“Of course I remember. How could I forget kissing the girl I love?”
Avery caught her breath. “I love you too,” she said, so glad to finally say it aloud.
It was close to dawn. She should get back to her room before her parents woke up. She stole another glance at Atlas, who lay propped on one elbow beneath the rumpled white sheets. He watched the play of emotions across her face, reading her as always. “You’re leaving,” he said.
Avery nodded and reluctantly sat up. But something else was bothering her. “What about Leda?” she asked. Stubbornness, her one flaw, Atlas always said.
He looked away. “I feel terrible about how I’ve treated Leda in all this.” I should feel terrible too, Avery thought, but even though Leda was her best friend, it was hard right now to think of her as anything but the obstacle that had kept her from Atlas. “I really didn’t mean to lead her on,” he added remorsefully, and Avery was reminded of her thoughts about Watt last night.
“Why did you sleep with her, in the Andes?”
“Because I couldn’t have you, Aves.” He shook his head. “I thought being with Leda might keep me from thinking about you all the time. That’s why I went away—to escape the way I felt about you. I kept hoping that if I just ran far enough, eventually I’d figure out a way to stop loving you.”
“I’m glad it didn’t work.”
“Of course it didn’t work.” Atlas smiled. “There’s no way it ever could.”
WATT
WATT HEADED HOME from the gym Sunday afternoon, taking a large sip of his painkiller protein shake, and winced at the soreness in his shoulders. It had been a particularly rough session with the boxing-bot, per his request. He’d hoped that if he punched the bot hard enough, he would forget the sting of Avery’s rejection. So far it hadn’t worked.
Watt had never answered the flicker Avery sent late last night. It sounded too much like a brush-off. Nadia, when he turned her back on, had suggested that he respond. But Watt was human and irrational, so he’d left it deliberately unanswered despite Nadia’s advice, his silence some kind of stupid prideful statement.
He stepped up to the 236th floor observation deck, full of recycled-water fountains and gimmicky ice-pop stands and screaming kids. There were more crowds up here than usual. He caught a glimpse of the sky through the floor-to-ceiling windows, and saw a roiling mass of storm clouds gathering.
I didn’t realize today was a rain day, Watt remarked to Nadia, moving closer. He’d loved rain days ever since he was a kid—the brightly colored dirigibles that rose into the air and released the hydrosulfates, the way moisture gathered around the exploding chemicals in perfectly symmetrical spirals, and then the satisfying hiss as the desired rain began to fall. Humans couldn’t control the weather on a global scale, of course, but they’d figured out localized methods of rain induction and prevention almost fifty years ago. Watt wondered what it had been like back when people were at the mercy of the weather: if they, too, thought rain was beautiful, or if they hated it because they couldn’t control it. Avery would know, he thought, then felt annoyed with himself for the thought.
“You’re welcome,” Nadia’s voice sounded in his eartennas.
Wait—you’re telling me this was you?
“You needed cheering up,” she said simply.
Sometimes I worry that I’m wasting your talents. Watt shook his head, smiling a little. Leave it to Nadia to hack the Metropolitan Weather Bureau just because a seventeen-year-old kid had gotten rejected by the girl he liked. But he was grateful.
Do you think Avery likes someone else? he asked Nadia as the first fat raindrops began to clatter against the skylight overhead. The edges of the Tower were lined with them, everywhere the building narrowed as the floors went up.
“I know she does.”
What do you mean, you know? Watt thought back, confused.
“Do you want me to tell you?”
Watt hesitated. Part of him was relieved that Avery’s rejection hadn’t actually been about him, that he hadn’t done anything to make her change her mind. But another part was angry with her for even asking him out at all, feeling the way she clearly felt about this other person. Of course Watt wanted to know who it was.
If he asked, though, he would be just as bad as Leda. And knowing wouldn’t change what had happened.
Thanks, Watt told Nadia, but I don’t want to know.
He held firm the rest of the walk home, through when he walked in the front door and Zahra and Amir jumped up excitedly, begging him to play games. He held firm all through dinner, and helping his parents clean up, and putting the twins to bed.
Yet he couldn’t stop thinking about it. Now that he knew that Nadia knew—that the message was literally inside his own brain—it was like an itch he felt desperate to scratch. Finally Watt’s willpower snapped. He retreated into his room and shut the door firmly behind him.
“Changed my mind,” he said aloud to Nadia. “I want to know.” He didn’t care that the knowledge wouldn’t be helpful, that it would probably just upset him even more. He needed to know whom Avery had chosen over him.
“I’m going to play you the room comp audio, from Atlas’s room,” Nadia told him. “This is from last night, after you left their apartment.”
“Okay.” Watt didn’t understand where this was going. Maybe Avery had told Atlas who she liked?
Watt frowned as he heard Atlas murmuring, and a moment later, a higher-pitched voice whispering. Okay, so he had a girl with him. Leda would want this, he realized. He could charge her a ton of money for it. He opened his mouth to tell Nadia to fast-forward to the part about Avery—
Watt’s fingers tightened around the edges of his chair. Oh god. He recognized that girl’s voice. And his anger dissolved into a sick nausea as he realized the truth.
RYLIN
LATER THAT WEEK, Rylin stood in the doorway of Cord’s room, steeling herself for what she was about to do. She’d done it once before, she reminded herself. But it had felt different then, back when Cord was just the asshole who’d hit on her after his party, not the boy who’d taken her to Paris and made her laugh—made her happy—despite everything else going on in her life. The boy she was falling for despite all her better judgment.
She thought of V, and the looming threat of Hiral in jail, and shivered with foreboding. She needed to do it now; Cord had just left for school—she’d heard the front door close behind him—and she wanted to get these and off-load them before he was home. Moving quickly, decisively, she slipped into the room and grabbed five Spokes from Cord’s hiding place, shoving them in her back jeans pocket. She walked out the door and halfway down the upstairs hallway—
And ran straight into Cord.
“Hey there,” he said, grabbing her shoulders to steady her, “where are you headed in such a hurry?”
“I thought you left,” she said, then winced; that was an odd thing to say. She couldn’t stop thinking about the last time this had happened, when she’d kissed Cord to keep from being caught red-handed. But now he looked so trusting she didn’t even need to distract him.
“I’m headed back out,” he said, and she realized he was wearing jeans and a plain white shirt instead of his school uniform.
“You’re cutting again,” she realized aloud.
Cord looked at her closely, and for a single terrifying moment Rylin thought he had somehow figured out about the Spokes, but then he nodded as if coming to a decision. “Do you want to come?” he offered.
Rylin hesitated. The Spokes were burning a hole in her back pocket. “I don’t know,” she began—and stopped, seeing the imperceptible flash of hurt that crossed Cord’s face. “All right,” she amended. This was a terrible idea, going out with Cord when she was carrying so many packets. But this place clearly meant something to Cord.
“Trust me, you won’t regret it,” he said mysteriously, and grinned.
* * *