by Pintip Dunn
For a moment, all I hear is the swish-swish-swish of the glider. And then Potts clears his throat. “On the other hand, I hear this wilderness community might be formed by people running away from TechRA. Psychics that are very interesting to them, particularly now. So I’d say the situation’s a little different, wouldn’t you?”
Logan and I exchange a look. Betsy’s roaming around the room again, and the glider continues swishing. If Potts doesn’t mean us any harm, maybe this is our cue to leave.
I clear my throat. “Thank you for your hospitality, sir, but we need to get going. Our parents will worry.”
“Is that so?” Something flickers across Potts’s face. He gets out of the chair, snapping his fingers for Betsy to follow. “Wait here a minute. I have something for you.”
Whistling a cheerful tune, he leaves the room, the bloodhound bounding after him.
As soon as they’re out of sight, I turn to Logan. “Did you hear that? They know about Harmony.”
“They don’t know. They suspect, but they don’t know anything for sure.”
“It’s not such a big leap from suspecting to investigating. I know the hologram projection keeps out casual intruders. But how good is it if they make a targeted search?”
He chews the inside of his cheek. “I’ll get a message to the Underground. They’ve got contingency plans for situations like this.”
The slats of the wood floor creak, and we fall silent. A moment later, Potts returns to the room, holding a long stick with a small pillow tied to the end. “This is my walking stick, but it’ll have to do.”
“What is it?” I ask.
“Your crutch.”
I blink at the unexpected kindness. Instead of my executioner, Potts has turned into an ally. “Thank you, sir.”
Waving off my words, he sees us to the door. “You’d best scoot along. The patrols may be back, and I wouldn’t want them to mistake you for those vagrants.” He pauses, and that something flickers again. “But if you ever need to find me again…you know where I live.”
We move back into the dense cluster of trees, me hobbling and Logan ambling beside me. Potts’s house disappears from sight, and the only bark closing in on us grows on the trees. Now that we’re back in the woods, I assume we’ll revert to the original plan. Any minute now, Logan and I will go our separate ways.
I tuck the padded part of the crutch more firmly under my arm. “He was nice.”
“I’m guessing he’s an Underground sympathizer,” he says. “Not quite one of us, on account of his ties with ComA. But I bet he knows a lot more than he’s letting on. Good thing we ran into him and not one of the patrols.”
We totter along a few more yards. “How’s that crutch treating you?” he asks.
“Not bad.”
“It’ll start jabbing you in a few minutes, and then you’ll be cursing up a storm.”
I swallow. As long as I live, I don’t think I’ll ever forget the dimples in his cheeks. Those grass-green eyes. “What you can’t hear won’t hurt you.”
“Why wouldn’t I hear? I’ll be right next to you.”
My hand slips on the crutch. “Logan, you promised your brother you would sever all contact with me as soon as we reached civilization. We’re here now, and this—” I point the stick from me to him. “This counts as involvement.”
“Keep hopping, Callie. We can fight while we walk.”
I wobble forward. Already, the strain is making me short of breath. “I’m not trying to fight with you. I just don’t want you to disappoint Mikey.”
“I don’t want that either, but there are a few things to consider. Number one, you’ve sprained your ankle. You can’t take public transportation because you can’t scan your ID. And my unit is a whole lot closer than yours. Mikey’s going to have to live with the situation.”
A tangle of exposed roots lies across my path. I grip Logan’s arm to keep from falling. It’s hard to argue when I so clearly need him.
“Callie…” He guides me over the roots. “You really think I’m going to leave you here, with a sprained ankle, knowing ComA’s patrolling the city?”
Of course not. He’s too honorable to desert me when I’m injured, no matter what he promised his brother. “No.”
His eyes drill into me, and I shiver at the intensity reflected in them. “Then you’ll have to put up with me for a few more hours.”
