One (One Universe)

sick that day. I couldn’t stand to look at it and know that I could never really see it — not the parts I cared about, anyway.
    The whole time I meet with Mr. Hoffman — doing pointless exercises; answering rapid-fire questions; staying up so late working the exercises he’s given me that I fall asleep in English class and yawn on walks with Elias; keeping everything from my parents; and worse, keeping it from Elias — one thought keeps piercing my mind. This is how I’m going to do it. This is how I’m going to get there. And the one comfort in the whole thing (or the rationalization — I don’t know which is which anymore) is that when I get there, I’m going to take Elias with me.
    And we’re going to be the first Ones who get fixed.

THIRTEEN
    T hat night, Elias and I head to his house after school and basketball. Elias hops in the shower while Mrs. VanDyne feeds me some kind of Chinese food dish that I suspect she’s asked Rosie to doctor to make it healthier. She talks to me about my classes and my grades, what books I’ve been reading, what TV I’ve been watching, but she never asks any questions about Elias and me. Good form, Mrs. VanDyne.
    Unfortunately, I don’t have such tact. “I haven’t seen…uh, Mr. VanDyne around here. Like, ever,” I say between bites.
    She smiles, exactly the same sad smile Elias has. “He’s preparing for the Symposium, dear. Being the Vice President and all… I thought Elias would have mentioned it.”
    “Elias isn’t really one to brag. About anything.”
    A fondness sweeps over her face. “No, he isn’t. Well, anyway, Andrew is the Vice President of the Hub and oversees experimental operations. Between the Symposium and keeping an eye on the girls after hours, he’s been working quite a lot.” Her gaze sweeps over the rest of the house, which is, as usual, dark except for the kitchen and her office off the corner of the living room area.
    She nods toward my plate, clean after two huge helpings — her plan to get some nutrition into me worked, but not unnoticed — and I say, “Thanks.” She takes it away and turns to put it in the sterilizer, saying, “Speaking of Elias, he seemed very…happy after your class met to see the Northern Lights. Did you four make some earth-shattering discovery or something?”
    I look at her curiously. Maybe he said something to her about the flying. With his dad being Vice President of the Hub and all…
    “Did Elias tell you what we can do?” I ask, scrunching my eyebrows together.
    “What you can do ?”
    “Yeah. We figured out that if we stand close together…”
    “The image from the radio telescope looks different to each of us,” Elias’s voice interrupts from the other side of the kitchen.
    “Oh,” his mom says, as if she was only half paying attention to begin with. “Very interesting.”
    He strides up to me and takes my hand in his. “Thanks for waiting around for this long. What did Mom do to you?”
    “Horrible things,” I say. “She fed me lo mein. But I think it was whole wheat. Right, Rosie?”
    “No, Merrin,” Rosie responds.
    I narrow my eyes. “What were those noodles made of then?”
    “Technically, they were a sixty percent wheat blend.”
    “She got you there.” Elias laughs, but it sounds hollow. “We’ve got a bunch of calc to finish up, Mom. Can I take a plate of that back with me?”
    “Rosie already made one up for you.” She hands it to him, and he leans in to kiss her on the cheek.
    “Oh! I almost forgot,” she says as we turn toward Elias’s room. “From the twins.” She hands him a long white envelope addressed to him by hand.
    I wrinkle my nose. “Snail mail?”
    “They’re not giving any of the gap year participants computer access, not yet,” she explains.
    When we reach Elias’s room, I whisper to Elias through tight lips, “What gives? Why didn’t you want me to tell your mom? About the flying?”
    Elias smiles down at me, and this is one I’ve never seen. Some cross between genuine and faking it. Tense and strange. He shrugs.
    “I don’t know. We don’t really know what’s going on, you know? Why it even works.” His voice is even weirder — the tone is assertive, but the words are not. “And I kind of wanted it to be just ours, I guess. For now.”
    “Just ours” is something I understand. Keeping secrets as delicious as ours makes sense to me, in a way. So I nod slowly, say, “Okay.”
    “Besides,” he says, pulling me close to