Coda to Youth

Tuesday July 19, 2163

12:53

 

FLAG

            Glaring lights of the gameshow set get replaced with the dark backstage as I dart off the set as quick as I can without running. The dress I got shoved into this morning itches.

            Mother, waiting in the wings with Father, pulls me into a hug when I reach her. “Well done, Faizah. Another win.”

            I push my face into her torso. The geometric Kente pattern on her dress dances in front of my eyes. This was the fifth show in four days. “Is it time to go home yet?”

            She smiles down at me. “Not yet, sweetheart.” Her usual nanobot make-up shimmers against her dark skin with moving patterns that change the shape of her face from day to day. Her chocolate eyes are the only things that stay the same, matching mine. “You’ve been invited to a special showcase as part of the celebrations. It will be broadcast across the continent.”

            “Can’t we just go home? I’m tired.”

            “We need the publicity,” Father says. He flicks through different news holos, long black hair in dreads decorated with silver. My face is plastered on half of them with more headlines about the eight-year-old prodigy who keeps winning trivia show after trivia show. The holos of my face overlap his in a mishmash of features. Except for the full lips and high cheekbones we share.

            I frown. “But right now you’re reading—”

            “Faizah, sweetheart?” Mother crouches down in front of me with a sugar-sweet smile. “You’re so lucky to be asked to be a part of this showcase. It will be a breeze, no competition, just you showing off how wonderful you are.”

            “But—”

            She stands and smooths the escaped baby hairs from my puff. “You can rest on the car ride there.”

            I can hear the chatter of voices from outside before we even open the door. Flashing cameras and cascades of people shouting my name crash into me as soon as the door opens. The security people waiting to escort us to our car don’t do anything to help that.

            Clutching Mother’s hand, I try and disappear into her dress.

            She nudges me with her hip. “Smile on, sweetheart.”

            I swallow a grimace, detach myself from her side and give the swarming hovercams a fake smile and a shy wave. Inside the hovercar, I melt into a puddle on the seat.

            The auto-drive takes us into the center of the city. Blue flags pop up on the streetlights the farther in we go. Each one has a decagon stamped on them. A letter sits over every side, one for each of the ten government heads, and spells out “Japincatch.” Today makes it fifteen years of them being in charge, since they began building the nine massive cities across the continent. Like the one we’re in now. “Beacons of progress,” they called them; something I only know because Mother had me studying their history. I guess this showcase was the reason why.

            At our destination—some other kind of broadcast station—I go through the familiar process of getting ready to be put on TV. Stylists wipe the old make-up off just to slather more on, and fuss with my hair and clothes. By the time they plop me on the set and stick a mic-patch on my jaw, I want to crawl out of my skin. My dress is still itchy.

            There are three other people on the set with me. One sits with a cello. Another wears athletic clothes and stands in front of a balance beam. The third is behind a table covered in technology that makes my hands itch to tinker with it. They all look like teenagers. I’m the youngest. And I don’t have anything to hide behind. I reach up and pull at the skin on my neck. A nervous habit. Mother hisses my name and I snap my hand back down.

            Camera lenses bore into me as the room prepares to shoot. There’s no audience here. And a bunch of security people. I find out why a few moments later.

            With another clump of security guards, a woman walks onto the set. Her red hair is tied in a knot at the nape of her neck, not single hair sticking out. Icy blue eyes take in the room. The lights wash out her pale skin until someone adjusts them. She looks more like a soldier than anything, dressed in a perfectly smooth blue uniform with a soldier’s beret pinned on her head. Juliet Andrews. The unofficial head of Japincatch. 

            After surveying the room, she turns to us. We all straighten. Her icy stare melts into a crooked smile. It’s the first bit of warmth I’ve seen from her, even with all the times she’s on the holo feeds. Like a proud parent.

            I stare at my feet until another pair steps into view. Juliet crouches down to look me in the eye. Still smiling, not upset like I thought she’d be. “Chin up, dear. You’re here because you are something magnificent.”

