by Julia Karr
“But I don’t understand. Why don’t the police arrest guys who try to force themselves on girls?”
“That, Deeds, I don’t have an answer to.” I really didn’t. I thought it tied back into when the Fems were around, that all of this was about power, not about sex. But I didn’t know how to explain that to myself, let alone to Dee.
We were interrupted by a tap at the door. Wei stuck her head in. “What are you guys up to? Mom wants you to come up for dinner if–– What’s going on? Did I come at a bad time?”
“Two guys tried to force Nina to have sex,” Dee said.
“Wait, what?” Wei asked.
“Dee, why don’t you go tell Mrs. Jenkins we’ll come up for dinner. I’ll fill Wei in.”
“No, I should stay with you,” Dee said.
“No, you shouldn’t.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “They didn’t do anything. I. Am. Fine.” I stared her down. “Go.”
As soon as the door closed behind Dee, Wei said, “Are you really all right?”
“Oh, Wei, I thought they were going to kill me. One guy had a switchblade.” I proceeded to tell her the whole story. How Gordo had kissed me and stuck his hand under my sweater. How disgusting it was. And how scared I’d been. I started shaking just recounting the details to her.
She threw her arms around me and held me close. We sat that way for several minutes, until the trembling stopped.
“I can’t let Dee see how much this got to me,” I said. “I’ve got to be strong.”
“Let’s go upstairs,” Wei said. “Maybe getting your mind off of it for a while will help. I’m so glad they didn’t hurt you. Well, not any worse than that cut and some bruises.”
We were halfway upstairs when there was a knock on the door. It took both of us by surprise: not many unexpected visitors came by the Jenkinses’. Wei shot me a look and went back down to answer it.
“May I help you?”
“Yes. I’m Angelo Fassbinder. I’m looking for Nina Oberon.”
Skivs! Mr. Lessig’s assistant. “I’m right here.” I walked slowly down the stairs. Despite Lessig’s friendly manner at Paulette’s party, I knew I couldn’t trust him, not with the way he’d linked Ginnie to the FeLS scandal. I glanced at Wei. “Would you let Dee know I’ll be right up.”
Wei didn’t look any too happy about leaving me with Angelo, but what was he going to do here in the Jenkinses’ house? I ushered him into our apartment.
He scanned the furnishings. “Nice.” His upper lip curled. “Retirement and survivor benefits must pay better than I thought.”
“These belong to the Jenkinses.” I crammed my attitude down, waiting to hear what he wanted. At least focusing on this meant I wasn’t thinking about those two creeps.
“Ah, yes. Jonathan Jenkins does quite well as senior investigative correspondent. How fortunate for you that his family has taken pity on you.”
Because of Gran’s warning, I didn’t say the first thing on my mind—about how the Jenkinses were old family friends, and that’s what friends do. Besides, Fassbinder probably already knew everything about me. It’s not like Lessig couldn’t find out anything he wanted. “Would you like to sit down?”
“No. This will be brief.” He pulled out what looked like a tiny LED flashlight and zapped it around the room. “Interesting.” He replaced it. “Now, Mr. Lessig has a proposition for you regarding your grandfather.”
I took a step toward him. Maybe, just maybe, Lessig was still going to help me. Maybe Gran had been wrong. Maybe the odd feeling I had about him was wrong . . . Fassbinder curled his fingers into his palm and shined the nails with his thumb. He fanned out his hand, admiring his manicure, or whatever.
I was losing patience. “Yes?” I prompted.
“Mr. Lessig is a very powerful man.” He continued preening. “He can make or break people depending on how he tells a story. Just look at the sad truth about your mother.”
“That was a lie,” I said. “My mother didn’t have anything to do with FeLS.”
“Really? That’s not what the B.O.S.S. agents said. Are you sure there were no porn vids found after your mother’s death?”
I glared at him. He knew there were, and he knew they weren’t Ginnie’s.
“See? The truth always comes out. In any way that Mr. Lessig tells it.” A slow smile spread across his face. He was enjoying himself. “So, Miss Oberon. You would like your grandfather free?”
