Until We Meet Again(26)
The water is an opaque indigo. Salt burns my eyes. My lungs
ache for breath. I feel my body sinking like a stone.
Chapter 9
Cassandra
y body twists. I don’t know which way is up and
M
which is down. I flail my arms and legs, searching
for some semblance of balance. But that only seems to drag me
down further.
And then, just as my lungs are about to burst, a pair of arms
wrap around my waist. My body rights itself and I kick up as
hard as I can. My head bursts out of the water and I gasp. Wet
hair covers my face. I wipe it aside, coughing.
“Cassandra! Are you okay?” Lawrence’s voice crackles, soft
and distant. And yet I still feel his arms. I nod, panting for
breath. I can hardly make out his face.
“How did you see me?” I ask, shaking from the whole
experience.
“I don’t really know,” he admits. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
“I’m okay. Let’s just go back.”
We swim a few strong kicks. The thrust of the waves propels us. As we draw closer to the shore, the blurry, translucent
Lawrence fills in with color and form until he’s back to himself.
We swim hard—not speaking. Then finally we reach the shore.
I crawl up on shaky limbs and collapse onto the sand.
I lie there for a moment, my cheek pressed to the sand. Waves
rush over my feet and legs, but I don’t move. Lawrence lies on
his back beside me.
“Well,” he says, his voice halted and tired. “That’s that, then.”
When we’ve caught our breath, we wrap in the towels
Lawrence brought and sit back in our spot on the beach.
“I still don’t know how you saw me under the water,” I say,
hugging the warm towel close to me. “I could barely see you
even above the surface.”
Lawrence shakes his head. “I’m so sorry to put you through
that.”
“It’s not your fault I’m a crappy swimmer.”
He rubs his temples. “When we got that far out, I was so sure
we’d discovered the solution. I got excited and let go of your
hand. But then, I couldn’t see you… I thought you’d drowned.”
“I was worried about that myself for a minute.”
He puts his hand on my back. “Cassandra, can you forgive
me? If I’d known, I never would have suggested that we—”
“Don’t apologize. The waves were stronger than I thought,
that’s all.”
“But I am sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, Lawrence.”
He sighs. “Well, I feel awful grummy about it anyhow.”
This makes me smile. “You say the weirdest words.”
The corner of his mouth turns up. “You’re one to talk.”
I bump him with my shoulder, and we both laugh.
We’re sitting close. Little more than a few inches apart. The
impulse to scoot closer and rest my head on his shoulder tugs
at me, but I resist. I wonder if he’s thinking what I’m thinking:
that we’ve run out of scientific reasons to stay on the beach.
It’s clear—there’s no way around it. This beach and this beach
alone is where our worlds overlap. So, what now?
Lawrence draws a line in the sand with his finger. “So I guess
the day’s over.”
I swallow hard. “Yeah, it is.”
“And we know all we can know about…this.” He motions to
me and the beach.
“I suppose so.”
“I don’t know what to make of it,” he says with a sigh. “I really
don’t. What does it mean? Why did this happen? What are we
supposed to do about it? Maybe we should tell someone.”
“And who would believe us?”
“We can prove it. We’ll show them how you disappear on
the path.”
I imagine myself telling Mom or Jade. How could that possibly go well? “I don’t know,” I say.” That seems like a bad idea.
I say we keep it to ourselves for now.”
Lawrence nods. “You’re probably right.”
I exhale heavily. “Maybe we should be more careful.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. What if it’s dangerous somehow?”
Lawrence turns to face me. “You mean…you think we should
stay away from each other?”
“I don’t know what I think, okay? This whole scenario freaks
me out.”
“What if we try and forget that then,” he says.
“What do you mean?”
His gaze is intense. “What if we forget that I’m from nineteen
twenty-five and you’re from two thousand fifteen.”
“How can we forget that?” I point toward the bushes. “How
can I forget that you dissolve into the air if you try to leave