You make my dangerous ideas sound better than my rational ones. You make me want to think for myself.
You make me want to open myself up and abolish the slavery of wires. You make me want to disengage. You make me want to live.
So what happens now? Without you, I feel like I might trip and fall. I don’t want to resurface without you. I’ve always had fantasies about falling in love. Like castles in the sky that you think are all just a fairy tale. But you helped me tour those castles. Now I want to live inside them.
I’m not safe anymore. I’m no longer hiding in a digital world where I can choose my own ending and never mess up. I know I can’t learn anything worthwhile without leaving this safe place. But what does L.A. have in store for me?
Do you have to turn in your old life to start a new one? Is Justin right, that our souls are scattered and life is about searching for all the missing pieces? Is that what makes us whole?
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I tapped my pen on the bedspread and looked at the clock. It was 2:30 a.m. I was miles from sleep. I tossed my journal aside and leaned against the wall. I could feel him on the other side. That’s where I wanted to be. On his side. And I was wasting precious time.
I shoved my covers off and tiptoed down the cold hardwood floor in my bare feet. I opened his bedroom door and could feel the energy inside meet my skin like a gust.
I heard Justin move on the bed and as soon as I closed the door behind me I felt a warm hand grab my arm and another hand pulled me down on the sheets. His arms wove their way around me and pulled me against him.
“You’ve been ignoring me,” I whispered.
He shook his head. “I wanted you to get some sleep.”
I rubbed my fingertips against the scars I knew were under his T-shirt.
“Are you mad at me?” he said in the darkness. I could feel his eyes studying me.
“Mad isn’t the word for how you make me feel,” I said honestly.
His hand traced the edge of my face.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“For what, exactly?” I asked. “For avoiding me our last night together, or for never calling the last three weeks while you were away?”
He leaned forward until his lips were in my hair and he sighed. “This is exactly why I didn’t want to fall for you,” he said.
“It’s a little late for that.”
His dark eyes could smolder even in the dark. “You mean more to me than you realize. Do you know the day I met you how hard it was to keep a level head when I was around you? I’d love to have you in my life every day, but I started something I have to finish. I can’t be there for you, Maddie. And you deserve that. You deserve someone that can live for you, every day. But I can never put you first. And I don’t want you getting involved in my life. It’s too dangerous. What happened in Portland was only a taste.”
My mouth tightened stubbornly. “Just so you know, it’s okay to invest in yourself once in a while.”
He shook his head. “I don’t think about myself. It’s so hard to explain,” he said. “Not many people see life like I do.”
I turned on my side and stared at him. “Try me.”
He traced his hand slowly up my side. His touch made my skin tingle.
“Think about our bodies. We’re a chain of veins and organs and they’re all interconnected. If something isn’t going right in one area, the whole system can get out of whack. That’s the way I see the world. We’re all connected. I don’t see myself as this separate entity. I see things in a much larger scale. Everything I do directly affects another person, all the way down the chain. Every person I help can help another; we’re all connected. Change happens one person at a time. And I want to commit my life to seeing that through.”
I studied his profile. “You’re the one that says you need to have a balance, that one extreme isn’t any better than another. So I’m willing to compromise but you need to open yourself up. You’re great at giving yourself, Justin, but let people give themselves to you once in a while. Because someday, when your life slows down, you’re going to look around at all the great things you’ve done and the people you’ve touched and you might go down as a hero. But no one would have ever wanted your life. Because you’ll be alone.”
He narrowed his eyes at me. Then a grin slowly played on his face.
“Why are you smiling?”
“Do you think you would have said that before you met me?”
I looked down at his chest and didn’t answer him.
“Maybe you’re right,” Justin said. “Maybe I need more of a balance. But I’m not going to slow down anytime soon. I’m just getting started.”
“So am I,” I said.
I met his eyes and smiled because I could be just as persistent as him at getting what I wanted.
The next morning Justin woke me as the sun was barely starting to rise. I got dressed and grabbed my duffel bag and quietly followed him outside. We pulled away from the large Victorian home full of dark windows and people inside still asleep. I watched the trees waving in the pink light of the morning sky. I threw the sweatshirt hood over my head and sat back deep in my seat.
We drove along the coastal highway, trains zipping past us every few minutes. We rarely passed a car. My foot tapped anxiously as we inched our way closer to where we were meeting Joe.
“When will I see you again?” I asked.
He hesitated before he answered me. “I don’t know for sure. I’ll be gone a while. People are starting to fight DS being a national law. Which is really good news, but it’s going to be a lot of work.”
I stared down at our fingers, interlocked together so I couldn’t tell where my skin ended and his began.
“I have to get back to my routine,” he added. “It’s rare for me to ever be in one place more than a day or two. I told you that.”
I took a deep breath. I knew this was a hopeless argument. I loved Justin for how passionate he was, how committed, how loyal. I knew what he did defined him so I could never try to hold him back. I knew his idea of love was trusting people enough to let them go. So I said the only thing I knew for certain.
“I’ll miss you.”
