GLAZE (24 page)

I grab a handful of Ethan’s t-shirt. ‘They’re all looking for me,’ I say. ‘All of them.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Don’t you see? Everyone with a chip is sending data straight back to WhiteInc. Everyone on Glaze, whether they want to be or not. Nowhere’s safe. Nowhere.’
 

Ethan glances at the people up ahead. ‘Are you… are you sure?’ He sounds as terrified as I feel.

‘Eyes everywhere,’ I say. ‘I can see. They can see.’ I lean my head against his chest.
 

‘We’ll have to hide you then.’
 

He pulls off his hoodie and hands it to me. He’s only wearing a thin shirt underneath.
 

‘No. You’ll freeze.’

‘I’ll be fine. Put it on.’
 

I push my arms into the dark sleeves then struggle to zip it up with my numb hands. Ethan takes over and zips it to the top and finishes off by pulling the hood up and over my face. It hangs low over my eyes.
 

‘There, all you need is a stealthscarf and you’d look like any other looter. Now come on.’

I go to follow him and stop. ‘Wait.’
 

There’s a camera on the lamppost next to us. I squeeze my fists tight under the too-long sleeves, my nails digging into my palms, and focus on that camera.
 

It works. The street ahead appears in grainy black and white, with a jerky, too slow frame rate that makes my head ache. I’m looking as if through the eyes of the lens.
 

To the left, two policemen patting down a young boy, his arms splayed against a wall, abandoned shoes boxes by his feet. To the right, people, watching and trying to look disinterested.
 

‘Go right,’ I say.
 

We step onto the high street and turn right. I keep my head down and allow Ethan to guide me through the crowds. I let go of the camera feed and pick up another, like Tarzan swinging from vine to vine. Somehow I know I’m viewing the street through the eyes of someone from WhiteShield. And he’s coming straight for us.
 

I yank Ethan inside a shop. Broken glass crunches under our feet. This shop has already been raided.
 

‘What’s going on?’ Ethan asks, as I squat down behind an empty shelf.
 

‘Wait,’ I say, pulling him down.
 

‘Can I help you?’ A pink-faced shopkeeper glares at us, bouncing a baseball bat in his hands.
 

‘Now?’ Ethan says, anxiously, looking at the man.
 

‘Wait,’ I say again. The view I’m seeing gets closer to the shop.
 

‘If you give me any more trouble, I swear to Allah, I will crush your head.’ The man stomps towards us.

‘Now?’ Ethan says, desperate.
 

The WhiteShield officer reaches the shop, gives the shopkeeper the briefest of glances, and walks on. He didn’t see us.
 

‘Now!’ I say and we dart out of the shop away from the crowd.
 

We leave the high street, taking side roads, winding away from the hustle of people.
 

I let my focus drift. Max is out there, looking for me. I sense him, sorting through feeds that are meant to be private but are, I now realise, never private from the people who control Glaze itself. I can almost sense his frustration.
 

Every time we pass someone I check Ethan’s hood is covering my face. I pick up the trails of their feed as they pass by: snippets of conversation; routes they’re following on overlay maps. It’s lucky for me they’re so wrapped up in their own lives that they hardly even see me.
 

I flinch as all of the images on my feed are replaced with single network-wide message.

// C
URFEW
HAS
BEEN
CALLED
. P
LEASE
RETURN
TO
YOUR
HOMES
. P
LEASE
RETURN
TO
YOUR
HOMES
. //

The message fades and the unwanted images return. I know that everyone who is hooked up is now peacefully making their way back home. Leaving the streets to the others: those who are too young, too old or too criminal to get hooked up. Ethan and I belong to them now.
 

‘I can’t. I need. Stop,’ I say, my words as fractured as the images I’m receiving. My legs are shaking and I don’t know if I can go on much longer.
 

‘Is it safe to?’
 

I push my hood back and nod. ‘Everyone on Glaze is going home. We have only cameras and police to hide from now.’

‘Only cameras and police, hey? Well, that should be easy,’ Ethan says dryly.
 

