Nine

by Zach Hines

  Nicholas nodded to Franklin again. Franklin took a stack of manila folders from his bag and walked through the room, passing them out.

  Nicholas continued. “In that spirit, today we shall have the absurd honor of witnessing a burn from our newest initiate, Amit Sandoval.”

  There was a quiet murmur of surprise. Some turned to look at Amit, who sat with a frown on his pasty face, staring straight ahead, trying hard not to acknowledge anyone looking at him.

  Amit was “the fat kid.” No one had ever thought he would be a Burner, but he begged to get in, and so Nicholas created an infamously mortifying hazing to prove him worthy. It culminated in a rather unsavory evening involving a nude and oiled Amit, a table full of tofu bricks, and a cauldron of boiling water with a chair fixed inside . . . Amit’s Miso Special. Amit persevered, and eventually Nicholas allowed him in.

  And now he had apparently created this burn proposal titled Escape the Asylum. The Burners were leafing through and . . .

  “Whoa.”

  “Shit.”

  Various other gasps and cries of surprise.

  “Say what you will about Amit, but he has learned to embrace his absurdity,” Nicholas said. “The burn Amit has proposed here for his third life is something I have never encountered. And I have studied every burn in the book, so I’m not easy to impress.” He smirked and raised an eyebrow.

  Nicholas handed a small bag to Franklin. Inside was a stack of red ink pens. Franklin passed them down the line. “These are the pens called for in Amit’s plan,” Nicholas said. “You each get one. Your instructions are clear in the dossier. The burn culminates during Headmaster Denton’s fall quarter address after lunch.

  “Listen.” Nicholas paused. His trademarked Listen. The word invariably signaled the final movement of all his big speeches.

  “We all must die. Nine times, each of us. That’s the way of it. But we are going to make each death count. All you pledges in the back? Pay close attention today. Dismissed.”

  The Burners got up and left, murmuring quietly to one another as they headed out into the halls. The pledges followed them out, their faces pale, rattled by Nicholas’s intensity.

  As the room emptied, Franklin tossed Amit’s proposal on the table.

  “Did the fat kid really come up with this?”

  Nicholas looked up at Franklin as if he had just heard the dumbest question of his life.

  “That moron?” Nicholas said. “Of course not. I wrote it.” Nicholas collapsed theatrically into a chair in the wings.

  “But the Bible says every burn must be of our own making,” Franklin said. “You know, ‘from our inner absurdity.’ This isn’t—”

  Nicholas cut him off. “If people believe that big dumb Amit can conjure this, then they might pull their heads out of their asses and think of something interesting for once. Besides, Amit believes it was his idea. So, he’s fully on board, and we’re technically still following the rules.”

  Nicholas inspected the sleeve of his jacket and discovered a tiny dark spot and furrowed his brow.

  “Our class is a group of pathetic, boring losers,” he said. “I swear to God, if I have to read another autodefenestration proposal . . . And they can’t even spell ‘defenestration’!”

  He licked his finger and thumb and furiously rubbed the dark spot on his jacket between them. “If it weren’t for these parties I spend so much time organizing, who knows how many of them would actually be going through with their burns at all? And I tell you what, burn parties get old. We barely got a ninety-second segment on the news. We need something viral.”

  There was a loaded pause as Franklin watched Nicholas attempt to eliminate the stain on his sleeve.

  “Maybe we need to do more as their leaders,” Franklin said finally. “Inspire them.”

  Nicholas looked up from his sleeve, his brow scrunched severely.

  “Franklin, please contribute something positive to this conversation, or shut your mouth.”

  Franklin frowned as Nicholas continued.

  “Now, let’s say Amit pulls off this grotesque miracle today. There is no guarantee he will, by the way. It could be another stupid farce like Clayton’s whole car-parasailing thing,” Nicholas said, shaking his head.

  Franklin remembered how Clayton had managed to clip a telephone pole and break his back. He had to be put down unceremoniously behind closed doors in the hospital.

