A Girl Called Fearless (2 page)

I danced and danced and beat my arms in the air, lost in a house where no one understood.

Maybe Dayla was already in Canada. Maybe she and Seth were safe, but once she crossed that border, it was worse than her being a thousand miles away. It was forever.

I lowered the volume, until all I could hear was the whispery sound of hushed anger. My fingers poised over the keypad.

Yates was the only one who'd understand.

I knew his cell number, but if I tried dialing it, the monitoring software would send the call right to Roik.

I closed my eyes and remembered how Yates had held my hand through the funeral when Dayla's mom died. I was ten and he was twelve, and I know his friends teased him about it later, but he didn't let go when I couldn't stop crying.

And when Mom died nine months later, he and Day huddled over me, keeping the smothering well-wishers away so I didn't have to hear one more person tell me how kind my mother was or how much she'd be missed.

And two months later after his mom's funeral, Day and I barricaded Yates and his sister Becca in his dad's lanai and played endless games of pool, not saying a word, because even one word was too much.

I dropped to the floor. Now Day was gone, Becca was dead, and I wasn't allowed to talk to my oldest friend. How was I supposed to survive without them?

4

A silver van from H&S Monitoring was blocking the driveway when I came down for breakfast. The backseat of our SUV had been ripped out, and Dad stood over two guys whose arms were shoved elbow deep into the upholstery.

I scuffed to the kitchen, thinking how weird it was Roik wasn't out there, because that car was his
domain
. Nobody touched Big Black without his permission. Not even Dad, and he owned it.

My synapses didn't fire until I had a mouthful of juice.
Dad's monitoring Roik and me. He's freaked by what happened with Dayla and Seth.

I choked on the nasty. Me and
Roik
? Roik was even older than Dad. And he wasn't at all hot. Not like Seth.

A hummingbird whirred past the window. Dayla and Seth had been gone for twenty-four hours. They could be in Oregon, maybe even Washington if they'd pushed it. By tonight, they'd be across the border, starting a new life.

Dayla was lucky. Seth really cared about her, not like Braden, the guy who Signed her. Braden's technoczar dad bought Day for him as a college graduation present.

I remembered the green sparks of envy I'd felt when she'd told me about all the times she and Seth parked the car after school. About the day in the abandoned picnic ground that she wanted him so bad she ripped half the buttons off her shirt. Or the time they fell asleep in the backseat, and Seth pounded a nail into the tire to prove they'd had a flat.

My finger traced a heart on my juice glass. I wanted what Dayla had, a real love, not a Signed one.

Once I turned eighteen and went to college, I'd have a lot more freedom and there was a chance I'd meet The One.

I'd imagined moving into the girls' dorm at Occidental. Running into Yates around campus. Having coffee with him between classes, with Roik sitting a couple tables away and actually giving us some privacy for once. Yates would look out for me. He'd tell me which guys I could trust and which not to.

The front door banged open. A man charged into the foyer and yelled, “Avie! I need to talk to you!” Dad was right behind him, saying, “Relax. Relax. I'll get her.”

I peeked into the hall. Dayla's dad was sprinting up the stairs toward my bedroom. “Avie!”

Oh, God.
I shrank back into the kitchen.

“She's not up here! Where is she?” Mr. Singer sounded angry, like he'd just lost six million dollars and I was to blame.

“Hold on, Singer. I'll get her. Avie?”

The doors upstairs were banging open and shut. I scooted behind the island. “In the kitchen,” I called back.

Mr. Singer blew into the room, and I held on to the granite counter like it could somehow protect me. “Where is she, Avie! Where's my daughter?”

The Rolex Submariner glinted on his wrist. Dayla's future father-in-law gave it to him at her Signing. Job well done.

“I have no idea,” I said. “Dayla didn't tell me where she was going.”

“But she told you she was going somewhere!”

He circled around to make a grab for me, but Dad got between us. “Slow down. You're scaring her.”

“Don't tell me to slow down. My daughter's disappeared. I've got to find her and that bodyguard before the authorities do.”

