The Glimpse (39 page)

‘Whether I join with Jasper has got nothing to do with the Board.’

‘Think about it,’ Lake said, snapping her lighter open and shut again. ‘The Board never proved your father altered your Pure tests, which means they had to admit they might have made a mistake. You’re a constant and now very public reminder to them of that. And now Jasper, who asked to be bound to you, who told them he didn’t care about your genetic defects and argued you shouldn’t be punished for their mistake, is rumoured to have had some kind of involvement with the Enlightenment Project prior to disappearing. There’s even speculation he wasn’t abducted at al. He vanishes for seventeen days drawing enormous negative media attention to the BenzidoxKid negotiations, and is then found wandering in the City amnes-ic. What are the chances of escaping, but not amnes-ic. What are the chances of escaping, but not remembering anything about what happened? What are the chances of both of you being kidnapped? Your stories are ful of bul-shit.’

Ana groaned. So much for not wanting to know what was going on. Lake obviously had a fair idea. Anyway, there was nothing Ana could do about Jasper’s involvement with the Enlightenment Project becoming public knowledge. She 360

curled up in her nest of bedcovers. ‘I’m through. I’m done fighting. I’l live in the City. It’s what I want.’

‘You wouldn’t last a minute in the City. They’d have the Psych Watch puling you off the street within a week.’

A sliver of dread coiled through Ana. She wondered whether her father’s refusal to cal off the joining had anything to do with what Lake was saying. Was that the choice

– the Community, or the Psych Watch and another loony dump? No, her father wasn’t thinking of her, he was thinking of himself, of his need to protect and control.

‘When the Board see Jasper,’ Ana said, ‘they’l know there’s no longer a threat. They’l forget about me.’

‘You’re the threat, hon. Not Jasper. The public aren’t about to forget you. If one test can be faulty, why not a thousand? If one Crazy can live in the Communities, why can’t they al? They’re backing
you
, Ariana.’

Ana felt a burst of peevish resentment. ‘The Board, the public, my father . . . Everyone’s trying to make me into something I’m not.’

Lake took a final drag on her cigarette, then tossed it in the bathroom sink where it sizzled and snuffed out.

‘Yeah, wel, the loser thing you’ve got going here – wow, I can see why you wouldn’t wanna give that up.’

Heat rose to Ana’s cheeks. ‘You’ve got no idea what I’ve been through, what they’ve taken from me.’

‘Everyone’s got a story, hon. But you can give people something they haven’t got. You can give them hope.’

Hope!
She didn’t have any hope left, what did she care about anyone else?

But her thoughts flew to Jasper and how his own mind 361

had been twisted against him. She remembered the way his face smacked the ground when the orderly had dumped him in the courtyard after shock therapy; the bafflement and pain in his eyes when he’d started to come around.

She thought of Tamsin, imagined her friend’s attempts to stop the Psych Watch from dragging away some toddler and his mother, and paying for it with her future. And lastly she thought of Cole, on a cargo boat to the US war zone, branded a murderer for trying to uncover the truth, for seeking justice.

Up until that moment, she’d had every intention of turning up to her joining a total wreck, hoping the Board would declare her Active. She’d even begun to suspect she was actualy sick. Despair had been eating through her like rot, consuming her body and thoughts so that she rot, consuming her body and thoughts so that she couldn’t sleep, eat or function normaly.

As she lay with her head stuffed in the bedcovers, breathing the same warm air over and over, something tiny and delicate unfurled inside her. She finaly understood –

whether the pain that could turn to disease lurked in the cels, the blood or the mind, wasn’t important. What was important was who controled it. Until that moment she believed it was the Board – their Pure test, their diagnoses.

But suddenly she knew it wasn’t up to them. If despair, grief or yearning was going to take her, she had to let it.

The paralysing fear she’d felt towards the Board, which had grown inside her for three years, began to vanish like popping soap bubbles. Lake was right. She couldn’t let them win. She wouldn’t. It undermined everything her friends 362

had sacrificed. She was going to have to go through with the joining ceremony, whether she liked it, or not.

