Frozen

14. TURNING BACK

“I hate it,” I told Auden as we walked to class. The hallway was mostly empty, but not empty enough.

“What?”

“The way they all stare at me.”

“No one’s—”

“Spare me,” I said.

“Okay. They’re staring. But at least they notice you,” he said. “Would you rather be invisible?”

I didn’t want to tell him that he wasn’t invisible, that all those people he hated were perfectly aware of his existence. They just chose to ignore it. “Let’s blow this off,” I suggested.

Auden looked doubtful. “And go where?”

“Who cares? Anywhere but here.”

“We only have a couple more hours to get through…”

Since when did a couple hours of hell qualify as only? “Whatever. You stay. I’m going.” I turned on my heel and headed quickly down the hall, but not so quickly that he couldn’t catch up, which he did after a couple steps. He always did.

“You win,” he said. “Where to?”

“Out.” I pushed through the door at the end of the hall, wishing I could smell the March air. It no longer got much warmer as winter shifted to spring, but there was still something different in the air, something sweeter—fresher. Or maybe that’s just how I like to remember it. “Then we’ll come up with something.”

But we wouldn’t.

The exit we’d chosen was tucked at the end of a mostly unused corridor and opened into the alley behind the school, usually packed with delivery trucks, repair units, garbage compactors, and the steady trickle of students who’d elected to seek their education elsewhere for the day and preferred to do so without getting caught. But that afternoon it was empty except for a couple groping each other against the brick wall, her tongue shoved into his mouth, her back to the wall with her shirt creeping up to expose a bare, flat middle while his hands pawed her skin, snaking beneath her skirt. His fingers found her neck, her arms, her abs, her hair; hungry, grasping, needing, she sighed, he groaned, they breathed for each other. I couldn’t see their faces.

I didn’t need to.

I recognized the sound of him first, eager panting punctuated every so often by unprompted laughter, like a little kid, like an unexpected joy had overwhelmed him. I recognized his hands. Especially the way they crept beneath the skirt, massaging bare thigh.

It took a moment longer to identify her, although it shouldn’t have, even without her face. I knew her arms, her legs, her sighs, her lanky blond hair. I’d just never known them like this. Or maybe I didn’t want to know.

I let the door slam behind us.

They sprang apart. Walker looked up. Gasped. My sister took a deep breath and opened her eyes.

She looked like she’d been waiting for me.

I couldn’t look at them. I couldn’t look at Auden, either. I couldn’t stand the idea of him—of anyone—seeing me see this. I wanted to run the scene backward, slip back into the school, back to the hallway, back to class, like none of it had ever happened. Some things were better not to know.

Because once you knew, there wasn’t much choice. You had to deal.

Somehow.

“I’m sorry,” Walker said. His hand was resting on her lower back. Like he was trying to keep her steady. Her.

“It just happened,” he said.

“I didn’t want to hurt you,” he said.

He was still touching her.

“I don’t know how it started,” he said.

Enough.

“I know.” My voice was steady. That was easy. My legs weren’t shaking. My stomach wasn’t heaving. My heart wasn’t pounding. I was steady. “You shoved your tongue into her mouth. My sister’s mouth. That’s how it started.”

“You’re wrong,” Zo said. And she was steady too. “I shoved my tongue into his mouth. That’s how it started.”

“Zo,” he said, like he was pleading. “Don’t.”

“Why not?” she said. “Aren’t you sick of this? How long were we supposed to wait?”

“How long?” I didn’t want to know what the words meant.

I knew what the words meant.

“How long, Walker?” I asked.

He looked down. So this wasn’t the first time. “After the accident…”

I wished for a stomach, so I could throw up. But there was no way of getting it out. It was all inside of me, stuck. Rotting.

“I was upset, and she was upset, and it helped to, you know, talk. To each other. And one day, we… we just… It wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“So, just to be clear. I almost died,” I said, still calm, still steady, “and while I was learning how to walk again, fighting to survive, you were back here, fucking my little sister?”

