The fireworks were to celebrate midsummer. The people of Glenwood appreciated their festivals. Clayfield Street was choked with people, so she stuck to the side streets as she made her way to Sarah and Kenny’s.

Anna tried not to hold out hope.

She knew it was over. She knew her part was done. She knew the story had ended. Whatever had allowed her to meet Michaela, to dance with her, to go on a picnic with her, to share an adventure with her, was gone.

She wished she’d brought her smart phone to Glenwood. Then she could have typed Michaela’s information into it, saved it to the cloud. The cloud was safe from an accidental dunking. She wished she’d read the information, tried to memorize it. She was pretty good at memorizing things. Michaela Madigan, from some version of Glenwood, outside a large city. But which city? Was it the same city Anna lived in? Maybe it was a city on the other side of the world? Maybe it was a city on another plane of existence? Same shelf, different book. Whatever the case, she was gone now and Anna knew there was no use holding out hope that a bit of magic would linger. That the fog might roll in. That they could have one last conversation. That she could at least thank Michaela for being the best friend she’d ever had and say goodbye.

She wanted to believe that would happen, so she forced herself to understand it wouldn’t. To hope too strongly was to invite crushing heartache.

Her asthma returned. She had such a coughing fit the next morning that Sarah called a doctor. Once she had her inhaler and lay still for a few hours, Anna was fine, but the doctor came up the hill anyway. She asked Anna a series of questions Anna was used to. Eventually the doctor assured Kenny and Sarah she was fine but recommend she take it easy for a few days.

Sarah called Violet.

Anna had to sit on the stool at the kitchen island and use the clunky headset connected to the wall with a coiled cord to talk to her.

Anna avoided the back half of the house so she didn’t have to try to not see the house across the vale. She largely stayed inside so she didn’t have to avoid looking at the tops of the mountains and their caps of clouds refusing to descend. She slept in most mornings and spent most of her time curled in a blanket in the extra room that served as a library. Sometimes she would read or write, but mostly she stared through the pages in her lap. She joined Kenny and Sarah for dinner every night, but didn’t say much. She did the dishes so she didn’t feel like a burden.

Kenny invited her to come to the hardware store and help him pick out handles for the cabinets he was working on. Sarah invited her to help harvest and can tomatoes. She declined politely as she could manage, and neither of them pushed the issue.

After a few days, she felt that great sucking hole in her chest open. It pulled all feeling into it. Enthusiasm, frustration, anger, sadness, and hope. Especially hope. Anna shoved whatever hope that might linger as deep into the hole as she could. She didn’t want to feel it. Any of it.

• • •

After breakfast, Anna did the dishes, scrubbing and rinsing without paying much attention, loading them into the dishwasher and starting the machine. She was headed back upstairs when she realized Kenny wasn’t out back. She couldn’t hear him humming tunelessly to himself. She couldn’t hear the rasp of sandpaper or the tapping of a hammer. She couldn’t smell fresh stain or sawdust. Curious, she went to the sliding glass door at the back of the house, opened it and stood upon the porch.

Perhaps he’d gone to the hardware store or was visiting with a customer, but it was strange not to see him there.

In scanning the backyard her gaze accidently fell upon the house across the vale. She clenched her eyes and flinched away before she could notice any of its details: faded blue trim, weed-choked courtyard, dusty-panned window seat.

She went inside, closing the sliding door a bit harder than necessary and was headed for the stairs when she noticed Kenny sitting in his reading chair, book open in his lap, staring into space. There was no trace of his usual grin or good humor. She paused, uncertain. Perhaps he was thinking. Perhaps he didn’t want to be interrupted. Perhaps he wanted to be left alone.

“Kenny?”

He started and his eyes focused on her. “Oh. Hey, kiddo. Thanks for doing the dishes.”

She nodded. “You all right?”

“Me? Well enough.” He gave a weak grin.

“You seem a little… I don’t know.”

