“Oh, I know where that is!” Imogen said, leaping to her feet. “We need to go to the bookcase.” She looked at Charlie expectantly. “Gulliver’s Travels. Remember, Mom used to read us that story about that man who traveled the world.” They ran out to the family room and searched the shelves.
Charlie spied a small piece of paper tucked underneath a worn, magenta-colored book and grabbed it.
“You found it!” Imogen cheered. “Read it. Read it!”
He unfolded it to see Mom’s large, loopy handwriting. He hadn’t told anyone, but right after she died, he took a grocery list from the fridge and tucked it away in his drawer. And sometimes, late at night, he’d take that same list out and trace the words, thinking it somehow brought her closer.
Charlie took a deep breath. “This is the place where we’d watch the setting sun or Mom would relax when she came back from a run.”
“The porch!” Imogen said. She turned back toward Mom, who was perched on the arm of Dad’s favorite chair. It was weird not to see him in it. “These are a lot easier than other clues you’ve made before!”
Mom laughed. “It’s been awhile. I’m out of practice.” Charlie remembered the very last scavenger hunt they’d had. Dad had to write the questions, and Mom could only watch through half-closed eyes on the couch. That time, they had found scrapbooks Mom had made for them with the help of her care nurse. They were full of pictures and tickets to concerts in the park and small memories tucked between the pages. “It’ll help you remember me,” Mom had said.
“Let’s go!” Imogen grabbed Charlie’s hand and pulled him to the front door. As she opened it, there was a loud whooshing sound, like air was being sucked away from the house. The sky was dark now. The giant blanket of clouds moving in had snuffed out each star as if they were the tiny flames of candles.
The air was cold, though Imogen didn’t seem to notice, even with her short sleeves. But Charlie folded in his arms a little tighter.
“Where do you think the next clue is?” Imogen said, dropping to her hands and knees and examining the floor of the front porch. But Charlie barely heard her.
Instead, he marveled about how this street looked exactly like his, but it was here and not there. They were on the same front porch, staring at the same cars that lined the streets, the same stop sign on the corner. Though normally at this time, there’d be a bunch of kids playing tag in the yard, and moms and dads standing on the sidewalks, talking. Not here. This street was quieter, emptier—there was no one else there but him and Mom and Imogen.
He thought back to the hatch in the bedroom. Frank had told him about wormholes—shortcuts through time, tunnels through space. Maybe that was what he and Imogen had traveled through. Maybe this was some alternate universe—some things the same, some things different.
Charlie was brought back to reality by a light touch on his shoulder. Mom. “Everything okay, Charlie?” she asked.
He squeezed her around the waist. “Everything’s great.” And it was.
Imogen pulled out a slip of paper stuck between two slats in the porch swing and held it up in a triumphant fist. “I found it!”
She read the clue out loud. “This is the place you will go to eat. Look on the counter for a very special treat.” She paused and squealed. “Is it what I think it is?”
Mom gestured her inside. “Go and see!”
Charlie followed Mom and Imogen, closing the door behind him. As he did, the pain in his skull got worse. But after a moment, the pain dulled and once again, he was left with only a little reminder pinging at the back of his neck.
When he reached the kitchen, Imogen was staring at a small paper bag.
A crinkled white paper bag. Mom reached in and pulled out a black-and-white cupcake, the same kind he had bought for Imogen earlier that day.
“You remembered!” Imogen cried. She threw herself at Mom, allowing herself to be swallowed up in a hug.
“Of course I did!” Mom smoothed Imogen’s hair and then loosened herself from her grip. She pulled out a knife from the drawer. “Do you want a piece, Charlie? You two can split it.” Mom handed Imogen half, and Imogen took a giant bite.
All Charlie could think about was his own wrinkled bag sitting on the counter. His heart sank. He shook his head.
“The scavenger hunt was so fun!” Imogen said, licking her upper lip where an icing mustache had formed. “I can’t believe we hadn’t done one before!”
