I am everything I need to be.
Hopefully the money they spent putting me in this crisis helped me develop the skills to get myself out of it.
“Do you want to talk about what just happened?”
Harmony has changed into a button-front dress that is plainer than the one she wore yesterday, tinged yellow, and slightly shorter too, a scandalous ankle length. Her gloves stop at the wrists. This must be the Church version of casual wear.
“No,” I reply. “There’s nothing to discuss.”
“But—”
“Honor thy parents is one of your commandments. Honor thy contracts is one of mine.” I try to say it like I mean it. “I’m not a renegger.”
“So you’re okay?”
I nod vigorously, afraid that my voice might betray my lack of confidence.
Harmony fusses with her gloves for a moment, then says, “Amen to that.”
And if I were the praying kind, I just might have amened along with her.
I’M SITTING ON THE FLOOR IN THE MIDDLE OF MELODY’S closet, averting my eyes as she models yet another outfit in front of the mirror.
“How does this look?” she asks, more to the mirror than to me.
Those second-skin jeans and Co-Ed Naked Human Evolution League T-shirt don’t look any different from any of the other combinations of clothing she’s put on and taken off in the past ten minutes: sacrilegious. But then I remind myself that here in Otherside, such provocative outfits aren’t against the Orders. If I’m going to blend in here, I need to pay close attention to how such fashions are put together.
“Is this an outfit that says, I’ll be bumped any day now?”
When she turns to look at me, I realize that she’s waiting for my opinion.
“Y-y-yes?”
She slaps her hand to her forehead. “Look who I’m asking!” She gestures at my full-skirted day dress and matching gloves. “I bet you never worry about what to wear.”
When I realize that she’s being playful, not judgmental, I return her smile. “By dressing simply and humbly, we don’t waste time worrying about our appearance. We have more time to serve God and our community.”
“I wonder how much more I could accomplish,” Melody says, throwing the T aside and reaching for a gauzy floral blouse, “if I didn’t go through this every single day.”
I think about my big housesisters, Mary, Lucy, and Annie, and it makes me giggle to imagine them agonizing over whether to wear the pink day dress or the other pink day dress, blue or blue. Even my little housesisters, Laura, Katie, and Emily, don’t dither over which shade of white they’ll wear today. They’ve been awake for two hours already, have already done their outdoor chores (gathering eggs, milking cows, collecting wood for the fire) and indoor chores (setting the table, serving the meal, clearing up) and are now gathering for the Monday-morning prayershare. This is the first one I’ve missed since I was struck down by mule flu last year. Forgive me for saying so, but I don’t regret not being there.
Please don’t think I’m disrespecting the power of fellowship and group prayer. When we join together in worship, we gain one another’s strength. However, we’ve been taught that we can only ask for things that bring glory to God and I don’t see how it glorifies God when Laura asks Him to cure her bad breath. He’s is all the way up in Heaven and not sharing the same loom. She’s wasting God’s time.
It pains me to say this, but Katie uses prayershare to shed embarrassing light on others’ failings under the pretense of saving a soul. For example, a few weeks ago she said, “Please pray for my friend who has lust in her heart for her fiancé’s brother.” And nobody could pray hard for the rest of the session because we were too busy not so quietly speculating who in our prayerclique had lust in her heart for her future brother-in-law. Such gossip isn’t praiseworthy. And it was doubly pointless because everyone already knows that Emily sobbed for a week after she was betrothed in her Blooming to the younger, bucktoothed Stoltzfus boy.
“Thanks for cleaning up.”
Without even realizing it, I have gathered up all of Melody’s T-shirts and folded them neatly in a stack. The one on top is printed with an image of a green pill on a wet pink tongue with the words OPEN UP WITH TOCIN. I instinctively turn it over to the blank side.
“So. What do you think?”
I look up to see that Melody has changed into a silky sleeveless T in a beautiful sky blue hue that I’m forbidden to wear unless—I mean, until—I give birth to a son.
“I like the flowery one better,” I say, thinking quickly. “It’s more . . . maternal.”
