“Fine, I’ll catch you up,” she says, entering the room and sitting down on the desk chair. The visitor tentatively steps into the room, bearing coffee and a bag of something I hope is a scone. I admire his striking features, piercing eyes, flawlessly messy hair.
“Hey, Luke,” I say, with undertones of seduction that I hope fly over my mother’s head.
From my right, Mom gasps. Not the reaction I’d expected.
Luke looks surprised. Then thrilled. Then skeptical.
“You remember him?” my mom asks.
“Of course,” I say, throwing her a look that says I think she’s lost it.
“You do?” Luke asks. Now I’m furrowing my eyebrows at him, too. What is wrong with everyone?
“And you haven’t looked at your notes yet today?” Mom asks incredulously. I wish she’d leave us alone, because I can think of a better way to spend the few minutes we have before school.
“Is that coffee for me?” I ask Luke, arms outstretched. Then I answer my mom: “No, not yet. Why? Why are you acting so weird?”
She lets loose a silly, girlish giggle, and Luke and I can’t help but laugh with her. When we all compose ourselves, I ask, “What’s funny?” which sends my mom into hysterics once again.
Luke crosses the room, hands me my coffee, and sits next to me on the bed. He kisses my cheek and says softly, “You remember me.”
I think of Luke tomorrow; I remember him from next year.
“I get the feeling that I didn’t before,” I say, matching his low tone. Through her laughter, my mom excuses herself and leaves us alone.
“Nope,” Luke says, eyes bright. “But you do now, and that’s all that matters.”
“Well, let me catch up,” I say, grabbing the stack of notes off the bedside table. After I’ve reviewed them, my mood has changed.
“Luke, we need to talk.”
“Is this about yesterday?” he asks, looking hurt.
“Yes,” I say, thankful for the details. “It’s pretty serious.”
Luke tenses and shifts to face me. “You’re not breaking up with me, are you?”
“No,” I say with a little laugh, brushing his hair out of his eyes.
“Just go ahead,” Luke says glumly.
I take a deep breath, and slowly, carefully, I tell Luke the story of the memory that I know, from my notes, came back to me yesterday. I still remember it today, so I don’t need to look back at my notes to explain everything. I’m detailed but to the point, never wavering until the very end.
“And then I die?”
“Yes,” I say, my eyes welling up with tears. Luke and I will have a great relationship. We’ll talk about marriage, but he won’t get the chance to propose. Instead, he’ll die.
The color drains from Luke’s face, but he doesn’t cry with me. Instead, he’s still, pensive.
“Are you all right?” I ask after I’ve dried my tears.
“I don’t know,” Luke says, still immobile. He holds his coffee cup awkwardly by his left leg. I take it from him and set it on the table.
“I’m sorry for telling you.”
“No, don’t be,” he says. “I’d rather know.”
I’m not sure I feel the same way about my own end, but I don’t admit as much. Luke continues.
“I think knowing about it is better, because then maybe I can avoid it. We can avoid it together,” he says, with forced strength.
“I guess,” I say, looking into his eyes.
“No, seriously. Okay, yes, this is pretty intense. I’m a little… I don’t know. I can’t quite process it all right now. But don’t you think the advance warning gives me the advantage?”
“But, Luke, I—”
“No, really. You changed something with Page. You’ve changed other things, too. You can change this. It won’t happen,” he says with authority, as if he’s trying to convince himself. I guess that’s the best anyone can do with this information.
“Maybe you’re right,” I say calmly.
“I am right,” he says, his voice increasing in volume. “You’ll change your future. You’ll save me.”
“And what if I can’t?”
“Then we just won’t go down the alley. Trust me, it won’t happen.”
Luke hugs me tight and kisses me with such strength that I almost buy his story. But when he releases me, I see it flash across his eyes.
Fear.
Hoping to distract him, I offer my notes so that he can read up on yesterday’s events while I get ready for school. As I shower, I can’t help but wonder whether I did the right thing by telling him.
Then again, maybe he’s right.
Maybe knowing how to avoid bad situations is enough.
Reaching for my fluffy white towel hanging on the hook, I think one thought over and over again: Please, be enough.
44
Jamie looks at me in Spanish class without grimacing, but the rest of the day is bleak. I float through school in a fog, asking myself questions I can’t answer: Is my brother alive? Will Luke die the death I remember? Will I ever get to meet my father?
Surprisingly, the dad thing is heaviest today. I remember bits of him. I want more.
I want a dad.
I want my dad.
Before bed, I trudge in slipper-clad feet to my desk to power down my laptop. Just as I reach for the mouse, a message box pops up.
LJH6678: Hi. Are you awake?
I recognize Luke’s screen name immediately; he’ll have it for as long as I know him.
LondonLane: Yep, just getting ready to go to bed.
LJH6678: I won’t bug you. Just wanted to say good night.
LondonLane: You’re not bugging me!
I stand in front of my desk, staring at the screen, waiting. After a few seconds, he types back.
