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  She started to write a list, and she was surprised at not just the number, but also the variety, of secrets that surrounded her.

  Karen had a new hobby.

  Chapter 3

  The next day time stopped again for Karen Richardson. She couldn’t recall it ever happening two days in a row, but that didn’t bother her. After all, there’d never been any rhyme or reason as to when time stopped. Sometimes it was a couple of times a week over the course of a month, and other times, it seemed like forever. Once she remembered going almost six months, and she’d felt like a normal kid for the first time in as long as she could remember.

  At sixteen, she’d now lived with her weird relationship with time for almost a decade, and she no longer questioned how it happened, why, when, or anything else. There were never any answers, and so why frustrate herself by questioning? She might as well ask a fruit fly about faster-than-light travel.

  Except … .

  There was something about that guy—Bobby. He seemed confident. She’d only seen him that one time at the beach, two years earlier. He had hinted at information. He said he’d show her how to fly, and she still thought about that.

  Karen enjoyed science, even though she sometimes wished she didn’t, and she wondered if Bobby had figured out how to mess with gravity. Force equalled g mass (Earth) mass (Karen) divided by the square of the distance to the center of the world. What if somehow her mass was actually zero when time stopped? That would make the force of gravity zero too.

  But her mass wasn’t zero. If she jumped into the air, she came back down the same as she always did.

  God’s keeping score.

  Well, God or some other freakish cosmic comedian.

  Karen had avoided the beach for a year after meeting Bobby. He scared her.

  Slowly, though, she started slipping back. Watching people on the beach was one of her favorite hobbies, and walking in the ocean relaxed her.

  She went back the day after starting to write her Secrets Journal.

  Wading in the water, she thought about going for a swim, but it was colder than normal and she wasn’t really feeling it.

  “Hi again.”

  She froze and tried to pretend she hadn’t heard him, knowing how silly that was.

  “You can’t just ignore me. I’m not fucking blind. You’re right in front of me.”

  She turned. He was only two feet from her. At first he frowned but then he relaxed and smiled.

  “Don’t worry. I don’t bite.”

  He laughed and reached out to take her hand. Karen was too surprised to complain, and then she realized that the warmth of his hand actually felt nice on hers.

  “It’s been a long time,” she said.

  “Miss me?”

  She felt herself flush and stared down at the sand.

  He laughed and moved closer, then used one finger to lift her chin.

  “You’re cute.”

  Karen didn’t know what to say or do. No boy had ever said anything like that to her.

  She knew he was the same age she was, sixteen, but somehow he gave off an aura that made him seem much older. If she hadn’t known better, she would have said he was at least twenty.

  His face was smooth and handsome, his brown eyes staring at her own blue ones. For once, time seemed to stop for Karen, as she looked at the stranger. She couldn’t move, as if he held her in a trance.

  Then he leaned over and kissed her softly on her lips. Her mind wanted to stop him but her body wouldn’t let her. She felt his mouth on hers and pressed herself to him. His tongue found his way between her lips, and she loved the way it made her feel. Somewhere along the line she had closed her eyes, and she wanted the moment to last forever.

  It was her first real kiss. She remembered kissing Jeff and Bonnie when she was free to do whatever she wanted, but that wasn’t the same. This was real.

  Bobby suddenly pulled back.

  “Not bad, kid. You might be worth kissing one day, but not yet.”

  “What?”

  “Besides, you didn’t come all this way to kiss me. What are you really here for?”

  Karen pursed her lips and felt a rush of anger.

  “You’re not that great yourself, you know.”

  He laughed, a long, loud laugh that would have embarrassed her if there was anybody who could hear.

  “Actually, I am.”

  “Modest, too, I see.”

  He laughed again.

  “So what do you want, kiddo? Why are you really here? You want to know how to fly, don’t you?”

  So he does know.

  Her mind imagined her floating over the beach, high above the frozen visitors. There was a way to do it. Somehow he could use their special talent to soar with the eagles … .

  Karen tried to say, “Yes, that’s what I want,” but her mouth was dry and she didn’t trust herself to get the words out. She just nodded twice.

  “It’ll cost you.”

  “What?” she whispered.

  “We’ll get to that.”

  Bobby smiled. She wanted him to kiss her again, but he looked away and she knew that wasn’t happening again anytime soon.

  “You remember my name?” he asked.

  “Bobby Jersey.”

  “And who are you?”

  “Karen Richardson.”

  “Yeah, that’s right. You told me that two years ago. I wanted to be sure you didn’t give me a different name. Be sure you didn’t lie to me last time.”

  He started down the beach, and she kept pace beside him. They walked around most of the people, and she saw that he stared as they passed. It was like he was looking for somebody but didn’t know if it was a man or a woman. He stared at everyone equally.

  “You ever do things you wouldn’t do if time wasn’t stopped?” he asked. “You know, things you’d be ashamed of if anybody knew?”

  She thought back to her Secrets Journal and all the times she’d snuck into her neighbors’ houses to find what they’d been hiding.

  “No. Nothing like that.”

  “Bullshit. Stop wasting my fucking time. How could you not?”

