Ascent (25 page)

“Really? Who from?”

My smile beams across my face. “From your audition. They want to see you again.”

Her face lights up. The bad night is in the past. She has a new path ahead of her. She glows in the afternoon light that peeks through the blinds.

It’s like looking at an angel.

And it’s time for me to return to the present.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Farrah–Kate

It’s time to go back. Everything’s changed. My mother’s not lying in a box at the morgue. She’s at home. And now my time here is up. I have to go back. I have to do everything just the way Dr. Thompson planned.

I did everything that was on the list and nothing more.

I walk into my bedroom and pull out the Slider. I press the buttons to change the mode.

It’s time to go home.

***

I sneak out the front door while Mom watches soap operas and drinks water. And it’s weird. I see myself back in the house, sitting on the end of the couch, wishing we could watch anything else.

It’s like I’m separating myself from the past. I don’t understand how it works, how I can be two places at once, but I guess don’t have to understand. I just need to be sure it works.

I run down the street, following the readout on the Slider. The readout is all funky, like it can’t find the hole for the vortex. I think I’m getting close, then the readout changes and I’m not close at all.

There’s nothing at the end of the road. The vortex was supposed to be here! Where is it?

I turn in a circle, looking for the wavy lines, the hole in the air.

There’s nothing.

The vortex on 164
^th
Street is how I’m supposed to get back. If I miss the vortex, I don’t know how I’ll get home. I hold the Slider up to the sky. The signal is weak and getting worse. Suddenly I’m afraid. What if I’m lost? What if I can’t find my way back?

Matt didn’t come back. If you miss the vortex you can end up on the other side forever. And what will I do here? I already finished what needed to be done. Mom is on her own now.

My mind spins in circles as I search for the instructions for returning. Dr. Thompson showed us what to do if we miss the vortex.

Spin the dial for a signal and follow the arrow. When you get close you’ll get a reading.

I stop and pull myself together. It’s not like I’m going to have to stay in the past forever. I’ll be able to get back. I have to. I need to find out what happened to Matt.

But maybe this is what happened to Matt. Maybe he got lost on the other side.

I turn the dial. It spins in a circle, looking from the wrinkle in time that can take me home. But there’s still no signal. Nothing. I start running down 164
^th
Street, looking for an intersection. Maybe the buildings are blocking the signal and that’s why I can’t get back.

As I get closer to the end of the street the dial starts to slow. I’m on the intersection when the dial stops and points to my right. I turn and run the direction the arrow is pointing. The signal gets stronger and I pick up my pace.

The Slider starts to beep.

Bull’s eye.

People walk past without noticing. The airwaves blur everything in front of me and the buildings in the background disappear. A man walks alongside the vortex without even blinking. He can’t see it. You need the Slider to get through. Without the Slider you can’t see what’s going on around you.

My hands shake as I switch the Slider to transport mode. It glows in my hand and the red light flashes ‘ready’. I look around, taking in the past, thinking about what was. It’s like those last moments before you leave a place you’ll never come again and wish you’d spent more time taking in your surroundings. I want to soak it all in and remember a time when my life felt different. But it’s too late.

It’s time to go back.

I key the button and run into the vortex.

***

This time is different. Before when I pressed the button, I was swept into a dark tunnel with people flashing by in a blur.

Then I’m out on a lake. The sky is cloudy. Time is floating all around me. Clocks with wings float from the sky.

Where am I?

I panic. This is nothing like I’ve ever seen. I spin in a circle, looking for a vortex. I’m surrounded by water; it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen.

“Hello?” My voice echoes in emptiness. There’s no one around. “Hello? Is anyone out there?”

I want to run, but I have no place to go. I’m stuck in some type of dream world.

And that’s when I realize I forgot to type in the date I’m traveling to.

I’m lost in time and space.

***

The air above the lake turns wavy. The Slider vibrates in my hand. I crawl over branches that are over the lake. They shake under my weight, twigs crack and fall into the water. A sound is coming from the waves in the air. It’s almost like a low hum. The signal on the Slider strengthens.

I know I’m in the right place.

I feel the air pulling me. I feel the molecules in my body pulling apart.

I see babies born and seniors die. I see accidents and floods. It’s like everything is everywhere. An earthquake pancakes a town. A car drives off a cliff. A couple kisses at a wedding. I want to panic, but I can’t. I need to reprogram the Slider.

Everything around me turns to a blur as I’m sucked into a tunnel.

I hear a voice scream. In front of me I see a young girl and a man. There’s something about her that’s familiar, like I know her. The man has her hair wrapped around his hand and is dragging her behind him. She claws at his arm and screams again. The screams ring in my ears, shooting through my temples. He stops and kicks her. They blur in and out. She looks like she’s only nine year old.

He pulls her to the edge of a pit in the forest. She grabs at his arm and tries to push him away, but he’s too big. He drags her to the edge of the hole in the ground and picks something up. A brick. He swings it back and hits her in the head. One hit, and that’s it. She crumples. He kicks her body over the side of the pit and starts scooping up dirt to cover her up.

I want to cover my eyes to make it go away. But they are both there and not there at the same time. I want to reach through the air and grab her, to pull her away from the man.

He scoops another shovel of dirt over her body.

The Slider vibrates in my hand. It’s asking for a date. I punch in the date, the force of air sucks me through the tunnel and the vortex goes black.