Charlie couldn’t either. It did seem like something they would do. Like something Mom would have planned in the past—one of her adventures. His brain strained to remember other scavenger hunts but couldn’t seem to locate them. The mental filing cabinet that would have held memories like that was empty. The only hunt Charlie remembered was the one he had just done down here—Gulliver’s Travels and the porch and the cupcake but nothing more.
The thought sent a little shiver down his back, but he couldn’t quite pin down why. It wasn’t important, though. The important thing was that he got to experience this one now with Mom, who was here and alive and in his life once again.
ANOTHER GOOD-BYE
Tonight had been the best night Charlie could remember in a long time. Good food for dinner, folded clothes in the hallway, Mom’s smile, and a scavenger hunt with clues and everything.
He still couldn’t quite believe it. Every couple of minutes or so, he’d find himself reaching out to Mom, touching her sleeve or her arm or her back, just to make sure that this whole thing was real. That she was real.
“I wish we could stay here longer,” Imogen said. She lay on the couch in the family room, stretched out like a cat.
Mom smoothed Imogen’s hair. “I know. I wish you could, too. I’ve missed spending time with you both so much.” Mom moved to stand up, and Charlie felt a little stab of sadness in his gut.
“Are you sure we can’t stay longer?” Charlie asked. Saying good-bye the first time was the worst, and now they were going to have to do it again.
“Oh, I would love that, but here’s the thing. You can only be in one place, Charlie,” Mom said. “You can be here or you can be out there in the real world.” She made a large circle in the air with her arm. “If you’re gone for too long, people might start looking for you. They might make you stay away from here.”
Imogen’s eyes grew wide. “Why?”
“Because they won’t understand what this place is,” Mom said. Charlie knew this was true—he hadn’t believed Imogen when she had told him earlier that morning. People might think that they were crazy or making things up. People might stop them from coming down to visit Mom again. “It will be our secret.”
“Can we come down again? Soon?” Charlie asked.
“The sooner the better,” Mom said. “I can’t wait to see you both again.”
Charlie went to one side of Mom and Imogen to the other, circling her in a hug. Charlie’s mind went to the photograph on the wall at home. The one they had taken at the beach. They were in the exact same positions, only now Dad was missing.
In this world or the other, it seemed like Charlie was always leaving someone behind.
There was no resistance, no spring back like before, when Charlie and Imogen stepped into the hatch this time. They both dropped down into it and, after a moment or two, appeared back in the real house. There was no mistaking it—the sweet, flowery scent of Mom was gone. And though it was still dark out, when Charlie’s eyes adjusted, he could see the pile of laundry in the corner and Imogen’s unmade bed.
Even though his stomach was full from the spaghetti, he felt empty again. That hole opening back up underneath his skin that only being with Mom could fill. He missed her already.
Charlie braced his arms against the side of the hatch and pulled himself up. He grabbed Imogen’s hands to help her but eventually had to lift her from under her armpits because she had grown limp and heavy. It was late. He was sure that Imogen was exhausted. According to the glowing clock on her dresser, it was 3:05 in the morni
ng.
He helped her to her bed and slipped off her gym shoes. He grabbed the blanket off her rocking chair and tucked it around her. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught her ruby slippers sitting next to her backpack. The musical. He turned to ask her about it, but she was already softly snoring, her curls a wild halo around her face. He’d have to talk to her about it tomorrow.
Charlie closed the hatch quietly, letting the wooden door latch back into place. Right before he left the room, he doubled back. He took a giant stack of the heaviest books from Imogen’s bookshelf and placed them on top.
If Charlie and Imogen could travel to some alternate world, maybe things could travel to theirs. He didn’t know everything about how it worked yet, and he didn’t want strange creatures he didn’t know or trust climbing up through the hatch. Mom he could trust; other things, he wasn’t so sure.
There was probably nothing to worry about.
But he wanted to be certain, just in case.
SATURDAYS
When his family wasn’t busy having their adventures Mom had planned, Charlie and Frank would grab their bikes and ride all around their neighborhood. They’d eat bagels at the park, and then they’d swing by Rohan’s house to play video games or watch a monster movie.
