Flawed (19 page)

“I don't want to talk to her,” I hiss.

“By order of the Guild,” Mom says quietly. “Apparently, it's part of the package. Every Flawed must be available to speak with Pia after the trial. And if I didn't let her in…”

“You'd be seen as aiding a Flawed.”

“You're my
daughter
,” she says, her eyes filling.

“Mom, it's okay. I'll do it.”

“What are you going to say?” she asks nervously. “Perhaps we should call Mr. Berry.”

“I don't want to be coached. He'll just tell me to lie, and I can't do that.”

It still hurts for me to put full weight on my foot, but I don't want Pia to see me limping. She's waiting for me in the library. I take a deep breath and enter. I tell Mom it's okay for us to be alone. I would prefer it, without having to look at her constantly and worry if what I'm saying is okay. I don't plan on saying much anyway. Monosyllabic answers would kill Pia, and that's what I intend on giving.

Pia is even tinier in the flesh than on TV. She's like a petite doll that looks like the wind could blow her over, though I know that is not the case. Even the wind would lose a battle with her. Her skin is soft and peachy, her clothes delicate and pretty, a silk ivory top with delicate organza flowers and a lace pencil skirt. She even smells of peaches. Everything about her is so fine and pretty, but then her eyes are hard. Not cold, but ready. All-seeing, aware of everything like two zoom lenses on a camera.

“Pia Wang,” she says politely, holding out her hand.

I stall, unsure what to do. My seared hand is no longer bandaged; I had to remove the light gauze for school so I wouldn't be seen as hiding my flaws. I haven't had to shake hands with anyone yet. My hand hangs limply by my side. I leave her hand hanging midair. Her eyes drop to my hand, and then she smiles. “Oh, of course.” She drops her hand. I'm certain she knew what she was doing.

I didn't trust her before, and I don't trust her even more now. If she tried to put me in my place, on the back foot, then she has failed. It is she who has fallen back first, because I won't make this easy for her.

“Nice to meet you,” she says. “Shall we sit here?”

There are two armchairs by the bay window, which overlooks a small, pretty flower garden that Mom tends when she insists she's having a fat day. But the shutters are still closed to protect our privacy from the press.

She holds out her hand for me to sit, as though this is her home.

“I've been wanting to meet you for a long time,” she says with a big grin. “You're big news, Celestine. Seventeen-year-old ex-girlfriend of Art Crevan, branded five times, turns out to be the most Flawed girl in history. Talking to you is the biggest scoop of the year.”

“I find it intriguing that my life entertains you so much.”

Her smile lessens a little. “I'm not alone in that, obviously.” She refers to the press outside the house. “As you know, under the Guild rules, I have a sit-down with the Flawed, which will go out on our online news, TV, magazines.”

“All the Crevan media.”

She pauses. “Yes. I'd like us to do an interview first, and I propose something new. A series of televised interviews as we follow you around and film your life as it is now.”

“A reality show?”

“If you want to call it that. I prefer documentary.”

“Because you're a hard-hitting journalist and all.”

She pauses to take the insult. “I'm interested in people. Intrigued by what makes them tick. Interestingly, with you”—her eyes run over me—“I can't quite figure that out. I'd like to find out.”

“I don't want to be followed around by a camera. My dad is a TV editor. I know exactly how you can make me look: whatever way you want. If I have to do the newspaper interview, then I'll do it, but that's all.”

She's clearly disappointed by this, but there's nothing she can do about it. “Okay. It will be a series of meetings, not just one sitting. I want in-depth. I want to understand you, Celestine, really get to know you.”

I half-laugh.

“I amuse you?”

“You work for Crevan. Do you think I'm stupid enough to think that you want to understand me? That anything you have to say about me will be favorable? That anything I actually say will make it into your articles?”

“You're an interesting case, Celestine.”

“I'm a person. Not a case.”

“Friend of Judge Crevan, honors A student, a perfect good girl. You're an unlikely candidate for this situation. People want to know about you.”