Logan’s unit is closer than mine, but to get there, it takes two hours of shuffling on my crutch and riding on his back. At least we can stick to the woods. His residential building is made of gray stone and shoots into the sky, but it’s on the edge of the city and backs up to the forest.
We ignore the front entrance. Although it’s been a week since I broke out of Limbo, I’m sure there’s still an alert on my ID. So we head to the fire escape at the back of the building, and I hobble up five flights of stairs.
By the time we reach his balcony, sweat has soaked through my T-shirt and washed the dirt from my face. I’m not sure which look is preferable—caked mud or oily sweat—but Logan’s not looking at me anyhow. He’s staring at the back door to his unit. I’m sure he’s not seeing the dusty gray stone that could use a good washing. He probably doesn’t even notice the reflective patio furniture, which doubles as solar panels to convert every drop of sunshine into energy.
He sees what I wish I was seeing: home.
“You ready to go inside?” I ask.
He stirs and gestures at the warm glow spilling out of the open window. “Someone’s in the eating room. Mom’s usually in the leisure room by now, waiting for my dad to get back from work. She must have company.”
I stiffen. “Does she usually have friends over?”
“No.”
A light mist begins to fall, and the sun dips behind the horizon. We crouch behind the solar-paneled chairs, so that we are semi-sheltered from the rain. Logan’s forehead is creased with lines, and we stay there for what seems like forever, looking at each other.
“Your mom will come out to cover the furniture,” I finally say. “Then we can find out if it’s safe to go in.”
“Good thinking.”
So we huddle and wait. The rain falls faster and harder. The darkness rolls in like a thundercloud, but Logan’s mom still doesn’t come out.
“She must be really involved with her conversation,” he says. “It’s probably someone from the Underground.”
“What if it’s not?”
“Who else would it be?”
“Maybe a ComA official is interrogating her, and he won’t let her out of her seat to cover the chairs.”
All of a sudden the window swings closed with a thud. My pulse shoots into double time. “Okay, that’s it. Let’s get out of here.” I stand up and begin to squeeze behind the table.
He grabs my arm. “Wait a minute. This is my house. My mom’s inside.”
“Your mom’s noticed the rain, Logan. And she doesn’t care about her solar furniture. Something’s wrong. We need to leave, now.”
But it’s too late. The back door opens and a thin beam of light jumps all over the balcony before landing on us. “Who’s there?” a woman’s voice asks.
I shake my head, but Logan squeezes my arm and steps around the table. “It’s me, Mom. Who are you with?”
That’s when I notice there are two shadows by the door. I squint, but before I can make out any details, the beam jerks away from us, and the first figure runs out to embrace Logan. The second figure bends down and picks up the flashlight. As the light swings upward, I glimpse a messy brown bun.
My breath catches. Could it be? But how? As I stand rooted to the spot, the beam hones in on my face. A woman cries out. Next thing I know, I am enveloped in arms that smell like vanilla and disinfectant and spring.
My mother.
36
The rain pelts us, but I don’t care. I’m in my mother’s arms again. A minute passes, or an hour, and I finally work up the strength to loosen my hold. “What
are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same question.” The lines in my mother’s face seem to have multiplied since I’ve been gone, and the bun in her hair droops from the weight of the rain. But she’s still beautiful. So beautiful.
She loops her arm through mine and guides me toward the house. “I suspect your answer will be longer than mine, so I’ll go first. I met Hester when your father and I first got married, but we’ve lost touch over the years. When FuMA informed me you had broken out of Limbo, I got in touch with the Underground and learned that Hester’s son was responsible for your rescue.”
We reach the doorway and escape from the rain. “Since they took Jessa, I’ve been hanging out here, hoping to hear some news through Hester’s telepathy with Mikey. The transmission’s been spotty, but Hester was able to glean enough to know you were with them in Harmony.”
A million questions bubble up. So they arrested Jessa? Did it happen like my vision? How long has my mother known about the Underground? Did she get the message I sent? What does she know about Harmony?