“Of course,” I said.
“Well, Mr. Lessig would be glad to deliver him—for a price.”
“A price?” My heartbeat quickened. “I don’t have many credits, but I have a job.”
He snorted. “Credits? As if Mr. Lessig needs more credits. He’s one of the richest men on Earth.”
“Then what does he want?” I was getting tired of playing games.
“Information, Miss Oberon. Information can buy anything.”
“What kind of information could I possibly have that Mr. Lessig would want? I’m sixteen. I go to school. I work part-time as a tier-two clerk.”
“Oh, you so underestimate yourself. You’re the daughter of the founder of the Resistance; you live in the home of a very wealthy Media employee. And your mother was a NonCon.”
I sucked in my breath. Prickles raced up my spine. Careful, I thought. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” No matter what he knew, I couldn’t let on that I knew anything. “My father died the day I was born. Surely you’re aware of that. And my mother was a tier-two cashier in a cafeteria. She was not a NonCon. The only thing you got right is that I’m living with the Jenkinses, and Mr. Jenkins works for Media.”
Fassbinder sighed. “I told Kasimir you’d be difficult.” He drew near to me. “You want your grandfather. Mr. Lessig wants information about Jonathan Jenkins. There have been suggestions made that Mr. Jenkins is a Resistance sympathizer. Especially after he took in the daughter of their founder.” He gave me the once-over. “Lessig gets the information, your grandfather lives. You refuse, your grandfather dies. Simple enough even for a low-tier sex-teen like you to understand, isn’t it?”
I jammed my fists in my pockets to keep from using them on Angelo Fassbinder’s face.
“I won’t spy on my friends,” I said.
“Really?” He took out his PAV, punched in some numbers, and threw a projection on the wall. “Bring him out,” he said to the projection.
I stared at the screen. At first it was just an empty room. A man entered pushing an older man in a transchair. The man in the chair had tubes running into his arms; his head was lolled over.
“Show me his face,” Fassbinder said.
The man pushing the chair grabbed the older man’s head by his hair and pulled him up so I could see his face.
“Pops! No!” I clapped my hand over my mouth, stifling a scream.
“Please”—Fassbinder rubbed his ear—“it’s not like he can hear you.” He turned off the projection. “Your grandfather is in reassimilation stage one-oh-one. Mr. Lessig has the power to stop the process. But you seem to think the cost too dear. Too bad for your ‘pops.’”
“I didn’t say that,” I said. The tears welled up inside me. I couldn’t make this choice. “I need time to think.”
“Maybe you should learn to think on your feet. But as I told Kasimir, in all fairness—and you can thank me for this later—you should have twenty-four hours to give him an answer. It’s classic film noir, isn’t it? Always give the poor sap time to squirm.” He tucked his PAV back in his pocket. “I’ll be in touch. Twenty. Four. Hours. Six p.m. tomorrow.” Straightening his jacket, he said, “Oh, I nearly forgot. If anything out of the ordinary happens—if the Jenkinses should happen suddenly to disappear, or if anything else suspicious happens—your grandfather’s a dead man. I’ll show myself out.”
I crumpled to the floor. What was I going to do? The Jenkinses had taken in Dee and me without hesitation. They’d treated us like family—they were family, practically all I had. Burying my f
ace in my hands, all I could see was Pops’s limp form.
I couldn’t betray them—could I?
I don’t know how long I sat there, staring at the carpet. A rap on the door brought me back to reality.
Chris peeked in. “Your company gone?”
Before I could get a word out, a tear trickled down my face. Then another.
Chris came in and sat on the floor next to me. “This doesn’t look good. You want me to get Wei or Mom?”
I shook my head.
“Who was that guy?”
“Kasimir Lessig’s assistant.” I could barely get the words out.
“About your grandfather?”
That did it. I burst into tears. Chris took me in his arms, rocking me until I was cried out. I stayed there, my head against his chest, listening to the rise and fall of his breath, the beating of his heart.
“How can I help?” he asked softly, his arms holding me tight.
