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The blast of air-conditioning as we entered the building made Addie shiver and raised goose bumps on our skin but didn’t ease the knot in our gut. Three stories tall, the museum erupted into a grand, open foyer just beyond the ticket counter, the two upper floors visible if one tilted one’s head back and stared upward. Addie had tried it the first time we’d entered. We’d been thirteen years old, and the sight of it had crushed us with the weight of all that history, all the battles and wars and hatred.
No one looked up now. The others because they were bored. Addie because we never again wanted to see.
Addie’s friend had abandoned her for someone who could still laugh. Addie should have gone after her, should have forced a smile and a joke and complained along with everyone else about having to come to the museum yet again, but she didn’t. She just drifted to the back of the group so we didn’t have to hear the guide begin our tour.
I said nothing, as if by being silent I could pretend I didn’t exist. As if Addie could pretend, for an hour, that I wasn’t there, that the hybrid enemies the guide kept talking about as we entered the Hall of Revolutionaries weren’t the same as us.
A hand closed around our shoulder. Addie whirled to fling it off, then flinched as she realized what she’d done.
“Sorry, sorry—” Hally put her hands up in the air, fingers spread, in peace. “Didn’t mean to scare you.” She gave us a tentative smile. We only had this one class with her, so it hadn’t been difficult for Addie to avoid her since last night.
“You surprised me,” Addie said, shoving our hair away from our face. “That’s all.”
The rest of the class was leaving us behind, but when Addie moved to catch up, Hally touched our shoulder again. She snatched her hand back when Addie spun around, but asked quickly, “Are you all right?”
A flush of heat shot through us. “Yes, of course,” Addie said.
We stood silently in that hall a moment longer, flanked by portraits of all the greatest heroes of the Revolution, the founders of our country. These men had been dead for nearly 150 years, but they still stared out at Addie and me with that fire in their eyes, that accusation, that hatred that had burned in every non-hybrid soul all through those first terrible warring years, when the edict of the day was the extermination of all those who had once been in power—all the hybrid men, women, and children.
They said that zest had died over the decades, as the country grew lax and trusting, forgetting the past. Hybrid children were permitted to grow old. Immigrants were allowed to step foot on American soil again, to move into our land and call it their own.
The attempted foreign invasion at the beginning of the twentieth century, during the start of the Great Wars, had put a stop to that. Suddenly, the old flame burned brighter than ever, along with the new vow to never forget—never, ever forget again.
Hally must have seen our gaze flicker toward the oil paintings. She grinned, her dimples showing, and said, “Can you imagine if guys still went around wearing those stupid hats? God, I’d never get done making fun of my brother.”
Addie managed a thin-lipped smile. In seventh grade, when we’d had to write an essay on the men framed in these paintings, she’d tried to convince the teacher to let her write about the depictions from an artistic viewpoint instead. It hadn’t worked. “We should get back to the group.”
No one noticed as Addie and Hally slipped into place at the edge of our class. They’d already made it to the room I hated most of all, and Addie kept our eyes on our hands, our shoes—anywhere but on the pictures hanging around us. But I could still remember them from last year, when our class had studied early American history and we’d spent the entire trip in this section of the museum instead of just passing through, as we were now.
There aren’t a lot of photographs salvaged from back then, of course. But the reconstructionist artists had spared no detail, no grimace of pain or patch of peeling, sunburned skin. And the photos that did exist hung heavily on the walls. Their grainy black-and-white quality didn’t hide the misery of the fields. The pain of the workers, little more than slaves, who were all our ancestors. Immigrants from the Old World who’d suffered back there for so many thousands of years before being shipped across a turbulent ocean to suffer anew in another land. Until the Revolution, when the hybrids finally fell.
The room was small, with only one entrance and exit. The crush of the other students made Addie hold our breath. Our heart thumped against our ribs. Everywhere she turned, we bumped into more bodies, all moving, some shoving each other back and forth, some laughing, the teacher scolding, threatening to start taking down names if they didn’t show a little more respect.
Addie shouldered our way through the room, for once not caring what the others might think. We were one of the first to get through the door. And we were going so fast, lurching past the others, that we were the first to hit the water.
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ddie slammed to a halt. The girl behind us couldn’t stop her momentum quite as well and plowed into us. We crashed forward onto the ground, our skirt and part of our blouse immediately getting soaked in the stream of water gushing through the room. The water?—
“What the hell?” someone said as Addie scrambled back onto our feet, our knees and elbow aching from taking the brunt of our fall.
