A World Without You (6 page)

Intent matters.
As soon as I even thought about warning Sofía, about trying to save her, time pulled me back.

I thump my head against the common room door. The windows outside are dark, far darker than the evening of October 3, and I don't have to pull out my phone to check that I'm back in the present, but I do anyway.

At least I got to see her. It wasn't much, but it was something.

I close my eyes and try to picture her in that moment when she saw me and her eyes lit up. I want to hold on to that image forever.

This is progress. My control has been weakening, but I wanted to see Sofía, and I did. Figuring out the intent thing brings me one step closer to saving her.

I turn to go back to my room, but I realize that it would actually be nice to have a distraction from all that's going on. I push open the common room door. For a moment, I see it the way it was on October 3, with Sofía at the table, and a
smile plays at my lips. But I blink, and it's today, and Sofía's not here.

Ryan has the chess set out on the table, and as I step inside the room, a white bishop knocks over a black pawn of its own volition. Ryan picks up the fallen pawn, twisting it in his fingers as he stares at the board, and a black rook slides forward to take the bishop. Gwen cranks up the volume of the television across the room, ignoring everyone but the zombies she's shooting. Harold must be in bed already.

As upset as I am, I still like this place. Berkshire is a far cry from the old, rambling farmhouse where I grew up. Maybe that's why this room wraps around me like a warm blanket. That house, with its two and a half acres and pond and willow trees, is just a little too . . . provincial for me. Provincial. That's an SAT word my sister would love. But it fits. Even though the house isn't in the middle of nowhere, it's far from all my friends and within walking distance of exactly nothing. Somehow, all that space cages me in. Everything in the Berk is wrapped up in brick and contained together. It's nice.

As much as I love the academy, though, it's still a school, and the only place where Sofía and I can really just chill is the common room. It's where we eat, where we take breaks, where we hang out. Sofía first opened up to me in this room, over by the wing chairs. She was sitting on the floor, behind the chairs, reading a book and sort of fading in and out of visibility. If it hadn't been for the book, I don't think I would have noticed her.

I told her that she was reading my favorite book, but that was a lie. I'd never read it—I just wanted to talk to her. She started to tell me what she liked about it, but I was super
distracted by the way she slowly turned visible, her hair illuminating gold then copper then rich brown.

I think she suspected that I didn't know the book. I mean, I knew
of
the book—it had been an option for ninth-grade reading, something about gangs in the '50s or whatever—but I'd never read it, which didn't take her long to realize. “It's about death,” she said. “And it's about living after someone you love dies. And . . .” She paused, and in that moment she became completely, 100 percent visible. “And it's about not being afraid of being alone. Because in the end, we're all alone.”

“Oh,” I said, because I didn't know what else to say.

Books meant a lot to Sofía, and she was always reading. I didn't have many books that I liked, and I didn't really have anything eloquent that I could say to impress her, but I kind of regret not talking to her about the few books I did love. She was showing me a part of her when she told me about what book she was reading. I should have told her about a book that meant something to me the way that book meant something to her, because I can think of no better way to meet a girl than to see her through the eyes of the story she loves best.

I scowl. I don't like the way I keep thinking about Sofía, in memories and regrets as if she's gone for good. I step further into the room, torn between playing a video game with Gwen (I'd likely lose) or chess with Ryan (I'd definitely lose). But then I see Harold in the corner. I guess he didn't go to bed after all.

Harold sits as far away from everyone else as possible, his wing chair shifted so it's almost completely facing the wall. I can still see his mouth moving, though, and I can tell he's talking to spirits that only he can see.

When it comes to our powers, no one has it worse than
Harold. He sees and speaks to spirits and ghosts, but they tell him what they want to tell him, not anything he wants to hear. He can't command them. He can't do anything useful with them. He's just sort of stuck, forever listening to a bunch of dead people he can't shut up.

Maybe it's just the suckiness of this weekend, but a dark fear rises in my throat. I can't stop thinking about the black-hole feeling of where Sofía was supposed to be in the timestream. I stride across the room, scattering the chess pieces Ryan had floating beside the board. “Hey!” Ryan says indignantly, waving his hand and bringing all the chess pieces back to his side.

I start to drag another chair across from Harold, but it's heavy and loud, so I just plop down on the floor at his feet instead.

“Hello,” Harold whispers, his eyes at a spot about a foot above my head. I'm not sure if he is talking to me or to a spirit I can't see. When I don't answer, Harold's gaze drifts down to mine, an expectant and curious glint to his eyes.

“Hi,” I say.

Harold usually sticks to himself and spends far more time talking to his ghosts than to any of us.

