Chapter 12
My first reaction is to find Enzo—William?—whoever he is, so I dart downstairs and scan the students sprawled in Hyde’s common room. He’s not there. I try the student lounge. Nothing. No luck in the dining hall either. Not even when I take a fast lap to Segner’s common room.
where’s your roommate? I text Sumner.
how the fuck should I know, he texts back.
Cool. Great talk. Incredibly helpful, as always.
I rake a hand through my hair and stare down at the journal.
William’s initial confusion plays back in my mind.
I’d made so many assumptions because they slotted easily into my brain’s logic box.
He is Sumner’s roommate. He couldn’t have attended classes if that wasn’t true, right?
But everything else makes less sense. The formal introduction, the lack of modern technology. His bright-eyed curiosity.
1859.
Oh my god.
My brain leaps to the impossible.
I can’t go barging into the guys’ quarters, and I’ve checked everywhere else. Everywhere except—
The library.
As soon as I’m out the door, a rush of evening air greets my lungs. I race past Mr. Kovacs, who hollers at me to slow down, but I can’t. And I don’t. Not until I’m yanking on the double doors of Chelmsford and letting the warm, musty-vanilla scent wash over me.
And there, toward the very back of the room, sits William.
His head is bent over a book, loose tendrils of deep golden hair hanging on either side of his cheekbones as he reads. It’s so perfectly ordinary, which makes me hesitate before padding over and taking a seat across from him.
He looks up, then immediately stands by way of greeting.
“Miss Car—er, Delaney,” he says with a note of surprise.
I take him in. He wears the Ivernia uniform: steel-blue tie, white button-down, navy slacks. Does that mean his luggage arrived? I’m not sure. Part of me feels like I’m losing it.
“Hi,” I say carefully as he sits back in his chair. “Studying?”
His gaze flicks toward his physics textbook. “I don’t believe Sumner enjoys my company, though I do fear his habits and behaviors are objectively appalling and, quite frankly, unbefitting for a gentleman.”
“Um,” I say slowly, unprepared for this pivot. “I’ll admit that gentleman isn’t the first word I associate with Sumner, but—”
“He lives in filth,” he interrupts. “His attire is undesirable and comparable to a degenerate. He has ambition and a strong aspiration to accomplish, but as for his company and conversation? I believe his mannerisms could be improved.”
“Please don’t tell me you told him that.”
“Of course I did.”
I groan. No wonder Sumner’s fed up.
The smooth leather in my hands reminds me why I’m here. “I think I have something of yours.” I slide the journal across the table and watch his eyes widen, brows slightly raised. He recognizes it. His throat works around a hard swallow, and I track the movement.
“I—” he begins, then stops. Flips through a few pages. “I thought I’d left this behind.”
“It seems important, like it was passed down to you? From an ancestor?” My mind scrolls through the looping dates etched on thick parchment. There’s an explanation for this, one that doesn’t involve the unhinged theories sparking like ignited embers in the depths of my brain.
A terse silence.
“It belongs to me,” he says, eyes lifting to meet mine. “My findings, educational notes. Things of that sort.”
My nerve endings hum like a tuning fork. “It’s just—I couldn’t help but notice…the dates.”
He nods. “After a few very strange days, I began collecting evidence that this”—his hand sweeps across the room—“is all a dream. One where I’m expected to be someone else entirely, though I cannot explain why for the life of me, and I cannot seem to wake no matter how hard I try.”
My mouth dries. I run my hand across the table. “This?” I pick up his textbook, drop it back down with a sturdy thud. “Isn’t a dream. I—”
I sweep my gaze toward students bent over books and hunched over laptops. There’s an occasional glance in our direction. We need privacy. I stand. “Can you come with me?” I say, quashing my growing panic.
He rises from his seat and follows me out the door, where we cross the quad in a contemplative silence. I swipe us into the admin building, ushering him down the hall until we’re outside my intended destination. The Forgotten Lounge.
The space was meant to act as a second student lounge, an area where you could socialize and play games and not worry about your volume, but it was inconveniently placed away from the houses and too far to walk to in the cold winter months. Hence the name.
Sunken couches, wheel-less wheely chairs, wobbly tables, and a cracked Ping-Pong table are scattered across the thin beige carpet, which muffles our footsteps as the door closes behind us.
A stale musk hangs in the air, like a window hasn’t been cracked in a long time.
It probably hasn’t, and despite this, you would not believe the number of secret hookups that have occurred here.
