But he doesn’t move. Ryan just stands in the doorway, challenging Gwen to magically move through him.
I shift nervously. Ryan’s all spit and rage; he wants a fight. He wants to destroy—something, someone. I’ve never seen anyone look so dead inside. The only thing Ryan wants to do is spread the hate boiling inside him.
“Listen, man, so what if the Berk closes?” I say, trying to bring some level of logic to Ryan. “It’s not that big a deal. There are other schools.”
“This school is mine,” Ryan snarls. “And I won’t let them take it away from me.”
“Well, this room isn’t yours, so get out!” Gwen shouts at him, her voice cracking over the words.
“It is. This whole building. Everyone in it.”
“This is Sofía’s room!” Gwen yells at him.
“Sofía’s dead.” Ryan says the words maliciously, violently, like he wants nothing more than to kill Gwen with the sound of his voice.
But the words don’t stab at Gwen. They don’t eat her alive like a monster. She has already accepted Sofía’s death. She has been nothing but the silent counter of the days since Sofía’s been gone.
I’m the one who hears Ryan’s words like a saw through my brain. I’m the one who loses my breath, gutted at the way Ryan can say them, like there was never any question of her death.
? ? ?
I’m the one who snaps.
CHAPTER 60
You’re scaring me. The words are Gwen’s, but I don’t know who she said them to.
I am standing in the middle of Sofía’s room. The walls move like liquid.
No, those are just shadows. From the flames. The flames on her bed.
Sofía’s mattress is on fire.
All around us is a raging inferno, climbing the walls and making the paint bubble.
The door swings, the movement from the air making the flames sway. Ryan just left.
Gwen’s in the corner, crouched against the floor. There’s blood on her lips and tears in her eyes. She looks utterly powerless, and then I realize: There is nothing of the flame inside of her. Whether Gwen has powers or not, she’s always had fire inside. Now—nothing. My eyes scan the room. The Zippo lighter is in the center of the mattress, melting through the burning cloth.
Did Ryan do this?
I reach for Gwen. She flinches.
Did I do this?
Gwen struggles to stand on her own. “Bo?” she asks, hesitating, as if she’s not sure I’m going to respond. As if she’s not sure I’m me.
I nod at her.
“We have to go,” she says.
I open my mouth to protest.
“I can’t control it, Bo,” Gwen says sympathetically. “We have to go.”
“But.”
“You really thought we were, like, special, didn’t you?”
I stare at the flames. I try to pull them back through time. You can kill a fire if you take away the oxygen; I want to take away the time it took to burn.
“I get it,” Gwen says. “If I could choose my own reality, I’d choose the one where I had powers. Where I had Sofía.”
I look at the bed again. The fire has spread. It’s in the walls now.
Sofía told me a story once, about how there was a family that had wolves in the walls. They hid behind the drywall and ate the family up at night, all because no one believed the little girl when she said there were wolves in the walls. It was a picture book for children.
? ? ?
I am alone in the room. Smoke boils on the ceiling.
Where did Gwen go?
When did Gwen go?
? ? ?
I’m losing time.
? ? ?
It’s always about time.
? ? ?
Ringing. Screaming. An alarm.
? ? ?
I step out of Sofía’s room, coughing, choking for air. I have to get out of here. I’ll die if I don’t. I’ll die like Sofía died.
No. Not like Sofía. Sofía died in the cold.
No. NO. Sofía’s not dead.
Smoke billows down the hallway; the flames have spread to other rooms.
? ? ?
You can’t control fire.
I close my eyes and think of the timestream. If I could just go back—just a little jump, just a few minutes ago, I could stop the fire from starting.
You can’t control time.
? ? ?
I throw my arm in front of my face, and I stumble-run down the hallway toward the stairs. As I pass a window, I see people fleeing, escaping the burning building. There’s a thumping sound, and sobbing, and it’s coming from the walls. Wolves in the walls. One of them knows my name.
The fire has jumped the hall, spreading over the wood paneling of the ceiling. Ashes and embers fall like rain. The carpet singes and smokes, black holes ringed with red, burning my bare feet as I run.
The fire alarm is going off. Sprinklers too.
But it’s all too late. Nothing will stop this fire. It will burn until there’s nothing left to burn.
I skid to the landing, barely stopping myself from tumbling down the steps into the foyer. People are streaming out the door—the cooks, the nurses, the other teachers. And I see the Doctor there, standing in front, waving his arm as if that’ll make people move faster.