“For real!” Sophie added, to be helpful.
Julie came in from the living room. Sophie wasn’t allowed to bring a tablet into the dining room, but Mom put hers on the floor in the corner before Sophie had a chance to point it out. David still hadn’t come down.
“I thought the Pilot was supposed to make him able to pay attention to more things at once,” Sophie said.
Ma sighed. “He’s eighteen. Just because he can hear us doesn’t mean he thinks it applies to him. Sophie, I’d love it if you skip past the whole teenager attitude phase.”
“I’ll try,” Sophie said. She was serious, but both her parents laughed. “I’ll go get him.”
“Be careful on the stairs,” Ma said.
Sophie knew how to show teenage attitude. She could have said, Thanks for the concern. I was going to climb the stairs on stilts, but now I’ll walk. Instead, she pretended she hadn’t heard. She took the stairs two at a time, since nobody was looking, holding the railing as a small concession. Attitude or no attitude, she tried to remember they were looking out for her. If the Big One came for her when she was on the stairs, she really would get hurt, but she didn’t feel it lurking.
Before she even knocked on his door, David said, “Come in.”
She peeked her head in. He was playing a different game. No zombies, but warrior angel things.
“How did you know I was here? I was quiet.”
“There’s a creaky floorboard.”
Maybe that was how he’d caught her sneaking earlier; she’d have to figure out which one it was for future reference. “Dinnertime. It looks pretty edible.”
He punched a couple of angels, then paused the game and smiled at her. “Okay, let’s go, Softserve.”
The smile made up for his use of her least favorite nickname. She never realized how much she missed him being nice to her until he was nice to her.
They ate dinner and chatted about everyone’s day. Nobody mentioned Sophie’s suspension. She said she had read more of Johnny Tremain for school and part of Powers for fun. They were encouraging. Way to read your life away, Soph.
When everyone had gotten a turn to talk, Julie said, “I have something else to discuss.”
They all looked at her and waited.
“I’m getting a Pilot.”
Sophie wished for one second she had a Pilot herself in order to take in everybody’s reaction at once. She was watching Mom because Mom was talking, so she missed David and Ma. When she turned to them, David looked curious but not surprised, and Ma’s face was guarded, with no surprise showing, either. Mom said it was a discussion, but she also said “I’m getting,” not “I’m thinking of getting,” so they probably had talked about it already, and this was the formal Telling the Kids.
She remembered something her ma had said to her once, that someday she and Sophie would be among the only ones without Pilots. She didn’t think Ma had meant this soon, but it was already pretty true. Most classes at school were divided between Pilots and non-Pilots, with the non-Pilots being mostly kids like her, with seizures or intellectual disabilities or autism or other things that made them “unlikely candidates,” and one or two with religious objections. There wasn’t even a rich-poor divide since the company covered them for kids unable to afford the procedure; the divide was between approved brains and unapproved brains and degrees of acceptable neurodiversity.
Nobody had said anything yet, so Sophie asked the only question that came to her head. “Why?” She understood the reason for kids, but didn’t get what was in it for a grown-up.
Her mom looked grateful that somebody had said something. “It’ll be useful for work. There are a lot of people in my office who have them now and I’d like to keep up.”
Val looked at her, and she added, “Not that I couldn’t do the work without a Pilot.”
Sophie knew that last part was for her benefit.
David looked up from his pasta. “It sounds like you’re telling us, not asking us. I’m okay with it either way. Just remember what a hard time you both gave me when I wanted mine.”
Julie nodded. “Noted.”
David cleared the table after dinner. Both parents had gone to the living room, but Sophie lingered. “Do you want me to dry?”
“Sure,” he said, smiling as he turned on the tap. She grabbed a towel and stood on one leg while she waited, like a flamingo.
David eyed her. “That’s not some weird new seizure, is it?”
She shook her head, trying to keep her balance.
“Y’know, Soph, if Mom is getting a Pilot it’s going to mean some changes for both of us.”
“What do you mean?”
He handed her the colander to dry and lowered his voice. “You know how I can play a game but know where you are in the room? Imagine if Mom can do that. No sneaking. It’ll be harder to get away with anything.”
“What do we get away with?”
“That’s the thing. You don’t know how much you get away with until suddenly somebody is watching and listening all the time. If she had a Pilot she’d look like she was reading but she’d be listening to us at the same time.”
“If she had super hearing. She’s two rooms away.”
He splashed her. “True. I’m just saying things might get stricter, even if that’s not her plan. I know they’re already strict with you.”
Sophie swatted David with the towel to make up for the splash, then nodded. What he said made sense, but more important, for the first time in ages it felt like he was taking her seriously.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
SOPHIE
Kevin Boatman caught Sophie after English on the day she went back to school. “What was it like?”
Sophie shrugged. “My mom worked from home and made me sit on the couch and read. Not that different.”
“Why would they think suspension is punishment? I’d rather be anywhere than school.”
Sophie