These Saturdays disappeared before Frank did. One Saturday, Charlie sat by the door all morning, waiting for Frank to ring the doorbell like he always had. And Frank didn’t. And when Charlie called him, Frank didn’t pick up, and he didn’t say anything about it that following Monday at school either. In fact, he didn’t say anything to him at school at all.
So when the doorbell rang that Saturday morning, Charlie shot up in bed. Then he groaned. His legs and arms were a little achy and his head was stuffed with cotton. For a moment, that was all his brain could focus on—he felt like he was coming down with something, a cold or maybe the flu. Then at once, it all came back. Last night and Mom and spaghetti. The passageway under Imogen’s bed. The little headache that was lingering today. Maybe it had all been a strange dream, though his legs and head said other-wise.
He stumbled out of bed and down the hall into Imogen’s room. She was still asleep. He fell down onto his hands and knees next to the hatch and pushed aside the books he had set there the night before. He traced the edge where the wood door of the hatch met the floor. It was real. It was all real. He sat back and ran his hands through his hair. Mom was down there. Mom was back!
The doorbell rang again.
Imogen didn’t stir and he didn’t hear Dad moving about, so Charlie scrambled to his feet and ran down the hallway, past the picture wall, to the front door. He opened it without even looking out through the peephole.
It was Elliott. And Ruby.
Ruby first tried to nose her way in the door past Charlie. “Ruby, no.” Charlie laughed, but Ruby didn’t stop, and he had to grab her by her cherry collar and turn her back out the door.
“Hey,” Charlie said, looking up at Elliott. Moving around was helping the fog clear from his head.
He glanced past her at the bike she had propped against the front porch. It was blue and yellow with racing stripes down the side. She saw him looking and laughed. “I got a new bike. Do you want to ride around?” She tapped her sneaker up down, up down.
“With you and Ruby?” Charlie asked.
Elliott shrugged. “She was already here when I rode up, waiting on the porch.”
Strange. Ruby waiting for him again. He remembered Edna’s words—Ruby always went where she was needed. What did Charlie and Imogen need now that Mom was back in their lives?
He looked back to Elliott. What Charlie really wanted to do was go back down and see Mom again. But he couldn’t go too often. Or stay too long. That’s what Mom had said. And a ride with Elliott did sound great. What would be even better was if Frank pulled up a moment later and they all went together. If anything, last night had taught him that the impossible could happen.
“Yeah, just give me two minutes.” Charlie closed the door and ran back down the hall. He grabbed his toothbrush out of the bathroom and popped into Imogen’s room.
“Do you want to go on a bike ride with me and Elliott? Ruby’s coming, too.”
Imogen groaned and put one of her pillows over her head. Normally, she would have beaten him out the door. She loved Elliott and was certain that Ruby was made of magic.
“Come on, Imogen. It will be fun. Maybe we’ll even get some Skyline for lunch,” Charlie said. That was sure to convince her. Imogen loved getting the chili dogs with extra cheese and onions—the more hot sauce the better.
“I don’t really feel like it,” came her muffled reply.
“Okay,” Charlie said. He lingered at Imogen’s door a second—maybe he should stay. But then he heard Ruby’s bark and Elliott’s laughter and decided it would be okay if he went for just a little while. “We won’t be gone too long.” He finished brushing his teeth and changed into jeans and a fresher-smelling T-shirt he retrieved from the laundry pile.
“Are you sure?” he called one last time.
Imogen didn’t answer.
The air was crisp and cool—the kind of air that makes all your nerve endings tingle. The sun was bright overhead and the light streamed through the trees, making the leaves seem greener and oranger and redder than normal. Everything seemed alive. Charlie felt alive.
As they pedaled down Allston Street, Charlie felt like his bicycle had grown wings. The wind was in his face, threading through his hair, lifting his jacket up at the waist. He and Elliott raced down the streets, zigging this way and that, Ruby close behind. Elliott veered left toward Tiny Meadows. They jumped off the bikes, leaving them at the edge of the playground, wheels still turning.
