“Oh yeah, because it’s just that simple,” she mumbled.
“You’ve met my dad, haven’t you?” I inquired of Justin as Ricky’s eyes narrowed.
“So, Miss Madeline, would you like to come home with us today instead of the bus?”
A small laugh came from her.
“Are you sure there will be room?”
Ricky let out a loud short laugh.
“I have an SUV remember?”
“No, sorry I don’t, remember I’m held hostage at home unless the timing fits, Sawyer’s father.”
I hated that man for how he treated her; I already didn’t care for him. My dad didn’t treat her well. I always thought I treated her well, but Ricky has commented about how much of a soft spot I had for her. Ricky has asked me a few questions as well about our relationship. I always brushed it off. How could I care for the source of why my mom left? I still don’t get it; mom would have loved Madeline. Mom would have loved to have helped Madeline get ready for her first day of high school. My mom leaving never made sense to me, but I wasn’t able to find her to question her.
“Hey, don’t worry about it kid, between me, maybe Justin, and Sawyer, you’ll always have someone to be there for you.”
“Thanks, and I know,” Madeline whispered, looking at Ricky, but I was holding her hand under the table, squeezing it.
“Come on, Dad; just lay off her for once in your life.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about, son. You’re still a child yourself, but you will understand the importance that she means for the whole world one day when you’re older.”
“Dad, do you even hear yourself? You don’t even deserve to have us!”
“Oh, shut up!”
I was getting sick of these yelling fights between my dad and me. The conversations never seemed to go anywhere, and they made living with him worse, along with making him angry before he went anywhere with Madeline. That couldn’t be good either I couldn’t wait for college, so I didn’t have to live with him anymore.
“I hope you rot in hell.” I growled.
“You’re impossible!”
“For a smart man, you’re coming up with poor arguments!” I shouted, and I headed for the stairs.
“You’re grounded for speaking to me that way!”
I let out a hard laugh as I turned around to look at him. My eyes narrowed at his dark eyes behind his glasses.
“You’re seriously choosing now to be a parent? You’ve never been to a parent-teacher conference, a soccer game, or even celebrated a birthday, but you’re going to ground me now? You make me sick. You’re killing Madeline and me; we can’t take it much more. You need to leave us the hell alone and stop dragging her around like a pet poodle. Haven’t you done enough of that already? She’s thirteen years old, hasn’t the world seen enough of her?”
“This is the perfect time to be showing her off. She’s not only the first successful human clone, but she’s lasted for thirteen years! She’s hitting the years where the reproductive systems start kicking in. We’ll have to see if her reproductive system works like a non-clone teenager; it’ll be interesting observing her.”
My face scrunched, and my grip tightened on the railing.
“So, what, you’ll breed Madeline?” I could feel my blood boil as my whole body heated up.
“Of course not, just to see if she is like a normal human-”
I ran up the stairs away from him, stomping as much as I could to stop my ears from listening to this sick man. I couldn’t bring myself to hear his explanation. I opened the door Madeline’s room. It was the same room my mom had put her in when she was a baby.
Her mattress had a thin sheet on it with a multi-colored blanket. Only a couple more weeks, and I’d have a car, then I’d get her new bedding. There were a couple of her books sat on the solid wood dresser next to her bed. I found it on the curb of the street. The dresser’s bottom drawer was lopsided while the other three tended to get stuck. Though it didn’t matter about the drawers since I think only one and a half of them were full.
With the door against my back, I couldn’t see her. She had to be in the closet. I could hear my father fuming downstairs with his loud steps pacing, probably waiting to come and find me to finish the argument, so I knew I had to hurry. I opened the closet door to see her curled up into the tiniest ball she could get herself into in the corner.
“Madeline, it’s me, and I need you to come with me. Please come on,” I saw her green eyes peek up from under her eyelashes at me.