I peeked around Dad. As bad as it would be if her dad caught up to her, it would be ten times worse if Day got stopped by the border patrol. “I'm telling the truth, Mr. Singer,” I said. “I don't know where she is.”

I wasn't lying. Sure, I'd heard about Underground safe houses where they'd hide you if you were running for the border, but I had no idea how to find one.

Mr. Singer banged his fist on the counter. For a second I felt sorry for him. “You'll tell me if she contacts you?” he said.

Dayla wasn't going to contact me until she made it across. “I promise.”

Mr. Singer's phone rang, and he turned away to answer it. “Yes? Yes!”

“You'd better be telling the truth,” Dad whispered in my ear.

“I am. I swear.”

Mr. Singer shook his head as he pocketed his phone. “My people tracked the car to Visalia. No sign of Dayla or Seth.” He locked his eyes on me. “This isn't a game, Avie. We've got to get her back.”

I nodded, but inside I cheered. Day and Seth were still out there, free.

5

Dad didn't let me out all weekend and Roik made me hand over my Princess phone like running away was contagious. So when I walked into class on Monday, it was like being let out of jail.

But then I felt the skin on my arms prick up. It took me a minute, but I realized the posters for MIT and UCLA were gone, and a recipe conversion chart was stuck up in their place.

Ms. Alexandra stood like a model, her hair swept up in a chignon, her lipstick perfect. She had one hand on her hip and the other on the back of Dayla's chair, but only her lips were smiling.

Ms. A had handpicked our class when we were twelve, back when the Headmaster still listened to her, because she was the only female teacher left. Ms. A told him we had the most “potential.” Put us all together, and we were a color wheel of smart rich girls who'd racked up enough detentions to catch her eye.

But we were more than a mission. Ms. A called us the daughters she could never have.

There wasn't an upperclassman at Masterson Academy who hadn't heard that Dayla Singer had run off with her bodyguard, but Ms. A addressed our class in the ridiculously chipper voice she used for the security camera. “Dayla's father called. Her cold is improving, and she should be back soon.”

We all clapped, and Ms. A smiled at Sparrow. Two seconds later, the security camera buzzed like it was in pain. Ms. A nodded a thank-you, and Sparrow slid the scrambler she'd engineered back in her pocket.

“I know you're worried about Dayla,” Ms. A said quietly, “but my sources haven't heard a thing. Keep in mind that's good news.” She frowned. “I'm sure you're wondering why the posters were taken down. Last night, the American Association of College Presidents announced they were suspending enrollments for women.”

Sparrow was the first one to figure out what Ms. A just said. “You mean we can't go to college?”

“But they just let girls back in last year,” Sophie Park cried. “What's going on?”

“The reason they cited was their inability to provide adequate security for women on campus. They stated that until they can ensure the safety of female students, they cannot house or provide instruction for them.”

We all sat stunned as if someone had lined up our dreams and shot them. No NYU theater for Portia. No biology lab for Sophie. No MIT engineering for Sparrow.

No psych classes at Oxy for me. No escaping home for the freedom of a dorm. The
no
s hammered me and I pressed my fingers to my forehead to stop the pounding.

“But they're going to figure this out, right?” Zara asked. “I mean, they'll find a way to let us back in, right?”

“Yeah,” Sophie said. “Like, couldn't we take classes online for now?”

“Get real,” Sparrow snapped. “How's Portia going to learn acting if she can't go onstage? Or Sophie—how's cyber lab going to work for you?”

Ms. A held out her hand for us to quiet down. “Sources within the association have told us that colleges are being pressured to keep women out. They're being threatened with funding cuts if they don't cooperate.”

“I bet it's Senator Fletcher and the Gang of Twelve,” Sparrow said.

I looked back at Ms. A. For the last year, she'd been telling us about Senator Fletcher and the twelve other powerful members of Congress who headed up the Paternalist Movement and seemed to control everything the government did.

“But why are they doing this?” Sophie asked.

Sparrow rolled her eyes. “Fifty million women died and the country fell apart. The Paternalists want us home safe and sound in the kitchen. Not taking jobs away from men who
need
them.”

