Chasing Midnight (11 page)

But then I realize I’m gaping at her, and turn away, embarrassed.

“I come and go when I need to,” she says with a slight shrug of her shoulders, as if everything about her showing up in this grimy bathroom is completely normal.

“So this is a ‘need-to’ kind of situation?” I ask, staring at her image in the greasy mirror, rather than straight on. It feels less intimidating that way.

“Yes,” she says, dipping her head slowly. “I’ve come to enlighten you, child.”

“Great. I could use some enlightening,” I say, still trying to recover from Brecke’s odd accusations at whatever she seems to be implying about my supposed disappearance last night. “So what’s the deal?”

“You’ve been Struck,” she says simply, the intonation in her voice intoxicating.

“Struck? What does that even mean?”

A smile ignites her entire face when she chuckles a little, the tip of her finger touching the clock pendant at my neck. “It means
you
are now a lucky one. How about that, Mackenzie Love?”

“But, I mean . . . how does it all work?” I ask, trying to snap out of this trance I feel myself falling into. Her very essence seems to hold me hostage, and the longer my eyes linger on her face, the heavier they feel.

“The
how
is unimportant, my dear. All you need to know for the time being is that this is your life right now,” she says, touching my neck with a long, shiny black fingernail.

“For reals?” I say, clutching my clock charm like a lifeline, the ticking inside, the pulse of its own heartbeat. “For how long? Forever? A day? A year?” My vision blurs as the writing on the mirror splits in two, the double letters overlapping each other, my head whirring.

“That is entirely up to you,” Bird Lady says, drawing backward into the shadows, away from the light.

I turn around, not wanting her to leave. Not yet. “Wait . . .”

“No need to trouble yourself about it now. You’ll recognize the signs when it’s time,” she says, as if I should understand what she’s talking about. “You will know what to do then.”

“I will?”

“You have my word.” She dips her head at me and moves effortlessly toward the door.

I blink, and then she’s gone.

I’m hungry.

But lunch still seems a lifetime away and I am completely lost in my head after running into the Bird Lady in the bathroom. She only confused me more, I think, making it unclear whether or not my new life is only temporary—which I have to admit would be a major letdown. I was hoping for a permanent change of address.

Then again, maybe I misinterpreted her. She
is
a little vague.

I haven’t seen Aly yet, either, which is throwing me off. She’s like the caffeine boost to my morning. I’m not used to making it through the entire first half of the day without seeing her at least once. We used to have woodshop together. But that was before, with my old schedule. Now, instead of building cool stuff like birdhouses and storage chests, I am stuck here, being forced to listen to a lecture about art. But I can’t focus;
all I can do is think about my new life. And, as fantastic as I feel, I’m also a little discombobulated too. Especially without my regular schedule and my best friend by my side.

Something small hits me in the face. I rub my eye and scan my desk for the offending object. A tiny, crumbled ball of paper is lodged between my fingers. While Mr. Tabish paces up and down each aisle, I unfold the paper to find a scribbled stick figure girl inside. She resembles me, her long brown hair exaggerated way down to her bum, with big black circles for eyes. A toothy smile stretches across her heart-shaped face, the rest of her body made of lines. She holds a wilted flower in her left hand, and one lone triangle petal floats down to the scribbly ground where a message is scrawled at the bottom:

Cheer up, Mackenzie

My heart flutters, bringing a smile to my lips. I lift my eyes and scan the classroom for the mystery artist, only to find the backside of twenty similar heads, all seemingly enthralled by the most boring lecture I’ve ever heard in my life.

“If you’re working with a partner, you might want to meet over the weekend to brainstorm,” Mr. Tabish blabs, standing directly over me. “Otherwise, may I suggest you spend some time on your own, exploring different ideas?” For some reason, he seems to hold his gaze on me longer than anybody else.

Maybe he knows about the note in my hand?

I smash it flat against the desk and stare straight ahead, trying to throw him off. That’s when I see
him
—Cale Blackburn—pretending to listen to the lecture. His head is tilted slightly against his palm—barely enough for a quick glance in my direction without being caught by the teacher. He’s the tallest kid in the class by a mile, his broad shoulders towering above the rest, and a knit cap is covering his head like we live up in Canada, not California.

He turns his head when I’m still staring, catching me in the middle of judging him. Smooth, Mackenzie. Smooth.

Wait. He’s smiling.

Why’s he smiling?

I drop my eyes, positive he caught me staring. Sure of it.

I’m about to send some kind of look back his way when I remember that the yesterday I’m familiar with may have never even happened—no banter over Love and Rockets, no hanging out together with a bartender named Fritz.

Nothing.

I lift my eyes again and return a smile, because it appears that in this life not only do we know each other, but we may be pretty good friends too.

How good of friends is what I want to know.

“Miss Love.”

Wait, what?

My head spins around to face the teacher. Right there to the left of me.

How did he get there?

I feel my neck and cheeks go red. All heads turn my way, seemingly choosing me as their target—probably all relieved to be off the hook. A boy laughs under his breath. Somebody clears his throat. It’s too quiet, and my stomach is growling again.

“Do you have a partner, or are you on your own?” Mr. Tabish asks me.

Shoot.
Is that something I was supposed to have already figured out? I scan the room and lift my face upward, staring blankly at my teacher. He waits, staring back at me. The whole class is staring.

I gulp.

“Um . . . ”

“I’m her partner,” Cale says from across the room, lifting his hand just as the bell rings.

Everyone shoots out of their seats before I can say anything, and before I know it, Cale is right by my side, draping a long arm around my shoulders as we file out of class.

“What’s up with you?” Cale asks.

“What do you mean?” I say, my eyes immediately drawn to the front of his shirt. This one says WE GIVE GOOD FEELING.

