Conjured

“I mean, it’s obviously not my power.” Crashing through the underbrush, Zach hurried to catch up to her. “I have never been able to do a single thing like that before. Believe me, I tried. I was that kid who used to attempt the Jedi mind trick on his teachers in elementary school. For art class, I fashioned my own Harry Potter wand. Lacked a phoenix feather, though. But when I kissed you … I was thinking how kissing you was like floating on air—and we did. And the second time, I deliberately imagined us levitating.”

“And the books flying?”

“I wanted to see what else we could do. So I imagined that. And it worked!” Up ahead, the trees were thinning, and she saw bits of roofs and corners of houses through the branches. “My current theory,” Zach continued, “is that we’re like the Wonder Twins, except with lips instead of rings. And you know, not related. Not at all related. Because that would be disgusting.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Alternately, and more likely, it has nothing at all to do with who I am. I could be anybody. You’re transferring your magic to me, and then I’m using it. You’re the only special one.”

Eve looked back at the rock. A snake slithered down the face of the boulder and disappeared into the underbrush. “Can we walk faster?” Continuing to look backward, she didn’t notice that they’d reached the edge of the woods until Zach stopped.

He pointed across a street. “That’s my house.”

Zach’s house could have been plucked from the cover of a beautiful-homes magazine. On the left and right, the yards were parched yellow, but his was vibrant green, mowed to look more like carpet than a live plant. The house itself was pristine white and had a porch with two white rocking chairs and a wind chime that hung listlessly in the still air.

Eve took a step out of the bushes and then stopped as she heard a car turn onto Zach’s street. She retreated and crouched behind a tree.

A blue car drove past them.

She emerged again and checked to the right and left, aware that she was mimicking the way Malcolm always checked the street. Several houses down, a neighbor was mowing his lawn. A few houses beyond that, a brown dog slept on a porch. Eve didn’t see anything that seemed threatening or unusual. She started across the street.

Zach didn’t move.

“What is it?” Eve asked. She turned back to him and was rocked with another burst of memory: she’d been fleeing with her family. Or maybe it wasn’t her family, but she knew them well. At some point, she had fallen, and a man had picked her up and carried her over his shoulder as if she were as light as a jacket. She hadn’t been left behind.

Zach pointed to a silver car in the driveway. “My mom’s home.”

“Oh.” Eve tried to picture the people who had run with her. Family or not? The man who had carried her, had he been her father? Brother? Uncle? “Is that … bad?”

He still didn’t move.

“Back to the woods or to the house?” She felt too exposed outside the bushes. Anyone in any nearby house could see her. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a red car speed past their street. She tensed, ready to run, but it didn’t turn.

Zach shook himself. “Sorry. House.”

Eve bolted across the street, down the slate walkway, and onto the porch. Zach’s house had an antique door knocker and two baskets of flowers that framed the door. Several long seconds later, Zach joined her.

Slowly, so slowly that Eve wanted to grab the key herself, Zach drew a key out of his pocket. As he slid it into the lock, the front door opened. A woman in a pink shirt and white capris was framed in the doorway. “Yes?” She had pearls around her neck and a faded bruise on her left cheekbone, mostly obscured by makeup. She wore a layer of makeup over her face, her eyelids, and her lips, as if it were a thin plastic mask. “Oh, Zach! You’re home! And you brought a friend.”

This must be Zach’s mother, Eve thought. He had her lips, though hers weren’t curved into a smile like Zach’s often were. Her cheeks were so smooth that Eve wondered if she ever smiled.

“This is Eve,” Zach said. “She works with me at the library.”

“How lovely,” his mother said.

Eve checked the street as a blue SUV barreled by. For an instant, she couldn’t breathe. But the car didn’t slow, and she glimpsed a family inside it.

“I invited her to lunch.” Zach was peering over his mother’s shoulder as if he expected to see someone else with her.

“Delightful,” his mother said.

Another car, a black one, turned onto the street. She had to get inside, or at least out of sight. She inched closer to the door.

“I didn’t think you’d be home,” Zach said. “Is everything okay?”

Zach’s mother’s eyes brightened. “Of course, Zachary! Don’t be silly. Can’t I have a change in plans without causing concern? Come in, please, both of you.” She opened the door wider.

Eve darted inside. She flattened against the wall and watched through the window as a black car with tinted windows crept down the street. It rolled past the house without stopping. Her rib cage loosened, and she took a deep breath.