            Juliet stands and looks at each of us once more, “All of you,” then with a sharp nod, walks over to the prepared podium and the show begins.

            Juliet gives the camera in front of her a practiced smile. The unblinking lens doesn’t seem to bother her, she doesn’t fidget even a little. “Welcome. I’m overjoyed to stand here today, celebrating fifteen years of our governance. Fifteen years ago, we began to put into action a system to push humanity forward. To evolve it further, into something capable of incredible intelligence, ingenuity and creativity. To build strong bodies, strong minds and strong wills.”

            On the opposite side of Juliet’s podium, out of view of the cameras, is another girl my age, looking just as out of place as I feel. She’s a redhead, too, and wears a button up shirt and skirt that look as stiff as she is. The clothes are too old for her. It looks like she’s playing dress up. She watches Juliet intently and doesn’t notice me staring.

            “As a taste of what we have already created and what more we will achieve, we have gathered a few of the brightest and most promising young minds.” A track of applause plays as Juliet sweeps a hand to us. As soon as the camera switches to us, her smile drops into a blank and cold expression.

            They start at the other end from me. The cellist plays a piece so fast and complicated I’m amazed her fingers aren’t bleeding by the end of it. Jumping onto the balance beam, the gymnast performs tricks that look like they should break her bones—either from being bent out of shape or hitting the beam so hard. From the scattered technology, the third contestant builds a miniature hovercar with working electromagnets and everything.

            Juliet gets a crooked smile again as she watches the others show off. Much more genuine than the one she gave the camera. If she could see herself, would she correct her expression to make the smile less lopsided? The rest of her is all straight angles and symmetry. Yes, I decide. She would.

            Then it’s my turn.

            The attention of the room pinpoints on me like a laser and burns like one, too. Someone off-stage reads out the first question, “After the Mongols’ invasion of Russia in the thirteenth century, which two major cities were left standing?”

            I stare at the space just below the camera lens, like I always do, take a breath, and answer. “Novgorod and Pskov.”

            “Correct!”

            More questions fly at me.

            “What tools have been found from the lost Indus River Valley civilization and why are they remarkable?”

            “Their weights and measures, because were especially uniform.”

            “What processor did the second generation of Apple commuters use?”

            “A MOS 6502 chip.”

            “Joan Crawford won an Oscar for what movie made in which year?”

            “Mildred Peirce, 1945.”

            “This flower is known commonly as the corpse plant. What is its scientific name?”

            “Rafflesia Arnoldii.”

            “Correct, correct, correct, and correct! Look at her go, everyone!”

            Another applause track plays.

            I keep my focus below the camera. It keeps me from getting blown away in the whirlwind of words and lights.

            At last, the questions stop. Juliet says something else. I don’t hear it. It’s too bright in here and my dress is too itchy.

            “Cut!”

            I tear off the stage and into Mother’s arms. “Can we go home now? Please?”

            “Not quite yet, sweetheart. I’m sure there will be people who want to talk to you.”

            I shake my head. “I don’t want to talk to a bunch of reporters and paparazzi.”

            “Faizah, we need you to do this for us, okay?” Mother straightens my dress. “It’ll only be fifteen, maybe twenty minutes.”

            “I—”

            With a hand on my back, she ushers me out of the building. “Now. Smile on, sweetheart.”

            Another crowd waits outside. Cameras go off like bombs. Hiding behind Mother, I clamp my eyes shut against the lights and noise.

            “Don’t be shy, sweetheart,” Mother coos.

            “Mm-mm!” I shake my head vigorously.

            “Faizah.” She grabs my arm and pulls me in front of her.

            I yank my arm away and take off sprinting, back into the building.

            “Faizah!”

            I keep running. Back across the dimming set, out a door on the other side and down the street. Gasping for air, I duck behind a parked hovercar. How do I get away from all the eyes and cameras?

            Above me, a hovertrain floats towards the station down the street.

That might work.

