“You really think we’re living in a simulation?” Calvin’s voice was slurry; his words ran together.
“I don’t know. What does that have to do with you cutting yourself?”
Calvin collapsed in on himself, like his bones had liquefied. “’Cause if it is, then none of this is real. None of the good. Especially none of the bad.”
I stared at the gashes, at the fresh red ones, at the raised white scars of past hurts. “You should tell your dad what’s going on. He’s worried about you.”
Calvin pulled me down on top of him and kissed me. It happened so quickly, I kissed him back instinctually. I’d wanted him since New Year’s Eve, but I wanted him sober and lucid.
I twisted out of Calvin’s embrace and backed away from the bed. “Let’s talk about this when you’re not high.”
“Whatever.” Calvin rolled over, his back to me. “He used to give me pills. Dulled everything. Didn’t feel the pain.”
“Who was he, Cal?”
Calvin said, “I still don’t feel nothing,” and I wasn’t sure if he knew I was even in the room. “We’re meant to feel, but not me. Too numb.”
“Look, Cal, if this guy—whoever he is—drugged you to have sex with you, that’s rape. You know that, right?”
Calvin burrowed deeper into his covers. I thought he’d fallen asleep, and I was turning to leave when he mumbled, “I never said no.”
359,270 KM
GOOD-BYE, MOON. SO LONG, STARS. Along with Tommy and 99 percent of the universe, I remained the only person who knew they’d ever existed.
I pored over science books at work looking for mentions of the moon, but found nothing. None of the Apollo space missions had ever taken place. No country on the planet had attempted a single manned space mission. Instead of the Space Race in the sixties, the United States and Russia had fought over who could first construct a base on the bottom of the ocean, and President Kennedy’s speech at Rice University in 1961 was no longer remembered as one of the greatest speeches in recent history, because “We choose to go to the ocean” hadn’t inspired the same level of patriotism as “We choose to go to the moon” had.
Even though the shrinking universe continued rewriting history, most things remained the same. The technological achievements we’d discovered while trying to explore space still existed. Tommy and I had both gone through a period of obsession with space exploration, and we’d read dozens of books about the missions to the moon and the inventions NASA—which no longer existed—had created for space travel. Take the modern smoke and carbon monoxide detectors found in virtually every home across America. They were originally developed in the 1970s for use on the Skylab space station. But history had compensated for the changes to the universe, and I learned that the DOEA—Deep Ocean Exploration Agency—had invented the detectors during the construction of Atlantis, the first deep ocean base, built in the late 1960s.
Despite the universe shrinking, history seemed intent on protecting the integrity of the timeline. Like how Tommy’s mother had still dropped out of high school even though he’d never been born.
Sometimes thinking about it pushed me to the edge of sanity. The damn universe was disappearing and I was the only person who realized it. If other people knew the truth, there would have been riots and mass suicides and total chaos. But it was a problem I didn’t understand and couldn’t even begin to conceive of how to solve, so I focused on my other problems, the problems I could actually fix. Like Lua’s hand or Cal cutting himself or packing my room for the move, which my parents had scheduled for the following weekend.
When it came to Calvin, I hoped being there was enough to keep him from doing anything permanent, but I worried I wasn’t a good, or even a reliable, anchor for him. I seriously considered telling his father about the cutting, but it’d been a week since Dustin’s party and Calvin had kept his word not to hurt himself again, and I’d checked his arms and legs each time we were alone together to make sure. I still felt like my life was splintering, though, and I was terrified I couldn’t keep it all from flying apart.
? ? ?
Next Sunday was our last day in the house. Mom, who’d started her new job in Chicago, had flown home for the weekend to help pack. I’d begged Dad to hire movers, but he remained obdurately determined we do the work ourselves.
The soon-to-be new owners weren’t planning to move in for a few months, but Dad said they wanted us out quickly because they intended to gut the house and remodel everything. I was glad I wouldn’t have to watch the home I’d grown up in torn apart and transformed into a place I wouldn’t recognize.
I’d spent Saturday morning cleaning out my closet. A pile of too-small clothes lay in a heap across my bed, and I’d gotten sidetracked sorting a box of papers, mostly old homework. The drawing of Tommy that Renny had given me for Christmas stood propped up against the wall, like he was watching me. My memories and the drawing were all I had left of him. Sometimes I wondered if they were enough.
“Ozzie!” Dad called from downstairs. Between working and babysitting Calvin, I’d managed to avoid my parents, especially my dad, whom I was still mad at for cheating on my mom. I hadn’t switched sides, but had instead decided there were no winners in this war and that I was better off hating my parents equally. I continued to play nice, however, because I still hoped to change their minds about letting me go away to college. A plan that had, thus far, met with no success.
I wondered if my parents had any control over their decisions; if they were being subtly influenced by forces they couldn’t perceive. I still thought it likely Flight 1184 had crashed to send me a message to stay in Cloud Lake, and was forced to consider the possibility that my parents’ renewed unity was merely another warning shot fired from the great beyond.
“Ozzie!” my mom called. “Ozzie, get down here now!” Her panicked voice echoed through the house and into my room.
I pulled on a shirt and headed downstairs. I stalled at the railing, watching Mom and Dad zip through the house like bumper cars. Mom’s suitcase sat by the door even though she wasn’t supposed to leave until tomorrow.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
Dad looked up at me, his face pale and drawn, holding his phone to his ear. “Oz, come down here.”
I walked down the stairs and noticed Dad’s duffel bag open on the counter.
“Is someone going to tell me what’s going on?”
Mom stopped running about, but Dad walked into the other room to talk on the phone.
“Ozzie,” she said, “it’s Warren.”
“What’s Warren? Did something happen to Warren?”
“No,” Dad said, but to the phone, not to me. Tentacles of frustration tightened around his words. “Don’t put me on hold again. This is an emergency, and—”
Mom rushed me and hugged me so tightly I thought I might break. “Renny’s been hurt.”