Nova (18 page)

My words trail off. Michael is laughing. In little chuckles at first, and then larger hoots, and then finally great big belly laughs. He’s actually crying a little bit, he’s laughing so hard, a tear hovering in the corner of his eye. I stand there, stunned as he laughs his head off at my deepest, darkest secret. Of all the reactions I’d imagined, this was the last one I’d expected.

After a minute, he finally calms down. He wipes his eyes with the back of his hand and shakes his head. “Geez, Lia, you sure had me going for a minute. Going off on a freighter, being a Tellurian spy . . . I don’t know how you always come up with this stuff.”

In answer, I activate my chit and silently pull up my freighter contract.

“It’s true then? You’re really leaving?” Michael asks, the smile dying on his face as he takes in the contract.

“It’s true.”

He takes a breath, and then another, and another, almost as if he’s girding himself up for something. At last he says, “It’s the kiss, isn’t it? That’s why you’re going away.”

“The kiss?”

“I should have known after the way you lit out of there.”

“No, it wasn’t that. I explained—”

“Come on, Lia! Do I look like a complete deficient? Do you really think I believed that complete pile of slag you tried to feed me about avoiding some officer? At the time, I thought you were just trying to spare my feelings, that you didn’t know how to tell me you just wanted to be friends. In fact, that’s what I thought you were coming here to tell me.”

He whirls away and paces a couple steps, then comes back, his mouth pressed in a thin line. “You know, if you didn’t want to be with me, you could have just said so. You didn’t have to sign on to some freighter and make up some stupid story about being a spy. We’re not kids anymore, Lia. Grow up!”

“But—”

“You want to go? Fine, go!”

“Michael, it’s not like that!” I grab his arm as he turns to leave, and the rose falls out of my hair. He angrily shakes off my grip.

“No? Then what’s it like?”

My mouth flaps a couple times, no ready answer coming to my lips. I tried to tell him the truth and he didn’t believe me. What lie would convince him of something the truth could not?

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he says bitterly when I don’t reply.

This time when he wheels around, I don’t try to stop him. I just watch as he storms across the roof and through the door back into the building. He doesn’t look back once. The rose lies on the concrete beside my foot, its petals crushed and defeated.

I press my hand to my chest. Everything inside of me is cracking now, fissures rippling out from my chest as if all my innards were spun from glass. Maybe I don’t know my name, or what I am, or if I have a soul, but I am sure of one thing. I do have a heart.

23
I THUMB MY CONTRACT
as soon as I get back to the bay. I feel completely numb inside, as though the thing crushed underfoot wasn’t merely a flower, but my own heart. Marissa was wrong; tying up my loose ends was the
worst
thing I could have done. It would have been far better to take off without a word and only send Michael a message once I was safely away. Anything would have been better than enduring that painful face-to-face confrontation.

Slipping into the shadowed nook between a couple crates, I lean my forehead against one of the lockers. The metal is cool under my hands, soothing against my pulsing head. What did I expect would happen? For Michael to slap me on the back and congratulate me on my new job? No, I wasn’t naïve enough to expect that, but a hug, an “I’ll miss you,” maybe a “link me?” Yes, I had expected those. I had gone looking for a real goodbye and instead all I’d done was hurt the person I cared about most in the world.

A soft moan slips from my mouth. More than anything, I wish I could go back and find some way to show him what I am. To prove that everything I told him is true, and that it’s not really him I’m trying to escape but myself. It’s a foolish fantasy; even if he would listen, I have no way to prove any of this. All I can do now is forge ahead and try to ignore the horrible, gaping hollow inside of me.

Even though
Comet’s Kiss
isn’t flying out until the day after tomorrow, I start making preparations to leave. It doesn’t take long. Now that I gave away all the things I got from Michael’s family, my pile of possessions is pathetically small, even for a freighter hand. Well, I do have the milicreds I made doing various odd jobs on the station. There’s no reason I can’t add a little to the pile.

I don’t buy much. Some clothes—pants, shirts, and tanks like I’ve seen other spacers wear, in tones of brown, black, and olive green; a couple game holos for my off-duty hours, though I know those hours are likely to be few; a tool belt with a knife, laser cutter, multi-tool, measuring sensor, and a few other tools of the trade; and a duffle to put it all in. Everything is used, but I don’t mind. I couldn’t afford it all if it were new anyway.

