Blackout (Darkness Trilogy) (16 page)

Not again.

The intruder flicks the nearest light switch on, and all lamps illuminate to yellow. A bright glow floods every inch of Elektra’s room, and I feel vulnerable. Exposed. I shield my eyes with one hand and stare through the gaps between my fingers—it’s Star. I squint, but it’s true. The intruder this time is Star.

She stands
in a boxy brown sweater and loose pajama pants on Elektra’s lavender carpet. My girl. She’s here. I run toward her instinctively, but she pushes my arms away. Her forehead wrinkles with confusion as she looks over my shoulder. Worried, I follow her gaze to see Elektra awake and sitting on the edge of the bed. The front of her robe dips suggestively below her breastbone. Her thick and shining hair gathers on one side as she tilts her head, and she eyes Star up and down without a scrap of mercy.

“Hello, Star,” Elektra says.

Star takes a step back from me, wrapping her arms around her own waist. She looks like she just got punched in the stomach. I can’t bear to see her like this. Her pain is my pain. I lunge toward Star and try to hold her, but she swats my hands away. She stares in horror at my bare chest, torn up by what it implies.

“
Please, Star,” I say. “She made me.”

“She made you
what
?”
Star asks.             

“Sweetie, calm down,” Elektra says.

“Don’t talk to her like that!” I say tightly. “Star, this isn’t what it looks like. Please trust me. I swear to you, nothing happened.”

I venture a
nother step toward her and hold my hands out as offerings. My fingers curl limply toward my palms. Star shakes her head no, she doesn’t want to touch me. She backs farther away, gripping her sides more firmly in distress. The whites of her eyes turn pink and fill with tears. She hunches over her knees, and my abs tighten with aching visceral pain. For all she knows, I could’ve had sex with this DZ girl.

Star lets out a whimper, and it hits me,
I’ve never seen her so openly hurt in my entire life. Even when she sobbed in my arms about Wick, she would hide her face and tell me she was okay. She’d ask me questions about myself as she cried. She’s always been careful with my feelings, but now she’s completely unguarded. Overwhelmed. She’s standing right in front of me and experiencing the full extent of her sadness. She’s not putting on any distractions, making any excuses, or hiding one second of her suffering. Like she’s never felt anything so big before and doesn’t know how to control it.

I glare at Elektra.

“Make this right,” I order her.

Elektra shrugs
, playing with her hair. She takes her time looking for split ends before letting the gleaming strands fall to her shoulders. “He’s telling the truth,” she says at last. “I made Phoenix stay with me. For security purposes only.”

“
Elektra thinks I can’t defend myself,” I go on. “She got worried something was going to happen to me after the intruders came—two DZs crept into my room and tried to kill me. Elektra can fight, so she made me sleep in her room. We’re a team.”

“You’re a team,” Star repeats in disbelief.

“The whole
suite
is the team,” I remind her quietly.

“Star, dear, use your brain,” Elektra says, lying back down and relaxing. “Did you see the update he
posted about you? Of course you did. That’s why you’re here. Now, would he have been able to write that if we were busy together? The update went up about an hour ago…so no. Think about it, precious Star. Don’t be a stupid girl.”

I grind my teeth. I hate the way Elektra said it, but she’s right.

“Star, you’re seeing the words ‘Nice smile’ and thinking I wrote them,” I say. “It’s an analogy, but you know what I mean. You’re jumping to conclusions just like I did. Please, you have to trust me. You know me.”

Star rocks her head back to keep a tear from falling. I
reach for her hands, and this time, she lets me take them. I tuck a strand of hair behind her perfect ear and cup the side of her face. She nestles her damp cheek into my palm, and I gaze at every inch of her beauty with all the love I have. Her small chin looks so fragile, pure white and quivering. I brush it with my thumb, savoring every sweet touch.

“Let’s go somewhere alone,” I whisper.

I wrap my arms around her and pull her gently into an embrace. She hugs me back, and I feel the trust returning as I lead her into the dim living room. We’re still holding each other when we sit on the sofa, and I don’t want to let her go. I never want to let her go. It’s just the pressure that’s driving us apart, I keep reassuring myself. That’s all it is. Underneath all of this surface conflict—these stupid misunderstandings—our love is still strong. No matter what happens, we will always come back home to each other.