  Karen started looking at the people they passed just as intently as Bobby did, without a clue what she was looking for.

  He stopped and said, “You’re doing it right now. You’d never stare at people like that if they could see you.”

  “Well, that’s not much.”

  “You lied to me, though.”

  “Whatever. So, big man, tell me what you’ve done that’s so damned secretive.”

  He stared at her and didn’t say anything. Then he started walking away again, continuing to look at the strangers.

  “Don’t need to tell you,” he said. “I can show you just as easily.”

  He kept looking and finally stopped at a man standing beside a lawn chair, his feet ankle-deep in the water. He wore a straw hat and a smile, and both looked ridiculous. He was fat, at least three hundred pounds, with his belly spilling over his bathing suit.

  “Looks like an asshole, doesn’t he?”

  Karen didn’t think the guy looked any different than any other guy, but she didn’t want to get Bobby off track. “Whatever,” she said.

  Bobby reached to the guy and pulled down his bathing suit, so it was beneath the water at his feet. It looked like he was naked.

  Karen stared at the man’s tiny penis and couldn’t help giggling, while at the same time feeling horrible.

  “You can’t do that!”

  “You just watched me. Of course I can.”

  Part of her wanted to be around when time started, to see the man’s reaction. She’d never done anything like that before, never imagined it.

  A gear clicked in her mind, and she realized that a whole new level of excitement lay ahead of her. Then she took a deep breath when she came back to her senses, knowing she could never do anything to humiliate somebody like that.

  Bobby laughed, and she realized he wasn’t laughing at the man but a
t her.

  “You’re so fucking cute,” he said. Then he laughed again. “Have you ever even seen a cock? You haven’t, have you? That’s not exactly a good example, in case you’re wondering.”

  She shook her head in disgust. “You’re just awful.”

  He turned, looked toward the ocean, and whispered, “I know.”

  For one split instant, Karen felt sorry for him and realized that she knew very little about Bobby. She had no clue why sometimes he seemed to like her and other times he treated her like shit.

  What secrets do you hide, Bobby Jersey?

  She’d likely never know the answer. Karen looked at him from behind as he continued to stare out to the water, quiet and lonely-looking. She resisted the temptation to reach around and hug him.

  Suddenly, Bobby turned to face her. “Come with me, sweetie. You get to pick the next person.”

  “I’m not pulling anybody’s bathing suit down.”

  “No, this would be different.”

  “What are you looking for?”

  “Pick anybody. There must be a thousand people here, so just pick one for me.”

  For me. She liked the sound of that. It wasn’t something he was going to expect her to do.

  She walked slowly, feeling sand mush between her toes.

  There was an ice cream stand about twenty feet from the shore, attached to a pair of washrooms. She turned to move in that direction, although she wasn’t really sure why.

  Bobby followed her obediently.

  “Tell me about flying,” she said.

  “Knew you’d ask that.”

  “If you want me to pick somebody for you to humiliate, you tell me about flying.”

  He grabbed her by putting both his hands on her shoulders and staring at her.

  “You’re so cute, but sometimes you really are stupid. You believe that shit? Like we need some other piece of magic in our lives, like time stopping isn’t enough? I was shitting you so that you’d want to see me again.”

  “Oh.”

  “You’re old enough to know bullshit when you hear it.”

  “Yeah. I kind of figured … .”

  “Bullshit. Pick somebody. Now!”

  She looked around and saw a woman lying on a large pink blanket. She was covered with oil and her skin was dark brown, but Karen suspected if Bobby picked off her tiny bikini, she’d see snow-white skin underneath. A lazy bitch who spent all her time in the sun.

  The woman was about thirty. Karen wondered what kind of secrets she kept that forced her to want to hide alone among a crowd of a thousand people.

  “Her.”

  Karen and Bobby both stared at the woman. Then Bobby moved to her and squeezed her neck tightly with both hands.

  What the fuck?

  “What are you doing? Stop that. You’ll kill her!”

  Bobby just squeezed harder. “You picked her. This is your fault.”

  “Stop!”

  Finally he did stop. The woman’s neck showed the indentations of his hands where he had strangled her.

  “Will she be okay?”

  “I doubt it, but I don’t really know,” he said. “I’ve never been able to hang around after time started. Called back the same as you. So I don’t know what happens. I think she’ll likely live, but she’ll choke and wonder what the hell happened to her. Probably have a very sore neck for a while.”

  “You’re cruel.”

  He didn’t reply at first, but then he said, “Everybody can be cruel under the right circumstances. Even you.”

  “No, you’re wrong.”

  “I’m right.”

  “I want to get away.”

  “Away from her or away from me?”

  He was looking at her with wide eyes. She wanted to leave him, but she’d never found another person that was like herself.

  “Just don’t do anything like that again.”

  “You want an ice cream cone?”

  “Sure!”

  Bobby climbed into the ice cream stand and made two cones, both chocolate. He handed one to her.

  “What makes you think I like chocolate?”

  She licked the ice cream, and it tasted great.

  “You’re a girl.”

  “Very perceptive of you.”

