Only Ever Yours

by Louise O'Neill

  “Did carrie release a statement too?”

  “I doubt anyone asked her for one,” isabel says, and I nod, pushing the ePad away.

  “Are you feeling sick? Should I call chastity-magdalena?” Worry is etched on isabel’s face. Why is she being nice to me again?

  “How come you’re allowed to visit me?”

  “I’m not being chastised, am I?”

  “But you’re still breaking Isolation. Why haven’t the chastities kicked you out?”

  “Just lucky, I guess.” She picks at a spare thread in the blanket cover, avoiding my eyes. Another secret.

  “Fine. Don’t tell me.”

  “It’s not a big deal, freida. chastity-magdalena is being amazing.” She wags her finger at me. “You know, I think you’re her favorite. For some reason.”

  “Excuse me!” I can’t help but smile. “What do you mean, ‘for some reason’? Why wouldn’t I be her favorite?”

  isabel makes a grotesque face, and we start giggling again. “I’ve missed this,” I blurt out before I lose courage. “It’s been nice these last few days, sitting together at meals. Like the old days.”

  “Well, you were delirious from a lack of sleep …”

  “And I’m sorry about not inviting you to the garden. It wasn’t my decision.”

  “It’s fine.”

  She doesn’t offer me an apology in return or explain why she’s been pushing me away all year. I wish I knew why I didn’t say anything to her about this before now. Why didn’t I catch it at the beginning? But it all happened so gradually. A missed VideoChat request here and there, the night I lay awake sizzling in the heat and realized she hadn’t visited my cubicle in weeks … There was nothing you could pinpoint and say, “This is the exact moment that we stopped being best friends.” She sits back on the chair, tucking her ePad into the satchel neatly.

  “Anyway …” she folds over her lap like a ragdoll, wrapping her arms around her knees—“you’re just doing what you have to do.”

  “That’s no excuse.”

  “freida. That’s what we’ve been trained to do. You have to pull your rankings back up. There’s still hope for you.”

  “And what? There isn’t for you?” I ask, annoyed.

  She looks at me bleakly. “Just promise me you’ll try, freida.”

  The door opens and megan and the twins stomp in, their leopard-print platforms pounding on the wooden floorboards. They still have their hair in messy side braids, each of them in leather shorts with a marl-gray tank top and knee-high socks.

  “I mean it. Go back and get changed now,” megan barks at the twins.

  “We’ll be late for dinner!” liz and jessie whine.

  “Look at you, girls.” They turn to stare at me. “So coordinated.”

  “freida, can you just try and be normal for once?” megan tosses her head, her hair falling down her back like an ebony rope. Is it her voice inside my head all the time? She always seems to say the exact thing that I’m thinking about myself.

  “Did you visit her just to be mean?” isabel says.

  “Of course not! I was worried about you, freida, I wanted to check that you were, you know, alive.” She sits on the bed, crushing my foot beneath her. I yelp in pain, but she doesn’t move, still smiling sweetly.

  “And we were bored in Isolation,” jessie adds helpfully as she and liz sit on the other side. She pulls a bag of sweeties from her clutch, cramming one purple jelly into her mouth, then another.

  “I thought you said sugar was poison?” I say.

  “Everything in moderation,” jessie mumbles, swallowing the sweets without even chewing. “Besides,” she says, clearing her throat, “I’m only eating purple-colored food this week so these don’t count.”

  “This room is weird,” megan says, swiveling around to take in the cream-painted walls, the old-fashioned wooden bed. Her gaze rests on isabel. “That chair looks strong, doesn’t it, girls?”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” isabel says.

  “Nothing.” megan smiles. “Don’t be so sensitive.”

  “You look so skinny, freida,” the twins chorus.

  “Thanks.”

  “Like sick-skinny, you-could-be-dying-skinny,” liz says, and jessie crumples the empty sweet bag in her hands, a guilty look on her face.

  “Is that an ePad in your satchel, isabel?” megan interrupts. “Have you been on the Daily Tale? What’s going on with the Carmichaels?”

