“I have very little to say on any of those subjects.”
“Okay. How about . . . the most embarrassing song that you love. Or the stupidest thing you’ve ever spent money on. The worst food you’ve ever eaten.”
“Tell me about your future,” I said. The ache widened sharply, and the words came out almost like a sigh. “Where will you be in two years?”
“Two years,” Rob repeated. “. . . I think I’ll be in a city.” The words were slow but even. “I’m not sure which one yet. I’ll have an apartment. Maybe I’ll be in college part-time, maybe I’ll be working.” He paused for a second, his eyes on the windshield. “There’s this girl I hang out with. She has these crazy dark green eyes, and her hair changes color depending on the play she’s doing at the moment. And she has this tiny scar on her forehead that you can only see in bright light.”
I held my breath.
“We go to concerts. Movies. Coffee shops. On weekends, we explore weird parts of the city.” Rob paused for a second, like he was realizing something new. “I never get tired of talking with her. I feel like I’m still making up for the time when I didn’t know her. But I’ll probably always feel that way.” He turned away from the windshield and looked at me. “There. At least, that’s where I hope I’ll be.”
I was scared to speak. There was a lump in my throat, and if I opened my mouth, it would splurt out in a laugh or a sob or some weird mixture of the two. I reached out and took his hand instead.
For a minute, we just held on to each other. The ache wasn’t lessening. Thoughts came more and more slowly, gathering darkness around the edges.
Rob’s eyes flicked up to the rearview mirror. “I think if Pierce were still behind us, we would know for sure by now.”
“You’re probably right.”
“So. Now that we’re free . . . where should we go?”
I stared out the side window. The sky had darkened to the color of dirty wool. Streetlamps sent down beams of light that seemed to capture the falling snowflakes, trapping them in temporary slow motion. “I think there’s a park up here. Near the river.”
“At this exit?”
“The next one.”
Rob veered right. We tilted up the off-ramp, snow bursting across the windshield like fireworks.
“You’ve been to this place before?” he asked.
It took a second for his question to seep through the ache. “Oh. Yeah. A long time ago.” I swallowed, trying to steady myself. “My dad took us to every park in a thousand-mile radius. At least, when I wasn’t being punished or left at home or something. We’d go hiking, or fishing, or biking . . .”
Rob waited for a moment before speaking again. “Does it bother you to talk about him? We can talk about something else, if—”
“No,” I cut him off. “It usually does. But not with you.”
“Do I turn left or right here?”
“Right.”
We followed the road’s tight curve. Rob drove slowly—but not quite slowly enough. The tires met a patch of ice, and for a sickening instant, we shushed sideways over the snowy center line. My body went tight. Rob jerked the wheel. My head snapped back, the ache streaking after it. My mind winked out like a flipped switch.
Then the darkness scattered, and the world was still there, and Rob was still beside me, steering the car back into its lane.
“God, I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m not used to roads like this.”
“It’s fine. I’m fine.” My lips struggled with the words. “We’re almost there.”
“I’m going to drive embarrassingly slow for the rest of the way.”
“That’s fine,” I breathed, closing my eyes. “I’m fine.”
I kept my eyelids sealed until the ground beneath the tires changed, and the car bumped off onto a rougher road, and from there into a graveled parking lot.
“Are we there?”
“I think so,” Rob’s voice answered. “I just followed the signs.”
I blinked out through the windshield.
The park was unlit by artificial light. Even the glow of the surrounding city couldn’t reach all the way through the thick trees. Pines towered around us, their limbs heavy with fresh snow. Somewhere in the cloud-covered sky, the moon gave off a weak, pearly light. Snowflakes settled gently on the windows.
“Yes. We’re there.”
“Do you want to get out and take a walk?”
“No.” Clumsily, I rearranged myself in the seat, angling my face toward him. The ache lurched. “I just want to sit here with you.”
“That’s good too.” Rob lifted my hand and brought it up to his lips. It made me laugh. He gave me a little smile in return before pressing a soft kiss to the back of my wrist.
I let my skull flop back against the headrest. “You did that the very first time I saw you.”
“I did?” Rob still wore a smile, but there was a note of playful skepticism in it now. “I don’t remember trying this in anatomy class.”
“No. Not then. Maybe . . .” I pulled my hand away and rubbed my face. “No. It’s just—that feeling. You know. Like you’ve been somewhere before, even though you know you actually haven’t.”
I wasn’t making sense, even to myself. But Rob reached over and ran his fingers down the side of my face. “Yeah. I know.”
I leaned forward slightly, hoping he would kiss me, that it would push away some of the ache.
The sharp beam of headlights sliced through the car. Both Rob and I turned as a car zoomed by, its tires squealing around the curve, passing the park entrance. Its taillights vanished into the dark.
The park went quiet again. Snow cushioned the world. Everything felt soft, and muffled, and held gently in place, and Rob and I were two figures in a snow globe—except that the snow was falling outside the car, and we were sealed here together, warm and safe and dry.
“You didn’t tell me about your future,” said Rob, after a second. “Your turn.”