After a few minutes, we relax our arms and sit in silence
. The red blotches in her cheeks fade slowly to pink, and her breathing deepens back to normal. I kiss her tenderly on the forehead once, twice, letting my lips linger each time.

“Starlight,” I coo.

She looks more like herself now. She is keeping her pain hidden as best as she can in order to stop me from feeling worse. Just like she used to do. I scoop up her legs so that they lie over my lap, and now we’ve created our own private space. Away from the prizes, away from my suitemates, and away from the terrible red stains in Tinder’s room. I should tell Star what happened to Blaze, but not yet. I don’t want to relive that horrific scene right now.

“Did you get a phone number?” she sniffles.

“Yes,” I whisper. “Did you?”

She nods,
leaning even closer, and her forehead brushes mine. Of course she got his number. My own night comes back to me now, and snippets of sleazy Bing in the Underground replay in my mind. I sneer, remembering his entourage of Easy girls. His surrogate better have been less reckless. Or at the very least, less drunk.

“
How did he treat you?” I ask. It comes out harsher than I expected.

“Please stop it,” she says.

“Stop
what
?”
I ask.

“That,” she says, recoiling. She pushes my chest away with her hands. Her legs fall off of my lap, and she places both of her feet firmly on the floor. In just a few seconds, we’ve become separate again. We sit next to each other, but our knees are parallel.
The Frontier might as well run between us.

I sigh. Fine. Breathe, Phoenix.

“Maybe we shouldn’t talk about the prizes,” she suggests.

“Good idea,” I say. “When we’re together, they don’t exist.”

“They disappear,” she agrees. “And not just Bing and Hazel. All of them.”

“Fine, of course,” I say.

“That means Flora, too,” she says.

“Will you stop it?” I ask. I hear the edge in my voice now. “I don’t feel
anything
for Flora. I haven’t thought about her since Prize Night. On my date, I only thought about you. Whenever we touched, I was thinking about you
.”

“You touched her?” she asks quietly.

“Star!” I say. “Star, please. We can’t talk about the Carnival.”

This is a nightmare. We never fought like this in Dark
DC. There was rarely a cross word between us. Now, I can feel her jealousy seething in the air. She’s gone quiet again to hide it, but it’s there. I sense it lingering, intense and raw. For no goddamn reason. I hang my head and lace my fingers over the back of my neck.

“Let’s stop this,” I beg.

“You’re right,” she says, shaking her head. “I’m sorry.”

“No matter what, it’s us,” I say. “It’s always been us, it will always be us.”

“Oh, Phoenix, I’m so sorry,” she says.

“
Shh, let’s not talk about it,” I say.

I scoop
up her legs again, and we fall back into our private space. She wraps her arms around my neck. Sitting uncomfortably on my phone, I pull it out from under me and rest it by my side. I glance at it quickly to make sure I’m not supposed to be anywhere else.

SCHEDULE

**
ALERT: 15 Minute Warning before Next Event**

12:00
a.m.–10:00 a.m. SLEEP.

Location: Your suite on floor 33
. Description: Rest and recover.

So we rest. We recover.

As the silence rolls on,
I realize how much I miss these quiet times with her. We’ve only been in America for two days, but our life in Dark DC feels like an eternity ago. She leans her head against my chest, and we look out the window. Gusts of snowflakes swirl through crisp air, but we are warm. It’s strange to be so close to harsh weather—to actually see it—but to be stronger than it. Untouchable. Powerful. Just a few hours ago, I would’ve gotten such a rush from the feeling, but tonight I was reminded of what really matters.

“Do
you want my number?” Star asks, nodding at my phone with a small smile.

I break into a
grin. “Did I do a good job on our date?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “No,” she
says with a laugh. “But I love you.”

“I love you too, Star,” I say.

We enter each other’s numbers, and too soon, she turns to leave. Her sweater is soft against my hand as she pulls her arm away. I follow her to the foyer and lean against one of the curved white walls, savoring these last few seconds before she will disappear. I watch her walk to the front door where she pauses on the threshold and turns back for one more goodbye. Her round cheeks are even more beautiful when she smiles.

“See you tomorrow,” she whispers.

