by Nancy Kress
“’Cause I’m not on the show and you are,” Kaylie said. She threw a red sweater onto the floor and stomped into the bathroom, slamming the door.
“Kaylie, you can wear mine!” Amy called.
“Like we’re the same size,” Kaylie yelled. The shower started.
It was true. Kaylie was taller and bustier. Amy picked up the sweater, folded it, and laid it on the bed.
She didn’t want to be here. But unless she stayed at the hospital and watched Gran sleep for the next fourteen hours, there was nowhere else to be. Well, she could sleep, too. Once Kaylie was out of the bathroom Amy would take a shower, crawl into bed, and slide into welcome oblivion.
A knock on the door. Waverly stood there, even her hair clean and shining. Amy smiled. “You look great. All recovered from the tunnel? I want to thank you again for everything you did for—”
“I came to ask about the alliance,” Waverly said, unsmiling. Her voice was cool. “I helped you, as you just pointed out. So the next time we’re in a scenario, teamed or not, can I count on your help? Instead of you giving it to Violet or Rafe?”
Amy stared at her. “Was it just tit for tat, then? You only helped save my grandmother’s life because you expected something in return?”
“I asked you a question,” Waverly said. “I’d like an answer.”
It was incredible. Waverly acted as if Amy had never seen her cry, never seen her panic, never heard her choked longing for her own grandmother (“My grandmother was the only person in my entire family who was ever kind to me”). As if this was strictly a business deal.
Amy said, “I promised Violet and Rafe—”
“Who were no help to you in a crisis. Yes or no on your first loyalty, Amy?”
“I can’t!”
Waverly’s face didn’t change. Quietly she closed the bedroom door.
Amy stood listening, but the thick hallway carpet muffled Waverly’s footsteps. Misery swamped Amy. She couldn’t break her promise to Violet—but didn’t she owe Waverly, too? Why did Waverly have to make it seem so cold, such an impersonal deal? And then came a thought that Amy really didn’t like. If Waverly had been as warm and all-girlfriend as Violet was—as Violet used to be—would Amy have answered her differently?
Bleakly Amy wondered if she’d ever understood anybody. Including herself.
* * *
The next morning, after a long and refreshing sleep, Amy took a cab to the hospital. When she left, Kaylie had not been in her bed and none of the Lab Rats was around, but the restaurant, lobby, and bellman’s stand were thronged with focused-looking people in business attire, absorbed in intense discussions. No one paid her the least attention.
She expected to find Gran in the ICU, but the nursing desk told her that Mrs. Whitcomb had been moved to a geriatric ward; the ICU was now filled with victims of a commuter-plane crash just after midnight. Gran, to Amy’s further surprise, was not lying in bed but sitting up in a deep plastic chair of hideous orange, watching TV.
“Gran!”
A newscaster said “—brought under control due to quick and efficient response by municipal police, although in Atlanta and Detroit—”
“How do you feel? Are you OK?”
“—a pointed harbinger of civil unrest due to—”
“Good morning, Amy. Let me just hear the rest of this.”
“—major legislative initiative. Tonight the president will address the nation on—”
Amy waited impatiently. When the newscast switched to the plane crash, Gran muted it and turned a bright face to Amy. “It’s going to be all right. Remember when I told you this was a flash point? It’s galvanized those idiots in Washington and they’re going to pass the Emergency Economic Restructure Act. This is radical, Amy, and in time it will—”
“I don’t care,” Amy said, more harshly than she’d ever spoken to Gran before. “How are you?”
“You should care about this legislation.” Although her face looked drawn and weary, Gran’s blue eyes sparkled. “This is going to save the country. With any luck, anyway. Do you realize how close we were to going up in flames? Yes, of course you do—you almost did. Amy, you were wonderful yesterday. You and Rafe and Waverly. Thank you.”
“The important thing is that you’re all right!”
“Well, I’m a tough old bird, as I heard someone say yesterday. Come here.”