Charlie spun Elliott on the roundabout. Her ponytail whipped through the air. Her laughter filled the space between them. Faster and faster she flew until Charlie let go and they both stumbled to the ground, gasping for air. Ruby lay down next to Charlie, her body warm. She licked the tears that had formed on Elliott’s windburned face.
They all lay there, staring up at the clouds that ambled across the sky, and Charlie marveled at how free he felt. Before it was like he had been under piles and piles of thick blankets. He had never noticed until this moment, when nothing weighed on him at all.
“Do you think that cloud looks like a hot dog?” Elliott asked.
Charlie laughed. “I was thinking more of a banana, but I think it means we’re both hungry.”
They biked over to the Skyline. Elliott got the chili spaghetti with extra oyster crackers. Charlie got two chili dogs, and they made sure to get a plain hot dog for Ruby. They grabbed a patio table so Ruby could sit with them and leaned their bikes against the brick building.
Elliott broke open the top of an oyster cracker, dotted the top with a bubble of hot sauce, and popped it into her mouth. She followed it with a forkful of spaghetti.
“You know,” she said, “I love this, but your mom’s spaghetti was even better.”
Charlie froze, mid-chew. He inhaled sharply and then coughed, the hot dog almost getting stuck in his throat. Elliott reached over to pound him on the back.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Charlie wheezed. He took a big swig of his soda. Mom’s spaghetti. But last night was the first night they had eaten it with her, and Elliott didn’t know anything about that. “What do you mean, Mom’s spaghetti?”
A confused look passed over Elliott’s face. “Remember—we made that volcano together for class, and she made us dinner. Her meatballs were the best.”
It all sounded familiar, but as much as Charlie searched and searched his brain, he couldn’t remember eating it any time before last night. The sensation in his brain at that moment was like reaching for a word that you could almost think of, but not quite, and then days later it finally came to you, but then it was too late. He could feel Elliott’s and Ruby’s eyes on him.
“Yeah, of course,” Charlie said. He didn’t feel quite as light
anymore. Why couldn’t he remember it? Elliott did. But he couldn’t admit that to her without explaining everything, so he said, “That was so fun.”
He wanted to tell Elliott everything that had happened the night before, this huge secret that seemed to push on him from the inside out. But Mom had wanted to keep it between them, and even if she hadn’t, Elliott might not even believe him. They were quieter as they finished their food. Now the day seemed a little colder, the leaves a little more dull, and the sun didn’t shine so bright.
“Can you come back and hang out?” Charlie asked.
Elliott shook her head. “Cross-country meeting, and then we have a campout for Life Scouts. I’m in charge of the s’mores.”
Charlie rode alongside Elliott back to her house. Then, hopping off his bike, Charlie walked it the rest of the way alone, with only Ruby, his thoughts, and the clank clank clank of the front wheel’s broken spoke to keep him company. When they got back to his front porch, Charlie sat on the step. Some of the paint was peeling and he picked at it with his fingernail. Ruby sat beside him, leaning all her weight into him.
“So Mr. Spencer has these math problems that he gives us in class every Friday,” Charlie began. Ruby tilted her head like she was listening. “And they’re pretty impossible. Last year, I only got five right. Five! And that was more than anyone else in the class.”
He knew Mom had told him not to tell anyone about her and the hatch and the world below (or wherever it was), but Ruby wasn’t a person. Ruby was a dog. And dogs couldn’t tell anyone anything, so he thought sharing with her might be okay.
“That’s what this is like, Ruby.” He lowered his voice. “Last night Imogen and I went down a hatch, and I think we went to some alternate world. Where Mom is alive.”
Ruby growled.
“No, no, it’s not like that,” Charlie said. “It’s not like she’s a zombie or something. She’s normal. She made us spaghetti, and we had a scavenger hunt. It was just like old times. At least I think it was. I think we had spaghetti dinners and scavenger hunts with her before. I just can’t remember.”
The Remarkable Journey of Charlie Price Page 6