Teen, Inc. Read online

  It was a concrete drainage ditch. I knew it ran alongside the expressway then turned off deeper into the woods. I got closer to the water’s edge, thinking I could stick my ankle in, soothe the swelling, maybe even wash my cut. But it looked dirty, like liquid silver in the moonlight. You could see a little layer of oil or grease swirling on the top.

  I could see the blood on my arm now, too. It looked black, which was cool, though I was too scared to think so at the time. I pulled my shirt down over my shoulder and shimmied my arm free. There was liquid black everywhere. So I climbed on top of the concrete, and balanced on some of the rocks at the water’s edge.

  I either put too much weight on my ankle or hit a slick spot. Next thing I knew, I was in the water, freezing. It felt like being all wet and in a meat locker at the same time. The water wasn’t so deep that I couldn’t stand, but the current was very strong, so every time I took a step toward the bank, I was pushed farther downstream.

  My ankle stopped throbbing and just plain started hurting. I could see that the cut on my arm wasn’t too bad. It was about three inches long, still weeping blood, but the cold water seemed to slow that down. It stung, though, worse than iodine. And the water didn’t just feel cold, it felt like it looked, oily, like something not water.

  I wasn’t thinking too much about it. Mostly I was busy getting knocked down by the current. When I hit a deep section, I sucked water into my lungs. I was off my feet, trying to keep my head up, coughing. It was hard to tell how far I’d gone or where I was. I couldn’t see the fence or the stores. The water stung my eyes so much I had to close them.

  With a thud and a clunk, I hit something hard and metal, and stopped moving. I grabbed at it with my good arm. Water ran from my hair down into my eyes, but I forced them open and made out that I’d hit some sort of rusty grate built into a concrete bridge. I held on and tried to pull myself up, but it wasn’t going that well.

  Then I felt something on my arm, grabbing me, pulling me.

  I thought for a second maybe it was one of the mutant raccoons, that they’d take me to their underground city and make me their king. But it was a human hand, a strong hand. The policeman, I figured, but no, I looked up into a familiar face.

  Ben.

  Short-order cook supreme. He looked all freaky blue from the moonlight, but it was definitely Ben. He was pulling at me with both arms now, and I dropped the raccoon fantasy and started thinking instead that the whole thing was a dream, that I’d wake up back in bed. It would still be morning and my date with Jenny wouldn’t be ruined.

  Only the pain in my ankle, and my arm, which was getting worse, felt real. So did the cold as Ben rolled me onto the dirt and leaves.

  I asked him the obvious question. “What’re you doing here?”

  He gave me a look that said, “Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” but instead he said, “Nancy’s been calling everyone including the army. I thought you might head this way, so I was driving around when I saw your bike in the lot. Then I saw that cop come running around the other side of the fence.”

  He rubbed his thumb against his index finger and noticed I’d bled on him. “That’s not good. Let’s get you out of here.”

  I thought he’d lift me, but we’re the same height, so instead he helped me to my feet. I figured I was headed for a police car, but the cop was nowhere in sight. Ben was watching for him, too, which made me realize he wasn’t going to turn me in.

  I saw the fence looming. “No way can I climb that again,” I said.

  Ben got this little smile. “You won’t have to.”

  As we reached it, he turned, put his back to it and pushed. The chain-link spread open behind him in a line and he pulled both of us through. Okay, so for half a second I thought it was magic, but really, there was just a tear in the fence that I hadn’t seen.

  We walked up a hill and there was his pickup truck. My bike was in the back.

  Moving fast, Ben pulled a T-shirt from his gym bag and wiped my arm with it. “Don’t worry, it’s clean,” he said.

  He looked at the wound the way a mechanic might look beneath the hood of a car. “You might need stitches. We’d better get you to a hospital.”

  He wrapped the shirt around the cut and told me to hold it tight. He didn’t have to, I already knew that part. Then we hopped in the truck and headed out, driving right past two police cars coming into the lot. It was great, like in the movies, only with twice the adrenaline.

