“You’re a saint.” I bite off the words, wishing I could be the poison to him that Fia is to Eden.
“For what it’s worth, I really am sorry. About everything. And I promise I won’t leave her alone tonight. I’ll take care of her.”
“She’s not yours to take care of.” I walk to my room without tracing the wall and slam the door shut. “Fia? Where are you?”
A muffled sob comes from the couch. I trip on the corner of it and swear. I haven’t tripped on my furniture in years. Then I nearly sit on her legs as I try to sit next to her. “Shh, it’ll be okay.”
“It won’t be okay. Annie, what I did . . . what I did . . . I’m so sorry. I’ll fix it, I promise.”
I find her hair and stroke it; it’s soft but at the end it’s hard and crusted with something. Blood. I want to throw up. My baby sister is on my couch and she has blood in her hair and I don’t know if it’s hers or his.
“Did you see anything?” she whispers. “Are they going to kill us? Are we still okay?”
“We’re fine, we’re fine, I promise, we’re fine.” I wish I could see her arm, see how bad it is. Look in her face to see how much pain she is in. Maybe I don’t wish it, actually. I’d rather see her dancing.
Which reminds me. “Don’t go dancing.”
She laughs. “Why?”
“Someone watches you.”
She laughs again. It’s harsh and low and nothing like the way she laughed when we were little. “When I dance, everyone watches me.”
I sigh, lean my head against hers. “And don’t let James stay at your place tonight.”
“Did you see something? Is something bad going to happen?” She sounds terrified.
“I’m your big sister. I don’t have to see anything to know James is always something bad.”
Fia snorts. “You wouldn’t think so if you could look at him.” Then her voice is muffled as she moves the pillow back, brushing my face with it. She screams into it, then sobs, then throws it with a thud across the room. “My arm really hurts,” she whimpers. I hear her finger tapping on the couch cushion, the three-then-pause-then-three in an unending loop. Oh, Fia.
“I know. But it’s okay. You’re done. I won’t let them make you do that ever again.”
“Annie,” she says, hooking one hand behind my neck and pulling my head down to her lips. “I didn’t do it.”
“Didn’t do what?”
“I’ll fix it, I promise. You’ll be proud of me, I’ll make you proud, and I’ll get you out. I didn’t do it. I couldn’t. I didn’t kill Adam.”
My heart freezes, and I grab her by the shoulders. She yelps with pain. “You didn’t?”
“No, I couldn’t! I’m sorry. I know I screwed up. But I thought . . . I hoped . . . you wouldn’t have wanted me to kill him. He’s nice, Annie. I made the right choice. I listened to myself for the first time in years. I was so scared I’d come back and you’d be—that they’d know, and they’d hurt you. But they don’t know. I got away with it. And I’m going to keep listening to myself. I can do this.” She waits for me to answer, but I don’t, I can’t. Her voice is even more pained when she talks again. “I thought you’d be proud that I saved someone Keane wanted dead.”
I let her go and sink back onto the couch. A sharp knock raps on the door. “Keane didn’t want him dead,” I say.
The doorknob clicks; our talk is over. At least Dr. Grant is a man and therefore our minds are safe for now.
“Who then?” Fia asks, her voice slipping. She is in so much pain it hurts me to hear her, but I can’t go to her, I can’t help her. “Who wanted him dead?”
I stand and move away from the couch. “I did.”
“I SAW THE LAKE! I CAN’T BELIEVE IT. DOES IT ALWAYS look that amazing? I can’t wait to go!”
“But you won’t actually be able to see it,” Fia says, slamming a drawer shut.
“No, but I’ll be able to remember seeing it in my vision! I can pull it all up and play it out in my mind, and I can match what I remember seeing with how it all smells and feels and sounds.” I throw a pillow, jumping on her bed. I feel like I could fly. I feel like I am flying. I saw something because I thought about it hard enough, and it wasn’t horrible or confusing. I still don’t have many visions, and can’t usually figure out what they are anyway—people I don’t know, places I can’t recognize. None as bad as the one with my parents but none particularly awesome.
