The Unhappening of Genesis Lee

by Shallee McArthur

  I had to stifle a laugh, still a little giddy from finding her safe. Ren turned from him in disgust.

  “What do you want?” she snapped. “I was sleeping.”

  “It’s three in the afternoon,” I said. “I didn’t think I’d be disturbing your beauty rest. I need to talk to you.”

  “Go talk to your Populace boyfriend. I’m sleeping.”

  “Hold on!”

  The door slammed.

  “Ren!” I banged a fist on her door. No response. I hissed into the door crack as loud as I dared, “I’m losing my memories.”

  The door flew open. Ren had paled beneath her messy hair. “There haven’t been any thefts reported.”

  “All my Links are here.” My words echoed in the stairwell. “I’m losing memories anyway.”

  “Get in here.”

  Kalan followed me into the tiny studio apartment. Mom and Dad would have been horrified at the clothes on the floor and the unmade bed. I didn’t mind. It wasn’t a disaster, just . . . lived in.

  Ren sat on her bed. I took the single chair from her desk, leaving Kalan to park himself on the floor. Served him right after checking out my sister.

  The place was sparse, almost utilitarian. No pictures, holo or otherwise. No sign of her once-beloved ceramic frog collection. Only the bed, desk, and an old TV. She didn’t even have another chair for her rickety kitchen table. I’d thought Happenings paid better than this.

  “What’s going on?” Ren demanded.

  I told her about losing my memories—twice.

  “I don’t get it.” Ren crossed her socked feet on the bed. “What’s the point of siphoning from you? What would they want you to forget?”

  “The Link thief, probably,” Kalan said. “It’s like someone’s trying to make her forget we’re investigating the thief.”

  “Whoa, hold it.” Ren threw her arms up, palms out. “You’re looking for the thief? Gen, are you nuts?”

  Do not yell back, do not yell back. “Cora’s my best friend. And I’m losing memories too, even before I started searching for the thief. What else am I supposed to do?”

  “Let the freakin’ police handle it.” She ran a hand through her hair, standing it further on end. “You’ve never so much as picked your own clothes in the morning, and now you decide to hunt a memory thief. What’s wrong with you?”

  Not true. I shopped for all my own stuff. “You’re the one who wanted me to grow a backbone.”

  She frowned.

  “Look, Ren, I need a little help with this. What can you tell me about Happenings?” I asked. “What about Happenings?”

  Kalan reclined on his elbows. “Any chance they might kidnap you?”

  Only the deeply driven habit of not touching people kept me from smacking Kalan upside the head.

  Ren pursed her lips.

  “It’s just . . . well, with Blaire missing and Miranda in the hospital...it can’t be coincidence.” I kept quiet about the other possible missing people, seeing as Ren was freaking out enough already. “And she left some kind of evidence in a memory, but we aren’t sure what. Do you know what Blaire was working on? Was she keeping secrets or anything?”

  Ren rested her elbows on her knees. Her head drooped. “Of course she was keeping secrets. I should’ve known.”

  Her sudden vulnerability pierced me. I wished I dared put an arm around her. She’d done that for me once. A hesitant, sideways hug when she found me crying in the backyard gazebo after Grandma died. We felt too far apart now for me to return the favor.

  “It wasn’t your fault, Ren,” I said. I cleared my throat. “So . . . she never said anything about what she was really doing? Maybe she was working with someone higher up—this could go all the way to Liza Woods herself.”

  “No.” Ren lifted her head. “And I think you’re being stupid.”

  “Excuse me?” Trust Ren to resort to insults.

  “Those lame rumors about Happenings are bad enough.” Ren threw herself on her pillow. “This is completely idiotic. The CEO? Liza’s been on sick leave for months, she doesn’t even come in to the office anymore. I highly doubt she’s sneaking around town kidnapping people and stealing Links.”

  Liza Woods sick? How convenient. I had no idea how it could connect, but I filed it away for later.

  “She’s not Mementi, though,” Kalan pointed out. “She couldn’t have siphoned your memories.”

  My lips pinched. “All I said was she could be involved. There’s a lot we don’t know, but you have to admit, there’s too much weirdness going on to ignore Happenings.”

