Becca poked at her chicken. As much as she wanted to get done with dinner as quickly as possible, she didn’t think she could force down a single bite. Her stomach hurt more with every word her mom spoke.
“You don’t seem like yourself today.” Her mom peered at her more closely. “You’re not still thinking about what that friend of yours said, are you?”
Becca flinched at the mention of Anna.
Maybe she should just ask her mom about what she had found on the computer. It might not be as bad as it looked.
Then common sense caught up with her. Asking her mom would mean admitting she had gone snooping through her mom’s files. Besides, even if her mom told her the truth, what could she say that would get it to make sense?
The only table small enough to fit in this kitchen wasn’t quite big enough to hold their plates plus the serving dishes. Becca’s plate clanked against the bowl of salad as she cut herself a bite of chicken. She shoved the bite into her mouth to stall for time. It tasted like sand.
Her mom frowned in concern. “You’re not, are you? I thought you knew better than to take something like that seriously.”
If Becca denied it, would her mom believe her? Her mom could tell when she was lying.
But what was the alternative? Admitting what she had found?
Becca shook her head. “I know better than that,” she agreed. “I’m not a dissident.” Her hand was starting to ache. She looked down and saw that she was gripping her fork so tightly the edges were digging into her palm. She let go. The fork hit her plate with a clang that made both of them jump.
“Rumors like that are dangerous,” her mom lectured as she cut her chicken. “They may seem harmless, but they can easily allow dissident ideology to gain a foothold in society.”
“I told you, I don’t even believe it. It’s just something—” She couldn’t say Anna’s name. “Something a friend said.”
“I don’t want you spreading rumors like that.” Her mom put her fork down. “Even if you know better than to believe it, somebody you talk to might not, and you will have helped the dissidents undermine faith in our government.”
Her mom studied her. “If that’s not what’s bothering you, then what is?” She held up a hand before Becca could speak. “Don’t tell me everything is fine.”
Becca had blamed her mood on the situation with Heather before, and it hadn’t worked. What could she say that her mom might believe?
Her mom pushed her plate aside, nearly knocking the platter of chicken to the floor in the process. “We need to do something about this. We barely feel like a family anymore. I never get a chance to talk to you, and when I do, you’re keeping secrets.”
Her mom had lied to her face, and she had the nerve to complain when Becca didn’t tell her everything?
Becca pushed away her own plate. She didn’t want dinner anyway. “I’m not keeping secrets.”
“Then why won’t you tell me what’s bothering you?”
“Maybe because the last time I told you something, one of my friends disappeared.” Too late, Becca clamped her mouth shut.
The silence stretched between them until Becca could hear her own heartbeat.
New lines appeared on her mom’s face. “You need to think about what you’re saying, Becca. Anna was a dissident. Her parents were dissidents. The information you gave me helped Internal figure that out. If you regret what you told me, it means you regret helping Internal find three dissidents.”
She had to tell her mom the truth.
She could hear Jake’s voice in her mind, talking about false accusations. Did this qualify? But Anna’s arrest was her fault. She had to make it right.
If it wasn’t already too late.
“I have to tell you something.” Her mouth was dry. “The thing I asked you about the other day… I didn’t actually hear it from Anna. Heather and I were looking through her parents’ things, and—”
Her mom shook her head. “I know this is hard for you. First Heather’s parents, now Anna. But you did the right thing when you told me what she said. Lying about it now won’t help anything.”
“But—”
“You need to stop this right now.” Her mom’s voice was sharp. “Internal found enough evidence to suggest that Anna and her parents were dissidents. Lying to protect a dissident qualifies as dissident activity.” She held up a hand as Becca opened her mouth to speak. “I don’t want to hear another word about this. Do you understand?”
The doorbell rang.
Becca jumped up from her chair. “I’ll get it.” She raced to the door and yanked it open.
Jake stood in front of her.
He smiled. “Don’t tell me you forgot.”
Right. Their date. She smiled weakly. “Of course not.”
She looked down at the jeans and wrinkled shirt she had worn to school. Heather would never approve of her wearing something like this on a date, but Heather’s opinion didn’t matter much to Becca right now. Besides, it wasn’t like she cared about impressing Jake.
“Who is it?” her mom called.
At least going out with Jake would get her away from her mom. Becca had never thought she’d see an upside to going out with a possible Internal spy who might be trying to get her best friend arrested. “I have to go, Mom,” she called back. “I have a date.”
Her mom strode into the living room behind her. “You didn’t tell me about this.”
Jake backed out into the hallway, giving Becca room to get out the door. “Are you ready to go?”
It wasn’t too late to make an excuse and stay home.
And go right back to the kitchen to finish her conversation with her mom.
She gave Jake what she hoped was a convincing smile. “Ready when you are.”
“So,” said Jake over the low hum of conversation that filled Lucky’s Pizza, “what will it take to get you to believe that I’m not spying for Internal?”
Becca tensed before realizing that he had meant it as a teasing question, not a challenge. She forced herself to relax. She didn’t exactly have much practice with this kind of thing.
“You could start by telling me about yourself.” She kept her voice light.
The smell of pizza made her mouth water. Her stomach had stopped hurting the second she had left the apartment. Jake might be trying to get her to trust him so she would say something incriminating about Heather, but that was nothing compared to what her mom had done.
And being here with Jake, trying to figure out his true intentions, would keep her too distracted to think about Anna.
Almost every table at Lucky’s was full, but Becca only saw a couple of people she knew, and none of them were looking her way. Good. She didn’t need anybody to see her out with Jake. She didn’t know how they would twist this date into further proof that she was a dissident, but she knew they could find a way.
Wait. The woman at the next table over—was she watching them? Becca tensed and angled her body slightly to get a better view. The woman’s eyes flicked from their table to the one next to theirs, to one across the room, scanning each one for a few seconds before moving on to the next. She paused for a few seconds to take a halfhearted nibble of her pizza, then began again. Just a Monitor, then. Becca could see the glint of the pin now. Monitors were everywhere; unlike their counterparts in high school, adult Monitors got paid a small amount to watch their fellow citizens, so there was never a shortage of volunteers.
The woman’s eyes met Becca’s. Becca quickly looked away.
She had never been afraid of Monitors before.
“There’s not much to tell,” Jake was saying. “Grew up here, moved away, came back with my dad after my parents split up. Suffering through school until I graduate.” He shrugged. “I’ve lived a boring life.”
