright spots dancing across my vision. I blinked and blinked, shocked by the brilliance of real sunlight. After a while, the stinging in my eyes lessened and shapes began to form, outlines of objects like silhouettes against a wall. A tree, tall and gnarled and thick, its branches heavy with green and stretching like long black fingers across the sky, and another with pointy oval leaves that fell like tears all the way to the ground.

  I put my hand over my chest, trying to quiet my heart. Felt the smooth marble underneath my feet, saw the outline of the vines growing across the e
splanade and the start of the grass. Heard the shhhhhhh of the wind across it. The air was cool against my damp clothing, and it brought that tangy smell of salt from the sea. The ocean was close, but I couldn’t see it. My heart pounded harder. The presence of so much reality made it race. The App World sky was beautiful, but knowing it was only virtual, that ultimately it was a projection, diminished the awe I’d had for it.

  There came a singing, high and rhythmic. Insistent.

  I closed my eyes and listened. Let it fill my ears until it was all I knew. The sound of it seemed to rise, grow bigger, as though it was aware someone had just tuned in. A sense of peace, of hope was carried atop its music as I realized its source.

  Crickets.

  They sang their last high notes as the night receded completely.

  I remembered them from when I was small, how fascinated I was with every little thing that crawled across the earth. My sister had come upon me once, crouched in the grass one early morning like this one, staring at this strange, spindle-legged creature whose song I’d followed until I encountered its ugly brown-black body. She got down next to me, and before I could cry for her to stop, she reached for it—I thought to crush it—but all she did was capture it in her palm so I could get a better look. We watched it, studied its wings, its waving antennae, the way it rubbed its legs together, until it lost patience with us and hopped right from her hand, disappearing back into the grass.

  My throat tightened. The crickets seemed to want to remind me of my family, to celebrate the reunion Jude and I would have once I left this place and found her, to tell her and my mother that yes, I was really here. That I’d come for them. I was back, as real as ever, and I’d never forgotten them, just as I’d promised.

  The singing stopped abruptly.

  The sun inched higher. The Keeper would be up soon. If I was to leave, I’d have to do it now, before she discovered that I was gone and I’d taken her key. I was about to start off when I remembered what the Keeper said about the epidemic that had swept through the Real World, how some Keepers would hide their faces, worried about breathing in some new virus that might overtake the city. I hurried back through the mansion’s rooms until I reached the one with the gowns and dresses. I found a pale scarf that would cover my hair and face, and a loose long-sleeved tunic of sorts that reached all the way down to my knees, covering my body. I wrapped the scarf around my head and, just as quickly, went outside again. It wasn’t disease, but the strange dreams that haunted me, especially the most recent one, a warning about my face. It made me think better of simply stepping out into the Real World unprotected.

  I walked a few paces, my eyes squinting in the glare of the rising sun, then turned around to take in the house. No, it really was a mansion. It was five stories tall but each level had such high ceilings that it seemed more like ten. Every room had a balcony, with columns reaching between floors, a hundred toothpicks propping up an elaborate house of cards. The French doors and windows were covered with boards, plants and vines overtaking parts of the facade, some of them blooming with tiny white flowers. Solar panels were spaced out across the roof, but only a few were still clean enough to capture the sun and give off any power. Tall, thin windmills reached above the trees. To the left of the mansion were the remnants of a garden, wild and overgrown, great pink and red roses thick and full, their thorns choking away everything else. The marble of the esplanade shone a bright white in the sun. Along the edge of the wide lawn there was a long wrought-iron fence. Beyond it was a sight that made my heart skip.

  The ocean.

  Dark blue and sparkling in the light. It really was close. I thought of diving in, of swimming in its current and submerging myself in its waters, but it seemed to rear up from below, too far and too dangerous to access from here. The mansion must be built on a cliff. The sky behind everything was bright and clear and blue as a robin’s egg.

  My blue sky, sang my mother’s voice in my head.

  The Keeper was wrong about my family, that they could be a danger to me. It was simply impossible.

  I would find them and prove this was true.

  A gentle breeze rustled the leaves on the trees and rippled across my shirt. I pulled the scarf away from my face for a moment and breathed in, the smell green and sweet, grass and flowers mingling with the dirt.

  Summer.

  A strange, potent feeling welled inside me. It filled my heart, expanding my lungs and lifting my spirit. There was an ecstasy in the fresh air and real sunlight on my skin, and a peace, too. A pang of sadness drifted through me. I wished Inara were here, experiencing this with me. Longing filled me like water rising to the top of a bottle, longing to see my family again, longing to finally be in a place where I belonged, longing to have my mother and sister assuage my fears that I’d been forgotten or even abandoned. It took up every part of my insides and threatened to spill over.

