The Backward Season

  “Two days, two days,” the Bird Lady trilled as she wedged the last bit of the scroll into the tight glass bottle neck. “Two days until your Wishing Day, dear Klara.”

  Ava freaked out. Two days? But Ava had wished to go back in time with the goal of arriving three days before Mama’s Wishing Day. Three days, not two!

  Everything was wrong! What was it Mama had said? Mama and the Bird Lady had both said it, that Willow Hill’s magic was “fluky.”

  But where did that leave Ava? Communicating with the Bird Lady was a wash, and Ava had even less time to fix things than she’d anticipated.

  Mama, she thought. I’m trying. Really, I am!

  Longing washed over her: for Mama, for thirteen-year-old Klara and thirteen-year-old Emily, for wholeness and rightness and love.

  She reeled as once again came a scattering of light and a whoosh of wind. This time, she arrived in a bedroom. A girl’s bedroom, with a pale blue comforter on the bed and an assortment of teddy bears propped against the pillows. Hold on—she recognized one of the teddy bears! He was in better condition than she’d ever seen it, but it was Johnny, all right. Brown button eyes, soft plush fur . . . Johnny the teddy bear, who belonged to Ava now.

  Well, not in this now. But he would. Ava, in the present, had slept with Johnny all through her childhood. He’d been Mama’s, Papa had told her. Ava felt comforted when she held him.

  If Johnny was here, that meant . . .

  Yes. Klara. Her one-day mother was sitting at a small desk, doodling in a notebook. Ava peered over her shoulder, and her lungs squeezed together when she saw the hearts Mama was drawing over and over, filling each with a variation of Klara + Nate.

  “Mama?” Ava said tentatively.

  Klara kept doodling.

  “Mama, it’s me.”

  Still nothing.

  “Klara,” Ava tried.

  Klara’s back stiffened, but only for a moment. She shook her head.

  Ava moved closer. She touched—or imagined touching—Mama’s arm, and goose pimples popped up all over Klara’s skin. Klara looked at her arm and inhaled sharply.

  “This is real,” Ava said. “You’re okay. You’re not . . . going crazy or anything.”

  Klara rubbed at both arms, the way someone does when they’re trying to warm up. She was unnerved, Ava could tell, but she still couldn’t hear Ava. Ava felt like crying. The Bird Lady had neither seen nor heard her, and now it seemed that Mama—Klara—couldn’t either. What was the point of her wishes if she couldn’t communicate with her mother?

  Working yourself into a frenzy won’t help, Ava told herself. This is a puzzle. You have to figure it out. So figure it out!

  With Aunt Elena, she’d had the sense, for the briefest of flashes, that she and Aunt Elena had connected telepathically. It was when Aunt Elena was trying to remember who could confirm her story about Emily being real. It turned out to be the Bird Lady, and it had been Ava who helped Aunt Elena find the answer in her mind. How had she managed it then?

  Through focus, concentration, and single-mindedness of purpose, like the articles she’d read had suggested. She’d imagined sending energy from her mind to find energy from Elena’s mind—and it had worked.

  She’d done the same thing with Klara, and it hadn’t!

  What was different???

  With Aunt Elena, Ava had told her aunt about telepathy. She’d asked Aunt Elena to try it with her as an experiment, and Aunt Elena had agreed. They’d both been on the same page. Also, they’d both been strongly connected already, because they’d been talking about the same thing and wanting the same thing.

  How could Ava connect with Klara when Ava had no connection with Klara, not Klara as a thirteen-year-old?

  But she’s your mom, Ava told herself. That. Is. A. Huge. Connection. And fine, maybe she’s not your mom yet, but she will be.

  Ava gave a jolt. The letter Mama left for Ava before walking away from their family for eight and a half years! Ava had been disappointed in the letter when she first read it—and she’d been disappointed on her second, third, and all other future readings, too. Mama had told Natasha and Darya the good stuff, that was how it seemed to Ava, while to Ava, she’d basically said, “I’m weary now, my darling. Your sisters will fill you in.”

  There’d been one other part, though. At the time, Ava hadn’t thought it was important. Maybe it wasn’t.

  But maybe it was.

