Body Parts

by Jessica Kapp

  He takes a long drink—so long I get the impression he wants to move on from the topic of baseball.

  “Did you graduate?” I ask.

  “I decided I’d had enough of school. The girls all looked like plastic and guys like Ry, well, let’s face it, he looks like a cologne model.” He pantomimes spritzing me. “Care to try Eau de Ry?”

  I laugh and push his hand away. But on the inside, there’s a knot in my stomach. What happens when looking perfect isn’t good enough? When everyone on the team hits home runs? Then what? More powerful pills? What if harvesting organs becomes acceptable and expands to the mainland? I imagine Centers popping up in every state, kids corralled into a slaughterhouse for mass liver transfers. The thought makes me queasy.

  I consider Ms. Preen’s flawless face and Tony’s muscles, which bulged although I never actually saw him exercise. They took pills to perfect themselves, and someday one of them might need a new liver. I hope we can shut down the Center before that time comes, that none of my friends are used to keep either of them alive.

  “You all right?” Gavin asks when I’m quiet for too long.

  “I’m fine.” I try to relax my jaw, but my thoughts drift to the twins. I’m sure Meghan’s fixated on beating any records associated with my name, whereas Paige is probably welcoming the newbie they brought up from the Center for Growth to take my place. Paige will take the tween under her wing, helping her transition from brain growth to fitness, and Parker will keep benching as much weight as the instructors can fit on the barbell. All of them oblivious to the fact that the Center will never place them with a real family, no matter how old they are or how hard they train.

  “What’s going to happen with Mary?” I ask, the cold from the cone pressing into my palm.

  “We haven’t figured that out yet.”

  “She’s just going to grow up at the barn?”

  Gavin shakes his head. “I don’t know. Right now she’s safe. That’s what matters. And she’s got a lot of people willing to do whatever it takes to look after her.”

  “But she needs to go to school, meet kids her age. And what about—”

  “I’m working on it,” he snaps.

  The temperature in the truck feels much colder than it was a few minutes ago, and I shiver.

  Gavin glances over and blows out a breath. “With a missing cornea, I don’t know how safe Mary is out here.”

  “But she still has her eye.”

  “Only because cornea surgery is cleaner and faster.”

  “Can’t she wear a patch?”

  “Too obvious. If someone from the Center or the doctor who operated on her saw her, you can be sure they’d want to keep her quiet. She’s safer at the barn. For now.”

  That makes sense, but there has to be another way. Something we could do to help her live a normal life.

  “Maybe we could teach her,” I say. Gavin quirks an eyebrow like I’ve asked him to teach her quantum physics. “What? Did you drop out?”

  “No. I went to summer school and finished early.”

  “I’m sure there’s something you could teach Mary.” My voice is dry and mocking.

  “You can teach the lesson in sarcasm.” He pushes me lightly in the shoulder.

  A tiny flutter starts in my stomach, and I change the subject before it can grow.

  “When you left school did you miss your friends?” I ask.

  “Just about everyone was hooked on Euphorium.” He gestures with his milkshake for me to try it. “It makes it a little hard to get to know someone when they’re floating in the clouds all day.” He narrows his eyes, scolding me with his glare.

  Guilt tunnels its way into my stomach. Thanks a lot, Ry.

  I take a sip of Gavin’s shake. The straw is blue and wide enough to let the real fruit bits climb out.

  “You’re seventeen then?” I ask, handing his drink back.

  “I turned eighteen last month. What about you?”

  “I’ll be seventeen in October.” Why am I trying to make myself sound older? “I’ve spent the last ten years at the Center.”

  “They didn’t raise you from birth?” The truck sways just enough for me to notice. I glance at his grip, his hands tight around the wheel. “I’ve never heard of a kid who started at the Center late.”

  Kid. The word stings.

  “Well, I did.”

  “Oh.” His lips move, but he must be too afraid to ask. I let him stew for a while before I save him the trouble.

