In the After

we love, we’ll always be sisters.

Baby nodded, still with her head on my side. She didn’t want to let go of me, and I didn’t mind. She anchored me to who I was.

I looked up at Rice and smiled. “We’re okay,” I assured him.

“Great,” he exhaled loudly, genuinely relieved. He clearly wanted to move on. “Let’s get some chocolate milk.” He grinned at Baby. “Would you like that?”

Baby raised her eyebrows and half smiled. She didn’t understand him, but she knew he was excited about something and wanted her to be excited too. She waved her hand in front of her face.

“Fan!” Rice shouted, pleased. I smiled. The tension melted away, though I was still unsettled.

I like him, Baby told me.

Me too. He’s . . . nice. I wasn’t sure how I felt. His knowledge of this place was comforting, and he did make me feel at ease—which was something I hadn’t felt in a long time. He was also cute, and something dipped in my stomach every time we were close. But after being on my own for so long, I wondered if I would recognize a crush if I tripped over one.

“Can you teach me more of the words in your language?” Rice asked, snapping me out of my thoughts. “It’s fascinating, all the modifications you’ve made, especially how sometimes you sign into each other’s hands when you don’t want people to know you’re communicating.”

“Oh, you noticed that?”

“It’s not obvious,” he assured me, “but sometimes you hold hands and tell me what she’s saying. Either she’s letting you know somehow or you’re a mind reader.”

I bit my lip. “You wouldn’t believe the latter, would you? You shouldn’t underestimate my psychic ability.”

“I’ll believe it if you guess what I’m thinking right now.” He turned and looked intensely into my eyes. I noticed again how good-looking he was. He and I stared at each other, not saying anything, for what felt like minutes. I smiled, a real smile this time, not the forced, tense imitation of a smile I’d been wearing all morning.

It was strange. On some level I genuinely felt comfortable with Rice, almost like he was a friend from Before. I raised my thumb and pointer finger to each temple. “You are thinking . . .” I feigned concentration. “. . . that you wish you didn’t have to babysit two post-aps when you could be off somewhere engineering chemicals.”

“Clearly you are not a mind reader.” He grinned, turning to Baby. “I’m actually enjoying this. You and Baby are . . . different.”

“Thanks,” I said sarcastically.

“No, I mean in a good way.” He looked at me again. “I’m really glad you’re here. And I won’t tell anyone about you two being able to communicate through touch.”

“Thanks,” I said again, and this time I meant it.

We walked to another large white building that turned out to be a standard cafeteria. A smell that made my knees weak hit me immediately.

Burgers. Not pigeon burgers. Not squirrel burgers. Not rat burgers. Honest to goodness hamburgers. I sniffed the air. There was another scent, just as heavenly: French fries.

My stomach growled loudly. I looked at Rice and grinned. “I skipped breakfast.”

“We’re supposed to wait for your mother . . . but go ahead, if you want.”

We made a beeline for the servers and I grabbed a tray. But before I got in line, I stopped.

“I don’t have any money,” I told Rice.

“It’s okay, we don’t use money here. We have enough resources for everyone, at least for now. If you live here, you get whatever you want.”

“Fan.” I smiled and piled plates onto my tray, thinking of what Baby would like to eat as well. Hamburgers, fries, a baked potato, three slices of pizza, some kind of burrito thing, and two pieces of crude-looking apple pie. I made my way past a table of kids my age, all dressed in red, and another table of pregnant women, talking excitedly. I brought the food to an empty table and signed to Baby that she shouldn’t place her shoes on the tabletop. She dropped them under her chair and looked at me expectantly.

Well, dig in, I told her with a smile. I ate until I was in danger of bursting. Baby was on her second slice of pizza. Rice just watched us, trying to make conversation.

“You know, you’re not really eating beef.”

“You could have fooled me,” I mumbled, my mouth full.

“It’s a synthetic protein that we manufacture from soy and a chemical compound.”

“Sure tastes real. My dad used to make us eat soy burgers all the time and they weren’t half as good as these are.”

“We’ve perfected the formula this past year,” Rice told me, obviously pleased. He went on to explain how there was a nearby dairy farm that they were able to save when the Floraes arrived and how they kept the cows fed a steady diet of a synthesized organic compound that maximized milk output with minimal caloric intake. I tried to listen, but I was lost in the euphoria of the banquet in front of me.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Days seem to go by here, but there are no windows in my room and I am unsure about the passage of time. More often than not, I am unable to focus. I can’t think very well. When I ask questions, no one answers. I’ve learned that probing just confuses me and I keep forgetting why it is important in the first place. I’ve stopped asking for my mother, for Baby. If either of them came to see me I do not remember their visit.

I am brought meals and medication by Dr. Thorpe or one of the nurses. I dutifully swallow the pills and whatever food they put in front of me and fall asleep soon after. I like being asleep. When I’m awake my head is foggy.

Eventually Dr. Thorpe encourages me to leave my room and visit the common areas and the small cafeteria. There I eat with the other inhabitants of the Ward. They don’t talk and neither do I. I leave them alone. I don’t want to cause any trouble.

There is a large window in the common room and I sit and look out it sometimes. There is nothing to see really, the glass is thick and covered in bars, but past that I can make out some trees. I like the color green. It goes on endlessly. When the wind shakes the leaves, it seems as if the world is rattling.

Sometimes, when I’m lost in the trees, I feel someone there, sitting next to me, holding my hand. The hands are rough and much larger than mine, but gentle and masculine at the same time. I feel like they belong to someone I should remember. Sometimes he doesn’t hold my hand, but I still feel him there, watching over me. When I turn to look, though, he’s gone and I wonder if he was really there at all.

* * *

He stares at you when he thinks you’re not looking.

Maybe it’s the fan haircut you gave me. Crossing my eyes, I stuck my tongue out at Baby. I can’t help that I’m beautiful.

He’s looking at your face, not your hair, Baby told me with a slight smirk. I realized she was giving me a hard time. I made another face at her, but I inwardly smiled and tried to hide my blush. I looked up and saw Rice watching us, trying to figure out what we were saying. He raised his eyebrows questioningly.

“Baby was just talking about my awesome haircut,” I lied. “She did it herself.”

Rice smiled widely. “She did an excellent job . . . very . . . even.” He gave Baby an enthusiastic thumbs- up.

See, he likes it. I told her. Maybe you should get your hair cut just like me.