She gets out of the car and walks to the edge of the hill, where an ancient-looking stone wall shores up the earth. Beyond it, the ground drops away dramatically. I join her and ask straight up: Has she made progress on finding me a way home?

She sighs. “It’s all speculation. I want to have a concrete answer, and I don’t. I liked time travel better when it was something to dream about, not a problem to solve in real life. There’s no single pattern—no one-size-fits-all explanation. The oldest stories—mostly time slips—are based on a rift somewhere in nature, and all the newest—the wormhole ones—are also about openings in space and time, portals and such. I don’t think humans get to choose the space, only capitalize on it.”

I’m way ahead of her. “So I need to go back the way I came. From the arts building.”

“Where?”

I forgot it hasn’t been built yet. “Oh! You get the academy to build a whole arts center for drama and music. It’s your masterpiece, and they use it to death on social media—er, videos.”

“I get them to do that?” Her face lights up. “I’ve spent most of this year expecting they’ll find an excuse to fire me.”

“Over Godspell?” Even I don’t hate Godspell that much and trust me, I hate Godspell.

“I don’t know about the twenty-first century, but being the only Black woman on staff right now isn’t a cakewalk. Everything I do has to be twice as good for half the acclaim.” I do not tell her that this hasn’t changed so much. Her tone gets a little sharper. “I know about being a target.”

God, I suck. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I wasn’t thinking.”

“You’re not the first.” I’m guessing that’s a massive understatement. “But let’s focus on the problem at hand. If it is a portal, you can’t travel back through a building that doesn’t exist.”

I’m not fazed. “The rift or portal or whatever didn’t care. It just dropped me in the field where the building will be in my time. So maybe I have to find that exact spot on the field again. Which shouldn’t be that hard.”

“I suppose. But the place is likely the easy part.”

Ugh. She’s right. “The time …”

“Some of the stories tag it to celestial events—an eclipse or a full moon. Most seem to use anniversary logic: the same day and time, but, say, a month later or six or a year.” A year. My heart sinks. But she’s not done. “And in some of them …” I don’t want her to go on. “The people don’t go back. They stay.”