When You and I Collide

by Kate Norris

  “You have a father back home.”

  “Do I?”

  Going home might mean finding out he didn’t miss her at all. He might even be glad she was gone.

  “Even if he does miss me,” Winnie said through tears, “there’s no way it’s anywhere near as much as Mama and Father will miss Winnie here.”

  She could tell from the way he was looking at her that he wanted to reach out for her. To hold her and comfort her like he would if she were his own Winnie.

  But he didn’t.

  When Scott opened his mouth to speak, Winnie said, “Don’t. Don’t say it. I haven’t forgotten about Scott. But we don’t know—”

  “Our experiment design is sound—”

  “Yes. And that ship is a good sign that I can manipulate time. But we don’t really understand how it works. Obviously. And that ship—it’s something that happened because of our experiment, right? It’s just sheer luck that it didn’t kill anyone.”

  “It happened when you and Winnie were both in the same place. Maybe that’s what caused it. That’s not an issue now.”

  “Maybe,” Winnie shrugged. “Or maybe not.”

  “Let me get this right. You’re saying you’re done trying? We’re giving up, and—what? You’re just going to stay here and try to move on like nothing has happened? What will we do about Hawthorn? And do you really think Winnie’s parents won’t realize you’re a different girl?”

  Winnie put her head in her hands. “I don’t know. I don’t know. I just need some time to think.”

  Scott didn’t say anything. Just looked at her.

  She felt the weight of his disappointment settle over her. But she could carry it. She could carry it if it meant staying with Mama.

  “Are you going to tell them about me?” she asked hoarsely, hardly louder than a whisper.

  He stared off across the room, considering.

  Scott had kept a secret for her double. Would he keep one for her?

  “I don’t know,” he said finally. “I need some time too.”

  * * *

  • • •

  Scott went home, and Winnie told her double’s parents that she didn’t want dinner—that she just wanted to rest. She was bone tired, but lying there alone in her double’s bed, sleep would not come. The horror of what had happened—of what she had done—had sunk into her and settled there. She didn’t think she would ever really be free of it.

  No matter how many times Winnie went over what had happened in that shed, she couldn’t imagine anything she could have done to force a less tragic outcome. What was she supposed to do, just let Hawthorn take her? But this was little comfort. How could something so awful be so inevitable?

  What must it have been like for her double to see Winnie openly discussing what was, for her, her darkest secret? Both seeing her need for secrecy validated—Winnie’s ability had put her in grave danger, after all, and Father’s obsession with it was what had caused the accident that killed Scott and brought her here—but also seeing Winnie share something with Scott that she must have, at least sometimes, longed to share herself.

  And the fear! She must have been so scared that now her secret would be exposed too. Winnie was a somewhat solitary person, but even she couldn’t imagine being so alone with that much fear. How relieved her double must have been when everyone believed she simply didn’t see them. But how terrible too, to miss the opportunity to share it with them, and to know that the people she loved would never really know her, not entirely.

  She thought about the splinter she’d seen that morning and wondered if Winnie had seen it too—seen the death that was waiting for one of them, right around the corner—and soldiered on anyway, because there was nothing else to do.

  Winnie watched through her double’s bedroom window as the sun sank, turning the sky from a peaceful pink to the deep purple of a fresh bruise.

  Just like the color of her double’s fatal wound.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  “How are you feeling?” Mama asked.

  Winnie sat up, surprised to realize she must have fallen asleep at some point. Her head was pounding, and she could feel every muscle in her arms and shoulders tender from strain.

  . . . the strain of burying her double.

  The cut on her forehead stung, and every small movement of her hands pulled at the places where her blisters had torn open and were trying to heal.

  Winnie might have slept, but her sleep had not been restorative.

  Still, she said, “Better,” because she didn’t want to stay home from school.

  Being alone with her thoughts all day sounded awful enough, but what if Hawthorn showed up, demanding to know why Winnie hadn’t handed off her double as agreed? What if—god forbid—she stayed home, and Mama insisted on staying home with her? What if Hawthorn showed up with Mama there?

  Mama did work outside the home, didn’t she? A memory sifted its way through her foggy brain—Mama had mentioned something about a presentation. What did she do?

  Winnie swung her legs off the bed and stood gingerly. She couldn’t help but wince as all her aching bits cried out at once.

  Mama’s brow knit in concern.

  “Perhaps you’d better not—”

  Winnie’s guilt mounted at this tenderness, feeling like someone marooned in the desert presented with a mirage of ice-cold water. Best to not even reach for the glass.

  It wasn’t for her.

  “I’m okay,” Winnie said quickly. “Really.”

  Mama left Winnie to dress. A glance in the mirror revealed that in addition to her ugly cut, there were half-moons of fatigue under her eyes, and she was winter-pale. She didn’t bother with makeup. Perhaps her double would have had the art to make a presentable face out of all this mess, but Winnie didn’t.

  Winnie joined Mama at the breakfast table. Father was already on his way to the university. Winnie noticed a headline on the folded newspaper on the table. MYSTERY TIDES—she read, then eagerly opened the paper to read the other half—RETURN TO NORMAL.