  “My parents died; that’s how I wound up there.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” He looks at me, and I can see he means it. It doesn’t make my heart hurt any less, though. Every time I talk about it, I feel like I’m checking the wound beneath a Band-Aid prematurely. The gash exposed—unable to seal itself, unable to create new skin.

  “It was a car accident.” My eyes burn and I look out the passenger window.

  Gavin stays quiet and I have a chance to compose myself. When I turn back around his face is grim.

  “What’s going on?” I look straight ahead, but the traffic is moving, and a glance at the side mirror shows no one is following us.

  “Nothing,” he says.

  I can’t get a read on him. He seems so distant now. Cold. Like he was when I first met him. I take a deep breath and prop my feet up on the dashboard, leaning back in my seat for the rest of the ride to enjoy my soggy cone as we follow the signs to the hospital.

  • • •

  We pass several areas under construction. Subdivisions with massive homes, built with columns and brick, and wide enough to eat up the entire lot.

  “The population’s booming,” Gavin says. “They can’t build homes fast enough. Pretty soon the houses will trickle further west, out toward the barn.” He purses his lips.

  The shops on Main Street are as neat and tidy as the people, a reflection of the flawlessness they’re trying to project. Streetlights are polished and store windows gleam.

  When we get to the medical district there are fewer people, but the glass buildings are just as grand. Workers in blue scrubs wander in and out with aimless expressions and hospital caps to cover what I can only assume is perfect hair.

  Gavin’s lips are still in a tight line as we drive past a grassy island with a concrete sign that reads Gladstone Memorial Hospital in blood-red letters. It’s a curvy font, too whimsical for what goes on here, but the color seems appropriate.

  We pull past the emergency entrance and head under a skywalk to the rear of the building. At the back, there’s a dumpster stuffed with white drawstring bags and an ambulance that looks like it’s been retired. It’s the ugly side of the hospital, hidden from view, just like the truth about the Centers.

  “Here he comes,” Gavin says.

  I look over my shoulder and my heart seizes. The guy runs a hand through his honey-blond hair, and without thinking I dive behind Gavin’s seat.

  Gavin’s window is already halfway down, and he doesn’t question me as the footsteps approach.

  “How’s it going?” the guy says.

  The wound on my neck seems to throb at the sound of his voice.

  “Good,” Gavin says. “Thanks for meeting me.”

  “Last mission go okay?”

  “Damn near perfect.”

  “That’s what I’d hoped,” the guy says. “We make a good team.” I hear the crumpling sound of a paper being wadded up. “The schedule is at the bottom of the bag. Mostly routine stuff, but there’s a surgery on there that fits what you’re looking for. Same doctor being called in, so I assume it’s a transfer.”

  “Thanks.” Gavin puts the brown bag on the passenger seat.

  “You’re bringing the same crew out next time, right?” the guy asks.

  “That’s the plan.”

  “Good. They should be able to get in and out in no time.”

  They exchange goodbyes before Gavin brings the window up and pulls away. He waits until we’re back on the road before he lets me ha
ve it. “What the hell was that?” Gavin tosses the bag in the back after I climb into my seat. I search for the man in the side mirror, but he’s long gone.

  “I think I know him.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “He was at my health screening. He’s the one who sliced my neck.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about. He never finished med school; there’s no way he’d be cutting people.” Gavin shakes his head; like that should be enough to appease me.

  “I remember seeing his badge. His name is Curtis.”

  “Wrong. That guy,”—Gavin points a thumb over his shoulder—“is Kenny.”

  “His last name starts with an R.”

  “No. His last name is—” Gavin squeezes into the left lane. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is he’s on our side.”

  “I recognize his face, that voice—”

  “From a truck window?”

  “I know it’s him.” I fold my arms, squeezing myself tight. At least I believe me.

  “You’re wrong.” Gavin shakes his head and pounds the accelerator when the car in front of him changes lanes. “Kenny works in scheduling. He’s behind a computer all day. He wants to help us stop what they’re doing to innocent kids.”

