Chapter 30
Priscilla
Time could run out. Time could disappear.
Even though I know full well I’m existing inside a time before cell phones had internet—before most people had cell phones at all—I still want to take mine out of my bag, wishing so badly to call her, or to look at her social media page and figure out what spots in Garden Meadows she loves the most so I can post up there, spending all my energy to convince her to come back to the real world and live in it with me.
It takes me about a quarter of a mile to accept that there is no reason to run, because I don’t know where I’m going, and the rain is so aggressive I can barely keep my eyes open.
Still, my heart wants to heave out of my chest, and this is the closest I can get to a physical representation of my emotional state, so I continue on, in the ballet flats Psychic Priscilla gave me to wear, worn in all the right spots, matching my gait perfectly.
Our lives might not be the same, but thank god our walking patterns are.
The only place I know is the stage, and though it feels like this might be one of my stress dreams where I’ll be performing another impromptu Hedda Gabler scene for every teacher who hated me in high school, I still keep running.
By the time I make it near the entrance, the rain has stopped, just like Dallas said it would. Nine minutes that changed every version of his life forever. The sky returns to blue so instantly, you’d never know it happened at all.
Walking up, I see Dallas leaving out the front door. Only it’s not the current Dallas. It’s Dallas from thirty years ago, following the faint sound of sirens, his gut already telling him what he’ll find.
I keep my head up as I pass him. He says hello to me, just like I knew he would, and I say hello back.
How I wish I could stop him from the pain he’s about to face.
Instead, I offer this Dallas my biggest smile, knowing it’s going to be the last bright thing he sees today.
I hope he remembers it the same way I’ve held on to the small kindnesses I’ve received on my worst days.
It won’t be much, but it’s the only thing about this day I can change for him.
When I get inside the school, my heart’s so heavy I have to run again to chase off some of the ache. I’m going so fast I don’t see her until we’re about to crash into each other. We stop each other’s momentum, holding on so tightly it sends us to the carpeted floor of the auditorium.
“Why were you running?” she asks me, breathless.
“You,” I say, tears filling my eyes. “Why were you running?”
“You,” she says.
When she kisses me this time, all I want is to feel her as deeply as I can. I kiss her until she’s the only oxygen I have. When it finally feels like close to enough, our mouths break apart, but I’m still lying on top of her in the middle of the aisle.
“Where did you go?” she asks.
“I went to see myself,” I say. “Little me. I wanted to know if how I remembered my childhood was actually how it was.”
She brushes a piece of hair off my forehead. “Was it?”
“Not really,” I tell her. “I guess I was expecting some big fight. Or to see what a nuisance I was, or how hard my parents were on me. They never knew how to handle me, and that’s made me believe for so long that no one knows how to handle me.”
“I do,” Marlowe whispers. “I’ve always known how to handle you.” She kisses me again. Featherlight. “I was scared you left because of what the psychics told you. I know I’m the one you need to release. But I don’t want you to.”
“You were never the one I’ve needed to let go of,” I tell her.
“It’s my mom. She’s who the psychics were talking about.
I understand now that it does me no good to expect the worst from her.
Because, yeah, maybe I’ll get it. But someone told me recently about having faith.
And I think I can stand to have a little of that with her.
I can let go of my resentment and just let it be what it is. ”
Marlowe clutches her heart, her relief visible.
“There’s so much we’ve misunderstood about each other,” I say. “And I know we can’t go back to high school and change it. I wouldn’t want to anyway. But there is still something I want you to see.”
“What?” she asks.
I climb off her, extending my hand to help her stand. “Just get into the machine and trust me.”
“I have faith,” she says.