His grin widened, a genuine twinkle to his eye. “That’s one way to put it. You’re an observant kid, Anna. I imagine that makes you a great writer.”

Anna shrugged and blushed.

“Don’t worry about me,” said Kenny. “I’m just in a funk today. Some days I push through, some days I let it run its course. You know?”

Anna nodded. She did know. It was exactly how she’d been feeling since she’d realized her story was over.

“Would it be okay if I sat with you and pretended to read for a while?”

Kenny patted the arm of Sarah’s reading chair. “That’d be nice, kiddo.”

She selected a book and sat, pulling her legs to her chest. She couldn’t stop thinking about the fog, the adventure, Michaela.

“Is it anything in particular?” Anna asked.

Kenny sighed. “Everything and nothing, I suppose. I worry about Jennifer. She’s our oldest. She just broke up with her boyfriend of three years a few days ago. I’m sure you heard Sarah on the phone with her.”

Anna hadn’t. Or at least she didn’t remember. She’d been so caught up in her own head she had paid much attention to anything else.

“And I don’t have any ideas for my next project. Nothing feels right. Plus,” he waved his hand vaguely. “Everything in general, I suppose. Some days it feels like it’s all tumbling down around our heads.” He sighed again. “What about you? How have you been feeling?”

Anna shrugged. “Not great.”

“Want to talk about it?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I did.”

“Does that matter?”

Anna considered. Perhaps it didn’t. Perhaps she could tell Kenny everything and he would believe her. He had talked of ghosts in the fog. Maybe he’d meant it. Maybe he’d had his own experience of fog magic. Maybe he knew about the other Glenwood. Maybe he wouldn’t think she was crazy. Maybe it would help to talk about what she’d experienced. And the friend she’d made. And how she’d never get to see her again.

“No thanks.”

Kenny nodded.

They sat together silently, and though the hole in her chest didn’t go away, it did shrink a bit.

• • •

Anna was glad neither Kenny nor Sarah pushed her to talk. She was invited to meals, to reading after dinner, to trips into town, sewing, gardening, and so forth. It was hard to write, hard to read, hard to focus at all. But bit by bit, moment by moment, it felt less bad.

One morning, she was woken by the bright, early summer dawn. She sat up, stretched, and felt the hole in her chest bare more than a pinprick. Today, she thought, she would push through. She went downstairs and found Kenny and Sarah weren’t up yet, so she put on a pot of coffee, cut up a bunch of fresh tomatoes and set to scrambling eggs. The last time she’d done this, it’d been with Michaela in the pirate castle kitchen. The memory made her chest pang. She sniffled back tears.

But she also smiled.

Just a little.

By the time Sarah came out of the bedroom, Anna was dishing up piles of fluffy scrambled eggs, bacon not quite burnt, sliced tomatoes, slices of toast, Sarah’s preserves, and black coffee.

“Good morning, dear. Did you sleep well?” Sarah asked.

Anna nodded. “I thought I might walk to town this morning. If that’s all right.”

“Of course.”

After breakfast, Kenny took over doing the dishes, so Anna made her way down the hill into town. It felt good to get out of the house, to stretch her legs, to hear the faint wind high in the mountains of the valley. She found herself outside Coffee Courtyard, one of the few places open so early. She went in, sat at a table, and withdrew notebooks, pens, pencils, and postcards.

She’d only sent one postcard in the weeks since arriving. Violet, her mother, deserved better. Anna withdrew a new postcard, one of a lake between hills, turned it over, and began to write. She wrote everything, beginning to end. She wrote about sunflowers in the museum of art. She wrote about Robert and Becky and Jill throwing erasers. She wrote about lying awake with the hole in her chest and the train ride to Glenwood and how kind Kenny and Sarah were. She wrote about the fog and she wrote about Michaela.

She wrote about their adventures.