  “It’s just as likely that Ascalon is involved,” Ren said. “If anything, it’s more likely. All they have to do is point at Happenings, and this whole town goes crazy.”

  “Huh,” said Kalan. “That’s actually a decent point. We ought to look into that.”

  Stupid boy. Was he going to agree with Ren on everything?

  “You shouldn’t be looking into anything.” Ren sat up and clasped her hands in her lap. “Gen, you need to leave the Link thief alone. You’re losing memories too.”

  “You were the one who said we had to take chances with our own memories.” The memory from that night was fragmented, but I did remember Dad and Ren fighting.

  “This isn’t what I meant,” she said. “There are acceptable risks, things we can calculate to help ourselves, to reach our real potential. This isn’t one of them.”

  Acceptable risks. What was an acceptable risk for getting Cora’s memories back? And my own, and the rest of the victims’? My heart shriveled, and I wanted Dad to be right, that the best approach to memories was to stay hands-off.

  I stood. Ren scooted off the bed.

  “You’re leaving?” she asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Thanks, Ren,” Kalan said. “I’m glad you weren’t kidnapped.”

  I snorted, then sighed. I was glad she wasn’t kidnapped too.

  “Just—think about what you might lose,” she said. “Please.”

  I met her eyes and saw a hint of fear. For me. No matter how much we irritated each other, my sister still loved me. Even if she completely ticked me off most of the time.

  “Thanks, Ren.”

  Kalan and I walked into the desert heat, headed for the nearest tramstop. The sun scorched through my scarf, and my frustration bubbled over. “I don’t care what Ren says, I still think Happenings has something to do with this. Blaire had evidence of something. Plus the whole Liza-is-sick thing sounds way too suspicious.”

  Kalan rubbed the back of his neck. “Maybe. Or we could be totally off-base. Maybe it really is Ascalon, and they’re placing the blame on Happenings. Or it could be neither of them. Maybe Blaire just saw the thief, and that was the evidence she hid, and the thief has totally different motives.”

  Too many coulds and maybes. We were trapped by all the questions we couldn’t answer. I twisted a loose strand of hair around my gloved finger, tugging it in frustration.

  “You should dye it.” Kalan nodded to the hair in my fingers. “Ren’s looked cool.”

  I yanked extra hard on the strand of hair. “You liked that.”

  “Yeah. The color is fun with the black.”

  Well, if my hair wasn’t fun enough for him, he could hang out with Ren. “I don’t want to.”

  “Why not?”

  I paused. “It was my idea.”

  “What was?”

  “The hair dye. Ren knew that I’ve been wanting to dye blue streaks into my hair for forever. Just a few, near the front.” I tugged at my gloves, my hands hot and sweaty.

  “So now you don’t want to do it because she stole the idea.”

  “Told you it was stupid,” I said.

  He kicked a rock and it clattered down the road. “Do you still want blue hair?”

  “It’d be cool.”

  “So do it anyway. Don’t let her decisions ruin yours.”

  We came up on the rock he had kicked. This time I kicked it. “You know, somet
imes you sound very much like a preacher’s son.”

  He ran a hand through his curls. “Sorry. I’m not trying to lecture.”

  “At least you didn’t tell me God would smite me for dying my hair an unnatural color.”

  He laughed. “If that were true, I’d have lost God’s favor a while ago. I dipped my hair in blue Kool-aid when I was nine.”

  I smiled, picturing a mini-Kalan with a mop of blue hair. “I love it.”

  “So did Dad, actually. I made a good object lesson for his sermon on repentance washing away the stains of sin.”

  My smile widened. “I think I’d like your dad.”

  “You do like him. At least, you seemed to the other day.”

  The sentence came out lightly, but it struck me like a smack in the face, killing my momentary happy buzz. I stopped in the middle of the empty road and stared at the small red rock I’d been kicking. I’d lost so much. Maybe Ren was right. I should savor what I still had. I didn’t have to risk bleeding out more memories.

  “You okay?” Kalan asked.

  “How do we know we’re doing the right thing, chasing the Link thief?”

  He cocked his head. “Does it feel right to you?”

