cradle. Her mouth in an “o” when I gave her the purple stuffed dog. My sister opening a door and welcoming me home. Open, open, open.
I wait for the rush of sensation, I close my eyes and focus and yes! There it is! The memory. OPEN.
I’m straddling a metal plank inside an open pod. My hands grip the handles on either side of me. I fly into the air and fall back down again. Up in the air, and down again.
I frown, falling out of the memory. “I don’t understand. I got the same memory again.”
“I expected as much,” Logan says. “Remember, this is a passive ability. You don’t get to decide when you receive a new message. If it works anything like mine, Jessa has to send the memory before you can open your mind to it.”
“But that’s crazy. How would we ever connect?”
“You don’t have to be doing it at the same time.” He lowers himself onto the log, and I sit down next to him. “Think of it this way. When she sends you a message, it’s stored somewhere, in another dimension maybe, waiting for you to retrieve it. Until she sends a new one, when you open your mind, you’ll retrieve the same one over and over again.”
He reaches up and catches my earlobe between his fingers. “You have really nice ears. Anyone ever tell you that?”
The air gets stuck in my chest, until I feel like my lungs might burst, along with my heart. If Logan keeps touching me, I’ll have no organs left. Breathe, Callie. It’s just a touch, a slight sensation I might not even notice in a crowd. But we’re not in a throng. We’re in a magical clearing at the edge of the world. And now that I’ve felt his touch, I never want to be without it again.
But never is a long time. And no matter what Angela says about focusing on the present, I have to remember today will disappear like sand falling through an hourglass. Before I can grasp more than a few grains, it will be gone.
Just like Logan will depart, leaving me with nothing but a handful of memories.
He releases my ear. The sun has ducked behind the trees. Dusk falls in purple shadows around us, and invisible insects flit around my arms.
“What does this mean?” he asks. “Does it help you figure out why TechRA wants Jessa?”
I shake my head. “Not really. If anything, it opens up more possibilities. They could be studying her precognition or her abilities as a Sender.”
“Don’t worry. You’ll figure it out.”
He puts his arm around me and tucks my head onto his shoulder, nestling it under his chin. Our bodies touch in a line, and it’s like he’s thrown a warm down blanket over us and lit a crackling fire for good measure. We’re in the middle of nowhere, with no electricity or running water. He’s leaving in a few days, and yet I feel safe. He makes me feel safe.
I snuggle closer to him. I don’t want to think about the future. I’d rather open my mind to see if Jessa’s sent any new memories. It may be a few days too late, but I’m going to make good on my promise to my sister. I’m going to stay with her, all night long.
25
It’s the first thing I hear when I get to Angela’s hut—the gut-wrenching moan of a heart being split.
I don’t think twice. Flinging aside the rawhide door, I rush inside. Darkness surrounds me, and I drop to my knees and crawl toward the noise. By the time I reach Angela, my eyes have adjusted enough to make out her balled-up figure.
As I’ve done for my sister all of her life, I take Angela into my arms. She turns to me, buries her face in my shoulder, and cries even harder.
“It’ll be all right,” I murmur into her hair. “There now. Everything will be okay.”
But will it? Maybe it’s because I can’t see more than a foot in front of me. Maybe it’s because I’m kneeling in a shelter that will never see electricity. Maybe I don’t believe in happily ever after anymore.
Whatever the reason, my words fall flat in the air, revealed as the platitudes they are.
“My mother’s dead,” Angela whispers. “She passed away from a vicious strain of the flu. The ceremonial burning is in two days.”
I pat her back helplessly. “I’m so sorry, Angela.”
“I never got to say good-bye. A month ago, she sent