Alix couldn’t help smiling. The hard version of Moses was gone again, replaced by the… what?
The decent version?
She realized that Moses was now looking over at her, seemingly made aware of her eyes on him. Alix looked away.
Why do you even care?
But apparently she did.
My world is insane.
Moses seemed to take her look as an invitation to join her. He climbed up to where she and Cynthia had found their perch, and pulled himself up beside her.
“So,” she said, “Have you changed your mind and decided to let me go?”
“Don’t know. Have you decided to help us?”
Alix knew the smart thing would be to say yes.
“No.”
He shrugged. “Then I guess not.”
“Why would you trust me, anyway?” she snapped. “I could just lie and tell you whatever you wanted to hear.”
“So why don’t you?” Moses asked.
“Because—” She broke off. Why don’t you just lie? It made sense. Just tell him whatever he wanted to hear and then run like hell. And yet here she was, stupidly saying the wrong thing.
“Maybe I’m stubborn,” she said.
“You want to know what I think?” Moses asked.
Alix snorted. “Yeah. Sure. Give me your theory of Alix.”
He laughed. “ ‘Theory of Alix.’ I like that.” He paused, smiling. “Okay, here’s my Theory of Alix.”
“Constructed from long hours of observation,” she added.
“Indeed.” Abruptly, Moses’s smile disappeared. “From many long hours.” And his expression became so intense that Alix felt a sudden chill of self-consciousness.
She realized she didn’t want to hear whatever he had to say.
He was looking at her too seriously, as if he were carving her up into tiny pieces and inspecting each part. It was so intense and invasive that she felt as if she were naked. She was surprised to find that she felt an almost overwhelming shame.
She didn’t want him to say anything. He was peeling away all the layers of who she was, and she knew before he opened his mouth what he would say.
He would look at her vacations to Saint Barts and her parties in the Hamptons and all her stupid obsessed conversations about boys with Cynthia and all her worrying about SATs and whether she should go to Harvard or Dartmouth or Bryn Mawr, and he would see her as a joke.
She suddenly could see herself in his eyes, and she hated what he saw.
“Never mi—”
“You’re ethical.”
“What?” Alix looked at him, confused.
“You’re ethical.”
Alix wasn’t sure she liked that assessment any more than the one she’d been expecting.
“You make me sound like some kind of Goody Two-Shoes.”
He laughed at that. “I didn’t say you were obedient. I said you were ethical. They’re different. It’s why you’re stuck now. You know we’re right about your dad—”
“I didn’t say that.”
“—and you also know you love him. So you’re stuck in a lose-lose situation, and you keep trying to find some way out.”
“The way out would be to lie to you.”
“So why haven’t you?” He was smiling as he answered his own question. “Because you’re ethical.”
Alix rolled her eyes. “Because I’m stupid.”
The truth was, she had no idea why she hadn’t just told him what he wanted to hear. Was she actually starting to believe his crazy conspiracy theories? Was she having some kind of Stockholm syndrome moment? All she knew was that each time she considered lying to him, she felt queasy.
“I know you, Alix,” Moses said. “I really have been watching you for a long time.”
“Yay,” Alix said bitterly. “Me and my shadow.”
“You can try to make a joke out of it, but I see you. I’ve seen you with your brother, trying to take care of him. I saw you take Cynthia in.”
Alix glanced sidelong at the girl sitting beside her. “She manipulated me.”
“No. You helped her. She asked for help, and you helped her. The first day of school, she said she was lost at Seitz, and you took her in.”
“That just says I’m a sucker.”
“No.” Cynthia shook her head. “It says you’re kind.”
“Oh look, I’m kind and ethical. Nominate me for sainthood.”
“There are worse things to be,” Cynthia observed, and before Alix had a chance to reply, she jumped down from their perch, leaving Alix sitting alone with Moses.
“Cyn’s right, you know,” Moses said.
“So why am I not feeling like I won the lottery?”
“No one said being ethical was easy,” Moses said. “And that’s why you won’t lie to me now about whether you’re going to help us.” He shrugged. “It’s one of the things I always liked about you. You don’t take the easy way.”
“I could still lie to you.”
“You won’t.”
“I might.”
“You won’t.”
It was irritating to have him sit there, looking smug and psychoanalyzing her. She gave him a sour look. “Okay, so if you’re so smart, why kidnap me? Why not just try talking to me, instead? I mean, Christ, I’ve seen college recruiters who do a better job of selling than you do.” She laughed. “Most people, when they want to change your mind, they don’t resort to kidnapping.”
“We tried, actually.”
“That’s funny. I didn’t notice.”
“You’re right,” Moses said with a laugh, “You didn’t. We put Cyn right next to you for eight months. She had all kinds of questions for you about your dad. But it was like you were asleep. Everything went right past you. You were too cozy.” He shrugged. “So I decided to shake you awake.”
“And now I get to spend the rest of my life in a factory.”
“It’s not about you.”
“Right. It’s about my dad. I get it.”
“No.” Moses jerked his chin toward Tank, who was still making runs at the ramp on his skateboard. “It’s about him. Kids like him.” He waved his hand toward the rest of the 2.0 crew. “Kids like them.”
“They don’t really qualify as kids.”
“We were all kids when this started. I was Tank’s age when my dad had his heart attack.”
Alix felt awkward at the mention of Moses’s loss. “I’m sorry. I forgot—”
“Don’t be. You didn’t do it. Like you said, it’s not your fault. You weren’t involved.”
“Still…”
“It’s not on you,” he said shortly. “You want to know what is on you, though? Whatever happens next. The next kid who sucks on Azicort like Tank’s sister did—that’s on you.
“She died because of Azicort. Tank barely made it. Doctors stuck him with so much adrenaline that the kid should still be bouncing off the walls. And there are going to be more kids like him, because your dad’s working overtime to make sure Azicort doesn’t get blamed.”
“I think someone would notice if an asthma drug was killing people.”
“Oh sure, they notice. And then your dad and his good buddy George Saamsi get to work. They blame other medications. They blame genetic defects. They say patients didn’t use the correct dose. They say it wasn’t used as directed—that’s what they said about Tank. I watched good old Santa Claus George get up in front of the FDA and show them studies that proved Azicort is safe as houses.”
“But you know better,” Alix said drily.
“Damn straight.”
“Because you’re so much smarter than anyone else in the whole world.”
“No. Because I’m paying attention.”
Alix could feel her annoyance rising, again. “Not every company is evil, you know. Just because someone sues McDonald’s for having hot coffee, it doesn’t mean the company was bad. It just means people are idiots. I know you like your big conspiracy theory and all, but maybe it was something else that made Tank sick.”