“Maternal as in ‘ready to bump.’ Right?”
“Right,” I reply, this time without a stammer.
Melody sighs as she puts the other blouse back on, assesses herself in the mirror once more. A look of triumph lights up her face. “Now, a last check on my hair and makeup!” she says as she runs out of the closet.
I don’t follow her.
Instead, I pick up the blue shirt from the floor. The fabric is unlike anything I’ve ever felt before, virtually weightless, and so unlike the rough-hewn cotton and wool we use to make most of our clothing. I hold it up to marvel at the lack of discernible seams or stitches, clearly the product of neither spindle nor loom.
Melody bursts back into the closet. “Oh! I almost forgot!”
I yelp and drop the offensive shirt to the floor. Did she see me? No, she’s too busy searching for something in her jewelry box. She holds what’s she’s looking for—a chain with a single, small bead—and regards it with a frown before putting it around her neck.
“So you’ll be okay by yourself?” By the way she’s blinking and rolling her eyes, I can tell that she’s more focused on the MiNet than me.
I pray I won’t be by myself for long.
“I don’t have time to set up the touchpad for the MiNet right now, so you won’t be able to—”
“Oh, that’s fine,” I interrupt. “There’s plenty in here”—I tap my Bible—“to keep me busy!”
“Um,” she says distractedly, eyes racing in their sockets. “Right.” Her eyes focus on the middle distance between us. “I’m leaving so . . . if you need . . .” More eye rolling. “Zen’s here?” Without finishing her thought, she backs out of the closet in haste. A few moments later I hear the front door open and slam behind her. She doesn’t say goodbye.
With fourteen housebrothers and housesisters, I’m rarely by myself. I like to go on long walks in the overgrown fields once cleared out for another never-built neighborhood. Ma still sees me as the sickly baby I once was and worries that I’ll put too much stress on my delicate constitution. Going on those walks isn’t against the Orders but is still a form of disobedience. I’ve always known my mother disapproves, but I’ve gone anyway. Not for the exercise, fresh air, or scenery. Just to be alone with my thoughts.
I pray I’ll be forgiven for the worry I’m putting Ma through right now.
I shyly reclaim the blue T, then nervously hold it up to my own body, partly expecting to be discovered by several pairs of watching eyes all ready to chastise me for my transgressive ways. When it doesn’t happen, I am emboldened to walk to the other side of the closet, where Melody’s jeans are organized by color in tidy rows. I select silver.
The silence inside the closet is unnerving. I sing to myself just to make some noise.
“You’re knocked up . . .”
I bury my blushing face into my hands. Assimilating with the sinners is not going to be easy.
I have to remind myself that nothing I do here is against the Orders.
Cling to your faith in Christ, and keep your conscience clear.
I turn away from the mirror and unbutton my dress. Quickly, and still afraid of being scrutinized by invisible eyes, I pull on the jeans and slip on the T-shirt and . . . I still feel naked! The fabric is as light as air, no more than a whisper against my skin. It’s indescribably strange to be covered up and yet, so . . . free. I cautiously look in
the mirror, afraid that this is somehow a trick. . . .
That pretty girl in the mirror, openmouthed and pink in the cheeks, looks almost like an Othersider. There’s just one minor adjustment.
The gloves come off.
Now she stands here in a T-shirt that brings out the blue in her eyes, and jeans that cling to every inch, two gloveless, ringless hands on her hips. This girl isn’t Melody, though she looks exactly like Melody.
She is me.
ZEN IS STRADDLING HIS BIKE IN MY DRIVEWAY.
“To what do I owe this great honor?” I ask, unlocking my own bike. “Are you here for me? Or are you and your new best friend shopping for chastity belts today?”
“I’m here to see you,” he insists.
I wait for him to finish.
“To talk about her.”
I knew it. I pull on my helmet and swing my leg over the crossbar.
“If you hadn’t blinded your MiNet last night, you would know what I want to talk to you about.”
“If you hadn’t blinded your MiNet for the last month, you would know what I don’t want to talk to you about.”
