“Shh…” Tanner whispers against my hair. “It will be okay. I promise it will be okay.”
It’s more than okay. Callie’s not dead. She’s been here, the whole time, in this realm, this dimension. In the same city, for Fate’s sake. Just like the future, all I have to do is reach out and I’ll be able to touch her.
My tears eventually subside, and the physical world seeps back in. Tanner smells like soap, fresh and woodsy, and his shirt brushes against my face. It’s not rough, like I imagined, but baby-soft. The contrast of the texture over his solid chest makes me shiver.
I glance up, and his face is inches away. So close I can see the individual bristles on his chin, the creases like shadows in his lips. I lean forward to get a closer look.
He briefly tightens his hold on me. “I’m not going to kiss you.”
I blink, not understanding. And then the words sink in. “Who says I’d let you?”
“I’ve been with enough girls to know when my kisses are wanted, Jessa.”
“Well, you’re w-wrong,” I sputter, heat flooding my face. “I just found out my sister’s still alive. The last thing I want is to kiss you.”
“I’ve told you before. You’re not my type.” He smiles, still gentle, and smooths my hair back from my face, so carefully that I feel like a precious artifact from the pre-Boom era.
My mouth dries, and my pulse speeds as though it’s approaching the final leg of a race. I wonder if he can hear my heartbeat—but it doesn’t matter. Because none of this is actually about kissing. He’s trying to pull me back from my despair, and he knows he can’t do that by soft words and sympathy. He knows he has to make an outrageous statement to which I’ll react.
Swallowing hard, I turn to the stretcher and Callie. She’s just reappeared in my life, and already, she’s protecting me. Saving me from awkward conversations and confusing emotions.
“What’s wrong with her?” I ask.
He slides his hand down my arm to my waist, his thumb moving in slow circles. “She’s suffering from a condition called Asynchronicity, which means her mind is not lined up in time with her body. It’s the same condition that afflicts time travelers. The main reason they get lost is because their minds don’t stay in the same time as their bodies.”
I struggle to concentrate on his words. “Never heard of it. Is this a new disease?”
“Nah. It’s been around since the beginning of time.” His thumb continues circling, hooking under my shirt and lifting it. All of a sudden, the rough pad of his finger is pressed against my bare skin. I shiver, zips of awareness racing through my entire body. “But back then, when a traveler showed up, claiming to be from a different era, he was dismissed as crazy. It’s been only in the last ten years, since time travel’s been accepted as a possibility, that Asynchronicity was also recognized as a medical condition. There are a few reported cases in the European States, but Callie’s our first patient in North Amerie.”
His thumb keeps moving; the zips keep shooting. Part of me never wants him to stop—and part of me wonders if he’s deliberately trying to distract me. Is he telling me the entire truth, or are there parts he’s continuing to hide?
I move back, and his hand falls from my waist. I don’t know whether to cry or be relieved. “So how do I wake her up?”
“You can’t. Or at least, we haven’t been able to, not for lack of trying. You see, her body’s here, at this fixed moment, but her mind floats through time, skipping from one period to the next, unable to distinguish what is real and now. We need to signal her, somehow, that this is the present, so that her mind knows where to land.” Now that his hands are free, he holds them up, palms out. “That’s the problem. Ten years have passed, and she’s never been present in this time. So how is she supposed to recognize it?”
“But she sent me the vision,” I whisper. “Of running the maze through the purple and green hallway. Did that corridor exist ten years ago?”
He shakes his head. “It was repainted last year. So you’re right. The memory couldn’t have come from a decade ago. Callie leaves this room twice a month, so that the medics can thoroughly examine her. She would’ve traveled along the exact path that you ran.”
My pulse leaps. “That proves, doesn’t it, that she’s more aware of the present than you think?”
“I don’t know,” he says slowly. “Her eyes would have to be at least cracked open. She would’ve had to see the hallway and register it. Maybe it means her mind is starting to become more aware. But even then, it doesn’t mean she recognizes the hallway as the present. She probably sent you that memory because it pops up the most often.”
He pauses, as if he’s not sure if he should continue. “Whatever the explanation, time’s running out. Last week, she took a turn for the worse. With each day that passes, she gets weaker. Her hold on life gets more tenuous. She’s been in a coma for ten years now. She can’t hang on forever.”
“No.” I turn to my sister’s body, wrapping my fingers on the railing. “I’ve only just found her. I’m not going to lose her again. Besides, she looks good to me. Not weak at all.”
She’s thin, but there’s warmth to her cheeks and a glow to her skin, no doubt due to the sunlamp slung over the monitors. If I didn’t know better, I could believe she was simply asleep.
Tanner comes up behind me, the quick exhalation of his breath caressing my neck. “You’re right. She looks a lot better than she did yesterday. Maybe it’s due to your physical proximity.”
I can’t breathe. It’s like the air has turned to lead, and I’m trying to suck it up with a straw. Is Tanner right? Is Callie stronger because I’m here? More importantly, would she be stronger still if we resumed our natural roles and I were to send her a memory?
There’s only one way to find out. I haven’t exercised this muscle in years, but it’s not something you forget, no matter how hard you try. I should know.
Hesitantly, I pick up her hand. It’s so narrow, so limp. But warm. Alive. I sift through my memories and choose one from earlier this year, when my mom and I made dinner on the anniversary of Callie’s supposed death. We hand-cooked a meal, even though neither of us has a fraction of her Manual Cooking talent. The eggplant Parmesan was too soggy, the chocolate cake too dense. Still, we lit a flame and remembered Callie until the candle burned down to a stub.
I send this memory to her now, pouring it into the psychic threads that still connect us. Into the bond that won’t be severed, no matter how much time has passed. Even if I was led to believe that it was merely wishful thinking.
I pour the memory into my hand connecting hers, my body touching her body, my heart intertwining with her heart.
Come back to me, Callie. Oh please, come back.
I hold my breath, waiting and searching for the click. The same click I used to feel years ago, whenever Callie opened a message from me. It’s like the memories I sent hovered in another dimension, waiting to be received. When she got the memory, the communication was complete. The universe clicked into place.
Come on. Where are you, click? I count down the seconds. One, two…I know it’s here. It’s got to be…seven, eight…any moment now…eleven, twelve…Oh Fates, the click’s not coming. It didn’t work…
And then I feel it. Click.
She jerks once, twice. Static erupts from the monitors hooked up to her body. A beeping fills the room.
My heart stops. It hangs in my chest, suspended, the beats superseded by the beep-beep-beep of the monitor. The noise surrounds me, swelling in my ears, filling the entire cavern of a room. Loud. Insistent. Accusing.