[uglies] leave me the way i was before
Title: leave me the way i was before
Fandom: Uglies
Rating: R (swearing, sex, mentions of self-harm)
Notes: embarrassing confession: when i first read these books as a preteen, i started shipping david and shay like the actual minute that it's mentioned that david touches her shoulder at the smoke. i was CRUSHED and BETRAYED when david and tally ended up together instead (lol @ me). anyway 10+ years later, it is super clear to me that a) tally and shay belong together and b) david was kind of a douche. but tbh i still feel some kind of way about david/shay so here we go~
title from "cloud on my tongue" by tori amos.
leave me the way i was before
David sees Shay again in the last place he thought he would, stumbling around the forest on the edge of the city. She is wearing a dress - long and impractical, it's already snagged on a few stray branches - and incongruously, sensible walking shoes. She crosses the forest floor slowly, turning in wide, looping rotations, like she's never seen it before. Maybe she's forgotten that she has.
He only recognizes her because the Smoke's spies have managed to capture a few images of the kids that were taken back to the city. It's been months since the last time he actually saw her, and in that time, those few weeks of her as a pretty had faded. In his memories, she looks the way she did for so long - what she and Tally would call ugly, with her narrow face and wide-set eyes.
He shouldn't reveal himself to her, but the temptation is too great. He slides easily out of the tree he's been hiding in, landing just a few yards away from her. When their eyes meet, she walks towards him with purpose, and that is new and alarming, too - the certainty in her stride is so unlike the pretties he's seen. When she says his name, he knows she is more lucid than she looks.
"David."
There is so much they have to say to each other. He tries to gather the words, doesn't know whether to start with an apology or an explanation or questions - he has so many damn questions.
Finally, he asks, "Won't they know you're out here?"
"I left my interface ring in my room," she says. "They think I'm sleeping off a hangover."
A chill goes through him at the idea. The more the New Smoke grows, the more he waits at the edge of the city to see what's happening, the more he realizes - he has known that they are watched and monitored, every breath they take measured to make sure that nothing is out of place. But he has never fully grasped what that means. Shay is taking a risk just leaving the city boundaries, even though they're far from true wilderness. They'll know something is wrong. Pretties aren't supposed to come out this far.
Which brings him to the question: what is she doing out here, anyway?
"It's easier to stay bubbly out here," she says when he asks. "It's like everything makes sense, you know? Well, of course you know."
He wonders if she's a little drunk, or if this is just how pretties talk. He can't quite remember how she was when they first took her away from Special Circumstances - he'd been so caught up, tied up in the grief of his father's death, Tally's betrayal. He hadn't thought about Shay at all.
Now Tally is off with Zane - and doesn't that sting, that she's chosen the most cowardly, the most shallow -
In truth, David hadn't minded Zane when they'd met, hadn't even cared when Zane chose to stay in the city instead of coming to the Smoke, but jealousy colors his memories of the other boy.
"No, I don't know," he says carefully, watching her.
She sighs, tipping her head back to let the light rain fall on her face. "Everything is so much more out here. It's like - wow. It wakes me up. I forgot things could feel this way. I forgot a lot of things, actually."
She looks at him then like she is expecting an answer, like there was a question in something she said. She cocks her head to the side, watching him with her perfectly round dark eyes, fringed with long lashes.
The worst part is, some part of him does think that she looks pretty. This girl in front of him might not really be Shay, but she's still impossibly lovely. Every feature has been engineered to appeal to whatever primitive part of his brain associates big eyes with helplessness and clear skin with vitality. And it works. He has to remind himself that it's not real, that it's only an illusion the city has created to make everyone pliant and easy to manipulate.
"Is that why you're here?"
"There were rumors you were out here. And so I had to see you," she says slowly. "Before I forget."
"Forget what?" He's amazed the words even come out, his mouth is so dry.
She blinks, confusion flitting across her pretty face. "Forget - everything. Everything…" Then the confusion is gone, her expression clearing. "You. The Smoke. Running away. It's all so clear right now. I'm going to forget tomorrow. For a few months there, I thought you weren't real."
"Maybe it's better that way."
Her mouth twists, and his eyes are drawn to the movement. Her lips are painted dark red, a color he's never seen on her, and yet it is the only part of her that is still familiar to him. He remembers - he still remembers, despite everything - the shape of her mouth under his own, that first and last time they kissed.
It's almost comforting, this last piece of her that they haven't touched, but the smirk on her face isn't quite Shay-like, isn't quite human. He doesn't know if it's that anger just looks wrong on a pretty face, an emotion that they're not meant to have - or if it's something else, if what's coming out of her now is something new and dark.
"It would be for you, wouldn't it?" she asks innocently. Her eyes are still wide, but her words sting, and David thinks she knows it.
"That wasn't what I meant. It's just that…the way things are…" The words trip coming out. He doesn't know what he wants, except for none of this to have ever happened. It's not fixable, none of it can be undone, and it scares the hell out of him. Maybe it would be easier, if Shay simply never remembers. If he never has to explain what he did to her. Because it was him, he can see it now - he'd failed her and his parents and every kid who came to the Smoke. This is my responsibility, he'd told Shay, and then he'd thrown it away like some thoughtless city kid. He'd let himself get distracted, caught up in Tally and the words she'd said, the way she'd looked at him.
And now Dad is dead, and his home is gone, and Shay…
Shay is looking at him now, leaning in close and examining him like he's a particularly interesting magazine from the old Smoke library.
"It doesn't matter, you know. Sometimes I remember you," Shay whispers. She's so close, he can see every detail - the strange, unnatural flickering lights that ring her eyes, every individual eyelash.
Her hand comes up to his neck, fingers brushing the ends of his hair. There's a white bandage wrapped around her hand, and its rough fibers scrape his skin. She stares at him like she's hypnotized, slowly stroking the nape of his neck, her eyes searching his.
