Adam Silvera - More Happy Than Not

“We?”

The woman doesn’t answer. Thomas and I exchange a glance. We follow her. The closer we get to 168th Street, the louder we hear a crowd hidden by buildings. There are cop cars blocking the street, their sirens failing to warn other people away. We round the corner, and the street is as crowded as a holiday parade, except instead of character balloons in the air, there are picket signs being raised.

I’ve seen pictures of the Bronx district Leteo Institute before, but the unhappy rioters add an edge when seeing it up close. You’d think the institute would look more futuristic, like the Apple Store in Manhattan, but honestly, the Museum of Natural History looks more cutting-edge than Leteo does. The building is four floors high with bricks the color of ashes.

Leteo is getting the bad rap of a good morgue with their body count. It’s still strange to me how hospitals never incite this sort of reaction when they’re guiltier of more cases of malpractice. Maybe it’s because Leteo is supposed to only exist in old science fiction shows and this advancement scares people.

A bald guy fills us in on the recent botched surgery. Apparently some schizophrenic girl in her early twenties was having a procedure done to wipe her mind clean of imaginary characters that have shadowed her since childhood. Instead, she never woke up at all, near death but not close enough. Representatives of the institute haven’t come forth with any additional information about the girl’s coma.

A curly-haired woman and an older man are trying to squeeze through the crowd, unsuccessfully. They both have signs:

no miracles for criminals

grief is natural. guilt is deserved.

It doesn’t match the brain-dead bit.

“You did a criminal a favor!” the older man shouts over the crowd, as if someone from Leteo is listening to his complaints in person. “What, you going to save some terrorists next?”

“Excuse me, sir,” Thomas says. “What’s with the signs?”

It’s the woman who answers us. “We’re here to speak out against the car accident, of course.”

“We don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say.

She nudges the man. “Harold, tell these boys about the wreck. You tell it better than I do.”

“You kids should get off your phones and watch the news,” Harold says. I turn to Thomas, who smirks. “A few months ago some yahoo crashed his car and killed his four-year-old son and wife. For some bizarre reason, the hellions at Leteo agreed to wipe the memory of his wife’s and son’s existences after he tried to kill himself in jail.”

“Why would he want to forget his family?” I ask.

“Guilt,” Harold says. “Leteo says he’s able to function better with prison tasks under the belief he killed strangers. Maggie and I believe that is nonsense. That guilt is his to feel.”

“It’s worse than a hit-and-run, truly,” Maggie says. “They view us all as clients, not patients. Big difference.” She turns her back on us and pumps her sign up as high as she can, screaming, “No miracles for criminals! No miracles for criminals!”

Police charge through the crowd in an effort to reach the entrance. Thomas drags me back so we don’t get caught up in any of it. I turn one last time, bumping shoulders with a couple people, and I see a child on a man’s shoulders waving a sign that reads no to tabula rasa. The kid definitely has no idea what it means, but if anyone snaps a photo it’s bound to go viral.

On the other side of the crowd, there are Leteo supporters. Maybe only a fourth of the protesters, but they’re here. They’re probably friends or relatives of forgetters who appreciate how Leteo repairs lives. I half expect Kyle’s parents to be there, though I can’t possibly imagine what sort of sign they would have. Maybe good job on making my son forget his twin. he always wanted to be an only child. No, if they were around here, they’d more likely be inside Leteo to forget Kenneth too; I would if I had to live with someone who had his face and his laugh.

Thomas finally lets go of me when we get to the corner, but we stop and watch as a chant begins: “Never forget! Never forget!”

“I used to think the procedure was the shadiest scam in all of Scamville,” I tell Thomas as we walk home, keeping my voice low as we passed a crowded bus stop — as if the entire country doesn’t know about Leteo. New York hosts three institutes, one here in the Bronx, another in Long Island, and a third in Manhattan. I wonder if there are riots going down in front of the ones in Arizona or Texas, California or Florida. “I know someone who went through it. I don’t know him anymore. I mean, I know him, but he’s different now, you know.”

“Wait, what?”

“Kyle, this kid I grew up with. His twin brother was killed and it was sort of his fault, so he forgot Kenneth ever existed so he could live. I hope he’s doing okay and not having any weird delayed reactions,” I say.

“You don’t see him anymore?”

“Nope. His family moved away before they got it done. I’m not even sure where they went. Baby Freddy’s mom somehow found out about the procedure and our entire block knew by the end of the day. It would’ve been impossible keeping everyone he’s ever met from asking about his twin, so leaving made sense.”

Kyle and Kenneth, the Lake twins. We don’t remember them nearly enough. In every generation on my block, a group of friends loses someone. One of the Big Kids, Benton, drunk-rode his bike into traffic a couple years ago. I don’t know the details beyond that, but I guess it could be said that Kenneth took one for the team. The least we could do is fucking remember him, especially when Kyle can’t.

My heart is racing just thinking about it, the way it pounds when I’m the last one standing in a game of manhunt. “Would you ever do it? The procedure?”

“I have nothing to forget, and I wouldn’t if I did,” Thomas says. “Everyone plays a purpose, even fathers who lie to you or leave you behind. Time takes care of all that pain so if someone derails you, it’ll be okay eventually. You?”

“When you put it that way, I have nothing I’d want erased either,” I say. “Well, maybe clowns. I could go without circus memories.”

“Doctors should work on erasing clowns. Period.”

I’ve been picking up extra shifts at Good Food’s because Mom’s not feeling well. She’s missed work two days in a row already, and it’s really going to set us back. Mohad even trusted me to close up last night, and all my friends naturally wanted to lock themselves in and have a party with every beer and cigarette and snack available to us. The last thing this family needs is me getting thrown in jail and sued.

It’s my first day off since witnessing the Leteo rally with Thomas, the last time I saw him. I’m meeting him in a bit, but until then I’m chilling with Brendan and Baby Freddy on a staircase. On one of the steps, Brendan is rolling up some weed on top of graph paper and overdue bills.

“I thought your clients do all that themselves.”

“These aren’t for my clients,” Brendan says, licking the tip of his freshly rolled-and-folded blunt. “I’m branching out. I’ll work some corners and colleges and if I roll it myself they won’t realize I’m skimming them twenty percent of what they’re paying for.”