I leaned back in the seat. “It’s weird. I used to think about it all the time. I’d imagine the shows I might be in. The cities where I’d live. Places I’d get to see, characters I’d play. Half the time, if a teacher called on me, that’s where my head would be. I’ve given some pretty stupid answers in algebra class.”
He laughed. God, that voice. My spine rippled. That voice.
“But now, it’s just—I don’t know. Ever since all of this started . . . trying to stay in this time is enough.” I ran my fingers over the scar. “Maybe that’s because my brain’s running at about ten percent capacity.”
I could see him grin back at me, his face silver in the snowy moonlight.
“Or maybe it’s because right now is . . . I don’t know. Right now, there’s nothing else I’m wishing for.”
I heard the latch of Rob’s seat belt click against the door. I unbuckled myself next. We both lurched forward, me awkwardly, Rob quickly, and somehow managed to knot our arms around each other while leaving just enough space for me to tilt my face up to his.
He kissed me, or I kissed him, for a very long time. His mouth was so warm. So much more real than anything I could have imagined. I could feel my body starting to dissolve, little bits of me zinging around the interior of the car, glittering, weightless.
“Any supernovas?” I whispered. “I feel like I need to compete with the Warrior Mermaid.”
Rob’s fingertips were cool against my neck. “I’m so glad I finally met you.”
“Finally?”
“You know. All those places, all those people. And now you.”
He pulled me toward him again. On the windshield, snow collected in thick white waves. We might have been there for minutes. We might have been there for hours.
Rob finally leaned back slightly, his breathing fast. “I don’t want to stop here. Believe me.” He brushed away a strand of hair th
at had tangled in my eyelashes. “But I’m starting to picture what your sister will do to me when I bring you home.”
“Yeah.” I was out of breath too. “She can be pretty brutal with a hairbrush. I speak from experience.”
“In that case . . .” Rob reached for the gearshift. “God, I really don’t want to leave. But I’d also really like to survive until next time.” He turned back to me. “There will be a next time, right?”
I smiled. “Yes. There will absolutely be a next time.”
“Okay then.” Rob let out a long breath. Then he grinned at me, put the car in gear, and eased gently into the turnaround.
“Whoa,” he said as we crunched to the edge of the lot. “Where did the road go?”
“See that sort of smoother snowy part? That’s the road.”
“So I just have to trust that it’s there?” He pulled out onto the main road. The snow was deep and clean, the ruts of tire tracks already filling. “This requires some serious object permanence.”
“Yeah, it’s a good thing we don’t let infants drive.”
I heard Rob laugh. And then I heard the roar.
This time, the headlights came from the opposite direction. They smashed through the windshield like a battering ram.
There was a flash—headlights, or something else, something brighter. And then a sudden, crystalline explosion, thousands of glass diamonds and tumbling snowflakes decorating the frigid air. I heard the crunch of metal, the snap and grind of steel against steel against ice against wood. I was floating upward into the darkness. My fingers lost their grip on Rob’s hand, and whatever it was that had seemed so real was gone.
CHAPTER 26
There was blood on the snow.
White, with a smattering of red. Like petals.
Two suns burned my eyes. Their beams poked through a net of my own tangled hair. The longer I squinted up at them, the surer I felt that they couldn’t be suns; they were too close and too small to be suns.
No. They were headlights. Behind them, I could make out a glossy black car crumpled against a tree trunk, and another car—a smallish, bluish car—smashed to the side, its roof pressed against a wall of trees, its front end folded into the black car’s hood like two pieces of wrinkled laundry.
Of course, I thought. Of course.
Somewhere, a motor ran pointlessly.
I inched backward on my elbows. The ground beneath me was cold and sharp.
Outside the pool of light, I stopped, breathing hard. There was a shrieking in my head, and a new ache in my side that twinged each time I inhaled.
The headlights sparkled on the snow. On bits of broken glass. On the dark spatter fanning over the snowbanks.
Wind hissed gently through the pines.
By rolling onto my side—the side without the twinge—I managed to get to my knees, and from there to my feet. The ground beneath me tilted with the trees.
Standing upright, I could see a dark shape hunched in the black car, mounded up against the dashboard. A few steps to my right, another shape lay in the snow.
I stood still. Sensation dwindled. The shriek in my head died down. I was suddenly disconnected from all of this: the crunched cars, the unmoving black shapes, the whirring engine. It was like a set once the stage lights had been switched off.
I turned toward the trees behind me. The headlights carved a path through the frosted trunks. I set off down the trail, dragging my feet. When I stumbled and plunged my bare hands into the snow, I couldn’t feel a thing.
Of course you can’t. This is all just pretend.
I got up again.
The beams of light began to dim, and the ground underneath me sloped downward, angling like a theater aisle. The surrounding tree trunks smoothed into pillars. Under the snowy branches, folding seats curved in rows, moss-soft and empty.
Just ahead of me, a little farther down the aisle, I caught the flicker of a fairy’s wing. Hamlet’s outline shivered in the shadows.
“Whither wilt thou lead me?” he whispered as I wandered past.
I followed his eyes to the end of the aisle. An empty stage was waiting.
Empty stage. Empty stage.
