BRINK: Book 1 - The Passing (6 page)

“Miss Nelson, expulsion from this process is not beyond our powers at this moment.”

“Go!” I hiss finally, pushing Johanna from her seat. She staggers toward the stage, her beauty as present as always, but now washed in a kind of florescent desperation, uncertainty causing her to shrink into herself. The image of the injured gazelle from the first scene of my sim springs into my mind; Johanna has the same terror etched into every delicate curve of her body. She walks unwillingly up the stairs like a dove fluttering up to an altar. It is terrifying to watch.

Three men are called; one of them, David Friederickson, is an 802. Not terribly close, but closer than 197, for sure. He's dark haired, like Harlow, but taller, and slightly more athletic in build. He's wearing a sweater and slacks with the wrong color of shoes. Heavy brow. Slightly dazed expression. Nothing of Harlow's sharp attention to detail and sly smirk, his casual classiness and easy wit. So completely, utterly wrong for Johanna. But her eyes take him in, and flick to Harlow, who leans forward in his seat, white-faced, forcing a smile. Trying to remind her that she's already made this decision, that the numbers don't matter, that he loves her. I clutch the edge of my chair with sweaty hands and watch as she gazes at Harlow and then turns back to this David guy, and suddenly I know she's going to pick him. I can see it in the set of her shoulders. She's going to throw away the love she has nurtured for ten years, the man who would die for her, her soul mate, her everything... all because she got lost in the hype, the panic, the numbers. Yeah, the odds are abysmal, but...it's Johanna and Harlow! How could God separate them? If only she had a little more time to think. If only there were some way to get her out of this moment where everything seems so insurmountable. To give her just a few seconds to clear her head. I wish there were some way I could just give her that. And then I realize that I can.

“Wait!” I shout, my voice pitifully weak and small – a tiny bat squeaking in a massive, silent cavern. Surprise lights every one of the hundred-plus faces turning to watch me rise from my seat and half walk, half run across the room to the stage. It takes forever for me to reach Johanna. I keep thinking one of the guards is going to stun-gun me at any moment, but they don't, and I reach her side unharmed. The judge is already on his feet, looking like he's going to murder me with his bare hands, but I put on the most innocent, if slightly panicked, face I can muster and pant, “My medication. I need it. Now. And I, uh, just remembered she has it in her purse.” I point at Johanna and try hold back a nervous swallow. I've always been a terrible liar.

Stone-face fumes, then nods quickly.

“Hurry up.” He spits the words out of his mouth like rotten cherries.

Confused, Johanna frowns at me. I give her a look.

“My allergy pills, remember? I took some earlier this evening, and then I gave them to you to hold on to for me.”

The light dawns. She reaches shaking hands for her clutch, opens it, hands me the last of the ibuprofen. I take it and search her eyes. “You good?” I say under my breath.

“Good,” she responds.

“Okay. Remember what's important. Remember who has your heart.”

A strange look passes over her face, reminding me, somehow, of the look on my mother's face when she talked about losing Samantha. Then it's gone, and she's nodding. “I will.”

I should feel relief melting over me like warm maple syrup – should feel the click of everything in the universe shifting back into its rightful place. I gave Johanna her moment. I broke the spell. She should be fine now. She should be able to make the right choice. She should.

But the same icy hand that clutched my heart when they read Johanna's number still has me in its grip. I leave the stage and move toward my seat because I can't think of anything else to do, but I can't shake the feeling that nothing has changed. Behind me, I can hear the judge urging Johanna to make her selection, but I don't turn around to watch. I can't. I can't watch her. I know - I
know -
what she's going to do.

I know that I failed.

By the time I reach my seat and look up, Johanna is already gone, and Harlow is still sitting in his seat among the men, sobbing soundlessly into his hands, not caring that people are staring at him, their discomfort etched on their faces. Numbness and disbelief steal over me like a shadow. My best friends torn apart. The triumvirate broken. No matter what happens now, we will never be all together after this – the pain of this separation will never dissipate. I don't realize that I've broken my resolution not to cry again until a tear drops onto the back of my hand.

Harlow is called back up to the stage a mere two people after Johanna leaves. He moves like a sleep-walker, like gravity is suddenly a force too strong for his back, his head, his eyelids. When raven-haired Marta Reid chooses him as her match, he accepts.

I hadn't been able to watch Johanna leave the room, but I watch Harlow now. The look on his face is not one of pain so much as absolute, unfathomable emptiness. He reminds me of the one time I saw the curse in action – the one person I ever watched die.

