All Good Children (28 page)

“We have to get out of here before she rats me out,” I tell Mom. She's in the bathroom, brushing her teeth. I stir a packet of noodles into a cup of water in the kitchen. “We can't wait for the passport of some kid who might not show till New Year's Day.”

Mom sticks her head around the corner. Her eyes are bright, her lips foamy. “Would you leave without Dallas?” she asks excitedly.

“That's not what I meant.”

She wipes her face and walks over, rests a hand on my arm. “They're not going to let him go, Max, and taking him without permission is kidnapping.”

I rip my arm away. “Man, you're such a liar! You're going back on this now?”

“No. I'm just worried. Our races won't play out well at the border.”

She's right. No one would blink an eye at a white family taking a black kid out of the country. But there's no way the border guards will let someone as black as Mom smuggle a white ultimate away forever. “Did you tell Rebecca we're bringing him?” I ask.

“Yes. And if we stay with her, under her last name, Arlington might not find us for a while.”

“You think he'll try to find us in Canada?”

“We're kidnapping his child, Max.”

There's a knock at the door. We both jump. I figure the room is under surveillance and the word
kidnapping
alerted the cops.

“It's eight o'clock at night,” Mom mutters as she goes to the door. I crouch behind her, tiptoeing in my own home.

In the hallway, Dallas waits with a backpack on one shoulder and his RIG in hand. “I'm informing the community about the benefits of our New Education Support Treatment,” he says. He chews a bit, and I pull him inside.

Mom pats his arm. “Oh my god, you're good at that. We were just talking about you.”

“I know. I had my ear pressed to the door.”

“What if the camera saw you do that?” I snap.

He shrugs. “The zombies do it all the time. It's part of their training.”

“Could you really hear us?” Mom asks.

“Just the odd word. I'm sorry about Ally.”

“We should have left sooner,” Mom says. “At least you two are still okay.”

Dallas waits for her to shut her bedroom door before he heads toward the living-room couch. “I just came to give you this,” he tells me. He unzips his pack and lifts out a blue-flowered pillowcase so full and heavy that the seams stretch tight. He sets it on my lap.

I peek inside—pearls, gold chains, earrings, coins, bundles of paper money. “Jesus, Dallas, is this real?”

He nods. “Austin's been stealing from our parents and their friends since he was little.”

I jiggle the contents. “What's it for?”

“For the car, of course.”

“I told you. We're trading the apartment for the car.”

“Then it's for gas and food and somewhere to stay when you get there.”

“When
we
get there.”

He shrugs.

“Don't start that again,” I say. “You can see your parents when you're an adult.”

“It's not that. They don't even like me.” He brushes his bangs from his eyes and tries to smile. “I just don't think I can go. What if it's all a spill-zone up there? Or what if there's no work and we end up living in the car? Can we even go to school there? What if they ship us back? Or what if we get killed in Freaktown?”

“It's a lot closer than Mexico. And safer.” I try to lighten his mood by asking, “Who would you rather be killed by? A bunch of freaks or a bunch of Mexican drug lords?”

He scratches his head. “I've never been good at decisions.”

“We'll be fine, Dallas. The timing is perfect. School's out on Friday. Mom has the weekend off. You can tell your parents you're Christmas shopping. No one will look for us all day. We'll be over the border before they know we're gone.”

He nods, but his heart's not in it.

“Mom can probably get you that passport with the name Connors.”

He snickers. “I'm a bit pale for your family.”

“Then we'll hide you in the trunk,” I snap.

“And what if they look?” he snaps back. “You've got this one chance, Max. You can't do anything illegal or they won't let you out.”

“It's not illegal to leave.”

“I heard that word.”

“What word?”

“Kidnapping.” He stands and brushes off his pants. “It won't be easy getting me out of here. Even you guys alone might have problems. Your Mom's a lot darker than you. They might think she's taking her kids away from her husband.”

“We have his death certificate and all our documents.”

“You can't take the chance of getting caught for kidnapping.”

“We are not leaving you.”

“I'll have another chance, Max. My family has money. I'm almost sixteen. By summer I could have my own car. I can drive myself across the border.”

“Summer? Dallas, we've been doing this for eight weeks and we're barely hanging on. How are you ever going to make it through another six months?”

“I can do it. I'm good at it.”

“You're falling apart! You'll have nothing left when I'm gone.”

He shoulders his pack. “I can do it, Max. I still have my thoughts. I just can't say them out loud. I still have my feelings. I just can't show them. I still have all the things that used to matter. They're inside me. They can't take that away.”

I smack his arm. “Yes, they can! They can take anything away! They just took everything from Ally. They took it from Pepper and Xavier. And they sure took it from Tyler Wilkins, didn't they? If they get their hands on you, Dallas, you will line up and ask them to take those things away.”

“Shh!” Mom peeks into the living room, half asleep. “Keep your voices down. Is everything all right?”

“Fine, Mrs. Connors. I'm just leaving.” Dallas waits till she's gone, then whispers, “I'll be caught at the border. And I don't want to be caught, Max. I don't want to take that chance. I cannot take the stress of hoping for something that's not going to happen. I'd rather stay here and be hopeless. Then I might be able to hang on.”

“To what?”

He doesn't answer. He just leaves.

Mom stomps back in, ready to give us hell for keeping her awake. She softens when she sees my face. “What's wrong?”

