by K. L. Kettle
*
Bzzzz
“The nose is OK,” says the doctor. “But those ears. A few stitches maybe.” Cold, gloved fingers tilt my head to the side. Aye-Aye isn’t there any more, his bed freshly made. When was that – yesterday? Did I dream it?
“A stronger chin maybe? She likes that. It would heal fast enough.”
“Do we have a peel for the acne scars?”
There’s sensation somewhere, down in my elbows, my knees, I could fight my way out before they stick a pin in my head.
“Definitely need to fix the teeth, bit stained,” says one of them as I wrestle my way out of bed. I try to get up but my legs are funny and I smash into the cold tiles.
“Needs a trim – that mop won’t work. Blond?” says another, fighting me back on to the bed. “Like the other one?”
“No, she wants to keep this one dark.”
*
Bzzzzzzzz
I’m dreaming of the dorms. But they’re in these dark, sticky spiders’ webs so old and clogged with dust that they’ve turned into wheels of tarred black spokes. I want to scratch for web strands in my hair but when I try to move nothing happens.
“So we were talking about Romali,” the woman says, spidery black too, all elbows and eyes.
“Aspiner,” I slur. What if Romali hasn’t gone for the Chancellor yet? What if Walker’s safe and has found you? How long have I been here?
“Now, now, no one in the whole of High House will believe any of the Aspiner family would work with the Hysterics. I heard you promised a name.”
“Aspiner,” I repeat. My face feels different, like it’s made of a stranger’s skin.
“You think you’re being strong? Do you want to find out what happens if you don’t give her what she wants?”
The beds are empty now. They were all here, the Roids, but now they’re gone. Not dead. Gone.
Death is a mercy, the Chancellor said. She pinheaded them. Their minds ‘absolved’ like the Surrogates under her mother’s care. Why wouldn’t she kill them like the rest? Or send them to the mines?
“Walker?” I ask.
“Where’s my daughter? I know she visited you.”
“Madam Vor?” I try to focus on her, but she moves away. This is the woman who leads the Lice. Every boy that’s lost their life, every woman their mind, it’s been down to her house. She has dark hair, shorter than mine, a stiff dark suit. Every edge of her could cut paper.
“Maybe tomorrow then?”
“No, wait, don’t go, please.”
*
It has to be a dream, right?
The hands round my neck. Your hands.
Is it a nightmare? Drugs? Memories of the night of the blackout, the sheets creaking, fingers holding fast round my neck.
“No,” I croak. “I don’t want to die, not today, not any more.”
Or it’s a memory? Not your hands at all but the feeling of falling. The remembered ache in my throat scratching against my neck bones, that’s all.
Or it’s madness, thinking I can hear you swearing at me, calling me an imposter, telling me you deserve to succeed. You came from nothing. I don’t know what you had to do, sacrifice, to survive. I had everything, you say! You press down with all your strength. But it’s insanity, that’s all.
Or it must be your ghost.
No, you’re alive and I’m going to find you. And I’m going to save you, I say. It’s my fault, I say, my fault. The ghost hesitates, but only for a second.
Consciousness comes and goes, from black to swirling faces in grey. I can’t shake the vision of the Roids’ faces, hollow like the women’s masks. A crowd of them. All my brothers. Expressionless, with empty eyes, gaping mouths. And you, bright and burning with your brown eyes wide, and your teeth gritted and tears down your cheeks. Maybe you can still help, you say. Help who?
It’s the drugs.
Because it can’t be you, because you had scars and this boy has none. Besides, if you were here and you were alive and you did try to kill me, we both know you’d never give in. Not until I was dead. That’s the kind of boy you were. Walker thinks I’m a fighter, but I never was, not like you.
Bzzzz
Coward.
Bzzzz
*
“The ball,” I tell Madam Vor when she comes again, before she even asks. There’s not a part of me that isn’t wrapped up, tweaked, bettered. Only one last procedure to make me perfect, the doctors say, the one that the Roids didn’t come back from. I thought I could hold on, but you’re gone – like the Roids – and I can’t, can’t justify fighting. Maybe I’m protecting a ghost, falling for the Chancellor’s game, and Romali doesn’t need a stupid boy trying to help. “Ro – she was angry, about the Gardener,” I say. Can’t fight any more. “She’s going to kill the Chancellor.”