  There’s a long pause, so long my palms start sweating.

  “I’ve no idea,” isabel says eventually. “I told you, I don’t watch that show.” She takes lotion from her satchel and starts rubbing it into her hands, the smell of lavender filling the room. “But don’t worry. You only have one more day of chastisement, right?”

  At the prospect of another evening in Isolation without their ePads, the three of them burst into loud chatter. liz is ranting about what a bitch angelina is. Or was it anya? jessie is talking about how this new purple-coded diet should help her lose fourteen pounds in two weeks. She’s wandered closer to the mirrors, measuring her waist with her hands.

  “… purple cabbage … raisins …”

  “… then she said that she had worn the blue top first when everyone knows that I had …”

  “… grapes … eggplant …”

  “When I asked her, she actually laughed in …”

  “… purple kale … figs … plums …”

  “… and that’s when the boys are going to be introduced.”

  Everyone stops.

  “What did you just say?”

  “It’s going to be announced tomorrow.” megan’s eyes are triumphant as she leans in closer to whisper confidentially. “I overheard some of the chastities talking about it.”

  “They’re finally coming?” I ask. “When? Are they going to be the Inheritants that we’ll be matched with? Are they going to be here every day? Are they going to stay here or commute daily from the main Zone?”

  I’m firing questions at her, ignoring her air of self-satisfaction. The Inheritants come every year, but their visits are always shrouded in mystery. The eves of previous years refused to discuss it with us, and even on TV, if women ever reminisce about their Inheritant module at School, the sound goes dead so all we eves can see are moving lips.

  “It’s getting so late in the year, I was beginning to think they had decided to scrap the Inheritant module,” I say, shaking my head. “When are they arriving? Are you absolutely sure?”

  megan mimes zipping up her lips and throwing away the key, which means she doesn’t have a clue. liz and jessie are buzzing, talking loudly, clamoring over one another to be heard.

  “Can you believe it?” I say to isabel, and only then do I notice how very pale she is.

  “Are you okay?” I reach for her hand and find her skin clammy to touch.

  “Awww,” megan says. “Are you scared at the thought of real-life boys? I wouldn’t worry, isabel. I doubt they’ll pay you too much attention.”

  The three girls scream with laughter, jessie’s mouth open so wide I can see her purple-stained tongue.

  “Shush, the chastities will hear you,” I say. I want to defend isabel, but I know I can’t antagonize megan and my head is hurting with the effort to do both.

  “Yes, the chastities will hear you. I’m not sure what you girls are even doing here, considering the terms of your chastisement state that when you’re not in class, at Organized Recreation, or having meals, you are required to remain in your cubicles. Alone.”

  “Sorry, chastity-ruth. We were on our way to the Nutrition Center and we just wanted to wish our fellow eve a quick recovery,” megan says, as full of crap as ever.

  “I don’t have time for excuses, #767,” chastity-ruth says. “Leave immediately.”

  They get up to leave, megan ordering the twins to get changed before dinner.

  “Maybe you can borrow isabel’s smock. The two of you could fit easily in that thing.”<
br />
  “Bitches,” I say under my breath once they’ve gone.

  “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” chastity-ruth snaps, before continuing in a milder tone, “isabel, dear. It’s time for you to leave too.”

  “I’m not hungry,” isabel says. “I’ll get something to eat later.”

  I flinch, waiting for chastity-ruth to explode at isabel’s defiance, but she just nods her head in agreement.

  “Fine. And as for you, #630, you are to report to me whenever you are in need of SleepSound. I’ll ensure you receive an emergency stockpile to keep in your cubicle. We can’t afford any further incidents,” she says, her lips pinched. The Euro-Zone Doctor must have really done a number on her. “I shall expect you back in class tomorrow. You’ve missed far too much already.”

  She slams the door behind her. For someone who is so quiet sneaking up on you, she sure likes to make an exit. I sag down in the bed, my limbs feeling like dead weight. isabel clucks and pulls the covers up under my chin, neatly tucking the blanket in around me.

