I stop short and look up. Suddenly, I’m right in front of the blue-gray house. Another instance of my body knowing where to go even while my brain’s elsewhere.

  The house looms above me. It’s set back from the road on a thick bed of grass and raised up on a majestic stone wall. There’s a circular driveway out front with a flagpole in the center and a small gazebo off to the left. The house has blue-gray siding and bright white shutters, its black roof providing a sharp and attractive contrast. Off to both sides of the property are covered porch areas, and there’s a front porch, too, with several heavy white rocking chairs and an abundance of potted plants. I stare at the rocking chair, and a flash comes to me.

  You’re sitting on that chair, trying to think, trying to breathe. Maybe you should call Will’s house, you think. Maybe you should do it, just to see, just to try.

  I blink hard. Was this from the same day? I remember that Becky did end up calling Will—on that new cell phone of hers. There was no answer.

  I glance around, realizing something else. Did Will live near here, too? Or was Avon Shores familiar to Becky only because she—or the man she was going to marry—was from this place?

  I turn back to the house. At this time of year, the trees and bushes are bare, but I swear I can detect the scent of wisteria in my nostrils. A flash rips through me:

  Walking next to him as you walk up the front steps. “It smells amazing.”

  The voice is close, nearly tickling the hairs around my eardrums. As hard as I fight in the memory, I can’t see whose hand Becky is holding. Not Will’s, though. Someone else’s. The guy this house belongs to?

  I peer around for a mailbox. There isn’t one. Even if there was the owner’s name printed somewhere, who’s to say it would be the same owner as before?

  “Casey?”

  I wheel around, startled. An old wood-paneled station wagon with rust around the wheel wells lurks at the curb. The driver’s window cranks down a little farther, and Jake leans out, peering at me curiously.

  I draw back in horror. “How did you know I’d be here?”

  Jake smiles sheepishly. “I took the bridge that’s closer to this side of the island. Just as I was getting off, my mom called. Said you left. Although she also said you went in the opposite direction of the Wayfarer.” He shrugs. “Took a guess that I’d find you here. Coming back to the scene of the crime, huh?”

  A frisson goes through me. Jake came looking for me. His mom was spying on where I went after I left her house. Jake knew to find me here. He said the scene of the crime.

  The place where Becky was kidnapped, he means. Or maybe where she was going to get married.

  Jake is staring. There’s something so swoon-worthy about his deep-set eyes and earnest smile. I’m drawn to an . . . essence, maybe, a deep vibration I can’t explain. Or maybe I can explain it. Maybe it’s because of Becky.

  “You were really going to leave without saying goodbye?” Jake sounds hurt. “I mean, I get it—you have to study. But I’d love to talk with you. As friends,” he adds quickly. “If that’s not too weird. I mean, maybe this is being presumptuous, but I have to think that there’s a tiny part of you that chose to come to Avon Shores to study because of me?”

  I think of the textbooks still in my backpack at the Wayfarer. I can’t bomb my exams. Being good at school is my whole identity. And if I bomb my exams, Marcus Coleman would likely not offer me an internship. My whole life would implode.

  I look at him helplessly. “I’m sorry. I have so much work to do.”

  Jake nods. “At least let me buy you an early lunch. There’s this amazing spot near here. The owner is old and cranky and hates everyone and sometimes throws peanut shells at people’s heads.”

  I twist my mouth. “You’re really selling me on the place.”

  “Yeah, but he makes the best burgers on the Eastern Seaboard. And I’m including the city in that statement.”

  When I glance back at the blue-gray mansion, the floral smell no longer wafts in my nostrils. It’s just a big-ass house, nothing more. I am in the present now, and in the present, I realize that I am weak with hunger. Besides those few nervous bites of pizza, I last ate—when?

  I turn back to Jake’s arm dangling casually out the window. Something about his long, sinewy fingers sends a warm feeling through me.

  “Are we able to walk there?” I ask, feeling a ribbon of hope.

  Jake grins. “Sure. Nice morning for it.”

  An hour with him can’t hurt. And not so deeply inside me, I can feel Becky prodding, suddenly back again.

  Saying, Go.

