I nod dumbly. This isn’t the first time the Doctor has prescribed pills. Everyone in the group was put on mild antidepressants when they first arrived at the Berk. “To temper your powers until you can control them a little more,” the Doctor had said. And there was other medication: a fever reducer for Gwen, some little green pills for Ryan, an entire handful of stuff for Harold—though Harold gobbled up the pills eagerly, as if they were candy.
Dr. Rivers stands up and moves behind the Doctor, reading the notes he’s written in his book. “I agree, Dr. Franklin,” she says. “These should help Bo considerably.”
I grit my teeth. So. That’s what’s happened. The officials know that I’m not duped by their illusions, so they’re going to drug me.
CHAPTER 33
I stare at the pages of my calendar.
I lost so much time.
Time that I could have spent working to save Sofía.
But I was selfish. I stole my night with her, and somehow time’s been stealing itself back.
My mind feels like it’s splintering. Save Sofía. Stop the officials. Can Dr. Franklin be trusted? What is happening?
I clutch my head, bending over my bed and pressing my face against my cool pillow. Too much time has passed. The officials aren’t just going away. Sofía isn’t just coming back.
It’s all falling apart.
An abrupt, violent feeling cracks inside me, at my core, the way cold glass shatters when boiling water is thrown on it. The timestream flashes in front of me, stuttering in and out of existence, the threads ripped up like grass being whirled around in a hurricane. I reach for it—hoping to calm it, maybe, or just find a way to calm myself in it—and a noise like radio static vibrates all the way into my bones. Reality feels jagged in my hand. I stumble off my bed, staggering to find steady ground, and—
I fall into a different time.
I haven’t gone somewhere I had zero control over in ages, and this is the first time the timestream has ever acted like this, like it was made of sound and fury and little else. It felt like a television turned on to a scrambled channel inside my head.
I blink in the bright daylight, trying to figure out where I am. When I am. It’s definitely not Berkshire, and it’s sometime in the afternoon, I think . . . and I know this place. It’s not somewhere I’d elect to go, but at least it’s familiar. I’m on the grassy lawn just in front of my parents’ house. Judging from the temperature, I’d guess it’s springtime—although I can’t tell the year. The sweet scent of Mom’s cherry tree fills the air, and a few pale petals float by.
The front door opens. I drop immediately to the ground, crouching between the bushes and the bricks of the front porch. Girls’ voices fill the space, one of them definitely my sister’s. I’m not sure where in time I am. Is this the past or the future? The house doesn’t look much different, and Phoebe sounds like herself, so it’s possible that this is today. Or a month ago. Or next year. It’s impossible to tell.
As the girls—two of them, plus Phoebe—settle onto the porch, I move carefully under the steps, out of sight. I can hear them walking across the wooden planks, the squeak of the front porch swing, and I pray they stay where they are. If they come down to the yard and look directly at the steps, they’ll definitely see me.
If I’m seen, it might cause trouble, so it’s best if I figure out what’s going on first. The timestream won’t let me create a paradox or conflict with my own timeline—that’s been made abundantly clear—but the static-filled stutter that brought me here was not normal.
Maybe something’s wrong with time. I can’t afford to screw things up until I know what’s going on.
The dirt under the porch is cool and damp, and spiders creep along the undersides of the wooden boards, but I ignore them, my heart racing. Whatever’s happening now, I shouldn’t be here. But time has put me here for a reason.
The girls start chatting, and I finally recognize them. Jenny and Rosemarie, two of Phoebe’s best friends, are occupying the big porch swing that my father brought home from our grandmother’s house after she died. They’re barely skimming their toes along the wooden planks of the porch, just moving the bench seat of the swing enough for the chain to squeal in protest.
Phoebe sits down at the top step, her bright pink socks parallel with my eyes.
“I think I’m going to try to do a foreign-exchange program,” Phoebe says suddenly.
“You mean, like, some kid from Africa or China or some other country is going to share a room with you?” Rosemarie asks.
“You do realize that Africa is not a country, right?” Jenny tells her, leaning over the swing so that Rosemarie can see her arched brow.
“Yeah, it is.”
“It’s a continent.”
“No,” Phoebe says. “I mean I think I’m going to be the one to go to Africa or China or something.”
Rosemarie and Jenny both stop swinging. “What?!” Jenny says at the same time Rosemarie exclaims, “Why?”
“I just . . . I want to get away.” Phoebe says in a distant voice, as if she can already envision herself in Africa or China or something.