“For some people,” Dylan mumbled as Hunter pulled the front door shut behind him.
Dylan left his half-eaten cereal and went out to the city bus stop on the corner. He was supposed to walk to school. Drury High. But he wasn’t going to Drury. Everyone mistook him for Hunter; he might as well make the most of it.
He got on the bus thinking of that gold cuff. Remember me.
The bus dropped him off at Hevlen late. Can a person be late if he isn’t enrolled?
He went to philosophy, which was the only class worth going to school for, and wasn’t offered at Drury. He had to do stuff like this when his brain went numb from boredom.
Mr. Conrad looked up, brow furrowed, when Dylan walked in. Dylan could sense the man’s vorpal whirring weakly like a run-down clock. Dylan stood rooted to the spot and tried to figure out if Conrad recognized him this time. Or if he remembered that Hunter didn’t take philosophy this period. “I, uh, have to switch to first period for today, because . . .” Dylan’s voice trailed off.
Conrad spoke to the class: “Mr. Yates here is demonstrating the principle of sufficient reason: There must be a reason he has walked in during the middle of my class.”
Dylan’s face burned.
“But that does not mean his tardiness happened for any end,” Conrad went on. “A reason but not a reason. Have a seat, Mr. Yates.”
Dylan hesitated. It took him a moment to figure it out: He thinks I’m Hunter after all. He dropped into an empty chair.
Conrad turned back to the board, paused. His vorpal grated against Dylan’s bones, searching, and then retreated from Dylan’s reach. “Is it you who plays basketball?” he asked Dylan. “I’m told we won the game Saturday.” He didn’t wait for an answer, just went back to scribbling on the board.
Everyone else in the room still had their gazes trained on Dylan. He could almost hear their thoughts. Great game. Nice job.
It wasn’t so bad sometimes, being mistaken for Hunter.
In fact, Dylan had to admit to himself the real reason it happened so often: He wanted it to.
During morning break, Dylan found a bench in the quad and started scribbling in his notebook the things he remembered about the Other Place: the drum of bird wings under the tower roof, the whir of wind-up clocks in the hall.
He remembered discovering a carved tree in the palace garden whose branches were really handles that rang hidden bells.
He remembered the maze of boardwalks over marshland, and crouching to rescue a tiny creature all covered in spines, only to have it pierce his hand.
He remembered floating in ocean water so buoyant he’d half expected to look down and find he’d grown a fish tail, and then wishing he had grown a tail, because it would mean he would never leave, that he belonged there.
Something tugged at Dylan’s attention. He sensed Chess even before he saw her sitting under the trees at a table, sharing a pair of earbuds with another girl.
He stood up and walked across the quad, feeling drawn to the gold bracelet glinting on her wrist. Could he get it back from her? Probably not, but Hunter could.
That was another thing about Dylan’s vorpal—usually he could use it to convince someone who wanted to be convinced. And who at Hevlen wouldn’t rather be around Hunter than around Dylan? Especially Hunter’s girlfriend.
She turned to flash him a knee-weakening smile. Then she froze, yanked the earbud away. The buzz of some pop song with an urgent beat accompanied her sudden confusion.
“Movie tonight, huh?” he blurted, scanning the science fiction film club flyer she held in her hands, hoping to distract her from whatever was making her look at him like that. Kate Chesterfield was listed as the film club’s president. Chess? Had to be her.
Chess’s gaze narrowed. “The Day the Earth Stood Still.”
Dylan’s gaze went to the gold band that had slid down her arm. “You’re wearing the bracelet.”
She put a protective hand over it, scrutinized Dylan. He could hear her vorpal, undeveloped as it was, snick-snick-snick. Why were everyone else’s vorpals so much weaker than Dylan’s? Impossible to say. Maybe it ran in families—his brother’s was stronger than most, but he never used it, didn’t really know how.
“You’re Hunter’s brother.” She tilted her head to one side. “From the pawnshop.”
“Dylan,” he said, a bit deflated.
“Took me a minute to recognize you.”
Dylan shifted his stance. Well, it had almost worked. He looked at the bracelet. He could still ask for it back—she’d been nervous about taking it from the shop.
An image popped into Dylan’s head: Chess smiling at him, the gold robot mask pushed up over her dark hair. Like a matching set, mask and bracelet.
He tore his gaze away from her and pointed to the flyer. “Which appendage will it cost me to get into your club?”
“What?”
“Arm? Leg? I’m prepared to give both.”
She looked him over.