She’s actually talking about wiping out the whole year? That’s crazy! She doesn’t look happy about it, so why does she think this is a good plan? “You can’t do that,” I say.
“If it’s the only way to keep you all safe, then I will.”
“Serenity, we can’t ask that of you.” Sophos taps a knuckle against his lips.
“You haven’t. We’re volunteering it. We hope it won’t come to that.”
We? When did Serenity and Jase become a unit? I look at Sophos, expecting him to forbid her to carry that around, but he says nothing.
“Is there anything else for today?” Serenity asks.
“Just be prepared,” Sophos says. “It will all happen quickly now, so be ready to get on the train to Lawson at any time.”
“All right,” she says.
They both stand up, and Sophos rounds the desk to hug her. “We’ll get you out in time.”
“Thank you,” she says.
I follow her to the door, stopping her before she opens it. “Serenity, I’m sorry I got you into trouble with this.”
The joyful smile on her face is completely out of place for this situation. “It’s okay, honestly. I’m glad I could help.”
My eyebrows furrow in confusion. I’d expect her to be terrified at this point. “Not long ago, you didn’t think you were particularly strong.”
“I’ve had some tests of it since then.” She hugs me and says near my ear, “Thank you for helping me understand that.” Released from her embrace, my mouth turns down as I look at her. “None of that,” she says. “Do your job and get me out, so I don’t have to revert back to the puppy you hated so much.”
That coaxes a smile from me. “I don’t think that girl would want to learn to play football.”
“Exactly.”
She leaves, and I return to the chair opposite Sophos’ desk. “How can you let her do that?”
“It isn’t my choice. Do you think she’s easy to control?”
I sigh. She isn’t. Images of her sneaking me out to her apartment, chomping at the bit to go on the distribution missions, and running out to help me save Jase flash through my mind. Usually, I consider it a good thing that she’s grown to be independent, but now she’s willing to use it to destroy herself. Ironically, she’s grown strong enough to stubbornly defend her right to make herself weak again.
Maybe I could give her the vaccine. Except it would only protect her from the amnesia drug for a few days. I wouldn’t know she’d need it. And the bigger problem—she would hate me for it. It wouldn’t matter if it’s for her own good; she wouldn’t want the choice taken from her.
Sophos tells me he’s going to have Tori check on that service station to see if it houses a way to get us down the tracks. She and I will need to go set those charges as soon as possible.
I can’t focus on that right now, though. Not when I’m racked by guilt about putting Serenity in danger. There has to be a better option. Hoping the uprising begins before the Establishment takes her isn’t good enough, and her plan B is unthinkable.
Chapter Forty-Two
SERENITY
“Don’t forget me taking you home after you and Adwin broke up,” Vogue says. “Even if you hadn’t blown up the secret about the islands, that drunken junk-food picnic in my bedroom was important.”
She tries to smile and make light of it, but she’s terrified by the possibility of me losing this year to amnesia. I sit cross-legged on the floor, scribbling away at the coffee table. I feel like I’m doing a book report. The book is my life this year, and deciding what’s important is no small feat. What do I need to tell myself if this happens?
“I don’t think it should be long enough to give detailed events like that, but I am setting you up as my backup to this backup plan.”
“How so?”
“I already knew you were my best friend at the beginning of the year, but I’m making it crystal clear that you care for me more than anyone else, and I trust you explicitly. That way afterward, you’d be able to fill me in on the year’s events, and I’d believe every word you say.”
She taps her nose as she mulls over the concept. “I accept the responsibility, but I hope to never have to act on it. Just in case, though, you should tell me what really happened Thursday night, so I can give you the accurate version.”
I drop my face into my hands as I laugh. “I did give you the real version!”
When I sent Jase here yesterday morning to get me something to wear, Vogue about lost her mind. The rain had kept up too late, and I couldn’t have walked home in my damp dress or Jase’s clothes by the light of day. She refuses to believe that I slept alone in Jase’s bed while he slept on the sofa, though. He does take the gentleman thing very seriously.
The elevator chimes. “Open.” She smirks at me. “Your boyfriend is here. Hello Jase,” she says as he walks in.
“Hi Vogue,” he says with a smile. Apparently, her interrogation of him yesterday was quite the spectacle as she got some things together for me.
“I wish you could come with us.” Vogue twists the hem of her shirt.
My answering smile is soft. “Jase and me learning to use guns would go over very well with Kemp, I’m sure.”
“I know. Well then, I’m off. I’ll see you later, and make sure you review whatever story you’re going to tell me about this alone time, so you don’t contradict each other.”
Jase and I laugh our goodbyes to her as she departs. He sits on the sofa behind me and leans his chin on my shoulder to peer down at my project. “How’s it going?”
His breath on my ear sends a prickling sensation down my neck, and my heart skips. Maybe it’s not cardamom he smells like. Cloves? I take a deep breath of it before I respond. “It was going fine, but a distraction just walked in.”
He leans back, laughing. “I already finished my two-and-a-half year review. I figured you’d be done with your seven months by now.”
“Maybe you had no life for two years.”
