Just a Matter of Time Read online

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  JUST A MATTER OF TIME

  Also by Charity Tahmaseb

  About the Author

  Copyright Information

  JUST A MATTER OF TIME

  To: [email protected]

  From: [email protected]

  Subject: You’re running out of time

  If time is money, then someone is robbing you blind.

  A Friend

  WHEN THE MESSAGE LANDED IN MY EMAIL, from a fake account, I ignored it. It was spam. Or a joke. Or one of those random things that happen on the Internet—and if you fell into that time suck, then you deserved to get robbed.

  So I deleted it and went back to AP World History.

  But two weeks later, as I sat in the orchestra room, my hand clutched the neck of my violin like I might strangle it. I wondered if I really had run out of time—or become very bad at managing it. I’d been late for tonight’s special practice. I let the violin strings bite into my fingers, preferring pain to shame.

  I blinked, trying to figure out when the room had cleared. I blinked again as if waking from a dream and breathed in the stale, silent air. I looked from my own hands, still clutching the violin, to the ones on the clock.

  6:38.

  The fire of lost time started in my toes, raced up my legs and straight to my heart. I jumped. My music stand crashed into the director’s podium, but I didn’t bother to right it. In the storage room, my fingers fumbled with the closures to my violin case. I had everything locked in the cubby, but when I turned to leave, I nearly crushed my bow beneath the sole of my ballet flat. More wasted time.

  Bow tucked away, I sprinted to the lobby, fear like a fist in my stomach. The significance of the closed auditorium doors slammed into me—and me into them. The thud echoed, then died. Above me, the clock read:

  7:00.

  Muted applause reached me from behind the closed doors. A name echoed, one that sounded a lot like Sadie Lin. Somehow I’d missed the start of the National Honor Society induction ceremony. Missed it—and had no idea what to do. Should I barge in and demand my certificate and pin? Should I wait? Or was it better to hide? My legs shook, then gave out. I sank to the floor, closed my eyes, and let the linoleum cool my sweaty palms.

  Half an hour later, when the doors swung open, I was still slumped on the floor. Maya Milansky floated from the auditorium, gold pin glowing on her collar, certificate clutched in her hand. We hadn’t been friends since ninth grade, so when she spun and said, “We missed you, Sadie,” it wasn’t sympathy I heard in her voice. It was something sweeter—and nastier—all wrapped up in Maya’s fake red hair and the fake butterfly tattoo on her ankle.

  Other students filed out, followed by parents and teachers, each set giving me odd looks. The AP World History teacher, Mrs. Harmon, opened her mouth as if to say something consoling, but closed it and hurried off.

  At least none of the parents or grandparents belonged to me. If there was a bright spot to this night, it was that. My mom died when I was three. All my memories of her were misty things. My grandmother wasn’t well enough to attend—just a bad cold. Not that it stopped me from worrying. As for my dad? Well, the commute from Afghanistan was a long one.

  I decided to search out the NHS advisor, get my pin and certificate, and make up a story about the ceremony for my grandmother.

  Before I could stand, a shadow fell across my legs. Gordon Bakersfield stood so the toes of his shoes touched the heels of mine. In his hand, he held two certificates. He didn’t smile, or give me any sort of look born of sympathy. He simply stared; the intensity in his eyes unnerved me.

  I sighed. “I don’t have time for this.”

  “You’re right,” he said. “You don’t.”

  * * *

  When I left school that night, the hands on the clock read 8:15. I had no memory of the lobby clearing, or parents leaving, or Gordon Bakersfield vanishing from my sight. All I remembered was sitting on the floor, linoleum chilling my legs, the National Honor Society certificate and pin by my side. Had Gordon done that?

  Honestly, I didn’t care. All I wanted was to keep my 4.0 GPA intact and ace the SAT. No problem. Until recently.

  The next day, I stood at my locker, fingertips resting on the upper shelf, my gaze fixed on the dark inside. What had I wanted? To go to the library. Yes. But why?