Amy crouched beside the orange chair. Gran put a rope-veined hand on her shoulder. “Listen to me, Amy. I’ve rallied this time, but there will be more like yesterday. Not brought on by a desperate escape from fire, I hope, but just because it’s nearly my time. But I had a long talk with a doctor before you got here. My end will almost certainly come like yesterday, a simple stopping of my heart. It won’t hurt and I might not even know when it happens. I’m lucky in that such a death is easy, love. I won’t say that I’m not nervous about it, but . . . well, I don’t want you to get all emotional before it even happens. I want that today you go to your job and carry on with your life.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No!”
“Well, I can’t force you, Amy, but I plan on spending the entire day watching news, witnessing what I think is going to be a genuine turnaround for this country. Do you know what the pundits are calling the legislation? The ‘Raise-Up-Everybody Act’—isn’t that wonderful? This is a historical moment. I want to learn everything about it, so don’t talk to me while the analysts are on.”
The analysts were on endlessly. Gran watched news: devoured it, Amy thought, which was more than she did to the lunch a nurse brought on a tray. Of course, Amy was glad that things were going to get better, if they were (TIMES BE TOUGH MAN), but why did Gran need to hear it analyzed and debated and dissected and discussed and disagreed with and predicted and disbelieved and ardently believed and doubted and prayed for and illustrated with charts, graphs, numbers?
While Gran watched, Amy checked her cell. Strange that no one had called her. She found that the phone was dead. The charger had burned with the Fairwood Hotel, along with the computer TLN had provided her. She sighed and tried to concentrate on the news analysts.
Only once was Amy’s attention fully engaged. A talking head said something about the president’s speech being followed by political analyses tonight and by quickly prepared shows about the local protests tomorrow. “Including, strangely enough, one by Taunton Life Network as part of its schlocky teen show Who Knows People, Baby—You?”
The second talking head shuddered. “That’s one I can skip.”
“I agree. But at the same hour on CBS—”
Gran looked at Amy. “You know about this?”
“No!”
“Well, maybe you should find out more. Go on, honey, call TLN. Better yet, go to work and stop fidgeting here. You’re distracting me.”
Amy kissed the top of Gran’s head—tough old bird didn’t even begin to describe her—and escaped the ten-millionth analysis of a speech the president hadn’t even made yet.
Back at the hotel, Jillian accosted her. “I wish you’d told me you wanted to go to the hospital!” Jillian’s ponytail bobbed aggressively.
“I’m sorry,” Amy lied. “But my phone is dead and the charger went in the fire.”
“Oh. We’ll get you a new phone. Right now everybody else is at a day spa. TLN’s treat. You could have gone, too. Anyway, a van will pick you all up at seven thirty a.m. tomorrow, so be ready. Wear jeans.”
“Okay. Jillian, what about this special report on the show about the hotel fire?”
Jillian’s voice turned guarded. “What about it?”
“Well, what will it be? How will it fit with any of the scenarios we shot? I don’t get it.”
“I don’t know any more than you do. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”
A phantom sprang into Amy’s mind: a beach ball rolling down a steep slope. Now, what the hell did that mean?
She had no idea.
* * *
The president’s speech was exactly what the entire day of newscasts had said it would be. The Lab Rats all piled into Cai’s room to watch it, but only Rafe gave the speech his whole attention. The rest watched intermittently. No one had any information on the “special edition” of the show promised for the next night, although everyone had speculations. Amy, sitting on the floor in front of the TV, tried not to look at the pair of Kaylie’s panties under Cai’s bed.
When the speech was over, Rafe said, “Perfect. It’ll work. Despite all the yelling from special interests.”
Violet said, “Thank you, Mr. Analyst. Now if you watch all the follow-up talk, you watch it alone. The rest of you, come with me. I found something terrific. Rafe isn’t the only one who explores his environment.”
Rafe glanced from the screen. “Violet, I told you this room—all our rooms—is probably bugged.”
“Which is why we’re not staying in this room. Come on!”
To Amy, Violet’s voice sounded unpleasantly shrill, but if anyone else noticed, they didn’t say anything. All six of them followed her to wherever she was taking them.