  Mama, in her letter, had told Ava a story illustrating how stubborn Ava was. She’d told her how for an entire year—the year leading up to Mama’s departure, in fact—Ava as a toddler had insisted that Mama read one book and one book only to her at bedtime every night.

  The book was called Love You Forever, Mama had written. Do you remember? It was about a mother and a son, and every night, the mother sang the son a song that went like this: “I’ll love you forever, I’ll like you for always, as long as I’m living, my baby you’ll be.” It was a sweet book, and a sweet song, though part of the song always rankled me. You, Ava, will be my Ava even after I’m done living. For that matter, before! You, Ava, will be my baby forever. Please hear me. Please believe me.

  In the book, the boy grew older and older, and when the boy was a man, there’d been a funny illustration of the mother creeping in through his window and rocking him in her lap even though he was huge. Then, at the end . . . and it made Ava feel teary even now . . . the tables had turned. The mother was old and feeble, and the son had held her in his lap. The son held his dying mother in his lap and sang the familiar song, changing the last line to “As long as I’m living, my mother you’ll be.”

  Ava sang the song now. Her voice made no sound, but she sang it with all her heart. She imagined her mother as a baby, her mother as a teenager, her mother as her mother. She imagined herself in her mother’s embrace. She imagined Klara in her own invisible embrace.

  “As long as you’re living, my mother you’ll be,” she sang.

  For too many minutes, nothing happened. But one of the articles she’d read at Rocky’s Diner said that ghosts—or energy untethered to a physical body—could communicate with living beings, so she didn’t give up.

  “As long as I’m living, your baby I’ll be,” she sang, changing the final line for her own purposes.

  It’s me, Mama, she thought as she sang, texturing the words with that one-day truth. She pushed on that thought with all her might. Again and again, she imagined energy flying from her to her mother . . . and it happened! A door edging open, the same way it had happened with Aunt Elena!

  Brilliant light . . .

  Tiny wings . . .

  Confusion, and Mama, and Ava as a baby.

  Then, like two layers of a picture sliding together to form a single image, their spirits merged.

  Ava swelled with exaltation. Mama, it’s me!

  Thirteen-year-old Klara put her hand to her face. She said, “Omigosh, I’m going crazy.”

  You’re not, don’t worry! But you might, if you don’t listen to what I say. Molecules buzzed and hummed. Can you hear me, Mama? I mean, Klara? For real? Nod if you can!

  Klara tilted her head, rested her ear against her cupped palm, and did that jostling thing with her hand as if she were trying to get water out.

  That was as good as nodding, Ava decided.

  Except bubbles of fear clogged Klara’s blood. Ava tasted metal. The bubbles were so dense and airless they could drown a girl. Could Ava drown within her own future mother?

  Klara’s heart raced, and Ava experienced it as if her own heart was racing. Klara breathed shallowly. Ava breathed shallowly.

  Whoa, Ava thought.

  “Whoa,” Klara said, and Ava felt the weight of Klara’s emotions. It was a richer tapestry than she’d initially realized. Anger and fear, yes, but also sadness. The way Klara let her body slump told Ava how helpless she felt.

  But you’re not, Ava told her. I’m here. I’m here to help.

  “Who are you?!” Klara demanded.
>
  Don’t you know? Didn’t you listen? I’m Ava.

  “Ava,” Klara said flatly.

  Yeah. I’m, well . . . I’m your daughter.

  Klara’s pulse skyrocketed.

  In the future! I’m from the future! Ava rapidly explained. Years from now, you’ll have three daughters: Natasha, Darya, and me. And guess what? You do marry Nate Blok!

  Klara didn’t try to boot Ava out. Instead, she allowed their connection to strengthen. Ava knew there was no science to confirm it, but she sensed that they were connected as deeply as they were because everything Ava was saying was true. Ava was Klara’s future daughter. Klara was flabbergasted at Ava’s presence, so Ava repeated to Klara her own mantra. It’s okay. Sometimes impossible situations call for impossible solutions, that’s all.

  “Yeah, sure, that’s all,” Klara muttered. “And what did you mean, I grow up and marry . . . Nate?”

