And God created the whole universe from an atom no bigger than a thought.
Grace’s life fell apart because of a single word: sympathizer. My world exploded because of a different word: suicide.
Correction: That was the first time my world exploded.
The second time my world exploded, it was also because of a word. A word that worked its way out of my throat and danced onto and out of my lips before I could think about it, or stop it.
The question was: Will you meet me tomorrow?
And the word was: Yes.
Chapter Ten
Symptoms of Amor Deliria Nervosa
PHASE ONE
preoccupation; difficulty focusing
dry mouth
perspiration, sweaty palms
fits of dizziness and disorientation
reduced mental awareness; racing thoughts; impaired reasoning skills
PHASE TWO
periods of euphoria; hysterical laughter and heightened energy
periods of despair; lethargy
changes in appetite; rapid weight loss or weight gain
fixation; loss of other interests
compromised reasoning skills; distortion of reality
disruption of sleep patterns; insomnia or constant fatigue
obsessive thoughts and actions
paranoia; insecurity
PHASE THREE (CRITICAL)
difficulty breathing
pain in the chest, throat, or stomach
difficulty swallowing; refusal to eat
complete breakdown of rational faculties; erratic behavior; violent thoughts and fantasies; hallucinations and delusions
PHASE FOUR (FATAL)
emotional or physical paralysis (partial or total)
death
If you fear that you or someone you know may have contracted deliria, please call the emergency line toll-free at 1-800-PREVENT to discuss immediate intake and treatment.
I’d never understood how Hana could lie so often and so easily. But just like anything else, lying becomes easier the more you do it.
Which is why, when I get home from work the next day and Carol asks me whether I don’t mind having hot dogs for the fourth straight night in a row (the result of a shipment surplus at the Stop-N-Save; we once went a whole two weeks having baked beans every day), I say that actually, Sophia Hennerson from St. Anne’s invited me and some other girls over for dinner. I don’t even have to think about it. The lie just comes. And even though I still feel sweat pricking up under my palms, my voice stays calm, and I’m pretty sure my face keeps its normal color, because Carol just gives me one of her flitting smiles and says that that sounds nice.
At six thirty I get on my bike and head to East End Beach, where Alex and I agreed to meet.
There are plenty of beaches in Portland. East End Beach is probably one of the least popular—which of course made it one of my mother’s favorites. The current is stronger there than it is at Willard Beach or Sunset Park. I’m not exactly sure why. I don’t mind. I’ve always been a strong swimmer. After that first time—when my mother released her arms from around my waist and I felt both the surging panic and the thrill, the excitement—I learned pretty quickly, and by four I was paddling out by myself all the way past the breaks.
There are other reasons why most people avoid East End Beach, even though it’s only a short walk down the hill from Eastern Prom, one of the most popular parks. The beach is nothing more than a short strip of rocky, gravel-flecked sand. It backs up against the far side of the lab complex, where the storage and waste sheds are, which doesn’t make for particularly pretty scenery. And when you swim out at East End Beach you get a clear view of Tukey’s Bridge and the wedge of unregulated land between Portland and Yarmouth. A lot of people don’t like being so close to the Wilds. It makes them nervous.
It makes me nervous too, except that there’s a part of me—a tiny, little flick of a part—that likes it. For a while after my mom died I used to have these fantasies that she wasn’t dead, really, and that my father wasn’t dead either—that they had escaped to the Wilds to be together. He had gone five years before her, to prepare everything, to build a little house with a woodstove and furniture hewed from tree branches. At some point, I imagined, they would come back and get me. I even imagined my room down to the smallest detail: a dark red carpet, a little red and green patchwork quilt, a red chair.
I had the fantasy only a few times before I realized how wrong it was. If my parents had escaped to the Wilds it would make them sympathizers, resisters. It was better that they were dead. Besides, I learned pretty quickly that my fantasies about the Wilds were just that—make-believe, little kiddie stuff. The Invalids have nothing, no way of trading or getting red patchwork quilts or chairs, or anything else for that matter. Rachel once told me that they must live like animals, filthy, hungry, desperate. She says that’s why the government doesn’t bother doing anything about them, doesn’t even acknowledge their existence. They’ll die out soon enough, all of them, freeze or starve or just let the disease run its course, turn them against each other, have them raging and fighting and clawing one another’s eyes out.
She said as far as we know that’s already happened—she said the Wilds might be empty now, dark and dead, full of only the rustle and whispers of animals.
She’s probably right about the other stuff—about the Invalids living like animals—but she’s obviously wrong about that. They’re alive, and out there, and they don’t want us to forget it. That’s why they stage the demonstrations. That’s why they let the cows loose in the labs.
I’m not nervous until I get to East End Beach. Even though the sun is sinking behind me, it lights the water white and makes everything shimmer. I shield my eyes against the glare and spot Alex down by the water, a long black brushstroke against all that blue. I flash back to last night, to the fingers of one of his hands just pressed against my lower back, so lightly it was like I was only dreaming them—the other hand cupping mine, dry and reassuring as a piece of wood warmed by the sun. We really danced, too, the kind of dancing that people do at their wedding after the pairing has been formalized, but better somehow, looser and less unnatural.
He has his back toward me, facing the ocean, and I’m glad. I feel self-conscious as I plod down the rickety, salt-warped stairs that lead from the parking lot to the beach, pausing to unlace and kick off my sneakers, which I carry in one hand. The sand is warm on my bare feet as I set off toward him.
An old man is coming up from the water, carrying a fishing pole. He shoots me a suspicious glance, then turns to stare at Alex, then looks at me again and frowns. I open my mouth to say, “He’s cured,” but the man just grunts at me as he walks past, and I can’t imagine he’d bother to call the regulators, so I don’t say anything. Not that we’d get in trouble trouble if we were caught—that’s what Alex meant when he said, “I’m safe”—but I don’t want to answer a lot of questions and have my ID number run through SVS and all of that. Besides, if the regulators did haul ass all the way out to East End Beach to check out “suspicious behavior,” only to discover it was some cured taking pity on a seventeen-year-old nobody, they’d definitely be annoyed—and guaranteed to take it out on someone.