  “But let’s say Amit at least dies in front of the school without dragging it out,” Nicholas said. “The question then becomes: What’s next? Have you considered that, Franklin? Do you have any thoughts?”

  Chastened, Franklin folded up his laptop and put it in his bag, then he started packing up his desk. “We would just get on with burning everyone else,” Franklin said, flat and quiet, looking down at his bag as he packed.

  “No,” Nicholas said. “You’re thinking small. We would need to top ourselves. Really stir the mort quotient. With something big. Something huge.”

  There was a mad scheme of some kind rattling around in the kid’s head. “I’m sure you’ll come up with something,” he said.

  Nicholas looked at him with his big, searching eyes and blinked. “I already have.”

  He handed a folder to Franklin from his bag. His lips formed a thin smile, framing his perfectly straight, bone-white teeth.

  Franklin opened the folder. It was titled You Never Forget Your First Time.

  Below was a profile of the school’s only One: Julian Dex.

  Chapter 6

  “I HAVEN’T NOTICED A WRINKLE YET,” MOLLY SAID, PULLING the plastic off a chocolate pudding cup. “But they say sometimes it takes a while. My sister went on for a year in her fourth life before she realized she couldn’t smell flowers anymore. Then on her fifth life, she woke up deaf. You just never know . . .”

  Julian nodded. They were at a table in the back of the cafeteria.

  “The main thing now is that I’m feeling more confident in myself,” Molly said.

  “Are we talking that kind of confidence?” Julian asked, looking toward the entrance.

  Constance was entering through the security doors. She was hands down the hottest girl in the school. She was curvy in the right ways; her hair was long, black, and impossibly straight; she had a cute face that could turn devilish with the right circumstance; and she was always pushing the dress codes to the boundaries of acceptable. Julian understood her beauty on an objective level, but he just wasn’t turned on by her. The thing was she was too hot—almost untouchable. Certainly for Julian, a One, she was an impossibility.

  Today Constance was vamped out in red lipstick and pouting at anyone who gave her a second glance. She was carrying a red pen, which she put theatrically in her mouth when the school security guard, a middle-aged man with a sad, thin mustache—a Six—asked her to raise her arms to scan her with a metal detector wand.

  “I wish,” Molly said, looking at her. “Dang. There sure are a lot of pretty girls in the Burners.”

  Julian looked at Molly with a sudden mixture of sadness and frustration. “Yet another reason . . .”

  “Reason for what?”

  “Come on, Molly, why don’t you pledge already?” Julian asked bluntly.

  Molly bristled at the question. “Jules . . . ,” she said weakly. “It’s over. I did it. So just drop it, okay? My family gets another rebate, and that’s that. I won’t burn again until my life table comes up. Which is . . .” She calculated in her head. “Eight years from now. My twenty-fifth birthday.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Julian said with undisguised bitterness.

  Molly frowned. “Julian,” she said. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m perfectly fine,” he said. “I know what I believe in. I know what’s right. And I live my life by that.”

  Molly blinked, momentarily stunned.

  “Is this about my Three? I’m a senior this year. I’m trying to put my life together,” she said.

  “Yeah, put your life together
by killing yourself. Funny how that works.”

  “That’s how the world works, Julian. What’s your plan?”

  “For what?” Julian turned a page.

  “For life. We’re graduating in the spring,” Molly said, exasperated. “You need a plan.”

  Julian looked up.

  “Yeah, okay,” he said. “Here’s a plan. There’s this island in the Indian Ocean. It’s called Mauritius. It has white beaches, a volcano . . . and no Lake at all.”

  “No Lake? Where is everyone reborn?”

  “The nearest Lake is twelve hundred miles away in Africa. So rebirth isn’t really a thing there. They just don’t do it.”

  “Come on, that sounds like some urban legend bullshit.”

  Julian sharpened his eyes at Molly. “Mauritius,” he said with finality. “You asked what my plan is. Well, that’s my plan.” Julian went back to his notebook. He could feel Molly staring at him.

