In Some Other Life: A Novel

by Jessica Brody

  He barks out a laugh. “So this newspaper thing, you’re serious about that?”

  “Yeah,” I say earnestly, then I turn and face out the window, as though I’m no longer talking to him. As though I’m announcing it to the whole world. The whole universe. “I’m a writer. It’s what I do.”

  He’s quiet for a moment, like he’s digesting this new piece of information. “I think I remember you saying something about that. About loving to write.”

  “On our date?” I ask, finally voicing the word that has seemed off-limits for so long.

  “Yeah,” he says quietly, looking away. “On our date.”

  I want to ask him for more details—Where did we go? What did we do? What else did we talk about?—but I know that admitting to him I don’t remember any of it will only make things worse. So instead I just say, “We had fun, didn’t we?”

  He laughs to himself, like he’s reliving a memory I will never be able to share with him. A moment in time that I will never experience. “Yeah. We did. I mean, I thought we did. I asked if you wanted to go out again and you said yes, but then…”

  “I never responded to your texts,” I finish, an ugly knot forming in my stomach. An ugly truth forming in my mind.

  “Yeah,” he replies distantly. Then, as though pulling himself out of a trance, he shakes his head and adds, “Anyway, I remember we talked about writing. How much we both loved it. I always wondered what happened to that. Why you never pursued it.”

  I glance down at my pristine Windsor uniform with the single dark streak on the skirt. Suddenly it feels like more than just a smudge of chocolate. It feels like a stain on my whole life.

  I know the answer to his question. It’s obvious to me now. This world—this choice, this place—it changed my priorities. It changed who I thought I was.

  “Do you believe in the multiverse theory?” I ask him.

  “Is that the one that states that every decision we make creates an entirely new universe?”

  I nod. “Yeah.”

  “It’s a cool theory, I guess.”

  “Do you ever wonder about all those other versions of you out there? What they’re doing. Where they are. If they’re happy. Is this really the best possible version of your life?”

  He scoffs. “I will now. Thanks a lot. As if I didn’t have enough to worry about.”

  “Sorry,” I offer.

  He smiles to let me know he was joking. “Do you? Think about that stuff?”

  What if I had just broken up with Austin years earlier?

  What if Dylan and I had gone on that second date?

  What if I’d never applied to the Windsor Academy to begin with?

  “Pretty much every day.”

  “And?” he prompts. “What have you come up with? Is this the best possible version of your life? Are all those other Kennedys Crushers, too?” I don’t miss the sarcasm he places on my nickname.

  I let out a sad little laugh. “The truth is, I’m not even sure this Kennedy is.” Then I reach for the door handle and step onto the curb. “Thanks for the ride.”

  Then I Know What You’re Thinking

  By the time I reach the house, I’m completely soaked. Wool definitely wasn’t meant to stave off moisture. I peel off my blazer and hang it in the laundry room before heading upstairs to my room.

  I lie on my bed and scroll through Laney’s SnipPic feed, staring at happy picture after happy picture, until I grow too disgusted and toss the phone aside. Then I pull out my laptop, carry it to my desk, and plop down in my chair, vowing to get some work done.

  The computer opens to the same window that I closed it on: the log-in page for the test thief’s anonymous email address.

  I lean in and stare at the password hint.

  I know what you’re thinking …

  Why does that sound so dang familiar? Why does it seem like the answer is on the tip of my tongue?

  I know what you’re thinking …

  “I wish I knew what you were thinking!” I yell at the screen, maneuvering the mouse to close the window. But just before I click the little red X in the corner, words flood into my memory. Like water filling holes.

  It’s a deep, masculine voice that speaks them.

  “I know what you’re thinking … and you’re right.”

  It’s from Dad’s favorite TV series. Magnum, P.I. It aired in the early eighties. Dad used to make us watch countless old reruns when we were growing up. Frankie and I always thought the show was lame. The effects were outdated, the pacing was slow, the dialogue was cheesy. And Tom Selleck, the actor who plays Magnum, always did this corny voice-over throughout each episode, narrating his reaction to what was happening on the screen.

  Whenever he would get into some kind of trouble, he would always say to the audience …

  “I know what you’re thinking…” I repeat aloud, a chill running down my back.

  Then, he’d usually follow it up with “And you’re right.” Or “But you’re wrong.”

  That’s the question of the day, isn’t it?

  The question of a lifetime.

  Am I right? Or am I wrong?

  I pull the laptop closer, click on the empty password field, and position my shaking hands on the keys. Then, slowly, I type:

  M-A-G-N-U-M.

  The name of Dad’s best camera. The name of Dad’s favorite character on his favorite show.

  His full name was Thomas Sullivan Magnum IV.

  I gaze at the email address in the log-in box and feel my stomach clench.

  TSM4@youmail.com

  As my finger hovers over the Enter key, I close my eyes, not wanting to see it. Not wanting to admit what I’m fairly sure I’m going to have to admit in a matter of seconds.

  I press down, holding my breath. When I open my eyes again, my heart starts to hammer and I feel sweat pooling on the back of my neck.

