The Takedown Page 9

  Oh, terrific.

  “Mama?” I said. “So you think it’s a girl?”

  “I think the vid is perfect. It’s not a prank or gag. The hacker wants to x you out. You have any spurned boyfriends?” I shook my head no.

  Boyfriend. Unboyfriend. Friend. Unfriend. Whatever his title, Mac would never do this.

  “Then it’s def a chick. Pay attention to enemies that have come into considerable sums of money. And stay tuned for a second attack. She needs to keep views up or bye-bye revenue stream. You could try following the dollar signs, but if she finds you poking around her bank accounts? With her hands on tech like this? She’ll end you. Way I see it, you have two choices. Capitalize on your new popularity and embrace your notoriety—”

  “Or?” I asked.

  “Erase yourself. There is no way to prove this isn’t you.”

  With a curt “Have a nice life,” Ivy left. And although I was supposed to count until twenty before I turned, I spun around after “one” and watched as Ivy reattached her Eden tie and name tag, then slumped onto a stool behind a help desk at the front of the market. As I walked past her, a grandmother with her three wailing grandkids approached and asked to “borrow a phone” for help “calling a cab.”

  Karma, baby.

  No sooner had I left the market floor than my Doc lit up with messages from Audra. Not How was the meeting? or What did you learn? No, the latest read:

  audy Dinner at six, betch.

  Dinner was always at six. The timing of the Rhodes meal was as predictable as the intense dreadfulness of it. Normally, among us girls, dinner at Audra’s was the standard against which all other instances of torture were measured. Example:

  Me: “I can’t believe Linkman is making us watch Transcending Transgender again. That’s four years running. Doesn’t he get it? There’s a reason the film’s dated. Nobody cares anymore.”

  Fawn: “Unconscionable. I’d almost rather have dinner at Audra’s.”

  Audra: “Yuk it up, ladies; it’s only my abysmal home life you’re laughing at.”

  I’d been planning to go home, take a long bath, and then have a hot fudge sundae on the couch with Kyle. Then I was going to shirk my homework and reread the new installment in the Suicide Games series. Just proving how desperate I was for my friends’ companionship, dinner with the Rhodeses actually sounded nice.

  moi Still in the city. Might not make that in time. Can you believe I just ’d that?

  audy HA! Like I’d let you off that easy. I already hailed you an Elite. It’ll be waiting for you out front by the time you get there.

  When Audra pinged an Elite to drive us to Sharma’s the day the video dropped, I figured she was splurging because it was dire circumstances. Nobody except the uber-wealthy took them. Not only were they self-driven vehicles—assuring utter privacy and no unnecessary messy human interactions—but their minimum fare was fifty dollars. An Elite to Brooklyn? That was at least a hundred-dollar ride. Apparently girlfriend was as desperate for company as I was.

  Suddenly, I felt kinda good. Fine, I wasn’t making monumental (or any) progress, but I was in the coolest store in the world, it was slathered in Christmas green and red, hologram snowflakes twinkled in the air like stars, and my best friend wanted to be around me so badly that she’d pinged an Elite for me.

  Before the video I’d always known I had a good life. Maybe I still did.

  As if echoing my joyous thoughts, the atrium filled with laughter. On the hour, Eden did a Christmas show. Tourists from all over the world trekked to NYC to watch it. When I looked up from my Doc, I expected to see hologram Santa and his crazy-realistic hologram reindeer rocketing around the atrium dome. But people weren’t looking up at the dome. They were looking at me. Not in the pretty-girl-in-a-short-skirt kind of way, either. In like a naked-guy-in-the-subway kind of way.

  A father, there with his small children, shouted, “Turn it off, already.”

  More people stopped, scanned the room with their Docs, landed on me, and simply stared.

