by Amy Joy
“Where are you going to sleep?” I answered in the same quiet tone.
“On the couch; it’ll be fine.”
“Please stay...”
He looked at me for a moment and chewed on his lip. “Okay. You sleep in the covers and I’ll sleep on top. And I’ll keep the door open, if you don’t mind. I just have to run and close the back door.”
He left the room and I could hear his quiet footsteps padding down the hall and returning a moment later. As promised, he laid down next to me on top of the covers.
“What time is it?” I asked, trying to orient myself.
“About four o’clock.”
“Have you slept at all?”
“Not yet.”
“What have you been doing? Did you see any meteors?”
“Just a couple. Mostly I’ve been thinking.”
“About what?”
“A lot of things.”
I didn’t know if I should pursue it, so I laid there for while, then took my hand and laid it over his.
“Thank you for coming,” he said moments later.
“I wish I had a birthday present for you.”
“It’s fine, really.”
We laid there quiet for some time. I now felt a strange sense of groggy alertness. If I weren’t with Bryan, I’m sure I would have slept, but now that I had rested, being with him pumped just enough adrenaline through my system that I didn’t know if I would be able to fall back asleep.
“I don’t want to go,” I said, finally breaking the silence, not even sure if he was still awake or if I was now talking to myself.
“You mean leave here later, or you don’t want to go to The Academie?”
“Both. Just think how great it’d be if we were able to date like normal people. The biggest challenge we’d face would be the fact that we live a couple hours apart.”
“And that could be easily remedied,” he added. “We could go to the same college, or I could go to another nearby.”
“Oh man!” I rolled over and buried my head into the pillow.
“Okay, I could stay far away if you want.”
“No, of course not.” I rolled over again, took his hand and wove my fingers between his. “I’d love to have you close by. That’s the point.” I paused. “But instead, soon I won’t have any contact with you at all.”
He sighed. “We’ll figure something out,” he said after what felt like several minutes.
“Have you ever thought about running away?” It may be childish, but I had to ask.
“Oh, of course. A hundred million times I’ve thought about it. But where do we go? We’d have to get to Canada or Mexico to escape The Academie. And that’s easier said than done.”
“I just want to feel like I’m doing something. Just giving in and going—it feels wrong.”
He surprised me by smiling.
“What?” I asked.
“You sound like my mom.”
I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to take that as a compliment. “That’s a little creepy.”
“No, it’s just, well, she’s the same way. She’s all about action.”
“I just hate it when people sit around complaining about something, but they don’t actually do anything to change things.”
He half-smiled again, and I could tell he was still thinking that I sounded like Anna. I guess I should take it as a compliment; I really did admire her. But it all seemed a little weird in a strange Freudian kind of way.
He looked at me seriously. “We’ll do something. It might just take a little while to figure out what.” He paused and took a deep breath. “In the meantime, you’ll get to see what The Academie’s like from the inside.”
I felt my stomach drop. How was I ever going to survive The Academie when I felt sick just thinking about it? I sighed and turned to stare at the ceiling.
He touched my chin lightly and guided my head so that I turned to look into his eyes. “You’re going to be okay. It really isn’t that bad.”
I don’t know how he did it, but somehow, in that moment, I felt better.
“Besides, at least they won’t make you cut your hair,” he added teasingly, pulling at his own.
“Sorry,” I said, smiling and scrunching my face up in a way that I hoped conveyed how bad I felt that I hadn’t been more considerate of all he’d been through already. I brushed my hand over the top of his head. “It’s cute though.”
“Thanks, but it’s really not me.”
His eyes met mine again. His face was only inches from my own. He was right there, so real, so flawless, so beautiful. I ran my fingers over his forehead and cheeks again, trying to memorize every detail.
He slid his hand behind my neck and gently pulled me closer. Then our lips met again and I knew why it was that people closed their eyes when they kiss, because I couldn’t have kept mine open if I’d wanted to; the feeling of ecstasy that rushed through me was so intense, I could feel it course from my heart, to my head, out my arms, down through my body, reaching out even to the tips of my toes.
He softly kissed each of my cheeks, forehead, and lips again, and I laid there with my fingers tangled up in his, wondering how it was that I would bring myself to say goodbye to all of this in a few short hours.
He unwound his fingers from mine and sitting up, grabbed a blanket from the base of the bed which he threw over both of us as he laid back down. “Let me know if you get too warm,” he said, “but you still feel cold to me.”
I still had the comforter over me, which divided the lower half of my body from his. But he took one arm and wrapped it around me, pulling me closer, while with his other hand he pulled the blankets up to cover my cold arms.
I positioned my head in the comfortable spot between his chest and shoulder, and in this safe and cozy place, I drifted back to sleep.
25. morning breath
I awoke to Bryan’s gentle caress on my cheek. I opened my eyes from a brief but restful sleep to see his dark brown eyes and dimpled cheeks smiling down at me. I had slept so deeply that it took me a minute to get my bearings. The happy surprise of seeing him there caused a wide grin to spread across my face.
