I smiled and nudged his elbow.
“Let’s start with the drama department and work our way around the school, shall we?” Janice said. “If you have any questions, be sure to speak up.”
“Weren’t you friends with Burnham Fister and Rosie Sinclair?” someone asked.
I peeked around the others to see it was the tall black woman who had spoken.
“I was, yes,” Janice said. She still smiled, but more tightly. “To be honest, though, I meant questions about the school. I’m not comfortable talking about my friends. If anyone wants to know more about Burnham or Rosie, or safety here at Forge, you can stop by the dean’s office. They’ll be able to answer your questions. Now, the music building, here on your right, was built fifteen years ago.” She continued smoothly on with her tour info.
I was impressed with her aplomb.
“You knew her?” Tom asked me quietly as we moved with the crowd toward the auditorium.
“Yes,” I said. “We’re in the same year.”
“What’s her blip rank?” he asked me.
“You’ll see on the board in the dining hall. Or you could check her profile on your phone.”
Janice led us around the campus, winding over to the dorms and behind the dean’s tower to the sculpture garden. Seeing her in the role of guide, both businesslike and anonymously friendly, made me itch to jolt her out of it, but I had to resist.
“How do you like Mr. DeCoster for a teacher?” I asked politely as we headed into the library. He’d been my favorite.
“He’s brilliant,” she said. “My Media Convergence class meets in the basement here.”
“Could we take a peek?” Tom asked.
The others were interested, too, so Janice led us down the stairs. The Ping-Pong table and the couches by the fireplace were the same, and the boxes of Settlers of Catan and Dominion still occupied the coffee table. Burnham’s computer had a Ping-Pong ball in a paperclip before it, just like the one I’d set there ages ago, after his accident. We didn’t know then if he would recover. It was a horrible time.
I drifted near. Burnham wouldn’t recognize me now if I tried to reach out to him, but I still felt guilty for my part in our accident. I would never be able to apologize to him. He didn’t know I existed. I let my fingers hover over the small white ball. I missed my friend.
“Coming?” Janice asked from the doorway.
I glanced over to see that Tom and I were the last ones in the room.
“Yes. Sorry,” I said.
After a stop in the main library upstairs, we returned to the quad, where Janice gave the history of the clock tower. I gazed up at the motto inscribed near the top: Dream Hard. Work Harder. Shine.
Lies, I thought. It should say Dream Hard So We Can Mine the Best out of You.
“Can we go inside?” I asked.
Janice hesitated. “We’re running short of time.”
“I’d like to go in, just for a second,” I said. “For Rosie’s sake.”
Janice looked at me oddly. “Did you know her?”
“I feel like I did,” I said.
She glanced around toward the others. A few were nodding. I wasn’t on The Forge Show anymore, but Janice still was, and I could practically see her calculating. Her feed was live right now, and viewers who knew Janice and Rosie had been friends were watching her reaction. This could be worth a spike to her blip rank.
Her gaze went distant for a moment. “She used to look for ghosts,” Janice said obscurely. Then she straightened and gestured to the tour group. “Go in if you’d like, but I’ll wait out here.”
She held the door for us, and I led the way into the tall, hushed space. High above, the mechanism of the clock made its distinct ticking, and the chains with their cylindrical weights dropped down through the gloom. The narrow windows shot diagonal streaks of sunlight into the dim air, and dust moats drifted into the light like fairy dust. For me, this was the heart of the campus, a crux of nostalgia and danger. The others came in curiously, stepping softly as if respecting a sacred place. They touched their fingertips to the railing, one by one, and looked down into the pit as I had done the first time I’d been here with Linus.
I lingered with my back to the wall and let the quiet chill of the stones seep into me. Tom stood patiently nearby, saying nothing, and as the last visitor left, he stepped to the railing and peered down.
“I can’t see the bottom,” he said. His voice carried easily in the hollow space.
“No,” I said. “It’s thirty feet down.”
Without warning, I felt a twinge of déjà vu, my first ever in my new body, and I breathed deep. The quirk of familiarity brought me super alive.
“Want to come look?” he said.
I saw myself step forward an instant before I did. I watched myself set my small hand on the black railing, knowing in advance how it would look around the metal. I felt a tug to lean over the railing, an impulse stronger than any déjà vu. I was certain to lose my balance and tumble head first into the black.
I held tight to the railing, leaning back as my heart pounded.
Take me out, I tried to say. But I didn’t speak in real life. My voice couldn’t escape.
Tom turned to me. “Are you all right?”
I foresaw myself capsizing down through a black rushing noise until I slammed into the floor and died.
“Thea? Let’s go back out,” Tom said.
A piercing headache spiked between my eyes. I gasped as Tom peeled my fingers off the railing. Blind with pain, I felt his arm come around me. He guided me out of the clock tower, and I blinked at the sunlight through a haze of needles.
The others were waiting in the rose garden, and Janice’s spiel of information broke off sharply. “Is she all right?” Janice asked.
“We’re just going to rest here a bit,” Tom said. “You all go ahead.”
I sank to a bench and leaned my head heavily into my hand.
“I can call the nurse,” Janice said.
“No,” I mumbled.
“It’s okay. She gets a little nauseous sometimes,” Tom said. “We’re fine, really.”
Dimly, I heard them discussing me, but I couldn’t say anything more. My headache was crushing my brain into pulp. One instant it was so bad I thought I was imploding, and the next instant, just as suddenly, the pain vanished, like a vice breaking apart into atoms. Cautiously, I tilted my face back so the sunlight fell on my cheeks. Merciful tingles of pleasure danced down my skin like warm streams of water, and the world returned to focus.
“See? She’s already better,” Tom said.
“I guess,” Janice said uneasily. She pointed to the nearest building. “There’s a bathroom in the dean’s tower if you need it.”
“Thanks,” Tom said. “We’re all good. And thanks for the tour.”
Janice gave us one last look, and then she continued with the others, veering off toward the studio art building.
“What was that about?” Tom said quietly. He sat beside me, and his eyes were lit with concern.
My baby kicked inside me, and I shifted slowly on the bench. “Just some weird spiking headache,” I said. “It’s gone completely.”