As I reenter the bay after my shopping trip, I glance at the timescreen on the wall, wondering if it’s late enough to go to bed. Drowning myself in sleep seems like a good option at this time. To my surprise, a familiar figure stands just to the left of the screen.

“Teal?”

She turns, the searching look fading from her face as soon as she sees me, to be replaced by a set expression. Contrition washes over me as I realize I never said goodbye to her, or Taylor for that matter. I was so focused on my meeting with Michael I completely forgot. Not that I would have been able to go in and face them after what happened. I smile, thankful I’ll at least have the chance to say farewell to Teal.

“Teal,” I say again as she reaches me, “I’m so glad—”

Smack!

My head slues back under the force of her slap, the crack loud enough to make several heads in the vicinity turn our way. I drop my duffle and grab my cheek.

“How
could
you?! How could you do that to Michael? After all he’s done for you!”

“I’m sorry, I—”

“I knew you were bad news from the moment he came home and said
Lia
was back!” Teal sneers. “I knew you’d end up being just another disappointment, another person he would end up losing. As if he hasn’t lost enough people already. He already lost you once, and everyone else on Aurora. Our parents, his friends on Stella and all the other stations we lived on. Why did you have to come back and just mess him up all over again?”

“What, you think I did this on purpose?” I ask, spurred to my own defense in spite of myself.

“You tell me! You’re the one who glommed onto Michael—”

“
He’s
the one who came and found me.”

“—insinuated yourself into his life, acted like his best friend—”

“I
am
his best friend!”

“Then why are you running out on him? Why are you leaving him?”

“I’m not leaving
Michael
,” I protest. “I’m leaving
for
Michael.”

“What in a black hole is
that
supposed to mean?”

I take a breath and stop. “I can’t explain,” I say weakly, wishing more than anything I could. “All I can say is that I have to do this. I have to go—for Michael’s sake, for yours, for Taylor’s—”

“Don’t! Don’t even try to pretend you care about all of us or that you’re doing this for
our
sakes. Whatever you told Michael up there on the roof, it’s pretty obvious it wasn’t for
him
.
” Teal shakes her head, anger seeping from every pore as she mutters to herself. “I
thought
you were different. That you really cared about Michael. Waiting around all evening just to make sure he was sat . . . How could I have been so deficient as to be taken in by
you?
”

“You weren’t taken in about anything! I
do
care about Michael, and I have since . . . I don’t even know when! Don’t you get it? Michael’s all I have. My parents, my past, everything is
gone
.
Without him, I’m nothing.” I pause. The contempt in Teal’s eyes has dimmed, uncertainty mingling with her scorn, and I grasp for the opening, small as it seems. “Believe me, if I could find a way to stay, I would.”

She stares at me for a long moment, clearly undecided, and then her eyes fall on the duffle bag at my feet. Her eyes harden. “Obviously you didn’t try hard enough.”

She brushes past me with a hard swipe of her shoulder. I stumble, regain my footing, and call, “Teal!”

She doesn’t turn around.

I start to follow her, and then think better of it. What did she say, after all, that wasn’t true? Oh, she was wrong about my intentions—hurting Michael was the last thing I ever wanted to do—but that doesn’t change the end result. She’s right. I came back into his life, his best friend Lia from Aurora, only to walk out again without even the grace of a real explanation. Or at least a believable one. No wonder Teal blew a circuit.

A slight smile curls my mouth as I think of thirteen-year-old Teal defending her older brother so fiercely. After all this time, I finally understand why she disliked me so much. It wasn’t that she was afraid I’d come between her and Michael; she was afraid I’d hurt him. And she was right.

Shouldering my duffle, I make my way back to my corner. I feel sick to my stomach as I remember how upset Michael got when his dad canceled on him. Why did I think he would react any better to my leaving? At least he still has Teal, I console myself as I set my duffle down under my cot. Sharp, tough-as-nails Teal, always keeping herself just the smallest bit protected from the world, and her brother too, inasmuch as she can. That’s what’s so great about Michael, I realize. While Teal has become jaded by her losses, Michael is still open to the world around him. Big-hearted, honest, ready to ward off life’s perils with a grin and a joke, to find a friend where others would only see a stranger.

