Once We Were

bye.

It would only be one call. A few coins in the slot. Ten numbers. So quick. So simple.

Hi, Lyle, I imagined saying. I pictured his flop of yellow hair, his skinny arms and legs, his crooked-toothed grin.

Hi, Lyle—

Then what? Happy birthday. Happy eleventh birthday.

The last time I’d wished Lyle happy birthday—actually spoken those words aloud —he’d been turning seven. After that, I’d lost the strength to do more than watch as Addie spoke for me. I’d hovered in a body I couldn’t control, a ghost in a family that didn’t know I still existed.

What did one say after four years like that?

Thinking about what I’d tell Mom was even worse.

Hi. It’s Eva. I was there the whole time. I was there all those years, and you never knew.

Hi. It’s Eva. I’m okay—I think I’m safe. Are you okay? Are you safe?

Hi. It’s Eva. I wish I were home.

Hi. It’s Eva. I love you.

I could see Mom so clearly it hurt: the panes of her face, her laugh lines, and the deeper lines on her brow not etched by laughter. I could see her in her waitressing uniform: black slacks and a white blouse, stark against her corn-silk hair. Addie and I had always wanted hair like hers, so smooth and straight it glided through our fingers. Instead, we had Dad’s curls, lazy and halfhearted. Princess hair, he’d called it when Addie and I were small enough to sit in his lap, breathing in the smell of his aftershave, begging for stories that ended in Happily Ever After.

I wanted, so badly, to know how our family was. So much could have happened in the nearly two months since Addie and I had last slept in our own bed, last woken up staring at our own ceiling.

Had Lyle gotten the kidney transplant we’d been promised, or was he still chained to his dialysis appointments? Did our parents even know what had happened to Addie and me? What if they thought we were still at the clinic, being cured of our hybridity?

Was that better or worse than them knowing the truth? A month and a half ago, Addie and I had broken out of Nornand Clinic of Psychiatric Health. We should have brought all the other patients with us. But we’d failed. In the end, we’d left with just Ryan and Devon, Hally and Lissa, Kitty and Nina. And Jaime, of course. Jaime Cortae.

Now we were hiding outside the system entirely, sheltered by Peter and his underground network of hybrids. We were the fugitives we’d heard about in government class. The criminals whose arrest—and they were always arrested in the end—blared across the news.

Would Mom and Dad want to know that?

What would they do if they did? Come charging across the continent to take us home? Protect us, like they hadn’t protected us before? Tell us they were sorry, they’d made a terrible mistake in ever letting us go?

Maybe they would just turn us in again.

No.

I couldn’t bear to think they might.

They’re going to help you get well, Addie, Dad had said when he called us at Nornand. Mom and I only want the best for you.

Peter had warned us how the government might bug our phone lines. Maybe Dad had known someone might listen in on our call at Nornand, and he’d had to say whatever they wanted to hear. Maybe he hadn’t meant those words.

Because that wasn’t what he’d whispered as Addie and I climbed into Mr. Conivent’s car.

If you’re there, Eva, he’d said. If you’re really there . . . I love you, too. Always.

Always.

<Addie> I said.

The knife of her longing cut us both. <Just a few words.>

<We can’t> I said. <Addie, we can’t.>

No matter how much we ached to.

When Addie didn’t release the phone, I slipped into control and did it for us. Addie didn’t protest. I stepped out onto the sidewalk, the city greeting us with a slap of wind. A passing car coughed dark exhaust into the air.

<You think . . . > Addie hesitated. <You think he’s okay? Lyle.>

<Yeah. I think so.>

What else could I say?

I waited at a crosswalk with a small crowd of early-morning commuters, each sunk in their own thoughts. No one paid Addie and me any attention. Anchoit was the biggest, busiest city we’d ever seen, let alone lived in. The buildings loomed over the streets, contraptions of metal and concrete. Every once in a while, one was softened by a facade of worn red brick.

Peter had chosen Anchoit for its size. For the anonymity of its quiet alleyways and busy thoroughfares. Cars, people, thoughts—everything moved quickly here. It was a far cry from old, languid Bessimir City, or the all-but- stagnant Lupside, where Addie and I had lived before.

It seemed like more happened in a night in Anchoit than in a year in Lupside. Not that Addie or I would know. Since Peter had brought us here from Nornand, I could count on one hand the number of times we’d been allowed out in the city. Peter and Emalia weren’t taking any chances.

In Anchoit, it might have been easier to hide what Addie and I were—hybrids, fugitives, less-than-normal. But it didn’t change the facts. I dreamed of roaming the neon streets after dark. Of playing games and buying junk at the boardwalk. Of splashing through the waves again.

<Police officer> Addie said quietly.

Our legs froze. It took three thundering heartbeats before I calmed down enough to move again. I crossed the street so we didn’t have to pass the policeman directly.

Chances were, his presence had absolutely nothing to do with us.

But Addie and I were hybrid.

Whatever the chance, however small, we couldn’t take it.

TWO

Emalia’s apartment building was silent but for the buzzing of overhead lights, which flickered on and off like struggling fireflies. A trash bag slouched, stinking, in the corner.

Peter had housed us Nornand refugees together in his apartment as long as he could. But he spent as much time traveling as he did living in Anchoit, and eventually, we’d been separated. Kitty and Nina lived with us at Emalia’s. The Mullan siblings were only a few floors up, with Henri, but it wasn’t the same.

Even worse, Dr. Lyanne had taken Jaime away to a little house on the fringes of the city. None of us had seen him in three weeks.

The apartment was still dim when I slipped back inside, the living room half-lit by hazy morning sunlight. Emalia and her twin soul, Sophie, kept their home achingly neat, softly decorated. In a weird way, Peter’s apartment—since Peter was so frequently absent—had seemed like our place, our home. Here, Addie and I felt like intruders in a sanctuary of muted sweaters and woven placemats.

<So> Addie said. We sank onto the couch and stared at Emalia’s potted plant. Every leaf looked meticulously arranged. Even her plants were orderly.

<So, what?> I let our eyes slide half-closed. We’d hardly slept last night,