  I’m staring at an inbox.

  And not just any inbox.

  The inbox of a thief.

  There are a zillion questions banging on the doors of my mind, begging to be let in. I try to keep them all at bay as I skim the messages on the screen. Most of them are from gibberish email addresses, anonymous accounts like the one I set up. I spot my own sting email near the top of the list. It’s still unread.

  As are the next twenty messages.

  I follow the trail of unread emails all the way down until I find the last message that was responded to. I click on it and read the familiar exchange.

  The name of a class, the date of a test, the title of a book, forty-eight hours.

  Emma is the book.

  This was the money Dylan and I found in the library last week. But how long was it just sitting there? When did this exchange take place?

  I glance up to the email heading and read the date stamped into the reply.

  November 15.

  The date instantly sets off a series of alarms in my head. Why does that date sound so important? Why does it seem to be engraved into my mind like an inscription?

  I quickly grab my phone and search my calendar, but there’s nothing out of the ordinary about that date. Just the usual. School, clubs, homework.

  In this life, the voice quietly reminds me.

  I’m starting to wonder if it’s really a voice of reason.

  Or a sign that I’m going crazy.

  But once again, it’s right.

  My vision starts to shimmy. The walls of my bedroom start to shake, like they’re getting ready to collapse around me. They’re just waiting for someone to plunge down on the detonator.

  November 15 was the date of my Columbia alumni interview.

  In my other life.

  When I bombed it. When I didn’t speak German. When I mistook the Kalahari Desert for New Mexico. When I flipped out and drove straight to the Windsor Academy to beg for my space back.

  When I hit my head and woke up here.

  November 15, the last time this inbox was checked, was the day I swapped lives with
a girl named Kennedy “Crusher” Rhodes.

  Then I Make a List and Check It Twice

  It’s a coincidence. It has to be. A lot of things happened on November 15. It doesn’t mean anything. So what if I happened to know what the password hint meant? That was a lucky guess. A shot in the dark. I’m sure a lot of people watch Magnum, P.I. and would get that reference. I mean, it’s like basically common knowledge.

  It doesn’t mean anything.

  It doesn’t mean anything.

  It doesn’t mean anything.

  I skim through more returned emails, reading the same conversation over and over again. Another class. Another test date. Another book title.

  I get out my notebook, flip to a blank page, and start writing them all down as a list.

  History—November 22—Jane Eyre

  Spanish—November 23—The Scarlet Letter

  Algebra—November 21—Great Expectations

  English—November 18—Don Quixote

  I stop and stare at the list, tapping my pen against the page. There’s something about those dates that feels so familiar.

  November 22

  November 23

  November 21

  Those are all dates that I was here. In this life. But what significance do they have?

  I write them out in numeric format, trying to bring to flame the tiny spark that keeps flickering in the back of my mind.

  11-22

  11-23

  11-21

  I stare at the sequence for what feels like hours, until my vision blurs and my eyes water.

  And then, as I’m blinking away the moisture, I notice it.

  I remember where I’ve seen those numbers before.

  With a lump in my throat, I go back to my first list and write each entry in shorthand next to the original.

  History—November 22—Jane Eyre / HI-1122-JE

  Spanish—November 23—The Scarlet Letter / SP-1123-TSL

  Algebra—November 21—Great Expectations / AL-1121-GE

  English—November 18—Don Quixote / EN-1118-DQ

  I don’t need to look at my phone to confirm what’s in front of me. I don’t need to reexamine those strange, coded tasks in my Windsor Achiever app to verify that they’re an exact match.

  I don’t need to see anything else to know, without a shadow of a doubt, that it was me.

  It was me the whole time.

  Then I Become Her

  I leap out of my chair and start pacing the length of my room as Dylan’s cryptic, seemingly nonsensical words from the car come flooding back to me.

  “For a while, I suspected … I mean, I’m in the library a lot. I see things. So I thought … Well, the point is, I was mistaken.”

  He knew. Or at the very least, he thought he knew. The whole time I was suspecting him, he was suspecting me. Was that why he was so interested in helping me? Because he was trying to prove his own theory? Because he was trying to prove I really was the brainwashed zombie he always thought I was?

  “… I was wrong about you.”

  No! I want to scream aloud as tears spring to my eyes. You were right.

  He must have thought I was crazy. Investigating a story that he was so sure I was behind. He must have thought I really had cracked.

  I continue pacing, struggling to take deep breaths. To calm the deafening racket in my head. Then, as I reach the end of my room and turn around, my gaze lands on my desk. On the bottom drawer.

  I run over to it and, with shaking hands, yank open the drawer.

  There it is. The big, black monstrosity. Sitting there like the heavy stone that’s settled in to the pit of my stomach.

  I kneel down next to the drawer and run my fingertips over the smooth metal surface of the box, stopping when I reach the four-digit combination lock.

  It’s time to crack this code. It’s time to solve this mystery once and for all.

  Again, I try every combination I can think of. My birthday, Dad’s birthday, Mom’s birthday, Frankie’s birthday. I even look through my phone to find Sequoia’s birthday and try that, too. Nothing works.

