Backward Glass Read Online Free PDF Page B

it in front of her and aimed my flashlight at it.
    She stared at it long enough to read the words three or four times. Then she ran her forefinger over the writing at the bottom, the message to me. “So it really is about you and me,” she said.
    “What do you mean, you and me?”
    Luka pursed her lips. “I should have shown you before,” she said. “I just—I got so used to keeping it a secret. I never showed anyone. Since we moved in.”
    Without another word, she stood up, walked to the dresser, and pulled out its top drawer. She brought it back and lay it upside down, the beam of my flashlight revealing the rough, scratched letters.
    Luka, help Kenny. Trust John Wald. Kenny says he is the auby one. Save the baby.
    “Okay,” I said after a long, long silence.
    “I found it years ago,” Luka said. “What’s that mean, an auby one? Did they misspell Aubrey? How is that even pronounced? Is it aw-bee or oh-bee? Or oh-bye?”
    “No idea. But that’s our names.”
    “I know.” She grinned and so did I. “This is the coolest thing that’s ever happened in the world. I mean—it’s really you. There’s really a Kenny.”
    “Hey!” came a voice from the hallway. I heard a door open. “You on the phone with your stupid father again? Hell’s the matter with you?”
    Luka’s eyes grew wide, and she snapped off the light. “Go,” she whispered, pushing me to the dresser. “Remember, it’ll be cold.” I was already pressing my hand on the glass. Just as I felt it give, she leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek. “For luck,” she said, and was gone like a shot to her bedroom door, opening it and charging out to meet her mother. “I’m not talking to anyone,” she said. “You were having some drunk dream.”
    The last thing I heard in 1987, before I shoved my face into iced molasses, sounded like a slap.

    Luka wasn’t kidding about the cold. It touched every part of your skin, no matter how much clothing you wore. And it held on. I closed my eyes as I pushed through. The journey didn’t seem so long this time, maybe because I had done it before, maybe just because I was coming home. No matter what reassurances Luka had given me, a part of me had been terrified of being trapped.
    I took a large step through the bone-chilling cold of the mirror and felt the air of the carriage house. My forward hand found a grip on the frame and I pulled myself out, feeling like I was climbing out of a mountain of slush.
    I collapsed, curled and shivering with the transit. I had never felt such cold. It went beyond skin, beyond lungs, bone, teeth. My memories, my thoughts, my whole life was freezing, clenched into a shuddering ball. The excitement of time travel drained out of me. It would be good to sleep here. Maybe if I could do that, I’d wake up and it would all be over. My mother would have more hot chocolate. My dad would tell me to take a day off school.
    In the end, I only got up because of that rational inner voice, the one that had told me I didn’t want to come out here and be disappointed.
    There was also the kiss still freezing on my cheek. That was worth getting moving for.
    By the time I got into bed, my clock showed almost four. I had never been up this late in my life. Before I gave in to sleep, I thought ahead enough to take a final look around my room and make sure any signs of my nighttime journey were gone, my clothes scattered in their usual way, the note and the list back under my mattress.
    Next thing I knew my mother was shaking me and telling me I was going to be late.
    For a second day, though for different reasons, I went through the motions of school, mechanical and uninspired. Whenever I could, I replayed parts of last night. Nintendo. Welcome to the future. Nintendo. The feeling of pressing my hand onto an unyielding surface only to have it melt away. Luka. Nintendo. If I closed my eyes, I could still see Mario running and jumping through castles and fields.
    And feel that