A World Without You(30)

She gestures toward the ten or so kids from other units waiting for their own rides.

“We could be friends with them. Instead, I don’t even know their names,” Gwen says. “I spend all day with you guys and Dr. Franklin, taking the same classes from the same tutors . . . nothing changes. At least with Sofía I had a friend.”

“She’s coming back,” I say automatically. I’m still not sure how I can save her, but I know I will.

Gwen narrows her eyes, examining me. “She’s really not,” she says. “You get that, right?”

“What do you mean?” There’s a roaring in my ears, an ocean rising up in my brain, trying to drown out the doubt on Gwen’s face. She says something else, but I don’t hear her. I hate the way everyone underestimates me. They think that I’m not good enough, not strong enough, not powerful enough to save Sofía. I am. I can. I will.

“There’s my mom.” Gwen picks up her overnight bag and heads to the door. Before she can leave, though, the Doctor calls her name from the top of the stairs. She pauses, waiting for him to reach the door, and they go out together. Through the window, I see the Doctor bend down, talking to Gwen’s mother with a serious look on his face. Gwen glances back at me, but I can’t read her expression before she throws her bag in the backseat and drives off with her mom.

The next car to arrive is Dad’s Buick. Dr. Franklin’s already waiting for him, and Dad gets out so they can talk more. Even though I hustle to the car, they finish their conversation before I arrive.

“How ’bout them Patriots?” Dad asks loudly as I approach, obviously cutting off whatever conversation the Doctor was trying to have with him.

The Doc looks a little nonplussed, but he recovers quickly. “Bo’s such a good student,” he says. He reaches for me like he’s going to ruffle my hair, but I’m not ten years old, and that’s kind of a weird thing for him to do anyway, so I duck out of his reach and get into the passenger seat.

Dad doesn’t speak as we drive off.

“What was that about?” I ask.

“What was what about?”

“What did Dr. Franklin say to you?”

Dad turns the blinker on well before he needs to, and he doesn’t speak as he crosses the bridge, taking us off Pear Island and toward Ipswich.

“Bad business,” he finally says when the car bumps from the bridge to the road.

“What do you mean?”

Dad shakes his head. “There’s some bad business going on at that school.”

Oh. The Doctor told him about the officials visiting.

I wonder what Dad thinks about it all. He knows I have power—he and Mom had to approve me going to Berkshire, and the Doctor told them how it’s structured just for people like me, even though my particular power is super rare.

Mom was all for me going; it was Dad who hesitated.

It was Dad who called me a freak.

Not to my face. Never to my face. But I really wanted to go to the Berk. I couldn’t stand my high school, even though Phoebe loves the place. And my mom wanted me to go, even though it’s crazy expensive. She argued that it would help me fit in better with society after graduation and that the education was really good and could lead to future opportunities, blah, blah—she was for it.

Not Dad. Sure, the tuition was high, but I don’t think he minded that. Honestly, I think he’d be pretty cool paying almost anything to get me out of the house and out of his realm of responsibility.

Dad was against Berkshire because it meant he had to admit that I wasn’t normal. That I wasn’t fixable. That traveling through time wasn’t a “phase” I was going through.

Most people would be like, “Your kid has a superpower? Cool!” Not Dad.

I remember what he said the night Dr. Franklin came over to discuss the program. They thought I was in bed, but I wasn’t.

“I don’t want this place on his permanent record, Martha,” Dad had said, ice clinking in his glass. “I don’t want every future employee looking at his résumé to know that he’s a freak.”

It wasn’t that he called me a freak. It was the way he said it. Like he really meant it. Like he believed it.

Things haven’t been that great with Dad since then.





CHAPTER 18


Phoebe



I hear the door click open, and two sets of heavy feet stomp on the tiled floor of the kitchen. Why are boys—men—always so loud when they walk? It’s like they have a need to announce their arrival.

“We’re home!” Dad shouts, which, obviously.

I swing my feet over the side of the bed, tossing my book onto a pillow, but I don’t get up. It’s weird, but I’m not really sure what to do next. Bo’s my brother, but to rush out of my room and greet him with a hug and a smile wouldn’t feel right. We’re not brother and sister like that. We share the same memories of growing up, but that’s basically where our relationship ends.

“Phoebe!” Mom yells from the bottom of the staircase. “Come say hello to your brother!”

“Why?” He’s home every weekend. There’s no point in making a production of it.

“Phoebe!”

I roll my eyes and get up off the bed, grabbing an empty glass on my way out the door. I fiddle with it as I descend the stairs.