This, however, is not my objective. I needed a place we wouldn’t be overheard. Except—
A burst of springy coils pops up behind one of the sagging couches. “Hi!”
“Hey, Lionel,” I say.
In response he holds up his Switch and peels his headphones off his ears. “I’m just gaming.”
“Sorry to interrupt,” I say as he slides them back on. Lionel’s a bit of an outsider, a twiggy senior who’s had braces all four years of high school and must get mistaken for an eighth grader anytime he goes anywhere. I’d temporarily forgotten he likes to occupy this lounge, but it doesn’t matter.
I nod to the furthest corner from Lionel and turn to William. “Okay,” I say. “I’m going to need you to explain why the year 1859 is written all over your notebook.”
He stares at me for several seconds. “You went through my notebook?”
“I thought it was mine,” I say. “My dad has similar journals. I’ve been reading through them and—” I stop because this isn’t the point. “I’m just really confused.”
“Imagine how I felt,” he starts, “when that friend of yours began calling me Enzo.”
I freeze. “Your name isn’t Enzo?”
“No, and it’s rather vexing he—and everyone else—believes this to be true,” he says, frustration bubbling. “I must say, the absurdity of the last few days has been entirely troubling.”
My heartbeat slams against my rib cage. “Four days ago,” I say slowly. “What day was it?”
His amber eyes hold my gaze. Something in them softens, as if we share a mutual understanding of the events that haven’t quite added up.
“September second,” he whispers, then, sensing I’m seeking more from him, “in the year 1859.”
A sharp inhale fills my lungs. For a moment, we just stare at each other. Unmoving. I’m waiting for him to explain, or say he’s kidding, or provide any further context that could make this make sense.
My phone chimes.
He raises a finger in its direction. “That was my first bit of evidence.”
I try to process the fully illogical thoughts spiraling through my brain as I read Sumner’s text: where are you?
I start crafting an excuse when he sends me a screenshot of an Instagram message.
yo sumner, it’s ur assigned roommate enzo.
idk what kind of magic trick u pulled but thank u.
my parents enrolled me but I’m in Ibiza because my bud has a spot and we’ve been launching this dope vape brand and I was dragging my feet on school anyway but they insisted bc they want me out of trouble.
can u keep covering for me that’d help me out a bunch, thx man
Oh my god.
My gaze lifts. “You’re not Enzo.”
“I’ve just told you that,” he insists. “And as I’ve said before, my name is Lord William Cromwell, born the first son of Lord and Lady Cromwell of Dunbry.”
I’m not familiar with British peerage, but even I can’t deny that sounds important. I cast a sideways glance to make sure Lionel is still immersed in his game. The back of his head of hair bobs over the couch as he sways to music only he can hear.
“Then why are you here?”
“If I knew, believe me, I’d tell you.”
I call for backup. forgotten lounge, I text Sumner, then shove my phone in my pocket. “What is happening,” I say, more to myself. “This is not real.”
“Right, returning to my dream theory—”
I’m shaking my head. “You don’t have any identification on you? A license, or, like, a passport?” If I can identify this guy, then maybe there’s a chance of figuring out where he came from. And if that place happens to be a psychiatrist’s office.
William only removes Enzo’s student badge from his pocket.
“I don’t understand,” I say, which might just rank as the number one statement of the evening. “How did Sumner get you that?”
“You tell me,” he says, exasperated. “I don’t have my papers. Yet everything was already in order.”
Right, Sumner had said that, hadn’t he? Enzo had pre-registered.
Since he’s the wait-listed transfer they were expecting, no one must have questioned him when Sumner brought him to administration.
A fault in Ivernia’s security, sure, but there’s a bigger problem on our hands.
William is not supposed to be here, and he is certainly not supposed to be posing as another student.
The door swings open and in storms Sumner, brows furrowed. As the latch clicks behind him, Lionel pops back up with another enthusiastic greeting.
“Hey, Lionel.” Sumner’s already striding across the room, eyes locked on William. “Who the hell are you?”
Lionel’s headphones slip back over his ears.
I tense, my gaze shifting from William to Sumner.
“Because you aren’t my roommate.” Anger tinges his words. “Which means you aren’t supposed to be here.”
I’ve never seen Sumner try to get a rise out of someone. I didn’t know he had it in him. He’s several inches taller than me, but he’s built like a candlestick, which might be one intimidation factor against him.