“I’m glad to hear it,” her dad said, thankfully not seeming to notice her chipmunk voice. “So tell me something. Why is it that I keep seeing your boyfriend biking past our house?”
“Marcus? But what’s the point? I’m not there anyway.”
“Sentimentality makes us act in strange ways,” her dad said. “They’ve done studies on it, in fact.”
Lena didn’t understand why. If anything, she was the opposite of sentimental. Instead of trying to hold on to the past, she was afraid of it happening again. “Dad, before Mom left, did you have any idea it was going to happen?”
He let out a surprised cough. “No…” he said slowly. “Well, perhaps that’s not quite true. I knew she was stressed and unhappy, and there were times when she seemed so far away. I think part of her was already gone.” He sighed. “But could I have predicted that it was bad enough to make her decide to leave? No, I don’t think so.” He paused. “Why do you ask? Are things not going the way you wanted them to with your mom?”
“No, no,” she said. “I guess living with her has brought up some old memories, but no, everything’s fine. It’s great.” At least, it would be if they could just get through this power outage thing. “I have to go. Tell Viv I say hi, okay?”
She could practically hear her dad smile over the phone at the mention of his new girlfriend. At least Lena didn’t need to worry about one of her parents. “Will do,” he said. “Take care of yourself, Munchkin.”
Right as Lena hung up, her mom pulled up in front of the theater.
“I’m so sorry, honey,” she said when Lena jumped into the passenger seat. “My assignment took longer than I thought it would.” She sounded drained, and there was what looked like grease streaked through her hair.
“But you got the soul, right?”
“Yes. Eventually.” Her mom shook her head, and her voice turned soft and distant. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take, honestly. I have more assignments every day, and they all seem impossible without my powers.”
That’s when Lena sensed it, the exact thing her dad had been talking about. Her mom was in the car with her, and yet, she wasn’t.
“It’ll be fine, Mom. Whatever happens, we’ll figure it out, okay?”
Her mom gave her a sad smile. Then she shook her head again as if to clear it, and when she spoke, her voice was back to normal. “How was class? Anything interesting happen?”
Lena opened her mouth, ready to spill everything about Pearl. But…she couldn’t. Because the last thing her mom needed was more stress to make her run again. And if Lena told her about Pearl, she’d have to tell her about the new powers too. So Lena forced a smile onto her face and said, “It was good!”
All Pearl wanted was to find her friend. Who knew? Maybe Myrna was still around. In which case, all Lena had to do was reunite the two of them. That was simple enough. And if that didn’t work out… Well, Lena didn’t know what she’d do. But she was sure she could handle it on her own.
Chapter 11
“When did this start?” Marcus asked Connie when he was finally able to get her alone. He’d had to stand by and watch as she and the other kids flailed around on trampolines for nearly an hour. He’d been too wound up to focus on jumping. His brain was already doing gymnastics to figure out how Connie could suddenly be a matchmaker. And how she could have powers when everyone else’s were gone.
“It started yesterday after I saw you at the mall,” Connie said as they stood outside the building waiting for her stepdad to pick her up. Her words tumbled out in a breathless flow. “My cousin went home, because she said she was sick of shopping, so I went to get my nails done. The salon lady was going on and on about how lonely she was, and then this guy came in to deliver water, and he was really cute, and then suddenly my fingers started glowing, and the salon lady totally didn’t notice and kept working on my nails, and then the light kind of shot out of my fingers and disappeared into her, and the next thing I knew, she and the water delivery guy were all into each other and totally forgot I was even standing there!”
“You must have been really freaked out,” Marcus said, trying to picture what it would be like to have your powers appear without warning.
“Are you kidding?” Connie said. “It was great! Imagine having the power to fix people up whenever you want.”
Marcus didn’t have to imagine it. “But you can’t fix up whoever you feel like,” he said. “It doesn’t work that way.”