“So.” I press my lips together, my hands twitching with nervous energy. “I mean, so. Sofía, right? It's my fault she's gone, and obviously I need to go back and get her, but . . . I can't. I mean, I've tried. I've tried a
lot
. But for some reason, I can't save her, no matter what I do. And . . .” I swallow, almost unable to continue. “And I'm worried that maybe the reason why I can't save Sofía is because she's already too far gone, that I can't save her because it's impossible.”

Harold looks at me as if I'm crazy.

“It's just that, I should be able to go back to exactly where she got stuck in time and pull her out. But . . . I can't. So maybe the reason why I can't find her in the timestream anymore is because . . . maybe she's . . .”

No. Those words can't be spoken.

“You talk to ghosts, right?” I say finally.

Harold's eyes shift, unfocused, gazing at something . . . someone . . . only he can see. “The voices speak to me,” he says softly.

Creepy stuff like that is exactly the reason Harold got beat up so much at his old school.

He lets silence fall around us.

“I guess I just wanted to ask . . .”

Harold stares at me intently. Waiting.

“Do you see Sofía?”

There. I said it.

“I don't always see,” Harold says, his eyes losing focus. “Often, I just hear. Whispers. Regrets. Whispers.”

I lean up on my knees. I want to grab Harold, force him to give me his full attention. “But do you see or hear
Sofía
?” I ask, my voice rising. “Maybe she's gone, maybe what I did—” I swallow. “Maybe what I did killed her. And if it did, I know she'd come back. Here. To me. To all of us. Has she . . . do you see her? Do you hear her?”

Harold cocks his head like a cat about to pounce on a bird rustling in the grass. When he speaks, his voice is almost inaudible. “No. She is silent. She is not in the voices. She is just . . . gone.”

I sag in relief. Gone—but not so far gone that I can't still reach her. She's not dead. She's okay. She's stuck in the past
behind some sort of block that's stopping me from saving her, but she's still alive.

“Thanks, man,” I say, standing up and smacking Harold on the knee. Harold jerks as if startled out of deep sleep by the touch. I'll leave him to his ghosts, then. I wander over to the cushions where Gwen is sitting, using a flamethrower on the horde approaching her character on the screen.

“You should be careful what you say,” Gwen mutters, not taking her eyes off the TV.

“Huh?”

Gwen shoots me a look. “The Doctor's not here, but he is, you know?” Her voice drops an octave. “Watching.” Her eyes flick to the corner where I had just been sitting, talking to Harold.

“I don't under—”

“There.” Gwen's eyes linger on the ceiling, on the almost invisible black camera lens that points at exactly the spot where I had just been sitting.

“Why is the Doctor spying on us?” I ask, shifting closer to Gwen. I scan the room and notice at least three more cameras, one in each corner, pointing down on us.

Gwen shrugs. “Don't know. But he is.”

“It's been like this for two weeks,” Ryan calls from the table in the center of the room, his attention still on the chess game. “They installed them after the last episode.” His eyes flick to Harold.

Three weeks ago, Harold was possessed by a malevolent spirit he'd been trying to talk into leaving him alone. He attacked Dr. Franklin. The Doc wasn't hurt, of course—he
healed himself in seconds—but I guess the director decided to add more security after that.

To be honest, I'm just relieved that the cameras weren't installed because of
my
screw-up.

“It's probably just a precaution,” I say. I can't help but wonder, though, how the director expects cameras to keep us safe.

“Sure,” Ryan says, his tone flat. “Yeah, that's probably all it is.”

Sunday.

The last day of the weekend. Tomorrow, classes start again. And next weekend, I'm stuck going to my parents' house. I have to make today count.

All right, fine, let's approach this scientifically. I grab my notebook from my desk and make a list:

What I've Done Already:

• Tried to go into the past where Sofía is. Can't get there. Utterly blocked. Powers don't work.

• Tried to go to a few minutes before I sent Sofía to the past to stop myself. Didn't work. Timestream blocks me from my own timeline.

• Tried to go into the past and warn Sofía not to go with me to the 1600s. Can't get there.

Underneath the pitiful list, I add in big, bold, underlined letters:
INTENT MATTERS
.

Now let's try something completely different:

Attempt 1: Go back to my own past and leave myself clues to not get Sofía stuck in the first place.

I pick another weekend when I wasn't at Berkshire, so I can be sure not to meet my past self. But rather than go see Sofía, I stay in my room. I keep my mind as clear as possible, grab a piece of paper from my desk, and write a huge warning note to myself. I expect time to snap me back to the present, but it doesn't. I write the note, leave it on my bed, and return.

But it obviously doesn't work, because Sofía's still gone and the past hasn't changed.

I don't remember getting any notes in the past either, so what happened?