  Bobby walked into the girls’ bathroom and she followed.

  “I like seeing girls when they don’t think anybody is looking,” he said. Unfortunately nobody was in the bathroom.

  She didn’t reply.

  “So, it’s time for you to tell me what you do when time stops. You’ve seen what I do, but what do you do?”

  Karen took another long swipe of her ice cream to buy her some time.

  “I like to look in my neighbors’ homes, to see what secrets they keep from the rest of the world.”

  “Ahh. You’re a peeping Tom.”

  “At least I don’t hurt anybody.”

  They both stopped and stared at each other, a familiar feeling lurching through Karen’s body. The calling.

  Bobby recognized what was happening. “Darn.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Come find me next time. I’ll be here.”

  She didn’t commit to that as the calling started to pull her back toward her house. She wasn’t sure she wanted to see him ever again.

  But part of her knew she absolutely wanted to.

  Chapter 4

  Karen’s father was named Parker. Parker Samson Richardson. Her friends sometimes wondered if his parents liked comic books or something, since the name seemed so weird, something out of Spider Man or the X-Men, maybe. She tried to pretend it was nothing special, perhaps a tribute to some long-forgotten relative or something.

  He was forty-one years old when Karen was seventeen. She knew he loved her, even though sometimes it was hard to tell by how he treated her. He smiled and laughed with Tina, but with Karen, he was more reserved and serious. He expected more from her.

  One day when Karen was alone with her mother, she asked, “Why does Dad treat me so hard? Why does he love Tina more?”

  She immediately regretted the question when she saw the hesitation and heartbreak on her mother’s face.

  For a moment, there was only silence.

  “Truth be told, your dad loves you as much as Tina, if not more. He just knows you’re the one who could follow in his footsteps and work in fields that he respects.”

  Her mom looked around to be sure Tina wasn’t nearby.

  “He doesn’t really expect much of your sister. He still loves her, but he’ll be happy if she manages to just find a job—any job—and have a happy life with somebody who cares for her. He wants more for you, and he wants to help you be all you can be.”

  Karen absorbed this and never spoke of it again. She tried to look at her dad with new eyes, but somehow he never seemed much different. He seemed so hard to please.

  On top of that, she knew his secrets.

  * * *

  On May 30, her world changed. She woke early to the sound of commotion in the living room below. She glanced at her watch: 4:42 a.m.

  A gray haze hung outside her bedroom window, waiting for the sun to rise. A hint of bright red lights periodically flashed through the gray.

  Police?

  Tina was still sleeping.

  “Please, help him … .”

  Mom’s tiny voice was full of fear as it hovered and found its way from downstairs. Karen ran to the stairs and saw two men dressed in white, moving her father, who was lying on a stretcher. He was moving a little, but mostly what she would remember later was that he was crying. He moaned from pain and tears fell down his cheeks. Karen had never seen her father cry before. He was dressed in his Frosty the Snowman pajamas, a Christmas gift from Tina two years earlier.

  Mom was standing beside the stretcher, one hand on Dad’s shoulder.

  “Tell me he’s going to be okay. Please.”

  Tears were rolling down her cheeks as well.

  “We’re taking him to Highl
and Hills, Mrs. Richardson. They’ll do their best.”

  “I’ll go as soon as I get dressed.”

  The paramedics took Dad outside. Karen ran down the stairs and watched with Mom.

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know. He woke up and said he needed help. He could barely move, saying the pain was much worse and he couldn’t stand it anymore.”

  “He’s had pain?”

  The ambulance pulled away with its siren wailing.

  “I have to get dressed and go.”

  “Mom, tell me. What pain?”

  They both started up the stairs. “I don’t really know. He’s had it for a while but wouldn’t go to the doctor. Kept saying it would go away.”

  Mom rushed to her room and called back, “I’ll phone you when I know.”

  Karen watched as her mom got dressed and then left after giving her a quick hug. She sat in her father’s favorite La-Z-Boy armchair and waited for her mother to call.

  * * *

  It didn’t take long for the diagnosis. Parker Samson Richardson had cancer. A lot of it.

  The doctors guessed it started in the liver, but they weren’t sure. It had metastasized and spread through his body. His lungs were dripping with the stuff, and when the doctors realized it had spread through his lymph nodes, they told Karen’s mom there wasn’t much that they could do. It had been too long.

  Parker Richardson didn’t have a good reason why he hadn’t gone to the doctor earlier, but the surgeons seemed to think it wouldn’t have made much difference anyway. It was spreading fast and had been for a long time, possibly longer than he was aware.

  What caused it?

  Nobody had a clue. He didn’t drink much, didn’t smoke, ate healthier than most people, and had no particular risk factors in his family history.

  “He’s just an unfortunate random choice,” said one doctor. Karen heard him say that, and from his voice, he seemed to be trying to be sympathetic, but the words had the opposite effect on her. They made her angry.

  She had been a churchgoer all her life, not every Sunday, but two or three times each month. None of her friends went to church, and when she was younger they used to tease her; but there was something vaguely reassuring about believing in some crazy old man who lived in the sky and made things happen just on a whim.