“Sooner,” I say. “See you in my dreams.”

I
stride toward Elektra’s room feeling full of light. I run my fingertips along the golden wallpaper and let myself smile. The gray sky tells me it’s almost morning, and my phone says it’s about five. I still have five hours to sleep. Five hours to see Star the way I told her I would. I smile wider. I’ll imagine her happy and safe.

Right before I enter Elektra’s room, I pause.
A yellow glow beams from beneath her door, and I realize Elektra’s lights are still on. Puzzled, I turn the doorknob warily and find Elektra seated straight up on her bed. Her arms cross like two rigid sticks, and her dark eyes are fixed on me. She looks like she’s been waiting. I gulp when I understand, she’s been waiting—for God knows how long—for me.

In nothing flat
, she is standing just a breath away from my face and staring at me with the sharpest look I have ever seen. She grabs both of my wrists, and I cry out loud from the pain. The next thing I know, she drags me across the hall and flings me into Tinder’s old bedroom, slamming the door behind me. I am left alone in the middle of the room cloaked in eerie silence. Haunting memories of the murders dance through my mind.

“Elektra, what’s going on?” I
demand.

“Baby,” she
whispers from the hallway, “get some sleep.”

A chair screeches across the floor outside, and I hear it wedge
under the doorknob. My jaw drops in horror as I realize I’m being punished. For not telling her about Star, for writing that update about her, or for just spending an hour with her in the living room, I’m not sure. But I am damned sure that she’s going to make me stay here until the next event.

“I’m sorry, Elektra
!” I shout. “Just open the door.”

Silence.
             

SCHEDULE

**
ALERT: 15 Minute Warning before Next Event**

10:00
a.m.–12:00 p.m. PERSONALITY REPORT.

Location: Your suite on floor 33
. Description: Tests assessing your fit with Hazel will be sent to your phone. Complete them in the allotted time, and your customized Personality Report will be posted to your profile.

The door to Tinder’s old room opens at exactly 10. I look up from my phone and watch it drift slowly ajar from where I lie sideways on his bed. I’ve barely slept, but I bolt into the hallway with the energy of a well-rested man. Anything to get out of there.

Finally outside, I sigh. I stretch.

After a few moments, I make my way into the kitchen. Last night’s heavy emotions still weigh me down, and the tile floor feels cold against my feet. Elektra and Tinder are both eating exotic fruits. They stand over the kitchen island, a square of counter in the center, and stare at their phones, probably reading the same alert I just saw. A pile of magazines sits next to the fruit bowl between them. I open the refrigerator and let the cool air sting me.

“So is Star your girlfriend?” Tinder asks.

I slam the refrigerator. “Come on, Tinder,” I say. “I just woke up.”

“I heard you two in the living room last night,” h
e says, his tone hurt. “You said your update wasn’t true. You said you didn’t love her. You lied to me.”

“I know, I know,” I say. Tinder look
s at me as if I’ve betrayed him, and the only thing I can think to do is tell the truth. “I didn’t want anyone to know about us. I thought we would end up like Laser and Sunshine. Can you understand that?”

“No,” he
insists childishly. “You should have trusted me. We’re in this together
.
”

“I’m sorry, Tinder,” I
say.

“
How sweet,” Elektra says carelessly.

I ignore her. “Tinder, can you forgive me?” I ask.

“Give him time,” Elektra snaps. “Now, read this.”

She
throws a magazine at my chest, and I fumble to pin it against my body. Tinder looks down into his ocean-blue cereal bowl and sulkily spoons milk into his mouth. I grimace, but I know Elektra is right. Tinder just needs a few hours. Then he’ll come back around. Watching him sip slowly, looking so wounded, I don’t see one hint that he will use this information about my relationship against me. I could’ve trusted him all along.

“Read it, baby,” Elektra urges.

I resist the urge to glare at her. I’m still not Elektra’s biggest fan, but at least I can consider us even. I hid my most precious secret from her, and she locked me in a hellish room. So I swallow my resentment and take the magazine.

“What is this?” I ask.

“It’s today’s edition of
Spotlight
.”

