Sofía looked off into the distance, toward the ocean and the sun and forever, but she couldn’t see any of that. “I want to go somewhere far away.”
She didn’t bother explaining any further. She just kept walking. I don’t think she was going anywhere in particular, but we headed toward the state park. I thought about running back to get her abandoned red shoes so she wouldn’t have to walk on the splintery wood of the boardwalk, but she veered left, where the ground was soft.
I look around me now. Any minute, past-me and past-Sofía will come around the bend and be standing right in front of me, at the chimney. It’s where Sofía took me that day, right before she whirled around, her eyes blazing, her long, dark hair whipping back, and said: “Here.”
“Here?”
“Can you take me back to this place? Back when there was just one family on the island, the ones who built this house?”
“It wasn’t built here,” I said. “It was built in Salem.”
“Fine, then when the house was moved here. To . . .” She turned around, her eyes scanning the plaque. “Let’s go back to 1692.”
“I . . . um . . .”
“You can do it, right?”
“Yeah,” I said immediately, wanting to impress her, to erase the doubt in her voice. “I’ve been back further than that. It’s just . . . why?”
“I want to go away. I want to be as far away from this world as possible. Take me back further than 1692, I don’t care. Let’s go to the days when Native Americans were here. Let’s go further. Let’s go to the dinosaurs.”
All my muscles were tense, and I moved very carefully, like I would if there were a wild animal in front of me. “I’ve never been that far back before,” I said. I regretted telling her that I could take her back. I wanted to wrap her up in my arms and hold her tight, not fling her through time and space. I didn’t realize it then, but a part of me sensed that she was running away, and I didn’t want to let her go, even if I was going with her.
“I don’t care, I just—” Her voice cracked. “I need to escape.”
I took a deep breath and grabbed both her hands in mine. I didn’t know what was wrong with her, but I knew I would do anything to make her happy. As I was holding her, I called up the timestream. I saw it expanding out from the two of us, strings erupting in every direction, each one linked to a different time and place. She couldn’t feel it; she didn’t react at all as I focused on the date engraved on the chimney, on the house that once contained it, on the island of the past.
And then we were there.
We had been standing among ruins; we were now standing in front of a chimney with bright red bricks streaked with soot. A roaring fire blazed at the bottom, casting Sofía in an orange-yellow glow and flickering shadows across the wood floor. There were herbs drying in one corner, an iron cauldron bubbling in another. The house smelled . . . warm. It wrapped around us, peaceful and beautiful.
Sofía sighed. In that moment, I think, she was happy.
Then the door behind me flung open, and I could hear a man’s deep, accented voice: “Oh my God.”
I started to turn.
Sofía’s hands slipped from mine.
And suddenly, like a rubber band breaking, I was snapped back to the present. I gasped for air, my entire body in shock, having been thrown through more than three centuries. My arms and legs trembled, and I fell to the cold ground, my fingers clutching the sharp blades of the long sea grass.
“What happened?” I said.
But there was no answer. Just the ruins of an ancient chimney.
Since then, I’ve spent every waking moment trying to find a way back to Sofía. But my powers have worked sporadically at best, and never in a way that would be helpful. Now, though . . . now that I’m here, back to the time before she was trapped . . .
I have a chance.
I could save Sofía. I could stop my past self from taking her back, from leaving her stuck in a world that wasn’t hers. I’ve tried so many times to reach this time and place again, and now that I’m here, I can fix it. I can make sure she never ends up in the past, abandoned, trapped where I can’t reach her.
I hear voices down the path. It’s past-me and Sofía. This is my chance. I can save her.
I stand up straighter, prepared to run to her.
I take one step forward, my voice already rising in my throat, ready to shout a warning . . .
? ? ?
I’m snapped back to the present.
I feel a cool hand on the back of my neck. “Hey,” Gwen says softly. “You okay? You were gone there for a moment.”
I nod, swallowing. I don’t know why I expected this time to be different.
I can’t save Sofía. I took her to the past, and I left her there, and I can’t bring her back. I’ve tried and I’ve tried. Every time I get close to her, time snaps me away again.
She’s trapped. And I put her there.
CHAPTER 4
Phoebe