“That was at least one theory,” he agreed. “Although I’d say we’ve had a few more since then.”
A few? Psychokinesis, quantum entanglement, resonance fields, wave patterns, signature trails, quantum tunneling—it seems like the longer physicists talk, the more theories they can throw at each other.
But I continued on my current line of thought. “I was thinking about Halli’s wave pattern being in the room with mine. Does that mean she’s doing something to put herself over here?”
“I don’t know,” the professor said. “Maybe.”
“Why?” Albert asked.
“It’s just that . . . I don’t know, something is bothering me about that. But I can’t figure it out. It just seems . . . wrong somehow. Like we’re not really getting it.”
The three of us were both silent for a moment. Then I shook my head.
“Anyway, I’m just tired—”
“Don’t dismiss it,” Professor Whitfield said. “Keep working on it—you might be on to something.”
“Yeah,” I said, “but what?”
62
“Okay,” Professor Whitfield said after about another hour. “We’ll start again around 9:00 tonight. Audie, I’ll take you back to the hotel now. Looks like you could use some rest.”
As soon as I got in I took a hot shower, even though I’d already had one this morning. But who cares? I was a free woman in my own hotel room, no one around to tell me I shouldn’t waste the water. I stood there under the spray for a long time, letting the heat coax some sort of answers out of my brain. I know I’m not the only physicist who thinks really well in the shower.
But it wasn’t working. I must have been too tired. I put on my pajamas and crawled into bed for a short nap, and ended up sleeping for a couple of hours. When I woke up it was close to 6:00. I was hungry again, and thought I should probably try to figure out how to get some dinner, but first I had an idea. I decided to do an experiment.
Because it was still bothering me: why was Halli’s outline in that sound-proof room? She had never physically been there, the way I had, so how had she left an imprint? Even if we were like entangled particles somehow, that wouldn’t explain why her wave form was there in the same place as mine. The whole point of entanglement is the particles are connected at a distance—not that they’re still glued together in one place. It didn’t make sense to me.
That’s why I wanted to try something.
I propped up the pillows on my bed, and got into a comfortable position. I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths.
Then I silently called to her in my mind: “Halli.” I wasn’t trying to go to her, I just wanted to see if she could hear me—or more specifically, hear my thoughts. I just wondered if maybe that was possible.
But nothing happened. I tried it a bunch of times over the next five or ten minutes, but I never felt or heard anything back.
So we weren’t connected—not at that level. I couldn’t communicate with her at a distance the way entangled particles seemed to be able to signal each other. So much for another theory.
I gave up and climbed out of bed. I really needed some food now. There was a restaurant downstairs, but I didn’t really feel like sitting in there alone. The professor said he’d pay for all my meals, so I hoped it was okay if I ordered room service. Maybe just something small, like an order of French fries. And maybe something for dessert.
That’s the thing about being an independent woman traveling by yourself: you can eat whatever you want. Order junk food if you feel like it and have a room service waiter bring it right to you. Sit around and watch premium cable since you can’t afford it at home. Or sit there in bed racking your brain, trying to solve a physics problem that’s really, really bothering you.
Which is what I did after I hung up from ordering my dinner. Sat there staring at the painting on the wall across from my bed, searching my brain for the answer:
What about all of this was I missing?
63
It was dark on campus when we returned, and none of the grad students except Albert were hanging around the lab anymore. Either they weren’t interested in the nighttime session, or the professor hadn’t told them there would even be one.
He and I sat in the sound-proof booth while Albert monitored us from next door in the observation room.
“You read about remote viewing in my book?” the professor asked.
“Yes,” I said. “Is that what we’re going to do?”
“I thought it would be a good next step.” The professor had brought in a pad of paper and a pencil with him. Now I understood why.
“I want you to remember,” he said, “that remote viewing has nothing to do with being psychic or having any kind of what people would consider paranormal powers.”
I remembered all that. He and his team tested all sorts of people from all walks of life, and none of them felt they had any psychic powers. Remote viewing is supposed to be this skill anyone can learn to use.
“There’s something called ‘beginner’s success’ with this,” the professor told me. “A lot of people have a very high success rate on their very first try. So don’t be surprised if you can do this really well.”
I didn’t know if that was some sort of psychological pep talk, or if it were really true. Either way I was still nervous.
“So we’re just going to relax and take our time,” Professor Whitfield told me. “And see what you can see.”
What he wanted me to see was this: where Halli was and what she was doing in the five or ten minutes before I went over there. A kind of instant preview so I could then go over and verify that what I’d seen was real.
Professor Whitfield told me they’d done these studies with people separated in different cities across the world—one person in Colorado, another in Moscow, for instance—but no one had ever done such a thing from one universe to another.
For obvious reasons.
“You’re going to be the first,” he told me.
No pressure or anything.
I took a deep breath and cracked my knuckles. Then I tilted my neck from side to side to crack that. Then I rolled my shoulders, and—
“Take your time,” the professor said, but he knew as well as I did that I was stalling.
