Read Online The Body Electric - Special Edition by Beth Revis - Free Book Online
Authors: Beth Revis
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dig deeper into Representative Belles’s mind, trying to figure out how he knows this beautiful boy. A name, an address, anything. A ghostly image of their last interaction plays on a loop: the boy looking around furtively, whispering something too fast for me to catch, and holding something out for Representative Belles’s to take. A folded up piece of paper, or maybe a digi strip; I can’t tell. And while Representative Belles’s memories show that he took the paper, he hasn’t looked inside it yet. He himself doesn’t know what it contains.
It could be nothing.
But it doesn’t look like nothing. This boy—this moment—is weighing on the representative’s mind. He can’t forget him, and, judging by the fuzzy outline around him, he’s tried.
I peer closer at the boy. It’s not really him here, just a memory of him. But he looks anxious—almost mournful. I watch the way his eyes dart, left-right. I can see a pulse thrumming in his neck.
A buzzing sound fills the air, and I notice a fat yellow-and-black bumblebee has made its way from the orange groves of Representative Belles’s reverie over the wall into the area where I’m working. The wall seems thinner—through it, I can see the dreaming representative still walking with his grandfather, but I know I don’t have much time left.
I turn back to the repeating image of the boy and lift my hand. A small filing cabinet rises up beside him. I lean over to open the drawer—but it won’t budge.
Locked.
My eyebrows raise. This really is a secret the representative doesn’t want me to know. It’s buried deep within his mind, and though I might be able to extract the information I need, the reverie’s already so close to ending that any effort on my part will break the connection, wake the representative, and leave me empty-handed. I release the drawer’s handle and peer down at the label instead, hoping for something.
Written across the label in handwritten green, capital letters is a name.
JACK TYLER.
I look up at the fading image of the boy who gave the representative a secret message. “Jack Tyler,” I whisper.
The image, which had been playing in a constant loop, stops. It freezes, the memory of Jack Tyler holding out the piece of paper, leaning forward.
And then, impossibly, the boy turns his face to me. His head turns eerily, as if he is possessed.
His pale eyes meet mine—
—And I wake up.
fourteen
My heart thuds in my chest. I can’t get the way he looked at me out of my mind—not just in Representative Belles’s reverie, but in real life, too, when I saw him—Jack Tyler—at my father’s grave.
I tap into the spa’s security feed, watching as Representative Belles wakes up. My cuff connects automatically to the mental spa’s interface system, the image crystal-clear on the thinner-than-paper responsive tech-foil skintight around my wrist.
Ms. White is all smiles and graciousness as she helps him up and leads him to the lifts that go to the rest of the Reverie Mental Spa. I count to ten, waiting for him to be well and truly gone, but also waiting for my heart to calm down. I catch a little of the representative’s conversation with Ms. White before they disappear into the lift—he’s completely satisfied with the reverie of his grandfather and completely ignorant of what I was doing in his mind, that I even was in in his head at all.
As soon as the representative is gone, Ms. White returns to me. She watches me in silence while I peel off the electrodes and straighten up the chair.
I take a deep breath. “He’s scared,” I say finally.
“Scared?” Her gaze is intent, worried.
I nod. “I think he’s afraid of another war.”
“A war he’s contributing to.” When I don’t answer this, Ms. White continues, “Anything else?”
I look down, rubbing the sudden chill from my bare arms.
“Ella?” Ms. White asks gently.
“Just a name,” I say. “Jack Tyler.”
Ms. White stiffens, as if she
It could be nothing.
But it doesn’t look like nothing. This boy—this moment—is weighing on the representative’s mind. He can’t forget him, and, judging by the fuzzy outline around him, he’s tried.
I peer closer at the boy. It’s not really him here, just a memory of him. But he looks anxious—almost mournful. I watch the way his eyes dart, left-right. I can see a pulse thrumming in his neck.
A buzzing sound fills the air, and I notice a fat yellow-and-black bumblebee has made its way from the orange groves of Representative Belles’s reverie over the wall into the area where I’m working. The wall seems thinner—through it, I can see the dreaming representative still walking with his grandfather, but I know I don’t have much time left.
I turn back to the repeating image of the boy and lift my hand. A small filing cabinet rises up beside him. I lean over to open the drawer—but it won’t budge.
Locked.
My eyebrows raise. This really is a secret the representative doesn’t want me to know. It’s buried deep within his mind, and though I might be able to extract the information I need, the reverie’s already so close to ending that any effort on my part will break the connection, wake the representative, and leave me empty-handed. I release the drawer’s handle and peer down at the label instead, hoping for something.
Written across the label in handwritten green, capital letters is a name.
JACK TYLER.
I look up at the fading image of the boy who gave the representative a secret message. “Jack Tyler,” I whisper.
The image, which had been playing in a constant loop, stops. It freezes, the memory of Jack Tyler holding out the piece of paper, leaning forward.
And then, impossibly, the boy turns his face to me. His head turns eerily, as if he is possessed.
His pale eyes meet mine—
—And I wake up.
fourteen
My heart thuds in my chest. I can’t get the way he looked at me out of my mind—not just in Representative Belles’s reverie, but in real life, too, when I saw him—Jack Tyler—at my father’s grave.
I tap into the spa’s security feed, watching as Representative Belles wakes up. My cuff connects automatically to the mental spa’s interface system, the image crystal-clear on the thinner-than-paper responsive tech-foil skintight around my wrist.
Ms. White is all smiles and graciousness as she helps him up and leads him to the lifts that go to the rest of the Reverie Mental Spa. I count to ten, waiting for him to be well and truly gone, but also waiting for my heart to calm down. I catch a little of the representative’s conversation with Ms. White before they disappear into the lift—he’s completely satisfied with the reverie of his grandfather and completely ignorant of what I was doing in his mind, that I even was in in his head at all.
As soon as the representative is gone, Ms. White returns to me. She watches me in silence while I peel off the electrodes and straighten up the chair.
I take a deep breath. “He’s scared,” I say finally.
“Scared?” Her gaze is intent, worried.
I nod. “I think he’s afraid of another war.”
“A war he’s contributing to.” When I don’t answer this, Ms. White continues, “Anything else?”
I look down, rubbing the sudden chill from my bare arms.
“Ella?” Ms. White asks gently.
“Just a name,” I say. “Jack Tyler.”
Ms. White stiffens, as if she
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