Undertow

by Michael Buckley

  “Someone knows,” I tell him, “just not me.” It’s an answer I have to give him over and over again until I’m embarrassed with myself. My ignorance of the world around me makes me feel foolish. I am surrounded by stuff I use every single day, and I don’t have the faintest clue how any of it works. Streetlights, cars, bicycles, microwaves, the Internet—he wants to understand them all. I must look like the dumbest human on the planet.

  He’s interested in photographs. He points at the ancient ads for movies and TV shows we see on walls and bus stops. He is especially fascinated by pictures of people.

  “How is this made?” he asks.

  I cringe. “I don’t know, but I can do it for you.” I snap a picture of him with my phone and show him the results. He stares at it with growing wonder.

  “You captured me.”

  “It’s called taking a picture. You can do it too.” I hand him my phone and adjust his hand so his finger is on the button. Once he’s set, I lean in close.

  “What are you doing?” he says, slightly startled.

  “We’re going to take a picture of us,” I say. “It’s called a selfie. It’s what people who are in love with themselves do to keep themselves busy. You can’t really be an American teenager if you aren’t willing to take one of these a couple dozen times a day. Smile.”

  “Why?”

  He takes the picture. It’s a bit out of frame but not bad. He didn’t smile. In fact, he looks constipated, but it’s a nice pic. We look like we’re real friends. He stares at it for a long time as I watch a sadness come over him.

  “Fathom?”

  “For this I would be human,” he says.

  “It’s just a phone,” I say. “They’re obsolete after a year and they make you buy a new one.”

  “With this I could capture the faces of people I love,” he says, then gives it a shake. “It will not disappear?”

  “No, it’s digital. It’s forever unless you erase it.”

  “Forever,” he whispers. “My mother—”

  He stares at our picture while my heart crumbles under the weight of his tragedy. His mother is gone, and it dawns on me that he doesn’t have a single picture. What would I do if my mother died? If I could not look at her face every single day?

  “You are blessed, Lyric.”

  “I know,” I whisper, and for the first time in three years, I really feel it.

  Eventually the heat gets the best of me, so I drag him under a long-forgotten scaffolding by the old Shore Hotel. We sit on a stoop and I read to him. Today it’s Curious George; Amos & Boris; Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel; and Oh, the Places You’ll Go! And he listens, like a little boy listens. We sit close and he leans in, watching my finger move from word to word. The closer he gets, the more I squirm inside. Possibility is an aching addiction, and it won’t let me be.

  What if?

  Shut up, wild thing.

  You deny yourself too much.

  For good reason! Everything I want is dangerous. Every decision I make is a wrong one. Even these stupid feelings are just a self-destruct button in disguise. I cannot have this boy.

  The heart wants what the heart—

  Screw you. I’m going to stop this right now. “How long have you been with Arcade?” I ask.

  He sits up, startled to hear her name. “When I was five years old, her father and mine declared us selfsame.”

  “Selfsame?”

  “Meant for each other.”

  “Oh, and they knew this how?”

  “Royal tradition is for fathers to join their children into a promised future based on matching qualities,” he says.

  “So your father picked your . . . ?”

  “Mate. My future requires management.”

  There! He’s engaged. Totally off the market, has been since he was five. Naturally, it’s more crazy Alpha tradition, but what matters is it crushes any little daydream I might have had. The disappointment is sour but necessary, just another reason why a world where he and I could be together doesn’t exist, since fear of being killed by an angry mob was clearly not fazing me all that much.

  “Oh,” I say. “But you love her, so it all worked out. Right?”

  Please say yes. If you say no, then I’m not going to be strong enough to push you away. Just tell me you love her so I can tell you I’m happy for you, go home and have a good cry, and then wash my hands of all this.

  He looks into my face and nods. “I do.”

  Ouch. That hurt.

  “I’m happy for you.” I say. You lie.

