Deadly Design (9780698173613) (10 page)

“C
an I get a few more towels?” I ask the man at the front desk of our hotel in Dallas.

“Sure.” He smiles, then disappears through a door marked
STAFF ONLY
.

Usually when we travel, Mom and Dad get one room and Connor and I share another. Last year, traveling meant my folks and Connor going somewhere for the weekend because of a meet or a tournament. They didn't like me staying home by myself, but if it was only for one night, they'd let me. They weren't worried about me inviting all my buddies over for a beer-drinking potfest. I didn't really have any buddies to invite over.

With Mom, Dad, and I sharing a room, we need more than the standard two towels, and I am more than happy to volunteer to run down to the front desk. I love my parents, but too much of a good thing is still too much. We were at the airport two hours before our flight, which got delayed for another two hours. Then we were crammed together for an hour-and-a-half flight followed by a fifteen-minute cab ride. I'm so ready to breathe some parent-free air.

The phone rings, and the desk clerk appears again, two towels in his hand, but instead of handing them to me, he sets them down and answers the phone.

I turn and look around the lobby. There's a small area with four round tables where patrons, earlier, consumed their continental breakfasts. A flat screen hangs on the wall broadcasting the noon news. There's another closetlike room with a computer and free Wi-Fi. Next to the large window and the sliding glass door are three chairs. Only one is occupied. There's a woman sitting with her long, tan legs crossed at the ankles. They're nice legs, but I can't see what the woman they belong to looks like because she's holding up a
USA Today,
and it covers her face and most of her torso. I don't know why she doesn't put the paper down and
watch
the news on the television. She turns pages, and the charm bracelet on her wrist rattles. I catch a glimpse of blond hair.

The desk clerk hangs up the phone, then apologizing, hands me the towels. I take them and feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. Someone is staring at me. I can feel their eyes, but when I turn around, the only new person I see is a tall girl wearing sweatpants and an oversized T-shirt. She's standing in front of a complimentary basket of fruit. She's holding an apple in her hand, shifting it from her right to her left to her right again as she stares at the apples, oranges, and bananas. I'd wager anything she's not thinking about fruit.

She's beautiful. Her skin is the oddest color. It's pale but warm at the same time, and I doubt any amount of time in the sun or under a tanning lamp would change it because this is the color Dr. Mueller had painted in her DNA. This is how he'd envisioned her—tall with a long neck, large, deep eyes that aren't blue, but are so gray they hardly seem real. Her nose has a perfect, level slope to it, and her hair, held against her head in a bun, is almost as red as the apple she's cradling in her long, slender fingers.

I can't help but think of her as Snow White's evil, beautiful stepmother. She doesn't look like a sadistic person who murders with fruit, but she doesn't look natural either. She looks like the product of some witch's spell. Her eyes turn to me, and she smiles. I can tell she knows instantly, like we're separated siblings, that there's a connection between us.

She tilts her head toward the hallway leading away from the lobby, and I follow her.

“So you're the boy from that little town outside of Wichita,” she says once we're standing alone in front of a row of numbered doors.

“Rose Hill,” I say. “Ever been there?”

“Sorry, I can't say that I have.”

“Don't be sorry. It's not like you missed anything. The hot spot's the convenience store. As of June first, there's a do-it-yourself sundae bar. Hot fudge, caramel, nuts—the works. It's pretty awesome.”

“Well.” She smiles. “Ever since Dr. Hodges called my parents and told them I'm about to have a heart attack, they've had me on a strict no-hot-fudge-sundae diet. That's why I came down here where they have a wonderful assortment of healthy fruit. But . . .” She looks around like she's afraid her parents are going to come popping out of the elevator. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Sure.”

The girl, the Mueller baby from Wichita, comes close enough to whisper in my ear. Her warm breath tickles against my neck, but just when I think the words are about to come, she moves her face in front of mine and kisses me. Really kisses me, tongue and all. Then just as abruptly, she backs away.

“Can you taste it?” she asks.

