Chapter 1
Wow.” I stood just inside the park, stock-still, attempting to take in everything around me.
There was pop music playing from the speakers, and people were streaming past me, laughing and talking in groups.
There was an energy I’d never experienced at Disney before—the feeling like we were starting an adventure, like anything could happen.
It reminded me of a carnival—the lights against the darkness, the groups of friends running around together, the feeling that you were about to have a great time.
We’d entered the park near the Avengers Campus.
Just to the left, I could see the Guardians drop ride.
The park’s lights were glowing brightly, and as I looked around, I realized that I hadn’t ever been here in actual nighttime before.
In the past, I’d stayed until dusk or late twilight.
But it was properly dark now—we were here after the park was normally open and looking at all the lights glowing in the darkness, I could really appreciate what that meant.
There were people streaming past all around us—friends walking in groups, people running past and yelling happily, couples walking hand in hand.
But, I realized as I looked around, these were all teenagers.
And while I saw this every day at school, of course, there was something surreal about seeing a huge group of my peers at an amusement park—with no parents in sight, no little kids, nobody pushing strollers, just the occasional adult chaperone peppered in.
In the swirl surrounding us—the lights, the laughter of the other kids, the song hitting the final chorus about how tonight would never be forgotten—there was an air of excitement and giddiness that was palpable. Like everyone there was taking the song’s words to heart.
“Who’s ready to have the best night ever?” Sheridan—looking very awake now—yelled this as he barreled past us. Presumably, he was heading toward the Cars Land DJ he’d been so excited about.
“Me! I am!” This was Manny, hurrying behind Sheridan and seeming to think that this rhetorical question needed an answer—but at least this time he didn’t raise his hand. He stopped to take a selfie, directly in the middle of where everyone was walking, creating a bottleneck.
A group of kids I didn’t recognize dashed through the wooden entrance door. A girl in a blue sweatshirt, running fast, dodged out of the way of Manny at the last minute—only to crash hard into Bryony, sending her stumbling and falling to the asphalt.
“Oops!” the girl said. She clapped her hand over her mouth, paused for only a second, then ran on, her friends following behind her. “You okay?” she yelled over her shoulder once she was too far away to have done anything about it if Bryony wasn’t.
“Oh my god,” I said, hurrying over to Bryony. I reached down to help her up, but it was Amy, surprising me, who got there first.
“Are you all right?” Amy asked, helping Bryony to her feet.
“Yeah,” she said, wincing slightly as she stood up. “Did everyone see?”
Amy and I exchanged a look, then both collectively decided to lie to her. “No,” we said at the same time, with exactly the same inflection.
“There’s so much going on,” I added, hoping that Bryony would buy this. She certainly didn’t need to know about the people I’d seen filming it, undoubtedly for some collection of epic falls on TikTok.
“Totally,” Amy agreed, bending down to pick up Bryony’s cross-body purse from where it had fallen to the ground.
“That girl came out of nowhere,” I said, looking back to the entrance.
Manny had moved on—probably realizing that this was partially his fault, and not wanting to deal with the fallout.
But I could see that we were kind of in the way.
I gestured to a nearby stone bench, and Bryony nodded and headed over to sit down on it, still moving a little gingerly.
“Babe!” This was Carlos, calling to Amy from where he was standing nearby, clearly ready to get their night started. “Come on!”
“Just a second!” Amy snapped. It was such an unusual tone for her to take with anyone—but especially Carlos—that Bryony and I exchanged a loaded, silent what-the-heck? look.
“I’m really okay,” Bryony said, giving her a smile. “Thanks, Amy.”
Amy gave her a nod, then handed her back her purse before going to join Carlos. “Why didn’t you help her?” I heard her ask as she joined him.
“Me?” Carlos asked, sounding baffled. “Why would I?”
“Why wouldn’t you?” They headed off, their voices fading out and blending with the music—currently Carly Rae Jepsen.
“That was weird,” I said, looking after them. Seeing Amy and Carlos arguing was like what I would imagine seeing the yeti was like. Technically possible, in theory, but you never expected to actually encounter it.
“So weird,” Bryony agreed. “But they’re AmyandCarlos. They’ll be fine. They’re going to get married and have a million kids, the way they told everyone they would back in seventh grade.”
“Maybe the pressure of graduation is getting to them. They’ll have to face what their relationship will be like without the bubble of school—you know, going their separate ways.”
“Hey!”
