Pulse

by Patrick Carman

  “Easy! Once we’re connected I can tap into your location. You’d have to leave your Tablet at home in order to lose me, and who does that? Nobody! Pretty cool, right? If you’re in trouble, I’ll know how to find you. Like if you fall into the lake.”

  Hawk pointed out into the darkness, the glow of light from his Tablet illuminating his nervous expression. “Sorry, you guys. Really, I messed up.”

  He looked like an injured puppy with his mop of brown hair, and both girls lost any interest in beating him up or chasing him off.

  “Do me a favor and stop hacking into my stuff, will you?” Faith asked.

  “But what if you’re in trouble?” Hawk asked. “And how will I get you more jeans for three Coin?”

  Liz stepped up and shoved Hawk hard on the shoulder. “No way.”

  Hawk shoved Liz right back, nearly hitting her in the chest. “Yes way!”

  “Watch the hand placement, Romeo,” Liz said. “And can you get me three-Coin jeans?”

  “Sure I can, but you’ll have to let me hack into your Tablet first. And bonus! We can chat during lectures.”

  “You’re right; he’s harmless,” Liz said to Faith. “And weird.”

  Faith wanted to get to their destination and started backpedaling. She smiled as she thought of the clothes and makeup Hawk was probably going to be able to get for her for next to nothing.

  “Come on, Liz, let’s let Hawk in on our little secret. It’s the least we can do.”

  Liz started walking, and Hawk fell in line with her, measuring her height against his own and smelling the air around her head when she wasn’t looking.

  “What are you, like, ten?” Liz asked.

  “Thirteen,” Hawk said. “I’m small for my age. But my brain is huge.”

  “I bet.”

  They walked toward the grade school, laughing and listening as Hawk explained in complicated, incoherent detail how he had hacked into the State shopping system and gotten the pants massively discounted and shipped for free.

  Even if Hawk had not been filling the air with his chirpy voice, none of them would have heard the figure dressed in black moving along the trees nearby, taking in every word.

  Chapter 3

  Great Story, Bro. Tell It Again.

  The grade school at Bridgeport Commons had been closed for many years. The building was crawling with green ivy that covered the walls, the windows, the doors, and the roof with a thick carpet of tangled leaves. Faith and Liz went to the grade school because it was the kind of place the States didn’t have: a secret place with treasures inside. On the darkest side of the school there was a broken window covered with plywood. They’d long since pulled away the thick ivy and used a hammer to pry a small, square piece of wood away from the opening. They crawled through and, once inside, made their way through the empty cafeteria.

  “Now we go it alone,” Faith said, glancing at Hawk, who looked shattered at the idea of being left behind by the two older girls.

  “Not you, silly,” Liz said, taking hold of his Tablet and trying to slide it free from his hand. He’d snapped it into its small size, using its screen as a flashlight. “We don’t take our Tablets any farther than this. It sort of ruins the experience.”

  For Hawk, the idea of being without his Tablet even for a few seconds went beyond his reasoning.

  “I can’t go anywhere without my Tablet. I don’t do that.”

  “It’s not alive,” Liz coaxed, gently tugging on the edge of the gleaming instrument. “It’s not like a pet or a brother or a girl. It’s just a Tablet. You can live without it for a little while.”

  Hawk looked at the Tablet and the girl, but he was not convinced. He pulled the Tablet closer, and to his astonishment, the girl came with it. She was not letting go. Liz leaned down, her lips inches from Hawk’s, and he could smell her grape bubblegum breath.

  “Give me the Tablet,” Liz whispered, and Hawk nearly fainted. “Come on, you can do it. Let it go.”

  Faith was having a hard time keeping a straight face and turned away, taking her Tablet out of her pocket and setting it on a cafeteria table with Liz’s. She stole a glance at the screen, searching for a message from Wade. No message—and she felt a little sting in her heart.

  “Here,” Liz said.

  Faith turned to face her friend. Liz was holding out Hawk’s Tablet, which she had finally managed to pry loose. Hawk was holding Liz’s hand.

