Fair Coin (20 page)

Nate pressed a button, and the screen came to life, displaying strings of numbers. “These are all the coordinates of the realities we've visited so far.” He eyed Ephraim. Nate typed in some numbers on the keypad, too fast for Ephraim to catch them. It looked like there were ten digits, and the first was an 8.

Nate extended the controller to him with the bottom half flat. “Please insert twenty-five cents.”

Ephraim pulled the coin out of his pocket. It was still just a blank metal disc. He ran his thumb over it, as though he could wear away the surface and reveal the quarter beneath it. He hoped the controller would recharge it. Ephraim fit the coin into the circular space in the controller.

Numbers began scrolling up the screen. The disc shimmered, and George Washington's face reappeared on the coin.

“The controller seems to be downloading coordinates from the coin. These are all the universes you've been to. You've been busy,” Nate said.

“Can I see?” Ephraim said casually.

Nate searched his face. “Of course,” he said finally.

The controller was made of a smooth light-blue metal, cool to the touch. It felt solid but as light as aluminum. The screen was dead to his touch, and no amount of pressing would bring it to life.

Ephraim had the controller now and the coin. Should he run for it? He glanced at the open bedroom door.

Before he could make up his mind, Nate reached over and pressed his finger to the display. “Let me show you how it works,” he said. The moment his skin made contact, it came to life. He scrolled through the lines of numbers then tapped one of them to highlight it. “This button at the bottom sets the coin to whichever coordinate is highlighted.”

Nate pressed it, and Ephraim nearly dropped the machine when the coin suddenly floated up from its groove and hovered in mid-air.

“Wow. How does it do that? Magnets?” Ephraim asked.

“You haven't seen anything yet.” As Nate scrolled through the list, the coin reoriented itself in the air, turning and rotating with each line he highlighted in the center of the display.

“It
is
like a gyro,” Ephraim said.

“A what?” Nate said sharply.

“Uh. I mean, it looks like a gyroscope. One of those navigation things.”

This was his chance. But just as Ephraim was about to grab the coin, Nate snatched the controller from Ephraim. He cleared the display and tilted it so Ephraim could see the screen was blank. “Now I'll program it for a random universe,” Nate said. “Unless you'd like to ‘wish’ us to one.” He chuckled.

Nate held down the button at the bottom of the keypad. The coin spun and rotated in place, still hovering just above its dock on the controller. It picked up so much speed it turned into a semi-transparent globe in front of them. A warm breeze blew against Ephraim's face, and he smelled burning ozone as the air around the rotating coin heated up. Numbers raced over the screen, too fast for Ephraim to read.

“Round and round it goes. Where it stops, no one knows,” Nate said.

When Nate depressed the button, the coin stopped suddenly, frozen in place in mid-air and oriented almost directly vertical.

“Now what?” Ephraim asked.

“Hold onto me, then grab the coin,” Nate said.

“Why is that necessary? If we aren't in physical contact when I touch the coin, won't you just follow me like you were doing before?”

Nate rolled his eyes. “It isn't automatic. Even if I have the coordinates you shifted to, the controller still has to track the coin and home in on its signal. That takes time, depending on how far you've gone. And I'd have to deal with the Ephraim who switches places with you. This is much less trouble.” Nate smirked. “You're not hoping to get rid of me already?”

“No, I was just curious. Trying to figure out how this all works.” Ephraim tried to sound as casual as possible. “So why did I switch with other Ephraims whenever I visited another universe?”

“It must be because the coin wasn't docked in the controller. I've been wondering about it myself. I bet it's a sort of stealth mode, for spying on other universes. If you replace your double, you can move right into his life without even wasting a bullet. Think about it: my Ephraim might have replaced
you
if he'd figured it out sooner.”

Ephraim shuddered. He would have just woken up in this war-torn version of the world with a psycho best friend and no idea how he'd gotten there. “You don't seem that broken up about losing your best friend,” he commented.

“He
did
betray me in the end. Hard to forgive that. And like I said, there's more where he came from.” Nate clapped Ephraim on the shoulder. “I think I like you more, anyway. I've been watching you. You're a loyal friend. But keep in mind, if you ever do think of leaving me behind somewhere, it won't be easy to fool me the same way twice.”

