They thanked Colin and he said he was awfully glad they’d come and he seemed to mean it. It had been sort of fun. Memorable even. Tess’s mother said those were the best nights out, the ones that you remember.

Colin politely walked them out to the elevator which arrived this time without an elevator operator.

Max did not point out to Tess that there were only 7 numbers on the elevator panel, even though he did note it himself. Tess was weirded out enough already. Tess didn’t usually get unsettled by anything. Max was also tired. He hoped Aunt Evie hadn’t “checked” on them. It was late, and he was certain she would be nervous if she hadn’t been able to find them. But thankfully everything was copacetic in The Garden Room. “Copacetic” was a funny word their mom used—it meant A-OK. In less than four minutes, both Tess and Max were in their pajamas and in their beds, safely under the covers, sound asleep.

Tess had a dream she was trying to make her way through a maze, high-tech, orange-colored and strangely three-dimensional, straight waves of Day-Glo orange light, precise lines in a hallway that sharply changed direction and elevation in a nanosecond and seemed to have no end. She wasn’t certain whether she was supposed to be walking on them, as if they were a pathway, or underneath, ducking endlessly below them, sidestepping them, for fear they were a laser of a sort or a sophisticated security system that might sound an alarm at any moment, as if she wasn’t meant to be there, at all.

She was startled awake by the dream. Her heart was pounding. The dream ended—well, it hadn’t really ended. She’d woken up in the middle—without her knowing whether she’d found her way out or not. And the three-dimensional orange lines reminded her of the strange vectors of light she’d seen that afternoon that had flashed out from the cat’s eye marble. It took her a little while to calm down before she went back to sleep.

~ CHAPTER THIRTEEN ~

in which tess hopes that ]everything is normal

Oatmeal, please,” said Tess. There was something comforting about oatmeal. Comforting and normal. “No, no almond milk. Whole milk, please,” she said to the waiter who was hovering over her as he always did. He pulled her napkin out from around her silverware and with a flourish settled the napkin on her lap. Tess managed a smile, but she wasn’t in the mood to be special or to be treated as if she was special.

She realized she was starting to feel a little like Max had, wishing they could have a normal vacation. She was still a bit shook up from the dream she’d had the night before. And the strange thing Adele had said to her that she didn’t want to think about.