I picked up the pencil. Then I closed my eyes.
“Try to draw it first,” Professor Whitfield said. “You can describe it as you go, but we’ve found the drawing is usually easiest for people.”
“But I don’t really draw,” I said.
“Don’t worry about that,” he said. “Just do your best.”
And so I started drawing.
Two long lines.
“I don’t really know what these are,” I said, my eyes still closed, my hand moving across the page.
“Just draw,” the professor encouraged softly.
Two long lines. Then a bunch of shorter lines bisecting them. Like a ladder or something.
“It might be a ladder,” I said.
“Maybe,” he said. “Keep going.”
Then I could see Halli there, in that grid. Sitting on one of the patches, between the lines. And I could see other people around her—Daniel, Sarah, other people I didn’t know.
I said all that out loud.
“Wonderful, Audie. Keep going.”
I drew little squares inside the ladder-like lines.
“They’re like . . . folded . . . something. Like fabric, or something.”
“Can you rise up above the whole scene?” the professor asked. “Look down on it from above.”
And then I could see it really clearly: Halli bent over her screen on her lap, and some sort of hologram rising above it. Daniel and Sarah looking at it, too.
“I can see them!” I said excitedly. “They’re all sitting together looking at a map. One of those holomaps like Halli showed me, but this one is on her screen.”
“Excellent, Audie. Now I want you to rise up even higher, and see if you can look down on
the whole building they’re inside. See if you can see what it looks like.”
“Yes,” I said in a second. “It’s long and rectangular. It has a red roof.”
I paused for a moment.
“And there’s some white on top of it. It’s . . . snow.”
“Snow?” Professor Whitfield said.
“Yeah. It’s coming down on the roof and on all the ground around it.”
“Okay, Audie,” he said, “let’s stop there.”
I opened my eyes.
“I’m going to leave you now. I want to hold your thoughts on that place. Do what you did before, sending yourself to find Halli. Close your eyes again. Lean back and relax.”
I heard the door gently shut. I leaned back in the wide, comfy chair and tried it again—that pushing of myself, instead of being tugged. Pushing myself into the scene—
I trudged in my sneakers through the snow. I hadn’t landed at the hermit’s hut this time, but in between some buildings, just beyond the outside tables.
An old man stood under the eaves of the main hut, drinking from a mug and watching the snow. As I tramped toward him, he rasped, “Halli Markham!”
“Nein,” I said, pointing to myself. “Cousine.” At least I’d learned those two words.
I looked around at the buildings, searching for one with the red roof. I found it: a long, thin building that it just so happened Martin was coming out of at that moment.
He pulled his jacket up around his ears. “You going with Halli today?” he asked me. “Or coming down with us?”
The answer seemed obvious. “With Halli.”
“You’re on that suicide march, too, then, eh? Well, good luck.” Before I could ask him what he meant, he patted me on the shoulder and said he’d catch up to me in a few minutes—he was off to pack some food.
I followed the stone walkway to the front of the building he had just exited. More people were just coming out.
So this was the mattress lager. A long building almost completely taken up by two giant bunk beds inside. Each bed frame held twelve mattresses in a row, with another frame stacked above it. A total of forty-eight people could sleep in the room.
It matched what I’d seen, even though I didn’t realize what I was looking at back in the lab. Even the fabric squares made sense now: they were blankets folded at the end of every mattress.
I noticed everyone had left their shoes outside the door, so I stepped out of my wet sneakers and went inside. Red hopped off the bed as soon as he saw me and came over with a happy wag. Halli and Daniel and Sarah were there, too, huddled over Halli’s screen. Just the way I’d seen them.
They all greeted me, then Halli went back to what she was saying.“You’ll want to take this route,” she said, pointing to an indentation between the hills. I was right—there was a holomap rising from her screen. “There’s a fork here,” she continued. “Go right, not left. You might see other people going left, but don’t follow them. Trust me, this will be the easier way.”
I joined them on the bunk bed.
Daniel reached over and gave my hand a squeeze, then went back to studying the holomap.
“The lake is here, then?” he said.
“Yes,” Halli said. “The boat runs every two hours, unless the weather makes it too impossible. So the sooner in the day you can get there, the better your chances are.”
Sarah looked from Halli to me. “I can’t believe I won’t see you every day anymore! How I’ll miss the cousins!”
“We’ll miss you, too,” I said, and meant it more than she knew.
Daniel and I looked at each other. There was a lot more I would have said, if it were just the two of us alone.
“Think you’ve got it?” Halli asked Daniel.
“Yes,” he said. “Thanks.”
“Good,” she said, putting aside her screen. “Now let’s take care of that ankle.”
I watched as Halli carefully rewrapped Daniel’s ankle with strong white tape, smoothing it down as she made each new pass around the joint.
“How’s that feel?” she asked him.
“Like it won’t bend again until I can cut myself out of it.”
“Good,” Halli said. “It might be a little uncomfortable, but I think it will hold.”
