Assimilation (Concordia Series Book 1) (8 page)

“Sorry!” I blurt, rushing back to the dining room, still holding the glasses.  I set them down but move toward the servette again.  I have to get out.

I run in the direction we originally came from.  I don’t know which slides to take to get back to Ritter’s, but I don’t intend on trying, anyway. I just want to put some distance between their house and my constant
wrongness.

I am used to being awkward…to feeling awkward. Always being the new kid sort of lends itself to that. But here, being the new kid is worse than any of the twelve moves I’ve made back home.  Even the worst move, when I was thirteen and just getting boobs and feeling utterly betrayed by my body amidst a school of complete strangers, was better than this.

I don’t know the rules here. Every moment is a moment to be on guard. Who can live like that? I’m strung so tight I feel like I might shatter into a million pieces.  I desperately want Strega to appear and fold me into himself in that way that he does, the one that makes all the sharp edges of this place smooth out, even if only for a little while.

I stop not far from the Serdas’ keeping and walk back, trying to ignore how cold it is outside, especially for mid-spring. I sit down on the front steps and wrap my arms around my knees.

Melds don’t make much noise when they open the way doors do. No hinges to squeak, I guess. The light breeze rustling through the trees is enough to cover the whisper of the meld. I jump a little when I hear footsteps echo on the porch floor, but I don’t turn around.

I’m surprised when it is Melayne that sits down beside me instead of Ritter. Tears leap up when her arm goes around my shoulders.

“You are having a decidedly rough day,” she says.

The corner of my mouth twitches. Surprising. I don’t feel the least bit like laughing.

“I’m sorry,” I apologize again.  I have a feeling I’m going to be doing it a lot for the next week. I put my head down on my knees.

“What for?  I should be apologizing to you for my idiot husband. He’s…” she trails off. “It’s complicated.  He’s really not the jerk he seems to be.”

“No,” I say, squeezing my eyes shut as my cheeks grow hot all over again. “I’m sorry I walked in on you. On…whatever that was.”

“On…” she pauses, her voice full of puzzlement. “Oh! In the servette? That?”

I don’t answer.  I nod and hope she can see it because I can’t bear to speak.

“We were tracing,” she says quietly. “But I don’t guess you know what that means, right?”

I make a noise that I hope sounds like agreement, my face still pressed into my knees.

“Davinney, it wasn’t anything to be embarrassed about,” she says, tugging gently at my hair until I turn my face toward her. I don’t lift it. It feels heavy. Everything feels impossibly heavy these days.

She holds out her arm so that her Idix picks up the light from the street lamps and gleams. She runs her finger along one of the lines, stopping on one of the circles.  “Tracing can be very intimate, but it isn’t about sex,” she says.  “We’re all made up of energy. And when you allow someone to trace the paths of your Idix, you’re exchanging that energy. It’s like letting them into your soul. It isn’t necessarily just for your mate.  Parents trace their children and vice versa. Friends trace friends,” she shrugs.  “You have to choose carefully who you trace, though. Because you can’t always control the parts of you they’ll discover. And if someone ever traces you against your will,” she adds, “that’s a violation of the abuse standard.”

I guess she can tell by my expression that I don’t understand what she’s talking about.

“When someone traces you, they sort of blend into you. Whatever memory or feeling comes to the surface…it’s like they live it, too.  You can’t control it.  No one knows why you can’t or even why tracing is possible. You just…get what you get. So you better be sure you can handle it if you let someone inside.”

Melayne is silent for a long time. “Davinney, I hope we can be friends.  Scuva and I just moved out here, and we haven’t met too many people yet. Seems like a mere hour is too far for a lot of people to travel for a visit,” she says bitterly.  “And I think you could use a friend right now. I can’t imagine how you must be feeling, but if I’m anywhere close, I would hate to be alone at a time like this. Ritter has my codes. Use them anytime.  I’m not functioning right now since we’re still setting up our keeping, so I’ll have a lot of free time this week.”

I nod, my face turned back into my knees. Tentatively, she touches my shoulder.

“Things will get better, Davinney.  I know that probably sounds like a whole lot of wrong, but they will.”

I nod again as another set of footsteps sound on the porch floor.

“Melayne,” Ritter says, and I hear the rustling sounds that most likely mean they’re swiping each other’s foreheads. “Thanks for dinner.  We should be going.  Beautiful keeping, by the way.”

“Thank you.  It’s not quite up to par yet, but we’ll get there.”

