“She’ll be much too busy,” Halli’s mother says. “This is not a recreational visit. Tomorrow is a work day.”
I can’t take it anymore—all this talk swirling around me, people talking at me and to me and about me.
I rise to my feet. “I’m not feeling well,” I tell them. “I’m sorry, but . . . I have to go.”
Red looks happy to come with me. Those imaginary birds must be frustrating.
I lurch out of the room, like I’m trying to walk uphill on a Tilt-a-Whirl. I probably look like I’ve lost my mind.
I stand just outside the door, trying to get my bearings. For one thing, all the enormous glass walls of the Grand Hallway remind me that it’s night. I’ve just left bright daylight.
“Are you all right?” Jake asks behind me.
I nod weakly. “Can you help me outside?”
He takes hold of my arm and steadies me toward the door. As soon as it’s open, Red races outside. He seems to prefer reality, too.
I bend over at the waist and prop my hands against my knees. I take a few deep breaths.
“Do you ever get—”
“Sea sick?” Jake says. “Not anymore. But when the technology first came out.”
“That was awful,” I say.
Jake chuckles. “You should see the Arctic blizzard. They almost chose that one instead.”
I stand upright and start walking. Fresh air is my friend.
“Why?” I ask. “Who would want to eat with all that going on?”
“They thought you would,” Jake says.
“Me?” But then I think I get it. They’re trying to relate to Halli. Big adventurer-explorer. Of course she’d love to eat on the high seas. Or enjoy some pasta with her family in the middle of a blinding snowstorm. And since that was the scene outside the last time I saw Halli alive, I’m more than grateful they didn’t pick that one.
“Please,” I say to Jake, “if you could maybe slip them the hint . . .”
“No more?” Jake asks.
“No more.”
Red is in the water again. Even though it must be freezing. I can see his head bobbing in the dark.
And for some reason, maybe because I’m too tired, maybe because I’m just tired of pretending anymore for one day, I drop any pretense and just ask my question:
“What am I supposed to be doing here? What’s all this about the board and lawyers, and ‘We can finally settle this once and for all’?”
If that means I’ve blown my cover, so be it.
Jake doesn’t answer at first. And for a moment I panic and think “so be it” is a really stupid strategy.
But then he comes through for me.
“How much did your grandmother tell you?”
I decide to be honest. “Absolutely nothing.”
“Nothing?” He sounds surprised. And probably Ginny did tell Halli all sorts of things, but I wasn’t privy to those conversations. These ears may have heard them, but I wasn’t wearing them at the time.
I make up a lie on the spot, and hope it at least sounds plausible.
“We never really talked about my parents. Ginny didn’t seem to want to, and I didn’t want to press her. But now that she’s gone . . . there’s just a lot going on that I don’t understand.”
“So she never told you about the company,” Jake says. “Or her arrangement with your parents.”
“Nothing,” I say.
Jakes gives off a low whistle. “So how much do you want to know?”
“All of it. If you don’t mind.”
“Here.” He removes his dinner jacket and drapes it across my shoulders. “This is going to take a while.”
7
I’m grateful for the coat.
The air here is cold, and moist in a way I’m not used to. I’ve always lived in the desert, and up until the past few weeks with Halli, have never spent much time anywhere else. And now just because of her I’ve already been to Colorado, Germany, the Alps, and now a private island off the coast of Washington. Not to mention a whole separate, parallel universe, if you want to count that.
“I don’t know all the details,” Jake is saying, “but I’ve heard a few things over the years, so I’ll tell you what I can. Some of it is in the histories, but a lot of it is just gossip among the staff. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No,” I say. “Gossip is fine.” In fact, gossip is great. At this point I’m so hungry for information I don’t care if it has to come from the friend of a friend of a gardener.
“Your grandmother lent your parents money,” Jake says. “Do you know about that?”
“No,” I say. “Go on.”
“It was back in the beginning—before your parents even knew they would start a company. They had an idea for a water process, and needed some money to test out their theories.”
“Their theories?” I say. “Both my mother’s and my father’s?”
“His in chemistry, hers in hydroengineering.”
Now I get it. I was too overwhelmed by all the shoes in that warehouse of a closet to really pay attention to what Alexa said before. When she told me Dr. Markham expected everyone to dress for dinner, somehow I thought she meant Halli’s father. But now I remember his last name is Bellows. Which means it’s Halli’s mother who is Dr. Markham.
So both her parents are scientists. And Halli grew up to be an adventurer. Whereas both my parents are social working do-gooders, and yet I became a scientist. Go figure.
“The three of them,” Jake continues, “your parents and your grandmother, were in India together at the time. They were visiting different villages so your parents could assess the need. Your grandmother agreed to guide them, since she knew the country.”
That makes sense. Halli said even before she was born, Ginny was already a world-traveler, and had spent time in India, among other places.
“Then your parents came up with the idea,” Jake says. “The osmotic power system. And right around the same time, your mother became pregnant with you.”
