Page 3 of Jinxed

I click open.

Dear Lacey,

We regret to inform you that...

The phone flies out of my hand like it’s heated to a thousand degrees. It bounces off the corner of my bedframe and on to the floor, where – just like that – the screen shatters into a million tiny pieces.

Just like my dreams.

‘I’M SORRY, WE’RE SOLD OUT OF THE praying mantis.’ The vet doesn’t even look up at me as he stares down at the information provided by his retriever baku. They’re standard-issue for employees ofthe Moncha Store (and most service industry professionals), always helpful, with smooth black digital fur that makes reading information off their backs easy.

I feel a twinge of jealousy at the sight, and then a wave of embarrassment for envying a Moncha Store employee. They call themselves ‘vets’ because they think it’s hilarious, as if they have real medical degrees or something, but the actualgeniuses behind the bakus are the companioneers, not the faux-hip guys in white lab coats and lens-free, plastic-rimmed glasses with no real understanding of what makes their bakus tick.

But the truth is, this vet is still going to have a better baku than I will.

‘This is a waste of time,’ I say to Zora, turning away, but she grabs my arm and drags me back around to stare at the screen on theglowing white counter.

‘No way am I standing in line again,’ she hisses. Then she turns her sweetest smile on to the vet. On the counter, one of Moncha’s slogans glows into life... MONCHA: WE ALWAYS HAVE YOUR BAK(U).

Well, it doesn’t havemyparticular baku, but that’s apparently beside the point.

‘So... no praying mantis and no dragonflies. Whatdoyou have in stock?’ Zora asks. Linuspokes his head out from underneath her collar and twitches his nose at me. I wrinkle mine in response and poke my tongue out. Linus ducks back under the fabric and Zora shoots me a look over her shoulder. I roll my eyes but pay attention to the vet once again.

‘We have butterflies and scarabs in the insect department,’ he says, bringing up my options on the screen. ‘If you want to move up tolevel 2, small mammals, the selection is a lot bigger...’

I grimace. Without the Profectus grant, all I can afford with my savings is a level 1 insect. ‘I’ll pick something another time,’ I say, through gritted teeth, not feeling inspired by any of the options.

‘You can’t, because you smashed your phone, remember? You need somethingnow.’ Zora grabs my arm again to stop me moving.

I sigh.I know she’s right, but my mind is still refusing to accept reality. I rub the sore spot behind my ear where the leash has been installed. I’m committed now, and I have to choose something.You can always upgrade in a few years, when you’ve saved more money...

The vet stares pointedly over my shoulder at the long line snaking its way out of the door behind me. I take a deep breath and forcemyself to focus. ‘Okay, I’ll take a scarab,’ I say, pointing at one on the counter’s screen. Its carapace is greenish purple, iridescent like an oil slick. It’s kind of pretty. Scarabs are known for having flight issues (something about the way the wings fold up) but I don’t want the same baku as my mom. That would just be too sad.

‘Coming right up. Rolo and I will go get one for you.’ He snapshis fingers and his retriever baku follows him obediently to the stock room.

Once the vet and his baku are gone, I turn my back on my counter and fold my arms across my chest. ‘Well, this sucks.’

Zora nudges my shoulder. ‘Can I give you a hug?’

She knows I’m not normally the touchy-feely type, but I nod – every hug is worth its weight in gold right about now. The sting of the Profectus rejectionis a raw hurt, an open wound that refuses to heal over. I keep going over it in my head.

Did I fail a portion of the test?

Which bit?

If I’d studied harder...

Or maybe the competition this year was just too much...

Yet as much as I want to pretend it was a mistake, or forget the email ever came in, Zora’s right; I barely lasted the morning without the internet (is net-withdrawal a thing?Because I was all shaky and sweaty without being able to check my Flashes...) and I can’t show up to school with a broken phone. I need a baku. It’s not even a social standing thing any more. At St Agnes (my high school, where I’ll be forced to stay now that I’m not going to Profectus), once we enter our senior year, all our textbooks are stored in baku-encrypted software and homework assignmentsare sent to our bakus directly. It’s the trade-off of living in Monchaville. It’s not really called that, but it might as well be. Moncha provides our housing, healthcare and education – it’s a corporate mini-city that has grown up within Toronto, spreading beyond the ‘discovery district’ where Monica first shared a co-working space to occupy almost the entire eastern half of the city. Anda requirement of living in Monchaville is that you have your own baku. Not that that’s a big deal any more. Almost everyone in the country has one.

Another slogan appears where my elbows are touching the countertop. BAK-UP YOUR LIFE... MONCHA’S NEWEST CLOUD SOFTWARE INCLUDED WITH EVERY NEWBAKU. This time, a picture of Monica flashes up, with her signature asymmetrical fringe cut into a diamondpattern, almost like a reverse crown. Mom has a story of when I tried to cut my hair into the same style... and that’s why I had a pixie cut for half of second grade.

Seeing Monica’s face makes me smile. The story behind bakus is ingrained in our cultural history and Monica Chan is its main protagonist. There’s even a Hollywood-produced mini-series about her journey, called (WO)MAN’S BESTFRIEND. I stream it whenever I’m feeling low, or uninspired – and I dread to think how many times it’s been logged that I watch it.

The story goes that Monica grew up glued to her smartphone – so much so that it began to be detrimental to both her mental and physical health. During her doctor-mandated phone-break, she walked the streets of Toronto and found herself watching people walking theirdogs in High Park. She realized what she’d been missing all along: a companion. If her smartphone was going to be by her side all the time, why not have it be cute and interactive? Something she could love and feel comforted by? But that could also be useful – helping her keep track of her life and her calendar, stay in touch with her friends and family, and access her social media, the internetand everything else she needed.

She started work in the storage locker of her apartment building, because her parents didn’t have a house with a garage (I bet her mom couldn’t stand the smell of solder either). They squeezed their entire family into a two-bedroom condo, just like my family’s. She designed a robotic pet with all the features of a smartphone and called it abakubecause of a storyshe’d heard from her Chinese grandmother, about creatures made up of the leftover parts of other animals. Her first model, affectionately known as Yi (the Chinese word for ‘one’), was built from the screen of her portable gaming device, her old smartphone’s motherboard, and metal parts she could scrape together from old toys and electronics. She went door-to-door in her apartment building, askingher neighbours to give her any old bits of tech destined for the scrapyard.

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