by Dan Rix
Amber tucked her hair behind her ear. “And you think I would disturb them?”
Aaron studied her green eyes, and it occurred to him that she might be the reason his heartbeat wasn’t slowing. “Never mind,” he said, and he grabbed his volleyball off the floor and collapsed onto his bed. “So what did you want to tell me?” He set the ball to the ceiling and caught it.
“It’s about Clive,” she said.
Of course. She was here to confess that Clive was her half. Suddenly, he didn’t want to hear it. “Look,” he muttered. “Whatever weird thing you have with Clive, you can keep it to yourself. I really don’t care.”
But he was a bad liar.
Amber’s eyebrows nudged upward. “You do care?”
“I said I didn’t.”
“You kept my phone number,” she observed.
“I was keeping it for Buff.”
“Uh-huh.” There was a teasing glint in her eyes, as if she now had a secret she could use against him. “Well, I wasn’t going to tell you about that anyway.”
“Then what?” said Aaron, frustrated she had gotten to him so easily. He set the next ball so it landed in her lap, and she jolted back in surprise. He smirked and sat up next to her. “Does he know you’re here?”
“I hope you don’t think I’m that stupid,” she said.
“No, but I think you’re trying to make him jealous.”
“Yeah, Aaron,” she said, rolling her eyes, “I drove all the way out here just to make him jealous.”
“Good plan,” he said. “Are you going to tell him you’re with me? Or do you want me to do it this time?”
“I didn’t tell him last time.”
“Then why is he paying me a visit this Friday and why is there a fat dent in my car?”
“Probably because you’re dumb and you keep taking his bait.” And without missing a beat, Amber surveyed him from head to toe, announced, “You’re not wearing green,” and pinched him on the waist.
He pinched her back. “Neither are you.”
She pointed to the flower in her hair. “What do you think this is?”
“Nope,” he said with a smirk, “It’s got to be clothing.” And he pinched her again.
She flung the ball at him, and he caught it. They gazed at each other struggling not to laugh, but for a moment too long. Aaron felt a tingle at his sternum, pressing down on his heart—before she blinked and looked away.
Then she spoke all at once. “I lied to you about Justin Gorski. The last person with him wasn’t Dominic . . . or Clive. It was Clive’s father.”
“Clive’s father?” said Aaron.
“He’s a doctor,” she said, “and they’re staying with Dominic’s family until they find something more permanent. All I know is Justin was supposed to have an appointment with him. When Justin and Dominic offered me a ride after school, they were on their way over to see him. That was the last time I saw him.”
“Aaron rolled the volleyball to the floor. “Why are you telling me this?” he said.
“Because I heard what happened to that girl at your school, and because . . . ” she trailed off.
“Because what?” said Aaron.
Amber brought her legs onto his bed, brushing his arm with her knee. She sat cross-legged and faced him. Straight on, he noticed her eyes were layered, like gold dust sparkling at the bottom of a stream. “You aren’t looking forward to your birthday either,” she said.
“You remembered?” he said.
She held his gaze. “You’re different.”
“Yeah. You could say that.”
“Did you know her?” she said. “That girl?”
Aaron nodded, and he realized how tense his own body was, how his muscles felt taut—because of how close Amber was. “I saw it happen.”
In a quiet voice, almost a whisper, she said, “What was it like?”
“It was like a hand tugging at something inside her,” he said, remembering the unnatural recoil of Emma’s body. “She was tense for a few seconds, and then she just went slack. Like it finally ripped out.”
“You know, it’s getting worse,” said Amber. “Every generation.”
“You mean half death?”
“People were fine living without their halves for millions of years,” she said. “Like that old woman on the news. Her half probably died ages ago and she didn’t even feel it.” Amber pulled her legs up to her chest. “It wasn’t even until the second generation that people started dying of half death . . . our grandparents’ generation. And back then it took years. Now it’s only a few days.”
“I know. Soon you won’t be able to take a piss without holding Clive’s hand.”
