Thirty Nights (American Beauty #1)(5)

Reagan hangs up, the look of obstinacy still on her face. “Don’t worry. We’ll figure something out.”

I simply nod. “Thanks, Reg. And thank your dad too. I couldn’t have made it this far without you.”

She darts across our small kitchen and gives me a hug that squeezes the last air from my lungs. I will miss her like Portland misses sunshine. She is right there with Javier in my small family. The sister I never had. I feel a lump in my throat and retreat quickly before I fall to pieces again.

*

After dinner, I huddle in bed in my flannel pajamas. My parents’ photo is on the nightstand. Peter and Clare. It took one year to be able to say their names out loud. If you name something, does it exist? I turn off the light and start reciting the periodic table. Hydrogen, 1.008… Abruptly—with one of his precise moves—Mr. Hale appears in the darkness. I devour his sculpted lips, dark hair, broad shoulders. I pretend he knows the girl in the painting exists. I pretend he can write laws that don’t make it illegal for her to be me. And I pretend that he can stop time. The last image I see is his sapphire eyes. Then the night changes to a shade of turquoise and I am lost.





Chapter Five





Tick Tock


“What did you say?” Professor Denton is staring at me as though I grew horns overnight.

“Yes, they denied the application. There’s really nothing I can do.” My throat constricts. “I’m so sorry, Professor. You’ll have to find a replacement for the summer, but I can help train them as much as you need me to,” I mumble, as if that’s the real problem.

He looks at me pensively. He has a kind face and a salt-and-pepper beard, with light blue eyes that peer at me through his wire-rim glasses. After what feels like an eternity, he simply shakes his head.

“My country just made a big mistake,” he says, defeated, and takes a deep breath. “Well, you have another month. Let’s see if we can find someone to work with you in England on this last stage.”

Gratitude for my favorite professor floods me. He is not pushing the there’s-got-to-be-a-way agenda. He is thinking practically, as he would with a science experiment. But I cannot think about England right now, especially not something so finite and official as working there.

Still, I smile at Denton. “Thank you, Professor. They’ll have big shoes to fill.” I stand to leave because I know he has papers to grade, but he purses his lips as he does when he is solving a stubborn combinatorial algorithm.

“What about selling it, Isa? I know what it means to you, I really do, but there’s no reason not to benefit from all your blood and tears.” He waves at the wall-to-wall whiteboards covered with my color-coded scribbles.

I nod. “Actually, I’ve thought about it. It can help with my visa but the companies I contacted said they’d be interested in the final product, not the research.”

Denton’s lips purse more tightly than a beaker stopper. “Well, let me dig around. Maybe we can find a smarter buyer.” His voice is almost a dignified pleading.

“It couldn’t hurt.” I shrug, even though I know the trouble is not finding a buyer. It’s finding someone who will buy it for exactly one million. Not a dollar less will satisfy the CIS.

I thank him again and pick up my rucksack to leave. But he reaches over and rests his hand on my shoulder. “For the next month, let’s go with Isa and Arthur if that’s okay. You’ve grown more over the years than any student I have taught. I’d be proud to call you a colleague, as you should have been, if you were allowed to stay.” His voice takes on a casual but melancholy edge.

I cannot find the words to thank him. They are lodged somewhere else, along with my tears.

*

For the next two days, I bury myself in textbooks with a mania that is alarming even by my standards. I take my genomics and neuroethology finals, turn in my report for biochem and even start writing Reagan’s paper on clinical psychology. By the end of each day, I’ve worn myself out so much that I don’t need the periodic table to fall asleep. Javier has stopped by my apartment every night. I worry about him driving around so much in his beat-up Honda Civic. If he gets pulled over and the coppers see he does not have a valid driver’s license, he’ll get deported. After I beg him, he promises to take the bus or bike over here.

We told his parents, Maria and Antonio, but we can’t explain it to his four younger sisters. Still, to prepare them, we said that I may visit England for a while. When they started crying, we dropped it.

Thankfully, Reagan has stopped Googling immigration reform, although I’m sure she is pestering her father on a daily basis. I will have to thank him properly before I leave. Not just him, but all of them, for giving me a home here.

Without conscious thought—like reflex or instinct—my brain summons Mr. Hale again. His eyes trace my throat, my jawline, my lips until my very skin is tinted turquoise from their light. Instantly, I feel warm. I don’t know why my mind invokes him with every ticking hour. Perhaps because his home is the only home where I will remain in this land. Or maybe because he chose to keep me on the same day that his government kicked me out. Whatever it is, he keeps my lungs going.





Chapter Six





When It Rains, It Hales


Thursday morning, I wake up to the deafening crack of Oregon’s thunder. One more final and it’s over. I cannot think about that. I bolt out of bed, throw on the first jeans and sweatshirt that my hands touch, leave Reagan’s finished paper by her rucksack and storm out into the torrential rain to the bus stop that takes me to school. As I duck under its Perspex roof, my ancient flip phone rings from the depths of my rain jacket. I dig into my pocket for the artifact and answer it.