“Yeah,” I say, my mouth wanting more, and I'm not sure if it wants more of the flavor of chocolate or more of her. She's a damn good kisser, not that I'd probably know the difference, since I've never been kissed like that. Actually, besides Emma's good-bye kiss, the only other time I've kissed a girl was at Samantha Pritchard's twelfth birthday party during a game of laser tag.

“Besides a basket of healthy fruit, there's a vending machine. I crammed a whole Hershey's bar in my mouth and just let it melt there.” She closes her eyes, savoring the memory.

Her gray eyes glint with tears, but she refuses to cry, and not a single tear escapes onto her cheek.

“This whole thing sucks,” she says.

“What's your name?” I ask, feeling like I should know the name of the girl who just left a hint of Hershey on my tongue.

“I'm Amber. And you?”

“Kyle.”

She looks toward the elevator. “Are you scared, Kyle?”

I nod. I am scared, I'm scared shitless. But hopefully if the freezing thing didn't mess me up, I've got some time for the doctors to figure things out—to find a way to save me. Right now, what I'm most afraid of is Amber. I don't want her to die. I don't want her parents to lose her and have to bury her. I don't want her dad to lie about having allergies and her mom to quit her job because she can't keep herself together. Mostly, I just want Amber to live. To have a chance to kiss lots of guys or, more importantly, the right guy.

She stares down at the apple, turning it over and over in her hands. “My friends were supposed to take me to Club Rodeo for my birthday. I still can't drink or anything, but . . . it would have been fun, you know? Do some dancing. Meet a cute guy. Do you have a girlfriend? I bet you do—I mean, you're gorgeous, but then again, you probably would have thought I've had lots of boyfriends, but . . . My friends say it's because I'm
too
beautiful. Boys are intimidated by me, or they assume I'm a conceited bitch, which I'm not.” She bites on her lower lip in an attempt to keep it from quivering.

I get it now, the sweatpants and hair pulled in a mess against her head. This isn't just because she's lounging around her hotel room with her parents; this is how she always dresses. But it's no use. There's nothing she can do to make herself less beautiful. I can't imagine what she'd look like if she put on a prom dress, makeup, and had one of those fancy upswept hairstyles. Guys would worship her. They'd have no choice.

“Do you have a girlfriend?”

“Not exactly,” I say.

She tilts her head back, shaking it at the injustice of everything. “I finally meet a guy who doesn't have a girlfriend and who wouldn't be totally intimated by me, and I'm probably going to be dead in a few weeks.”

“They'll figure something out,” I say. “This is one of the best hospitals in the world. They'll find a way to save us.”

She nods, but this time the tears come too quickly; she can't stop them. “Well, Kyle from Rose Hill, will you promise me something?”

“Sure.”

“If I'm alive on my birthday, promise you'll sneak into Club Rodeo and dance with me. Be my boyfriend, even if it's only for a night.”

I nod because I don't trust my voice right now. I have this growing cemetery in my head. Connor and Alexis Warren, Hannah Welch and Triagon Summers. I don't want Amber to join them.

She wipes the tears away with her sleeve, then takes the apple and tosses it into the garbage can next to the elevator. Then she takes my face in both of her hands and kisses me like she's Sleeping Beauty or Snow White and this kiss isn't just a kiss but a spell, a bridge between the living and those afraid to slip into that eternal sleep.

She goes to the elevator and pushes the button. As she waits, she wipes her eyes again. She has a huge smile on her face when the door opens, like her parents might be in the elevator, coming to look for her, and she wants them to see her being strong. I wonder if Dr. Mueller gave us a gene for bravery. I don't know if there is such a thing, but I hope there is.

I
hate hospitals. It's only been three days, but we've already sunk into a routine of eating breakfast at the hospital cafeteria after I've had my blood drawn—no food or drink after midnight so they can get an accurate read on my blood sugar and triglycerides. Then we sit around the fourth floor waiting room, where we have a wonderful view of families coming and going in the parking lot.

Occasionally a nurse will come in and call my name. Then I'll have an EKG or run on a treadmill and get a CT scan. Then it's back to the waiting room. Down to the cafeteria for lunch, back to the waiting room to watch some horrible daytime television while we wait to see if my name will be called again.