The water barely reached our ankles now, but there was no saving our shirt, though Addie hurried to wring it out. No one was paying attention anyway; everyone stared openmouthed at the flooded exhibit hall. This was one of the largest rooms in the museum, filled with artifacts from Revolutionary times encased under glass and period paintings on the walls. Now it was also filled with several inches of murky water.
The guide whipped out a walkie-talkie and sputtered something. Ms. Stimp tried her best to usher everyone back into the room we’d just left, which was connected by a low step and remained dry—for now. Wherever the water was coming from, it was getting worse, spilling over the ground, soaking people’s socks—dirty water that would surely stain the white walls.
The lights flickered. People screamed—some sounding genuinely terrified, others with almost a laugh in it, like this was more excitement than they could have hoped for.
“It’s those pipes,” the guide growled under her breath, stalking past us. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes so bright they seemed almost wild. “How many times have we said to get those pipes fixed?” She clipped her walkie-talkie back to her skirt, then raised her voice and said, “Please, if everyone would just come back around through this room—”
The lights went out, cloaking everything in darkness. This time, they didn’t come back on. But something else did—the sprinklers. And with them, the earsplitting blare of an alarm. Addie clapped our hands over our ears as water sprayed down into our hair and ran over our face. Somewhere in the museum, something had caught on fire.
It took nearly fifteen minutes to get everyone back onto the bus. There weren’t too many other visitors at the museum on a hot Friday afternoon, but enough to form a sizable crowd as everyone poured out of the museum doors, confused and still clutching ticket stubs in their hands, mothers herding small children before them as they went, men with dark stains on their pant legs where they’d dragged in the water. Some of them were soaked through. All of them were complaining or demanding answers or refunds or just staring dumbly at the museum.
“Electrical fire,” I heard a woman say as Addie made our way back to the bus. “We could have all gotten electrocuted!”
By the time we got back to the school, our blouse was still damp and no longer completely white, but talk had turned from the museum flood to the end-of-year dance, still more than a month away. And when Ms. Stimp, frazzled and irritated, turned off the lights in the classroom and popped in a video, a quarter of our class went surreptitiously to sleep, even though we were supposed to be taking notes.
<I hope there’s irreparable damage> I said as Addie stared blankly at the screen. Bessimir was proud of so many things in that museum—those paintings; sabers and revolvers salvaged from the Revolution; an authentic war poster from the beginning of the Great Wars, dated the year of the first attack on American soil. It urged citizens to report all suspicions of hybrid activity. Teachers didn’t mention it in class, but I could imagine the finger-pointing that must have occurred. People back then couldn’t have been so different from people today. <I hope the foundation collapses. I hope the whole building comes crashing down.>
<Don’t be stupid> Addie said. <There was all of two inches of water. It’ll be fixed in a week.>
<There was fire. And I said I hope.>
Addie sighed, resting our chin in one hand and doodling the girl in front of us—who slept with her mouth half-open—with the other. It wasn’t like we needed to actually watch the movie to fill out a page or two of notes. We’d covered the Great Wars of the twentieth century so many times we could recite the major battles, rattle off the casualty counts, quote the speeches our president had given as we’d fought off the attempts at invasion. Eventually, we’d proven too strong for them, of course, and their attention had turned back to their own continents, chaotic and ravished. That was what war did. What hybrids did. What they were doing, even now.
<Yeah> Addie said finally. <Me too.>
On television, an airplane dropped bombs on an indistinct city. The boy sitting beside us yawned, his eyes drooping shut. We didn’t have much footage of the latter part of the Wars, since they’d happened so far away, but what we did have was shown over and over again until I wanted to scream. I could only imagine what we’d be subjected to if there had been such a thing as TV news during the invasions a few decades earlier.
<Eva?> Addie said.
I shoved my emotions away from Addie, shielding her from my frustration. <I’m fine> I said. <I’m fine.>
We watched as fire swept across the chaos-stricken city. Officially, the last Great War had ended when Addie and I were a baby, but the hybrids occupying the rest of the world had never stopped fighting among themselves. How could they? Addie and I had enough arguments, and we didn’t even share control. How could a society founded on two souls in each body ever be at peace? The individuals making up the country weren’t even at peace with themselves, and that led to all sorts of problems—constant frustration, lashing out at others, and, for the weaker-minded, eventual insanity. I could see the bleak prognosis on the pamphlets at the doctors’ offices, printed in boldface.
So I understood why the Revolutionary leaders had founded the Americas as a hybrid-free country, why they’d worked so hard to eradicate the existing hybrids of the time, so they could start clean and fresh and untainted. I could even understand, in the most rational parts of me, why people like Addie and me couldn’t, on the whole, be allowed free rein. But understanding a thing and accepting it are so very different things.