  Someone brushed my shoulder as the bell rang—someone with spiky black hair, dark eyes, and an intense stare. A burst of something flowed through my body. I could breathe again. My mind cleared. Of course! I was going to spend lunch at the library and finish an extra credit report.

  Except. Gordon stood there, arms folded across his chest like he was guarding the way down the hall.

  “Excuse me?” I said.

  He stepped to one side. I grabbed a notebook and—before he could block the way again—raced up to the library.

  In the library, Maya Milansky was working on what was no doubt the same extra credit report for AP World History. I sat down three tables away. She glanced up from her paper long enough to throw me a sneer. I threw one back. It never reached its target. Gordon slid into the chair opposite mine and caught the full force of my snark.

  At least he blocked my view of Maya. Still. Back in ninth grade, I’d crushed hard on Gordon—one of those epic and deeply humiliating crushes. The kind that made you stalk his class schedule, so you could be at his locker when he was. The kind that had you biking past his house—multiple times. The kind where you confessed your entire heart to your best friend just to relieve a little of the pressure.

  That best friend might have been Maya Milansky. Gordon might have gone to the freshman dance with her. From then on out, I’d pretended that neither existed.

  Now I had no choice but to acknowledge at least one of them.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  Gordon shrugged. “Running interference.”

  World History was calling, so I said, “I don’t have time for this.” Whatever this was.

  “You’re right,” he replied, in an echo from last night. “You don’t.”

  I stared at him.

  “Where do you think she—” He swiveled in his chair, pointing at Maya. Her hair fell forward, hiding her face in a curtain of red. “—gets all the time?”

  Now it was my turn to shrug. Maya did everything I did—and then some—and managed to show up on time, too.

  He leaned forward, eyes fixed on mine. “You.”

  I felt that burst again, my mind clearing, my thoughts all at once my own. My hand reached for my notebook, but Gordon’s gaze transfixed me. My cheeks didn’t heat up. I wasn’t tongue-tied. But I couldn’t glance away, either.

  “Did you ever wonder where some people find the time and energy to do everything while everyone else desperately tries to keep up?” he asked.

  I nodded, slowly. For months now, the threads of my life had been hanging just out of my reach. No matter how hard I worked, I couldn’t capture them and weave them back together.

  “You know that saying, ‘time is money’?” he continued.

  “Yeah.”

  “And you know it’s possible to steal money, right?”

  “So?” I wasn’t exactly sure where Gordon’s train of thought was going, but I suspected the first stop was crazy-town.

  “If it’s possible to steal money. . . and time is money. . . come on, you’re on the honor roll. Do the math.”

  Right. Crazy-town. Either that, or this was some elaborate practical joke that Maya had cooked up. I pushed back my chair.

  “Really? You’re doing this? After last night?” So I missed the ceremony. Why rub it in? I clutched my notebook tight to my chest in a feeble attempt to stop the ach
e. “I used to think you were a better person than that.”

  I left the library without looking back.

  * * *

  “Sadie! Wait up!”

  Gordon’s voice chased me down the hall. My head felt heavy on my neck. My stomach growled. I could pick up something at the snack bar. An apple, maybe. Something to restore my blood sugar and stop the persistent throb in my temples. Except I wasn’t really hungry—not after the library.

  “Sadie, please!”

  Maybe it was that please, or the tone of his voice. I didn’t turn around, but I slowed down. When Gordon landed next to me, panting, I realized I’d stopped right in front of his locker.

  A flush burned my cheeks.

  “Hear me out.” Gordon raised a hand, as if that alone could hold me in place. “Then I won’t bug you anymore.”

  I nodded, too stunned to protest.

  “I know it sounds crazy, but it’s possible to steal someone else’s time.” He gave me that intense stare again. His eyes, I realized, weren’t just dark. They were the color of wet tree bark, but flecked with green. No matter how hard I’d tried during ninth grade, I’d never stood this close to Gordon before. The unfairness of that almost made me walk away.

