“Sure. But I’m not sure they’re worth the trouble. This kind of thing . . . Man, it’s—”
Then he broke off abruptly, as if he’d either just thought of something or maybe decided not to tell me something.
“It’s what?”
“Nothing.”
“What?” I pressed. “You were about to say something. It’s what?”
He leaned forward across the counter, dropping his voice. “It’s the kind of thing people would trade.”
“Yeah,” I said, feeling stupid. “That’s why I’m here, right?”
“Sure. Yeah.” He answered quickly, though I could tell that wasn’t what he’d meant. “Right.”
That was classic CYA if I’d ever seen it. “No,” I said, puzzling it through. “You didn’t mean trade with you. So trade with who? The Collabs?” I kept my eyes glued to his face, but the flicker of acknowledgment didn’t come quickly enough. “With the Dean’s office?” I asked, not believing for a second that might actually be who he meant. But there it was in his eyes. That subconscious you-nailed-it look.
“They do that?” I had heard rumors, very vague rumors, of that sort of thing.
Joe said nothing, his expression tight and unnaturally still like he’d given away far too much already.
I didn’t think I was going to get any more from him, but I asked anyway. “But no one in the Dean’s office would need these.” I tapped the top of the box. “These have no value to them. Why would they . . .” That’s when it hit me. “They wouldn’t want the pills. They’d want info about who had them. They’d reward someone willing to betray other Greens.” Disgust settled low in my belly. “Who would do that?” Before Joe could even open his mouth, I snapped, “Okay, I know. That sounded stupid.”
“Not stupid,” Joe said. “Just naive. You and Mel, you’ve been, like, completely isolated. You don’t know how bad it is. And something like this? This could buy someone a trip off the Farm.”
“Seriously?” And for that flicker of a second, I considered it. Could I somehow buy Mel’s freedom by turning myself in? It sounded so easy. I’d be completely absolved of the responsibility of taking care of her. It was a nice fantasy, even if it wasn’t a solution.
Because, of course, I wouldn’t trust Mel’s safety with anyone else, least of all the Dean. He was worse than the Collabs.
“Will you get me the stuff I need?” I asked, because I couldn’t think any more about the politics on the Farm or the many ways people could betray one another.
“Yeah. Sure. I can get it,” he said, only a trace of stoner dude left in his voice.
Joe’s sudden new gravity only ratcheted up my tension. I patted the box in my pocket. The pills rested right on top of that sick feeling of dread that knotted in my belly.
“How much for the shiv?” I asked abruptly.
Joe looked from the lump in my pocket back up to my eyes. Then he gave a sad little half smile as he pulled it from behind the CDs and slid it across the counter. “I’ll throw it in for free. Try to lie low for a couple of days, okay?”
“Mel and I always do.” I wrapped my hand around the handle of the shiv and the cool metal against my palm made me tremble.
He nodded. “Come back in two days. I’ll have your stuff then.” He looked at my pocket again. As I walked toward the door, he added, “And be careful. You and Mel are more memorable than you think. Two girls living alone in one of the academic buildings. A lot of people know where to find you.”
Once I was outside of Stoner Joe’s, I climbed a few steps until I was able to peek over the wall of the alcove. I could hear Greens around the corner. They wouldn’t notice me, huddled in the shadows.
I pulled the pills from my pocket, slipped my hand under my sweatshirt, and wedged the packet into my bra. Then I slipped the handle on the shiv through one of my belt loops. I turned the sharp edge away so it didn’t rub against my stomach before tugging the waistband of my sweatshirt low on my h*ps to hide the weapon.
I was trembling before I even made it up the stairs and out of the alcove. The wind had died down and for the first time in weeks, the sun peeked through the clouds, but its warmth didn’t seep through the fleece of my hoodie. Or past the frigid blanket of fear that had surrounded me.
The quad was mostly empty now, with only a few Greens scuttling between buildings. I felt as vulnerable as they looked, the hairs on the back of my neck prickling with that being-watched feeling.
I glanced over my shoulder back at Joe’s, wondering if he’d followed me out. He hadn’t, but I was being watched. A guy in a gray sweatshirt stood at the top stairs of the dining hall. With the sun at his back as he looked out across the quad, I couldn’t distinguish any of his features. Then he stilled, his gaze aimed toward me, and I was sure he was the guy who’d picked up the pills earlier.