I was twenty-two – freshly graduated from college and mere months from meeting Seth. I had spent the day alone in Bellview Park, a favorite reading spot of mine because of its distance from the main hub of the city and its few visitors. Sprawled on the grass beneath a beautiful oak tree, I was so engrossed in the final chapters of the novel I was reading that I didn't hear the woman approaching until she stumbled and fell onto her hands and knees on the sidewalk, mere yards from where I was lying.

I leaped to my feet, book forgotten, and ran over to the woman, intending to help her up. But she waved me off before I could reach her.

“Don't bother,” she said, her voice strained and rough. “It's no use.”

I remember thinking her word choice was a bit dramatic for the situation at hand, but then she shuddered rather violently and lay down on her side, placing a hand on her head as though she were dizzy or fainting.

“Are you okay?” I asked cautiously, sinking into a crouch beside her. “Can I help?”

“No,” she said hollowly, closing her eyes.

“Erm...no, you're not okay or no, I can't help?”

Instead of answering, she opened her eyes and looked up at me, her face unreadable. “What's your name?”

“Brynn.”

“Brynn. Hmm. Pretty dress you've got on, Brynn. Your daddy a doctor? Or maybe a governor. Yes. That's it. Your face changed when I said that. Must be nice to have a Daddy that can buy you expensive things.”

“My mother made this by hand, actually.”

“She must have lots of time to waste.”

I ignored her statement. “Can I get you some water or something?”

“Pretty and rich, but not too bright. I said it was no use, didn't I?”

“You did, but...”

“Well, that's probably what I meant.”

Dumbfounded, I stared at her. She looked healthy and clean, if a bit pale and tired. I'd have guessed she had a strong personality as well, given her long, fringed skirt, Roving Lions t-shirt, and defiant, blue-streaked, auburn hair. Very nonconformist, but in a kind of cheerful way. Not someone who I would guess had depressive tendencies or the habit of becoming distraught over a small tumble on a walking trail. And though it might have been prudent to just leave her alone, I found that the desire to know her story made doing so nearly impossible. With a sigh, I gave in to my curiosity and sat down on the ground next to her.

“Why is it no use?” I asked the woman, my voice making it clear that I wasn't going anywhere. This seemed to amuse her.

“Stubborn little broad, aren't you,” she chuckled softly. “Okay, then, Brynn. Since you want to know so bad. I'm dying.”

I blinked. “Of what? Cancer?”

“The curse.”

“Oh.” I blinked harder, taken completely aback. “Didn't you...”

“Go through The Passing?” she finished for me. “No. I didn't. Mine was last night, but I didn't attend. I was here, in the park, sleeping in a bush.”

I was about to ask her why when the reason dawned on me. “You were hiding.”

“Yup.”

“You thought the government, or someone like them, was behind the deaths. You thought if they couldn't find you, they couldn't kill you, and if you didn't die, you could prove that the curse was a hoax.”

“Yup and yup. Haven't seen a single soul in twenty-four hours. Turns out, it really is God that's killing us. The filthy rat-bastard.”

“'Rat-bastard' seems a bit...inappropriate...”

“Don't tell a dying girl she can't curse, Brynn. It's one of the few pleasures I have left.”

A long moment passed while I tried to think of something to say.

“Are you sure you're really dying? Maybe you're just dehydrated.”

To my surprise, the woman laughed out loud.

“I kinda like you,” she said candidly. “A bit too optimistic, sure, but you've got some spunk. We might have hung out, under different circumstances.” Her smile faded from her face. “But to answer your question. No, I'm not dehydrated. I just know this is the end. My whole body is...turning off. Like a music box that needs winding. My muscles, my lungs, my heart – they're all losing strength. It doesn't hurt. I'm just...really tired. I don't think it's going to be much longer.”

I felt a pang of distress that surprised me. I really wanted this stranger to live. She was feisty, and sarcastic, and she had broad freckled cheeks, and sable eyes, and terrible fashion taste, and I thought there was probably no one like her on earth. No one to take her place in the universe if she left it.

“Here,” I said to her as I pulled my phone from my back pocket, “let me call for help. If we get you to a hospital maybe...”

“No. I'm not checking out of this place with a tube stuck down my throat.”

“Well, then at least let me contact your family...”

“Don't have any. I was raised at the University.”

For some reason, I felt like crying. “Maybe you have friends I could text?” I asked weakly, giving it one last shot. She smiled again and reached for my hand.

“You be my friend.”