“Sure it does! I’ve fixed up five couples so far. It would have been six if your friend Albert hadn’t left. Do you think he’ll give my cousin a chance if I make her promise to throw out her rock collection?”
Marcus almost fell over. Connie had managed to fix up five couples in twenty-four hours? “Connie, listen to me! If you go around zapping people at random, it could totally mess up the order of the universe.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “How do you know? Wait…can you do this too?”
There was no way he could deny it. “Yes. Or, at least, I could until a couple of days ago. Then my powers kind of shut off.”
“What happened to them?”
“I don’t know! Last I heard, everyone’s powers were out. That’s why it makes no sense that you can do this…unless…” Marcus’s brain was spinning. “You said this all started right after you saw me? Maybe my powers aren’t turned off. Maybe you have them.”
“Can I keep them?” Connie asked eagerly.
This was a far cry from when Marcus and Lena had swapped powers and Lena had been ready to do anything to get rid of them. She’d been convinced that love was fake, just chemicals in your brain making you do crazy stuff. He’d thought that was hard to deal with, but this was even worse. He couldn’t have someone running around with his powers and zapping everyone in sight!
“No, Connie, you can’t become a matchmaker whenever you want. You have to be chosen for it.”
“But I was chosen, wasn’t I? Your powers jumped from you to me. I bet that means I’m supposed to have them.”
Marcus couldn’t stop shaking his head. Connie wasn’t getting it. “I need those powers. I have assignments to do, and I can’t do them when I can’t zap people.”
“What assignments?”
“Well, right now, it’s just Albert. But I could get another one at any point.”
“So I’ll help you,” Connie said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “It’ll be fun!”
“It’s not supposed to be fun!” Marcus roared.
“Wow, Marcus. Relax!”
But how could he relax? None of this made sense. He tried calling Eddie yet again, but it went straight to voice mail. Marcus quickly left him another message and then turned back to Connie. He had to figure out how to keep her from causing any more trouble.
“Until I hear back from my boss, you have to promise you won’t zap anyone else.”
“Why?”
“Why? Because you’re not supposed to be zapping people at all! That’s not how it works!”
“Then how does it work?”
He took a deep breath, realizing he’d been talking so loudly that people in the parking lot were staring. “Okay, let me back up.” He tried to explain to her about assignments and auras and the order of things. “If you fix up people who aren’t supposed to be together, it won’t last. And if you do it for personal gain, then—”
“I get it!” Connie said. “Wow, you make it sound so boring. Maybe these couples won’t wind up together forever, but I mean, look at them!” She pointed to Abigail and Ty, who were coming out of the trampoline park holding hands. Even if Marcus hadn’t been able to see the sparks around them, he would have still said they were glowing. “When I got here, they looked so blah, so I did the matchy thing, and now they’re so happy!”
Marcus sighed. Poor Abigail. Just a few weeks ago, she’d b
een zapped with a love bolt that had gone crazy, and she and her friend Hayleigh had spent days fighting over a guy who wasn’t interested in either of them. Finally, her life had gone back to normal, and here she was again, under yet another love spell. Okay, she did look pretty happy as Ty put his arm around her, but who knew how long that would last? And if they weren’t a good match, they’d be even more miserable when it was over.
“They might be happy now,” Marcus said, “but that’s not up to us to decide. We get assignments, and we do them and—”
“Maybe you do, but I’m not like you. I don’t have a boss. I don’t have to follow anyone’s rules.”
“But—you—”
“Oops. My ride’s here,” Connie said. “See you later!”
“No, wait!” Marcus cried. “I need your help with Albert!” If he did finally figure out who the guy was supposed to be fixed up with, it would be a lot easier to do it with powers. Even if they were in the wrong person.
She paused. “When are you supposed to fix him up?”
“He’s coming over to my house at seven thirty, so I was thinking I could—”
“Okay. I’ll see you then!” Connie called. Then she gave him a wave with her perfectly manicured hand, hopped into her stepdad’s car, and zipped away.
