The Jump, page 22
“Themperor.”
Oh god, the cheese on this guy.
“What?” Karim asks as Mama starts to chuckle.
Ava rolls her eyes and asks, “Yeah, actually, what’s up with that word? ‘Themperor’?”
“Listen, if Mama gets to be the queen of this house, and you get to be the princess, and Jax gets to be the prince, then Zaza gets to be the ‘themperor.’ I don’t make the rules. That is, if they’re okay with it?”
Zaza nods from the couch.
“I like it!” they say. “ ‘Themperor’ has a ring to it. But you can just call me Jesse, as decreed by the themperor.”
“Jesse it is,” says Karim, standing up with his now-empty plate. “Excellent meal. Is there more?”
“Right up there in the white Crock-Pot,” says Mama, nodding toward the gazebo where several people are milling around with plates full of food made from things grown right here, all around us.
I look over at Ava, who’s scrolling through something on her phone, taking advantage of Mama’s leniency about phones at the table when guests are over. And when we’re not technically at a “table.”
“Hey,” I say quietly. So quietly, she doesn’t hear me. “Hey.”
She looks up at me, startled, and I lean in.
“I’m sorry for how I treated you when we were doing the puzzle,” I say. “It was wrong. I snapped at you, and you didn’t deserve it. And… after talking to the cops at the detention center, I, um…”
What do I say to her? I can’t get into how the cops have pictures of her on the front lines of protests, and how she’s probably okay since only her closest friends and family would be able to identify her from that picture of her eyes alone, without taking up the whole lunch conversation. Plus, Mama and Zaza and Karim don’t need to know about her activism until she wants to tell them.
“After talking to the cops at the detention center, I think we should grab lunch somewhere sometime, and, I don’t know… talk?”
She raises an eyebrow at me, but a smile curves her mouth.
“Sure, little bro,” she says, “and apology accepted.”
I nod. God, I misunderstood her. My sister. My sister who’s always journaling and looking inward and retreating into her room, on the front lines of protests, I assume without Mama and Zaza knowing a thing.
I’m so proud to be her brother.
“All right, so,” says Mama as she and Karim return and take their seats on the logs behind us, nestled into the dirt, framing the path. Zaza soon follows with a plate of their own. My phone beeps with a message.
HAN: Thanks, everyone.
ME: For what?
SPIDER: For being awesome, of course.
HAN: For being my friends.
YAS: Course, Han! Pleasure’s all ours. And thanks, everyone, for sticking together through all of this.
SPIDER: We may not have won the puzzle, but we damn sure got some power.
I have to smile at that.
ME: Yeah, I guess we did.
HAN: So, Jax… are you still going to try to track down the real Order and join them?
JAX: Pretty sure I’m done with the Order for now, real or not.
And I mean it. Sure, the real Order is super glamorous and all, but after all of this, they haven’t taken interest in what’s happened here, in what the people of Seattle—the kids of Seattle—have done to protect what we love, so maybe my time is better spent here, in the Vault, with the people I love.
SIGGE: So… what now?… Are we still going to be two teams? Karim and I don’t exactly make a whole unit by ourselves.
ME: I think a 6-person team would be pretty dope.
YAS: What would we call ourselves?
HAN: A blend of JERICHO and ROYAL?
SPIDER: Royalicho? Jeroyal?
SIGGE: Jeroyal sounds like something that’ll have you unconscious under a table after a few sips too many.
ME: Something to commemorate all of this, everything we just went through.
We’ve come so far together in just a few days. It has to be something good.
My phone dings with another message.
KARIM: How about the Jump?
I look up at Karim as he looks up at me, his smile warm and eyebrows raised in anticipation. The Jump. To commemorate the jump that almost got Karim and me killed last week? Or that jump that Han took through the elevator to escape Lucas? Or the jump that Yas took to save Sigge on the scaffolding? Or the jump that Spider took when he leaked everything? Or the fact that this whole thing was rigged from the jump? Or “The Jump” to mean the beginning of something new?