  I feel pressure in my forehead and flashing lights in the corners of my eyes. A migraine is coming. I have to get out of this heat and away from this boy. Just as I lean over to collect the books, ten kids on bicycles race under the scaffolding and stop. I peer at them closely, wondering if any of them go to my school, but I don’t recognize their faces. All I need to see is their Niner shirts.

  “You two got any money?” the first boy shouts at me. He’s riding a low-rider bicycle, droopy jeans, and a face full of wickedness.

  “No,” I say. “I didn’t bring my purse.”

  His friends boo me.

  “I think she lying,” another shouts.

  “She definitely lying!”

  The first boy points his phone at us. He is making a video, something he can post on the Niner web page. They like to show off, and the million hits they get a month mean other people like it too. We’re their next stars.

  “Maybe you could go get some. Maybe we can come with you,” another one says. His face is shadowed beneath the brim of his hat, but I can still see his sharp eyes.

  “Move on,” Fathom says.

  They all turn their attention to him.

  “What are you going to do if we don’t, fool?”

  “My father is a policeman,” I say nervously.

  “Oh? Where he at?” another boy shouts, and the others roll with laughter like I just announced that my daddy can beat up their daddies.

  Fathom stands and pulls down his hood. “It would be smart of you to leave.”

  “Don’t talk to them, Fathom,” I say.

  “Fathom! Yo, he’s one of those fish heads,” one of the boys cries.

  The others hop off their bikes and let them fall. The smallest of the group steps forward and is handed a knife. It flashes like his eyes.

  “Make yourself famous,” says the one recording us on his phone. “Stick a mermaid and you’ll be the man.”

  The boy puffs out his chest, mustering the twisted courage the others expect of him, but he’s afraid. His heart isn’t in it.

  Shhhtikkt! The noise burns my ears. There’s a flash and the sound of the knife bouncing on the pavement and the smell of salty blood. The boy screams, looking down at his mangled hand. Fathom raises his arm to strike again.

  “Fathom, no!” I scream. He looks at me, confused, and the gangstas jump on him, punching and kicking and forcing him into the street. He takes a fist to the jaw and a kick in the ribs.

  I shout for help, and it comes in the form of soldiers. Bonnie is there, dragging the Niner kids off of the prince, subduing them with a hand-held Taser when they refuse to stop fighting. Others are pulled away and handcuffed. Police cars are everywhere, and cops rush around snatching smart phones out of the hands of anyone taping the event.

  My father arrives and leads me away from the shouting.

  “It wasn’t his fault.”

  “There’s no excuse for all this blood,” my father says.

  Chapter Nineteen

  My father has a long conversation with Doyle—a long, loud, profanity-filled conversation. He tells the principal he can shove my mother’s identification . . . well, we all know where you shove things. It ends with him slamming his phone on the table so hard, it cracks the screen.

  “He’s not going to take no for an answer,” I say.

  “He’s going to have to,” my father steams.

  As if on cue, my phone rings. It’s him. My f
ather reaches for my phone, but I pull it away.

  “You’re not breaking mine, too,” I say.

  “Let your father know that the problem solved itself,” Doyle says when I answer. “The prime has canceled the meetings. He doesn’t want you in the camp.”

  “I’ll try not to take it personally,” I say. “So, I’m done?”

  “You’ll continue when school opens.”

  I whisper a bit of my own profanity.

  “When does that happen?”

  “Two days. Don’t worry, Lyric. Things are going to be different when you come back. You’ll see. Everything is going according to plan.”

  They’ve moved the barricades even farther back from the school so that now you cannot get within four blocks of the building. Still, to get to the barricades, we have to push through the bellowing masses and their great cacophony of “WTF?” Being pushed so far from Hylan doesn’t sit well with Bachman. I’m sure it’s no fun to put on a show if your audience can’t hear you. This morning she hovers just inside the barricades, near her zealots but not close enough so that they could touch her. She can’t have that.

  While Irish Tommy searches Bex’s purse and drips sweat over all her things, the cops move everyone aside to make room for an armored van. The crowd pelts it with rocks and eggs and trash as it rolls into the safe zone.