Addie dashed off some halfhearted notes as the movie came to a close and the bell rang. Normally I would help her, adding the facts I remembered to hers, but I was hardly in the mood now. We were out the door before our paper reached the front of the room.
We’d only made it a few steps down the hall when a second person shot out of the classroom and called Addie’s name.
“What is it, Hally?” Addie said, holding back a sigh.
To my surprise, Hally’s smile slipped a notch, but only for a moment. Enough, though, for me to say <Addie, don’t snap at her.>
<She keeps following us around> Addie said. <First babysitting, then at the museum. I—>
“Want to come over for dinner?” Hally said.
Addie stared. The hall was filling with people, but neither she nor Hally moved from their spots in the middle of the corridor.
“My parents are going out,” Hally added after a moment. Her thick hair still wasn’t completely dry, and she wrapped a finger around a curl. “It’s just going to be my brother and me.” She raised her eyebrows, her smile returning to full force. “I’d rather avoid eating alone with him.”
<Addie> I said. <Stop staring. Say something.>
“Oh,” Addie said. “Oh, well—I—I can’t.”
I’d never heard Addie turn down an invitation to go to someone’s house before—not without a very good reason. Many of the students at our school had attended classes together since primary; entering late had meant hitting a lot of walls when trying to make friends. Everyone already had a place, a group, a seat at the lunch table, and Addie had learned to grab on to what fingerholds she could. But Hally Mullan just plain being Hally Mullan was, I guess, enough reason to decline any offer of friendship.
“It’s my shirt,” Addie said, looking down at the stain in the white fabric. “I’ve got to get home before my parents and wash it. If they—” If they see it, they’ll ask what happened. And where. And then that look will fall over their eyes, the one that snuck onto their faces every time they saw another news report about a hybrid being discovered somewhere, or a reminder to watch your neighbors, to be forever on the lookout for the hidden enemy. It made our gut wrench. Made us want to leave the room.
“You can wash it at my house if you don’t want your parents to see,” Hally said. Her voice was softer now, less brilliant in its cheerfulness, but gentler. “I’ve got stuff you could wear while it dries, no problem. You could change back before you leave, and no one would ever know.”
Addie hesitated. Chances were, our mom was getting ready to drive home. We’d certainly get back before she did, but no way would our shirt be dry before then, and I told Addie so.
<I could lie> Addie said. <I could say I fell and got dirt on it. I could—>
<Why not just go?> I said.
<You know why.>
Hally took a step toward us. We were almost the same height, mirroring each other—or inverting each other. Hally’s dark, almost black hair to our dirty blond. Her olive skin to our pale, freckled arms. “Addie? Is something wrong?”
Again that question. Are you okay? Is something wrong?
“No,” Addie said. “No, nothing.”
“Then you can come?” Hally said.
<Come on, Addie> I said. <Go. No one will know. Nobody even talks to her. What can it hurt?>
I felt her waver and pushed harder. Addie might not have appreciated this girl who questioned Robby about Will and didn’t flinch from talking about settling, but I did. If nothing else, she intrigued me. <It’s Friday. Nobody’s going to be home for dinner anyway.>
Addie chewed at our bottom lip, then must have realized what she was doing and said quickly, “Well … all right.”
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ddie had to run to the pay phone to tell Mom we wouldn’t be home for dinner, so by the time we reached the arranged meeting spot, most of the other students had gone. Hally stood alone by the school doors. She didn’t notice us until we were right next to her, and then she jumped as if we’d startled her from some quiet reverie.
“You ready?” she asked as soon as she found her voice.
Addie nodded.
“Great. Come on, then.”
The solemn contemplation of a moment ago disappeared. She was all bubbles and energy. Addie hardly got a word in edgewise as Hally blabbered on about how glad she was that it was finally Friday, how nice it was that it was almost summer break, how tiring the first year of high school had been.
Yes, said Addie. Yes, except for the mosquitoes and the humidity. Yes, but it had been fun, hadn’t it?
Neither she nor Hally brought up the ruined trip to the history museum.
We’d expected Hally’s house to be larger than it was, especially after all the pomp and circumstance of the wrought-iron gate guarding the neighborhood. It was bigger than ours, of course, but smaller than those of the other girls we’d visited after school. Whatever its size, the place was impressive, all worn brick and black shutters and a slender, pink-flowered tree in the front yard. The lawn was manicured and the door looked recently painted. Addie peeked inside a window while Hally rummaged for her keys. The dining-room table inside shone a deep mahogany. The Mullan family certainly didn’t need scholarship money to send Hally and her brother to our school.