I turned and saw the Emmas coming toward us, Emma R. carrying a blue plastic Disneyland bag. I was impressed that she’d already managed to buy something—we really hadn’t been here that long. But clearly bus one had gotten the jump on us.
Emma R. was smiling and waving, but Emma J. and Emma Z. didn’t look quite so happy. They seemed to be having an intense conversation, their heads bent together.
“Hey, guys,” Bryony said, standing up from the bench. Emma J. and Emma Z. stopped talking quickly, Emma J. shaking her head as she moved a few steps over from Emma Z. It was surprising to see—like they were in a fight. First Carlos and Amy were bickering—and now the Emmas?
“Look!” Emma R. said, reaching into her bag. She pulled out what looked like regular Mickey ears—except they had a tiny mortarboard in the middle. “Isn’t this so cute?”
“Wow,” I said, leaning closer to look. It really was.
I hadn’t known they’d have graduation-specific merchandise tonight.
Bryony and I had agreed ahead of time that we’d each get one souvenir.
I’d been thinking I’d get a sweatshirt—from everything I’d heard, it was going to be chillier in Oregon—but this was making me rethink things.
“Oh man, I might need those,” Bryony said, her eyes lighting up.
“We’re debating what to do. Either the Incredicoaster or Soarin’,” Emma R. said, scrolling through her phone. “There’s, like, no line right now.”
“Well, Cass doesn’t really do roller coasters,” Bryony said, glancing at me.
“It’s okay.” I wanted Bryony to have the best time tonight—I didn’t want to stop her from having fun just because I suffered from motion sickness. “I can just wait…”
“Chip!” Emma Z. yelped, which didn’t seem to fit with this conversation.
I turned to look the way she was pointing, and my jaw dropped.
A chipmunk was walking toward us. He was dressed in a graduation robe, complete with mortarboard on his furry head.
There was a cast member walking with him, and he was waving to everyone as he passed.
All around us, people had noticed him, too, and they were pulling out their phones to take pictures, or jogging along beside him as he walked, trying to get selfies.
I looked closely, then turned back to her.
“It’s Dale,” I said.
“Um, he’s wearing a robe,” Emma Z. said. “How can you even tell?”
“Fun fact,” I said, and I heard Bryony let out a laugh—she knew what was coming. “Dale has a red nose. But Chip’s nose is black, like a chocolate chip. So that’s how you can remember it.” Emma Z. just stared at me, and I gave her a smile back. She had asked.
“I had no idea that the characters would be in graduation outfits!” Bryony said. “This is the best thing ever!”
“It really is,” I agreed.
“So? Incredicoaster?” Emma R. asked, looking from me to Bryony. “You guys coming?”
“Maybe later,” Bryony said. “I’ll text you?”
“For sure,” Emma R. said. The Emmas waved at us, then hurried away as a group, Emma R. putting on her new Mickey ears, the other two Emmas resuming their conversation, heads bent together.
“You want to find the Mickey ears, don’t you?” I asked.
“I really do!” Bryony said immediately, and I laughed. We walked away from the entrance, scanning for souvenir kiosks. I didn’t know which one Emma R. had gotten her ears at—but I figured most of them would have the same stuff.
We stopped at the first kiosk we saw. In addition to selling regular souvenirs, there was also graduation-specific stuff, like T-shirts and sweatshirts with GRAD NITE printed in collegiate font. There were also lots of variations of Mickey ears—but none with mortarboards.
“Do you see them?” Bryony asked.
I shook my head, then caught the attention of the cast member working the kiosk. “Hi—do you have the mouse ears with the graduation cap?”
The cast member—her name tag read SNEHA, SUGARLAND, TEXAS—shook her head. “Sorry. We’re all sold out.”
I blinked at this. “Already? Didn’t Grad Nite just start?”
She shook her head. “Some of the schools do a day pass thing as well, so they can be here longer. Sorry.” Maybe seeing the disappointment on Bryony’s face, she added, “But I’m not the only one selling them. Other kiosks have them, too.”
“Okay, thanks,” Bryony said.
We walked away from the kiosk, both of us nodding respectfully at Thor as he passed and taking a moment to appreciate his resplendent hair. “Sorry about that,” I said, glancing back at the kiosk. “We can keep trying, though.”
“Do you think maybe Emma got the last pair?”
“I’m sure she didn’t. But if so, we can bargain with her for it,” I suggested. “Find out the thing she wants the most and dangle it in front of her.”
Bryony laughed at that and looked around. “So, what do you want to do?”