The Gift (11 page)

“Uh—what?” I finally manage to get out a couple of syllables. I’m unable to meet his hazel eyes for too long, so I find myself
staring at his faded black T-shirt, which reads,
NO ORDER
. I like it. We have something in common already.

“Your drumstick. Kind of funny for a guitarist and a singer to be carrying a drumstick around.” He has a nice smile, too.
Not too much, just right.

“Yeah, I know.” I smile back. Maybe a little too toothily. “My mom gave it to me. I think it’s for good luck. It’s kind of
a collector’s item.”

“It looks like it,” he says. “So your
mom’s
a drummer?”

I am not about to ruin this with a mood-killing “I think my mom was a witch and this is a wand she gave me the night I was
kidnapped” dud.

“She was,” I lie. Ouch. Mom wouldn’t like the past tense. “I mean,
is.
” That feels even worse. “I mean,
was
.” My face goes from pale pink to fuchsia in about three seconds.

But Drummer Boy looks at me with… sympathy? “I know, it’s hard.” How could he have possibly grasped my blah-blah? “A lot of
us don’t know if our folks ‘is’ or ‘was.’” He puts a comforting hand on my arm, and my stomach kind of flips.
God, he’s sweet. He understands!

His eyes drift back to my stick. “Can I see it? Is that all right with you?”

“Um… sure!” I start to hand it to him, but as he grabs
the end to take it from me, he jumps back, yelping in pain.

“It burned me!”
he says, sticking the side of his hand into his mouth. “What’s with that?”

“Jeez! I’m so sorry!” I say. I look down at the stick in my hand. It doesn’t feel even slightly warm, but it
is
glowing red at the tip where he tried to touch it.

“I had no idea it could do that,” I say. “I
really
didn’t mean —”

“Don’t worry about it,” he says, shaking his hand and smiling through the pain. “It’s nothing. Especially next to what’s happening
every day to kids in New Order ‘schools,’ right?”

“Have you been to one?” I ask, a little surprised.

“Not yet. A little too risky for us. But we’ve had fan tips about that last facility you raided.”

“Er… how do you know about that?”

“You and Whit and Byron made the underground newswire,” he says, and shrugs. “You’re famous. But you don’t act like it.”

Byron hears his name across the room like he’s got supersonic ears and is by my side in half a second.

“They’re practically writing folk songs about you already, Wisty,” Drummer Boy continues. “That facility you hit is part of
a system of exploitation and experimentation. The New Order calls them Juvenile Education and Repatriation complexes. It’s
just cheap child labor.”

“That’s really shocking,” says Byron. The boy’s like a bad cold. You just can’t shake him.

“That’s not the worst of it,” says the drummer, and I realize I don’t even know his name. “There’s another place, the BNW
Center—the Brave New World Center. We’ve heard they’re doing live human experiments on everybody they keep there. ‘Special’
kids”—he uses air quotes—“like you and your brother.”

Everybody’s quiet for a moment, and as the gravity of this sinks in, I lower my eyes from his. “I better go meet up with my
brother. He needs to hear about this.”

“Yes,” says Byron Officious Swain as if he’s my aide-de-camp—or, worse, my boyfriend. “Keep us apprised,” he tells the drummer.
Then he actually grabs my hand and starts pulling me toward the door.

How is it that I mess up with just about the hottest guy I’ve ever seen—and then find myself holding hands with Byron?

This isn’t about being “special”; it’s about being
cursed.

Wisty

CURSED, YES, but not for long apparently.

That’s because Eric—as he finally introduced himself—and the rest of the Bionics decide they want to come back with us to
Garfunkel’s.

Whit is less than enthused. I have the sense he doesn’t trust them—and, of course, he’s still mad about the whole stealing-his-journal
incident—but with Sasha, Emmet, Janine, and me backing the Bionics, he can’t quite say no.

A bunch of us are in the middle of doing an impromptu a cappella version of “The Fire Outside” when suddenly Whit floors the
gas pedal while making a sharp turn. Eric’s hand
just happens
to slide off his knee and come to rest on my hand. It stays right there. I have no urgent need to remove it.

“Buckle up, everybody!” Whit shouts. “We’ve got New Order police on our tail.”

“Police?” I say, incredulous. “What are they doing here in Freeland?”

“Yeah!” shouts my brother. “And how did they manage to find us is another good question. Now brace yourselves!”

The van accelerates, and I scramble to look out the back windows. Three heavily armed New Order police vehicles are bearing
down on us. This looks bad. Whit takes a sharp left turn that sends us all sprawling against the side of the van.

My head’s flung against Eric’s chest. Talk about making the best of a bad situation.

“Sorry,” I mumble.

“S’okay,” Eric whispers.

But then a sharp
right
turn sends us rolling violently against the other side.

And now I’m tangled up with Byron.
Ick.