“You’re just acting weird today, Kenzie.”

That’s when I realize he used my nickname, which catches me off guard because being friends with Cale Blackburn was not on my list of wishes. Although, I have to admit I sort of dig the attention from him anyway, even if he does wear stupid T-shirts.

Attention from cute boys is always good.

“I’m just tired,” I say, wondering what it is about the way I’m acting today that seems so different than usual to everyone. To me, I’m acting myself. I’m not sure how to tell the difference.

“Mackenzie, Mackenzie . . . ” he says, his lips parting into a smile. “You’ve got the best smile in the whole school. That’s the whole reason I’m friends with you, you know? You can’t go around being so serious all the time.”

Best smile? Who,
me?

“You’re somewhere else today,” he adds. “I thought for sure Mr. Tabish was going to make you stay after and help him clean the easels or something. You didn’t hear anything he said, did you?”

“Nope.”

We stop at my locker where I toss my books inside, glad to finally be only moments away from eating. All at once I realize I have no idea where I’m supposed to meet up with my friends or—more importantly—what I usually eat. I’m used to Aly meeting me at my locker and the two of us sitting on the front steps together with a sack lunch of PB&J. Where is she today, anyway?

I slam my locker shut and head toward Aly’s locker but realize Cale is still beside me, still watching my every move. He looks so cute right now, the way his eyes are crinkled at the corners, how his freckles are barely visible in the morning sun. For some reason, even that shirt seems
slightly
endearing today.

“When do you want to work on our project?” he asks, leaning against the wall of lockers.

“Um, I don’t know.”

Really, I don’t. The thought of trying to schedule something in this new life, with no memory of anything before today, is scary. Plus, the last thing on my mind is an art project.

“What are you doing tomorrow?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” I say again, offering my best smile. “Let me think about it, okay?”

He raises his eyebrows, not about to let me get away with vague. “Well, don’t think too long. Tabish said we needed to start brainstorming ASAP.”

“I know,” I say, hoping tomorrow will work out, hoping he won’t hold me to it if it doesn’t.

“Look, I have a cool idea. Have you ever seen that place down by the yogurt shop—” He keeps talking but I can’t focus on what he’s saying. And he’s still standing there like he isn’t planning on leaving anytime soon. I don’t know what to do because I don’t know what I usually do at lunch. And I want to find Aly too, but I’m not sure where she fits in with James and everybody else. It’s like an impossible word problem that has no answer.

And I suck at math, anyway.

Cale has stopped talking. I look up at him, wondering why he’s so quiet now.

“What?” I say.

“Nothing.”

I pull out of my pocket his crumpled sketch I rescued off the floor. “Hey, thanks for the note by the way. You’re really a good artist, you know.”

“You seem surprised,” he says, grabbing the paper and wadding it back up.

“Hey!” I snatch it back from him. “I was going to keep that.”

His arm is somehow around me, pulling me into his torso while he squeezes my wrist and shakes it, trying to get me to
release the paper. But my grip is too tight. He forgets (or maybe doesn’t know) I’m a pianist plus I’m also pro at Mario Kart (fine motor skills). “Give it back,” he hisses in my ear.

“Never!”

“Whoa. Did I miss something?” says a voice from behind us.

Cale’s elbow locks around my neck and my hand freezes on his chest. We both jerk upright to find James staring at us, his dark eyes drawn together in either irritation or surprise; I can’t really tell.

I immediately pull away from Cale and shove the ball of paper into my pocket.

Cale straightens up. “What up?” he says to James like holding his girlfriend in a headlock is a totally normal thing to do.

“What are you doing, K?” James asks me while ignoring Cale.

Cale chuckles. “Kenzie couldn’t resist me,” he says with a wide, mocking smile as he swoops his backpack over his shoulder in one easy move.

“I’m starving,” I say, trying to break up the tension.

“I’ll catch you later,” Cale says to me, still smiling at James like he just heard the funniest joke ever.

“Nice shirt,” James says, clenching his jaw as if challenging Cale to a duel.

Cale ignores him and disappears around the corner, leaving us alone.

James tilts his head toward me until his face eclipses mine. “K, you’re acting trippy today. You okay?”

“Yes.” I nod.

His fingers briefly touch my arm before sliding away from me.

We walk toward the quad in silence. I don’t know what to say or how to act right now, even though this is something I always dreamed about—James Odera digging
me.
But, for some reason, it feels like we’re on a first date in the middle of the school hallway. And my stomach is all twisty and raw.

James opens the door for me. I exit first into the breezy
sunlight rife with the scent of redwoods and pines. A group of kids block our way and we stop to let them pass. When we start up again, I nearly plow straight into Aly. She stops too, and sunlight dapples her hair, catching in the whites of her eyes.

“Aly!” I yell, nearly throwing my arms around her. It is so good to see her familiar face.

James stiffens beside me. “Whoa, K. What are you doing?”

“What?” I turn around, confused.

His jaw is tight, and his eyes are bouncing back and forth between Aly and me, like something is wrong.

I turn to Aly again, searching out those blue eyes I recognize as well as my own. They rest on James for a moment, and then shift back to me before finally panning away. I’m surprised when they don’t linger on me, even more surprised at their lack of recognition or warmth.

She tries to step around me, but I pull on her arm, trying to get her to wake up.

It’s me, Aly! Different life, same me.

She frowns and yanks her arm away from me.

James snickers.

All at once, a thought strikes me like a skewer through my heart, and I feel my breath fall short—the Aly Campbell I know isn’t here anymore. She and I
aren’t
best friends, not in this life. No. This girl in front of me—
this
Aly—is a stranger to me, and I am to her.