I thrust my body away from the table, to the shock of everyone who watches without interference. I stumble outside and fall to my knees on the lawn of Professor Alexander-Grant’s house. The grass smells sweet. The cold fall air is chilling. “Two and a half weeks until midterms,” I say before vomiting up everything in my stomach. “Have to pull it together,” I try and convince myself.

There are lights in the sky. Brilliant hues: green, purple, red. I’ve never seen such a marvelous sight. “What’s that?” I ask when I notice my professor kneeling down next to me. “Is it the end of the world?”

She is stunned also. “Wow, this weather has really been insane lately. Now this? That looks like the northern lights, the aurora borealis. It’s the result of electrons colliding with the upper reaches of Earth’s atmosphere, but they’d never happen here. We’re not far enough north.”

“They look like the portal in my room,” I say in awe.

Professor Alexander-Grant looks at me in confusion, before pointing at the sky again and saying, “Look at that! I think it’s a shooting star.”

“Wow!” I exclaim in drunken glee, watching the point of light streak across the sky.

“You really see all this too, right?” I ask, after a few minutes of silence, confirming it’s not some kind of mind trick like the portals.

“Yes, of course, we can all see. It’s magical.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Except, there is some magic others can’t see. After that night, I am haunted by a series of inexplicable occurrences. Letters, entire word families, jumping over the edge of all my books and papers. What’s left on the page, always spelling out the same thing: He rises, but they’re here to help. Items not found where I left them. My water bottle on Manda Panda’s desk instead of in my backpack where I put it after class earlier. “Hey, I poured a little of Snoop’s gin and juice in here,” she says deviously. “I assume that’s why you left it here. I see you, girl. PARTY!” she says, raising the roof remarkably off beat even in the absence of music. My mother’s Jesus reborn over the wardrobe on the opposite side of the room. I didn’t move him. The portal, spinning clockwise now behind Jesus’ celestial figure, and humming as if there is a hive of bees inside.

It doesn’t make sense. Time and space seem to be breaking down around me. The watchers are everywhere now, in multiple classes. They stare with wide eyes and always deny their watching. I feel increasingly disoriented and off-center, like I’m losing my mind—the inexplicable occurrences accelerating my descent into madness.