  How long would it take to try every possible combination?

  I do a quick calculation in my head. There are 10,000 combinations. If I can input one every ten seconds, I’d be done in …

  Just over twenty-seven hours.

  I collapse onto my back with a sigh and stare at the ceiling. There’s got to be a better way.

  Think, Kennedy. THINK.

  She’s the same person as you. We share the same brain. The same first fourteen years of our lives. You cracked her email password, you can crack this, too.

  What was important to her?

  What was important to me?

  Dad. Mom. Frankie. But I tried all of those.

  What else?

  The newspaper. That was important to me. But not to her. Other Me never had a chance to cultivate that passion. She never had the opportunity to feel the thrill of commanding a room full of writers. Of putting an issue to bed after fifty straight hours of reading and rereading and proofing and last-minute cuts and last-last-minute additions. Of handing over a flash drive to the printer like she was handing over her whole life.

  She never got to feel the satisfaction of holding that Spartan Press Award in her hand. Of framing that prized issue and hanging it on her wall.

  My gaze drifts up to the place where those frames used to hang. I would look at them every day. For strength. For courage. For motivation. On good days and bad days. They were my reminders that no matter what happened, no matter what regrets lived in my heart, something was good.

  Life was good.

  That life was good.

  And now, as I stare at the single frame hanging in their place—my acceptance letter to Windsor—I wonder if life can ever be good again.

  Tears blur my vision as I gaze up at the letter. At those familiar words that I memorized oh so long ago.

  Dear Ms. Rhodes,

  Congratulations! It is on this date, May 12, that we are pleased to inform you …

  On this date, May 12.

  That was the day that my life split into two directions. Where the choice was offered to me. Where I was so convinced that I took the wrong turn.

  That I chose poorly.

  But as I lie here on the floor with a lockbox full of dark secrets, I wonder which way was really the wrong turn. I wonder if the mistake that haunted me for more than three years wasn’t a mistake at all. If maybe, it was the best decision I ever made.

  But what did Other Me think? What has been going through her head for the past three and a half years? Did she have regrets about that exact same moment in time? Did she think back to that day she got the letter and wish she had taken another path? Did she look at her deathly reflection in the mirror every morning and wonder how her life could have been different?

  On this date, May 12 …

  Two roads diverge.

  On this date, May 12 …

  I choose Austin.

  On this date, May 12 …

  I choose Windsor.

  May 12.

  I bolt upright and glance at the black box next to me. The keeper of my secrets. The truth I didn’t want anyone to see.

  On this date, May 12 …

  I become who I am.

  With shaking, uneven fingers, I dial in the combination.

  0512

  Then, somewhere in the farthest dark corner of every single universe, I hear a faint click.

  Then I Open Pandora’s Box

  The money pours out like a gushing fountain. Piles and piles of hundred-dollar bills. They’ve been stuffed to the brim inside this box. They’ve been hidden from sight like a skeleton in a closet.

  I don’t bother counting. I don’t even want to know how much is here. How deep the secret goes.

  It’s enough to see it.

  It’s enough to feel the cash slithering around my ankles like a swarm of snakes. I jump to my feet and back away. Afraid of being bitte
n. Afraid of being infected. Afraid of my very existence.

  I don’t understand.

  My life was perfect. I was at the top of my class. I was a member of too many clubs to even keep track of. I raised thousands and thousands of dollars for the school. I was a shoo-in for Columbia. Why on earth would I risk it all?

  I can’t, I decide in one sweeping emotion. I can’t risk it all.

  I need to shut this down. I need to erase all the evidence, pretend it never happened, go on with my life. I need to get into Columbia, become a rock star journalist, live a fulfilling life. That’s how I’ll fix this.

  Not by getting caught and suspended, ruining my future, and maybe even ending up in juvie.

  No. Not gonna happen.

  It wasn’t me who did this. It was her. She’s the culprit. The thief. The perp. Whatever Other Me did was her problem. Not mine. And I won’t take the fall for her mistakes.

  I run to my bedroom door and turn the lock. Then I get to work. I start by deleting both of the anonymous email accounts (TSM4@youmail.com and the one I set up last week). Then I clear my cache and erase my browsing history. I rip out all my notes from my notebook, light a match, and burn them in the shower, washing away the ash with a blast of cold water. I stuff the cash back into the box and lock it. When I get to school tomorrow, I’m going to have to search through every book on that reading list and get rid of any money that’s still hidden in them.

  There won’t be any front-page story or any school newspaper. That’s gone. Not many people knew I was working on it anyway. Mr. Fitz turned down my request. For all he knows, I took his advice to heart and didn’t pursue it further.

  The only loose end is Dylan.

  The person who suspected me from the very beginning.

  I grab my phone, find his contact information in the Windsor Achiever app, and tap out two text messages to him, choosing my words carefully.

  Me: Looks like I’ve hit another dead end.

  Me: Couldn’t figure out the password. Got locked out. Oh, well.

  I rap my fingers anxiously against the phone as I wait for him to respond. A few seconds later, a message appears.