            With the crowds, no one notices me as I follow the flow of people onto an outbound hovertrain. My legs don’t reach the floor. I swing them as I sit. Someone’s jasmine perfume fills the train car.

            Out the window, I watch the buildings get smaller and closer together before growing into the towering apartments that boarder the edge of the city. I know from studying the government built them in their cities to get rid of homelessness.

            The train leaves the growing city, picking up speed as it races towards one of the smaller cities that existed before the new government. I get off at the very end of the line.

            The sky seems bigger here without apartment buildings to block it out. I’m closer to the coast, too. The ocean glitters in the distance. But something seems . . . out of place? Missing? I look around more carefully until I realize what it is: there are no cameras. Not just the reporter kind, but the tiny black lenses on every building corner in the city. What am I supposed to do if I’m not being watched?

            Not sure where to go, I walk in the direction of the ocean until I reach a park with an old playground. The grass is worn away in places, giving the ground the appearance of a patchwork quilt. Almost in a daze, I walk to the little square of pebbles. To my ears, small rocks hitting others is prettier than the fanciest symphonies. The playground is empty. Hoisting myself onto the top of the rusting monkey bars, I lay down on the rungs and close my eyes against the sun.

            “Ray, don’t. No, wait! Ray!”

            “Hey! Get off!”

            Small hands reach up through the rungs and push me off the bars to the stones below. I land on my stomach and elbows. Standing in front of me, glaring at me with crossed arms, is another girl about my age. She wears a worn pair of shorts, a too-big red T-shirt and old canvas shoes. Behind her stand two boys. One is tall with curly red hair and the other is a little shorter than me with brown hair, both in a different combination of shorts, shirts and shoes.

            “Ray, did you have to do that?” the shorter boy asks.

            I stand, but don’t bother to brush myself off. I hate this dress anyways.

            “Yeah. She was on our monkey bars, G.”

            “You could’ve just, y’know, told her to get off,” the taller boy says.

            “Yeah, but she looks like a city-prissy and they don’t listen to anyone. You know that, Fox.” Ray? G? Fox? Are these nicknames? The girl—Ray, they said—turns back to me. “Get out of here, prissy. This is our playground.”

            “Um . . . Look, I get that,” Not really . . . “but can I please stay?” I wrap my arms around myself. “I know this might sound weird, but I probably won’t be able to come here again.”

            “Why not?” Ray demands.

            “I doubt my parents will let me. I was lucky I got away this time.”

            Her eyes narrow. “Don’t get along with your folks, huh?”

            “Well . . . no.”

            Ray considers me a moment longer before turning around to talk to the boys.

            “She doesn’t seem like a prissy, Ray,” the shorter boy, G, says.

            “I know. It’s throwing me off.”

            “I mean, she just wants to play.” The taller boy, Fox, shrugs. “Maybe she doesn’t, y’know, like the other prissy people either.”

            Ray spins around, hands on her hips. “What’s your name?”

            “Faizah.”

            “Is that English?”

            “No. It’s Swahili for ‘victory.’”

            “Huh. That’s cool. But it won’t work. What are your initials?”

            “What do you mean by that?”

            “If you’re going to hang out with us, you need a new name like we all have. Now, initials?”

            “F.P.”

            “Hmm . . . ” She drags her heel through the rocks to write the two letters. “F and P . . . ”

            “If you put them on top of each other, they kind of look like a flag.” I draw it in the rocks beside hers.

            “Flag! That’s it!” She points at me enthusiastically. I jump back. “From now on, you will be known as Flag! But first . . . You have to prove you’re not like the other city-prissy people.”

            Nervous butterflies flit in my stomach as she leads the three of us away from the park.

            We stop outside the back of a stout two-storey building.

            “Up in there,” Ray points to the second level window, “there’s a drawer in the desk and there’s an envelope labeled ‘Sunray.’ Go get it and bring it back. That is your proof.”

            G frowns. “Ray, why are you getting her to steal something? Do you want someone to call the cops?”