  A boy in a glammy fake-fur coat and sparkly blue eyeliner tapped my shoulder and nodded behind me. At any given moment there were thousands of people shopping at Eden. I should have expected it. It was simply a matter of mathematics and technology. Apparently, Lucy Helen Banks had left the building, because now I had the most popular G-File in the place, and the certified largest wall screen in the entire world was showing my most popular clip. It couldn’t have been on for more than twenty seconds before whatever safeguards they had against exactly this happening caught it and the feed cut out. But it was long enough.

  “Do you have a safe way to get home?” the boy asked.

  “My friend called me an Elite.”

  “Fancy. Well, lock the door when you’re in, honey, because I do not like the pervy eyes that man has been aiming at you. He’s been watching you since even before they played your debut. Trust me, I notice these things.”

  The man in question wasn’t much older than me. College or shortly out of it. When our eyes met, he opened his mouth like he was about to speak. Maybe it was the unblinking way he was watching me, or that he kept fidgeting with his belt, but I’d Bet a semester of early registration that whatever he wanted to say wasn’t G-rated.

  “You get out of here now, sister, and for heaven’s sake don’t share that ride. This world is filled with not-very-nice people.” Then, disproving his words entirely, the boy in the fake fur walked up to the creeper and created some interference. “Excuse me, sir, I think you dropped something. No, look, this gum wrapper. I believe it’s yours.”

  I hurried off into the crowd. And maybe this will sound naïve, considering the video had been playing on a football field–sized screen, but right then, I finally got how huge it was. Never mind my college apps or my ruined reputation at school. With this many views, the video would never be pushed down in my profile. My children would see this. Their children would see it (even considering my whole not-till-I’m-thirty-eight agenda). If I didn’t take down the video, it would forever be the first thing anyone knew about me. If I didn’t take down the video, I wouldn’t be able to escape it for the rest of my life.

  I was finding it hard to breathe. A guy wearing tight pants and white sunglasses nudged me and said, “Yo, girl, you famous. Can I get your autograph?”

  “Can I get your digits?” His friend laughed.

  I pushed past them. To calm myself down, I thought about what President Malin would do. She’d say, “I will not mince words. This is a nearly insurmountable problem. But we will roll up our sleeves and try to fix it, because we have everything to lose.” Just like she did in her October web address about the challenges of reversing our escalating environmental collapse.

  Me?

  I ran.

  The Elite Audra had pinged me honked when I went outside. I was wondering if having a fully automated car identify me officially made me the most recognizable girl in the world, when the back window rolled down and a petite platinum blondie waved at me.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked, running up to the car.

  “I told you.” Audra grinned. “I sent you an Elite. I just didn’t mention I was in it.” She let out her best evil-villain laugh. “Come on, silly; get in.”

  Brooklyn to the city and back? This would be at least a two-hundred-dollar ride. I tried not to think about what a waste of coin that was. After all, I was in an Elite for only the second time in my life and the last time I’d equaled too upset to notice how prime the experience was. Adjustable tint on the windows, audio controls for temp, music, and speed. A bus passed us and splashed our front windshield. The Elite’s wipers immediately flicked on. It even still had that new-car smell. Unthinkable in a normal cab.

  As Audra slid next to me on the unmarred leather seat and tucked her arm beneath mine, I txted my mom.

  moi On duty for dinner at Audra’s.

  mama Heard!

  “What coordinates did you give it?” I asked as we turned
out into traffic. “Brooklyn’s that way.”

  “Kyle, are you seriously trying to backseat-drive a computer? Or are you just that anxious to see the Parents? Chill, please. I’m taking you somewhere special first. Someplace I’ve never taken anyone else.”

  “How come I’m so lucky?”

  “Must be that charmed existence.”

  After our light banter, we fell into the inexplicable silence that had been creeping between us for months now whenever the other girls weren’t present. Still our arms stayed entwined. Based on our recent history, maybe it was better that we didn’t talk.

  After a few minutes of quiet, unable to take it anymore, Audra streamed our favorite nightcore song and cranked it through the Elite’s speakers. One verse in, we were singing along, trying to keep up with the lyrics. When the Elite cut through the music to tell us we’d reached our destination, we were both breathless with laughter and nightcore and using each other’s fists as microphones. We were also parked outside the Met.