“This isn't fair!” Zara cried. “We're going to be eighteen. We're supposed to be free to choose what
we
want.”

“They'll pay for this,” Sparrow muttered like it was something she intended to carry out herself.

I stared at her. It wasn't the first time Sparrow said something like that, but it always shocked me, because she looked like a Renaissance Venus with soft curly hair and a perfect oval face. Not a kick-ass chick you'd expect to wreak vengeance.

Ms. A touched Zara's shoulder. “I promise you,” she said, “the Paternalist Movement doesn't control everything or everyone. Don't forget there are people fighting for your rights in this country, including our president.”

Sophie burst out, “But we can still go to college in Canada, can't we?”

“Yes, that's still an option.”

I sank into my seat. I'd never get Dad's blessing to go to Canada. The only reason he'd sign off on Occidental was that it was twenty minutes away.

“This is why you cannot be silent, my dears,” Ms. A said. “When you leave Masterson next year, you must speak out for Gen S.”

Generation Survivor.

Ms. A nodded at Sparrow, and the security camera quit buzzing and went live. “Let's start with embroidery, class.”

We got out our needles and thread. Last spring the Masterson Board of Trustees had revamped our curriculum. They cut back our courses in science and math and slipped in classes in child rearing and the domestic arts. With our mothers and older sisters no longer around to teach us, they wanted to make sure we were prepared to assume our roles.

But Ms. A turned embroidery defiant: a game we played against the administration and the trustees. Each stitch was part of a secret code Ms. A used to teach subjects we were denied: velocity, DNA, vectors.

We'd stitch or knit or crochet the principles into our heads and tear the stitches out after class. Chinese women used
nu shu
code to write letters to each other. We used ours to learn.

Ms. A marked out a pattern to follow on the board. Sparrow glared at the blank spot where the poster for MIT used to be. Zara was sniffling, and Portia stared at Ms. A with hollow eyes.

I tried to thread my needle with the white silk, but the thread wouldn't go through. Sophie took it from me and did it in one try.

“So you think you'll go to Canada for school,” I asked her. “Your dad won't try and stop you?”

“He believes in my dream. He would never try to stop me.”

I knew about Sophie's dream, because she'd shared it with us—of inventing a blood test that would reveal if Scarpanol had turned a girl's ovaries into cancer factories before it was too late to treat.

I didn't have a dream like Sophie, but I had questions I needed answered. I needed to understand why people did what they did, why they fed Scarpanol to cattle without years of testing it. Why the government let people import it from China, why the scientists cleared it so quickly when they already knew hormones could twist estrogen into cancer? I needed to understand why nobody stood up and said, “Wait. Are you sure this is safe?” I knew I couldn't change the world, but I needed to understand why greed and profits were so much more important than my mother's life.

Ms. A finished marking out the pattern and said, “Pay attention, class. Mastering this lesson is required for graduation.”

Zara stopped sniffling.

“Damn straight,” Sparrow said under her breath.

Anyone reviewing the security tape would think we were quietly stitching a line of ducklings following its mother, but in reality we were learning to stitch code: “We shall overcome.”

6

Roik waited with the other bodyguards in the car lane after school. Two lines of armored SUVs curved past the fountain and rose beds. Usually, the bodyguards loitered in their suits on the steps outside the main doors, but today I smiled, seeing them stand at attention for Ms. Alexandra.

“A historic landmark!” She pointed at the white stucco mansion with its iron railings and red tile roof. “Designed by Julia Morgan, the architect for Hearst Castle! So show some respect, gentlemen, and stop tossing your disgusting cigarette butts in the flower urns.”

Roik spied me, and my heart skipped a beat, because I could tell from the way his hand hugged his jacket pocket, he had a message for me from Yates.

Roik didn't like smuggling messages, but he needed the money for retirement. Dad had cut his salary when the company started hurting. Roik wouldn't do it often, and he made it clear he'd listen to any message first.

“I found this on the seat.” Roik dropped an earring into my hand.