  There’s that word again. Kids.

  “I was going to introduce you since he helped spring you, but then you freaked out.” Gavin scratches his head like he’s trying to scrape the last thirty seconds from his memory. “He’s already paranoid someone will turn him in for helping us. He even eyed the backseat like he knew someone was hiding. He’s probably worried we’re setting him up.”

  “I’m telling you, it was him. I know what I saw—”

  “Just drop it.” His voice softens, but his arm muscles stay tight as he grips the wheel like it’s the only thing keeping him steady. “We need Kenny. He can get us exact surgery dates and times, not to mention badges and scrubs. He’s putting a lot on the line to help us, and if you spook him, I guarantee he won’t help us get your friends out.”

  I stare out the window as I answer, my eyes stinging. “Well, I don’t trust him.”

  “You’ll take a random pill from Ry, but you don’t trust Kenny?”

  “It looked just like mine. I thought—” I didn’t think, though, I realize. I let my guard down too quickly.

  “Maybe you should rethink your instincts,” says Gavin. He pauses then throws one last jab. “I’m just glad you didn’t break Adrian’s nose.”

  My face feels as red as my hair. I want to hit something. Preferably Gavin. Of course, that would only strengthen the argument that I am a kid—too immature to control my emotions.

  We spend the rest of the ride in silence.

  Chapter 8

  Sasha is outside with some of the others when we pull up. They’re tossing a disc back and forth, and Craig flings the saucer toward Gavin when he gets out.

  Gavin tosses it back and looks at me. “You coming?”

  I leave the hat on the seat and shake out my hair. “I’m gonna go for a walk.” Regardless of what Gavin thinks about Kenny, trust isn’t going to be that easy for me. Not when everything I’ve ever trusted has been a lie.

  “Suit yourself.” He shakes his head and carries the bag with scrubs and badges toward the barn.

  Gavin hasn’t been raised like a fish in a bowl to be chopped up like sushi. Still, he’s trying to help us. I should trust him. And maybe, I should trust he knows more about the people he’s chosen to help than I do. I stare at his back, and the disc hits me in the leg. Sasha laughs and waits for me to return it, but when I toss it the disc ends up in the trough Gavin dunked me in.

  “Nice one,” she says, her sarcasm as thick as whatever she uses to make her hair stick up. Probably paste, based on how white it is.

  “Oops.” I flash a false smile and start for the woods.

  I hear gravel crunching behind me before I make it to the bend in the drive, but when I turn, it’s not Gavin.

  “Wait up,” Ry says, jogging up to me.

  “Where’d you come from?” I look past him. The disc throwers are still outside. “I didn’t see you out tossing that pancake thing…what’s it called again?”

  “A Frisbee.” He smiles like Gavin did when we pulled up to Dairy Land. It must be interesting to watch someone experience so many things outsiders have taken for granted—except right now I feel like someone’s science experiment. “When Gavin came in without you, I figured you were hitting the trail.”

  “How perceptive.”

  “Can I join you?” When I shrug, he pulls out a pill bottle. “Want some Euphorium for the run?”

  “No thanks.” I push the pills away and he pops one in his mouth as we start to jog.

  Without Endurance, he’s not as fast. I have to keep a slower pace so I don’t lose him. He spends most of the time peering up at the trees like he’s seeing something that’s not really there. Gavin must have thought I looked like a fool when I took Euphorium. I catch myself grinning as Ry shrieks with joy when a ladybug lands on his finger.

  I stay on the widest route, glancing back at Ry each time we pass a split in the trail, to make sure he doesn’t wander off without me. Luckily my red sweatshirt is easy to spot because he seems to have no sense of direction.

  We don’t make it too far before Ry wants to sit and play with some flowers that look like miniature bells. I’m glad, because I’m overheating and in desperate need of my tank top.

  “How do you guys do laundry?” I ask.