I
grab a red apple from the bowl and bite it hard. The skin breaks easily under my teeth, and my mouth fills with its sweet juices. I chew another bite and savor the delicious tang, crunching a couple of seeds. With my free hand, I skim the glossy pages. There’s a
DZ Style
spread of pictures, but I ignore it. The next article seems more important. It speculates about which players got phone numbers.

…
CUTE has a new name, and it’s ELEKTRA! This crowd-favorite got WESLEY’s digits just TWO HOT SECONDS after meeting his surrogate at Carnegie Hall…

Of course. I
stop chewing and flip the page.

…
and a phone number for STAR! Spotlight caught her LIP-LOCKED with a very horny surrogate outside Madison Square Garden…They started going at it before they even went inside…Is she SEXY OR SLUTTY? COMMENT on our website…

I
gasp in a chunk of apple. Its edges feel razor sharp as they tear down my windpipe, and for a second, I can’t breathe. Tossing the core aside, I try to cough up the fruit. It shoots out onto the magazine, right smack atop the blurb about Star.

I
wipe my mouth with my forearm, still staring at the words.
LIP-LOCKED.
Star should have told me about that. Last night, when we were together, she should have at least mentioned it. She’s kissed Blaze and surrogate Bing, and she still hasn’t really kissed me. And I had to find out with the rest of the world.

I feel my face
heat up and turn red.
LIP-LOCKED.
Goddamn
LIP-LOCKED.
The awful words surround a thumbnail picture of Star smirking. She’s in a tight orange dress with the sides cut out, like she was in some kind of car wreck. I block the picture with my hand, but I can’t get it out of my mind. She must have been thinking about me when he touched her, though. She
must
have. I shut the magazine and toss it toward the fruit bowl. The slick apple taste coating my mouth has turned sour. I smack my tongue in disgust.

Our phones buzz twice, thank God
.
I’m grateful for the distraction. A sixth tab has been added to my phone. It reads:
Personality Report
. I thumb it and join Elektra and Tinder around the island counter to begin. The instructions tell me that statements will appear one at a time across the top of my phone. If the statement is true, I should wave my phone to the right. If it is false, I should wave my phone to the left.

Simple.

PEOPLE TEND TO DESCRIBE ME AS KIND. Wave left. False.

FAMILY IS VERY IMPORTANT TO ME. Left. False.

I AM ALWAYS ON TIME. What an Easy question. Left. False.

I HATE WORKING UNDER PRESSURE. Left. False.

I TRUST REASON OVER MY FEELINGS. Left. False.

Elektra waves her phone back and forth much faster than I do. Right. Right
. Left. Tinder seems to be considering every single question carefully, as if each one is a puzzle. He holds his phone motionless in his palm and reads with a creased forehead.

I continue.

I LIKE TO PLAN IN ADVANCE. Left. False.

THINGS ARE BETTER WHEN DONE SLOWLY. Left. False.

I FIND IT DIFFICULT TO RAISE MY VOICE. Left. False.

I lean more of my weight onto my elbows, where the counter feels hard and cold. Answering the questions has become automatic
, fast. My mind drifts back to Star. I need to know more about that kiss. She can’t just “go at it” with a surrogate and not tell me. I would never do that to her. Not in a million Carnivals. She must be protecting my feelings, but the hiding is making me feel worse. A hell of a lot worse.

She’s
going to have to describe it. That’s the only solution. If I don’t hear every last detail, I’m going to torture myself wondering how it went. Imagining where he might have touched her. If she liked it. I tilt the face of my phone away from Elektra and Tinder and swipe out of the personality report for a second. I keep waving my phone left so that they won’t notice I’ve stopped. Slowly, I type her a quick note.

Phoenix: Meet up?

I resume the report as soon as I can.

I SEEK OUT NEW EXPERIENCES. Right. True.

I LIKE BEING THE CENTER OF ATTENTION. Right. True.

My phone buzzes twice.
I freeze in a small panic as Elektra and Tinder spin their heads toward me. Elektra grabs my phone out of my hands before I even realize what she’s doing. I know the new message is from Star. Elektra hands the phone to Tinder so that he can see it too. His eyebrows angle up toward each other in an expression of plain and simple pain. He doesn’t look any closer to forgiving me.

“Phoenix,
dear,” Elektra says, “listen to me closely.”

“I’m sorry,
okay?”

