Six (4 page)

Parker's wrist started vibrating again. He pressed down on the flashing light until it stopped.

Their father had implanted the device into Emma and Parker on the first day of their summer vacation, just a week after Emma had turned six. Parker could remember many things about that day—his picture of a space shuttle framed on the wall of his mother's office, her white lab coat draped over the back of her tall-backed chair, the smell of antiseptic—but he couldn't remember the procedure itself. It had been done under local anesthetic administered by his mother, so perhaps the absence of pain had lessened the memory's impact.

He did—not surprisingly—recall in vivid detail the moment he had used Effie for the first time. His mother had knelt at his side and shown him how to call Emma by pressing down on the light on the right side of his wrist. In response, Emma's arm had started to vibrate. She had jumped in surprise, and his father, kneeling next to her, had smiled and, with his hand over hers, had pressed down on the flashing light on her wrist.

“Think of something to say to your sister, Parker. Nothing too complicated, so that she can read it easily.”

In time, Parker would come to realize the significance of this moment—the first-ever thought-to-thought transmission—and would wish his first words had been more fitting of the occasion. As it was, he had simply relayed the first thing that had come to mind.

Your glasses are a funny color.

Emma's eyes had lit up in amazement as Parker's thought had been translated into subtitles that had scrolled—imperceptibly to anybody else—across the right lens of her new lime green glasses. There'd been a brief pause as she'd slowly read what Parker had said. She'd looked up at Parker, grinned, and her thought had been translated almost instantaneously into a very slightly robotic voice inside Parker's head.

Not as funny as your face,
she had replied.

Parker's thoughts were interrupted by his wrist vibrating once more. He had tried hanging up the call a few times, but Emma just kept calling back. She wasn't going to give up. Finally Parker sighed and pressed down quickly on his sister's light to answer.

I don't want to talk,
he said. Well, he didn't say it; he thought it. For Parker and Emma though, thinking via Effie was as natural as it was for others to open their mouths to speak.

Where are you?

I'm fine. Don't worry. I just want to be by myself for a while.

What happened? Are you okay?

I said I don't want to talk about it.

Just tell me what happened.

I'm going now.

But, Parker—

Parker pressed the light on his wrist and Emma's voice cut off before she could finish her sentence. There was nothing she could do to help. That was the thing about Emma; she wanted to help everyone. Victims of disasters, starving children, injured animals, and now him. His father said that she was just like their mother. He meant it in a good way. If anybody asked their father about his children, he would tell them (to Parker's and Emma's embarrassment) that Parker was going to grow up to be a Nobel Prize–winning scientist, and Emma, well, she was going to save the world.
Good for her,
thought Parker, but she wasn't going to start by saving him. Not today. Right now all he wanted to do was hide.

Parker—his eyes adjusting to the dim lighting—unzipped his backpack and pulled out a bright yellow Walkman that had once belonged to his dad. Emma had found it in the attic of their old house when they'd been packing for their move, and neither she nor Parker had had a clue as to what it was. Their dad had been shocked, and even more so when he'd pulled out a cassette tape with a tangled loop of brown plastic ribbon hanging out and neither of his children had looked any more the wiser. Mumbling something about getting old, their dad had left and returned some time later, triumphantly holding a pencil, a pack of batteries, and a set of headphones.

Parker had watched as his father had put the pencil into one of the holes of the cassette then had turned it slowly, causing the ribbon to wind back into its housing. Turning it upside down to show Parker that the ribbon had now become taut, Parker's father had then placed the cassette into the Walkman and pressed play, only to find that it didn't work. He'd shaken it, replaced the batteries with another set, pressed all the buttons with increasing frustration, and finally banged it against the wall before giving up. There was, he'd said, too much packing to do to be wasting time fixing junk.

Parker, however, was not so easily deterred—it was exactly the kind of challenge that he loved. That night, after hours spent carefully dismantling the Walkman, locating the problem, and then rebuilding it, Parker had lain on his bed and listened to the mixtape his dad had made while at university. The next day, Parker had rummaged around in the attic and found three more cassettes. It was one of these—another homemade collection of songs with the words
ROAD TRIP
scrawled in thick black marker on the front sticker—that he pulled out now. Parker clicked the cassette into place, closed the cover, put on the headphones, and pressed firmly down on the play button. He leaned back against the wall, closed his eyes, and allowed his thoughts to be washed away by the music.

*  *  *  *  *  *

Three songs into side B of the cassette, the lights above Parker began to flicker on. Startled, he bolted upright and, with a swift yank, pulled the headphones from his ears.

Clunk. Rattle. Clunk.

It sounded like somebody was rummaging through a box.
Of all the days to pick,
thought Parker, cursing his bad luck. He held his breath and waited, hoping that whoever it was would find whatever it was they were looking for quickly and leave.

A few seconds later the noise stopped. Parker waited—every part of his body frozen in high alert, but instead of hearing the door opening, as he'd hoped, he heard the sound of something—a crate maybe—being moved not too far from where he was sitting. As quietly as possible, Parker scooted over to his left until he found a small gap between the crates and the cart. He leaned forward and, with his eye pressed to the gap, looked out onto the room.

Parker saw him straightaway. In the center of the room, leaning over a box with his back to Parker, was a boy wearing black trousers and a short-sleeved blue-and-white-checked shirt. He guessed that the boy was maybe his age and could see the brown skin of his arm but, other than that, Parker couldn't make out much more from where he was sitting.

Parker stayed still and kept watching as the boy gave up on the box, stood, and turned to his left to survey the line of boxes against the wall. Now that he could see the boy properly, with his closely shaved black hair and thick black-framed glasses—Parker realized that he knew him. He was almost certain they were in the same grade, and he was trying to work out what classes they shared when, in a decision that took him completely by surprise, the boy suddenly turned on his heels and began to walk toward him.

