Page 49

It all ends with the butterflies. At the exact moment I piece it together, the butterflies flood us from all angles.

Hundreds. Thousands. As though every single one in the entire forest has rallied here to help us.

They paper themselves to the eyes of the men, Brian, and Emily.

Their delicate bodies block the glow from the wildly swinging flashlights.

The confused shouting is immediate.

“Run!” Keiffer bellows, scooping Kiara into his arms.

No one needs to be told twice. We have only this one slim window of opportunity.

“This way!” With one hand I steal my radio back and with the other I grab Evan’s hand.

They take Tayla’s, the one not currently gripping the flashlight she had the presence of mind to snatch in the panic.

She shines it behind us to guide Radhika and Keiffer, making sure to keep it close and low to minimize chances of being followed.

The forest floor isn’t brambly here at the lowest elevation, so there’s mercifully nothing for us to trip on. Nothing to grab and rip and tear. But we run like there is.

Like there are predators hovering just out of our eyeline.

Like our lives depend on it. Like the full moon is almost at its peak.

Something in the trees keeps pace with us, a shadow that has the shape of a human, moves like a human, and at one point, even looks at me with the whites of its eyes like a human, but the shape is too dark and too fast to see properly.

Before I can focus on it, it streaks away like it was never there.

“Nova?” Evan calls, bringing me back. “What is it? What do you see?”

I don’t have an answer.

We run, and we run, and we run until the cries of agitation grow fainter and fainter behind us.

My lungs are on fire by the time the wishing well comes into view.

It’s only a couple of feet high, more of a circular wall than any of the cutesy fairy-tale wishing wells from childhood stories.

The final bird shines directly above it, the radius around the crumbling stone shimmering misty white.

There are words scratched into the face of the stone, so weathered and smudged that they’re almost illegible.

Evan presses a hand against their heart, mouth open.

Radhika’s voice is giddy as she crows, “I knew I’d find it!”

A laugh bursts out of me, wild and wonderous.

We’re here. We’re actually really truly here, and it isn’t until this exact moment that I realize that a part of me never expected to find the wishing well after all.

Never thought I was special enough or deserving enough or repentant enough to be here , the one place in all the world that could undo the worst thing I’ve ever done.

I’m here, Dad. I’m going to get you back.

“What do we do, what do we do?” Radhika dances in place.

Keiffer gently lowers Kiara to the ground. “Someone make the wish.”

Kiara leans against him as she finds her center of gravity again. “I think my ankle is worse.”

“Someone do something,” Radhika insists shrilly. She shows us her watch. “Twenty minutes until midnight!”

Evan rests their elbows on the well and leans in. “I wish Kiara was no longer cursed.”

We all look expectantly at Kiara. She shakes her head.

“You have to throw a coin in!” Tayla hip checks Evan. “Does anyone have a—oh, thanks, Keiffer.”

“No problem. I always pick up random parking lot change if I spot it and collect enough to make a donation with,” he says. “Do you think this oxidized green one is luckier than a shiny penny? Older is better kind of thing?”

“I’m sure it doesn’t matter.” I snatch the gleaming coin from between Tayla’s fingers, give her a dirty look, and throw it into the well.

For a pregnant pause, there’s nothing, not even the tinkle of it hitting stone on the way down.

Then, finally, I hear the soft splash of it hitting water.

“I wish Kiara to no longer be cursed,” I say.

Nothing happens.

Evan blinks. “Well, that was anticlimactic.”

“I don’t feel any different,” says Kiara. She holds her arms out, wiggles them a bit. “Should I?”

“Let’s do the gunky green one, then,” says Radhika, plucking it away from Keiffer. “And maybe more gravitas this time. No offense, Nova, but you sounded a bit demanding. The well probably wants more respect than that.”

Demanding, huh? I want to laugh. “What does the book say about it?” I ask, voice steely.

“You don’t know?” Evan seems surprised.

“Never read it. Dad had a copy, but…” I shrug then look at Radhika head-on. Now that we’re out of imminent danger, it’s time for her to admit what she’s doing with Dad’s book. “Let me take a look at it.”

“I know what it says by heart,” she says. “It went something like…um…”

“You know, I’d really like to read it for myself.” I hold out my hand.

“Nova, I know you want answers, but do this later ,” says Tayla. “We’re running out of time.”