I gave a small smile as I put out my hand for her to take. My nerves started to race, wondering if I would make it before my dad came up here. Her small hand reached out for mine then I pulled her up with me. A gasp escaped from her lips. Quickly I yanked her to the window and opened it, noticing that the screen was still there. Cursing to myself, I unhooked the metal clips, quickly hearing my father’s angry steps heading up the stairs as Madeline shook next to me. I smiled as I saw her screen fall to the ground with a soft crashing sound on the grass.
“Do you trust me?”
I turned to look at her, hearing his steps getting closer.
“Are you seriously asking me that?” Madeline’s face looked scared, but disbelief was making itself known, making a small smile form on my lips.
Bending over, I swung one leg out of the window, so I was straddling the window, then I completely jumped out of the window. I then stumbled a little and then fell backward. Quickly getting up, I stood by the window, waiting for Madeline to jump. With a quick look behind her, Madeline hesitantly did the same as me. Then with a loud thud, she gasped and pushed herself out of the window and into my arms.
Placing her down on her feet while holding her hand, we ran for our lives down the street, hoping he wouldn’t try to follow. Man, our neighbors must think our house was a reality TV show.
4
Madeline
"Sawyer, where are we going?" I finally asked after waiting for some of his anger to cool off.
Sawyer took a deep breath. He let it out slowly, then gave our interlaced hands a tiny squeeze before letting go. I felt horrible standing next to him and not knowing what to do after everything he has done for me. I looked at the ground as the sensation of stupidity and guilt started taking over my stomach.
"Don't worry about it; I want you to ignore what he does. He's a jerk."
I wish I had his courage. At least half of what Sawyer had would be beneficial at times. Like against the people in school, and especially Dr. Vodola. I stared at the ground as I shuffled my feet to keep up with his pace. I gulped nervously, trying to find all the right words to comfort the main person in my life.
"Sawyer, sorry to get off-topic, but where are we going?"
Sawyer came to a halt leaving, but I had taken a few steps before I noticed. I turned around and looked at Sawyer confusingly. He gave a small laugh.
"I don't know."
I gave a small smile at him that he returned. I walked over to Sawyer and put my arms around him. Leaning my head at the bottom of his neck, I breathed in the scent that I knew as Sawyer. Slowly Sawyer encircled his arms around me tightly, and for a moment, I thought he needed me as much as I needed him. I wanted to be as much of a comfort to Sawyer as he was to me.
"He can't control us forever," Sawyer whispered closely in my ear.
My heart dropped into my stomach.
"Easy for you to say…"
Sawyer pulled away from me a little and started to walk away with an arm around my shoulders. I let my eyes fall, knowing we were going to have this talk again.
"He can't keep you this close forever."
I wanted to believe that, but I knew that was not true. It was a feeling deep in my gut that I was stuck with Dr. Vodola until I died.
"I wish I could believe that. Your dad will let you go off to college, and then I'll never see you again while I'm stuck with him for all eternity."
I knew I sounded bitter as I pouted, but
I could feel that nightmare taking over my mind. The horrible days before, the scientists had threatened to take me away if I didn't go to school. The years I spent living in the corner of Dr. Vodola's lab. The cold floor sending permanent chills down my spine as the shadows on the walls kept me there, too afraid to move.
"Just remember I'm here for you. Hey, look, if we walk a little further, we can get some ice cream." Sawyer informed me, rubbing my shoulder.
My heart was racing as I sat in the folding chair. There were rows and rows of people in front of us. I was sitting next to Dr. Vodola with a few other scientists that I grew up around. Each of us had a microphone and a glass of water in front of us.
"First Question?" Dr. Green asked.
Dr. Green was the most senior member of the team. I still remembered him as one of the people who wanted me to start school. Hands shot up in the air as cameras continued to flash before us. I had spent so much time with Dr. Green over the years.
"The clone is small for her age; she's around five feet. Do you imagine if we continue to clone that all of them would be smaller?"
