Matched

“We’l read them tonight,” Xander promises sincerely. I try to keep from rol ing my eyes in amusement because he sounds exactly the way he does when a teacher gives him a learning assignment. He’l read the new guidelines and memorize them, as he read and memorized the official Matching material. And then I flush again, as a paragraph from that material flashes across my mind: If you choose to be Matched, your Marriage Contract will take place when you are twenty-one. Studies have shown that the fertility of both men and women peaks at the age of twenty-four. The Matching System has been constructed to allow those who Match to have their children near this age—providing for the highest likelihood of healthy offspring.

Xander and I wil share a Marriage Contract. We will have children together.

I don’t have to spend the next few years learning everything about him because I already know him, almost as wel as I know myself.

The tiny feeling of loss deep within my heart surprises me. My peers wil spend the next few days swooning over pictures of their Matches, bragging about them during meal hour at school, waiting for more and more bits of information to be revealed. Anticipating their first meeting, their second meeting, and so on. That mystery does not exist for Xander and me. I won’t wonder what he is like or daydream about our first meeting.

But then Xander looks at me and asks, “What are you thinking about?” and I answer, “That we are very lucky,” and I mean it. There is stil much to discover. Until now, I have only known Xander as a friend. Now he is my Match.

The hostess corrects me gently. “Not lucky, Cassia. There is no luck in the Society.”

I nod. Of course. I should know better than to use such an archaic, inaccurate term. There’s only probability now. How likely something is to occur, or how unlikely.

The hostess speaks again. “It has been a busy evening, and it’s getting late. You can read the courtship guidelines later, another day. There’s plenty of time.”

She’s right. That’s what the Society has given us: time. We live longer and better than any other citizens in the history of the world. And it’s thanks in large part to the Matching System, which produces physical y and emotional y healthy offspring.

And I’m a part of it al .

My parents and the Carrows can’t stop exclaiming over how wonderful this al is, and as we walk down the steps of City Hal together, Xander leans over and says, “You’d think they’d arranged everything themselves.”

“I can’t believe it,” I say, and I feel opulent and a little giddy. I can’t believe that this is me, wearing a beautiful green dress, holding gold in one hand and silver in the other, walking next to my best friend. My Match.

“I can,” Xander says, teasing me. “In fact, I knew al along. That’s why I wasn’t nervous.”

I tease him back. “I knew, too. That’s why I was.”

We’re laughing so much that when the air train pul s up neither of us notice for a moment, and then there is a brief moment of awkwardness as Xander holds out his hand to help me climb aboard. “Here,” he says, his voice serious. For a moment, I don’t know what to do. There is something new in touching each other now, and my hands are ful .

Then Xander wraps his hand around mine, pul ing me onto the train with him.

“Thank you,” I say as the doors close behind us.

“Any time,” he says. He does not let go of my hand; the little silver box I hold creates a barrier between us even as another one breaks. We have not held hands like this since we were children. In doing that tonight, we move across the invisible divide that separates friendship from something more. I feel a tingle along my arm; to be touched, by my Match, is a luxury that the other Matchees at Banquets tonight do not share.

The air train carries us away from the sparkling, icy-white lights of City Hal toward the softer yel ow porch lights and streetlights of the Boroughs.

As the streets flash past on our way home to Mapletree Borough, I glance over at Xander. The gold of the lights outside is similar to the color of his hair, and his face is handsome and confident and good. And familiar, for the most part. If you’ve always known how to look at someone, it’s strange when that directive changes. Xander has always been someone I could not have, and I have been the same for him.

Now everything is different.

My ten-year-old brother, Bram, waits for us on the front porch. When we tel him about the Banquet, he can’t believe the news. “You’re Matched with Xander? I already know the person you’re going to marry? That’s so strange.”

“You’re the one who’s strange.” I tease him, and he dodges me as I pretend to grab him. “Who knows. Maybe your Match lives right on this street, too. Maybe it’s—” Bram covers his ears. “Don’t say it. Don’t say it—”

“Serena,” I say, and he turns away, pretending that he didn’t hear me. Serena lives next door. She and Bram torment each other incessantly.