            “Don’t worry about it.” She gives me a smug smile. “She won’t be able to do it anyways.”

            Squaring my shoulders, I kick off my shoes and in my bare feet, shimmy up a drainpipe. Holding onto the pipe with my legs, I reach for the sill with one hand, then the other. Making sure I have a good grip on it, I let go with my legs and pull myself through the window.

            Inside the room—which leeks the smell of ink—I tumble onto the floor next to a desk with drawers, and a few filing cabinets. As Ray promised, in the first drawer, there’s an envelope with “Sunray” written on it.

            “Hey! The hell do you think you’re doing?” A lady covered in tattoos stands in the doorway to the office.

            Grabbing the envelope, I jump out the window, not bothering to climb down. My knees take the brunt of the impact and start bleeding.

I shove the envelope at Ray and hide behind her.

            Ray looks over her shoulder at me, brows jumping up. “Wow.”

            “Get back here!” the lady shouts out the window.

            “Thanks for the money, Andrea!” Ray waves at the woman with the paper in her hand.

            “Rachel? I told you I would come give that to you tomorrow. What on Earth are you doing? Who is that?”

            “Initiation! This is Flag.”

            I wave sheepishly from behind Ray.

            “Greg, Terry, I thought I told you to keep her under control.”

            “I cannot be contained!” Ray shouts, beaming and running off.

            We’re all quick to follow her.

            In the excitement of the day—including my first time in the ocean—I forget about my scraped knees. No lights, no cameras, no contestants. Just me and other kids.

            “I never knew how much fun the ocean is!” All I did was splash around in the waves, but still. Much better than studying it. I smile as Ray walks me back to the hovertrain station after G and Fox have gone home.

            “Next time, you can bring something to swim in. I’ll teach you to swim myself if I have to.”

            “But I don’t know if I can come here again.” And I’m not very good at swimming.

            “Hey,” she points at me, “you’re one of us now. You have to find a way to. Screw your parents! If they won’t let you leave the house, you have to find a way to do it anyways.”

            I stare at my feet. “Right . . . ”

            “Oh, your knees,” Ray says, following my gaze. They’ve already scabbed over. “That was cool, by the way, when you just jumped out the window.” Ray sits me down and pulls some small bandages out of her pocket. With gentle fingers, she puts them on my knees.

            “Thank you.”

            “Just ‘thanks.’” She grins and gives each bandaged knee a peck. “There. All better.”

            Staring at my knees in the sunset’s light, I’ve never felt happier. “You didn’t tell me your name.”

            “Ray.”

            “Your full name.”

            She sighs, but says, “Rachel Evangeline Depp. My initials spell RED. That’s why it’s my favourite color. What’s yours?”

            “Yellow.”

            Ray nods her approval.

            “I’ll figure out a way to come back.”

            Ray gives me a thumbs up as she runs back home. I get on the next hovertrain.

            When I get to the gated neighborhood, I crawl back in through my window. I make sure to put on a clean dress before I go downstairs for a late dinner, hopefully by myself. Instead, it’s a very, very, very long dinner where I get lectured about running off.

            My parents never ask where I went and never notice the scraped knees.

 

 

Thursday April 4, 2171

09:12

 

FLAG

            I experience the showing as if through a thick wall of glass. All it needs to officially become a museum of living exhibits are actual clear boxes around each of us and signs saying “Don’t tap the glass.” People walk past my podium, some glancing at the hologram on the front proclaiming me an infinite well of knowledge, others pausing to ask me a never-ending list of obscure questions. I barely hear them asking, and certainly don’t hear myself answering.

            The exhibition hall’s monochrome greys and dull blues don’t help the feeling of detachment. High ceilings and the hall’s sheer size leave me lost in an empty void instead of feeling spacious. And I swear the walls are soundproofed, like a musician’s practice room. It makes my head feel uncomfortably full. If I thought the gameshows were bad, all these showings my parents drag me to on behalf of the government are infinitely worse. At least there I didn’t have to look around at dozens of other kids who are just as miserable as I am.