I carefully make a mark in my calendar, noting which day I traveled to. When I turn around, my eyes fall on my bed. When I was younger, I used to hide things from my nosy little sister between the box spring and mattress of my bed. I check, and sure enough, my note is there, but I don't know why or how.

I want to go back, I want to try again, but each weekend I travel back to creates a little divot in the timestream. The more I go back in failed attempts to leave notes, the more I run the risk of creating tangles and knots in the strings of time. If I don't play my cards right, I'll ruin my chances.

The universe doesn't want me to save Sofía.
Attempt 2: Brute force.

Sofía's vivid red string is easy to spot amid the myriad of grays and taupes and sage greens and pale blues of the other strings that represent the Berk at various different times. A
lump rises in my throat as I look closely at the weave, at the way Sofía's string knots up with mine, just before it shoots off into the black hole of 1692.

The red string whirls into darkness. Trying to grab it just as it disappears into the void is crazy, like trying to grab a live electrical wire thrashing on the ground.

I do it anyway.

The string cuts into my skin—it feels like I'm trying to climb a mountain with a thread instead of a rope. The swirling vortex at the point in time and place where Sofía is threatens to throw me aside, but I don't let go. I can feel time around me, building like pressure from all sides, wanting to expel me. I strain against the forces of time trying to keep me out. Strings start to unravel, and they whip against my hand, lashing my skin.

I grit my teeth and pull harder. The string feels like barbed wire crackling with electricity.
No
, I think to myself, just that word, just
no
.

But I have to give up anyway. I can't hold on. The strings of time slip through my fingers, swirling back around the vortex where Sofía is trapped.

I go for a walk. I pace the grounds of Berkshire, from the brick steps to the sick kids' camp to the green gate blocking the boardwalk and back again. I stand in front of the burned-out brick chimney, the only link between where I am now and where Sofía is in the past. I stare at it. I argue with the blackened bricks. I argue with time. I argue with myself.

There has to be a way.

I wish I understood more about my powers. I wish I could say, “I want to be at this place, in this time,” and go right back to that specific moment. Instead, I'm always sort of guessing,
and everything is a little random, a little uncontrollable. It's like swimming in the ocean. You can point to a spot out in the distance where the waves aren't cresting yet, and then you can swim and swim, but you're probably not going to end up at the exact spot you were pointing to. The ocean's just too big, and the current is always moving.

By the time I make it back to Berkshire, it's almost dark. The giant lights around the brick facade are already glaring down at me, accusing me of breaking curfew. But when I slip past the big wooden doors inside the main hallway, it's mostly deserted. I half expected Dr. Franklin to be waiting on me, scowling, but instead, I'm face-to-face with one of the other unit leaders. She works with the older students, the ones who normally would have graduated by now but whose powers are either so odd or so uncontrollable that they're remaining at the academy.

“Bo,” she says, nodding at me. I'm surprised she knows my name, but then I realize that the Doc probably told her to wait up for me specifically. Since Sofía's disappearance, he's been watching me more closely. I think he thinks I'm depressed, but I'm not. I'm just angry. At myself, at my powers, at the whole situation.

I nod to the unit leader, and she checks something on her phone and then proceeds to lock up the building. She sets the alarm and locks all the doors and windows to the academy with a nod of her head—she must have telekinesis like Ryan—then she smiles at me and click-clacks in her high heels toward the kitchens. Some of the staff have begun taking down the black bunting that had been spread throughout the hall for Sofía's memorial service.

I wonder what everyone else in the school thinks happened.
All the units are pretty tight-lipped. We hardly ever see other students. Mealtimes are kept small and regulated. There are very few school-wide gatherings, and when there are, we're told to keep our powers hidden and in check. Maybe they're afraid people will show off and lose control. Or maybe there's some other reason for us to be so secretive.

I bet most people thought the memorial service was real.

I wonder if they think I killed her.

It's my fault, after all, that she's not here, now.

What have they been told? Do the other unit leaders and teachers know, or does everyone here think I'm a walking tragedy?

I shake my head. It doesn't matter. Let them think whatever they want.

My footsteps as I trudge up the stairs are echoed by the unit leader's. She stays about six or seven steps behind me, but she carefully matches my pace, following me all the way to my unit's hall. She stands there, staring at me silently, until I'm in my room and the door is shut. Before she leaves, she rattles the handle of my door. It's not locked, and she doesn't enter, but the metallic rattle still sounds like a threat to me.

I am reminded of the video cameras that now watch us in the common room. I didn't think they were added because of me, but now I'm not so sure.

Before I go to bed, I creep around the corners of my room, looking for more blinking red lights hidden in the shadows. I don't find any more cameras, but I can't shake the feeling that I'm being watched.