Chapter Ten

August 23

I make it to the curb and sit down, so abruptly it hurts. My heart is pounding. Black spots eat at the edges of my vision

again. Forget roller coasters or cliffs, my stomach has actually disappeared.

Time travel, especially backward, according to everything I googled, is impossible.

But the newspaper dates, the broken faucet, the books on the table, Hank...

All of that really, really seemed like 2009.

I run a hand through my hair and pull out my phone again. It’s still dead. Useless as a brick. I think, for a second, about

going back into the bookstore and yelling that someone had better explain what the hell is going on. Just to see if anyone

pops out with a camera and yells, “Gotcha!”

No. I’m too shaky for that. I feel like passing out is not out of the question. Like my brain might just give up and switch

off due to an overload of... everything. I need coffee. Or something to eat. Or both.

I push myself up, dust off my pants, and head for Magic Beans.

The wooden door of the coffee shop is propped open by a chalkboard easel sign listing seasonal coffee specials. The smell

of coffee wafting out is so strong that for a minute I just stand on the sidewalk and breathe it in. It’s grounding.

The women with strollers are still sitting at one of the café tables. I glance sideways at them. It’s a little hard to tell with the baseball hats and sunglasses, but I’m pretty sure I don’t know them, which is kind of a relief. Maybe they’re the new people Mom keeps talking about, moving to Oak Falls.

Inside, Magic Beans looks like it aspires to be a coffee shop in New York. The worn carpet of the video store is gone, exposing

scuffed wood floors. The drop-ceiling tiles with their ugly fluorescent lights are gone too. The ceiling is higher now, revealing

pipes snaking along it. There’s a big steel-and-wood counter where the old video store counter used to be, glinting under

a row of pendant lights shaped like globes. The only hints of Main Street Video are three framed movie posters behind the

counter— Singin ’ in the Rain, Ghostbusters, and Casablanca —hung against an exposed brick wall, which has to be fake, or an addition, or something, because Main Street Video definitely

did not have an exposed brick wall.

“Darby?”

I turn.

Michael Weaver is sitting at a small table just past the counter. He’s got a laptop in front of him, and his hands are hovering

above it like he was mid-type. His hair is more rumpled than it was when I ran into him outside the bookstore, and instead

of a button-down, he’s wearing a gray T-shirt and beat-up jeans.

The T-shirt just makes me notice his arms again. And the way his shoulders are so much broader than they used to be. Not like

he’s spent hours at a gym—just like he’s filled out. Grown up.

And he’s looking at me. With a kind of hesitant surprise.

My mouth goes dry. It takes me a minute to find my voice. “Hi.”

Behind the counter, the barista asks, “What can I get you?”

I tear my eyes away from Michael and turn to the barista. She’s about my age, black hair pulled into a messy ponytail, a folded

bandana tied around her head.

She doesn’t look familiar at all. So, not someone I went to high school with, at least. “Uh...” I scan the menu on the

wall behind her, trying to ignore the fact that I’m 99 percent sure Michael is still looking at me. “Just a latte, please.”

I pay with a credit card and then stand awkwardly while she heads to the espresso machines. I really wish my phone wasn’t dead. Then I could look at my phone, instead of glancing around the coffee shop, trying to decide if I should make eye contact with Michael or if that would be weird. Or if looking around the coffee shop, obviously not making eye contact with Michael, is weirder.

Finally, I have to look at him. Because I could swear I’ve looked everywhere else and my latte still isn’t done.

He’s gone back to looking at his laptop. My stomach sinks. It feels almost like a reflex. Like even though I haven’t seen

Michael for more than a decade, my automatic reaction is still to feel disappointed any time he decides to ignore me.

“Here you go.” The barista with the bandana slides a white cup and saucer across the counter toward me, a flower drawn in

the foam.

“Thanks.” Crap. I should have asked for a paper to-go cup. In New York, to-go cups are the default. In New York, everyone is moving too fast

for anything else, unless you’re at one of the coffee shops where people sit with laptops. And then they ask you if you’re

staying or going.

I could go sit outside. It’s bright and I’m not wearing any sunscreen, which means I’ll resemble a tomato in under ten minutes,

but at least I’ll look less like I’m obviously trying to avoid Michael...

I swear that’s what I mean to do—balance my cup and saucer and head for the door. Who cares if it means I’ll end up staring

at In Between Books? But instead, somehow, I’m suddenly turning to Michael. “I’m sorry I was so awkward the other night.”

He looks up. His eyes meet mine and he drops his hands to his jeans, shoulders hunching up. It’s exactly how he looked every

time he was nervous in high school. Shoulders rising to his ears like he wished he could turn into a turtle. “No, it’s...

it’s fine,” he says.

Right. Okay.

I should leave, right? I should turn around and go outside, like I meant to—stare at the bookstore, continue spiraling, and

leave him alone.

But he’s still looking at me. And I can’t seem to look away.

He jerks, like he suddenly realized he’s staring, and gestures to the seat across from him. “Do you want to sit for a minute?”

I look at the chair. And then back to his face. Is he being serious?

He sounded friendly. He’s looking at me again, and he looks like he means it.

“Um. Sure. Thanks.” I set the cup and saucer on the table and sit down, pointing at the laptop. “Are you working on something?”

“Oh.” He looks down at his laptop like he forgot it was there and then closes it. “Just lesson plans for the semester.”

