Need Read online

  “Aw, man. I wish I had been with you guys.” DJ sighs. “There is nothing wrong with me.”

  “You had a fever,” Mom says.

  “I have a cold.” DJ rolls his eyes. “The doctors said it was no big deal, but Mom made them do a bunch of tests anyway. What a waste.”

  Maybe. But I still wrap my arms around his slight shoulders and hug him tight. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost him.

  “Hey.” DJ squirms, but not very hard because he loves me. He knows I need this moment. And maybe he needs it too, because the second before he breaks free he hugs me back.

  “Cut your sister a break, kid. Her nerves are shot from all the jumping and shrieking. She put on a better show than the actors did.” Nate gives me a deliberate look. “If you want to watch it again I’d be happy to come back.”

  “That would be awesome. Right, Kaylee?” DJ turns toward me as I’m about to say no. And I can’t, because I see the fatigue under the excitement and the worry that he tries to pretend he doesn’t feel. That soon there may not be movie nights and fun. That the steroids will stop helping. That his kidneys will give out before a new kidney can be found. And I can’t bring myself to take away even a single moment of happiness.

  “Absolutely,” I say. “The sooner the better.”

  “How about tomorrow?” DJ asks.

  Mom shakes her head. “The doctor said you need to rest.”

  “Actually, Mom,” DJ says, grinning, “that’s what the doctor told you.”

  “How about this?” Nate says, shrugging into his thick black coat. “You rest tomorrow, and on Friday we’ll have a horror movie marathon to celebrate the demise of your cold. You can even pick the first flick.”

  “Deal.”

  Mom gives Nate a grateful smile as she tells DJ to get ready for bed. Looking at Nate, she says, “I hope you won’t mention DJ’s cold to anyone. The last thing he needs is more people gossiping about his health.”

  “You can count on me, Mrs. D.”

  “That’s great.” She gives an absent smile. “Have a good night.” Without a glance at me, she hurries after my brother to make sure he actually goes to bed instead of reading comic books by flashlight.

  “Thanks,” I say, walking Nate to the door.

  “You never have to thank me for watching scary movies.”

  “Not that.” I smile, grateful that he once again has the words to make me feel better. “But . . . tonight. Putting up with me. Keeping me sane. Being nice to DJ. You know.”

  “I know.” Nate steps forward and wraps his arms around me for the second time tonight. I think that’s a record. I must look pathetic, but at the moment I don’t care. I lean into him and breathe in the smell of popcorn and dog, and the faint scent of cigarette smoke that means his mother has fallen off the no-smoking wagon again. For several seconds we just stand there. When we were nine, Nate told me we could do anything as long as we did it together. I think he got the line from a movie. He was a film junkie even then. But wherever he got it, I believed him. And I still believe him, because he’s here after all the mistakes I’ve made and the idiotic things I’ve done. Because that’s what best friends do.

  “Call me tomorrow and let me know how you’re doing.” He gives me one last hug before jamming the purple hat his grandmother knitted for him onto his head. “And don’t forget to check your inbox and accept the invitation. You don’t want to live with my failing physics grade on your conscience, do you?”

  He heads out into the cold and I lock the door after him. Then I watch out the front window as he walks down the driveway I shoveled yesterday to the street. When he reaches it, he turns and waves. I smile, wave back, and watch him trudge out of sight, knowing he’ll text me when he gets home because I like hearing he’s safe. Nate is crazy and fun and sometimes a touch wild, but he’s always forgiving of what he calls my compulsive need to control the world.

  Figuring my mother is too tired to come back downstairs, I check to make sure the back door is locked, then head upstairs. There’s light under Mom’s door, but I don’t knock to see if she’s still awake. Instead I walk to the next closed door, turn the handle, and squint into the darkness. I don’t step inside because I’ve learned the hard way that I don’t want to walk on whatever LEGO are currently scattered across the floor. So I stand in the doorway and watch DJ sleep, grateful his breathing is easy. For tonight he’s okay, and for the zillionth time I wish I were different so I could help make him well.

