Tally looked down at her dress, irritated. Why did she have to wear such a disgusting, city-made garment again? She just blew up ia few/i of the spaceships, and only because she thought they were missiles at the time! She shouldn't have to embarrass herself for itheir/i sake as payment, but she hadn't refused. Everyone knew Tally Youngblood could have refuse, but hadn't. She owed them isomething/i for the destruction she had caused after all. Now, as the party throbbed and moved around her, she was stuck standing by the wall and pushing away any thoughts of how this was like her time as Pretty out of her Special head.
David was staring at her; she could feel his eyes boring into her. An uncommon feeling of empathy washed over her. After three years of living mostly in the wild, she certainly didn't like cities much, but he had never lived in a city before, so being in one was almost unbearable for him.
He could have easily skipped out on the party, saying that only Tally and the Cutters were needed for the publicity. But he had came. It didn't slip by Tally that the only reason he came was iher/i. He was braving a city party for her.
The chatter and laugher around Talley reminded her of her bubblehead days despite David's presence. It was stifling. She closed her eyes, willing herself to stay in control. It came easier each day, but it was still a struggle not to treat everyone – including David, the last person in the world she'd want to – with the contempt she felt for them. Even her follow, cured Cutters were less than her in her eyes. It was sickening to know this, to know that her brain was iwired wrong/i. It was slowly rewiring itself, but it had a long way to go before it would be able to override all the awful "programming" Dr. Cable given her.
Tally's eyes flashed up to David's wishing for only a moment that he had a skintenna and she could merely whisper her words to him, to hear him her head. It wasn't the same thing – communication with David and the rest of the world – then it was communicating with Shay and the other Cutters. They weren't as… connected to her. But something about David and David only was different then the Cutters, closer. More intimate. It was a closer connection than she had with the Cutters, skintenna or not.
Tally glanced around her, noticing the glitter cams – fancy hovercams were all they really were – had given her a wide birth, probably the "reputation bubble" Aya had mentioned. No one was close enough to them to hear her if she whispered something to him now. The people seemed to react the same way as the hovercams. She was glad. From how Aya and the others had talked she was afraid she'd be hounded by hovercams and those who call themselves "kickers" and loose control of her own mind. Realizing, despite her relative privacy, she still might have her Special wiring take control and snap, she leaned forward.
"Let's get out of here. This party is so… bogus."
David's normal face broke into a grin. She took in every detail of his delight including the scar cutting through his eyebrow over his eyes that were lit up with excitement and agreement. To some, he was ugly (Aya had proven that no one had really gotten pass Prettytime's opinion of anyone not being surged as ugly), but to her… to her he was as special as someone who wasn't a Special could get.
"Yeah," he agreed slowly, glancing around. Somehow she could see that he hadn't noticed the fact that no one and noithing/i was too close to them. He seemed surprised. She almost reminded him about the "reputation bubble", but decided not to. It wasn't important. Wishing she had a sneaksuit to blend into the walls and be completely invisible, she crept along the wall to the closes window, David following her.
Once they reached the window, Tally jerked her head, telling him to go first. He wasn't as famous as she was – not that she asked to be famous! – so it would be best if someone caught them and Tally unleashed her Special mindset that he be gone. She couldn't bear to see the look of disappointment in his eyes if she failed to keep her brain rewired for even a moment. He hadn't looked at her with fear in a long time and was certainly unafraid of her now, but he still looked at her with disappointment when she lashed out.
Unleashed, she was a monster. Her contempt for anybody average came out and she reacted violently and angrily, uncaring of who got hurt in the end. The scars on her arm was one way she used to keep herself icy, but know they were a bitter reminder that she had to keep fighting – to keep rewiring herself no matter how many times she came undone.
David was out the window, graceful as anyone, before Tally had time to tell him to wait below for her. Surely, he'd know. He always seemed to know what she was thinking or where to find her. He was perfect that way.
When she heard him land with a soft, but audible through her enhanced hearing thud blow, she followed, falling gracefully through the air. These were times that her Special muscles, agility, and reflexes came in handy. She landed on her feet, unlike David. Grinning, she grabbed his arm, careful not to be too rough in her excitement, and pulled him toward a garden. This girl – this irandom/i - had own pleasure gardens.
The minute the thought crossed Tally's mind – the term, really – she froze. Amidst the shadows, she could see David's face with inferred, but he couldn't see hers. The concerned expression told her he noticed her hesitance now, but he didn't understand it.
Neither did she. She loved David. A part of her that had laid dormant in her time as a bubblehead had always loved him. But… she had only been in a pleasure garden alone with one boy. One very special boy to her. He, like David, was never a true Cutter, but he was something more than a random to her. As he laid in that hospital bed in Diego, she had saw the boy die. The boy's breath just istopped/i.