The way he found me.

A bit of liquid trickles over my lip, and I reach up to touch my face. Did Teal’s slap open up a cut I missed? But it’s only my nose, bleeding again. I wipe the blood off with my hand and check the timescreen: 1958. Thirty-six hours until the
Kiss
shoves off. My lips twitch as I remember my last thirty-six hour countdown. That countdown was to my death; this one is to my new life. So why do I find this one so much more terrifying?

Maybe because, unlike before, this time I have so much more to lose.

Settling down on my cot, I close my eyes and begin the wait.

Stars twinkle around us in all directions as we stand together in the observation deck below Level Thirteen.

“How did you ever find this place?” Michael asks, pressing up against the glass to gaze in wonder at the velvet cloak enshrouding us.

I shrug. “Oh, I have my ways.”

“Well, it’s amazing!
You’re
amazing.” He turns to me and our eyes meet. His enraptured gaze is for me alone now, and I can barely breathe through the rushing of my pulse. Michael reaches out a hand and cups my cheek. “You have the most beautiful eyes,” he says, and even before he leans in, I know he’s going to kiss me.

It’s perfect. The pressure of his lips and the soft touch of his hand on my face. I reach for him, wanting more . . .

A tear falls on my cheek. Confused, I pull away and swipe at the moisture.

It’s gray. Gray and thick and metallic.

Fluid suddenly fills my eyes, streaming out of the corners and from beneath the lids. I glance up at Michael in shock. “Michael, help me!” I plead, but he only jerks away in disgust.

More fluid washes over my eyes and everything goes gray.

We’re on Level Five now. My eyes are clear and my face clean. Around us, station personnel walk by in every direction, all going about their normal duties.

“Are you going to go Nova now?” Michael asks me.

I gasp. “How do you know about that?”

He points to my face in answer. This time it’s blood that spills down my face, pouring from my nose and dripping on my jumpsuit. I clap my hand to my nose, but I can’t stem the tide.

“It’s time to fulfill your mission,” he says.

“I can’t. Even if I wanted to, I don’t know how. My clock is broken; I don’t know how to fix it.”

He just looks at me. “Obviously you didn’t try hard enough.”

Suddenly we’re surrounded on all sides. Teal is there, and Taylor and Rowan. The doctor, the military commander, Lela with Kaeti, the sickly man and woman, and others. So many others, crammed into the shadows on all sides, pushing up around me.

“
Obviously
you didn’t try hard enough,” Teal echoes.

“Obviously
you
didn’t try hard enough,” the military commander says.

“Obviously you
didn’t
try hard enough,” the sickly woman adds.

“
Try
hard enough.”

“Try
hard
enough.”

“I
did
try,” I protest, throwing out my hands to ward them off. “I tried!”

Another figure steps out of the shadows. Shar. She stares at me for a long time. “
Obviously you didn’t try hard enough
,” she whispers. Slowly, deliberately, she reaches out and touches my forehead. White spots burst in front of my eyes and everything falls away. Everything but for a child’s voice, singsong and high, echoing through my mind.

“Cross your heart and hope to die, stick a needle in your eye.”

I pace around the walks of the hub, too tired to jog anymore, but unable to stop and sit still. The words from my dream,
Teal’s
words, have been racing around my brain since the moment I awoke this morning.

Obviously you didn’t try hard enough.

Could it really be true? Is there really no solution to my predicament or is it just that I was afraid of what the solution might mean? In my heart, I fear it might be the latter. For what if the solution means blowing up this station? What if the solution means killing my best friend? It’s easier to run, to remain ignorant of my past. To go far away and forget that I was sent here for a reason.

Easier, yes, but is it a choice I can live with? After what happened with Michael and Teal, I’m starting to think it isn’t. Unlocking my past could doom my future, but there’s also a chance it could save it. If nothing else, I need to know that at least I did everything I could to find out. I need to know the consequences of my decisions before blindly choosing. Otherwise, Teal’s right. I didn’t try hard enough. Isn’t Michael—everyone, really—worth trying for?

My feet make the decision before my mind does, for I’m halfway to the lift before I even know I’m going there. My heart is thrumming in my chest as I rise the one level to Eight and make my way back to the bay. Maybe she won’t be there; maybe I won’t be able to find her anywhere.