Page 44 of Everything All at Once

I texted Em:

Another errand tmrw?

She wrote back almost immediately:

Yes, yes OK. I’ll come over early. <3

I put my phone down on my nightstand. Then I grabbed the nearest Alvin book—Alvin Hatter and the Mysterious Disappearance—and started reading it all over again.

“The Overcoat Man didn’t die?” Alvin asked quietly.

“What’s worse,” A. said, “is that you left him alone in the house in the woods. He has access to EVERYTHING. We have no idea what magical secrets he’s stolen!”

“A., calm yourself,” E. scolded.

“It wasn’t OUR fault,” Margo spat. “He was trying to kill us, remember? How about a ‘congratulations on not ending up dead’?”

“Of course,” E. said. “We are all very happy about that.” He paused again, looking from Margo to Alvin as if just now noticing how tired they looked, how pronounced the circles under their eyes had become, how pale their skin was. “We are being incredibly insensitive; you both need rest. We’ll continue this discussion in the morning.”

He and A. left the room presently.

Alvin paced a tight circle on the rug while Margo sat heavily on the bed, arms crossed.

After a minute, and with a smile on his face, Alvin said, “‘Congratulations on not ending up dead’? You do know that isn’t really an overachievement for us, right?”

“Well, they don’t know that,” Margo snapped. “Stupid society with their stupid names. Whoever heard of a woman called A.?”

“It’s for privacy. They don’t trust us yet, obviously.”

“Well, I don’t trust them either,” Margo said.

And even though the Everlife Society might be their best shot at finding their parents, Alvin wasn’t sure he trusted them either.

—fromAlvin Hatter and the Everlife Society

11

“Where are we going this time?” Em asked. We were in my kitchen, dividing a pot of coffee between two Thermoses.

“Back to the shore,” I said, dumping cream in each thermos and stirring them with a long spoon.

“I haven’t seen the ocean this much since... I don’t know. I’m not complaining.”

“Have you heard of a music store called Magic Grooves?”

“Magic Grooves!” Abe exclaimed, walking into the kitchen, his eyes still puffy with sleep. “Love that place.”

“You’ve been there?”

“I used to go with Aunt Helen. Is there no more coffee?”

“I’ll make some more,” I said, getting the grinder back down from the cabinet.

“I like music stores,” Em said.

“Oh, this is the greatest. Are you guys going? Can I go? They still sell vinyl and cassettes. Like,cassettes. When was the last time you saw a tape?”

“Aw, someone made a mixtape for me once. It was sweet but, like, bittersweet. I had no way to play it, and I had to tell him I was a lesbian,” Em said.