Madam Vor’s hand grips my wrist.
“Enough,” she says. “Enough, Jude.” She sits. Black grit and grime cling underneath the chipped edges of her blunt nails. “I burned my sister-in-law’s body today.” A shot rings in my ears, but it’s not really there. My jaw hurts as I bite down; it clicks when I push my bleach-burned teeth together. “We’ll find a time to honour her sacrifice. Until then let’s talk about nice things.” Madam Vor leans close, grips my wrist tighter, her voice falling to the kind of quiet that makes your hairs stand on end.
“The ball, for example. It’s our Chancellor’s favourite night of the year. We wouldn’t want to ruin that, would we? We’re going to do everything we can to make it a success, aren’t we? Now you’re going to ask how you can help,” Vor says. I don’t answer. “You can’t. All you can do is say goodbye to your friends.”
Air floods out of my body as Vor moves away and the doctors move in. I didn’t even notice I was holding my breath.
“I don’t know, he looks weird,” says Stink, poking me.
They find me in the stairwell.
Father Jai was sent up to collect me. He helped me put on my suit and as the drugs wore off he helped me walk. There was kindness, I think. That was a few hours ago, before he sat me in the stairwell, told me to wait. It’s like someone has scraped inside my head with a spoon. Nightmares drift in and out of my mind as I wait, numb. I gave Ro up. I’m a killer; right in that moment I killed her. It should feel good. If you’re alive, I saved you, didn’t I? Except you’re quiet now. That voice, silent. You’ve never felt further away.
“He’s been staring into space since we got here,” says Rodders.
“I’m fine,” I say. My voice sounds different, deeper somehow. When I touch my throat, it feels like it belongs to someone else.
She’ll let you go now she has what she wants, what I promised, right?
“You’ve been gone five days, Superstar,” Rodders says. He’s not wearing his specs. The only time he normally takes them off is in appointments and on event days. He says everything onstage is easier if it’s blurry. Rod comes close enough for me to smell the fresh perfume of the deo, the bitter tang of aftershave. “You actually look pretty good.”
“You’re blind, Rod,” Stink sighs.
“Five days?” I ask.
They’re too close and I feel like I’m going to scream so I move to get away. The chatter of my brothers getting ready echoes up from below. “The ball?” I tug at the dark cotton of my jacket. The suit Walker had made for me. Black, smart, striped. The lining inside red, his favourite shade. The silk tie at my throat feels like a noose.
“You’re home just in time.” Stink smacks my shoulder. “Justin, get it?” he laughs, because that’s his name. There’s a badly covered-up scar on the bridge of his nose where the Roids lamped him. “Though maybe you shouldn’t dance too much? Looks like you’re going to chuck.”
“I’m fine,” I manage to say.
“You’ve got a mirror, right, Rod?” Stink asks.
Before I know it there’s a glass in front of my face. The man looking out from the mirror is hardly Jude Grant. I don’t know who this man is. He hasn�
�t got a single mark, not one bruise, or spot, or scar. His eyes seem bigger, brighter than mine, bluer than before, his eyelashes darker. No spots, no stray hairs between his eyebrows or in his nose.
This isn’t me.
“You sure you’re fine?” Stink asks. “Are you sure you didn’t get your head rattled by the Muscles?”
The inside of my mouth is burning; my teeth are too white. My hair’s shorter, darker, neater, perfect. Perfect body, perfect smile.
“Promise,” says the man in the mirror. My eyes prickle as I remember how they dragged Aye-Aye away. There’s the ghost of you as I tug my tie loose, push the mirror away. I don’t want to look at what they’ve made out of me.
“Jai said he had to get you from the infirmary.” Rod seems impressed. “Look, sorry we didn’t, you know, when the Roids came. But seriously they’ve done you a favour. You look kinda hot. On trend and everything.”
