Libba Bray Read online

  Just make it to the turnoff. That’s all. Just. Don’t. Stop.

  Somebody’s standing in the road.

  I hit the brakes, nearly skidding out again. It’s dark, and hard to see, but somebody’s definitely there. And he’s big.

  “Hello!” The panic in my voice freaks me out. “Call the fire department!”

  The guy doesn’t move.

  “Hello? Can you help me?”

  A sonic boom of thunder drowns me out. Lightning crackles around us, and I get a glimpse: Big dude. Black armor glistening like oil. Spiked helmet, steel visor. Sword. The light bounces off the sword in arcs that hurt my eyes. Sword. He’s got a fucking sword! Darkness falls again, and after the intense lightning, the night seems thicker than before. I can’t see, can’t move, can’t think, can’t do anything but breathe quick as a fish washed up on the beach, hoping to catch a wave back to safety. Lightning shreds the dark for another two seconds.

  He’s gone. The road ahead’s clear.

  Rain crashes down hard and fast; it spurs me into action. With my heart going punk in my chest, I tear up the road, putting as much distance as I can between me and whatever that scary weirdness was back there. Only when I’m safely around the turnoff do I look back: In the downpour, the burning fields are smoking down to charred ruins. The fire gods and the big dude are gone. And up in the sky, there’s nothing to see but clouds and rain.

  The empty oblong bubble with its question-mark icon stares back at me, white and unknowing. “Trust me,” I want to tell it. “I don’t even know how to start this search.” Humungous, futuristic knight dudes standing in the middle of the road? Menacing, seven-foot-tall fire giants? Black holes over suburbia?

  Maybe it was a tornado or some optical illusion or that pot was laced with some Grade-A Hydroponic Strange. Under the glare of the computer screen, I type in “bad pot experiences.” What comes up is page after page of people who’ve passed out at parties and had Asswipe written on their foreheads in permanent marker, kids who ended up getting busted by the ’rents and grounded for life. Nothing about what I’ve seen. I hit Refresh, and suddenly, a new link pops up: www.followthefeather.com. And there’s a picture of one of those weird feathers like I found in my room.

  My mouth is so dry it’s like my saliva’s been burgled. Finally, I tap the bar, and the screen goes dark for a second. An image of the It’s a Small World ride comes up. The song bleeds from my speakers. A line of script floats to the middle of my screen and settles into focus: Follow the feather. Beside it is a little feather icon. I click on it, and a video clip plays.

  A guy in a lab coat sits at a desk cram-packed with stuff—papers; a strange light-up toy that looks like it’s part seashell, part pinwheel, with little tubes all over it; a framed photo of a smiling lady with light hair and freckles; an old-fashioned radio. I recognize the song playing—something by the Copenhagen Interpretation. A shelf behind the guy’s head hosts an impressive snow globe collection. He leans in to adjust something on the camera, his face going blurry. Then he’s back and smiling, hands clasped.

  “Hello,” he says. He has a nice voice. Soothing. It’s hard to say how old he is, older than my dad, though. He’s Asian, with long, salt-and-pepper hair, and bushy black eyebrows framing eyes that seem both exhausted and surprised, like one of those people who’s seen just about everything and still can’t believe it.

  “I will find it. Time, death—these are only illusions. Our atoms, the architecture of the soul, live on. I’m sure of it.” He holds up the weird toy. “Somewhere in those eleven dimensions we cannot yet see, lie the answers to the greatest questions of all—why are we here? Where do we come from? Where do we go next? Is there a God, and if so, is He unconcerned or just really, really, really busy?”

  There’s a blip, and the video jumps to some footage of people playing soccer on a field near wind turbines. Click. Quick cut to the same guy with his arm around the smiling, freckle-faced woman from the photo on his desk. She presses her lips to his.

  “Ah,” he laughs. “There’s eternity—in a kiss!”

  The video cuts out for a second, and when it comes back, it’s the same man, but he’s older now, his long hair gone mostly to silver, his eyes wearier. The Copenhagen Interpretation song still plays. He holds up a big, pinkish-white feather.