But this one! It was the beach, a beautiful narrow stretch of pale sand on the shore of the lake, a lake so wide—melting off into the horizon—it might as well be the ocean. My classmates—I saw some of them, too, but the only one I recognized was Eden because of her wild curly hair that I play with when we’re hanging out. And Clarice! I saw Clarice; I knew it was her because I heard her voice and I’d know her voice anywhere. Her hair is long and her eyes are blue, the same color as the sky. I had forgotten to miss blue. Blue!
I flop down onto my back, tracing my stomach happily. “I didn’t tell you the best part.”
“Oh?” Another drawer slams. “I can’t find my bra,” she mutters.
“The best part is, I saw you.”
“So? I’m not that great to look at.”
“Don’t be stupid! This is the first time I’ve seen you since you were a toddler! Your hair is so shiny, and your face. Oh, Fia, you’re beautiful. You’re so, so beautiful. I knew who you were the second I saw you.” Tears trace from the corner of each of my eyes. I’m on Fia’s bed, and it smells like her, sweet vanilla, and now I know what look goes with that smell.
She was there, on the beach ahead of whatever vantage point the vision gave me, and she looked back for a brief second before kicking a ball wildly and chasing after it through a group of adults.
She didn’t look happy. I wonder if she always looks that way and I don’t know. Or maybe I don’t remember what happy looks like. But even with her brows knit together and her mouth pulled tight, she was so beautiful. And when she ran, she was every description of graceful I have ever read.
“You’re beautiful,” she says with a sigh. “And I’m glad you saw something happy. Really. That’s amazing. I hope you keep seeing happy things. It makes everything worth it.”
“Maybe next time they take us on a Broadway trip I can see the show beforehand and ruin the whole thing for you.”
Fia lets out a dry laugh. “You do that. I hate musicals anyway.”
Our door flies open. “Where were you in class today, Fia?” Eden says, and then they both swear loudly and I feel a blanket get ripped out from underneath me.
“KNOCK FIRST!” Fia screams. I’ve never heard her so angry.
I wave a hand lazily in the air. “Relax! Eden doesn’t have to knock. Oh, wait—are you naked? Did she see you naked?” I giggle, still giddy with happiness, still seeing the beach. I know what Eden looks like. I want to touch her hair again; it was so wild in my vision. Now when she comes over, I don’t have to imagine what I think she looks like. I know! “Does Fia have big boobs? She won’t tell me, and apparently it’s not okay to feel them and see for myself.” No one laughs. “Sheesh, joking.”
“What happened to you?” Eden says. She sounds scared.
Fia stomps to the door. “Shut up. Get out of our room.”
“What’s wrong?” I sit up.
“Her body . . .” Eden says.
“I SAID SHUT UP.”
“No, tell me what’s wrong. Eden, what can’t I see? What’s wrong?”
“She’s covered with bruises and cuts! Her whole stomach, and her arms, too! What have they been—”
“Get out of my room!”
Eden shrieks and I hear footsteps tumbling over each other, then the door slams and Fia’s breathing is heavy.
“What was she talking about?”
“Nothing. Eden’s an idiot. I hate her.”
“She was not talking about nothing!” I stand, reaching out for Fia. She always comes when I reach out for her. But my hands meet only air.
She’s staying away from my hands.
She’s never stayed away from my hands before.
“Are you really covered with bruises and cuts?” It comes out a whisper. I shuffle forward, and finally I connect with her. She doesn’t move. I pull the blanket away and tenderly reach for her stomach. It’s smooth. I trace my fingers along and she hisses a sharp breath, and there, under my fingers, on her ribs, the rough ridge of a cut. There, higher, another one. I pull her arm to me, she’s been wearing long sleeves all the time—why hadn’t I noticed that? A long cut down her forearm, another on her shoulder.
“How did this happen?”
“Training,” she says, and her voice has no life.
“What kind of training?”
“Lately it’s been knife fighting.”
“They have you learning knife fighting? I thought you were in a gymnastics and self-defense class!”