LJH6678: I’m glad you told me.
LondonLane: Are you? I’m still not so sure about it.
LJH6678: It was the right thing to do.
LondonLane: If you say so!
The tiny screen is blank for a bit. I check the clock and shift from one foot to the other before leaning over to type.
LondonLane: I should sleep….
LJH6678: Okay.
LJH6678: Wait London? I have a question.
LondonLane: Okay?
LJH6678: I’ve been thinking about all of this today, about you remembering our whole relationship.
I slide down into the chair so I can read easier and type faster.
LondonLane: And?
A little butterfly pokes me under the rib as I hit enter and wait for Luke’s response.
LJH6678: And I’ve been wondering whether you remember everything.
I ponder the question for a moment, then type.
LondonLane: I’m sure I don’t remember everything. I remember the future the way you remember the past. You remember the really good and bad and forget some of the middle, right?
LJH6678: Sure.
LondonLane: Same with me. Why?
LJH6678: Do you remember us having sex?
My hand flies to my mouth, and I look around my room for eavesdroppers, even though I know I’m alone. My stomach won’t stop doing somersaults.
Luke learned that he’s going to die young today and all he wants to ask me about is sex?
LJH6678: Well?
LondonLane: Truth?
LJH6678: YES!
LondonLane: Yes.
LJH6678: Not fair.
LondonLane: I know but listen. In the way that you probably choose not to think about things that you don’t want to remember, I do the same. It helps things be a little bit… surprising.
LJH6678: Still not fair. When is it?
LondonLane: Not telling.
LJH6678: Seriously, not fair.
Checking the time again, I lean back in my chair and stretch. The day is wearing on me. I need sleep.
LondonLane: Luke, I have to go to bed.
LJH6678: I know, I know. Me, too.
LondonLane:
See you tomorrow?
LJH6678: Want a ride?
LondonLane: Of course.
LJH6678: I’ll bring you treats if you tell me the date.
LondonLane: You’ll bring me treats anyway.
LJH6678: I’m going to have to work hard to surprise you, London Lane.
LondonLane: Yes, you are.
LJH6678: Night, beautiful girl.
LondonLane: Night, Luke.
45
It’s the last day of my junior year but it might as well be the first. I know the layout of the school from next year, but everything else is gone.
There is no math class tomorrow to remind me where I sit today. There are no locker trips next week to tell me where mine is located now. Luke can’t exactly escort me around like a guide dog.
“You’ll be okay?” Luke asks as he grabs my hand. He looks almost as nervous as I feel. We’re walking in from the student parking lot carrying matching half-empty lattes.
“I’ll be okay. My mom wrote it all down for me.”
“That was cool of her,” he says. “Has she heard anything yet?”
“No, not yet,” I say, feeling a heaviness in my chest that might not ever go away.
“At least I can get you to your first class safely,” Luke says, pulling me up the main hallway. We stroll in easy silence, Luke angling me over a couple of times when I almost collide with other students. He laughs when he realizes that I’m looking at their shoes. He walks me to the door of my Pre-calculus classroom and kisses me good-bye.
“Good luck,” he says.
“Thanks,” I say back, wanting to handcuff myself to him and make him sit through all my classes with me. Instead, I force myself to go in.
After class, I hit my locker for a book to read in study hall. Luke reminded me to bring one, since Ms. Mason apparently gets mad when we talk to each other.
As I approach, I find Jamie standing there waiting for me.
“Hey,” she says softly when I stop in front of the metal door.
“Hi,” I say. We’re both silent; I stare at my lock. Without tomorrow as reference, the combination isn’t coming to mind. I pull out my cell, where it’s stored.
“Thirty, twenty-two, five,” Jamie says before I have the chance to look it up.
“You’ll always have my back,” I reply, spinning the dial.
“And you’ve always had mine,” Jamie says.
I look into her eyes and know that this is it: we’re okay.
“I’m sorry for getting so mad at you about… everything,” Jamie begins.
“I’m sorry for the awful things I said,” I reply.
“Do you remember what you said?” Jamie asks.
I cringe at that part in the notes. “Yes,” I say. “I forced myself to remember.”
“That was cool of you,” Jamie says. She waits a beat and then gives me a quick hug.
“I missed you,” she whispers into my hair.
“Same here.”
“Liar,” Jamie says playfully as she pulls away. “You can’t even remember me. How can you miss me?”
“Oh, I remember you,” I say. “Do you want to know all the things I remember?”
“No!” Jamie shouts with a laugh. “Keep your fortune-telling to yourself!”
Jamie and I link arms and start down the main hall. We laugh together as we walk, and I can’t help but feel overwhelmed by Jamie’s loyalty. Before we part, she turns to face me.
“Let’s never fight again,” she says.
“Agreed,” I reply, knowing that really, other than small disagreements in college, we won’t.
It makes me realize how much I appreciate Jamie’s willingness to trust me without knowing. She can’t see what’s coming. For Jamie, our relationship is a gamble. And yet she sticks with me. She keeps rolling the dice.
