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“It can play with our memories,” I echo. That could explain the flash, and the pain that sometimes lingers. I touch the place where Miles bandaged my arm yesterday. “We’ve noticed that.”
Miles nods. “In the beginning, whatever happened the previous day wouldn’t affect us at all. But now, if I so much as get a paper cut, then I feel it the next day.”
Knowing Miles has been in pain for much longer than I have makes me want to wrap him in the biggest fleece blanket I can find.
“Let’s say one of your theories is right. The more scientific one,” I say, with a sideways glance at Miles, who gives me this small quirk of his mouth that is ridiculously adorable. The fact that I can keep my hormones in check enough to ask the professor somewhat articulate questions is a feat of tremendous strength. “And let’s say we found that connection point. What would you do then?”
She taps a few fingers on her chin, her rings catching the light. “Gravity,” she says finally. “If I knew the connection point, I’d go where the gravitational pull is strongest.”
“Closest to the center of the earth,” Miles explains, but not in a condescending way.
“You always reset at the same time, correct? To the best of your knowledge?” We nod, and she continues, “Then I might try to be at that connection point at the time of the reset.”
My mind works to process this. “But that connection point could be anywhere.”
“Presumably somewhere you’ve both been, but yes. At the bottom of the Grand Canyon or in the closet of a child’s bedroom, that place they’re certain there’s a monster behind,” she says. “Or a million spaces in between.”
The weight of it settles over us. Miles tries to get a sip of his tea with the two cats now in his lap. We’re closer than we’ve ever been to figuring this out, and yet I only feel farther away. For all her knowledge, Dr. Devereux has never tested any of these theories. Finding a connection point, if that’s even the solution, sounds about as easy as finding a dandelion seed in a snowstorm.
Dr. Devereux gets up to pour more tea.
There’s something else I’ve been wondering, and this might be my only chance to ask. “Could I ask why you left UW?” I say, knowing full well that any decent journalist would start with softballs. But we must be beyond that.
She pauses halfway to the kitchen. If I hadn’t been studying her for the past half hour, I might not have noticed the new droop to her shoulders. “My class wasn’t very… respected,” she says, fumbling for the right word. “Parents thought it was a waste of money, and I can understand that—university tuition is a crime these days. They certainly made it no secret that they wanted me gone.”
“So you had yourself completely erased from the internet,” I say, my heart breaking.
“I was done with people telling me I was a fraud. That I’d lost my mind. I couldn’t focus on my research with all those voices in my head,” she says. It’s clear this is a painful topic, one that isn’t easy to talk about. “But it’s been a long time, and I miss teaching. When I left, I always assumed I could never go back, and now that it’s been just over a decade… well, I wonder sometimes. Part of me worries they wouldn’t want me anymore, but… I don’t know.”
“I’m so sorry,” I say, meaning it. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”
When she looks at me, her eyes soften, and now she sounds wistful. “I’ve had a lot of time to process it, but thank you.”
“I would have been bribing my way off the wait list to get into that class,” Miles says, and god, I love that he says it—not just because it’s classic Miles, but because it makes her eyes glow even brighter.
Ada Lovelace jumps onto the couch next to her, and Dr. Devereux runs a hand along her back. “I wish I could do more,” she says. “But I’m afraid I have a town-council meeting to attend tonight. Time to defend this ‘eyesore’ for the hundredth time.” She waves her hand around to indicate the house. “It certainly feels like a time loop sometimes.” We join in when she laughs, but it’s muted. “You’re welcome to come, but I’m not sure how thrilling it’ll be.”
“You’ve already given us so much.” I get to my feet. “Thank you. Truly.”
“Please, don’t hesitate to reach out to me anytime.” She scribbles ten digits on a piece of paper. “Memorize this if you need to call me. Although I suppose it may very well be a different version of me. Extraordinary,” she says, and the word follows us out the door.
Chapter 34
WE’RE QUIET AS WE GET back into the car. It’s my turn to drive, but I spend as much time studying Miles’s face as I do the road in front of me, his eyebrows pinched together while he fiddles, always fiddling, with a loose thread on the seat of the rental car.
I want to know exactly what’s going through his head, for him to let me in the way he’s done before. And yet he says nothing, and so do I.
He can’t be losing hope. Yes, he’s been stuck much longer than I have, and if anyone’s earned the right to feel hopeless, it’s him. But if he doesn’t think there’s a way out of this, then… well, then I’m not sure how to feel either.
Because it isn’t just that I want to kiss him senseless. It’s that I want to truly know him, to be the person he talks to when he isn’t sure he can talk to anyone else.
We’re crossing the border into Washington State when I spot a familiar sign.
“We should go to the beach,” I say abruptly, pointing to the sign. LONG BEACH: 15 MILES.
Rain splatters the windshield. “In this weather?”
“My mom and I used to come here when I was a kid. Maybe it would be good for us to clear our heads. Get some fresh air.”