  “We struck a bargain,” Liz explained, trying to downplay any meaning in the arrangement. “My hand for the Tablet. I’ll survive.”

  Faith laughed and set Hawk’s Tablet on the table. She could tell that Liz was actually fine with the circumstances. The keeper of Tablets was also a hopeless hand-holder. It was a comfort, even from a geeky freshman who wouldn’t shut up.

  “I can’t believe I’m doing this. Do you realize I haven’t been this far away from my Tablet since before I was born? They put it in my crib on day one! I feel like I lost a limb.”

  “One step at a time. It will get easier,” Faith said, then turned in the darkness, running her hand along the slick tile wall.

  “I love this school,” Liz said dreamily. “It’s like they all just got up and walked away and didn’t look back. It’s beautiful and strange and lonely, you know?”

  For once Hawk didn’t answer. He was staring back in the direction of his Tablet, thinking about bolting for the cafeteria.

  “Here we are, my favorite place on Earth,” Faith said, inviting them in like a magician’s assistant. “Oh, wait! Forgot the lights. Don’t go anywhere.”

  Faith ran back in the direction from which they’d come, and Hawk tried to follow her. But Liz had a strong grip, and that grape bubblegum breath and those dark curls of hair draped across the sides of her face.

  “Steady now,” she said. “She’ll be right back.”

  And she was. The dancing beam of a flashlight arrived quickly, and Faith handed out two more. All three of them, wielding old flashlights of their own, stepped inside the room and looked around.

  “I bet they don’t have one of these at either of the States,” Faith said. She looked down at Hawk. “Have you ever seen one before?”

  Hawk let go of Liz’s hand and pointed his flashlight every which way. “I’ve heard of them, but I’ve never seen one. It smells funny in here.”

  “That’s the scent of books,” Faith said, taking in a big breath through her nose. “I love it. Come on, I’ll show you around.”

  They were standing in a grade school library that had been abandoned but left undisturbed. Faith arrived at the far corner of the room and put her hand on a row of tall, skinny picture books. The feeling of their slick spines against her fingers as they passed by, like little speed bumps, made her heart beat faster.

  “Once everyone had a Tablet, no one wanted these anymore. But there’s something different about holding them in your hands.”

  Hawk was scanning a line of picture books with his flashlight, reading the titles.

  “These are in the data cloud; everyone has access to them. I’ve read them all. It’s crazy that people used to have to lug these things around. What a hassle.”

  Liz had peeled off along the wall of books and pulled out a stack. She flopped down in an orange beanbag, and small bits of white Styrofoam shot up in the air through a hole in one side.

  “I always forget about that before I sit down,” she said. “One of these days I’m going to be sitting on an empty bag. That’s gonna hurt.”

  Hawk still couldn’t believe he was in a dark space with two older girls. He eyed Faith’s long legs and Liz’s dark hair as it spilled over the beanbag chair. He wished he could kiss one of them but knew that would be tricky.

  Ignorant of Hawk’s desires, Faith held out a book and said, “The Sneetches are different in print. This will change your life.”

  Hawk leaned back on his heels. He’d never touched a book before. He kept thinking about all the people who had touched the book, all those snot
ty little hands who’d also played by the lake outside. The book had a musty odor to it, like nothing he’d ever smelled before; and this, too, bothered him. He was used to the cleanness of his Tablet, the glass surface, the brushed metal casing, and the billion things inside, all vibrant and new.

  “It’s not really my thing,” Hawk said, backing away from the book a step or two like Faith were holding a live badger.

  “Suit yourself, but I’m telling you, it’s not the same. And it won’t hurt you.”

  Faith set the book back on the shelf and took two others—Green Eggs and Ham and Oh, the Places You’ll Go!—and walked to the old librarian’s desk.

  “She likes to feel like she’s in charge,” Liz joked from the beanbag.

