A World Without You (17 page)

I don't know
if I'm seeing ghosts like Harold does, or maybe time just jumped around enough to show me Sofía's dead friend, but I'd like to never have that happen again, please.

Ryan's pissed that I'm not focused on the problem at hand: the very real possibility that Berkshire may close. He doesn't understand that I
do
care. We're like a family. A tiny, broken family twisted with weird powers, but a family. I don't want to see what would happen if we're broken up. I can't imagine trying to figure out my powers with anyone other than these guys.

But time is falling apart around me, and Sofía is still gone.

• • •

At night, rather than waste time in the common room, I creep across the carpeted floor toward the last dorm room at the end of the hall. I've been to that room many times, but I haven't been there since I left Sofía in the past. At first, I avoided her bedroom subconsciously, but as time kept moving forward
without her, I started to avoid it on purpose, going so far as to take a different route to get to classes just to skip passing her room. That shut door used to be open all the time, spilling out little snippets of her music and the scent of her shampoo and her bright pink lamp that cast an eerie glow in the room. The fact that the door is always shut now just serves as another reminder that Sofía isn't inside.

But now, I just want to feel close to her again. Maybe just being in a space that is hers will be enough.

My hand trembles as I twist the knob to Sofía's bedroom door. The door creaks open. But before I can even flick the light on, I can tell that something's wrong.

Sofía's room is empty.

Of course she's not there, but that's not what I mean. It's empty of everything that made it her room. There's a stripped-down bed against the wall, an unadorned desk, a closet with ten bare hangers. It's empty of
her
. Someone has come in and taken away everything that made this room Sofía's.

“The hell is going on?” I mutter, turning slowly around the room.

I cross her room in three quick strides, pressing my hand against a patched coat of paint that doesn't quite match the rest of the walls. This was where Sofía and Gwen had their first fight. The two girls were very different, but they had bonded over the first few weeks of class. And then they fought about something stupid, I can't remember what, and Gwen had flashed too hot and accidentally burned a streak in the wall. Sofía had covered the dark spot with a poster so that Gwen wouldn't get in trouble.

But the poster's gone, and the dark spot is covered up. It's as if Berkshire is trying to make it look like Sofía was never here in the first place.

There's a flash of movement near the door, and I spin around. A short, teenaged girl with soot streaked down her body pauses, a look of confusion and shock on her face when she peers inside the room and sees me. I'm equally shocked and confused—not only have I never seen this girl before, but she's dressed in a full-length black skirt with a black top and a huge white collar. She has a thin white cap on, covering most of her pale brown hair.

She's from Salem.

I lunge for her. “Are you from the past?” I demand. “Have you seen Sofía? A girl—she's got brown skin and talks differently, like me, and she may have been accused of being a witch.”

The girl opens her mouth to speak; her face is twisted with fear and revulsion, as if she thinks I'm of the devil.

I blink.

And she's gone.

Cracks in time. Everywhere I go, the timestream follows, leaking moments and people that pop up in the shadows as reminders that I am not in control.

I try to get my heart to stop racing from the shock of seeing—and then
not
seeing—the girl from Salem, when suddenly the door bangs open and Gwen bounces in.

“What are you doing here?” I ask at the same moment Gwen squeaks in surprise at seeing me.

“I come here all the time,” Gwen says defensively. “What are
you
doing here?”

“I miss Sofía.”

Gwen's lips twist up, and for once, she doesn't have a snarky quip to fire back. Her shoulders slump and her hair sweeps into her face as she looks down, a defeated expression in her eyes.

“I miss her too,” Gwen says. Her guard is still up, as if she expects that I'll demand she leave. But this place isn't Sofía's, not anymore, and even if it were, I wouldn't keep Gwen from whatever remained of her.

“Why do you come here?” I ask.

Gwen shrugs. “Privacy.”

“There's no privacy in your own room?”

“I like it, okay?” Gwen says, moving past me and plopping down on the empty, bare bed. “I like the big room with no stuff in it.”

She likes the very thing I hate about this place: the echoing emptiness.

“Are you going to stay or what?” Gwen asks.

I shrug.

“Whatever.”

