It must be just after midnight. I’m halfway down the hall, heading back to Kat, when my legs suddenly stop before I know why. My brain catches up quickly and I see it. The door to Kat’s room is ajar. Probably just a nurse checking up on her, but I don’t know that for sure. So I tiptoe toward the room until I can peer inside. There’s someone standing over Kat’s bed. Slim and dressed in a hoodie and jeans, it looks a lot like the figure I saw at Elmer’s right before the floor collapsed. I drop my coffee and lurch forward, grabbing hold of the intruder’s sweatshirt. The yelp I hear is unmistakably feminine. Then the hood falls back, revealing an elegant head.
“Busara?” I ask, though I can see her clearly. It’s just hard to believe she’s here.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I thought you’d gone home. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“It’s the middle of the night. What are you doing in here?” I demand. Then I remember the video on her computer at school, and my confusion quickly turns to rage. “Wait—were you just filming?”
“No, it’s not like that,” Busara says. “I don’t have a camera with me.” She’s calm. Too calm. Maybe she’s an android after all.
“Bullshit,” I say. That’s when I notice the plastic band around her wrist.
“What’s this?” I ask, grabbing the band and pulling her arm toward me to get a better look. The sight of her name and birth date on the plastic takes me by surprise. “You’re a patient here?”
She lowers her arm and covers the band with her fingers as if she’s ashamed of it. “I have a heart condition,” she says. “I spend a lot of time at the hospital. My cardiologist is on this floor.”
“Oh.” That explains why she’s out of school so much. I feel like an asshole. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she says. “How are you?”
It’s a simple question, but one I find myself unable to answer. My mouth is open, but for the first time ever there are no words spilling out. We stand together looking down at the girl in the bed. What’s left of Kat’s hair is spread across the pillow, and her eyes are hidden behind the Company’s slim black visor.
My vision blurs and a drop slips down my face and over my lip before I can catch it. I’ve spent hours alone in this room, and I haven’t shed a single tear. Then some random girl shows up and I lose it. Having Busara here makes me realize how alone I am. I don’t want her sympathy. I want Kat’s. The one person I would have turned to is gone. I’m here for her, but there’s no one here for me.
“My doctor says Kat has something called locked-in syndrome,” Busara says. I’m grateful I can reply with a nod as I wipe my eyes on the collar of my shirt.
Busara turns her gaze away from me and back down at Kat. “It seems to be going around.”
I clear my throat. “What do you mean?”
“I heard that two of the other kids who survived the accident at the factory have it too. West and Brian. They were moved to a long-term care facility earlier this afternoon.”
I wonder if that’s where they’ll be sending Kat soon. To some place where malfunctioning human bodies are kept clipped and cleaned while the minds trapped inside them wait for death. My only hope is that the White City has set Kat free.
“It’s surprising,” Busara continues when I don’t respond. She seems eager to keep the conversation going. “Locked-in syndrome isn’t very common, you know.”
I didn’t know. And I’m not sure how she does.
My skepticism must show on my face, but it doesn’t stop Busara. “As a matter of fact, it’s pretty rare. And yet three of the four kids who survived the accident have it. What do you guess are the odds of that?”
She looks at me as if expecting an answer. All I can offer is a shrug.
“I gotta say, if I were the fourth kid, I’d be feeling pretty lucky right now,” she adds.
A memory flashes through my brain, and I’m reminded of something I meant to follow up on. “Marlow Holm is the fourth kid. Did you know that?”
Busara nods.
“What else do you know about him?” I ask. “Have you found out anything new?”
“Nothing much, really,” she says. “His old social media posts make it seem like he and his mother had to leave California pretty abruptly. But why do you ask? Do you think Marlow had something to do with what happened to Kat?”
Marlow was the one who suggested the party. He was also the only kid who walked away. And his abrupt departure from California does seem pretty fishy. “I don’t know what to think yet,” I tell Busara.
The room stays silent for longer than I’d like, but I can’t come up with anything to say. Finally Busara breaks the silence. “You really love her, don’t you?”
Love is too small a word for what I feel. How do I explain that before Kat, nothing was real? The nannies who doted on me were all paid to do it. One day they’d be hugging me, and the next they were gone. Kids at school played with me so our parents could network. Most never even pretended to like me. Then I met Kat, and she chose me. No one forced her or paid her. I was the one she wanted to be with. When I was eight years old, Kat stepped out of the woods and rescued me. I will spend my entire life thanking her for wanting to do it.
“Yes,” I tell Busara. “I love her. Kat’s my whole world.”