“Yes, I’m fine. I’m just so excited,” she said, jangling the bracelets on her wrist. “The principal called when I got to work, and put Dr. Robbins on the line. I called Dad as soon as we hung up. He’s ditching the rest of the conference and coming home tonight. He sounded pretty jazzed.”
Dad would have a lot of reactions to this, but “jazzed” wouldn’t be one of them, Will thought.
Will worked to keep his breathing under control, the way his dad had taught him. It got harder to stay calm when they passed a black sedan parked on a side street a block from their house. It looked like the same car from this morning.
“I guess we have a whole lot to talk about,” he said, trying to sound calm.
“Indeed. But I have to say, Will-bear, you don’t sound all that excited.”
“I want to look over what’s in here,” said Will, gripping Robbins’s packet in his hands. “One step at a time.”
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#20: THERE MUST ALWAYS BE A RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EVIDENCE AND CONCLUSION.
“You know, you’re absolutely right,” she said as she pulled into their driveway. “We shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves. One step at a time.”
She parked and gathered her things. Will hurried in ahead of her. He ran upstairs, threw on some sweats, grabbed his MacBook, and brought it down to the kitchen. Fighting to stay calm, he clung to what he knew he had to do: Open his senses, clear his mind, notice every detail.
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#9: WATCH, LOOK, AND LISTEN, OR YOU WON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE MISSING.
“You get started, then,” said Belinda, grabbing a Diet Coke from the fridge. “I’ve got to head back to work. We’ll go over everything later with Dad.”
She hugged him from behind as he sat at the table. Her touch felt tense, fraught with twisted anxiety, wrong. Her dark glasses slipped down, and for the first time Will saw her eyes: they were Belinda’s, but chillingly glassy and vacant.
“We are both so proud of you,” she said, and then she was gone.
He heard the front door close, then hurried to the living room and watched her drive off. The Green Machine slowed as she turned the corner where he’d seen the black sedan. Her window slid down as she edged out of sight. Will ran to the next window, where he could see both cars. Stopped beside each other, driver to driver.
She’s talking to them.
Will locked the doors. He tried his dad’s cell—please, Dad, please answer—but got voice mail. Will hung up, then tapped a text: NEED TO TALK. CALL ME.
Caps. SHOUTING. Anything to grab Dad’s attention. Will set his phone beside his laptop and picked up Dr. Robbins’s packet. His hands were shaking. It took every ounce of self-control to keep his terror from breaking loose.…
His phone marimbaed. Will jumped out of his skin and picked up before the second ring: Dad calling.
“Dad?… Dad?” Will heard a hollow metallic whistling, like water echoing through a storm drain. “Dad, are you there?”
There was a burst of static, then silence. Will hit CALL BACK and heard the same swampy interference. Dad must be out of range or driving through a dead zone. Will killed the call and set the phone down where he could see it. He needed to stay focused, ground himself in facts. Analyze, manage, arrange: The Importance of an Orderly Mind.
He opened Robbins’s packet and paged through some forms, including an admission application for his parents to sign. A magazine-sized blank rectangle, made of strong, flexible material, slid out. The words TOUCH HERE appeared, and he did. More words appeared, in a simple, elegant font:
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THE CENTER FOR INTEGRATED LEARNING
Below that, the school’s crest took shape. It was a coat of arms, an ornate shield in navy blue and dark silver, divided into three horizontal sections, each with an image. On top, a winged angel held a book and a sword. In the middle, a majestic black horse reared, its hooves rimmed with flames. On the bottom, a knight in armor pointed his sword at a vanquished foe lying on the ground. A scroll unfurled below the crest with a date, 1915, and a motto: Knowledge Is the Path, Wisdom Is the Purpose.
Photographs of the campus filled the screen. An audio track with quotes about the school’s credentials and distinguished faculty began to play. One of the photos stopped him cold: a shot of a still forest in winter, shrouded in thick mist, hardwoods and evergreens buried in thick snow. The female voice on the audio said, “You’ll feel as if you’re in a dream.”
It was the image he’d remembered from his dream the night before.
The image dissolved into video of students in classrooms listening to lectures and working in labs. Hanging out in a coffee shop and a bowling alley. Performing plays and concerts, riding horses, playing a dozen different sports. Bright, eager faces of kids Will’s age or older. All wore clothes in variations of the Center’s colors—navy blue and gray. The voices on the audio track were saying, “Life-changing opportunities around every corner … I made friends I knew instantly would be mine forever … I gained a feeling of confidence and belonging that’s stayed with me my whole life.”
Will knew this was advertising, designed to arouse specific feelings: The Center makes students smarter, stronger, and more popular. My best qualities will be recognized and rewarded and all my dreams will come true.
The screen shifted to video of the school choir singing in a candlelit jewel-box chapel. The beauty of the song gripped him, a slow, celestial melody that continued over heartwarming images of a graduation. Proud parents embracing their beaming cap-and-gowned kids. This was the part of the deal known as closing the sale. But knowing he was being manipulated didn’t prevent it from working. The Center made the life he’d spent stumbling through overcrowded, underfunded public schools seem futile.
Could a place this perfect really exist?
Will Google Earthed the school’s mailing address: New Brighton Township, Wisconsin. A rural community, seventy miles northeast of the corner where Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin came together. He zoomed in on the town, then scrolled out until he found the Center. It appeared exactly as he’d seen it in Robbins’s 3-D preview: the grand old buildings, the playing fields, the nearby lake.
It’s real. It’s all there.
Will’s parents didn’t have money or connections, and they’d trained him to leave no tracks, so he’d reined himself in. Posing as a B+ student, flying under the radar. Following Rule #3: DON’T DRAW ATTENTION TO YOURSELF meant he had no chance of earning academic or athletic scholarships and the life that went with them. But now, without asking for it, a door to this astonishingly better world had opened.
What if the Center was a place where he could finally be himself?
Will’s phone dinged. It was a text from Dad: IN THE CAR. BAD RECEPTION. HOME BY SIX. TALK THEN.
Will glanced at the time and was shocked to see it was the middle of the afternoon. He’d been grinding this for hours. “Belinda” would be home from work soon, and he didn’t want to be in the same room with her again until Dad returned.
I need to see what Dad thinks. Then we’ll decide what to do about it together.
Will made a PB and J and wolfed it down as he prowled the house. He looked at the meager possessions they’d dragged around to six cities in fourteen years. They owned a small TV but seldom watched anything but news. All they did with their free time was read. Shelves lined every wall in the house—scientific, medical, legal texts.