“Even if it’s odd, it seems like a pretty harmless activity. Why does your father forbid it? That sounds a little stern.”
“My father’s an important man. When you’re in a position of power like he is, you have spies and enemies. He’s warned me about them from the time I was a child. He’s told me I must be careful. He has to be careful as well. And that sometimes means being stern.” She climbs onto the lower rail of the bridge and leans over, looking at her reflection below.
“Is that why you straddle rooftops in the middle of the night? Is he stern with you?”
Her foot slips and she tumbles forward. I grab her by her waist just before she goes over.
“Don’t. Move.” I grunt. It’s an awkward position and I’m afraid I still might lose her or that we both might somersault into the water. I tighten my grip around her waist and hoist her in one quick lift. We both tumble backward and fall onto the bridge.
She sits up,
rubbing her wrist. “It wouldn’t have been the end of the world if I fell in. I can swim. I’ve fallen in before.”
I lie there on my back and shake my head. “You’re welcome.”
She gets my point and smiles, the first real smile I’ve seen on her. “Thank you,” she says. She stands and offers me a hand up. I take it and we continue across the bridge and through the gardens. There’s a long period where we say nothing. I’m conscious of the silence and the space between us as we walk. I try to think of something to say. I came to get information, but everything seems too much like prying and I think asking her just one thing about her father is what made her lose her footing on the bridge.
I finally ask her about the Collective, a safe topic that might provide some insights, and she tells me who the members of the A are. That’s what they call their small group. The A Group. According to her the A stands for Agony. She says the people in it are tolerable enough, but the very controlled socialization is a complete bore.
“But Vina’s thrilled that you’ll be joining our group.”
I note that she doesn’t say that she’s thrilled.
“Well, Vina may find I’m not so thrilling once she gets to know me.”
Raine looks sideways at me. “Where did you say you were from?”
I hear suspicion in her voice. “I didn’t say. But for the record, I’m Boston born and bred. Only I’ve been away for a long time.” A very long time and I wonder if it’s showing.
“Are you here to stay now?”
“I don’t know. I hope so. For a while at least.”
She crosses her arms in front of her like she’s cold. “There’s something very different about you.”
I slow my pace. What difference has she noticed? Something minor? Or has she sensed something else? Something deeper beneath my skin? I’m always on guard about what my BioPerfect might reveal. It’s blue for God’s sake, and I know there’s a lot Gatsbro didn’t tell me about it. What if one day I start oozing the damn stuff? I reach up and wipe away the moisture on my upper lip, checking the palm of my hand as I return it to my side.
“How so?” I ask.
“You’re not like other boys.”
I attempt to redirect her thinking. “I’ve traveled a lot. Maybe that’s what makes me different. You travel much?”
“No, it’s not that. It’s something else. Maybe it’s the way you watch the world. You’re always thinking, aren’t you? Thinking about big things. You’re intense.”
A little side effect of not having a body for 260 years. “Sorry. I don’t mean to be intense.”
“I didn’t say it was a bad thing.” She kicks a pebble in the pathway and runs ahead to kick it back to me. “Tell me about your family, Locke. Are you close with them?”
I hesitate, caught off guard at the mention of my family, surprised at the instant tightness of my throat. I stare at the pebble at my feet. I want to tell her about my family. With a wild passion that makes no sense, I want to tell her everything. I want to tell her how my mother had beautiful wavy hair and saved feathers that fell from the sky because she said they were gifts from loved ones in heaven. I want to tell her how my dad was the strongest man I ever knew and he wasn’t afraid to cry in front of me. I want to tell her about my grandparents who took us in when my parents were trying to save money for a new house in a better neighborhood. I want to share how my uncles helped gut and fix up that house and my aunts would bring casseroles and we’d eat on tables made of plywood and sawhorses. I want to share about my real family and how much I miss them, and how I let them down and how more than anything in the world I wish I could have just one more minute with them all, so I could at least say good-bye. I want her to know who they were and how they once walked this street, this sidewalk, this park, and breathed this air. Just like us.
I look down at the pebble still at my feet.
Kick it back, Locke.
Kick it.
I kick the pebble back to her and I stick to the story the Network has created for me—the family who doesn’t really exist. The lies are sour in my mouth.