We talked idly for about twenty minutes before she slipped into unconsciousness. Out of respect for her aversion to hospitals, I waited until she stopped breathing before I called the police. They arrived in what seemed like no time at all, took my name, and told me I was free to go - they would call me if they had any questions. They never did.

When I got home that night I lie awake in bed for hours, thinking about how bizarre it had been to watch someone only a few years older than me simply slip away. With a start, I realized that I'd never even asked the woman who she was. I had witnessed the last glimmer of life leaving her body and never bothered to learn her name.

Now, watching Harlow up there on that stage, seeing the gray pallor of my friend's grief-stricken face, I'm struck by how much he looks exactly like the nameless woman from the park, and I decide that there are far more ways to die than just one.

There are still close to a hundred of us in the room, but I can see some candidates getting nervous. Two girls behind me are whispering about all the attractive guys being gone already. I want to scream at them that true love just died right in front of them and anyone who can watch that and still be concerned with chiseled jawlines and a nice set of biceps deserves to be shot. Instead, I clutch the vial of ibuprofen I took from Johanna and grit my teeth, feeling some wild, powerful impulse building in my chest.

By the time my name and number are called, I'm a writhing mass of conflicting emotions. I can barely register that I have scored a 176, close enough that Harlow would have been an easily acceptable match, had he not already been chosen. Harlow with
me
instead of Johanna. The thought makes me think I might actually vomit. Anger and fear tangle in my chest, sadness weighs down each step, confusion makes my brain buzz. I take my time walking to the stage, trying desperately to get a grip on myself. When I finally take my place near Judge Crawler, he smiles at me with something strangely akin to triumph. I wonder what battle he thinks he's winning.

“The gentlemen closest in number to 176 are, in reverse order, Zachary Slatesan, 243...”

A lanky gentleman in a three-piece suit stands and starts walking toward the stage. Had I been less depressed, I might have rolled my eyes.

“...Alexander Ott, 182...”

Fancy-pants is joined by a dark-skinned guy who's been to the stage once already.

“...and Eli Palmer...176.”

There is a moment of absolute silence as everyone absorbs the enormity of the judge's words. 176. Perfect match. Direct hit. Boom goes the dynamite. The crowd hums like a downed electrical wire, and my throat closes up tight. A sweet-looking guy with mousy brown hair has risen to his feet, but seems unable to move forward until someone nudges him from behind. Then he makes his way to the stage, a dazed expression on his round, flushed face.

“Why, how very fortunate for you,” says the judge, the false congratulations in his voice grating on my nerves like bones crunching under tire tread. “A perfect match. Please proceed to the room of blessing.”

I spin so fast the end of my ponytail whacks me in the face. “Wait!" I exclaim, panic nudging my voice up a half-octave. "Don't I get a choice?”

Judge Crawler gives me a look like I am causing him physical pain. Like he would rather drape himself in raw chicken and play tag with a starving wolverine than address the question I just proffered. Like if I were to suddenly transform into the chalk-eating child of a woman who consumed nothing but opiates, alcohol, lead paint, and canned tuna for the duration of her pregnancy, he would consider our chances for intelligent conversation much improved. But he sighs, long and arduous, and curls his upper lip.

“In a hundred years of research, there have been only two other perfect matches,” he explains. “Both couples wisely chose to be united, and all four spouses remained fully functioning members of society well past their hundredth birthdays. However, if you believe yourself to be a better judge of compatibility than the algorithm and would prefer to make another selection, you are free to decide, provided you can do so within the next sixty seconds. After that, we shall choose for you.”

I want to hit him as hard as I can, right in the middle of his now-let's-be-adults-about-this face. But if he really wanted to, he could lock me in a closet, unmarried, until tomorrow morning, when the curse would carry me off into nonexistence. Or when a government agent would feed me a lethal dose of some untraceable substance that would cause my brain to shut itself down. Whichever. So instead I look once at my “perfect match”, with his bewildered, somewhat hurt expression, his hand gripping the hem of his linen shirt. Eli. He's darling, I realize, and the softness in his eyes makes me think he's probably very kind-hearted, too. A good bet. Someone my mother would love, and my father would accept. But while I'm looking at him, I can't help but think of Johanna, and her tattoo, and her decision to save her own life rather than spend it with Harlow, and how horrified I was by her actions. I can't help but think of Harlow's emotionless face as he left with Marta, a sickening reminder that existence is more than a heartbeat. And suddenly, I am transported back to the granite platform, to the sea of boiling lava, to the choice I made to save a sister I didn't even know. Why? Why her and not my parents or my best friends? Or myself? Was it because she was fierce and strong and beautiful, and I wanted to be
like
her? Or because I felt the wrongness of her death in my bones and wished that she could have had a second chance? Or because, of anyone I had ever known about, she was the only one who seemed to have truly fought to live life on her terms? I'm not sure. The one thing I do know is that, somehow, I made the right choice, and that it's time for me to make it again.