He looked at me.
“Don’t,” he said, like it was easy. “I don’t want you to waste your time missing me. You’re only seventeen. Your life is just starting. If you think too much about the future, about seeing me again, you won’t experience anything. You’ll just be a slave to time.”
I turned and looked out the window. I couldn’t make sense of my mind because it was warring with my heart. It was so strange to argue with someone when all I wanted to do was love them.
I watched him closely. “You asked me to join your side.”
He nodded. “And that decision is yours to make.”
“If I choose you, if I agree to help you out, then can we be together?”
“Don’t do that. Don’t factor me in to this. It’s a larger decision than that. It’s not as simple as me versus them. It’s your life—it’s how you want to live and what impact you want to make.”
I felt sadness rise in my chest as I listened to Justin. I was sick of being so frustrated with everyone I tried to love.
We turned off the highway and pulled to a rest stop where another car was waiting. My heart was pulled in two directions to see my brother standing next to his car in the sunshine. When we stopped I jumped out of the car and ran into Joe’s arms. I knocked him off balance with surprise.
“Maddie, when did you become such a sap,” he joked, and hugged me tightly.
Justin walked up to us and I noticed Joe’s back stiffened. He thanked Justin for dropping me off and extended his hand, but his mouth tightened into a straight line. Justin shook his hand and told him it was no problem.
“I’m glad she can stay with you,” Justin said.
“Thanks for organizing everything,” Joe offered.
Justin nodded and put his hands in his pockets. Joe watched
him with a cool edge to his eyes.
“Can you give me a minute?” I asked Joe.
He nodded. “I’ll be in the car,” he said. He glanced once more at Justin before he turned away. I saw a look pass between them, like a subtle understanding.
We walked back to the car and Justin grabbed my duffel bag out of the back seat. The sun beat down on us in the cloudless sky, but I had never felt more shadows fall around me.
I took the bag from him and felt hot tears pool in my eyes. They slowly streamed down my face and Justin rubbed his thumbs over my cheeks to catch them. He wrapped me in his arms.
“I promise I’ll find you,” he said. I nodded and let go of him. “Have fun in L.A. Make the most of it.”
I turned and looked at my brother’s car. The engine was running. I thought about speaking my mind and saying the things I needed to say and what a relief it is to let the heaviest words go. There was a word that sat in my heart like a weight pulling me down. I thought about what I would say right now if I could instantly delete it. Except I didn’t want to delete it, I wanted it out there, because that was the good stuff. So, before I could hesitate, I wrapped my arms around Justin and he leaned down to me. He kissed me and before I let him go I pressed my wet cheek against his warm one.
“I love you,” I whispered in his ear. I felt his head nod slowly against mine. I leaned away and fixed my eyes on him. “I’m just being honest.” His lips curled up on one side but his eyes were frustrated, like he was still trying to fight this. I wondered how often Justin heard those words. I’d never once heard his parents say they loved him. And he deserved to hear it. We all did.
I took a deep breath and turned forward to face my new life. I slid into the car seat next to Joe and closed the door behind me. My brother looked at my tearstained face.
“Looks like we have a lot to catch up on,” he said.
I wiped my eyes. “You have no idea.”
“You have no idea how hard it was to rent a car, even in L.A.” I laughed through my tears and felt torn, elated to be sitting next to my brother but also a little broken, like a piece of me was falling away.
“You ready for this?” Joe asked. I nodded and held my chin high. My brother turned out of the parking lot and as we entered the highway, I looked out at the western horizon. I saw a seagull in the sky, hovering above the water, and despite everything, I couldn’t help but smile. It was a sign something exceptional was going to happen.
Acknowledgments
First, a huge thanks to my agent, Helen Breitwieser, for loving my book and seeing so much potential in my writing. More than anything, thanks for the endless encouragement you gave me along the way—you believed in this book more than anyone. Second, an enormous thanks to Julia Richardson, my editor, for your vision and feedback that helped make this book shine. Thank you to Jennie Bartlemay, my very first editor, for your honest comments and feedback. Thanks to everyone at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt who helped design and market Awaken. Thank you to the entire staff of Red Horse Coffee Company for fueling my body with caffeine and my mind with encouragement throughout this entire process, and thanks to Damian Kulp for helping to build and design my author website. I also can’t thank my parents enough for all of their love and support through this journey.
Lastly, thanks again and again to Adam. I would not have written this book without you. Thanks for making me leave my comfort zone when I was ready to settle (think of all the experiences we would have missed). Thanks for believing in me more than I believe in myself.
Part 1
New Life
Los Angeles, September 24, 2060
I have over one hundred online profiles. They link me to thousands of people who link me to thousands more and together we form an anonymous world. My life is ruled by stars and thumbs and tomatoes and points and carts. I can rate my friends. I can know anything. But sometimes I don’t want all the answers. I want to cleanse my mind of knowing because I never have to wonder or imagine or think or reflect. I never have to remember or organize or plan. It’s all done for me. But doesn’t that just make me a marionette?
