The Becoming of Noah Shaw (The Shaw Confessions Book 1)

WE WALK SILENTLY AND A bit scattered—Jamie’s first in our little queue; I follow with Daniel, Leo, and Sophie. Mara and Goose are behind us. We approach at Jay and Sands streets and we’re not stopped. The police might not know what’s happening, if she’s even here. She’s picked a good hour for it.

“She might not even be here.” Daniel gives voice to my thoughts. Having him beside me is steadying, stops me from thinking about Mara in the study—or office, rather. My father had a study.

I blink in the soft, dusty light. Below us, somewhere, is the carousel, encased in glass like a jewel box. Around us is graffiti, harsh and livid. The sun is trying to rise, like a chick trying to break free from its egg. But it’s not dawn yet.

It feels as though we’ve been walking for ages when I spot the first officer. He’s turned to the side, hands in his pockets, staring at something but I can’t tell what, from this angle. He’s still—unnaturally still—as we approach him. He doesn’t turn his head, his eyes don’t move at all, not even to blink.

Jamie looks back at us. “What new devilry is this?”

“Not devilry,” Leo says. He and Sophie exchange a look. “I’m trying something.”

Goose shouts from behind us. “Has it got anything to do with why I feel ill all of a sudden?”

Leo stops. “I’m working on something. An illusion. For the cops and us.”

“Might’ve been nice to have a warning,” Goose says, looking peaked.

“I didn’t know if it would work,” he says. “I still don’t know.”

“Sophie, how many people are here?”

“I’m only seeing us.”

I hang back, to let Goose catch up. “What’re you feeling, mate?”

“Bloody awful.”

“More specifically?”

“Like I’ve just given ten pints of blood . . . from my brain.”

Daniel tenses. “If Leo’s using you to create whatever . . . illusion . . . he’s creating, on however many people . . . there’s not going to be much Goose can do for anyone else.”

Still, next to him, the percussive sound of thousands of heartbeats batters my skull. The bridge trembles as the trains run, but I don’t hear any cars. Maybe the police have caught on to what’s happening and stopped traffic?

Ahead of us, Jamie’s stopped. When we reach him, I see why.

Stella’s climbed the fence. She’s clinging to it, facing the walkway, not the water. She’s been waiting for us.

She’s not the only one here. There are police above, paramedics as well, and one of them’s suspended between the upper level of the bridge and this one. But like that first officer, they too are frozen.

“I’m glad you came,” Stella says, drawing my eyes. “Wasn’t sure you’d bother to find me.”

Jamie’s nostrils flare. “Of course we—”

“I’m talking to Noah,” Stella says. “I knew you’d find me, if you could. But you don’t have his Gifts.” She spits out the word. “What a bullshit word.”

“Are you doing this because of me?” I ask, point-blank.

She laughs. “Don’t flatter yourself.” She looks at Leo, then, and her eyes tear up. “Neat trick,” she says.

“I wanted us to be able to talk without them getting in the way.”

“If they were in the way, maybe they could actually help . . .” Daniel mumbles.

I shake my head, knowing that Stella heard him—his thoughts, if not his actual words. “If they were in the way, Stella would jump. Isn’t that right?”

She smiles. “I like the water.” She twists her head to the left, as much as she can while she’s gripping on to the fence. “I kind of always wondered what it would be like to jump.”

“Like breaking your neck,” Mara says. Her cheeks are flushed; I can feel the anger coming off her like fire. “Why are you doing this?”

“I’m not doing this,” Stella says. Her rage is cold. “You are.”

“That’s bullshit, and somewhere in there, you know it.”

“Stop,” Leo tells Mara, holding out his hand. He walks toward Stella. “Let me pull you back. All of us, together, we can make it go away—”

Stella’s eyes frost over. “I made a video to make sure it wouldn’t go away. Now everyone will know what we are, that we exist, and they’ll stop what’s happening to us.”

“Or stop us,” Mara says, without pointing out that Stella didn’t actually name anyone to stop.

A twisted smile forms on Stella’s lips. “Yeah. Maybe they will. I hope they do.”

It doesn’t matter. Reality doesn’t even matter—only what’s in Stella’s mind, and I don’t know that any of us have the right words to change it.

