SONDER (IV): tmr thomas

021: I shouldn't remember

Leo 21

We are very little, all six of us. If I had to guess, maybe five years old. The room has colourful posters on the walls, but the paint beneath them is peeling. I have finished my paper, putting my pen down next to the desk. I scan over the complex chemical equations, and the medical terminology as quickly as I can. The rest of the kids are still writing.

A man comes up to me, a frown on his face. He grabs my paper off the desk, scanning it quickly. Slowly, he begins to pace his way to the front of the room. I bite my cheek in anticipation.

Finally, he looks up from his letter. "Excellent job, Jane."

~~~

I wake up in the middle of the night. There is scuffling above my head. Slowly, I glance up above us. Two heads hang above the rafters. They are boys; boys that I don't know. As quickly as they are there, they are gone, heads hidden in the rafters.

I climb up to my top bunk, staring up above us. I can barely make out their shadows.

"What are you doing?" I demand. "Are you seriously back, Newt?"

The little boy nods at me. "The vents are comically wide, you know? I'm surprised that WICKED didn't intentionally create them like this."

His other friend remains silent.

"Who are you?" I ask. I don't recognize him.

The boy stares back at me. "Thomas."

~~~

"Jane," Michelle tosses a ball to me.

I reach for it and fumble with it. Primitively, I tighten my hands. The zap escapes the metal bracelet wrapped around my arm. It stings, but I am always a baby when it comes to pain.

The scientist beside me says nothing when I whimper. I force myself after the ball, picking it up off the ground and throwing to Dawn. "Lottie."

~~~

I'm giggling in a bathroom with Beth. She is twirling her fingers through my hair. For a second, she leans in and presses a kiss on my cheek. Her lips linger too long.

"Sorry," I mutter. It's not that she isn't pretty. Oh God, she is beautiful. Her skin is cream and her hair chocolate. Her smile is contagious, and she is more than perfect.

Beth scoffs, pulling back. Her hands slip away from me. "I get it. I'm not her."

~~~

"So, Eli over there suggested that we all go up at once, to throw off Group B!" Ella smiles. "Like, they take one every month, so we should go a day early all at once and then WICKED's experiment will be ruined."

"I am totally in," Dawn smiles, her smile spread from cheek to cheeks. "Has he talked to the boys? Leo will be totally down, and if you can get either Michael or Don to agree, then the other will follow."