I sag against the wall as her words sink in. She’s right. Bandit doesn’t actually want to go first. He’s not a reckless thrill seeker looking for adventure in an untested time machine, one that could as easily send his mind to a black hole as to the target date.

He just wants me not to take the risk.

“You’re right,” I say. “I am lucky.”

In the present, my eyes fill. Blinking quickly, I press my foot on the accelerator. The car rattles, as though it might come apart at any moment.

Good. Because I’m going to find Bandit in time—or die trying.

Chapter 51

Chapter 51

Ninety minutes later, I arrive at my house. Pulling crookedly into the driveway, I’m out of the car almost before the engine stops running. I vault up the front steps and burst through the front door.

“Archie?” I call. “Are you here?”

Of course my brother’s home. He was sleeping in his bed when I left this morning, and he never goes anywhere on Saturdays. It’s his favorite day of the week because he can work uninterrupted.

I skip down the basement stairs two at a time, but he’s not sitting in front of his computer. Huh. I go back upstairs and check the bathroom. Nope. The living area. Nada. The bedroom, in case he’s sleeping—nothing, nothing, nothing.

Okay, this is weird. Déjà vu washes over me. Didn’t I just go through these same actions, looking for someone else? For the one other boy who’s vitally important in my life?

I swallow, but I can’t budge the lump that’s taken permanent residence in my throat. I shuffle my feet—and then I hear it. The scrape of a spatula against a frying pan. Come to think of it, I also detect the greasy scent of something cooking in oil.

Archie! I race toward the kitchen. I suppose even my scattered brother can make an omelet when he’s hungry enough.

When I fling myself over the threshold, however, I see not my brother but another man standing at the stove, one with the proud stance of a prodigy who graduated college at nineteen to start his own company.

“Dad.” I screech to a stop, dismay seeping through my word. “It’s you.”

He lifts an eyebrow. “And you wonder why I’m not around more often. So pleased to see you, too, daughter.”

“Sorry,” I say, too distracted to be truly sorry. “I was looking for Archie.”

“He already left for prom.” He cracks an egg in the frying pan and then peers at me. “Which, frankly, is where I thought you were.”

Prom.

I stumble backward. Prom. I can’t believe I forgot. This is what happens when the administration schedules the most important dance of the year on the final weekend of spring break. Damn the exam schedule and budget constraints!