Time Between Us (10 page)

Four hours later, we return home to find that one minute has passed. Steam rises from the coffee mugs. The water is still ice cold. And I’m about to throw up.

“You don’t look so good.” Bennett leads me to the living room couch and instructs me to lie down. A voice that sounds far away says, “I’ll get you some crackers,” and in the distance I hear cabinets creaking open and shut. He comes back carrying a giant box of saltines.

He sits on the edge of the sofa, rubbing his temples, and looks down at me. “Interesting.” He’s watching me with a fascinated stare, like I’m a glob of unidentifiable goo in a petri dish. “It hits me in the head, and you and Brooke in the stomach.”

I see a white cracker coming toward me but I can’t even take it, and I cover my mouth and close my eyes to keep the room from spinning.
Please, God
, I beg in my head.
Please don’t let me throw up in front of him. Please. Just this one thing.
And I’m not sure if it’s time passing or the work of a higher power, but after a few horrible minutes the feeling washes away and I can open my eyes again. He’s still here. Still looking guilty and still holding that little cracker. This time I take it, nibble on the corner, and then try a larger bite.

“I’m so sorry,” he says, but I stare at him, confused, and even though my mouth is full I try to talk. “What did you say?” he asks. He looks so worried.

I swallow hard. “Worth it.” I give him a weak smile and grab another cracker. I eat a few more and sit up when he offers me a glass of water and orders me to take small sips. The room comes into clearer focus.

I run my fingernail up my pant leg and bring it back to examine the caked, wet sand. We’re home, back in the cold snow, and I’m wet and covered with sand from a Thai island. “No way.” My energy is starting to return. I laugh, shaking my head in disbelief. “This is so cool.” I look over at Bennett and find that his pants look the same.

I stand up, feeling just a little bit closer to normal again, and he follows me up the stairs to my parents’ room. I dig out an old pair of sweats and a T-shirt from my dad’s dresser, pass him the folded pile, and show him where the bathroom is.

When I’m alone in my room, I peel my clothes away from my skin. I take off my shirt and shake out my hair, watching in awe as sand flies though the air and sprinkles itself across my bedspread, and I can’t help giggling. I pull on a pair of tight-fitting black sweats and a sweatshirt from some 10K race I ran last year, and go back to sit on the bed. I run my palm across the granules and think about Ko Tao. About the heat of the sun and the salt of the ocean, and suddenly I’m so grateful for every last speck of sand—on my bed, on my carpet, in my hair, glued to my clothes—because they’re the only tangible things I have to remember this day by.

“Where should I put these?” Bennett’s voice shocks me back to reality, and I turn around to find him standing in my doorway, looking adorable in Dad’s Chicago Marathon sweatshirt.

I gather my sandy clothes up from the floor and meet him at the doorway. “I’ll take them,” I say, as I add his pile to mine.

He gently grabs my arm as I walk past him. “Hey…you okay? You looked sad for a minute there.”

“No, not at all.” I laugh it off. “I was just wishing I had a souvenir, like a postcard or something. It was silly. I’ll be right back.” I float down the stairway, my feet barely touching the wood.

I’ve left Evanston.

I’ve left the
country
.

I put the pile of sandy clothes on top of the dryer and walk into the kitchen to grab a plastic bag.

And Bennett’s in my bedroom.

I return to the laundry room, looking up the staircase as I pass.

Bennett just closed his eyes, held my hands, and took me to Thailand.

I scrape our clothing, collecting as much sand as I can inside the little bag, and zip it shut.

And now we’re back. And he’s in my
bedroom
?

I throw the clothes into the washing machine and stand there holding the bag of sand, listening to the water fill the drum, and thinking back to last night. I remember the expression on Bennett’s face as we stood in the bookstore’s Self-Help section, his voice quivering as he asked me the question.
Are you afraid of what I can do?
I wasn’t then. Am I now?

I’m not afraid of the fact that he can disappear and reappear. I’m not even afraid of the fact that he can travel back in time. I’m not afraid of what he can do. I
love
what he can do. But there’s more I don’t know, and the moment I have the thought I feel a knot form deep in my stomach. I
am
afraid—I’m afraid of whatever’s next. Whatever it is that might make me question whether or not I want to know him, even after we have spent the afternoon swimming in a sea so salty we were literally buoyant. Whatever it is, it can’t be bad enough to make me not want this daring adventure. And I picture him, alone in my bedroom, and suddenly I can’t wait to see him again. With the bag of sand tightly in my grasp, I run up the steps, taking them two at a time.