While Nate's hand was on his shoulder, Ephraim reached for the coin. He hesitated for a moment, then plucked it out of the air.

Ephraim felt the familiar lurch as they shifted together.

They were still in Nate's room, but it was more like the one Ephraim remembered. The expensive equipment was gone. His friend's old 20-inch TV was hooked up to a Playstation 2.

Nate carefully closed the controller and tucked it away. Ephraim pocketed the coin. It still felt warm and it vibrated gently. He wondered how much of a charge it had built up. It hadn't been in the controller for long.

Nate smiled as if he knew what Ephraim was thinking. “You could leave the coin in the controller to charge,” he said.

He did know what Ephraim was thinking. He was good.

“No, that's okay. It's probably safer for me to hold onto it, in case we have to use it in a hurry.”

Nate nodded and looked around the room. “This could have been tricky, if there were another version of me home today. Not that we couldn't handle him between the two of us. We usually leave from the library, which is more isolated.”

“Trickier still, if there'd been no house here at all,” Ephraim said. Nate paled.

Unless the coin swapped them with their doubles, the Charon device seemed to fix travelers to the same spatial location as they moved from one universe to another. He hoped that with all its safeguards, the coin wouldn't be able to transport him into the middle of another object, or a world with a toxic atmosphere.

Ephraim wandered to the window and looked out at a perfectly ordinary street, a view he was quite familiar with. “Where are we, anyway?” he asked.

Nate grinned. “I don't know! That's what's so great about this—you always end up someplace new. Stick with me, partner.”

Nate took Ephraim to the Spanish grocery store a few blocks away from his double's house. He pulled up his hood over his eyes just outside the store.

“What are you doing?” Ephraim asked.

“Watch and learn,” Nate said.

Ephraim followed him inside to the register in the front, which was lined with scratch-off lottery tickets and candy. Nate opened his wallet and handed the cashier a ten dollar bill.

“Can you break this?” he asked. Ephraim didn't recognize the picture on the front of the bill, and the paper was tinted orange. It looked like Monopoly money.

Nate studied the cashier carefully, a look of anticipation on his face. He seemed relieved when the man put the bill in the register without even giving the money a second glance. A smile played across his lips as the cashier handed over a five dollar bill and five singles.

Nate examined each bill closely, holding them up to the light. The five dollar bill was blue, but the singles looked a normal green and had the familiar portrait of Washington.

“You think I give you fake money?” the cashier said angrily.

“You can't be too careful these days. These look okay,” Nate said. He tucked the money away and reached into the right-hand pocket of his hoodie.

“Nate—” Ephraim said.

“No names!” he snapped at Ephraim. He pulled out his gun and turned back to the cashier. “You. Empty the register,” Nathan said calmly, pointing the gun at the cashier.

“Are you nuts?” Ephraim said.

“Chill. This guy's an easy mark in every universe. He's practically our personal ATM.”

The cashier glanced between the two of them. “No trouble. Please,” he said.

“I know, I know. You have a wife and three kids,” Nate said.

“How could you know this?” The man was even more frightened.

“There won't be any trouble, pops. As long as you hand over all your money,” Nate said.

Ephraim looked behind the cashier and noticed a security camera behind his head. “He's recording us!” he said.

Ephraim used to worry endlessly about getting detention at school. He'd always tried to follow the rules. Now he was breaking the law. He was
robbing a store.
He shoved one shaking hand into the pocket with the coin.

“Calm down,” Nate said. “We'll be long gone before the cops get here.”

“But—”

“And where we're going, they can't follow us. Get it?”

The cashier started stacking bills on the counter. Nate nodded to Ephraim. “Take it,” Nate said.

Ephraim grabbed two handfuls of money. The panicked cashier held open a paper bag for him, and Ephraim dumped the cash in.

“Uh, thanks. Sorry,” Ephraim said.

“Okay, let's go,” Nate said.

They exited the store slowly then dodged into the alley behind the store. Nate put the gun back in his pocket.

“They won't catch us, but what about this reality's Ephraim and Nathan?” Ephraim said.

“What about them?”

“They're
us.
They might get caught.”

“We don't owe those guys anything.”

“How can you screw your other self over that way?”

Nate scowled. “You worry about other people too much.”

Sirens sounded in the distance. Ephraim was used to hearing sirens, but this was the first time they were coming for him. He peeked nervously around the side of the store.

