Resonance - Erica O'Rourke Page 0,87
see you.”
“But he does now. More clearly than anyone.”
He reached out, his fingers hovering over my cheek. “If I’d been here, I would have seen you. From the very beginning.”
“Even if you had,” I said, as gently as I could, “you wouldn’t have been him.”
His hand dropped, his expression turning shuttered and unreadable.
“I’m sorry,” I said, searching for a way to undo the damage. But it was seventeen years in the making. A few words from me couldn’t begin to make reparations. “We should go.”
He stood and headed down the driveway, back toward his house.
“Simon . . .” I started to follow, but he held up a hand.
“Five minutes, okay? Can you give me five minutes before we break up the happy family reunion?”
I backed away. “Sure. Take as long as you need.”
He stalked off, and I stared at the darkening street, listening to the pitch of the world and the whisper of the pivots around me. If I picked one right now and Walked through, I could see my parents.
They might listen. Despite her unshakeable faith in the Walkers, my mom wouldn’t refuse to hear me out, would she? I was her daughter. Rose was her mother. For once, she’d have to pay attention.
My parents were well-regarded. Highly placed. They could tell their friends, tell their teammates. Change didn’t have to come from one sweeping moment. It could come from countless small ones. A single drop of water had little power—but enough of them, over time, wore away mountains.
Simon was nowhere in sight, which meant he couldn’t stop me from Walking through the pivot by the mail slot and heading into my kitchen.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Days until Tacet: 8
Begin Tacet
HOMECOMING SOUNDS SO EASY. SO celebratory. But it’s not nearly so simple, even when you know the way. It’s a kind of time travel, the person you are colliding with the person you were, a gap between what was and what is, and there’s no smoothing over the difference.
I heard the radio first—not NPR or some other news station, but the special half frequency the Consort used for emergency broadcasts—the announcer’s droning lost amid the hammering of my heart.
My parents sat at the table in their usual places, ramrod straight, food untouched.
Mom jumped up as I came down the hallway. “Addie! Did you—”
“Sorry,” I said with a weak smile. “Just me.”
“What are you doing here?” she exclaimed. Her face was blotchy, eyes swollen. “Del, of all the dangerous, irresponsible, stupid things you could have done! The Consort is—”
My dad cut in. “Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Did someone force you? Did Monty and the Free Walkers threaten you?”
“Nobody forced me to do anything,” I said, which wasn’t strictly true. I would have rather left Monty in the oubliette, but getting Simon back had been worth it.
“Then why would you betray us? Those people are dangerous. They’re lunatics!”
“They’re not,” I said. “If you would listen to me for two minutes—”
“We’re past listening,” she said. “You’ve left the Consort no choice.”
On the radio, the announcer read a string of numbers, repeating them twice.
“What is that?” I asked.
“The Tacet,” my dad said. “They’re calling out cleaving assignments.”
My knees gave way, and I grabbed the edge of the table. “The Tacet wasn’t supposed to happen for another week!”
“The Consort decided it was better to hold a smaller Tacet now, rather than wait for the rest of the plans to be completed,” he said.
There was no such thing as a small Armageddon.
A clammy sickness spread through me. “Aren’t you supposed to be running it?”
“We’ve been removed from anything directly related to the Tacet,” my mother said stiffly. “The Consort feels we’re a security risk.”
“What about Addie?”
“Don’t,” she snapped. “Don’t pretend you’re concerned about us after everything you’ve done.”
“I’m not trying to get you in trouble,” I said. “I came because I didn’t want anyone else to get hurt. The Free Walkers—”
“I’ve heard enough about the Free Walkers,” she said.
“You haven’t heard anything! They want to stop the cleavings and protect the Echoes. They found a way to do it that won’t harm the Key World, and the Consort’s known about it all along. They have proof it will work! If you would just listen,” I said, seeing the worry in their eyes, “we could stop this before it gets worse. Please.”
“Come here,” my dad said, and it felt so good to let him envelop me in the familiar bear hug, to know my parents had finally heard me.
Tears of relief sprang up, and I sniffled into his shirtfront. “I don’t