“Are you kidding?” Ritter jokes. “If I just switched keepings, there’d be cartons all over the place.”

Her voice drops. “You didn’t see the third unit, did you?  Floor to ceiling cartons.”

Ritter laughs appreciatively.

“I hope you’ll come again.”

“Of course,” he says.

Melayne glances at me as I stand up, hugging myself in the chill night air. “Let me get you a jacket, Davinney. We look about the same size.”

I don’t argue. I’m freezing, and after sitting on the steps for so long, I almost can’t feel my butt. When she returns, she helps me into the jacket and then, predictably, swipes my forehead. I echo the gesture awkwardly, but she grins.

“Have a safe slide back!”

She watches in the meldway as we head off down the walk.

The ride home is silent. Lonely. I want to ask Ritter if he’s angry with me.  I don’t feel anger coming off of him, but I wonder why he doesn’t speak to me. I’ve made such a mess of the night I’m afraid to speak to him first, even though I want to ask him why Melayne and Scuva looked at me with such puzzled recognition at the unwind earlier today. I also want to ask what the consequence will be for stealing me from Attero.  I’ve been so focused on the possibility that I will be stranded here, I haven’t thought much about what the punishment is.

I feel horribly selfish all the way around. All he wanted was for me to keep my arm covered so that no one would know I’m not from Concordia. And every time he’s asked me to hide it, I’ve ended up all but shouting it from the rooftops.

No matter what the potential consequences, eight (now seven) days can’t pass quickly enough for me.

7

YOU WOULD THINK that my track record would stop Ritter from introducing me to anyone else, but I meet several other friends over the next two days. I somehow manage to keep from outing myself, much to Ritter’s relief. None of them give me the odd looks the Serdas did. He’s never mentioned the night at Melayne and Scuva’s, and I’m too much of a coward to do so, either. 

He seems relieved, though, when Melayne calls that evening, two nights after the disastrous dinner party.  We talk for so long he apologizes when he has to ask for his logger back.  “I’ve got an old one around here somewhere that we might be able to get running for you,” he says.

When he returns to the living room, he holds up a logger and says, “Found it.  Just needs a charge, and you’ll be all set.”

I wait until he’s settled back on the sofa and ask him the question I’ve been asking for the last two days.  “Ritter, are you going to introduce me to your family?”

He blinks.

“I know,” I say, trying not to feel hurt at the wary look that passes quickly over his face. Like it’s the last thing he’d ever do. I suppose that’s why anger blooms in my chest and invades my mouth. “The least you can do after taking me away from my family is introduce me to yours!” I regret my words immediately.

He flinches, but he doesn’t argue.  Instead he stares at his hands and says wearily, “It’s just that you look like someone I used to know. That’s why I kept staring at you on Attero.  I wanted to talk to you, but I didn’t know what to say.”

“Used to know?”

He nods down at his lap. “Yes. She…” He pauses. “She died last year. Ended,” he says, remembering his resolve to help me commit to Concordian English.
“You look…” He forces himself to meet my eyes. “You look a lot like her,” he repeats.

That explains the funny looks the Serdas gave me.

Moments later, with a sigh of resignation, he swipes the screen of his logger, watching me as he listens.  “Hi, Mom. I can’t talk long, but I was wondering if I could come by tomorrow after all. My schedule just opened up. Great. See you then. Me, too.”

He tosses the logger on the cushion between us, looking like he wants to say something more. I feel the same way. What I want to say, it isn’t an apology, exactly, for all but accusing him of keeping me from my family.  It was the truth. Ugly, but true. No matter how much I wish I didn’t, some part of me resents his intervention that night.  But I was too blunt.

What keeps me from apologizing is the subtle jab in his logger conversation. His plans opened up after all.  Which means that his mother invited him for something and he lied to her, made an excuse. He doesn’t have to tell me that I was the excuse…the reason he begged off on seeing his own family.  I’m messing up his life, too.

“This whole thing is so complicated, Davinney.” He shakes his head.  “I can’t explain it, but you have to understand that I am not angry with you. And I’m not ashamed of you.  The Tribunal…” he tapers off.

“Tell me something about them,” I say.

“About the Tribunal?” he asks, puzzled.

“No,” I reply, rolling my eyes. “About your family.”

“I’m adopted,” he says. “My parents died in a slide accident when I was ten. I didn’t have any other family. Strega and I were best friends, so his parents petitioned the Tribunal and were granted custody.”

“Wow. I’m sorry.”

