Prologue

Caralyn

My name is Caralyn Schultz. I am five-foot-eight with dark blond hair, blue eyes, pale skin, and no freckles.

My IQ is incredibly high. I started reading novels when I was four, and could fix a computer by the time I was six. Because of it, I'm in an elite private school, with top marks and multiple scholarship offers from some of the top universities and colleges in the world.

I play five different sports at my school: basketball, volleyball, soccer, hockey, and boys' football. I'm the captain of all five teams. I am the top scorer in basketball and hockey, have the most rushing yards on the football team, and hold the school records for both long and short distance running.

I am a musician. I started singing at the age of four, and have learned the cello, violin, flute, piano, guitar, and saxophone. I played my first concert when I was five, and my first major solo, a Vivaldi violin concerto when I was seven. I can hear things that are often too quiet for anyone else to hear. I can tell twins' voices apart. The reason is that I have perfect pitch.

Well, really, I have perfect everything. I am a seventeen year old prodigy.

And I am all this because that's what my parents decided they wanted me to be.

I am a designer baby. That means that my parents paid a geneticist big money to specifically pick and choose my genes before I was born so that they could have a perfect child. One they could brag about to the people at the country club. One that might one day make a huge discovery, or make it to Carnegie Hall or the big leagues. One that would be the best. Like I said, perfect, in every way imaginable.

Except that I hate being perfect.