  A flicker show of impressions raced through Ava: A photograph of Ava’s family when Ava was three and their family was whole. Then Mama, depressed. Mama abandoning not just Ava, but also her sisters, Vera and Elena; her other two daughters, Natasha, Darya; and, of course, her husband.

  Nate.

  Emily’s brother.

  Ava’s one-day Papa.

  Klara knuckled her eyes. She said, “Okay, I didn’t get all that. I’m not sure I want to.”

  No problem, Ava said. That’s why I’m here, to make sure none of that happens. To make sure Emily doesn’t—

  “Doesn’t what?” Klara pulled her bare feet onto her chair and hugged her knees. “When you think about Emily, it’s like a black hole or something. Everything goes shadowy.”

  Ava’s thought went skittering. Don’t tell her about Emily being erased, she cautioned herself. Not yet!

  “Erased?!” Klara said. “Did you just say erased?”

  Ava tried to close off her brain—except, why? This was the reason she was here, wasn’t it?

  “Everyone loves Emily!” Klara went on. “No one would ‘erase’ her, ever!”

  No one but you, Ava thought, and it was out, despite her effort to ease into it more gently.

  Ava, formless though she was, clapped her hand over her mouth. If not acting like a person who still had a body was hard, not thinking the thoughts she wanted to banish was even more difficult.

  Oh, just go ahead and do it, she told herself. She relayed to Klara the future that might be, and Klara bolted out of her room and into the bathroom, where she dropped in front of the toilet and threw up.

  Oh, Ava thought. Oops . . . ?

  Klara retched again, and then once more, even though her stomach was empty. She grabbed some toilet paper and swiped at her mouth. Then she stood, unsteadily, and cupped handfuls of water into her mouth, rinsed, and spit. She stared at herself in the mirror.

  “Are you really . . . ?” she asked.

  I am, Ava said. She felt a wrenching twist of sympathy for this girl, her one-day mother, who hadn’t yet done anything. Not anything bad, that is. And . . . I’m sorry.

  “But why—” Klara gave a hard shake of her head. She did believe Ava. Ava could feel it. She might not understand, but she believed.

  Someone knocked on the bathroom door. “Klara?” said a small voice. “Are you all right?”

  Klara startled. “Um . . . I’m fine!” she called. “Upset stomach. Better now!” Peering again at her sallow complexion, she whispered, “I just won’t make my wishes at all, then.”

  Ava snapped to attention, knowing that wasn’t the answer. The wishes mattered. The magic mattered.

  Go to Emily, Ava thought.

  Klara felt a rush of relief. Ava felt it with her, a stripe of sunlight in a windowless room. Emily was Klara’s best friend. She needed her best friend at a time like this.

  First thing in the morning, Ava prompted. Now, bed.

  Klara nodded. She dried her hands on the hand towel and returned to her room, passing a very young, very cute Aunt Elena wearing a comical expression of concern.

  Snuggled beneath her covers, Klara shivered and turned off her bedside lamp. She and Ava slept.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Emily, Age Thirteen

  “Wait. What?” Emily said. It was the day before Klara’s and her Wishing Day. They’d planned everything out, down to the last detail. Then Klara had arrived at Emily’s house before school started, pale and agitated and shifting her weight from one foot to another. She’d dragged Emily to Emily’s bedroom and shut the door, jabbering about stuff that made no sense.

  The most disturbing part? Klara wasn’t Klara. Or, she was, but she wasn’t the Klara Emily was accustomed to. She was Klara Plus, kind of.

  “We have to stay together,” Klara said. “The Bird Lady—she isn’t the batty nice lady I thought she was.” She screwed up her face. “Or . . . no . . . that’s not right. She’s . . .” Klara’s gaze grew unfocused. “I missed that. What?”

  Emily rubbed her arms. She and Klara were the only ones there, and yet Klara looked for all the world as if she were talking to someone else. Someone in her head. Worse, Emily could almost feel someone else in Klara’s head.

  Except that was crazy, obviously.

  Maybe she’s got a stomachache, Emily thought.