We’ll go with the last one, I decide. I nod up at Karim.
ME: I like it.
Spider
Umma shuts the door, and I open the letter with trembling hands. It’s written entirely in Korean. And it mentions no names.
Hey, man.
Thanks so much. For everything. I can’t say much, because, you know, the situation at hand. But I’m doing well. I’m safe. And so is my sister.
I get my degree in two months.
And I have a new employer.
They’re the real deal.
They make things happen.
Call me if you’re interested.
I read it again and again.
No way.
The real deal?
They make things happen?
Tae-Jin Hyung… who exactly…
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
When I dedicated this book to everyone who is sick and tired, I meant it. We are the arbiters of change. And when I said we’re going to make it, I meant it. None of us are alone in wanting better for this world.
The inspiration for The Jump started when I read about the events of the Cicada 3301 puzzle (it’s quite an interesting story if you enjoy mystery and intrigue), and I realized that if a group of teens got into cryptology and encountered such a puzzle, I’d want to read about it.
So, I wrote about it.
Thank you to everyone who continues to give my chaotic ideas credence, starting with my agent, Quressa, for always seeking the absolute best for me and my work.
Thanks to my editor, Deeba, who (I don’t know how you do it) handled so much in so little time. Thank you infinitely for keeping these characters three-dimensional and root-able (root-for-able?)—I’m sure you know the best way to phrase that.
Thank you to all three sensitivity readers who made Han, Yas, and Spider come to life. They are real characters because of your emotional labor, honesty, and detailed critiques. Thank you for helping me to write responsibly.
Thank you to my closest friends—Becca Boddy, Jackie Mak, Sydney Clark, Annastasia Nuñez, Ari Bloom, Alexandra Keister, Christopher Mikkelson, Eric Smith, Roseanne Brown, Laurie Halse Anderson, Grayson Toliver, Aaron Oaks, and James Stoner. I love you all.
To my love—my husband—Steven, who has overcome so much to be as incredible as you are. Thank you for taking care of me and you. I wouldn’t have anyone else. And to my son, who already takes on the world with more curiosity than I could have hoped for, never stop learning. Never stop asking questions. Explore all you want, not-so-little one, and the world will meet you.
More from the Author
The Cost of Knowing
SLAY
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
BRITTNEY MORRIS is the bestselling author of SLAY and The Cost of Knowing and has written video game narrative for Insomniac Games’ Spider-Man 2 for PlayStation 5, Unknown Worlds’ Subnautica: Below Zero, and Soma Games’ The Lost Legends of Redwall. Brittney is an NAACP Image Award nominee and an Ignyte Award finalist. She holds a BA in economics. You can find her online at AuthorBrittneyMorris.com and on Twitter or Instagram @BrittneyMMorris.
Visit us at simonandschuster.com/teen
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Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
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ALSO BY BRITTNEY MORRIS
SLAY
The Cost of Knowing
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales — Wings of Fury
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Text © 2023 by Brittney Morris
Jacket illustration © 2023 by Kingsley Nebechi
Jacket design by Laura Eckes © 2023 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Morris, Brittney, author.
Title: The jump / Brittney Morris.
Description: First edition. | New York : Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, [2023] | Audience: Ages 12 up. | Audience: Grades 7–9. | Summary: The stress of an oil refinery being built in their backyard, threatening their families’ livelihood, prompts four working-class teens to join a dangerous scavenger hunt where the reward of power could change their families’ fates and save the city they love so much.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022037718 (print) | LCCN 2022037719 (ebook) | ISBN 9781665903981 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781665904001 (ebook)
Subjects: CYAC: Treasure hunt (Game)—Fiction. | Power (Social sciences)—Fiction. | Seattle—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.M6727 Ju 2023 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.M6727 (ebook) | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022037718
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022037719
Brittney Morris, The Jump
