Springback

by Jana Miller

  “What do you know about Max?” Janie asked, moving a little so she could see Lillian better.

  Lillian pulled back a little. “Janie. I didn’t even see you there.”

  My stomach soured as Janie asked, “How do you know my name?”

  Lillian smiled. “I know a lot about you,” she said patronizingly. “Chloe knows that.” Then she looked up at me. “And she knows how...persistent I can be.”

  Instinctively, I side-stepped in front of Janie. “Get away from her,” I said. “You can’t do anything to us. Come on, Janie.” I tugged on her, and Leah too, and we headed for Leah’s Jetta, but then a springback hit us and Leah and I stumbled.

  “Are you okay?” Janie asked, and I nodded vaguely.

  “Fine,” I said. “Just be glad you can’t feel it.”

  Lillian blinked a couple times too, but then she smiled serenely at us. Either her rewind hadn’t affected her as strongly as the jolt had affected us, or she was hiding it well. “You were saying?” she asked.

  “I can’t believe you’re actually my mother,” Leah said in disgust, and we continued toward the car.

  We only made it a couple steps before the next jolt. I struggled to keep my balance, grabbing at my head. I couldn’t believe she was holding us hostage with springbacks—or that I couldn’t just rewind the situation. Even just a week ago, rewinding the ten or fifteen minutes back to when we’d first arrived and taking the journal into the museum with us would have been simple, but none of us could reverse even that far anymore.

  “What’s going on?” Janie asked, her voice a little bit panicked.

  “I don’t mind doing it a few more times,” Lillian said. “I’m sure Janie would love watching how you react to multiple springbacks, Chloe. All you have to do is tell me where the amulet is, and you can go.”

  “That’s enough, Lillian,” Rob growled.

  “But be sure to tell me the actual location,” Lillian continued, pinning me with a glare, “or I’ll have to get mean.”

  “You’re sick,” Jake spat, and Lillian shrugged dismissively.

  “If you come anywhere near me or my sister, I’ll call the police,” I threatened, taking my phone out as I tugged Janie to hurry toward the car.

  “Lovely,” she answered. “I’m sure it will be entertaining to hear what you decide to tell them I’ve done wrong. In fact”—she brightened a little, and it was just as creepy as every other expression I’d seen on her face—“You’ll be doing me a favor. Because that amulet belongs to me, so if you find it—or already have it—and you don’t hand it over, I’ll need to call them anyway. Either way, I should probably let them know that you came here to steal it.” She set the journal down on the trunk of her car and got her phone out again.

  I glanced at Leah. I had no idea if Lillian was bluffing—or if her claim that the amulet belonged to her was true or not. Leah just shrugged a little, her eyes wide. Gene had insisted he’d never given it to her—and Rob had been positive he never would—but she’d had charge of Gene’s affairs for years; could she have legally claimed it somehow?

  Rob sighed. “You’re even crazier than I remember,” he told her, clearly repulsed. Then he turned to us. “It’s okay, guys. You go ahead. Put the phone away, Lillian. I’ll show you where it is.”

  My eyes widened. As far as I knew, the amulet was in his pocket. I certainly wasn’t about to leave without it.

  “But—” Jake began, but Rob cut him off with a shake of his head. “I can pull time just as well as she can,” he assured us. “I won’t let her follow you.”

  Leah, Janie, and I exchanged desperate, unsure looks, as Rob told her, “It’s inside.”

  Lillian breathed a small chuckle, eyeing the museum as if it were an insect. “Somehow, I don’t quite believe you.”

  “Oh no?” he asked. “Didn’t you know this is your dad’s favorite museum? Or have you really never listened to a word he’s said?”

  Jake looked between the two of them, then moved toward us.

  “What are you talking about?” Lillian asked.

  The four of us crossed the rest of the way to Leah’s car, trying not to draw Lillian’s attention. I knew she could still rewind us even if we left, but I was pretty sure she couldn’t pull more than a couple minutes, with the strands how they were. And at some point she’d have to stop when it got to be too much for her. I didn’t know how well Rob could actually rewind—he hadn’t even accessed the strands for years—or what good it would actually do for him to fight back that way.

