That’s when I hollered for the one person who still had a savvy that could help. The one person who, against all odds, had gotten a switched-up savvy five years early.
“TUCKER! I need you! I need you right now!”
I screamed for little Tuck, and capital B-I-G BIG Tuck came.
SOMETIMES WE SURVIVE OUR falls. We catch ourselves, or someone else catches us. Or we go down, scraping our knees, our chin, our elbows, or our pride. We might cry a little, then get up and find some rainbow-colored Band-Aids. If we’re lucky, life goes back to normal.
Anderson, Casey, and Parker were still inside the school, helping B-Bug free Tripp from the rubble. Nola and the two old veterans were racing around the corner of the building, moving toward us. I was relieved to see one of the vets cradling a ball of orange-striped fur in his arms. As far as I could tell, Corporal Vasquez was the only member of the expanded rescue party who’d seen Tucker grow . . . Grow . . . GROW. Vasquez was the only one from her platoon who’d watched Tucker catch Grandma the moment she slipped from my grasp. And she was the only one to hitch a ride back down to the ground with us on Tucker’s open palm.
Visibly shaken, Vasquez had watched Tucker shrink back down to his normal small size. Even I had been stunned by Tucker’s goliath feat. I’d had no idea he could get so very, very large.
The corporal recovered surprisingly fast, all things considered. I supposed that Vasquez, in her time as a soldier, had probably seen plenty of things that I’d never seen before. Things that might be equally unbelievable, in their own way. Perhaps watching a little boy turn into a giant—becoming as big and as brave as he knew how be, in order to save someone else—well, maybe that was something Corporal Vasquez could understand completely.
Still, the experience left the corporal stammering and off-balance. She kept looking around, like she’d just been monumentally pranked by her buddies and was now waiting for someone to jump out with a camera, and yell: “Gotcha!”
“Is . . . is someone going to explain to me what just happened here?”
Little again, Tucker cupped both hands around his mouth and shout-whispered to Vasquez: “I got really big and saved everyone.”
“Yeah . . . I got that. Outstanding. But—but . . . how?”
“Could you maybe forget what you just saw, Corporal?” I asked, hoping she wouldn’t pull a satellite phone out of her jacket and call for a team of helicopters, a supply of elephant tranquilizers, and a giant net with which to capture my youngest brother.
Vasquez gave me a long, stony stare. Then she swore under her breath and shrugged. “Forget what? I didn’t see anything, kid.”
When we all looked at her in surprise, Vasquez held up her hands and said, “If I start talking about the jolly young giant here, I’ll get kicked out of the Corps on a psych discharge, quicker than a boot-camp haircut. Improvise, adapt, overcome. That’s what we marines are trained to do. Right now, kid, I’m adapting.”
I felt as though I’d been doing the same thing all night: Adapting to my switched-up savvy; improvising the rescue of my grandmother; trying to overcome every new fear and obstacle in my path.
“I think your grandma needs some rack time,” said Vasquez. She continued to shake her head, like something inside it had rattled loose and she was trying to knock everything back in place. “Let’s get the old lady inside, out of the weather, and see if the others need help freeing that other boy from the rubble. Anderson was going to call for help—a rescue team should be on its way here shortly. They’ll have blankets and water for everyone. Your grandmother will be taken care of. She should be out of danger now.”
Relief washed over me. My final savvy vision had come to pass and Grandma and I had both survived the fall.
This time, we entered the abandoned high school from the back, finding a gap in the plywood sheeting that led us into an old gym at the rear of the building. It was a quicker and easier way inside than the one we’d first taken. I wondered if Tripp and B-Bug had gotten into the school the same way, looking for Del.
Vasquez wanted to carry Grandma Pat inside. But Samson and Tucker insisted that they be the ones to support our grandmother as she shuff-shuffled back into the building. Grandma Pat shook and shivered, mumbling about TV shows, tuna sandwiches, and loud boys with enormous hands. Her eyes were unfocused behind her glasses. Her tiara was gone for good. I hoped her Old-timer’s would make her forget the trauma atop the clock tower, quickly.