I don't want to be poked or prodded or X-rayed or injected, but I'm almost happy when my name is called, because at least then the scenery changes a little.

I keep a look out for Amber, and I can't help but wonder if she's being held in a waiting room on another floor. Chances are she's having more tests than I am. After Connor died, our family doctor ran me through the cardiac wringer. This is all new to Amber. Last week she was planning her birthday, and now . . .

Mom's pretending to read a novel she picked up at the hospital's gift shop, but I've noticed that she never turns the page. She's not wearing makeup either. I remember when I was little, she'd never go anywhere without ‘her face,' as she put it. But over the past month and a half since Connor's death, she's stopped wearing makeup. What's the point if she's just going to cry it off? Dad's holding a newspaper, but he's not reading it either. He remembers to flip the pages every once in a while, even makes a show of shaking out the creases, but I know he's not reading. If he were, he'd be making comments about this story or that.

“I'm going to take a walk,” I say, because I can't stand it anymore. I can't stand the endless talk shows about food and swimwear and how to know if your husband is cheating on you and
who is
the father of the baby.

“We should get some playing cards,” Mom says, putting her book down. “We can go down to the gift shop and see if they have any. Maybe they have board games.”

“It's okay, Mom.” I stand and stretch my legs. “I just want to walk around a little. I won't go far.”

“What if they need you?” Dad says.

“Text me,” I say, “or have them page me.” That's something else I'm sick of—the constant overhead voice telling Dr. So and So that he has a call on extension twelve, and can Dr. So and So come to room 489, and Dr. So and So is needed in exam room seven.

I open the door to the hallway and choose, for no particular reason, to turn right. There's a drinking fountain, and I stop, even though I'm not really thirsty. At the very end of the hall are double doors labeled
OPERATING ROOM FOUR
. There's another waiting room on the left, where a large family is huddled together in prayer. I continue walking past patient rooms until a familiar sound makes me stop. It's the sound of a can of pop falling from a vending machine. I check my pocket for change and bingo! A can of sugary caffeine is just what I need. Maybe I'll see Amber there, sneaking another candy bar. Maybe she'll want to share the flavor with me again.

I follow the sound down a long hallway. At the end of it is a square room. The walls are a pale yellow, and there are no framed pictures or inspiring photographs hung on them. There is a long table draped with a white plastic cloth covered with a variety of donuts and a sign reading
HELP YOURSELF
. On another table is a row of coffee makers, two labeled regular, one labeled decaf.

I go to the freebie table first and pick up a cinnamon-and-sugar-covered cake donut. Then I go to the vending machine, put in my change, and wait for my can of Mountain Dew to fall like manna from heaven.

“Shit's bad for you,” a deep voice says, and I nearly jump out of my shoes.

“Fuck.” I grab my chest because I swear my heart has literally skipped a beat.

“Sorry. You okay?” An African American boy, close to seven feet tall, is standing in the doorway. He comes forward and puts a hand on my shoulder. “Last thing any of us needs is a premature heart attack. Premature being before our eighteenth birthdays.”

“James M.?”

He offers his hand. “In the flesh.”

I don't take his hand. He's close to a foot taller than me, but I go up on the balls of my feet and throw my arms around his neck. At first, he seems startled, then he hugs me back, even lifting my feet off the floor before letting me down.

“James M.,” I say, giving his firm shoulder a pat. “I'm so glad to see you.”

“So I gather,” he says, flashing me the biggest, broadest, best smile I've ever seen. He leans over the freebie table and picks up a glazed donut.

“I thought you said this stuff's bad for you,” I say.

He puts a finger to his lips. “I won't tell if you won't.”

He's beyond handsome. His face is ridiculously chiseled. His jaw, his nose, his prominent cheekbones look like they were either formed by a skilled artist's hand or by God himself on an exceptionally good day.

“Sucks they're keeping us apart. Well, I guess they're doing it on purpose. Trying to protect our emotional states, I assume. They don't want us getting too close in case . . .” His eyebrows lift, and he sighs. “Have you met the other one, Amber?” he asks.