His face shutters over. “It is what it is.”

I watch him for a few seconds, but he offers nothing else.

I wonder if he can feel it, the burst of pain that explodes in my chest whenever I think of home.  Maybe he can. Or maybe he can only see it. Maybe that’s why he and everyone else avoids asking me about them, about my life on Attero. Like my feelings are a disease they want to avoid catching. Maybe that’s why he doesn’t reciprocate.

After a few more minutes, he rises from the sofa and stretches. “I think I’m going to surf the rift,” he says with a yawn.

I’m tired, too, but not quite ready to sleep.  I think about turning on the viewer, but I haven’t really figured out Concordia’s version of television yet.

I think I hate the evenings the most, being stuck in my head after the activities of the day have ended and we’re back at Ritter’s keeping.  He’s done what he can to distract us. Meeting his friends, showing me the quadrant, sharing some of his herald knowledge with me.  In the end, though, in the dark and quiet hours, both of us hear the ticking of the clock winding down to Tribunal day.  Both of us dread it for different reasons, but in the dread we are one.

Just as I’m wishing desperately for a distraction, I hear the tone that says someone is standing outside the meld.  I wave my hand over the glass and the meldspy shows me Strega rocking on his heels, waiting for one of us to let him in.

He smiles slowly at me when the meld opens.  There are questions in his eyes as I move aside to let him in.  I’m not sure if they’re a caretaker’s questions or a friend’s, but I welcome either type. Anything’s better than being stuck in my head.

“Hi,” I say.

He sees the bandage on my hand and frowns.  “You hurt yourself? You didn’t come to me?”

“It’s okay,” I tell him, even as he’s taking my hand in his own. Something in me grows warm as he cradles it, cupping my elbow and leading me into the cleanse. “Ritter’s friend, Melayne, patched me up.”

“But she’s not a caretaker,” he replies. He seems offended by it somehow. He looks at me several times as he washes his hands, like he wants to say something.

“That’s true,” I say as he unwraps the bandage.

He does nothing to disguise his dismay.  “It looks alright,” he says grudgingly.

I fight a smile. It feels good. It’s the first time in days I’ve felt anything resembling more than fleeting humor. “Isn’t that a good thing?” I ask, equally unable to keep the mirth out of my voice.

Strega peeks up at my face and the irritation in his gives way to a reluctant smile. “Yes, of course,” he admits. “But you should always come to me if you’re hurt. I’m your caretaker.”

My mouth quirks higher. “
My
caretaker? My very own caretaker for ever and ever?” I’m not sure he’ll understand my teasing. Nothing ever seems to translate with him.

He is, in fact, a little baffled by my humor. He nods. “Yes.”

He punches something into the MedQuick and out pop two tubes.  Like Ritter and Melayne, he explains their contents. The first is the numbing agent. The second is the ointment. I don’t have the heart to tell him that Melayne used exactly the same things or that she wrapped it exactly the same way.  He is very possessive of his medicine. And there’s something deeper in his touch, something Melayne doesn’t have.  That familiar, odd sense of calm washes over me as he smooths the bandage down.

“Ritter’s in his unit,” I say, suddenly feeling awkward.

Strega releases my hand and glances at the meldway leading into Ritter’s unit. The cleanse sits in the middle of both units and has a meld leading into each of them and a third meld that opens into a little hall off the living room. “It’s early,” he says. “Is he okay?”

I shrug. Strega turns back to me.

“What about you? How are you?”

I don’t know how to answer that. I’m okay physically, except for my hand.  But I’m not sure about the rest. Mentally. Emotionally. One second feeling in awe of this place called Concordia, with all its technological wonders and the cleanliness of the streets and buildings. There is obvious pride in so many places.  The happiness you can’t help but notice in the citizens even in passing. But in the next second, I’m so desperately homesick I almost can’t breathe. The differences are glaring and grating. Flawed or not, dirty or not, I’d return to my streets in a heartbeat if I could. Because my streets contain my people…my parents, my friends, my dog, my teachers…even Jake Armadice.  I’d take them all if I could. The good, the bad. The
mine.

Strega doesn’t ask again. Instead, out come the silver fingertip disks, which he presses to my temples. The sharp edges of my thoughts blur and smear as if someone took an eraser to them.

“What are those things?” I ask moments later when he drops them into the low pockets on either side of his caretaker’s shirt.

“These?” he asks, pulling them back out.

“Those,” I agree.  He lets them slide back into his pockets.

