Page 26 of Made for You

I cover my face because suddenly, tears are wetting my cheeks. I don’t know how to name everything I’m feeling, but I hate that it’s getting the best of me.

“Sorry. I wasn’t going to fall apart,” I say, my voice muffled behind my hands.

The girls descend. I can’t see them, but I can hear them, feel them, like a flock of birds, settling at the foot of the couch, on either side of Josh, drawing close, surrounding me like a protective wall.

“You have all of us,” says a female voice, sweet and steely. Camila. “We’re in this together.”

I uncover my eyes, utterly shocked by this display of support from the very last person I would have expected. We look at each other for a solid three seconds. I can’t describe what passes between us. Only that it’s powerful, and that some of the steel in her seems to enter me.

I reach up a hand. We thread our fingers together; she presses tight. My voice comes out throaty. “Thanks, Texas.”

Camila gives me a half smile. “Sure thing, Red.”

And then, as if moved by her display of affection toward me, Josh enfolds both our hands in his grasp and squeezes, making an odd bond of three.

“We’ll take care of her, right?” says Camila, breaking our gaze and locking eyes with Josh.

“Absolutely,” he says.

The burn of jealousy and suspicion is so fierce and sudden, I could retch. But, with my hand trapped between theirs, I try to muscle my emotions toward the right things—the things Josh might love me for: trust, kindness, gratitude.

“Thanks,” I say in a gentle tone, and as Josh’s eyes slip away from Camila and back to me, I tamp down the hot swell of victory under a delicate smile. “You guys are the sweetest.”

NOW

Walmart after eight o’clock is a dystopia, empty and overlarge. They’re pumping tinny vintage pop music into the atmosphere like a noxious gas, and the soaring industrial ceilings give it a ghostly echo.

I’m a bundle of anxiety and exhaustion as I jog my gigantic cart through the endless aisles, trying to find baby wipes, sweating under my snug fleece. I normally shop at the smaller local grocery co-op, but that’s east of Eauverte and would take me thirty minutes out of my way.

“Come on,” I say with genuine distress as I turn into an aisle of pet food. Didn’t the greeter say aisle 26? I spin around a corner into garden supplies. Where the hell is the baby stuff?

“Excuse me?” I call toward a woman standing much farther down, the only person I’ve seen here so far since the greeter. The woman lifts her head but says nothing. Probably a shopper, not an employee, but I don’t even care at this point. “Do you know where the baby wipes are?”

She stares at me as I trundle the cart toward her, past fertilizer and decorative pink flamingos and all-weather party lights. Did she hear me? She’s still as a statue, a single terra-cotta planter in her hand. Older middle-aged, maybe sixty, kind of slumped, like her spine is made of wicker instead of bone. Her wisp-thin hair is dyed an awful cheap carroty red.

I stop a couple feet from her, breathing heavily. God, I can’t wait to take off this fleece.

“Baby wipes?” I repeat.

She just shakes her head, her pale blue eyes wide.

Could you be any creepier? I think, but I force myself to say, “Thanks anyway,” in a pleasant tone.

As I turn into the next aisle, I cast a quick look back. She’s still staring, and then—

“Julia!” she cries in an unearthly voice. The shock of surprise gives me wings; I fly around the corner, the cart lifting off one side. I should be used to the recognition that comes with being something of a celebrity, but it still manages to feel like an attack every damn time.

I race all the way to the end of the aisle with a death grip on my shopping cart, make a sharp turn, then another, in case she’s decided to come after me.

I never imagined that being a Synth would contaminate nearly every outing. In the past, I’ve tried to hide under sunglasses and oversize sweatshirts. I even purchased a wig once, but it was itchy, and the two times I wore it, I felt even more conspicuous. Anyway, I don’t want to have to hide to be acceptable.

Andy has reminded me so many times that we’re playing the long game with Synth rights. That our focus needs to be earning the public’s trust, and that my social media has an important role to play. Regular, relatable content, he’s drilled into me. They need to see you’re just like them. But it all feels so burdensome. I don’t want to spend my every waking moment thinking up that next great post that will make me seem likable, trustworthy, deserving. I don’t want to have to work so hard to convince everyone that I’m a person. I don’t want to be my own saleswoman on a team of one... And maybe this is the price of being different, but I didn’t choose this price, I didn’t even choose to exist, so why is it on me to keep paying it, when all I want is—

Wipes. Right in front of me. Hallelujah. I load three bulk boxes into the cart, followed by two jumbo boxes of diapers, because the fewer shopping trips I have to make, the better. I pause once, thinking I heard steps, but it’s nothing. Still, I don’t want to linger. I practically sprint toward the exit. There are two registers open. I choose the one with the younger employee. Less likely to be clued in to who I am, and less likely to care.

Sure enough, the bored teenager barely gives me a glance. I could hug her for her blessed indifference. As she scans my items, I check my phone. New text from Cam.

I’m thru in Indy Friday afternoon. Want a weekend guest?

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