“Yeah.”

“She kiss you?” he asks, his dark eyes narrowing.

I laugh. “You too?”

His laugh is deep. It makes the air vibrate, and when he stops, there is an eerie stillness because we know why she kissed us. Because there is a fuse two weeks in length burning toward a bomb that will explode and kill her. But there're people who know about the bomb—people who are trying to douse the fuse with water while others work to defuse it.

“I'm sorry I didn't send you a friend request,” James says.

“That's okay.”

“I was kind of scared to. Dumb, I know. It's just that I sent Triagon a friend request, and he died. And there was this girl I met at a scholar's competition. It was a daylong event, invitation only, and the person who most impressed the panel of judges won a full-ride scholarship to the University of Missouri. This girl, she was smart. Genius kind of smart. She got a perfect score on her ACT, but she said she basically cheated, because she had an eidetic memory. You know, where you remember every single thing you read.”

“That could come in handy,” I say. “Especially in world history.”

James grimaces like history isn't his favorite subject either.

“So the girl?”

“We ended up spending most of the day together. Kind of skipped some of the competitions, but we both had our sights on other universities, so what the hell.”

“She was one of us?”

He nods. “I wanted to ask her out, but I was kind of chicken, so I told her I'd send her a friend request. She accepted it . . . and then she died.” James goes to sit down in one of the chairs, and I can't help but think of the story of Goldilocks and the three bears, because with his stature, there is no chair in this room, in this hospital, that will fit him just right. “I know Facebook isn't cursed, but guess I was still afraid that if I sent you one, you'd die too.”

I open my can of pop and sit down next to him. With our legs out straight, his legs dwarf mine.

“I guess Dr. Mueller thought my parents wanted me to be a basketball star,” he says. “My parents would have been fine with that. They put me in leagues as soon as I could walk, but I was more interested in angles and velocity. The aerodynamics of the ball and the force that propels it in any certain direction. Physics. That's my thing. Love the stuff. Got a scholarship to MIT.”

“That's awesome,” I say and hope to hell he'll get to use it.

“So I'm curious.” He looks at me. “Is there something wrong with your parents—their DNA, I mean? That girl I was telling you about, Maci, Huntington's runs in her family. Her dad and her aunt both have it. I've got three brothers with sickle cell anemia. So what disease were your parents trying to avoid by trusting the good doctor?”

“Spinal muscular atrophy,” I say, sinking into my chair. “Do you think it's the same way with everyone? Every family had something in their genetics they were afraid of, so they went to Mueller?”

“I bet so. Question is, how many families went to him?” James asks. “How many of us are there, and why are we dying?”

“What do you think?”

James bends his knees and props his elbows on them. “Best I can figure, he went too far. Maybe all the energy, the life force it takes to make us this way—superior, as Triagon put it—is too much. Maybe us Mueller babies are all born with a certain amount of life force, and around the time we turn eighteen, we run out, like a battery going dead.”

The whites of James's eyes, and even their black centers, are illuminated. Maybe he's right. Maybe we're like lightbulbs, destined to shine brightly until we go out.

I hear a strange humming sound, and James pulls his phone from his pocket. He reads the text, then puts it back in his pocket. “Time for my treadmill,” he says, standing and jumping from side to side like he needs to warm up. “Good thing I've got my running shoes on.”

I stand too. “I guess I'll see you around.”

He extends his hand. I take it, my hand disappearing in his large grasp. “Thanks for looking for me, for putting Dr. Hodges's info on Triagon's blog. If you hadn't done that, I wouldn't be here. If you hadn't connected the dots, none of us would be here. Thanks to you, we might have a chance.” He walks to the door and stops. “And just because you're too polite to ask, I'll tell you. I'm seventeen years and eleven months old. Amber's birthday is in two weeks; mine's in four.”

Four weeks. On one hand, a month seems like a long time for the doctors to figure out how to save us. On the other hand, I can't help but think that if Amber and James are the only two remaining Mueller babies, in four weeks, I might be the only one left.