  When we walk into Woody’s, I’m not assaulted with the familiar, which makes me think that perhaps this is a place Becky never frequented. It’s clear Woody’s existed in the early 2000s—I take in the weathered plaque on the front door that reads “Established 1966.” But perhaps this wasn’t really Becky’s or her fiancé’s cup of tea. Whoever her fiancé was.

  Because it certainly is a very specific flavor of tea in here. On the walls are old license plates, wrinkled fishing maps, and various crisscrossed wooden fishing poles, some of them with sharp, rusty hooks still attached. The floor is littered with peanut shells and sawdust, so much that it sticks to the soles of my shoes.

  “They ever think of sweeping in here?” I murmur.

  Jake eyes me. “You ever been to McSorley’s in the city?”

  I squint at that name. It’s familiar, but I’m not sure why.

  “It isn’t far from NYU,” Jake adds. “East Seventh Street, I think? Really old bar. They only serve two types of beer—light and dark. There’s sawdust all over the floor there, too—pretty sure Woody took it as inspiration for this place. It’s featured in this great book about Manhattan called—”

  “Up in the Old Hotel!” I blurt.

  Jake’s smile stretches wider. “You’ve read it?”

  No wonder the bar’s name was familiar. The book is by the journalist Joseph Mitchell, and it chronicled interesting characters around the city in the 1940s and 1950s—including McSorley’s. I loved books about New York City from that time period, but I’d never met anyone else who’d even heard of the book.

  “I read those stories over and over when I was in high school. I feel like the city isn’t like that anymore. It’s so slick now. Everyone is the same.” I cock my head. “How do you know about it? I’ve never met anyone else who’s read that book.”

  Jake pauses to think. “Sometimes, when I’m at the library, there are certain books I’m just drawn to. I go with it. I’ve learned about a lot of strange subjects that way.”

  “I do the same thing,” I murmur. “One of my favorite games when I was younger was going to the library and just randomly walking into a section and seeing what caught my eye. I never went for the books on the display shelves.”

  “Same!” Jake says.

  We share a smile. There’s that deep, magnetized pull again. Why had I picked up that book about McSorley’s? Was it my choice, or had Becky guided me? Maybe she and Will used to read it together. Maybe they even went to the bar together, in the early 2000s, once they were old enough.

  I clear my throat. Can I ask Jake about Will? I want to. No one else I’ve met shares this predicament. No one else understands.

  But then I sense a presence behind us. A balding man with tufts of white hair above his ears and bushy white eyebrows glares at us through watery blue eyes.

  “Woody!” Jake says cheerfully. “How are you, my man? Table for two?”

  Woody grunts and points to a bistro-style table with two mismatched bar-height chairs. We head over and sit. The old man practically hurls menus at us.

  “Thank you!” Jake sings. He points to me. “This is my friend. Casey.” He quickly glances at me. “Or would you rather be called Becky?”

  “Casey is great,” I say, noticing that Woody doesn’t seem to give a shit what I’m called. It’s amazing we can get drink orders out of him. I say I’ll just have water, but Jake orders a Dr Pepper. Woody grunts and points at a soda dispenser in the corner as if to say Get it yourself.

  Jake cheerfully unfolds himself from the seat and lopes over, filling a paper cup with water and another with soda. As he brings them both back to the table, I watch as the Dr Pepper bubbles rise to the surface. Something about its distinct smell ignites another tiny fire in my brain.

  You sit across from each other, and Will orders a Dr Pepper. You watch as he slurps it down nervously and then orders another, drinking it just as fast. You giggle at how unsure he seems. You tell him he’s going to have to pee a lot the rest of the night. The tips of his ears turn red.

  “Have you always liked Dr Pepper?” I ask.

  “Oh yeah. It’s my kryptonite.” He sucks more through the straw.

  Because of Will? I wonder. I wonder if I drink what Becky drank, eat what Becky ate. Bacon sandwiches, despite otherwise being mostly a vegetarian? Those weird wrapped cakes at bodega checkout lines? Hot sauce on everything? Chocolate milk?

  “So, you sleep okay?” Jake asks, puncturing my thoughts. He stirs the ice cubes in his drink.