“Look, I told you,” he says, “I’ve got IAMs to study for. Not everyone aces them the first time around.”
A lot of good it’s done me. My parents have already signed me up for another round because near perfect on the International Aptitude Measurements isn’t perfect enough to get into Global U.
“I don’t get why you’re suddenly so obsessed with the IAMs anyway,” I say, rolling my bike back and forth, crunching the gravel. “Weren’t you the one telling me that brick-and-mortar institutions of higher learning are so last century? That my parents had the right idea, going out there and living life with the whole world as their classroom . . .”
I stop myself. My awesome parents are the last people I want to talk about right now. Gah. I change the subject.
“What did you say to Harmony yesterday?”
Zen looks relieved to return to this line of questioning.
“I said a lot of things,” Zen says.
“You say whatever it takes to get everyone to like you.”
He slumps over his handlebars and looks up at me with goo-gooey innocence. “Why do you think I’m always trying to get everyone to like me?”
“Zen! You invented the Like Me Algorithm!”
In ninth grade, Zen wrote an app that instantly cataloged the likes and dislikes of anyone who had ever created a MiNet profile and used that data to whatever ends he needed to get that person to like him.
“Not relevant,” he says. “I never used it.”
This is true. He destroyed the program immediately so it wouldn’t be exploited by, in his words, “forces of evil.”
“Your sister found me naturally charming. Just like you do.”
I snort.
“In fact . . .” He throws his arms out in front of him as if presenting himself as a gift. “She might want me.”
I make a big show out of laughing so hard I can hardly stand up.
“I’m serious!”
Still laughing, I push off down the hill.
“You’re talking about a girl who thinks she’ll go to hell if she shows a bit of ankle!” I yell into the breeze. “A person who wants me to marry one of her housebrothers at the end of the month.”
“And why do you think that’s so important to her?” he shouts from behind me.
“Maybe because she’s been told her whole life that anyone who doesn’t do things the Church way is going to burn in hell for all eternity? Because she’s been brought up to believe that it’s her mission in life to save as many of us sinners as possible? It would be a major failure if she couldn’t even convince her own identical twin sister to have God.”
“That’s one way of seeing it,” Zen says, struggling to keep up. He’s got the better bike, but I’ve got longer, stronger legs. “I think she’s the one who needs convincing, not you.”
“And what did she say that makes you think that?”
“It wasn’t what she said,” Zen shouts. “It’s what she didn’t say. . . .”
Gah. Typical Zen.
“Promise me, Zen, you won’t tell anyone at school about Harmony until I’m ready.”
“Mel . . .”
“PROMISE OR I’LL TELL EVERYONE YOU STILL SLEEP WITH BOO BOO.”
Boo Boo is Zen’s girlbot. By sixteen years old, any self-respecting guy has replaced—or at least supplemented—his artificial lovin’ with the real thing.
“We had good times together. I’m keeping her for sentimental reasons—”
“Oh, is that what they call it these days—”
“When you hit below the belt, you really hit below the belt—”
“JUST PROMISE.”
“Okay.” He rubs his helmet because he can’t pull at the hair underneath. “I promise because I’m such a great friend, and not because I’m worried about anyone finding out about Boo Boo because guess what? It’s common knowledge among dudes that we all hook up with our girlbots every now and again. . . .”
Gaaah. I pedal faster.
“Wait, Mel!” he says, panting harder now as I pick up the pace. “I’m being serious now. What if there’s more than what Harmony is telling you . . . ?”
“I don’t have time for your hypotheticals today!”
I zoom ahead, leaving him behind as if he’s cemented to the sidewalk.
NOW THAT MELODY IS GONE, ALL I HAVE TO DO IS WAIT.
“Do me a favor,” Lib had said. “Skip school. Stay home today. Play NOOKY HOOKY. Because GUESS WHAT! It turns out our boy Jondoe was in New York City over the weekend to bump the mayor’s daughter. She pregged on the first try! What a pro. Anyway, now he’s got a few days free before he has to fly out to Los Angeles to promote his new fragrance. He can be there this AFTERNOON. Will you skip school so I can set up a one-on-one?”