He should move away, but he finds that he can't, so maybe he is hypnotized, too.
"Sometimes," Shay says again. "Sometimes I can almost…"
And then she reaches up and touches her lips to his. He freezes with shock for a moment, then instinctively kisses her back, with only a fleeting thought that this is a terrible idea. It is so fucking cold out here, and she is so warm and still so familiar to him - with his eyes closed, their mouths touching, he can almost believe that nothing has changed.
She bites his lip gently - not enough to wound, just enough to cause a shiver to chase down his spine, just enough for a hunger to spike in him. It brings him back to reality, because Shay has never kissed him like this before. This is something new, she is something new.
He pulls back, finds her watching him, pupils huge.
"Better than last time, David-la?" she asks. "I've been practicing, you know."
That hurts, too. It's strange, because he never thought it would.
She doesn't press for a response and merely watches him, her gaze calm and steady. After a moment, she licks her lips.
"Interesting," she says finally. "Bubbly."
Then she turns and disappears into the trees.
~
The crash of the hoverboard into the skeleton of the building echoes through the ruins, the metallic clang reverberating over and over. Every time David thinks it's finished, it repeats again, reaching further and further into the trees.
"Fuck," David says, but he doesn't see any lights in the distance, doesn't hear the hum of a hovercar. It is only Shay, half-tripping off of her board, her steps heavy on the floor.
"Oops," she says with a giggle, the sound rippling into another echo. David rolls his eyes and goes over to her before she can cause any more damage. He takes her hands in his, tugging her back towards his makeshift workstation and sitting her on the floor.
"You have to be quiet," he says.
She pouts dramatically. "Aren't you glad to see me?"
He hesitates, not wanting to entertain her questions when she's like this, but then - "Yes," he admits, because it's true. He's glad she's still alive, that their - encounter - hasn't had any consequences for her. At least she's still just a bubblehead and not - whatever else they might do to her.
"Oh, good, because I'm glad to see you, David-la," she says. She rises up to her knees and bends forward to look at him, her back arching like a cat's. "I need your help."
He opens his mouth to tell her to go away, that she is putting them both in danger for some cheap pretty thrill. That's all this is, he knows, and he has to remind himself of that every time he thinks about kissing her again.
Then she rocks forward - just slightly - and her sleeves ride up. He sees scars and still-healing scabs on her arms, raised and red and angry. They're wide and bold on her skin, not the scratches of a stray bramble, and there are too many of them to be from an accident. He can't help but stare, wonder where they came from. There is nothing in the city that can cause wounds like this. She can't be - the city wouldn't -
"Hello?" Shay asks. "Are you going to help me or not?"
David looks at her more closely and this time he sees a look in her eye, something sharp and cold like the icicles that grew on the Smoke's cabins in the winter. It is that same near-lucidity she had the first time they'd met again, and as his eyes look at her scars, then back at her face, a dark idea begins to form in his head.
"Shay," he asks quietly. "What are you doing?"
"Staying bubbly," she says. "Obviously. Pain works the best - and so does falling off of things - but the city does kind of notice pretties jumping off of buildings. So we have to find other things. Anything, really, that gets you…you know. When you can almost feel your blood flowing. That's when you wake up."
"And what part of this do you need my help with?" he asks warily. Some part of his brain is already tugging at him to say yes, yes to whatever this beautiful girl with the big eyes wants. All a trick, he reminds himself.
"This," she says and kisses him. It's wet and open-mouthed, clumsier than last time, and he tastes alcohol and citrus on her breath. Heat sparks in him, but he manages to push her away.
"Isn't there a party you could be doing this at?" Even as he says the words, something unpleasant twists deep within him at the thought of Shay entwined with someone else, the way he's seen city kids do in their manicured gardens. He wonders if she still looks at pretty boys the way she used to look at him in the ruins, if she still flirts in challenges and arguments, if compliments still make her laugh, always like she was a little startled. He shouldn't care, and yet - facing her again now, he finds that he does.
Shay presses her lips together, that unpretty hardness crossing her face again. "It's not the same. With the others. I don't know why."
Against all common sense, something like pleasure unfurls deep within David. The brief visualization he'd had of Shay kissing someone else dissolves, taking its bitterness with it.
But it's not a good idea. All the reasons tumble through his head - the danger, the city watching them, the way they'd left each other the last time. It's too much, so he only says, "We can't."
Her eyes flash. "You'd do it if I were Tally."
"No, I wouldn't," he snaps. Tally is - Tally feels almost like a dream, like a romance from the flatscreen movies that his parents like to play sometimes. There are times when thinking about those sweet few weeks with her in the Smoke are all that keeps David going - holding on to the hope that they might be like that again one day.
If Tally came to him like this, pretty-minded and babbling about bubbles, he likes to think he would have enough of his pride and sense left to say no - although why he can't seem to say it to Shay, then, he doesn't want to think about.
"You're right," Shay says. "Because she's already cured, isn't she? You gave her the cure - and Zane-la, too, oops - I know you didn't mean for that bit to happen. But some of us didn't get cured, soooo…" She gives him a little shrug, as if to say, I wonder how that happened.
"I am sorry, Shay," David says quietly. "About everything."
Shay bows her head, dark hair falling into her face and hiding her eyes. Then she looks back up at him. "It's just to keep me bubbly. It won't mean anything."
David swallows. He should resist her. He has to resist her.
He can't.
He leans in and Shay meets him there, her lips soft and smooth against his own chapped skin. She slips her tongue into his mouth, and a low thrum starts in his veins, a thrill at what she might do - what they might do together. Despite having checked the perimeter several times when he'd first set up, David glances around one more time to be sure they're alone. He's faintly embarrassed by his arousal; the feelings spiking in him are the kind that he's always had to repress in the dark of his cabin at home.
