This Strange and Familiar Place

by Rachel Carter

  “It doesn’t change anything. Finding you was a mission. Now you have been delivered to the Project and the mission has been completed.”

  It’s not until I taste the salt that I realize I’m crying. The tears drip down my face. One falls onto Wes’s foot, a tiny drop that disappears into the blackness of his boot. “Why didn’t you turn me in when we got back from nineteen forty-four? Or when we first came to eighty-nine? Why did you wait so long?”

  “Those events weren’t close enough to the time I was instructed to bring you in. Now it is. The timing of our missions is precise.”

  I shake my head back and forth and dig my fingers into the stretchy material of his sleeve. “You told me you were dying. Was that a lie too?”

  He doesn’t answer.

  “Wes, I love you. You love me. Don’t let them take this from us.”

  He pries my hands off his arm and takes a step back. “You were a mission. That is all.”

  “Give me a sign,” I whisper anxiously. “Show me that this isn’t real. That they’re forcing you to say this.”

  But he just turns and strides toward the door.

  “Wait!” I shout, my voice cracking on the word. I see him hesitate. “When I first saw you in Grandpa’s cell, you hugged me back. There was no reason for that.” I take a step closer to him. “You told me that you loved me. You gave me your watch, Wes. I know this is real.”

  He faces me again, and there’s a slight spark in his eyes. Finally. But he reaches into his shirt pocket and pulls out the gold pocket watch. “You mean this?”

  I reach for my chest, but the watch is gone. “When did you . . . ?”

  He last had his arms around me in the cell. While I thought he was showing me a small sign of his love, he was actually taking his watch back. I didn’t even notice.

  A dull emptiness spreads through my limbs. Is this what going into shock feels like? My legs no longer support my body and I slide onto the floor. Wes stares down at me with what looks like pity. But not love.

  It was never love.

  “Why did you do this to me?” I spread my hands out on the white tiles and desperately press my knuckles into the floor. It hurts, but I don’t care—I want to feel something other than the pain.

  “It was my job. I told you someone like me isn’t capable of love. You should have listened.”

  I can’t look at him again. Somewhere above me I hear the door open and close.

  “Get up,” a voice snaps.

  General Walker is back, sitting in the same chair. It’s like Wes was never here.

  I tilt my head up.

  “Now you know the truth,” General Walker says calmly. He crosses one leg over the other one and hooks his hands around his knee. “The question is what you’re going to do about it.”

  “I thought you were forcing me to become a recruit,” I manage to say.

  He gives me a thoughtful look. “I have an offer for you to consider. Yes, your first option is to agree to train here as a recruit. But you’re right that you are older than any of our other recruits. And you’re in a unique position, given that we’re holding your grandfather. In exchange for your cooperation, I’m willing to bypass one part of the training process.”

  “The brainwashing.” Now I sound just as robotic, just as emotionless as Wes. “You don’t need to break me because you’ll kill my grandfather if I disobey you.”

  “Very good! You are a smart one, aren’t you?” His expression darkens. “Your second option: You can refuse, and we will kill you and your grandfather. Because I’m a fair man, I’ll let the rest of your family live.”

  I suck in a breath.

  “As a recruit, your main objective will be to stop the nuclear war in twenty fifty. There’s nobility in that, Lydia. Don’t forget that the Project was created to help people. You could be a part of it.”

  He smiles at me. It almost looks kind. “I’m giving you something that none of the other recruits have gotten. I’m giving you a choice. You can join us and help save our world, or you and your grandfather can die.”

  “That’s not much of a choice,” I whisper.

  “And yet it is one.” He leans in toward me. “So what do you decide?”

  CHAPTER 21

  The hallway is freezing. I cross my arms over my chest for warmth. It is always cold in here, or maybe that bitter chill is coming from somewhere inside of me. I can’t tell anymore.

  I’m still in 1989; I’ve been at the Center for over a month now. At least I think so—it’s easy to lose track of time in this dark, windowless place. The new recruits are housed in the western wing, hundreds of feet below the ground. Every morning we are woken at dawn and sent to training. First, hand-to-hand combat, then karate, then languages, then world history, then wilderness survival. This is only the second stage, they tell us. It will take a year of study and physical conditioning before most of us are ready to start training with the TM.

  We’re given just enough food to stay alive, and we sleep on bunk beds in a large, open room. There are no blankets or sheets on the beds; too many recruits have tried to kill themselves with them in the past.

