Vanishing Rain (Blue Spectrum Chronicles Book 2) (2 page)

Chapter 2

Plan

It must have been several hours later when I awoke with muddled images filling my head, splotchy and ugly.  I gagged, nausea taking over my stomach, my body.  Somehow even my brain.  My head was spinning and the glider was twirling around in circles. But I knew I hadn’t moved. 

My eyes slowly drifted to my arm, blood oozing out of the white gauze, a red inkblot of freedom. I moved my eyes to the severed tracker-timer that had settled on the floor of my glider, a reminder to my poor head and body of what I had done.  There was no going back after removing it, but with the stupid thing lying right there, I realized in my foggy state, that I could still be traced.  Paranoia kicked in, clenching my body into a vice. They had probably put out an alert for me, and it wouldn’t take them long to find me if I didn’t get going.  The faster the better. 

But I couldn’t seem to move, to form a plan beyond getting away from parking garage.

Orion had left clues, or so I thought.  He and my S.L.A.G. brother, Ice, had disappeared at about the same time, and I didn’t know if that was just a coincidence or my mind playing tricks on me, a nasty, merciless magician nestled inside my brain.  There was the letter K.  For some stupid reason, the letter K had kept popping up.  On the back of the necklace he had given me.  In the stars.  In the dirt of our hedge gap meeting place.  I hadn’t known if they were real clues or if I was losing my mind.  Probably a little of both, but it didn’t change my situation.  I was pregnant, alone, and determined that the Administration was not going to kill my baby, S.L.A.G. or not.

My head spun furiously as grey clouds swirled above the parking garage, the small amount of light that snuck in splitting my head into two, maybe three distinct pieces. Thick nausea overtook me again, and in an instant, I leaned over and vomited, filling the floor of my glider with a golden bile that burned more coming out than going in.  I gagged, saliva dripping off of my lips. My arm screamed in pain, demanding that the tracker-timer that had been there for eighteen years be replaced.  Gods, what had I done?

I ignored the pain and nausea as I struggled to sit up, thankful that I had at least wrapped my arm with gauze before I passed out. 

I thought about Province K…the Asters…the elusive, dead Province that supposedly housed the Exiles.

Could I really become an Exile?  While pregnant and alone?  And how would I get there? 

I had scoured my tablet, searching for information on Province K, but all I could find was typical Administration bullshit.  What did Ivy say that day at the teen center?  I scrunched my face up, trying to remember.  The past few weeks wobbled and teetered in my mind.  Then it came to me.  She said the Exiles took the abandoned sewer routes under the city and survived by eating rats.

Always a gagger, I retched at the thought, then I threw up again.  It had become a normal morning activity, and I had been blaming it on nerves.  But the previous day, when Dove had told me I missed the Shot while I had been incarcerated, I easily pieced it all together. I vividly recalled the previous month when I had passed, maybe before they could give me the Shot.  That meant two missed months of birth control shots, and so much had been happening that I didn’t even connect that I had been throwing up almost every morning since Orion had disappeared.  Since that night in the hedge…

Just then, I spilled the contents of my stomach again, my heart aching as if a giant hand were squeezing it. I puked repeatedly, spewing my insides out onto the floor of the already soiled glider. I wondered if I would just vomit out a tiny baby, because I was sure there was nothing left in my stomach.  It was as empty as my heart, as bloody as my arm.

I needed to get going.  I just didn’t know how. 

It would have been so much easier if I could just go back, take the Shot after my shift at the Clinic and let the medicine do its work.  Abort the fetus.  I wasn’t far enough along for anyone to notice.  I could go on with my studies, become a researcher to find a cure for S.L.A.G.  I could continue working with the Spectrum Reds at the Clinic, find the three S.L.A.G. sibs that I had just found out about…

But it was Snow’s face.  Always Snow.  He was supposed to be born with S.L.A.G., yet he was perfect. Smart, normal. It was Ice who had the autistic gene, not Snow.  And the Administration had taken Ice away, making Snow a LAST.  Technically, Ice was a LAST, too. They were some of the last wave of babies conceived naturally.  It was the Administration’s way of wiping out S.L.A.G.  Or just another way to control us all, turn us into mindless zombies.

I held my spinning stomach, knowing the alcohol would be bad for the fetus inside of me.  Yet aborting it wouldn’t be so good on it, either.