“Dallas is scared to come. He thinks he'll get caught.”

She nods. “It's risky.”

She holds up her hand to stop me from interrupting, but I interrupt anyway. “Maybe we should all stay,” I say. “What if things are worse in Canada? Isn't that a theme through history—people go off in search of a better land but they end up in some nightmare and wish they'd never left in the first place?”

“There's also the theme of people going off in search of a better land and finding a better land.”

“But if we're the only ones—”

“You're not.” She takes my face in her hands. “There is a whole world out there full of normal children, Max. We think because we're trapped here that this is our only choice, but it's not. We'll be okay. Like you said, I'm a nurse. I can find work. We can go anywhere.” She kisses my forehead. “We can't stay here for Dallas.”

“You're leaving him?”

“No.” She nods as she repeats the word. “No.”

“I won't leave him, Mom. The teachers and his father? I won't leave him to that. We're taking Dallas or we're not going.”

Montgomery limps into history class wearing a crisp white shirt under his gray uniform. His right arm hangs limp at his side, no rings or dangling bracelets. He holds his neck stiffly, head cocked to the right, the muscles of his face pulled tight, partially paralyzed. I've seen a few kids like that since the shots. I think it's temporary.

Mr. Reese looks up and follows Montgomery with sad dark eyes. Mr. Reese is a mess of sighs and pauses and coffee stains these days. The classroom tiles are spattered with French roast from the door to his desk. He arrives early every morning and projects his instructions so he doesn't have to hear his voice shake while he speaks. He used to be my favorite teacher and I guess he still is, but that's not saying much. Every time I look up, he's on the verge of tears, his eyes fixed on one of us, swimming in memories of better days. There's no outrage in his gaze. No petition, no protest, no hand up for clarification. Just a dull resignation. Like my mother must have shown when she first started drugging her patients. Sad but self-interested, waiting on a bright side.

I can't think of a single adult that I admire.

“Please begin item one,” Mr. Reese says quietly. “Keep your voices low, please.” He does a lot of unnecessary begging.

We're supposed to pair up and ask review questions. I turn to Dallas, who sits in the row beside me. He looks away from me and taps Brennan's shoulder. “I need a partner,” he says.

Brennan glances at me for a moment before he nods, rises, straddles the back of his seat. He and Dallas stare into their RIGs and murmur answers to each other. They look like they were born best friends—obvious ultimates, worlds away from me, rich and tall and smart.

Next thing I know, Mr. Reese is beside me, his bitter breath falling on my face. “Max, you seem to be the odd man out.”

I almost laugh. “That is true, sir. That has always been true.”

Mr. Reese frowns on me. “I'll do the review with you if you like. Come up to my desk.”

I hate the murmur of voices in the room. I tug on my ears and fold the cartilage against my skull so all I can hear is a dull drowning rush. My face tingles and burns. It launches into spasms I can't control. My eyes blink and tear. My nose itches. My tongue travels inside my mouth, pushing over my teeth, under my lips, against my cheeks, poking around like something trapped and desperate.

“Are you all right?” Mr. Reese asks.

It feels like bugs are living in my eyebrows. My skin crawls with them, and I have a sudden compulsion to peel it off. I rub my face, and the itch spreads up through my hair and down the back of my neck, across my shoulders, along my forearms, between my fingers. I can't stop clawing at myself.

Mr. Reese grabs my wrists with his pale sweaty hands. “Stop, Max, stop!”

I can't stand the smell of him. I yank myself out of his grip and jump to my feet. “Don't touch me!”

He reaches out like he wants to hug me.

I shove him away, and he slams into the wall. “Don't touch me!” I shriek.

I stumble between the crowded desks, out of the classroom, down the empty hallway. The only sounds are my heels hitting tile and my breath coming sharp. I pass lockers, cameras, corridors lined with photos of previous graduating classes. I walk by the receptionist and the guard and out through the doors of the school. My skin chills and trembles in the cold air, but I'm hot and throbbing inside. I need to run.

I tear away from the school into a maze of gray suburban streets. I run them hard, trying to focus on my breath and the soothing swing of my arms and legs. When I reach the Spartan my legs tremble, my gut rolls, my cheeks tingle. I double over and vomit on the dead grass beside the entrance. Milky puke burns through me and splatters onto my shoes. I retch again and again until my gut aches and my eyes stream and screaming gobs of phlegm are all that come out of me.

I hork and spit. I can't stand the smell of myself. I'm sour and rotten and shaking with cold. I straighten my spine and look around. I'm alone, brown and gray in a brown and gray landscape.

I break three branches off a cedar shrub and lay them over my vomit in a damaged attempt to cover the sight and smell of it. I wipe my hands on the soft creases of my pants and walk into the Spartan, up the stairs, down the stale hallway to my door.

I shower for twenty minutes and brush my teeth twice, then lie down in bed, naked under the covers. It feels too exposed, so I get up and dress. It's so quiet. I might be the only person in the whole building.

I empty the pockets of my uniform and stuff it in a laundry bag. I check my RIG.

Already there's a message from the principal about my outburst, a copy of an official letter to my mother. It informs her that I'm suspended for two days and that “any more unexceptable behavior will lead to expulsion.” Seriously, that's how he spells it. A kid could choke to death on irony.