No, not home anymore. The Smoke is gone. This is all he has left - a makeshift camp outside of the city, a sleeping bag on the floor of an abandoned building, and a girl he used to know wearing a face he doesn't recognize.
Shay pushes him back to the ground and sprawls on top of him, her long dress hiking up around her knees. He can't hear the river anymore - his own blood is pounding in his ears, all he can hear is Shay's breathing, all he can feel is the brush of her mouth against his own.
Shay doesn't seem to care that his hands are covered in calluses when he touches her, that they're not smooth and soft like a spoiled pretty's. She sighs into his mouth, her nails lightly scratching him as she slips her hand down to where he's hard and wanting.
David has never done this before, but Shay's movements are confident. She guides his hand between her legs, showing him just how she likes to be touched while she strokes him. He follows her lead, every circular motion making her breathe harder, making her tighten her grip on his shoulder. When he slides a finger inside her, he feels her body tighten around him, and the intimacy is strange and overwhelming - and good, so good when he arches into her touch, the world falling away around him.
"David, David," she says, breath coming in quick little gasps, his name catching in her throat. She comes with a soft cry, pressing her face into his neck, her body heavy in his arms as she lets herself go.
He feels boneless himself, emptied out in a way that's oddly pleasurable. For a moment, they lay together in silence on his homemade blanket, but then Shay shoves at his chest and pulls herself away.
"Thanks," she says, her voice cold. "That helped. I remember everything now."
David takes a slow, measured breath. "Everything?"
"Of course." She turns to flash him a smile, but it doesn't reach her eyes. "Don't worry, David-la. I won't tell Tally-wa about this. You wouldn't want her to think that you've given up on her, would you?"
David flinches. This is the price, then, of helping her. Every time she comes back to herself, she'll remember everything he didn't do for her, remember that so much had gone wrong even before the Specials came.
Shay adjusts her dress, pulling the shiny fabric back up over her shoulders. Her scars disappear from view, and David clears his throat. "Shay…"
"What?" she snaps.
"You're hurting yourself," he says. "Aren't you."
Shay shrugs. "Better than letting anyone else hurt me." She snaps her fingers, and when her hoverboard zooms to attention, she hops on with a fluid grace so unlike her entrance. "I'll see you around, David-la."
~
He does see her again, and again, and again. She sends a ping to him every few nights - never with a message, only a pulsing notification that comes through the crude network he's rigged up here.
He finds himself waiting for her signal every single night. It's foolish, he knows, but - he wants, wants the release he always feels with her. If he thinks about it too much, he can dredge up some shame for what he's doing, for letting lust overrule his common sense.
But he doesn't feel enough shame to stop. Or maybe his desire for Shay is that strong, which - is something else that he doesn't want to think about too much.
The mind is a weird thing - no wonder it's so easy for the city doctors to mess with. He'd nearly forgotten, but it's coming back to him, slowly, the familiarity of it all. He used to feel the same way when Shay's group of runaways would meet him in the Ruins - the faint nerves low in his stomach, the soft whisper in the back of his mind that of all the runaways, he was hoping to see her the most.
The quiet hum of a hoverboard reaches him, and he turns to see Shay leap down through the empty window frame, landing lightly on the floor. She turns to tug her board through behind her.
She's more and more clearheaded every time David sees her, though he knows he can't take all the credit. She won't talk about it, and he's learned not to ask, but he sees new scars on her body every time she comes to him. Whatever their - meetings - are doing for Shay, it's not enough.
They do talk about other things, when there is time - Shay tells him about the Specials crashing their parties, the handcuffs Tally and Zane wear now, the other pretties she is trying to gather and help - David tells her that the Smoke is trying to rebuild, that they're going to come back for her and Tachs and Ho one day. It's the closest thing he can offer to a truce.
He thought about just giving her the cure, but Mom keeps the pills locked away and she's refused every time he's asked for them. He could only give vague reasons for why he wants them, and David knows his mother would be furious if she knew what he was really up to.
Shay seats herself in his lap and tosses back her hair. "Hi," she says simply, shrugging off her coat and slipping off her sparkly top.
It's almost embarrassing how quickly his body responds to hers. Her hips nudge his in the faintest command and he obeys instantly, rolling over to pin her underneath him.
Pretties' bones are made of some kind of ceramic, he knows; they're healthier and stronger than any normal human could ever be. Shay could flip him over at any second, but she doesn't. She lets him pull off her underwear and skirt, lets him hook her legs over his hips. Sometimes, when they don't have much time, he just makes her come with his fingers or his mouth, but mostly she likes it with him inside her. David doesn't know if it really makes a difference, or if she just wants him to come too, wants to make them even.
There are new scars on her hips and her stomach, and the ones on her arms and thighs are darker, deepened from reopening the wounds again. On impulse, David leans down to trace one with his mouth, but Shay yanks at his hair before he can go very far.
"Leave it," she hisses. "Leave it and just fuck me, will you?"
He doesn't want it to be like this, like some kind of fight that they're having with their bodies instead of with words. He wants to take his time with her, touch the harsh red scars and tell her that he's trying, that he thinks he understands, now.
But that would defeat the entire purpose of what she's doing, probably. Would she even believe him, anyway? He was the one who pushed her away, those final weeks in the Smoke. He'd broken what they'd had, without ever realizing how much there was between them to break.
"This is better, isn't it?" he asks as he pushes inside her, not sure if it's a question or a plea. "Better than - what you're doing?"
"Yes," Shay breathes, but then he realizes that she's not answering him at all, because he tilts his hips again and she says, "Fuck, yes, like that."
When it's over, David braces himself over her, catching his breath. Shay stares up at him, slowly running her hands over his shoulder blades, down to where his hands still rest over her ribcage.
