The grand finale crackles and sparkles. The crowd oohs and aahs. As the last fireworks explode, I feel the token drop back on my chest. It pulses heat like a flaming heartbeat. Or maybe it’s just my heart, beating out of my chest. Glitter falls from the fireworks in the sky and covers the grass in front of us. The last firework shoots out and draws an outline of elevator doors in the sky. They come and land in front of us. A golden coin slot, shaped like the Golden Gate Bridge, rises up from the ground. A little sign next to it says Pay Toll Here. I reach inside my shirt and, while Lenwood and Kenwood step toward the doors, I pull the token off the chain, put it between both my palms, and speak softly.

“Take the Badger brothers to present day San Francisco. Then take me and Zoe home.”

“C’mon kid! Open the doors!”

I can see in the eyes of the brothers the same thing I saw on that fateful day I left them hanging on the bridge. Greed. I wonder if Miss Gertrude was right. They aren’t ready yet.

Oh, well, here goes.

I step forward and deposit the token. Then I make the open-door motion with my hands. The doors open and the Badger brothers run in, laughing and yelling. “Finally! We’re going home!” And then, to my surprise, the doors close right behind them!

“ARCADE!” Zoe freaks out. “What did you just do? WE MISSED THE ELEVATOR!”

I hold my palms to the sky. “I don’t know what I just did!” But one thing I finally know for sure.

I trust the tester.

“We just need to wait for the next elevator, Zoe.”

“The NEXT elevator?”

“Yeah. You live in New York City, right? There’s always another elevator.”

*  *  *

Sure enough, another elevator appears! But this time, there is no coin slot. That’s fine, because I don’t have the token anyway. When the doors open, the Triple T lady is standing inside, smiling. She steps out.

“Happy travels,” she says, just like the first time I met her, in the Ivy Park Library. “You’re about to have a delightful—and definitely not boring—Thanksgiving.”

We step inside the elevator and she winks at me as the doors close.

Chapter 37
A Definitely Not Boring Thanksgiving

“It’s the coldest Thanksgiving in a century here in New York City!” The TV commentator shivered in her big, red puffy coat as she held the microphone. “And those balloons may not fly if this wind doesn’t calm down.”

Zoe, Doug, and I sat wrapped in blankets munching on cinnamon rolls and bacon. We were getting ready to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade while Mom and Dad began the process of cooking turkey and all the other traditional stuff for our mid-afternoon feast.