I’m ready to cut the strings.
I’ve made it my goal to start deleting my profiles, one each day. It’s my new detox plan. My mom always says you need to weed your life every couple of years, of things and even of people, or it all piles up and accumulates, and it’s impossible to stretch out when so many things are competing for space to grow.
I’m keeping some of the sites, the ones that inspire me and encourage me and put people in my path who are irreplaceable. The ones who value my time instead of squandering it. But I need more than this life. It’s all communicating on the surface, living on the surface—it’s like low-calorie relationships. Well, that isn’t filling enough for me. I’ve never had the willpower to diet. I’d much rather feast.
U-DESIGN-IT PROFILE: DELETED
I can design anything I want with this site. I can sit inside the mouth of a volcano. I can ride down a lava flow. I can be a director and a cook. I can wrap my arms around a star. I can walk on top of the arch of a rainbow. I can lift a building with my hands and place it here or there. I can play God in this place. But at the end of the day, have I really done anything? Or am I just full of hot air? Do I deflate when I log off?
MAKE-YOURSELF-OVER PROFILE: DELETED
This site is a personal shopper. Commercials tell me what to own. Celebrities tell me what to look like. But isn’t it what we do, not what we own, that makes a difference? Isn’t it how we treat people, not how we appear, that makes us attractive? If we could see only internal beauty, what would people look like? Who would the supermodels be?
DS-MEET-ME PROFILE: DELETED
I can meet you. But I can’t hear you smile. And that’s my favorite sound, how his skin and breath and lips change when he smiles. It can’t show me that each hair on his head insists on growing in a different direction, so it’s always a mess, even after he combs it. It can show me his hair is dark brown, but it can’t show me that it lightens just above his temples. It can’t show me that he prefers to sleep on his stomach with both hands tucked under the pillow, up to his elbows. It can’t tell me that when he walks into the room I will feel calm and nervous and elated and relieved all at the same time.
People are like places: you don’t truly know them until you take the time to visit and experience them in person. I prefer to be a traveler. Life is three-dimensional, but there are other dimensions we can’t see, can only feel, and those are the ones I want to explore.
I’m learning that the real world is full of land mines. I’ve set a few of them off. It’s full of mistakes, and of actions and words you can’t take back. But I’m also learning that mistakes may open more doors than they close.
Chapter One
Clare and I changed at Pat and Noah’s apartment in Hollywood. She was in town visiting for the weekend and we both agreed to celebrate by getting dressed up and going clubbing in L.A. We got ready in Noah’s practice studio, crowded with guitars and amplifiers and speakers stacked up to the ceiling. I squeezed into a red dress that Clare loaned me. It was tight and low cut, something my dad would probably ground me for wearing, which was reason enough to embrace it. I slipped my arm under the silky strap, watching the tattoo of a bird on my wrist happily soar through.
Clare’s black strapless dress sparkled with tiny sequins. We sauntered down the hallway like we were strutting down a catwalk. When we turned into the living room we found Pat and Noah just as we’d left them over an hour before—sitting on the couch wearing jeans and T-shirts and working off their manly testosterone by battling it out over a soccer video game. I now understood why guys played video games—they needed something to do to kill time while they waited for girls to get ready.
Pat and Noah shared a typical bachelor pad: every inch of wall space was covered in digital screens, and every piece of furniture was black leather with built-in drink holders, back massagers, footrests, and video-control pads.
The bottom cushion of one seat was propped up to reveal a minifridge (since taking four steps to the kitchen was such an inconvenience).
Clare cleared her throat, and Pat’s eyes flickered toward us. He paused the game and stared for a few seconds, confused, like we were strangers who’d let ourselves in without knocking.
“Wow,” Noah said. “You two look amazing.”
“What’s the occasion?” Pat asked.
Clare raised her arms like it was obvious. “Aren’t we going dancing?”
“Yeah,” Noah said. “But we’re just going to Nino’s.”
Clare’s shoulders sank and she shook her head.
“What’s Nino’s?” I asked.
Noah blinked with surprise. “You’ve never heard of it? It’s a virtual dance club. It’s going off tonight.”
My face fell. “It’s virtual? Isn’t the point of going out to be around people? There’s got to be real dance clubs in this city.”
“There will be people there,” Noah said. “It just makes getting rejected by women a little easier for Pat.”
“You’re hilarious.” Pat snickered.
“Maybe your ego needs some rejection once in a while, Noah,” Clare informed her brother, whose band, the Managers, had been getting national attention since they recorded their latest album in L.A. Clare made it a priority to deflate his star status whenever she got the opportunity. “How many girls call you on a typical day?” she asked.
Noah brushed some shaggy dark hair out of his eyes. “You mean call or text or voice-text or videochat or message or contact?”
Clare groaned and ran her fingers through her short brown hair. “This, I haven’t missed.” Pat’s phone beeped and I noticed his eyebrows arch when he checked the screen. He started to type a message.
“Who’s that?” I asked him.
“Probably Noah’s latest groupie,” Clare offered.
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