“Me and Angelina Tinder. Funny, isn't it, two Flawed on one street within the span of two days? Such a coincidence.”

Something flashes in her eyes. Something different. A doubt of some kind, but then she resumes normal play.

“Euthanasia is frowned upon by our society,” she says, defending the Guild's ruling on Angelina Tinder.

“So is compassion. I helped an old man to a seat.”

Then I realize I just gave her a headline. She's thrilled.

“You see, Celestine.” She grins, moving forward in her chair. “It's comments like that that are making people pay extra attention to you. You're refreshing. For one so young.”

“I'm not
trying
to be anything.”

She looks momentarily confused and then looks around quickly before changing her tone, as though she shouldn't be telling me this. I'm on the edge, trying to analyze her tactics. “Enya Sleepwell was at your trial every day.”

I look at her for more. I have no idea whom she's talking about.

“You do know who she is,” she says patronizingly.

“No,” I sigh. “I have no idea who that is. Was that the old woman who spat at me? Or the young woman who threw a cabbage at me? Or perhaps it was the lady in the third row who ate an entire bag of Pick n' Mix on my Naming Day.”

She frowns. “She's in the news a lot these days. You haven't heard of her?”

“I don't watch the news.”

“I find that hard to believe. You're in it every day.”

“Well, then, why would I watch it? I know what I'm doing every day.”

She gives me a small smile. “Your parents don't talk to you about what's happening? About what's being said out there?”

“It's not important what's being said about me. I don't need to hear it. I can't control it and I can't change it.”

She looks confused, then checks the door to make sure it's closed. “I mean, you seriously … you don't know this? Enya Sleepwell is in the Vital Party. You must know who they are. They picked up a lot of seats in the last election. They're the fastest-growing party in Parliament.”

I shake my head. “I don't follow politics. I'm seventeen. All of my friends couldn't care less about it, either. We're not even allowed to vote until we're eighteen.”

She looks at me in surprise, studying me as if she can't believe a word I'm saying, trying to figure me out. “Well, politics is following you, Celestine.”

I mock her by looking behind me to check. I realize I've replaced monosyllabic answers with sarcasm, but it's far more rewarding.

“So you didn't work with Enya Sleepwell? Meet with her? Before the incident on the bus?”

“What? No!” I reply.

“Some people think you were trying to be a hero,” she says. “That you still see yourself as a hero, that you're perhaps above everybody else. That your apparent selfless act does not make you Flawed, or at least that it puts you on a different level from the other Flawed. I think you wanted to be different, stand out, were tired of being in the middle of the road, normal girl, boring girl, abider of rules.”

I bite my lip to stop myself from snapping at her, which is what she wants.

“Do you think you're a hero, Celestine?”

I sigh. “If I was such a hero, that old man would be alive now. Nobody seems to be considering the fact that a man is dead. A man died because an entire bus full of people failed to help him. Do I think I'm a hero? No. I failed.”

She frowns, slightly confused. “But you succeeded in raising your issue to a higher platform. Everybody is now talking about the ‘aiding a Flawed' rule. An overwhelming number of people want it stricken from the rules.”

I'm surprised to hear this. If it's gotten rid of, will that mean I'm not Flawed anymore? How can they undo my scars? They can't. Never.

She looks at her watch, then at me eagerly. “When can we meet again?”

I shrug. “I'm here every day after school. Don't plan on going anywhere.”

“A popular girl like you? I'm sure you have plenty of offers. I heard you were offered a perfume deal.”

I snort. “What, Eau de Flawed? Who would be bothered to buy that, and why on earth would I want that? You really don't know anything about me at all, do you?”

“I just wanted to introduce myself today. Let's meet again tomorrow,” she says eagerly, picking up her briefcase. “If you're not the boring teenager who was fed up with her life and did something as a cry for attention, then I suggest you talk to me or that will be my story.” She holds out her left hand this time. I reluctantly reach out and shake it with my unbranded hand.

