“No. I don’t.” He drops his finger and returns his attention to my neck. “Well, don’t even think about not showing up tomorrow. They’ll be watching for that. They’ll give you a break for one day, but they’ll come down hard on you if you don’t turn up tomorrow.”

Part of me wants to know what coming down hard means exactly. After getting imprinted, what’s left? What’s worse? Unlike a few other states, Texas hasn’t started implementing internment camps, virtual prisons from all reports.

I watch him in the mirror as he tends to my neck with efficient movements. Still, there’s a warmth to his touch. A gentleness I did not expect. “Did you have someone do this for you? Look after you when you were imprinted . . . ?”

“No. I did it myself . . . with a bunch of my foster brothers giving me a hard time through the bathroom door.”

“They made fun of you?” I frown. “That’s . . . not nice.”

He shrugs. “Just bringing some levity to it, I guess. Two of them were already imprinted. I was the third. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before the other two are.”

“You’re all carriers?”

“Marlene—” His gaze flicks to mine. “That’s my foster mother. She gets paid more for fostering kids that are carriers. And she’s not afraid of us. Her brother’s a carrier. He’s in prison.”

“I see.”

“No. You don’t.” He shrugs like that’s no big deal. “You can’t even wrap your head around any of it.” He glances at my bedroom. “How could you when you come from this?”

And he’s right. Naturally. Even though I’m a carrier—an imprinted one at that—nothing about his life makes sense to me. For starters, I can’t see how anyone would open her home to multiple imprinted carriers.

I moisten my lips. “Isn’t she frightened of letting you all into her house? I mean even with her brother . . . anyone would be.”

“True. Marlene isn’t anyone though. She doesn’t scare easily. Besides, since she took us in, no one has broken into her house. She says we’re the best security system around.” There’s that hint of a smile again.

He sets the washcloth down and stares at me. The proximity, our closeness, makes me nervous, but I don’t move.

“Why did you come here?” I finally ask. “Why are you doing any of this for me?”

He doesn’t answer for a while, just looks at me in that intense way, like I’m a bug under a microscope. “Because I know this is hard for you. Harder than it ever was for me.”

I frown. I don’t like thinking of myself as worse off than him—if that’s what he even means. It makes me feel all the more alone.

“How so?”

“You have more to lose than me.” He shrugs one shoulder. “I was a kid when I learned I was a carrier. I was already parentless. Poor. No future. Hard to hit bottom when you’re already there.” His mouth flattens into a grim line. “I was used to being nothing.”

A nothing who showed up here today when I needed someone most.

A nothing who marched into the bathroom when Brockman cornered me.

A nothing who picked me up when I was stranded and out past curfew.

A myriad of responses rush to my lips. “You’re not nothing.” You’re here.

For a reason I still don’t understand, he came when no one else did. Discounting my own family, and they kind of have to be there for me when I live in the same house with them. He’s the only one who went out of his way to see me. Not only are my friends not here . . . they are the ones who made sure I got imprinted.

He turns away and gathers the scraps of gauze. “I didn’t say that for your pity.”

“I’m not saying it because I pity you—”

He snorts and rises to his feet. “No? Ever since we first met, you’ve either looked at me with fear or pity.”

“Okay. Maybe that’s true.” I speak hurriedly as he heads for the door, aware that he’s about to leave and I’m going to be alone again, and suddenly I don’t want to be alone. “But you’re not nothing. If you’re saying you’re nothing, then . . . what does that make me?”

He stops. I stare at his back. I hold my breath, waiting for him to keep on walking right out of my room. To leave me without fully explaining why he came here in the first place.

Then he turns. With just a few strides, he’s in front of me. My heart thumps hard and fast as he reaches for my face, cups it with one hand. And then he answers me with one word. Just a breath. A whisper.

My heart seizes in my chest.

I lean forward, savoring against my better judgment the sensation of his hand on my face.

Dropping his arm, he turns and leaves my room. Only the echo of his voice stays behind, lingers on the air, in my head.

Perfect.

Juilliard Dance, Drama, Music

The Juilliard School, 60 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023

To Ms. Davina Hamilton:

We have been alerted of your recent HTS status and must, unfortunately, revoke our offer of admission. As you know, entrance into Juilliard is extremely competitive. Every year the most talented, most promising students vie for a place at the School, and it is the Office of Admissions’ responsibility to see that only the most deserving gain entry. Clearly, you no longer possess the necessary qualifications to be included among those ranks. . . .

SIXTEEN

I DRAG MYSELF DOWNSTAIRS THE FOLLOWING morning. Dad’s not there but Mom is, sipping from her oversized coffee mug, looking once again her usual put-together self in a pantsuit. Pearl drops dangle from her ears. She hardly looks the mother of someone like me. This strikes me almost at once. How easy it’s become for me to alter my perception of me. It makes me wonder if I really ever knew myself.

I dressed in jeans and a dark T-shirt that Mitchell outgrew—some band I never heard of emblazoned across the front. I finally washed my hair. Still wet, it looks dark brown in the twin braids that hang low across my shoulders.