  “That doesn’t matter.”

  Kalan raised an eyebrow.

  “I can’t trust feelings to tell me what’s right.”

  “Then what do you trust?”

  “I—” He didn’t get it. “Feelings lie. They come out of nowhere and half the time don’t make sense.” And occasionally turned you into a hyperventilating freak show.

  Kalan reached out, his hand stopping before it brushed my arm. My heart swelled until I thought the beats would take me over. A whisper that he was a stranger fought against the rhythm. I looked away, confused.

  He dropped his hand. “Maybe feelings don’t seem to make sense because they know more than your brain. Just because you ignore your heart doesn’t mean it’s not still talking to you. If you listen, you’ll know what to do.”

  That had the ring of recitation to it. “Did you just quote your dad?”

  Kalan grinned sheepishly. “Well, he usually uses it in reference to God, not your heart. But I figure in a lot of cases, it’s the same thing.”

  Whether it was God or my heart talking to me, that still didn’t mean they were saying the right things.

  “Do you still want to do this?” I asked.

  “Yes.” He stepped closer to me. “Do you?”

  I’d promised Cora. And to be honest, I wasn’t ready to let go of this strange partnership with Kalan. The more I got to know him the more I wanted to get to know him.

  “Yes. But we need a plan.” Go big or go home—that’s what they always said, right? “Let’s nail the Link thief. Tomorrow.”

  “Okay. Um. I’d very much like to know how you plan on doing that.”

  I crossed my arms. “We’re going to break into Happenings.”

  16

  Do we indeed desire the dead

  Should still be near us at our side?

  —Alfred, Lord Tennyson, In Memoriam LI

  My parents were plugged into their Link buds when I got to the kitchen the next morning. Newscasts of violent protesters lit up the table, projected from their Sidewinders. Neither noticed I’d joined them. I crunched my cereal extra loud for the annoyance factor.

  It’s not like I wanted to tell them all about the lovely time I’d had with Kalan yesterday. But couldn’t they ask? They scheduled my school and dance, they set my curfew, they demanded my itinerary, but heaven forbid they actually ask how it went.

  I wanted to break the silence, loudly. No words, just a scream. Could I get it just right, with the perfect pitch of frustration, the high volume of anger, the hint of a desperate rasp, so they would finally hear me? Because I wanted to tell them about Kalan. His goofiness and tenderness and cute curly hair. I wanted to cry to them about what I’d done to Miranda at the hospital. I wanted to confess my mission to Happenings today so they could tell me I was brave or tell me I was stupid or tell me anything at all that they saw in me.

  My spoon clattered in my cereal bowl. Loud. As loud as I dared. Mom glanced up, but didn’t say a word. And I found that maybe I didn’t want to talk to them after all.

  I marched to my room and dug out my “I prefer the drummer” tank top. Mom hated it and had forbidden me to wear it outside. I pulled on a cob-webby black shrug over it and finished the ensemble with a thin red scarf. I gave Hades a quick stroke.

  “Wish me luck,” I whispered to him. “I’m breaking all the rules today.”

  The house alarm dinged as I left without a goodbye.

  I didn’t head for the south-bound tram for school. I needed the west-bound. The one aimed at the Populace side. Broken rule number one: cutting class.

  I edged down the aisle to find an empty seat. No one nodded to me. No one smiled. No one even looked up from the floor. I sucked on my lip, anxiety beginning to eat away at my protective anger. Why the sudden abandonment of politeness? I’d never missed it, but I almost didn’t recognize these silent people headed to work. Or maybe to protest.

  Or maybe to siphon memories from unsuspecting victims.

  I found a seat in the corner and scrunched in tight, then pulled out my Sidewinder.

  Text from Genesis Lee to Kalan Daniel Fox, TDS 9:52:31/5-9-2084 You working today? Can we meet earlier than we planned?

  Text from Kalan Daniel Fox to Genesis Lee, TDS 9:53:45/5-9-2084 Work’s closed because of the protest. No school?

  Text from Genesis Lee to Kalan Daniel Fox, TDS 9:54:02/5-9-2084 Not for me.