He wonders if he looks ugly to her. Mom says that pretties' eyesight is so good that they can see every pore and ingrown hair from half a foot away; part of their mind-control is an intrinsic disgust whenever they see a natural face. Maybe the constant sense of revulsion is what helps Shay keep her mind awake.
But Shay isn't looking at him as though he's diseased. Her gaze is thoughtful, searching.
"You okay?" he asks.
"Yes. Fine," she says, her voice turning brusque. She lolls her head to the side, looking away from him.
There are no more words he can say; all his apologies and concerns will only make her leave. David dips his head to rest on her shoulder, touching his lips gently to her neck. He waits for her to push him away, but she doesn't. After a moment, he feels her fingers thread through his hair, holding him close.
~
"I don't understand why you did that to your eyes," David says.
They are huddled together in his sleeping bag, Shay's legs entwined with his. Sex always brings her back to lucidity for a while, but every now and then she starts to drift towards pretty-mindedness. David keeps talking, trying to keep her focused.
Shay makes a face. "It made more sense at the time," she admits. "I was thinking - or I was trying to think - that it was like...a metaphor. Like turning back time behind my own eyes. Trying to remember the past."
The bejeweled clock faces in Shay's eyes - her actual, literal eyes - remain one of the most skin-crawlingly invasive things David has ever seen, and yet, he finds himself nodding slowly to her explanation. As ridiculous as it is, there's a sort of sense in it - she'd known, even with the lesions, that there was something wrong with her. Something she'd lost and needed to get back. Maybe all pretties know, deep down, what's happened to them. Dimly, David thinks that he should send a message to the Smoke, tell them what he's learned, but he can't bring himself to move from the warm sleeping bag.
Shay curls closer to him, closing her eyes to get some sleep. David idly brushes a lock of hair out of her face, and she hums happily. Her face is relaxed and even more calculatingly perfect in sleep - dark lashes fanned over her high cheekbones, full lips turned down at the corners. After a moment, though, she twitches just slightly against him, her brows knitting together, as though an unpretty thought has flickered through her dreams.
Something strange and tender unexpectedly cracks open within him. They used to be friends - more, even. Had it really bothered him so much that she was a little impulsive, a little naive? He misses her, he realizes now. He misses racing her on their hoverboards through the ruins, the jokes they'd traded, the way she threw herself into the work at the Smoke. Not as pretty as Tally at first glance, no - but beautiful in her own way, with dirt on her face, her hair yanked back into choppy pigtails, freckles forming on her shoulders. He sees it all so clearly, suddenly, and the longing pulls at his heart until he thinks he actually feels a physical ache.
It won't mean anything, Shay had said, but David is scared that it does.
~
It's raining when they wake up - not heavily, just a light, fine layer of mist surrounding them. David has always liked this about Shay and Tally's city. He likes the damp, clean air and the deep green of the trees and grass. It feels alive in a way not a lot of places do. Maybe that's why their city is so paranoid, so controlling. Nature here is insistent, pressing against the border of the city, reminding them that it can't be dominated.
Shay is getting dressed, in a hurry to get back before her absence is obvious. She chews a toothpaste pill quickly and still tastes like mint when she leans over to kiss him, hard and insistent.
"There," she says, pulling back, her eyes bright. "Nice and bubbly." She traces his eyebrows with one delicate finger. "Thanks for the ride, David."
He finds a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, surprised by the gentleness of her touch. Stay, he wants to tell her. Maybe they can stay here for a while, heal together in this quiet place between city and wilderness, where nothing that they have done or that has been done to them matters.
But he knows better. He has a duty, and so does she.
At the broken window that she always leaves through, Shay tilts her face up to him. "One more, then?" she asks. "It'll hold me over until I reach the city."
David leans down to kiss her, and Shay twines her fingers through his hair, pulling him closer. He can feel the beat of her heart through their clothes, and hopes that she can feel his. That this is enough.
"Shay," he says.
"Mm?"
He slips his fingers underneath the sleeves of her coat, touching where he knows her scars are. "I would take it back, you know," he says softly. "Everything that happened to all of us - to you - I would change it. If I could."
Shay's face softens at that, pretty features turning limpid and longing. "But you can't," she says, her voice sad. "You can't give me my face back."
David swallows. His parents - his mother - might be able to. She and his father had reversed the surgeries on themselves, after all. But it had taken time, and it had been painful, and they had never been able to get rid of their false features entirely.
He takes too long to respond. One side of Shay's mouth quirks up into a wry smile, somehow managing not to look lopsided on her perfect face. "I didn't think so."
There's no anger in her voice anymore, just resignation. She squeezes his hands once, then lets go, turning away to go back to the city.
David watches her until she is out of sight - which does not take long; the thick gray clouds are hanging low and swallow her hoverboard up within seconds. He keeps watching anyway, imagining that he can still see her path back into the city, can see her land at her pretty mansion. They're playing a trick tonight, she said, something to try and keep the rest of her friends lucid while they figure out what Special Circumstances wants with them.
It's not fair that he wants her now, like this. That it took all this loss and betrayal for them to finally understand each other.
David takes one last look at the city. Then he turns to start packing up his things. Croy sent him a message last night, telling him that they found a way around Multnomah's interface; they can try to infiltrate the city tomorrow night and find new runaways. David has to join them.
As he rolls up his sleeping bag, something shimmering and silver falls out. David picks up the piece of thin material, confused for only a moment before he realizes what it is: a ribbon, a useless silky city decoration. He remembers pulling it out of Shay's hair the third - fourth? - time she had come to him. He remembers the way her dark hair had fallen over her shoulders, a spill of ink on his blanket.
He should throw it away, flimsy thing that it is. But he finds himself slipping the ribbon into his pocket, not quite able to let it go.