“They take it very seriously here, apparently.”
I’m squeezing her arm, maybe I’m hurting her, but I can’t let go, I can’t let go because then I can’t see her at all. She sighs.
“They’re training me to fight. The knives are new. Before it was just hand-to-hand.”
“Like karate?” Karate would be okay. Kids take karate all the time. Not with knives, though.
“Like street fighting. They have real knives. I have a plastic one. I don’t get to stop until I’ve delivered an incapacitating blow. Doesn’t matter how many times I get cut.”
“No.”
“It’s okay, Annie. I don’t get cut much anymore. These are old. They’re almost all healed. And I’m getting very, very good.” Her voice sounds like the knives I can see sliding across her skin, through her skin, her pretty, pale skin, pale like the sand on the beach where I saw her.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I back up, pulling her with me, until my legs hit my bed and I can sink down. My fingers trace and trace and trace the lines on her arms.
“It’s not a big deal.”
“It is a big deal! It’s a huge deal. I can’t believe they’re letting you do this! I’m going to tell Clarice. I’ll complain. This is insane. They have to stop. Is Ms. Robertson behind it? I’ll have her fired!”
“Okay,” she says, and I can tell from the sound of her voice that her head is turned away from me and toward the window. “You talk to Clarice. I’m sure that’ll fix it.”
“Did you tell them you don’t want to do it?”
Her arm moves up as she shrugs. “Yeah. They said it wasn’t optional. Could come in handy someday. They always blabber on about how they tailor our educations to what we’ll need. Maybe I’ll need to be good in a knife fight.”
“You are never going to be in a knife fight,” I say. My head is spinning. I don’t know what’s going on or why she hid this from me. But I’ll tell Clarice, and Clarice will make sure whoever is responsible for this is in serious trouble.
I clutch Fia’s hand, feeling the sand beneath my toes. I thought today would be magical, but as I match up what I saw with what I feel and hear and smell, I just keep seeing the expression on Fia’s face from the vision.
She wasn’t happy.
Nothing about her was happy. I remember my parents’ faces, I remember what happy looks like, of course I do. The dozen other girls shout and laugh around us; I hear a few running through the shallow waves even though it’s far too cold to get in.
We spent the afternoon at the aquarium. Eden could tell I was distracted and kept telling me the names of the weirdest fish, but I couldn’t stop wondering about what’s going on with Fia. Still can’t. Fia pushes my hair aside where it’s blown into my face and I try to smile at her.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” I ask, hopeful.
“Yeah.”
“Eden?” Clarice asks. “Could you take Annabelle’s hand? I need to borrow Sofia for a minute.”
I relax a little. I talked to Clarice yesterday and she was horrified. She said some of the trainers they brought on were new and overzealous, and what they were doing with Fia was completely inappropriate. She said she’d fix it immediately. I smile and let go of my sister’s hand. Clarice is going to tell her that she’ll never have to do that insane class again.
There’s so much noise here, so many different sounds to filter through. The water, constant, under and over everything. Birds. I didn’t notice the birds in my vision—I’ll have to pay closer attention next time. Traffic. We must still be near a road. Conversations around me. I can pick out Clarice and Fia.
“Why?” Fia asks.
“We want to see if you can do it. Think of it as a game.”
“It’s stupid. I won’t do it.”
“You want out of Ms. Roberston’s sessions?”
Pause. “Yes.”
“Then show me you can do this. Focus. Go on instinct. All you need to do is figure out a way to get this into that woman’s bag without anyone around her noticing.”
Pause. “That’s all?”
“That’s all.”
“It doesn’t feel right.”
“Make it feel right then. You can focus it. I know you can.”
“Fine. Whatever.”
Then the conversation is over and I’m confused. That wasn’t what Clarice was going to talk to her about. Maybe Ms. Robertson is in charge of the self-defense classes. But what was that about a woman and a bag?
I let go of Eden’s hand and sit where I am, sifting sand between my fingers, wondering if this is the part where Fia turns back with that look on her face.