  “Usually we use the trough, but there’s a waterfall not too far from here. Makes the chore much funner if you ask me.”

  It’s not the fun that perks my interest in the waterfall. It’s the privacy. I could really use a bath. “How do I sign up for laundry duty?”

  “There’s a board on the back wall. Just put your name down.”

  “No one will mind?”

  “Not. One. Bit.” Ry’s face is so close to the ground he could snort the dirt. He’s following a ladybug and trying to balance one of the flowers on its back, but he’s not having much luck.

  “Thanks, Ry.”

  “That’s what I’m here for,” he says, smiling at the bug. “Sasha will be happy to give up laundry duty.”

  “So Gavin busted her out, huh?”

  “Yep. ‘Bout a year ago.”

  “Last year? Then how come I don’t recognize her?”

  “You probably wouldn’t. She had black hair and was about fifteen pounds thinner. She was fit and fast. She made the Endurance pills look worthless.”

  A memory surfaces of a girl with long hair and a valance of bangs that framed her face—a face that never scowled.

  “There was a girl…but her name wasn’t Sasha,” I say, although I can’t recall what it was. “She left right after I transferred from the Center for Growth. But that had to have been three or four years ago, not a year.”

  “That’s how long she was in isolation. The patient died right before the operation was scheduled. They hadn’t cut Sasha open, so they just locked her away until they could redo the tests and match her with a new patient.”

  “Why not just send her back to the Center?”

  “She knew too much, had started to question what was going on when she woke up from the anesthesia. Didn’t you?”

  He doesn’t look up, but I nod anyway.

  “The day of her surgery finally came, and they took her uterus. She’ll never have kids.”

  I gasp. “That’s awful.” The look she gave me when Gavin introduced us makes sense now. They took away her ability to create life. I was lucky enough to get away with everything intact.

  “Surgeries can take hours, so they space them apart to give the doctors a break. Before they could cut up the rest of her, Gavin got her out. She doesn’t want to remember her old life. When she cleaned herself up, she renamed herself Sasha. A rebirth if you will.”

  “Cleaned herself up?”

  “She got hooked on pills
trying to numb the pain. It’s a trip what they do to you guys if you really think about it.”

  I’m trying not to, but it will happen again, to people who need me. It’s the one thing that keeps me from dwelling on the reality of it all. I need to save my foster friends. The only family I have.

  I draw in the dirt with the toe of my shoe. It’s odd knowing Sasha once succumbed to pills. She seems anything but weak now.

  “So after they removed her uterus, they kept her alive to take the rest of her organs?”

  “Yep. Just like Mary with her cornea and kidney,” Ry says. “Some parts need to be used immediately. Others can be stored. That’s what the top floor at the hospital is for. It’s the cryopreservation unit. You never know when someone might need a lung or heart. With today’s technology, parts can keep for a couple of years.”

  He sounds proud. I want to step on his fingers. But Ry is so focused on the ladybug I have to believe the drugs mask his real emotions.

  I dig out some of the pills from my pocket. I have less than a week’s worth of my heart medication. I’ll need to space them out to make them last until I can get more. The handful I have left are mixed in with the ones I took from Ms. Preen. “Any idea what these do?”

  Ry looks up, and his eyes grow wide. He stands so smoothly it’s like strings are lifting him. His mouth quivers for a moment. “That’s the holy grail,” he says, pointing a flower stem at the big red pill.

  I put the rest of the pills away and hold the red one out, pressing it between my fingers. It’s squishy, like there’s liquid inside. I move it to the right and left, and his eyes follow. They’re so dilated the black sucks up most of the blue. He doesn’t blink until I tuck my hand behind my back.

  “What’s so special about this pill, Ry?”

  “That’s a Fireball.”

  “But what’s it do?”

  “I’ve never taken one.” He takes a step and I scoot back. “It’s supposed to be some sort of love pill. Better than Euphorium and Lust put together.”

  “Like a love potion?”