  “You’re taking me to look at art?”

  She tweaked my nose. “Better.”

  We hurried up the steps to the museum. Dinner started in fifty minutes. Even if we encountered only green lights and all the other cars on Fifth Avenue miraculously disappeared by the time we came back outside, we were going to be late. The Parents hated lateness.

  Once inside the Met, we walked straight to the members’ line. Audra’s Doc blinked green. Welcome, Ms. Rhodes flashed on the turnstile screen. She selected a with guest option. And then we were through.

  “Are the Parents members?”

  “The Parents wouldn’t know good art if it OD’d in front of them. I’m a member because the Met is home to my favorite place in the entire wide world.”

  Audra glanced at her Doc and quickened her pace. I thought for sure we were headed to the sold-out special exhibit by the famous artist who tattooed on lemons, but instead of going up to the second floor, we stayed on the first and made our way through the European Sculpture and Decorative Arts wing. I kept expecting Audra to stop in front of a particular painting or sculpture, but instead she wound through the museum until we were in a deserted section that held ancient African urns and an easy-to-miss door in the farthest corner of the room.

  Although there was an exit sign above the door, it for sure seemed like one of those doors that emitted high-pitched alarms if opened.

  “Almost there.”

  I could hear the giddy in her voice.

  “Audra…” I warned as she pushed through the door and stepped into the space beyond.

  I glanced around, expecting a guard to come and yell at us, then realized that the only other person who would think that happened anymore was my mom. Most museums now implemented static barriers around the artwork. Since this room stayed emptily ancient, I figured we were entering allowed space. Besides, if whatever was on the other side of this door led to my girl’s favorite place in the world, minor electrocution would be worth it.

  Or so I thought.

  As Audra turned to me with wide, happy eyes, I couldn’t help asking, “Did we take a wrong turn?”

  For on the other side of the door was a plain, gray, institutional stairwell. And we weren’t climbing it to get someplace cool. Audra planted herself on the steps, halfway up.

  “We are exactly where we’re supposed to be.”

  We were risking the Parents’ ire for this? I didn’t get it. I checked my Doc, but there was no signal.

  “That won’t work in here,” Audra said, then patted the space next to her. “The first time I came in here was because my Doc told me it was the quickest way to the bathrooms. It only goes up and down. It hits all the most boring exhibits. I’ve never encountered another soul in here, no matter how long I’ve sat. I thought you could use a little shh.”

  Leaning back on her elbows, she closed her eyes.

  “Isn’t it wonderful?”

  “You have a membership to the Met so you can skip the line to sit in an empty stairwell?”

  “Mm-hmm,” she said without opening her eyes. “Try it.”

  I dropped my bag and sat next to her.

  “Audy, I didn’t sleep with Mr. E.”

  “Shh,” she said. “Listen. Isn’t it amazing? Nothing. No sound, no ambient noise, no buzzing or dinging. And look around. No cameras or holoscreens. No motion sensors or triggered ads. No one can see us right now, Kyle. No one can hear us. Or find us. These walls are so thick even the best PHD can’t access Wi-Fi. This stairwell might be the last place of untraceable freedom in all of New York.”

  “Audy, is everything okay with you?”

  I thought about her excessive mood swings. How her Doc was always on private. How she hadn’t slept over at my house in weeks. She leaned her head on my shoulder.

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, Kyle, but you wouldn’t understand. Just know whatever happens, everything I’ve done—”

  “What have you done?”

  “Everything I’ve done,” she pushed on, “has been because I’m trying to make life better for us. Now close your eyes and just feel it.”

  Thoroughly freaked-out, I shut my eyes. And, weird as it was, Audra was right. Even two days ago, when I was invisible, I wasn’t. I’d been seen daily in a hundred different ways even when I was alone. I’d just never minded because all the images of me were good and praiseworthy.

