“Look at this, guys. I used to beterrifiedof spiders!” Mimi exclaimed, like it was just the most fascinating thing in the world, that spider. She moved her hand up and down as it spun around her fingers, down her knuckles and on her palm again. She was even laughing.
“Put that down, Mim. It might be venomous,” Russ told her, but she didn’t care. She stood up with her hand in front of her face, completely in awe. Her eyes sparkled.
“You don’t understand. I wouldn’t sleep for days if I saw a spider in my house,” she said. “I used to be so, so afraid…” She watched as the spider slipped down the thread it made, hanging from her middle finger, toward the floor lightning fast.
Mimi looked up at nobody in particular. “What happened to it?” she said, more to herself than us, her smile slowly fading as if the thought was just registering to her mind. “What happened to my fear of spiders?”
Well, I had no idea what had happened to her fear of spiders, but I would rather keep away from them myself.
“So, we need to fix these hourglasses and create a working clock again—without activating this baby,” said Anika, touching her hand to the bulb of the Thirteenth Hour. It was slightly bigger than the rest. “Sounds easy enough.”
But it didn’t. Because how did one activate the Thirteenth Hour in the first place?
“We need to fix the broken glass, put the timesand back in, see if it works first,” March said. “We’ve got Sparetime to do that, don’t we?” He pulled out the Life Clock from his pocket and looked down at the pointers. Most did the same.
Yes, we had plenty of Sparetime to magic broken glassand make it whole again. But was that really what we ought to be doing?
Seth clapped his hands hard and loud, making us jump. “Let’s get to it, sandbrains. Let’s fix this broken clock and get out of here!”
Something was…off.
I watched them gather around the sand and the broken glass, trying to figure out which belonged to which, and who could afford to spend more minutes from their Life Clocks. Levana and Russ decided they’d spent enough at the tea party, so they were going to sit this one out and only help with gathering the sand and the glass shards. They split up into pairs to start fixing the hourglasses faster, and I made for the twelfth hour, hoping to be able to do it alone. They would just slow me down, anyway. I worked better by myself.
Until…
“March—I said, I’ll be at the seventh!”
It was Levana. She was so loud I had no choice but to turn and look behind me—at March who was striding toward me and Levana who was standing behind him, calling for him to get back.
Something like jealousy and triumph invaded the rational parts of my brain so suddenly. The sensation knocked the breath out of me. I turned to the pieces of glass again, pretending I didn’t see March coming, hoping he’d go to another hour, but praying he came to me.
He did.
His energy was so vibrant ittouchedme physically when he squatted next to me in front of the broken hourglass.
My cheeks were on fire.
“You should go work with them. I got this,” I muttered out of sheer awkwardness.
He stopped picking up shards and looked at me. Grinned. “I’d rather watch you flushing from close up,” he said. “Your freckles almost disappear completely. It’s like magic.”
Thebastard.I looked at him, teeth gritted.
“I don’t need your help, Heartling,” I spit.
“But I think you do. I think you’re a bit…out of focus since last night.” That grin.
My ears steamed. “You can’t seriously be assuming that you’redistractingme.” I tried to sound incredulous, but he was. He was very,verydistracting to me.
“I don’t need to assume,” March said, perfectly unbothered as he continued to pick up the pieces, then paused for a split second to meet my eyes and say, “I remember,” and winked.
Sparetime save me, my body really had become my worst enemy. I was pissed off and turned on at the same time, and I had no idea which part of me had control of my vocal cords just now, until I heard my own words.
“You’re right—I remember, too. I remember you’re much more tolerable when you’re on your knees andnot talking,” I said in a rush, and if I could have slapped myself in front of everyone, I would have. If I could grab myself by the shoulders and shake myself until I came to my senses, that’s exactly what I’d be doing right now.
Because I must have lost my damned mind.
For a second, March was speechless. I felt him looking at the side of my face, but I was so flushed, so embarrassed that I didn’t dare turn to him at all. I just pretended to pick up shards and cut my fingers in the process three times because my hands were shaking.
