Authors: Julie Cross
The man nodded and took my money, then I slid over to wait.
“Small hot chocolate with skim milk and extra whip cream.”
My head shot up when I heard that voice. The man handed me my coffee and I snatched it and turned quickly. I knew as soon as I heard her speak, my plans to follow the seemingly invisible Agent Freeman wouldn’t happen. Not when I so desperately wanted to talk to my sister again.
How could I do this? Lure her somewhere without Agent Freeman seeing me? Or what if I could lure her somewhere and he
did
follow? Then I’d get to see him, and since this jump didn’t change anything … who cares if he sees me? As long as I could get Courtney alone for a little while.
Then it hit me, like a sack of potatoes. The stupid password Dad gave us. Courtney and I would roll our eyes anytime he mentioned it and we made him give it up in high school.
“Never go anywhere with someone who doesn’t know the password,”
he had recited every single day from the time when Courtney and I started kindergarten.
It was like a bad PSA announcement. Over and over. Another example of what up to now I’d just dismissed as Dad’s overprotective paranoia. But today it might actually be useful.
I turned back around and looked at the twelve-year-old version of my sister: bright green stocking hat and matching mittens, white ski jacket, uniform skirt sticking out from under her jacket, cheeks pink from the cold, yet so bright and healthy. As she handed the guy at the register her credit card, I breezed past her and muttered, “Go fish.”
She jumped and dropped her wallet on the counter before looking at my face. We’d been given careful (and annoying) instructions to listen to anyone with this code. But no stranger had ever walked up to us and given us “the password.” The younger me probably would have thought it was a joke. Courtney was a little more serious. Still too humiliated to tell her friends about it, but more responsible.
I slid next to her, keeping my eyes forward. “Do I look even a little familiar to you?”
I could feel her eyes burning into the side of my face, then she whispered, “You look kinda like my brother.”
I couldn’t help smiling. “Wanna hear a crazy story?”
“Okay?” she said slowly.
* * *
“I can’t believe this,” she muttered for like the twentieth time. “So, you talked to me before? How many times?”
“Just once.” After Courtney had skillfully managed to sneak out of school between homeroom and first period, we were in a little bookstore around the corner from the school. I told her the same version I had the first time. She was right. This
was
like
Groundhog Day.
And I couldn’t stop looking around, waiting to get a glimpse of the sneaky spy, Agent Freeman, but so far he was nowhere to be found.
“If you knew where you were headed, why didn’t you think to wear a coat?” she asked.
I rolled my eyes. “Funny. I didn’t have time to pack.”
She rocked back on her heels and then leaned against one of the bookshelves. “How long has it been since you left the future? The 2009 future.”
“I’m not sure exactly how long, but it feels like forever. You want to go somewhere else with me?”
Someplace where Agent Freeman might follow.
“Sure, but we should get you a coat first. Short sleeves in ten-degree weather is not a good way to blend in.”
I smiled. “A twelve-year-old with a credit card. So dangerous.”
She snorted a laugh and then we left the store and headed out into the cold air.
Courtney at twelve was different than I remembered. I always got along well with my sister, but she just seemed so bubbly and adorable to me now. Mature, but still a little girl with an imagination. Exactly why I could feed her my crazy freakin’ story and she believed it. Kids are much more accepting than grown-ups. Even so, there was a limit to what a kid will believe, but it was like Courtney could see through me, knew I wasn’t lying.
Courtney used her credit card to buy a new coat from a department store before we planned our next adventure.
* * *
“How do you do it, the whole time-jumping thing?” she asked.
We were at the Met, blending in with the visiting tourists. “I don’t know how to explain the actual jumping part. How do you explain breathing?”
“Do you think I can do it?”
I turned my eyes from her face. “Good question. Go ahead and try.”
She smiled and shook her head. “Why can’t you just tell me if the older me has superpowers? I need to mentally prepare myself for something like that.”