“You have a point. It isn’t until the tail end of that period that my life started to get interesting.” He lifts me up onto the sofa to sit next to him.
“I’m more interesting than joining a rebellion?”
“Absolutely.” He tucks my hair behind my ear, his fingers lingering at my jaw. I tilt my head into his hand, and he slides it to my chin, lifting my face to look at his. Our lips meet, and every nerve in my body fires.
I drop my forehead onto his shoulder and sigh. “Now, I’ll never finish that.” I wave at the paper on the table.
“What if I kiss you often enough that you stop being affected by it?”
I straighten myself up to look at his face. “I don’t want to stop being affected by it.” Feeling comfortable with Adwin seemed like a good thing at the time. Now, this electric feeling that comes with every touch from Jase makes me think safe and comfortable are overrated.
His lips curl up to one side in a mischievous half-smile. “I don’t want to either.”
“Don’t let that deter you from kissing me, though.” Our smiles come together once more, but I reel myself in. “I need to get this done. Vogue wants to upload the recordings on Monday.”
“Any way I can help, besides leaving you alone?”
I rub my fingertips over my forehead. “I don’t know. How long do you think the recording should be?”
“No more than a couple of minutes.”
“Seven months in less than two minutes?” He’s got to be kidding.
“If we have to use it, it’s an emergency situation, so we won’t have a lot of time to let our minds regroup.” My fingers play a tune that only I can hear on my shoulder. “Do you want me to leave?”
“No.” I puff out a breath. “Here, read this and tell me if you think it will work.” I hand him the sheet of paper.
Jase reads through it, muttering bits and pieces as he goes. “Sophos is my mentor, blah blah blah, Adwin broke up with me?”
“That’s what I
told him, so I figured I should maintain the same story.”
“You really wanted to hurt him, didn’t you?”
“How is letting him break up with me bad?”
“If you had broken up with him, he’d just mourn his loss. Instead, he had to beat himself up over being foolish enough to give you up.”
I shake my head. “I don’t think he cared much. You’re biased or overestimating my power over people.”
“I’m the only person who can fully understand your power over people.” He continues reading as I glance away, embarrassed and flattered.
“Oh, I see what you’re doing there with Vogue, that’s clever. Where am I? Oh, here we go, the good part.” He smirks. “Finally, after years of friendship, Jase Delgado and I started dating in June.”
When his eyes meet mine, a giggle slips through my lips. “It’s so ridiculous that I’d believe the city-wide lie about our friendship. I prefer the version where we fooled everyone.”
“Who would have thought Serenity Ward gets her kicks by deceiving the masses?”
“I was supposed to be on the council someday.”
He brushes his fingers down my cheek, feeling my guilt about what I could have been someday. “You wouldn’t have been like them. You’d probably have started your own uprising.”
Jase might think too highly of me, but God, do I want to be the person he sees me as.
“More importantly,” he says, “there is nothing about me sweeping you off your feet.”
“At least we get to be together longer in this version.”
“That’s true. If I didn’t know better, I’d say telling your mother we were together for a couple of months was on purpose.” We share a lighthearted look before he continues. “Blah blah blah, ah, he’s the consummate gentleman, he pays attention and notices everything about me, he’s thoughtful, he looks at me like I’m the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, and he makes me feel more special than I am.”
His eyes twinkle as he looks at me, and the heat of a blush rushes to my cheeks. “That’s the look. The one where your eyes act as if they are beholding the most beautiful thing they’ve ever seen.”
He smiles coyly. “Not sorry.”
“Is my summary too much?”
“It aligns fairly well with what I said, except in place of you feeling more special than you are”—he rolls his eyes as if that is nonsense—“there may be something about me being lucky because you’re too good for me.”
I pause a moment to absorb his sweetness. “Post-amnesia Jase and Serenity would be saps,” I say. “I should include that my sarcasm is what draws you to me. It would be more realistic.”
“We’re just lucky that I believe my new memories so blindly. There’s no way I should believe you’d be with me.”
“Believe it,” I say and kiss his forehead. I run my fingers through his hair, wondering about the damage we’re willing to do within our skulls. “What is it like taking the amnesia shot? How do the new memories work?”
“It’s like taking a shot of the strongest liquor you’ve ever had. You feel dizzy, confused, and if no one tells you anything while you’re in that daze, you’d think you flashed forward across the lost time. But if someone gives you any information, it’s seared into your brain as your own memory. You know it as a fact, even if it isn’t as vivid as a real memory that engaged your senses.”
“But you don’t remember Krisalyn telling you whatever she says?”
“No, I just know it. That’s why it’s hard to question.”
It’s hard to imagine a simple liquid can pull out material from my brain and replace it with anything I happen to hear. If you can’t trust your own memories, what can you trust? I’m terrified I’ll lose myself if I lose this year. Meanwhile, the Establishment erases the lives of a myriad of teenagers every year. My problems look petty in comparison.
