“I made it yesterday.”
“You’re kinda young for it, aren’t you?”
“You just have to be thirteen,” Ezra replied. “I’ve been fourteen since April.”
“Hmm.”
“I followed you. Did you see?”
She checked. Sure enough, there was the new follower notification, buried in Emma Han’s standard avalanche of likes, comments, and tags. Jiyeon went to Ezra’s profile. The last line in his bio read,Managed by Mum @l.goldsmith. She went over the words two more times. Then she switched over to see what he’d posted so far: a carousel of photos from the past two weeks on set, innocuous, mostly buildings around downtown Monroe.
“Mum says it’ll be good to have social media,” said Ezra, “so people can get to know me.”
It’s not good, her brain screamed in protest. But freaking out was the best way to put an end to this conversation, so she managed a wan smile. “You like scenery, huh? So does Eunjae. Never has any people in his posts.”
“I saw that. I didn’t follow him, though. He wouldn’t follow me back.” He gripped the back of a chair, knuckles briefly showing white. “Apollo’s only following each other. ”
Followers. That number had skyrocketed into the thousands and his account was less than a day old. It made her feel sicker than ever. “You have a good eye,” she said, trying to stay calm, trying not to think about all the pitfalls waiting for someone so young on an app like this. “Do you like taking pictures?”
“You mean like Eunjae does?” Ezra shook his head. “I’m not that serious about it. It’s his thing, not mine.” He shifted from one foot to the other, two spots of bright color blooming on his cheeks. “I didn’t want to mention him. In my profile, I mean. Mum told me I had to say that Ari from Apollo was my brother, or else nobody would care about me, and I figured she was right. I’m not… It’s not because I’m trying to copy him or whatever.”
“Sure. I get that. Believe it or not, I only started posting on Instagram ‘cause of my sister. Janie had the account first. Then she got bored and moved on, but I stuck around.” The admission tasted bittersweet, the way talking about Janie often did. “Nobody remembers that this used to be her thing. I never thought it would be mine, either.”
“I want something that’s mine,” Ezra said then, something fierce burning behind every syllable, something that struck a chord in her heart — a familiar tone, a note that echoed, ringing like the high, piercing chime of a bell. Jiyeon knew that wish. She understood it much too well. And she wanted to stop Eunjae from leaving, she had to tell him what she’d just figured out, but there was no need to look for him at all. He’d overheard, and he was here, expression etched with revulsion and cold fury.
“Mum let you do this? What was she thinking?” There was no disguising the raw emotion in his tone. It shocked Arthur into silence. Brothers froze where they stood, alarm written largeacross each of their faces. Jiyeon reached for Eunjae’s arm, a foolish move, caught by the cameras.
“Delete this. You’re too young, you’ve got no clue what you’re getting into.”
“I’m keeping it,” Ezra shot back. He lifted his chin, hands curled into fists. “You can’t stop me.”
An excerpt fromMolly Merriweather and the Timeless Prince, second in a series of children’s books(Molly in Time)by Robin Ayres
“You can't stop me.”
These were the first words Molly Merriweather ever exchanged with herself. Not in the mirror, speaking to her reflection, and not in her mind, a silent show of defiance. She had fallen sideways through time again, tumbling eight years into the past, and this version of Molly was only eight years old.
“That's not how it works,” the child went on. “We can't ever change what we already did. As soon as we make the choice, it's already too late.”
“I know that. You don’t have to explain.”
Molly was instantly sorry for snapping at her. It made her sound like even more of a child than the one sitting up in bed, wrapped in a nightgown two sizes too large. This girl still had her mother downstairs, surrounded by books and papers, exhausted but perfectly safe.
The younger Molly didn’t know any other reality. Puzzled, she said, “Then why did you come here? You know what Mama told us. We can only change Right Now, and this isn’t Right Now for you.”
Right Now for Molly, aged sixteen, was a place where Mama had vanished. If her eight-year-old self hadn’t chosen to replace one gear in a machine’s stuttering clockwork heart, her mother might have stayed. There would be no voyage to an island long since wiped from every map. She'd be at home. She'd be part of Right Now instead of Once Before.
If this Molly didn't make a different choice, only Never After was left. For both of them, that long passage into the future would lead to places where Mama remained lost. It was so hopeless to imagine those different, fragmented futures coming together at this juncture, united by a single tragic thread: every Molly in every timeline would lose the person she loved most in the world. Every Molly would make the same mistake.
The rules existed, set in stone. To break them was to risk making everything worse, splitting the long river once more. Molly couldn’t explain the weight of this choice or the consequences of making it. That would go against everything her mother ever taught.
“I really am sorry,” said the other Molly. “Time’s already split. My future isn’t your future. Even if I make a different choice, it won’t change anything for you.”
Molly choked down a sob.Don’t you see?she wanted to shout—
21
Therewasnoactualgarden at the Monroe Garden Inn. They made up for it with window boxes and containers, as well as two very small but very lovingly tended flower beds outside the lobby. Eunjae was willing to wager that the inn’s profusion of terracotta pots held more plants than most full-sized gardens.
