Chapter 11
Carly
When Carly restarted the loop and found herself in the funeral home, along with her normal reset feelings of numb acceptance,
there was also excitement because, as she’d discovered, there had been no change in the eclipse. It had remained only twenty
seconds shorter.
Which meant that maybe her absurd theory—that her good deeds for Adam were somehow causing the shift—was the right one. When
she stood from her chair she had a little bounce to her step. She couldn’t wait to reveal that she not he had figured out how to keep making the loop shorter. She was a bit manic about the whole thing, really.
“Oh, Adam,” Carly singsonged as Shireen zipped past the funeral service room on her way to the exit.
Carly could feel the smug expression on her lips—and honestly, she’d earned it. She wasn’t just an aspiring screenwriter stuck in this cow-filled abyss. She was an aspiring screenwriter who was going to break them out of the loop so she could finally hit Reply on the email from Marilyn Montgomery.
She practically skipped down the aisle of chairs, because she would finally be able to prove to Adam that she could bring
just as much to the table.
Carly faltered a bit when she saw him, though. So tall. Such pointy cheekbones. Hair the color of fire. Her breath caught
when he looked up and his brown eyes widened at the sight of her. “Hello,” she forced herself to say.
“Hello,” he replied, then cleared his throat. “Nice to, um, see you.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Oh . . .” She realized what was happening. “Yeah, sorry I didn’t say anything yesterday, but I had
to test a theory, which was correct.”
“What theory?” He leveled her with a doubtful expression. “Ah, let me guess. You formed a coven?”
Her mouth opened in surprise. Was Adam . . . mocking her? “Um, excuse me, if I could form a coven I absolutely would. But
that’s not what I was going to say, you coldhearted cow lover.”
“Can one be both coldhearted and a lover of cows? I think you’ve made a moooo-t point.” Adam bit his lip, as if suppressing
a laugh.
To her amazement, she found his little pun charming. She eyed him, and he eyed her. Were they bantering with each other? What
was . . . happening here?
When she didn’t immediately respond—too alarmed by Adam’s ability to crack jokes at her expense—he began to roll up the sleeves
of his button-down shirt, and that was when she clocked the muscled forearm.
“So you didn’t start casting spells, then what’s this theory?” He interrupted her staring.
A little shiver coursed through and she worked fast to shake it off. “I realized that the eclipse had changed on the days when I did good deeds for you.”
He narrowed his eyes, and her body quickly cooled.
She tried again. “This last loop, I decided to test that by avoiding you all day. And as you probably noticed, the eclipse
didn’t shorten. It stayed twenty seconds shorter.”
“Uh-huh,” he eventually said. “So you think we are closing the loop?”
“I think it’s more tied to my good deeds. I always had this hope that if I did enough of them, I’d get out of here. But on
the days when I did nice things for you, all of a sudden the eclipse shortened. Maybe that’s because you’re, like, usually so rude, so it gives my good deeds extra powers? So, yes, there’s something going on here.” She gestured to the space between them, and while she hadn’t meant to suggest
that there was something between them in the relationship sense, she realized she may have misspoken. “Do you have a better idea?”
A smirk ghosted across his lips. “Yes, I think I do. If we want to speed up the process, we need to look more closely at the
shadow bands.”
She crossed her arms. “You know, I read that Peter Pan’s shadow is a metaphor for the part of himself that he’s lost. Are
you feeling lost, Adam?”
Carly enjoyed the exasperated look Adam gave her.
“It’s not as weird as you’re making it sound,” he said. “I just think it’s interesting that this wildly unique scientific
phenomenon happens at the same time we find ourselves in a time loop. It’s either connected, or the strangest coincidence
I’ve ever heard of.”
But then Carly’s stomach loudly grumbled. She picked up a mint from the tin in the lobby, unwrapped it and popped it into her mouth. “Sorry, I always reset on the hungry side. This girl needs cheese. Mind if we go eat?”
Carly eagerly dipped her chicken tinga taco into a cup of queso as she handed a tinfoil-wrapped beef taco to Adam. She was
grateful that Julian had a well-stocked taqueria that was on par with the delicious ones she’d grown up with in LA. But Adam
stared at his like she’d just handed him a bomb and he had no idea how to defuse it. Everything Adam did seemed to involve
hesitation—following Carly, eating his food.
