Peeps by Scott Westerfeld Page B

balcony, we were only a foot apart, and I could smell her perfectly—the jasmine hair, a salt smell of nerves. We were too close for comfort. I pulled my eyes away from her and pointed at the next balcony over. “Who lives there?”
    “Um, this girl called Freddie,” Lace whispered.
    “She at home?”
    Lace shrugged.
    “Well, let’s hope not.” I jumped up onto the rail and across.
    “Jesus, dude!” Lace squeaked.
    I turned back to look down through the two-and-a-half-foot gap, realizing I should at least pretend to show fear, if only for Lace’s sake. The parasite doesn’t want its peeps too cautious; it wants us picking fights, complete with the biting and the scratching and other disease-spreading activities. We carriers don’t mind a little danger.
    Lace, though, was fully human, and her eyes widened farther as she stared down.
    “Come on,” I whispered soothingly. “It’s just a couple of feet.”
    She glared at me. “A couple of feet across . Seven stories down!”
    I sighed and jumped back up, steadied myself with one foot on each rail, and leaned back against the building. “Okay, I’ll swing you across. I promise I won’t drop you.”
    “No way, dude!” she said, her panic breaking through the whisper.
    I wondered if the cleaner had heard us and was already calling the cops. My Health and Mental badge looked real, and if a policeman called the phone number on the ID, there would be a Night Watch employee sitting at the other end. But Lace had been right about the whole illegal entry thing, and if someone went looking to complain to my boss in person, they would find only a bricked-up doorway in a forgotten basement of City Hall. The Night Watch had cut most of its official ties two hundred years ago; only a few bureaucrats remained who knew the secret histories.
    I leaned down and grabbed Lace’s wrist. “Sorry, but . . .”
    “What are you—?” She squealed as I lifted her up and over, setting her down on the next balcony.
    When I jumped down beside her, Lace’s face was white.
    “You . . . I could have . . . ” she sputtered. Her mouth was open, and she was breathing hard. On the tiny balcony, my senses started to tangle up with one another, smell and sight and taste, the parasite pushing its advantage. Excitement radiated from Lace; I knew it was only fear making her pupils expand, her heart pound, but my body responded in its own blind way, construing it all as signs of arousal. My hands were itching to take hold of her shoulders and taste her lips.
    “Excuse me,” I squeaked, pushing her away from the balcony door.
    I knelt and pulled out lock-picking equipment, desperate to get off that balcony and inside, anything to be a few feet farther away from Lace. My fingers fumbled, and I banged my head against the glass on purpose, clearing my brain long enough to squirt the keyhole with graphite.
    Seconds later, the door slid open.
    I stumbled inside Freddie’s apartment, away from Lace’s smell, sucking in the odors of industrial carpet, recently assembled Ikea furniture, and a musty couch. Anything but jasmine.
    When I managed to get back under control, I put my ear to the wall. The welcome roar of a vacuum cleaner rumbled back and forth next door. Taking another deep breath, I collapsed onto the couch. I hadn’t kissed Lace and the cops weren’t on their way—two near disasters averted.
    Without catching Lace’s eye, I looked around. Another clone of Morgan’s apartment, the walls innocently white. “Might as well check in here too.”
    Lace didn’t say a word, staring at me from where she stood just inside the balcony door. Her expression was still intense, and when I switched on the UV light, the whites of her eyes glowed fiercely. She was rubbing her wrist where I’d grabbed it to lift her across.
    She said calmly, “How did you do that?”
    “Do what?”
    “Pick me up. Swing me like a cat.”
    I attempted a cavalier smile. “Is that how cats are swung?”
    She