I open my mouth to ask, but Logan’s mother cuts me off. “You poor children.” Hester tucks her son’s hand firmly in her own. “Let’s get you cleaned up and fed. Everything makes more sense after a hot shower and full stomach.”
“But—”
“In due time, Callie.” Mom pushes the bangs off my forehead, like she’s done a thousand times before. “We have all night to catch up. You’re home now.”
Ten minutes later, I’m assaulted by drops in every direction. An overhead shower sprinkles rain on my head. Vertical rows of nozzles squirt water on every inch of my body. A fountain even spurts from the floor, to give my feet personal attention. One button mixes soap with the water. Another adds a moisturizing scent of my choice. A third replaces the water with heated air to dry the droplets from my body.
I’ve never thought twice about the showers in civilization. But now they seem luxurious. Excessive even. I would give it all up for a bucket of hot water.
I put on clean socks, clean sweatpants, and a clean T-shirt. The steam from my shower fogs up the mirror, and I stare at the glass while my reflection slowly comes into focus. I look the same. Sure, my skin’s darker. The flesh on my face hugs my bones a little more tightly, but the girl looking back at me is largely the same. How can that be, when so much has happened? When I feel so different inside?
Suddenly, I want to smash my hand against the mirror and watch the cracks ripple out from underneath my fist. I can’t stand seeing the girl I used to be. So young. So clueless. Waiting for my future memory to tell me what to do, how to act, what to feel. I actually thought the memory would bring me my happily ever after. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
I fling open the bathroom door. A rush of cool air envelops me, and I smell the sweet tang of tomato coming from the eating room. The two mothers, ordering up a late-night meal for their children. Nothing could be more innocent. But there are secrets here. Things my mother’s not telling me. So it’s time for answers.
I limp into the eating room, my stomach growling in response to the smells of garlic, tomato, and basil. Hester looks up from the Meal Assembler and points at the table. “Sit. Your food will be ready in thirty seconds.”
My mother takes my arm, helping me to the table. As soon as I sit down, Hester sets a steaming plate of spaghetti squash in front of me. I can already taste the crisp strands of squash, smothered in rich, bubbling sauce. They may be manufactured, rather than handmade, but I’m tempted to scoop up the food with my fingers and cram it straight into my mouth.
Then I notice Logan, already at the table. And even though he has a clean set of silverware and a plate of food, he’s sitting there patiently. Waiting for me.
“You look nice,” he says.
His damp hair sticks up in spikes, and he’s wearing flannel pajamas. All of a sudden I’m hungry for something else entirely.
Blushing, I sneak a glance at my mother. She’s preparing mugs of peppermint tea, and if she notices the matching plant bracelets on our wrists, she doesn’t mention them. “So do you,” I say.
Hester swoops down on me with a set of silverware. “Eat. The food will get cold.”
She doesn’t have to ask twice. Logan and I dig in, and for the next few minutes, the only sounds are the clink of the forks and the crunch of the squash.
When we finish, my mother picks up my injured foot and settles it onto her lap. Potts’s salve has worn off. Where my ankle used to be sits a goose egg the shade of an eggplant.
“What did you do?” she asks.
“Twisted it on a rock.” I try to pull away. “It’ll be fine, Mom. It’s starting to feel better already.”
She holds on to my foot. “I’ve been so helpless to do anything for you. At least let me wrap your ankle.”
I nod. As she nurses the injury, Logan and I tell our mothers everything. From jumping off the glass and steel building, to the huts in Harmony, to Mikey’s relationship with Angela. From my newfound psychic abilities to my plans to rescue Jessa.
As we talk, my mother seems to withdraw into herself. She smears a gel over my ankle and wraps it with a bandage with built-in ultrasound therapy. When there’s nothing left to be done, she sits quietly, hands folded in front of her.
“Mom?” I ask, my ankle buzzing soothingly. “What did Jessa’s hair look like, when they arrested her?”