  Once we were down the road, I exhaled and asked him, “How’d you find that hole in the fence? That was lucky.”

  Without taking his eyes off the road, he reached down and held up a pair of wire cutters. “Sometimes you make your own luck.”

  “Ha!” I said. “That is so cool.”

  He glared at me. “No, it’s not cool, Jaiden. And don’t think that’s the end of it.”

  He flipped open his cell phone and pressed a number on speed dial.

  “I’ve got him, Nancy. You can start breathing again.”

  “Aw, no! Did you have to?” I said, slumping sideways into the seat. I should have expected it, but part of me was hoping we’d both go on a crime spree or something.

  “He’s got a sprained ankle and a pretty deep cut. I’m taking him to the emergency room,” he said. His brow furrowed as he listened. Ben has these thick eyebrows, and when his brow furrows the hairs in the center rise up like little antennae.

  “What? But … but … Fine.” He snapped the cell shut.

  “What?” I asked.

  “We’re going to my house. They’re sending a car. With their own doctor.”

  “And there’s something wrong with that?”

  He looked at me, then back at the road.

  “I had half a mind to let the cop take you. It’d teach you something.”

  After the way he said it would “teach” me something, I didn’t feel so grateful anymore. I thought about trying to explain, but instead I clammed up.

  His house wasn’t far. Apartment, I mean. Two rooms on the third floor of a three-family house off Gunson, with barely enough property for the driveway and the garage. By the time you walked inside his apartment, you were in the middle of the biggest room.

  It was clean, though, and there was lots of cooking stuff in the kitchen, neatly organized, like it was a store. There were weights in one corner and photos of a woman on the wall, maybe his wife or ex-wife, but I didn’t ask. It sure didn’t look like there was enough room for two people in the place. I was feeling crowded just standing there.

  Ben stood there. I thought maybe he was embarrassed, but I realized he was just trying to figure out what to do while we were waiting. He sat me down, took the T-shirt off, and looked at the cut again.

  “Bleeding’s stopped. That’s good. But I don’t like that color.”

  I twisted my arm to see. It ached, not on the cut anymore, but beneath it. The skin at the edge of the tear was greenish.

  “What is that?” I asked.

  Ben shrugged. “Don’t know. Maybe you’re just still cold. Cold skin turns colors. Blue usually. I’m sure the doctor will figure it out.” Then he made a face. “You know that was stupid, right?”

  I shrugged.

  He looked me dead in the eyes. “What happened with your friend stunk, but you’ve got to understand, your whole life you’ve been inside NECorp. It’s like a fish tank. Everyone can watch you, but you’re safe. School is one thing, but you just don’t have enough experience with the world to try running off like that.”

  I looked at him, annoyed. I felt guilty about being annoyed since he’d rescued me and all, but I was annoyed just the same.

  “So what are you saying? I’m too lame to make it in the world?”

  All of a sudden he didn’t sound like my main man anymore. He sounded like one of the suits.

  “No, you’re making it out all wrong. Ever hear of the bird in the gilded cage? It may want to be free, but if it got out, the first cat it ran across would have it for din
ner. I know your life feels like a prison sentence, but keep getting yourself into situations you have no clue how to handle and you’ll see exactly what the difference is between a corporation and a state penitentiary. You hang tight, though, four more years and you’ll be done with NECorp. You can do whatever you want. You’ll be a free man.”

  “Free?”

  He shrugged. “Free as any man can be.”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond, but as it turned out I didn’t have to worry much. Out the window I could see a black limo pulling up. Nancy got out of the back.

  My gilded cage had arrived.

  Freedom, like Elvis, had left the building.

  7

  A WIN/LOSE SITUATION

  Ever have an experience you think’ll change your life, but all it does is stick you back where you started, only now you’re more miserable because you’re convinced things can never change? The rest of the night was like that, starting with Nancy being worried my bleeding would ruin the limo’s leather interior.