            For the umpteenth time, I glance at the clock projected onto the inside of my glasses. Fourteen minutes have passed. Four hours and twenty-seven more to go. I fade in and out of the space, brought back only by my legs aching from standing for hours on end, the high-pitched ringing of a faulty holo-projector to my left, or to check the clock in the corner of my glasses. Five minutes pass between fades. Then twelve. Thirty-seven. Two. Fifty-nine.

            Halfway through auto-piloting my way through a question, I catch Mother and Father heading my way, taking in the other kids on display as they go. I don’t know if the other kids’ parents come to all their showings, but mine haven’t missed one. Father gives me an encouraging nod as he passes. Mother holds a finger up to the corner of her mouth in a silent, “Smile on.”

            I take a deep breath and remind myself what’s coming after this: I’m sleeping over at Ray’s tonight. I’ll get to see her, G and Fox all of tonight and into tomorrow morning. Hours spent with open skies and no staring eyes. And Ray.

            That makes it almost effortless to put on a smile and rattle off more word salad.

            From my right comes the wheezing of someone having a panic attack. I don’t even pause my next answer. It’s only when a gasping, crying teenager is brought past me by a pair of uniformed people do I get hit with a jolt. Have I really become that numb to it? The thought makes me nauseous. At long last, a set of chimes plays over a loudspeaker and an automated voice announces, “Thank you for visiting, but our showing has ended for today.”

            My legs stiff and wooden, I make my way off the podium and follow my parents out to the car. I’ve got a headache from clenching my jaw and I massage my temples as the car drives us home.

            “You really stand out, you know, Faizah. The others there always look so nervous.” Mother shakes her head, pity coming across with just a little too much disdain. “They don’t make it look as effortless as you do.” Her sugar-sweet smile leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.

            “I wish you wouldn’t talk about them like that.” I massage harder. “I have a photographic memory, it’s not like I have to actually study anything.” I’m hit with the image of the person being escorted out of the hall today. I didn’t know him, but I’d seen him at almost every showing. Am I ever going to see him again? “Of course, everyone else looks scared.”

            “Yes, well, in either case, I have exciting news.” Mother beams at me. “I’m not the only one who has noticed you. You’ve been invited to join the specialized program in the city up north.”

            A pit opens up in my stomach and swallows all my words. I mutely shake my head. Vigorously.

            Mother sighs. “Faizah, this isn’t up for debate.”

            “You’re right, because I’m not leaving Ray, G and Fox.”

            “You’ll still see them, I’m sure—”

            “You know people aren’t allowed to travel between cities anymore.”

            “They’re a distraction," Father adds, fiddling with the car’s AC, "keeping you from reaching your full potential.”

            “How? All I do is read books and articles and watch documentaries and stuff my head with useless stuff I don’t even care about!” I grip the seat under me to keep my hands from shaking. “Without them I—” My throat closes up before I can finish the sentence. More showings and who knows what else, fading in and out and in and out with no light at the end of the monotonous tunnel . . . It won’t be long before I’m the one getting dragged hyperventilating out of some hall never to be seen again. “I’m not going.”

            “I’m sorry, Faizah, but it’s not up to you.” Mother runs a hand down my cheek as the car pulls up to the house. “You’ll thank us when you’re older.”

            I throw the car door open and slam it shut in her face. The sweet scent of mandazi dough still wafting out of the kitchen from breakfast clashes with the bitter taste in the back of my throat. I storm upstairs and start packing for the sleepover tonight without bothering to close my door. Which is why I jump when I hear the door click shut and lock.

            “Hey!” I rattle the handle with both hands. “What the hell?”

            “We were told to take the proper precautions so that more drastic measures don’t have to be taken.” Mother says, voice unusually quiet and shaky. “I know you’re upset. But we’re protecting you from yourself. We’ll talk about it more tomorrow, okay, Faizah?”

