Chapter 14
I was back in my hospital room – the only occupied patient room in the entire A wing of the Stark Institute for Neurology and Neurosurgery – and back in a hospital gown. Dr Holcombe and his staff wanted to run some more tests. How well I did on the tests would dictate how soon I got to go home – or, I guess I should say, to Nikki Howard’s loft, since that’s where my home was going to be once I was released, now that I was to resume Nikki Howard’s contractual responsibilities. Of course, Mom and Dad told me I didn’t have to go through with it. The part about pretending to be Nikki. They said (later, when Stark’s legal eagle, Mr Phillips, wasn’t around) that they’d find a way to pay the two million – and the legal fees and fines – if I didn’t think I could handle it. ‘We can always declare bankruptcy,’ Mom said, way too cheerfully. Yeah. Because that’s so what I want my parents to have to do for me. I told them I wasn’t worried. Not about Nikki Howard’s contractual responsibilities. And I wasn’t. I mean, come on. How hard could modelling be anyway? You just have to stand there in front of the camera with your stomach sucked in, right? Look at all those models Frida’s always reading about in her fashion magazines. They’re not exactly rocket scientists. But I’d already experienced enough of Nikki Howard’s personal life to know it wasn’t going to be easy. Nikki’s love life alone was . . . complicated. To say the least. That had my stomach twisted up in knots (although that could have been the acid reflux Lulu had warned me about). The fact was, I was basically going to have to act like Nikki all the time. Only our immediate family was to know the truth about who I really was. According to Mr Phillips, a story was going to be released to the public that Nikki had suffered a head injury when she’d fainted due to her exhaustion and hypoglycaemia, and that the head injury had resulted in amnesia. This was so that when I showed up for photo shoots and didn’t recognize make-up artists and stylists Nikki had worked with before, there’d be a rational explanation. Though if Stark Enterprises really thought amnesia was a rational explanation, they needed a major reality check. I’d told Mr Phillips right away that there was one problem: I might have already mentioned to Lulu Collins and Brandon Stark that I wasn’t Nikki Howard. But Mr Phillips didn’t look worried. He said, ‘The amnesia story will take care of that. ’ And I realized he was right. Lulu and Brandon would totally believe I had amnesia. They were already prepared to believe I’d been the victim of brainwashing by Al-Qaeda or a spirit transfer. They’d believe anything. That wasn’t what I was worried about. Really worried about, I mean. What I was really worried about was . . . well, Stark Enterprises. I mean, they already had my family in an iron grip there was no way we could squirm out of – how were two professors ever going to come up with two million dollars (and fines)? But someone was also tracking Nikki Howard’s keystrokes on her Stark-issued computer. Someone who hadn’t thought Nikki – or I – would notice. And I didn’t want to be paranoid or anything, but I had a pretty good idea who that someone was. And that was her employers at Stark Enterprises. So, yeah. I didn’t want to say anything, but that was concerning me. Stark Enterprises and their sudden omnipresence in our lives. And one other thing. What had happened to me. The me Christopher had said so long ago looked fine. ‘So . . . where’s my body?’ I asked my parents as we sat waiting for Dr Higgins to come and escort me to the testing lab. ‘I mean . . . the one I was born in?’ I saw them exchange glances. Then Mom said carefully, ‘Well, honey . . . we had it cremated. ’ I stared at her in horror. ‘We had to,’ she went on quickly, seeing my expression. ‘We had to have a memorial service. We couldn’t keep what happened to you a secret, there’d been paparazzi at the Stark Megastore, following Nikki Howard around. They got the whole thing on film – it was on CNN moments after it happened. Everyone saw that plasma screen land on you. There was virtually nothing else on television for days – it was a slow news week. We had to have a service. We didn’t have any other choice. ’ ‘You’ll be happy to know it was very well attended,’ Dad said, as if this was supposed to make me feel better. ‘Stark Enterprises paid for Grandma to come all the way from Florida—’ Suddenly, tears filled my eyes. ‘Grandma thinks I’m dead?’ I asked. No more T-shirts with World’s Greatest Grandchild printed on them for Christmas. No more birthday cards with twelve dollars tucked inside. ‘Well, honey,’ Mom said, chewing the inside of her lip. ‘Yes. I’m sorry. But you know what a gossip she is around the pool where she lives. We really couldn’t tell her the truth. ’ I couldn’t believe it. It turned out rumours of my death hadn’t been exaggerated. I was dead. Legally. Medically. Technically. In every -ally, really, except the one way that mattered: literally. I was dead, and I hadn’t even been able to attend my own funeral. ‘Was anybody from school there?’ I asked. ‘At my memorial service, I mean?’ ‘Of course,’ Dad said, sounding a little hesitant for some reason. ‘Christopher, and his father—’ Now, for the first time since I’d woken up in Nikki Howard’s body, I really lost it. ‘Christopher?’ I gasped. ‘Oh my God. You mean you didn’t tell him? Christopher thinks I’m dead?’ Mom and Dad exchanged panicky glances. Suddenly, I was crying so hard I couldn’t even see them. I guess it wasn’t any wonder they thought I was losing it. I saw Mom signal Dad to leave the room – no doubt to search out Dr Holcombe and ask him for more of those coma drugs to calm me down. ‘Honey, you know we couldn’t tell him the truth,’ Mom said, coming to sit down beside me on the bed and putting her arms around me. Cosabella, who’d been busily grooming herself at my feet, hurried over to give me a few concerned licks as well. ‘We felt terrible about it, but . . . well, you heard what Mr Phillips said. ’ Oh, I’d heard what Mr Phillips had said, all right. Thanks to Mr Phillips, the mystery of why Emerson Watts, eleventh-grader, had been saved using the incredibly rare and expensive lifesaving technology of whole-body transplant had been cleared up. She hadn’t. Stark Enterprises had used it to save Nikki Howard. Not me. ‘I know it’s awful to say,’ Mom went on as she hugged me, ‘but . . . Christopher will get over it. Eventually. With time. He really will. ’ ‘G-get over it?’ I wailed. ‘My best friend th-thinks I’m dead, only I’m not, and I c-can’t even tell him – and you think he’ll just g-get over it?’ Frida chose that moment to stroll into my room. Her brown eyes were practically crackling with rage, and her chin was sticking out – sure signs she wanted to have a confrontation with me about something. But she stopped dead in her tracks when she saw that I was crying. ‘What’s with her?’ she demanded. ‘She just found out about Christopher,’ Mom said, gently rocking me. ‘You know, thinking she’s dead. ’ ‘Oh. ’ Frida stared at me. ‘So? Don’t worry about him. I saw him in school the other day and he was fine. ’ This just made me cry harder. It also caused Mom to say, ‘Frida!’ ‘Well?’ Frida sauntered over to where my television’s remote control sat on the bedside table and picked it up, switched on the TV and began flipping channels. ‘It’s true. He was a little upset at first, but he’s already over it. I don’t know why you’re freaking out. You said he’s not your boyfriend anyway. Remember?’ Mom got up, let go of me and snatched the remote from Frida’s hand in one fluid motion. ‘May I have a word with you in the hallway, young lady?’ she asked briskly. The two of them left the room. While they were gone, I tried to pull myself back together. I couldn’t believe how selfish I’d been, not having given Christopher a second thought since I’d woken up. Except for the whole wishing-he’d-been-the-one-kissing-me-instead-of-Justin-or-Brandon thing, I mean. What could Christopher have been going through all this time, thinking I was dead? Was he all right? How had he handled it, those moments after that TV had fallen on me, right in front of him? He must have been so freaked out. Who was he eating lunch with now that I wasn’t in school? He didn’t have anyone else to make fun of the Walking Dead with, or to play Journeyquest with, or to watch surgery shows on the Discovery Health Channel with. Poor Christopher! Unless . . . unless some other girl had snatched him up for herself
. Only who? What girl at TAHS (besides me) had the sensitivity to look past all that long hair and see the potential hottie that lay beneath? What other girl was fine enough? God. Surely there had to be one. She could be sitting down next to him in the cafeteria right now, complimenting him on his avoidance of the tuna salad . . . Suddenly Frida was back, this time by herself. She looked sullen. ‘I’m supposed to apologize,’ she said. Her gaze was on Cosabella, the now black television screen, the window behind me – anywhere but on my face. ‘So . . . sorry if what I said upset you. It’s not true anyway. Christopher’s not fine. I guess. But then . . . he was always so weird anyway, it’s kind of hard to tell. ’ I had already dried my tears – or Nikki’s tears, I guess, although Dr Holcombe told me not to think of my new body that way. It’s YOUR body, Emerson, he’d said. Not hers. Not any more. Right. I just had her name. Her face. Her loft. Her boyfriend(s). You name it. ‘I don’t get it,’ I said to Frida. I still felt like crying every time I thought about Christopher, and how a new girl might be getting to play Journeyquest – or sit around and watch surgery shows – with him right this very minute. Although truthfully, the allure of surgery shows had sort of waned for me. But I was trying to deal with it. As Dr Holcombe had pointed out, at least I was alive. ‘What’s eating you?’ ‘Nothing,’ Frida said. ‘Gabriel left. ’ For a second I didn’t understand what she was talking about. Then I remembered how she’d gone downstairs with Gabriel after he’d dropped me off. ‘Oh,’ I said. Was that what was eating Frida? She was jealous that I’d spent time with Gabriel Luna? ‘OK. ’ ‘He had to. ’ Frida flopped into the chair next to my bed. ‘They wouldn’t let him back on the floor. ’ ‘Well,’ I said, ‘I’m sure he’ll learn to live with the disappointment. ’ ‘God!’ Frida glared at me. ‘You don’t even care about him, do you?’ ‘How can I care about him?’ I demanded. ‘I barely know him. And besides . . . ’ I felt myself flush as I was about to add, I like Christopher. But I couldn’t admit this, not even to my sister. Not even now that Christopher thought I was dead, and I was in Nikki Howard’s body, and I had no chance of ever getting Christopher to like me. So I changed it at the last minute to, ‘He thinks I’m Nikki Howard. ’ ‘So?’ Frida shrugged. ‘You shouldn’t be so hard on him. He’s a really nice guy. He thinks you’re really great. ’ ‘How do you know that?’ I asked her, finding this hard to believe, since I had it from the guy’s own lips that he thought I was a drug addict. ‘He told me, of course,’ Frida said. ‘Down in the hospital cafeteria. We split a cinnamon bun. You know, one of those ones that are as big as my head? Totally fatty, but I’ve been completely off my diet since your accident. It’s hard to do the no-sugar thing when your sister is having a brain transplant. So what did he rescue you from?’ I blinked at her. ‘Excuse me?’ ‘You said back in the hallway that Gabriel rescued you. What from?’ ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Lulu Collins and Brandon Stark kidnapped me last night and took me to Nikki Howard’s loft. But you can’t tell anyone, OK, Free? Because I don’t want to get them into trou—’ ‘LULU COLLINS?’ Frida was on her feet and shrieking. ‘You met Lulu Collins? And Brandon Stark? Are you kidding me? You hung out with them? Where did you go? Did they take you to Cave? Oh my God, did you get to see Justin Bay?’ ‘Whoa,’ I said. ‘Hold on. First of all, stop yelling. And second of all, no, it wasn’t like that—’ ‘Oh my God. ’ Frida stopped jumping up and down and looked at me, wide-eyed. ‘Brandon Stark and Nikki Howard are – used to be – dating. If he thought you were Nikki, he must have – did he try to kiss you?’ I shook my head. No way was I telling my little sister about Brandon’s tongue-dive, let alone what had gone on with Justin – or how much I’d enjoyed both. ‘Of course not,’ I said. ‘He and Lulu were just worried about their friend. It really sucks, Free. I mean, that people think I’m Nikki. ’ Frida, to my surprise, rolled her eyes. ‘Oh yes,’ she said sarcastically. ‘Being mistaken for the world’s most famous teenage supermodel? I’m sure that must suck. ’ ‘Um,’ I said, stung. ‘Actually, yes, it does. And thanks for telling me when I woke up. ’ ‘Telling you what when you woke up?’ Frida cocked her head to ask. ‘About how they’d put my brain in Nikki Howard’s body,’ I said, injecting as much sarcasm into my voice as possible. ‘I appreciate it. ’ If I was concerned Nikki’s voice was too high-pitched and babyish for sarcasm to come across, I needn’t have worried. Frida looked immediately sheepish. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘That. Yeah, well, I wanted to. But they told me not to. They told me . . . well, they said it might upset you. They wanted to give you time to adjust first. ’ ‘Great,’ I said, still working the sarcasm thing. ‘Way to watch my back, sis. ’ But I saw that I’d gone too far when her eyes filled up with tears and she said, ‘Em . . . I was really scared. I thought . . . these past few weeks I thought when you woke up, you wouldn’t even know who I was. They told me that you’d be . . . you know. Yourself. But then I’d look at you, lying there, and I’d just see . . . Nikki Howard. And I thought, There’s no way. I mean, that you’d wake up and be your old self and be mad at me for trying out for cheer-leading—’ ‘You tried out for cheerleading?’ I yelled. ‘Are you insane? Do you know what Mom’s going to do to you when she finds out? Because I’m assuming you haven’t told her, seeing as how you’re still alive. ’ But Frida, instead of looking offended, burst out laughing. ‘See?’ she said. ‘It’s so great that I’m hearing that . . . well, kind of great, because it’s still annoying. It’s just so weird that all that annoying stuff is coming out of Nikki Howard. I guess it’s better than never hearing it again, but—’ ‘Hearing what again?’ Mom asked, coming back into my room. ‘Um,’ Frida said quickly. ‘Nothing. We were just talking about . . . clothes. ’ Dad, following behind Mom, looked amused. ‘That’s what I like to hear. Things sound as if they’re getting back to normal if you two are squabbling. But Em was talking about clothes?’ ‘Well,’ Frida said, looking panicky. ‘No, not exactly . . . ’ ‘We were talking about school,’ I said quickly. ‘And what’s going to happen now? I mean, now that I’m going to have to start working, and I’ll be living at Nikki Howard’s loft and everything, I guess I’m going to be way too busy for high school—’ ‘On the contrary, young lady,’ Mom said, something like the old spark I knew so well showing up in her eye, just as I’d known it would, at the suggestion I drop out of school. ‘Under no circumstances will you be forsaking your education. ’ ‘Absolutely not,’ Dad said. He looked shocked. ‘You can’t put off college, and certainly not high school. There’s no long-term financial stability in modelling, like there is in teaching or a career in law or medicine. ’ ‘Of course,’ Mom said, chewing her lower lip. ‘With your schedule, attending regular school might be hard. We might have to look into enrolling you into one of those performing arts high schools. Or maybe getting you tutors. Perhaps Stark Enterprises could help us with that . . . ’ Much as I disliked the idea of us allowing Stark Enterprises any more access to our lives, I shot Frida a triumphant look. ‘Gosh,’ I said. ‘But I just love Tribeca Alternative so much. I’d really like to be able to keep going there, if I could. ’ Mom and Dad looked plenty surprised to hear that. But their surprise was nothing compared to Frida’s scowl. I guess she’d thought, with me out of the way, she could just do whatever she wanted – become a member of the Walking Dead, try out for cheerleading, maybe even start going out with an upperclassman. Well, she’d thought wrong. ‘Really, honey?’ Mom looked stunned. ‘Well, I suppose we could speak to Mr Phillips. I’m sure Stark Enterprises could arrange something with the school. There’s no reason why, if your schedule allows it, you shouldn’t be able to take some classes there when you can. You may not be able to graduate on time next year, but you’ll still graduate . . . eventually. ’ ‘That’d be great,’ I said with completely false enthusiasm. ‘Nikki Howard would never get into a school with academic standards as rigorous as TAHS,’ Frida, the expert on all things Nikki Howard, chimed in quickly. ‘I mean, tec
hnically, age-wise, I guess she’d be a junior like Em. But she dropped out of high school her freshman year, when she got her first big modelling contract . . . ’ ‘I’m sure if Stark Enterprises gave a big enough financial gift to the school, they could get her in,’ Dad said. ‘If that’s what you really want to do, Em. But, like Mom said, there are tutors – and other schools we could try as well. ’ Frida turned towards me eagerly. ‘Yeah, Em. See? You don’t have to go back to TAHS. ’ ‘Oh no,’ I said, giving Frida the evil eye. ‘TAHS is exactly where I want to go. And they can’t act like they don’t have space. We all know there’s an opening in the junior class, don’t we?’ And my going back there would kill two birds with one stone . . . I could keep watch over Frida and make sure Christopher was OK. And, OK, it wouldn’t be fair of me to make sure he wasn’t dating other girls. I knew if I really loved him and all, I was supposed to set him free. But . . . why should I, when I wasn’t really gone? And I also knew I couldn’t tell him who I really was, either. But still. Maybe we could become friends, like we were before the accident. And maybe . . . just maybe . . . more than friends. Like Brandon and Nikki were more than friends. Only hopefully neither of us would be fooling around behind the other’s back like those two appeared to have been doing. The bad thing would be that I would always know something Christopher didn’t know . . . that apparently, a lot of famous people – because only the super rich (or people like me, who had a massive corporation like Stark Enterprises paying for it) could afford a whole-body transplant – who we’ve been told are dead are actually really alive, just living in a new body. I’m not going to name names (primarily because no one at the Stark Institute would tell me for sure), but hints were dropped that a lot of famous people – some of whom had been about to be sentenced for crimes like securities fraud, several others of whom were famous musicians long thought to be dead by their adoring fans, and still others of whom were members of certain British and European royal families – who supposedly ‘died’ are actually alive and well and just living in different bodies under assumed identities, while their family members go around pretending to this day like they’re all sad about them having passed away. But the joke’s on us, because they aren’t dead at all. In other words, Christopher and I were right all along: there really are Walking Dead. The problem? Now I’m one of them.