  “Uh-huh.” I look at him coyly. “I like your bed sheets, by the way. I had the same ones when I was growing up.”

  “Oh shit.” Jake grimaces. “I was hoping you didn’t notice. I’ve had those sheets since I was, like, nine.”

  “Same.” I clear my throat. “I watched all the movies.”

  “For sure. It was all so magical to me. I even liked Jar Jar Binks. I know everyone else hated that guy, but he really resonated with me.”

  “Me too!” I cry. Something hits me: The Star Wars movie with Jar Jar came out in the late nineties. I wonder if Becky saw it. Maybe she and Will watched it together.

  Am I going to dwell on every cultural reference this way?

  “And, um, I met your mom,” I add. “She seemed nice.”

  “Right!” Jake’s eyes light up, but then he grimaces. “I hope she didn’t force her mushroom tea on you. It’s god-awful.”

  I shake my head. “Luckily, no. She has an interesting decorating style. Does she know Karin, by any chance?”

  “The psychic?” Jake looks taken aback. “How do you know her?”

  “I . . .” I feel like it should be obvious. Isn’t one of a psychic’s jobs talking about past lives? But I just shrug, muttering something about seeing her sign on the storefront. “I didn’t think Avon Shores was big enough for two psychics.”

  “Oh, my mom isn’t psychic.” Jake waves his hand. “She’s a vet, remember? She’s just fascinated with all that stuff on an amateur level.”

  “But she knows about us,” I say carefully.

  This seems to surprise Jake. His cheeks turn pink. “Well, yeah. I hope that’s okay . . .”

  Is it okay? I have no idea.

  I clear my throat and look at Jake. “So about . . . us. The past—our past.”

  A worried expression crosses Jake’s features. He stares into his drink. “Seriously. We don’t have to talk about it.”

  “I won’t pass out again. I promise.”

  Jake fiddles with a napkin. “The thing is, I might.”

  I sit back. “Really?”

  On the TV, a man dressed in a Santa suit gets excited over an electronics sale. Ho, ho, ho.

  “Look,” Jake says. “I’ve had a lot of anxiety thinking about all of . . . that. It’s been really hard for me, too.”

  My lips part. I nod, encouraging him on.

  “I want to think about it, but . . . it’s hard to look it in the eye, you know? My mom is so good at talking me through the anxiety. And this is the thing she always says—the past is the past. And now is now. It’s better to live in the present than dwell on what happened—or what didn’t happen.”

  I’m frowning . . . and nodding . . . and frowning again. I’m disappointed he doesn’t want to go there—yet—but I also respect his feelings. Just because I want to know more about a past life doesn’t mean I can just ask any old question I want. Jake is traumatized. It’s possible Jake’s seen more of Will’s life than I’ve seen of Becky’s. Even scarier stuff than what I’ve seen.

  It’s possible he’s seen Will’s death.

  “Anyway.” Jake turns the menu over. “Is that okay if we don’t, like, rehash quite yet? If we just kind of stick to who we are now? I still want to know who you are, Casey. There’s so much I have no idea about. So, like, maybe we can go forward—not back?”

  “Sure,” I say, nodding. I’m disappointed that he doesn’t want to talk about what I find to be the most interesting trait we have in common . . . but I can live with it. Maybe, in time, I can earn his trust . . . and we will talk about it.

  My thoughts screech to a halt. I’m thinking about Jake like I’m going to know him going forward. Like there will be more conversations after this. But, I mean, I can have a friend, can’t I? Is that really so out of the question?

  Woody returns, this time with an apron tied around his waist and a small notepad in his gnarled hands. Jake glances at me. “I recommend a burger. They’re the best.”

  “Sounds great.”

  As Woody ambles back to the kitchen again—I wonder if he’s a one-man show in there, as I haven’t heard any other voices—Jake smiles at me. “So. Besides reading a ton and studying a ton, what else are you all about?”

  I laugh. “How much detail do you want?”

  He rubs his hands together greedily. “You can go as far back as elementary school if you want. As far back as birth.”

  I twist my mouth. “I thought you didn’t want to talk about the past.”