My feet thumped up the wooden steps.
Trunks of trees, faint and misty, formed a backdrop. Dusty red curtains hung open to either side. I crossed slowly to center stage. The beams of twin spotlights found me. For a second, I was blinded, everything around me washed away in a flood of bleary white.
I blinked out into the rows of seats.
Hamlet had disappeared. At first I thought the rest of the house was empty too. But as my eyes adjusted, I could make out a single silhouette seated in the center of the theater.
The lights set off little flares in my eyelashes. I squinted harder. I couldn’t see who it was, only that it was a man, by himself, his head tilted to gaze up at me. I shielded my eyes with one hand, and still, I wasn’t sure if I could make out the waves of brown hair above a high forehead, the twinkle of a gold earring, or if that was just a trick of lights on the snow.
“So . . . is that it?” I asked. My voice sounded strangely clear. “What happens now?”
There was no answer. The silhouette was still.
“Am I dreaming this? I must be dreaming this. Right?” I looked around at the ripple of velvety seat backs, the moon-white stage floor. My own scraped hands. “Or am I . . . with you?” My voice lost its steadiness. “Am I dead?”
I waited again, holding my breath.
Still no answer.
“Can I have one more chance?” I pleaded. “Just one more. Please. I know I screwed up again. This time, I’ll—I won’t—” Even now, I couldn’t say it. Not even in pretend. “Please. Just let me have another chance.”
The seats swam. The light seemed to swell and soften around me. The silhouette didn’t speak, but it stirred slightly, tilting its head. There was no gold hoop earring on its ear. There was no wide velvet collar.
“It’s you, isn’t it?” I whispered, my voice carrying through the stillness.
I took a step forward, staggering slightly. “Was this a test? Were you trying to save me, and I still wouldn’t listen?” I paused. No answer. “Or were you just . . . I don’t know. Were you trying to prove that I’d make the same stupid choices over and over, no matter how many warnings I got? Or are you just watching me? Are you just . . .”
My knees buckled suddenly. I sagged down onto the chilly stage floor. “Is that what you meant about ‘how the story goes’? Just . . . all of us, being us? Ophelia has to fall into the river. Juliet has to pick up the knife.” I let out a little laugh. “I would have thought you’d hate that idea. That we just are who we are, so why try to change it? Midnight Plum. Sad Spice and Scary Spice. Me and Rob.” I laughed again, rubbing my head. “Maybe.” The lights shimmered. “I just . . .” My feet were going numb. “. . . I’m not sure I can change anything. I’m not sure I would change anything.”
The silhouette moved again, listening. Around us, the light glinted on a few drifting flakes. Something dripped onto the back of my hand; something warm and dark that trailed over the edge of my jaw.
“I still want to make you happy.” My voice was starting to slur. “I always want to make you happy. Even though I know you’re not really here.” Words floated out of reach like a puff of blown snow. “But I don’t know . . . I can’t . . .”
The spotlights were dying. The glittering snow sank into gray. The pale columns of the trees began to soften, dwindling backward, the scene fading gradually into black.
“I know how the story goes,” I mumbled. “But what if . . . what if we just changed the ending. Just once. Like—what if the spell didn’t work. Or there was no duel. What if Juliet woke up just in time . . .”
My eyelids were starting to close.
“I’m so tired, Dad,” I breathed. “I’
m just . . .”
The light died.
Blackness.
Silence.
The light touch of snowflakes on the backs of my hands.
Someone lifted my elbow.
My fingers were numb. I couldn’t hold on as my arm was wrapped through another arm. I felt my body being dragged upward with it.
He braced me against his side.
Our feet moved across the dark stage and down the steps, mine shuffling and stumbly, his steady and slow. What had been the aisle was now just a winding strip between the pine trees. I tripped on a snow-buried root. He held me up.
His arm was firm and ropy, just like I remembered it. His hand, holding my elbow, was solid. I could almost feel the warmth of breath coming from him. Almost.
We reached the break in the trees. The two crumpled cars—the broken glass and black flecks in the snow—pulled me to a stop again. I stumbled.
“You’ve got this, kiddo,” murmured a voice in my ear. “One foot in front of the other.”
I stepped forward.
The hand holding my arm let go.
Then I was staggering closer, through the clinking glass, to the side of the crushed black car.
The shape inside of it hadn’t moved. I eased open the driver’s-side door.
Pierce was slumped against the steering wheel. The airbag had opened. His face rested against the deflating gray pillow, looking almost asleep. Blood trickled from a gash over his left eye.
I held my fingers under his nose.
Breath. Shallow, but steady.
“Hold on, Pierce,” I said out loud, reaching into his coat pockets as gently as I could. “I’m calling for help. Just hold on.”
The 911 operator’s voice sounded very far away, but calm and clear. I answered questions. Gave directions. Made my own voice as steady as I could. Katharine Hepburn. Meryl Streep.
“Police and EMTs are on their way,” the voice told me. “Just hang on. How many were injured?”
“Three. Three of us.” The ground trembled under my feet. “One is still in his car. He’s unconscious, but he’s breathing. The other one is . . .”