Cecelia Ahern - Flawed

I nod. Whenever I see him again. If I ever see him again.

“I’m holding an event tonight. A small gathering for those who need support. It’s at five PM. You’ll have time to get there and back for your curfew. Here’s the directions,” she says urgently, pushing a folded piece of paper into my hands. “Come speak for us tonight. I know you will inspire the people. Move them to action.”

“Action?”

“I call it a support group.” She raises an eyebrow. “But really what I’m trying to do is make something happen. Bring an end to the Guild. What the Guild knows is that I work with the Flawed, with their families, providing a counseling service for those affected by it. I arrange fund-raisers for families. The F.A.B. Adoption campaign is supported by many in the government and the Guild. These institutions are costly, and adoption would help their budgets greatly. They always have their eye on the bottom line, of course. So I have many of them on my side. That’s how I can make this work. And not just the adoption campaign. They know that my counseling work with the Flawed and their families is vital in maintaining calm in society.”

Even hearing that she is supported by the Guild makes me distrust her again, despite what she’s saying. “Alpha.” I barely look at the crumpled paper in my hand. “I appreciate your support, but I’m not a speaker. I don’t even know what I would say.”

Her eyes linger over me for a moment as though she’s trying to figure me out. “I often think you’re more clever than you let on, and other times I think you’re a child who has found herself in a situation that is so much bigger than she and has no idea what to do.”

I don’t answer her. It’s not for me to help her analysis of me. Understanding myself doesn’t keep me awake at night, but I’m still not used to people airing their opinions of me so boldly like that. Any thoughts I have of her I have politely kept to myself, though some people, like her and Pia, have found that it is their right to express their opinion of me freely, as though it can’t hurt or alter me. It’s the branding that does that, and I know it. It dehumanizes me in a way to others. I’m to be stared at and talked about as if I’m not here.

“My work began as a charity, counseling, and fund-raising, but since your case, the numbers have grown. I see a rise in our donations. Privately, of course, but there are some big names. I feel a change coming, and you have started that change. Of course, much of it is political. My organization can do so much more. It’s time. Try to bring your friend Carrick if you can. It’s time to urge the people into action.”

FIFTY-FIVE

THAT AFTERNOON, KNOWING that I have a week of confinement to the house ahead of me, I pace my room like the caged lion Carrick always seemed. Even if I could speak at Alpha’s gathering, which I wouldn’t, I can’t leave the house. How empowering is that to people?

Home from school, Juniper walks by my open door. She looks lost and as though she has been crying. I’m glad. She stops and looks at me. She’s back in her own clothes, head to toe in black. Apart from my brandings, there’s not much to tell us apart.

“Nothing ever happened with me and Art if that’s what you’re worried about.” She sniffs. “All we ever did was talk about you.”

I want to slap her hard I feel so angry, but instead I calmly raise my hand out and push the door closed in her face. It is a gratifying feeling, but it doesn’t do anything to fill the emptiness inside me. I know she hasn’t left the house at night since I stumbled across them together. I know because I lie awake in bed, unable to sleep, and listen for her. I think of all those nights she went to meet him on the summit while I was trapped inside on curfew, in agony, healing, and my heart pumps with rage. I don’t know what I think about something happening between them. When I found them, they were sitting side by side and laughing. If it hadn’t happened already, it might have. It is the sound of their laughter that haunts me, particularly as I was running for my life. I will never forgive them. But it doesn’t mean I can stop myself from caring about him. I wonder who is helping Art now that Juniper isn’t. I wonder if he has run away for good, if he has had the courage to leave Humming, even Highland altogether, and live somewhere far from the reach of his dad. I wonder if I’ll ever see him again. I shouldn’t care about him and I shouldn’t worry about him. But I do.

I’m summoned to the kitchen because Mary May has paid me a surprise visit and apparently has an announcement. I’m immediately terrified. I’m guessing it has something to do with the alcohol test I took Friday night that tested positive. Despite Colleen, Gavin, and Natasha being unable to escape the situation as Logan had, the three of them had categorically denied drinking any alcohol, which made it look like it was an act I had done on my own, which is against Flawed rules. Though how I, tied up and locked in a shed, had happened upon alcohol all by myself is too stupid for even the Guild to pin on me. Though I’m sure they spent the weekend trying.

Mary May produces some documents from her satchel. Looking at her, I feel the sting of her leather glove on my cheek and I see the woman who reported her entire family to the Guild and watched them one after another be branded for life. Who knows what else she’s capable of, and my life is in her hands.

“Your detention this week has been withdrawn,” she says in a clipped voice, and I can tell she hates delivering this news. I can tell she hates even opening her mouth wide enough in this house to breathe in the Flawed air. She’s appalled by it, yet she’s drawn to it. “An anonymous source submitted the photograph in its entirety to the Guild. The Guild had it tested for Photoshopping or meddling of any kind and is satisfied with the claim that it is original and is the image of Juniper North in her art class. On your separate charge, the Guild has also ruled to drop the alcohol charges. Colleen Tinder’s testimony matches with the amount of alcohol found in your bloodstream, which was minimal.”

To my utter surprise, Mom, who is wearing dungarees and a plaid shirt, punches the air close to Mary May’s face and hisses, “Yes!” Then she throws her arms around me in a tight embrace so that I can’t see Mary May’s reaction. Mom warned me only days ago not to test Mary May, but she is playing a dangerous game herself. I hear the door slam as Mary May leaves.

Feeling victorious from my double win, I feel like I can take on the world, that I can go further to righting more wrongs. Now I am free to investigate as I planned. Leaving everybody to celebrate without me, including Juniper, who looked genuinely pleased for me but knew not to come near me, I go to my bedroom. I take out Mr. Berry’s business card from my pocket and dial the number written on the back.

“Hello?” a quiet voice answers.

“Hello, is that … Mr. Berry’s husband?”

“Who’s this?” he says, even quieter, so that I have to strain my ear to hear.

“My name is Celestine North. He represented me in—”

“I know who you are,” he interrupts quickly, but not rudely. “You shouldn’t be calling here.”

It sounds like he’s moving around. Distracted. Something brushes against the phone.

“I’m sorry, it’s just that Mr. Berry provided me with this phone number in the invoice, and I thought that he wanted me to call here. Can I speak to him, please?”

Silence. At first, I think he’s gone, but I can hear him breathing.

“Hello?”

“Yes,” he says quickly again, so quietly it’s as though it’s a bad line and he’s a million miles away. “He’s not here,” he says, and my heart falls. “She already called looking for him.”