My head was bubbling, waving, twisting in confusion.  I had made a plan, but sticking to it was proving to be difficult.  Stage one.  I had removed the tracker-timer from my arm. I stared at my bandaged arm, then, and laughed out loud, not the crazy drunken laughter like before, but bitter, grown up laughter. Sarcastic.  Angry.  Bitter.

There was no going back. The tracker-timer was removed.  What would I tell them if I went back, anyway? That it accidentally fell out?  I pushed myself up groggily, lifted the bloody tracker-timer in my right hand and threw it full force onto the vomit filled floor, watching in fascination as my blood and vomit mixed into a pink and red soup, a tiny machine spicing it up.  I twisted my body so I was sitting up and stomped down as hard as I could on it with my shoe, crushing it into several pieces as the bloody vomit splashed against the windows of the glider, onto my uniform – a rainstorm of Rain’s insides.

It felt satisfyingly good, like stretching out with your friends on a warm day.  Eating something besides Administration regulated food.  Drinking champagne instead of nutrient water.

I heaved a great breath, the tracker-timer destroyed.  I was thirsty, and it felt like my mouth was full of cotton.  I dug in my satchel, found a bottle of nutrient water and tipped it back, the sweet water soothing my parched mouth and throat.

Then I reached for the button to open the glider window, replaying that night with Orion over and over in my mind, a pitiful song that was stuck in my head.  If I could rewind time, go back and change a thing, would I?

No.  That night with Orion was held somewhere precious inside of me, a memory that could never be taken away, a soldier standing sentry to my bruised heart.  I sniffed the stale, vomit infused air, my mind starting to clear.

I shook my head back and forth, pulled myself up into a sitting position, as the glider shields opened with a whir.  The fumes from the garage hit me in the face, a slap of smoggy province air.  I glanced around, hoping that nobody was watching.  Thankfully, the garage was empty.  Everyone was gone, working their Administration directed jobs.  I spewed out a dose of hot, stinky breath, then laughed out loud.

The paranoia had lifted. I was nobody. Just one kid missing from school.  It would take them a while to piece it all together, especially now that I had destroyed the tracker-timer, their only way to trace me. 

I gulped, then, a touch of the paranoia returning.  I was somebody.  I was Moon’s daughter.  High born, my number so low that I was almost royalty in Province A.  Still, I had never let it get to my head.  I had left my mother’s apartment and gone to live with Dove and my Dad, but would my mom let it go?  Let me go without a fuss?  I doubted it.

Reaching for my satchel, I thought about the plan I had so carefully formed in my bedroom that night, how it all came to be.

Gods, I hoped it would work.  Because if it didn’t, I knew that losing the baby would be the least of my worries.

Chapter 3

Vanishing

I had gone to my bedroom to study that last night, after kissing Snow and the toddlers.  All I could think about was the scheduled shot the following day, how I was pregnant and I had less than twenty-four hours to figure it all out. 

Dove and my dad were watching a vid on the big screen in our elaborate apartment. I told them I would be studying, and they both just nodded at me, snuggled up together on the couch as if they were one unit.  I wondered if I would ever find someone to love…someone to love me like that.  I shot them a smile, etching the image of them in my mind.  I knew what I was about to do would break their hearts.

When I got to my room, I held my stomach, somehow feeling the life inside of it, knowing it was there.  I had already been researching Province K for my Fast Track Geography project, and without thinking I switched from Province K to Province A’s sewer map system.  A stream of lines, some diagonal, but most formed in right angles had popped onto the screen.  I knew that I had to copy the map somehow if I was going to make it to the Asters.  As I stared at the conglomeration of lines, I wondered when it had become the Asters instead of Province K…who started calling it that. 

My pulse was clipping along at a rapid pace, and when I looked down, I could see my heartbeat in my veins, so close to my tracker-timer that my heart sped up.  Could I really follow through with this crazy plan? Remove it like some back wood doctor of times past?

I heaved a giant breath. I needed to do a lot of things, and I didn’t want Dove or my dad to know.  Biting on my lower lip, thoughts traveled at light speed through my brain.  I would need something to write with.  And some paper.  But where would I get such things?  Everybody wrote on tablets, talked through ear communicators. 

I hadn’t been living with Dove and my dad for long, but I knew Dove kept wrapping paper in the hall closet for the parties she gave Snow and the toddlers.  That would have to do. I could figure out something to write with, knowing there weren’t many ancient writing instruments left in the Provinces.