“We weren’t doing that.” Zo paused. “Not then.”

“This is disgusting,” I said. “You’re disgusting.”

“Lia—”

Zo put her hand on his arm, and he stopped talking. Apparently she was the boss. I’d taught her well. “I told you this would happen,” she said quietly. “Just let it go.”

“Oh, you told him this would happen?” I laughed bitterly. “What, that I’d have the nerve to get upset about my boyfriend screwing my sister?”

“I’m not your boyfriend anymore, Lia. You made that clear.”

“Lucky you, right?” I spat out. “So you could ditch me and go back to the one you really wanted.” Now it made sense. Why he hadn’t wanted to touch me, why he hadn’t wanted to be with me. Why he hadn’t wanted me. Maybe it wasn’t me.

It was her.

“We stopped for you,” he said. “I was willing to try. I told you that.”

Right. Because he pitied me.

“Give him a break,” Zo said. “You don’t know what he was willing to give up for you.”

“I guess I do know, now,” I said. “You.”

I didn’t ask if they actually thought they were in love. I didn’t have to. I didn’t care.

“Why?” I asked. Not Walker; he wasn’t worth it. I asked her.

“I don’t know,” she said lamely. “It just happened.” But she was lying, I knew that. Nothing “just happened” to Zo. It wasn’t the way she ran her life.

I didn’t have to push it. I could let this be like all the other times, when I just let it go, when I pretended things between us were the same as before, that she was just being Zo, nothing more, nothing less. I could keep pretending.

Except I couldn’t keep pretending. Not anymore.

“I mean, why do you hate me this much?”

Her expression didn’t change. “I don’t hate you.”

“You’ve got a weird way of showing it.”

“What do you want from me?” Zo asked. “You want me to give him up? For you?”

That would be a start.

“Blood is thicker than water, right?” she said, her lip curling into a sneer.

“Well, yeah.”

“Then show me,” she said flatly.

“What?”

“Your blood.”

The anger was a flood, drowning my words.

“I can’t believe you,” I finally choked out. “Literally, I can’t believe this is happening. You’re my sister. How the hell can you do this to me?”

“It’s not my fault he doesn’t want you anymore. None of this is my fault.”

“It’s all your fault!” I screamed. “You should have been the one in that car. It should have been you!”

The world froze.

I’d never said it out loud before. I’d promised myself. I wouldn’t say it, I wouldn’t think it, I wouldn’t feel it. I would not blame her. I wouldn’t process the ifs. If she’d been in the car, if she’d died that day instead of me. I would still have my body. I would still have my boyfriend. I would still have my life.

I couldn’t take it back.

Walker put an arm around her shoulder.

“Sorry to disappoint you,” she said slowly, her voice cold. “But it wasn’t me. It was you.” I didn’t know what she was thinking. We were sisters, but I never knew what she was thinking. She wrapped her arm around Walker’s waist. “Let’s go,” she murmured. He nodded.

“I’m sorry,” he said again, over his shoulder as they walked away.

She never turned back.

I don’t know how I ended up on the ground. But suddenly that’s where I was, sitting with my back to the wall, only a few feet from where they’d been kissing.

Auden sat next to me. I still couldn’t look at him. Not that I wanted him to go—but I didn’t want him to stay, either. I didn’t want anything except to not know. My brain was a computer: It should have been possible to delete.

“He’s not good enough for you,” Auden said finally.

I wanted to laugh. Such a lame cliché. True—but still lame.

“And your sister… You know she didn’t mean what she said.”

“She meant it,” I said flatly. Zo had only told one lie that afternoon—that she didn’t hate me. Because obviously she did. Fine. That made us even.

“Okay, so she’s a bitch and he’s an asshole.” Auden looked hopeful. “Does that help?”

I had to laugh. “No. But thank you.”