Bennett is standing in front of the wall of built-in shelving, examining my trophies and racing numbers. “Wow. How many races have you been in?”

“Eighty-seven.” I cross the room and drop the bagful of sand on my nightstand. It makes a little sound as it hits the surface and I’m happy for this confirmation that it’s real.

Bennett walks around the room, analyzing each trophy and photo. “This is incredible. You’re really good.”

“You sound surprised.”

“No.” He looks me in the eye and I feel my breath catch in my throat. “I’m impressed. Not surprised.”

He turns his attention from the trophies to what’s in between them: my CDs. He paces past the shelves, running his finger along the plastic spines of the jewel cases until he finds one, pulls it out, examines the cover, and then returns it to its alphabetized home. I lean back against my desk and watch him check out Blink-182,
Cheshire Cat
. Bush,
Sixteen Stone
. The Smashing Pumpkins,
Siamese Dream
.

“This is quite a collection.”

It probably looks like I’ve spent all my bookstore earnings on CDs. “My dad and the owner of the record store across the street are good friends. We swap books for music. It’s pretty much for my benefit.”

He removes a few more cases and pauses, letting his fingertip rest on one of the mixes. “What are these?” He removes one of the twenty or so cases painted in Justin’s trademark watercolor swirls.

“Running mixes. My friend, Justin, makes them for me. His dad owns the record store.”

He nods and turns away again before I can see the look on his face. While he continues examining my music collection, I press play and then shuffle on the stereo, and the lyrics to “Walk on the Ocean” start up immediately.

We spotted the ocean

At the head of the trail

“Hey, I’ve seen these guys,” he says without looking away from the bookshelves. “At a little club in Santa Barbara. They were pretty good.”

“You’ve seen them live?” I heard him the first time, but I have to say something, because my chest feels heavy as I stand here, picturing secluded Ko Tao, and listening to the song tell a story about traveling to a faraway ocean, stepping on stones, and coming home without any pictures to prove it.

“It’s sort of a hobby.”

“Who else have you seen?”

He shrugs and gestures toward the shelves. “Just about everyone here.” As if the exotic world destinations weren’t enough.

“Really?” My eyes wander to the bulletin board above my desk, where my lonely Pearl Jam stub is pinned, and I sigh. Even the things I’d treasured a couple of days ago look pathetic and trivial when I see them through his eyes.

He follows my eyes to the desk, then walks over and examines the stub. “No way.”

“What?”

He shakes his head hard, like he’s trying to dismiss a thought he doesn’t want to have. “Nothing. I’ve got this giant bowl of ticket stubs—” He holds his arms out wide to demonstrate the size of the bowl and confirm my assumption. He probably can’t believe I’ve only been to one concert.

And that’s when he spots the map. Now I really feel insignificant.

He walks over to get a closer look, and stands there, arms crossed, serious, examining it like it’s a piece in an art gallery. I cover my eyes in embarrassment and force myself to go and stand by his side.

“My dad made it for me. It’s supposed to mark all my travels.” I flash back to the night we sat in the coffeehouse when I told him about my plans to see the world someday, and I steal a sideways glance at his face. I wonder what he’s thinking. No, I
know
what he’s thinking. Like the lone ticket stub, the four little pins on my map must make a pretty sad statement, especially to someone who has never known limits. “As you can see, I’m off to a fine start.”

But he just looks at the map and says, “It’s fantastic.” After a long pause, he steps backward so he can take it all in. “See, now, I’ve never been to any of these places.” I laugh. “I’m serious,” he adds. Right. Like he wasn’t making fun of me.

I hold my palms flat like a balancing scale and lift them up and down like I’m weighing the destinations. “Let’s see. It’s a Tuesday. Should I go canoeing on Boundary Waters or rafting on the Amazon? The Amazon or
Boundary Waters
?” I stress the last destination like it’s the more interesting and exotic of the two. “It’s okay, Bennett. You don’t have to pretend to think it’s ‘fantastic.’” I look past him instead of into his eyes. “To tell you the truth, the map used to make me a little sad. I guess sometimes it still does.”