            “What the actual fuck!” I pound on the door. “Let me out!”

            Nothing, except footsteps getting softer.

            A fire lighting in my chest, I whirl around and punch the damn locked door with all I have. There’s a crack and, for the split second before the pain hits me, I think I broke the door.

            Crying out, I clutch my hand to my chest. Where’s your head, Flag? Why did you do that? Through the throbbing, a strange sense of clarity comes over me. It’s just going to get worse, isn’t it? I’m just going to be met with more and more locked doors.

            More than once, Ray’s talked about me running away to the phantom-town outside the city, even said I could live in her bedroom. I always hesitated. I’m not the most inconspicuous person with all the time I’ve spent on holo feeds. But if I can’t see Ray, G and Fox anymore . . .

            Rubbing my bruising knuckles, I glance out my window. I’m not letting anyone take away the one good thing I have.

            With my non-injured hand, I finish shoving things into my backpack for the sleepover, and a few extras. Laptop, memory sticks with music and other things on them, and my favourite fiction book holos. My trombone is already in its case and I throw the strap over top the backpack strap.

            Then I pull my hoverboard out from a cut in my mattress, and my hoverboarding shoes from under the bed.

            I climb out the window, drop onto my board and take off. Not once on my way out of the city does my smile drop. Ray and I must’ve talked about me running away for years. It’s thrilling to be doing it for real.

​

Thursday April 4, 2171

15:51

 

RAY

            Empty desks suck up space in the classroom like blackholes. I’m pretty sure Flag told me blackholes mess with time; these ones certainly make last period drag on impossibly long.

            The most recent distortion in space and time is one row over from me. Sage was his name. I didn’t know him well, but he always brought homemade cookies for the band after concerts. He had a good laugh, too. And now he’s gone. Over a quarter of the desks are empty now. I have a morbid bet with myself if we’ll get to half by the end of the year. I bet no.

            But I don’t like my odds.

            I resist the urge to take my eyes off the hologram at the front of the class to glare at the uniformed woman standing at the back, sweeping the room with a faint smile. Looking for her next victim who falls just a hair too short of whatever standards Japincatch set.

            At last, the final bell rings. The class lets out an audible breath.

            We spill out of the school like a splatter of ink and flip our hoverboards’ solar panels shut with our feet. Smooth navy panels give way to black and gold, riddled with tiny loops for the hooks of our hoverboarding shoes to clip into. The top of the board is warm enough from the spring sun that it reaches through my shoes. At the school’s gate, our friends group splits, G, Fox and I going left, Margo, Kiki and Ingrid going right.

            I lace my fingers behind my head as we fly home. Hovercars on the electromag road next to us pass by with nothing more than a whoosh. My hoverboard shivers with each one, the electromagnets in my board reacting to the much larger ones in the cars. Fox plays rhythms in midair with his drumsticks, and G and I have our instruments floating behind us in zero-G cases—alto sax and trumpet respectively.

            “Dad’s on call tonight,” G says in my direction. “If you and Lilian want to come over and eat his share of leftovers.”

            “No can do.” A grin breaks across my face. “Flag’s sleeping over tonight. Finally got her parents to ease up enough to let her out of the house for a full night.”

            “Ooo!” Fox wiggles his eyebrows. “And are we invited?”

            “Nope, girls only slumber party.”

            “What if I, like,” Fox pockets his drumsticks and draws longer hair on his head with his hands, “wear a wig?”

            I look up, holding a finger to my chin, “Hmm,” then look back at Fox, “no.”

            Fox snaps his fingers, then shrugs. “Eh, I couldn’t have anyways. Reggie and I gotta wrangle the goblins tonight.”

            G squints at Fox. “How, how much ‘wrangling’ does it take for a six-year-old and someone who’s barely one?”

            “Ah! You see,” Fox spins to fly backward, gesturing at us as he talks, “Reggie and I take one each, that way they can’t sneak up on ya. It’s good practice for when number five shows up.”