“Do you think—No, never mind.”

“What?” I asked.

“It’s none of my business.”

“Auden, I think we’ve just established you’re the only one I’ve got. So if it’s not your business, then whose would it be?”

“I was just wondering…” He hesitated. “I mean, you’re obviously upset.”

“You noticed.”

“Is it because you still… I mean, if Walker wanted to get back together, would you…?”

“You want to know if I’m still in love with him?” I asked.

He nodded. “But like I say, it’s not really my business, so…”

“It’s fine.” I just wasn’t sure how to answer. “I’m over him, I think,” I said, and it felt true. “If he was with someone else, anyone but—” I couldn’t say it out loud. Instead I lowered my head and pressed the heels of my hands over my eyes. “What he said, about being willing to try? He was. And what if he’s the only one who… What if no other guy… I mean, who would want me like this?”

His hand brushed my neck, flitted to my shoulder, then disappeared. “He’s not the only one.”

“Whatever.”

“No. Lia. I’ve been waiting to—I mean, I didn’t know how—I have to tell you—” The hand was back, resting firmly on my shoulder this time, heavy. “He’s not the only one who would. Want you. Like this.”

Shit.

“Auden, you don’t have to—”

But he wouldn’t stop.

“I know you probably don’t see me like that,” he said, talking quickly, like if he paused for breath he wouldn’t get himself going again, although I guess that was too much to ask for. “But I think you’re amazing and when I’m with you, it’s like we really understand each other, you know, and I think you’re beautiful, you’re more beautiful like this than you ever were before—”

Not now, I thought, furious with him, furious with myself. Not now, when I need you. Don’t do this.

“I know I shouldn’t say anything, I know, I always say something, I always ruin things, I should just let it happen, but I can’t let you think that no one would—because I would, I do, I just…” His entire body had gone rigid. “What do you think?”

“I’m a little… This has been a weird day for me,” I said, stalling. “You know, with—” I glanced toward the spot they’d been leaning against, where I imagined I could still see their afterimage bright against the bricks.

“I know.” He shook himself all over. “I know. It was stupid. Bad timing.”

Damn right. But, “No, it’s okay.”

“It’s not okay. It’s stupid. I shouldn’t have thought—”

I kissed him.

Because he wanted me to. Because he wanted me. Because no one else did. Because he’d saved me, more than once.

Because why not?

And in the fairy tale that’s it, the end, happily ever after.

In the fairy tale they never mention the part about your tongues scraping against each other or your foreheads bumping or your nose getting bent and flattened or his tongue just sitting there in your mouth, limp and wet, and then spinning around like a pinwheel, bouncing back and forth between your fake palate and your porcelain teeth. In the fairy tale they never mention how it tastes, although to me it didn’t taste like anything at all.

I’m not saying he was a bad kisser.

I’m not saying he was great, because he wasn’t. But I’m not saying it was his fault, even though maybe it was. Or maybe it was mine.

I’m just saying it was bad.

Worse than bad. It was nothing. Like kissing my own balled-up fist, as I’d done for practice when I was a kid. I wanted not to care, to just go with it, because it would have been so easy, it would have made him happy, and it would have made me… not alone.

When our faces separated, he was smiling, his eyes glazed and dewy, his mouth half open, like he wasn’t sure whether to speak or to lunge in for another round.

“I’m sorry,” I said as gently as I could. “I can’t.”

“Did I do something wrong?”

“No!” I said quickly. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea.”

He sagged, a deflated balloon. “I should have known you would never… not with me.”

“It’s not that,” I said. “It’s just too much right now.”

“You don’t have to say that,” he said bitterly. “I know I’m not Walker. I do have a mirror, you know. I get it.”