  Text from Kalan Daniel Fox to Genesis Lee, TDS 9:54:31/5-9-2084 Rebel. We’ll get you a motorcycle and blue hair dye. See you there.

  I laughed and had the weirdest desire to hug my phone.

  The tram pulled to a stop near Happenings. Nearly everyone got off, their determined steps sounding like a march into battle.

  Get a grip, Gena. Dramatics were Cora’s domain.

  I found Kalan in a grove of trees outside Happenings. The midday heat pierced the shade of scrubby pines overhead. A roar of shouting wafted on the wind.

  “Did you bring my motorcycle?” I walked up next to him.

  He gave me a tight smile. “No time. I’ve been here all morning.” “Why?”

  Kalan kicked up a puff of red dirt. “Trying to stop my dad.”

  “He’s part of the protests?” I didn’t remember Elijah, but that didn’t jive with my impression of him.

  “Not exactly.” Kalan scowled. “Some of the church folks are trying to ‘promote peace.’ I told Dad all he’s going to promote is a few people to heaven. He says God wouldn’t want them to sit home and watch people hurt each other.”

  I smiled a little. I needed to meet Elijah. Again. “You don’t always agree with your dad on church stuff, do you?”

  Kalan crossed his arms, glancing behind him, towards Happenings. “Dad’s a good guy. But he’s so busy caring about people in general, sometimes he forgets to care about people in particular.”

  I stepped around the tree and got my first live view of the protest. My arms squeezed to my side, like the press of the crowd reached me even here. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of fists pounded the sky, beating out a rhythm to their chants. Words drowned in the noise. Bodies pressed close, people pushing past each other toward the front lines. Mementi, rubbing shoulders for the first time. Eaten up by fear until they’d forgotten who they were.

  What was worse, to lose your memories or to lose your humanity?

  They faced off with a writhing swarm of Populace, a square pond creating a sort of no-man’s-land between them. Above the chaos, Happenings’ giant wallscreen played a newscast of the protest itself. It focused on an uneven line of black-clad police brandishing riot shields, batons, and pepper spray. A Populace man charged a cop, yelling. The cop thrust with his shield, sending the man sprawling to the ground. A roar of outrage swelled. Populace surged into the no-man’s-land, only t
o be beaten back.

  I was losing my nerve to invade Happenings, fast. I took a deep breath. Ignore the nutso people in the mob. Focus on the goal: the x-shaped building, ringed by rent-a-cops.

  “It’s mostly the front doors that are guarded. If we can get around the corner of that wing—” I pointed to one of the arms of the X—“we can find the employee entrances. My friend Kinley had a DNA lock-picking algorithm that actually worked . . .”

  Sort of. She’d only gotten it to work once. On me, actually. She and Cora snuck into my house and plastered my walls with maxi pads as a prank.

  “If that fails,” I finished, “we wait for people to leave for lunch and sneak in to find out what Blaire was working on.”

  Her mysterious evidence.

  Kalan kicked at the dirt. “We’re never going to get through this crowd, let alone into the building.”

  “So what’s your brilliant plan?” I demanded. “We have to find the Link thief now, before these people kill each other. Before I lose more memories.” Before Cora melted away, life dripping out of her like a damp watercolor painting.

  Kalan didn’t reply for a moment. “You Mementi have to be right about everything, don’t you?”

  I glared.

  “I’m kidding. You people are smarter than I gave you credit for.”

  “I’m the only Mementi you know. Even if I am pretty smart.”

  “Fine. You, Genesis Lee, are the smartest and only Mementi I know. So be smart, and come up with a new idea. Because I will stop you from killing yourself with this scatterbrained plan.”

  Okay, the arrogant tone? Not the way to win me over. “You’re the one who said I needed to ‘trust my heart.’”

  Kalan rested against a tree and crossed his legs. “So your heart is telling you to break into a locked-down building in the middle of a riot to find information we aren’t sure exists? Trusting yourself doesn’t mean letting your emotions overrule common sense.”

  I leaned on the tree next to him, looking away. “You sound like a preacher again.”

  “Maybe you need a little religion.”

  I pressed my head back and a stubby branch pricked my scalp. Stupid boy—who happened to be right. About the common sense thing, at least.