Twenty-seven
FRIDAY
IN THE ELEVATOR Violet took a plastic key-card from her bra and stuck it into a slot above the elevator buttons.
“For VIPs only. Which I just promoted us to being.”
Cai said, “How did you get that?”
“I have my ways. . . .”
“I’ll just bet,” Waverly muttered. Violet ignored her.
Because the elevator ascended, Amy expected another roof terrace like the one Rafe had taken her to on top of the Fairwood Hotel. She was both right and wrong. This was a roof terrace, but not like the other. There was a whole other hotel up here. The long, flat roof of the three-story building held an outdoor restaurant at one end, an indoor club and spa at the other, and in between a garden with fantastic landscaping: topiaries shaped like rabbits or sprays of water, flowers so perfect they looked unreal, a small stream with tiny arched bridges and a waterfall splashing over varicolored rocks. The dusk smelled of blooms, of spices, of living water. Faint music drifted from the glass doors of the club. The whole was enclosed by an eight-foot-high concrete wall so that none of it was visible from below, but all was open to the sky.
Violet said, “Your ordinary business guests use the restaurant and bar on the ground floor. This is for security-vetted superguests only, so that everybody important doesn’t have to fear being assassinated.”
Cai said, “Let’s go back down. I don’t have any money.”
Waverly said, “I got the tab.” She gazed around with a distinct pout. Amy thought, She’s upset that she wasn’t automatically given a card to this.
Rafe said, “I’m no gardener but I don’t think those flowers are in bloom yet naturally. They’ve been forced indoors and transplanted here. This one garden must take a huge amount of labor.”
“Who cares,” Kaylie said. “Let’s see what that club is all about.”
Violet said, “Except that this isn’t where we’re going.”
They gaped at her. Rafe got it first. “Bugged. Security here will be higher than anyplace else in the hotel.”
“Besides, we’re underage,” Violet said. “Just follow me.”
She led them through the twilight toward the waterfall. The night had turned chilly, and no one else walked the garden. The pretty stream spouted from the top of an artificial hill covered with moss and ivy. It cascaded over rocks placed to produce maximum splashing, and then wound between flowerbeds. Violet ducked around the side of the hill and pulled aside a heavy swath of hanging ivy. Amy took a leaf between her fingers. It was plastic, but such a close match to the real ivy on the front of the hill that you had to touch it to tell.
Behind the ivy was a narrow door. Violet slipped in her keycard, pulled the door open, and flipped a switch. Light spilled out. “Hurry!”
The space under the hill was about ten feet square, sloping as the hill sloped, and littered with burlap bags that smelled earthy. Rakes, mops, buckets, trowels, and hoses hung on the walls, plus all sorts of things Amy couldn’t identify. Above them, the stream babbled and ran. Low light plus the odors of loam, fertilizer, and water made it seem like a primitive cave beneath a river.
“A maintenance room,” Rafe said. “You got that keycard from somebody on the maintenance staff.”
“Natch,” Violet said. “But that’s not the best part. Ta-da!” She reached behind a pile of sacks and produced a bottle. “The very best third-rate Scotch.”
“Ugh,” Waverly said. “Not for me, thanks.” She moved toward the door, fastidiously twitching her skirt away from the burlap sacks.
Amy had been going to say the same thing, although more politely, but something in Waverly’s prissy, superior manner suddenly rankled. Just because Waverly came from money, why did that entitle her to think she was so much better than the rest of them? It wasn’t like she’d earned the money by being brilliant or successful or anything. She’d just inherited it, or at least she would someday. All the humanity that Waverly had shown in the tunnel was gone again.
“I’ll have some,” Amy said defiantly to Violet. “Have you got glasses?”
“Of course.” Violet produced a stack of plastic cups. To Waverly she said, “At least promise you won’t sound the general alarm on us.”
“Of course not,” she said loftily, made a moue of disgust at the bags of soil, and slipped out the door.
Cai looked uncomfortable. “Tommy shouldn’t drink, his doctor said so. I’ll take him to his room.”
“Are you coming back?” Kaylie demanded.