  “Who’s that?” Bex asks.

  “It’s the principal,” Tommy says. “He had a little incident outside the school yesterday, so we’ve decided to up his security. He’s going to need even more after today.”

  “What’s happening today?” my dad asks.

  “Sorry, Leonard. That’s above your pay grade.”

  Shadow meets us just before we go in, and he gives Bex a kiss on the cheek.

  “So we’re announcing this is a thing?” I tease.

  “The poor boy,” she says. “He can’t help but love me.”

  He shrugs. He’s not denying it.

  There’s a new security checkpoint at the door. They’ve installed a full-body scanner that allows officers to see underneath our clothes. So. Much. Fun. Bex hops in and raises her arms over her head.

  “Get a good look, perverts!”

  Bonnie is at the door with some other soldiers, directing kids into the auditorium.

  “Forget homeroom, students. We’re having an assembly,” she says. I give her a questioning look, and she shrugs. “Just doing what I’m told.”

  We find three seats in the middle, where I can look out on the crowd. Our student body is half of what it was on the first day, and when the others notice, it seems to heighten their worries. Doyle has struck fear in even the hardest kids. They sink into their seats with their faces forward, not even whispering to their friends.

  I crane my neck in every direction, dreading when I’ll see Fathom but not being able to stop myself from looking. I’ve had three days to think about what I’ll say to him, and what I came up with wouldn’t fill a sentence. He hypnotizes me, but I’m also terrified at how easily violence finds him. I want to kiss his mouth and run away from him at the same time. It’s ridiculous and stupid. I’ve turned into a girl I would absolutely despise. I would mock me behind my back. Even my dreams have been stupid. I’m with him on the beach, cradled into the nook of his body, kissing and making promises, and then it’s a bloodbath where he’s cutting half of Coney Island in two and begging me to help him become more human. If my dreams were a movie, I would demand my money back. I would give it one star.

  And yet, when I cannot find his face, I panic. Did someone get the best of him on that beach? Was he killed while his family cheered? Did one of those gang kids hurt him and no one told me?

  I need to know, now. I stand, ready to dart off in search of Doyle. He’ll know, but suddenly someone plops down into the empty seat beside me. I look over and see that it’s Gabriel.

  “Hey,” I say. He’s blocking my path, so I ease back into my seat.

  “Haven’t heard from you in a while,” he says.

  Two days ago he started sending me texts again. All of them were HEY and WHAT’S UP and LET’S HANG. With only slightly less effort he wouldn’t have done anything at all, so I ignored them. Before the roof I would have been checking my phone every ten minutes in case I missed his texts, but now the longing for his attention is gone. I don’t really miss him. I don’t really think about him much at all. Maybe because I realized my bad-boy boyfriend was just a bad person.

  “I’ve been busy,” I say, continuing my search for Fathom. Where is he?

  Mr. Doyle enters the room and taps the microphone on the podium stand. He has a black eye and a bandage on his right elbow—trophies, I suppose, in his own game. I recall how he took my father’s punch and wonder who was so tough as to give him a beating. It couldn’t have been just one person.

  “Too busy for me?” Gabriel says. He’s angry and, it seems, hurt. I can’t believe it.

  “Since when has that mattered to you?” I whisper. “Wasn’t it you who wanted to be a part-timer?”

  “I might want to be full-time if you were nicer,” he says.

  I feel my hostility spark. He only wants me because I’m ignoring him.

  “Oh, I get it. I left you hot and bothered, so I’m not nice. Okay, Gabriel. I’m sorry I didn’t let you deflower me on a filthy rooftop. I guess I just think more of myself than you do of me.”

  Doyle is talking, trying to assure us that the school is safe and new security measures are in place, including metal detectors, bomb-sniffing dogs in the halls, and new procedures intended to secure the building. He also announces that in the spirit of compromise, Governor Bachman will be here several days a week to consult on security concerns. She stands up and asks to speak, but Doyle shakes her off. I swear I just saw her stamp her foot, but he holds his ground. Nothing he is saying is easing anyone’s mind. Most of the students look like they’re on the verge of a nervous breakdown, watching the exits for the next lunatic to come storming in with a weapon.