  I just hoped she wouldn’t go all car-chase-crazy—or car-accident-crazy—on us once that happened.

  “It’s locked right now,” Rob was telling her, “but we were just looking for a way in. If you’ll let them go—and promise to leave them alone—you and I can go in together and get it.”

  There was a pause and I glanced over my shoulder to see Lillian watching us. I yanked the back door open and pushed Janie inside, not waiting to hear Lillian’s response before I got in next to Janie and slammed the door.

  * * *

  Leah peeled out of the parking lot and I buried my face in my hands. “I can’t believe she showed up.”

  “Did you turn off your GPS?” Jake asked Leah.

  “Yeah, as soon as she mentioned it,” Leah answered, her voice tight with anger. “I don’t know how she managed to start tracking me again, because I turned it off after my ten-day rewind.”

  “That’s your mom?” Janie asked Leah, who nodded stiffly. “How do you know her, Chloe?”

  I stiffened too. “What do you mean?”

  She searched my face. “You acted like you knew her, but like she’s your enemy or something.”

  “Arch nemesis,” Jake corrected, though without his usual humor.

  I hit his arm. “She is not my arch nemesis,” I said, giving him a shut-up-or-die look. “She’s just the one who messed up the Ring, and she’s—”

  “Horrible,” Leah finished for me.

  I bit my lip, silently agreeing.

  “How can she still rewind?” I asked. “She didn’t seem like she was even affected by it!”

  The emotion Leah’s face was so mixed I couldn’t read it as she said, “A few years ago, she started taking a prescription narcotic—she has a chronic back problem that even rewinding can’t fix—and she got addicted to them.” She pressed her lips together as she checked an intersection and turned, and my eyes widened at this new dimension of Lillian. “She takes them so often that pulling and springbacks barely hurt her at all.” She swallowed. “She doesn’t even mind the way the strands feel now.”

  We were all silent. I glanced at Jake, who was watching Leah with his lips parted. Part of me thought this would have been helpful information to have earlier, but I knew it probably wouldn’t have made a difference, so I didn’t say anything.

  “What about Rob?” Janie asked after a minute.

  “I’m sure he’ll be fine,” Jake said. “Just drive a few miles, Leah. Take the forest roads, then pull over.”

  “What are we going to do?” I asked.

  He looked at me as if it were obvious. “Enter the Ring.”

  “But Rob has the amulet,” I argued.

  “Nope,” he said with a grin, reaching into his pocket. “I have it.”

  “What?”

  “He slipped it to me.” He pulled it out of his pocket and passed it around. When I held it, I was reminded of Gene’s journal, where he’d said it didn’t feel powerful, just looked old. But I didn’t feel that way at all. Maybe it was just because I knew what it was, but it was definitely sending out rewind vibes. Holding it even seemed to ease my headache a little more, but whether from feeling better emotionally or from the actual power of it, I couldn’t say. I passed it to Janie.

  “This is so cool,” Janie said as she held it reverently. “Seriously, Chloe, I can’t believe you never told me about any of this.”

  “I actually did,” I said, leaning my head back with my eyes clos
ed. “Twice, I think.”

  “What!? Why—”

  “You were so annoying,” I said with a sardonic smile. “You asked me so many questions about it and kept asking me to rewind stuff for you, and then you totally blurted it out to Mom and Dad.”

  “But why couldn’t Mom and Dad know?”

  “Should I really just take some random forest roads?” Leah interrupted.

  “Oh, yeah.” My thoughts snapped back to the present. “Where should we do it? We don’t have to go to a spiritual vortex, do we?” I said it with much less sarcasm than I usually used when discussing New Age beliefs. They were kind of growing on me.

  “I doubt it,” Jake said.

  “And I don’t know how much time we have before my mom—”

  But Leah’s words were cut off as a massive jolt ripped through us. Through the stabbing pain and all-encompassing blackness, I was vaguely aware of gasps and moans of pain, a jarring screeching noise, and the feeling of spinning—before I was no longer aware of anything.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  “Chloe.” The voice drifted through the fog as through from far away. “Chloe, wake up.”

