Autumn passed too quickly. By mid-November, snow replaced rain. Each morning, fresh snow dusts the town like powdered sugar, accumulating quickly along the roadsides.
Now, I pry my eyes away from the hypnotically falling snow.
Emma has divided art history flash cards into neat piles on the table in the center of our quaint window nook.
Charlotte is waving Night Watch in front of my face. “Didn’t you hear? Mrs. Bernhardt is taking a group of art history students to Europe next summer!” Her voice rises until she’s practically shouting. “Are you coming?”
Outside, wind churns the snow in swirling gusts across the windowpane.
Europe isn’t touring art museums and architecture. Europe is reality—my reality.
… Shouting … blinding flash of light … Yves Saint Laurent cologne …
It comes on so fast.
Charlotte continues rapidly, “We need someone who speaks the language …”
… running … blood …
“… to show us around … the shopping and cafés, the museums and châteaus!”
I’ve gone weeks without being triggered. I can hold it back.
… breathe in for three … out for three …
“You can be our translator!” Emma adds enthusiastically through a bite of apple tart.
“Interpreter,” I correct her, distracting myself. “Translators handle documents.”
“What’s it like?” Charlotte asks wistfully, peeling off a golden layer of almond croissant. “Like, the Parthenon. In person.”
Marble columns. Heat. The sea. A scent of olives in the breeze. I can do this. Easily.
“Sunny,” I reply, swallowing the rest of my hot chocolate. “With the way the ruins are perched on the hill, you can stand among the fragmented columns and look out across the Saronic Gulf and see hundreds of rocky islands floating in turquoise—”
“Noooo!” Charlotte groans. “The one with the hole and Raphael is buried—”
“You mean the Pantheon, in Rome?”
“Yes!” Charlotte giggles, “That one.”
I laugh. “Inside the Pantheon, when it rains, it comes blasting through the hole in the roof and hits the stone floor with a sound like an orchestra. The first time I visited, my father asked me to count the number of tourists who entered and exited the roped-in chapel within one minute. I was off by two, so he made me do it again.”
Emma screws up her face. “Why would he tell you to do that?”
My cheeks redden. I said that aloud?
“Gelato,” I improvise. “It was a game. He bribed me.” I talk faster. “Listen. When you exit the Pantheon, cross the piazza northwest, take your fifth right, walk past the fountain, and turn left into a narrow cobblestone alley. Eighty meters down is a yellow door with glass panes. Behind it is Cremeria Monteforte, which has the most incredible flavors: chocolate-orange … lemon-fig … pistachio-hazelnut … lavender-honey—”
“Lavender ice cream?” Charlotte wrinkles her nose in distaste.
“You’d like it!” I laugh, “and you will love Europe.”
Emma picks up her phone. “I’m going to be late for the meet!” she squeals. She crams her notes into her bag, shovels the last of her pastry into her mouth, and licks her fingers. “Wish me luck!”
Two hours later, Charlotte and I make our way to Fish Market—Waterford High’s aptly named natatorium. The meet has started, and it’s already crowded; the air is dense and muggy. At the top of the bleachers, I sit down beside Charlotte, who sits beside Mason.
Below us in the swimming pool, bodies skim across the water like Arctic seals.
“No swim team this year?” Charlotte asks Mason, who eats the remainder of her half-eaten croissant in one bite.
“Only one Jensen twin is getting a scholarship, and it won’t be me.” Mason grins.
Tate McCormick squishes down beside us.
“Why don’t they swim in bikinis?” Tate snickers. “I’d come to watch that!”
“You are watching,” Charlotte points out.
“Hydrodynamics,” I say at the same time. “Loose fabric drags, causing friction, slowing the swimmer …”
Tate stares at me, open-mouthed.
Booooom! The starting horn blares. Everyone seated in the bleachers screams. My whole body tenses. Noise. Shouting. People.
Now is not the time. Now is not the place. Bodies press into me on either side, hot and sticky. The air gets heavier … sweating … footsteps …
Blurry images shift into focus, prompting a tidal wave of memories.
My fingertips grip the bleacher. I close my eyes.
… Breathe … Count …
I push my trembling lips tight, resisting.
But it is too loud. Too hot. Too muggy. Too crowded.
No matter how hard I resist, it still feels as though I am in a nightmare, unable to run, unable to move. My defenses are weak.
“Sophia?”
I open my eyes. Charlotte’s hand is on my arm. She is watching me anxiously. Her eyes are wide with