  “That’s your plan,” Molly repeated. “Some island in the middle of nowhere?”

  Julian did not look up.

  “Don’t be an asshole, Jules. You’re seventeen years old. I’m asking a reasonable question.”

  “I’m just saying that this shithole isn’t for me. And yeah, maybe I don’t know what I’m going to do yet, but I’m sure as hell not going to stick around here any longer than I have to.”

  “You mean in Lakeshore?” Molly asked, confused.

  “Yes,” he said simply.

  “Come on, you’re not going to Mauritius or wherever. If it’s true that they don’t have any rebirths there, then they won’t let anyone in. They won’t be able to support that many lives. Not on an island.”

  “Maybe, but I won’t know until I see for myself,” he said.

  Molly laughed. “You’re going to be some sad-sack emo One moping around Lakeshore your whole life, chasing fantasies, pretending you’re immune to the world.”

  “Wow, you really know how to make me feel good about myself, Molls,” Julian said.

  “I’m sorry, but you know, people are talking. Everyone thinks there’s something wrong with you. . . . You’re my friend, and sometimes even I think there is something wrong with you,” she added quietly.

  Julian closed his notebook and looked up at Molly.

  “Yeah, well, what if I just didn’t do it? Like, ever?” he said softly.

  “Didn’t do what? Didn’t follow the score?”

  “Yeah, what if I just didn’t follow it?”

  “You have to be on Life Two when you graduate,” Molly said. “There’s no college out there that would accept a One. That’s how the real world works.”

  “That’s not how I want to work, though,” Julian said.

  Molly furrowed her brow. “Julian, think about it—if we all lived our nine lives any which way we wanted, the world would starve to death. You know what happened in India. The whole country is closed off now. It’s hell on Earth.”

  “How do you know that? You haven’t been there. All you know is what they tell you on TV,” Julian said.

  Molly looked at him sharply. She caught his eyes lingering on her neck.

  “Admit it. You’re jealous.”

  “Jealous?!”

  “Yes, jealous that you don’t have the guts to do it.”

  Julian choked out a sarcastic laugh. “I’m not jealous. It’s just . . . I’m disappointed. I never thought you would turn out to be one of the idiots.”

  “You asshole,” Molly said, standing up. She glared at him, a storm brewing in her eyes.

  Julian shook his head. “I’m sorry. Hey, really. I didn’t mean it. It’s just . . . I hated seeing you dead like that, on the floor of Gloria’s house. It . . . I don’t know. It just made me realize that . . .”

  “That this is the real world?” Molly asked. She didn’t wait for an answer. “Well, it is. Whether you like it or not. You can’t be a One forever. It’s not legal, it’s not normal, and it’s not even right. For your own sake, grow up.”

  For the second time in as many years, Julian watched Molly walk away.

  He snapped his notebook shut and looked out across the students gathered in the cafeteria, chewing their prepackaged soy protein nuggets, slurping down their saccharine pudding, chatting, laughing, all of them racking up their numbers, waiting to get out of school and start climbing their way up in the world.

  Maybe she was right. Maybe he’d be stuck in Lakeshore. Nine lives, and all of them drained out in this shithole.

  As he stewed, Julian caught sight of Constance in the back of the cafeteria, talking to Headmaster Denton. Denton was signing a form for her, using her red pen. Constance was smiling her sexy, red, twisted smile.

  He watched her as she left Denton to find a seat among the row of white-clad students at the Burners’ table in the back. It suddenly struck Julian why exactly he was never into Constance. It was because she had a kind of beauty that the world demanded he desire. It required him to want it, to need it—even though the rules were designed to keep people like him as far away from it as possible.

  Well . . . he refused to be one of the idiots.

  Chapter 7

  THE CENTERPIECE OF THE LAKESHORE ACADEMY GROUNDS was the sprawling, religiously manicured lawn that separated the academic building from the gymnasium. An old stone wall enclosed the yard, and a two-hundred-year-old elm tree anchored the center of it. This afternoon, the old elm stood resolute as the entire student body parted and flowed around it on the way to the gymnasium.