I hesitated, feeling the grief sweep over me like it had the last time, but I forced it down and kept my eyes straight ahead before answering. This wouldn’t last much longer. Someone would come for her soon. “Sorry. Can’t break the ethical codes of time travel. I’d get booted out of the club.”
I sighed with relief when she didn’t seem to notice me balking at that question.
“Damn. This has to be because of Mom, right?” She said this like it was common knowledge. “Dad’s not a time traveler. Superpowers come from a superparent.”
“Or a vat of toxic waste,” I added.
Courtney giggled and shook her head. “I doubt it.”
Adam and I
had
gone in the genetics direction just a couple times with our theories. One being the time when I thought I saw a younger version of my sister wandering around the zoo. We never even came close to any concrete theory, let alone a conclusion. We did have a pretty elaborate plan to steal medical records, one that never happened because I ended up in 2007. But it was my records we were trying to steal, not my mother’s. Courtney and I never knew our mother. She died from childbirth complications just days after we were born. Dad didn’t want to talk about her and, after I turned seven or eight, I stopped asking questions. It’s hard to want something like a mother when you’ve never had one. I didn’t know any different.
I stopped and Courtney turned to face me. “You think it was Mom?” I asked.
Even if I wanted to get hold of her records, where would I look? She’d been dead for so long. Besides, medical records aren’t exactly easy to steal.
Courtney shrugged. “Could be why Dr. Melvin always does those scans of our heads.”
I didn’t know if it was Courtney’s revelation or just a lack of sleep and food, but I got dizzy all of a sudden, feeling even lighter than I had a couple hours ago. “I need to sit down.”
She dragged me by the hand over to a bench. “You look really pale. Are you okay?”
Beads of sweat formed over the back of my neck and trickled down my shirt. “I’m just … tired.”
I lay all the way across the bench and closed my eyes. Courtney swiped her hand across my forehead, removing the cold sweat. I needed to get back to 2007 before I passed out in the past or something worse, which might require medical attention.
That
would be interesting. Where the hell was the spy? This whole trip would be pointless if I couldn’t see him.
I opened my eyes and put a hand on her cheek. “I don’t think I should stay here much longer, okay?”
Her eyes were teary. “I won’t remember this, will I? Like when you go back to 2007,
that
me won’t remember this?”
My throat tightened and I had to force out the words and force back the tears. “I don’t think so.”
She nodded. “It’s kinda like daydreaming, isn’t it?”
“Exactly. Something you do when you don’t want to face the real world.” I stood again, very slowly, and she put her arms around my waist. “I love you, Courtney.”
“I love you, too, even if I never tell you,” she whispered.
I could feel myself going back, but not by choice. One second she was in my arms, and just like that, cold air replaced the warmth of her body.
Courtney would never have left Holly there dying. She was the brave one. Always did the right thing. And if nobility counted for anything, I would be the one buried under the ground, not my sister. But not only am I still alive, I’m the twin that got handed the time-traveling superpower.
Just as the darkness swept over me, a short stocky man about my age came running up behind Courtney, followed by my dad. I tried my best to memorize his face. Focused on it for as long as my body would let me.
“There she is!” I heard the man shout.
“Don’t shoot him!” Courtney screamed. But then they were all gone. Or I was gone. Back to purgatory.
CHAPTER TWELVE
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2007, 9:20
P.M.
“Hey! Are you all right?” a man’s voice shouted into my ear.
“He was gonna run out of here without paying, then I saw him just pass out,” the waitress said.
“How long has he been unconscious?” someone else asked.
“About ten minutes,” the waitress said.
Great.
I’d never be able to show my face here again. I stared straight up at the ceiling, willing myself to get off the floor. It was a slow process, but I eventually managed to stand, with the help of the manager.
“Sorry, just a little light-headed … um, low blood sugar,” I mumbled.
The manager stepped in front of me. “Maybe we should call an ambulance instead of the police?”
Police? Damn!
The waitress was tapping her foot again, holding up my wallet. “His credit card was declined. I think it’s a fake or a copy of some kind.”
Uh-oh. “Actually, I’ve got another one and some cash.”