A wet chill goes through me, and it’s not just from the nighttime breeze. I’m starting to get a bad feeling. I think I know where this is going, but I don’t really want to hear it.
“Red!” He’s jumped out of the water, and decided the best place to shake himself dry is right behind Jake and me. The back of my dress is soaked.
“Go on,” I tell Jake, pausing to wring out my dress.
He hesitates. He doesn’t know that I’ve already guessed.
“I don’t know this part for sure,” he says. “It could just be people talking.”
“They made a deal,” I say. “Me for the money.”
“Not that mercenary,” he says, “but yes . . . in a way.”
“So what exactly was the agreement?” I ask. “They hand me over and Ginny finances their company?”
“I don’t know if you really want to hear this,” Jake says.
“Tell me.”
We’re heading up a dirt pathway now, leading us away from the water toward the forest behind the mansion. I can’t see my way very well, but Jake obviously knows the path.
“Your parents . . .” I can hear him snap a twig off a low-hanging branch. More snaps as he breaks it into pieces. He’s stalling, and I know it.
“Jake, you can tell me,” I say. “I’d rather know. I doubt it’ll change how I feel about them.”
“They’re not bad people,” he answers. “But they’re not . . . parental. They don’t like kids—they never have, as far as I can tell. I’ve grown up in this house, and they never liked me or Alexa or any of the other children until we were at least teenagers. They still look right through some of the younger ones like they’re pieces of furniture.”
“Yeah,” I say, “they sound like great people.”
He stops on the dark path and turns to me. “I don’t want you to have the wrong impression. They didn’t give you to Ginny—”
“No, they sold me.”
“No,” Jake says, “they wer
e honest. They didn’t give you to her just because of the money. They knew you’d never have the kind of life with them that you could have with your grandmother. She wanted you. Your parents—they just didn’t. What they wanted was their work. And Ginny could help them with that. At least that’s what I heard.”
We start walking again. And I’m not sure how I feel. I want to be disgusted, but that feels like a fake reaction—like I should feel that way.
What would Halli think, hearing this story? I guess there are two sides to it: One, Ginny really did love her and want her, from the very start, and she made a smart decision by offering to take Halli when it was clear her parents didn’t want her.
But on the other hand, who wants to hear that your parents just turned you over? That it was an easy trade, yeah, you take my kid, and would you write me a nice, fat check in exchange?
And on the other-other hand, I look at this place, and at the people who own it, and think there’s no way in a million years Halli could have been as happy here, with them, as she was with her grandmother. And she’d still be happy if Ginny hadn’t died. So isn’t it better that Halli had sixteen great years with a grandmother who adored her, rather than sixteen miserable years with parents who didn’t care about her at all?
“There’s more,” Jake says.
“Oh, boy,” I say, letting out a breath. “Okay, tell me.”
He snaps off another twig.
This time I grab his fist before he can do the whole stalling routine again. “Just tell me.”
“Halli, you’re freezing.” Jake takes my hand between both of his. “Why didn’t you say so? We can go back inside.”
“No,” I say. “I’m fine.” Although now that the truth is out, my teeth feel free to chatter. “Finish what you were going to say. I want to know.”
“At least put this on.” He helps me slip my arms into the jacket. Up until now I’ve just had it draped around my shoulders. He folds the front of it across me, then opens up the collar so it warms my neck.
“Better?” he asks quietly. He’s still holding onto the collar. He’s so close I can feel the warmth of his body, the feeling of his breath against my cheek.
I’m having a hard time finding my voice. I force myself to nod. And even that feels like it takes an incredible amount of strength.
But I have to say something. I know I do.
I can barely croak it out. “What were you going to tell me?”
“I forgot,” Jake says.
He doesn’t smell like Will, he smells like himself. I close my eyes and breathe it in. I don’t know why I ever thought it was the same. This is much, much better.
Then he whispers my name—
—her name—
“Halli . . .”
And finds my lips in the dark.
8
Some physicists say that if you’d just look at the world from a sub-sub-nuclear perspective, the boundaries between objects disappear. Stars become mountains, leaves meld into rocks, and one person becomes indistinguishable from another. We’re all just waves in a vast cosmic sea.
I always thought that was just another nice theory, like so many of the amazing ideas floating around out there from so many brilliant minds. But I can tell now from experience that it’s not theory. It’s an actual, physical fact.
Because when Jake’s lips touch mine, and they aren’t mine, but another girl’s entirely, the molecules of her body dissolve away to the atomic and then the subatomic and then the smallest elemental particles underneath it, until what I feel is the wave of Will and Jake crashing into the wave that is me, and Halli’s body is no barrier at all. I feel everything—absolutely everything—just like this body was the one assigned to me at birth, and these have always been my lips, my hands, my mouth—
“What’s going on?”
A light burns in our faces.
Jake shields his eyes.
“What are you doing?” Alexa repeats.
“What’s it look like, Lex? Get out of here.”
I’m too stunned to do anything but back away out of the light.
But it follows me and keeps on shining right in my face.
“Miss Markham, your mother sent me for you.”
“Oh . . . okay . . .”