  “People steal time,” I said, instead. “Right.”

  “Think about writer’s block. It’s the perfect example. Know where it comes from?”

  I gave my head a little shake. As much as I hated to admit it, writing essays was getting harder and harder. I’d taken to waking up spontaneously at three a.m., my head filled with words, and writing then. But that was the only time I could.

  “Ever sit down to write something but get nothing but a blank?” he asked.

  He’d just described my school day, nothing but a great big white space.

  “And even though you’re there, and you think you’re working,” he continued, “it feels like nothing. Or at least, that’s how I think it feels.”

  “Don’t you know how it feels?”

  He shook his head. “No one’s ever stolen my time.”

  Wow. This was insane. Gordon Bakersfield, of the epic ninth-grade crush, was insane. “You know what I think?” I said.

  He leaned forward, ever so slightly, like he was certain of the outcome. I almost hated to disappoint him.

  “I think you’re wasting my time.”

  After two years of confusion and hurt, being the one to walk away was epic.

  * * *

  For the rest of the week, I avoided Gordon. Or maybe he avoided me. The only person I couldn’t lose was Maya. Library at lunch? There she was, two tables away. On the bleachers during open gym? Directly across from me, a perpetual smirk just visible in the parting of her red curtain hair.

  And today, in the cafeteria? She stood up and moved closer to me.

  Closer.

  Fortunately, I’d finished my extra credit report early that morning—in another weird three a.m. writing session. First, I’d checked all the doors, even though I knew they were locked. With Dad gone, it was like the air had changed; it was thinner, harder to breathe, the house not just empty, but lonely.

  I was examining some applesauce on my spoon (how long I’d been holding it there was hard to say, but long enough to be embarrassing) when Gordon slid into the chair opposite mine.

  “Look, I know you think I’m crazy, but she is seriously killing you.” He whirled and nailed Maya with a look that made her head jerk back. If it weren’t for the whole crazy factor, I might have clapped—just a little.

  “No,” I said, “she’s just creeping me out. I can’t get away from her.”

  “Because she’s using you. She’s sucking up all your time.”

  I spared Gordon a glance before contemplating my applesauce again. “Right.”

  “Think about it. What about the violin solo that should’ve been yours?”

  His words knocked the appetite from me. I dropped the spoon. During auditions, my bow had come to a screeching halt. My violin hadn’t screamed like that since sixth grade. It was like I’d murdered it, and I certainly butchered the audition.

  “Where was Maya?” Gordon asked.

  “Outside the . . .” I trailed off, not wanting to confess she’d been right outside the door when I left the audition.

  “What happened today when she switched tables?”

  My gaze darted toward my applesauce.

  “Yeah. I’m sure it’s fascinating stuff.” He snorted. “But it took you five minutes to eat a single bite. And you know what she did during that time?” He jerked a thumb toward Maya.

  I shook my head.

  “Finished her extra-credit report. When did you do yours?”

  “This morning.” I raised my chin, but dropped it a second later, realizing the move highlighted the dark circles under my eyes. “At about three a.m.”

  “That’s probably the only time you could.” Gordon stood, hands planted on the cafeteria table. “Think about it this weekend when you’re far away from her. Think about how you feel, about whether there’s any difference. Then decide whether or not I’m crazy.”

  With that, Gordon walked away. I glanced toward Maya, bracing myself for that triumphant little smirk. Instead, she stared after Gordon, her red hair limp, eyes wide with a look I’d seen in my own.

  It was terror.

  * * *

  I would never say I lived for the weekends. It was such a cliché.

  But more and more it became my mantra. Not just because Dad was deployed and we got to Skype with him some weekends. (It was hit-or-miss, but he always tried.) All semester long, I’d chalked up the brain fog to Dad’s deployment, to the too-quiet house at night, to how I’d wake at three a.m. and check all the locks before sitting down to finish my homework.