  “Don’t worry about chastity-ruth. I’ll handle her.”

  “She always goes easier on you. You’re the special one.”

  “I am not.” isabel almost spits the words out in fury. “Take that back.”

  “Okay, okay. Calm down,” I say, taken aback. “I’m sorry.”

  In the ensuing silence the tick, tick, tick of a clock fills the room and I yawn, my eyelids becoming heavy.

  “Do you think megan is right? About the Inheritants coming soon?” I say sleepily.

  She goes rigid, as if her bones are holding her hostage. I want to ask her what’s wrong, but the words are in my head and I can’t get them out, my tongue fat with drowsiness. She stands next to me again, stroking my hair softly, soothing me to sleep as if I was her own child, as if she loved me.

  I dream of fields of lavender, of boys and of mothers. I dream of things I know nothing about.

  Chapter 12

  “It’s pointless being here when I’m not allowed to use the machines,” I moan, stretching out on the stationary treadmill, hoping I’ll feel cooler if I lie down.

  “Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?”

  isabel is pedaling furiously on a rusted exercise bike; her hair is damp with sweat and sticking to her tomato-red face. She slows down to look over her shoulder at me and a warped robotic voice bellows from the bicycle spokes, mangling every second word. “Go faaaaaster, you … idiot. You … but … but you … fat … fat … fat … Why … faa … GO FASTER.” She picks up speed, the steel weights wrapped around her ankles blurring.

  “They really need to fix that bike,” I say.

  We’re in the chamber for our morning detention. A menagerie of gym equipment is squeezed into the circular sauna. It’s so small that it can just hold a treadmill, an exercise bike and a locker to store our bags. Glowing electric heating grids line the ceiling. The walls are a 360-degree movie screen flashing inspirational images of #1 eves from previous years.

  “Anyway …” she says. The screen has melted into a magnifying mirror, amplifying her reflection from every angle. She stares at it as if she’s trying to find her old self underneath the excess flesh. “… this is your last day on detention.”

  I know. I’ll miss you. Will you miss me?

  “I can’t remember being in here last week,” I say instead.

  “I should have known something was wrong when they showed an old interview from What kate Did Next on the screen and you kept asking kate why her hair was so shiny.”

  “I did not.”

  “You did! You even told her to answer quietly because you didn’t want ‘the others’ knowing the secret too.”

  “What others?”

  “Exactly, you lunatic,” she says with a wheezing laugh, and I smile. Being sick was worth it if it means that we might be friends again. And if she keeps working out like this, she’ll lose weight. She’ll be pretty again, and popular. We can go back to the way things were before.

  “You sound better today, freeds.”

  “I feel it.”

  Why wouldn’t I? My SleepSound has been returned and chastity-ruth has given me an extra stockpile of supplies to make sure I don’t become sleep-deprived again. I’ve started keeping a spare tablet in a silver locket around my neck, just in case of emergencies. I didn’t even have to take my weekly foto this morning. I got to choose an old one from my archive to post instead, so my rankings should be unaffected.

  “Less talking, girls. This is not a social group.” A chastity’s voice fills the tiny room.

  “Sorry.” We both squint at the mirror, wondering which chastity is hidden behind it.

  “The Eternal Fat girl!” I say in disbelief as the mirror turns back into a movie screen. I use the frame of the treadmill to pull myself up to sitting position. “I haven’t seen this in years.”

  “It’s not actually called The Eternal Fat girl, you know.”

  I’m not listening, engrossed in the familiar story. The Wandering Fat girl travels from town to town, stealing sweets from Inheritants, shoving them in her mouth. She has no friends. She is always alone, eating and eating. “Fat girls are disgusting. Fat girls are lazy. No one will ever love a fat girl,” the voiceover repeats over and over again.

  “It doesn’t even make sense,” isabel puffs, pedaling faster and faster. “Why isn’t she in School?”

