Item: a wrinkled napkin from High Score, a sports bar that had closed a couple years ago, probably because its TV was only thirty-two inches wide and its waitresses, who mostly looked like they’d been around since the Eisenhower administration, preferred using it to catch up on SOAPnet reruns of Dynasty and Melrose Place. For her sixteenth birthday, Harper had given Miranda her very first fake ID. It was crude and cheap, and claimed Miranda was a twenty-one-year-old Virginian named Melanie DeWitt, born May 27, Gemini, residing on Applewood Road, Manassas, Virginia, 20108. All details Miranda had struggled to memorize before they set out to test her new identity at High Score, where it was reputed that they’d let in a second grader if she flashed a homemade library card with her picture taped to it. Miranda was still nervous, forcing Harper to give her a pep talk before they strutted past the bouncer, flashing their ridiculous IDs, and sat down at a bar together for the first time. And despite the gross tables, nasty smells, and cheap beer, it had been the first truly great night of Miranda’s life.
Item: a program from the ninth-grade musical, Oliver! Miranda had wanted to try out-and, given the size of their school, “try out” really meant “write your name on the list and Mr. Grady will assign you your part.” But Harper had labeled it TLFU, Too Lame For Us. Lots of things were TLFU that year, which, not coincidentally, had marked the beginning of Harper’s rise to the top of the social stratosphere. White sneakers, boy bands, binders, the color pink (in the previous year, now out once again), eighth-grade boys, PG movies, sparkly nail polish-all TLFU. It was a lot for Miranda to remember, which was why, as in the case of the school musical, Harper had to keep reminding her. But they’d gone to see it, because Harper had scored them an invitation to the cast party, hosted by geeky Mara Schneider, whose brother Max was a junior and topped the official list of high school hunks. Max was supposed to be at the party, but didn’t show. Instead, Harper and Miranda got stuck in a corner with Barry and Brett Schanker. Barry had played the Artful Dodger, Brett had played the trumpet in the pit; both were pale, gangly, pockmarked, and intent on getting Harper and Miranda to play Twister with them in Mara Schneider’s rec room. Instead, Harper and Miranda had escaped into the backyard, where they’d spent the night dangling their feet in the Schneiders’ pool, smoking a full pack of cigarettes (courtesy of Brett Schanker), getting drunk on the hot pink “Kool-Aid-plus” punch, and pretending that they were the only two people there, or at least the only two who mattered. By the end of the night, Miranda had thrown up in the bushes, Harper had nearly fallen into the pool, and, in an act of mad courage (or courageous madness), they’d snuck up to Max’s room and snagged a pair of his boxers. (White, size medium, and covered in bright yellow happy faces; Max, they decided, was definitely TLFU.)
Item: a dried carnation from tenth-grade Valentine’s Day, left over from the bouquet Harper had given Miranda when she freaked out about not having a boyfriend.
Item: a magazine clipping of a tropical island, where they’d dreamed of someday co-owning a vacation house with their unspeakably wealthy and unbelievably handsome husbands.
Item: a Scrabble tile, rescued from the trash, after Harper-tired of losing each and every rainy day-had dumped the game.
Item: a thin, green plastic ring purchased for a quarter from a gumball machine. They’d each bought one, pledging to wear them forever. Miranda had lost hers first-this was Harper’s, because they both knew that Miranda’s card board boxes were the only place it would be safe.
Miranda rubbed her eyes. She’d been looking through the boxes for hours, as if something in one of them would be able to explain what was happening. But there were no answers, only the record of a friendship that should have been enough.
It was enough for Miranda-it had, for all these years, been nearly everything, and here was the proof. So why did Harper need so much more? And why was she willing to trash it, for Adam, for Kane, for Kaia, for anything?
Miranda had been willing to put everything aside for Harper s time of need, because that’s what best friends do. But it was obvious now: Whatever Harper needed, it wasn’t her.
Sometimes, she knew it was a dream while it was happening.
“Where are we?” she asked Kaia, gaping at the tiny huts lining the cobblestone streets. They wound up and around into the hills, giving way to long stretches of emerald green vineyards. On the other side, the land dropped off abruptly, and at the base of a cliff lapped the waters of a calm, turquoise sea.
“Italy,” Kaia said, looking bored. She slipped on a pair of sunglasses, despite the cloudy sky. “A little fishing village on the Riviera.”
“But I’ve never been here,” Harper said, confused. She’d never been out of California, not that she would have admitted it to Kaia, with her passport stuffed full of stamps from glamorous getaways to international hot spots.
“I have,” Kaia said, shrugging. “It gets old.”
“But this is my dream,” Harper pointed out. She wandered down one of the uneven paths, stopping just before the land dropped off to nothingness. Keeping her back to the town and staring out over the cliff face, she felt like she was on the edge of the world. “How can-?”
“You want to argue?” Kaia asked, stretching out on the ground as if she were at the beach. “Or you want to get a tan?”
Harper tossed a small rock over the edge of the cliff She tried to follow its way down, but didn’t see it land. “What are we doing here? What are you doing here? You’re…”
“Can’t say it, can you?” Kaia laughed bitterly. “Dead. Kaput. Kicked the bucket. Passed over to… woooooooh…” She made her voice dramatically low and solemn, “the Other Side”
“I was going to say, ‘You’re annoying me,’” Harper corrected her. “Can’t you just leave me alone?”
“I did leave you alone. Isn’t that the problem?” Kaia stood up and brushed herself off. “Why else are you acting like such a mental case?” Before Harper could answer-not that she had an answer-Kaia wandered over to a small storefront, where she haggled with a stooped old man. She came back a moment later with an ice-cream cone heaped high with dripping scoops of chocolate and handed it to Harper.
“None for you?” Harper asked.
“Some of us actually care about our figures,” Kaia said, giving Harper a pointed look. She ignored it and took a big, slippery mouthful. It was chilly and delicious and, just like everything else, seemed somehow more real than waking life. For weeks, everything had looked gray, tasted dull; but here, even the air tasted sweet, and the ocean blazed a brilliant blue.
She stared down at the jagged rocks at the base of the cliff. The waves slammed against them, frothy geysers spurting several feet into the air. Harper crept closer to the edge, feeling a strange sense of power and possibility. Taking another step seemed like such a small, routine choice-she took steps every day, thousands of them-but the next one could launch her into midair, hundreds of feet above the ground.
What happens if you die in a dream? she wondered.
And maybe she wouldn’t die at all-maybe the water would cushion her and she would float away. Or maybe, since it was a dream, she would step off the ground and discover she could fly.
She was too afraid to find out.
“I don’t blame you.” Kaia’s voice was almost lost in the thunder of the crashing surf.
Harper didn’t turn around. It was all so easy for Kaia. It always had been. She just did whatever the hell she wanted, and then walked away. Disappeared. Harper was the one left to face the consequences. Harper was the one left to bear the pain.