  As I close DJ’s door, my mother steps out into the hall. “Is everything all right?” she whispers.

  “Everything’s fine. I just wanted to make sure he didn’t need anything before I went to bed. You should get some sleep,” I tell her. She has to get up for work in the morning.

  “I will. You should go to bed too.” Mom frowns and looks down at her hands. “And I know I said you could get some of those driving hours in after I get off work tomorrow, but with DJ’s cold, I don’t want him going in the car unless he has to and he shouldn’t be left home alone . . .”

  “Don’t worry about it, Mom.” I shrug. “It’s no big deal.” Nate isn’t the only one who can lie. “We can do it another time when things are better. Maybe Sunday.”

  “We’ll see.”

  I’ve heard those words enough to know that I have a better chance of having a pink pony delivered to my door than getting a driving lesson this weekend. At this rate, I’ll earn my license by the time I graduate college. I could get angry, but there are more important things to focus on.

  “Mom . . .” I say before I can lose my nerve. “Have you thought any more about hiring a private detective? I could chip in the money Nana and Papa sent me for Christmas. It’s not a lot, but it could—”

  “I told you no, Kaylee.”

  I flinch at the anger in her voice, but I don’t back down. “But if there’s a chance Dad could be a match—”

  “If your father was interested in helping your brother, he would never have left in the first place. We’ve even talked this through with Dr. Jain. I’m handling things. I expect you to let me. Now go to bed.”

  She goes to her room and closes the door behind her. I hear the click of the lock. My mother has shut me out. Again. And really, why should tonight be any different? I could force the issue and demand she talk to me, but that would only wake up DJ. That wouldn’t help anything.

  I ball my hands into fists and stare at the door, foolishly waiting for her to change her mind. For once, I want her to understand. Yes, Craigslist wasn’t smart. Lying about a cash reward for anyone who got tested and was a match wasn’t just a bad idea, it was illegal. Something I didn’t realize when I did it. But I was desperate. I’ve done so many things out of desperation to help. And so far, instead of saving DJ’s life, I’ve screwed up everything about my own.

  I change into a pair of flannel pants and a T-shirt and am climbing into bed when I hear my phone vibrate. Nate. He’s texting to say he arrived home and is hoping I am sitting at my desk, helping him secure a better future with an improved grade.

  I text back that I wouldn’t dare limit the possibilities for his life. Then I hop out of bed and walk over to my laptop. A few keystrokes and I click on the email with the header “Nate Weakley has invited you to NEED.”

  CONGRATULATIONS. YOU HAVE BEEN INVITED TO NEED—THE NEWEST, INVITATION-ONLY SOCIAL MEDIA SITE FOR NOTTAWA HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS. JOIN YOUR FRIENDS IN DISCOVERING HOW MUCH BETTER LIFE CAN BE WHEN YOU ARE PRESENTED WITH AN ANONYMOUS WAY TO EXPRESS YOUR THOUGHTS AND ARE GIVEN THE TOOLS TO GET THE THINGS YOU NEED.

  I didn’t realize the site was only for NHS students. That’s strange. But now that I know, I push my chair back from the desk and think twice about clicking on the link below the sales pitch. While I don’t like most of the people from my high school, and I don’t associate with them unless I can’t avoid it, accepting their online friendship requests is basically a requirement. Why they bother to send those requests is beyond me, but it seems like the m
ore someone dislikes a person, the more they want to have contact on the Internet. Up until now, I’ve ignored anything they post, especially when it seems like they’re baiting me into a response.

  Most of the kids at my school are jerks. A few got tested when I put posters up and began passing out flyers about the kidney donation process before class. Three that I know of out of hundreds. The rest stopped meeting my eyes in the hall. Even the teachers looked the other way, so I fought back. I fought for my brother. Nate says I shouldn’t take their name-calling personally. He says everyone hates feeling like a coward for not wanting to be tested. And instead of admitting it, they attack the person who has forced them to acknowledge to themselves that they’re afraid.