“We are a
team,”
she says. “When you jeopardize yourself, you jeopardize all
of us
.
We said we were going to help each other, and now you are
dangerously
on the verge of breaking your word.
Tell me that you understand.”

“I understand,” I growl.

“So if you contact her one more time,” she says clinically, “I just may snip the thread of your relationship. Tell me again that you understand.”

“Fine,” I
retort. “Now give me back my phone.”

Her thumb dances over the surface of my phone before tossing it toward me. I
check it quickly, only to find that Elektra has deleted Star’s reply and
her number. I bite my tongue to hold myself back. Sure, I’ll get Star’s number the next time she messages me, but I don’t like being under Elektra’s control. She’s screwing around with my emotions. And with
Star
. I look to Tinder to take my side, or at least to show some sympathy, but he shakes his head. Goddammit, I should have known trust and loyalty would be so important to him. He’s the one obsessed with honesty. Perfect for Flora, and useless right now.

Elektra resum
es waving her phone. I shake mine more aggressively. Left. Right
.
Left
.
We pass the rest of the questions in silence, but my mind is howling. I’m going to have to listen to Elektra after all. Goddammit, I’m going to have to be even more careful with Star. Elektra’s guided me through the whole Carnival. I still need her to win.

Left. Right. Left.

The three of us end up sitting in various positions around the kitchen. I sit on the edge of the sink with my bare feet resting on the damp bottom. My head droops. I’m barely reading the questions anymore when the phrase
Personality Report Complete
flashes across the screen. Suddenly, my phone buzzes once, and I swipe to the newest alert.

SCHEDULE

**
ALERT: 15 Minute Warning before Next Event**

12:00
p.m.–02:00 p.m. PARENT PERMISSIONS.

Location: Your suite on floor 33
. Description: The prizes’ fathers will issue their permissions to players by phone. Each father will call his favorite player first. Without any permission, the player will be disqualified.

What?

No one
told us anything about needing parents’ permission. The Easies didn’t say a word about that. Not one goddamn word.

My heart is racing.
I clench my phone so hard it cuts a red line across my fingers. The Easies are always keeping us in the dark. Telling us nothing and then everything at the last minute. Only now do they let me know I’m about to sink or swim. I can’t miss this call. As my nervousness sets in, I curl my toes in a reflex toward the bottoms of my feet. My toenails scratch the silver inside of the sink and make an uncomfortably high-pitched noise. Tinder flinches at the sound, inadvertently tossing his phone into the air. Oh no. I watch in horror as he fumbles to catch it. We both sigh with relief when he holds it again.

“Careful,” I say.

“Careful yourself,” he retorts, his voice shaking. His tone tells me he hasn’t forgiven me yet, and he’s far more scared than I am. He holds his precious phone to his heart and starts to chew anxiously on the knit gray crew neck of his sweater. He’s still in his boxers from last night, and below them, his knees are trembling.

Elektra
drops to the floor from her perch on the counter and stretches. Her pink cardigan rises up with her arms as she reaches for the ceiling, revealing two dimples in her lower back. She looks at Tinder and me over her shoulder and smiles effortlessly. There’s not a worried wrinkle in her whole face.

“I’ll take my call in the living room,” she says.

Tinder dodges after her. I climb down from my seat and wander after them. I’m not used to sitting this much. Walking helps ease the tension. I roll my neck around as I enter the living room and it cracks nervously.

Tinder and I start to pace. He and I walk at odds back and forth between the
couch and the window. Elektra sits in front of the sofa with her legs crossed, leaning back onto her elbows. Her chin reclines to point at the ceiling in a pose of perfect relaxation. It’s 11:59 a.m. Tinder’s hands shake as he paces. I keep glancing at him, but he won’t make eye contact with me. He steps one foot after the other in an anxious weave and accidentally walks into the window. Offering to help would make it worse. He rubs the red spot on his forehead.

12:00 p.m
.

12:01 p.m
.

12:02 p.m
.

I take a seat next to Elektra. Tinder stands with his back to us now, glaring at his phone. Something buzzes, and everyone jumps. Elektra holds her phone up to ear, and I’m
let down but not surprised. Of goddamn course.

“Hello?” she asks. “Nice to meet you Mr.
Parker. Yes, this is Elektra.”