  Faith sat down at the desk and opened to the first page of Green Eggs and Ham, holding her flashlight so the faded colors punched up in the darkness. And then she smiled a special sort of smile, a contented one, a smile that Hawk saw in the light bouncing off the pages. She was touching one of the pages, tracing the lines of the drawings with her finger, lost in a way he didn’t understand. She retrieved a piece of paper and a pencil from the librarian’s desk and began drawing the picture from the book.

  It was the smile more than anything else that got Hawk to touch a real book for the first time in his life. That and the fact that he ached for his Tablet, and he thought maybe The Sneetches would help him forget about how badly he felt. He did love the strange creatures with stars on their round bellies.

  “Dr. Seuss,” he said, “don’t fail me now.”

  There were no more beanbags, so he sat cross-legged on the floor and opened the book. He had never turned real pages before, but it was sort of like turning pages on his Tablet, only he had to admit, it felt very different. The pages were heavy, and he liked the way they brushed against his skin as he moved them and landed on the first page of the story. It was, he would recall much later, impossible not to touch the image. If he had done this on his Tablet, something would have happened, and that was the biggest shock. Tablets reacted to everything. If they were touched, they did something. When he touched a Sneetch on his Tablet, words were spoken, lessons and commands emerged, and he was expected to interact. But the book just sat there, and for this Hawk loved it. His index finger traced the line of the picture of the Sneetch. He felt the roughness of the paper—nothing like the slick glass of the Tablet. He felt the yellow color of Sneetches’ fur like he’d never felt yellow before. It got under his skin.

  Fifteen minutes later, after having been lost entirely in the story, Hawk heard a voice.

  “Told you. It’s not the same, right?”

  Faith was pointing her flashlight in Hawk’s direction, which felt blinding and harsh as he looked up. It woke him from what felt like a dream he’d fallen into; a dream with green stars and furry, yellow creatures and bright-blue water. Forever after, Hawk would never forget the words of that book, or the feeling of holding the story in his hands. He retold the whole story of the book out loud, all the way from the creation of the first star-bellied Sneetch to the very last page. “This book is about us,” he concluded, looking off in the direction of where the Western State awaited them. “All of them in there, the few of us out here. It’s timeless.”

  Liz stretched her arms over her head and let the book in her lap flop shut, yawning loudly. “Great story, bro. Tell it again.”

  Hawk didn’t catch Liz’s sarcasm. He was a tad slow when it came to pretty, older girls and their senses of humor, so he went on about the parallel between their own lives and that of the Sneetches until Liz rolled her eyes and he realized he’d already said too much.

  “What are you reading?” Hawk asked her.

  Liz looked at the cover of the book and ran her finger along the smooth illustration of a monster sitting on the shore where a small boat was arriving.

  “Where the Wild Things Are. It makes me forget about everything else. It’s like the rest of the world just falls away.”

  Suddenly, a sound echoed down the long corridor and made its way into the library.

  Faith slowly shut her copy of Green Eggs and Ham. In all the times they’d been there, no one had ever followed them. And now it had happened twice in one night. It scared her, but it also made her protective. Who would come into this special place besides her and the people she showed? What were they doing here?

  Drifters.

  The word squirmed itself into her brain, and she was suddenly imagining a mysterious group of people living in one of the classrooms in the abandoned school.

  “Shut off your lights,” Faith whispered, and they all did. The library turned especially dark in an instant.

  “What if they see the Tablets?” Hawk said nervously. “It’s the first thing they’ll take.”

  Faith and Liz were thinking the same thing, but they didn’t say so. It would only upset Hawk even more. Maybe it had been a mistake leaving them behind like they had. They waited a while longer, but there was only silence; and they began to wonder if they’d heard anything to begin with. Maybe it had been their imaginations.

  “This has been really cool and all,” Hawk said. “But I think I’m ready to get my Tablet back. And I should probably go home before my mom starts messaging me, wondering where I am.”

  Faith lived in the neighborhood, but Liz didn’t. Her house was a fifteen-minute walk away, on the other side of the abandoned mall. Neither of them had any idea where Hawk lived.