“I don’t think so. I’ll just . . . just wait for you downstairs.”
Kaylie scowled. Cai and Tommy followed Waverly.
“Anybody else chickening out?” Violet said. “Rafe, you intimidated by being the only guy with this harem?”
“I’m fascinated,” Rafe said. “Bring it on.”
“Good boy.”
Amy, Violet, Kaylie, and Rafe settled themselves onto bags of soil, which were surprisingly comfortable once Amy had wiggled her butt into an indentation. She could feel tension in every muscle of her body, over everything: Gran, the fire, the riots, the president’s speech, Cai, money, her entire life. Anything that could ease her knotted neck, shoulders, brain seemed all at once infinitely desirable. When she’d worked in the restaurant kitchen, there had been a lot of drinking and drugs. Amy had steered clear of the drugs but once in a while had shared cheap wine with coworkers. It had relaxed her.
But not like this. The Scotch, which Violet poured halfway up the plastic cups, didn’t really taste good. However, after just a few long sips she felt her body begin to loosen and her head to feel pleasantly light. She sipped more.
Rafe and Violet were arguing about the coming legislation to improve the economy. “You can’t uncollapse the Collapse,” Violet said. “We’re permanently screwed.”
Rafe said, “The legislation won’t uncollapse anything. It will take the economy in an entirely new direction that—”
“I don’t care,” Kaylie said loudly. “Fuck the economy!”
“I think we already did that,” Rafe said.
Kaylie turned on him. “You’re always so smart! Pretending you know everything and are so much better than the rest of us. You’re just like Waverly!”
“Ouch,” Rafe said.
Amy said, “Waverly has unexpected depths.” She was surprised that her words came out slightly wrong, although they were the words she’d intended. “She helped me with Gran. And with you, Rafe.”
“For which I will be eternally grateful. But I think that was you. If Waverly had been alone when she saw me unconscious, she’d have left me in that stairwell.”
Amy tried to decide if this might be true. Her brain seemed slow. She drank more Scotch, which didn’t taste so bad now.
Kaylie said suddenly, “Cai is such a wimp!”
Violet purred, “But so
gorgeous.”
“He’s always afraid of getting in trouble, breaking the rules, doing anything fun!”
Violet said, “And you like the bad boys.”
“I’m only with him because—” Kaylie stopped and peered fuzzily at Amy.
Amy said, “You’re only with him because you want to be close to the show, in case Myra somehow puts you in it.”
“She might! I’d be interesting to watch!”
“I know,” Amy said. “But you’re fifteen, not legally an adult. And . . . and give me that glass. Gran wouldn’t want you to be here, I shouldn’t have let—”
“You don’t ‘let’ me do anything—I make my own decisions! Saint Amy. You and Cai belong together. And . . . you know what? You can have him. I’m breaking up with that wimp.”
Amy’s heart behaved oddly: First it rose up in her chest, then it did a slow somersault, then it landed with a thud. “Bad dismount,” she said.
“What?” Violet said.
“Nothing.” What had she said? Nothing made sense, especially not Kaylie dumping Cai. If she really was going to.
Amy said, “You’ll change your mind.”
“Watch me. And you know what—this little party is stupid and lame. I’m leaving.” She rose, staggered to the door, and fell. Rafe caught her and set her steadily on her feet. Kaylie twisted in his arms and kissed him deeply and long.
“Uh-oh,” Violet said.
Amy felt something else happen in her chest, but she didn’t know what. Kaylie was kissing Rafe. He wasn’t protesting. Kaylie shouldn’t kiss Rafe. Kaylie—
Rafe pushed her gently away. “You’re so pretty, Kaylie. And that felt terrific. But you’re not the one I want.”
Kaylie let out a cry of frustration, yanked open the door, and slammed it behind her.
Violet said, “And then there were three. Amy, your sister has real issues, she does.”
“I have to go after her,” Amy said. “She won’t—” Won’t what? Won’t break up with Cai, like she promised? No, it wasn’t that. . . . Amy’s head felt even more floaty than before.