Chapter Six

August 22

No way.

Absolutely not.

The kid behind the counter can’t possibly be me. Because the last time I worked in this bookstore—the last time I looked like

this kid—it was the summer before I went to college, and that was 2010.

It’s obviously not 2010. So unless my seventeen-year-old self somehow time traveled ahead twelve years...

But this kid—this kid who is absolutely-definitely-100-percent Not Me—is still looking at me, eyebrows raised, waiting. As

though nothing strange is happening at all.

“Um.” My voice comes out a squeak. I cough. “I’m good. Thanks.”

And I do the first thing that occurs to me: I walk very fast into an aisle between two bookshelves where the kid behind the

counter can’t see me.

My pulse thuds in my head. My heart is going a mile a minute. I lean back against the shelf behind me, trying to slow my breathing

down, blinking, because my vision is suddenly full of black spots.

What is happening?

I’m hallucinating. I have to be hallucinating. Maybe my mom put something in the coffee this morning. Cannabis is legal in

Illinois now. Maybe my mom watches TV and does a whole lot of weed.

Not that weed has ever made me hallucinate. I’ve only gotten high a couple times, because I’m boring, and that was way back in college. So I suppose I could have forgotten the finer details of what it felt like, but I’m quite sure I never hallucinated something like this. Something that felt so real.

So maybe I’m dreaming. Maybe I’m actually still asleep in my mom’s house. Or, hell, maybe I never even left New York. Maybe

the last week was a really intense fever dream.

I pinch my arm, hard . But all that does is make my arm hurt. I watch the pink mark slowly fade. Either I’m not dreaming, or I just pinched myself

in the dream. Now that I think about it, I don’t know why pinching yourself is supposed to help you determine if you’re awake

or asleep.

I lean around the end of the bookshelf, just far enough to see the cash register.

The kid who looks like me is still sitting behind the counter. No, not looks like— is me . Sitting there, reading a book.

I have the same feeling, straight to my core, that I get when I look at old pictures of myself. That certain knowledge that,

yes, that’s me, even if I look like a girl. Even if I feel, almost, like I’m looking at a stranger. Like I’m staring into

a life that never quite belonged to me.

Why is there a teenage version of me in here?

I lean back and focus on the shelf of books in front of me. They’re travel books. Guides to Venice. London. Los Angeles. Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson.

I’m in the travel section.

I grab a book off the shelf. Travel books are updated all the time. I remember that from when I worked here. There were new

editions out practically every year. This book is a Fodor’s guide—a thick paperback about India. I flip the cover open and

turn the first page, looking for the copyright information.

First published: 2009.

Okay. Well, obviously this one is old. Out-of-date. How much demand is there for a guidebook about India in Oak Falls, anyway?

People in Oak Falls are not big world travelers. Maybe this book has been sitting on this shelf since it came out in 2009.

But I know that’s impossible. No bookstore would keep stock around that long. And In Between Books is not a very big store—we

were always clearing space for new books.

I put the India guide back on the shelf and pull out the Fodor’s guide to Florida instead. Oak Falls residents definitely go to Florida. Jeannie Young used to spend the winter in Miami. She paid me five dollars a visit to water her plants twice a week.

First published: 2009.

My heart is hammering again, so hard it’s rocking me back and forth where I’m standing. I go through several more guidebooks,

and they’re all from 2009, except for one about Arizona, which is from 2008. Every book in this section is old enough to attend

the seventh grade.

I look around the store. My eyes catch on the table of new releases right near the entrance. It’s in full view of the counter,

which means there’s no way to get to it without the teenager—without me —seeing me. And if I see me, then...

Then what? Would I recognize myself?

I don’t know. I mean, I probably wouldn’t expect my older self to look like a guy. By the time I left for boarding school,

I definitely knew that girl felt wrong for me. I think I even knew—in a back corner of my mind that I didn’t fully acknowledge—that I wasn’t a girl.

But I didn’t really let myself picture what a not-girl version of my future might look like. It seemed impossible, in Oak

Falls, to even get myself into that future.

So... okay. I probably wouldn’t recognize me now. I mean, nobody really spends time, at seventeen, thinking that much about

what they might look like when they’re about to turn thirty, right? Even if they don’t want to change genders.

But still. Last night, Michael Weaver recognized me.

Maybe that doesn’t mean anything, either. Michael could have looked me up online, Google-stalking me the way I’ve almost Google-stalked

him countless times. He could have seen my Instagram. Or the LinkedIn page I should really get rid of because it’s never once

been useful. Or RoadNet’s website, if that’s even still up.

Something flutters behind my solar plexus at the thought of Michael Weaver Google-stalking me. Deciding I was worth looking for, even in an online way.

This is ridiculous. Just go look at the new releases.

I take a shaky breath and walk, as slowly and casually as I can, to the table in the middle of the bookstore. At the counter,

the younger version of me just keeps reading.

I pick up the first book on the table that catches my eye, because it’s a book I remember reading in high school. The Last Olympian. I flip back the cover.

First published: 2009.

This is going from weird to unhinged.

I open more book covers— The Help, When You Reach Me, What Alice Forgot...

They all say 2009.

I get that feeling in my stomach again—the same feeling as when Greg Lester told me RoadNet was folding. Like I’m plunging

down a roller coaster. But this time it’s worse. This time it’s like I’m plunging off a cliff.

I look around the store again, at the gray carpet, at the book clock ticking away, at the handwritten signs on the ends of

the shelves, labeling each section. It’s all just like I remember.

Exactly like I remember.

Like no time has passed at all.

The hair stands up on my arms and I feel suddenly cold.

I have to get out of here.

I head for the door without looking at the counter. One foot in front of the other. I reach out, find the doorknob, push open

the door, the bell jingling overhead...

And then I’m outside, back on the sidewalk. Warm, humid summer air washes over me. Across the street is the coffee shop—the

one that replaced the video store. The sign hanging from the lip of the roof reads magic beans , which might be the world’s worst coffee shop name. The women with strollers are still sitting at their café table.

I fumble my phone out of my pocket so I can check my calendar. Check the date. Check the year...

My phone screen is black. No matter how many times I press the power button, it won’t wake up. It’s completely dead, even

though I charged it overnight.

Great.

I look back at In Between Books. But from here on the sidewalk, I can’t see anything through the big picture window. There’s

too much glare. All I get is the reflection of Main Street.

And I can’t quite make myself go up to it, like I did last night, and peer in. I can’t make myself go back through the door, either.

I should go back to my mom’s house. Have another cup of coffee, or pet Mr. Grumpy, or go out to the yard and touch literal

grass. Ignore whatever just happened. Maybe my brain can work it out in the background if I let it stew in my subconscious.

Don’t people solve problems that way?

At the very least, I can go home and raid my mom’s kitchen and make sure she really didn’t add anything to that coffee.

I rub my eyes under my glasses and start walking. Okay.

Okay.