  Maybe he’s right. It’s hard to separate what they’ve done out of embarrassment from what I’ve done out of anger. I’m to blame for a lot, but not for everything. The rest is on them. Which is why I avoid dealing with them online as much as possible. Why bother if I don’t have to? Then again, unlike all the others, this site wants its members to be anonymous. The network doesn’t want anyone to know who’s lurking behind the profiles. No one will know I’m a member. I know I’m trying to talk myself into joining because I don’t want to disappoint Nate, and deep down I have to admit that I’m curious to see how my classmates and former friends interact online when they don’t know who they’re talking to and when they’re certain their parents or other adults in the community aren’t watching.

  Biting my lip, I roll my chair back to the desk and click the link with my mouse.

  Welcome to NEED appears on the screen.

  PLEASE ENTER YOUR NAME AND CLICK THE BOX TO CONFIRM YOU ARE A STUDENT CURRENTLY ENROLLED IN NOTTAWA HIGH SCHOOL.

  I follow the instructions and hit Enter. A new screen appears giving me my site identification number, D106; congratulating me on becoming a part of NEED; and inviting me to customize my home page. There are lots of options for adding wallpaper, changing my avatar to one of the hundreds of colorful images in the NEED database, and choosing links to the Need Exchange page, where members can message each other. I click around the site for a few minutes, trying to decipher its purpose, and end up on the page that Nate showed me earlier.

  I read the boldface words again.

  WANT: A DESIRE TO POSSESS OR DO SOMETHING. A WISH.

  NEED: SOMETHING REQUIRED BECAUSE IT IS ESSENTIAL. SOMETHING VERY IMPORTANT THAT YOU CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT.

  WHAT DO YOU NEED?

  I stare at the question and the blinking cursor in the box below it and think of my mother telling me she doesn’t have time for me, again. Of the way she locked the door to keep me out. Is she concerned about DJ? Yes. Should she be? Absolutely. Nephrotic syndrome is scary. Incredibly scary, even in the best of circumstances. Is Mom upset that I keep pressing the issue of searching for Dad? Of course. But I can hear more than concern and frustration behind her words. I see it in her eyes every time she thinks I’m not watching. It doesn’t matter that I didn’t hesitate before offering to be a donor for my brother. It doesn’t matter that I asked the doctors to test me anyway even though my blood type isn’t a match. It only matters that when my mother sees me, she sees herself. Someone not quite good enough to save DJ. And, as hard as I’ve tried, I can’t find the person who can.

  I wipe tears from my cheek with my T-shirt and take a deep breath. Crying is stupid. And I hate feeling stupid.

  WHAT DO YOU NEED?

  The red words on the screen are seductive. Do I believe someone sitting behind a computer creating a website for high school students can help me? Do I believe that whoever created this site really wants to make my life better?

  No. I’m not that naive. But in the darkness, I find myself wanting to believe there is someone who cares. Someone who opens the door to me instead of bolting it shut. So, under the question that asks what I need, I type:

  I NEED A KIDNEY FOR MY BROTHER.

  And I press Enter.

  The minute my finger hits the key, I want to take back the request. How dumb can I be? The site is anonymous now, but even so, other members will know this request came from me. They’ll all laugh at me. Great.

  The same message I saw when Nate made his request flashes: NEED REQUEST BEING VERIFIED. PLEASE STAND BY. Followed by a red ticking clock. I watch the second hand crawl and wait for the site to send a reply.

  Tick. Tick. Tick.

  With each passing second, I feel more foolish. Ten minutes go by and the clock is still ticking. Huh. Maybe my screen is frozen. I shut down the browser and log on again to NEED. The clock reappears. The hands are still moving, and I start to wonder if the response Nate received was sent by a live operator. If so, the person behind the system is either long asleep or completely baffled as to how to reply. I did ask for something that would immediately identify me as the user. Maybe breaking the rules means I won’t be able to request anything else.

  Well, if the person who’s running NEED is asleep or has decided to put my account in limbo, there’s no point waiting for whatever message is on its way. But instead of closing my laptop, I turn it so I can see the screen from bed before slipping under the covers. Just before I drift off to sleep, I squint across the room and see the site clock vanish.