  Gabriel won’t stop his rant. “So now you shut me out completely?”

  “I have a lot going on.”

  “Or maybe it’s because you’re giving it up to someone else, or should I say something else?” he seethes. “Aren’t you afraid you’ll get one of its diseases?”

  I can’t help it. A stream of curse words sprays all over him. I unload every frustration and bad thought I have ever had about him, multiply them by a thousand, and top them with colorful metaphors and emasculating insults. To put a period on it, I pull back and smack him right in the face. I am my father’s daughter, and no amount of lectures about me keeping my head down will change what’s in my DNA.

  “Is there a problem?” Mr. Doyle says. I turn to find his eye, and every other, trained on me. I turn bright red, but I’m not embarrassed. I’m furious and I want everyone to see it.

  “No,” Gabriel says as he holds his raw cheek.

  When Doyle returns to his speech, Shadow leans forward. “Gabe, I’m going to tell you this once. You shut your mouth right now or I am going to knock you out.”

  “Bring it on, fatty,” Gabriel growls.

  Shadow stands, and the people around us “ooohhh” with anticipation.

  “Gabriel Bowen,” Doyle bellows.

  “What?” Gabriel snaps.

  “Come down here and join us in the front row,” Doyle says.

  “What? He started it,” he shouts, and points to Shadow.

  Doyle gestures to an empty seat, and Gabriel stalks down to sit in it.

  When Shadow sits down, Bex slips her hand into his. “I am crazy in love with you, Tito.”

  Shadow becomes a big, red, grinning idiot.

  “Mr. Doyle, I’d like to say something,” Mr. Ervin says. He stands and joins Doyle at the podium. The principal looks like he just dug out a bitter seed from between his teeth, but he lets Ervin talk. I’m positive he only allows it because it will make Bachman’s head explode. She crosses her arms and huffs. Hilarious.
>
  “Welcome back. It’s good to see you all safe and sound,” he starts. “People, I’m going to be completely honest with you. All the experts have suggested that what we need here is some sense of routine. I’ve been instructed to just move on like nothing happened. Well, I can’t do it, and I’m probably going to get fired for saying this, but routine is the last thing we need. We need a whopper of a change.

  “Almost two weeks ago a man came into these halls to hurt us. All of us. Not just the Alpha kids, but human kids too, teachers, staff—all of us. He wanted to hurt the whites and the blacks and the Asians and the Latinos. He didn’t care who you were or where you came from. He wanted you dead. One of our own let him in so he could try to stop the community we’re trying to build here. He wanted to kill us because he didn’t get his way. Luckily, he was stopped, but there are more just like him. Keeping them out is our job, and we blew it. The country, the state, the city—this school—they failed you. The cops and the soldiers failed you. The administration failed you. I failed you. And you failed yourself.”

  “You’re blaming the kids for what that man did?” Bachman cries.

  “Yes, I am, Governor. Oh, and I blame you, too.”

  “How dare you!” she cries.

  “You’re a miserable sideshow act, Governor. This ridiculous circus you lead drove that man over the edge. His blood is on your hands.”

  I look around to see how everyone is reacting to Ervin’s accusation. There are a couple of kids in the back scowling, but for the most part we’re all listening. Even Ghost and Luna are giving him their attention.

  “You’re insane,” Bachman shouts.

  Ervin laughs in her face. It’s a raw, mocking sound. I had no idea he could be sarcastic. I like him even more this way.

  “The Alpha are here, folks, and we have an opportunity that no other generation in the history of the world has ever had. We get to talk to a completely new species of person, with a culture that is thousands of years old. They have a language and art and science no human has ever witnessed. You are the envy of billions, and you all took a crap on it. What a waste.”