If we could get more time, though . . .

“Stella, don’t,” Sophie calls out, interrupting my thoughts. “We can fix this.”

“No, we can’t. Maybe they can,” Stella says, indicating Mara, me. “But we can’t. They’re the Originals. We’re just copies.”

Mara starts to say, “That doesn’t mean what you think—”

“You’re not helping,” I tell her.

“What’s she talking about?” Sophie asks me. “Originals, copies?”

“Just a little something I heard Felicity think before she died,” Stella says. She takes one hand off the fence, the muscles flexing in her arms, her core, as she wipes her hand on her shirt. Her muscles must be on fire. She’s stronger than she looks.

Or something’s making her stronger.

“Noah knows, I bet. Jamie, too.” She pauses. “And Mara, of course.”

I’m wary of latching on to anything she says for fear that she’s already so far gone I can’t trust it, but my conversation with Daniel surfaces regardless. He was the one to first bring up Stella’s type—“suspected original.” Stella just called herself a copy. What does she know now that she didn’t know before?

I wonder if Daniel’s caught it. There’s movement in the corner of my eye. It’s him, backing up.

“Stella,” I say, feeling every second as it’s lost, grasping for more. “You weren’t there when my father said the things he said.”

“I didn’t have to be there. It’s in your head. I can see it.”

“You can see his memory of it,” Mara says. “Memories are tainted. Unreliable. If you bothered to look at my memory, I bet it would be different.”

Stella smiles again, coy. “What makes you think I haven’t?”

I look reflexively at Mara. Her face reveals nothing, her expression almost as still as the paused officers’.

“That’s why I made the video,” Stella goes on. “So everyone can see who you are, what you do. Obviously, memories can’t be trusted. I mean, look where I am right now.”

“You don’t have to be here,” Mara says.

“No, I don’t have to be here. I could be in some basement with a gun in my mouth—it probably would’ve taken people a while to find me. A quieter death would’ve been a lot more convenient for you.”

Leo looks at me, his hands balled into fists. “Why aren’t you stopping her?”

“Stopping whom? Stella’s in control here. Aren’t you, Stella?”

She looks around, up at the frozen police, the paramedics. Then at each of us, landing on Mara, last.

“Am I?”

I follow her gaze—the bodies of everyone who isn’t Us shimmer and blink. And then—gone. It’s elegant, the way they’re wiped away. Replaced with blank space. The pieces don’t completely fit—the pavement shivers, miragelike, where they once stood.

“She’s in your head too,” Stella says to me, but it’s Leo I look at.

“What are you doing?” I ask him.

“I’m trying to make it so we focus on Stella, because I can’t hold the rest of them for long.”

I turn to Goose, who’s sheet-white, with Daniel next to him, speaking in a low voice. Mara takes a step toward Stella. “What am I saying to you, in your head?”

“You’re not saying anything. You’re just there, crouching like a tiger.” Stella laughs, which is especially disturbing, considering the fact that there’s nothing between her and a 135-foot drop. When she rights herself, she steadies her gaze on Sophie.

“You’re next, I think.” She blinks slowly. “I think you’re safe for a while, Leo. I’m glad.”

“I’m begging you,” he says to her. “Don’t do this.” I try and focus my energy on him, on listening to his heartbeat, to hear if he’s lying to all of us or telling the truth, but all I hear is a swarm of flies. I look back and see Sophie, but instead of her face, I see a skull.

“Stop,” I say to Leo through clenched teeth, but Stella thinks I’m talking to her. She’s about to say something back when Mara says—

“Let go, then.”

The words echo, then flatten, then become part of the swarm.

“Stella,” I say quickly, “this isn’t happening the way you think it is.” I turn back, looking for Daniel, for Jamie, for help, and the bridge behind me vanishes, rubbed into white space.

“You said you wanted a cure,” I hear Mara say. “You could be fighting for one. Instead, you’re giving up.”

“Fuck you,” Stella spits. “I’m not giving up, or letting go. I didn’t get to choose my own adventure, but I can choose my own ending.”

I don’t know if it’s a trick of my eyes, of Leo’s, or if what I’m seeing is real, but Stella doesn’t fall from the bridge, or jump.

She dives.