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CHAPTER 1
Somewhere nearby, shit was going down, and Cassie had to be a part of it.
She followed the crowd down a block lined with shady trees and around a corner that she remembered well. They were heading to the baseball field in her old neighborhood, the one where Cassie had swung and missed more times than she could count. The one where Cassie's dad, Harlon McKinney, had hugged her after a skinned knee, after a tough loss, after a mean joke from the pitcher. Now, with every step she took, her blood ran hotter, her breath pulsed quicker in her lungs.
She raised a hand to shield her eyes from the blinding sun, which had just peeked out over the trees like it knew the crowd needed its own audience.
As she approached the field, the charge in the air became palpable. These people, despite their varied ages, races and backgrounds, had a shared mission, and Cassie felt their energy in her body. Her fingers twitched, her stomach knotted. Let's do this, she thought. And then, smaller: Please let me feel something new. Anything.
Her mother had disabled Hive Alerts on her phone, but there was nothing her mother could do to her phone that Cassie couldn't undo. Rachel was a classics professor, not a coder. Cassie's phone wasn't even running the software it had come with — it ran a custom variant she and her dad had cobbled together.
Now its sudden burst of pings made her jump. This was it. All around her, people were receiving the same notification she had just heard through her earbud: he was here.
The crowd roared, so Cassie did, too, the sound surprising her as it reached up her throat, around her teeth. It felt unexpectedly good to yell. Because all the others around her were stomping their feet and shaking their fists, she did as well, and that also felt good, kind of. It was real, and it wasn't pain, so that counted for something.
Cassie tried not to think about it too deeply, but for months she hadn't been able to shake the feeling that she was viewing the world from a distance, like she was occupying a different physical plane from everyone around her. Here, in this moment, Cassie thought — maybe — she could see things normally again. She could feel things normally again. She could belong.
And right now, she belonged here, at Rasche Field, with the others who'd also been drawn here by GPS and Wi-Fi and the unrelenting triangulation of cell towers.
"Do your justice," the synthetic voice in her ear said, followed by the hashtag. Everyone else heard the same.
Cassie had always hated being tall, a trait she'd inherited from her dad, but today it felt like a sign. Her first Hive Mob and she practically had a front-row seat. She saw the perpetrator immediately: a slight, sandy-haired man, his head down, climbing the bleachers, as he'd been instructed to do by the thousands who logged their votes locally. It took him forever to reach the top. When he finally did, Cassie took note of how his shoulders, which had been sagging, suddenly straightened; how his slight frame suddenly seemed to grow in size. This man was determined, Cassie realized.
Almost ... proud.
Well, he wouldn't be proud for long. He'd humiliated his family in public by writing an anonymous blog in which he'd detailed his ambivalence about his relationships with his wife and his children. Honesty on social media was admirable, but there were limits. After a particular post with the confession that his response to his wife's cancer diagnosis was to tell her he didn't love her anymore, his blog went viral, and the usual doxx gangs quickly uncovered his identity. His Dislikes and Condemns skyrocketed — even Cassie had shared the call to Condemn him, and she barely shared anything online these days.
Overnight, Hive Justice was declared, and #publicjunk was agreed to be an appropriate sentence. So justice would be served, right here, right now. As punishment for his indiscretion, he'd be forced to parade around town naked, with the words "World's Worst Husband and Father" written on his chest.
Someone started chanting — "Monster, not a man!" — and Cassie joined in, even though it was a dumb chant, but the chant wasn't the point of all this, was it? It was the togetherness, Cassie knew. The unity. That's what everyone said, anyway. She tried to say the words again, to be a part of it all, but the chant caught in her throat. She coughed as she watched the man on the bleachers square his shoulders again, like he could form a barrier around himself before things got started. The sun shifted overhead, brightening the field even more, giving Cassie a clearer look at him. She blinked. There was something about his face ... for a second Cassie wondered if she knew him.
Still waiting on the top row of the bleachers, the man took off his glasses, folded them carefully and placed them in his left shirt pocket. Then he patted them. Twice.
Cassie's stomach heaved.
"Dad," she whispered.
Around her, the crowd quieted.
"Wait," Cassie said. No one heard her.
A woman with a bright scarf wrapped around her head, carrying a marker, climbed the bleachers. Noticing her, the man began unbuttoning his shirt. The sunlight gleamed off his sandy hair. Cassie struggled to catch her breath.
"Mark him!" someone behind Cassie yelled. Bursts of applause followed. The new chant thrummed — "Mark him! Mark him!" — on the bleachers, the perfect stage for the crowd in the field; the woman had approached the top, and the man had removed every item of clothing. He was completely naked, completely vulnerable. Cassie averted her eyes and tried to squelch the hot nausea climbing her throat.
She struggled to even her breathing. "It's not him," she whispered to herself. She knew that. He was white, for one thing. But still. He was a dad, someone's dad, and her own father, like this man, was always taking off his glasses and putting them in his pocket for safekeeping. Her limbs felt shaky and loose. What happened to the energy, the charge she'd felt just moments ago? The camaraderie?
