The sound was sickening, a dry crack that silenced the entire lake.
Grace lurched forward, but Anna was already moving, gliding fast and low, reaching Martha before anyone else could. Martha’s husband knelt beside her, flapping his hands, trying to help but only making it worse. Anna knelt, too, taking control of the situation with calm, practiced authority.
“It’s okay, don’t move, you’re going to be fine,” Anna said, voice soothing. She looked up at the crowd, searching for someone official. “Does anyone have a phone? Someone call the paramedics.”
Martha bit down on her lip, but didn’t scream. Her face was white and streaked with sweat, breath coming in sharp pants. Grace knelt nearby, keeping her distance, but met Martha’s eyes for a brief, intense moment.
“It’ll be okay,” Grace said, then realized how useless that sounded. “You’ll heal fast.”
The paramedics, at least three of them on standby for events like this, arrived within a minute. They splinted Martha’s arm, loaded her onto a small rescue sled, and skated her off the ice with professional, efficient care. The crowd watched, solemn and quiet, then slowly returned to their own skating, like a record picking up after a skipped track.
Anna stood and dusted snow from her knees. “That was… not the best,” she said, then managed a wan smile. “But you saw it coming, right?”
Grace nodded, her own knees shaking a little. “Not exactly this. But I knew she’d end up in the hospital. I thought maybe something worse, but—” She didn’t finish the sentence.
Anna looked at her with real kindness. “Sometimes a broken arm is just a broken arm,” she said. “It doesn’t have to mean the whole universe is unraveling.”
Grace let the words settle. She looked up at the sky, at the circling skaters, the trees rimmed with white. She breathed in, slow and deep. The vision had come true, in a way, but it hadn’t destroyed anything. Maybe she was allowed to be wrong in good ways, too.
Anna nudged her with a hip. “We’re not done, are we? I was just getting into my groove.”
“Race you to the far dock,” Grace said, and then they were off, slicing through the blue-white expanse, chasing each other in the cold, clear air, and leaving all prophecies behind.
8
After the skating incident, Anna insisted on buying Grace lunch as a reward for both surviving the ice. Anna sang along to the radio as she navigated the snow-packed streets. Grace tuned in and out, distracted by the strange way sunlight shimmered over the drifts, turning the ordinary into a stage set for something unreal. Every so often Anna’s voice would jolt her, “you better watch your back, or I’m coming for you! I’m coming for you!” Then laughter, bubbling and infectious, bringing Grace back to the present. She liked that about Anna. She could draw you in with a line, no matter how absurd.
The pizza place was across town, in one of the old buildings on the edge of the tourist district. The sign above the door declared it “Pi’s the Limit!” in peeling green letters, with a hand-painted π symbol where the apostrophe belonged. Inside, it was warm and noisy, packed with teens in hockey gear and a few tired-looking parents who’d probably lost the battle for dinner input weeks ago. Anna elbowed through the crowd and found a booth near the front window.
Grace slid onto the vinyl seat, automatically turning her face to the window. The glass was fogged, the world outside blurred into a watercolor of blue and white, and she felt the residualtension from the morning begin to loosen. Anna flagged down the server, a girl with a ponytail and a nose ring who called Anna “Miss H” and took their order without a notepad. They settled on a large pie with “everything but anchovies” and a pitcher of root beer, Anna’s favorite.
Once the server left, Anna fixed Grace with a shrewd, sea-glass gaze. “You doing okay?” she asked, softly, so that the hockey kids wouldn’t overhear. “You looked pretty pale back there after Martha went down.”
Grace shook her head, tried to play it off. “Yeah, it’s just still kind of weird having these psychic abilities,” she said. “Pair that with how different this place is from my childhood cities, and I feel like I’m experiencing everything for the first time. Even this place. Most of my childhood was spent at chain restaurants and Army bases. This restaurant, this town is something else. Something almost as weird as my new powers.”
Anna’s laugh was kind, not mocking. “You’ll get used to it,” she said. “Holiday Hollow’s all about big gestures. The first year I was old enough to volunteer, I ended up in a Cupid diaper for the Valentine’s parade. There are photos. Don’t ask.” She topped off Grace’s glass. “But I mean it. You did good. If you hadn’t warned Bryant, half the mayor’s office would’ve been barbecue.”
“Or,” Grace pointed out, “they’d be fine, and I’d just be the crazy new girl who sees death everywhere.”
Anna’s smile faltered, just a fraction. “You’re not crazy. Just gifted. In the Hollow, that’s a good thing.”
Grace nodded, but she didn’t say anything more. The place had started to fill up, the Friday night rush bringing in families and clusters of high schoolers. The noise was oddly soothing, like the low hum of a busy airport, an orderly chaos. Grace leaned back and watched Anna work her charm with the staff, trading barbs with the server and a group of retired teachersnear the counter. She was good at this, blending in, making everyone feel like they belonged.
Their pizza arrived, steaming and magnificent. Anna attacked it with professional speed, folding her slices and inhaling half the pie before Grace had finished her first. They talked about nothing. Holiday plans, the latest episode of the baking show Anna was obsessed with, whether Grace was going to actually go to the Winter Ball with Bryant or “do the small-town thing and play hard to get until someone keys his car.” Grace laughed more than she expected, and for a moment, the past and the visions receded.
A kid dropped something onto the floor. Onto the red tile that clashed with the green walls, and Grace stiffened, a sense of déjà vu washing over her. There was something about the place, something that tugged at the back of her mind. It wasn’t the décor, which was a riot of plastic ivy and old math posters. Nor was it the smell, though the air was thick with melted cheese and oregano. It was a feeling, a persistent echo, like the rumble of a distant train. The more she looked around, the more she was sure she’d been here before. Not in the literal sense, but in that strange, sideways way her visions worked.
She pushed it down, refusing to let paranoia take root. Instead, she grabbed another slice and changed the subject. “You ever regret staying here?” she asked Anna. “In Holiday Hollow, I mean. It must get… weird, being in a place where everyone knows your business.”
Anna’s answer was instant. “Nope,” she said, dabbing her mouth with a napkin. “I love this town. I left once, for college, but I couldn’t hack it. Too dry, not enough snow, and no one believed in magic. I’d rather be a mermaid in a pond than a goldfish in the ocean, you know?” She smiled, big and genuine. “Besides, someone’s got to keep the Wonder Guardians from getting too smug.”
Grace snorted. “Are you still pushing that name for the magical people running the holidays here?”
“Better than ‘Holiday Keepers,’” Anna retorted. “Sounds like an old folks’ home.”
They finished their food, but their server was busy with other tables.
“I can get some to-go boxes from the back register,” Anna said, starting to stand.