He leads me to a low wall in front of a closed shop and I take a seat. The brick feels rough through my jeans.
 

Ethan stays standing, watching over me. He’s silent and I’m grateful.
 

I take a deep breath and let the flow of information wash over me. At first it’s overwhelming, but slowly, I start to feel more in control.

It reminds me of when Zizi took me swimming when I was little. I failed horribly: I never could get my limbs to cooperate with each other and I’d always swallow too much water. But what I used to love was sinking down to the bottom of the pool and sitting on the tiled floor with my legs crossed. I’d stay down there as long as my breath would allow, watching the bodies flail about above me. In the moment before my lungs would start to burn and I’d be forced to return to the surface, in those few seconds, I felt free.
 

Sitting here, letting all the information in, feels like that. In a moment, I’ll need to return to the surface, gasping for air. But for now, things seem clearer.
 

There are themes that repeat over and over. A lot of talk about the virus and what was it. But then mundane stuff, like what’s on TV or what people are eating. And sex. So much sex. People watching it, thinking about it, filming themselves doing it. I flinch every time I’m confronted with yet another contorted face. Why are people doing this? Putting their most intimate moments up on Glaze. Don’t they realise they can be watched? Stupid question, I think. Of course they don’t realise. Up until about twenty minutes ago I didn’t realise. Is this the secret Logan wanted me to know?
 

I think of Ryan, and wonder what he’s doing now.
 

Then I know. I see a single image—Amy’s face filling my sight—and I know I’m looking through Ryan’s eyes. Amy is shouting, her normally pretty face made ugly in rage. The auto-captioning starts without me even willing it.
 

// Y
OU
DID
THIS
TO
ME
! Y
OU
PUT
THAT
VIDEO
OUT
THERE
. A
ND
NOW
EVERYONE
’
S
CALLING
ME
A
SLUT
. W
HEN
YOU
’
RE
THE
SLUT
, R
YAN
. Y
OU
’
RE
THE
SCUM
! //

Ryan closes his eyes, breaking my connection. I close my eyes too, trying to block out the image of Amy’s tear-stained face. She found out about the video after all. Logan was right. There are no more secrets. Our mistakes follow us for ever now. Scars etched onto our souls for all to see.
 

 
When I open my eyes I can see an image of a girl on a roundabout, and I know, without really knowing how, it’s a father playing back old memories as he tries to fall asleep.
 

‘I think I’m getting a grip.’

‘How?’ says Ethan.
 

‘I don’t know, but if I think of someone, someone I know, it’s like I can centre in on their feed. It’s less random. But I can still see things I’m not meant to be able to see. This stuff, it’s not publicly streaming. It’s like I can… ’
 

‘Spy on them?’
 

It’s what I didn’t want to say, but Ethan is right. That’s exactly what I’m doing. Whether it’s the feed from the drones and CCTVs all around me, or the lives of normal people, I can see everything they see. And if I can see it, so can Max.
 

The laughing face of the girl on the roundabout is replaced with an image of Max from some PR event or other. His too-white teeth and his too-large smile loom down on me like something out of a nightmare. I flinch and turn away from the image.

‘You can focus on anyone you know?’ Ethan says, resting his hand on my arm.
 

‘I don’t know. Maybe?’ I say, opening my eyes again. The image of Max is still there.
 

Ethan opens his mouth as if he has an idea and then stops.
 

‘What?’

He looks uncertain, as if what he’s about to suggest might be a really bad idea.
 

‘What?’ I say again, irritated. I want it all to go away.
 

‘Kiara?’ It’s the merest suggestion of her name, as if he’s afraid to speak it. At first I’m confused. He doesn’t even know her. I know I told him about her being affected like those other people, like my mother and that man, how she’s in a coma... and then I understand.
 

‘Kiara,’ I say.
 

My focus shifts. I’m looking up at a ceiling. It’s covered in glow-in-the-dark stars, spread across the white paint seemingly randomly. I pick out the constellation of Leo amid the mass of glowing green. And Cassiopeia is there too. And that’s all. Kiara’s ceiling in her bedroom.
 