My imprint is there for the world to see. I don’t try to hide it with my hair or a high collar. When I got ready for school this morning, I kept thinking of Sean. How proud he appears. Unapologetic. And I want to be like that. I don’t want to look cowed or ashamed. I may not want to be this, but I don’t want to be that girl, either. I don’t want to be afraid.

“You’re going to school?”

“Yeah. I kind of have to.”

Mom nods. “Yes. Of course. I’m glad to see you up and moving around.” She fixes her gaze to my face, her eyes strangely wide and unblinking. Like it’s taking everything inside her not to look down. Not to gawk at my neck. At what I’ve become.

She sets down her coffee cup and picks up some papers from the table. Sliding them into her brief bag, she murmurs casually, “You sure you want to wear your hair like that?”

“What’s wrong with my hair?”

She shrugs. “It’s just a little . . . young for you.”

This almost makes me laugh. She doesn’t care how young it makes me look. She cares about how much it exposes my neck. “I can’t hide it from the world. Figure I better get it over with and let everyone see it today.”

Her cheeks pink up and I know it’s because I saw through her words. She opens her mouth as if to deny this, but then presses her lips shut. Instead, she nods. Picking up her bag with one hand and her coffee with the other, she nods at the door. “You ready now? Your car is still at school. I can give you a lift.”

“Sure.” Grabbing my backpack, I follow her out.

We’re a little early arriving to school. There are still a lot of kids mingling in the parking lot, gradually making their way to the double front doors. She pulls up to the curb, and I hesitate in my seat.

Mom waits a moment, glancing at the clock on her dash. “Sorry,” she finally murmurs. “I have a meeting.”

“Just take me to my car. I’ll wait inside until the bell rings,” I snap, clearly annoyed. She knows the rules. I’m not supposed to arrive until twenty minutes after the first bell. What does she expect me to do?

Mom doesn’t comment, which only aggravates me further. I don’t say good-bye, just open the door and start to climb out, pausing when she calls out, “I won’t be home for dinner. You can order pizza.”

“All right.” With a grunt, I slam the door shut and punch the UNLOCK button to my car. I’m already sliding behind the wheel as she drives off.

No one really notices me, sitting alone in my car, watching the swarm of students. I start the car and listen to the radio. One guy races across the parking lot, his letterman jacket a blur as he grabs a cheerleader off her feet. He twirls her, sending her little yellow-and-blue-pleated skirt flying around her tan legs. She swats his back, laughing, loving the attention.

Several of her friends look on enviously. I stare with a hollowness in my heart. I used to be that girl with the envious friends, the coveted boyfriend, a bright future. It had all been an illusion. None of it real. Just as I hadn’t been real. If my life had been real, if it amounted to anything, it would have survived a DNA test that declared me potentially dangerous. I’d still have that boyfriend, those friends, the life that was going somewhere. I have to make my own way now, figure out a new future.

The students thin out. I tap my fingers against the steering wheel and keep an eye on the clock. When it’s finally time, I turn off the car and get out. Coco and I enter the building almost simultaneously. She forgoes her usual pattern of ignoring me and stares openly.

When I meet her gaze, she gives me a slight nod and falls into step beside me. “It’s a good look on you.”

Unbelievable as it seems, I smile.

I realize I forgot to pack a lunch when Brockman announces that everyone can eat. I continue working on my assignment, not lifting my head. Not even when I hear the metallic clang of the door.

“Did you hear me, Hamilton?” He nudges my shoulder, and I pull away sharply in the opposite direction. He never touches me when Sean’s around. I wince at the realization, wishing there was something I could do to earn the same results. Sean can’t be around all the time. “Time for lunch. I’m not going to let you eat later. This is your one chance. Don’t think that mark on your neck changes anything. It doesn’t impress me—”

“I don’t have a lunch,” I interject, hoping to end his diatribe. Did he really think I thought this mark on my neck would earn me better treatment?

He grunts and mutters something. I can’t understand him. I’m just glad when he walks away.

A few moments pass and Gil slides into the desk in front of me. Facing me, he hands me half a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

I look from the half sandwich to his earnest face, hesitating before saying, “I’m not hungry.”

“Yes, you are. Take it.”

“I don’t need your pity. I’m not starving. I just forgot to pack my lunch today.”

“It’s not pity. It’s food. Take it.”

Feeling a little silly for being so unfriendly to one of the only nice people I’ve met since this all started, I take the sandwich and bite into it. Instantly, the sweetness of the jelly floods my taste buds, and the peanut butter sticks to the roof of my mouth.

“I don’t think I’ve eaten peanut butter since I was ten,” I get out around a gooey mouthful.

He pats his almost concave stomach. “Lines your belly.”

I point. “What belly?

“Oh, this belly can put away more food than you probably eat in a month. It’s an endless pit.”

“And that’s just tragically unfair.”

He starts digging around in his brown paper sack. “I’ve got cheese puffs in here, pickles, fruit snacks, a couple of Snickers, and three pudding cups.”