Amber arched her lip in disgust. “Eww, Aaron . . . Why am I even talking to you?”
“Not appropriate?”
“What I meant is I think it’s doing something to our genetics.”
“Like what?”
“Like we’re inbreeding.”
“I get the feeling you know a lot more about this stuff than . . . most people.”
Amber didn’t respond. She rested her chin on her knee and continued to watch him.
“Why did Justin have an appointment with Clive’s dad?” he added, forced to fill in the silence himself.
“Clive and Justin got in a fight,” she said, “and Justin had these chronic headaches afterward. He was threatening to sue, so Clive’s father offered to treat him so he’d keep his mouth shut.”
“Justin made a pass at you, didn’t he?”
Her eyes flashed a warning. “Don’t act like you know my life.”
“Fine. So the vial Clive brought to the beach . . . That stuff came out of Justin?”
“I don’t know, but Clive didn’t have it the day before.”
“There was something written on the side of the vial, some kind of code,” said Aaron. “You remember what it was?”
Amber shot him a glare. “Yeah, Aaron, I have photographic memory.”
“It was four letters,” said Aaron. “I’m not asking you to memorize the bible.”
Amber was about to snap out another retort when her eyes brightened. “Hold on,” she said, reaching into her pocket. “I think Clive took a picture on my phone.” She flipped through her photos then showed one to Aaron.
They stared at the photo on her cell phone screen together. The vial, just as Aaron remembered, now with an ID code clearly silhouetted against the fluid.
JGEM130301
“The numbers are a date,” said Aaron, “March 1st.”
“No duh,” said Amber, “I can read too. That’s the day Justin disappeared. The letters are initials.”
Aaron nodded, feeling a wave of chills. “Justin Gorski and Emma Mist.”
They both fell silent. Slowly, Aaron released his breath and cupped his face in his hands. Amber quietly returned the cell phone to her pocket, and by an unspoken agreement, they didn’t bring it up again. There was nothing else they could do.
Amber broke the silence first. “Why are you scared of meeting your half?”
“Because I don’t want to spend my life with a stranger,” he said.
“You know the first second you see her, you’re going to change your mind,” she said. “You don’t need clairvoyance to love someone.”
“I know, but it’s supposed to be more than that with your half.”
“It’s not,” she said. “The high wears off after a few months. Then you’re just two ordinary people faking it like the rest of the adults.”
“At least it’s better than it was before.”
“You mean pre-discovery? Clearly you haven’t seen the bad ones.”
“What bad ones?”
“Like my parents. They’re rotten and they hate each other’s guts. Just because they’re joined at the hip doesn’t make them saints . . . They actually bring out the worst in each other.” Amber swiveled away from him again. “And that’s what I get to look forward to.” A few strands of her hair came loose and dang
led in front of her eyes.
Aaron resisted the urge to brush them back. “Is that because you’re Clive’s half?” he said, dreading the answer.
She bit her lip and edged away from him, and a single teardrop teetered on her eyelid. Aaron recognized right then what he should have seen from the beginning. The redness of her cheeks. Amber had been crying before she came to his house.
“I’m sorry—” he began.
“I have to go,” she said, and without a glance backward, she fled for the door.
“You don’t have to,” he blurted out, halting her in the doorway and immediately regretting it. “I mean—you’re allowed to stay.”
“Oh, really?” she said, “Actually, Aaron, what I’m allowed to do isn’t up to you.” Then she gave him one last look that set his skin on fire and vanished into the hallway. A few seconds later, he heard the front door close.
Aaron grabbed his volleyball again and lay on his bed, loathing the pounding in his chest. He tried to set the ball to the ceiling, but it struck the shelf above him and dislodged a T-ball trophy, which fell on his face.
Aaron sat up and rubbed the cut on his forehead. Clearly, he had to stay away from her. He couldn’t afford to fall for her, not with his birthday in two weeks.