I stay in my seat, fuming, thinking back over our conversation. “By the way, I don't have five brands.”

She freezes at the door, pivots ever so delicately on her peach pumps.

“Pardon?”

“You said I am the most Flawed person in history, with five brands. Crevan gave me six.”

 

THIRTY-THREE

PIA IS STILL
staring at me. She hasn't blinked once. I know the press hasn't reported my sixth brand for some reason, which surprises me. I assumed Crevan would want the whole world to know. If she doesn't know, she can't print it. And while Pia's not knowing gives me comfort, I also want her to know that she doesn't know everything, that even her basic knowledge of me is wrong. She tried to put me out when I walked in. I'll put her out when she leaves. If Crevan has lied to her, her little, solid world will be rocked, and I want to see the look on her face for my own gratification. Saying it is worth it for the reaction.

“He what?” she says, shocked, her cool demeanor completely gone. “In court, he distinctly said five.”

I make a decision whether to continue. It will probably come out sometime anyway, better that it's from me. And even if she prints it, it's true. Crevan can't blame me for that. My heart pounds as I say it aloud. “He came to me in the Branding Chamber. He asked me to repent. I wouldn't. So he ordered a sixth on my spine. Without anesthetic. Said I was Flawed to the very backbone.” I decide not to mention that it was him who branded me. Best to save my revelations.

“He … what?” She can barely speak. “But that's not allow—I mean, it's never been…”

She knows she can't say much more about it. Question and doubt Judge Crevan? In the company of a Flawed? She's not that foolish.

“Talk to your buddy Crevan about it.” I leave her standing in the doorway in shock.

It's the first time I smile in almost a week. When the lows are so immense, the victories are small. But they are there despite it. You just have to know them when you see them, little pockets of light and hope hidden away in the darkness.

When I return to my bedroom, I find Mary May has been rummaging through my table beside my bed. I look around my bedroom in surprise. My wardrobes are open, clothes have been pulled off the hangers and left on the floor, and my shelves have been rooted through and left untidy. She's sitting on my bed reading my journal, which is sitting on her lap, my private diary. I want to cry right there. I haven't written in it since before the trial, I haven't had the energy. It feels like a different life, but they are my private thoughts, silly things, embarrassing things, but things that were important to me at the time of writing them. My
secret
thoughts, and she's sitting right there stealing them.

I open my mouth to protest, but as if sensing it, she holds up her gloved hand to silence me. She turns the page. Finally, she snaps the journal shut and looks at me up and down as if seeing right through to my soul.

“Rules state you are to expect random searches of your private possessions. If you're going to continue writing this journal, for example, further thoughts on whether your thighs are fat and if you'll be any good at sex”—she sneers, and I feel my whole face heat up with embarrassment—“I expect you to hand it over to me every Friday so that I can read it for myself. Is that clear?”

I swallow. And nod.

“What did I say about verbal communication?”

“Yes,” I say, and it comes out as a whisper. I clear my throat and repeat it, but she's pleased by the effect she's had on me.

She picks up the Highland Castle snow globe that she's found in my bedside table and gives it a shake.

“Always good to have a reminder, isn't it?” she says, dropping it into my hands as she passes, the red sparkling glitter falling down and coating the bottom like drops of blood. It feels like a warning.

I rush to the bed and throw the snow globe back into the drawer. I never want to see it again. I pick up the journal and start to rip the pages out, first one by one, then frantically as I start to sob. When I've torn all the pages out, they lie scattered on the floor.

Mom comes to the door and watches me, concerned.

“She was reading my journal,” I splutter.

Mom joins me on the floor and looks around at the pages. Then she picks them up and starts to rip them into little pieces, her face not as cool as usual, her eyes filling up. This gesture means more to me than anything she could have said. I join her, and we rip the pages of my handwriting, excited exclamation marks, stars and hearts around Art's name, doodles and words that came from my heart, concerns I ached over, stories I giggled over, private thoughts that were once only mine. I watch the hearts be ripped to pieces.