Tabula Rasa Kristen Lippert Martin (16 page)

you what you don’t want to hear. They fill out paperwork about
 your status and your future. And then that’s it. No matter what
 you do, no matter how hard you try, you can’t ever be the same
 again.
I feel like I’m falling. I feel that tickle in my stomach as I plunge
 down into a shaft of darkness, and as I fall, I pull the emptiness
 around me right into my heart. I want to be one with this nothing-
 ness. The empty black nothingness.
But suddenly there’s an abrupt shift inside my mind, and in an
 instant, this bad memory is a flag snapping in a too-strong wind.
It tears loose and is carried off.
Now I’m climbing, hand over hand. Higher and higher. My
 feet slipping on metal bars that are not meant to be used as steps.
I’m climbing to get closer to something, or farther away—I don’t
 even know. And wrapped up in this pain, as inseparable from me
 as a parasite is from its host, is the name Erskine Claymore.
I’m on the bathroom floor again, panting.
I make myself stand up, and then I spit into the sink and
 rinse my mouth, because I taste stomach acid at the back of
 my throat like I’m going to throw up.
The only thing I can think to do is move. To run. Just
 like Thomas said. If I move fast enough, I can leave these
 bad dreams behind and they’ll fall away and evaporate.
I rush into the hallway, dashing one way, then another,
 like a frantic bird that’s accidentally flown inside of a build-
 ing. I run with no sense of purpose or direction. I just
 want to get more lost. The hallways are full of turns, full
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of choices that I refuse to make, and it wouldn’t matter if I
 did. Because they all lead me to the same place. To pain, to
 the dull emptiness of grief.
I run and run and run, until I notice that beneath my
 feet the bare concrete floor has given way to soft carpeting.
I stop and try to pull air back into my burning lungs.
Up ahead I think I see a light. I lower my glow stick,
 and there it is. A small green circle. I head toward it and
 come to a fancy door made of striped wood with a smoky
 glass center. The room beyond is dark, but now I see that
 the tiny green light is from a magnetic card reader. I seem
 to have come to the edge of where power and outage
 meet.
I wonder what this place could be. I pull my passcard
 out, debating whether I should use it. What if it gives my
 location away? I don’t care. I’m too curious.
I zip the card through the reader and pull the door open.
The room on the other side looks like a hotel lobby,
 complete with concierge desk. There’s a water feature—
 the kind that trickles and drips and is supposed to make
 soothing noises like a mountain brook. In the center of
 the room is a coffee table made of tangerine-colored glass,
 two clear plastic armchairs, and a huge sofa with square,
 white leather cushions and chrome legs. Looks expensive
 and extremely uncomfortable.
I walk in, sit down, and put my hands on my knees.
Obviously it’s a waiting room.
It’s the kind of place where you sit alone, chewing on a
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piece of your hair and bouncing your leg nervously. Before
 you hear adults say that they did all they could but it was
 too late. Before you pick out a casket. Before you’re told
 that you’ll be moving to a new home the next day, so
 gather everything you have into a single bag—everything,
 including all the happiness you’ve ever known—because
 they’re going to shepherd you into a bleak new future and
 you can’t refuse to go.  
Before all that, you wait in a room like this. Except it’s
 a lot less nice.
I stand up and straighten my back. A calm anger
 strengthens me, sharpens me, as I look around.
It’s all so strange. This is newly built. I don’t under-
 stand why the government canceled this project just to start
 decorating this place like a posh resort. It makes no sense.
My eyes sweep back and forth, trying to see if there’s
 anything worth taking. I see a crystal candy dish on an end
 table marked with an E. C. It’s filled with candy-coated
 chocolate mints. Without thinking, I grab one and toss it
 into the air. Before the candy lands in my mouth, a mem-
 ory lands first.
“Catch it!” my mother yells.
I don’t.
“Again!” she says, tossing another seed to me.  
I miss.
“Ay, Angel, you’re terrible at this!” she says, laughing. “I’m
 almost out of pepitas!”
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“I can do it!” I pout. “One more time.”
We walk and she tosses another pepita. It bounces off the end
 of my nose. We are now emerging from the subway onto the street.
It’s our mysterious yearly trek to the Upper West Side. I have
 never asked her why we come here before, but today I do.
She takes me by the hand and says, “I like this place.”
“We have parks, too,” I say, defending our neighborhood,
 which is not this nice or this quiet. And there are too many men
 without jobs hanging around, and they usually start drinking by
 noon.
“I know, but this park brings me happy memories,” she says as
 she swings my hand high above my head.