My arms ached and my spine felt like it had been stretched three inches longer. I didn’t think I’d ever forget the sensation of Grandma Pat slipping from my grip, six stories up. Or the relief I’d felt at not having to be alone at the end of my adventure. My brothers, my friends—even the United States Marine Corps—had been there to help. Someone had been looking out for me after all.
Our footfalls echoed as we entered the cavernous gymnasium at the back of the building. The gym’s wooden floorboards had been torn out long ago, leaving a rough surface of hard-packed dirt and cracked concrete. We kicked through the dry leaves, aluminum cans, and shredded plastic shopping bags that had blown inside over the years. Here and there, snow lay in strangely patterned drifts across the floor, where it had gusted through the broken skylights in the roof.
It was shadowy inside the gym, but not completely dark. With the skylights smashed out, and most of the windows gone, the moonlight held free rein; it speckled the gymnasium floor and lit the backboards of the rusted basketball hoops. Moonbeams illuminated dusty rafters and rotting bleachers. Powerless electrical cables hung down from the ceiling like dead vines.
I didn’t know when Del had linked his fingers through mine again, but I was happy that he had. We’d done it! We’d gotten through the scariest vision of the future my savvy had ever shown me. After jumping from the clock tower, taking a leap of faith that somehow everything would be all right, I knew I had the strength to face whatever time brought next. I’d just take life moment by moment, trying my best to keep my eyes open as I moved forward.
Samson and Tucker deposited Grandma Pat on the nearest, most solid-looking bleacher. Then, as Nola and the two vets fumbled their way into the gym, Tucker rushed to the man who held his kitten.
“You found her! You found Cap’n Stormy.”
We didn’t have to see if B-Bug and the marines needed our help digging Tripp out of the rubble. They found us a moment later.
“Oorah!” barked Private Casey, marching into the gym.
“We got him out,” said Lance Corporal Parker, right behind him.
Anderson and B-Bug carried Tripp into the gymnasium between them. Using a two-person hold, they clasped each other’s arms to make a seat for the skinny boy.
“What the heck, Del?” Tripp snarled when he saw us. “I thought your girlfriend said there was going to be a party here tonight! Were you two plotting the whole time, trying to lead me and B-Bug into this death trap? Is that why you left that stupid, bloody note? You’re going to regret messing with Travis Kaminski the Third. Give me back my phone! I’m gonna ruin you.”
A party? Had I told Tripp there was going to be a party? I supposed that, in a way, I had. When I first met Del at his uncle’s store, I had asked him if he’d seen my grandma, explaining that she thought she was going to a dance at Larimer High. Tripp had overheard only a part of our conversation. He’d jumped to the wrong conclusion.
“I said, give me my phone, Del,” Tripp snarled again.
I looked at Del, wondering what he’d do next. I couldn’t see into his future. Would he run away? Would he stand his ground, cuss Tripp out, or smash Tripp’s phone into a million tiny pieces?
I closed my eyes and stopped time without a whisper of a word. Then I crossed my arms and turned on Del. With the others frozen, and Grandma Pat still resting on the bleachers, Del and I may as well have been alone inside the gym.
“Exactly what’s so bad about
the picture on Tripp’s phone, Del?”
“You stopped the clocks just to ask me that?”
“Yes!”
Del laughed. But he also looked pleased, like it made him happy that I’d stopped time for him.
“Why does that horrid boy think you wouldn’t want anyone to see your sister?”
“Um, Specs?” Del laughed again, a bit nervously this time. “I told you back at the bus station—I’m an only child.”
That’s right, I thought. He did tell me that. I knew something had felt wrong earlier, when Samson asked Del about the photo.
“So, explain,” I said. “There may be two thousand people in this city, and twenty-seven in Tuvalu, who are wandering around right now with us, but I’m certain not one of them cares about some silly picture on a bully’s phone. Show it to me?”
Del hesitated, then he fished the phone out of his pocket and displayed the photo Tripp considered so embarrassing.
I understood what I was looking at immediately. It was a picture of Del. Wearing makeup.
“It was the first day you stopped time, Gypsy—” Del began to explain, rolling his eyes and then looking down at his feet. “Last Sunday. Remember? That was the first time you killed the clocks, right? Man, that day went on forever!”