  “I meant our past. Not yours.” He leans on his elbows. “So. I bet you were the smartest in your grade.”

  “I was.”

  “Oh yeah?” he teases. “How smart?”

  I tell him about being moved into higher reading and math levels as soon as I started school. How reading and math came so easily to me, and I felt confused when others struggled because it all seemed so simple.

  “Always came easy to me, too,” Jake said. “I think I was reading at four, maybe? Most kids I know didn’t pick it up until they were nearly seven.”

  “You know why,” I say. “It’s because . . .”

  But then I trail off. Jake doesn’t want to talk about when he was Will. Will’s knowledge might have seeped into him, and while that’s unbelievably cool, I’d made a promise not to talk about it right now. I can’t break that within the first five minutes.

  Woody reappears with two plates. That was fast, I think, but the food looks fresh. Jake tries to thank the man, but he turns with a grumble back to the kitchen.

  “You’re going to love these,” he says as he reaches for a shaker.

  I crunch into my food. I try not to eat much red meat, but I have to admit, the burger is delicious. I grab a fry next, and it’s perfectly crispy, perfectly salted. I can already feel my body gaining strength, thanking me for eating. This is the first time in a while that I’ve felt relaxed enough to eat. Ever since I started hearing the voice in my head, I’ve been so tightly wound, practically too afraid to breathe.

  I tell him about how I wrote story after story as a little kid, yearning to be an author as early as third grade. Jake says he liked to draw at that age, and like me, he was the kid who stayed indoors, doodling, instead of playing sports with other kids. I admit that I don’t draw much.

  “The only thing I remember drawing was this cartoon of a pyramid in my journal, and it was related to writing. At the top were published authors. At the bottom was me, just floundering around.” I pop another fry into my mouth, then duck my head. “Sorry, you don’t want to hear about drawings I made in third grade.”

  “Who says?” Jake asks. “What third grader even knows the concept of a published author?”

  My cheeks blaze. Have I ever told anyone about that silly cartoon before? I’m not sure I even showed it to my mother. She encouraged me every step of the way, even when I couldn’t figure out how to move from chapter one to chapter two. “Just keep writing,” she’d always say.

  My chest feels tight with grief. I look up at Jake, trying to refocus. Dwell on the present, not the past.

  “So what are you up to now?” I ask Jake. “You, um, work at the vet’s office? And what else?”

  “Uh, don’t you remember me telling you?” Jake tilts his head. “Straight guy, Broadway dreams?”

  How much did we chat about before I fainted, anyway? I shrug noncommittally, asking Jake to repeat the story. He explains that he likes drawing, but he loves theater. “Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve been performing,” he says. “I love playing characters. I love telling stories. I feel more natural on a stage than I do in real life.”

  I nod. “I create versions of myself for different situations in real life.”

  “Same.” Jake folds his hands. “It makes it easier, doesn’t it?” But then he sits back. “So does that mean you’re playing a part for me right now?”

  “I mean . . .” I think for a moment. Am I? I don’t really feel like I am, astonishingly. Not at all.

  Then Jake tells me that he was in most of the plays through high school, many of them musicals. He rattles off a sampling of songs from some of the shows he performed—Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady and Curly McLain from Oklahoma! When he starts singing a new song from a more modern musical, I feel familiar tingles again. I know the words, but not because I’ve ever seen the play. When I close my eyes, I’m in Becky’s body again, listening as someone sings them to her.

  You look up at him and applaud. “Thank you, Will,” you gush. “That is and will forever be my favorite song.”

  When I come back to myself, I feel flushed. And when I look at Jake, he appears even cuter than before. I look away quickly.

  Jake explains that he’d love to go to school for theater—maybe even NYU. But he needs to save up some cash, which is why he took a year off.

  “Working at the vet’s with my mom isn’t so bad,” he says. “The locals love us. Of course, you get the snotty rich people from this side of the island who are kind of bitchy with their pets—but even they were okay.” He crunches a fry. “In the summer, I also had a job working with a diving instructor. The rich people were real jerks. They think they’re slumming it, using a local instructor instead of, say, learning to dive on their trip to Turks and Caicos.”