Gwen hasn't really liked me since Sofía and I started dating. I can't blame her. I took away her best and only friend—or, I didn't take her away, but I took away time with her. And then I took her to the wrong time. Guilt clangs around inside me like a bell.

Gwen stands up and flips the mattress over. This is the bed where Sofía slept, although when she slept here, the bed was covered with pale pink-and-green sheets and a quilt her grandmother made.

And, I'm fairly certain, the underside of her mattress wasn't covered in long burn marks.

“People think fire is uncontrollable,” Gwen mutters,
kneeling in front of the bed as if in prayer. She flicks her fingers, and sparks shoot up. At first I think she's remembered her powers, but then I see the Zippo in her hand. “But it's not. It's
powerful
, and power doesn't like to be contained.”

She runs the flame in a smooth, even line on the silky mattress material, and it blackens and burns. An acrid stench rises up from the scorching cloth. Even though Gwen's forgotten her powers of pyrokinesis, she's remembered her grief. And her love of fire. There are dozens of similar black lines, burn marks, all in a row. Careful, even marks monitored and cultivated. They look like scars.

I count the marks on the bed.

One for every night Sofía has been gone.

Family Day takes me by surprise.

I knew it was coming, obviously, but time's been messing with me lately. During mealtimes, the servers are tailed by a small brown-skinned girl with braids, dressed in clothes from at least ten years ago, who speaks Spanish. When I stare out the window during math, a group of Native Americans stalks through the sea grass. During free time outside, the camp for sick kids is fully occupied in one moment, then an abandoned ruin again in the blink of my eye.

All around me, time is leaking flashes of history.

Or—and this is what I fear far, far more—I'm seeing death. They're ghosts in front of me. Spirits reaching out, accusing me of messing with their pasts.

Sometimes, all I hope is to see Sofía. But other times, I'm terrified that if I see her, that means she's already beyond my help, she's already dead.

So I am somewhat distracted by the time Family Day rolls
around. I skipped breakfast and went to the morning session with Dr. Franklin, and no one was there. It wasn't until my science teacher, Mr. Glover, walked by and saw me waiting outside the Doc's door that I finally figured out what day it was.

I rush outside, where the Doctor has only just noticed I was missing. He kind of fusses over all of us, like in the old movies where the orphans are paraded in front of prospective adoptive parents. Except here it isn't about being selected to go to a new home, it's about hoping our own parents are happy enough with us to take us back.

The parents arrive individually. It seems like forever before anyone shows up, and then, suddenly, everyone's here. Gwen's mom is one of the first to arrive, then Harold's whole family. My parents arrive next, dragging along Phoebe. Only Ryan's family doesn't bother to show, but the Doctor makes him stand outside with everyone else, which is actually kind of a mean thing to do.

It's still a little too cold to be outside today, even though the season is starting to change. Everyone's wearing coats, and Gwen's hopping around from foot to foot, trying to keep warm. Despite this, the whole place smells like a cookout. The staff associates “family” with “cheap food.” Last Family Day was a build-your-own-sandwich bar.

“Hey,” I say in the general direction of my family. Harold's all excited to see his family, but I see mine every weekend. I don't know why they bother to come, honestly. Phoebe never has before.

Dr. Franklin greets everyone as they enter the big open foyer at the base of the ornate stairs of Berkshire. A laminated banner hangs over the first-floor landing—
WELCOME,
FAMILIES
—and the staff has added festive paper table covers to the buffet, where they're piling up mounds of grilled hot dogs, ruffled potato chips, and dip, but it all feels . . . forced. Everyone's smile is plastered on, but hardly anyone looks happy to be here, especially after Dr. Franklin introduces the officials, saying that they're here as consultants “during our tragedy.” Nothing like reminding everyone about a missing student to bring up the cheer factor.

“Well, let me go get my thirteen-hundred-dollar hot dog,” my father says. He smiles like it's a joke, but I can tell he doesn't think it's funny at all. Mom squeezes my arm, like she's trying to say everything's okay.

“Dr. Franklin,” she says, turning to him. He greets her with a too-broad smile, all his teeth showing. “May I speak with you?”

She draws him aside, and they start speaking quietly. I glance at my sister, who's just standing there, texting on her phone, ignoring us all.

Ryan sidles up beside me, four hot dogs on his plate. “This blows. Let's leave.”

