And yet I don’t always recognize her. Sometimes, older Alice is frantic. Erratic. She’s calm during some visits and angry during others. She occasionally repeats herself. Could the time travel be interfering with her mental faculties? Or is that just wishful thinking, because I don’t want to kill Bandit?

“Please, Alice,” the boy in question pleads. “Give me something. Anything. I’ll take any explanation that makes some sort of sense. I just need some logic in my world, now that everything’s been upended.”

I can’t tell him. I may not be happy with my older self, but I can’t knowingly jeopardize the future. Not on a few fleeting tendrils of suspicion.

“I’m sorry,” I say quietly. “I wish I could give you a good explanation.” For more reasons than one. “But I just can’t.”

He continues to stare at me, a stripe of his cheek and jaw highlighted by the moon. When I remain silent, he sighs and turns the key in the ignition. The engine roars to life, and the car inches forward, slower than ever.

We travel twenty miles without speaking. I stay plastered against the door, giving up the notion of killing us tonight. First, I’m too frazzled. More importantly, the opportunity is gone. While I pressed my cheek against the window, willing it to cool, we descended from the mountain and got on the highway that will take me home and Bandit to the hospital to see his uncle. I can’t take out the gun and shoot him any more than I can yank down on the steering wheel. Any accident now might involve another vehicle. Might end the lives of innocent bystanders. I can’t take that risk.

Cars zoom past, their beams painting Bandit’s face with dappled light. I collapse against the seat with the temporary reprieve. I’m glad I don’t have to kill him tonight. I’m just not ready.

I will be. Tomorrow, or the next day, I’ll gather up my courage and do what needs to be done. Or maybe…I’ll find another way out.

Bandit is still innocent. He hasn’t done anything wrong, not yet. There’s got to be another solution to this mess. I just have to find it.

“Tell me this much,” he says as he signals the turn onto my street. He hasn’t so much as glanced in my direction since he started driving again, and he doesn’t look at me now. “This afternoon, when we kissed. Did you mean it?”

I bite my lip. It’s a difficult question. Not because I don’t know the answer but because I do. Because my feelings for him are stronger and more genuine than anything I’ve felt in seventeen years. But I don’t want to lead him on. Not when this can’t possibly end well.