"There is a chance that the cloning process caused her to be smaller. We are still figuring out if that was a genetic make-up situation or the cloning process itself." Dr. Vodola answered.
"Over the years, the question of who she is a clone of has come up repeatedly, yet no one on the team has answered the question. Why is that?"
Dr. Vodola leaned over. "For the privacy of the family that we got the DNA from, we will continue to respect their privacy."
The reporter opened their mouth to continue, but Dr. Vodola picked someone else. I raised an eyebrow. Who was I a clone of? Would I ever meet them? Why hadn't I asked that question?
"In another interview, you mentioned she was ahead of the curve academically. Is that still the case?"
"She is, she's a freshman taking some sophomore-level honor classes, but she could have skipped more grades." Dr. Vodola's voice was sharp.
"We discussed putting her with her academic peers, but we wanted to see how socially she would do closer to her actual peers." Dr. Green continued.
The reporters continued to scribble away. A few were typing.
"Are you planning on going to college?" a male reporter up front asked, looking at me.
My eyes widen. They didn't usually directly ask me questions. I cleared my throat and leaned closer to the microphone.
"I haven't thought about it."
"She's going to go to a school where she can commute and stay near us to study." Dr. Vodola's voice was louder than mine.
His words echoed through my head. Stay near them. My stomach twisted. More hands shot up. I leaned back in the chair and couldn't look at the audience any longer. The prison bars grew clearer. I would be with Dr. Vodola for longer than Sawyer was thinking. Sawyer was thinking of himself, thinking as far as he could. Part of me knew that I wouldn't be as lucky as him. The questions were like buzzing in my ear. I was unable to hear any other questions to answer again. I had listened to my prison sentence.
The full moon rays came through my window. The moonbeams shined through the new bars on my windows. The bars' shadows clung onto the wall around me, making my eyes stay wide open and worrisome to my surroundings. Feeling stupid, I threw my sheets over my head, grasped firmly in my trembling hands, and forcefully shut my eyes. I tried to calm my breathing. The darkness of my closed eyelids betrayed me, showing me my nights of being terrified out of my mind. I saw the nightmares of the ice woman and her cold eyes watching me, and I shook my head to erase her. Yet those glazed eyes were fixed on me.
The other day, being at that conference sent me back to the old days—the constant poking, prodding, and measuring that left me feeling naked even when I wasn't. The panels weren't much better; I didn't know who asked more invasive questions, the media or the scientists.
A shudder went through me that was a mix between disgust and dread. I opened my eyes to see how much time was wasted by lack of sleep—shifting the sheet just enough so that one eye could look at the alarm clock. Seeing the red numbers, eleven fifty-five. I yanked the sheets over my head again. I had a test the next day, and I didn't want to fall asleep on my test.
I was in high school, and I was hiding under my sheets because of shadows on the walls and a fictional frozen lady, taking a big breath and counting to three. I then whipped the sheets over so I could bolt to the room next to mine. I hoped Sawyer wouldn't mind. Without any hesitation, I took the cool metal handle in my hand, twisting it quickly to see the disaster Sawyer called his room. Manoeuvring through Sawyer's room, I prayed I wouldn't step on any land mines to stand next to his bed. His eyes were closed, and his mouth was wide open as he laid on his stomach.
With a shaky hand, I nudged his shoulder gently that was covered by some T-shirt. He groaned and turned to face the opposite direction making me more persistent as I pushed him again. My eyes tried to adjust to the darkness as he sat up a little to look at me.
"Madeline?"
"I can't sleep."
"Are the frozen lady dreams back again?"
My throat felt tight. It was that dream and much more, but Sawyer didn't need to know that, nor could I tell him. I just nodded my head. Turning sideways, Sawyer scooched over a little, so there would be space for me. Sliding into his bed which was so different than my own. I pulled his black Jersey cotton sheets up to my chest as I felt Sawyer's chest against my back. I started to smile as I felt his arms wrap around me, interlacing my fingers with his so I could hold tight, praying this would keep the shadows of nightmares away. My eyes drifted closed as one last sigh escaped.