Stink smacks Rodders round the top of his head. “Stop flirting!”
“What? The Toppers won’t keep their hands to themselves later. Though we need to sort that hair out, the side parting is way too last century. Hang on.” He starts searching his pockets. “I got some decent gel as a tip in an appointment last week. Just the thing.”
I’m always surprised at how he manages to carry so much in his home-made pockets without ruining the lines of his suit. Wasn’t Rod taller than me when I last saw him? I can’t have grown three inches since Swims, can I?
Stink pokes at my neck again like I’m made of jelly. I snatch his hand hard, an instinct. Stink yelps and rubs at his wrist, “Saints, someone’s jumpy!”
“Yeah,” my new voice creaks, “you would be too.”
“Honestly, though, you’re actually glowing. What the fog did the Roids do to you? They’ve turned you into one of them!”
I shake my head and lie. “I don’t know.”
Medicine, serums, cold presses, injections. That’s how Walker stayed so young all these years; she sent him to the infirmary every time he looked tired. I can’t count the times he came to my appointments with bandages, or new hair, fewer lines. But when Walker tried to stop them taking me it didn’t matter how good he looked. Aspiner drove his perfect head into the ground. Her large palm pressing down on his cheek, the other on his shoulder. Then she flipped a switch and ploughed so much juice into him that I can still smell the cotton of his suit sizzling.
Whatever the doctors did, there’s still damage underneath my buffed-up skin. My muscles ache, my throat too. There are parts that hurt that didn’t hurt before: my knuckles, the tops of my feet. And there’s that dream of you again. She’ll never love you, you said. Of course not, there’s no such thing. Isn’t that what they teach us? Even the imaginary you warned me away from Ro. As if Ro ever would – I mean I’m not even sure she likes me, not after she learned about her aunt.
I told Vor that Ro would be at the ball. I’ll have to warn her, then we’ll find you together and we’ll leave together. It’ll be all right. It’ll be all right.
“Jude, are you sure you’re OK?” Stink keeps asking as we make our way with the rest of the dorms up to the front of house.
“Nervous,” I say, my mouth dry. My teeth tingle, too big for my face, too straight. I paw at my palm, searching for the scar from when Walker auditioned me. Never thought I’d be so pleased to see that broken part of me.
“I don’t need twenty-twenty vision to know you’re acting like you left your brain in your bunk,” Rodders says, blinking a lot without his glasses on. “Look sharp, Superstar, will you? The debs will eat you alive if you don’t snap your wits on.” He leans in. “Or I will.” He winks.
Stink hits him again.
“What?”
“Rod, you’re so shallow,” Stink sighs. “I’m surprised you don’t trip over your own forehead when you walk.”
“Hold!” Father Van calls down.
We’re to wait in the upper stairwell. We’re to come out at the first-floor balcony to the atrium, be announced and walk down the grand staircase, round the fountain. Then it starts.
“You’re nervous. At least you can bloody dance. I get all elbows,” Stink sighs. “Never know where they might put their hands!”
“I can’t dance,” I say.
“Oh, come on! I was at Swims. Besides, you think we don’t know about those lessons Walker’s been giving you all year! We’re not stupid.” And I think of Walker and I have this twisting feeling in my guts that I might never see him again.
“He didn’t make me a better dancer,” I say.
“Yeah, I bet. He’s always got his favourites. It was that kid Vik last year,” says Rod.
Everyone goes quiet at Vik’s name.
Stink laughs to break the weirdness. “I get a lump just thinking about one of them touching me. I’ll be throwing ice down my pants all night.”
Some boy near us laughs so much he sneezes on the boy in front.
“Toss them Superstar’s way,” shouts another from above. “He’ll distract them for the night. Hey, it’s not like they’ve a chance bidding on him with the Chancellor’s reserve. He’s not going to steal away your guardians.”
“True, and with Vinnie and that lot out of the way,” Stink adds.
“Don’t,” I snap, feeling that twist in my guts again when I think of them. “They’re gone.”
“Gone?” Stink repeats. “Like to the mines?”