  “‘Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul.’ Emily Dickinson. Why must we die when everything within us yearns to live? Do our atoms not dream of more?” His hand closes around something that looks like a ticket or key card. “Tonight, I embark for other worlds. Searching for proof. For hope. For a reason to go on. Or a reason to end …”

  That’s it. There’s nothing more. I try to play it again, and all I get is the bit that plays at the end of every ConstaToons cartoon: a picture of a twinkling galaxy and suddenly, the roadrunner pokes his head right through space, puncturing a hole in it. He holds up a sign that says MEEP-MEEP. THAT’S IT FOR NOW, KIDS.

  The next thing I know, a siren’s blasting in my ears.

  “Cameron!” someone shouts, competing against the brutal electronic scream that won’t stop. “Cameron!”

  With a gasp, I wake, drenched in sweat.

  “Cameron! We’ll be late!” Mom. Yelling. Downstairs.

  The alarm clock’s still shrieking. Digital numbers assault me with their red blinking: 7:55 a.m. I’m in my bed, still dressed in yesterday’s clothes.

  “Be right there!” I punish the alarm clock with a hard whap. I feel like shit. My clean clothes are in a heap on the floor. When I reach for them, every muscle aches. Definitely a school nurse day.

  Downstairs, the house whirrs with busy household noises, all that to-ing and fro-ing people seem to love so much. Mom’s more frazzled than usual. She’s wearing one earring and searching for the other. “Cameron, we have to go, honey! Grab a breakfast bar.”

  “Not hungry,” I say, taking half of Jenna’s bagel from her plate.

  Jenna snatches it back. “Mom, could you please remind your son that he’s not to have any interaction with me?”

  Mom throws up her hands. “Could we not do this today? I have a very important meeting with the Dean.”

  “He started it.” Jenna pouts.

  The kitchen smells like smoke, and for a minute, I panic, remembering my pot-induced episode from last night. “Mom, you left the toaster on. It’s burning.”

  “No I didn’t. Where on earth is that earring?”

  “Mom-dude. I can smell it overheating. It’s making me nauseated.”

  Jenna holds up her bagel for inspection. “Hello! Not toasted, okay?”

  “Ha! Made you talk!” I’d gloat some more but even that exchange hurt my brain.

  “You guys, please. Jenna, could you help me find my earring?”

  The stench of burning plastic is getting stronger. I know Mom has used the toaster and forgotten to unplug it. If it overheats, Dad will have a cow.

  “Fine, I’ll unplug it.”

  A low, pressurized hiss escapes the toaster. Tendrils of smoke seep out around the sides. There’s a flicker of orange that makes me jump back. Before I can pull the plug free, the flicker morphs. Long, curved fingernails of fire inch out from behind the smoking toaster and rake deep black scars into the wall there.

  “Mom …” My voice cracks.

  The toaster bursts into flames, shooting a stream of fire all the way up to the ceiling. Mom and Jenna yelp, but I can’t stop looking. The flames have eyes—hard black diamonds in a face of blue-orange heat, and they’re staring right at me.

  “Get the fire extinguisher!” Mom shouts.

  They’re not real. They’re not real. They’renotrealnotreal-notreal. It’s another dream, Cam. Just wake up. But I can’t. In my ears is the hiss and pop of flame coming closer. My knees buckle. I’m on the floor, shaking. Above me, the fire giants laugh, and I feel it in my body like a virus I can’t eject.

  Help me. Help me. Help me.

  “Cameron? What’s the matte
r? Cameron!” Mom yells. “Jenna—get your father. Frank! Frank!”

  Mom falls on top of me with her full weight, but I’m fighting her. I’m not trying to. I just am. Stop. My brain’s screaming the order, but my legs aren’t getting it.

  “Cameron?” Mom’s eyes are wide with fear. I want to tell her, warn her, but I can’t make the words. And the fire giants are so close. Feels like I’m melting from their heat. One bends down, cocks its head. Its flickering tongue snakes out and licks along my arm to the shoulder, sending hot shards of stabbing pain through me. It laughs that terrible laugh I heard in the cotton fields. I can’t wake up and I can’t make it stop. And then the only sound I hear is my own terrified screams.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  In Which I Recount the Untold Joys of MRIs and Open-Backed Hospital Gowns

  “Okay, Cameron, just hold still for a second.”

