For one long moment we stare at each other, a current of electricity running between us. I don’t know how it happens, exactly. I drop everything, and in a move that is half dive, half tumble, I clear the little fence, slide onto my stomach, lower myself over the side of the house, where my feet magically find the latticework. I somehow make it to the flowery-smelling earth, my feet barely making contact before I move into a dead sprint.

– 13 – Willow

By the time I realize the boy was not a ghost at all but an actual boy, he is long gone and I have missed ten calls from Bea and am in the process of missing another. I fumble to hit answer while simultaneously locking the front door of the house. It is physically painful to leave the magic (pun intended) of Aunt Sage’s house behind, but there’s no way I’m taking the risk of stumbling upon some other random stranger in the dark. This adventure is over, at least for tonight.

“Willow! You scared the hell out of me!” Bea shrieks into my ear.

“I was right. There was someone on the roof. A boy.” I give the front door of Aunt Sage’s house a tug, double-checking that it’s secure before tucking the key into my pocket and launching myself off the steps.

“There was a boy on the roof?” Bea is always calm, but right at this moment she sounds seconds from hyperventilating.

“Yeah, he was really…” I’m about to say “cute,” because he was cute, notably so—big brown eyes and really great hair—but that feels like a weird way to describe an intruder you meet in the night. Particularly to someone whose breath sounds ragged. “He looked close to our age. Do you have your inhaler?”

“Forget about my inhaler. What was intruder boy doing up there?”

“Mason,” I say.

“What?”

“His name is Mason. Or at least that’s the name on the notebook he dropped.” With my non-phone hand, I flip the notebook open to see his name again. Mason Greer. But no phone number or address. I flip to a page in the middle and I’m immediately met with rows of careful writing. Location: Brookline, MA. August 6. Mercury in retrograde. The optical illusion we all love to blame our problems on.

Suddenly I remember the telescope. Mason wasn’t an intruder; he was stargazing. But why was he doing it in Sage’s house? Is he connected to Sage somehow? Some sort of cousin or family friend? Had the aunts forgotten to warn him I might show up, so he panicked?

For a moment I’m torn. Should I leave the notebook on the rooftop so he can come back and find it? Or should I keep it to show to the aunts?

I tuck it under my arm. I’m keeping it. If only to have proof that it actually happened.