“I don’t know,” he whispers. “They’re powerful. I don’t know.”

“Then that’s what you need to find out,” I say. “You have to . . .”

But the words fall away as my eyes drift past him to the other side of the alley. To the building set back, just out of view of the street. My chest tightens, and I push past Jackson to get a better look.

It’s a diner with flashing red sign. It’s the diner from my nightmare. Only I realize now, it wasn’t a dream at all. It was a memory.

23

The sign flashes RED’S DINER. I’m beside myself, not sure I can trust my eyes. I start that way, and Jackson catches up with me, asking what I’m doing. He keeps looking back at the theater, probably hoping that I’m running away with him. But instead, I walk up the stairs and enter the restaurant, a bell jingling on the door.

I look around, knowing what I’ll see before I do. The vinyl booths with chevron pattern, the checkered floor. And there’s the table from my dream, sitting empty. I walk over and slide into the seat, just like I’m sliding into the memory.

I sat in the booth next to the window with a bowl in front of me. The air reeked of grease—bacon, sausage, ham. Meat. The table was sticky with syrup. I had a bowl of oatmeal, unsweetened. I stirred my spoon slowly, lonely. Scared.

I missed my girls. I wanted to be with them.

“Can I help you?” a waitress asks Jackson. He seems unsure and asks for two waters. I hear him, almost faraway. He’s not in this memory with me. The scene plays across my vision.

I looked across the table and there was a man. He was older, and his sweat glistened in the fluorescent light. His fingers gripped a breakfast sausage as he shoved it into his mouth. He had no manners. He was indulgent. Crude.

At graduation, when Anton sat me down and told me I’d have to live with this man, I cried so hard that I threw up. He gave me a vitamin and told me tomorrow would be better. And then he gave me to Mr. Pickett—my sponsor. The man who had attended all of my open houses and paid my tuition.

It had only been a car ride, but I already knew that I was terrified of Mr. Pickett. Terrified.

“Don’t worry,” he said from across the table. “We’ll be home soon.”

Thunder boomed outside, making me jump. Rain poured down. I hated the rain. I hated this man.

“I’ve had other girls before, you know,” he said, slurping his coffee. “Too stupid. They said you had spirit. I paid extra for it.”

The waitress sets down two glasses of water and asks me what I’d like to eat. Jackson impatiently asks her to give us a few more moments. I feel tears slide down my cheeks. I’m shaking.

I was shaking. This man intended to hurt me—I knew that. Even a vitamin couldn’t erase that. Couldn’t make me compliant enough. I wanted my girls. I wanted my girls.

“Hey, sweetheart,” the man said to the waitress. “Give me a refill.”

“I’m not your sweetheart,” she said, annoyed, and hastily filled his cup. As she walked away, he stared at her backside before turning to me.

“Stuck-up bitch,” he said so she could overhear him. “And look at you,” he told me. “You’re prettier than her. But you know better than to talk back, right?” He smiled at me and reached over to touch my hand.

I jerked back, hating his touch.

I jerk back, knocking over the glass of ice water, splashing it over the side of the table. Jackson tells me it’s okay, that I should stop crying. That he’s here.

I couldn’t stay another moment with Mr. Pickett. I wouldn’t. I didn’t care if they permanently dismissed me. I didn’t care about anything but getting back to my girls to protect them. We needed each other.

I jumped up from the table and rushed for the door.

I yank open the door, the bell jingling.

I ran out into the rain, the water soaking my hair and clothes. My vision was blurred with tears, thunder boomed again.

Jackson’s voice booms, shouting for me to wait as he chases after me down the alley in the sunshine.

The storm raged around me, lights blinking and confusing me. I didn’t know which way to run. The man screamed my name.

“Philomena Pickett!” he shouted. “Get back here. You’re mine!”

And so I ran faster. Faster, faster toward the lights. I just wanted to escape. I stepped off the curb, startled by the sudden change in surface. And just as I swung around, headlights blinded my vision and I raised my arm just before—

There’s a sudden grab around my waist and I’m hoisted off my feet, startling me out of my head. A car horn beeps as it passes, the driver cursing at us. The sun is shining, my face is wet with tears.

Jackson is breathing heavily, his eyes wide. His arm still around me.

“Christ, Mena,” he says. “What were you doing? You just ran out into the street. You—”

“I died,” I say as fresh tears fall from my eyes. The physical pain still resonates, the vibration, the darkness. The absolute emptiness. I look up at Jackson, stunned. Traumatized.

“Jackson,” I say, my voice weak. “I died.”

He doesn’t know what to make of this, but he grabs me fiercely into a hug. I can feel his heart racing under his shirt, his hand holding the back of my neck.

I pull away from him, not wanting him to touch me. Not wanting any man to touch me. Jackson is taken aback but doesn’t insist. He’s not Anton. Instead, he leads me back over to the wall, carefully watching me in case I make a run for it again.

“Please tell me what happened,” he says. “I don’t understand.”

“He paid extra for me,” I say, sickened by the words. “He . . .” My eyelids flutter, and I shake my head, not wanting to continue. When I look over, Jackson is crying. He’s scared, more so than before, I’m sure.

“Why were you in the street?” he asks, trying to skip over the parts I can’t say.

“I’ve been here before. That diner. And I was running back to the girls,” I say. “I was going to save them. But . . .” I start to calm, the sunshine drying up my tears. I soak in the warmth. “I was hit by a car,” I say. “Everything was . . . gone. When I woke up again, Anton told me . . . He told me ‘Welcome home.’ And I never saw Mr. Pickett again.”

Jackson adjusts his stance. “It doesn’t work that way,” he says. “People don’t wake up once they die.”

“No,” I say, furrowing my brow. “Not . . . dead dead. The school . . . They changed my name to Philomena Rhodes.” I run my hand through my hair, confused. Deeply confused. “And my parents came with me to the academy. . . . They dropped me off for the first day.”

Only it doesn’t make sense. I was already at the academy. The memories of my life contradict the flashback.

“It started all over again,” I say to Jackson. “The academy trained me, same rules.” I try to catch my breath. “Same . . . future.”

“You’ll be a prize for any man,” I whisper Anton’s words, hating them. I look at Jackson. “That’s what they’re doing,” I say. “The experiments. They’re training us to be perfect girls for men. Just like in ‘Sharp Sticks.’ ”