32.
now
“I truly can’t believe I wasted one of my wishes on you,” I tell Yolo.
He glares at me.
Yolo and I are on a stakeout at the high school. We’re sitting in the Subaru right in front of the marquee. We’re ready. One of Jack’s old baseball bats rests across my knees. We went back home to get it.
I stare up at the marquee.
GET TH3M BACK.
What do the words mean?
There are a few options.
Get them back, like I got Yolo back?
That’s what I’m hoping. That’s what I want.
GET TH3M BACK.
The words could also mean revenge. Like settling a score, an eye for an eye.
The time is coming around again. 8:31. When I think everyone disappeared.
If I wish, right now, something will happen. It has to.
I close my eyes.
I say a name in the dark.
33.
once
“Wait.” Jack folded his arms and fake-frowned at me. “Sam’s incollege?”
“You don’t get to have an opinion,” I said. “You’re mylittlebrother.”
He grabbed my phone and held it over his head. “Say that again.”
“Ugh.” Every time I called him my little brother, he did some variation of this. Grabbed my phone or my car keys or the bowl of cereal I was eating and held it up over his head, because I could no longer reach that high.
“Say it,” Jack told me, “and you can have your phone back.” Yolo twined himself around my legs as if he were on my side.
“Never,” I told Jack.
My phone chimed with an incoming text. “Ooh,” Jack said. “That’s probably him.”
I groaned. “Come on, Jack. Give it to me.”
“I will if you say it.”
“I’m not going to say it.”
Another chime. Another text. Ugh.