She blinks, as if she’s not sure why it matters. “She’s been begging for extensions. All the other girls in her unit had them. Last week, I relented.”
I exchange a look with Logan. Extensions! I hadn’t thought of that. The teens in Eden City change their appearance almost daily, but I assumed it had yet to hit the T-minus eleven class. I assumed wrong.
“Now, can you answer a question for me?” my mother asks. “I just don’t understand. Why were you even arrested in the first place?”
I look out the window. The raindrops splatter against the glass and chase each other down the pane. The bandage has numbed my ankle. Too bad the same can’t be said for my heart.
I’ve been dreading this moment ever since I got my future memory. If I’m being honest, I might have even left civilization, in some small part, to avoid telling my mother what I did.
Hester stands and gestures for her son to do the same. “Let’s give Callie and her mother some privacy. Your father will be back from work soon, and he’ll want to speak with you.”
Logan takes a step toward me, as if he wants to shield me from what’s coming. But he can’t help me. No one can. This is my mother, and what I’m about to confess is only the truth.
Hester prods her son. He looks at me one last time and then follows his mother from the room.
We’re alone now. There’s spaghetti sauce on my shirt. A small insect buzzes around the lit-up walls, and the leaky faucet drips in the sink.
I take a deep breath. “I don’t know how to say this. So I’m just going to tell you what I saw.”
Staring at the floor, I recount every detail of my future memory—the shoe print on the ground, the trail of soil leading to a broken plant, the teddy bear with the red ribbon. And then, there’s only one thing left. I look into my mother’s face, knowing she will never see me the same way again. Knowing I’m about to tell her the one thing that can make her unconditional love conditional.
“I stab the needle into her heart, Mom. In my future memory, I kill Jessa.”
Her eyes widen. In that moment she looks so much like the Jessa of my memory, an instant before she died, that I feel the needle as a physical pain stabbing my own heart.
“I’m sorry, Mom.”
She doesn’t say anything. She won’t look at me. She stares at the air vent as if she’s counting the particles of dust lining the edges.
I move closer, and the bandage slips on my ankle. “Look at me. Please.”
She jerks, but when her eyes land on me, they’re vacant. It’s even worse than I imagined. I thought she would yell
, throw things, cry, not look at me as if I didn’t exist. As if I were already dead to her.
“Do you hate me?” I whisper.
This rouses her. “How can I hate you for something you haven’t done?”
“But what if the memory comes true?” I swallow hard. “What if I kill Jessa? Will you hate me then?”
My mother sighs. “I don’t know, baby. If I’m being honest…I can’t guess how I would feel in that situation. I’m sorry.”
“That’s okay.” I stare at my reflection wavering in my tea. “If I kill her, I’ll hate myself, too.”
“Hey,” she says. “It hasn’t happened yet, so let’s not worry about it, okay?”
“So you think I can change my future?”
“I know you can.”
“How?” I ask. “How do you know?”
My mother picks up the mug and swirls the tea around. “I’ve seen it happen. I know someone in the Underground who managed to change her future.”
Something snaps. Too many emotions whirl inside me. Too much guilt, too much remorse. In an instant, the heaviness turns to rage. I spring to my feet, ignoring the pain in my ankle. I snatch the mug from my mother’s hands and fling it into the sink. This is my life. And she never bothered to fill me in about any of it. “How come you never told me about the Underground? Didn’t you think I deserved to know?”
She blinks. “It was too dangerous.”
“Dangerous! And it’s not dangerous for me to walk around without a clue?” My hands are shaking now, rattling at my sides like bags of bones. “Mom, I never prepped Jessa on how to answer their test questions. I didn’t even know you could. Apparently, the Underground’s got whole libraries of prep materials. So you see? It’s my fault she’s locked up at FuMA.”
“Oh, Callie. That’s not what happened.”
I lace my hands together, but they continue to vibrate. “I saw FuMA take her away kicking and screaming. Are you saying that didn’t happen?”