“Devon?” Hally called, pushing the door open. No one answered, and she rolled her eyes at Addie. “I don’t know why I bother. He never answers anyway.”
I remembered the boy we’d seen at the gate yesterday, standing behind the black bars. Since he was two grades higher, Devon wasn’t as common a topic of gossip as Hally was, but our teachers mentioned him from time to time, and we knew he’d skipped a grade.
Hally slipped off her shoes, so Addie followed suit, undoing the laces and setting our oxfords side by side on the welcome mat. By the time we looked up again, Hally was in the kitchen with the refrigerator door open.
“Soda? Tea? Orange juice?” she called.
“Soda’s fine,” Addie said.
The kitchen was beautiful, with polished dark wood cabinets and granite countertops. A small, lushly colored statuette stood in one corner, a half-burned candle serving sentinel on either side. A tiny clementine lay at the figurine’s feet.
Addie stared, and I was too curious myself to remind her not to. Hally’s looks were one thing—she couldn’t help those. But to broadcast the family’s foreignness like this …
“I was thinking we’d get takeout,” Hally said. Addie turned just in time to catch the soda can she tossed at us. It was so cold we almost dropped it. “Unless you’re a brilliant cook or something.”
“I’m all right,” Addie said.
<Liar. We’re terrible.>
“But takeout sounds good,” she added.
Hally nodded without looking at us. She’d turned her head a little, her eyes focused on some point in the distance. Addie snuck another glance at the small altar. Was it Hally’s mother or father who’d so carefully arranged the candles and the statuette?
“Devon?” Hally called again. But there was still no answer. I thought I saw her mouth tighten.
“I’ve never actually met your brother before,” Addie said, looking away from the altar as Hally’s attention returned to us.
“No?” Hally said. “No, I guess not. You’ll meet him tonight, then. He really ought to be home…. I don’t know why he’d be late.”
Addie set her soda on the counter and pulled at the bottom of our shirt. “Well, while he’s not here, could I …”
“Oh, right,” Hally said. She blinked and brightened, all smiles again. “Come on. You can choose something from my room. That stain shouldn’t be too hard to wash out.”
Addie followed her up the stairs, which were covered with a rich, cream-colored carpet that extended to the upstairs hallway. Our socks, I realized, had been soaked in that water, too. They seemed too dirty for this house, this whiteness. Addie checked behind us to make sure we weren’t leaving marks on the carpet. Hally didn’t seem to care at all. She bounded on ahead, toward what must have been her room at the end of the hall, leaving Addie trailing behind.
<Look> I said, whispering though it wasn’t like anyone else could hear. <They’ve got a computer.>
We could see it in one of the rooms on the way to Hally’s, a large, complicated-looking thing sprawled over a desk. We’d used computers once or twice at school, and Dad had mentioned, a long, long time ago, getting one once they got cheaper, but then we hadn’t settled and Lyle had gotten sick and there was no more talk of computers.
Addie paused to stare at it and, by extension, the rest of the room. A bedroom, I realized. A boy’s room with an unmade bed and … screwdrivers on the desk. Even more strangely, there was a gutted computer in the far corner—at least I thought it was a computer. I’d never seen one with all the wires hanging out, bright silver parts naked and bared. This was Devon’s room. It had to be, unless there was another member of the Mullan family I’d never heard about. But what sixteen-year-old boy had computers in his room?
“Addie?” Hally called, and Addie hurried away.
Hally’s room was ten times messier than her brother’s, but she didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed as she invited us inside and closed the door. She threw open her closet and waved a hand at the clothes hanging inside. “Pick whatever you want. I think we’re about the same size.”
Her closet was full of things Addie would never wear. Things that said Look at me—too-big tops that hung off one shoulder, bright colors and flashy patterns and jewelry that might have gone well with Hally’s black-framed glasses and dark curly hair but would have looked like dress-up clothes on us. Addie looked for something plain as Hally perched herself on the edge of her bed, but Hally didn’t seem to own such a thing.
“Can I just, I don’t know … wear your spare uniform blouse or something?” Addie said, turning.
That was when I noticed something was wrong.
Hally looked up at us from her bed, but there was something in her eyes, something dark and solemn in her stare that made me stop, made me say <Addie. Addie> without hardly knowing why.
And then slowly, so slowly it was like something deliberate, there was a shift in Hally’s face. That was the only way I could put it. Something minuscule, something no one would have caught if they weren’t staring straight at her as Addie and I were staring now, something no one would have noticed—would have even thought to notice—if they weren’t—