  “She is nice,” Klara said emphatically. She focused again on Emily. “The Bird Lady’s nice, but she’s confused. She wants to make things better, which is good. Only she doesn’t yet know that what she’s planning to do will make things worse, which is bad.”

  “I don’t understand,” Emily said, not for the first time. She’d tried several times since Klara had arrived to push on Klara’s thoughts in order to gain some sort of clarity, any clarity, about what had happened to her friend. Normally, she stayed out of Klara’s head, but she’d decided that this was a special case. Klara was acting so strange.

  Emily couldn’t, though.

  She couldn’t push her way in.

  Something (or someone?) was blocking her.

  Shivers ran up her spine. She rubbed her arms more vigorously, trying to warm up.

  “Emily,” said Klara abruptly. She stared at Emily with wide eyes. “This is going to sound really out there . . . but do you think maybe you have, like, psychic powers?”

  Emily paled.

  “Please don’t get scared,” Klara said. “Ava just—I mean I just . . . I just have this feeling that you do.”

  “Do you have psychic powers?” Emily said, hearing her pulse in her head. If Klara had a gift like she did, how had she failed to notice for all these months and even years?

  “No! I wish!” Klara paused, again adopting her listening face. “Or, maybe I do, but . . . they’re on loan.”

  “You’re scaring me, Klara.”

  “For what it’s worth, I was scared, too. I threw up, even.”

  “You threw up? When?”

  “Last night, when, um, it first happened.”

  “When what happened? Klara, tell me what’s going on!”

  Klara pushed her hand through her hair, which was wild and unbrushed. “It’s going to sound impossible. It is impossible. But—”

  Klara seemed to fight an internal war with herself. She closed her eyes and groaned, then stared at Emily with resignation. “My daughter is here. From the future. It has to do with her wishes.”

  Emily had no words.

  “She says not to feel bad,” Klara went on. “She says that the Bird Lady couldn’t sense her, either. Maybe because she’s not, you know, real yet?”

  “Not real yet,” repeated Emily. “Your daughter from the future?”

  “I know. I know. Her name’s Ava—”

  “She has a name?!”

  “Well . . . yeah! And supposedly, Ava reminds people of you, so you shouldn’t be mean to her.”

  Emily held out her hands, palms up.

  Klara puffed out a breath of air. “She thinks she’s blocking you from, like, reading my mind, so she’s going to get out of the way for a bit. I don’t k
now how, so don’t ask.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it,” murmured Emily.

  “Oh, God, Emily. There’s so much you need to know!” Klara cried. “It’s life or death, literally. So just . . . help yourself?”

  And then it was as if a veil was lifted from Klara’s thoughts. Emily felt a jolt. Time seemed suspended for several long, mind-bending moments.

  Then time started up again, and Emily heard an insistent buzzing. She tried three times to shake the buzzing out of her ear before realizing that the buzzing was real. She uncoiled herself from her spot on her bed and strode to her window, cracking it open to free a honeybee that was bashing itself repeatedly against the pane.

  “So . . . do you know now?” Klara said. “All of it?”

  Emily returned to her bed and perched next to Klara. She prodded, but Klara’s mind was closed again.

  “She—Ava—is back in?” Emily said.

  Klara nodded.

  “Right,” Emily said. She felt foggy from the information dump she’d just undergone. It was as if she’d read a book in its entirety, but had yet to absorb its contents—and there was so much to absorb. “Can you give me a minute?”

  Klara nodded again: up, down, up, down.

  Emily wondered if she was as pale as Klara was. She felt the lurching terror of free fall, imagining the future Ava came to warn them of, and was at once resolute.

  “I agree with . . . Ava,” she said at last. It was odd, talking about someone who was both there and not there, but it had to be done. “We can’t not make your wishes at all. We can’t not make our wishes out of fear.” She cocked her head at Klara. “You’d seriously wish that you won the contest instead of me?”

  “No! Never!” Klara’s face distorted, and Emily wondered if Ava, and the truth, sat like stones within her. “I don’t know—and, to be fair, the contest results haven’t even been announced.”

  “They’re announcing the winner this morning,” Emily mused. “And tonight, according to Ava, the Bird Lady was going to come to your house? Throw rocks at your window and persuade you to wish you’d won instead?”