Cecelia Ahern - Flawed

I think of Carrick’s file and remember the F.A.B. beside his name. Flawed At Birth . The file also said Carrick received a brand to his chest for disloyalty. This would add up if what she’s saying is true. I decide to believe her, but I’m still not sure if I can trust her.

“Carrick should have waited a few months,” she says angrily, almost as if she’s directing it at me and it was my fault he did this. “They always keep a close eye on their students for the first few months to make sure they don’t search for their biological parents, but he searched for them too soon, almost like he wanted to be caught.…” She trails off, eyes studying me for my reaction. I don’t respond to her. I’m too stunned by what I hear, too moved, feel too sad for Carrick. I want to find him and hug him right now. I wish I’d known this when I was in there, when we were sleeping side by side in our glass cages. I thought he was a soldier, somebody who had done the worst possible act, but really all he had done was the gentlest. The caged animal who paced and fought and looked like he wanted to fight the world had merely tried to find his parents, who were forced to give him up as a child because they were Flawed. Does knowing that Carrick is the son of Flawed parents change my opinion of him?

Yes, it does.

He’d spent years being endlessly brainwashed, being told that his parents were worthless, that he was better than them, only to search for them too soon after his release. His love couldn’t be broken; he won. He is even braver than I’d thought. He is the soldier I believed he was.

The comments Tina made about him in the cells now make sense to me, that he was a “bad egg,” and Judge Crevan’s flippant comment about his being “Flawed to the bone.” It’s true. He never even had a chance. His trial must have been a joke. He was branded as soon as he was born. He was never going to lose that. Maybe Alpha’s suspicions are right, maybe he did deliberately want to become Flawed. Maybe he wanted to be who he really was for better or for worse, and not somebody the Guild had reared him to be. The more I think about him, the more he goes up in my estimation.

Alpha slowly breathes out, trying to calm herself. “Carrick’s was an unfortunate case.”

My heart is broken for him. “Yes,” I say sadly. “Yes, it was.”

She views me again in her studious way, as if realizing what I am slowly learning myself. “You two were close?”

I feel my cheeks go hot and I look away. I’ve felt a connection to Carrick ever since he walked into that cell and turned his back on me. I felt it every second that he was beside me and every moment he was behind me in the courtroom. It seems ludicrous to feel like this about someone I didn’t know, but we experienced something so intense and were the only two people at any time, in any room, who knew how each other felt.

“Tell me about the institutions. He didn’t talk about them very much.”

“I’m not surprised,” she says. “Though they’re not horrible places. In fact, they’re probably quite the opposite, state-of-the-art facilities, greater luxuries than most people ever know. The state supports these institutions because most of our greatest athletes have come from them, some of our greatest recent scholars were educated in these places. Despite that, there is no hiding from the fact that all these children have been taken from their parents from birth, never allowed to see them or hear from them again. That is cruel, that is wrong . Carrick’s situation is slightly different, though,” she says. “As you know.”

“How is it different?” I ask, confused.

“Well, because of the age he was taken. It probably explains why the brainwashing didn’t work so well on him. He had memories of them, which couldn’t be taken away. Carrick was taken as a young boy, at the age of five. His parents had managed to hide out when they had him, but he was found, unfortunately,” she says sadly.

“I don’t know which is worse,” I say, thinking of him as a young boy knowing what was happening as he was taken away, torn from people who loved him.

“So”—she straightens up—“that is why I have tried so hard to fight for adoption rights for F.A.B. children.”

“F.A.B. children can’t be adopted?”

“Of course not. It interrupts the brainwashing process, and, anyway, the Flawed community isn’t allowed to adopt at all,” she says. “My husband even suggested divorcing me just so I could adopt a baby, because he knows how much I want it. Only on paper, of course. He wasn’t intending on leaving me. Where’s the logic in that, Celestine, you tell me that? Modern laws tell me I could adopt a child on my own but not with my Flawed husband.” She sighs. “Sorry. It’s just a subject that angers me.”

“I can see that,” I say softly, relieved to finally hear somebody speaking out against the Guild. “How do you know so much about Carrick?” I ask, still not completely trusting her rage against the Guild. “His file didn’t reveal very much about him.”

“So you saw his file,” she says, amused. “My, my, Celestine, you have more access than I thought.”

I don’t respond to that. It takes great nerve to hold my tongue.

She continues.

“All Flawed files are a matter of public record, available through citizen information, because everybody is entitled to know if they are living near a Flawed person, unless of course you are a Flawed person and you, therefore, have no access to these files.”

I swallow hard, caught out.

“However, to receive the files, you must submit a form to the Guild requesting access, and this raises alarm bells. And on top of that, Carrick’s files aren’t as readily available as yours are. The Guild doesn’t like to admit that the system has failed, or at least that the brainwashing has missed a brain or two. So to answer your question of how do I know so much about Carrick? I have a large organization. When a case like Carrick’s reaches the courts, people tell me. I went to his trial.”

I’m immediately envious of her. I wanted to be at his trial. I wanted to stand in the back and be his pillar of support as he was for me. I wonder if he had anyone, or if he went through it all alone. I feel more urgency to find him.

“How … how was he?” I ask, feeling my body starting to tremble.

“Remarkably strong,” she says with a fond smile on her lips.

“Did you go to the Branding Chamber?” I ask.

She nods. “Because of my charity foundation, I was allowed. The Guild understands that it’s important for me to witness events such as those to help the families and Flawed community in counseling.”

I think of him in the Branding Chamber, remember how hot it felt with the bright ceiling lights on me in the chair, picture him in the red gown feeling the same thing as I felt. My eyes fill with tears. “How was he?”

She takes my hands, and I feel the tears slip down my cheeks.

“Celestine, you’ll be proud to know, he was remarkably quiet. I’ve never attended a branding where there was such … silence.”

Inside, I feel broken, but I also feel like dancing. He did what I did. He followed my lead. He wouldn’t let them hear him cry.

“Have you seen him lately?” she asks as I wipe away my tears.

I smile, a knowing smile, like I know where he is but won’t say. “Do you know where he is?”

She laughs. “Actually, no. He’s doing a good job of hiding. To escape undetected from the Whistleblowers is a rare and difficult thing.”

I nod in agreement.

“He must have help.”

I know she wants to say more on that, but she doesn’t. Instead, she changes tack, and I now know why she’s really here. “When you next see him, please tell him that his support would be greatly appreciated. The organization needs as many Flawed who are willing to share their stories with us and speak out. Doing it alone doesn’t give us the weight we need to make a difference. To have a child of two Flawed parents, who was raised at an F.A.B. institution, who wanted to find his parents, whose only flaw was to break F.A.B. rules and try to find his parents, would be a real bonus for my campaign for F.A.B. Adoption. You’ll tell him that, won’t you?”