4.
The first time I got thrown in Lock Up, my mother came as soon as she got the e-comm. If I’d stayed longer, I might not have been so eager to go back (the getting-puked-on came during my second incarceration). My mother droned on about how embarrassing it was for our family to have a rule-breaker, how my sister, Tyson, hadn’t died so I could be a vagrant, how I was exactly like my father. Blah, blah, blah.
I was proud of her last argument. I wanted to be like my dad. Maybe not living in the Badlands against my will. But at the time, I thought even that would be better than living in the Goodgrounds according to someone else’s will.
After the lecture-that-had-no-end, my mother smeared perma-plaster over my link, gunking me up from ear to ear. She dialed in special transmissions for me, ones about lying and stealing. It started because I told her I’d attend this totally lame Goodie party. And I went to a party, just not that one. Instead, I’d snuck down the street and into the Abandoned Area where I’d hidden an old ID card on another . . . questionable trip.
With the card tucked in my back pocket, I’d snuck to the Central community closest to the Southern Rim. Zenn arrived a few seconds behind me using his older brother’s ID.
We had a good time. A little too good. On the way back to the teleport pad, I only made it half a block before a red iris recognizer caught my bleary eye. At least all the good citizens were asleep and hadn’t been influenced by my bad choices. Yeah, those were my mother’s words.
Now, sitting in prison, I reminded myself that it wasn’t my fault Dad had been snatched. It wasn’t my fault Ty died. Disgusted that I’d let my mom get to me, I followed a Mech down the hall without trying anything funny.
We met a human guard at the entrance to the showers. “Lucky you,” he said. “The guys all shower together.”
I tried to get that picture out of my mind as I scrubbed my skin in lukewarm water—in a room that wasn’t completely closed off. I kept my eyes toward the doorway and my towel nearby. Maybe now that Jag had specifically pointed out that we didn’t have adequate facilities, I’d get a separate cell.
The water turned off as I finished rinsing. I toweled my hair, but I had nothing to make it stand up the way I liked. Jag seemed to get his spiked. Maybe he had something hidden back in his cell.
Maybe they’d put me in a cell close enough to borrow it.
Oh, they did. They put me back with Jag.
The guard threw in another blanket along with a pillow and fixed me with a glare. “Don’t try anything bad.” But he wore a knowing smirk on his face as he shuffled away. Why did I have to share a cell with Jag when the whole ward was empty? They wanted me to break more rules. Well, they weren’t gonna get that.
Something strange bubbled inside, smoked through my bloodstream. “I’m innocent!” I pressed my face against the bars. The guard turned around, something silver already in his hand.
I jerked my thumb toward Jag. “He distributed illegal tech. I took a walk in the damn park.” The foreign feeling seethed beneath my tongue, coated my mouth. Rage.
Jag lay on the bed, a notebook open, his dull pencil hovering in midair. With a curious hint of determination, his eyes warned, Be careful.
A blue spark caught my attention. A taser filled my view. Then the guard’s cruel grin. “You had a question?”
He wasn’t any bigger than me, but that was some serious electricity flowing next to some very metal bars. I swallowed. “Um, no.”
“No, what?” A very unfatherly twinkle resided in his dark, slanted eyes.
“No, um, sir.”
“That’s what I thought.” The guard sauntered away, deactivating his taser before stuffing it in his pocket.
The rage waited, coiled in my toes.
Jag went back to writing. The scratch of the pencil grated on my already raw nerves. “What are you? Like, a poet or something?”
He didn’t answer, but I didn’t feel like being ignored. “Where’d you even get that? You’re in the Goodgrounds. We use projection screens and electro-boards.”
“And you get controlling messages transmitted to your communicators,” he said, still scrawling away. “I think I’ll stick to my notebooks, thanks.”
If only we could all be so lucky. “Where’d you get all this stuff?”
He glanced up. I wore the same blue uniform he did. Mine didn’t have my name blinking on the sleeve. I guess they didn’t think I was worth it for only a week. At least I still had my own shoes, and I slipped them on so no one could take them without a swift kick.
“I’ve been here awhile.”
“So? That means you get to have notebooks and hair products?”
Jag watched me intently, and my heart did that annoying flop again. Something passed between us, a feeling so strong, certainly he noticed it too.
“Yeah,” he said, his eyes never leaving mine. Determined not to look away first, I waited for him to say more. He didn’t.
“Well, then can I borrow your gel?” I asked, spreading the blanket on the concrete.
“Sure.” He plucked the tube of green gel from beside him and tossed it to me.
It smelled like guy. Like spicy aftershave or musky something or other. Maybe pine needles. I cringed.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“This reeks.”
“What does it smell like?”
“Like a guy,” I said. “I don’t want to smell like a boy.”
“Fine.” He snatched the tube back.
Smelling like guy was better than flat hair, and I decided to apologize. Spiking, coloring, and cutting my hair were the only outward gestures that showed my blatant distaste for the rules. My hair was all I had, even if it wasn’t technically against the rules to have bluish-black hair. Yet.
“You know, I could show you how to make it cooler.” He studied the tube of gel like it was the most fascinating thing on earth.
“What? My hair?” I followed his long fingers as he tightened the lid. He caught me looking, and raised his eyebrows. I shrugged like I didn’t give a damn about the gel. Jag didn’t buy it.
He made me kneel on the bed and look in the scrap of a mirror hanging above it. Then he stood on the bed behind me. His breath tickled the back of my neck and his hands lingered just above my hair, his fingers almost touching my scalp.
A loud hiss echoed in my head. Don’t let him touch you! It sounded parental, demanding.
I deliberately didn’t move. Hardly breathed. That Thinker couldn’t make me follow his rules anymore. I waited.
Jag hesitated. I met his eye, and we breathed in together.
Then his fingers landed against my skin. I jumped. “That’s cold!”
He concentrated as he pulled the spikes into place, a tiny crease appearing in his forehead. After he finished, he kept his fingers in my hair, his eyes down.
“Are you done?” My hair looked better than ever.
He hopped off the bed, wiped his hands through his hair and then on his pants. “You clean up nice.”
“Prison clothes and a two-minute shower in freezing water. You must be joking.”
He shrugged. Something lurked behind that signature gesture, but he wasn’t sharing.
I pulled the covers down and stretched out in the bed. “I’m taking a nap. You can have the bed tonight.”
“Nice,” he said as he settled on my blanket and pillow, pulling the notebook over from where it had fallen on the floor.
I tried to get the feel of his hands in my hair and the image of his straight, white teeth out of my head while I fell asleep.
Yeah, that didn’t work.