  No one speaks to anyone else; we learned that lesson quickly enough. All of the kids here are younger than me, and they have already completed the first round of training: the brainwashing stage. Their vacant eyes are unnerving to look at.

  So far General Walker has kept his word, and they have not tried to torture me emotionally, to brainwash all my memories away. At least, they haven’t done it in the obvious ways. But I don’t know how else to describe these endless days. My head hurts from the minute historical facts they pump into it. My arms and legs are bruised from the hours I spend in the fitness center. I try to eat, but the food tastes like paper. I can’t sleep. All I hear are the muffled sounds of children crying into their bare mattresses.

  I thought that I was alone when I came back from 1944, to a new life where no one knew the real me. But I didn’t know the meaning of alone then. This is what it’s like to truly be alone. To be completely lost in your own mind.

  There are still unanswered questions about what happened that I mull over, unable to explain away. Who is the Resister, and what is his rebellion? How did my grandfather find that list? Was I always destined to be a recruit, even before I went back in time to 1944?

  Is Wes really dying, or was he lying about that too?

  But there’s no point in thinking about questions I will most likely never answer.

  There’s a lot I try not to think about these days. Like how long it will take for my body to start deteriorating too. Will I make the same choice that Seventeen did? I want to say no, but after only a month down here, I’m not sure what I would do. Not anymore.

  I mostly try not to think about those people I left behind. Mary and Lucas, who are married and happy in the past. Dean, working as a doorman, with no idea who he really is. LJ, maybe even now being tortured at the Facility in Montauk. My grandfather, shivering in a cell somewhere, probably still drugged. My parents, Hannah, and Grant, never knowing why I disappeared.

  And then there’s Wes.

  Sometimes, when I’m blocking a kick during karate, I’ll get a flash of his face in my mind and I’ll wonder if he’s in these underground tunnels somewhere. Maybe in the housing area where the recruits stay, or even here, watching me train. There are times when I even feel his gaze on me, but I fight against my instinct to turn around and look for him. Instead I jab my elbow into my training partner’s throat and listen to them gurgle as they fall to the ground.

  It turns out it’s easier than you’d think for love to turn into hate.

  Because I hate Wes. More than I’ve ever hated anyone.

  The soldier in charge of my training, First Lieutenant Andrews, informed me that he’s expediting the process for me, that he’s eager to get me out and into the field. Unlike the other recruits, I’m given small freedoms. Like taking a message from one training soldier to another, and being allowed t
o walk alone through out-of-the-way, unguarded hallways.

  They are not worried about me running away because they know the threat to my grandfather’s life keeps me tethered here. And it turns out that Wes was right, at least about one thing. There’s no place left to run away to.

  I pass a glass door, and I catch a brief glimpse of my reflection. I have been trying to avoid mirrors, afraid of the hollow look in my eyes. But now I stop and stare at the blurry vision of myself. I am stronger, I can see it in the way my muscles curve under the black shirt I’m wearing. But I look like a stranger. Like another one of those robotic recruits, already dead inside. I turn away and hurry back down the hallway.

  I thought it would be nice to be by myself for a minute, but somehow it’s worse. At least when I’m around the other kids I can trick myself into thinking I’m not quite so alone. But now the solitude is heavy and consuming, and I can’t ignore it. I rub my hands together in an effort to create even a small bit of warmth.

  The hallway is deserted. Suddenly feeling defiant, I spin in a small circle. As rebellions go, it’s pretty small, but it does make me feel a little better. They cannot entirely control me. I can’t forget that.

  I hear a noise from up ahead, and I automatically shrink back against the wall. It’s footsteps, and they’re coming closer. One of our first lessons was on how to conceal ourselves. Because recruits are in and out of the facilities so frequently, we are trained to hide from people we don’t know, especially in isolated areas. For one thing, you never know when you might be running into a future or past version of yourself.

  This stretch of hallway connects to another corridor, making a T-shape. I doubt there are even any cameras around here, but I still look around for a place to hide.

  There is a small alcove to my right and I duck into it. From here I can see the hallway, but anyone approaching won’t be able to see me. I make my breathing shallow and low, and I lock my muscles. I am getting better at being still, like Wes always was. But thinking of him makes me want to break something, so I force him from my mind.

  The footsteps get louder. Closer. Now I can tell that it’s two people, not one, and that they’re approaching from the left. Survival training is starting to pay off.

  Someone says something in a low voice, and someone else . . . giggles. Down here? It doesn’t make sense. I peer around the edge of the alcove and then pull back quickly as two figures round the corner. They stop right in front of me, but just out of sight. I hold my breath as I wait to see what they do.