  Except I wasn’t invisible in here, either. When I opened my eyes Audra was studying me.

  “Nice, isn’t it?”

  I nodded, and she clapped her hands, pleased.

  “I can get you your own membership. Skipping the line equals the best.”

  “I’ll be okay,” I said.

  She patted my knee. “I know you will, sweetie. Now, let’s hurry the FCK up. The Parents will kill us if we’re any later.”

  Bridge traffic, an hour later, and thirty minutes late, Audra and I were sitting at her teak dining room table. Everyone had their Doc out. The Father and I were both browsing the news on ours. The Mother had hers on holoscreen and was flicking through a patient’s case history. Audra had her larger Home Doc up on a stand, so none of us could see what she was looking at. Our late arrival made the oppressive silence of the meal even more punishing than usual. It was the eve of Christmas Eve, but in the Rhodes brownstone, not a single holiday bauble was in sight.

  I wasn’t surprised. The Parents’ religion wasn’t faith-based. It was purely clinical. Audra’s parents were both psychiatrists. Even the most banal comment was so ruthlessly dissected that I hesitated to thank them for dinner lest they diagnose me with a flattery complex. They were parents in name only—the Mother, the Father—who must have had their daughter completely by accident, because not an ounce of affection or interest went into raising her. Yet, strangely, they insisted on these nightly dinners. Most likely so they could hold them up to their patients as parenting done right.

  If I’d grown up in Audra’s house, I’d hide in empty stairwells, too.

  On the wall behind Audra, life-sized American soldiers shot at some desert culture’s rebels. These wallpaper screens had come out a year ago. I’d always thought it was strange that the Rhodeses had installed theirs in here instead of in the family room.

  “Why would they put it in the family room?” Audra said. “It’s the least-used room of the house.”

  I looked down at my plate as the position of the screen made it look like the soldier was taking aim at Audra’s head. I’d had more than enough screens for one day.

  As if she weren’t breaking into utter silence, the Mother asked, “And school, girls?”

  The Mother was a carbon copy of Audra—tiny, with delicate features, slim wrists, and impeccably coiffed hair. For the most part she was a cold, aloof woman, but on the occasions she had a bad day or drank too heavily, she could put Audra’s nasty streak to shame. At one of the worst dinners I’d attended, she’d derided Audra to the point that my friend was whimpering. Audra had stayed at my house for
a whole week after that evening.

  Still studying her holoscreen, the Mother nibbled on a small green bean, chewed it thoroughly, and washed it down with an equally tiny sip of pinot blanc. If people in Audra’s family took normal-sized bites, dinners could be finished forty minutes earlier.

  “Unstimulating as usual,” Audra said. “Oh, and yesterday someone posted a sex vid of Kyle—”

  “A fake sex vid of Kyle,” I corrected.

  “And she thinks her life is…” Audra paused, sent a txt, then said, “All-caps OVER. But on the bright side, everyone now wants into her pants and thinks she has amazing tatas.”

  I wrapped my cardigan tighter around me.

  “Audra, I appreciate your effort to shock us with the content and quality of your language. Don’t you, honey?” The Mother directed her words to the Father. “It shows quite the need for attention and acceptance, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Yes, dear.” The Father reached across the table without looking and patted empty air as if searching for his wife’s hand, but then he picked up the home-hub controller instead. “And I am oddly put at ease that our daughter still tries to shock us.”

  As the New York Times banner filled the wallpaper screen behind her, Audra scoffed like it was an art form.

  “I’m not trying to shock you. I was trying to converse with you.”

  I never understood why Audra spoke to her parents, why her method of adapting in this household hadn’t evolved into simple one-word answers. I guess I had to admire her pluck.

  “Oh, darling.” The Mother directed her voice at her husband again. “I had a breakthrough with the coked-out model today. Did I mention it?”

  After what felt like a full minute’s pause, the Father replied, “You did.”