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What reaction he was expecting, I have no idea. But the group falls deadly silent before swinging their collective attention to me and Andrew.
“What is considered ‘hooking up’ these days?” Lisa asks quietly, and my stomach drops in mortification.
“Wait,” Ricky says. “Sorry, I feel like I missed something.”
“Whatever.” Theo turns to walk down the sidewalk. “Doesn’t matter.”
“Theo.” I chase after him, jogging to keep up with his long strides, and reach out to grab the sleeve of his jacket, but he tugs free. “Wait.”
I hop over a patch of ice and slow to a bewildered stop in front of a small ice cream shop that’s closed for the season. Is he seriously just running away?
“Theo!” I shout, but he keeps going. I take another step and then freeze at the sound of a metallic groan, followed immediately by a cacophonous crash just behind me.
Turning, heart hammering inside my chest, I see that the metal frame beneath the shop’s awning has crumpled, plummeting to the sidewalk not a foot away from where I stand. The innocent patch of ice I stepped around is now buried beneath it.
I turn my face up to the sky. “What?” I throw my arms out. “What am I supposed to do? Am I not supposed to follow Theo? Am I supposed to just stand near Andrew? What! Just tell me!”
Benny comes over, a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Mae. Honey. Calm down, it was just an accident.”
“It wasn’t, though.” Hysteria has taken over my brain, my blood, my pulse. It pours through me, silvery and hot, obliterating anything rational or measured. “The car crash? This?” I motion wildly at the twisted mess of fabric and metal. “Clearly it was my fault.”
Dad steps forward, gently murmuring, “Mae,” with Andrew right at his side. “Honey, what’s wrong?” He looks to Benny. “What is she talking about?”
Andrew comes close, putting his hands on my shoulders. “Maisie. What’s going on?”
I look past him to Benny. “I can’t act like this isn’t happening anymore. It’s exhausting. I don’t know how to keep the act up.”
Benny gives me a helpless look.
I turn to Andrew, and then my dad and my brother. I scan my eyes across the group. “I’m stuck in some sort of time loop, and I don’t know how to get out of it. I mean,” I say, “a few days ago, I wanted out of it so bad. But now I don’t want to mess it up.”
Andrew takes my hand. “What are you talking about?”
“I don’t know how to explain it.”
Benny clears his throat. “We think Mae is in a Groundhog Day–type scenario. She’s been to the cabin a few times, and each time she gets injured and then wakes up back on the plane on December twentieth.”
Andrew lets out a little incredulous laugh. Everyone looks around at each other like, Are we all hearing the same thing?
“I’m trying to keep track of everything,” I admit, “and I realize this sounds crazy, but I’m scared something terrible is going to happen, so can everyone just take a few steps away from me?”
No one moves.
“Please,” I plead, and pull my hand out of Andrew’s grip. “Back up.”
My composure feels like a string being slowly dragged along the serrated edge of a blade. I turn to my brother, who is watching with wide, worried eyes. “Miles. Punch me.”
He lets out a disbelieving laugh. “What?”
“In the face. Hard.”
A few voices murmur my name in pity, but I’m not having it. “Punch me. I want to go back to the plane.”
“Mae, I’m not going to—”
“Punch me!”
He takes a step behind Benny, looking to our dad for help, and then I realize that Ricky has picked up Kennedy, that Lisa is holding Zachary, and that everyone—even Andrew—is looking at me like they’re afraid of me.
I turn and run away down the street. I don’t know where I’m going. I’m praying with everything I have that all of this ends and I wake up in seat 19B. Take me away from this nightmare.
The only voice I hear behind me is Benny’s gentle “Let her go, Dan. She needs to be alone.”
• • •
Two hours later, Benny walks into the small diner where I’ve been sitting. He does a brief scan of the interior, spots me, exhales in relief, and makes his way over.
I’m sipping my fourth cup of coffee, hands vibrating as I shred a napkin into smaller and smaller pieces. Pretty soon they’ll be microscopic, a smattering of dust on the Formica tabletop. A tinsel-covered Christmas tree stands in the corner, glittery paper snowflakes flutter overhead, and a small rock fireplace burns nearby. None of it helps. None of it makes me feel anything.
“Hey, Mayonnaise,” he murmurs, kissing the top of my head.
When I don’t reply with a silly name, he pulls out the chair opposite me and sits down. “You’re not answering your phone,” he says. I can see the worry in the tiny lines around his eyes, the downturn of his mouth.