  I’m lying on the conveyor belt part of an MRI with the feel of cold medical stainless steel against my bare ass. They’ve made me wear this ridiculous, open-backed hospital gown that I swear is made out of tissue paper, and my buns are freezing. They let me keep my socks on, though, like that’s supposed to make me feel better.

  This is my third doctor’s visit in four days. I’ve had questions asked, blood taken, reflexes tested, MRIs examined, and one biopsy sent off. I’ve been poked and prodded in places I’d always prided myself on keeping untouched for that one special doctor who gives me a ring and a promise someday. “We just want to rule some things out,” they all say—doctor code for “brain tumor/cancer/meningitis-TV-movie disease of the week.”

  The conveyor belt moves me through the metal circle till I’m mostly inside. My body’s shaking, and I don’t know if it’s whatever is wrong with me or just the fact that I’ve been nearly naked for hours on end. The disembodied voice from the MRI control tower reverberates in the cone. “Cameron, we need you to lie perfectly still, okay?”

  “Okay,” I answer, but my voice doesn’t go farther than the metal over my head.

  The thing starts up, taking snapshots for some doctor’s photo album. Nobody warned me about the sound. Kerchung-kerchung-kerchung, like a giant stapler traveling across my skull. Shit. I can’t wait to get out of this thing. After what seems like ten minutes past forever, a tech comes in, takes the IV out of my arm.

  “You’re done,” he says. “You can get dressed.”

  I’m sitting on my bed, reading Don Quixote when Dad comes home. He knocks and lets himself in.

  “Hey, buddy.” The last time Dad called me buddy I was eight and had the measles.

  I look up briefly. “Hey.”

  “How’re you feeling?”

  “Okay.”

  “Yeah?” He asks like he really wants to know.

  “Yeah. You know. Okay.”

  “Yeah.” He nods and picks up a Great Tremolo LP and pretends to read it. “This guy any good?”

  I shrug.

  “Your mom told me about the, ah, the doctor’s visit. I swear those guys don’t know their asses from their elbows. Anyway, Stan in my office—you know Stan Olsen?—he gave me the number of a specialist in Dallas. I made an appointment for Tuesday.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’m sure it’s nothing, Cam. Viruses can mimic all kinds of things. The doc will probably throw us out for wasting his time.” Dad puts the Great Tremolo LP down. He looks at the junk-strewn floor like it’s causing him actual pain but he only clears his throat. “Cameron, what did you see? When the toaster caught on fire? Your mom said something about fire giants.”

  “I guess I was just getting sick.”

  Dad thinks it over, nods. “Speaking of fire, maybe I’ll build us one tonight. We could toast marshmallows, watch a movie?”

  It seems like a bad time to point out that it’s sixty degrees, not exactly cozy fire weather. “Sure.”

  “Okay. Well. I’ll, ah, just … chop some wood. Okay, buddy?”

  I hear the sliding doors into the backyard open and close. When I peek out my window, Dad’s standing in the yard with his hands on his hips, just looking around like he’s never really seen our backyard before. He picks up the ax, takes a halfhearted swing at a puny log. Then he drops to his knees and closes his eyes for a minute. I’d almost swear he was praying. But my dad’s a scientist. He doesn’t believe in religion. He leaps up and swings the ax down hard on the log, putting his whole body into it again and again till there’s nothing left but a mess of splinters.

  The specialist’s office is in a huge glass-and-stone complex near the hospital. I’m starting to think there’s an interior decorator who specializes in medical décor. Somebody responsible for choosing the so-fake-they-almost-look-real plants and the beige striped wallpaper I’ve seen in every doctor’s office I’ve been in lately. She probably even fans out the magazines on the side table, the copies of stuff no one ever reads like Let’s Fish! and Mazes for Kids and Automobile Quarterly.

  “How are you feeling, sweetie?” Mom asks me for the fourth time this afternoon. She holds my hand.

  “Fine.”

  Dad drums his fingers on his knees. “Maybe we could go to Sancho’s for enchiladas after. Would you like that?”

  “Sure,” I say.

  Mom stares straight ahead. “They have good guacamole.”

  “Very good guacamole,” Dad seconds.

  I pick up a copy of Automobile Quarterly and pretend to be interested in an article about a guy with a used car lot specializing in refurbishing old Cadillacs. Anything to avoid talking.