I sort of fluster around for a moment, not really sure what to do, while meanwhile Jake stands his ground.
“We’ll come in a minute,” he tells his sister. “Get out of here.”
“I’m not leaving,” she says. “Dr. Markham sent me.”
“We’ll come in a minute.”
“No, that’s okay,” I tell Jake. “I have to go. Come on, Red. Red!”
The dog crashes out of the brush, and since he’s already in motion it feels natural to just run along with him. The path is too dark to go fast, but there’s no way I’m asking Alexa for her light.
I can hear her and Jake still arguing behind me, but all I want is the cold air off the ocean and the feeling of movement in these feet. That girl is horrid. This place is horrid. I just want to get away.
There’s enough light from the windows of the mansion to guide me the rest of the way back. I’m just about at the doors when one of them swings open and Lyman gives me a bow.
“Are you all right, Miss Markham?”
“Yes,” I tell him breathlessly. “Thank you. Thank you for the door.”
“Of course, Miss.” He bows again.
I squeeze his wrist. “You’re really nice. Thank you.”
Then I tear up the Grand Staircase before I can run into anyone else. Red’s toenails scrape on the wood. Good. I hope he leaves marks. I only wish he were still dripping wet.
Once we get to the top I stop running. I walk past the closed doors, hoping I remember which one is mine.
As soon as I open it, the lights come on, and yes, it’s the right room, with Halli’s duffel still resting on the bed.
I turn around to lock the door, but there is no lock.
I hate this place.
I need to get my information and leave.
9
Why did I do that?
I keep replaying it over and over in my head.
Okay, and in my body.
Halli’s body.
Which is the point.
A guy tells you in no uncertain terms that he’s had a thing for you since he was a kid, and you know very well he hasn’t had a thing for you, and yet you lead him on and let him kiss you—
When the real you has a boyfriend, Audie, and he’s a nice guy and he’d be so hurt by this—
And yes, it was GREAT. It was FANTASTIC. I’m not denying that, and I’m trying very hard not to jump up and down on this soft, springy bed because of it, because really, it was AMAZING, I can’t believe how incredible it was to be kissed by him and held by him—
But do you have no morals? Do you have no judgment? Do you have no sense?
It’s wrong. It was a trick and it’s wrong. It’s one thing to pretend to be Halli because I have no other choice at the moment, and I’m hoping I can pretend my way into gaining valuable information that can help me undo this, but it’s another thing entirely to carry on some romance in this body with a guy who’s completely without a clue about what’s going on.
It would be different if I told him the truth. “Hey, Jake, guess what? Oh, man, you’re going to laugh at this . . .”
Then say it really fast and hope he doesn’t notice: “I’m an intruder from another universe and I’ve taken over Halli Markham’s body, but I’m hoping it’s only temporary, glad to meet you, my real name is Audie—so, do you still want to make out?”
Ugh. Never. Wrong.
I need to get out of this place. I can’t believe everything that’s happened in one mere day—from waking up in Halli’s body this morning to kissing some guy with her lips tonight—but what that tells me is I can’t afford to spend another full day here and let the whole situation get worse.
First thing in the morning, I have to use whatever cha
rm Jake thinks I have and talk him into getting me Halli’s tracking information. Then I need to sneak out of here, figure out a way to get back to Halli’s house, and then sit down and concentrate on the physics of getting her back. Without the distractions and the complications of this place.
Of course, it’s going to be pretty hard to sneak away when these people can track my every move.
Which is, no doubt, how Alexa found us tonight. Both culprits with our tracking dots going Beep, beep, beep, here we are, secluded in the woods, obviously up to no good, so hey—come and find us.
And no lock on the door? Isn’t there such a thing as privacy in this place?
I guess not, when even the walls of the guest room are bugged.
I’m so caught up in the misery of the moment, it takes me a minute to process something.
When Alexa was showing me to my room earlier, didn’t she ask someone through the wall to bring me a tablet?
And didn’t some girl answer back that she would?
I sit up and look around the room. And there it is, sitting on the fancy desk, so small and thin I didn’t notice it when I first came in.
I race over to it, and my heart keeps up the sprint. Because maybe I won’t need Jake or anyone else at all. Maybe I can figure out how to access Halli’s information myself.
And maybe I can track down Daniel while I’m at it.
And make up for what I shouldn’t have done.
10
“Miss Halli?”
It’s morning, and there’s a stranger standing by my bed. A girl who looks about twelve years old, holding a tray that looks much too heavy for her. On top of it are a teapot, a coffee pot, cups, various drink accessories, fruit, muffins, and a daisy in a little vase.
The girl smiles as soon as I pry open an eye.
“Good morning, Miss Halli!” She’s way too cheerful, too early.
“What time is it?” I mumble.
“Five-thirty. Ferguson said to give you plenty of time to eat and walk your dog before he sees you.”
“Who’s Ferguson?” I groan. “Why is he torturing me?”
“It’s his job,” the girl answers.
She presses a button on the edge of my bed, and the curtains in my room scroll open.
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