Placebo Junkies

The Tyrant's Daughter

THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Text copyright © 2015 by J. C. Carleson

Cover photograph copyright © 2015 by Ray Shappell

Interior illustrations copyright © 2015 by Shutterstock

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House Children's Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

Excerpt from “The Gambler,” music and lyrics by Don Schlitz, copyright © 1978 by Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC. All rights administered by Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Carleson, J. C.

Placebo junkies / J.C. Carleson. — First edition.

pages cm.

Summary: Teenaged Audie pushes her mind and body to the breaking point when she participates in a series of clinical drug trials for cash.

ISBN 978-0-553-49724-3 (trade) — ISBN 978-0-553-49725-0 (lib. bdg.) — ISBN 978-0-553-49726-7 (ebook)

[1. Drugs—Testing—Fiction. 2. Placebos (Medicine)—Fiction. 3. Medicine—Research—Fiction. 4. Mental illness—Fiction. 5. Love—Fiction.] I. Title.

PZ7.C21479Pl 2015

[Fic]—dc23

2014042559

eBook ISBN 9780553497267

October 2015

Random House Children's Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.

v4.1

ep

For my boys, who are

both the cause of and the cure for

most of the craziness in my life

Check a box. Initial.

Check a box. Initial.

Waiver, waiver, sign and date.

Consent. Acknowledge.

Release.

It's money in your wallet, every little square. Check a box, ka-ching. Check a box, ka-ching.

Fuck yes,
consent.

You wake to a burning sensation.

It gets worse as you shove off your covers and stiff-leg limp down the hall, then sails way past critical and all the way to freaking
agony
as your urine stream rat-a-tats unevenly into the toilet bowl, and it's all you can do to stop it, hold in that razor-blade wetness long enough to find a cup, a bucket, anything to catch it,
dammit,
and you barely manage to stifle your scream of triumph as you find an empty Snapple bottle in the trash can and fill it with your beautiful, cloudy piss with its faint but unmistakable trace of blood.

You're mesmerized by the dancing sunset clouds of bacteria and protein, afraid to believe it at first, this pastel
screw you
note from your kidneys.

A verifiable side effect.

Ka-ching.

The other squatters see what's in your bottle as you walk out of the bathroom, and their faces go hard with envy.

It's money in your pocket, this cotton-candy piss. You hit the jackpot, you can see it in their eyes, those poor placebo motherfuckers.

You keep your bottle next to you while you scarf your breakfast, then you take it for a stroll. The lab doesn't open until nine and you never know what some of these people will do for money.

One more month. That's all you have to last.

One more month till you have enough. Then you can close up shop, say
sayonara
to the needles and the pills, and give your orifices a much-deserved rest. It's nothing, thirty days—a hop a skip and a hump. Could be even less if the burning turns out to be serious. They don't mess around with serious here. Bad for business. No faster way to get paid—here's your check, don't let the door hit you on your way out.

You knew it could happen when they sent you to the twelfth floor, but no pain, no gain (
pain pain pain
).

It's nothing that a little rest won't take care of, maybe a bowl of Mom's spicy beef soup. By then your appetite will surely reappear. Good old Mom will put the meat back on your bones. Your bones.

Your bones.

It's 9:00. Time to get to work.