How could I forget the day everything switched? It was the day Poppa told us Grandma Pat was sick and she needed to come live with us; the day Samson caught fire and Tucker grew big for the first time; the day I’d spent feeling endlessly alone, cleaning the house and eating cereal straight from the box, doing everything I could to keep bad things from happening. I had walked to the highway and back. I had tried on all of Momma’s jewelry, and her makeup. I’d played with makeup that day! I smiled. Apparently, I hadn’t been the only one.
“I was working in Uncle Ray’s shop when you made the world stop turning,” Del continued to explain. “For a while, I kept stocking the shelves, not sure what was happening. But soon I ran out of stuff to do. I ate potato chips. I played tic-tac-toe by myself. I wandered around the bus station, switching everybody’s hats around. Tripp and B-Bug were there, frozen halfway down the escalators. If I could’ve seen into the future the way you used to be able to do, I might’ve turned Tripp and B-Bug around, or tied bells to their shoes or something. If I’d known Tripp was on his way to Ray’s store to steal stuff and threaten me, I would never have started messing around with all of the makeup behind Gran’s old cosmetics counter.”
I listened to Del tell his story, feeling sorry that my time-stop had caused him trouble.
“I wish you’d figured out how to restart time sooner, Specs. I was bored out of my mind! So bored, I decided to give myself a makeover. I should’ve noticed that something had changed the minute people in the bus station started moving again. But I didn’t. I was too busy trying to put on a pair of fake eyelashes—those suckers are tricky! I looked up from the mirror and Tripp and B-Bug were standing right in front of me. Tripp already had his phone up in my face.”
Del frowned. “For the last week, Tripp’s been trying to take something my gran taught me to love, the one thing I’m actually good at, and use it to make me feel bad about myself.”
I knew how Del felt. Shelby had made me feel bad about myself too, when I was in Flint’s Market.
Del stared long and hard at Tripp, then said, “I’m going to let him do it, Specs. Go ahead and restart time. I’m ready to face this guy.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m positive.”
As soon as I set the world into motion again, Tripp cackled: “Maybe we should start calling him Delphine now instead of Del. Right, B-Bug?”
“Really, Tripp? Really?” Del shook his head. “I’m pretty sure I remember you begging for my help a few minutes ago. I didn’t think you’d go back to being a horse’s backside quite so fast. I don’t even care about your stupid picture. Here, you can have your phone back.” Del tossed the phone in Tripp’s direction, letting it clatter to the floor. “Go ahead, Travis. Send my picture to anyone you want. I look smokin’ in that snap. My gran would’ve been proud.”
Private Anderson, who was still helping B-Bug hold Tripp aloft, looked from Del to the slippery salamander boy in his arms. Anderson scowled at Travis Kaminski the Third, and dropped him like a hot potato. “Kid, I get the feeling you can walk alone.”
Tripp landed squarely on the floor. B-Bug had dropped him too.
AS TRIPP GROANED ON the floor, B-Bug drew a crumpled and blood-stained paper napkin from his pocket. He held it up with an apologetic half smile. “Next time you run away from someone who’s about to clock you, Del, you might not want to leave a note saying where you’re going.” Tripp and B-Bug had found Grandma’s note after Del discarded it. The note that read:
I don’t care what you think.
I’m going to the dance at Larimer High tonight.
Don’t come after me!
“So, where’s the dance?” asked B-Bug. “Wasn’t there supposed to be a rave here tonight or something?”
“Cleavon!” When Grandma saw B-Bug across the shadowy gymnasium, she leaped to her feet with the energy of someone closer to sixteen than seventy-six. “Cleavon Dorsey! I’ve been waiting for you for ages.” Grandma’s eyes shone brightly, as though she saw a thousand twinkle lights and silver streamers no one else could see, decorations for the winter formal going on inside her mixed-up mind.
When B-Bug saw Grandma coming, he dropped the napkin. Grandma’s note floated away from him, riding on an invisible current of air and joining the rest of the debris time had littered in the shadows.
