Silver Eyes by Nicole Luiken Page A

Zinnia said, entering the room breathless, “there’s something I wanted to show you.” She stopped the movie and put in her own disk. “This one’s my favorite,” she said shyly.
    A severe-looking blond with a snub nose appeared on the screen. She looked familiar, but I couldn’t place her. I assumed my memory had another hole in it, and I braced myself for the drowning that usually followed, but it didn’t come. As the blond woman held up a child’s shapesorting toy, I realized that Zinnia and Dahlia had the same snub nose.
    This must be Iris Cartwright, their progenitor.
    â€œDon’t show them that!” Dahlia was on her feet, embarrassed, as Iris Cartwright demonstrated how to push the various blocks through the correct slots, naming the color and shape of each block as she did so. “This is one of the baby tapes.”
    Zinnia ignored her, speaking to President Castellan. “I like this one because she smiles. . . . There! Did you see it?”
    â€œI saw it,” President Castellan said gently.
    Dahlia rolled her eyes at her clone-sister’s dorkiness. “So she smiled, so what?”
    Rianne scowled at Dahlia and said to Zinnia, “You’re lucky to have the tape. I used to have one of my dad singing me happy birthday, but it broke.”
    â€œAre we going to watch the movie or not?” Dahlia demanded.
    Timothy obligingly started the movie again. “Watch this shot. Mariner hadn’t been to Mars yet, so they still thought the Martian canyons were ‘canals.’ ”
    The movie was so bad it was funny. We threw popcorn at the screen whenever they said something wrong about Mars, even developing a rating system. One kernel was thrown for obscure facts, up to a handful for dead obvious ones, like the color of the sky.
    One movie turned into a marathon. Timothy made chocolate milk shakes, and we all pigged out. Zinnia went to bed after the first movie. Dahlia started to fidget halfway into the second and left soon after.
    I watched the first three movies but faked a yawn and excused myself when Timothy put on a fourth. I caught Rianne’s eye and signaled that she should follow me.
    Mike saw and stood up, too.
    â€œOh, are you all leaving?” Timothy sounded disappointed. “I could play a different movie.” He started to rifle through his disks. Timothy appeared to own all the Martian movies ever produced and to have seen every one of them.
    I sent Mike a pleading glance.
    â€œSure,” Mike said easily. “What movies have you got?”
    Timothy was happily listing off titles when Rianne and I slipped
out.
    â€œWhat is it?” Rianne asked curiously.
    â€œI need help with something. Remember earlier when I said I thought Timothy needed to have more fun? I want to play a prank on him. Something fun, not mean.”
    Rianne looked interested. “What did you have in mind?”
    I told her, and she laughed.
    Half an hour later, we finished. Every item in Timothy’s room had been moved and smushed up against the left wall. Bed, desk, lamps, pictures, hanging model of Mars, everything. It looked as if a black hole had tried to suck up the room and failed. I brushed my hands together, pleased with myself.
    My search of Timothy’s room hadn’t turned up any sign of suicidal tendencies. No guns, no razors, no death literature. Except for his Mars obsession and a too neatly made-up bed, which could probably be attributed to Graciana, his room could have passed for any teenage boy’s.
    â€œWhat about the closet?” Rianne asked.
    â€œGood thought.” I crossed the room and slid back the door—and my stomach dropped to my knees.
    Timothy’s mother had a right to be worried, after all. The reason the bed was so neat was because Timothy wasn’t sleeping in it. A pillow and a blanket lay on the floor of his closet.

I CLOSED THE CLOSET IMMEDIATELY, shielding it from Rianne’s