Kiara frowns, clearly perturbed by the fact that Tayla and I know something she doesn’t. “What’s going on?”

“Nova,” says Evan. They nod up at the full moon. “Endings. New beginnings.”

“Whatever we’re doing, we have to do it now ,” insists Radhika. “We’re down to fifteen minutes.”

With a huff, Kiara takes the coin from Radhika and says, “Please, magic of the well, accept this humble offering and return to me my good luck before anything worse happens.” She touches it to her lips then lets it fall. After an eternity, it meets the water.

“You aren’t supposed to ask for your luck back!” Radhika exclaims. “You have to undo the bad luck.”

“Um, I have another coin somewhere.” Keiffer begins to pat down the pockets of his cargo pants.

We need to go faster than this. I throw a despairing glance to the full moon then reach for my back pocket. “I have one.”

Tayla glances at it, a frown creasing her forehead. “This is a…a two-cent piece. Is this fake?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Radhika says impatiently. “Just throw it in!”

“It’s not fake,” I say. “So it won’t, like, offend the well, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Hold up. Aren’t rare coins supposed to be lucky?” asks Tayla.

“Yeah,” Keiffer says. “I’ve never even seen one. But here’s the penny I found at the trailhead. Toss one of them in and make the wish, Tayla.”

But she’s preoccupied by something else. “So how did you just happen to have a rare coin, Nova?”

My heart stress ball–squeezes. I should have just let Keiffer keep hunting for a coin, but nooooo , I just had to expedite matters, didn’t I?

I meet Tayla’s suspicious gaze and evenly say, “I don’t know. I don’t look at my change when I get it back. I’ve got some Canadian coins, too, if you want to interrogate me about that.”

Keiffer puts a hand on my shoulder. I glance up to see steadfast support etched into his face, including the worry lines I’m pretty sure weren’t there a week ago. It makes me second-guess the way I’m going about this. Damn it.

“Before we took off, I stopped by Petra’s to grab some lucky charms to help Kiara,” I mumble. “The acorn was one of them. The two-cent coin was another.” I leave out everything else so I don’t look like a complete weirdo, but I think that ship may have sailed.

“I knew it!” says Tayla. “That acorn was way too pristine.”

“Oh, Nova,” says Kiara. “That’s sweet. Why wouldn’t you want me to know that?”

Evan grabs Radhika’s hand and squints at her watch. “Twelve minutes,” they warn.

“Why didn’t you just tell us the truth?” asks Radhika.

I snort. “Seriously? Coming from you?”

“What is that supposed to—”

“I just gave you an opportunity to be real with me and—”

“Don’t turn this around on me! I’m not the one hiding things, Nova.”

“Oh, for the love of—” Keiffer shakes his head. “I’m sick to death of all these secrets. Radhika, I love you, but don’t you think that’s a little hypocritical?”

“Keiffer,” she says. Her eyes flick to me. “Not now.”

His exhale is rough, frustrated. “Then when? You had this whole trip to tell Nova you found her dad’s copy of The Way of the Wish in the woods a few weeks ago, and you didn’t!”

“Keiffer!”

“No, he’s right,” Evan says. “You think I don’t know that you’re only here for material ?

Fodder for your college admissions essay.

You’ve been making a meal of this Henry Prior thing for years, and you thought if you found the wishing well, you could prove the legend was true and get the credit.

I’m not saying you didn’t want to save Kiara, too, but don’t pretend that your own motivations were totally selfless. ”

Radhika flushes. Biting her lip, she says to me, “Nova, I did try…”

“And you, Tayla.” Evan scowls at her. She fidgets with her necklace under their scrutiny.

“You’ve been impossible this whole trip because you want Kiara back, and you think Nova being here will keep that from happening.

You’ve been undermining her and, frankly, pouncing the second you think she’s acting suspicious. ”

“Because she is suspicious!”

Keiffer sighs with gusto. “Tayla.”

“Can I see the book or not?” I ask Radhika.

She gives it to me. “It’s yours. Keep it. I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you when I found it. I just…”

“Wanted it too much,” I say. “I don’t forgive you for keeping it from me, but I can understand that.”

The paperback is soft. The pages rounded from reading. I picture Dad’s fingers flipping from front to back, red pen poised to attack. I brush my thumb over the yellowed edge, let the cover buckle as I reach the end of the slim volume.

Then and only then do I turn to the first page.