“They’re called alpha inducers. They help calm the mind.”

I don’t tell him that even though they work, they don’t actually cure what ails me.  They only…stave it off. He’s also proud of his devices.

“Well,” he says, giving the meld to Ritter’s unit another glance.  “I guess I’ll go.  Can you tell Ritter to check his logs tomorrow?”

“Sure,” I agree, walking Strega to the meldway. When he turns, I start to swipe his forehead, startled when he captures my hand.

“The lady never goes first,” he says, and completes the gesture. Then he releases my hand so I can swipe back. “Not unless it is between two women.  And then, if it’s known, the oldest goes first.”

“What does it mean?” I ask.

“It’s a blessing,” he says, “a wish for well-being.  It started during the reconstruction, when the ashes in the air made people dark with grime. You would reach out to someone you cared for and wipe the ashes from their face so they’d be clean, starting with their forehead. Going down and to the right is a symbol of benign intent, that you’re friendly and you mean them no harm.”

He seems to think I’ve heard of the reconstruction.  Because it’s late and I’m tired, I don’t ask. I figure that if it is part of Concordia’s history, I’ll learn about it soon enough. Probably from Ritter, who knows quite a lot about the history of Concordia.

“But why do men and elders go first?” I ask as he stands in the meldway.

“Because,” is all he says.

I stare after him as he walks to the curb and turns left. I stare until I can’t see him anymore.

Ritter is silent beside me on the slide, but he can’t sit still. His knee bounces, his fingers stroke the case of his logger. Periodically he rubs his hands along his pants as if to dry them. 

When I woke up this morning, I told Ritter about Strega’s visit and that he should check his logs.  He’d checked them but had not replied to Strega, which I only know because when Ritter helped me set up his old logger today and how to import Mina’s, Melayne’s and Strega’s codes, I sent them all a quick log so they’d have mine. Strega instantly logged back.

“Did you tell Ritter to check his logs?”

I don’t know how to respond. I don’t want to hurt Strega’s feelings. I don’t know why Ritter hasn’t responded.  I close my logger and put it in my pocket and try to ignore the insistent weight.

Ritter’s parents are almost three hours away to the southeast. We take three supersonics and two regulars to get there, arriving early in the afternoon. The first thing I notice is the heat. It feels more like Surprise outside. I desperately want to shove my sleeves up my arms, but I leave them down.

Just like the Serdas’, Ritter’s family lives in a visually different neighborhood. Their property is on a large plot of land, surrounded by an adobe fence. I half expect the gate to be a meld, ridiculously out of place where wood should be, but it isn’t. It’s wood. Bright turquoise, in fact, and it creaks when Ritter reluctantly pushes it open. Beyond it lies the house, with curving, sloping natural mud walls and ordinary windows like I am used to. Except, of course, for the meld, which seems so out of place.

There’s a party. Ritter says it is basically what we call a barbecue on Attero.  Much of the rest of his family is supposed to be here. From the sound of it, most everyone showed up. The happy screams of children playing and the baritone laughter of men travel to us as we make our way to the meld.

When it opens, a woman with Strega’s gentle eyes breaks into a huge smile, but then her eyes flick my way and her expression turns to one of absolute horror. Her hand flies to her mouth, but she’s too late to stifle the cry.

“Ritter! What have you done?”

I feel like I’ve been slapped but don’t know why.  My sleeves are down.  I haven’t said a word. But she knows something is wrong.  I flash back on Ritter’s words from the night before. 
It’s just that you look like someone I used to know.
I back up a step, but Ritter grabs my wrist in his left hand and pushes past the woman with the other. As I open my mouth to ask Ritter who it is that I look like, the woman—his mother, I think—calls out for someone.

“Harmon!”

I resist the urge to flee. I am the one who pushed this meeting, and now I know why Ritter tried to avoid it. 

Harmon, who resembles Strega even more strongly, ushers us all into the living room.  I like him instantly because he’s like Strega. His expression makes it clear that he, too, is rattled, but he approaches the uncertainty without fanfare.

After a quick round of introductions, what is obvious to me is confirmed. Harmon and Zula Bocek are Strega’s birth parents and Ritter’s adoptive ones.

“Ritter,” his father says, reaching for a pitcher of liquid that was already prepared and waiting for Ritter’s arrival. Cascade, I think the drink is called…water infused with several notes of citrus and a variety of cool melons. He passes a plate of the mildly sweet lemony wafers I’ve come to enjoy over the last several days of meetings like these.