We find a bench and sit to eat the lunch my mother has brought:
 beef empanadas, plain white rice, and a Coke. We always sit on
 this bench, directly across from a big mansion overlooking Riverside
Park. My feet do not touch the ground. I swing my legs like I’m
 kicking the air.
“I wish I was rich. I wish I had a house like that,” I say.
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“You know, I used to work for the man who lives in that big
 house.”
“Really? What was he like? Are rich people mean? That’s
 what Yolanda Cruz told me. They’re all mean and selfish.”
“No, they’re not all mean and selfish. The man I worked for
 was very nice. He was the best man I ever knew.”
“What happened to him?” I ask.
My mother does not reply.
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“Mamá?”
She looks up to the uppermost window, and I think I see some-
 one looking down at us. But only for a moment.
“My friends say things about who my father is,” I mumble.
She sighs and waves her hand. “They don’t know anything,
Angel. Just remember that you are special, and someone is always
 watching over you.”
I press the heels of my hands to my eyes and groan. It’s so
 frustrating! To be so close to remembering and still not be
 able to see my mother’s face, just a cloud of white. I need to
 remember things that will help me figure out who’s trying
 to kill me and why, and this memory has given me noth-
 ing useful.
I look around the room again. I pick up one of the pil-
 lows. It’s burgundy velvet, corded on the edges with gold
 thread. I push the nap of the fabric back and forth. My fin-
 gers leave streaks. This pillow alone must have cost a small
 fortune. I tuck it under my arm. I’ll bring it to Thomas.
Maybe it’ll help him rest easier.
I continue searching the room, looking for anything
 else that could help him, and as I round the side of the tall
 concierge desk I see something even better. A laptop. I fold
 it up, snatch  the power cord coiled next to it,  and hang it
 around my neck like a scarf.
I’ve lingered long enough. I need to get going. I turn
 around and stop in my tracks. I haven’t entered this waiting
 area through the main entrance. I’ve come the back way.
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I face a set of large glass doors with the letters E. C. on it.
And now I know what the initials stand for.
Of course.
Erskine Claymore.
I’ve seen these doors before. From the other side. This
 is South Wing.
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CHAPTER 21
 may be smeared with blood and mud, but I’m hoping
I  that the soldiers still see me as a girl, because only a
 girl would take such a long time in the bathroom. I don’t
 want to have to explain too much about where I’ve been
 or what I’ve been doing. I doubt these strange, barefoot
 guys would get it.
After a few wrong turns I find my way back. As I
 approach the rec lounge door, I hear an agonized scream.
It’s Thomas. I burst back into the lounge and see Sylvester
 with his knees on Thomas’s chest. I’m about to pull him
 off when I realize that he’s doing it to keep Thomas from
 writhing around while Elmer works on the leg wound. I
 rush up to them and wish I hadn’t when I see the extent
 of Thomas’s injury. His lower leg looks like the muscle has
 been filleted off the bone.
I turn my head and nearly drop the laptop. I watch as
Elmer wraps the leg from the knee down. He returns to his
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medical kit and produces a syringe and pops Thomas in the
 thigh. I pray that whatever Elmer’s delusions are, they still
 allow for proper dosing of pain meds.  
When I kneel next to Thomas, he clutches at me and his
 eyes open. He’s focusing on somewhere far away, a place
 he wishes he could go to get away from this pain. I keep
 staring at him, wishing I could take the agony he’s expe-
 riencing and pull it into myself. At the very least, I want
 to let him know I’m there with him, through every single
 second.
After a few minutes, I feel his grip relax, and he closes
 his eyes. His face becomes less ashen. I look gratefully
 toward Elmer.
“That morphine shot should last him a few hours,” he
 says.
“Thanks. He seems more comfortable.”
Elmer must have taken Thomas’s hat off at some point.
I slide the pillow I brought back with me under his head
 and notice something I hadn’t before: the roots of his hair.
Beneath the black dye he’s a redhead.
“I brought you a very expensive, fluffy velvet pillow,”
I say.
“And a computer,” Thomas says. I put the laptop on
 the floor next to him. He reaches over and pets it. “Nice
 computer.”
Elmer points to Oscar, who I now see has his shoulder
 bandaged. “I think the bullet passed through. Obviously,
 not his first gunshot wound. He must have seen a lot of
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action. Do you know which province he was stationed
 in?”
Province? I’m not sure what he’s talking about.
Elmer motions toward Thomas. “His leg is pretty bad.
He’ll need surgery soon or it’ll have to come off.”
I pull him away so Thomas won’t hear me. “Come off?
What do you mean, come off?”
Elmer says unapologetically, “I’m a medic, not a doctor.
I’ve done what I can.”
“Help me sit up,” Thomas says to our turned backs.
“No,” Elmer and I say simultaneously.
