Page 20

Sunlight.

The world sharpens in fragments. The musky scent of soil, the crisp green fragrance of pines. The hardness of pebbles against

my skin. The sun dragging itself up over the horizon, painting the silhouette of the mountains gold. Birds singing from the

trees.

I cough. Rub my eyes.

My whole body is stiff, and my mouth feels like it’s been stuffed with sand. I sit up very slowly, as though waking from a

long, disorienting dream. Something feels different. Despite the pain in my joints and the dirt in my hair, I feel... lighter.

Like I’ve finally taken off a soaked, oversized coat and slipped into my own shirt.

Then I see Jessica standing above me.

Jessica.

Shock spears through my chest. I’m blinking, blinking, my head spinning so fast it makes me dizzy. She’s wearing the same

clothes I was in yesterday, her school blazer wrinkled at the sleeves, her fingers covered in blue paint. Her face is pale,

her eyes wide.

“Jenna?” she says.

I lurch to my feet, more awake than I’ve ever been. My heart kicks against my ribs as I lift my hands to the air and inspect them. There are calluses on my palms and my index finger, marks from all the nights I spent painting alone in my room. My hands.

I exist again.

“Oh my god,” I say, and it’s the sound of my own voice. I could sob. “Oh my god.”

“What happened?” Jessica asks, looking as dazed as I feel. “I just woke up and we’re on a mountain and... what is this?”

I open my mouth, but I have no idea where to even begin. “I was you,” I manage at last. “I—I made a wish and I was you. I

became you. I had your appearance, your life, your family. Can you remember anything? Do you know? I... I tried to look

for you but...” I trail off, a sudden, overwhelming wave of guilt crushing the words in my throat. But I’ve failed, so many times.

“I kind of remember,” she says, massaging her temples, her brows drawing together. “It’s hard to describe. The last night

I recall clearly is...” She closes her eyes. “The night of the Harvard acceptance. Aaron had come to visit—yes, and you

were there too. Then you left and I went to bed and everything was normal and the next morning I woke up....” Her eyes

snap open again. “It was like I was watching a movie play out from far, far away. I had some vague impression of everything

that was going on, but I wasn’t myself. I was... suspended in a place in the back of my own mind. Just hovering there,

weightless, in a closed room. I couldn’t control my body. It was... freeing.”

“Wait. So you were there? This entire time?” Despite the warmth from the sun, my skin goes cold. “You were just... trapped?”

“Not trapped, exactly,” she says. “There were these few moments early on when it felt like the door in my mind wasn’t fully

locked, when it seemed possible for me to break through, if I really wanted to. Like when you called my name. But I was—scared.

I wanted to stay in that room and just... rest. And the longer I stayed there, the harder it became to remember why I needed

to leave at all.”

There’s a certain kind of fear that comes not before or during, but after an event has passed. The same fear that comes after you’ve swerved the car out of the way a second before it crashed; of

missing a step and catching yourself right as you’re falling; of noticing a mistake on your test and correcting it before

the teacher collects it. The sharp, heart-pounding realization of what could have happened, of how fragile and arbitrary life itself is, of how one moment, one mistake, could have the power to change

everything.

“I’m sorry,” I babble. “I’m really sorry. It was my wish that started it all... it should have never happened—”

She waves the apology away briskly, without resentment. I’d almost forgotten that about her. Jessica Chen doesn’t like to

dwell on platitudes and well-wishes and empty sentiments. “It was my wish too,” she says. “And besides, I’m more curious how it happened. Have there been any... I don’t know, any conspiracy theories about this? Has this sort of phenomenon ever

been reported before?”

“I don’t think so,” I say slowly. “You know, I used to have this theory that if I wanted something badly enough, the universe would make sure to keep it just out of my reach. Like a cruel joke, or a trick. But... maybe the cruelest trick the universe can play on us is to give us exactly what we wish for.”

She shivers, rubbing her arms. “Really? You believe that? That the universe is listening?”

“It’s possible.” I shrug. “I mean, how much do we actually know about the universe and what’s out there? Maybe anything could

happen. Maybe all those things people speculate about—time loops and parallel universes and whatnot—could all be real. Maybe

somewhere on the other end of the world, someone else also has the ability to wake up in another person’s body, or to foresee

the future, or turn invisible.”

“I wouldn’t usually agree with that,” she says, “except it did happen.”

“It did happen,” I echo. I run a hand through my hair, shaking out the loose leaves and twigs, marveling at the impossibility

of it all. That we’re standing here on the peak of the mountain and watching the clouds shift colors in the light and having

a normal conversation about this.

Jessica shoots me a curious look, like something’s just occurred to her. “And you really wanted to be... me that badly?”

“Oh, not at all, not anymore,” I say, then pause. “Um, no offense.”