  “We’re going to get caught,” a girl’s voice says. She sounds oddly familiar.

  “There are no cameras here.”

  I press my hands to my mouth. It’s Wes’s voice. But who is he with?

  “It’s not safe.”

  “Stop worrying so much.” He sounds like he’s on the verge of laughing.

  I hear the rustle of clothing, and then the soft sound of lips touching.

  I squeeze my hands into fists. He’s kissing someone. Of course. It’s probably another mission. I bet it’s that pretty dark-haired recruit who stared at him in the Assimilation Center. All I want to do is fly around the corner and rip both of their heads off. But I satisfy myself with craning my neck to try and see who she is.

  They shift to the right as Wes pushes her lightly against the wall. I suddenly have a perfect view of dark red hair and pale skin.

  It’s me.

  He’s kissing me.

  I can’t help gasping, but it doesn’t matter—they’re too caught up in each other to notice what’s happening around them.

  They are both wearing the black recruit uniform, and Wes’s hair is shorter than it was the last time I saw him. He sinks his hands into her—my—hair and pulls me closer. This other version of me has her eyes closed tight and runs her fingers up his back. He leans away a little and whispers something against her mouth, and she laughs softly.

  “I missed you,” I hear myself say. “I hate all this pretending.”

  I want to burst out of this hiding spot, to grab myself and ask how old I am, to demand to know the future, and most importantly, what could ever have changed to make me forgive Wes?

  But I can’t. If nothing else, the Montauk Project has finally taught me to stop interfering with time. Interacting with a future version of myself would be messing with a line I’m no longer willing to cross.

  I watch as they touch each other’s cheeks like they’re trying to memorize the individual curves and dips. “We don’t have much time,” she says quietly.

  I’ve never heard my voice in person like this. Mine, but not mine. Lower than I thought it would be, or maybe that’s just because of the way Wes is looking at her.

  “We’re supposed to leave tonight. They don’t want us to stay—we’re both here in the past right now, remember?”

  “I know.” His hands tighten on her shoulders. “I don’t like to think about that time.”

  “I hated you.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Future me scrunches up her face and pokes him in the stomach. Love has made her skin glow and her hair shine. There’s no way this happy, healthy girl can be the same one I just saw in that cloudy glass door.

  Wes grabs her finger and pulls her close again. He presses his lips to her forehead and smiles. He looks lighter than I’ve ever seen. “Let’s go, Lyd. Before they realize we’re gone.”

  She takes his hand and together they walk back up the corridor.

  I step out from behind the corner and stare at the now-empty hallway. I press my hand to my chest, the exact place where the pocket watch would fall if I were still wearing it.

  For the first time since I arrived down here, I feel a small stirring of hope.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Photo by Joshua Simpson

  RACHEL CARTER grew up in the woods of Vermont. A graduate of the University of Vermont and Columbia University, Rachel has been a teacher, a nanny, a caterer, and a bellhop. She is also the author of So Close to You and is at work on her next book in Brooklyn, New York. You can visit Rachel online at www.rachel-carter.com.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

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  CREDITS

  Photo of girl © 2013 by Gustavo Marx/MergeLeft Reps, Inc.

  Photos of clouds © 2013 by Adam Brown

  Photo of city © 2013 by Rob Hult

  Cover design by Alison Klapthor

  COPYRIGHT

  HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

  This Strange and Familiar Place

  Copyright © 2013 by Full Fathom Five, LLC

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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  * * *

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Carter, Rachel (Rachel Elizabeth), date.

  This strange and familiar place : a So close to you novel / Rachel Carter. — First edition.

  pages cm

  Summary: “Lydia Bentley will do anything to fix the mistakes she made in the past, like losing her grandfather in time—and the only way she knows how to begin is by time traveling to 1980s New York with Wes, posed as a Montauk Project recruit.”—Provided by publisher.

  ISBN 978-0-06-208108-7 (hardcover bdg.)

  Epub Edition © APRIL 2013 ISBN 9780062081100

  [1. Time travel—Fiction. 2. Experiments—Fiction. 3. Grandfathers—Fiction. 4. Missing persons—Fiction. 5. Science fiction. 6. Montauk (N.Y.)—History—20th cent
ury—Fiction. 7. New York (N.Y.)—History—20th century—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.C24783Th 2013

  2012031814

  [Fic]—dc23

  CIP

  AC

  * * *

  13 14 15 16 17 LP/RRDH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  First Edition

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