I walk over to the plastic bag. Inside there’s a brass Little League trophy and a completely nondescript black notebook. I pick up the notebook. When I flip through it, I see that it’s blank. “Was this important to him?”

Quinn shrugs.

“Why aren’t you taking this seriously?”

“I am,” she insists.

There’s something going on with her. I know there is because I can read her better than anyone. This reminds me of when her stomach hurt really bad on our second-grade field trip because the bus ride made her nauseous, and she didn’t want to tell me because she was embarrassed. But I knew something was wrong and so I followed her into the bathroom and helped hold her hair while she puked into the toilet. I really hope this isn’t another puking situation.

“Fine,” I say, not wanting to get into it with her. I need to be positive. I wrote that over and over again in my notes. Almost every anecdote I read about someone finding a wormhole talked about the power of positivity. I know Dad would say that sounds like fake science, but still. At this point, I’m willing to stretch a little.

“Let’s set up the barrier,” I say. That’s another thing I read about. It’s supposed to help.

Without answering, Quinn begins collecting twigs. We work in silence, quietly creating a wide circle around the tree that’s made of twigs and random stones that we find. Quinn even pulls a few wet rocks out of the creek.

Once the circle is finished, we stand inside it.

“Looks pretty good, don’t you think?”

Quinn nods.

I study her face. “You sure you’re okay?”

She pushes her hair behind her ears. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

“Okay. Well, I think the barrier is going to help. It gives our experiment limits, you know? Scientific experiments need limits.”

Quinn nods again.

Her silence scratches at me. Quinn is always quiet, but usually it’s a comfortable silence. But right now it’s like a buzzy static, like how the car stereo sounds when it gets stuck between radio stations.

“Well,” I say slowly. “Let’s unpack Mabel’s and . . .” I can’t say his name. I stare at Quinn’s shoes.

She gets the message though because she goes and grabs the plastic bag. “Where do you want these?”

I carefully unpack Mabel’s things. My hands tremble as I set down Waddle, her stuffed penguin, who she would tell you she stopped sleeping with when she was nine, but the truth was, he always had a spot right next to her pillow.

I don’t want Waddle to get any dirt on him, so I gently lay out a washcloth I brought from home and put Waddle on top. Then I put Mabel’s silver star necklace, a tube of dark plum lip gloss, and The Tale of Despereaux, which was her all-time favorite book, down next to Waddle.

Mabel was so much more than these objects, but these objects also say Mabel. I hope the wormhole agrees.