When she ran out of room on one card, she moved to the next and the next and the next. When she was done, she’d written on nearly all the cards, her hand was cramped, and a cup of tea curled cooling steam nearby. Anna looked around, blinking away tears unabashedly. She didn’t remember ordering tea.

“Looks like she’s come back to us,” Bertie said.

Anna looked behind her to find Frank and Bertie sharing a table nearby, the remains of an overly large muffin between them.

“You’re crying, Anna,” said Frank.

Anna nodded and wiped her cheeks.

“I take it you weren’t thinking about nothing this time?” Bertie asked.

Anna shook her head and laughed and the tears came freely. She turned back to her table and picked up the tea. The cup was warm, but not scalding and when she breathed over it, the scent filled her, stilled her, and she took a deep drink.

She swallowed, eyes closed, and felt herself relax.

“Thank you for the tea,” she said over her shoulder.

“Of course,” said Bertie.

“It’s what friends are for,” said Frank.

Anna gathered her things into her shoulderbag and turned to face the two. “Would it be all right if I joined you for a while?”

Bertie scooted around the table so she and Frank were closer together, making room for Anna.

“You look like you’re feeling better,” Bertie said.

“Um, she’s crying,” said Frank.

Bertie nudged him.

Anna laughed again and it felt like a bottle uncorked, the hole in her chest covered over, gone for the moment. She sat with the two and enjoyed her tea while they chatted the morning away.

• • •

Anna wandered the streets and alleys and corridors of Glenwood, snatching bits of poetry and writing them in her notebook. She walked past Old King and into the foothills along a well-worn path. She stopped at a large stone and a fallen tree and a patch of clover. And some time later, the path broke the treeline and she was looking at the backside of Michaela’s house, faded and overgrown.

“I suppose it was inevitable.”

She crossed the dip between the foothills and the house and approached the building with a tremble in her chest. She’d gotten her emotions out at the coffee shop and felt better, but being here threatened to spill her over again. She didn’t try to hold it back as she wandered through the tall grass of the backyard around to the front where the double doors stood, dusty and forgotten beyond a weed-choked courtyard.

And there she found Flandel, arms crossed firmly, tapping his foot impatiently, as though he’d been waiting for her. Behind him were a pair of men and it took her several moments to recognize them out of their guard uniforms: Curtis and Renee, who’d guarded King Richard’s dinner party.

Anna stopped. She held her breath. She didn’t blink. She tried not to move for fear anything she did might break the spell. There was no fog, no spirit lights, and yet here stood a trio of men who only existed on the other side.

“Finally,” Flandel groused. “Give it here.” He held out his hand.

“What? How… how are you here?”

Flandel’s frown deepened. “I’m here for the spyglass, young lady.”

“Oh.” She put a hand to her shoulderbag. The feel of the item through the canvas was familiar to her touch. She’d forgotten about it, though it’d remained in her shoulderbag all this time. “Right. Of course. I’m sorry, there hasn’t been any fog…” She reached into the bag and withdrew the spyglass, then hesitated. “Can I ask a favor?”

Flandel looked incredulous. “No. It’s time to return it.”

“Right. Yes.” Anna couldn’t help herself. Tears slid down her cheeks. A tremble took her throat. She tried to stop herself. To tell herself she was being silly, embarrassing herself, but she couldn’t stop. The tears just came. And when she tried to speak, all she could do was sob.

She clutched the Truename Spyglass to her chest and squeezed her eyes shut so she didn’t have to see them looking at her. Judging her.

“Sheesh,” said one of the guardsmen. She didn’t know them well enough to recognize them by voice. “Maybe we should just let her keep it?”

“No,” said Anna. She took a deep, shuddering breath. “No,” she said again. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t…” She thrust her hand out, holding the spyglass, eyes still closed. “Take it. I shouldn’t have asked. I just wanted to see her again.”

Flandel’s touch was surprisingly gentle. He took the spyglass from her and she let it go, fingers tingling, the last of the magic disappearing.

“See who?” he asked, voice gruff.