“I’m gonna go down to the water; wanna come?” Eden asks, but I shake my head, lost in what I saw. She puts her hand on top of my hair. “You worry too much. Shout if you want me.”
A few minutes later someone flops to the sand next to me, and I can tell from the scent and feel of her nearby that it’s Fia.
“What did Clarice want?”
“Nothing. Just a stupid game.”
“But you’re out of the classes, right?”
“Right.”
“Good.” I smile and lean my head onto her shoulder. “I like how it smells out here.”
“It smells like rotten things. You’re crazy.”
“It smells like it looks. And I know how it looks, too.” I smile like the crazy person Fia said I was, and she lets out a small laugh, even though I can feel from the tension in her shoulder she still isn’t happy. I’ll make her happy. I can fix things. I can be the big sister. “Oh! They said the doctor should have some of the test results back soon, but they want some samples of your DNA to compare and—”
A crack louder than thunder rips through the air, and a flash of heat whooshes past, carrying stinging bits of sand. Fia knocks us to the ground, throwing herself on top of me, and everyone is screaming and I didn’t see this, what happened, what happened?
“What happened?” I shout in Fia’s ear. But then she shoves off me and she is gone in the blackness now, screaming, screaming as loud as she can.
“WHAT DID YOU MAKE ME DO? WHAT DID YOU DO? WHAT DID I DO?”
She screams and screams until a soft thud hits the ground near me and then she is silent but everyone else is screaming and this is not the beach I saw and I crawl desperately in the sand, searching, because I don’t know where Fia is.
Where is Fia?
“DRUGS, DRUGS, PLEASE GIVE ME DRUGS.” I MAKE A face at my pale reflection. My arm hurts. My head hurts. I don’t understand anything that’s happened today. Annie put the hit on Adam. She’s helping Keane. Why? And thanks to Keane’s rules, I can’t visit her or even call her without being spied on. How could she do this to me? To us? She used me.
My arm hurts.
My life hurts.
“Drugs, drugs, drugs, I want some drugs,” I sing, dancing out of the bathroom and into my living room. It’s a beautiful apartment, Lincoln Park, impeccably furnished. James picked it for me when we got back from Europe and they decided it was dangerous for me to have easy access to Annie. One too many stray t
houghts of grabbing her and running. Stupid Readers.
So she stays at the school and I get “freedom” that is as much a prison as Annie’s secure hall because they know I’ll never leave her.
As long as I do exactly what I am told I am perfectly free.
“Drugs, James, drugs, drugs—” I stop short, almost tripping, and let my anger (always on simmer, I keep it on simmer just for this) explode. “What are they doing here?”
Ms. Robertson and Eden are sitting on my couch—my couch—and James is by the window on his phone. Anger, anger, anger, Eden is already squirming, looking like she’s going to be sick. I turn to Ms. Robertson and mentally list every dirty, foul, obscene word I’ve ever heard or read. I start screaming them in my head, letting them bounce around inside my skull, the whole place a vast echo chamber of filth and bile and words, words, words.
Then, because her severe mouth is a single straight line but she hasn’t gotten truly angry yet, I smile, bare all my teeth at her, and think three simple words: Andy, Ashley, Ally. She gasps in horror and rushes from the couch straight at me, grabbing both my arms (my arm, my arm, pain pain pain) and slamming me into the wall.
“How do you know their names? How?”
Andy, Ashley, Ally. Andy, Ashley, Ally. ANDY, ASHLEY, ALLY.
“STOP IT!” she screams, and I sigh in relief as James pulls her off me. Oh, my arm; spots dance in front of my eyes, but it’s worth it.
Ms. Robertson is screaming at James and he’s talking, trying to calm her down. I sink along the wall to the floor and laugh. I knew it was a good idea to pick up her cell phone when she left it out on her desk the other day. I didn’t even have to sing pop songs, and my thoughts are safe.
“If she doesn’t have anything to hide, then why does she do that? You don’t know what it’s like, having to listen in on her thoughts! She’s a monster!”
“Rawr,” I say.
Sister Assassin Page 5