I stroll into the library for the last time this year, happy that my best friend is betting on us.
46
Hours later, after walking into the wrong classroom twice, seeing a little too much of Mike Norris (the boys’ bathrooms near the History wing aren’t properly labeled!), lunching with Luke, and handing in a year-end graphic design project that I could have purchased for $29.95 from CheatersRUs.com, for all I know, the school day and the school year are over.
Luke drives me home, holding my hand across the center console all the way. I feel like more than the year is ending, but I have my forward memories to prove that it’s not. Still, there’s something bittersweet about our kiss good-bye.
“Don’t stay up too late tonight,” he calls before I close the door.
“Yes, sir,” I say, laughing and trying not to think of why he wants me to be well rested. I know, but I won’t write it down tonight.
Some things should be a surprise.
Inside, I’m shocked to find my mother, home early, sitting alone at the kitchen table.
“How was your last day?” she asks, forcing small talk.
“Fine,” I say. “I made it to all of my classes, eventually. I handed in that project. It went as well as possible, I guess. What’s up, Mom?”
“They want us to come down to the station,” she says nervously.
“They know something?” I can feel my brain pulling together pieces from memory and notes to form a complete picture.
“Yes.” Mom stands, ready to leave.
We drive in silence the twelve minutes it takes from the garage to the parking lot in front of the police station. We wait two minutes to see Captain Moeller. When we’re all settled in his office, he tells us that they have conclusive results.
I move to the edge of my seat. My mom covers her mouth with her hand, presumably to thwart an impending scream.
We wait.
Captain Moeller clears his throat.
I want to jump across the messy desk and rip the words from his voice box.
Finally, he speaks.
“The boy you buried isn’t Jonas.”
Captain Moeller’s words hang in the air; I can almost see them floating there. No one speaks. No one moves. When I can’t take the tension anymore, I ask the totally irrelevant question: “Who was it?”
“A Baby Doe, probably from another state. He wasn’t in our missing children database.”
Finally, sound comes from my mother’s mouth in the form of a gasp.
“I know, it’s terrible,” Captain Moeller says to my mom.
“So what’s next?” she asks through the fingers over her mouth.
“We reopen the search for Jonas,” Captain Moeller says.
My mom looks a little like she’s in shock. She doesn’t reply, so the captain keeps going.
“I took the liberty of having the team use the aging software on the old photo we had of Jonas. We can put that image out over the wire and get people in the area on lookout.”
“What if he’s not in the area?” I ask.
“We’ll distribute it nationally, too,” he says to me.
“Can I see it?” I ask.
“Of course,” he says. The captain rifles around on his desk for a bit and unearths a thick, worn file. I wonder how many times it’s been opened over the past decade.
Captain Moeller pages through the file and pulls out an eight-by-ten photo.
“Here you go,” he says, sliding it across the desk. My mom leans in to see but doesn’t touch. Tears silently flow down her cheeks; she’s so quiet I barely know she’s there.
Captain Moeller hands her a tissue and leaves us alone. When he’s gone, I pick up the photo for a closer look.
For some reason, a strange calm washes over me at the sight of him: my brother. My shoulders loosen and I exhale slowly.
It feels right.
He seems familiar.
“Do you remember him? From the future?” my mom asks in a voice so weak it’s like she’s a mouse.
Excited for a moment, I rack my brain for a memory of my brother—any memory other than the horrific one of him being taken.
“No, Mom,
I don’t,” I say. It causes her tears to flow faster. Instead of comforting her, I continue to stare.
There’s nothing there, and yet…
There’s something.
Like that punch line of a joke you forget by the end, there’s something.
And to me, right now, something is just fine.
47
Luke parks directly in front of a NO TRESPASSING sign on the barbed-wire fence that keeps us from driving off the incline. He kills the engine and the headlights along with it.
The town twinkles below, and I inhale the warm evening through the open windows.
“Did you bring me here to kill me?” I tease.
“Not tonight,” he says warmly. “This is a do-over.”
“Of what?”
“Of our first date,” he says, staring into my eyes. “We fell asleep; you forgot to write it down. I’ve told you about it. You’ve probably read about the morning after…”
My cheeks flush.
“… but you didn’t experience it. So I’m doing it again.”
“You’re awesome,” I say, without thinking too much about it. Luke grins sheepishly and heads to the back of the van to get some pizza.
After dinner and a movie, Luke suggests stargazing and I wholeheartedly agree. He rolls up the windows, since the night air is growing chilly, and we lie together under the blanket Luke thought to bring, staring up through the moonroof to the universe above.
“We should talk about it,” Luke says, face to the stars.
“About what?” I ask, but I think I know what he’s referring to.
“About you suggesting we break up.”
I scoot closer to him, if that’s possible.
“It’s not that I want to break up, I just said that it might be better. For you. It might change the future so that you don’t get killed.” I say the words without conviction.