I turn to look at the men still sitting in the auditorium, easily locating Aaron, his eyes ever on my face. Was it coincidence that he decided to talk to me mere minutes after I prayed for help? Is our attraction based on more than the fact that he thinks I'm kind, and I think he's funny, and we both think Judge Crawler is an asshole? It seems like perhaps he knows what I'm going to do the second before I know myself, because all of a sudden he sits up straighter and takes a deep breath. I close my eyes.

“I choose him,” I hear myself say, pointing. "I choose Aaron."

There is yet another murmur in the crowd. Really, I'm becoming quite adept at causing a stir. Perhaps my father was wrong, and a career in politics is not completely outside the realm of possibility for me. At the thought of my father, I realize with a start that, unlike the day I got half a tattoo, the idea of disappointing him hadn't paralyzed me just know. It hadn't even registered. Somewhere in the events of the evening, I've become someone else entirely.

Slowly, Aaron rises from his seat, pointing at himself and raising his eyebrows. A question. I nod at him, and he stares at me a long moment before he nods in return. Then he makes his way up to the stage to stand in front of me. I watch him the whole way, thinking,
This is it. This is him
.
The person I'll spend the rest of my life with.

Or die with.

Suddenly, I'm terribly shy, struck dumb by both the connection I feel with this relative stranger and the complete foolishness of what I've just done. What kind of idiot basically proposes to a man when she barely knows his name, much less his number? And yet...he's still standing here, apparently just as foolish as me. That has to mean something, even if it's only that we're equally imbecilic.

Judge Crawler sighs, making no effort to hide his annoyance and derision.

“State your name,” he demands impatiently.

Instead of answering, Aaron steps closer to me, taking my hands and sending a thrill through my body. Touching him is fire and ice and trembling and forgetting everything that is going on around me. It's magical. It's terrifying.

“I'm worried that this is about your friends...” he murmurs, softly enough that only I can hear. “The two that came together. I just...you have to know that you can't fix their mistake by making one of your own.”

I search his eyes. “If you don't want to do this...”

“I do,” he says quickly. “I do want to. I feel like I'm supposed to be with you, somehow. But I don't want you to regret it. I don't want you to regret...me.”

I shake my head and bite my lip, trying to think of a way to make him understand. “It's not about them. Any of them. It's about...not losing sight of what life means. It's about not losing
myself.
And you're not a mistake. I will never, ever regret you.” As I say the words, I know they are some of the truest I have ever spoken, and that thought gives me hope.

Somewhere in the distance, the judge clears his throat, a curt reminder that we are wasting his time.

“Your name, boy,” he growls. “Now.”

“Aaron Evans,” he replies, finally, keeping his eyes so intently on mine that I blush and look away. The judge notices this and rolls his eyes, groaning, before glancing at his tablet.

“Ahem. Mr. Evans, your algorithm result is...”

“I don't care,” Aaron interrupts, turning his gaze from me to the judge. “I accept the offer.”

The judge drops his stylus.

“You what?”

“I accept,” he repeats, more slowly, making no effort to hide his distaste for the man. “I don't need to know my result. This is the part where you congratulate us,
ever
so sincerely, and send us on our merry way. Unless that sounds too difficult for you.”

A slow red flush creeps into the judge's long, angry face.

“Fine,” he hisses through gritted teeth. “Go ahead. But don't expect some kind of happily-ever-after. This isn't a game, and you haven't escaped the laws of our world. You're on the clock now. It's only a matter of time.”

Unperturbed, Aaron smiles at me. “Shall we?” he says. I nod. As he leads me through the exit to the auditorium, I look back over my shoulder and find the judge still watching us, hands clenched. Seething. Somehow, I don't think his final words were meaningless drivel or idle threats. He knows something we don't, a thought that should terrify me. And does, sort of. But despite the judge's ominous prophecy, and despite the knowledge that I've just thrown away my chance for an easy, uneventful future, I feel peace settling over me – the same peace I was hoping for when I prayed in the examination room. When we reach the door to the Room of Blessing and Aaron asks me if I'm ready, I take a deep breath and smile at him.

“I guess I have to be, don't I?” And I open the door.