Marwan sent a gentle reminder to his father that he had soccer that afternoon and wasn’t working, and his father wrote back, Right. Of course. I will miss seeing you, son.

Leaving for college next year was going to be brutal; his father might not survive it.

Eden got up and walked forward, accidentally kicking a wad of paper that skipped like tumbleweed across the room. Marwan imagined the instruments in the corners of the room playing that famous Old West whistle—from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, was it? When she got about four feet from the desk, the object pulsed white-blue light once, then went dark again.

She backed away.

Marwan paused the podcast and took out his earbuds. “Hey, Alexa,” he tried. “Play some easy-listening music.”

The cube didn’t respond.

Eden said, “Ha ha,” dryly.

The room seemed eerily quiet even as a train rushed past outside—the rhythm of it like a gun being loaded and reloaded and reloaded but never fired.

Marwan said, “Okay, Google,” but the cube didn’t respond to that either.

“Was worth a shot,” Eden said.

The door opened, and Eli Alvarez came in, looked up from his phone at Marwan and Eden, and then looked down.

Marwan shrugged at Eden again and put his earbuds back in, resuming the episode.

Eden

EDEN

Before the door even closed behind Eli Alvarez, who slid into a seat without a word, Ilanka Sokolova walked in. Eden knew both of their names and not much else, except that Ilanka was rich and Russian and Eli didn’t talk much—at least not to Eden—but somehow managed to get in trouble for cracking jokes in class pretty regularly. She’d gone to school with him since sixth grade, and they had first period math together this year, but she wasn’t sure they’d ever had a conversation.

“What’s this about?” Ilanka said, irritation perched on her nose.

“We have no idea.” Eden checked her phone.

Ilanka took a seat.

Eli looked up from his phone—some game screen by the looks of it—and said, “Where’s Mr. McKay?”

Eden and Marwan shrugged.

Julian had just posted from Starbucks. A photo of his name, misspelled “Gillian,” on a cup.

Eli said, “What’s that?” and pointed toward the desk.

“No idea,” Eden said. “But it lit up when I got close to it.”

Eli looked at her like she was an idiot and stood. He walked toward the cube, and again it pulsed light, then stopped. Eli picked it up, turned it around to examine it, and shook it like it was a Magic 8 Ball.

“I wouldn’t do—” Eden said, but Eli cut her off.

“What exactly do you think is going to happen?” He had long dark bangs he had to flip out of his face.