Chapter 12
“Can you see me okay?” Eddie asked, his face barely visible on Marcus’s laptop.
Marcus squinted. “Why is it so dark?” He turned down the volume so that his family members, who were still finishing up dinner while Marcus “worked on his geography project,” couldn’t overhear the conversation.
“I’m in my basement,” Eddie said. “My phone gets no reception here, so I come down when I need quiet.”
Was that why Marcus hadn’t been able to get Eddie on the phone in days? He’d been hiding in his basement and sending Natalie out to deliver messages? Then again, if tons of people were looking to Marcus for answers, he’d probably be hidden underground too.
“Let’s get Lena on the line,” Eddie said. He started clicking around, and his face lit up. “Ooh! I can make my voice sound like a robot!” An instant later, he asked, “How is this?” Not only did his voice have a hint of a Spanish accent, but now it was also brassy and mechanical.
“Creepy,” Marcus said. “We were going to talk to Lena, remember?”
“Affirmative,” Eddie said with a robotic chuckle.
Great. The whole world was messed up, and Marcus’s boss was still acting like a little kid. Marcus wasn’t sure whether to be annoyed that he wasn’t taking things seriously or to see this as a good sign. If the world was about to end, surely Eddie wouldn’t be using a drawing pad to sketch robot antennae on the screen right now, would he?
Finally, Lena’s face appeared next to Eddie’s on Marcus’s computer. The instant Marcus saw Lena, he relaxed a little. They’d figured out plenty of crises in the past. Surely they’d be able to figure out this one too.
“Sorry I couldn’t get back to you kids sooner,” Eddie said. “Things have been crazy.”
Lena blinked at his weird robot voice but didn’t say anything. Clearly, she was as used to Eddie’s antics as Marcus was.
“But you’re fixing it, right?” Marcus said. “You figured out why this is happening?”
Eddie let out a long, distorted sigh. “I wish I could say yes, but the truth is, we are stumped. We have never seen this kind of thing before. It seemed to happen overnight.”
“And random people have been getting powers all over the world?” Lena said. “It’s not just us?”
“Us?” Eddie said. “You have been experiencing power swaps too?”
“What?” Lena blinked rapidly. “No. I just meant Marcus and Connie. But if it happened to them, it could happen to anyone, right?” Her voice was oddly high-pitched, and Marcus had the feeling she was lying. But why would she hide something from Eddie?
Their boss didn’t seem to notice though, as he continued, “I am afraid it’s happening everywhere. Thankfully, it appears temporary. Some of the powers have already faded.”
“Oh phew,” Marcus said. That meant Connie might not be a matchmaker for much longer. Who knew how many more couples she’d zapped since he’d seen her? He’d tried texting her to remind her not to use her new powers, but she only sent back a bunch of smiley faces.
“But why is this happening at all?” Lena chimed in. “If our powers are gone, how could they be jumping to other people?”
“They’re not gone, not completely.” Eddie scratched at his short beard. “Think of your powers like a web. They’re all connected to each other. But for some reason, that web snapped, and strands went all over the place. Now, they are hanging loose, and sometimes, they will latch on to someone else for a little while. But then that thread will snap back and hang loose again.”
“So how do we patch up the web?” Lena asked.
Eddie shook his head. “It is not like a quilt. Patching will do no good. It needs to be rebuilt.”
“But how?” Marcus asked.
Eddie sighed. “That I don’t know.”
“Natalie and I were thinking that if we can trace the source of the outage, we might be able to—”
“We have already tried that,” Eddie broke in. “There is no event that seems significant enough to have caused this.”
“And you’re sure it’s not our fault somehow?” Marcus asked.
“How can it be?” Lena jumped in. “I’m not even there.”
Something clicked in Marcus’s head. “Wait, what if that’s the reason? I mean, things went crazy right around the time Lena left town, didn’t they?”