  “How many times have we seen this?” I ask her.

  “Every day until we were seven …”

  “And then we started Organized Recreation instead.” I finish her sentence. “You have a good memory.”

  She can’t find the breath to answer as she crouches over the handle bars. An oversized gray sleeveless tee is clinging to her sweaty body, her thighs jiggling in black leggings. They must be at least three sizes too small for her. Fat girls should be made obsolete. I thrust the thought away and lie back down on the belt of the treadmill, pulling my tank top up to the same height as my bra. I feel the bones of my ribcage, resting my fingertips in the cavities between them, holding my thinness to me like a comforter.

  “isabel?” I say in a wheedling voice.

  “Yes?”

  “Can I borrow your computer?”

  “Did you not get yours at breakfast? I saw chastity-ruth handing them back.”

  “Mine was the only one she managed to forget. Imagine that.” Our eyes meet in the mirror. “She said she’d give it to me after class.”

  “Fine.” She gives in. “It’s in the locker. Keep the protective cover on it though. I don’t want the steam to damage it.”

  “They’re not toys,” I say, mocking the chastities. “They’re expensive.” I crawl over to the locker, wading through the heat. Grabbing the ePad, I droop back down on the belt, logging onto MyFace.

  “Your inbox is at maximum capacity. Please delete some private messages immediately.”

  That’s strange. I only had two saved messages when I checked my account yesterday. I click on the inbox, my jaw dropping as I scroll through icons for dozens and dozens of messages, some from months ago. Most of the recent ones are unopened and all of them have a gray blank box where the profile foto usually is. Anonymous accounts. Who would send me anonymous messages?

  I put in the earbuds and click on the most recent one.

  “No one likes you. Everyone wants you to die. Why don’t you just kill yourself and get it over with?” says the distorted voice. I shut it off hurriedly, my heart pounding.

  The profile foto at the top of the page. It’s isabel’s face. I steal a sneaky look at her, but she’s engrossed in her workout so I click on another message, and another and another, the same gray profile image filling the screen, the same disembodied voice like an ugly wound bubbling with pus.

  “You are lazy and vile and the ugliest eve in our year.”

  “You make me want to vomit. You should do everyone a favor and kill yourself.”

  “Everybody hates you. You are disgusting. I wis
h you didn’t exist. I wish you were dead.”

  I turn it off. My face is pale in the black screen.

  “isabel …”

  Anxiety tightens my throat. Who could have sent those messages? They’re vicious, even for megan and the twins, and they couldn’t have been acting alone. The quantity alone negates that possibility. Did cara send any? agyness? Why didn’t isabel tell me what was going on?

  I go cold. Does she think that I sent one?

  “isabel,” I say more urgently. I sit up, shuffling to the top of the treadmill and swinging my legs over the edge, holding on to the leg of the control panel. “isabel, stop cycling and talk to me for a moment.”

  “I can’t,” she pants.

  “Why?”

  “What is wrong … you? … so useless … can’t even ride a biiiiiiike prop … ly? … back … biiiiike … you stup … fat …”

  “See?” She picks up speed again as the stuttering exercise bike screams at her.

  “Are you trying to lose weight before the Inheritants come? Because who knows when they’ll be coming? You can’t trust what they say,” I say, emphasizing the “they” in an attempt to distance myself from megan and the twins.

  Her right leg slips, and she yelps out in pain as the pedal spins around and bashes into the back of her knee.

  “… fat … stupid …”

  “You’ve got nothing to worry about!” I desperately want to be the antidote to all those poisonous messages. “You’re beautiful, isabel. You’re special. You’ve always been special. Everyone knows that.”

  “Don’t say that.” She stops, ignoring the robotic shrieking. (… get baaaack … bike … instant, you uuuseless fat …)

  “Don’t say what?” I’m bewildered. “What did I say?”

  “Just stop. For once in your life, freida, can’t you just stop?” Her voice cuts through me. I never get anything right. I am like a faulty toy that no one will ever want. No one will ever love.