He steps in to close the distance that separates us, and I think I stop breathing when I feel the warmth of his skin next to mine. The oversize sweatshirt doesn’t show off his body the way his T-shirt did, but that doesn’t keep me from picturing the strong shoulders underneath, the way his arms cut through the water, and the way he pulled his body out of the surf. “Why does it make you sad?”

As I look at him, my chest is tight with the feeling of holding back what I really want to say. “Four pins,” I finally squeak, as I shoot him a fake smile and try not to look like I care quite so much. We stare at each other but say nothing.

Then Bennett reaches past me into the clear plastic container of pins and takes one by the sharp silver point. He holds it up. The tiny round red tip looks enormous in the small space between us.

“Five,” he says, extending his hand.

I reach out to take the pin from his fingers and stare at it, pressing my lips together so I won’t cry. “I don’t even know where it is,” I finally say with an embarrassed laugh.

“Right there.” His voice is kind, not at all condescending, as he points to an unmarked speck in the Gulf of Thailand.

I consider the dot on the map, not much larger than the tip of the pin itself, and wonder how something so tiny could mark the most extraordinary four hours of my life. Then I look at Bennett, dressed in my dad’s sweats, his shaggy hair still peppered with sand. His expression is sweet and soft and, if it’s possible, even more grateful than mine. He gave me this gift today, but I can’t help feeling like I gave him one too.

I consider the pin once again and step forward to meet the map. I’m still fighting back happy, overwhelmed tears as I reach out, hands shaking, and press it firmly into the tiny island of Ko Tao.

I make grilled-cheese sandwiches and we sit on the couch, eating and trying to think of something to say. He’s not starting in on the rest of his secrets, and we’re way beyond small talk, so I turn on the TV and flip channels just for something to do, but there isn’t much to watch at two thirty on a weekday. Not that Bennett seems to care; he finds the commercials far more amusing than the actual shows, but refuses to tell me why. More important, he doesn’t seem at all concerned that our day’s running out, and he still hasn’t told me everything. I still don’t even know the rest of the
second
thing.

I lift the remote with a dramatic gesture, stare at him, and click the power off. The room goes silent, and he turns to me. “I’m ready for the rest of the second thing.”

“Haven’t you had enough for one day?”

I shake my head.

“Okay.” He sits back against the cushions again and twists to face me. He props his arm up on the back of the couch, and for a moment, it’s as if we’re back in the coffeehouse, telling each other our secrets. He gives me a little grin, and the small, insignificant gesture makes me want to lean over and kiss him to get it over with. But I’m afraid if I do, I’ll never hear the rest.

He takes a deep breath. “I can go anywhere in the world, but
when
I travel is…restricted. I can go into other
times
, but only within certain dates.” He stares at me like he’s waiting for me to react, and when I don’t, he opens his mouth to continue.

“Wait.” I hold my finger up in front of me and listen.

“What?” he asks.

I hear a car door slam. Mom or Dad would have come in through the garage, so it can only be one person. “Emma,” I say in a panic. I’m not ready for Bennett to leave, but I’m also not prepared to explain why he is sitting in my living room.

“Don’t worry. I’ll go.” He grabs my hand and gives it a little shake. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says. I watch as his hand, still holding mine, becomes transparent. Then it’s gone with the rest of him. I wonder if I’ll ever get used to this.

She knocks hard on the front door and then rings the doorbell for good measure.

“Coming!” I yell as I slide the two plates and their leftover grilled-cheese passengers under the couch and inspect the room for other signs that I haven’t spent the day alone. When I open the door, Emma practically falls through it. “Oh, my God!” she yells as she drops her backpack on the floor and wraps her arms around me. “I heard what happened last night! Are you okay?”

Last night? The robbery? Was that
last
night?

“I’m fine,” I hear myself say over the deafening thump of my own heartbeat.

“I’ve been trying to get here since I heard, but Dawson caught me trying to leave campus, and I couldn’t escape after that!” Her voice is high-pitched and dramatic. “I’ve been so worried. Are you seriously okay? Do you want to talk about it?” She plops down in the exact spot Bennett was just sitting in.

“Not really,” I huff. But I can tell from Emma’s eager eyes that the protective side of her needs to know I’m okay and the gossipy side can’t help wanting to hear every detail. Since I can’t tell her that I spent the day on a Thai beach and I’m not sure I’m ready to tell her about Bennett, I figure I might as well give her what she wants. “It all happened so fast.”