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until Mum made me go cold turkey from it when I started school. I’ll admit I dug it out again at age nine, when we moved to the States. It was the only way I could sleep, early on.
    So unless someone has managed to tap into my memories — and that’s a pretty big stretch, even considering current developments — only Mum could have put all this embarrassing stuff in my contacts.
    “Why would she give you fake friends?” Alice sits down beside me and squints at the phone.
    I look at the phone again, willing it to give away its secrets.
    “My mother does nothing without a plan. It must mean something.” I open up the “Marigold” entry, and sure enough, there’s a number: 3463764889.
    “O-kaay,” Alice says. “That doesn’t even look like a proper phone number.”
    I hit SEND . I know there’s no signal, but maybe this is like one of those urban legend distress numbers that work anyway.
    Nothing doing. The call fails to connect.
    I scroll down to the next entry, “Mum.” Her number is 5555006005959.
    “This one’s even longer. Ridiculously long,” I mutter.
    I check out the entries for my kiddie comfort blanket and Smitty.
    86337274343.
    55461760328189.
    “Weird,” says Alice, leaning in. “Is it like code or something?”
    I fling my head back and hit it on the bed. Oh bloody hell, Mother .
    “That would be just her frickin’ style.”
    I go back to the first number again. Jeez, are we talking 1 = A or something, here? I mean, that would be too damn obvious, but anythingmore sophisticated and I’m never going to work it out, especially with this cotton ball stuffing I currently have in my head. I can barely remember the alphabet.
    All righty, so …
    “Find a pen, some paper.”
    Alice rolls her eyes but gets something.
    3463764889 would be … “Write the letters down as I say them.” I concentrate hard. “C, D, F, C … nah, this is way wrong. No words start like that!” Besides, there are no ones or twos in this one, so that would mean she hasn’t used anything beyond the ninth letter in the alphabet.
    My head hurts.
    “Come on, think!” I run my thumb over the keypad on the phone and beg it to give me the answer. And then it does. “It’s a text message.”
    Alice crinkles her nose. “How?”
    “My phone is old school. No QWERTY going on here, just a regular number pad, with the numbers corresponding to different letters, like on a landline phone.” I feel a rush of blood to my head and search clunkily through the phone’s screens until I can select the option to send a text. “If I’m right … we should type in the number as if it was a text message, and letters will appear.”
    Alice’s eyebrows are causing major furrows on her pretty little face. “Do you have a fever?”
    “No — I’m serious — watch this.” I type the numbers in.
    Cdfcgfdhhi
    “Oh, yeah. Totally clear now,” Alice snarks.
    My hands are shaking. “We are not done yet …”
    The phone beeps at me, and I nearly leap a foot into the air. LOW BATTERY flashes on the screen.
    “No!” I cry. “Don’t die now!”
    “Get on with it, then!” Alice says.
    “I am.” I fumble with the phone, nearly dropping it, quickly scrolling until I find what I need. I choose PREDICTIVE TEXT from the menu and type in the number.
    Finesmittw
    My heart jumps into my throat. Smitt . That is no accident. I look at the phone keypad again.
    “Fines-mitt-wuh?” Alice says.
    W is on the same key as Y . Smitty … my thumb traces over the keys … of course, E is on the same key as D . I make the substitutions, and I geddit.
    “Findsmitty,” I shout, standing up and holding out the phone for Alice to see. “Find Smitty!”
    She does not share my joy. “Couldn’t your mum have just left an actual message? Like a normal person? Oh no — I forgot. She’s related to you. You don’t do normal.”
    “This is a message, Blondie! My mother’s still alive, and she wants us to find Smitty.”
    “Are you sure?” Alice