I lost count of the number of times I'd been in this room. When I was younger, it seemed more frequent, but now it was every six months on the dot I was back in the examination room. Dr. Vodola picked me up a little early from school to have my appointment with all the doctors. However, he wasn't in the room anymore when they had the examination. The last couple of years, it had been just Dr. Green and me. It was easier to talk to only him. Yet, I still could not tell him how Dr. Vodola treated me when everyone else was gone. If things were bad, how much worse would they get if I told on him?
Glancing around the white wall room as I sat on the metal bed with the thin sheet, my legs swung over the edge, causing a crinkle sound. I was wearing nothing, but a flimsy robe tied in the back. The room was a little chilly, and I could feel my fingers tingle. I took in a deep breath and released it. I had been here six months ago for the same reason, but it didn't make it less nerve-racking.
The door creaked open, and Dr. Green came in with a tablet. I straightened up and gulped. Dr. Green was reading something on his screen before he sat on a stool by me.
"Hello Madeline, how are you doing today."
I shrugged. "Okay, I got an A on my math test the other day."
Dr. Green smiled. "That's great, but how are you doing outside of school."
I shrugged again and felt my face heating up. "Okay. I don't have classes with two girls I thought were my friends, so I haven't heard from them. I sit with Sawyer and his friends at lunch which is fun."
He grinned and continued to write on the screen.
"That's good about Sawyer and those friends. Sorry about the girls, though. If it makes you feel better, my daughter had the same issue with her high school friends. I think it's a girl thing. Are you good friends with Sawyer?"
I nodded. "I guess so."
My fingers uncoiled and curled onto the edge of the table.
"Dr. Vodola can't hear us in here." Dr. Green responded with a raised eyebrow.
I gulped.
"Is there anything going on between you and Sawyer?"
I shook my head. "No. He's about to ask out this girl Lisa from school. He and I are just friends."
"Is there anyone at school you'd like to date?"
I titled my head and scrunched my eyebrows. "I honestly haven't thought about that."
He raised an eyebrow. "Really? Do you
have any crushes on anyone?"
I shook my head.
"So that answers my next question. Are you sexually active?"
Dr. Green hadn't asked me that before. My eyes widen, and I felt like my body was on fire.
"No!" my voice came out like a squeak.
"Have you kissed anyone?"
I shook my head, unable to find my voice after the last question.
"Have you gotten your first menstrual cycle?"
"No." my cheeks continued to get hotter.
He sighed. "Okay, let us begin the examination part of this visit, shall we?"
I found myself drumming my fingers on my knee with the beat of a song as our choir teacher playing on the school piano. She gave us a preview of one of the pieces in the concert. My eyes skimmed the words as she played. She bopped around as she played. Music helped me relax and go to a different place from the real world. It wasn't like I wanted to have my whole life revolve around music, but I just needed that small part in my life to help with my sanity.
"Okay, now, it's your turn."
She started at the beginning with the introduction as I mentally counted. Then we all came in like average high schoolers. There were the ones who were the future music majors. The ones that weren't too bad yet wouldn't be selling out concerts, people who just took choir as an easy class, and lastly, the ones who thought they were the best in the entire world but were utterly tone-deaf.
"No! Not like that try with more oomph!" Her voice boomed vigorously, trying to show the spirit she wanted from us. "Now, let's try this again!"
Starting a measure before the trouble area, she kept playing the piano and added her comments of what she wanted to fix. Finally, the period ended with the chainsaw bell making people rush out. I stayed in my seat until most of the students were gone. I grabbed my stuff and headed for the door.
"Madeline, dear, come over here, please I would like to have a word with you," Her gentle brown eyes investigated mine while she sat on the computer chair at her desk. She was probably doing her attendance late again.
Beaker to Life Page 3