“Good morning, Angel,” he said, seeing my smile. He smiled back and leaned over to kiss my forehead. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yeah, actually, I did.” And that’s when I remembered how little time I had left with him. “What time is it?” I asked, sitting up in a panic. Please let it be early still.
“Almost nine.”
“Oh no. Really?” I threw my legs over the side of the bed, preparing to get up. He had to be back at ten. That meant we had less than an hour left.
“Hey,” he said, putting a hand on my shoulder, “it’s going to be okay. My mom’s making pancakes. Why don’t we join her?”
“Yeah, okay….Oh, I must look a mess!” I said, realizing that I had slept in my clothes—not to mention that my hair had matted up in my sleep and—oh god, I hope I don’t have morning breath.
“You look adorable, actually. I like your hair all mussed up like that; it’s cute.” Despite the fact that I thought he must be crazy, he appeared sincere.
“I hope you don’t mind if I comb it out and tie it back then?” I said, smiling.
“Whatever makes you happy.” He grinned and I wondered if his face hurt from smiling as bad as mine did.
I grabbed a brush from my bag that had mysteriously found its way into his room and attempted to comb out the tangled mess attached to my head. After making what I hoped was some improvement, I pulled out an elastic band and tied it all back in a ponytail. Bryan watched attentively.
“Beautiful,” he said when I’d finished.
“Thanks.” I would miss this later in the day.
We headed into the kitchen and found his mom flipping pancakes on a griddle and his dad staring down at his phone. “Good morning,” we chimed in unison.
“Did you sleep alright?” Anna asked, looking up from the stove.
I nodded,
but Bryan shrugged. “A lot on my mind…” he said.
“I see you made cookies,” Anna said, flipping a pancake and nodding to the stack of tins on the counter. “Had a little trouble with the flour too, I see.”
I looked at Bryan and grinned sheepishly.
“Damn, I thought we cleaned all that up,” he said, reaching for a tin of cookies.
“You aren’t going to eat those for breakfast, are you?” Anna reprimanded.
“Well, I won’t get to eat them later, will I?” he said, opening the tin. “Besides, homemade cookies are good any time of day. Like one Allie?” he asked, holding the tin out to me.
I hesitated, not knowing whether I should or not, since he had just been reprimanded for it, but I looked up and saw that they were both smiling. “It’s fine,” he encouraged. I pulled out a medium-sized one filled with chips and took a bite. He was right: cookies were good at any time of day. He grabbed out a big one and we grinned at one another as we sat eating our cookies for breakfast like a couple of mischievous kids.
“Well, I hope you will save some room for pancakes,” Anna said, resuming her work.
“Don’t worry mom. I wouldn’t miss a chance at your pancakes for anything.”
Anna beamed.
My gaze shifted to James, who I could see was still pouring over news on his phone. Bryan noticed it too.
“What’s up, dad?”
“Well, it appears that an Academie official has made the news this morning. Here, let me see if I can pull up the video. He clicked the mini projector in the side of his phone and flashed it onto a nearby wall. When the video started, I could see a disgruntled-looking man in a suit trying to evade a mob of reporters.
“Mr. Delamot, can you tell us anything about your resignation?” one reporter shouted above the rest. A hundred microphones flew into his face.
“I will not continue to work with The Academie system because it is immoral. That is all I will say.” He waved the reporters away as he proceeded through the crowd.
“Who’s that?” I asked as the video ended and James clicked off the projector.
“Samuel Delamot, former big-wig in The Academie system,” James said. “Just offered his resignation this morning.
“Well, I’m glad to hear that someone finally is recognizing that the system is messed up,” I said, feeling bolder than usual—possibly due to my lack of sleep
“I agree, Allie,” Anna said as she loaded the final pancake onto a plate to join us at the table.
“But it is strange,” James noted, “because Delamot was one of the leading advocates of The Academie system in the beginning.
“Yeah, I remember that,” I said, recognition dawning on me. “Yeah, he was the guy who was always on TV for a while—saying how great the concept was and how it was going to change the world. I wonder what made him change his mind.”
“Maybe he visited one of the facilities,” Bryan said, getting up from the table. “What would you like to drink Allie?” he asked, now standing beside the fridge. “We have juice, water, chocolate soymilk, and it looks like someone made coffee.” He appeared to be ready to drop the conversation and think about other things. I didn’t blame him.
“Coffee’d be great, thanks.”
He poured a glass of orange juice for himself and a coffee for me and sat back down at the table. Meanwhile Anna joined us with blueberry and maple syrups and a stack of plates and silverware.
“You first Allie,” Anna said, passing the plate of pancakes.
Breakfast, of course, went quicker than I would have liked. We finished when we realized that Bryan only had enough time left to scoop up his things and head to the door. With a quick kiss, a hug, and another promise it will be okay, he was gone.
I felt a giant hole rip through my heart as I stood there with Anna in the doorway trying to make sense of what had just happened.
Had any of it been real?