            His whole face scrunched up, G still darts forward to pull Fox out of the way of another hoverboarder.

            Fox shoves his hands in his pockets. “Whoops…”

            “No protest from you?” I ask G. “No burning desire to crash our party?”

            “No, not really, no. Your mom scares me.”

            I purse my lips. “Whatever. You weren’t invited anyways. You big wimp.” I poke him in the ribs.

            “Hey!” he snaps and smacks my hand away.

            A few blocks later, we climb the hill that marks where we part ways. From the top, the sun reflects off the hovertrain track that leads home. The glare burns a hard edge onto the back of my eyelids when I blink.

            Flag says they’ve started calling cities like that phantom-towns, since so many people are moving into the government’s cities now. Stable jobs, better schools or some other boring bullshit. G and Fox and their families left at the start of the school year. This will be my first summer without them.

            G and Fox carry on up top while I fly down the other side, racing the wind to Lillian’s school. She hovers at our usual streetlight outside the elementary school and towers over everyone else leaving. I like to think of us as inverses of each other, with matching sun-kissed skin. Me with dirty blonde waves and brown eyes, and her with bone-straight hickory hair and eyes like sun through rainclouds.

            We fly to the city’s border and hop onto the hovertrain track, the train no longer in service this far out. I take out a thin piece of metal from my pocket and jam it between the board and the government-issued limiter on the back. The limiter pops off and I pocket it, ready to be put back on tomorrow. I repeat the process with Lilian’s and we begin the long flight home together.

            As reach the edge of the phantom-town, I ask, “Can you look after yourself tonight?”

            “Sure. Why?”

            “Flag’s spending the night—”

            “Oh,” Lillian drums her fingers on her cheeks, “Flag’s ‘spending the night.’”

            My face heats. “Not—Not like that! She’s just—Sleeping over.”

            Lillian presses her lips together and nods thoughtfully. “Mm, mm-hm.”

            I bump her hip. “And where’d you learn to make jokes like that, you’re, what? Ten?”

            “Thirteen.” She looks back at the school, then hunches her shoulders. With school becoming harder in the last few years, she’s gotten stuck repeating a grade twice.

            “Hey,” I put an arm around her shoulder and squeeze, “you’re out of there this year, right, Lil?”

            “Yeah . . . ”

            “So, it doesn’t matter. Okay?”

            She doesn’t look convinced, but still says, “Race you home,” and we take off. I let her win.

            We bank up the slanting fence around our backyard, hop off our boards, and unfold their solar panels to charge before we go inside. The whitewashed house reeks of burnt sugar. I grimace. Lillian wrinkles her nose.

            Dumping my backpack by the stairs, I dart into the kitchen to scrounge up food for Lillian and I. Mom’s supplies are spread out on the counter, containers of pills blocking the cupboards. I push them out of the way with an oven mitt on. Like I could be infected by just touching them.

             Mom sits on the couch, a miniature molecular synthesizer on the cushions beside her, lacing candies at the molecular level with something illegal. Harder to detect that way. A finished pile of candy boxes sits on the floor at her feet. The bright pink stands out against the rest of the house, which I’ve always though looks washed out.

            “Just stay in your room, okay, Lil? I’ll come check on you before bed.” I crack and shake a self-making meal to start it heating up then pass it to Lillian. “Go do your homework and all that boring stuff.”

            She takes the food, glances at the candies, but grins at me before she leaves. “Have fun.”

            I snort and shove her. “Shut up.” After she’s safe, I return my thoughts to Flag, and grab snacks for us.

            I eye Mom as I fill my arms with food. “My day was great. There were more government weirdos in suits standing in the back of last period again, which is fun. And Sage’s disappeared. No one’s seen him in two weeks.” Supplies gathered, I shoulder my bag, but pause at the bottom of the stairs. “Kind of scary, don’t you think? One day I might just not come home and no one will ever hear from me again.” Despite the cynicism lining the words, they leave a lump in my throat.