The woman held the marker up to the crowd. Cassie expected her to be giddy, to smile at least, but instead her face was expressionless. She appeared to hesitate, then leaned in and gave the man a quick peck on the cheek. He closed his eyes in response.
The crowd, though, savored this moment. They clapped harder while Cassie felt herself shrinking back into the shell she'd formed so many months ago.
"A-ni-mal!" the little girl next to her roared. Cassie stared at her, this tiny angelic-looking thing whose eyes were burning, whose teeth were practically bared. She looked like she couldn't hurt a fly but yearned to do damage.
Cassie blinked. She looked around at the others, each of them cheering at the scene unfolding before them. On the bleachers, the woman began writing on the man's chest. He stood naked and perfectly still. Cassie turned away.
"I have to get out of here," she wheezed, and started to push back the way she came. Bodies everywhere. Cassie struggled, dodging elbows and shoulders and fists, trying to breathe.
Finally, a break in the crowd. She hit the open field and broke into a run. The sun was hot now, pounding on the back of her neck, her knees. The noise of the Hive Mob behind her quieted enough for her to clear her mind, to think again. She slowed to a jog, then a trot, kicking up the light brown dirt under her feet. It floated around her, making it hard to see. Any moment of clarity Cassie had had, any seconds when she hadn't felt like she was separated from the rest of humanity, were gone. Poof.
Behind her, the man was getting ready to spend his day naked in public, where the whole world could see his shame. He would be streamed live online, where people would comment and laugh and share. His wife would be even more humiliated. His kids, too. And Cassie had helped. Had cornered him at the field, left him nowhere to go.
That's what she'd wanted, right? To mete out the sort of immediate justice that the world demanded? To feel the righteous thrill of the Mob at her back?
She was going to be sick. She ran through the neighborhood, through the shade of the trees she'd grown up under, across streets and around corners until she reached her house.
Wait. Her old house.
"Dammit!" Cassie yelled, fists clenched at her sides. She stood in the middle of her old street, in front of the house that had been sold to new owners just a few weeks before. She'd been so desperate to flee that she hadn't been thinking; she'd just relied on muscle memory. Her new apartment was in the city. She'd have to ride a bus to get there.
"Thanks, Mom," Cassie mumbled. Rachel always ruined everything.
Luckily, Cassie knew the bus stop was nearby. She hurried there and caught the next one just in time. On the bus, she ignored all the BLINQs coming in to her feed and tried to settle her stomach. If she didn't think about it, about #publicjunk and the man who didn't look like her dad but could have been him anyway, about the press of the crowd and the little girl's blazing eyes, she was fine.
The bus ride was quick enough. When she got off, the sun hid behind towers and the air felt thicker. Cassie hated the city, but she had to admit it was at least useful: when you didn't feel like making eye contact, when you felt like you couldn't hold it together for another second, everyone left you alone.
"Cassie!" Rachel exclaimed when Cassie burst through the door to their cramped new apartment. She was sitting at the tiny kitchen table, laptop open, surrounded by books. "You okay?"
"Later, Mom," Cassie said. She went straight to her bedroom and slammed the door.
In her bedroom, Cassie dived onto her bed and fumbled at her phone's screen. Once the chat app opened, her breathing returned to normal. Everything was okay. She was safe.
Dad, she texted, today is horrible.
The response from her dad was instantaneous. Hey there, kiddo. Any day you can walk away from is a good one, right?
She groaned. Her dad's mordant sense of humor always had the ironic effect of making her feel better.
I miss you so much, Cassie wrote.
I miss you and I love you.
Cassie stared at her dad's words for a few minutes, letting them warm her the way they always did. There was an ache inside her without him around, like someone had torn a chunk of her body away and now she was expected to just live like that, without the very piece that made her a whole person. The only thing that filled that ache was anger. Some part of her knew that it wasn't healthy to walk around angry all the time, but it felt so much better than the pain.
She started to write back, needing to work out her thoughts about the day. He wouldn't have an answer for this one, would he? So, Dad, I joined my first Hive Mob today ... I was punishing a person whose name I can't even remember, if I ever knew it in the first place.
Then her mom burst through her door.
"Mom!" Cassie said hotly. "Jesus! Knock first!"
Rachel grimaced. "You're right. I'm sorry. But we talked about you texting your dad —"
"Who says that's what I'm doing?"
Her mom crossed her arms over her chest, leaned against the door and stared. Cassie scowled at her with deep, abiding rage. There was plenty left over from her aborted attempt at Hive Justice. All that anger and froth had to go somewhere. Mom was as good a target as any.
Instead of fleeing or bursting into flame, her mother sighed and sat gingerly on the edge of Cassie's bed.
"Honey, we talked about this, right? About texting him?" Rachel tried to smooth a lock of Cassie's dark hair, which was pulled into a knot at the top of her head, but Cassie batted her hand away.