We spend the rest of the afternoon talking about nothing and everything. Somehow, he guides our conversation in a way that has me spending a disproportionate amount of time talking about myself. My preference for archaic entertainment amuses him. I tell him I always wake to centuries-old music by RIOPY, and I’ve seen the original version of The Wizard of Oz, which is even older. He goes on an expedition to find my interests, dreams, passions, and fears. I even tell him I play piano, which I do not tell people.
“Oh, is that what your fingers are always doing?”
“Are you always this observant, or am I terribly conspicuous?”
“I’m only this perceptive when something—or someone—piques my interest.”
“Yes, when I’m too distracted to still my fingers, I absentmindedly tap invisible keys.” It sounds crazy when I say it out loud, but he isn’t put off by it.
He traces my fingers, and the feeling is as calming as playing the piano. It’s as if each new discovery is a piece in a puzzle he’s putting together, and each new piece makes him look for the next one that connects to it.
In the moments when I can turn the topic back to him, I learn things like the fact that he hasn’t seen his father since his parents divorced eight years ago, his favorite food is chocolate soufflé, and he hates the gym but loves to run.
By the time I get into bed, I’m terrified by how happy I am about all this. When was the last time I felt this hopeful? My life shattered at the onset of the year, but could I come out with a better one? My friendships are fewer but more meaningful, my life isn’t as easy but it’s rewarding, and I can’t even believe in all of this I could have found romance. Maybe I’m starting to know who I am rather than the person the Establishment told me to be.
This new life is infinitely more delicate. It’s teetering on a high wire, and the thought of losing it terrifies me. I was never afraid of losing my old life. I had no reason to be. Somehow, deep in my fear, I find that my new reality is all the more meaningful because it isn’t guaranteed.
Chapter Forty-Three
SERENITY
“Ready to go?”
I smile at Jase as I push away from my desk. “I suppose so.” Silly question, as I’ve done nothing all day. Nothing that matters, anyway.
He traces circles on my palm as we walk out of the Establishment Center. The tickle in the wake of his fingertip should be leaving a visible track for how deeply I feel that light touch. When I sit on his sofa, I glance at my hand, but it’s unchanged. Strange, because it feels like everything has changed. Shouldn’t there be more physical evidence?
“Here it is.” I hand him the pouch that Vogue labeled with his name. “The pods will play the recordings automatically when we put them in our ears. There is a five-second delay, giving us time to take the amnesia shots. They will only play once and then clear themselves so no one can hear them and realize we rewrote our memories. So, don’t test it.”
It sounds pragmatic enough, but my fingers tap out Flight of the Bumblebee, reflecting my frantic mood.
“We better hope they didn’t get switched,” Jase says with a smile. “How strange would it be to believe you were dating yourself?” Laughter stills my hands and slows my speeding heart. “I have the worst gift ever for you.”
“You really shouldn’t have.” He pulls a vial out of his pocket and hands it to me. I hold it between my thumb and index finger to examine it. How could something so destructive look so simple? Seven months to overhaul my life and myself, and this little shot can undo all of it in a moment. I slip it into the pouch with my ear pod. “I don’t want it.”
“I don’t want to give it to you.”
I fold one leg under myself to turn my body toward his. “Congratulations. You thought of a gift I might really need that I never would have thought of, but it’s still the worst.”
“I’m talented that way.”
“Lucky me.”
He runs his fingers through my hair. “No, I’m the lucky one, remember?”
I lean in and kiss him eagerly. The thought of losing everything my life has become this year is too much. In his arms
, my racing heart and shaky hands don’t feel like fear. This feels like passion. My hands weave through the back of his hair without a thought. I can’t think. I only feel. I’m all nerves, dying to be as close to him as possible. His mouth grazes my jawline, and he kisses me softly under my ear, sending a tingling feeling down my neck that takes my breath away.
“What’s going on?” he whispers against my ear.
I drop my forehead onto his shoulder, feeling like I’ve been caught misbehaving. Of course, he’d be able to tell I’m using intimacy to escape. He can read me like a book.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, stroking my back.
“I’m scared.”
He pushes my shoulders back to look at me. “Of?”
“Myself. You. The uprising.”
“Oh, that’s all?” He shrugs and intertwines his fingers through mine, perpetually brushing every surface of my hand with his featherlight touch.
“I’m scared of how I’m feeling about you. This is too fast, right?”
He closes his eyes and lets out a long breath. “I don’t believe there is a prescribed timeline for when we should feel anything. Although, perhaps… we should watch our speed on other things.”
One eyebrow arches up my forehead. That assertion is a surprise, and mildly offensive.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he sighs. “I already hate myself for saying those words, and restraining myself may be torture.” My offense fades. “But if we had to…” His gaze slides to the amnesia shot on the table. “I couldn’t bear to…”
Oh. Of course. He’s worried about what we might erase. “You’re right.” I put on as much of a smile as I can muster. “We should take it slow until there’s not so much hanging over us.” Easy enough for physical activity, but I’m falling for him fast and hard. That will complicate matters just as much, but I try to put on a brave face and lighten the moment. “Should be easy enough since we’re just faking this for the Establishment.” I wink at him, and he relaxes.
“I can’t deny that this feels too good to be true.”
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