  Not a chance, I wanted to say. Not gonna happen. Because while I wasn’t entirely aware of what had happened, I absolutely knew that waking up would bring far more agony than I’d yet experienced. And I wasn’t ready to deal with that.

  “Chloe.” Wait, was that Max’s voice? “Chloe, please. You’ve got to wake up. We can’t do this without you.” No, it was too old to be Max.

  Whoever it was obviously didn’t understand. I needed to stay in my dark cocoon. If I came out into the bright light and the loud, painful world, my head would probably explode.

  “Come on, Chloe.” It was a different voice this time. “We can’t let her win. We can fix this, but you have to wake up.”

  “Don’t let her mom win.” This was the first voice again. “Please, Chloe. I can’t lose another sibling.”

  And those words were so familiar, almost like my own voice was saying them.

  Janie.

  I wasn’t sure why, but I had to wake up for Janie.

  “Come on, Chloe. You can do it.” Leah. I had to wake up for her too. “I think her eyes twitched. Chloe, can you hear us? Keep talking to her, Janie.”

  “Wake up, Chloe.” Now I felt Janie’s hand on my shoulder, and the sound suddenly came rushing back toward me, and the light pushed through my closed eyelids, and my brain was on fire. I heard a moan and wasn’t sure if it came from me.

  “I’m so sorry, Chloe,” I heard Leah’s voice say. “I tried to stop but it happened so fast…”

  I forced one eye to crack open. I was lying on the forest floor, the sun breaking through the pine trees in shafts from above me. Janie’s face came into focus first, then Leah’s.

  What had happened? I tried to ask, but all that came out was a faint moan.

  “Chloe!” Janie’s exclamation came out as a relieved sort of choking sound, and she smothered me with a hug. “Oh, sorry,” she said, when I groaned, pulling back and wiping at her eyes.

  I blinked slowly and shifted my focus to Leah. “Where—?”

  “We’re still in the forest,” Leah said quickly. “Still in Pinetop. Or Lakeside.”

  That wasn’t what I’d meant to ask. “No,” I mumbled, my eyes going from the trees to Leah and Janie. “Where’s—”

  “Jake?” said Janie. “He’s right over there. She pointed behind me, the one place I definitely couldn’t turn my head yet. “He’s still unconscious,” she added quietly.

  I closed my eyes again. I wasn’t surprised. And suddenly I was enormously grateful I’d been so strict with Janie about not touching the strands at all. Apparently, just accessing them hadn’t done much more to her than the headaches she’d already been having, because now that I focused on her, I could tell she was more alert than Leah.

  “Was it your mom again?” I asked.

  Leah bit her lip, worry and fury warring in her face. “Probably. I don’t know what’s going on with Rob.”

  I strained to roll over onto my side so I could tilt my head back enough to see Jake. I focused, and after a moment I could see the rise and fall of his chest. The rest of us had woken up, so I had to believe he would, too. Then I realized there was blood. “He’s bleeding,” I said in a panic. “Why is he bleeding?”

  “We crashed,” Janie said. “The jolt—you all went unconscious at the same time. It hurt me too, but not like you guys. Leah lost control and we spun off the road. Into a tree.” She motioned to something behind me again, but not the same side as Jake. I managed to prop myself up on one elbow and saw Leah’s car, its doors all open, with the front passenger-side corner molded to a huge tree. I wanted to ask if the car was okay, wanted to get over to Jake, wanted to get into the Ring right now and figure out how to fix it. But my head was spinning—and also trying to fall down off my shoulders—so instead I lay back down. Just for a minute. Then I crawled over to where Jake lay.

  “Why isn’t he waking up?” Janie asked from behind me.

  I swallowed. “He’s only been rewinding for two months,” I said. “Or maybe three now, I’m not sure.” I’d lost track of real time. “He doesn’t have…I don’t know, a resistance to it yet, I guess.”