Samson moved to block Grandma’s way as she shuffled toward B-Bug. “That’s not Cleavon, Grandma,” he said softly. “That’s—”
“Don’t, Samson,” I said, stopping my brother from interfering. “Let her go. It’ll be okay. Trust me.” I crossed my fingers, hoping I was right to place so much hope in Byron Berger. It was a smaller leap of faith this time, not nearly as big or scary as the one I’d made up on the tower. But Grandma needed this. She’d never gotten to go to her winter dance. It was time she did.
I watched Grandma shuffle-twirl across the room toward her mirage of Cleavon Dorsey. I knew there would be many un-magical moments in Grandma Pat’s future. Her illness—her Old-timer’s disease—guaranteed it. But for one shiny, happy moment, Patrice Beaumont’s inner world was as full of enchantment as a thrice-charmed fairy tale.
“Oh, Cleavon,” Grandma sighed when she stood in front of B-Bug at last, reaching up to lock her fingers behind the boy’s thick neck.
B-Bug went rigid, and his eyes darted wildly between Grandma and Del. But he didn’t step away. He didn’t push my grandmother to the side or tell her to back off—not even when she leaned one cheek against his wide chest and said, “I never thought this night would come, Cleavon. You don’t know what I’ve been through to get here. Daddy told me I had to toughen up, and I did, for a while. But it wasn’t any fun. It feels like I’ve been dreaming of slow dancing with you for sixty years.”
B-Bug, to his credit, patted Grandma gently, if awkwardly, on the back and said:
“Er . . . me too?”
Then, as if he knew that he alone had the power to be Patrice Beaumont’s prince for a brief turn, Byron put his hands around her waist and slowly, carefully, began to waltz her around the gym.
Sometimes it just takes one person to change everything.
Next to me, tough-as-nails Corporal Vasquez sniffed sentimentally. Maybe love wasn’t such a battlefield after all.
“That’s just beautiful.” Vasquez sniffed again. But her expression turned Marine Corps–tough when Lance Corporal Parker glanced her way, looking poised and ready to ask her to dance. It didn’t matter. Soon everyone was dancing. Everyone but Tripp, the two old veterans . . . and me.
There wasn’t any music, but no one seemed to care. Samson held
a single pinkie finger out to Nola. Nola hooked her own pinkie around his and dipped a playful curtsy. Vasquez bent low to link her arm through Tucker’s, before Lance Corporal Parker could take another shot at asking her to dance. The rest of the group cut loose on their own, to whatever music they hummed, or heard inside their heads.
I hung back. I wanted to dance—I did. But it had only been a week since I’d danced through the aisles of Flint’s Market, leaping about to the tune from The Nutcracker, with my arms filled with boxes of soap. A lot had happened in a week, but a few of Shelby’s barbs were still stuck under my skin.
Before I could linger too long over painful scenes from my past, Grandma Pat broke away from B-Bug and grabbed my hand.
“Dance with me, Nettie!” she crowed. “Don’t be such a wallflower.” Grandma wrapped one arm around me, then let me go again, sending me spinning. I couldn’t believe it. Grandma Pat had hugged me! She’d danced with me! I didn’t even care that she’d called me Nettie.
Sirens sounded in the distance, growing louder, reminding me that Private Anderson had called emergency crews to our location. Our magical winter formal would soon be over. The pumpkin hour was drawing near. But now I knew that, even after the most frightening falls, we can pick ourselves up and dance.
“Come on, Gypsy,” said Del, catching me by the hand as soon as I stopped spinning. “I’ll teach you how to moonwalk.”
I took off my glasses, wiping away tears of happiness. I was about to return my sparkly purple spectacles to my nose when I stopped.
Staring into the blur around me, I imagined that I still had a savvy that let me see into the past. I pictured the old high school building as a living, breathing character, allowing me to peek into its dusty history—letting me watch every prom, homecoming dance, and winter formal that had ever taken place inside its rubble-strewn gymnasium. In my mind, I saw a hundred different parties. A thousand transparent dancers overlapping. And among these ghostly figures, a small group of solid, living, breathing ones: Grandma Pat waltz-shuffling slowly, back in B-Bug’s gentle arms; Corporal Vasquez bending down to swing-dance wildly with little Tuck; Del moonwalking next to me, waiting for me to mirror his smooth steps; and Samson and Nola, slow dancing to whatever love song Nola might be softly singing.