The Rebel Code

Chapter Three

"Hello again, kids! I'm Officer Justice, this is Spark, and we're here to talk about feelings!"

"Psst. Jenny." Malina waves the end of a pencil to try and get my attention. I glance at Mrs. Martin, but she's zoned out, browsing the internet with her ProtoBand and not paying us or our animated guests any attention. Malina flicks me a piece of paper, and I catch it in my fist. A note in her perfect, squiggly handwriting.

They cancelled my employment practice because I was scheduled to help out in the principal's office. The academy isn't letting anyone practice here ever since you-know-what. My Employment Skills teacher says to ask a friend to let me come with them. Can I join you today?

I look up and nod eagerly. Whatever I'm on schedule to do, it'll be easier with Malina there to help out. She smiles, and we turn our attention back to the protocol packet DVD, where Officer Justice is doing some kind of tap dance to a song about paying attention to your emotions.

"Now you see, you don't have to be embarrassed about being scared of freeboots! Lots of people feel this way. That's why Criterion sends special people to schools to listen to your feelings and help you out. No one can be efficient if they're scared or sad!"

Mrs. Martin turns off the TV and flips on the lights. "Okay, guys. Assuming everyone was paying attention, you all know what a recovery counselor is. We're handing out appointment schedules today, so everyone will have a meeting at some point this week."

She passes around a sheet of names and dates, and as soon as I get it, my stomach drops. When we do ordered activities in class, we always either go alphabetically or reverse alphabetically. Today is the latter, and as Jennifer Young, I'm first up. Malina gives me a sympathetic smile. Lucky, lucky, Malina Anderson.

Mrs. Martin shows me to the guidance counselor's office. I know our guidance counselor, a nice lady with the longest braids I've ever seen and a full dish of candy always on her desk. But her spot has now been claimed by a woman in a gray suit, with thick-rimmed glasses and tired, flat eyes. She checks my ID on my ProtoBand and motions for me to sit down.

It doesn't take long for me to realize that this is going to be a very one-sided counseling session. The lady—I find out that her name is Karla—is hoping to run this thing like an assembly line. I haven't been in the office for five seconds before the questioning begins.

"Tell me, Jennifer Young," she says in a monotone mumble, "were you emotionally close to the freeboot in question?"

"Mr. Bosman?" I shrink into the chair as she peers at me over the glasses. "I... didn't really know him very well. He was just the physical therapist."

She scribbles on a piece of paper. "When you got the news that he was a freeboot criminal, how did it make you feel?"

Scared, but not for myself. I can think of a thousand things I felt, but none of them are appropriate to say here. Not if I value my family's safety.

"I felt angry," I say plainly. It's not a lie, and I won't have to lie, as long as she doesn't make me elaborate too much.

"Angry?" She presses her lips into a thin line. "What part of that made you feel angry?"

"I was angry when I realized that a freeboot had been living in our town for so long and I hadn't known." Also not a lie.

She nods. "Don't blame yourself. He was under deep cover here. No one could have known. It's okay to feel angry."

It all feels very rehearsed. The questions. The responses. She asks me more about my family life, and I tell her the tragic story of how my parents were killed in a fire, a story I inherited from Mo after she decided that her parents would be more likely to have died in a car accident. Karla asks how that makes me feel, and I say I don't feel anything. I never knew them. She asks if John is encouraging and supportive, and I say yes without hesitation. Some responses I don't have to calculate.