Page 20 of Glass Rose
Sofia’s directions come in fragments—”Left here,” “Take the bridge,” “Past the gas station”—each word tighter than thelast. Her heart rate’s elevated. I can hear it, a rapid staccato beneath her ribs.
The infection hasn’t fully claimed this area yet, but it’s coming. I can feel it in the air like static before a storm, taste the metal on my tongue.
“Is Gavin your real name?” Sofia asks.
“Yeah.” I keep my eyes on the road, scanning for movement. “Gavin Hart.”
She shifts in her seat, angling toward me. “What did they do to you in there? Besides the tests?”
I navigate around an abandoned SUV, its driver’s door hanging open like a broken wing. “You really want to know?”
Her fingers fidget with the hem of her lab coat. “Level 4 was off-limits to most researchers.”
“Lucky you.”
“That’s not what I meant?—”
“I—” My head explodes with fragmentary images. Needles piercing skin, restraints cutting into wrists, a woman in a white coat saying, “Increase the dosage,” while I scream. The steering wheel turns slippery under my palms. Sweat or blood? Can’t tell anymore.
I slam on the brakes, the van screeching to a halt in the middle of the empty road. My vision tunnels, black creeping in from the edges like ink.
“Gavin?” Sofia’s voice sounds distant, underwater.
I’m strapped to a table while they cut into me, watching my own skin knit back together in hours while the pain feels endless.
“Hey.” Sofia’s hand lands on my forearm, light as a butterfly. “Look at me.”
I lift my head and meet her eyes. Warm brown, like aged whiskey. Like something I might have drunk in another life, before this. Before them.
The phantom needles withdraw from my skin, the ghostly restraints loosen, and the pain disappears. It’s just her.
“That happen often?” she asks.
“Often enough.” I release the death grip on the steering wheel. “Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize.” She withdraws her hand, and I immediately miss its warmth. “I’m sorry for what we… for whatIdid.”
“I don’t want your apology.” The words come out wrong. Harsher than intended.
Her eyes drop to her hands. “I still?—”
“Stop. We all do shit we regret.” I ease my foot onto the gas. “You’re the one who called those guys. Tried to expose the place. That counts for something.”
“Not enough.” She stares out the window, shoulders hunched. “Not nearly enough.”
The silence hangs between us, heavy with all the shit neither of us wants to say. Fourteen months of my life stolen. Her complicity, however unwilling. The end of the fucking world happening outside our windows.
“Take a right at the next light,” she murmurs.
I do, scanning the darkened houses we pass. Most have their curtains drawn. Occasional lights and the sound of distant televisions. A sprinkler waters a perfectly manicured lawn, and a cat stretches lazily on a porch railing. A suburban community asleep, unaware that the world has already changed.
“Your parents,” I say. “They doctors too?”
“My dad’s a janitor at Green. Mom works at a daycare. They wanted me to be a real doctor, but I fell in love with viruses instead.”
“Bet they’re regretting that career advice now.”
She laughs, a short, broken sound. “You’re an asshole.”
