“It feels weird that you don’t ask anything. Don’t you feel trapped by not having any questions? It would make me very claustrophobic.”
That was an interesting way for her to put it, and not very different from the airless feeling I got when I thought of all the things I wished I could say.
“Do you know how I got to be a Placer?”
I didn’t, but I think I sat up straighter or something because Margot smiled, knowing she had my attention.
“Normally Placers recruit after careful observation. Kel does not cover the Onzième, but if you took gymnastics, someone from the Agency evaluated you before your fifteenth.”
She paused to let that sink in. The hairs on the back of my neck rose as I remembered the pale, blond man, and then I began to fume. I realized Margot was implying that I technically was not good enough to be a Placer.
I had the distinct impression she both admired and disliked me.
“Kel spotted me on a soccer field. I had been told I could have been in the Olympics? if they had soccer for girls. They do not. I find the Olympics? a joke anyway, since we no longer compete against other nations.”
I didn’t realize that we ever had. I was glad I didn’t have to admit it. My cheeks burned for a minute, and I had the ugly impression Margot could read my embarrassment. I wondered how much else she knew. She obviously had money and the better education that went with it.
“Kel found Henri doing Parkour in an alley in the Cinq. She says if she had not recruited him right then and there, he probably would have broken his own neck. He needed training. He moves like a dream now, though. Have you ever watched him?”
She fell silent. She wasn’t waiting for an answer; she was thinking, or maybe imagining Henri move. He was very skilled. Her posture changed. She looked smaller and younger.
“Do you like him?” she asked in a whisper.
I would have said no, even though I had not had time to weigh how I felt. This was what she really wanted to ask. Nothing else mattered to her. The trouble was that I could not give her an answer. A micro-shrug or a smile wouldn’t cut it. She looked me in the eye, frowning. She couldn’t discern anything one way or the other, and it frustrated her. It frustrated me.
She looked at me for far too long for it to be anything but awkward, and I didn’t know what to do. Without her chatter or her music, the Squelch seemed achingly quiet. Her violin ticked, settling on its perch. A string sounded an almost imperceptible note. Margot tensed, then slapped her hands at her thighs and stood.
“Well...” Her voice trailed away, and her cheeks burned red again. Was she angry or embarrassed? Mine felt warm, too. I felt them with the back of my hand. She opened the door and led out into the hall and back to her bedroom. Our conversation was over.
Did she still have both parents? She didn’t seem like an Affluent, but her home was extravagant compared to mine. It had a Squelch. Those framed composer posters were paper, which meant she paid for their registration and the monthly fees that went with them. Was she a Placer just for the fun of it?
“You know how to get home?” she whispered. Her Cuff vibrated and charged her. It shook me to see her speak so blithely. She could afford to talk. Resentment coiled in my belly.
She held the window open for me. I put my mask and gloves back on with care, then climbed outside. Margot shut the window and sat down on her bed, staring off into space. I shot a line out and zipped away. She would probably sleep until noon. I wished I could have done the same, but I didn’t have that luxury. I still had to go to school, and I scarcely had time to change.
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“You look exhausted!” Penepoli said, stating the obvious at the sight of the dark circles under my eyes.
I pushed through the halls with her at my side, not ready at all for Mrs. Soleman’s American? history class. That class was a complete waste of time.
“There’s twenty-nine Silents at the school now,” Penepoli whispered to me as I reached my seat. “I counted.”
I let out a breath. How was I supposed to feel about that?
“Thirty, if you count Nancee,” Penepoli added. Then, after a moment, “Do you think she is coming back?”
She wasn’t coming back. Not to school, for sure. My frown answered Penepoli’s question, because her face fell in disappointment. We both missed Nancee. My heart seemed to slow, thinking I might well never see her again.
“Shut up!” Phlip grunted from his seat behind us. His Cuff buzzed, and his face darkened.
Penepoli glared at Phlip and then turned back to me, lowering her voice. “Principal Ugarte is pissed,” she said, brightening a little.
“Okay, Miss Graethe,” Mrs. Soleman said, pointing Penepoli toward her seat.
Mrs. Soleman was a mousey little thing with watery eyes and slumped shoulders. She never seemed to have anything worthwhile to teach us. She would softly plow forward, reciting names and dates from board-approved selections of Great Events, and my mind usually wandered. I think she knew none of us paid much attention. I doubted she cared.
She adjusted the short sport coat she wore and cleared her throat as a preamble to her lecture.
“The Patent Wars were meant to consolidate and aggregate control of innovation in America?,” Mrs. Soleman said. She often lingered over words she found interesting or pleasurable to say. Most teachers did, since the government was paying.
I longed for Mrs. Soleman’s usual soft dullness; my eyes were begging to close. But she kept watching me, making it impossible for me to put my head down on the desk and close them. I folded my hands on my desk and let my chin rest on them, hoping I might still look interested while slumped forward. Mrs. Soleman looked disappointed.
What I wanted most was to sleep. If I was going to expend any brain power, it would be to consider how I could get into Malvika Place and what I would do with Carol Amanda Harving. If I could get Sam to her, how could I prepare him? Would his pleas be enough?
“Have any of you ever wondered why NanoLion? batteries continue to be unsafe?” she asked. Her eyes were steady on me. Was this a trick to get me to speak? To keep me awake? I felt a little sick, thinking of the man I had seen die in the street.
Everyone knew NanoLion? batteries were unstable, but it was bold and dangerous to speak publicly about it. Mrs. Soleman’s Cuff let out a low, ugly bleat. She’d spoken negatively about a product, and her Cuff had just fined her for it. I expected her to wince and back off, but she continued.