Fandom: Uglies
Rating: R (swearing, sex, mentions of self-harm)
Notes: embarrassing confession: when i first read these books as a preteen, i started shipping david and shay like the actual minute that it's mentioned that david touches her shoulder at the smoke. i was CRUSHED and BETRAYED when david and tally ended up together instead (lol @ me). anyway 10+ years later, it is super clear to me that a) tally and shay belong together and b) david was kind of a douche. but tbh i still feel some kind of way about david/shay so here we go~
title from "cloud on my tongue" by tori amos.
leave me the way i was before
David sees Shay again in the last place he thought he would, stumbling around the forest on the edge of the city. She is wearing a dress - long and impractical, it's already snagged on a few stray branches - and incongruously, sensible walking shoes. She crosses the forest floor slowly, turning in wide, looping rotations, like she's never seen it before. Maybe she's forgotten that she has.
He only recognizes her because the Smoke's spies have managed to capture a few images of the kids that were taken back to the city. It's been months since the last time he actually saw her, and in that time, those few weeks of her as a pretty had faded. In his memories, she looks the way she did for so long - what she and Tally would call ugly, with her narrow face and wide-set eyes.
He shouldn't reveal himself to her, but the temptation is too great. He slides easily out of the tree he's been hiding in, landing just a few yards away from her. When their eyes meet, she walks towards him with purpose, and that is new and alarming, too - the certainty in her stride is so unlike the pretties he's seen. When she says his name, he knows she is more lucid than she looks.
"David."
There is so much they have to say to each other. He tries to gather the words, doesn't know whether to start with an apology or an explanation or questions - he has so many damn questions.
Finally, he asks, "Won't they know you're out here?"
"I left my interface ring in my room," she says. "They think I'm sleeping off a hangover."
A chill goes through him at the idea. The more the New Smoke grows, the more he waits at the edge of the city to see what's happening, the more he realizes - he has known that they are watched and monitored, every breath they take measured to make sure that nothing is out of place. But he has never fully grasped what that means. Shay is taking a risk just leaving the city boundaries, even though they're far from true wilderness. They'll know something is wrong. Pretties aren't supposed to come out this far.
Which brings him to the question: what is she doing out here, anyway?
"It's easier to stay bubbly out here," she says when he asks. "It's like everything makes sense, you know? Well, of course you know."
He wonders if she's a little drunk, or if this is just how pretties talk. He can't quite remember how she was when they first took her away from Special Circumstances - he'd been so caught up, tied up in the grief of his father's death, Tally's betrayal. He hadn't thought about Shay at all.
Now Tally is off with Zane - and doesn't that sting, that she's chosen the most cowardly, the most shallow -
In truth, David hadn't minded Zane when they'd met, hadn't even cared when Zane chose to stay in the city instead of coming to the Smoke, but jealousy colors his memories of the other boy.
"No, I don't know," he says carefully, watching her.
She sighs, tipping her head back to let the light rain fall on her face. "Everything is so much more out here. It's like - wow. It wakes me up. I forgot things could feel this way. I forgot a lot of things, actually."
She looks at him then like she is expecting an answer, like there was a question in something she said. She cocks her head to the side, watching him with her perfectly round dark eyes, fringed with long lashes.
The worst part is, some part of him does think that she looks pretty. This girl in front of him might not really be Shay, but she's still impossibly lovely. Every feature has been engineered to appeal to whatever primitive part of his brain associates big eyes with helplessness and clear skin with vitality. And it works. He has to remind himself that it's not real, that it's only an illusion the city has created to make everyone pliant and easy to manipulate.
"Is that why you're here?"
"There were rumors you were out here. And so I had to see you," she says slowly. "Before I forget."
"Forget what?" He's amazed the words even come out, his mouth is so dry.
She blinks, confusion flitting across her pretty face. "Forget - everything. Everything…" Then the confusion is gone, her expression clearing. "You. The Smoke. Running away. It's all so clear right now. I'm going to forget tomorrow. For a few months there, I thought you weren't real."
"Maybe it's better that way."
Her mouth twists, and his eyes are drawn to the movement. Her lips are painted dark red, a color he's never seen on her, and yet it is the only part of her that is still familiar to him. He remembers - he still remembers, despite everything - the shape of her mouth under his own, that first and last time they kissed.
It's almost comforting, this last piece of her that they haven't touched, but the smirk on her face isn't quite Shay-like, isn't quite human. He doesn't know if it's that anger just looks wrong on a pretty face, an emotion that they're not meant to have - or if it's something else, if what's coming out of her now is something new and dark.
"It would be for you, wouldn't it?" she asks innocently. Her eyes are still wide, but her words sting, and David thinks she knows it.
"That wasn't what I meant. It's just that…the way things are…" The words trip coming out. He doesn't know what he wants, except for none of this to have ever happened. It's not fixable, none of it can be undone, and it scares the hell out of him. Maybe it would be easier, if Shay simply never remembers. If he never has to explain what he did to her. Because it was him, he can see it now - he'd failed her and his parents and every kid who came to the Smoke. This is my responsibility, he'd told Shay, and then he'd thrown it away like some thoughtless city kid. He'd let himself get distracted, caught up in Tally and the words she'd said, the way she'd looked at him.
And now Dad is dead, and his home is gone, and Shay…
Shay is looking at him now, leaning in close and examining him like he's a particularly interesting magazine from the old Smoke library.
"It doesn't matter, you know. Sometimes I remember you," Shay whispers. She's so close, he can see every detail - the strange, unnatural flickering lights that ring her eyes, every individual eyelash.
Her hand comes up to his neck, fingers brushing the ends of his hair. There's a white bandage wrapped around her hand, and its rough fibers scrape his skin. She stares at him like she's hypnotized, slowly stroking the nape of his neck, her eyes searching his.
