“They strapped me to a chair and made me relive memories that weren’t mine,” he says. I’ve said these words. To Ryder and Angela. In my own head. These are my words, my experience, and he’s taken them straight out of my soul. “Every last inch of me covered in cockroaches. Witnessing my parents’ pod accident. And my personal favorite: walking on a tightrope over a ravine before plummeting to my death. Every day for six long months.”
I feel like my lungs are in a vise. Dear Fates. That’s why he’s afraid of heights. And I made fun of him for it. What in Limbo is wrong with me? “I’m so sorry, Tanner. I endured their torture for a few days, and I’ve had nightmares about it ever since. I can’t even imagine. Six whole months. And you were six years old…”
“It happened,” he says stoically. “I survived, with the help of an angel who appeared in my life. I don’t know who she was. Maybe a medical assistant or one of the FuMA employees. But she held me in her lap and told me none of this was my fault. She told me that as alone as I felt in that moment, one day I would be valued and loved. And I believed her.”
My heart contracts until it’s the size of a pebble. I never thought I’d meet anyone who could relate to my childhood. And here, Tanner endured the same torture I did—except much, much worse.
No wonder I felt he understood me. Somehow, some way, he must’ve recognized the scars of his past in me.
Those few days formed my lifelong hatred of the scientists, but he had to continue living with them. He had no other choice. I didn’t have my mom when I left civilization, but I had my adopted community. My adopted family. Logan, Mikey, Angela, and Ryder.
Tanner had nobody.
I lick my lips. “They made me live through those nightmares because they were trying to find out about future memory. Why did they torture you? Do you have some kind of psychic ability, too?”
“Nah,” he says. “They were trying to make me answer a question I didn’t understand. Explain a situation that was unexplainable. To this day, I still wouldn’t be able to give them what they wanted.”
There’s something else here. Something he’s not telling me. I lift my eyes to meet his, and I reach into the future—his future. The vision pours into me. The future Tanner grabs me and kisses me. Without warning, without hesitation. It is hot and searing and exquisite. And I like it. Oh, how I like it.
“No!” I fall out of the vision and scoot away from him, so far that I approach the edge of the platform. My pulse is thundering; my nerves are jumping. Oh, Fates. What’s wrong with me? Is it because I don’t want him to kiss me? Or because I want it too much?
His eyes turn watchful. “Come back here, Jessa. You’re too close to the sky.”
I look into the open space, fluffy with wads of cotton-ball clouds. I take a breath, hoping to inhale some of the sky’s serenity. He doesn’t know about the kiss. Why would he? In the vision, he acted impulsively, without premeditation. The desire to kiss me hasn’t arisen in him yet. Maybe I can prevent it from cropping up altogether.
“Look, you don’t want to kiss me,” I babble, staying where I am. And hope I sound more reasonable than I feel. “It’s only because we talked about kissing the other day. When you talk about something, you give it life. Make it real. Like an annoying song you can’t get out of your head.”
He creeps toward me, his eyes flicking between my face and the sky. “So you can’t get the idea of kissing me out of your head?”
“I said it was annoying. Like a song. Not based on anything real.”
He stops five feet from the edge of the platform. “So let me get this straight. You saw into the future and we kissed. Right?”
“Y-yes,” I stutter, shocked that he guessed the truth so easily. “But it doesn’t have to happen that way,” I add quickly. “As my sister proved, we’re in control of our own fate. We can make any future we wish.”
“Unless this is our Fixed.” His voice is low, rough. And yet, every syllable imprints into my memory forever. “Unless this kiss is so important, it happens in every one of our worlds.”
“It’s just a kiss. How can it be that important?”
His eyes glitter with the challenge. With one last look at the platform’s edge, he crawls to me, slowly but steadily. “The path of our particular world might depend on this kiss. Would you risk our future just to be stubborn?”
And then, he’s right in front of me. He rests his hands lightly on my back. They slide down to my waist, until his fingers brush against the strip of bare skin between my pants and top. I shiver, and my skin pebbles into a million goose bumps. He pulls me against him. So much of my body is touching his that I can’t think, I can’t breathe. All I can do is feel. His trembling breath. My hammering heart. His shaking hands—or hell, maybe that’s me, vibrating against his touch.
Our lips are inches apart. Time blends together. You couldn’t move me from this spot if the world were crashing down around us.
“I thought I wasn’t your type,” I whisper.
“You’re not,” he says. “But for the fate of our world, I’m willing to make the sacrifice.”
And then, he closes the gap between us.
His lips tease mine, softly at first. Hesitantly. As though he’s not at all certain his kiss is welcome. His mouth lingers, waiting for permission, and I feel the sweet ache all the way to my toes.
I kiss him back. I’m not entirely sure how this is done, but I move my mouth against his. I run my hands up his back, over his neck, and into his soft, silky hair. Am I doing this right? Does he like what I’m doing? Does he feel what I feel—
Oh. Dear. Fates. He’s kissing me more assuredly now, and I didn’t know. I didn’t know it could be like this. He tastes like fresh mint. I’m flying down a ramp. My head’s spinning in the air. I don’t know which way is up.
This. The word lights up in my head, explodes at each of my nerve endings. This kiss. I’ve never felt anything like it. Every inch of my body is on fire. My heart’s about to punch a hole through my chest.
A few minutes ago, I lived out the vision like it was the real thing. But it wasn’t, and that makes all the difference in the world.
He eases me slowly onto my back. I feel the metal slats underneath me, separated by quarter-inch gaps. The air is tinged with moisture, on the verge of rain, and activity rumbles, long and low, far below us.
He shifts on top of me, and his weight is solid and welcome. The planes of his body press into me. Hard muscles. Soft clothes. Bristly jaw. So many textures. So unfamiliar, and yet so…overwhelming. Devastating. I’m not sure how I’ll be able to sit up again.
Tanner Callahan thinks he’s good at everything. Well, in this case, he is certainly, most definitely right.
And then, an alarm blares. I jerk in his arms. The sound is so loud and deafening that the platform turns inside out, upside down. I grab my ears and feel the noise deep in my bones.
“What. Is. That?” I shout to Tanner, but he can’t hear me. I can’t even hear myself. “Are we being invaded?”
He moves my hand and speaks directly into my ear. Or at least I think he does. I still can’t hear anything other than the ear-splitting siren. And yet, he must have spoken, because the words appear in my head like a thought.
The alarm is from ComA. They have a big announcement.
And I know, from the grip of Tanner’s fingers, that the announcement can’t be good.
20
We descend the chain ladder as quickly as possible, given Tanner’s phobia, and head to Mikey’s house. My mom and I have made a deal to meet at the Russells’ in case of an emergency. When Tanner and I arrive, she’s already there, wearing an old sweatshirt of my dad’s. Once upon a time, the sweatshirt might have been cozy and soft. Now, it is tattered, worn—sad, even. Kind of like our family.