“Yeah, two dollars. And I tried the other cards. All declined,” the waitress said.
I glanced around her shoulder, looking for my Spanish teacher, Miss Ramsey. She’d get me out of this mess. But an older couple was now seated at her table. Must have been a short date. “Just let me call … my dad.”
A police officer was already strolling inside with another one following. He snatched the wallet from the waitress’s hand and pulled out my license. “Issued in 2008? Interesting. And these look like the real deal. Professional.”
That’s because they are real
. And when did I run out of cash?
The officer holding my wallet glared at me, then looked over at the manager. “We’ll take care of this. Probably drugs.”
“It usually is,” the manager said, shaking his head.
“And with the looks of this wallet full of false documents, I’d guess addict and dealer,” the officer said.
The sneer on his face really pissed me off and I opened my mouth again. “Yeah, because drug dealers find it helpful to make false documents that only work a year from now.”
“Smart-ass,” he muttered under his breath.
I tried to move away from them, but the cop not holding my wallet blocked my way while the other grabbed my arms and put handcuffs around my wrists. Anger bubbled up in me and I started to wiggle away.
Don’t make this worse,
I told myself.
And don’t bother with jumping
. I’d just end up right back here and my vegetable state would probably make me look even more like a drug addict.
Every single patron in this place stared as I was led out of the restaurant and into the back of a squad car.
Seriously, could my life get any worse right now?
Yes, it could. Now I’d have to call my dad to bail me out of jail. My dad, who almost killed me in 2003.
This should be a freakin’ blast.
* * *
“Hey, Meyer, someone’s here to see you,” the police officer said.
I rubbed the blurriness out of my eyes and sat up from the bench I had passed out on in the cell. My jail cell. Because I’m a badass criminal. Or a really irresponsible time traveler who fails to collect proper and authentic documentation.
The footsteps echoed down the hall, growing louder. My stomach flipped over and over. I didn’t know how I’d react to seeing my dad again. Even without the CIA thing and the trying-to-kill-me part, I’d have been nervous to have Kevin Meyer, the CEO, come bail me out of jail. Especially when I wasn’t the right me. Would he know the difference?
“If it’s all right, I’d like to have a word with the kid before you let him go,” a female voice rang from down the hall.
Not my dad. That’s for sure.
“Whatever you want,” the officer said, then he stepped closer and unlocked the door.
The first part I saw of the woman was her boots. Tall black boots, going up her leg, almost to her knee. She had a short black dress on and caramel-colored skin. Maybe she was a lawyer? Except she didn’t look much older than me. Too young to be a lawyer.
She didn’t smile or give me any kind of a friendly greeting as her boots tapped their way into my cell. She just stood in front of me, arms crossed, waiting for the police officer to walk away. “Listen up, junior. Here’s the plan. I’m getting you the hell out of here and then we’re going back to your apartment, where you will explain your recent behavior. I have a long list of questions. But not a word about anything inside this establishment, understood?”
“Um … who are you?” I asked.
“Miss Stewart,” she said with a smug expression.
“
Miss
Stewart? How old are you, like, twenty?” She didn’t even look twenty. Eighteen or nineteen, maybe. Something wasn’t right and I had no reason to trust anyone at this point. Even if it meant staying on this bench in jail. Like it mattered. 2007 was already a prison.
“I don’t like to tell people my first name.”
“Where’s my father? I left a message for him.”
She dug through her purse and pulled out a slip of paper, then handed it to me. It was a fax, but definitely my dad’s writing.
Jackson,
Please do exactly what Miss Stewart tells you to do or you’ll only make things worse. She works for me and has extensive knowledge in handling confidential situations without getting media outlets involved. We will be talking later.
Dad
“What do you do for my father?” I asked.
“Secretary,” she said.
“Really?” I shook my head and stood up. “Whatever.”
She walked out of the jail cell and didn’t even wait to see if I followed. Like she just knew any halfway sane guy would tail her anywhere. Too bad for her, I wasn’t even close to halfway sane. But I couldn’t ignore my dad’s note.