The Calling. James Frey

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ style="font-size:15px;">      In 742.43625 days she’ll be free.

      No longer eligible.

      She’s in the 2nd row, behind a group of administrators, PTA board members, and football coaches. She’s a few seats from the aisle. Next to her is Reena Smithson, her best friend since 3rd grade, and four rows behind her is Christopher. She steals a look at him. Blond hair, five-o’clock shadow, green eyes. An even temper and a huge heart. The best-looking boy in her school, her town, maybe the state, and, as far as she’s concerned, the world.

      “Go get ’em, tiger,” Christopher says, grinning.

      Sarah and Christopher have been together since the 7th grade. Inseparable. Christopher’s family is one of the wealthiest in Omaha. So wealthy, in fact, that his mom and dad couldn’t be bothered to fly back from business in Europe to attend their own son’s graduation. When Christopher crosses the stage, it will be Sarah’s family cheering the loudest. Christopher could’ve gone to private school, or the boarding school where his father went, but he refused, not wanting to be apart from Sarah. It is one of the many reasons she loves him and believes they will be together for their entire lives. She wants it, and she knows he does as well. And in 742.43539 days it will be possible.

      Sarah gets into the aisle. She has on the pink Ray-Ban Wayfarers her dad gave her for Christmas, a pair of glasses that obscures her brown, wide-set eyes. Her long auburn hair is pulled into a tight ponytail. Her smooth, bronze skin is luminous. Under her gown she is dressed like all the others.

      Yet how many others in her graduating class will bear the weight of an artifact onto the stage with them? Sarah wears it around her neck, just as Tate had worn it when he was eligible, as it has been, passed from Player to Player, for 300 generations. Hanging from the chain is a polished black stone that has seen 6,000 years of love, sorrow, beauty, light, sadness, and death. Sarah has been wearing the necklace since the moment Tate got hurt and her line’s council decided she should be the Player. She was 14. She hasn’t taken the amulet off since, and she’s so used to it that she hardly feels it.

      As she makes the trip to the stage, a chant begins in the back of the assembly. “Sar-ah! Sar-ah! Sar-ah!” She smiles, turns, and looks at all her friends; her classmates; Christopher; her older brother, Tate; and her parents. Her mom has her arm around her dad, and they look proud, happy. Sarah makes an I’m nervous face, and her dad smiles and gives her a thumbs-up. She steps onto the stage, and Mrs. Shoemaker, the principal, hands Sarah her diploma. “I’ll miss you, Sarah.”

      “I’m not leaving forever, Mrs. Shoe! You’ll see me again.”

      Mrs. Shoemaker knows better. Sarah Alopay has never gotten a grade lower than an A. She was All-State in soccer and track, and got a perfect score on her SATs. She’s funny, kind, generous, and helpful, and clearly meant for bigger things. “Give ’em hell, Alopay,” she says.

      “I always do,” says Sarah.

      She steps to the mic, looks west over her class, her school. Behind the last line of 319 students is a stand of tall green-leafed oaks. The sun is shining and it’s hot, but she doesn’t care. None of them do. They’re finishing one part of their lives, and another is about to begin. They’re all excited. They’re imagining the future, and the dreams they have and hope to realize. Sarah has worked hard on her speech. She’s to be the voice of her classmates and wants to give them something that will inspire them, something that will drive them forward as they embark on this new chapter. It’s a lot of pressure, but Sarah is used to that.

      Sarah leans forward and clears her throat. “Congratulations and welcome to the best day of our lives, or at least the best day so far!” The kids go crazy, and a few prematurely toss their caps into the air. Some laugh. More cheer, “Sar-ah! Sar-ah! Sar-ah!”

      “While I was thinking about my speech,” Sarah says, her heart pounding, “I decided to try to answer a question. Immediately I thought, ‘What question is most often asked of me?’ and though it’s a little embarrassing, it was easy to answer. People are always asking me if I have a secret!”

      Laughter. Because it’s true. If there was ever a perfect student at the school, it was Sarah. And at least once a week, someone asked what her secret was.

      “After thinking long and hard, I realized it was a very simple answer. My secret is that I have no secrets.”

      Of course, that is a lie. Sarah has deep secrets. Profound secrets. Secrets that have been kept among her people for thousands and thousands of years. And though she’s done all the things she’s popular for, earned every A and trophy and award, she’s done so much more. Things they can’t even imagine. Like make fire with ice. Hunt and kill a wolf with her bare hands. Walk on hot coals. She has stayed awake for a week straight; she has shot deer from a mile away; she speaks nine languages, has five passports. While they think of her as Sarah Alopay, homecoming queen and all-American girl, the reality is that she is as highly trained and as deadly as any soldier on Earth.

      “I am as you see me. I am happy and able because I allow myself to be happy. I learned young that being active breeds more activity. That the gift of studying is knowledge. That seeing grants sight. That if you don’t feed anger, you won’t be angry. Sadness and frustration, even tragedy, are inevitable, but that doesn’t mean that happiness isn’t there for us, for all of us. My secret is that I choose to be the person that I want to be. That I don’t believe in destiny or predetermination, but in choice, and that each of us chooses to be the person we are. Whatever you want to be you can be; whatever you want to do you can do; wherever you want to go you can go. The world, and the life ahead, is ours for the taking. The future is unwritten, and you can make it whatever you want it to be.”

      The kids are quiet now. Everyone is quiet.

      “I’m looking west. Behind you, above the bleachers, is a bunch of oaks. Behind the trees are the plains, the land of my ancestors, but really the ancestral land of all humans. Past the plains are the mountains, from where the water flows. Over the mountains is the sea, the source of life. Above is the sky. Below is the earth. All around is life, and life is—” Sarah is interrupted by a sonic boom overhead. Everyone cranes their necks. A bright streak breaks over the oaks, scarring the blue sky. It doesn’t appear to be moving, just getting bigger. For a moment everyone stares in awe. A few people gasp. One person very clearly says, “What is that?”

      Everyone stares until a solitary scream comes from the back row, and it hits the whole assembly at once. It’s like someone has flipped a switch for panic. The sounds of chairs tipping over, people screaming, total confusion. Sarah gasps. Instinctively, she reaches through her gown and grabs the stone around her neck.

      It’s heavier than it has ever been. The asteroid or meteor or comet or whatever it is, is changing it. She’s frozen. Staring as the streak moves toward her. The stone on the chain changes again, feeling suddenly light. Sarah realizes that it’s lifting into the air under her robe. It works itself free of her clothing, pulls in the direction of the thing that is coming for them.

      This is what it looks like.

      This is what it feels like.

      Endgame.

      The sounds of terror fall away from her ears, replaced by stunned silence.

      Though she has trained for it for almost her entire life, she never thought it would happen.

      She was hoping it wouldn’t. 742.42898 days. She was supposed to be free.

      The stone pulls at her neck.

СКАЧАТЬ