‘Navigating by stars,’ I say.
 

Ethan doesn’t ask what I mean. He readjusts the hood of his top over my head.
 

As long as I focus on Kiara all I can see are those glowing stars. The relief is almost overwhelming.
 

‘That was a good idea,’ I say, wiping a tear from my eyes. ‘Weird and creepy, but good.’ I feel more myself. More able to organise my thoughts. The relief is unlike anything I’ve experienced. It’s like lying on cool grass after a long-distance run.

He laughs. ‘Gee, weird and creepy. Just what every guy wants to hear.’
 

‘Yes, but you’re not every guy, are you?’ I say.
 

The dull haze of a sol-light blends with the glow of the stars to illuminate his smile. He takes my hand and helps me to my feet.
 

‘We’re here,’ he says five minutes later.
 

We’ve stopped in front of a large, white building, with big double doors and a broken sign that used to read
Albion Hotel.
Only the letters b and t are missing. All the windows have been boarded up and it doesn’t look like anyone’s been here in years.
 

‘Where’s here?’ I say.
 

‘My place.’

‘You live in an abandoned hotel?’ I ask, following him down a set of stairs that lead off the pavement and towards the basement level. My legs shake as I bend them on each step, but I’m starting to feel more in control.
 

‘Dad and I stayed here, when Mum first kicked him out. I kinda liked it.’ He shrugs, and pulls aside a wooden plank covering a window. I squeeze through into the room.
 

I’m hit by the smell of damp. In the light bleeding through the cracks in the board, I make out mould creeping up the peeling wallpaper and grey patches spreading out from the corners of the ceiling.
 

‘You live here?’

‘For now,’ he says, dropping onto the floor beside me and replacing the wooden board.
 

‘It’s, um...’ I say, trying to find the words. And then, because I remind myself of Max I force myself to finish. ‘It’s cosy.’

‘It’s a shit-hole, Petri; you don’t have to lie. But it’s a temporary shit-hole.’

‘That’s the first time I’ve heard you swear,’ I say, more comfortable now that we both know this place sucks.
 

‘Yeah, you’re having such a good influence on me.’
 

He laughs and I laugh too.
 

I look around at the room. It was obviously once a guest room; it has a big double bed in the centre of the room, a large cupboard and small sideboard over a mini-bar fridge.
 

‘Do you want anything?’ he says.
 

‘What have you got?’

‘Well, let me see.’ He bends down and opens the fridge door. ‘We have a bag of crisps that has been open for a few days, a box of cereal—but no milk. Oh, some sweets.’ He straightens up, holding a yellow bag of jellies.
 

‘Sweets would be amazing.’ I hold out my hands and he throws the bag into them. I grab a handful of sugar-coated candy, not caring what colour they are, and shove them into my mouth. The sugar rushes through my blood and I can feel it tingling in my hands and feet. I’ve never tasted anything better.
 

I collapse on the edge of the bed. It creaks under my weight. Ethan lifts himself up onto the sideboard and watches me, his legs swinging. I’m struck by how exceptional this boy is, by everything he’s done for me, from the moment he stopped me being hit in the riot to now. And why? Because I saved him from Dave Carlton a year ago, even though I now know he’d have been more than able to handle Dave and his goons himself? Can it be as simple as that?
 

‘Being with me is dangerous, you know,’ I say. ‘If they catch me, I don’t know what they’ll do with you.’

‘I’ll take the risk,’ he says smiling.
 

‘You know what’s weird though?’

‘You mean besides absolutely everything we’ve been through?’

 
‘Besides that. What’s weird is you’re the only person I’m safe with right now.’

‘Because I’m what, so manly?’ he says, a smirk twisting his face.
 

I scowl at him. ‘No, because you don’t have a chip. Anyone else could be used by Max to find me. Even if they didn’t want to help, they wouldn’t have a choice. But you, I don’t have to worry about. What are the chances? Nearly a billion people on Glaze. But not you.’