He was in a good mood, probably because he’d taken Aunt Helen’s long-lusted-after pool table, and I guessed it was already set up in the basement. It was nice to see him in a good mood anyway. It was nice to see him smile.
My mom was unpacking boxes, unwrapping Aunt Helen’s footed teacup collection from layers and layers of tissue paper. I spent the next half hour moving my own boxes to my bedroom. When I was done I sat on my bed and looked at them. Some days it was harder than others, and this day had been like a hundred tiny battles one after another.
I thought of Sam, for some reason. I hadn’t talked to him since Mason’s Island, our pizza by the water. I texted him now: I had a really nice time the other day.
His reply came later. I’d opened one box—Aunt Helen’s photo albums. I stacked them neatly on the bottom shelf of my bookcase, and then I changed my mind and stacked them neatly back in the box, not yet ready to relive the memories she’d chosen to capture and stick inside them. My phone buzzed on my bureau, and I stretched to get it.
We should get together again sometime. If you want.
I didn’t answer right away. It was late, and I changed into pajamas and then washed my face and brushed my teeth. I covered up the boxes with one of the blankets from my bed. It almost looked like a fort, like the kind Abe and I used to build with couch cushions and pillows. I got into bed and opened the next envelope from Aunt Helen.
Lottie,
I’ve been thinking about writing since I finished my last letter to you.
I always imagined I would write something truly incredible, something one could appropriately call THE NEXT GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL. It’s hard sometimes, writing silly children’s stories about immortal children and societies of corrupt magic-keepers. You begin to think you aren’t putting anything important into the world. So many times I tried and failed to write something that fulfilled this idea of IMPORTANCE, but then one tiny, brief encounter showed me just how stupid I’d been. I was in the park, just having a stroll, and a young mother came up to me. She had a little boy with her, a darling little boy of six or seven. The mother recognized me from a TV show, some interview, and she brought the boy up and said, “This is the lady who writes the stories about Alvin and Margo.” His face just lit up, and he said, so excited, “You’re friends with Margo?” His mother told me in a whisper that his first word—his very first word!—had been Margo. It broke my heart and then mended it up again all in one second. I thought to myself: this is important. This is big. This is enough.
So here’s your next task, Lottie. On my computer you will find a file called MARGOT HATTER LIVES FOREVER. Yes—it is indeed the conclusion to the Alvin Hatter series (I thought Margo, for a change, ought to take center stage). Please deliver this to my agent. She’s in New York, and her name is Wendy Brooks. You’ll find her online. Yes, you must go in person. She’ll be thrilled to meet you, and I think you might find a little road trip provides a lovely distraction in times of sadness.
And yes, sometimes those thoughts come back, those nagging thoughts of IMPORTANCE and ACCOMPLISHING SOMETHING BIG and all that.
But I think if even one immortal boy has identified with Alvin’s struggles, it will have all been worth it.
Love, H.
Holy shit.
Another Alvin Hatter book? People were going to go crazy. She had said she was done with them, that she didn’t have any more Hatter stories in her, and now this. And she wouldn’t even be here to see its reception.
I googled Wendy Brooks on my phone and found her easily. Her office was in lower Manhattan, on Broadway.
My aunt’s computer was somewhere in these boxes. I took the fort apart and searched until I found it, a skinny laptop in a gray padded sleeve. I took it to my bed and opened it, and there, on the desktop, was a file called Margo Hatter Lives Forever.
I opened it up immediately and scrolled past the title page to the dedication.
To S.W. For all those years.
And for all the years I’ll never get.
S.W.? I had no idea who that could be. The last six Hatter books had been dedicated to my dad, my grandparents, Abe, Wendy, my mom, and me. Probably it was someone else my aunt had known in the writing world.
A new Hatter book!
It was the best possible news.
I could go to New York this weekend, on Saturday. I could ask Em to go with me—but she had a track meet in the middle of the day at some school an hour away from here. And I knew Abe and Amy were planning on a sort-of-cute/sort-of-nauseating marathon of John Hughes movies.
And there wasn’t really anyone else I felt like going with.
Unless . . .
But that was kind of weird.
It was weird to ask a guy you’d just met to go to New York with you, right?
But I guess I was in a weird mood. I picked up my phone and texted Sam: Do you want to go to New York on Saturday?
Almost immediately:
Yes!
I set the phone on my nightstand. I turned the light off.
And then, in the dark, I stayed up for hours and hours.
For Margo and Alvin’s last adventure.
I woke up Saturday before my alarm, filled with excitement about the trip to the city. I saved the Hatter file to a flash drive and put it into my purse and took a shower as the sun was dawning.
It had only been a few days since I’d learned about the last Alvin and Margo book, but I hadn’t told anyone yet. It was nice to have it just be my secret—I was the only person in the entire world who had read Margo Hatter Lives Forever! It was thrilling, like the biggest, most important kind of secret. But it was finally time to share it.
I found Mom and Dad having coffee in the kitchen, and I placed Aunt Helen’s computer on the table between them.
Dad looked at the computer, then at me, confused.
“Who’s this?” Dad asked Mom.
“It looks a lot like our daughter,” she replied.
“Our daughter, Lottie?”
“We only have one.”
“And what time is it?”
“It’s eight, Sal.”
“And what day is it?”
“It’s Saturday, Sal.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“I’m going to New York,” I said.
“You’re going to New York? For what? With who?” Mom asked.
“This is huge, okay?” I said, sitting down at the table. “I have something huge to tell you.”
“Oh no,” Mom said.
“What?” I asked.
“I don’t know. It seems like nothing good ever follows ‘I have something huge to tell you’ on a Saturday morning at eight o’clock.”
“Well, this is good. This is huge.” I put my hand on the laptop. “It’s another Alvin Hatter book.”
Mom’s mouth fell open slightly, and Dad looked like he hadn’t heard me.
“No,” he said.
“Yeah. She wrote another book, and she wants me to bring it to her agent.”
“Holy crap,” Mom said.
“And it’s good. I read it.”
Dad looked dazed, but like he was slowly getting it. I watched as an enormous grin spread across his face. He laughed and said, “I knew it! I knew Alvin Hatter and the Return of the Overcoat Man couldn’t be the last of the story! This is amazing! This is great! When do we get to read it?”