Parker ducked down and listened as the boxes in front of him were opened one by one in turn. Finally Parker heard the sound of a box being opened in front of the cart he was hiding behind, and he realized that the game was up—he was going to have to do something. Without enough time to think of a better plan, Parker reached into one of the boxes next to him and grabbed the first thing that came to hand.

“Found it!” he said as he jumped up and found himself face-to-face with the boy standing only a couple of feet in front of him.

“Aaaargh!”

The boy screamed then did a strange whole-body wobble before staggering backward to the floor, holding both hands in front of his face for protection. In spite of himself, the reaction was so comical that Parker had to laugh.

“I'm really sorry,” said Parker, pushing the crates out of his way and stepping out from behind the cart. “Did I scare you?”

The boy stared at him from behind his black-rimmed glasses, the whites of his eyes large and brilliant against his skin. “No,” he answered as he stood up. “I always scream when I meet people.”

Parker gave a small laugh, but the boy didn't smile back.

“Why were you hiding?” asked the boy. His voice was still weak from shock.

“I wasn't hiding,” Parker said, too quickly. “I was looking for something.” As proof, he held up the object he'd grabbed, before realizing what it was.

The boy tipped his head to the side and his eyes narrowed. “Why were you looking for a broken mouse?”

Parker looked at the dangling computer mouse in his hand and winced. He answered with the first thing that came to mind.

“I collect them.”

The boy considered this for a moment, then—with a look that said he was satisfied with the answer—shrugged and nodded, as if collecting broken mice were the most normal thing in the world.

“Okay,” he said.

“Well,” said Parker, eager to get away, “sorry again for scaring you. I'm going now.”

The boy didn't respond. He also didn't move from his spot. Feeling awkward, Parker walked back to his hiding place, stuffed the Walkman quickly into his schoolbag, and then stepped back out. The boy was still standing there, watching him.

“How could you look for something in the dark?” he asked as Parker emerged. “The lights were off when I came in.”

“I don't think they were,” said Parker. He placed the broken mouse on the cart to put his backpack on.

“No,” said the boy. “They were definitely off. I specifically remember turning the switch on, which means you had to be in the dark.”

“Okay,” said Parker. “Maybe. I don't remember.”

“You don't remember whether you were standing in a dark room?” asked the boy.

Parker breathed out loudly. “Wow,” he said, “you ask a lot of questions. Look, I'm going. Sorry again for jumping out at you.”

Parker nodded good-bye and turned to walk away. He was at the door, about to turn the handle, when the boy called out to him.

“Hey!”

Parker took a breath and looked back. “Yes?”

“You forgot your mouse.”

“Oh,” said Parker. He walked back and held his hand out, but the boy didn't offer it forward.

“Why would you want this mouse? IBM made millions of these. They came as standard with any desktop computer.”

The boy was beginning to really irritate him. “That one's European,” said Parker. “They only made a few of them in 1994. Okay?”

The boy raised a single eyebrow. “Really?” he said, nodding over to the wall. “Then that box must be worth millions.”

Parker turned his head and saw a huge white opaque crate overflowing with identical mice. He winced.

“You weren't really looking for this, were you?” asked the boy.

Parker turned back to the boy. “No, okay, Sherlock? I wasn't. Keep the mouse,” he said.

The boy didn't seem in the slightest bit bothered at Parker's obvious irritation. “I think you were hiding,” he said.

“I'm going,” said Parker. He turned.

“Was it because of that thing in the cafeteria?”

Parker stopped and threw his hands up in the air in frustration. “You know about that?”

The boy nodded.

“Then why were you asking me all those stupid questions if you already knew?”

The boy looked hurt. “I didn't know. That's why I was asking.”

Parker glared at him. “Well, now you've worked it out. Great. Can I go now?”

“You're annoyed.”

“I'm not annoyed,” said Parker. He was very annoyed.

The boy pursed his lips tightly in thought. Then, as if having come to a decision, he held his arm out to offer a handshake.

“I'm Michael.”

Parker shook his hand quickly. “I'm Parker. I've got—”

“I know. You're in my art class.”

As soon as he said it, Parker remembered. Michael was perhaps the only boy worse at art than he was.

“I'm sorry, I didn't mean to get you angry,” said Michael.

Parker stiffened. “I'm not angry—I'm just not in the mood for talking. Can I go now?”

“You shouldn't let Aaron get to you,” said Michael, ignoring Parker's question. “He's weak. All bullies are. They need to bully other people to feel better about themselves. You did the right thing and you should feel good about that.”

Parker pretended to think about this for a moment. “Okay,” he said finally. “Good pep talk. Thanks. I'll keep that in mind.”

“I don't let it bother me.”

“You don't let what bother you?” asked Parker.

“When Aaron and his friends take my money and stuff. I just remind myself that it's evidence of their weakness. One day, I'll be—”

“What?” interrupted Parker. “You
let
them take your money?”

“I don't let them. I just don't
not
let them.”

“That's exactly the same thing. Don't do that. Just tell them to get lost. Or tell a teacher or something.”

Michael shrugged. “It's no big deal, seriously. I can get more money, but I only have one face.”

Parker tried to work out the logic in that before deciding that there was none. “You don't have to choose between getting beaten up or giving them money. There are other options, you know. How long have they been taking your money?”

Michael looked down at the floor. “Since I started here. In September.”

“You're new? Where were you before?”

“Homeschooled.”

“Ahh,” said Parker, nodding slowly. “That explains it.”

“That explains what?” It was Michael's turn to sound defensive.

“No. I mean, there's nothing wrong with being homeschooled. It's just you're probably not used to standing up for yourself.”