But months before that, in a pleasure garden that this place reminded her of, he had… kissed her. He had captured her heart as he helped both of them become bubbly and break through the pretty haze that was Prettytime. Becoming bubbly had been their main hobby those days, and kissing most definitely helped. He taught her that. He taught her how to ibe/i bubbly at all. She had been stuck as a bubblehead until he showed her, and she knew she would have continued to be there if he hadn't been there with her, helping her, guiding her, urging to "stay bubbly".
But that boy was now dead. And the last thing Tally did was kiss him. Yes, while she was Cutter, a special Special, she had kissed a random. It was heartbreaking to remember, so much so that the thought made her icy. As the memory, crystal clear as if it was taking place that moment, filtered through her memory, she felt herself shudder.
They were sitting on the shore deep in the wild. They both had been willing to kiss, to try to rekindle the feelings they had had when she was a Pretty, just like he was. The feelings weren't buried as deep as they could have been by her Special new wiring, but they were buried enough and overridden like her brain was simple a computer to be programmed and wired everyone else's whim. She was programmed to think herself superior than the Uglies and Pretties, including the boy she loved. Damaged from a dangerous and experimental cure to Bubbleheadness, he was left crippled and shaking, tremors constantly passing through his body. For a short moment, when all she concentrated on was the feel of his lips against hers, she forgot about the shakes. She forgot about everything average and random about him. But then he'd made a mistake that had been her undoing.
iNo/i Tally thought to herself, standing in the darkness beside David who was trying desperately to read her unshared thoughts,i it wasn't Zane's mistake. It was mine. It was my weakness. The way my brain is wired!/i
He had touched her with his trembling hand while they kissed, and she had came undone, remembering her random and imperfect he was. Remembering he was unSpecial and crippled. She had pulled him away, hurting him in the process with her sneaksuit, and drove into the water to hide from him, to hide in shame of her outburst and own feelings of superiority. That was the last thing she ever did or said to him. Her last memory of Zane was pushing him away and be repulsed by him.
Now standing in the shadows, Tally could make out every imperfect inch of David's face. David.
He wasn't disgusting or ugly to her. Maybe he had been once, but he wasn't now. She was the disgusting one. She was the only who had to fight the way her brain was wired daily. Slowly, as if giving her time for her Special reflexes that didn't need time to pull away, he reached out, putting his hand on her arm. His unspoken question was clear: iAre you okay?/i
Tally shook her head in answer. Suddenly, as if she was completely free of her own brain for a moment, she grabbed the front of his shirt, careful not to rip it, and jerked him toward her. He stumbled forward, caught off guard. She caught him mid-fall with her lips as her arms circled around his waist, pulling him closer and steadying him at the same time.
The kiss iwas/I dizzy-making.
She remembered every detail of her last kiss with Zane – a kiss goodbye- but she didn't remember it being like this. This was like a faint memory of a kiss in the back of her mind, never to be remembered fully. It had been her first kiss. Her very first kiss was with this boy, David, who took on evolution to be in love with her, to think she was beautiful again and again.
After a moment of being unresponsive, his arms wrapped around her body, returning her embrace and her kiss. For a moment, Tally could forget all about Zane and concentrate on David. iJust David/i she thought, though she knew she'd regret this and pushing Zane aside in the morning or even a just a few mornings, she wanted to enjoy this moment. She wanted to savor the way her body craved his touch, wanted him closer, and wanted his lips to move against hers. His hands pressed against the small of her back, pressing her body to his. Her dress, thankfully, wasn't a sneaksuit and even if she came undone like she had before, she couldn't hurt him. Other than her actual body, Tally was harmless. But repulsion didn't seem to exist at the moment. All that existed to Tally was David and David's body and lips against hers, the way it felt. He tasted sweet like champagne that neither of them drank. After three years of caring for each other, loving each other, watching each other, and always being there for each other…
This is what those three years came down to: another kiss. A kiss that didn't repulse or disgust her. A kiss that every inch of her being had craved for three years; she could only ignore the feeling so long, and seeing Aya and Frizz kiss in the jungle must have been her breaking point.
iZane would understand, wouldn't he?/i After all, it was David's name that she had whispered to Zane after he had kissed her the first time. Zane must have known that somewhere deep inside her, she had always remembered and loved David. This boy who was in her arms. She had always loved him. iZane would understand, wouldn't he?/i
Tally pushed David away, only to pull him close in a simple embrace. "That was dizzy-making," she whispered in his ear.
"Yeah," he whispered back, his breathing fast and ragged.
Tally closed her eyes, keeping any new thoughts of Zane, or anyone else but David, from entering her head and keeping her Special programming shut down. For this moment, she only wanted to be iTally/i - just who she was. Not a Special, not a Pretty, not an Ugly. Just iTally./i Abruptly she remembered what David had said before, i"You just look like Tally to me"/i, he had told her. Pulling back, she looked at his face, her eyes soaking in every familiar detail.
"You're beautiful," she found herself whispering.
For the first time ever, it was Tally who was taking on five million years of evolution.