“They’ve got us boxed in. Coming from all sides!” yells Whit, braking the van to a rocking standstill. “We’ll have to run!
Everybody take off in different directions. Hopefully they won’t get all of us!”

“No!”
I yell. “That’s not the best plan. Seriously, just stay in the van!”

Everyone looks at me like I’m crazy, which I might be. We’ll know soon enough.

“You guys know the song ‘Magic Truck’ by the How?” I ask.

Eric starts laying down a beat on the floor of the van. The bassist and guitarist grab their instruments.

Meanwhile, police cars are skidding to a stop all around us—and then a voice is coming over their PA:
“Exit the vehicle immediately and lie on the ground.”

I wave for the band to keep playing. The lead singer starts in, and then I join him. The groove is instant, almost as if we’ve
been rehearsing together for a couple of months.

I hear the policemen pounding on the windows. We answer by turning up the volume.

Then we don’t hear the policemen anymore. That’s because we’ve succeeded in levitating the van several hundred feet in the
air.

Yeah, you heard me right.

The music was magic. The music did it.
The van is still rising in the air.

I look out the back at the police vehicles, and one of the cops is throwing his hat on the ground in frustration.

“That was close. Too close,” comments Byron, seeing the glass as half empty.

“It… freaking…
worked!
” I scream, and then I can’t help myself—I throw my arms around Eric.
My
glass is very,
very
full.

This is definitely the best night of my life on the
Wanted Dead or Alive
list.

Wisty

I THINK kissing was involved—I’m not certain, but I’m pretty sure. I think Eric’s a good kisser. Not sure, though. The entire evening
was kind of a blur.…

I wake up inside Garfunkel’s the next morning, and I have two distinct thoughts: First:
Did I dream of falling asleep in the drummer’s arms, or did it really happen?
Second:
My drumstick is gone!

It’s the first thing I reach out to touch in the morning. And it’s not there.

Problem. Big problem. Disaster. That drumstick is my magic wand
and
it’s a family heirloom.

Everyone else is deeply conked out after our night of revelry—so I begin a mad hunt to find the wand my mother gave me just
before I was separated from her and dragged off to prison.

I always sleep with the drumstick under my pillow. Or whatever the circumstances are forcing me to use instead
of a pillow. But it’s not there. And it’s not under the mattress either. And it’s not in my coat. And it’s not in my knapsack.
It’s
nowhere.

Okay, don’t cry about this. Think, Wisteria. What was different about last night compared to every other night you’ve slept
at Garfunkel’s?

Well, the Bionics were here.…

That’s got to be it—the drummer! Was Whit right about them?

I tiptoe over to Byron—snoring like a buffalo—and expertly swipe his supersecret smartphone and text Eric at the number he
gave me yesterday.

where R U?

He texts back right away:

had 2 go practice. didn’t want 2 wake u

got yr drumstx?

yep

got mine?

used oven mitt… just in case it was still hot

not funny

sorry

u have it? give back!

tots

you STOLE it

borrowed

i want it back NOW

im sorry. meet me

WTH? u bring it 2 me

don’t freak. m sorry. meet @ city of progress diner—11 am

fine

yr so cool

whatevs,
I type.

But my heart is leapfrogging, and I’m grateful that cell phones don’t convey blushes. I’m cool? As of when?

I mean, it was jerky of Eric to take my stick. But he’s a rock drummer and he admired it. And, I mean, I can almost hear my
mother’s voice telling me he just did it to get my attention. Just the way she told me why geeky Ben Campbell used to pull
my hair in first grade.

Now I
do
start crying. I miss my mother so much. She was my best friend. She
is
my best friend.

Wisty

I DECIDE against finding Whit and telling him where I’m going, even though he’s probably going to kill me when I get back. But I don’t
really have a choice, because guess what my brother would say?

A) Have a great lunch. Could you bring me back some fries?

B) It’s windy out there. Be sure to zipper your coat.

C) Fine, I’m coming with you. No arguments, firebrand!

Yeah. If you picked A or B, I’m going to politely suggest you turn back a few dozen pages and do some rereading.

I need to have my moment alone with Eric. So I sneak around quietly, making myself ready to infiltrate the City of Progress—the
New Order’s demented model city, the template
they mean to apply to the rest of Freeland after they’ve stamped out anyone who resists their disgusting ideas.

It takes a little bit of disguise to properly blend in (read: skirts and sweaters for girls, no black lipstick or obvious
piercings; jackets and ties for boys, and Byron-style hair preferred), but it’s doable, and necessary.

And, since my hair hasn’t grown back yet, it’s a great excuse for me to lift a new hairdo—a cute little brunette bob—from
the wig counter inside Garfunkel’s.

I tiptoe out the store’s front door, and suddenly I feel a vibration under my arm. More precisely, it’s coming from the very
un-Wistylike white purse tucked there.

Another text message. I click the phone on.

A text message
in my mother’s handwriting. WTH…?