  It seemed like her double’s death might have restored some sort of balance. Still, Winnie found it hard to feel relieved. That hadn’t been her double’s debt to pay.

  Her double’s mother presented Winnie with a plateful of eggs, sausage, and toast, but although Winnie hadn’t had dinner the night before, she found she was unable to eat. She was hungry, but her hunger wasn’t enough to overcome her repulsion. Her head was still full of corpses, and it seemed awful to be nourishing her own body when her double’s was decaying out in the shed. What must it look like now? Those eyes, covered in dirt . . . they would go first, she thought. Winnie could not contain a little shiver at the thought.

  “Winnie?” Mama said. “Winnie? You’re a thousand miles away.”

  “I’m just not hungry.”

  “I’m calling Dr. Gilbert. You don’t seem better at all.”

  “No, I am! Much!”

  Winnie took a forkful of the eggs that had cooled on her plate and shoved them in her mouth—gelatinous, like eyes. She chewed and swallowed with as much enthusiasm as she could muster.

  “I don’t like this,” Mama said. “You shouldn’t be going to school, and you shouldn’t be home alone. They can get a substitute in for me again today.”

  Mama must be a teacher, Winnie thought.

  “I swear, I’m fine,” she said, trying to inflect some annoyance into her voice, like she imagined her double would do in that situation. It was almost as difficult as pretending to enjoy her breakfast. It had been almost nine years since Winnie had a concerned mother cluck over her. Even though she had to convince Mama to let her go to school, she didn’t think a mother’s concern could ever really annoy her now. “I’m okay to go to school. Promise.”

  Mama sighed. “Well, all right. If you really think you’ll be okay.” She s
miled wanly. “Goodness, I hope my other students are as excited to be in the lab as you seem to be.”

  Winnie felt herself pale as the words sank in. Mama wasn’t just a teacher—she was a teacher at Winnie’s school. From the sound of it, she was Winnie’s own physics teacher. Better liked than Mr. Claremont, she was sure, although she wondered where he was here. Teaching physics at some other school? Working in a lab somewhere? Dead?

  Winnie’s heart was divided at the thought of being in class with Mama. She hadn’t anticipated having to playact her double at school with Mama in the audience—it made the stakes of slipping up so much higher. But it also meant getting to spend more time with her, and Winnie would get to see her teach. Her own Mama would have liked teaching, she thought.

  “You promise you’ll go right to the nurse if you feel unwell? I’ll take you straight home if being out and about becomes too much for you.”

  “I promise.”

  “I know you normally take the bus with Dora, but I’m driving you today. I insist.”

  This, Winnie readily agreed to.

  Anything to delay telling Dora her best friend was dead.

  * * *

  • • •

  “Oh, Winnie, your faaaaaaaaace!” Maribel exclaimed when Winnie walked into homeroom. “What happened?”

  Winnie froze a moment. She glanced around the classroom—to her relief, this didn’t seem to be a period she shared with Dora. For now at least, she could assume that Maribel was a friend here, but how close? Winnie had no idea how her double would react to the girl in this situation. Brush off the concern? Package it into a flashy, exciting story?

  It hit Winnie then—there was so much more she didn’t know beyond just who her double was friends with. It was bad enough she hadn’t a clue who she might be offending if she forgot to, say, smile at them in the hall. But she didn’t know what her schedule was or who her teachers were either. How quickly might any little misstep add up to equal This isn’t Winnie?

  “It’s not as bad as it looks,” Winnie said. “But I do have a concussion. It’s left me a bit . . . out of sorts.”

  Her injuries would help explain any odd behavior—for now.

  Maribel frowned sympathetically. “You poor dear! But what happened?”

  Winnie was relieved to have this conversation interrupted by their homeroom teacher.

  “Girls, hush now,” she said. “I have some announcements.”

  Mrs. Martin told them about upcoming bake sales and postponed intramural basketball games, and Winnie’s attention drifted back to her own concerns.

  She was safe from Hawthorn there.

  But for how long?

  * * *

  • • •

  Dora grabbed her arm as she was heading to lunch. “We have to talk,” she hissed, then practically dragged Winnie to the nearest ladies’ room.

  They waited while the last girl inside washed her hands, then Dora shooed her out and locked the door behind her.

  “Where is she? You were supposed to call me yesterday!”

  Dora thought Winnie was her double.

  Winnie just blinked at her for a moment, stunned.

  “Oh!” Dora said. “It’s you.”

  It hadn’t occurred to Winnie to wonder before, but had Dora been in on her double’s plan to turn her over to Hawthorn?

  It was almost unthinkable . . . but after everything that had happened, maybe Winnie should expect the unthinkable.

  Winnie leaned back against the wall. The little shelf under the wide mirror dug into her shoulder blades, but she hardly felt it.

  “Dora . . . Dora, did you know?”

  “Know what? What’s going on? I expected to hear from her in the evening—I hoped I would hear good news, but I expected to at least hear something. Then you didn’t even come home last night. Finally, I called, and Winnie’s mother said that she’d been hit by a car?” Dora paused to take a breath, then frowned. “But that isn’t true, is it?”