He should move away, but he finds that he can't, so maybe he is hypnotized, too.
"Sometimes," Shay says again. "Sometimes I can almost…"
And then she reaches up and touches her lips to his. He freezes with shock for a moment, then instinctively kisses her back, with only a fleeting thought that this is a terrible idea. It is so fucking cold out here, and she is so warm and still so familiar to him - with his eyes closed, their mouths touching, he can almost believe that nothing has changed.
She bites his lip gently - not enough to wound, just enough to cause a shiver to chase down his spine, just enough for a hunger to spike in him. It brings him back to reality, because Shay has never kissed him like this before. This is something new, she is something new.
He pulls back, finds her watching him, pupils huge.
"Better than last time, David-la?" she asks. "I've been practicing, you know."
That hurts, too. It's strange, because he never thought it would.
She doesn't press for a response and merely watches him, her gaze calm and steady. After a moment, she licks her lips.
"Interesting," she says finally. "Bubbly."
Then she turns and disappears into the trees.
~
The crash of the hoverboard into the skeleton of the building echoes through the ruins, the metallic clang reverberating over and over. Every time David thinks it's finished, it repeats again, reaching further and further into the trees.
"Fuck," David says, but he doesn't see any lights in the distance, doesn't hear the hum of a hovercar. It is only Shay, half-tripping off of her board, her steps heavy on the floor.
"Oops," she says with a giggle, the sound rippling into another echo. David rolls his eyes and goes over to her before she can cause any more damage. He takes her hands in his, tugging her back towards his makeshift workstation and sitting her on the floor.
"You have to be quiet," he says.
She pouts dramatically. "Aren't you glad to see me?"
He hesitates, not wanting to entertain her questions when she's like this, but then - "Yes," he admits, because it's true. He's glad she's still alive, that their - encounter - hasn't had any consequences for her. At least she's still just a bubblehead and not - whatever else they might do to her.
"Oh, good, because I'm glad to see you, David-la," she says. She rises up to her knees and bends forward to look at him, her back arching like a cat's. "I need your help."
He opens his mouth to tell her to go away, that she is putting them both in danger for some cheap pretty thrill. That's all this is, he knows, and he has to remind himself of that every time he thinks about kissing her again.
Then she rocks forward - just slightly - and her sleeves ride up. He sees scars and still-healing scabs on her arms, raised and red and angry. They're wide and bold on her skin, not the scratches of a stray bramble, and there are too many of them to be from an accident. He can't help but stare, wonder where they came from. There is nothing in the city that can cause wounds like this. She can't be - the city wouldn't -
"Hello?" Shay asks. "Are you going to help me or not?"
David looks at her more closely and this time he sees a look in her eye, something sharp and cold like the icicles that grew on the Smoke's cabins in the winter. It is that same near-lucidity she had the first time they'd met again, and as his eyes look at her scars, then back at her face, a dark idea begins to form in his head.
"Shay," he asks quietly. "What are you doing?"
"Staying bubbly," she says. "Obviously. Pain works the best - and so does falling off of things - but the city does kind of notice pretties jumping off of buildings. So we have to find other things. Anything, really, that gets you…you know. When you can almost feel your blood flowing. That's when you wake up."
"And what part of this do you need my help with?" he asks warily. Some part of his brain is already tugging at him to say yes, yes to whatever this beautiful girl with the big eyes wants. All a trick, he reminds himself.
"This," she says and kisses him. It's wet and open-mouthed, clumsier than last time, and he tastes alcohol and citrus on her breath. Heat sparks in him, but he manages to push her away.
"Isn't there a party you could be doing this at?" Even as he says the words, something unpleasant twists deep within him at the thought of Shay entwined with someone else, the way he's seen city kids do in their manicured gardens. He wonders if she still looks at pretty boys the way she used to look at him in the ruins, if she still flirts in challenges and arguments, if compliments still make her laugh, always like she was a little startled. He shouldn't care, and yet - facing her again now, he finds that he does.
Shay presses her lips together, that unpretty hardness crossing her face again. "It's not the same. With the others. I don't know why."
Against all common sense, something like pleasure unfurls deep within David. The brief visualization he'd had of Shay kissing someone else dissolves, taking its bitterness with it.
But it's not a good idea. All the reasons tumble through his head - the danger, the city watching them, the way they'd left each other the last time. It's too much, so he only says, "We can't."
Her eyes flash. "You'd do it if I were Tally."
"No, I wouldn't," he snaps. Tally is - Tally feels almost like a dream, like a romance from the flatscreen movies that his parents like to play sometimes. There are times when thinking about those sweet few weeks with her in the Smoke are all that keeps David going - holding on to the hope that they might be like that again one day.
If Tally came to him like this, pretty-minded and babbling about bubbles, he likes to think he would have enough of his pride and sense left to say no - although why he can't seem to say it to Shay, then, he doesn't want to think about.
"You're right," Shay says. "Because she's already cured, isn't she? You gave her the cure - and Zane-la, too, oops - I know you didn't mean for that bit to happen. But some of us didn't get cured, soooo…" She gives him a little shrug, as if to say, I wonder how that happened.
"I am sorry, Shay," David says quietly. "About everything."
Shay bows her head, dark hair falling into her face and hiding her eyes. Then she looks back up at him. "It's just to keep me bubbly. It won't mean anything."
David swallows. He should resist her. He has to resist her.
He can't.
He leans in and Shay meets him there, her lips soft and smooth against his own chapped skin. She slips her tongue into his mouth, and a low thrum starts in his veins, a thrill at what she might do - what they might do together. Despite having checked the perimeter several times when he'd first set up, David glances around one more time to be sure they're alone. He's faintly embarrassed by his arousal; the feelings spiking in him are the kind that he's always had to repress in the dark of his cabin at home.