“Michaela.”

“That’s right, there were two of you.”

Anna blinked rapidly and wiped at her tears, trying to erase the proof of her grief.

“I’m sorry,” she said again. “Please, just forget I said anything.”

“Very well.” Flandel turned and walked back to the guardsmen.

“Hey now, we can’t just leave her like this,” said one of them. Curtis she thought.

“Yeah, boss. She’s clearly distraught.”

“What do you want me to do about it?”

“You’re a great wizard. Can’t you help her see her friend?”

“Why would I do that? There’s been enough interdimensional mayhem for a century.”

“You told us you needed help communicating with people. This strikes me as one of those times.” Rene perhaps.

Flandel sighed. “I didn’t mean about this. I meant I needed messengers. You’re not here to be my conscious, gentlemen, you’re in case she refused to give up the spyglass.”

“Seriously?” said Curtis. “You brought us along to shake down a little girl?”

“It’s all right,” said Anna. “Please, I don’t want to cause you any trouble.”

“It’s obviously not all right,” said Rene.

The former guardsmen fixed Flandel with a pair of unwavering looks.

Flandel planted his fists on his hips and turned to look at her. “This friend of yours. She lives far from here. You only met her because Oscar’s soul permeated the fog, yes?”

“I think so.”

“All right then. I can conjure the magic, but you must provide the direction. You must think about your friend. You must think only about your friend. And you must understand the dimensional barriers have reset. They’re firmer now than they were theses last months. They will struggle against you being out of place and will pull you back here.”

Anna nodded. “The magic won’t give me much time. I understand.” Hope fluttered at her chest, and with no hole to suck it away, it filled her with sad warmth. There wouldn’t be enough time to say all the things she wanted to say, but there would be enough time to say ‘thank you’ and ‘goodbye’.

The tingle started between her shoulders. Rather than hunch from it, Anna closed her eyes and took a deep breath and as she did, the tingle spread to the edges of her shoulders, to the small of her back, to her sternum. And with each breath, the power spread through her until she felt it shining from under her eyelids, sparking along her fingernails, singing from the tip of every hair.

Her ears popped. Her knees wobbled. And when she caught herself, the sun was low in the sky over a hazy city skyline in the distance. She stood upon a small hill in a quaint suburb she didn’t recognize. The house before her was old, but recognizable. The courtyard was small but meticulous. The blue trim was bright and tidy. The double doors at the entrance were clean and dark. Anna looked up at Michaela’s window.

The light was on. She could hear voices, muffled by space and glass. Suddenly, Michaela’s guitar smashed against the windows, breaking apart against the bars in front of the glass, bars Anna was sure hadn’t been there before. Michaela appeared, picking up the guitar off the window seat, expression distraught. The woman she called Yaga appeared a moment later, grabbing Michaela by the hair and jerking her back.

Anna’s blood pounded and she sprinted for the doors. They were locked, but she put her shoulder hard against them and was through. She hurried through the opening room to the stairs and was up them quicker than thought. But when she turned down the corridor she knew lead to Michaela’s room, she found a tall, thin, iron-haired woman using a large, old-style key to lock Michaela’s door. Panic flooded her and she stood stock still as the woman slipped the key into the pocket of her apron. It was Yaga, Anna was certain.

The woman turned to Anna. Anna stopped cold, unable to move as the glowering woman stalked toward her. She tried to call out, to run, to hide, but it was like she was in a dream, weighed down by necessity. Yaga continued her march down the hallway and walked through Anna like she wasn’t there.

As soon as the woman was gone, Anna could move again and she hurried to Michaela’s door. She could hear the girl crying on the other side. She tried the handle and found it locked. She knocked softly, trying not to alert Yaga to her presence, but Michaela didn’t stop crying and Anna was certain she’d not been heard. Anna looked down the way Yaga had gone, then knocked harder.

“Michaela. Can you hear me?”

The crying faltered with a sniffle and a hiccough.

