Fast-Tracked (22 page)

It’s quite possible that I would have eventually forgotten about Byron completely and lost myself entirely to the fast-tracker world, if a series of events hadn’t occurred.

Autumn had just moved out of my apartment. To celebrate, Avery threw a party at his house. It was the first party he had thrown at his new home since it had been built earlier this year. He wouldn’t openly admit it, but he was anxious for it to be a success.

Unsurprisingly, he brought in a new batch of servants to help things along. I was so caught up in the party that I wouldn’t have even noticed the additional servants if it hadn’t been for one girl.

I had been laughing and joking with
Autumn
over the ridiculous outfits some of the girls had worn, when I heard a young girl plead, “Please, I don’t want to. Please just leave me alone.” Her voice had been barely a whisper, but there was something eerily familiar about it.

Autumn was already off saying hello to a friend that just arrived, so she didn’t notice me searching for the owner of the small voice.

My eyes found a girl standing in the far corner of the room, cornered by Slade. I couldn’t tell what Slade was saying to her, but his tone was taunting. And the girl looked absolutely petrified. My stomach rolled with nausea, which took me by surprise. I had gotten used to scenes like this. Seeing fast-trackers taunting and teasing the servants for their amusement didn’t shock me anymore. But something about this girl had gotten to me.

I watched her for a moment trying to figure out just what it was. She seemed to notice my stare and with her pale blue eyes she pleaded for my help. That’s when it hit me: her voice, her eyes, and her curly, light brown hair. She reminded me of Camille. Suddenly it took all my restraint to keep me from ripping Slade’s hair out as he continued to torment the girl.

I knew I had to do something but I needed to be smart about it. I quickly made my way over to Slade and grabbed his shoulder and turned him around. “Hey, Slade, have you seen Sapphire around? I’ve looked everywhere for her,” I lied in a jovial and slightly slurred voice. I knew Sapphire wasn’t here tonight; her parents had made plans she couldn’t get out of. But hopefully he’d blame my interruption on tipsiness.

Pretending to be oblivious to what I’d just interrupted, I ordered the girl, “I’m cold. Go get my sweater. I left it in the kitchen.” Quickly she scampered away to retrieve my non-existent clothing.

“Thanks a lot,” Slade snapped.

“What?” I asked innocently and added a soft hiccup for effect.

“Forget it,” he grumbled. “Sapphire couldn’t make it tonight. She’s not here.” With that, he stomped off.

As soon as he was out of sight I headed to the kitchen and found the girl frantically searching for a sweater. Tears streamed down her face. She flinched and her face went as white as her uniform the moment she caught sight of me.

“I remembered my sweater’s not in here anymore,” I said, trying to calm her. She looked a little less panicked, but the tears still came.

A plan started to form in my head. “How old are you?” I asked.

“I’ll be eighteen next spring,” she whimpered.

I looked at her as if I was examining her, “Are you a hard worker?” She let out a frightened squeak and nodded. “Do you know how to keep your mouth closed?” She nodded. “I’ve been thinking of getting a servant. I’m going to talk to Avery about you. In the meantime I want you to stay out of sight for the night. Slade can be unrelenting with his torment once he’s picked a target. The closet off of the kitchen pantry is a good spot. It has its own lock.”

Before I had a chance to say anything else the girl bowed and disappeared into the pantry. I headed back to the party to socialize as if nothing was wrong. It would seem too suspicious if I said anything to Avery right now.

So I spent the evening laughing, talking and dancing with everyone I knew. It was late in the night before Avery and I were finally alone together.

“You seemed like you enjoyed yourself this evening,” he languidly murmured.

“I did, and I’m pretty sure everyone else did too,” I reassured him.

“Slade was a little miffed. He seemed to be under the impression that you were drunk, but you seem fine now,” Avery pointed our curiously. “He grumbled about you butting in with a servant girl to find Sapphire.”

“Well I have to admit that I did have an ulterior motive when I approached him.” Avery shot me an intrigued look. “I was going to bring it up with you tomorrow. I’ve gotten used to having
Autumn’s
servants around. Seeing as you just got a new batch just for the party…”

“Of course you can have one of the servants – but that doesn’t quite explain why you were harassing Slade.” He raised an eyebrow at me.

“Well, it’s a bit shallow, but I want a pretty servant, and the one he was harassing was just adorable.”

“So what did you do, spend the night protecting her from Slade’s teasing?” Avery joked.

I hung my head, looking appropriately embarrassed. “No. I had her hide in the pantry.”

Avery barked with laughter and drew me onto his lap. “You know, you’re crazy. Why didn’t you just come straight to me?”

I ran my hand through his hair. “I didn’t want to spoil your night. I knew how important it was to you, even without you saying it.”

“Well if she spends the night in the pantry like you told her, you’ll know you’ve made a good choice and can bring her home after breakfast,” he instructed before kissing my neck. The sensation sent shivers through me. It was getting harder to resist him. We both knew I’d be spending the night tonight – it was just a question of which room I wanted to spend it in.

Remembering what was in my best
interests,
I lightly jumped off his lap and gave an exaggerated yawn. “It’s really late. I should be getting to my room.”

A hurt look entered his eyes that I had become very familiar with. I knew what he had been hoping for, but even if my feelings weren’t confused, I couldn’t give in. As a newbie my virtue wasn’t something that could be given away without first getting married.

But despite how much it pained him, Avery respected my wishes. With a long, drawn-out sigh, he led me to a guest bedroom for the night.

I woke up early in the morning and headed down to the pantry. After I reassured the girl that it was me on the other side, she unlocked the door. She had spent the entire night hiding away as I asked. I led her back up to my guest bedroom and explained to her what was happening. It was hard to tell if she was relieved or happy, because she just nodded her agreement. Her face remained stoic. But I could hardly blame her if she doubted what I was saying was true.