No, not home anymore. The Smoke is gone. This is all he has left - a makeshift camp outside of the city, a sleeping bag on the floor of an abandoned building, and a girl he used to know wearing a face he doesn't recognize.
Shay pushes him back to the ground and sprawls on top of him, her long dress hiking up around her knees. He can't hear the river anymore - his own blood is pounding in his ears, all he can hear is Shay's breathing, all he can feel is the brush of her mouth against his own.
Shay doesn't seem to care that his hands are covered in calluses when he touches her, that they're not smooth and soft like a spoiled pretty's. She sighs into his mouth, her nails lightly scratching him as she slips her hand down to where he's hard and wanting.
David has never done this before, but Shay's movements are confident. She guides his hand between her legs, showing him just how she likes to be touched while she strokes him. He follows her lead, every circular motion making her breathe harder, making her tighten her grip on his shoulder. When he slides a finger inside her, he feels her body tighten around him, and the intimacy is strange and overwhelming - and good, so good when he arches into her touch, the world falling away around him.
"David, David," she says, breath coming in quick little gasps, his name catching in her throat. She comes with a soft cry, pressing her face into his neck, her body heavy in his arms as she lets herself go.
He feels boneless himself, emptied out in a way that's oddly pleasurable. For a moment, they lay together in silence on his homemade blanket, but then Shay shoves at his chest and pulls herself away.
"Thanks," she says, her voice cold. "That helped. I remember everything now."
David takes a slow, measured breath. "Everything?"
"Of course." She turns to flash him a smile, but it doesn't reach her eyes. "Don't worry, David-la. I won't tell Tally-wa about this. You wouldn't want her to think that you've given up on her, would you?"
David flinches. This is the price, then, of helping her. Every time she comes back to herself, she'll remember everything he didn't do for her, remember that so much had gone wrong even before the Specials came.
Shay adjusts her dress, pulling the shiny fabric back up over her shoulders. Her scars disappear from view, and David clears his throat. "Shay…"
"What?" she snaps.
"You're hurting yourself," he says. "Aren't you."
Shay shrugs. "Better than letting anyone else hurt me." She snaps her fingers, and when her hoverboard zooms to attention, she hops on with a fluid grace so unlike her entrance. "I'll see you around, David-la."
~
He does see her again, and again, and again. She sends a ping to him every few nights - never with a message, only a pulsing notification that comes through the crude network he's rigged up here.
He finds himself waiting for her signal every single night. It's foolish, he knows, but - he wants, wants the release he always feels with her. If he thinks about it too much, he can dredge up some shame for what he's doing, for letting lust overrule his common sense.
But he doesn't feel enough shame to stop. Or maybe his desire for Shay is that strong, which - is something else that he doesn't want to think about too much.
The mind is a weird thing - no wonder it's so easy for the city doctors to mess with. He'd nearly forgotten, but it's coming back to him, slowly, the familiarity of it all. He used to feel the same way when Shay's group of runaways would meet him in the Ruins - the faint nerves low in his stomach, the soft whisper in the back of his mind that of all the runaways, he was hoping to see her the most.
The quiet hum of a hoverboard reaches him, and he turns to see Shay leap down through the empty window frame, landing lightly on the floor. She turns to tug her board through behind her.
She's more and more clearheaded every time David sees her, though he knows he can't take all the credit. She won't talk about it, and he's learned not to ask, but he sees new scars on her body every time she comes to him. Whatever their - meetings - are doing for Shay, it's not enough.
They do talk about other things, when there is time - Shay tells him about the Specials crashing their parties, the handcuffs Tally and Zane wear now, the other pretties she is trying to gather and help - David tells her that the Smoke is trying to rebuild, that they're going to come back for her and Tachs and Ho one day. It's the closest thing he can offer to a truce.
He thought about just giving her the cure, but Mom keeps the pills locked away and she's refused every time he's asked for them. He could only give vague reasons for why he wants them, and David knows his mother would be furious if she knew what he was really up to.
Shay seats herself in his lap and tosses back her hair. "Hi," she says simply, shrugging off her coat and slipping off her sparkly top.
It's almost embarrassing how quickly his body responds to hers. Her hips nudge his in the faintest command and he obeys instantly, rolling over to pin her underneath him.
Pretties' bones are made of some kind of ceramic, he knows; they're healthier and stronger than any normal human could ever be. Shay could flip him over at any second, but she doesn't. She lets him pull off her underwear and skirt, lets him hook her legs over his hips. Sometimes, when they don't have much time, he just makes her come with his fingers or his mouth, but mostly she likes it with him inside her. David doesn't know if it really makes a difference, or if she just wants him to come too, wants to make them even.
There are new scars on her hips and her stomach, and the ones on her arms and thighs are darker, deepened from reopening the wounds again. On impulse, David leans down to trace one with his mouth, but Shay yanks at his hair before he can go very far.
"Leave it," she hisses. "Leave it and just fuck me, will you?"
He doesn't want it to be like this, like some kind of fight that they're having with their bodies instead of with words. He wants to take his time with her, touch the harsh red scars and tell her that he's trying, that he thinks he understands, now.
But that would defeat the entire purpose of what she's doing, probably. Would she even believe him, anyway? He was the one who pushed her away, those final weeks in the Smoke. He'd broken what they'd had, without ever realizing how much there was between them to break.
"This is better, isn't it?" he asks as he pushes inside her, not sure if it's a question or a plea. "Better than - what you're doing?"
"Yes," Shay breathes, but then he realizes that she's not answering him at all, because he tilts his hips again and she says, "Fuck, yes, like that."
When it's over, David braces himself over her, catching his breath. Shay stares up at him, slowly running her hands over his shoulder blades, down to where his hands still rest over her ribcage.
