It’s from my father.

I tremble so badly the phone shakes in my hands. Beads of sweat blossom on my forehead and the back of my neck. I can’t get air into my lungs. I lean forward, hyperventilating, praying somehow to regain myself. It’s old. It’s old. It’s an old message. It’s old, it’s old, it’s old … and then I laugh stupidly, dizzily, because his timing is so—it’s so good. It is so good. It’s old, I think firmly, but another thought is louder and it makes me want to break myself, it makes me want to end it all here, now: he’s alive.

I open the message.

Lily’s here. It’s safe. Come home.

Part Four

PART FOUR

I need to go.

I get to my feet and jump down from the stage. I need to go to her. I need to get home now. No—I need to make sure I’m seeing this. I walk out of the auditorium, trying to figure out which way Cary and Rhys went. My hands are numb, still shaking so badly that I drop my phone. It clatters to the ground. I crouch down and pick it up, make sure it’s okay.

The message is still there.

And then my legs decide to stop supporting me. I sink to the floor and press my hand against my forehead and I start to laugh and then I start to cry.

“Sloane?”

I lower my hand and look up. Rhys and Cary are at the end of the hall. They rush to me, asking questions, what is it, what happened, what’s wrong. They try to guess. Are you hurt? Is it the barricades? They’ll never guess. I wipe my eyes and hold my phone out to them.

“Do you see it?” I can barely get the words out. “Do you see the message—”

Rhys takes the phone from me. Stares at it. He hands it to Cary wordlessly. Doesn’t he see it? I can’t tell if he sees it. Cary frowns and then his mouth hangs open in disbelief. I think he should be as ecstatic as I am in this moment—the girl he loved is alive and doesn’t he want to see her of course he’d want to see her—but instead he says, “This is old, Sloane.”

“It’s not that old,” I say. “We have to stop there before we go to Rayford. We can get her and then we can all go to Rayford—”

“You don’t even know if they’re alive—”

I rip the phone out of Cary’s hand. “It says it’s safe. It’s safe. We can stop there and we can get her and we can go to Rayford. My dad—he has a car—”

“They could be gone if they’ve heard the radio—”