  Now, I was contemplating a serious stop at crazy-town. Could Gordon be right? Could Maya actually steal time? For that matter, could anyone?

  Saturday morning, I pulled the car keys from the hook by the door. Grandma was in the yard, weeding, her face shaded by a huge straw hat, its brim covered in plastic apples. Back in middle school, I’d cringed every time she wore it in public. Today, the fact that she’d pulled it out and placed it on her head meant she’d shaken the cold. I couldn’t help but smile.

  The sun touched my face and made me squint. I shielded my eyes with a hand. “I think I’ll study at the park today,” I told her.

  “A lovely idea, but don’t stay too long. Your father might call.”

  “I know.”

  I headed for Five Mile Creek State Park, where Dad and I used to go camping. In a way, it was like being with him, only lonelier. Once there, I tried to think. That didn’t sound like much, but I hadn’t thought in ages. Not really. Now, with my chin propped on my knees, I allowed my thoughts to wander—daydreams of seeing Dad again and acing the SAT.

  Stress, I decided, after a few hours. That was all. No one was stealing my time. I could forget all about Gordon and his crazy ideas.

  Monday morning, five minutes after I walked into school, I lost everything—my willpower, my thoughts, my dreams. It was like a physical pull. I knew I had class and I knew I had to get there. But that’s all I knew.

  When I finally stumbled into first period World History and saw Maya Milansky fanning herself with an extra credit report—the 100% clearly visible—then glanced down at my measly 92%, something snapped.

  I was going to find Gordon. I’d listen to what he had to say. I’d do anything I could to get my time back, even if it meant booking a stay in crazy-town.

  * * *

  We’d debated where to meet. I didn’t want to explain Gordon to Grandma. His house was in the same subdivision as Maya’s, so that was out. We ended up in a strip mall coffee shop, a place called Jumpin’ Java. It had tables in the back, away from the windows, which was where we sat.

  “So,” he prompted, “was I right?”

  I hated to admit it, so I pulled my coffee toward me, but didn’t drink.

  He tipped
back in his chair and took a sip of his Americano, clearly prepared to wait me out.

  I sighed. “On Saturday, I drove out to the state park—no one around for miles.” I waved my hands as if that could indicate a lack of people. “And I could . . . think again. I only spent two hours there, but I remember every single minute.” Now, I leaned across the table, nudging my coffee cup out of the way. “Not only that, I remember living for each of those minutes. It was like going from bread and water to a buffet with an endless dessert bar.”

  Gordon’s gaze fell to his Americano. I thought he wasn’t going to say anything, and my strange confession had coffee-flavored bile burning the back of my throat.

  “So. Yeah,” he said at last. “Some people can steal time.”

  “Like Maya.”

  “Exactly like Maya.”

  “Like you?” It was a guess, an educated one, but still.

  “Remember Title 1 in first grade?” he asked.

  Amazingly, I did. It was one of those memories I’d pulled out during ninth grade and reexamined. The two of us were a team, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, wrestling with the words on the page. The words confused me so much that the Title 1 teacher thought I must be dyslexic or have ADD.

  “I didn’t know it then,” Gordon said, “but I was stealing your time to get through class.”

  “You what?”

  He held up a hand. “I was six years old. All I knew was whenever I leaned against you, I could think better and make it through class.”

  “The teacher thought I was ADD.”

  He dropped his gaze, then peered up at me through thick black lashes. It was a swoon-worthy look. Part of me suspected he knew that. If he had done that during the epic ninth-grade crush, I might have fainted.

  “Sorry?” He gave me a little shrug.

  And that would’ve slain me. But I wasn’t back in ninth grade; I was thinking about first. Over the summer, Grandma, disgusted with the teacher, had taken me to the library every day. She wrote articles that eventually found homes in places like Ladies’ Home Journal and Woman’s Day. I read. By September, I was reading at a fourth-grade level. Goodbye Title 1 and hello challenge reading.