* Read via NetGalley
* Spoilers are highlighted like so
:)
“I’VE READ MANY more books than you.”
“MY DISEASE IS as rare as it is famous.”
“MOVIE NIGHT OR Honor Pictionary or Book Club?”
“I’M READING ON my white couch when Carla comes in the next morning.”
“I’M UP TO the part where Charlie realizes that the mouse’s fate may be his own when I hear a loud, rumbling noise outside.”
“August 5
The family in the house next door moved away.”
“CARLA,” I SAY, “it won’t be like last time.”
“THAT NIGHT, I dream that the house breathes with me.”
“HIS MOM’S SCHEDULE
6:35 AM - Arrives on porch with a steaming cup of something hot.”
“HIS FAMILY CALLS him Olly.”
“I’VE JUST SAT down at the dining table for dinner.”
“BACK IN MY room, I go immediately to my bedroom window.”
“HOW LONG ARE going to mope around the house?”
“TWO DAYS PASS and I’ve stopped moping.”
“I’M JUST SETTLING in to bed when the pings begin again.”
“I CAN’T STAND it.”
“THE BUNDT IS sitting on a table next to the window.”
“THE BUNDT IS lying on a white sheet.”
“I TELL MYSELF that I won’t look, but as soon as the first ping sounds I’m at the window.”
“Hello, I guess we should start with introductions?”
“Wednesday, 8:15 P.M.”
“MR. WATERMAN’S ON his way up,” Carla says from the doorway.”
CARLA’S SMILING AT me like she knows something I don’t know.”
“MAYBE HE COULD come over for a visit?”
“I TRY AGAIN.”
“FIFTEEN MINUTES?”
“PLEASE, CARLA—”
She cuts me off.”
“CARLA DOESN’T SAY anything about it again until just after lunch two days later.”
“By the time you read this we will have met.”
“THE SUNROOM IS my favorite room in the house.”
“HYSTERICAL ABDOMINAL RHOPALOCERA
The condition of having one or more monarch butterflies take up residence in the stomach.”
“BEFORE CARLA ARRIVES the next morning I spend exactly thirteen minutes in bed convinced that I am getting sick.”
“AND IT’S THE wanting that pulls me back down to earth hard.”
“THERE’S NO EMAIL from Olly.”
“Monday, 8:09 P.M.”
“CARLA MAKES US wait a week before we can see each other again.”
“AFTER AN EPOCH, the week finally ends.”
“OLLY’S ON THE wall again when I enter the room.”
“MY CONSTANT IMING with Olly is catching up with me.”
“NUMBER OF:
minutes it takes Olly’s dad to begin yelling after he arrived home last night:
8...”
“HE’S NOT ON the wall when I see him again the next day.”
“TEN-YEAR-OLD OLLY AND his dad are at the breakfast bar in their old penthouse apartment in New York City.”
“YOUR MOTHER WANTS to know if I’ve noticed anything different about you lately,” says Carla from across the living room.”
“We’ve received your credit card application”
“NORMAL PEOPLE PACE when they’re nervous.”
“I READ ONCE that on average, we replace the majority of our cells every seven years.”
“Later, 8:16 P.M.”
“TWENTY-FOUR HOURS LATER, kissing is all I think about.”
“OLLY’S NOT ON the wall.”
“Later, 8:03 P.M.”
“THE UNIVERSE AND my subconsciousness may be conspiring against me.”
“I’M ALMOST ASLEEP that night when my door opens.”
“THE NEXT MORNING I wake to yelling.”
“I PULL THE curtains aside as soon as I’m back in my room.”
“MY MOM WORDLESSLY kneels to gather scraps of drawing form our game of Honor Pictionary and stacks them into a neat pile.”
“MY NEW NURSE is an unsmiling despot with a nursing degree.”
“OLLY’S SCHEDULE
6:55 AM — Stands at window.”
“WITH OLLY BACK in school, our IM sessions are even more limited.”
“I’VE CANCELED YET another mother-daughter night, so my mom stops by my room.”
“OLLY’S ALREADY WAITING for me when I go to the window.”
“SOMETIMES I REREAD my favorite books from back to front.”
“A WEEK LATER, something startles me awake.”
“SOMETIMES THE WORLD reveals itself to you.”
“IT’S A STRANGE thing to realize that you’re willing to die.”
“Dear Mom,
The first thing is that I love you.”
“HEARING
The alarm’s keypad tries to announce my escape by emitting a loud BEEP each time I press a number.”
“WE COME TO our senses.”
“MADS, BE SERIOUS.”
“CARLA SCREAMS AND covers her face when she first sees me.”
“Q” What is the best way to relieve earaches caused by changes in cabin pressure?”
“I’VE DECIDED BAGGAGE carousels are a perfect metaphor for life,” Olly says from atop the edge of a nonmoving one.”
“ACCORDING TO THE guidebook, Maui is shaped like a head.”
“OUR HOTEL SITS right on the beach and we can see and smell the ocean from the small, open-air lobby.”
“I FEEL MUCH better after we grab a quick bite to eat.”
“IT’S POSSIBLE THAT I should’ve tried on the swimsuit before I bought it.”
“I SURPRISE OLLY by getting into the water right away.”
“BACK AT THE hotel, Olly calls his friend, Zach, from our room phone.”
“IT’S LATE AFTERNOON by the time we get back to the hotel.”
“I COME AWAKE slowly, languidly until I realize what we’ve done.”
“ACCORDING TO THE Big Bang theory, the universe came into being in one single moment—”
“OLLY SMILES.”
“SOMEONE HAS PUT me in a hot oven and locked the door.”
“I DON’T REMEMBER much, just a jumbled mix of images.”
“MY MOM HAS transformed my bedroom into a hospital ward.”
“Wednesday, 6:56 P.M.”
“I’M IN AN endless field filled with red poppies.”
“I’M STRONGER WITH each passing day.”
“THE NEXT DAY, Carla bustles in.”
“HIS DAD’S SCHEDULE
9:00 AM - LEAVES FOR WORK”
“A MONTH LATER, just after Christmas, his dad moves away, too.”
“OLLY’S MATH SAYS you can’t predict the future.”
“I READ THE e-mail six times before the letters form words and the words form sentences that I can understand, but, even then, the meaning of all the words taken together eludes me.”
“CARLA’S BARELY IN the door before I’m on her with the letter.”
“ALL I HAVE to do is go to sleep—quiet my mind, relax my body, and go to sleep.”
“I RUN FROM the office.”
“ONCE UPON A time there was a girl whose entire life was a lie.”
“A UNIVERSE THAT can wink into existence can wink out again.”
“FOUR DAYS PASS.”
“I SPEND THE next few days searching for more information, for anything that will explain what happened to me and what happened to my mother.”
“I HAVE MY first weekly visit with Dr. Chase.”
“MY MOM TRIES to enter my room, but the door is locked with me in it.”
“I PAINT EACH wall in my room a different color.”
“I ORDER REAL plants for the sunroom.”
“DR. CHASE INSISTS that it’s too soon for me to attempt enrolling in high school.”
“A WEEK LATER Carla and I watch as Mr. Waterman makes his way across the lawn and to his car to leave.”
“A WEEK LATER my mom knocks on my door.”
“I OPEN THE present from my mom.”
“I STARE OUT the window of the airplane and see miles and miles of greenery sectioned into perfect squares.”
“EVEN AT 9 A.M.”