To clear his mind of Amber’s green eyes, he thought about the vial instead, and the question neither one of them had dared voice: what in God’s name was Justin and Emma’s clairvoyance doing inside a vial?
***
Health class wrapped up on Friday afternoon with a video on half disorders. Still preoccupied with the vial, Aaron didn’t bother watching. He already knew his disorder wouldn’t be covered.
But the next section drew his attention back to the screen for a different reason: “Premature Contact.”
“You meet your half at age eighteen for a reason,” said the narrator in his British accent, while a cheesy movie played in the background of new halves holding hands. “Just as touching a wire to a battery creates a surge of electricity, first contact with your half literally creates a surge of clairvoyance within your channel. Until you’ve gone through puberty, though, your clairvoyant channel is too soft to withstand this surge—and it’s liable to burst. Because of this unfortunate reality, juvengamy remains illegal . . . ”
Content the video wasn’t going to reveal any horrifying truth about Amber and Clive’s relationship, Aaron relaxed a little and leaned back in his chair. Though he still listened.
Apparently, juvengamy was still practiced in cult circles for the very thing that made it illegal. It made a man’s half docile by emptying her out.
The exposure was timed carefully. A girl’s body was more sensitive to clairvoyance, so her channel broke first. Most of her clairvoyance leaked out or collected in the boy.
All under the guise that juvengamy forged a stronger bond between halves.
Weird.
***
Aaron was waiting at his car after class for Buff when he heard squealing tires. He jerked his head up as a steel gray Beamer swerved through the parking lot, skidded around the speed bumps, and pulled up next to him. Dominic Brees sat at the wheel, Clive Selavio in the passenger seat.
Dominic leaned out the window. “Number eleven, don’t be a loner. Get in.”
Aaron stepped up to the window and casually surveyed the leather interior, which gave off the stale smell of marijuana. Finally, he stared at Clive.
“That’s eight-hundred and twenty-five dollars you owe me for my car,” he said.
“Why don’t you get in,” said Clive, patting the back seat. “We’ll talk while we drive.”
“No, you get out. We’ll talk right here.”
Clive reached for his seatbelt, clicked it, and the strap recoiled. His fingers closed on the handle.
“Not now—” Dominic grabbed his knee and nodded out the back. “Look who’s coming.”
Aaron glanced up and saw Buff trudging into the parking lot.
Though his fingers whitened on the door handle, Clive stayed in the car. “Lucky bastard,” he muttered, licking his chapped lips.
“So where’s my present?” said Aaron, leaning in through the window. “I was hoping you were going to bring me a puppy or something.”
A smirk crept onto Clive’s face. “Actually, Harper, I was thinking you and I could have some adult fun tonight—since we’re both turning eighteen next Saturday. Ever heard of the Pelican?”
“I’ll pass,” said Aaron. Clive was talking about a nightclub on the pier that had a reputation for underage sex. The Pelican was where seventeen-year olds with fake IDs got drugged up and lost their virginity to strangers, not realizing the consequences. Sex was meant for your half, no one else. If you broke that rule, something would forever be missing between you and your half.
“You know I’m going to take good care of you,” said Clive.
“Yeah? You can start by fixing the dent in my car.”
“Oh, did that make you sad?” said Clive. “Well guess what? Next time you see Amber, I’m going to put a dent in your skull.”
Aaron felt an itch in his fingertips. “She came to me,” he said.
Clive leaned across the seat toward him. “If that’s the story you prefer, Harper, then I’ll put a dent in her skull.”
It was too much. Aaron yanked open the door. But Dominic had already shifted into first, and the Beamer lurched away from him, the door slammed.
“Oh, I forgot to mention—” Clive yelled from the window, “Amber’s going too.” He broke into laughter.
Aaron kicked the rear bumper as hard as he could before the car accelerated away from him, his blood burning in his veins.
Clive was taking Amber to the nightclub.
A second later Buff was at his side. “That was Breezie, wasn’t it?” he said, smacking his palm with his fist. “I can smell his stink.”