  I put my glasses back on, lean forward, and read: YOUR NEED REQUEST HAS BEEN PROCESSED. WE WILL DO OUR BEST TO SEE THAT YOUR NEED IS MET.

  My last thought before drifting off to sleep is that I wasn’t asked to invite my friends. Either the system experienced a glitch or the person who sent the reply was too kind to say what I already know. That NEED and the powers behind it can’t help me. No matter what the site tells me or anyone says, my family is well and totally screwed.

  NETWORK MEMBERS—89

  NEEDS PENDING—78

  NEEDS FULFILLED—15

  Sydney

  SYDNEY CAREFULLY CLOSES the front door so he doesn’t wake anyone, and lets the heat inside the house seep into his frozen body and fingers. The weather report he watched on Monday said this week is going to be warmer than last.

  Yeah, right.

  Of course, the weatherman can afford to be wrong. He isn’t the one freezing his ass off. And the guy sure as hell isn’t going to get kicked off TV. Which just goes to show how unfair life is. If only Sydney’s father had gone into meteorology instead of leaving a computer security job in the city to run his own real estate company. Although, to be fair, for a while it had been good. At least, that’s what everyone says. Then the bubble burst and, with it, his family. Hooray for the American dream, where everyone can get screwed if they work hard enough. And his mother wonders why he isn’t all hot and bothered to go to college for a computer science degree or take the military recruiters up on their promises of a meaningful career in communications or some other crap like that. Since he didn’t apply to colleges, the school counselor asked him not to dismiss the G.I. Joe thing out of hand. So he hasn’t told them yet to take a walk. Working for the government has perks, according to his dad, since there are always jobs to be had. Makes sense, since the government prints its own money. But while showing off his shooting skill has appeal, taking orders for the rest of his life doesn’t. He does that enough now, although that’s about to change. At eighteen his real life is beginning, and he plans on making the most of it.

  Now that he can almost feel his ears again, Sydney peels off his gloves, blows hot air onto his hands and flexes his fingers. Better. They’re still stiff, but at least he can move them.

  He slides his backpack off his shoulder, puts it on the bench next to the front door, and takes a seat beside it. It takes three tries to yank off his boots, but finally his feet are free. Thank God. A warm shower will thaw them out. Quickly, he stores his boots and coat so his mom won’t ream him in the morning. The deer hanging behind the boat in the garage will probably cut him some slack, but he figures he should bank that goodwill. A guy never knows when he might need a “Get Out of Jail Free” card. Especially given what’s coming.

&nb
sp; Grabbing his backpack, he heads through the quiet house and down into the basement. He wants a shower and some sleep, but he’s still wired. He needs to unwind a little first.

  After blowing on his hands again, he powers up his laptop. While he waits for the Start screen to appear, he unzips his backpack and pulls out his grandfather’s old hunting knife. He reaches back in for a cleaning cloth, and—though he already cleaned the blood off the knife in the garage—wipes the serrated blade the way his grandfather taught him. Carefully, he places the knife in his desk drawer, locks it, and slips the key into the small box he’s mounted under the bottom of the desk. He doesn’t want anyone to accidentally hurt themselves. That would suck, and things suck bad enough as it is.

  Now that his laptop is booted up, he plugs in his password and gets to work. Typing fast he goes through several screens, and smiles. Very cool. This whole networking site is intriguing. And he decides he doesn’t mind taking a few orders when there’s something interesting going on. He leans back in his chair and flexes the fingers that are finally warm and tries to decide what he needs.

  The answer is easy. Money. And isn’t that always the answer? Now he just has to figure out how much.

  Kaylee

  “GUESS WHAT TIME IT IS?” I call down the hall.

  “Bite me,” DJ yells back. “I’m not taking my temperature again.”

  “Wanna bet?” I snag the thermometer off the kitchen counter and head to the living room, where my brother is sprawled on the couch in front of the TV. “Mom’s going to be calling in five minutes to check in.”

  “Tell her I’m fine.” A car skids and crashes in high definition.

  “She’s going to ask if you have a fever.”