envelope. Sure enough, that was my grandmother’s handwriting, same as on every birthday card and Christmas card. I shut the box and tucked it under one arm.
“What’s that?” said the thin man. His voice was showing some strain now. “The thing is, do I know you from somewhere? You ever … I don’t know … you ever wonder about your memories from a long time ago? Hey, what am I saying. You’re a kid. You don’t even have a long time ago, right?”
The seal on the envelope was old. It opened easily. Inside was a short letter.
“Maybe I do know you from somewhere,” said the man. “I think I can help with something. I think you’re Kenny Maxwell.” He stepped forward again, frowned, and looked at the coin in his hand. “Hey, there’s that tingling again. What does that mean? I think I used to know.”
That was enough. I took the box from under my arm, the large coin still rattling inside it, and stepped forward, thrusting it toward him.
He screamed. Blue sparks flashed in his hand, and he almost dropped his coin. The box insulated me from the shock of same-meeting-same, but I could feel the coin struggling inside it. Using the distraction of the blue sparks, I slammed into the man’s side and rushed past.
It felt a little like the last part of that “Going on a Lion Hunt” song the kids who go to camp always come back knowing. Down the creek bank, through the mud, across the creek, up the bank. At some point, the man calling himself Beckett took up the chase, while all along the large coin that bore his name clattered around in my wooden box. As I ran, my brain raced faster than my feet. Wasn’t Clive Beckett dead? Why did this man call himself Beckett and carry a coin with the name on it? He seemed more charming than the madman in the raincoat who had shot me. Was he Prince Harming? Were we wrong about that other man?
I risked a glance behind me as I reached the overhang above the hiding hole, as John Wald called it. Beckett wasn’t running. “It’s okay,” he shouted to me. “I just want to sort it out, who the man was. I can’t remember all of it. I just want to talk.”
I didn’t slow down.
When I reached the hedgerow that hid the carriage house, I ran into Lilly and Peggy coming out.
“Oh, there you are,” said Peggy. “What on earth is wrong with you?”
I almost collapsed onto them, heaving shuddering breaths.
“Kenny, is something wrong?” said Lilly.
“Man,” I gasped. “Chasing. Mirror.”
“Come on,” said Peggy.
As they pulled me through the hedges, I looked back, but I had lost him in the woods.
Only when we got inside the carriage house did I notice that the two of them were carrying large suitcases.
“What is this?” I said.
“Never mind,” said Peggy. “What are you running from? What man?”
“Prince Harming maybe. I think it’s a man who’s supposed to be dead. I don’t know.” What to do now? We couldn’t all just jump into the mirror, could we? Physically, of course, we could. If Lilly went in, she could pull us all back to 1937. If I went, I could take us in the opposite direction to Anthony’s time. But that would leave the mirror unprotected. What if Beckett took it and sunk it in the lake just as the other man had?
We had to do something.
It was Peggy who took charge. “Come on, then, help us up the stairs with these. We’ll talk once we’re through in Lilly’s time. I suppose we can find something to do with you.”
When she said “these,” I saw that she had a lot more than just the two suitcases I had seen them heaving through the door. Smaller overnight bags, a makeup case, and three pillowcases that looked stuffed with clothing and all sorts of knickknacks covered the floor.
“No,” I said. “We have to go.”
“Hold your horses, charley horse,” said Peggy. “Who’re you rushing? I have a lot of important things in these, and I’m not leaving them behind.”
Leaving them behind? I shook off the strangeness of the remark. “Look, whoever’s coming, it’s probably bad,” I said. I looked to Lilly for help.
“I think we should listen to him, Peg,” Lilly said after meeting my gaze for a moment. “Just—let’s get in what we can. Come on.”
I grabbed one bag to show my willingness to help, and herded them up the stairs, each of them carrying a suitcase.
The mirror and the sofa I had been sleeping on for the last three weeks were at the top of the stairs. Just being on the same floor as the thing calmed me a little. Whoever this man was, he didn’t seem to have it all together. We had the mirror and we knew the mirror. While Lilly and Peggy each lugged a suitcase into the mirror, I ran to the hayloft window. The hedges were shorter now, and over the top of them I could see the thin man. He was standing in the yard of the main house, looking around. I ducked back down and returned to the mirror in time to see Lilly and Peg come back out.
“What is this?” I said again, looking from one to the other. Lilly pursed her lips worriedly and looked to Peggy.
“What do you think it is?” said Peggy, fixing me with a stare. “Aren’t you the one who told me I’m disappearing?”
“But it’s not … it’s not until … ”
“Not until September, right? The hell it isn’t. You think I’m going to wait around for that? I’m not disappearing, I’m escaping.”
“But where will you … ?”
Lilly cleared her throat and gave me a shy smile. “She’s coming to stay with me, Kenny. We’ve talked about it and made a decision. Her parents are horrible, you know? They can’t make peace and they won’t stay apart. They insist on using Peg as a sort of cattle prod to stick each other with. If she’s going to disappear anyway, I’d rather take her with me.”
“But it’s not September,” I said.
“I have an idea about that,” said Peggy. “Mother went off again last night. Might not come back for a month. All it takes is for Father to not report me gone for a few weeks. Maybe he’ll think I’ve gone with her.” Her mouth twisted bitterly. “Maybe he won’t even notice.”
“Kenny!” came a shout from outside. “I just want to talk.”
Peggy narrowed her eyes at me. “Do you know who this man is?”
I shook my head. “He’s using the name of someone who died thirty years ago.”
“Come with us,” Lilly said. “I don’t know what we’ll do, Kenny, but it turns out Peg’s thought this through. She’s found a few investments my parents can make that will bring them some money. We both want to be nurses, and what with the war coming as Peg knows it is, she says there’ll be work for us. I don’t know how we’ll fit you in, but we must.”
“No.”
It’s funny about yes and no. I think I figured out that day that you make yourself who you are by what you choose to say those two words to, and maybe no is the one that really makes you. I had been saying yes just about all year long. Yes to going into the mirror. Yes to other kids’ plans.
Peggy had already begun her migration. She got Lilly to shove her hand in, opening the mirror up, and began moving the large suitcases inside. “Come on, kid, there’s no time for this. I guess Lilly’s right.”