So after an extravagant breakfast – Avery had really outdone himself – I brought the girl back to my apartment. Slowly as I gave her a tour of the apartment, and explained what I expected of her she started to relax. But it was talking about
myself
that really made her open up. I guess just knowing that not that long ago I wasn’t that different than her was enough to make her start to trust me.

Her name was Wendy
Bernally
. Her parents had been red level workers, up until two months ago. There had been a fire in their house. Wendy had a sleepover at her friend’s house that night. She was fine – but both her parents died from smoke inhalation. Her parents didn’t have any blood relatives, and the law doesn’t allow friends to act as guardian, so Wendy was sent to live in a worker class orphanage.

As a worker level orphan, Wendy lost the rank and level her parents had provided her. She wasn’t even entitled to any saved up income credit her parents had. They were all turned over to the orphanage to cover expenses, which was a complete joke. The orphanage only kept children until a fast-tracker family had a use for cheap labor. Wendy had managed to hide during all the previous ‘shopping’ visits fast-trackers had made to the orphanage. She had hoped to hide long enough to take the assessment test in the spring. But the day Avery and his father came
shopping,
another orphan had found and taken over her hiding spot, leaving her out in the open.

“You’ll still be able to take the assessment test,” I reassured her. “Think of my apartment as your home. While it’s important to keep up appearances whenever there is company, when we’re alone talk freely to me, and utilize my tablets to further your studies. I expect you to study hard. When you test this spring, I want you to be able to choose the job of your dreams,” I explained as she helped me move my belongings back into my bedroom.

Her frightened grimace was slowly replaced by a hopeful smile. But I could tell she still had her doubts. She insisted on treating me as her superior and waiting on me as much as I’d allow. It made for an uncomfortable first day together.

That’s what drove me to go running in the middle of the day. That’s what caused me to finally run into Byron again. I wasn’t looking for him – I had completely given up trying to find him. I had convinced myself that he didn’t want to be found, or that he had found someone to swap jobs with finally.

He had his back turned to me, but I easily recognized him. The moment I saw him I knew I had been lying to myself. I had stopped looking for him and stopped thinking about him because it was too painful to remember. Seeing him brought all my buried feelings right back to the surface.

He was softly singing
Little Tiger
to himself – not a good sign. He was an incredible singer and spent a lot of time singing. However, he saved the simple children’s songs for when he was upset – too upset to remember lyrics or carry a real tune. These songs were for when he just wanted to completely drown out all thoughts.

For a moment I considered passing by without making myself known to him. Then I noticed his shoulders shake and heard his fresh tears choke off the last line of his song. Without thinking, I walked up and place my hand on his shoulder as I quietly sang, “
Silly little tiger, climbing little tiger, stuck up in a tree.
”

He closed his eyes as if he were in pain and breathed, “
Lexi
.” It was barely a whisper, but the sadness it carried made me regret my decision.

“I’ll go.” I started to turn away, but then I felt the rough skin of his hand clasp around mine.

“No. Don’t,” he pleaded.

I turned in surprise at the sound of his voice and bumped right into his chest. He had been so mean and angry the last few times we’d met, that his kind tone was the last thing I expected. His arms closed around me as he gingerly lifted me and swung me behind the rosebushes.

His entire body was shaking beneath my touch. He leaned his face in to mine, but then he hesitated. He was so close that I could feel the warmth of his breath on my lips. I locked my arms around his neck and pulled him in the rest of the way in. His kiss started out soft and gentle but then it becoming fierce, fiery and full of need. The touch of his salty lips on mine caused a painful ache to form deep within me – embers almost extinguished were relit. My entire body yearned for the deep connection that it had been denied for so long. His kisses made my pulse race and my breath quicken, but there was so much more to it. I had been empty, missing a part of my soul without him.

I allowed my hands to wander, across his shoulders, and up and down his back and arms – but something was off. Something about him just didn’t feel the same. He must have felt my tension because he broke our embrace. That’s when I finally got a good look at him. His clothes hung loosely on him now. The dark circles around his eyes had darkened – now they looked permanent. His face now had a gaunt look to it, and his skin had taken on a sickly gray tone. Even his hair seemed thinner.

Brenda Shall had always been on the chubby side until the year she became bulimic. She dropped a lot of weight quickly and had a lot of the same characteristics that Byron had now, right before she collapsed and ended up in the hospital. But Byron never had weight or self-image issues. There was only one explanation I could think of for his current condition. Someone was messing with his rations. He was slowly being starved.

I gasped. I pulled my hand to my mouth as if that could somehow hide my horror. Just because it was too painful, I had put Byron out of my mind. But my denial hadn’t done a thing for his pain and suffering. I was a wretched, horrible person.

“I know I’ve looked better, but I didn’t think I looked bad enough to make people cry,” he joked as he gently wiped the tears from my eyes.

“How wrong is this? You’re the one being starved, but you’re comforting me,” I moaned. “You have to tell me what’s going on. Who’s cutting your rations?” I demanded.

“It doesn’t matter,” he grumbled and tried to turn away from me.

Since the assessment letter, whenever I reached out, he pushed me away. And I had let him – but now I had to put a stop to it. I grabbed into his arm and spun him back around. I could feel through his sleeve just how thin his arm had gotten – he had started losing muscle. “It
does
matter. Tell me who it is. I don’t have much pull yet, but some of my friends do. I might be able to do something about it.”

“No. No you can’t. Not unless you can get me out of this job and into an industrial area or some other place that is predominately working class,” he protested in a defeated tone.

I looked back at him, confused. “That doesn’t make sense. You want a more dangerous, more physically demanding job? A garbage collector might be a smelly, dirty job, but as far as orange level positions go, it’s pretty cushy,” I argued.