But I wasn’t. Maybe she was the more pragmatic, rational one of the two of us, or she was simply channeling that side of herself. Either way, I couldn’t give her what she wanted.
We stood silently through an update on interstate construction and the resulting traffic congestion, an on-scene report from the site of a house fire with fatalities, and discussion of a suicidal jumper off the top of a building right near Millennium Park (the photo was not of anyone I recognized). No mention of a shooting or bodies discovered at the park, though. Either the reports hadn’t reached the media yet, or the Committee had worked hard to cover up their cover-up.
“I want you to know that I wouldn’t change anything,” Ariane said, but I kept my eyes focused on the screen. “Not even the end. It was worth it. All of it. Especially you.” She was close to tears; I could hear it in her voice.
Fighting the urge to turn and gather her up, I stared hard at the television through rapidly blurring vision as the anchor introduced another clip from the featured story coming up at ten.
They cut to a shot of my mom seated in a molded plastic chair, the background dark, anonymous. I focused on the familiar gestures and intonations from my mother, strangely flattened out and stiff in front of the cameras. She was nervous. I could tell that much from the way she fidgeted before answering questions—shifting in her seat, tugging at the neck of her sweatshirt and then the too-short sleeves, which had been pushed up at the wrists.
“I had no idea what I was getting into,” she said, her gaze distant as she answered the reporter. “I…We needed the money, and GTX was the largest employer in town. Maybe I should have been more cautious, but I never dreamed that they were…doing what they were doing.” She tugged her sweatshirt down in place, smoothing the front, which had been perfectly smooth to begin with.
I frowned. That was…weird. Not her behavior—that I could write off as nerves. But she had never in her life worn a school team sweatshirt like that. She’d always dressed up more than other moms. Even when my brother had been star quarterback, breaking records left and right (except for my dad’s, of course), I’d never seen her in a Hawks shirt.
So for her to go on television in a school sweatshirt now, for an interview that had to be one of the biggest, most important moments in her life, that made no sense. Let alone a shirt supporting…I squinted at the screen. Who the hell were the Mustangs?
Of course, it could have just been a giant, convoluted “eff you” to my dad, who was no doubt watching all of this with the vein throbbing in his forehead like a separate heartbeat. Mom was calling his beloved GTX onto the carpet, very publicly.
But as I stared at those red, looping letters, I couldn’t get past the feeling that the shirt looked familiar.
“I’m going to go,” Ariane said. “The longer we wait…” Her words broke off in a pained sigh.
But I couldn’t acknowledge it. Couldn’t agree to her leaving, even if in such a tacit manner.
“Oh, they were very well aware of what they were doing,” my mom said on-screen, her chin lifting in defiance. “Dr. Jacobs and Dr. Laughlin were creating children to experiment on them.”
Even though that wasn’t the whole truth, the damage from that bombshell wasn’t going to go away any time soon. God, my mom might even go to jail. So much for any kind of discreet ending to all of this. Justine was going to be so pissed.…
Then it clicked. I knew where I’d seen that shirt before, why it looked so familiar.
“Ariane, wait,” I said sharply. I turned to make sure she was listening to me.
She’d just opened the French doors and crossed out of the bedroom, but she came back. Her hair swung loose around her shoulders; I’d been the one to pull the rubber band free from her ponytail. Or, rather, I’d tried and she’d had to help me. Her hair was both heavier and softer than I’d remembered and completely wild, but I’d loved seeing her like that, her white-blond hair a corona around her head and snaking down her naked shoulders, like the last piece of her public “I’m normal” persona had vanished.
I knew, logically, that she was still the slightly strange-looking girl from my Algebra II class. Her skin was too pale, her eyes too dark, her chin too pointed, but now she was so familiar, so beautiful, it made my chest ache like someone had taken a wrecking ball to it.
“Look at what she’s wearing,” I said, pointing at my mom as soon as Ariane was close.
Ariane blinked at me, taken off guard by my sudden willingness to speak as well as the shift in topic. She glanced at the television. “Yeah, I saw that,” she said, her voice rough. “I have no idea who the Mustangs are, but—”
“No—I mean, yeah, but that’s not what I mean.” I hesitated. “I think that’s Justine’s shirt.” I didn’t know what that meant or why she would do that, but it had to mean something, didn’t it? Were the two of them working together? How? Why?