Oh, god . I have committed the cardinal sin of the Midwest: I misread an invitation and actually accepted. He was inviting me to sit

down to be polite. I was supposed to recognize that he was busy, and say something about how that was so nice but I had something

to get to, even though I don’t.

I really should have gotten a to-go cup.

“Sorry,” I say. “I didn’t mean to interrupt you. I can let you get back to it—”

“No, no.” He says it quickly. And then he looks self-conscious. The tips of his ears redden. “You’re not interrupting. And

anyway, I should also apologize. I was awkward too, and... I didn’t mean to be so abrupt. I just... wasn’t expecting

to run into you.”

That makes two of us. “Well, I don’t live here.”

The corner of his mouth turns up. “Right. Yeah. You’re in New York now, right?”

My fingers tense around my cup. What do I say to that? Well, I was, but now I’m having an existential crisis so I’m living with my mother? “I’m... taking a bit of a break. Exploring my options, I guess. My mom is moving, so I came back to help.”

Exploring my options? I might as well have just said I got fired. It obviously means the same thing.

But all Michael says is “Yeah, she told me she was moving.”

I blink. “She told you?”

“I ran into her at the grocery store right after she bought the condo,” he says, like this is a completely normal occurrence.

Which I guess it is. Because Michael is an adult now, and grocery shops, and obviously runs into everyone else in Oak Falls

there, including my mom.

I try to picture them in the checkout line, having a casual conversation.

I wonder if he ever asks about me.

“Oh,” I say.

“So how is it?” he asks. “Being back?”

I rub my hands on my jeans. My palms are sweating. “A little weird.” Understatement of the millennium. “Things have...

changed and not changed.”

“Yeah.” Michael glances up at the pendant lights and then at the counter of the coffee shop. I suddenly notice how much sharper

his jawline looks. And that the freckles that used to cover his nose are practically gone.

“This place has been here for a while now,” he says. “But the Subway only moved in a couple of years ago. At least In Between

Books is still hanging on.” His ears turn pink again. “Which you obviously noticed.”

Wait.

Michael has been inside the bookstore since 2009. Of course he has—he lives here. He knows what it looks like now. Whether

it’s actually really exactly like it was back then.

“Yeah,” I say. “I haven’t stopped in yet.” A lie, but Michael doesn’t know that. Unless he was spying on me from inside the

coffee shop, I guess, but that doesn’t seem very likely. “Is it different?”

Michael fiddles with the handle of his coffee cup. “Kind of? It is and it isn’t.” He glances at me with a hint of that crooked

grin again. “Like everything else here.”

That wasn’t as helpful as I was hoping. “How’s Hank doing?”

“He’s getting older. Obviously.” Michael shrugs one shoulder. “He’s got pretty bad arthritis now. His daughter said he’s not

really in the store much anymore. He uses a cane, but even with that... I think it’s hard for him to be on his feet for

that long.”

Cold seeps through my skin. The Hank I saw did not have a cane. And he didn’t look a day older than the last time I saw him.

I try to push that out of my mind. “Does he have someone helping him?” I ask. “I mean, in the store?”

Another smile tugs at Michael’s mouth. “Like annoying high school kids who sit in the aisles and read stuff?”

“Yeah.” I smile, barely. “We were annoying.”

“Super annoying.” Michael glances at me, and the chasm between us—the years of distance and silence—doesn’t seem quite as

wide as it did a minute ago. “And yeah, Hank has a few regular employees. At least a couple of high school students during

the summer.”

“That’s good.” Although it doesn’t tell me anything about whether one of those high school students could mysteriously look

exactly like me. And there’s no not-weird way for me to ask that.

And I don’t want to. I want to ask something that will close the chasm a little more. Something that will let us keep talking,

pretending like we can erase that last year of high school.

Michael lets his breath out. “Well,” he says, with that finality that’s basically Midwestern for time to go. “I’ve got a teacher meeting at Plainview, so...” He picks up a backpack from the floor, slipping his laptop into it. His

eyes come back to mine. “It was really nice to see you.”

“Yeah.” Everything inside me sinks. “You too.”

He slings the backpack over his shoulder and stands up, picking up his coffee cup and saucer. And then he hesitates. His shoulders

hunch up and he turns back. “We’re having some friends over to our place tonight. My roommates and I. It’s this thing we do

every month—drinks night. You should come by... if you have time.”

This is a pity invite. It’s clearly a pity invite, and he’s extending it because I’m here and it’s polite. This is the moment

when I wave my hand and say, Oh, that’s so nice but, and come up with some excuse that doesn’t exist—like I should have when he asked if I wanted to sit down at this table in

the first place—because Michael doesn’t actually want me to show up at his house, and I’m supposed to know that.

But I can’t do it. The tug in my chest is too sharp and too strong.

“I’ll be there,” I say.

To his credit, he doesn’t look thrown. He just gives me a slight smile and readjusts his backpack on his shoulder. “Okay.

Well. People will probably start showing up around seven.”

I nod. “Seven. Sounds good.”

He looks at me for another moment, and I wonder if he’s going to say something else. But in the end, he just turns and slides the cup and saucer onto the counter, holding up a hand, waving to the barista. “See you later, Tash.”

“Bye, Mike!”

No one, in all the years I remember, ever called Michael Mike .

But he doesn’t seem to think it’s anything unusual. He just walks through the door and out onto the sunny sidewalk.