Anna knocked again. “Michaela. Please tell me you can hear me.”

She could hear rustling of fabric then footsteps toward the door.

“Vi-vivianna? Is that you?”

“Yes.” She tried the handle again. It rattled.

“Yaga locked the door.”

“She has the key with her. I couldn’t… I don’t…” Anna pressed herself against the door, wondering if she could knock it down if she tried hard enough. She took a step back and slammed her shoulder against it. In the next moment she was stumbling into Michaela’s bedroom and would have fallen had Michaela not caught her.

“How did you do that?” Michaela whispered.

Anna turned to find the door still firmly closed, unbudged. “I don’t know.”

“You walked right through the door.”

Anna shook her head.

“How are you even here? There’s been no fog and I’m certain I’m awake.”

“Flandel…” Anna shook her head. “We don’t have time The note got soaked and fell apart. I need you to tell me where you are.”

“2173 Clayfield Drive. Glenwood. It’s a suburb of Cape Lynette. But Anna…”

Anna put her finger to Michaels lips, closed her eyes and said “2137 Clayfield Drive. Glenwood. Cape Lynette.” She opened her eyes and found she was very close to Michaela, cheeks damp and flushed, eyes red and puffy, but with a bemused expression.

Anna removed her finger from Michaela’s lips and clasped her hands behind her back awkwardly. “I’m sorry. I just… 2173 Clayfield Drive. Glenwood. Cape Lynette.”

Michaela bit her lip and nodded.

“I’ll look for you,” Anna said. “I’ll find you.”

“But what if you can’t?” What if we don’t exist on the same shelf?”

“I spent the past several weeks refusing to let myself hope. But here you are.”

Anna could feel the tingle of magic leaving her finger and toe tips, receding to her center.

“I can’t stay,” said Anna. “The magic is fading.

“It’s okay,” said Michaela. “You are the best friend I ever had. This summer has been amazing, and I’m glad I got the opportunity to fall in love with the strongest girl I’ve ever met.”

Anna choked on her words. She could hardly believe what Michaela had said, that such a kind, skilled, brave person would say Anna was the strong one. She blinked rapidly, and tears slid down her cheeks. She cleared her throat and tried again, but the magic faded, and between blinks, Michaela was gone.

She’d felt better, writing it all out on the postcards. She’d thought she was through the worst. But seeing Michaela again and having her fade away was too much. She sat in the dusty old abandoned bedroom and sobbed. Unthinking. Uncaring. The cries pouring from her like all the world’s oceans in a storm. She didn’t care if anyone saw her or heard her or what they might think. But neither did she wish for the hole in her chest to come take away the pain. It seemed right she should feel this so heavily.

When she couldn’t cry anymore, she simply sat, knees to her chest, ankles crossed, head down. After a while, she realized the sun slanting into the room was low. Her grief spent for the moment, Anna got to her feet, each muscle aching, wiped at her face, and made her way across the vale to Kenny and Sarah’s house, doing her best to erase the evidence of her tears. She resolved to go the library first thing in the morning to look up 2173 Clayfield Drive.

When she got to the top of the hill marking the edge of Sarah and Kenny’s backyard, she received a shock. Violet sat with Kenny on the back porch, each with an iced tea in hand, talking quietly. Anna hadn’t expected to see her mother, hadn’t known she was coming. After several moments of shocked silence, Anna walked forward as carefully as she could. She wasn’t sure she could stand to break down in front of them.

“Oh, there she is,” said Sarah, coming out on the porch with a tray of crackers and preserves.

Kenny and Violet looked up to see Anna.

Violet set down her iced tea and stood. She took a couple steps toward her, arms spread, then stopped herself and put her arms behind her back. Anna wondered if she’d gotten that habit from Violet or vice versa. “I got some time off work and decided to come up. I hope that’s all right?” Violet said as Anna approached.

Anna wrapped her arms around her mother’s shoulders.