I nodded mutely.
“THAT’S MY GIRL. I don’t want another day to go by, Miss Melody Mayflower. Let’s deliver what the Jaydens are SO WILLING to pay SO MUCH for. This is your FUTURE we’re talking about.” He stopped, assumed a more serious tone. “You do realize that your life is about to change.”
My life already had.
“Once this news hits the MiNet, the optics are gonna go OFF THE SPRING. Your pregg will be famous. Morning sickness is NOTHING compared to how green with envy they’ll be when they find out who’s bumping you. . . .”
I didn’t hear anything else Lib said. When he vanished from MiVu, taking my Morning Star with him, I fell to my knees, humbled by the task that God had put before me.
Lib believed that I was Melody—and it’s his job to know everything about her. It shouldn’t be too hard to lead a stranger into believing the same. I only have to pretend long enough to make him change his mind about . . . doing what he’s supposed to do with my sister and, if possible, forsake his sinful profession altogether. If Jesus could spend His time preaching to the prostitutes, so can I.
Because I’m being challenged to serve a higher truth.
And saving Jondoe must be part of the plan now too.
GAH. I HATE BIKING TO SCHOOL. BUT AS PRESIDENT OF THE ECOmmunity Club, my parents say I have to serve as a conscientious example.
I arrive at school all windswept and slightly sweaty, just in time to see Shoko clamber down the steps from the bus everyone calls the Bumpmobile. It provides rides to and from school for all students with certified pregnancies, no matter how close they live to campus. Malia, Shoko, and I used to bike together every day and rant about the Cheerclones who can’t walk one-tenth of a mile to school but can still flip handsprings well into their third trimester.
“We’re gonna rock big bellies on our bikes!” we used to brag. “We won’t be like those lazy breeders taking the Bumpmobile.”
Now Shoko sits next to those lazy breeders every morning swapping cures for stretch marks. Malia is in lockdown. And I bike to school alone.
I don’t hold a grudge against
Shoko. Really. She’s been an awesome president. There’s a lot of tension between amateurs and pros at school. Like, amateurs look down on pros for bumping with strangers, not boyfriends. Or they pity us for missing out on all the partner-swapping fun at the masSEX parties. And pros say amateurs are jealous because they aren’t good enough to pregg for profit. And even if they were, they probably wouldn’t have the willpower to keep their legs closed until it was time to fulfill their contractual obligations. That sort of cattiness threatened to end the Alliance before it even began. But as the rare amateur turned pro, Shoko has served as an inspiration and intermediary between both sides.
So that’s the good news. The bad news is that this second pregg has given Shoko a major case of what experts call “adolescent amnio-amnesia.” I swear she’s dropped at least ten IQ points per trimester. She’s at thirty-nine and a half weeks now and can’t stay focused on anything. If she’s carrying her third pregg in college, she’ll fail out for serious. Like right now she waddles right past me without saying hello. As her peer birthcoach, the only nonrelative allowed in the delivery room, I’d be offended if I weren’t so used to it.
I tap the bell to get her attention.
RING! RING! RING! “Shoko, hello!” RING! RING! RING!
“Oy!” she yelps, clutching her belly. “Don’t break my water!”
She’s joking. At least I think she’s joking. Bounding off the bus right behind Shoko is none other than Ventura Vida. She and her adorable six-month bump believe other-wise.
“Oh, no!” she trills. “You rilly, rilly can’t go into labor until after the vote!”
Ventura smiles with more gums than teeth. I guess she’s figured out that she’s prettier when she’s meaner.
“Don’t worry,” Shoko says to Ventura and the group of variously pregnant girls surrounding her, many of whom I know from the Pro/Am. “I just know Burrito will take it to forty-two weeks, just like the first one.”
“You’ve got a very hospitable womb,” says Ventura, which makes everyone, including Shoko, laugh so hard that there must be more to it than what I’m hearing, the punch line for a joke that began on the bus.