Memory Girl (9 page)

“Why are you interested in me?” I finally ask what's troubling me most. “You're a scientist.”

“Scientists care deeply about youths. Did you know there were only two youths born in the first group?”

“Why so few?” I ask.

“Scientists were in charge of youth creation in the early stages, and we only had limited resources. This was decades after the Attack, over two centuries ago, which may seem like a long time when you're only age fifteen, but my memory stretches far.” Her gaze drifts across paths and buildings, as if winding into the past. “I had expected people to be content once they ceased aging and no longer feared wrinkles or death. Yet once they realized a side effect of immortality was infertility, there was a rush to get pregnant for those still under twenty-five. The sudden population increase drained our resources.”

“You mean people in ShareHaven gave birth the retro way?” I say, wide-eyed. Instructors had never told us this.

“Oh, yes, it was quite archaic,” she says with a chuckle. “After much trial and error, we calculated that fifteen youths every twenty-five years creates harmony among Families and restores an adequate number of Lost Ones.”

While this is interesting, I still have no idea why she's
talking to me.

“Sorry for rambling on,” she says with an apologetic smile. “You must be wondering why I've singled you out from the other youths.”

“Well … yeah,” I admit.

“After speaking to your Instructors, I know you have unique talents.”

Being the worst student ever is not a talent
, I think guiltily.

“You enjoy walking, often early in the morn, which is an activity I find invigorating too,” she goes on. “My compound borders the cliff, so I take walks at the edge of land and sea. Where do you usually walk?”

Is this a trick question? So I'll admit I regularly break rules?

“On marked trails,” I answer carefully, bending the truth.

“Those trails only circle around buildings.” She spreads her arms wide. “If I lived here I would want to explore wilder places by the sea.”

“That would be against the rules.”

“But I would go anyway,” she says, leading me away from the building to a dirt path winding into thorny berry bushes. “Scientists make their own trails.”

I am unsure what to say, confusion rising. What does she want from me?

Scientist Lila stops at a berry bush, its shiny, red-gold leaves hiding prickly thorns. She reaches into a berry bush and plucks a juicy red berry.

“No!” I shout, rushing to her side. “Don't eat that!”

“Why not? It looks ripe and delicious.” She lifts it to her mouth.

I slap the berry from her hand. “It's poisonous!”

She raises her brows, not alarmed as I had expected but smiling. “How do you know about puha berries?”

“The leaves are distinct.” I point to the reddish leaves, the only way of telling the safe berries from the poisonous ones. There's an antidote, but if not taken soon enough, paralysis could linger for a week. I made this error once, and now won't even eat the safe green-leaf berries.

“Thank you for the warning.” Scientist Lila twirls the red berry between her fingers. Her nails shine unnaturally with square tips. “Nature taunts mere humans, packaging the puha berry so it appears as safe as a verberry. But the puha berry is more interesting. If you crush it into a powder, it can heal infection.” She tosses the red berry aside, then bends over a clump of wild grass, plucking a scruffy green weed. “Did you know common weeds can be used for medicines?”

“Yes,” I say remembering the scarifying day I found Petal almost dead in my cave, moaning and barely able to move. I didn't know how to help her, but after a while, she crawled to the edge of the pond and nibbled on lavender sea grass. Within minutes she spit up, healing herself.

“Did the Instructors teach you this?”

I shake my head. “I learned from watching animals.”

Lila's smile softens the lines in her face. “I knew we were alike, noticing small things that others overlook and stretching boundaries. Do you agree?”

“Uh … it's possible. I guess.”

“A good answer. Stay open to possibilities. Questions begin every scientific discovery. It takes a special person to answer the call of science.”

If she's hinting at what I suspect—more than I ever
dreamed—I can escape the Crosses and live at the scientists' compound. No one will call me “Milly.”

She grasps my hands, and I can't look away from her. Her flowery perfume mingles with my dizzy thoughts, making it impossible to think. “Your curiosity and resourcefulness would be wasted on menial jobs,” she says. “I'll only ask you once more: Do you want to live with the Cross Family?”

Absolutely not
, I think. But the scientists' compound is so isolated, its mystery and secrets separate from ShareHaven. Only Grand Sarwald knows how to journey there. Would I be trapped there in a cage of secrecy? Never seeing Marcus or Lorelei again?

Still, it would be thrilling to learn science and create miracle discoveries. And once I'm a scientist, I can make my own rules. I'd find a way to see my friends. A wondrous future is within my reach. I only need to say yes.

I breathe in hopes and dreams and Lila's flowery perfume. My gaze sweeps down from her silvery hair to the dirt-stained hem of her shimmering purple robe. I jerk away, clasping my hands to my chest.

And I say no.

Scientist Lila Farrow's expression reveals no emotion. My answer must shock her, yet she doesn't question me. Twining her fingers together to form a hand temple, her gaze props me under a microscope and dissects my thoughts.

“Thank you,” she says simply. “I wish you much joy in your new life, Milly.”

She turns away, a swirl of silver and purple with a fragrance of orange blossoms. An orange-red leaf sticks to her shoe. A leaf only found near the sea cliffs. I smelled
her flowery scent when I returned Petal to the sea—after glimpsing golden movement in the bushes.

Scientist Lila was in the bushes.

Spying on me.

Leader Cross drives the solar coach with the confidence of someone used to being in charge. A stout man with a shaggy brown beard sits beside him. The hostile woman whose hair half hides her face has taken a back bench, avoiding contact with me. I sit beside Rosemarie, across from the three men who have similar sand-brown hair and stubby noses.

“My sons.” Rosemarie introduces them proudly. “Tyler, Tomas, and Titas.”