Inside, the jumble of emotions that had been competing for her attention all day kindled. Cassie knew that if her mom lit the match, things would explode.
She set her jaw — her defiance another trait inherited from her dad — and glared at Rachel. Her voice was cold. "You can't keep me from talking to him."
Rachel glared back at Cassie for a moment. "Actually, I can."
* * *
Rachel hated this part, the part where her daughter was finally feeling something, and she had to go and ruin it. As tears started to spill over Cassie's cheeks, Rachel steeled herself. Her only child was approaching meltdown, but she had to keep herself together for both of them. This was hard for her, too. Different, but just as maddening.
Rachel saw her husband in Cassie's big brown eyes, in her height, in the tiny dimple she had when she smiled. She never got to see that dimple these days. So what if Cassie needed to text her dad? Rachel felt herself caving, even though she knew it wasn't healthy. Even the therapist had said so.
Then again, Dr. Gillen was long gone, along with the extra funds to afford him. He wasn't there to see how Cassie changed when she talked to her dad, how she morphed back into the carefree, loving, spunky kid she deserved to be. Even if it was only for a few minutes.
"Please, Mom," Cassie whispered again. Outside, the city noises seemed to fall away, leaving a quiet, a peace Rachel hadn't heard in ... well, in six months.
"Okay," Rachel relented. "For now."
Rachel wasn't even out the door before she heard the blips and pops of Cassie's keyboard. A car honked outside, and the subway vibrated under her feet, even up here on the tenth floor.
Ping. Whatever Cassie had texted, she'd gotten a response.
It was all Rachel could do not to grab the phone from her daughter's hands to see what Harlon had written. She gripped the doorknob, her knuckles white, and shut it behind her. In the dark hallway she closed her eyes and counted to ten.
Of course, she reminded herself, padding back into the kitchen-slash-office-slash-dining room, it wasn't Harlon. Not really.
It couldn't be Harlon, because they'd buried him six months ago.
CHAPTER 2
Cassie made a face at herself in the bathroom mirror, still foggy from her shower. In the old days, she would do her hair, sweep on some mascara. But these were new days. She pulled her hair into another topknot and, doubling down, even decided to forgo her trademark berry-red lipstick. Who was she trying to impress anyway? The kids at her new school? Hard pass. They wouldn't give a damn about her, so why not return the favor?
The one thing she refused to compromise on, though, was her bracelet. She would wear it today as she wore it every day. It was a simple gold chain with ten colored stones on it. Not even real gems — just cheap knock-offs. But her dad had given it to her, so she adored it.
When she burst into the kitchen to grab breakfast, she stopped short at the look on Rachel's face. "What?" she snapped. Her hands flew to her lips, to her hair. Maybe she looked really bad, even for her.
Her mom's mouth had shrunk to a shriveled pucker, so tightly was she pursing her lips. Cassie realized for the first time how tired her mom looked, how the lines around her eyes and mouth had deepened. She was even more pale than usual, her skin almost translucent. Rachel shook her head tersely, fatigue and anger radiating from her in nearly visible waves.
"What, Mom?" Annoyance was overtaken by a jolt of worry then; she had a sudden flashback to that unspeakable day six months ago. Was Rachel about to say something else that would make Cassie's life explode into pieces again? She wouldn't be able to take that.
It's about your father. It's about —
But there was nothing left to explode, Cassie reminded herself. Nothing left to be taken from her. Rachel could say anything, and no matter how bad it was, it wouldn't make a difference. Things were already rock bottom for Cassie: Dad gone. Shitty new apartment. No doubt a shitty new school. No friends. And of course, nothing to wear, just to add insult to a festering pile of injuries.
When Rachel finally spoke, her voice was strained, like she was struggling to be heard through a wall. "What. Is. This."
Rachel spun her tablet around on the table, showing a video to Cassie. It took Cassie a few confusing seconds to understand why Rachel was so pissed.
Someone had recorded the Hive Mob yesterday. And there, clear as the blue sky overhead, was Cassie. Her height and pitch-black hair drew the camera to her again and again as it panned over the crowd, shouts and chants drowning out whatever Rachel was saying now.
The sick feeling started to bubble in Cassie's throat again, the same one that made her turn and run yesterday. Only this time she held it down, forcing it back into the pit of darkness she carried around with her these days.
As she watched the video, which was trending online, she was captivated. Watching yourself on-screen when you don't know you're being filmed is a total trip — though of course, everyone was filmed everywhere these days. It was like she was watching a twin she didn't know she had. As the video played, Cassie could see it in her eyes: the weakness. The fear. If she had been stronger, she would have stayed. If the perpetrator hadn't reminded her of her dad, well ... the video wouldn't be showing her turning her back and running away. Like a child.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "The Hive"
by .
Copyright © 2019 Barry Lyga, Morgan Baden, Jennifer Beals, Tom Jacobson.
Excerpted by permission of Kids Can Press Ltd..
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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