***

Dr. Thompson is the first person I see. He’s studying the readout on the Slider when, suddenly, I’m standing before him.

“Farrah! Thank God! I got a reading that you were lost in the vortex. I was afraid we lost another one.”

I blink against the bright sun. Everyone is wearing the same clothes from when I left. I’ve been gone days – but here it’s only been a few hours. I look around. Everyone is here but Matt. Matt hasn’t come back. He’s still lost.

My heart sinks to my stomach.

“Farrah, we need you to come back to the Institute so we can capture all your memories before they start to fade. We need to know everything you saw. You are our second successful traveler. How’s it feel? It’s a big deal, Farrah. You’re part of history right now.”

How’s it feel?

I don’t know what to say. I just returned from saving my mother. I’m drained. I thought I would feel better, but instead I’m exhausted.

Casey comes running over and throws her arms around me, giving me a tight hug. She smells like sweat, like she’s been standing under the scorching sun all day, blistering in the heat, waiting. Which I guess she has.

“I’m so glad you’re back. I was so worried you’d end up like Matt and try to save your mother. You did the right thing.” She squeezes again and the air gets pushed out of my lungs. “What was it like? Did you see your mother? Was everything the same?”

Dr. Thompson waves his hand in the air, a panicked wave that stops all the excitement. “We can’t destroy Farrah’s memories. We need to get her back to the ranch and interview her before her memories are affected by time. Hurry, everyone! Onto the bus! We need to get back.”

We scurry onto the bus. I pull the goggles over my eyes. The sound of the engine roars to life and the bus takes us away.

***

When I get back it’s like Matt was never at IYD.

All of his stuff is gone and his room is empty. Casey opened his hotel door to show me. She said they called his parents and they came by to get his things. They came and erased the fact that he was ever even here.

Maybe that’s the thing about pain. People become so damaged that they’ll do anything to make the pain disappear.

They’ll scrub themselves from the past.

I spend the next few days in a daze. The fresh memories of my mom start to fade. I grasp desperately to hold onto them, but time eases them away. The smell of her skin becomes fainter, the feel of her lips against my forehead, the way she crinkles her brow … I lay in bed at night replaying my time with her over and over, trying to hold onto the memories.

And a part of me holds out hope that Matt will return. I’m the last person in bed at night and the first person up in the morning – waiting for him to walk in the door. After all, I can’t sleep anyway.

Everyone else makes it back through the vortex. Dr. Thompson is thrilled when Shannon returns. Fourteen out of fifteen’s not bad if all you look at are the averages, and not the one out of fifteen who was lost.

The heat starts to loosen its grip on the desert and our time at IYD winds down

And Matt doesn’t return.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Rick

They never checked me. Don’t you think that’s something they’d do? Pat me down? I mean, who knows what I brought back?

But they didn’t. Instead they took me to a room and wired me up and started asking me a bunch of questions about my past and if I was able to change the day I hacked the governments computers.

I passed the test.

Because the answer is, yes, I did change my past. They just never asked if I changed it the way they wanted me to.

So I wasn’t really lying. That must be why I passed. I’ve been certified. I have passed all the background checks. Now I’m about to be initiated into the Party.

I’ll get an official uniform. I’ll learn the Party’s secrets. I’ll be able to wear the flag pin on my lapel.

I’ve done everything they wanted me to. Sure, perhaps not in the
exact
way they wanted. But close.

Close enough.

Close enough to pass their little test and become a Party member.

It’s too easy.

They have no idea what they’re doing. If they did I wouldn’t have been able to take the ePrivacy with me and Matt would have come back. That’s what happens when you pick the best and the brightest in youth to develop into the world’s next leaders.

Sometimes they’re smarter than you are.

***

All the travelling complete, the Party has fourteen potential recruits to initiate.

I overheard Dr. Thompson and Lisa talking about Matt. They’re scouring the past. Searching for him.

Graduation is tonight. Mom and Dad are arriving at McCarren International Airport. The Party is flying them in on a private plane.

The business center is empty as usual. I was expecting Maria when I walk in the front door and when I’m met with a broad shouldered man dressed in black, I stop. Maria must have the day off. Today one of the security guards is sitting behind the desk.

“Rick.”

His desk has a sheet with photos of all the Party trainees. I’m staring at a photo of myself taken on the first day of classes.

“Yeah,” I say, and my voice wavers. I clear my throat to sound more self-assured. I am about to become an official member of the Party: the security guard works for
me
. “I just need to use the computer.”

“Go ahead.”

I take my regular spot and sweep the ePrivacy across the hard drive.

I glance at the desk. The guard at the desk is looking at something online. I can see the reflection of his screen on the window behind the desk. From here I can see it’s ESPN.

The first order of business is to search for Matt Fenton’s name on Google. Matt was a star athlete at North Shore High School. If he made it through the vortex and decided to stay, I’m sure there’s an article.

The search results fill the screen in front of me. There are no stories on the accident. Instead I see that North Shore won the state championship. That was last year –
after
the date Matt went through the vortex. I examine the photos. Matt is holding a trophy. There are cheerleaders standing in the back. And there, in the back, is a girl I recognize. The long black hair and skin the color of porcelain. It’s Violet, the girl I saw in the photo Matt kept in his wallet.