HEAR by Robin Epstein Page B

you a question?”
    â€œCertainly.”
    I didn’t want to bring up Mara, but now I can’t turn back. I know I need to tread lightly; my uncle personally selected Mara to be here this summer, which means he must think highly of her and her “powers.” Still, for my own sanity, I have to get a sense of how dangerously cuckoo she really is.
    â€œSo,” I say, “Mara’s kind of an ‘interesting’ person, isn’t she?”
    Brian puts his glasses back on and straightens. “What did she do?”
    â€œWell, she basically threatened me with bodily harm if I didn’t stay away from Pankaj.”
    â€œI see.” Brian nods. “I suppose there’s a certain consistency to that. Even as a child she was terribly protective of him.”
    â€œWait . . . What?” I pause. “They knew each other as children?”
    Brian smiles. “Of course. From Camp Dodona. Mara’s always been a bit dramatic, and she tried to keep you away from him even then.”
    My heart is pounding all of a sudden. “Pankaj was at that camp too?” I whisper.
    â€œSo was his sister, Nisha, though she wasn’t in your group,” Brian adds. “She was in another program that Figg ran down the hall from ours—one for children with emotional and behavioral issues. I didn’t know the other campers in that group; I only knew Nisha because she and Pankaj were siblings and she would occasionally come looking for him.” He shakes his head ruefully. “Quite a bully, that one.”
    â€œBut it’s really weird,” I say out loud. “I have no memory of him being there at all. He hasn’t mentioned it either.”
    â€œ You were all quite young. And you weren’t there for very long.” He shrugs. “Memory is slippery.”
    My uncle is right about that. Memory is slippery, particularly if you don’t want to remember something. Like being bullied. I think again about my only clear recollection of Camp Dodona—the day I left, the day my popsicle-stick house was destroyed and I punched the kid who did it. Then I think about this afternoon at the art museum. I wonder how much of this summer I’ll recall in the future . . . and what my response might be if I’m provoked again.
    Brian is smiling at me. “It really was a shame you left camp so early. We were just starting to get the first real glimmers of your talents. But that famous ‘hit first; ask questions later’ streak of yours was also becoming more pronounced, and your father was not keen to let it develop further.”
    â€œMe?” I counter reflexively, my hackles rising. “Maybe I was a little impulsive, but let’s not forget, Mara’s the nutty one.” I’m not sure why I’m so defensive about my behavior at that age, but I feel like he’s suggesting I’m somehow responsible for provoking her. “She even told me it was your idea for her to go off her meds.”
    I’m expecting Uncle Brian’s jaw to drop. Or maybe I want him to be shocked and outraged by this revelation: that his handpicked HEAR is lying about such a dangerous act of negligence on his part, claiming that he deliberately told her to ignore her treatment.
    When he nods, I start feeling sick. “That’s true,” he confirms.
    â€œPardon?”
    â€œWith those drugs running through her system, her brain chemistry isn’t what I need it to be. For my experiments to work, there can be no interference. I assume you now know that she forecasted the disaster in Japan?”
    As he says this, the queasiness spreads. I start thinking about the others. Like how Dan knew his father would die, and how Alex knew about the mall shooting, that a Henley professor would be killed. “So it’s not just that your geniuses are so smart; it’s that they’re all prophets of doom. They all foresee disasters, don’t