“Tonight,” was all Aaron managed to say, his stomach turning queasy at the thought of Clive forcing himself on her, “we’re going to the pier. We have to stop a girl from ruining her life.”
***
Amber picked up after the first ring.
“Hey,” she said, as if Aaron calling her was totally normal.
“Amber, could you promise me something?”
She was silent while Aaron continued to fiddle with his car door in his driveway, trying to get it to latch.
“Probably not,” she said finally.
“Promise me you won’t go out with Clive tonight.”
“Let me guess, you’d rather I go out with you?” she said.
“Sure, whatever. I’ll take to a movie or something.”
“I didn’t say I would go out with you.”
“Look—” Aaron held the phone against his ear with his shoulder, “you might end up in a situation tonight where you could get hurt.”
“Then protect me,” she said.
“Amber, just promise me.”
“No.” And she hung up.
***
Calling her was a mistake, Aaron decided that night, as he scanned the swaying mass of halves grinding against each other inside the Pelican nightclub, their sweat glittering under green lasers and disco balls, because even if Amber hadn’t been planning on it, now she would probably come here just to spite him.
But what worried him even more was the way he’d risen to Clive’s taunts after school—how protective he’d felt toward her—when the odds seemed increasingly slim that they were halves. In fact, he wasn’t sure he even wanted Amber as his half; she’d be a nightmare.
Yet here he was at the Pelican because she meant more to him than he cared to admit, and if Clive date raped her in a filthy nightclub eight days before her birthday, if he scarred her like that, the loss she and her half would suffer for the rest of their lives was unthinkable. Aaron couldn’t let that happen.
He spotted Dominic dancing with Tina Marcello against the far glass walls. Clive would be near them. “Over there,” said Aaron.
Next t
o him, Buff pulled on his red and white rugby hoodie.
“Seriously?” said Aaron.
“I didn’t come here to dance, Buddy. Breezie needs to know what hit him.”
“Whatever. Just hold him off while I take care of Selavio.” Aaron straightened his leather jacket and plunged into the crowd. He focused on the rainbows cascading down Dominic’s back to stay oriented as he squeezed around pairs of bodies. In the sweaty fog, someone knocked him in the jaw—and he froze.
He had walked right into Clive, and the guy still hadn’t noticed him. It was too perfect.
Aaron reached for his shoulder, his heart thumping, and yelled, “Surprise!”
But right then a gap opened and he saw exactly what he dreaded most. She was rubbing up against Clive’s torso in a club dress with tiger stripes, lips shining with lip gloss, her arms draped seductively around his neck like they were already halves—Amber Lilian.
Clive whipped around to face him.
***
Aaron had three inches on Clive. It should have been an easy fight. A few punches. He could have broken Clive’s nose, knocked him out cold.
Instead he just stood there, stunned by the sight of Amber, as Clive attacked.
Aaron had been struck off guard before, knocked to the ground even. He had taken blows from other seventeen-year-olds, kicks, punches in his jaw. They didn’t faze him.
This was different.
The strobe light split Clive’s movement into frames. His fist burned in the white flash, a blur, before it smashed into Aaron’s jaw.
Pain rattled his teeth. Aaron toppled backward, dizzy, and hit the floor. Clive knelt over him and coiled his arm back again, ready to strike with his full weight. Aaron rolled, crawled through someone’s legs and jumped up. His ears still rang from the blow.
People scattered, shouted. Aaron tackled Clive in the stomach, pinned his neck. Clive squirmed out of his grip, a sour musk rising from his armpits.
Somebody’s hands closed on Aaron’s shoulders, dragged him backward.
“She’s not your half!” Aaron yelled, but it was pointless. More bodies crowded around him, grabbed and shoved him, their ugly faces hardly human. He flung off their hands, only to suffocate in their hungry perfume. Everything was in black and white. An entire club filled with shadows, halves of people herding him backward.