Double Helix Ch. 14

I nearly made it to the barn before I started bawling. I blinked against the tears clouding my vision and slipped inside through the main door. The big space was empty, both vehicles gone. Wracked with sobs, I put my back against one of the bit wooden supports that ran down the center of the structure. My emotions were completely out of control. First my roiling anger against Nock, and now this uncontrollable weeping.

I let myself sink to the floor as the sobs slowly subsided and my mind cleared. I hugged my knees to myself. I was still mad at Nock. Hell, I wasn't sure if I wanted to live in the same house as him anymore, but I needed to figure this thing out. It was possible that Nock made the whole thing up, even the trip to Seattle, though I found it hard to believe that. The part about Martin cheating on me had only come about in response to his grief over his fiance.

So, if that was true, then I had already caught Martin in a lie. That made me wonder if there were any other lies he might have told. My gaze roamed upward to the open window in the loft. That day a few weeks ago, up in the loft, he had mentioned sex in the back of a girl's truck.

Tilly has a truck. The thought jumped into my head unbidden. I stopped breathing for several seconds and had to force down a wave of renewed horror. No, I told myself. That's just one explanation. Maybe he had just been embarrassed and didn't want to talk about an old girlfriend with me.

I had to put this thing to rest, but I didn't want to confront Martin until I had more reason to believe he had done something wrong. I couldn't figure out why he would have gone to Seattle and taken the big truck, when our fixer was in Portland. Much as I hated to admit it, Nock was right. I needed to start there. There was really only one person that I knew of in Seattle that we still had contact with.

I brushed the dust from my skirt and fixed up my tear-stained face as well as I could without a mirror before going back inside. Our house phone was an antique corded device hanging on the wall in the kitchen. It was rarely used, but it had a list of all our important contacts. I dialed the number that said "Mike (medic)" next to it.

"Hey, Norm," Mike said cheerfully. "What's up? Change of plans?"

"Hello, Mike, it's Nissi from the farm in Corvallis," I said.

"Oh. Oh, hi. Sorry, I wasn't expecting to hear from you. I don't think we've ever met in person. What can I do for you, Nissi?"

"Norm is on his way to meet you today?" It was a reasonable guess, given what he had just told me.

"Yeah, supposed to meet him at one this afternoon. He should be leaving about now if he's going to get here in time."

I glanced at the clock. It was just after eight AM. I knew that it was about four to five hours to Seattle if you drove straight through without stopping. Probably closer to five with morning and midday traffic.

"Yeah, he left already, but he didn't tell me why he was coming up there. Why's he meeting you, Mike?"

"Uh, he didn't tell you?"

I twisted the phone cord slowly around my finger. "No, and he didn't tell anyone else he was even going to Seattle."

"Huh. Wait, you said this was Nissi? You know..." He trailed off. "Actually, I'm afraid I can't talk about it. You'll have to ask him."

"Mike," I said, drawing out his name, "this is important. Why is Norm coming to meet you today?"

"Sorry, I can't say. Good bye."

There was a click. Grinding my teeth in frustration, I dialed his number again, but it rang several times and went to voicemail. "Fuck!" I hissed.

Okay, so I knew that he was going to Seattle to meet with Mike. Mike was an EMT, previously a combat medic. Why would Martin need to go see him? Could he be sick? But why hide it from us? And why had Tilly gone with him? Would he tell her something like that and keep it hidden from me?

Or was there something wrong with Tilly? Again, why hide it from the rest of us? What could be wrong with either of them that they would need to keep secret?

I rejected the thought that popped into my head then. It was stupid. It was impossible. Genemods have to take hormone pills to trigger ovulation. But Tilly is unique, I thought. She had been engineered for sociological, rather than economic reasons. Maybe her mother had wanted her to be more like a human in her reproduction. Maybe even Tilly hadn't realized it until now.

It was ridiculous, though it fit the facts. It fit Mike's evasiveness, once he remembered who I was. Good God, had they gone to him for an abortion? And why leave three hours early? An hour, she could understand, but three? Were they so enamored with each other that they left early so they could have sex beforehand?

I shook my head. No, that was too crazy. I was really going out on a limb with that one. Tilly couldn't be pregnant. But again, they had left hours before they needed to meet Mike for whatever they were doing. And why would Martin risk going back to Seattle, where he was still wanted for the murder of a police officer?

I picked up the phone again and held my finger over the keypad, ready to punch in the number for Martin. One call could put this whole thing to rest. Or it could confirm my worst fears. Martin and Tilly would be well up into Washington my now, assuming that they hadn't stopped somewhere along the way for a little fun. Maybe in the back of Tilly's truck?

I hated thinking those thoughts. With an effort, I pushed them from my mind and focused on alternatives. Nock was a bullshit artist. He had known how much the idea of Martin cheating on me would hurt. This thing with Mike and Seattle was pure coincidence. Nock had just used it to lend credibility to his lies. I set the phone back on the hook and walked into the living room.