I shake my head.

“Come on,” Ryan whines.

I watch as Mom nods emphatically at whatever Dr. Franklin is saying. I wait for them to look at me—obviously they're talking about me—but instead, Mom looks past where I'm standing.

To Phoebe.

“Would you look at them?” Ryan says, pointing to Harold's family—two dads, a younger sister, and an older brother. They're so loud it feels like they're taking up the whole foyer. Except Harold, of course. He's always quiet, even around his
family. But he's smiling, at least—that's something. His little sister came from Haiti, and his older brother is from Cambodia. They're among the few living people Harold ever bothers to talk about.

“They're like a window display for diversity,” Ryan says, not caring if anyone overhears him. The little sister is wearing a neon yellow sundress and has her hair up in two twisted pigtails. She's bouncing around like she's eaten nothing in her life but pure sugar.

“They look like a nice family,” I say. I watch Harold's whole face come alive with happiness in a way I've never really seen before.

“They look like a bunch of freaks.”

I'd really like to tell Ryan to shove off, but my mother's coming toward us. No . . . she's heading toward my sister. She steers Phoebe over to the Doctor, saying something to her in a low voice. Phoebe shakes her head no, but then they're in front of the Doctor, and Mom pokes Pheebs in the back until she smiles politely at him.

Ryan stuffs a hot dog in his mouth. “Come on, I'm leaving,” he says. He reaches for me, but I sidestep away. I want to know what the Doctor is saying to Phoebe. She glares at him, resentment in her eyes, and I can tell she wants to say something to him but can't because Mom is right there. What are they talking about that's making her so angry?

And then Phoebe's eyes shoot to mine. So. They're talking about me. But Phoebe's whole demeanor changes as she looks quickly away, focusing again on what the Doctor is telling her. She shifts visibly from angry to . . . afraid?

I'm just out of earshot; I can't make anything out. My focus
zeroes in on the Doctor with such intensity that the rest of the world fades away. Phoebe's a smart girl, but I don't want her believing whatever lies Dr. Franklin is telling her.

A sound like a roaring ocean wave washes over me, and I stagger from the impact of it. I look around quickly—Ryan's still beside me, chewing in slow motion. Everyone in the foyer is milling around but barely moving. I see Harold's little sister's neon yellow dress fluttering; she's paused mid-jump, her feet above the ground, but it's like gravity quit working for her and she's almost floating, sinking by millimeters.

“Hello?” I say, but all the sound around me is low, almost subsonic.

I haven't stopped time—I've just slowed it to a crawl.

This is my chance. The timestream is working for me for once, helping me to get closer to Dr. Franklin and Phoebe without them noticing. I must be moving like a hummingbird from their perspective, barely visible as I scoot around the slow-motion bodies of the people between my sister and me. Even so, I try to avoid their direct line of sight, moving quickly to the shadows at the edge of the room and creeping forward in bursts.

When I'm close enough, I close my eyes and release my grip on time. A sound like all the air in the room being sucked away fills my ears, but everyone around me acts and moves and talks normally again. Ryan looks around, surprised at my disappearance, but he shrugs and makes his way to the stairs on his own.

“I know I'm here at Berkshire Academy, and I work with your brother, but in situations like these . . .” Dr. Franklin's voice trails off. “I don't just help Bo. I'm here for you too.”

Phoebe sort of shrugs, flipping her phone over and over in her hand. “I don't need help,” she says.

“It's not easy living with someone who has special needs, like your brother. Sometimes it can feel as if you're overshadowed,” Dr. Franklin says.

Well, that's entirely untrue. I may have powers, but Phoebe's the special one to my parents. A total daddy's girl, with straight
A
s and a mile-long list of extracurriculars. Phoebe has designed her whole life to make people love her, from our parents to college admissions officers. Nothing I ever do comes close to competing with the perfection of Phoebe.

“I've been speaking with your mother on the phone, and she wanted us to have a moment to sit down and talk,” the Doctor continues.

She puts her phone in her pocket. “I don't really know what to talk about.”

“Let's go to my office,” Dr. Franklin says. He turns a little, just enough to make eye contact with me, to let me know that he knows I'm there. “Where it's more private.”

He touches her elbow and leads her up the stairs, beyond my reach.