“Seriously. I need to type.”
Thomas rolls onto his stomach, trying to keep his
 injured leg still. He pushes the computer screen open and
 reaches into his pocket for his ugly glasses. The left lens is
 cracked, but he puts them on anyway. I realize I still have
 the power cord around my neck. I also realize it’s useless
 because there is no working outlet. When Thomas presses
 the power button, the screen lights up, and I’m flooded
 with relief. If there’s anything useful in this computer, I
 know Thomas will find it.
I crouch down next to Thomas as he works. Sam is star-
 ing at the computer, his eyes thin slits. He’s confused by us.
And suspicious. I don’t have any hairs on the back of my
 neck, but if I did, they’d be standing up right now.
After a few minutes of typing Thomas says, “I’ve got
 good news, bad news, and everything in between.”
“Let’s hear it all,” I say.
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“First of all, this computer is swank. Like, even better
 than 8-Bit’s computer. It’s also chock-f of tasty infor-
 mation. They seem to have a completely separate, encased
 mainframe for just this area. I’m sure 8-Bit didn’t know
 about it.”
I glance at the soldiers and then back at Thomas, who
 notices something is wrong. I give a slight shake of my
 head: Don’t ask right now.
“Go on,” I say, lowering my voice.
Thomas lowers his as well. “I can get into their system
 easily enough. It’ll take me maybe thirty minutes to bypass
 their security. Maybe an hour. I’m not really at my best at
 the moment.”
I wince. “And the bad news?”
“This battery has about fifteen minutes of juice left,
 tops.”
He closes the machine up.  
“It’s okay. I can take it back to where I found it.”
“You don’t need to take the whole thing. It’s got a
 removable nuclear battery. Not exactly commercially
 available. This might be a prototype.” He pops the battery
 out of the back of the computer and attaches the cord to
 it. “You found a place where the power hadn’t been cut?”
“Yeah,” I say, taking the battery from him. “I found this
 weird concierge waiting area thing. Thomas, this place is
South—”
I snap my mouth shut and look up. Sam is looming over
 me.
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“This place is what?” Sam asks.
I see his grip on the ax handle tighten and realize much
 too late that we have a new problem.  
“Whoa. What’s up?” Thomas asks. His forehead crum-
 ples as he looks back and forth between me and Sam.
How stupid I’ve been. I go to the “latrine” and return
 with a laptop computer? They can’t make sense of it. Part
 of what’s keeping these men here is their belief that they
 can’t leave. They’re prisoners of their own minds. Maybe
I’ve been living that way, too.
I take a deep breath and stand up to face Sam and his ax.
I may not have all the answers about my past yet, but I
 know that being timid, weak, indecisive—that’s not who
I used to be. And I need that girl back again. Right here
 and right now.
Sam is glaring at me. “Our captors could return at any
 moment. Unless you already know that . . . .”
Suddenly Thomas catches on to the danger we’re in.
“Hold on. Check that hostility just a second. Let me show
 you something.”
He reaches into the inner pocket of his jacket. Sam
 raises the ax slightly.
Thomas pulls out the tablet we retrieved from the dead
 soldier in the construction pit. I’d forgotten all about it. He
 must have tucked it into his jacket like a father penguin
 sheltering its egg when Oscar got homicidal with the back-
 hoe. He hands the device to Sam.
Sam tips it back and forth in the light. “What is this?”
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Jerry looks over Sam’s shoulder, trying to see what he’s
 holding. “How were you able to smuggle this in? They
 stripped us of everything.”
“Yeah. Even our dang tighty-whities,” Sylvester says.
“They don’t know we’re here,” Thomas says. “Nobody
 does.”
Sylvester lets out a whoop and elbows Sam. “I told you
 they’d send someone for us!”
But Sam is having none of it. He shakes his head and
 looks at me, unconvinced. “You think they’d send a girl to
 rescue us? Really?”
Sylvester’s face dims as he looks at me anew.
“I guess it worked then,” Thomas says as he nods toward
 me.
“What worked?” Sylvester asks.
“Special ops is getting trickier and trickier these days,
 eh? Who would suspect her?”
Sylvester’s face lights up at this answer. “Yeah. Abso-
 lutely. No one would.”
I point at the tablet. “We stole this. We’re still trying to
figure out how it works, but see these red dots? This shows
 us where the, uh, enemy combatants are.”
Sam clears his throat and looks down at the screen. I
 watch as he follows the red dots swarming all over. I can’t
 read his expression at all. Finally he points at the tablet
 and says, “They’ve concentrated their forces here and here.
That’s bad for them, good for us. One well-timed ambush
 and they’re wiped out.”
I pick up the backpack and hold it out to him. “We also
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