I had to tell her. As if sensing it, Merry came and sat next to me on the bunk. “Uh… you know, Harrison… anyway. I got pregnant.”
My sister looked appropriately horrified, then did the sweetest thing. She came and knelt before me and took my hands. “Oh, honey. I’m so sorry. That… that asshole.”
I’d never heard her use bad language before, even at her maddest. “Yeah. But a couple days ago I had a miscarriage. I got kicked really hard. And they operated on me to make sure it was all gone.”
“Someone kicked you?” My sister looked outraged.
I sighed. While that had been really, really bad, it was barely registering on my current list of awful life events.
“Cass. I’m really glad to see you, but trust me when I say that I would give anything for you not to be here.”
“I want to be where you are,” she said stubbornly.
“This is a prison,” I said carefully. “Full of kids from hundreds of different cells, including ours. Kathy Hobhouse is here, and I guess Livvie Clayhill used to be. But in here there are tests and training and fights.”
Cassie frowned. “What? Why?”
“How well you do at any of them decides how long you’ll stay,” I said, still pussyfooting around.
“So people get out?”
I hated seeing the spark of hope in her eyes. Slowly I shook my head. “No. This is… death row. The only way out is… to get executed.”
Cassie cocked her head to one side like a retriever. “What are you talking about?”
“Welcome to the crazy house,” I said.
56
CASSIE
BECCA HAS ALWAYS BEEN A big exaggerator. If we had a strong breeze, it was a tornado. If we caught a little trout, it gained ten pounds by the time Becca told someone about it. If Pa spoke to her sternly, then he had “taken her head off” or “skinned her alive.”
So at first I thought “executed” was an extreme description of something yucky, like having to mop these halls or whatever. Then Diego, Vijay, and Merry started backing her up, all of them speaking in low voices.
I still wasn’t convinced. Fighting until someone was knocked out? That was crazy. Push-ups over a board of nails? Who would come up with such an insane idea? Then Becca unzipped her jumpsuit and I gasped: her chest was covered with rows of unhealed dots of blood. She pulled her lip to one side and showed me the gap where her tooth had been. I stared at her, stunned.
They told me about their friend Robin. And a boy named Tomás. A girl named Little Bit. Becca blamed herself for that one.
By the time they were finished, tears were streaming down my cheeks. They were telling the truth. My sister had actually endured all this, and worse. Horror filled me—all this time I’d been searching desperately for Becca. Now that I’d found her, I’d never been so afraid in my whole life. I sat down on the cold concrete, unable to move, terrifying images spinning through my brain.
The lights went out at 10:00, just like back home. I curled up on the floor next to Becca’s bunk. She gave me her thin, ratty blanket. I pulled it over me and shut my eyes, then lay there shaking from cold and fear.
But I must have finally slept because a few hours later, the barred door slid open with a scraping sound.
“Cassandra Greenfield!” They were different guards than last night. “Get up!”
I saw Diego and Vijay were in their bunks, but Becca and Merry were already gone.
The guards handcuffed me and prodded me with their billy clubs. I tried to memorize the route, but soon gave up. All these hallways looked—and smelled—alike. When they undid my hands and shoved me through a doorway, I was only a little surprised to see a classroom. And the woman inside, staring at me with narrowed eyes, must be the legendary Ms. Strepp.
57
HOW WELL WE DID DETERMINED how long we lived. Becca told me that.
“Take a seat. I’m Ms. Strepp. I’m glad to finally meet you, Cassandra Greenfield.”
I sat down at a desk. Why would she care about meeting me?
Written on the whiteboard at the front of the room was: “Appearances are often deceiving” - Aesop. I’d heard of Aesop—we’d read some of his stories in school. His morals were always good lessons for the cell.
“First you’ll be tested on the basics,” Ms. Strepp went on briskly.
“Okay,” I said, and she strode over and whacked my desk with her wooden ruler.
“You speak when I tell you!” she snapped, and I pressed my lips together because I’d heard that same expression just… maybe yesterday?
It began. I was hungry and cold and exhausted, but I concentrated, thinking each question through carefully. It was all stuff I’d seen before, so if I didn’t make any sloppy mistakes, I would be all right.
Ms. Strepp paced back and forth all night and all day long, staring at me, glancing at her watch. A couple of times she left the room, but a guard immediately came in each time.
In the middle of an essay about the history of our cell (a cinch because we were all required to memorize it anyway) a few hot tears filled my eyes. I brushed them away.
This was ridiculous. Surreal. I’d only wanted to find my sister. I hadn’t been a bad citizen. I hadn’t even been an Outsider.
It was dark again when Ms. Strepp finished looking at all my test results. I was so hungry I felt almost sick—that horrible, hollow feeling you get when you’ve gone too long without refueling.
Finally Ms. Strepp looked up. “You did extremely well. I guess you’re used to being a star pupil, eh?”
I nodded cautiously.
Ms. Strepp threw my tests into the trash can. “I’m not impressed, star pupil!” she snarled. “Every kid in here gets scores like this!”
The words came out of my mouth before I could stop them. “Not Becca.”
Ms. Strepp stopped in mid-pace and turned to me. “Yes, Becca,” she said. “Becca aces these tests. She’s a star pupil.”
“Becca?” I couldn’t help asking. “Becca Greenfield?”
“Yes, Becca Greenfield,” Ms. Strepp repeated snidely. “She now gets almost perfect scores. Like you.”
Well. All I could think was: What the hell happened to Becca?
“In fact, I think you’ll find your sister very changed from when you last saw her,” Ms. Strepp went on.
No kidding, I thought. She’s a different person.
“And you’re about to find that out in a very visceral way,” Ms. Strepp said.
I raised my eyebrows as she motioned for the guards to come in.
“Take her to the ring,” she said.
58
NATHANIEL