  I started across the lawn. The mansion’s immense structure shielded me from whatever lay on its other side. There was a long winding path along the cliff that continued beyond the trees, and I followed it. For some reason, my feet pulled me away from where I sensed the city to be, as though they had a plan of their own, much like how they’d drawn me into the room with the mirror. It was like my body had its own internal GPS. I wandered through grass as high as my knees, the ocean to my left. I passed another boarded-up mansion. It was only one story, but that single story was tall and majestic, with marble columns and great archways sprawling outward on either side, a grand path lined with overgrown bushes winding its way to the entrance. More mansions followed, all of them perched far above the ocean, tempted by the beauty of the water, drawn close by the sight of the sea. Windmills dotted their lawns, slowly turning in the breeze, and solar panels like the ones I’d seen at the Keeper’s occasionally caught the glare of the sun as I passed. The path dipped lower. To my right was a wall of jagged stone and to my left, all ocean, the white foam of waves crashing into an ever-shifting outline along the island. The sun was higher in the sky now, bearing down on my bare arms and shoulders. Skin burned, this I knew from Mrs. Worthington’s class, but somehow I’d imagined it bubbling over like boiling water, and all I felt right now was the slight sting of heat. There came the sudden crush of gravel behind me and I spun, searching for its source.

  But there was nothing.

  Only the sight of tiny rocks falling away from the edge of the cliff, loosed by the wind. My hand went to the scarf draped across my mouth and nose, pulling it tighter, my breath hot against the fabric. I looked around, behind me, ahead of me. I didn’t see a single soul or other sign of human life. I seemed to be the only person alive and out in all the Real World.

  The path was so deserted I half expected an army of zombies to come at me from farther down the cliff, like in that Wandering Dead App I was obsessed with when I was a fourteen. Finally, after rounding another bend, I saw someone. A man was walking far ahead, his attention on the ocean. For a while I followed behind him, wondering if he’d turn around and see me. But he never did—he was too far away—and eventually he disappeared up a path that led away from the ocean toward the trees.

  A few minutes later I saw a second person. This time it was a woman, dressed in the same white attire the Keeper usually wore. She was headed toward me, which meant that soon we would be face-to-face. She was out walking her dog.

  I put my hand to my mouth and laughed. A real dog! Not one that was downloaded. It was big and tall, maybe tall enough to reach the middle of my thighs, with thick, black, curly fur. His eyes darted everywhere, like he couldn’t settle on what was most interesting, and his tongue lolled out of the side of his mouth. More than anything, I wanted to place my hands on his head and touch that fur. I couldn’t stop staring at him.

  I couldn’t even remember one from when I was small.

  The woman was a few paces away, and I found I couldn’t move. She brushed by me on the path without even a glance. The most attention I received was from the big black d
og, who pulled toward me on his leash, his nose trying for a sniff.

  My lungs let out a big whoosh of air.

  I started to laugh again, great and big and uncontrollable. What would the Keeper say if I returned to the house as though it wasn’t a big deal that I’d snuck out and said, “I hope you don’t mind but I’ve brought home a new friend,” and introduced a big curly-haired dog into our rooms? If it were a girl dog, maybe I would call her Lacy. I liked the idea of a loving, slobbery animal with that name.

  Thoughts of the Keeper silenced my laughter. I wondered if she was up yet, if she’d realized I was gone. I pressed my hand to my waist, feeling the outline of the key.

  I started on my way with more confidence now. The Keeper had been so worried I’d be unsafe out here, but she was wrong. Nobody cared who I was. Nobody even bothered to turn and look at me. I let the scarf slide away from my face and hang across my shoulders. Soon the path bent right and rose until it was level with the top of the cliff again.

  Then I stopped, stunned by what I saw.

  Far off in the distance were the outlines of New Port City, its buildings rising up beyond a line of trees. The skyline was familiar yet foreign, in the same way that seeing myself in the mirror for the first time had been strange, yet I still recognized myself. Great towers were clustered at the center of the island, as though the ocean had birthed them from below the earth, waves pushing up all that stone and smoothing it across glass. Huge steel and rock structures stretched like needles toward the clouds.

  My eyes landed on a skyscraper that was truly familiar.

  The Water Tower.

  It was dead center, poking up amid the other buildings, the tallest one among them. The sunlight seemed to ripple into bright-blue waves as it hit the side. I was tempted to head straight toward it, across the grass and through the wall of trees until I spilled out into the city.

  But my body, my mind, my feet were pulling me elsewhere.