Eddie looked skeptical. “I have worried about the link between your powers being so strong and causing further problems. But Lena leaving town, it is such a small thing…”
“Our powers have been linked ever since we swapped them, right?” Marcus asked, his brain spinning. “It’s caused chain reactions before. Why couldn’t it cause something bigger?”
“I can look into it,” Eddie said, but despite his mechanical voice, he sounded doubtful. Then Eddie gave them a robotic send-off—“Beep beep boop”—and the shadowy screen went completely black, leaving Lena and Marcus alone in the video chat.
Marcus could see how worried she looked. “Are you okay?”
She sighed. “This is not the relaxing vacation with my mom that I was imagining.”
“I know what you mean. I haven’t worked on a single model so far. But we’ll figure this out, okay? Did you get the elevator joke I sent you?”
Her face brightened. “Yes, you cheeseball!” She chuckled. “Where do you come up with this stuff?”
“It’s amazing what you find when you look up ‘ghost jokes.’” He expected Lena to correct him, since she was not a fan of the word “ghost.” But her expression was far away, and she was worriedly chewing on her lip. “Hey, what’s going on?”
Lena shook her head. “There’s just a lot happening. I need to work on my lines before tomorrow, and I have to do some research about a soul that’s haunting our theater, and—”
“A soul at the theater? You didn’t tell me about that.”
She sighed. “Yeah. And…” He could see her wrestling with something. Finally, she added in a whisper, “Don’t tell Eddie, but I think I have my mom’s powers. I’m trying to use them to get rid of this soul, but it’s not going that great so far.”
“Whoa!” Marcus cried. “How did that happen? What does your mom say? And why can’t I—”
“She doesn’t know about the soul yet, which is why I don’t want Eddie to know either. I’m trying to figure it out on my own.”
“Are you sure it’s a good idea to keep it a secret?”
“Trust me. My mom can’t handle any more stress right now. I’ll tell her when things calm down a little.”
“Maybe I could help. I’ll try looking some stuff up for you or—”
“That’s okay. You have enough going on.” She smiled, her face softening. “But thank you. I’ll let you know if I need help.”
“You want me to call you later? I could—”
“Sorry. I have a phone call scheduled with Hayleigh in a minute. She’s freaking out about Abigail’s new boyfriend. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?” She smiled and added, “Beep beep boop.” Then she was gone.
• • •
Lena couldn’t help feeling guilty as she hung up the phone. It was obvious that Marcus had wanted to keep talking to her, but she couldn’t focus on joking around with him when there was so much to worry about. She’d call him tomorrow. Once she’d done some research on Pearl.
She’d just managed to look up the theater and connections to anyone named Pearl or Myrna—with no results—when her phone rang.
“Abigail is driving me insane!” Hayleigh cried. “She only wants to hang out with Ty all the time. A couple of days ago, she’d never even mentioned him, and now, she won’t stop talking about him. What am I supposed to do?”
“Give it a few days,” Lena said. “I bet it’ll blow over.” Once Connie’s love boost faded, chances were Abigail and Ty would realize they had nothing in common.
“I don’t want them to break up!” Hayleigh said. “I want to double-date with them!”
“Uh-oh. Does this mean you’re into someone new?” Lena asked. Her friend was always developing enormous crushes on guys and then getting her feelings hurt over and over.
“No, but I’m sick of being alone,” Hayleigh said. “I know not all of us can find our perfect matches like you and Marcus, but that doesn’t mean I can’t have some fun dating, right?”
“There’s no such thing as a perfect match,” Lena said. “Everyone has their problems.”
“Wait. Don’t tell me there’s trouble in Lena and Marcus paradise!”
“No, not trouble,” Lena said slowly. “Marcus is great. I mean, ever since I landed in Phoenix, I keep taking pictures of things I know he’ll like and trying to remember stuff that I want to tell him. But he keeps acting like I’m still home, calling me and texting me all the time for advice on stuff. Of course I like hearing from him, but…but I have my own life too. You know?”
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