  I took a deep breath and pressed against my forehead with the palms of my hands before scooting a little closer and putting a hand on Jake’s shoulder. “Jake?” I said quietly. “Jake, can you hear us? You need to wake up now.” I looked him over and saw that the blood coming from the side of his forehead wasn’t that bad, but the lump underneath it was huge.

  “We might need to take him to the hospital,” Leah finally said.

  I looked up at her. “But we all woke up…don’t you think he will too?”

  “I think his injuries are worse than ours,” Leah answered. “He was in the front, where we hit the tree.” She paused. “And I’m not sure he was wearing a seatbelt.”

  I closed my eyes and sighed. “Of course,” I murmured to myself. He must have been too excited about the amulet to think of something as mundane as putting on a seatbelt.

  “So…does this mean we can’t try it?” Janie asked hesitantly after a few more minutes.

  “Absolutely not,” Jake mumbled, and we all stared down at him.

  I touched his shoulder. “Jake?”

  “We’re still doing it,” he slurred, his eyes still closed.

  I stared at him in disbelief. “There’s no way you can do it. You couldn’t even access the strands before the crash.”

  “I can do it.” His eyes fluttered open for a moment, then squeezed shut again.

  “We should just wait for Rob,” Janie said to me. “We texted him from Jake’s phone.”

  “He hasn’t answered,” Leah added.

  “Just give me a few minutes,” Jake insisted, forcing his eyes open. “We can do this.” He tried to push himself up to sit but fell back down with a wince and a groan.

  If Rob wasn’t answering, we didn’t have a choice. Jake would have to try. Lillian was obviously getting fiercer with her rewinds, and I could only hope that she’d be in a repeat for long enough to let us enter the Ring. Jake pulled a crystal out of his pocket and set it on his face between his eyebrows.

  “What’s that for?” Janie asked quietly.

  “It’s a healing crystal,” I murmured. “What’s that one for, Jake?”

  “Dunno,” he mumbled.

  The three of us waited, chewing our nails and checking the time.

  Jake lay on the forest floor, breathing deeply, and after only five minutes he reported calmly, “I’ve got it.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “I’ve got it. I can access the strands. Get the amulet.”

  * * *

  We reluctantly helped Jake stand up, then we all stood in a square, looking at one another, until Janie asked, “Now what?”

  Leah took a deep breath. “Let’s make the diagram. We can draw an X in the dirt
, and a square connecting the four of us.”

  I held Jake up and watched as Leah and Janie got sticks and drew in the dirt, randomly wondering if people would think we were pagan witches if they stumbled upon us.

  “Did you do this with your mom?” I asked Leah.

  She shook her head. “She doesn’t even know about the Káti stuff.”

  Right. “Should we draw the circle too?” Janie asked.

  “I don’t think so,” Leah replied. “Because that represents the Ring itself, which we’re going to . . .”

  “Summon,” Jake said, the word coming out as a grunt.

  I looked at him. “Are you sure you can do this?”

  “Yes. Stop asking.” He tried to smile at me, but it was more of a grimace. He limply pushed me. “Go to your corner.”

  I sighed and obeyed. Each of us took a corner and Leah placed the amulet at the center, where the lines of the X crossed. The dirt seemed like a strange place for it, but I wasn’t sure where I thought it should be instead.“You should be able to feel the rest of us there with you,” I said to Janie, then we explained to her how to stop the cords. “Once one person completely stops it,” Leah told her, “there’s a split second where you can feel it coming to a stop, and you can grab on and join in stopping it.”

  I couldn’t believe we were just throwing her into this—no practice, no safety net. How I could justify putting another sibling in danger? How could I let Janie do this? It wasn’t even like with Max, when I thought I was sending him to the safety of my mom’s arms. Instead I was sending Janie into the dangerous unknown.

  I clenched my jaw. I couldn’t afford to be overprotective right now. She was making her own decision, and I had to trust. It’s the real amulet, I reminded myself. Even if she gets hurt, it can’t kill her.

  Somehow that wasn’t all that comforting.

  “It’s fine,” Janie told me. “I can do it. I just, like—tell them to stop moving, right?”

  I swallowed. “Right. Imagine they’re still.” She nodded. “And absolutely do NOT pull,” I added.