The Alchemy of Forever

well-worn velvet couches sit on an artfully clashing selection of Persian rugs. Beyond that is a kitchen that is welcoming in its messiness. Kailey’s mother sets her purse on the counter. “You should go lie down, honey. Doctor’s orders.”
    I pause. To my right and left are two hallways, each leading, I guess, to bedrooms. But which way is Kailey’s? I take a chance and head to the right, taking a few cautious steps before Bryan clears his throat.
    “You think just because you’re a medical marvel, you get the master bedroom?” His tone is still lighthearted, but the look in his eyes is not. I can tell that he’s worried about me. Well, not me —he’s worried for his sister. I am gripped by the sudden urge to tell him the truth, but I am fully aware that the Morgans won’t believe me. At best they would think my concussion was worse than the doctor said. At worst they’d suspect I needed to be in a mental institution.
    “Just checking to see if you were paying attention,” I say, smoothly exiting down the other hallway. My voice sounds hollow, the veneer of playfulness utterly false.
    The first open door reveals an unmade bed strewn with jeans and hoodies. A multicolored jumble of Chuck Taylors spills out of the closet.
    I continue down the hallway to the next room. The scent of jasmine perfume hangs heavy in the air and I know it’s Kailey’s room even before I look inside. I shut the door behind me and exhale deeply. You’re almost there. Just wait for them to fall asleep tonight, then you can go to the cranes, get the book, and figure out Plan B—whatever that is.
    The room is painted a vivid shade of dark turquoise, and the bedspread is a silk quilt in a lighter green, closer to lime. Purple throw pillows with black beaded fringe are piled at its head. The effect is that of being surrounded by giant peacock feathers.
    I’m drawn to a violin case that leans against the desk. The violin is one of my favorite instruments. Was Kailey a musician? Looking more closely I see that it’s covered in a thick layer of dust. But in the corner is an easel with a half-completed painting of a girl standing on a beach, staring out to sea.
    The scene is all gray: cloudy sky, fog bank rolling in over choppy whitecaps. The girl looks like Kailey, her sparkling eyes the most colorful spot on the canvas. Despite the bleakness of the scene, she looks happy, as though she can see something, just out of view, that gives her hope. Looking closely I see that she’s outlined the shapes of mermaids just visible beneath the surface of the choppy sea. She never had a chance to fill in their details, but they are undeniably there.
    It reminds me of our voyage from Barbados to New Amsterdam. I had been furious with Cyrus for killing our servant in a fit of rage and had spent as much time as possible alone on the upper decks, the ocean breeze whipping my hair across my face. The opaque surface of the Atlantic frustrated me. I wanted to see beneath. I wanted to believe there was another world below us, where mermaids combed their hair under a permanent drift of golden silt and played music on a sunken harpsichord.
    Turning away from the painting, which fills me with inexplicable sadness, I regard a mirrored vanity that hugs one wall, postcards and ink sketches tucked between the glass and the frame. I pick up a stack of photos of Kailey and her friends: on a camping trip, at a school dance, lounging next to a gleaming pool. One girl appears in several of them; the magenta streaks in her dark hair make her easy to spot. Kailey’s eyes stare out at me in photo after photo, shining with life.
    I regard my new body in the mirror and furrow my brow. This is the first time I’ve been a teenager since my original body died, and the feeling is jarring. My eyes are a grayish green, with long, thick lashes, and my hair meanders from light brown to a shimmery gold where the sun has bleached it. It hangs past my jaw in loose curls, with a swoop of wavy bangs. My nose is a bit too pert for my liking, and my lips are a dark shade of coral, striking against Kailey’s tanned skin.
    There is no tangible difference between the face that I see in the mirror and the face in the photos, nothing I could point to with certainty to prove that everything has changed. And yet I don’t think I look like her, that smiling girl that Kailey was.
    “What do I do now?” I ask the stranger in the mirror. “Do I keep being you? Or do I go back to the