“Time for another perfect getaway,” Nate said. He pulled out the controller and gestured for the coin. Ephraim slotted it in the circular dock. Nate grabbed Ephraim's arm above the elbow and set the coordinates with his free hand. Ephraim paid close attention, making sure he could operate the controller when the time came. Nate nodded, Ephraim grabbed the coin, and they shifted.

“Now what?” he said. It looked like they hadn't gone anywhere at all.

“We're one universe over from the last one.” He folded the controller and slipped it into his jeans. “Back to the
bodega
.”

“What?”

Ephraim followed Nate around to the entrance of the store, and they ran through the same process. The cashier responded exactly the way he had before, but this time he offered Ephraim a plastic bag to carry the money in.

“I have my own, thanks,” Ephraim said. He held open the paper sack from the previous store.

Ephraim wondered what would happen if one of the cashiers didn't give up so easily and tried to resist them. Nate would probably just kill him and take what he wanted.

After four more identical trips, eerie in how similarly they played out in each universe, Nate finally seemed satisfied, and Ephraim had a dull ache in his stomach; he'd never made so many trips so close together before. Behind the store, Nate scrolled through the list and highlighted a set of coordinates.

“Let's go home,” Nate said. By now Ephraim was familiar with the routine. He grabbed the coin while Nate held onto him, and a moment later they were back in Nate's universe—or at least Ephraim assumed that they were. It looked no different from any of the other places they'd been, except it was raining now.

“How'd we do?” Nate said when they returned to his bedroom.

Ephraim unloaded the soggy paper bags of money, and they counted up the bills. Now Ephraim knew where his analog had gotten all that money.

“3,275 dollars. Not bad for this time of day,” Nate said. He split up the money and handed half of it to Ephraim. “Just in time, too. I was running low on cash and I want to take Mary Shelley out tonight.”

“Both of them?”

Nate just smiled. “With this technology, we can do anything we want, Ephraim.”

“Even if we can get away with it, it's still wrong,” he said.

“You sound a lot like the other Ephraim did at first. You going to try to double-cross me too?”

“I just…I'm still getting used to all this.”

“Go spend some of that money and you'll feel better. Tools are made to be used.” Nate said. He pulled the gun from his pocket and stashed it in his top desk drawer. He kept the controller tucked safely in his other pocket.

Ephraim nodded and turned away, wondering if that was how Nate viewed him—as a tool.

He was going to stop Nate, one way or another. All he needed was a plan.

“There's plenty more where I came from?” Zoe said. She pounded her fist on the kitchen table. “He really said that?”

Ephraim flipped the cheese omelet with the spatula one last time and lowered the flame on the stove.

“I can't believe you're actually working for him,” Zoe said.

“With
him,” Ephraim corrected. He turned from the stove to see her glaring. He was making Zoe dinner in exchange for the use of her couch. Mr. Kim hadn't been happy about the arrangement or Ephraim's apparent return to Zoe's life after a long absence. Zoe had pointedly reminded him that Ephraim had nowhere to go, and he had finally assented.

When Ephraim arrived at the house, Mr. Kim had awkwardly offered his condolences, then immediately gone out. Zoe thought her father would probably stay at his girlfriend's, as he did on weekends.

“I'm just pretending to cooperate with Nate,” Ephraim said. “We both know we're using each other. It's just a matter of who gets to take advantage first.” Ephraim turned off the burner and sliced the omelet in half. He slid each portion onto a plate.

Zoe took a bite of her omelet. “Mmm. This sure beats take-out. I'm tired of Chinese and Mexican.”

Ephraim glanced at her. “Yeah.”

She was right, though. The eggs weren't half bad. They ate in a companionable silence for a while. Ephraim kept trying to think of a plan, but his mind kept circling back to his conversation with Nate.

He sighed. “Zoe. Nate said that Ephraim killed his own parents before he left.”

Zoe clenched her fork. “You believe him?”

“I didn't know your Ephraim. You did. You tell me. Could he have done it?”

Zoe shoved her omelet around on her plate.

“He could have. He'd talked about it before, a couple of times. When he was angry. His father was a real asshole. He deserved what happened to him.” Her shoulders slumped. “But I don't think he would have killed Maddy.”

“So, did he or didn't he?”