I’d been watching the whole thing in fascination. Halli was so slick and assured in her movements. She looked like a professional doctor.
“How do you know how to do things like that?” I asked.
“Ginny made me learn,” Halli said. “There were so many times it was just going to be the two of us out somewhere alone, and she wanted to make sure we could take care of ourselves and each other if something happened.”
“Did anything ever happen?”
Halli laughed. “Plenty of times.”
A beeping sound came from Halli’s screen. Lights swirled above it.
Her mood instantly plummeted. “I meant to turn that off!”
Halli picked up the screen and stepped with it outside. As the head came into focus, I heard Halli’s familiar, “What.”
Sarah and Daniel and I exchanged a look.
“Yes, Regina, I’m aware it’s snowing. Look.” Halli held the screen out in front of her. I couldn’t hear what her mother said, but Halli answered, “I’ll leave when I’m ready.”
“Why does Halli hate her mother so much?” I whispered.
“Don’t you know?” Sarah whispered back. “Didn’t your parents ever talk about that?”
Daniel and I exchanged a glance.
“Not really,” I said.
“Well, they abandoned her, didn’t they?” Sarah said. “I even had that in the report I did for school: ‘Willfully orphaned by her parents.’”
“But why?”
Daniel gave me a subtle shake of his head.
“To build their empire, of course.”
“What empire?”
Daniel coughed.
“I mean, right—the empire.”
Sarah looked over at Halli, who was still arguing with her mother about the weather. Sarah lowered her voice. “I should think they’d want some of the grandmother’s money. Even with all their billions. Who could blame Halli for resenting them for it?”
“Right,” I said. “Yeah.”
Halli shut off her screen and groaned. She came back in and thumped back onto the bed.
“Why do you even answer it?” I asked innocently, but that turned out to be a big mistake.
“Why? Why? Because my mother is crazy,” Halli said. “Crazy. If I don’t answer, she likes to send out rescue crews. Or call my neighbors, even though some of them have never seen me in their life and don’t even know I live there. And she keeps calling and calling—she’s like water on a rock, wearing it down.”
Sarah raised her eyebrows at me.
“Well, she’s probably just worried,” I tried.
“Then where was she for sixteen years?” Halli answered. “She never called me once! Where was all her worry when Ginny was hauling me all across the world? Did she ever try to contact me? Did she ever call me for my birthday? Did she call me when Ginny died? No! It’s only now, when she wants something from me. So excuse me if I’m not thrilled to see her hideous face.”
Martin stuck his head in at the door. “We all ready, then?” he called out cheerfully.
Halli bolted up from the bed. “Absolutely. Let’s go.”
64
I’d negotiated with Professor Whitfield for extra time, telling him we should try it with me returning on my own. See what the readings were when I brought myself back, instead of relying on an external cue.
Of course the real reason was to buy as much time as I could to say goodbye to everyone, but the professor didn’t need to know that.
The five of us stood at the trailhead, snow coating our heads. There was wind, too, which made it extra special. At least I’d traded out my wet socks and sneakers for the dry socks and boots Halli had been carrying for me.
Sarah hugg
ed me fiercely. “Goodbye, Audie my love. Please call me when you’re home again—how I would love to see your face!”
Just the idea of it—how I’d never be able to see her again—Gemma, but not her—nearly made me start to cry.
Martin held out his hand. “Good luck then, Audie. Hope the weather improves. Otherwise you’re as mad as your cousin.”
“Why? What are you talking—”
Daniel’s arms pulled me in. His lips were cold against mine.
“So this is it?” I asked. “This is the last time we’ll see each other?”
“Unless you have any ideas,” he answered. “If not, then . . . yes, I’m afraid it is.”
Now I really wanted to cry. It was so unfair. To finally meet someone I liked and who liked me back, and yet all we had together were a few days—and we weren’t even kissing for most of those.
“Does it help to tell you I’ll keep working on it?” I asked Daniel. “Night and day?”
“It helps immensely,” he said. “Although somehow I wish you hadn’t told me about Colin.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I guess that was a mistake.”
“Just remember,” Daniel said, “when I look at Halli I see Halli, not you. It’s you that I’ll be looking for.”
How could you not throw yourself at a guy who says something like that?
We were right in the middle of one last kiss when Halli had said, “I’m sorry, Daniel, but you really need to go. I’m not sure about this weather, and you’re going to have to take it slowly anyway because of the footing. I don’t want you to miss your boat.”
“I know, I know.” He sighed and let me go.
“Wait a moment,” Sarah said, “I’ve just had the most brilliant idea! We’re having a party a few weeks from now—you both can come! It’s for our dad’s 50th.”
“Oh, that’s right,” I said. “Your family’s throwing a ball.”
“A ball?” Sarah said with a laugh. “Hardly! I’m sure it will be just family and a few friends. Oh, you must come! Mum and Dad would be thrilled to meet you—both of you.”
“You should think about it,” Daniel said pointedly to me. “If you can work it out.”
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