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“You could study harder and try to get a scholarship,” I said. “Then you wouldn’t need FeLS.”

She shrugged her sweater off one shoulder, smiling at the guy looking at her, and completely ignoring me.

“Sandy”—I hoped to appeal to her obvious sex-teen-ness—“you know you can’t dress like you do now if you’re a FeLS. I heard you have to wear uniforms. Plus, you’ll be out there in space, and who knows if there are any guys there?”

“Of course there are guys.” She shot me a look like I’d just said two plus two was five. “Guys are everywhere. And”—she paused; for effect, I guessed—“you’ve seen the verts… in your free time, you can dress any way you want, go anywhere you want, and do anything you want. Anything, except that.” She could tell I was not impressed. “Well, you can go anywhere on the station. Guess you can’t really sneak off of it.” She laughed, shaking out her hair, and the other side of her sweater slipped down, too. “Hey, Mike, isn’t Joan a FeLS?”

Mike was staring across the booth at Sandy’s practically naked chest. “Huh?” he grunted.

“Joan.” I snapped my fingers under his nose. “Your sister? She’s in FeLS?”

“She is?” He was struggling to focus somewhere besides Sandy’s breasts.

In order to help, I yanked her sweater closed. “Joan?” I kicked him under the table. “FeLS?”

“Oh, yeah.” He snatched up a fry. “She was.”

“Maybe I should talk to her,” Sandy said. “She could tell me all about how to get chosen, right?” She propped her chin in her hands, leaning toward Mike. “Can you arrange that? Please?”

“Nope. Sorry. Haven’t talked to her since she left.”

“Wait, isn’t her two years up?” I said.

“I guess. Mom gets chips from her, I think,” Mike said. “Heck, I dunno. My dad says she probably thinks she’s too good for us now.”

The guy who’d been watching Sandy motioned her to show her wrist. Reluctantly, she did. He shook his head and turned away.

“Oh well.” She flipped her hair, scanning the rest of the tables with no success.

“You gotta be a virgin to get into FeLS, don’t you?” Derek said.

“Of course.” Sandy rolled her eyes. “Everyone knows that. Why does everyone keep asking me if I know that?” She turned her attention to me. “I wonder what it’s going to be like, really? Can you believe those ‘how-to’ vids? We’ve watched like, what, one a week since school started? I mean, sex has got to be the most ultra thing in the galaxy! I wonder what the guys get to see when we’re watching our vids?” She looked over at Derek. “I don’t know why they separate us, we’re going to be doing it together, so, duh—”

“Will you stop?” It was bad enough that Derek was making moon eyes across the table at me. I didn’t need Sandy saying anything that might encourage him to think about me and sex in the same thought. “No wonder guys think when girls are tattooed all they want is to get laid.”

“Don’t they?” Mike gave me his biggest wide-eyed innocent look.

A part of me knew he was joking, but the part that didn’t said, “Shut up.” I paused, knowing the reaction I’d get if I said what was on my mind. I couldn’t stop myself. “Look at what happened to Angel.”

Suddenly, it seemed the remaining ketchup on Mike’s plate was the most interesting thing he’d ever seen. Sandy began digging around in her purse. Derek glanced at me for a second and then looked out the window. Nobody wanted to remember. I should have felt bad for bringing it up, but I didn’t. I was sick and tired of the constant sex talk, and teasing. Couldn’t my friends at least try to understand that maybe all girls—like maybe me—don’t want to have sex?

Angel Cordoba had been in Mike’s older sister Joan’s grade, just a couple of years ahead of us. She was cute and nice, and we’d all hung out at Oak Street beach two summers earlier, before Joan went into FeLS. Right after Angel got her XVI, a couple of guys invited her to a party. It was an eighteenth and she was the only girl there.

The guys got off with six months’ community service for the “accident” with the lighter fluid. There were no rape charges. They convinced the prosecutor that she’d wanted it—that happened a lot when the girl was a sixteen. All the Media news stories said Angel was just another oversexed sixteen, that she got high, accidentally lit herself on fire, and then blamed the guys after the fact. But anyone who knew her knew that was a lie. No one had the nerve to say anything, except her brother. He started an antitattooing, antigovernment vlog, but it got shut down and he disappeared. Rumors were he became a NonCon. Ginnie’d told me she thought he was dead.

Angel had five operations total. She almost looked like herself afterward, but looks weren’t everything. She hadn’t been the same person since.

“Sorry. But Angel didn’t want sex, did she?” I dropped the card Gran had given me on the table. “That covers mine. I’m going for a walk.”

“I’ll come with you.” Derek started to get up.

“No. I’ll catch up with you guys at the Water Tower at one.”

* * *

I always found downtown streets overwhelming. Sometimes I felt like the combination of verts and people would drown me or swallow me whole. My stomach tightened and my breathing quickened, and I had to keep myself from breaking into a run. Once I was out of the worst of it, I hurried over to Lincoln Park, to my favorite place.

A bigger-than-life-sized holographic statue of Lincoln stood at the park entrance. He’d been a president of the United States, which hadn’t existed for years. Ever since the End-of-Wars treaty, the Governing Council had ruled the Americas, the moon colonies, Venus, and the ocribundan mines on Mars. Except for the Great Oil Deserts, which no one cared about now that ocribundan was the Earth’s main fuel, and some islands off the Greater United Isles, the rest of the world was ruled by councils run like the GC.

I shielded my eyes from the sun, peering up at the statue. Lincoln was ugly, but there was something in his eyes that seemed kind. I pressed the info button and the image began reciting the Gettysburg Address. I should take time to learn more about what Lincoln believed in—freedom and equality for everyone. Between school and art classes and life, I barely had enough time to study anything except homework, and I didn’t always get that done.

Before the recording ended, I’d forgotten about Lincoln and everything else. My attention was drawn to the scene in front of me and I shuffled off through the brilliant fall colors. The trees looked like giant candles. Their fiery leaves were sparks flying wherever the wind took them. I crunched through the ones on the ground, reveling in the crackles and snaps and the earthy aroma that filled my nostrils. I felt lighter, freer. Being in any kind of natural setting did that for me. If I didn’t look beyond the trees to see the buildings, I could imagine I was a million miles from the city. Maybe out at Mill Run Farm with the cows and horses; I wouldn’t worry about anything then.

Before long, I was at the grassy mound that I’d always called “my mountain.” There was a weird animal-like noise, and for a moment I was scared. Oh, come on, I thought, what kind of animals would be loose in the park? Squirrels? Chipmunks? Not exactly terror-worthy. But the noise got louder and I realized that something wasn’t right. I strode to the top of the mound and looked down the other side.

Three guys were beating up a fourth who was curled into a ball, arms wrapped around his head. I could tell he was homeless by his clothes.

I should’ve turned and left, but I didn’t.

V