This time, she bursts out laughing, and the tension cracks. The sheer absurdity sets in. We’re both in hysterics, clutching

our sides and gasping for air.

“So what’s next?” she asks at last. “Do we... I mean, what, we just go back to our old lives?”

Before, the idea would have completely depressed and terrified me. What is there to go back to? I would’ve asked. There’s nothing waiting for me. Now I can’t imagine anything better. “We go back,” I confirm, my face splitting into a broad grin. “We go home.”

I’ve barely set foot in my house when my mom marches up to me.

“Where were you?” she asks shrilly. She’s still wearing her pajamas, an old bathrobe pulled around her narrow frame, her hair unbrushed. She’s

not smiling at me politely like a host or a distant relative. She’s scowling fiercely, her lips set into a furious line, her

eyes glowing with rage. When she starts talking, she doesn’t stop. “Where did you go, you xiong haizi? Do you know how scared

we were? Your dad and I were searching the whole house—your bedroom was completely empty. No note. No message. No letter.

We thought you’d been kidnapped or eaten by a bear or run over by a gigantic truck. We were just about to head down to the school to interrogate them. Your dad has high blood pressure, you know that? Did you

want to give us a heart attack? What will you do if we both die, huh? You can’t even do your own laundry; your shirts come

out all wrinkly. You think our life insurance is going to cover you? Why do you look so happy ?”

“Because I am really, really happy,” I say, beaming so wide the muscles in my cheeks hurt. “Mama.”

“What?” she asks.

“You’re my mom, right?” I ask, only to hear her say it. “I’m your daughter?”

She stares at me for a long beat, silent, and just when I feel a familiar trickle of fear, she reaches out and swats the back of my head. “What kind of nonsense is that? Are you looking for another mom? Because if you have any complaints—”

“I don’t have any problem with that,” I say quickly. “None at all.”

She frowns again, and presses her forehead to mine for a second. “Are you running a fever?” she mutters. “Why are you acting

so weird?”

“I’m not,” I say, then crane my head to scan the house. Everything’s gone back to the way it was. The family portraits, the

desk in the corner, the books on the shelves. “Where’s my dad?”

“He was about to start the car. Aiya, I better get him—” My mom whirls around and yells, “ Laogong! Haizi ta ba, she’s back. She’s back. She’s okay.” In the same breath, she turns to me and seizes my shoulders. “You are okay,

right? You’re not injured anywhere? Youmeiyou zhaoliang? You’re wearing so little—zhen shi de, bu zhidao leng re. I’ll boil

you some ginger water after this—”

The door creaks open.

“Where did you go?” My dad walks straight over to us. I had expected him to be angry, even angrier than Mom, but all he looks

is relieved.

“I was, um, exercising,” I say. “Up in the mountains with Jessica.” This was the story Jessica and I had agreed upon before

we parted ways outside my house. It’s the truth, in a way, and it’s the best explanation for why there’s dirt smeared on my

clothes and my shoes.

“Exercising?” Dad repeats in disbelief.

“You’re always telling me to exercise more, aren’t you?”

“Yes, but—”

“I woke up super early in the morning and just felt really, really inspired to start right then and there,” I tell him. “And

Jessica—well, you know, she’s always been very fit and likes to do her workouts at dawn. So I called her up and we went hiking.

I thought you’d be pleased.”

Dad exchanges a glance with Mom and then heaves a sigh. “Next time,” he says, “you have to tell us beforehand, okay?”

“Okay,” I say.

His bushy brows lift. “That’s it? Where’s your usual attitude? Aren’t you going to protest?”

I shrug, hardly suppressing my joy. “I’m in a very agreeable mood today.” I feel like it’s the last day of school, the promise

of summer flung out ahead of me. There is no greater or simpler joy than this: I can go anywhere I want—the glittering lakes,

the singing cliffs by the sea, the wide, wind-rustled meadows—and I can always come back home. “Wait. Can you make wontons

for dinner tonight?” I ask my mom, clinging to her arm. “Please?”

She laughs at me. “You’re craving them?”

“I’ve been craving them for ages,” I say honestly.

“All right.” She exchanges an amused glance with my dad. “I’ll defrost the ground meat.”

“I’ll help you mix it,” I promise, giddy at the very prospect of dinner, of being able to eat with my own parents, inside my own house. It’s bizarre, how everything that had once seemed so ordinary to me now feels uniquely, unbearably precious, and everything that had once seemed so vital now feels so trivial. “Can we also have egg-and-tomato soup another day?”

“Yes, yes,” she says, laughing harder. “Is that all, ni zhege xiao chihuo? Anything else that you’d like to have?”

I think about it for only a moment, then shake my head.