He wonders if he looks ugly to her. Mom says that pretties' eyesight is so good that they can see every pore and ingrown hair from half a foot away; part of their mind-control is an intrinsic disgust whenever they see a natural face. Maybe the constant sense of revulsion is what helps Shay keep her mind awake.
But Shay isn't looking at him as though he's diseased. Her gaze is thoughtful, searching.
"You okay?" he asks.
"Yes. Fine," she says, her voice turning brusque. She lolls her head to the side, looking away from him.
There are no more words he can say; all his apologies and concerns will only make her leave. David dips his head to rest on her shoulder, touching his lips gently to her neck. He waits for her to push him away, but she doesn't. After a moment, he feels her fingers thread through his hair, holding him close.
~
"I don't understand why you did that to your eyes," David says.
They are huddled together in his sleeping bag, Shay's legs entwined with his. Sex always brings her back to lucidity for a while, but every now and then she starts to drift towards pretty-mindedness. David keeps talking, trying to keep her focused.
Shay makes a face. "It made more sense at the time," she admits. "I was thinking - or I was trying to think - that it was like...a metaphor. Like turning back time behind my own eyes. Trying to remember the past."
The bejeweled clock faces in Shay's eyes - her actual, literal eyes - remain one of the most skin-crawlingly invasive things David has ever seen, and yet, he finds himself nodding slowly to her explanation. As ridiculous as it is, there's a sort of sense in it - she'd known, even with the lesions, that there was something wrong with her. Something she'd lost and needed to get back. Maybe all pretties know, deep down, what's happened to them. Dimly, David thinks that he should send a message to the Smoke, tell them what he's learned, but he can't bring himself to move from the warm sleeping bag.
Shay curls closer to him, closing her eyes to get some sleep. David idly brushes a lock of hair out of her face, and she hums happily. Her face is relaxed and even more calculatingly perfect in sleep - dark lashes fanned over her high cheekbones, full lips turned down at the corners. After a moment, though, she twitches just slightly against him, her brows knitting together, as though an unpretty thought has flickered through her dreams.
Something strange and tender unexpectedly cracks open within him. They used to be friends - more, even. Had it really bothered him so much that she was a little impulsive, a little naive? He misses her, he realizes now. He misses racing her on their hoverboards through the ruins, the jokes they'd traded, the way she threw herself into the work at the Smoke. Not as pretty as Tally at first glance, no - but beautiful in her own way, with dirt on her face, her hair yanked back into choppy pigtails, freckles forming on her shoulders. He sees it all so clearly, suddenly, and the longing pulls at his heart until he thinks he actually feels a physical ache.
It won't mean anything, Shay had said, but David is scared that it does.
~
It's raining when they wake up - not heavily, just a light, fine layer of mist surrounding them. David has always liked this about Shay and Tally's city. He likes the damp, clean air and the deep green of the trees and grass. It feels alive in a way not a lot of places do. Maybe that's why their city is so paranoid, so controlling. Nature here is insistent, pressing against the border of the city, reminding them that it can't be dominated.
Shay is getting dressed, in a hurry to get back before her absence is obvious. She chews a toothpaste pill quickly and still tastes like mint when she leans over to kiss him, hard and insistent.
"There," she says, pulling back, her eyes bright. "Nice and bubbly." She traces his eyebrows with one delicate finger. "Thanks for the ride, David."
He finds a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, surprised by the gentleness of her touch. Stay, he wants to tell her. Maybe they can stay here for a while, heal together in this quiet place between city and wilderness, where nothing that they have done or that has been done to them matters.
But he knows better. He has a duty, and so does she.
At the broken window that she always leaves through, Shay tilts her face up to him. "One more, then?" she asks. "It'll hold me over until I reach the city."
David leans down to kiss her, and Shay twines her fingers through his hair, pulling him closer. He can feel the beat of her heart through their clothes, and hopes that she can feel his. That this is enough.
"Shay," he says.
"Mm?"
He slips his fingers underneath the sleeves of her coat, touching where he knows her scars are. "I would take it back, you know," he says softly. "Everything that happened to all of us - to you - I would change it. If I could."
Shay's face softens at that, pretty features turning limpid and longing. "But you can't," she says, her voice sad. "You can't give me my face back."
David swallows. His parents - his mother - might be able to. She and his father had reversed the surgeries on themselves, after all. But it had taken time, and it had been painful, and they had never been able to get rid of their false features entirely.
He takes too long to respond. One side of Shay's mouth quirks up into a wry smile, somehow managing not to look lopsided on her perfect face. "I didn't think so."
There's no anger in her voice anymore, just resignation. She squeezes his hands once, then lets go, turning away to go back to the city.
David watches her until she is out of sight - which does not take long; the thick gray clouds are hanging low and swallow her hoverboard up within seconds. He keeps watching anyway, imagining that he can still see her path back into the city, can see her land at her pretty mansion. They're playing a trick tonight, she said, something to try and keep the rest of her friends lucid while they figure out what Special Circumstances wants with them.
It's not fair that he wants her now, like this. That it took all this loss and betrayal for them to finally understand each other.
David takes one last look at the city. Then he turns to start packing up his things. Croy sent him a message last night, telling him that they found a way around Multnomah's interface; they can try to infiltrate the city tomorrow night and find new runaways. David has to join them.
As he rolls up his sleeping bag, something shimmering and silver falls out. David picks up the piece of thin material, confused for only a moment before he realizes what it is: a ribbon, a useless silky city decoration. He remembers pulling it out of Shay's hair the third - fourth? - time she had come to him. He remembers the way her dark hair had fallen over her shoulders, a spill of ink on his blanket.
He should throw it away, flimsy thing that it is. But he finds himself slipping the ribbon into his pocket, not quite able to let it go.