Linus looks back at me, and then asks the question into the phone. He glances at me again and shakes his head. “No. Your mother doesn’t know.”
It’s going to destroy her. Bad as it is for me, it’s going to be even worse for her. She isn’t going to understand who he is. Nevertheless, she’ll have to be told. It’ll fall to me to tell her. I can see that now.
If she’s still alive.
Wouldn’t it be something, I think, if my mother’s dead, and the doctor in my father’s body seeds a new mind into my mother’s body? Wouldn’t they make a fabulous pair?
I let out one horrible, ugly sob before I clamp my hands over my mouth.
I miss my dad. I miss his goofy laugh. I miss how safe I felt with him. After all this time, I can hardly bear to scratch the surface of my memories of him because the hurt is too deep. And now I could actually see him walking around, alive?
My left hand loosens from my grip and through no effort of my own, my fingers stroke slowly down my cheek. I get that this thing inside me is trying to comfort me again, but it’s way too much for me to handle right now. Way too much.
“Stop that!” I say sharply. “I won’t be screwed up. I’m sick of this!”
My fingers still. The tingling stops. Then it grows stronger again, stronger than before, like a burning. It’s insistent and angry, the way I feel myself, and suddenly I’m stronger. Certain. A kick of adrenaline burns through my veins, forcing me to my feet. I leave the couch and step over to the porch door, where a film of moisture still coats the glass. My right hand lifts of its own volition, and my index finger traces six capital letters in the cool gray moisture: A-R-S-E-L-F.
My hand tingles as it drops away. I stare at the word. It’s a name.
“Arself,” I murmur, testing the sounds.
A light flashes behind my eyelids and a rushing fills my ears. I stagger back, still staring at the name on the glass. I can hardly breathe. It’s like getting ripped to shreds and being put precisely together at the same time.
“Rosie, what’s wrong?” Linus says. “What’s happening?”
But I can’t answer him.
Can you hear me now? says a voice in my head.
19
ARSELF
THE VOICE HAS AN ETHEREAL, hollow sound, like it’s coming from the end of a canyon or the bottom of a well. It’s mesmerizing and terrifying both.
Who are you? I ask.
“Rosie, what’s going on?” Linus asks, coming near. “Look at me.”
My heart is pounding and tightening in vicious ways. I back away from Linus and slide down the wall to sit on the floor. I press a fist to my chest, hard against my ribs, and suddenly the tight pain in my heart stops. Relief trickles through me like soft blue water, allowing me to breathe again.
Linus has joined me on the floor. I’m aware that he’s speaking to me, but I barely listen to him. The presence is active in my mind again, and I need to concentrate.
This is better, she says, and this time the voice is closer, more immediate. We knew you’d let us through eventually.
I didn’t let you through, I say.
You called our name.
An extra circuit of power is lacing slowly through my veins and muscles.
Three dimensions. So heavy! How does this work?
Invisible strings jerk at my elbows. My jaw works open and closed.
Hey, stop that! I say.
She sends a spiraling, giddy sensation through me, and an instant later, I laugh.
Linus frowns at me. “Rosie? Can you hear me? Say something.”
Get out of me! I say.
Instead, she balls into a heaviness that travels distinctly down my right arm.
So clumsy, but so perfect, too, she says.
I lift my hand and turn it before my face. As if a bright, new light is illuminating each cell, I notice the little creases that separate each section of my fingers. When I curve my fingers together, my palm creates a perfect little nest for water or berries.
Berries, she says. We want to taste raspberries fresh from a summer bush. Where? How far?
Would you listen to me? I ask.
A skittering shifts through my brain like fast hands through a pile of laundry, followed by a confused sense of alarm.
We’re cut off. We don’t know anything! How does she stand it?
The next search is more serious. My mind is actively frisked as every book in my mental library is taken out and shaken. The search is completed almost before I know it’s begun, and I’m left breathless, dizzy.
It’s okay. We can still do this, she says. It’s so personal. So immediate and sensory. That’s the trade-off. And what’s this?
I feel a plinking of strings at the back of my mind, like she’s testing the taut wires of a harpsichord.
Stop that! I say.
How do we turn her off? Is it this?
A slash of pain rips through my head and I gasp, paralyzed.
“Rosie!” Linus says. He gives my shoulders a shake. “You’re having a nightmare. Wake up.”
I manage to peer directly, desperately into his good eye.
“Help me,” I whisper.
With a jerk, Linus lifts me bodily and carries me out the door to the porch. Cold rain slams down on me, drenching me completely. Shocked, I suck in air, and my senses smack back on. The voice is gone. I’m alone again in my head. With both hands, I clutch Linus’s shirt. He lowers me until my socks meet the wet floorboards of the porch, and then he locks me close against him. My wet sweatshirt plasters thin to my chest. I can feel his belt buckle between us and the plane of his torso where we meet.
“Better?” Linus asks, searching into me.
He’s so near, I can see the rain clumping his dark eyelashes into spikes.
I nod.
“Let’s just be sure,” he says, and dips even nearer.
As I feel his lips meet mine, a ripple of happiness spirals through me. My eyes close, and I hold him tight. Rain is pouring down on both of us, but I don’t care. I gulp a big breath of air between raindrops and kiss him again. He is one strong, solid pillar in a haze of scary uncertainty, and I don’t want to ever let him go.
He squeezes me tighter, and then loosens his arms enough to meet my gaze.
“What was that?” he asks.
“A kiss?”
He laughs. “I mean before. You looked like you were in a trance. Could you hear me at all?”
“Not really,” I say, shivering reflexively at the memory. I feel like I barely escaped. “This thing completely took over me. It controlled my muscles like I was a puppet. It wanted to turn me off.”
“Did they seed a dream into you when you were down in the vault?” Linus asks.
“Whistler said they’d never do that, but it was something. I felt it before, back in the vault, but it didn’t control me then.”
“Is it gone now?” he asks.
I listen inside a second, hearing only silence. Then I nod again.
“You were pretty upset about your dad. Could that have triggered it?” he asks.
“I have no idea. I guess it’s possible,” I say. “It said I let it through. It talked like I was no more than a pesky fly, and it wouldn’t answer any of my questions. It was terrifying.”
“But you’re okay now?”