Stansy and Wendy were watching television and drinking coffee, with Ingrid curled up on the couch back behind Stansy's head. "Hey, sorry about earlier," I said.

Stansy looked at me appraisingly. "Is there something you need to talk to someone about, maybe in private?"

The offer to pour out my feelings and frustrations was tempting, but I didn't think it was a good idea to wallow in them. "No, I'm fine now. Do you know if he's still using the terminal?"

"Nock walked outside a few minutes ago, if that's who you mean."

I nodded. "Thanks."

The den was empty, so I sat down and went through the forums, catching up on what I had missed. Martin wouldn't be home until late afternoon or evening. So I would potentially have several hours to use the terminal unless someone else needed it.

Once I had read through the forums, I closed the browser and considered my next move. There had been something I had been contemplating for some time. I looked over at the gene sequencer, which had sat unused in a corner since Tilly had sequenced her genome to share on the darknet. It was worth a few thousand dollars and had taken many more thousands to ship to us. I had always thought that it was a shame that it would only see a single use.

Sighing, I got up and went over to the machine, moved it out to find the outlet behind it and plugged it in. It flashed to life, connecting automatically to the MC and launching the software there that it needed to run. A green "Ready" light flashed a few times and went steady. I checked the drawer on the end table it sat on and found the plastic bag that contained the blood sample collection kit that came with it. I sterilized my finger and poked it with a lancing device, then drew a few samples.

I had watched the process for using the sequencing machine a few times on the accompanying instructional videos. The machine had come with all of the necessary chemicals and equipment to isolate the DNA and analyze it using quantum tunneling to read and record base pairs. The entire process took a little over two hours.

At the terminal, I accessed the stored genome and searched for a particular long sequence of non-coding DNA. The software identified several instances of the sequence across each of my 23 chromosome pairs. When decoded to binary data, the sequence became a 1024-byte code that, as far as anyone knew, did not exist in any natural genome.

This sequence was present in every genemod created, a kind of genetic barcode to allowed our status to be easily and conclusively identified. Each instance of the code had a palindromic, that is, reversed, sequence of itself, with additional non-coding base pairs between. Those base pairs identified my model, the facility where I had been created, and two sequence numbers, one to identify my run and a second to single me out of the batch of embryos that had been grown. I have to admit that it made me feel a little small to realize that I was number 542 out of 850. I had over 800 sisters who had never made it past early development.

Wendy brought me lunch, but I was otherwise unaware of the passage of time, captivated by my research and analysis. I heard Tilly arrive, bounding in the door with a happy greeting to those in the living room. It was nearly seven in the evening. The clenching sickness in my stomach that I had felt earlier returned. I got up and went to join the others, but ran into Wendy coming down the hall.

"Tilly and Norm want you to come outside," she said.

"What's going on?"

"No idea, but she seemed excited."

I followed Wendy down the hall. Stan, Stansy, Nock and Nonna were there. Nock blew out a breath and pretended to have noticed some terribly interesting feature on the floor. Was he feeling bad about what he had said to me earlier? Well, screw him. He deserved all the guilt his black little heart could conjure.

"Ready?" Tilly said, beaming at me.

"Uh, sure, but what's this all about?"

"You'll see." She opened the door for me and I went through with a shrug.

The delivery truck was parked in the driveway in front of the door, with the back door pulled open. Martin waved at me from just inside. As I came closer and could look further in, I saw that there was a large object, about three feet high, covered by a blue moving blanket.

"Nissi," Martin said, "I wanted to wait until Monday night, but I'm afraid I couldn't wait that long. Happy birthday, my love."

He grabbed the blanket and pulled, sweeping it off to reveal the object beneath. It was glossy black, a foot thick irregular shape with three legs and a thick,stubby shelf on one end. A trio of white pedals hung below it. My breath caught in my throat and I could only stare, unable to believe my own eyes.

"It's a piano!" Wendy cried, and ran up to the end of the truck. She clambered up for a closer look.

"I think you broke her," Stansy said to Martin, giving me a clap on the back. "Trust me, hon', we're all pretty surprised, but you're going to catch flies if you don't close your mouth."

"Where?" I said, still trying to get my bearings. If I wasn't mistaken, it was a full-sized grand piano. I came forward to get a look at the gold lettering on the front. It was an actual Steinway. "How?"

"Yeah, where did you find this?" Wendy asked.

Martin was grinning ear to ear. "Mike arranged it. You remember Mike in Seattle? This beauty has been sitting at the back of a Goodwill in Tacoma for months. It's got a few dings and it's horribly out of tune, but Mike knows a guy who appraised it and said it was easily worth twenty grand, maybe more after it gets restored." He jumped down from the back and put his hands on my shoulders, leaning in for a kiss. "I won't tell you how much I paid for it."

"You went to Seattle to buy me a piano?" I felt tears coming on for the second time that day. What an idiot I was. And what a sad sack of shit Nock had been to make me doubt that this man loved me completely. I looked back over my shoulder at Nock. He still wouldn't meet my gaze. I turned back to Martin. "And how in the hell are we going to get this thing inside the house?" None of the doors were big enough.