I shivered in the sun and picked up my pace, praying that Mel and I weren’t in serious trouble. Most Greens stuck to the dormitories. It wasn’t a rule or anything, just common sense. Greens were like those penguins you saw on nature shows, huddled on the packed ice, waiting for the ones on the edges to get knocked into the water and picked off by the elephant seals. Greens did everything together. Only a few had squatted other places. If Joe was right and these pills in my pocket were enough to buy someone’s freedom, then our little closet in the science building wasn’t safe anymore. The guy in the gray sweatshirt could easily find us. Thank God our bags were packed and by the door. Mel and I could evacuate as soon as I got back to the room. I didn’t know yet where we would go. All I knew was I wanted to still be alive in two days so that I could keep that appointment with Joe.
CHAPTER THREE
Mel
Most days Lily is the steady drumbeat. The rhythm of my heart. The repeating melody of the music in my head. But not today.
Today she is a cacophony of dissonant notes. Just wrong. A jumbled mess. Can’t listen.
She’s out of rhythm. Trying to rush. Tempo’s all wrong. There’s no music in her today, only words. Talk, talk, talk, talk.
That’s Lily. Never has a thought she doesn’t say aloud. Makes her feel like the smart one. The normal one.
As if I count less because I don’t jabber. Because I listen to the music instead of talking over it.
I know I’m a burden. How twitchy it makes her, being the rhythm. Being the steady one. Twitchy and nervous. A rat-a-tat-tat.
But we’re not ready. If we go now, we’ll be caught. Caught like Trickster’s bunnies. She thinks I don’t know what happens to those rabbits snared out by the fence. But I know. Their music is so loud sometimes I can’t think. I block out their noise when I can.
I know we’re not ready. Can’t make Lily hear it. All she hears is the clock. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock. She doesn’t listen. All she does is talk.
Talk, talk. Talk, talk. Tick tock, tick tock. Talk, talk. Talk, talk.
I try to listen for the both of us, but I can’t hear over all her noise. I hold on to Slink and try to block out the noise, but even Slink doesn’t help. Freedom sounds like Paganini, but the pianist is sitting on his hands. The orchestra is too tinny and too loud by itself. Lily never understands that all the instruments have to play together to make music. Otherwise it’s just noise, noise, noise.
By myself, I tap my head against the wall. Alone should be a blessing, but I’m haunted by the plan. My plan, Lily’s plan, the plan. It’s not about what’s missing, it’s what’s out of rhythm.
I try to make the pianist play, try to hear why our plan won’t work, but the white noise of the room is in my ears, blocking out the music. All these things Lily has cluttered our room with.
Everything has its own pitch if you listen for it. Most people don’t. Lily doesn’t listen for the rustling of a box of neoprene gloves or the steady hum of the eighteen microscopes. The high-pitched glassy squeal of the beakers and petri dishes. All of this stuff makes too much noise. I can’t hear the music. If I could, I’d know what’s missing.
So I sort the things. Everything comes off the shelves. The big black book screamed beside the pink backpack. It slides into silence when I move it beside the twenty-four-roll box of paper towels. The pink backpack, so jittery, quiets once I empty it and place it beside the quilt. I do this, making sense of the chaos. If I can just isolate the melody—hear our escape plan—I’ll know what’s wrong.
If I can’t make the piano play, the rhapsody won’t work. Lily might blame herself, but it’ll be both of us who die.
Time is not on our side. Tick tock. Tick tock. Tick tock.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
CHAPTER FOUR
Lily
I don’t go anywhere these days without an escape route, but today was the first day I felt like I needed it. Today’s plan: get back to Mel, grab the bags, and . . . wait? I didn’t know yet if the guy in the gray sweatshirt had reported us. So did we leave the safety of the science building on the chance that he had or did we wait and see? Hiding in the dorms was out of the question. We might head over to the gymnasium on the north side of campus and hide there until morning, but there were some jocks who hadn’t become Collabs and they lived in the gym. I shuddered to think what it would take to convince them to let us stay there overnight. So far on the Farm, I hadn’t traded that. But as I walked up the six flights of stairs to the science lab, I knew that I would if I had to.
But if we made it through the night, then what? If the guy in gray reported us to the Collabs, we wouldn’t be safe anywhere on campus. We sure couldn’t head down to the dining hall for meals. The Collabs would grab us when they scanned our chips on the way in.
We had only one thing in our favor: everything we needed was packed and waiting beside the door. We could be out of the building in minutes. I didn’t yet know if we needed to run, but if the Collabs showed up, I wanted to be ready to.