I stared down at my tracker-timer, flashing the time and date at me.  It had to go, or I would definitely be caught.  The Administration would trace me, track me down like the fugitive I was planning to be, as long as it was implanted on my forearm.  The thought of it made my head spin.  Any medical procedure gave me the willies, and I would often just pass out.  Could I actually cut the damn thing out of my arm?   

A knife would work.  But where would I get a knife?  Our food was delivered already cut up and in perfect nutrient sized bites.  Maybe Ivy could get me one.  I thought about my bold friend. She could be trusted, but if I showed up at Citizen School, it would ruin everything.  Still, I might have to take a chance with her. 

I waited on my bed, studying Province K until the apartment became silent.  Then I crept out of my bedroom, padding softly on the luxurious carpet and quietly opening the hall closet door.  It wasn’t mechanized like most of the doors in the apartment, and the hinges squeaked as the door slowly slid open. 

Shelves were organized with toys, blankets, old clothes, my dad’s designing tools. I eyed an instrument.  It would do. Stuffing it in my pajamas pocket, I continued to scan the other shelves. Frustrated, I sighed.  There was no paper to be seen, and tears threatened to pour out of my eyes.  I had less than twelve hours before they would kill this baby.  I pursed my lips, turning to go.

“Rain, what are you doing?”

It was Dove.  Gods, how I loved her.  After all she had done for me, I was just going to leave her, leave Snow and Sun and Storm and my dad.  For what?  To save a baby who would most likely be born with S.L.A.G.  It didn’t seem too logical at that moment.

“Ummm,” I hesitated.   Dove’s blonde hair was tied up in a knot and she wasn’t wearing any make-up.  I glanced into her chocolate brown eyes.  “I’m sorry.  It’s Halo’s birthday tomorrow.  I…I thought that you might have some wrapping paper.”

“Silly girl.”  Dove hugged me to her, and the sweetest perfume wafted up to my nostrils.  I felt like the worst traitor, even worse than my real mom.  “I have tons of it.  Right here.”

Dove pulled down a box full of paper and bows.  I peered into the box, the hall light barely casting shadows over its insides. To my delight, an old calligraphy pen and some blank cards were tucked neatly in the box.

“What did you get her?” Dove asked. Oh, no.  More lies. 

I faltered for a minute, thinking of the antique broken heart necklace that Orion had given me.  The one with a K etched on the back of it.  He had a matching one, and when you put them together the heart was complete.  For a few hours I was on top of the world over that.  Until he up and disappeared.

“It’s a best friend necklace,” I told Dove, looking away from her scrutinizing eyes.  The hall light was dim, and I was hoping she wouldn’t notice anything was amiss.

“How sweet,” she smiled.  “When I was a kid I had a best friend, and we did the same thing.  One heart matches the other, right?”

“Yeah,” I answered, tamping down a tremendous dose of guilt.  My real mother could always tell when I was lying, but Dove trusted me. 

“Where did you get it?”  I knew Dove wasn’t prying.  She was genuinely interested in my life.

“At an antique store on Broadway,” I lied.  Part of me wanted to just spill the beans to Dove, to let her take over and make everything turn out fine.  Like she did when I had been incarcerated. 

I pursed my lips.  No.  This had to be something I did alone. 

“Okay,” Dove whispered, placing her hand on my shoulder and giving it a gentle squeeze.  “Get some sleep, sweetie.”

“Thanks, Dove.  I will.” 

I watched her small, slender figure disappear into her bedroom where she would lie next to my dad.  The man she loved.

At one point I thought I had that.  With Orion.  He had asked me to be his marriage partner.  Right before he disappeared without even saying good-bye. 

I stared at the closed bedroom door, knowing I would never have the love they had.  My heart was tattered, shredded into pieces, and I knew I could never love anyone again.  Not like I loved Orion.  I let out a frustrated breath. 

Maybe I just thought I had loved Orion.  Loving someone didn’t mean you would just up and leave that person.  For weeks my mind and my heart had been playing a cruel game of tic-tac-toe, and I never came out the winner. There was never a clean, straight line with all of the answers.  It was better before I figured out I was pregnant.  I could pull it together, try to forget about Orion and go on with my friends and my studies…my family.  But this baby…it changed everything.

I had made a decision in a matter of seconds, and it staked a claim on me, dancing murderously over the skeleton of my body, the beating pulse of my heart.

I knew then, more than ever, that I had to vanish.