*

The folowing morning, the day Ana and Jasper were supposed to make their declarations, Ana’s father left for work without mentioning her trip to the Hampstead Community Hal. She assumed he wasn’t taking any risks and would be sending the substitute as planned. Lake arrived shortly after ten with a score of dresses for Ana to try on and dye to return Ana’s hair to its original pale blonde.

As Ana tidied her room, the dye’s peroxide giving her a headache, Lake filed her in on the morning’s news from her father – the Taurels had managed to pul off a second joining ceremony on Saturday in North-West London, which meant she and Jasper were now booked into the St Johns Wood Community Hal under pseudonyms. Aside from close family, there would be no guests. And in an effort to distract the media, the Hampstead Hal joining ceremony would not be canceled.

Without the usual guests and after-ceremony party, Lake’s role had been reduced to fixing up Ana. But she didn’t seem to mind. Ana got the impression her joining planner would do anything as long as it paid. And there was a fair bit of fixing to be done. Personaly, Ana couldn’t bring herself to care about how she looked –

she tried on dresses and dutifuly checked her reflection, but she couldn’t see beyond her own heartache, beyond the grey eyes that resembled a washed-out, empty sky left after a storm.

They spent Friday manicuring, playing with the limited 363

options possible for Ana’s short hair, body spraying her pale skin two shades darker, and trying different eyeshadows and lipsticks. It stole Ana’s thoughts from Cole and for that at least she was grateful. But it didn’t stop her from questioning over and over whether becoming joined to Jasper was realy the right thing to do. She considered escaping.

She could return to the farmhouse where she’d once lived with her mother. It would be sitting vacant, miles from the nearest occupied town. Perhaps the vegetable from the nearest occupied town. Perhaps the vegetable garden would have survived, would be growing wild and free. Perhaps she could trap rabbit and fish the river and survive on the land.

But it was a fantasy. She knew she couldn’t run away from everything that had happened. She would do her part in weakening the Board’s authority, in reminding the Crazies and the Pures that the Board was not flawless, faultless, or omnipotent.

*

The St Johns Wood Community Hal lay on the north-eastern border of the St Johns Wood Community, only one hundred metres from the checkpoint. Before reaching a smal roundabout, Nick the chauffeur turned right into an arched driveway and puled up in front of the elegant Regency-style building with a portico of four Ionic columns. Through the car window, Ana saw a bel turret rising up from the cream colonnade. Straight ahead stood the hal’s pale-peach façade, two arched windows and two neatly

trimmed

bay

trees.

The

journalists

and

364

364

photographers were either expertly camouflaged or David Taurel’s ploy had worked.

Ana popped open her door. Before anyone could help her, she raised the heavy silk of her coral and ivory dress and stepped out. Her father’s hard shoes slapped down behind her. Lake alighted from the front passenger seat.

Nick stayed where he was. Ana hadn’t seen him since the day he’d driven her to Jasper’s house, and though she’d always thought her father hadn’t noticed how wel the two of them got on, now she suspected he’d been keeping them apart on purpose. He wouldn’t have wanted Ana confiding in the chauffeur, or persuading Nick to drive her around London searching for a way into the Project.

Ana glanced up at the hazy sky. Not a patch of blue.

Diffused sunshine sapped the colour and form of the trees and the road and the people passing by. She inhaled, lungs filing with dense air and flat light. Sighing, she took a step towards the building. At the tal wooden doors, she stopped. Lake squeezed past her into the sombre interior to inform the superintendent registrar of their arrival. What was once an old church had been recently redecorated in white and gold. Pilars stretched up along the outer aisles and the high ceiling arched over them – far larger and more imposing than the music room where she and Jasper had been bound. A wide limestone aisle led up to the registrar’s desk. The box pews on either side could have held three hundred guests.

Through the gloom, Ana couldn’t make out a single person.

A trumpet blasted from a speaker, echoing across the A trumpet blasted from a speaker, echoing across the 365

nave. Her father stepped up beside her, hooking his arm inside hers.

‘You look beautiful,’ he said.

She didn’t turn or blink or show him in any way that she’d heard.