I wished I had a rewind button on my life so I could go back, do it again, and somehow make it last longer. Maybe this time I wouldn’t fall asleep, or I’d skip breakfast, or I wouldn’t be so sleepy so it wouldn’t all seem so much like a dream…
26. the hidden value of the arts
“Allie,” Anna said as she backed away from the door. “I want to show you something.”
She led me to a back room on the opposite side of the kitchen. Inside, a large painting hung in the center of the back wall.
I gasped at the sight of it. Then my eyes circled around, horrified. Jetting out from the upper right hand corner of the painting, an enormous brick and steel structure protruded into a peaceful scene, its dark reds and grays contrasting sharply with the bright green, blue, and yellow of the lush landscape it overtook. In its wake it left storms and devastation—withered plants that seemed to cry out for sunshine.
“Do you know what it is?”
I nodded. “The Academie.”
“Did Bryan show you this?”
I shook my head.
“He painted it, almost a year ago now.”
I shook my head again. “He never mentioned that he painted…”
“Our society doesn’t value the arts, so The Academie doesn’t either. This is the last thing he painted, before he put his brushes away. This is my office,” she said, walking over to straighten papers on the desk. “I hung it here to remind me. Bryan and millions of others throughout the country are locked in there…”
I sighed.
“Allie, we’re trying to move to Canada.”
The pain in my chest grew deeper and a dull ache began in the pit of my stomach.
“We haven’t told him, obviously, but we’ve already applied for visas.” She looked at me to see how I was taking it, and I tried my best not to react. “Our jobs are not the same, now that The Academie has practically absorbed the colleges. Second career students are great, but it’s just—Allie, I’m sorry, but we just can’t leave him there for four more years.” Her eyes were full of tears.
I nodded and tried to hold the tears back from my own eyes. She looked away. “I’ll keep you updated, if I hear anything soon….” She sighed audibly and looked at me again. “I wish we could take you with us.”
“Me too.” My voice cracked.
Shortly after, I grabbed up my things and headed to the car with Anna.
On the way home, my throat ached so bad with grief it constricted my vocal chords, making everything come out strained and strange. My mind no longer raced as it had on the trip down. Now it was blank—everything burned away by the shock and pain of loss. But I wasn’t the only one. So mostly, we sat in silence.
When we got to my house, Anna got out, went to the door with me to thank my parents, and then gave me a close, comforting mom hug. “It’s going to be okay honey,” she said. I could hear Bryan’s voice in hers.
“I…” I wanted to say that I would keep in touch; that I wanted to see her—and all of them—again soon, but I how could I? I wasn’t going to be able to see or talk to any of them again for a very, very long time. For all I knew, by then they would be long gone to Canada.
They could forget all about me.
27. the rock
The first few weeks at The Academie were tough, but everything was so new—and crazy with the loss of Shara— that it kept me distracted from the truth: I wasn’t going home.
My life now seemed divided into two parts, marked by events that happened almost simultaneously: the beginning of The Academie, and meeting Bryan. And I would think about my life in these terms: before Academie/before Bryan, and now.
But now The Academie had become my life and everything I experienced before it appeared as unreal as a dream. Most of the time, I pushed the memories of my old life from my mind—why dwell on what you can’t have? But sometimes, I’d let myself lay in bed at night, replaying my conversations with Bryan—not even sure if they were really real anymore.
“I love you Allie…
“We’ll find a way out of this, I promise…�
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And a tiny spark of hope would ignite in me again.
I became a moody, unpredictable version of myself. One day I’d light up with the assurance that all would be okay—that Bryan was out there somewhere and he, Anna, and James were working on a way to get us out of here. One these days I’d bounce around, talking to everyone, smiling, laughing. Other days I was convinced the government would extend the enrollment age indefinitely, and I would spend all my days here—the everlasting Academie. Those days I would close up, going deep inside myself, looking out through unseeing eyes, talking to no one, looking at no one, seeing nothing.
I wondered how anyone could keep up.
For the most part, Matt and I ignored each other. But one day he had the audacity to approach me just to say that the instructors were having a meeting to discuss whether he should be moved to another facility where he could be offered challenges to meet his intelligence. That’s when I totally lost it.
I felt so useless. Unwanted. Discarded. Alone.
That’s when another realization hit me: whatever relationship I might have had with Bryan, was over.
It felt as though a large rock had come to sit upon my chest.
And as autumn faded into winter, I carried that rock with me wherever I went.
28. the longest winter
The holidays came and went without fanfare. We had a Halloween party the weekend before the holiday, and the cafeteria served up their version of a traditional Thanksgiving. A few weeks later, for Christmas, we were given new uniforms, school supplies, and toiletries. Just what I wanted.
Before The Academie, I’d hated the monotony of routine. But as my sadness deepened, I found comfort in The Academie schedule. It told me what to do when. I listened obediently. Unthinking. Unfeeling. Uncaring. Just walking through the paces, day after day. It offered a predictability I had never found in the outside world.
I pushed my new friends away. I still sat with them at lunch and walked with Stevie to class, but I didn’t talk much. Better not to get attached. They stopped asking if I was alright.