“Do you think you could kill someone?” Zoe asked.

“We're different people,” Ephraim said.

“I know,” Zoe said. “You seem a little…”

“Nicer? Cuter?”

“I was going to say a little more naive.”

“Oh.”

“But it works for you. Ephraim was always so…grown up. He carried the world on his shoulders. It's like he was impatient to become an adult.”

“Maybe he didn't have a choice.” Ephraim's mom had always needed him to be the responsible one. It seemed that hadn't been any different for his analog—worse, if his father was around to make things difficult.

“Maybe. I can't help but compare the two of you. It's surreal, sitting here like we always did, but you being so different. He didn't have your sense of humor, either.” She forked another bite of omelet into her mouth. “He also couldn't cook.”

“This is barely considered cooking.”

Ephraim also had to keep reminding himself that this girl wasn't the one he had been hopelessly infatuated with since the second grade. Aside from her appearance, he knew she wasn't the same person. She was a lot more confident for one, and had a quicker temper, too. Physically, she seemed more comfortable with her body and was more athletic, but was still as intelligent as Jena.

“What's she like?” Zoe asked.

Ephraim looked at her suspiciously.

“I know that look on your face,” Zoe said. “You're thinking about someone. It isn't hard to guess who.”

He cleared his throat. “Jena's great. I mean, just like you. You have similarities, of course. She's really popular at school. She's the smartest student in the whole county, I think.”

Zoe laughed. “Not all that much like me, then. I don't have many friends. And I hate school.”

“But you're so good at science and computer stuff.”

“Doesn't mean I have to like it.”

“If I had to go to school six days a week all year round, I'd hate it too. About the only thing I liked about it was seeing Jena every day. Your Ephraim probably felt the same way about you. I wonder why he didn't take you with him?”

“What?” Zoe's fork clattered to the table.

“Um. I mean, if the other Ephraim wasn't planning to come back here, why didn't he take you with him?” From her stunned look, he knew he'd really stuck his foot in it.

“Why do you think he wasn't coming back?”

He stared at his plate, the bits of yellow egg scattered across the cheese-streaked grape leaf pattern at the center of it.

“Nate said…”

“Oh! Nate said. I thought you didn't trust him?”

“I don't!”

“Then why would you believe anything he said?”

“I—”

“I'm sure he had a good reason for it.” Zoe slid her chair back and tossed her fork down on the plate. “He would have taken me if he could have, but that Charon machine only works for you and Nate.”

“But I—” Ephraim cut off his words. She obviously wouldn't want to hear that he'd shifted with other people before. The question was, had the other Ephraim known he could or not?

“Thanks for dinner. I'm going to bed early.” Zoe said. She stormed out of the kitchen. The door swung back and forth behind her. Ephraim poked at the lukewarm remains of his omelet and pushed the plate away from him.

He wouldn't be able to sleep if he left things with Zoe that way. At the rate that the people closest to him were disappearing, he didn't know if he'd have another chance to smooth things over, and he couldn't afford to lose another friendship, if he could even call it that.

He climbed the steps to the second floor and approached her room. He couldn't see a light under her door. He knocked softly, then more loudly.

He was about to tiptoe back downstairs when the door opened. Zoe had changed into a long T-shirt with a purple unicorn prancing on a rainbow.

“What now?”

Okay, so she was still a little upset.

“I just wanted to say that I'm sorry,” Ephraim said.

“For what?” Zoe asked.

“I was really insensitive. I shouldn't have said…what I said.”

She stared at him for a second then stepped onto the landing in socked feet.

“It's not your fault I reacted that way…” She leaned against the wall and hugged her arms around herself. “I've been thinking the same thing to myself since he left. He didn't even say good-bye.”

Ephraim drew closer to her. “Look, I know I'm not him, but I'm going to finish whatever he was trying to do. You're right—he did know what he was doing. He probably just didn't want you to get hurt. I can relate to that.”

Zoe sniffed a little. She rubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand.

Ephraim forged ahead, the words rushing out of his mouth. “His mistake was he trusted the wrong person, then tried to handle the problem himself. I'm going to need your help. If I say or do something completely idiotic, tell me—and make me listen. Even though we just met, I think you know me better than I know myself.”

“Don't worry. I'll definitely let you know when you do something stupid.”

They looked at each other awkwardly.