  A nurse pokes her head in. “Mr. and Mrs. Smith? The doctor would like to see you first.”

  It’s another fifteen minutes before I’m summoned to Dr. Specialist’s office. Somebody’s X-rays are up on a light box behind his head. I don’t know if they’re mine or not. At this point, they almost seem like they could be part of the medical décor arranged by that same decorator. Dad’s sitting in one of the chairs. His face is gray. Mom’s clutching a tissue.

  “Hi, Cameron. I’ve just been talking to your parents here. You’ve had quite a week, I hear,” the specialist says like he’s trying to be jocular, like this is a social call. Fuck him. I try to fold my arms over my chest but they won’t cooperate, so I let them twitch at my side. Just a virus. Viruses can do all sorts of things.

  “Your case is very unusual, Cameron.” The specialist taps his pen against a folder on his desk. “Have you ever heard of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease?”

  “No. What’s that?”

  “It’s a neurological disease. It affects the brain. You might have heard it referred to as mad cow disease in animals.”

  I glance at Dad, who looks like he’s posing for Mount Rushmore—not a single eye twitch.

  “Mad cow disease,” I repeat. “Doesn’t that affect … cows?”

  “Yes. Well. This is the human form. But it works in much the same way.”

  I vaguely remember hearing a news story about mad cow disease. Some cows got it from bad feed and went insane, hence the mad cow. But I’m pretty sure I haven’t been munching on any bad feed, unless you count what they serve in the Calhoun cafeteria. So I don’t see how I could have this Creutzfeldt-Jakewhatever. Sounds like a brand of kick-ass speakers.

  My right hand’s trembling. I can’t make it stop. I feel like unzipping my body and crawling out.

  “You see, there are these infectious proteins called prions that aren’t normally a threat, but sometimes they go awry. And when that happens, it’s trouble. For instance …” He pulls out a paper clip. “This paper clip holds papers just fine. But if I bend it, like so”—he pulls out one leg of it—“it no longer functions in the same way.” Dr. Specialist Man shoves a sheaf of papers into the messed-up paper clip and the papers scatter across his desk. “Then those prions—the bent paper clips—reproduce like that, bad copies of a wrong protein, taking over your brain, destroying it over time.”

  “Oh. Uh-huh,” I say, because I can’t really take in any of what he’s saying.<
br />
  “This is nuts. Where could he have gotten it? You tell me how a normal sixteen-year-old kid ends up with CJ!” Dad barks.

  “Could have been anything,” Specialist Man says with an unconvincing shrug. “Could have been tainted beef or even something genetic waiting to happen. The truth is, we’ll probably never know.”

  “Unacceptable. This is pure conjecture,” Dad snarls, and for the next few minutes, he and Dr. Specialist confer in some secret language—Dad basically telling the doc he’s full of shit, and the doc making a case for why he’s not. I don’t under stand a lot of it because my head hurts and it feels like there’s an army of ants doing an aerobics class under my skin and I don’t want to be here anymore.

  “So, what’s the treatment?” I ask.

  Dr. Specialist taps his pen against his desk lightly. Dad goes quiet. Mom squeezes her tissue. Something terrible twists inside me.

  “There’s a cure, right?”

  Nobody says anything for a few seconds, and those feel like the longest seconds of my life. Dr. Specialist sits up straighter, morphing from man to doctor-machine. “We’re still exploring options at this time,” he says in that calm voice they teach you in medical school along with crappy handwriting.

  “But, like, the other people who’ve gotten this Crew, croix …”

  “Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease …”

  “That, the, um, mad cow thing, what happens to them?”

  The doc clears his throat. “It depends on the progression of the disease. But there are some things you need to know, Cameron.”

  Dr. Specialist finally finds his voice, and now I just want to tell him to shut up. It’s like the information is a big wave rushing over me, and I can only grab at certain words and phrases to hold me up. “Progressive muscle weakness,” “uneven gait,” “dementia and delusions,” “four to six months,” “hospital,” “experimental treatments.”

  I don’t hear anybody mention it’s going to kill me. Probably because no one actually comes right out and says it. In fact, Dr. Specialist does everything he can not to say it.

  And that’s when I know I must be in some deep shit.