            “You’ll be fine, you’re not worth bothering over.”

            “So, you can hear me.”

            “I’m working.” Mom flicks her eyes to me as she transfers a finished candy from the machine into a box. “And make yourself scarce, Danny’s coming over and he’ll be here a while. We’ve got some,” she inputs the next set of buttons sharply, “business to sort out.”

            “Wait, tonight?”

            “Yeah, tonight, why else would I be telling you?”

            “But,” a bag of chips slips and I shift to catch it with my leg, “Flag’s coming over tonight.”

            “Who?”

            “A friend. The one from the city.”

            “So?”

            I chew the inside of my cheek. As much as I want to see Flag, I never feel safe when Mom has her “work friends” over. Maybe he’ll be gone by the time Flag shows up. “Whatever.”

 

***

 

            Later that night, I lie on my bed silently practicing my trumpet. I debate fighting back against the voices downstairs by practicing for real. But the voices already don’t seem very friendly. Putting down the instrument, I creep over to my door and crack it open to hear better. Just to decide if I need to get Lil and I out of the house or not.

            “It’s rearranging molecules. It’s tedious, what do you want me to do?” Mom asks, annoyance coating her voice.

            Danny paces, going in and out of where I can see him. “I want you to work faster.”

            “Why don’t you fucking do it then? I work too fast and it won’t be hidden well enough. I got two kids, you think I want the cops catching on?”

            Danny’s laugh is oil and grates on my ears. “Like you give two shits about kids you didn’t want in the first place.”

            I resist the urge to slam my door shut, but close it nonetheless. The last thing I want is their attention. Danny had the familiar bulge of a weapon in his waistband.

            Flopping back down on my bed, I open up my holo notebook and doodle tattoo ideas, writing short lines of words in between. Maybe it’s for the best Flag didn’t show up.

            Tick!

            I frown at my window through my holo. A pebble hits it a few seconds later with another tick. Hesitantly, I stick my head out the window. “Hello?” The streetlights are out again. “Who’s there?”

            “Hey!” Flag, sleeping bag and trombone case in hand, steps into the small puddle of light from my window. “Down here!”

            “Flag? What are you doing here?”

            “I’m sleeping over tonight, aren’t I?”

            A shout comes from downstairs. I check behind me. “Flag . . . Now’s not really the best time.”

            “But we’ve been planning this for months!”

            She is already here . . . I sigh and toss down her gravity-rig, the belt-adjacent thing that messes with gravity around us enough to let us use the boards or float around in zero-G. Flag wraps the rig around her waist and pushes herself up to my window, which acts as the front door for her.

            “Oh, shit, Flag! What happened to your hand?” The top of it has turned a strange shade of plum and swelled.

            “I, uh, got mad and punched a door.”

            “What? Never mind. Here, I’ll get you a bandage. I don’t have any ice, though.” I disappear into my bathroom, return with an auto-tensor bandage and fit it over Flag’s hand. “What happened?”

            Across from me on the bed, Flag recounts her argument with her parents—and the ensuing door punching—and what caused it in the first place. I take her non-injured hand and squeeze it. “You know we wouldn’t have let them take you away.”

            Flag frowns and shakes her head.

            “What? You don’t believe me? Fox and I would’ve convinced G.”

            She forces a shaky laugh. “If I hadn’t left now, I’m not sure you would have had the chance.” A silence falls. As much as I talk big, there’s a part of me that knows she’s right. Flag straightens. “I’d like to take your offer. To let me stay here. If,” she runs a finger along the edge of the bandage, “if that’s okay with you. I don’t know who might come looking for me.”

            I try not to let my smile get too big. “You think Lil and I are gonna rat you out? Of course, it’s okay. Duh. ” I glance towards the door. “Not like we’re strangers to illicit activities. But at least you’re here now.”

            Flag smiles sheepishly and leans back against my bed frame. “Thanks. That’s great, actually. Because I really would lose my mind without you guys.”