Somewhen. Ava’s skin tingled.
“Without time, there couldn’t be space. There couldn’t be us.” Stanley held Ava’s gaze. “Time is the fabric that makes space possible.”
Ava silently repeated his words, memorizing them.
“Ava, you look like you’re studying for an exam,” Natasha said with a laugh.
“What about wormholes?” Ava asked. “Physicists say that a person could travel through a wormhole to go forward or backward in time. Is that right?”
“Okay, whoa,” said Natasha.
“In theory,” Stanley answered. “The problem is that wormholes collapse once matter enters them.”
“What’s a wormhole?” Natasha asked. “And Ava? Why are you suddenly interested in this stuff?”
Prickles at the back of Ava’s neck cautioned her to be careful. At the same time, talking about all this was exciting. Unlike Natasha and Darya, Stanley was giving her real answers to her real questions. He was taking her seriously.
To Natasha, she said, “Pretend you have Aunt Vera’s tape measure, the soft one she uses for sewing, and you’re holding it tight.” She demonstrated, pinching an invisible tape measure between her thumbs and index fingers and stretching it taut. “If you wanted to go from point A”—she indicated the left end of the pretend tape measure—“to point B”—she wiggled her right hand—“you’d walk across it. Easy-peasy.”
“If you were an ant,” said Natasha.
“If the tape measure was twelve inches long, you’d have to walk the entire twelve inches. But there’s a faster way.” Ava brought her hands together so that the invisible tape measure hung in a loop. “Now you, or the ant, can go from point A to point B in one step. See?”
“Not bad,” Stanley said. “Ava just might turn out to be a scientist, Natasha.”
“But wormholes collapse,” Natasha said. “You said so, Stanley.”
“They do, like how caves sometimes collapse on coal miners,” Stanley said. “That’s the problem: figuring out how to make wormholes stable enough to travel through.”
“And?” demanded Natasha.
Stanley shrugged. “It’s impossible. Well, so far.”
Natasha looked pointedly at Ava, who turned her attention to the TV, where Marty McFly winced as a bully humiliated his future dad.
“So time travel is impossible,” Natasha clarified. “Right, Stanley?”
“You would die,” Stanley replied. “Yes.”
“Do you hear that, Ava?” Natasha said. She raised her voice. “Ava.”
Ava startled, pretending she’d gotten so absorbed in the movie that she’d lost track of the conversation. Then she adopted a solicitous expression, as if humoring an elderly relative. “Right,” she said. “Time travel is impossible. Traveling through a wormhole would kill me.”
“Good,” Natasha said.
Ava sank back into the sofa. Flux capacitors, wormholes, the space-time continuum—it was helpful information, even though Ava was sure any traveling she did wouldn’t involve a DeLorean.
As for the “it’s impossible” bit? She silently recited her new mantra: Impossible situations require impossible solutions.
I wish people would quit thinking that saying “It’s complicated” makes things any better.
—AVA BLOK, AGE THIRTEEN, THREE MONTHS, AND TWO DAYS
CHAPTER FOUR
Ava
The next morning, Natasha and Darya cornered Ava in her room.
“Tomorrow is your Wishing Day,” Natasha informed her.
“It is?” Ava exclaimed. “Wow. How time flies!”
“Ha, ha,” Darya said. “Speaking of, that’s why we’re here. You are expressly forbidden from trying anything stupid like that yourself.”
“Like what?” Ava asked innocently. She allowed the you’re forbidden part to slide. Although what in the world made Natasha and Darya think they could forbid her from anything?
“Like flying through time, dum-dum,” Darya said, flicking Ava’s head.
“Like wishing to go to the past,” Natasha said. “I told Darya about your sudden fascination with science, and no.”
“I can’t be fascinated by science?”
Darya put her hands on her hips. “You can be fascinated with science all you want. What you can’t do is wish for a blowhole or whatever to open up and suck you through time.”
“Oh, please, I would never,” Ava said. A blowhole, after all, was the hole whales used to blow air out of water. Although . . . hmm. The image of ocean spray spouting from a whale made bubbles fizz and pop in her brain. Water. Air. Diving deep into water and leaping into the air. And babies, human babies, breathed water before they were born, didn’t they? Then, when it was time, out they popped into the air, born into a new and different world?
“We’re not trying to be bossy,” Natasha said.
You’re not? Ava thought.
“Just, we love you, and we want you to stay safe.”
“I love you, too,” Ava said, and she meant it. Her intentions were as love-based as theirs. “Of course I’ll be safe.”
“Also, I’ve said it already, but I’m going to say it again,” Darya said. “Leave Tally out of it.”
Like you did last night at dinner? Ava was tempted to say. How you went on and on about Tally’s amazing artistic ability, the ability that made it possible for Tally to draw such striking likenesses of real, live people?
Instead, she saluted Darya and said, “Heard and understood, Sergeant.” Darya could interpret her remark however she chose.
It was a Saturday, which meant no school. After scarfing down a toasted bagel slathered with cream cheese, she snuck Aunt Vera’s iPad into her backpack and escaped to do more research. Tomorrow was indeed her Wishing Day, as her sisters had so helpfully pointed out.
At Rocky’s, an old-fashioned diner with swivel chairs and booths with red benches, Ava ordered a chocolate milkshake and took it to a high, round table, where she hiked herself onto a tall stool. She took a long sip of her shake and pulled out her aunt’s iPad. She considered, for a moment, the unexpectedness of stodgy Aunt Vera even owning an iPad.
Aunt Elena, Mama and Aunt Vera’s youngest sister, had given the iPad to Aunt Vera on Aunt Vera’s most recent birthday. Aunt Vera had pooh-poohed it until Natasha walked her through the basics and showed her how to connect to the internet. Now
