Because although I haven’t even had to wait a ful day for my Match, in some ways I have waited al my life.
“Cassia,” my mother says, smiling at me. I blink and look up, startled. My parents stand up, ready to disembark. Xander stands, too, and straightens his sleeves. I hear him take a deep breath, and I smile to myself. Maybe he is a little nervous after al .
“Here we go,” he says to me. His smile is so kind and good; I’m glad we were cal ed up the same month. We’ve shared so much of childhood, it seems we should share the end of it, too.
I smile back at him and give him the best greeting we have in the Society. “I wish you optimal results,” I tel Xander.
“You too, Cassia,” he says.
As we step off the air train and walk toward City Hal , my parents each link an arm through mine. I am surrounded, as I always have been, by their love.
It is only the three of us tonight. My brother, Bram, can’t come to the Match Banquet because he is under seventeen, too young to attend. The first one you attend is always your own. I, however, wil be able to attend Bram’s banquet because I am the older sibling. I smile to myself, wondering what Bram’s Match wil be like. In seven years I wil find out.
But tonight is my night.
It is easy to identify those of us being Matched; not only are we younger than al of the others, but we also float along in beautiful dresses and tailored suits while our parents and older siblings walk around in plainclothes, a background against which we bloom. The City Officials smile proudly at us, and my heart swel s as we enter the Rotunda.
In addition to Xander, who waves good-bye to me as he crosses the room to his seating area, I see another girl I know named Lea. She picked the bright red dress. It is a good choice for her, because she is beautiful enough that standing out works in her favor. She looks worried, however, and she keeps twisting her artifact, a jeweled red bracelet. I am a little surprised to see Lea there. I would have picked her for a Single.
“Look at this china,” my father says as we find our place at the Banquet tables. “It reminds me of the Wedgwood pieces we found last year ...” My mother looks at me and rol s her eyes in amusement. Even at the Match Banquet, my father can’t stop himself from noticing these things. My father spends months working in old neighborhoods that are being restored and turned into new Boroughs for public use. He sifts through the relics of a society that is not as far in the past as it seems. Right now, for example, he is working on a particularly interesting Restoration project: an old library. He sorts out the things the Society has marked as valuable from the things that are not.
But then I have to laugh because my mother can’t help but comment on the flowers, since they fal in her area of expertise as an Arboretum worker. “Oh, Cassia! Look at the centerpieces. Lilies.” She squeezes my hand.
“Please be seated,” an Official tel s us from the podium. “Dinner is about to be served.” It’s almost comical how quickly we al take our seats. Because we might admire the china and the flowers, and we might be here for our Matches, but we also can’t wait to taste the food.
“They say this dinner is always wasted on the Matchees,” a jovial-looking man sitting across from us says, smiling around our table. “So excited they can’t eat a bite.” And it’s true; one of the girls sitting farther down the table, wearing a pink dress, stares at her plate, touching nothing.
I don’t seem to have this problem, however. Though I don’t gorge myself, I can eat some of everything—the roasted vegetables, the savory meat, the crisp greens, and creamy cheese. The warm light bread. The meal seems like a dance, as though this is a bal as wel as a banquet. The waiters slide the plates in front of us with graceful hands; the food, wearing herbs and garnishes, is as dressed up as we are. We lift the white napkins, the silver forks, the shining crystal goblets as if in time to music.
My father smiles happily as a server sets a piece of chocolate cake with fresh cream before him at the end of the meal. “Wonderful,” he whispers, so softly that only my mother and I can hear him.
My mother laughs a little at him, teasing him, and he reaches for her hand.
I understand his enthusiasm when I take a bite of the cake, which is rich but not overwhelming, deep and dark and flavorful. It is the best thing I have eaten since the traditional dinner at Winter Holiday, months ago. I wish Bram could have some cake, and for a minute I think about saving some of mine for him. But there is no way to take it back to him. It wouldn’t fit in my compact. It would be bad form to hide it away in my mother’s purse even if she would agree, and she won’t. My mother doesn’t break the rules.
I can’t save it for later. It is now, or never.
I have just popped the last bite in my mouth when the announcer says, “We are ready to announce the Matches.” I swal ow in surprise, and for a second, I feel an unexpected surge of anger: I didn’t get to savor my last bite of cake.
“Lea Abbey.”
Lea twists her bracelet furiously as she stands, waiting to see the face flash on the screen. She is careful to hold her hands low, though, so that the boy seeing her in another City Hal somewhere wil only see the beautiful blond girl and not her worried hands, twisting and turning that bracelet.
It is strange how we hold on to the pieces of the past while we wait for our futures.
There is a system, of course, to the Matching. In City Hal s across the country, al fil ed with people, the Matches are announced in alphabetical order according to the girls’ last names. I feel slightly sorry for the boys, who have no idea when their names wil be cal ed, when they must stand for girls in other City Hal s to receive them as Matches. Since my last name is Reyes, I wil be somewhere at the end of the middle. The beginning of the end.
The screen flashes with the face of a boy, blond and handsome. He smiles as he sees Lea’s face on the screen where he is, and she smiles, too.
“Joseph Peterson,” the announcer says. “Lea Abbey, you have been matched with Joseph Peterson.” The hostess presiding over the Banquet brings Lea a smal silver box; the same thing happens to Joseph Peterson on the screen. When Lea sits down, she looks at the silver box longingly, as though she wishes she could open it right away. I don’t blame her. Inside the box is a microcard with background information about her Match. We al receive them. Later, the boxes wil be used to hold the rings for the Marriage Contract.