I turned my face to him, and the next thing I knew, my arms were around his neck and I was kissing him. And he was kissing me. Warmth seeped into me, and I felt myself floating somewhere outside of my head, in an ether that both surrounded and filled me with a sense of infinity and awe. Losing all sense of where I was, the unknown teemed with goodness and truth. I wanted to stay wherever I was forever. But reality intruded.
“Hey! You guys down there?” Wei called.
“Yeah.” Chris stood and helped me up. “We’ll be right there.”
At the door, he leaned down and whispered, “I’ll do anything to help you, Nina. Anything. Look, I know that you and Sal . . . Dammit, Nina. Do I have a chance with you?” I started to speak, but he put his finger on my lips. “Don’t answer yet. Let me think I do for at least a little while longer.”
***
After dinner, I got Wei alone in her room. Ignoring the major guilt I felt about kissing her brother while I was supposed to be in love with one of her best friends—who hadn’t contacted me in days—I figured life and death were more important than love. If I looked too closely, that seemed to be the story of my family’s life.
I took a deep breath, praying I wasn’t signing Pops’s death warrant. Several minutes later, I finished with, “That’s it. There is no way in hell I will betray you and your family.”
“Damn.” Wei stared at me for a good minute, before saying, “Did you tell Chris?”
“No, I wanted to tell you first. And, Wei, Brie called me earlier. She and Dorrie and Mag got the whole rescue plotted out for Joan. It’s set for Tuesday. But what are we going to do?” It was hard enough not to tell the Jenkinses about the rescue, and now this so-called deal from Lessig was making everything so much worse. “Pops—I can’t let him die. And I can’t give Lessig information about your dad. What do I do?”
“Correction. What do we do? It’s time for a meeting. A family meeting.”
“What about Dee? I can’t put her in danger.”
“Okay.” Wei pondered for a moment. “Not Dee. Let me get Mom up here. We need to tell her everything—even about Joan. Dad will go along with whatever she says.”
“And Chris?” I was already worked up, so any blushing went unnoticed.
“He’ll make his own decision. I’ll go get Mom.”
I hoped she was right. I’d already lost so much of my family. I couldn’t afford to lose them all, too.
***
“Nina, I respect your decision,” Mrs. Jenkins said. “A hard one to make, but I believe it is the right one.”
“Thank you.”
“I’ll get ahold of the Sisterhood about the change in plans for tomorrow,” Wei said. “Don’t worry, it will work out.”
I tracked down Dee in the kitchen, helping Chris clean up. I glanced at the cook center clock. It was nine. There was something about nine o’clock on Sunday. Skivs! The interruption with my drawings! With everything that had happened, I’d almost forgotten.
“Do you ever watch Vacation Destinations of the Ultra-Riche?” I asked.
“I’ve been known to.” Chris smiled. “You planning on becoming ultra-rich? ’Cause you just had your Holiday vacation.”
“May I turn it on?” I asked.
“Sure. Something special going on?”
“Actually—yes.”
Wei came downstairs. “Mom’s having that conversation,” she said when everyone’s attention was on the FAV.
The wheels were in motion, and I was powerless to stop them. Might as well enjoy my artistic triumph. It could be the only one I’d ever have.
“You guys all watch this with me,” I said.
Dee, Chris, Wei, and I sat around the kitchen table watching as top-tier families traveled to the week’s themed resorts. This Sunday was tropical fantasy islands. Right in the middle of a mid-twentieth-century Hawaiian luau, the picture flickered. The next image was the first of my homeless series, with music I’d never heard before backing it.
“Nina!” Dee grabbed my arm. “Those are your pictures!”
“I know.”
Chris leaned over and whispered quietly in my ear. “You keep amazing me,” he said. “Like no one else.”
As we watched my sketches broadcast on the FAV, with the haunting music Dorrie’d chosen behind them, I wondered how amazed he’d be if he knew what I was planning.