I want to tell them what happened. But I can’t even find the words.
“Just gone,” I say.
Beneath the finished mural of the Chancellor, looking down on us and smiling, the ball is steaming food, hot hooch and warm skin pushing past. Satins and silks brush my arm. Too real. Too fast. I don’t know where to look.
Saints, I wish you were here to see this! Never thought I’d be here, not in a million dreams. Am I allowed to be here because I gave up Ro?
Above, the vast internal spire of the atrium drips with lights that crawl down the swirling pillars. Women and girls look down and point from the endless balconies. Against the golden pillars, wax mountains of candles weep.
They call it the Unmasked Ball, but the women still wear half-masks over their eyes, their noses. My brothers wonder and point and whisper about their strange mouths under those large eyes. Pink, red, blue, black, golden, silver lips. Fat lips, thin lips. Old, chattering, laughing lips. Skin of every shade, hair of every colour, perfect teeth and soft pink chattering tongues.
Dressed in an explosion of gold fabric, Madam Glassey catches my arm at the top of the stairs and announces me. There’s applause but it’s mute. I keep thinking of how you scrambled in a run across this floor, how you fell, how you called my name. But when I picture it now it’s not you falling but Aye-Aye. Then it’s the others: the Roids, Walker. Gone. Just gone.
I survived. I’m alive and they’re gone.
Because of you.
For all I know, you might have been pinheaded like the Roids: alive but gone too, like Walker told me. If I can’t help you, then please, tonight, let me save Ro.
My brothers disappear into the crowd of dresses, girls cooing over them, asking for their dance cards. Stink winks, encouraging me down into the mass, but when I look back his eyes seem cloudy, hollow. I jump, shake the nightmare away.
“Jude?” He laughs. “You can do this.” He seems certain, smiling with his screwed-up teeth.
As I hook a finger into the knot of my tie because it feels too tight, a woman crashes into my ribs and apologizes. Not an accident. Her hands are all over me until I smile Walker’s special number ten this-is-the-best-thing-ever-and-it’s-even-better-because-I’m-pure-charm-doesn’t-it-make-you-squirm? smile, excusing myself, holding tight to the hidden bruises that are locked beneath my suit. Loosening the tie even further, I stretch my neck, my lower jaw until I can feel the air enter my throat.
Crowding women start asking for spaces on my card. I fumble inside the cotton bag Father Jai gave me, grabbing the small book. The women scrawl their
names in letters I’ll never understand.
Only the music lifts the ache inside. An explosion of sounds that slices through the crowd, through me. Happy drumming bounces from the furthest corner and shakes the candle flames. My foot taps and I stop it, push my toes into the floor until they feel numb as hundreds of women, and the probably less than a hundred boys that made it through Reserves, applaud with joy. The whole floor erupts into dancing as I scan the swirling mass for the glow of her red hair.
“Sorry,” I say, colliding with a strange woman as I search my way through. “Sorry. Excuse me. Sorry, ma’am.” I swear she wasn’t wearing a mask like the others, more like a white painted line across her eyes. She was gone before I could check. I’m seeing things again, the nightmares from the infirmary still swirling in my system.
A spotlight shines from the centre of the Tower, then descends, drawing a perfect white circle in the dark. The crowd whispers and mutters with prowling excitement as everyone moves off the dance floor, pointing to the Chancellor, who stands, glorious, on the silver-clad stage in front of the falling fountain.
Last time I saw her she murdered the Gardener.
One shot. Done. She didn’t even look back.
Clad in a sleek, mirrored gown, the Chancellor waves at her people, smiling like she’s pure goodness. She swims down, all grace, all light.
Any second now Walker will come out to join her. He’s all right. He has to be. They’ll have fixed him up and put him back in service.
The Chancellor’s skirt is made of shards that slice the light as she spins. Applause echoes in an explosion from the crowd. And I wonder what suit Walker will be wearing. Will his be mirrored too?
He’ll come onstage. Any second now…
I’m holding my breath, waiting for Walker, when a few of the women guide me towards the dance floor. Their hot hands push me in a gentle wave.