“Well, let’s feed you some breakfast first. Oh!” Mom snaps her fingers. “Before I forget, we should also tell Aaron. He’ll

want to know Jenna’s home.”

The very sound of his name jolts my heart inside my chest. “Aaron?”

“Yes,” Mom says, frowning. “It was quite strange. He called the house first thing in the morning—that’s what woke us up. He

sounded incredibly frantic. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him so worried before. I’m not sure what’s going on with that boy.

He kept asking for you and saying he needed to see you right away. I’ll give him a call back—”

“There’s no need,” Dad interrupts, pointing to the driveway beyond the window. “It appears he’s already come here.”

I close the front door behind me and wait for my pulse to calm down. It doesn’t; it only hammers faster and faster as Aaron

strides up to me. Grabs my wrist. Pauses mere inches away from me. His scent is so familiar—like gardenias and spring storms

and the air rising through the mountains on a clear, moonlit night—that I find myself inhaling deeply. It feels like breathing

for the first time.

“Jenna,” he says. I thought my mom might have been exaggerating, but his voice is every bit as distressed as she’d described. “Jenna. Thank god. You’re here.”

“Do you remember now?” I ask him, searching his face.

His eyes widen a fraction. “So it wasn’t a dream. You really were... you were gone. You were Jessica. All of that was real?”

I nod.

He releases a sharp, shuddering breath. He still hasn’t let go of my wrists yet. His skin is blissfully warm around mine,

his fingers firm but tender. “I woke up and I wasn’t sure—I just heard your name. That was the only thing that mattered. I

knew I had to find you.”

“And you found me,” I say simply.

“Yes,” he says, gazing down at me. He gives his head a little shake. “You’re really her?”

“Do you want to test me?”

“Are you being funny?”

“For once, no,” I say. “I’m serious. Test me. Any memory we have. Something only I would know.”

He deliberates on this for a moment. “The week before I left for Paris,” he says, and I can see the memory come alive in his

expression. I can almost feel the rain on my skin again. “When it was raining, and we were standing beneath the trees...”

We’re standing beneath the trees now, the wisteria spreading its branches around us, the soft purple petals brushing the top

of my head.

“What did you ask me, then?” He’s studying me as intently as I’m studying him.

“I asked you—” It’s hard to speak past the lump in my throat. “I asked you if you would ever hate me. And you said no. You said never.”

“You’re right,” he says, voice low, and it occurs to me that this is the first time the two of us have really been alone since

before he left for Paris. Maybe the same realization has struck him as well, because he swallows, hard. Drops his hands. “Well,”

he says. “Good. As long as you’re back now.”

There’s too much unsaid between us. Too much that’s passed already. Too much I want. His gaze flickers once to my lips, and

all the blood in my body rushes through my veins with the speed of wind. I’m lightheaded, dizzy with anticipation, with longing,

with relief. But he doesn’t move closer.

Instead, he rights himself. Casts one last, long look at me.

And turns to go.

No, I want to say, and in that split second, something else occurs to me: that life doesn’t have to go back exactly to what it

was before.

“Wait,” I blurt out.

His footsteps stall, and that’s all I need. I rush toward him and wrap my arms around his torso from behind, just like I’ve

always fantasized about, my body pressed so tightly to his I can hear his uneven breathing. I’m stunned by my own bravery,

but I bury my face in his shirt, in the space between his shoulder blades.

“I know exactly what I want now,” I tell him, my voice holding even, despite how hard my heart is pounding. “And that includes

you. I promise you’re not just some dream for me to chase. I promise I’ll never stop wanting you—”

I don’t have the chance to finish. He spins around, and his hands are in my hair, his lips are on mine, and my heart is on fire. I can’t believe it’s happening, even as I kiss him back, urgently, recklessly. Even as my fingers find the collar of his shirt to pull him closer, closer, closer, bridging the months of absence, the years I loved him in private. And I’m stunned by how right it is, how natural it feels. I’ve dreamed of this for so long that it seems impossible the reality of it could ever match

up to the vision I’d been building inside my head, but it’s somehow even better.

He pulls back just to look at me. His eyes are the deepest black, a shade I can never seem to replicate with oils or watercolors.

He lifts his hand and tugs my hair once, lightly, teasing, testing, as if he needs to confirm that I’m really here. Then he

runs one gentle thumb over my cheek, and I think I lean in. I think I stop breathing.

“Jenna, you’re all I’ve ever wanted,” he says, quiet. Perfect. “It’s always been you. It can only be you.”

The sun is bursting through my chest, breaking past my lips. It’s my life, I think with amazement, and it’s beautiful, and I can paint it any color I want to. Right now it’s drenched in the brightest shade of gold. I have the brush in my hands, and the canvas is mine. It’s all mine.