But if Adam didn’t like tacos—unfathomable, except that Adam was not like most people—then he didn’t have to eat them. He
could walk across the street to Moms and get pie, and maybe snag one with cheese on top for her.
“I realize we have competing theories, but the same goal of getting out,” Adam said as he gently unwrapped his lunch. “As
long as we’re willing to help each other, it still makes sense to work as a team.”
“Absolutely.” Carly wiped her mouth with a napkin.
Then Adam pulled a plain flour tortilla out of the to-go bag, wrapped it around the taco, and created a taco-burrito monstrosity, which he then took a bite of.
“Oh my God, what are you doing?” she practically yelled at him.
“I don’t like it when fillings spill out of the sides. This keeps them nice and neat.” He took another bite and her mouth
fell open in shock.
She couldn’t tell if his move was genius or unholy, but then Adam cleared his throat. The guttural, animalistic noise had
the most bizarre effect on her—goose bumps. Seriously? Goose bumps because the man cleared his throat?
Adam glared in response. To her delight, he had a bit of guacamole on his chin, which erased all those goose bumps.
She could either let him go about the day looking like a human tortilla chip, or she could help him out.
Without much thought, she picked the glob of guacamole off with her fingers.
A blush spread across his cheeks, which she rather enjoyed.
“My good deed for the day, making sure you don’t humiliate yourself,” Carly said. “And now we’ll see if that eclipse shortens
again.”
“Thanks,” Adam grudgingly replied. “What you’re proposing is . . . it’s not based in science.”
“But not everything can be explained by science, like the shadow bands,” Carly pointed out.
“They will be explained by science once I collect more evidence.” Adam gathered up their trash into the paper bag.
“Science is real,” Carly clarified, not wanting him to think she was being dismissive. “But life has plenty of magical moments,
too, and that doesn’t make them any less real. My dad always said that coyotes reminded him of my mom. Whenever he saw one,
he felt like it was a sign from her. And on my birthday every year we always saw one, without fail, in our front yard.”
Adam nodded, and she worried she’d revealed too much. What if he asked more about her mom? Carly didn’t want to start the
day with tears, so she sputtered out, “As an optimist, I choose to believe that the eclipse shortening is a good thing, and
that my good deeds have something to do with that.” She took a tortilla chip from the bag and filled the silence with her
loud crunching.
“And as someone who believes in facts over nonsense, I’ll be cautiously optimistic but also agnostic until we have more data.”
He crumpled her discarded wrapper into a ball.
The clip-clop of horse hooves caught Carly’s attention, and she saw Goldie in a red string bikini coming down the street. “Ten hours, people!”
“Ten hours left,” Adam said. “So three more until the eclipse and the shadow bands.”
“We could make a list of more theories as to why we’re still in the time loop. Like, maybe we’re all being punished for something.”
Carly had held this fear for a long time. Maybe she was stuck here for being such a shitty daughter.
“I find it hard to believe that every single person in Julian is so evil that they’re now trapped.” He gave her one of those
withering looks he was so damn good at, but she was part of this team, and she wasn’t about to let him shut her down.
“Look, it took two hundred forty loops for the eclipse to shorten, and this last loop it didn’t change at all. I don’t know
about you, but I don’t want to have to wait another two hundred forty times to see change again.” Carly stood as she spoke,
not making eye contact with Adam in case he melted her resolve. “I want us to do everything we can to end this thing.”
Adam seemed to actually consider this—a win, if Carly ever saw one—when a man with thick, dark hair, and the kind of shoulders
you could melt into called out, “Join us, sister.” He wore a white linen shirt and a long beaded necklace that swayed as he
walked over and handed her a heavy rock before turning back to his group.
“Ugh, the Chaos Club. Again. Better I have this than them,” Carly said and held the rock to her chest. Something about this Julian clique made her particularly uneasy.
How many times could you smash windows and still go back for more?
Carly glanced to where the Jesus-esque leader had gone and saw a teenager approaching her dad’s movie theater.
The theater was a place she always tried to avoid, but there he was—heading straight for it.
“My turn!” he shouted.
She noticed the heavy gray rock in his fist.
Without thinking, Carly started to run toward the teenager. She knew what this kid’s plans were, and the idea of him actively
firing a rock at the thing her dad had worked so hard to build was impossible. “Stop!” she shouted.
But it was too late. The boy’s hand had catapulted the rock, and it sailed through the air toward the glass doors. As it did,
Carly screamed out “No!” so loudly that she barely heard the glass shatter.