XXXVIII
First day back to school after Holiday, and Mr. Haldewick gave us a pop quiz. I glanced over at Wei, who was doodling with her rapido, already done with the test. Up the aisle, Mr. H scrutinized the class, most of whom were bent over their desks, writing furiously. Like Wei, I was finished, and . . . my life as I knew it was about to be finished. The meeting the night before hadn’t gone like I thought it would. There were things I had to do that I wasn’t sure I could do. But Lessig had given me no choice. And lives were at stake.
Then there was the whole Chris thing. How could I have kissed him like that? I’d gotten so lost in his kisses that I hadn’t wanted to find my way out. The thought of his lips on mine made my cheeks burn and my insides tingle.
Sal wasn’t in school at all today. And I hadn’t heard from him in days. I fingered the half heart dangling from my necklace. We were in love. Weren’t we? I mean, I loved him. Didn’t I? Whether or not he loved me, I wasn’t sure anymore. I didn’t love that he thought I needed protecting. I did love how it felt when he held me. I didn’t love that he was gone all the time. I had no idea what we were anymore.
I wondered if that’s how Ginnie had felt when my dad “disappeared.” She’d had to go through years of having the world believe he was dead. Seeing him only at clandestine meetings in the park, when he could get away from whatever Resistance work he was doing. Then, when she got pregnant with Dee, she’d had to . . . Ugh, Ed. That was the beginning of Ed. And then my dad was out of her life forever.
Was that what I wanted? A boyfriend who came and went like a specter—someone who was never there when I needed him but who made me feel like he was everything when we were together?
I remembered, when I was little, crawling into bed with Mom because of some scary dream. As I was drifting back to sleep, I felt her sobbing.
“Mommy, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing, sweetie pie.” She stroked my hair. “Go back to sleep. I’m here. Everything is all right.”
Except everything had not been all right. My dad should have been there with her. To comfort her. To help. Could he have been? Should he have been? I’d never know. Maybe sometime I could ask him, but even he wouldn’t have the answers for what had gone on in Mom’s head and, more importantly, in her heart.
Matters of the heart were a whole lot harder to know.
An insistent tapping disturbed my concentration. Cutting my eyes down to the left, I saw Mr. Haldewick’s pointer rat-a-tat-tatting on the floor beside me. Then following it upward, I ended at his face, which was contorted into a frown.
“Are you going to submit your test answers or sit there wool-gathering for the remainder of the period, Miss Ob
eron?”
“Submitting now.” I pressed the holographic Send button hovering in the lower-right-hand corner of my desk.
“Thank you.” He pursed his lips and moved on to his next victim.
***
“You okay, Neens?” Mike shoveled a handful of fries in his mouth. “You seem kinda spacey.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Even though Mike was one of my closest friends, I couldn’t tell him what I was really thinking. “It’s just, you know. Everyone’s avoiding me, or staring at me. They probably all believe that broadcast.” Unrelenting melancholy hung over me like those rain clouds in cartoons.
“Well, we don’t,” he said. “And we’re the only people who count. Right, Der?”
“Yep,” Derek said. “I think you need some F-U-N. Riley and I are playing Saturday. Wei’s coming.” He glanced over at her. “Right?”
She smiled up at him, her fabulous, warm smile. “I wouldn’t miss it.”
I was afraid she would.
“Hey,” Derek said. “Did you catch that great vid interruption? I nearly missed it, but Riley called and said that these ultra drawings were being accompanied by some amazing ancient spirituals. It was über-ultra! I’ve never seen anything like it.”
I grabbed a fry and allowed myself a brief moment of pride. It would pass soon enough.
***
After school I headed straight to the Institute. Even though I knew he had an event later on, I had my fingers crossed that Martin would still be in his office. As luck would have it, he was.
After our conversation, I asked, “Will I need anything special to get my friend in?”
Martin handed me a token. “Give this to the guard. It’s a building pass. You won’t have any problem getting her in. As far as the rest, I’ve got it covered, don’t you know?” His hand lingered on mine. “Nina, you’re sure this is the right thing?”
“It’s the only thing,” I said. “I’m sure.”
“I hate to leave you,” he said. “But there’s an estate acquisition I have to oversee.”