I see tears lining her dark lashes, and suddenly she seems so much younger. “What’s wrong?” I say. “Grandmother, what’s wrong?”
“I don’t want to scare you,” she says. “But you need to be prepared for what’s coming.”
Goose bumps prickle up along my arms as Grandmother buries her face in her hands, and I get out of bed to crouch in front of her. I’ve never seen her like this. I’ve only ever seen her the one way. She grips my hands hard, and her eyes find mine. “The stories,” she says. “It’s all in the stories.”
“What is?”
“Everything. The truth. The whole world, Natalie,” she says brusquely. “That girl jumped through the hole, not knowing what would happen, and the whole world got born. You understand that, right? The whole world.”
“I understand,” I lie, to calm her. Because I am scared now, and I need her to be the Grandmother I know, so I can be the child who’s soothed from her own fear of the dark.
“Good.” Her hand grazes my cheek. “Good. Because you have only three months.”
“What are you talking about—”
“Three months to save him, Natalie.”
“Save? Save who?”
Her eyes, immense and milky all of a sudden, dart over my shoulder, and her mouth drops open. “You,” she breathes. “Already—you’re already here.”
I look over my shoulder, neck alive with tingles, but no one’s there.
“Don’t be afraid, Natalie. Alice will help you,” Grandmother says. “Find Alice Chan.”
When I turn back, the rocking chair is empty, still nodding back and forth as though the ancient woman has just stood from it.
I’m alone again. I’m no longer the girl who talks to God.
2
I tumble out of bed and hurry to stop the shriek of my phone alarm. I don’t know how I got back to sleep after last night’s events, but apparently I did. The moonlight has faded, and the dim streetlights lining our cul-de-sac have popped on, sprinkling yellowy glares throughout the purple-blue of my dew-dampened windowpanes. The earliest birds and backfiring pickup engines are waking up, but the chirping crickets haven’t gotten the memo that this hellish hour is technically considered “morning.”
I flick the light switch of my walk-in closet, and Gus moos unappreciatively before turning over and going right back to sleep. I’m so jealous I throw a pillow at him, and would have immediately felt horribly guilty if not for the fact that he just lets out a snore and covers his eyes with one paw.
As exhausted as I am, I still can’t shake the fear left over from last night. For as long as I can remember, Grandmother’s been a force of calm in my life. I mean, her stories don’t tend to be happy or calming by any means, but her presence has always made me feel safe. Until last night.
What could she have been talking about?
My late-night Google trail of “Alice Chan” led to a dead end. It would seem that half the human population is composed of Alice Chans, each one less obviously significant than the last.
Three months to save him. I shake my head as if to clear the words.
I slip on a fitted black T-shirt dress and pull a denim jacket from a hanger on the top rack. It may be eighty degrees and ninety-nine percent humidity outside, but with Principal Grant in menopause, the school’s temperature is completely unpredictable. It’s best to be prepared. I survey the neat rows of heels that used to do something for me but now seem about as necessary as a pubic wig, and instead grab a pair of boots before walking back into my room.
Two of my walls are painted a ghastly orange, the other two a high-gloss black: Ryle High School’s colors. If that weren’t bad enough, one of the black walls has our mascot—the Raider, a one-eyed pirate with two swords crossed behind his head—taking up its majority. My bedding is white, and so are the tea-candle lantern and antique lamp on my desk. When I have headaches those are the three focal points I have to choose from, unless I feel like lying down inside my closet.
Mom and Dad decorated the room for me while I was away at dance camp the summer before seventh grade and already zealously looking forward to high school. Obviously the garish school-spirit color scheme was the best thing ever, until about a year ago, when I realized I had eyeballs, and it became just about the worst thing ever. With a better sound system and a few more Black Eyed Peas albums, my bedroom could give Guantanamo Bay a run for its money.