"It's going in the barn," he said. I opened my mouth to object, but he forestalled me with a finger to my lips. "Don't worry. I'm not just going to drop it on the dirt. I've got a plan to take out the animal stalls and put in new walls and flooring. There will be two rooms and a bathroom. We'll patch into the power from the house. I'm going to make one of those rooms an office for you, with your own terminal, and the other will be a recording studio." He pointed further back into the truck. "We've got all the materials we need. Walls, flooring, insulation, electrical, even sound treatment, plus microphones. I'll tie into the existing septic-"

I threw my arms around him, cutting him off with a kiss. "Do you ever know when to shut up? It's perfect, and I would love it even if you just shoved it into the sewing room. Thank you."

"You can thank Tilly, too. It was her idea to build you a studio. She thinks you should record your own music and try selling it. I thought you could use an instrument, but the only thing I knew you could play for sure was the piano."

"Really, thank you, both of you. This means a lot."

"Well, that was fun," Stansy said, clapping her hands together, "but dinner is going to burn if I don't get back to it."

"You need help moving that thing?" Stan asked.

Martin shook his head. "I'm just going to leave it in the truck for now. Once I have the flooring down and the walls up, we can move it in."

"Okay, just let me know. This was great. Happy birthday, Nissi."

He turned to go inside, and Nock, Wendy and Nonna followed.

I let go of Martin and jumped into the back of the truck to get a closer look at the piano. There were some scratches and dents on the exterior, and I cringed at the discordant note that it put out when I lifted the key cover and tried a few notes, but he was right. This was a very valuable instrument.

Martin leaned against the back of the truck to watch me. "I thought the whole surprise was blown when Mike phoned me to say that he just got off the phone with you. How'd you know we were heading to Seattle?"

An icy chill settled into my stomach. I had all but forgotten about my questions in the excitement of Martin's gift. "Nock told me," I said. "He said he overheard you and Tilly talking."

I wanted to leave it there, but I knew that this thing was going to tear me up inside if I didn't deal with it. Even so, I nibbled at the edges of the problem first. "Mike said you were meeting him at one, but Nock said you left at five in the morning. That's a good three or four hours earlier than you needed to go."

Martin shot Tilly a look, but then he shrugged. "Andy told me how he avoids the checkpoints. Tilly drove the big truck while I scouted ahead with the Ford. If we ran into a checkpoint, we would need to backtrack, so we wanted to allow time for that."

The explanation made sense. There was nothing else but to go for it. I tried to make my tone light. I didn't want Martin to think I couldn't trust him. "He also told me that you and Tilly have been having sex."

Tilly covered her mouth with a hand. Martin's shoulders slumped and he closed his eyes. "I didn't want you to find out this way. We were going to tell you..."

"So it's true," I said. My voice shook. "Isn't it?"

"Nissi," Tilly said, "I'm sorry."

I should have been furious with her, but all I felt was a profound sadness. "You lied to me," I said to Martin. "You betrayed me. You told me you loved me. How could you do that?"

Martin's voice was low and hoarse when he spoke. "I do love you, Nissi."

"Bullshit!" Now the anger came, flaring hot in my chest. I turned and looked at the piano as my fingernails dug into my palm. It took all of my will not to raise my fist and smash it down on that beautiful instrument. "You never loved me." As quick as it had come, my anger was cooling, giving way to emptiness.

"Please," Martin said, "Nissi, can we talk about this?"

"Just go," I said. I couldn't bring myself to look at him. "Leave me alone."

"Come on," I heard Tilly murmur. "You're not helping her by being here."

One set of footsteps started away and stopped. "Norm, please."

The sound he made was started as a sigh, but seemed to end in a sob. His steps and Tilly's crunched together in the gravel as they returned to the house.

I wanted to scream, if only to push back the desolation, the numbness. I had never given myself over to someone the way I had with Martin. It was made all the worse that Tilly had betrayed me as well. I had loved her like a sister in many ways, in part because of our mutual admiration of Martin. It had never occurred to me that she would want him in that way, but in retrospect, the signs were obvious. The only surprise is that it had taken me this long to see it.

I didn't cry. I would later, long into the night, and for weeks afterward, but for now, I felt like a towel that had been wrung dry. I had nothing left to give. I covered up the piano, that marvelous and extravagant gift that now felt like a kick to the teeth. Then I sat on the truck's bumper and watched the sun slip below the horizon. Some time later, Wendy came out to find me.

"I heard from Norm what happened," she said. "But you need to eat. Come on. I waited until the others were done. I told Norm and Tilly that they'd better stay out of your way."

"What about Nock?" My voice sounded small and petulant to my own ears.

"He's gone, too. It'll just be you and me."

I nodded, looking at the house, then at the driveway and farther on, the dark and empty road. If we had lived in a saner world, I might have just started walking. Instead, I got to my feet and took her hand.