  Unlike the academic building, which was built of red brick and lined with ivy-trimmed trellises, the gymnasium, a new addition to the school, was built with the same kind of drab architecture as the Lake receiving centers: white and gray brick, floor to ceiling, as blank and stark and boring as possible. That is, with one notable exception. The north wall was an ever-growing mural of graffiti. It was an unofficial tradition for the student body to fill the wall throughout the year and wipe it at the start of the next. But not, rumors had it, before some of the art was stenciled, copied, and sold among a certain class of high-numbered connoisseurs. “Creative destruction,” it was said to be called, capturing the vibrant imagination that high-numbered people lost with multiple rebirths. If true, this was perhaps an explanation for why some of the more controversial tags—“Piss in the Lake ☺” was one notable example—were allowed to remain for far longer than anyone expected they would.

  Students were finding seats for the fall quarter opening address. Two security guards were stationed at the entrance to the gym, acting like they were in an action movie, thumbs hooked through their belts, scanning the incoming crowd.

  Julian walked through the bleachers looking for Molly. He hoped maybe she might apologize to him—she knew burning was a sensitive issue, she’d even met his mother—and yet she had pressed that button.

  Or maybe he should apologize to her? Was that being more mature about it?

  Julian couldn’t find her, but he did find the Burners all sitting together in the front row, a chorus of white. He took a seat behind them. They were oddly quiet. Many were scanning the crowd, looking for something. Julian noticed legs bouncing up and down, and hands being wrung, and knuckles cracked—and every single Burner was fiddling with a red pen. In the front row, Franklin was tapping his leg distractedly. Beside him sat Nicholas: as calm and cool and collected as always.

  “Attention,” Headmaster Denton rasped into the microphone. The fluorescent lights gave his bald head a sickly gleam.

  The crowd slowly settled down.

  “All of you here . . .”

  Denton stopped, cleared his throat, and continued.

  “Nearly all of you here have begun down that most sacred path of advancing your life number, of gaining the maturity and wisdom through rebirth that you will need to succeed in this world.”

  Julian felt a hot flash of embarrassment bloom across his face. Did Denton just single him out? He slid into his seat, shrugging in an attempt to hide the One on his
neck.

  “For those of you who are sufficiently advanced in life number, I have an announcement today.” Denton turned a page in his notebook. “As of next month, those of you who have already achieved three lives now qualify for AP classes that carry early college credits. Those who qualify can . . .” Denton trailed off. He noticed an odd red drip falling on his notebook from the ceiling.

  He looked up. Everyone looked up.

  Standing on top of the scoreboard that hung over the center of the gym was . . . Amit? He was wearing a white straitjacket with two armholes cut into it, his arms jutting out of it like he had burst from his confines. He was holding a pile of white cloth. He looked pale and unsteady, a tourniquet wrapped tightly below his elbow. He let go of the cloth, which unfurled into a massive banner, covering the scoreboard.

  It read: “Escape the Asylum! Embrace the Absurd!” written in smeared red blood.

  Amit yelled, “Attention! This banner has been written in my blood!”

  The crowd was silent, confused. There was a squelch from the microphone as Denton leaned over the podium to peer up.

  “And your leave of absence has been signed in my blood!”

  Just then, all the Burners stood and held up red pens and pieces of paper—leave of absence forms. Oh god, Julian realized, the red pens . . .

  Amit’s blood.

  “Tomorrow!” Amit yelled. “I declare it Burners’ Day!”

  Amit tore the tourniquet off his arm. It released a few sickly pent-up spurts of blood from a black cut deep in his artery. The blood dripped down onto the podium in globs. Denton stumbled clumsily out of the way, barely dodging a splattering.

  Exclamations rippled through the crowd.

  As the blood from his arm quickly slowed to a trickle—was he expecting it to jet out theatrically?—the color drained from Amit’s face, his eyes rolled back into his head, and he fell forward, plunging into the stage with a wet thwack.

  For a moment, the room was silent.