Page 73 of Seven Percent of Ro Devereux
Taj points to the living room, a cozy space collaged in family photos, and Maren heads in to set up her camera.
“Is this okay?” Taj asks, gesturing at his flannel shirt. “I wasn’t sure what to wear for this kind of thing.”
This kind of thing.The casual dismantling of my entire dream. My weeklong apology tour.
“It’s great,” Miller says, nudging my elbow when I still haven’t moved toward the living room.
“So.” Taj drops onto the couch. Miller and I take the armchairs across from him and Maren stands between us, adjusting the legsof her tripod. “How many people are you guys talking to?”
“Ten,” I tell him. We’ve been recording video calls with people all across the country in between these visits—Matteo in Boston, who hasn’t written a word since MASH dashed his dreams of being an author; Victoria in San Francisco, who’s only fourteen and already knows she’ll never be a pilot; Alma in Pennsylvania, who’s destined to become a gymnastics coach even though a bad landing last year left her terrified of setting foot back in the gym.
We have four more calls before school starts, and they aren’t getting any easier.
“And the goal is what?” Taj tugs at one sleeve, folding the cuff over his knuckles. “Share them publicly somehow?”
“Exactly,” I say. A grandfather clock ticks in the corner; I draw a deep breath and squeeze the arm of the chair. “Honestly, the company we’re working with won’t let us shut MASH down. But we’re hoping if we get permission from people to show the truth of what’s happening to them, no one will want to use it anymore—that we can blow it up ourselves.”
Taj’s eyebrows twitch together, just a little. “You want to blow up your own app?”
I feel Miller look at me, but I don’t look away from Taj. “Yes. Because of stories like yours.”
“Stories like mine,” he repeats.
I nod and glance at Maren, who gives me a thumbs-up.
“You can share whatever you want,” I tell Taj, and he glances at the camera before smoothing his palms over his knees. “And you don’t have to hold back. We just want the truth.”
He stares down at the floor for a few seconds before nodding,then looks back up at us.
“All right,” he says. I hear the littleclickas Maren starts recording, and Taj reaches for a framed photograph on the table next to the couch. “Um, this is my sister.”
Miller and I lean forward at the same time to get a closer look. The little girl has Taj’s dark hair and long-lashed eyes, wearing a ballerina’s tutu and grinning.
“Dhara,” Taj says. He holds the picture as he speaks, a thumbprint over his sister’s face. “She died when she was seven. Four years ago.”
Something flares hot behind my ribs. We were freshmen four years ago—we knew Taj then, but I had no idea.
“I’m so sorry,” Miller says. His voice is low and sincere.
“Yeah.” Taj offers a muted smile. “Thanks. She was in an accident in a carpool from school, so we weren’t with her.” He sets the picture frame carefully back on the table. He’s still looking at it when he says, “She died at the hospital, before my parents got there.”
He draws a shuddering breath, then looks at Miller. “I swore after that I’d become an ER doctor, so I could be there for kids like her. And for families like mine.”
I close my eyes for the briefest moment andgod, I want to keep them closed.It’s still medicine, I’d told him. But this isn’t about me, it’s about Taj. And when I open my eyes, he’s looking straight at me.
“But MASH told me I’ll be a dentist instead. I haven’t been able to tell my parents, because we don’t really talk about her. But she’s here in every room, unspoken in all our conversations. And when they see this interview—”
He breaks off and it presses right against my teeth, what I really want to ask him.Do you hate me?
“Well, it’s just hard,” he says unsteadily. “I thought becoming a doctor would help with their grief, or something, and probably mine, but now I know I won’t get the chance to find out.”
“Taj,” Maren says softly. All three of us look up at her. “MASH isn’t in charge. You can still go to medical school.”
“Yeah, Ican,” Taj tells us. His eyes are dark as a rainstorm. “But I won’t, will I?”
It’s a weighty, heartsick week. I know this is the best I can do with what I have now but still I’m wrecked by it. Every home we step into, every person who looks at me through the camera and tells me how I hurt them. They are where they are, and they were better off before me. That’s the truth I have to live with. All I can do now is, maybe, prevent others from winding up in the same place.
We have our last interview on Saturday, an hour’s drive from Switchback Ridge. When we get to Leila’s house in Frisco, Maren has to pee so badly she practically pushes her out of the way to get to her bathroom.