“It’s not you.” I wanted to touch him, to shake him. “Everything’s so… screwed up. And I’m”—I gestured down at myself, at the body—“I’m different. We’re different, and I don’t think the two of us…”

“Is this about what that guy said? Jude?” Auden’s fingers flickered across the bandage on his palm. “I told you, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

“It’s not about what he said. It’s what I know. This wouldn’t work. And if it didn’t…” Now I did touch him—I took his hand. He pulled away. “I don’t want to mess this up, what we have. I can’t risk that.”

“Why not?” He was edging toward a whine. “If you really want something, sometimes it’s worth taking a chance.”

But what if you really didn’t want something?

“It’s not going to work, Auden.”

“Because you don’t want it to work,” he snapped.

“Because it won’t!” Why couldn’t he just let it go? “Stop pushing it!”

“I know you’re scared,” he said. “I’m scared too. But we can try this together. We can.”

I needed to make him stop. And I was pretty sure I knew how to do it.

“Why do you really want this so bad?” I asked in a low voice. “Is it me, or is it this stupid body?”

His eyes widened. “What?”

“Admit it, you’re obsessed with what I am, with what it’s like being a mech, with everything about it—”

“Because I’m your friend,” he protested. “Because I care!”

“But that came later. You were obsessed before—before you even knew me. You couldn’t stay away.”

“So I was curious! So what? And you know I was just trying to help.”

“Maybe—or maybe you’ve got some weird mech fetish. And you can’t stop until you know how everything works, right?”

He drew himself up very straight and very still. “I can’t believe you would say that.”

I couldn’t believe it either. And I couldn’t keep going, even if it was the one thing guaranteed to drive him away. Because I didn’t want him to go away. I just wanted him to shut up and leave it alone.

“I didn’t mean it,” I admitted.

“I would never…” I could barely hear him. “That’s not who I am.”

“I know.”

Then neither of us said anything. We just sat with our backs to the wall and our shoulders almost, but not quite, touching.

“I shouldn’t have pushed,” he said, finally cutting through the dead air.

“I shouldn’t have said that to you. That was cruel.”

Another long pause.

“We would never have been friends, would we, if it weren’t for your accident,” he said, asking a question that wasn’t a question. “We probably would have graduated without ever having a single conversation.”

I kept staring straight ahead. “Probably.”

“And even if we had talked…”

“You would have hated me,” I said. “Shallow, superficial bitch, remember?”

“You wouldn’t have bothered to hate me. It wouldn’t have been worth it to you.”

I didn’t deny it.

“But I’m different now,” I said. “Everything’s different.”

“I know. But would you keep it that way?”

“What do you mean?”

“If you had a choice, if you could go backward. Would you want to be the old Lia Kahn again, with your old life and your old friends—or stay like this, who you are now?” Stay with me, he didn’t say, but it was all over his face.

“Auden—”

“Don’t lie,” he said. “Please.”

I didn’t even have to think about it. “I’d go back. Of course I’d go back.”

“Even if it meant losing—”

“No matter what it meant,” I said firmly. “If I could have my body back, my life back, don’t you think I’d want it? No matter what?”

“No matter what.” He stood up. “Good to know.”

“Auden, that’s not fair. You can’t expect me to—”

“I don’t expect anything.”

“Don’t go,” I said. “Not like this.”

“I can’t stay,” he said. “Not like this.”

He left. I stayed. Maybe I should have tried, I thought. Maybe it wasn’t him. Maybe it was me.

Before, rejecting guys had been easy—and I’d had a lot of practice. Before, I knew what it felt like when it felt right. I knew what I wanted. And I knew there would always be someone new who would want me.

Before.

He’s just not my type, I thought. Too scrawny. Too intense. Too weird.

But I couldn’t be sure. Walker was my type—and I didn’t want him, either. Not really. Not anymore.

Maybe I wasn’t programmed to want. Maybe that was just something else lost, like running, like music. Something else that had slipped through the cracks of their scanning and modeling. Maybe it was one of those intangibles—like a soul, like free will—that didn’t exist, not physically, and so wasn’t supposed to exist at all.