“Girlfriend?” I ask to keep him talking, even if I’m not sure I want to hear the answer.
I hear his grin turn up around the edges. “No one serious. What about you?”
“No girlfriends.”
“Boyfriends?”
I consider lying. Fabricating a Spring boy from Niagara Falls or Myrtle Beach. It would be easy. But he’s not hiding. And I’m not trying to hurt him. Not now.
“Not since seventh grade.” My face flushes hot and I’m grateful he can’t see it.
“You’re kidding, right?” He sounds surprised. Or maybe doubtful.
“It’s hard to meet eligible guys in a terminal ward with Poppy as a roommate.”
“That was before. What about now?”
I shrug, thinking back on the handful of awkward kisses I’ve shared with other Spring boys over the years. Late-night games of truth or dare in someone’s dorm room after a few too many smuggled beers. Or an unexpected lingering peck on the lips in an empty Spring stairwell. “I wouldn’t exactly call them dates.”
“So... you and Julio? You never...?”
“What? Kissed?” I wrinkle my nose at the thought. I wish he could see it. Maybe then he’d believe me. “I have an aversion to coconut.” He laughs again. Coughs. Takes a minute to catch his breath, and something inside me reaches for him. Reaches for him without wanting to hurt him.
I slide my hand closer to the fence.
“Julio will never admit it, but he’s in love with Amber.” I can see exactly what Jack was thinking when he set those four batteries on the table in the library. “Your plan. Do you really think it could work?” I listen for his answer through his labored breaths.
“It has to be soon,” he says. “This summer, before the fall Purge. I know Poppy’s afraid. I know she wants you to fight.” I sink my teeth into my lip, remembering my promise to her. My promise to Julio. “But if we don’t get you out soon, we won’t get another chance.”
“A chance at what?” I want to hear him say it. I need to know this is about something more than just me and the red line. “What is it you want, Jack?”
As I wait through a heavy silence, I worry that maybe he doesn’t know. When he finally speaks, his voice is so weak, I have to listen with my whole heart to hear the answer.
“I want to ask you out without wondering when you’ll have to kill me. I want you to look at me without feeling sorry for what you’re about to do. I want...”
Jack falls silent again. For a moment, I don’t hear him breathing. “Jack?” I scramble to my knees and grab the fence, but he’s already there, pale and shaking, his fingers laced through the chain link. He presses his forehead to the mesh.
“You have to talk to Julio,” he says, his face wrenched with pain. “You have to persuade him to help you. Amber and Woody are already on board. Tell Julio to find a way to contact Woody. Woody knows what to do.”
Pale pinpricks of light glow beneath Jack’s skin.
I reach for his hand, desperate to hold him here. It worked before, it could work again. But Jack shakes his head.
“I have to go.” His whole body’s trembling now. “Last time. I promise,” he says with a weak smile.
Last time.A wave of panic grips me. Chronos or his Guards could kill me next week. I may never make it home or wake from stasis. I may never make it out of the Observatory alive to see Jack again. Our future feels like it’s teetering on a fulcrum, and suddenly I know which side I want to be on. I’ve already crossed the line. We’re already falling...
“I’m not sorry,” I tell him.
Our noses brush as I reach through the fence, making sure his transmitter is on. Then mine. I feel his breath, soft and cold through the opening in the chain link. Before our lips meet, I feel him slip away.
17
Special Delivery
Five Months Later
JACK
