I STOP HALFWAY TO FIA’S DOOR, THE TRAY BALANCED carefully on my hip. “You’re new,” I say. He smells like oranges and…something darker. Richer. Not the cheap, stinging aftershave of Stewart, the regular guard.
He laughs; it has an edge to it that sets my senses on alert. It’s unnerving and a little bit sexy. I am eighteen years old. I know nothing about sexy. Or men. I wish I did. I wonder what it would be like to have a life where boys were a part of it.
This man, whoever he is, knows everything about sexy. I can already tell by his smell and his laugh. “I am new. How did you know I was here?”
“Stewart smells much worse. And he breathes like a horse.”
He laughs again. “You must be Annabelle.”
I smile, then inwardly berate myself. What am I doing? He’s one of them. And, even worse, he’s new. Which means something must be changing. Which is absolutely terrifying. “Why are you here?”
“They needed a replacement for the previous project manager.”
The previous project manager. Clarice. Dead Clarice. “So, what did you do wrong to get assigned here?”
“Ah, you mean what did I do right? Because here is looking pretty good now.”
I don’t know if I’m blushing; my cheeks are hot and I feel like I need to tuck my hair behind my ear or touch my neck, but I’m holding the tray. Fia’s tray. “I have to take this in to Fia. Open the door.”
“Fia,” he says experimentally, then repeats it softly to himself. “Yes, about that.”
I feel the tray wobble ever so slightly. He touched it. “What did you just do?”
“I think it’s time we weaned your sister off the sedatives, don’t you?”
“Really?” I turn my face toward his voice, overwhelmed with hope. They’ve kept her so drugged up ever since…ever since that day. She’s barely a person. I’ve asked and asked, pleaded, argued, demanded. What was the point in keeping her here if they were going to leave her a zombie forever?
“Really.”
Tears spill down my face, warm tracks. I don’t know what to do with myself. I bend and set the tray on the ground, then, on impulse, throw my arms in a hug around him. He is tall and solid, and being this close he smells even better. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome, but I’m not doing it for you.”
“Thank you, thank you, thank you.” I let go and back away, suddenly embarrassed. “I’m sorry, I don’t even know your name.”
“James.”
“The beautiful boy with the booze?” I ask, horrified. That’s how Fia and I have referred to him ever since that night. And now he’s in charge of our very lives.
I wish I could take back my hug.
“Come on. Please? No one describes movies as well as you do.” I finish brushing Fia’s hair, but she still sits listlessly on the end of the bed. I moved into a bigger dorm, more like an apartment, last month.
James let me move her out of the secure wing and back in with me five days ago. She hasn’t seen him yet. I haven’t told her he’s in charge of us now. I still don’t know what that means, how that changes things.
But thanks to him, she’s off the sedatives. I just give her one at night to help her sleep. There’s almost no difference between heavily sedated Fia and normal Fia, though.
“You act like nothing changed,” she whispers.
“Why should I act like something changed?”
“You know what I did!”
I flinch away from her voice, but part of me is glad. At least I got a reaction. “It doesn’t matter.”
She laughs. It’s low and empty and I wish she wouldn’t ever laugh like that again. “You didn’t do it.”
“Let’s move on. Forget about it. You’re not going to be punished for it. Everyone understands. I talked with—I talked with Mr. Keane.”
“The Mr. Keane?” she asks.
“Yes. On the phone, right after. I was so scared they’d—they’d take you away. I told him everything, about what you saw, about why you—why it happened. He wasn’t angry!” Actually, he’d laughed, a silent whisper of a laugh. I couldn’t get it out of my head. It was the only laugh I’ve ever heard worse than Fia’s dead-girl laugh. “So we move on. Back to our plan. The plan not to have a plan. Remember?” I nudge her, smiling hopefully. She needs to have hope. She needs to have something.
Ever since it became obvious that I knew what this school really was and that I wasn’t seeing anything other than the occasional glimpse of Fia, they’ve pretty much ignored me. I can do whatever I want as long as I stay in a few select (and guarded) wings of the building. But they don’t pretend to care about my future anymore—no new tech, no more visits from the doctor. I wonder if there ever was any hope for my eyes. Probably just another lie woven to keep me invested and Fia trapped.
Just another future I’ve lost.
“You can’t see my hands,” Fia whispers. There’s a noise, almost too quiet to hear. A tiny tap-tap-tap, like she’s playing a beat on her leg.
I try to reach out for her fingers, but she snatches them away.