  “No,” Winnie said. “It’s not.”

  She was so relieved that Dora hadn’t known what Winnie was walking into yesterday morning . . . but that meant she had to explain it all now.

  Winnie was accustomed to lying to her own Dora back home. Lies like No, I don’t mind, or Don’t worry—I just got here, and of course she withheld important facets of herself, like her ability to see splinters. But she had never lied to Dora about something that really mattered.

  Not that a lie could really save her now.

  Scott knew the truth; it was only a matter of time before Dora found out too.

  Winnie took a few darting glances up and down the row of toilets to assure herself no one was listening in. “Her idea to restage the experiment was a setup,” Winnie said. “Hawthorn threatened Winnie, and she told him about me. She was going to hand me over to him for Project Nightingale. She thought that was the only way out for all of you.”

  Shock was plain on Dora’s face, but she stayed silent, waiting. And Winnie could not form the words.

  “But you’re here,” Dora said finally, “and Winnie is—not. Wait, did you trick him?” she asked angrily. “Did you turn her in instead?”

  Winnie swallowed nervously and shook her head.

  Dora’s eyes scanned her face, examining Winnie’s wounds. They drifted down to Winnie’s bandaged hands.

  Dora’s face crumpled. “No,” she whispered. She squeezed her hands into tight fists. A tear rolled down her cheek.

  “It was—just awful,” Winnie said. “It was an accident,” she added quickly.

  Winnie reached her hand toward Dora’s shoulder, but the girl jerked away.

  “So, now you’re what? Playing her at school? Going to take some pop quizzes? You think you can just replace her now?” Dora paused a moment, panting, then whispered, “How did it happen?”

  “She—she hit her head.”

  “And you thought, ‘Hey, this is convenient! Why try to save my Scott, when I can just take this one?’”

  Winnie was momentarily stunned by Dora’s words, but her shock was quickly replaced by anger.

  “You know what? You’re right! Just staying here forever would be so much easier. I can’t wait for the part where I get to tell Mr. and Mrs. Schulde their daughter is dead,” Winnie said sarcastically. “I didn’t ask for any of this!”

  She fell silent when she realized how loud her voice was echoing through the tiled room.

  “Yeah? Well, neither did Winnie.”

  “No. But she did decide she should tie me up and try to turn me over to the man who’d just killed Scott’s best friend.”

  Dora’s face softened. She closed her eyes a moment, and when she opened them, she was fully crying.

  “I’m sorry,” Dora said. “I’m sure you just did what you thought you had to do. But I can’t be a part of this. What happened—I can’t be your friend anymore.”

  Dora didn’t even wait for a response.

  She unlocked the door and left without a backward glance.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Physics was the last class period of the day, just like it was for Winnie back home. Of course, here there was one major difference: when she walked in the room, it was Mama standing at the front of the class. Winnie expected this, but still, walking in and seeing Mama there sent a wave of mixed worry and relief surging through her stomach.

  Mama wore a tailored suit, and her hair was as perfectly coiffed as it had been when they left home in the morning. Winnie had assumed Mama would be well-liked as a teacher, but now, seeing her there, she had a feeling that students were just as intimidated by her as they were by Mr. Claremont back home. She felt a little flash of pride.

  Mama’s expression was tense, and Winnie felt a momentary jab of fear that Mama knew everything.

  Then she noticed Hawthorn sitti
ng in the back corner.

  He had two men with him. The men weren’t in uniform, but they had a martial look to them, haircuts high and tight and posture perfect. These were military men; Winnie was sure of it. She had to get out of here.

  But where would she go? And how could she leave now without looking incredibly suspicious?

  For now, Winnie took a seat up near the front of the class. She wanted to be as far from their classroom observers as possible.

  Of all the classes of hers Hawthorn could have shown up to, why this one?

  The answer came to her immediately, making her feel stupid.

  Hawthorn wanted to send a message. A message that said, “Look how easily I can access your family.”

  And “Think about how easily I could take them from you.”

  And “None of you are safe.”

  Winnie decided that if it came down to it, she would turn herself over to Hawthorn. She wouldn’t let anyone else get hurt. But especially not them.

  Winnie jumped in her seat when the bell rang. She could feel Hawthorn’s eyes on her. How delighted he must be to watch her squirm.

  “First, let’s dispatch with the necessary,” Mama said now that class had officially begun. “Yes, there are three strange men sitting in the back of the classroom. Yes, it’s because of what happened in the gymnasium the other day. No, this does not mean we will be doing anything differently. Just ignore them. I’ve been assured they won’t be a disruption.

  “I was pleased to learn that you behaved yourselves while I was in Boston. Mrs. Potter informed me that she was able to cover all the material I had hoped she would. So, thank you!

  “Now, down to business. Today, we’ll be recreating Alessandro Volta’s ‘crown of cups’, an early electric battery. This will conclude our unit on electromotive force, and we all know what that means: there will be an exam covering this chapter of the text on Monday. So, if you have any lingering questions, make sure we address them this period.