But in her mind, all she could think was that she hadn’t seen Colin leave. All she’d witnessed was Colin get unbelievably pale, almost translucently pale. She’d seen Max get up from the couch and move away, as if he was oddly frightened and needed to get away. She’d watched as Colin got up and walked towards Max and . . . She had to be imagining things.

“I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night,” Tess said out loud. “My head hurts. I had a strange dream last night.”

“I hate strange dreams,” said Max. “I wish they were something you could wish away. Or rather, wish not to have.” This last sentence was said with a lot of enunciation between the words, spaces between the last four: wish not to have.

Tess looked at him strangely. Max didn’t usually say “Or rather.” That wasn’t one of his expressions. It was that weird British tone again. She’d also never heard Max say he believed if you wished not to have something, it might have an effect. Max believed in more logical things. Tess looked curiously at Max.

“Are you feeling all right?” asked Tess.

“Yes, quite,” he said, sounding even more British when he said this. And Tess couldn’t help it, partly out of stress, she started laughing.

Max laughed, too, although he wasn’t at all sure why they were laughing.

~ CHAPTER SIXTEEN ~

max

Tess shut her eyes and saw spots, bright colored spots, pink, yellow, blue, almost like bubbles.

Is that what a migraine was? Their mom’s best friend Franny got migraines and had to lie down in the dark because she said she saw spots in front of her eyes.

Tess wasn’t certain that was what it was, as Franny said she saw them when her eyes were open.

When she opened her eyes, Max was sitting on the floor, his legs crossed in an almost yoga-like position. Max didn’t usually sit on the floor, not unless they were playing a board game or something. Tess had never seen him sit cross-legged. It, too, was like something Franny would do, and she would probably have a name for it, like the lotus position. That was what it was. But Max didn’t do that. Max sat in chairs or stood up, or if he was on the floor, he would be sprawled out, at least one leg behind the other and one elbow down, never cross-legged.

Tess shut her eyes again. The spots were still there, pink, blue, orange, almost like confetti, except confetti dropped like waterfalls and these were stationary, as if they were floating in the air, fixed in the black three- dimensional space that presented itself when her eyes were closed, wherever that was . . .

Tess quickly opened her eyes again.