They crossed the threshold into the cool interior. Ana struggled to adjust to the low light. A galery ran across the back of the Community Hal and up the sides. Jasper stood at the end of the aisle before the registrar’s platform, head crushed down into his shoulders. Beyond him, the registrar waited behind a giant desk – once an altar – washed in soft light from a high window.

Ana drifted down the aisle like flotsam on the ocean –

fragmented, in pieces, swept along by an invisible force.

She wondered fleetingly if her legs would hold for the five-minute ceremony, or whether she’d have to sit down.

Jasper’s mother, father, sister and a man Ana didn’t recognise occupied the first pew on the right-hand side of the hal. On the far left-hand side, beneath the galery, two members of the Board sat stiffly facing forward, their gold-striped lapels glimmering in the shadows. Ana closed the remaining three feet to Jasper’s side. High up to her left, a flicker of movement caught her eye. Her eyes darted to the balcony. For a split second, she thought she saw a figure.

She squinted into the murk, attempting to discern a form, She squinted into the murk, attempting to discern a form, but after a moment she realised she’d been tricked by the light, or her heart.

As she came to a standstil, Jasper tilted his head in her direction, opaque eyes shifting on to her face. The registrar 366

began the opening address. Jasper didn’t look forward like he was supposed to, he continued to stare at Ana.

Unnerved, she glanced back at his parents. Jasper’s mother, Lucy, rose from her seat. The bald man –

Jasper’s psychologist? – put his hand over Lucy’s to stop her.

Jasper’s younger sister scowled at Ana and mouthed ‘

Call it
off!
’

The registrar sped over the introductory words, stumbling as she reached the part about the commitment to a family and the continuation of geneticaly Pure human species. Ana smiled bleakly, wishing she had eyes in the back of her head to see the Board’s reaction. She and Jasper were forbidden to have children; it’s what made their joining such a farce. It was a shame the press weren’t here after al. Such a mistake would have been a huge embarrassment to the Board.

Ana pressed the back of her hand against her burning cheeks. As she grew accustomed to Jasper’s stare, she let her eyes roam the galery to her left. In her mind, she found herself running over her conversation with Nate.

Her shock at seeing Nate in the Community – in her house! – coupled with the horror of his message that Cole had gone abroad, had submerged al logical Cole had gone abroad, had submerged al logical thinking. But now she thought it through, she decided the music disc Nate had given her wasn’t proof Cole had sent his brother to say goodbye. Nate hadn’t explained how he circumvented the checkpoint, or how he’d found her home and got around Warden Dombrant.

Waves of doubt lapped over her. What if Cole hadn’t realy sent Nate to say goodbye? What if Ana’s father had 367

tracked Nate down, and bribed or blackmailed him into delivering the one piece of news he knew would put an end to Ana’s plans of escape?

The registrar moved on to the declaratory words, not waiting for either of them to repeat the joining declarations. Ana wondered if the omission rendered the proceedings nul.

Suddenly, Jasper grasped her hand.

‘I’ve been thinking about what you said,’ he hissed.

The registrar floundered and dried up.

‘And I dreamt about you,’ he continued. ‘You were in a dark place, walking among the stars.’

Ana’s mind traveled back to the tanks.
What did he
mean?

How could he know that?

The registrar wiped sweat from her forehead. Jasper clung to Ana’s hand.

‘We wil now hold a moment’s silence,’ the registrar said, picking up the cushion with the rings, ‘while the couple reflect on the gravity of their undertaking before showing their final decision in the exchanging of rings.’

Behind Ana, in a pew by himself, Ashby sighed in annoyance. The air prickled electricaly. Ana’s eyes raked the galery, hoping for a miracle. Hoping for Cole.

She couldn’t bring herself to pick up the ring. Jasper didn’t move.

The rings on the outstretched cushion began to quiver.

Beads of sweat dampened the registrar’s upper lip.

‘Help them,’ Ashby growled at the official. The registrar put down the cushion and picked up Jasper’s ring. She began forcing it on to his swolen finger. Oblivious, Jasper 368

dug his free hand in his suit pocket and held up a wooden star on a rusty chain.

‘I made this for you,’ he said. The hand-carved wood was a replica of the pendant he’d worn the night he was abducted; the pendant with the disc Ana’s father probably had in his office.