She says she’s acting as an anchor for my father, who time-traveled into the future. She says if she leaves, he will forever be lost in time. But he’s already been gone for twenty-three years, with scant hope of every returning. For all we know, he’s dead, and the time-travel experiment was a miserable failure.
That’s what all his cohorts believe—everyone except my mom. The experiment was never sanctioned by ComA in the first place. Instead, a group of Underground scientists did the research and built the time-travel machine themselves. When my dad disappeared, they all but abandoned the project. It was just too risky, and no one was keen to lose another loved one.
In contrast, I’m right here, right in front of her. And she still prioritizes her absentee husband over me. What else am I supposed to conclude other than that she doesn’t love me?
And yet, you know what’s even more pathetic than a woman who doesn’t love her daughter? Underneath the eye rolls and the bratty behavior, I love her. The woman who deserted me.
And I would give anything if her lies could be truth.
4
My mother leaves the room to answer the door. I stick my arms into the jacket, and the heated rubber molds around my forearms and biceps. What’s it going to be this time? My very own self-driving car. More credits than I could spend in a lifetime. Admittance into the top uni programs for…what, exactly? Do they have university degrees for rappelling or, I don’t know, parkour?
I sigh, remembering Logan’s words about applying myself. For a moment, I wish I were part of Callie’s generation. They, at least, weren’t plagued by the unknown. They didn’t have to choose an area of study—because their future memories chose one for them.
Just as quickly, the envy disappears. Future memory was great when it worked. But when it didn’t…well, that’s exactly why I’m in this predicament today. With Chairwoman Dresden making me offers I can’t turn down—and me turning them down.
I zip up the jacket over my pajama top just as Dresden strides into the room, her icicle heels clinking against the tile.
My mother isn’t with her. Figures. She’s been conveniently absent during all my conversations with the chairwoman.
She doesn’t blink at my attire. “Jessa, so good to see you,” she coos, as if we’re great friends and this is a social visit.
“The answer is no.”
“You haven’t heard the question.”
“Doesn’t matter.” My voice is steady, even though my knees, my fingers, my shoulders shake. “The answer is still no.”
“You might want to hear me out, Jessa.” Her tone turns as clipped as her shoes. “I’m giving you the opportunity to do something selfless for a change.” She walks overs to my desk and plucks up one of my black chips. No doubt it contains vids of a hoverboarder performing tricks. Dropping the chip, she turns and crashes right into the transport tube that delivers packages to the cottage. I snicker. The tube’s made of clear plastic and is as wide as I am. There’s no way she should’ve missed it, but I guess even the chairwoman makes mistakes.
She straightens slowly. “It seems a position has opened up for a medical assistant, and we think your mother would be perfect for the job.”
“Oh, really?” I could mention the crash—in fact I’m dying to—but I don’t. “Even though she hasn’t worked in that position in two decades?”
“Through no fault of her own. There was no one better at her job than your mom. But then these young upstarts showed up with data chips revealing successful futures as medical assistants. Your mother couldn’t compete, no matter how competent she was. She had no data chip, and back then, no future memory meant no job.”
“You don’t have to tell me about my mother’s life,” I say.
“I’m reminding you.” She walks forward, her eyes more intense, her figure more menacing with each step. “Reminding you why your mom is stuck working as a bot supervisor, a job that gives her migraines from being around machinery all day, a job that chews up her soul and spits it back out. This is a unique time in our society, one you should take advantage of. Half of our employees no longer have their future memories, which means the hiring process is pure chaos as people are scrambling to figure out what to do, how to hire. All of a sudden, there’s an opportunity for someone like your mom, a good worker with a solid basis of knowledge. Don’t you want your mother to have the career she trained for? A career she would love?”
“Of course I do.” I close my eyes so I don’t have to look at Dresden anymore. Mistake. Because what I see, instead, is the way my mother sinks into a chair, massaging her temples, when I drop by her house. I see her turn off all the lights and lie flat on the tile floor when she doesn’t know I’m there.
Whatever her faults, my mother works hard. She may not love me, but she’s made a point to see me every day for the last four years. That’s something, right?
If I turn down Dresden now, how am I any different from my mom, when she chose her personal desires over me?
“One word from us, and that medical assistant job is as good as your mom’s,” she continues. “In fact, I’ll do you one better than that. I’ll make her a memory.” Her eyes glitter, as deep and black as jewels. “In the past, there was no way to manufacture future memories because it was impossible to make one that seamless, that real. A fake could be spotted in an instant. But now that the memories are deteriorating, it’s made room for a black market. It won’t be perfect, but your mom can just claim that her future memory is fading, and her employers would be none the wiser. A fading memory may not be as valuable as a pristine one, but it’s still better than nothing.”
I open my eyes and see the crisp navy suit, those transparent icicle heels. That uniform used to taunt me as it wove among the white lab coats. Of course Dresden is talking about fake memories and unethical conduct. I’ve known for ten years that’s what she’s about.
They…they tortured me back then. Strapped me to a chair, made me live memories that weren’t mine. Nightmare after nightmare of all the phobias known to man. Falling from a cliff, drowning in the ocean, being buried alive in a coffin. Over and over, until they found the one phobia specific to me. The one horror that made me scream louder than the rest.
They played that memory, again and again, until I curled into a fetal position and whimpered. Until, at six years old, I wished my life were over.
It was ten years ago, and my time with the scientists lasted only a few days. But I still live that memory they gave me, the one they played over and over again. The one of me betraying my family, of the shock and hatred on their faces. Of the bloody knife in my hands and the bodies at my feet.
The memory isn’t mine. They took it from a hardened criminal tripped out on fumes. I could see his long, ropey limbs; the hands holding the knife were calloused and masculine. And yet, several nights a week, I still jerk awake, drenched with sweat, and know how it feels to be a traitor.
That’s why I won’t work with the scientists. They can dangle whatever they want in front of me. I won’t cave. It’s the principle of the matter.
“No,” I whisper. “I don’t work with scientists who torture children by giving them fake memories. Not now, not ever.”
“Only a few of them were involved in that project,” she says smoothly. “The vast majority of TechRA didn’t even know about it. I can assure you, we no longer undergo such…experiments. The only fake memories we deal in these days are the innocuous ones. Would you really hold the shortsightedness of a few against an entire agency?”