  They decided not to turn the flashlights back on unless they had to. Their eyes had adjusted to the dim light, and they quietly padded along the slick floor of the corridor. When they came to the cafeteria door and found no one, they all felt sure it had only been the wind through the opening. They kept thinking that, laughing nervously, until they arrived at the table and they were staring at two, not three, Tablets.

  Hawk’s was no longer there.

  “Uh-oh,” Liz said.

  Hawk didn’t say anything. For once he was speechless. His emotions got the better of him, and his breath started to come in waves as he picked up the note that had been left behind. It was written on a small piece of tattered paper that had been torn off what had once been a full sheet.

  Get used to living without it.

  “I’m sorry, Hawk,” Faith said. “This is all my fault. I’m really, really sorry.”

  “Sorry won’t get it back!” Hawk yelled. He was pacing back and forth like a caged animal. He moved his hands in phantom swipes on a Tablet he no longer had, and then he began to run. He was at the window before Faith and Liz could catch him, and by the time they got outside, Hawk was far enough away that they could barely see his silhouette moving fast along the distant tree line.

  “Hawk!” Faith called out. “It’s okay, we’ll find it! We will!”

  “God, this is terrible,” Liz said. “Who would have taken his Tablet? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  They both felt uneasy about staying in the school any longer. It was too confined now, like someone could nail the plywood over the entry and seal them in for good. Faith went through the opening first, then Liz; and when the cool night air hit them in the faces, they felt a little bit better. They walked in silence, hoping the Tablet had satisfied whoever had followed them.

  “You know what,” Liz concluded as they came to the fork in the path where they would normally part ways. “This is going to be good for him. He’s too attached to that thing. I bet he’ll even thank us later.”

  Faith wasn’t so sure. They walked around the lake, and Faith thought of messaging Hawk to see if he was okay. But of course she couldn’t. He didn’t have a Tablet. And then her Tablet vibrated. A message was there, one she hadn’t expected but had been hoping for. Wade Quinn was back.

  Come see me tomorrow, gym, watch me high-jump?

  “Um, it’s Wade,” Faith told Liz. There was an awkward pause as they kept walking, and then Liz stopped.

  “Go ahead, you know you want to.”

  Liz stepped aw
ay, and their hands pulled apart like something snapping in half.

  “I think I’ll go on home,” Liz said, and before Faith could stop her, Liz was a shadow disappearing into the darkness. Faith knew better than to try to change Liz’s mind when she got this way. She tapped out a message and felt her spirits lift a little. Hawk would have a new Tablet before he could hardly grow to miss the old one; she was sure of it. And Liz would come around. It was all going to be fine; she just had to keep telling herself that. She took a deep breath and hit SEND on her message to Wade.

  I hope you jump better than you draw daisies. What time should I be there?

  Faith continued along the path that skirted the lake, a nervous energy in her steps as she thought of who or what she might encounter. It had been a weird night in more ways than one, and she just wanted to get home and lock the door behind her.

  As she came around the final turn that would lead to her house, she saw a familiar park bench. She’d sat on it many times, drawing the lake and the birds on the pond with her finger on her Tablet. Something on the bench was fluttering softly on the breeze, though it was too heavy to be blown away entirely. Its edge lifted and fell as she arrived at the bench and realized what it was: her drawing of Green Eggs and Ham, the drawing she’d done at the librarian’s desk in the library. The bottom third of the paper was missing. Get used to living without it.

  Faith’s hand was shaking as she ran for her front door.

  How was it possible?

  How had someone gotten the sheet of paper with her drawing on it, torn off the bottom, and left the note for Hawk? And all while they were still in the library?

  An hour later, in another part of town, Hawk was lying in his bedroom, a small lamp over his left shoulder. There was something in his hands, but it wasn’t his Tablet. It was a little wider and taller than that, but not much. It had fit perfectly in the backpack he carried around everywhere. The pack wasn’t designed to carry much—two straps over his shoulders, a thin sheath of foam around an oblong pouch against his narrow back.