  And it got worse. If she was stiff and robotic before, now Nancy was like the Herbert statue, only without the goofy smile. I thought she’d at least show some relief that I wasn’t dead. But she didn’t. She just stared out the window, yellow streetlamps flashing on her face, her skin what they call ashen.

  I was thinking of saying, “Sorry, Mom,” to lighten the mood, but something told me not to. The only thing she said was, “The doctor will meet us at NECorp.”

  The ol’ HQ never looked more like a mad scientist’s castle than it did that night. It was ten, and almost all the interior lights were off, making the windows black, but the outside spotlights made the white walls glow.

  Two sleepy security guards met us at the door. They flanked me and Nancy as we all marched through the huge lobby, past a big, ugly abstract sculpture that cost millions of dollars, past the cafeteria to the infirmary.

  Dr. Gespot, one of three doctors who looked after me, was waiting, tired and annoyed. He not only stunk of cigarettes, he was also what they call morbidly obese.

  I know people have all sorts of body types, and if someone starves themselves to look like a pencil, that’s weird, too. I think Nancy, for instance, is a bit on the thin side. But I always thought it was particularly weird to meet a doctor who smoked, or was really huge, since he should know exactly how that affected his health.

  Gespot’s weight also made his exams very uncomfortable. When he tried to listen to your heart, his gut would push at your side. Bet he never got an accurate reading because of that. Having that big chunk of gut press into you had to raise your pulse.

  Luckily, he was just looking at my ankle and arm. First, though, he snapped on some latex gloves. “Protects us both,” he once said, a comment that made me wonder if he had something.

  He twisted the ankle and I surprised myself, since I usually don’t scream that loud.

  “You’ve got a bad sprain.” He said “you” like he was talking to me, but really he was talking to himself and maybe a little to Nancy, who was busy punching data into her Blackberry. “We’ll x-ray it just to make sure.”

  Not every corporate facility has its own X-ray machine, but NECorp’s did, thanks to me. They were concerned about any bad press about my health getting out.

  Next, Gespot tried to peel Ben’s shirt off the wound. Some blood was already dry, so the cloth clung to the cut. With a little tugging it came free. He swabbed the edges with cotton and sprayed some stuff on it. For a second it felt soothing, but as the stuff got under the skin, the length of the cut ached.

  He looked at it, really curious, like if I was paranoid I’d say, “What? Am I going to die?” Then he pushed at it a little with his latex-covered finger. Under the examining room lights you could see that the green around the edges really was strange.

  “How long ago did you get this cut?”

  “Hour and a half?”

  “What did you cut yourself on?”

  “Barbed wire.”

  He looked at me like I must be lying, but Nancy confirmed it with a nod.

  “That’s pretty fast for an infection to get this bad, but I suppose it can happen. I’m going to give you a round of antibiotics. And you’ll need a couple of stitches.”

  I thought about those mutant raccoons and wondered if I’d been infected with their blood. Maybe during the next full moon, I’d be one of them.

  “Unless he develops a fever, he should be able to go back to school Monday.” He paused. “Will he be going back to school?”

  Nancy’s brow furrowed. “Haven’t decided.”

  That surprised me. I thought I’d be locked up until I was eighteen. “You mean you might send me back?”

  “The decision hasn’t been made. We’ll discuss it Monday morning.”

  School. For the first time, it dawned on me I might have to go back to Deever and see Jenny.

  Gespot injected some other stuff to numb me up, then it was just like sewing. You feel the pinch of the needle, and the thread sliding in and out, but as long as you don’t get freaked out by what it looks like, it doesn’t hurt.

  Once I was patched up, Nancy walked me back to good old Area 2B and introduced me to this guy standing outside who looked like a college-aged tank with curly black hair. Not someone I’d mess with, which, I guess, was the point. This was Anthony, a new security guard who’d now be posted directly outside my office suite.

  He smiled, all friendly, as if to say “We’re going to be buddies.” I was too intimidated not to smile back.

