The Gender Plan (The Gender Game #6)(47)

Moving to let him do the job, I stepped closer to Jay, placing a hand on his cheek. “Are you okay?”

Jay hesitated. “Yes. No. I don’t know.”

“That’s understandable. She… She really shouldn’t have said those things to you.”

He shrugged, his eyes drifting away for a second. “I don’t feel like I have a mother,” he said hollowly. “Sometimes I don’t even feel like I have a family.”

“Brother.” Tim’s hand touched his own chest as he spoke, his fingertips tapping lightly against his sternum. Then he reached out and touched my shoulder. “Sister.”

I smiled, playfully bumping his hand with my shoulder. “He’s right. We’re your family now, like it or not. If you’ll still have us.”

Jay gave a halfhearted smile. “Of course I will,” he said, and then sucked a deep breath in, pushing his melancholy aside. “I mean—I shouldn’t have said that last part, about feeling like I don’t have a family. You already are. I was just… not thinking.” Some of his sadness still lingered, and on impulse, I pulled him into a hug. Tim draped his arms over both of us, and we just stood there, holding each other tightly.

From behind us, there was a choked sound, and I turned to see Owen standing behind us, his eyes tearing up. “Excuse me,” he said stiffly, and walked out. Cody watched him go, and then swiveled around to look at us.

I took a step forward, realizing that our little session had triggered Owen’s grief, but Jay stopped me. “I got this,” he said, looking even better than before. “And I’ll be okay… after some time. Tim and I will make sure he’s okay.”

I hesitated, but then nodded. He was right. Things between Owen and me were still too tense. There was an awkwardness, a void of space between us filled with things left unsaid. A part of me wondered if they should continue to be unspoken.

“Thanks,” I said. “I gotta check in with Cody anyway.”

Jay flashed me a thumbs-up and then headed out the door. Tim was already waiting for him by the doorframe, twitching impatiently. I watched them go, then moved over and dropped down into the seat next to Cody.

He stared at me warily, and then fidgeted. “You said you wouldn’t be mad,” he reminded me, tugging at his shirt sleeves.

“I’m not mad,” I replied patiently. “But I am worried about what you and Desmond talked about.”

“We didn’t talk about much,” he said defensively, and I sighed.

“Cody, I want to believe you, but we both know you don’t want to be here. You could be lying.”

Cody looked away, and then frowned. “Viggo said something the other day. He said that I’m entitled to my feelings. Do you feel that way?”

I chewed on my lip, wondering if this was a distraction technique, or if there was a point to this. I wasn’t sure which it could be, but decided to let it play out. “I do,” I informed him.

“I thought so.” Cody shifted in his seat. “It made me think about a lot of things, you know. About how Desmond gives us the medicine, but it doesn’t make us feel anything, and it made me wonder if… if she would like me without the medicine.”

“Is that why you went to see her?”

He nodded slowly, his eyes fixed on the table. “She told me I was such a good boy for finding her, and then asked me to unlock her. I… I thought the key for her chains was on the keyring, but when it wasn’t, she got mad at me. Started saying really mean things, like I was stupid.”

I saw a tear roll down his cheek and reached out to lay a gentle hand on his back. He sniffled, and then wiped his cheeks with the cuff of his jacket. “I’m sorry,” he muttered, and I smiled at him.

“You’re entitled to your feelings, remember?” I said. “I’m just sorry that Desmond said mean things to you.”

Cody met my gaze, his eyes rimmed red. “Can I go back to my room now? I want to be alone.”

“It depends—are you going to be okay?”

He thought about it, and then nodded. “I think so. I just… I need to think.”

“Okay,” I said, standing up. I held out my hand, and, after a moment’s hesitation, he took it, allowing me to lead him back to the barn. It was not hard letting myself hope, even for just a moment, that this was a step forward for Cody. The only thing that kept that hope in check was my sense of caution, urging me to wait and see what he would do in the days to come.





17





Violet





I yawned and flexed my lower back, trying to alleviate the ache that had grown there, and in my shoulders, after several hours of sitting. I’d been awake for sixteen hours, organizing, distributing, moving to our new location, and then unloading. The unpacking process was ongoing, but I had been forced to stop participating, as Henrik wanted me to do a detailed analysis of the barricaded roads into and out of the city.

Releasing the stretch, I fought off another yawn and manipulated my fingers, slightly adjusting the position of the drone I was piloting so that the image on the screen swung around, revealing more of this guard post. Using my thumb, I put the drone into hover mode and grabbed the clipboard next to the box containing its remote controls.