The men smile, then talk among themselves about repairing a windmill. Rosemarie joins in, and I don't understand much of what they're saying. I turn away from them, pressing my face against the cool glass window. It's a dark night; heavy fog billows in from the sea, reminding me of what I'm leaving. No more mornings wading in the sea or swimming in my cave with Petal. And if Nate returns to the cave, I'll never know.

Conversation drizzles around me like mist, touching the air but not reaching my thoughts. I wonder again about Lila. How much did she see when she followed me? Nate? Probably not, or she would have alerted the Uniforms. But she surely heard me shout at Petal. I cringe, replaying the heaviness of the rock in my hand and the hurt in Petal's liquid eyes. Lila must think I'm cruel. Yet when she spoke to me, she said nothing of following me. Instead she asked if I
was happy with my Chosen Family. But when she returned me to my Family, not even Rosemarie asked any questions. They obviously care little for me. Why is Lila, an important scientist, so interested?

My Family is polite but distant, as if Choosing a youth is of no importance. Shouldn't they want to know more about me? Or do they only see me as a vessel to bring back Milly's memories? Who I am should matter too.

As if Rosemarie Cross knows my thoughts, she slips an arm around my shoulders. “I'm so happy you're here.”

I sense she hopes I'll say I'm happy to be with her too. But I say nothing.

“We'll share kitchen duties as before,” she goes on, not looking at me but at our blurred reflections in the window. “I thought you'd be more comfortable staying with me until after your memdenity, so I readied my room.”

“You planned to Choose a girl?” I ask, remembering my conversation with Lila. “Usually boys become laborers.”

“We took a boy last time,” she says with a shrug.

I glance over at her sons, wondering if one of them is a replacement like me. But I decide it must have been a different man since these men share their mother's rounded cheekbones, olive complexion, and rich, shiny black hair.

“I've rearranged the furniture and brought in a bed for you,” she goes on cheerfully. “It's been quite a house-craft, clearing out cupboards and the closet.”

“You're very kind,” I say.

“Selfish, more likely. I don't want to share you yet.” She giggles, which makes her seem closer to my age of fifteen, although she looks twenty-five and has experienced two, maybe three centuries of life.

“I want you to feel comfortable,” she goes on. “I know you won't remember much until the memdenity, but I hoped you might enjoy some of the same things as Milly. I hung her favorite painting on the wall over your bed—a lovely scene of a summer garden your—I mean, her—daughter Daisy painted.”

So I have a daughter. Not unexpected, but I shift uneasily on the hard wood solar cart bench. What will it be like to meet Milly's womb-born child? An adult now, of course, so she'll appear ten years older than me.

I really, really wish I'd studied the Cross Name book.

Tall poles with glow-lights brighten the dark roads, and other lights shine too, from buildings in the distance. I press close to the window, squinting at white streaks of fences that stretch over the rolling hills where the Hu Family dwells. I visited the ranch once on a lesson trip, and a tall man wearing a wide-brimmed hat explained the importance of fencing in livestock.

The terrain changes, flat as flapcakes, then rising into ghost-pale domes like giant bubbles. Distant lights shine like land-trapped stars, and I realize these multi-dwellings must belong to the Sarwald Family. The domed climate-controlled buildings contain acres of vegetation, our prime food supply. And it's where Marcus is. I already miss him and Lorelei, but I am glad they got the Families they wanted. I won't be able to see them often, and when I do, I'll have to call them Neil and Flavia.

The glass is cool against my cheek. Fields and orchards pass by as my thoughts travel to my new Family. Aside from kitchen duty, what chores will be expected of me? I have no labor skills, although I am quick with my hands and a good climber. My stomach knots as I imagine being ordered to
lift crates and other muscle-aching chores. Doing what I'm told: not my best skill. And I dread the memdenity. My head is already too full of thoughts. Why can't I make my own memories like retro-century people? Sure, their uncontrolled societies caused war, disease, and death, but at least no one had strange memories crammed into their brains.

Of course when ShareHaven was first created, no one lived forever either. The development of memdenities strengthened our society, preserving memory knowledge like ripe fruit canned in jars for future usage. My lessons come back now, and I can almost hear Instructor Heath's deep voice explaining how ShareHaven began as something called a “think tank” for scientists. Dozens of scientists were brought to this island to work in isolation on medical research. When the mind-plague struck and people all around the world were stricken with an airborne memory-wiping disease, most scientists left ShareHaven. The scientists who remained brought their families. Outside ShareHaven, civilization crumbled as fear and death spread. A false rumor that our scientists had a mind-plague vaccine led to the Attack: a violent, desperate mob, armed with guns and explosives, stormed ShareHaven. Buildings, research, and lives were destroyed.

Survivors put up the Fence to protect us. And when the scientists developed the cease-aging patch, they gave us immortality.

Living forever could grow boring with a dull Family. I think of the solemn way Scientist Lila stared at me, as if seeing inside my thoughts when she asked, “Do you want to live with the Cross Family?” I was going to accept until I realized she'd spied on me and couldn't be trusted. I wonder
what would have happened if I'd answered yes. Instead of heading for the Cross Family multi-dwelling, would I be on a different road?

“Aren't you eager to see your home?” Rosemarie nudges my arm, so I turn from the window toward her.

“I, um, guess.” I want to remind her I don't have Milly's memories yet, so “home” is only a word I've been taught at the Edu-Center.

“We're almost there. I have so much to show you! We've made many improvements since you … well, since Milly was there. Milly hated being so close to my sons' room because Tyler's snoring is worse than a claw's roar. But the boys have their own dwelling now.”