  “Eight A.M. Monday,” Nancy said. Then she left. She hadn’t even called me by name all night. I didn’t know if she was disappointed, hurt, scared, all of the above, or none of the above.

  As I got undressed I was thinking I was too upset to sleep, but when I hit the pillow, I went right out. No dreams, no nothing. I just remember opening my eyes, seeing a dull glow lining the blinds and realizing it was morning.

  Sunday consisted of waiting for Monday. I watched some DVDs, played some games, but couldn’t concentrate. It was raining to boot, so everything outside the window looked as gray as everything inside me felt.

  My arm still hurt, but it takes days for antibiotics to kick in. No fever to keep me out of school, unfortunately. I wanted to peek under the bandages and see if the wound was still that funny color, but Gespot had told me to leave it alone.

  My personal security-bot, Tony, turned out to be not such a bad guy. He was studying to be a marine biologist, thought the corporate nine-to-five life sucked, and didn’t blame me for running away. Not that he was going to let me out of his sight. But we got along. Played some tournament-style Doom. I rallied for that and kicked his butt, because you can’t just let someone beat you in Doom. That made me feel a little better.

  My food was brought up on trays and Tony took it in to me. That was it for the day. Something about the possibility that I might have to go to Deever made me tired, so again, when I climbed into bed I swear I’d just closed my eyes when my alarm clock went off.

  I didn’t bother to wash. I just pulled on some clothes and met Tony in the hall. I was thinking maybe we could do a perp-walk kind of thing, but he didn’t have any handcuffs. I was tired and embarrassed, so I didn’t say good morning to anyone. Tony almost got lost a couple of times and I tried to direct him to the right conference room. He looked at me like maybe I was trying to trick him, but eventually he believed me.

  When we reached the door, I was disappointed to find out he’d wait outside. I was hoping to have him stand behind my chair, like he was my bodyguard. If anyone got out of line, I could have him shoot them. Then again, the guy didn’t even have a gun.

  Walking in, I noticed three extra chairs, expensive chairs, at the table. Instead of one of those boxes of coffee-to-go and paper cups, there was a carafe and ceramic mugs. That meant one thing: Super-Creep Veeps. They don’t drink from paper, unless they’re trying to act like one of the guys, and they don’t like to do that often, probably figuring wha
t the hell is the point of being a senior vice president if you have to act like one of the guys?

  I figured on Jeremy Banks, from Legal, Carl Kracik, from Human Resources, and the new guy, Ted Bungrin, a transfer from NECorp’s LiteSpring subsidiary, which made, you guessed it, lightbulbs, mostly fluorescents.

  I hadn’t met Ted, but everyone was all excited about him. He was what they all called a real “mover and shaker,” which really just means he made things happen, which was pretty rare in the corporate world. Ben probably did more moving and shaking when he made scrambled eggs than any of these guys did in their entire lives.

  To be totally fair? A year ago, Bungrin spearheaded a new manufacturing process using an innovative filter that reduced the amount of mercury waste the LiteSpring fluorescent plant produced by about 75 percent, while tripling output. Mercury pollution is a big deal, so that won NECorp all kinds of pats on the back, even an award of some kind from the EPA. Everyone felt good about it, and about Bun-grin as a result.

  As I walked in, Jack Minger, standing by the door, gave me a little smile. “You’re in for it now,” he whispered. His tone was joking, and I guess he was trying to be nice, but it didn’t make me feel better.

  I kept my head down as I walked to my seat, trying not to look at anyone else, trying to pretend they weren’t all staring at me, studying my every move. When you look down as you walk, aside from the carpet, which was this gross burgundy color, all you see are shoes, pants, and occasionally legs. Everyone at NECorp is pretty well dressed, it’s part of what they call the corporate culture, which isn’t really a culture the way ancient China was, or Greece; it’s more about dress codes and smiling at people you don’t know or like.

  So all the shoes and pants were new and clean and well pressed, but then I passed these real shiny black shoes that looked like they were coated in glass. Above them were these perfectly pleated gray pants that had to be tailor-made.