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Current avionics systems have a fixed aircraft pin-out design in which each pin is assigned a unique signal assignment. Thus, some avionics systems have all of the aircraft pins defined, leaving no spare pins available for new functions to be defined. When this is the case, certain signals need to be removed before adding the new functions to the system interface. This results in two separate hardware configurations and part numbers to support the two aircraft pin-out designs. The new part number is most likely not compatible with the old aircraft pin-out and the old part number is not compatible with the new aircraft pin-out.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
}
|
This invention relates to an electronic timepiece including a system for compensating for the variation in a frequency of a time .[.reference.]. .Iadd.base .Iaddend.signal with a temperature by using a temperature signal generator. The electronic timepiece includes a time .[.reference.]. .Iadd.base .Iaddend.signal generator and means for forming a time .[.count.]. unit signal from the time .[.reference.]. .Iadd.base .Iaddend.signal. A .[.time counting mechanism.]. .Iadd.timekeeping means .Iaddend.is provided for keeping a time by using the time .[.count.]. unit signal and a time display .[.mechanism.]. .Iadd.device .Iaddend.is provided for displaying the time kept in the .[.time counting mechanism.]. .Iadd.timekeeping means.Iaddend..
The frequency of a time .[.reference.]. .Iadd.base .Iaddend.signal should essentially be kept in the restricted range even when the temperature of the surroundings of the timepiece is varied.
The specific resonance frequency must be changed with the external temperature even in a crystal oscillator which is used as a reference oscillator for a time .[.reference.]. .Iadd.base .Iaddend.signal generator used in high accuracy timepieces.
In order to overcome the problems of variations in the resonance frequency, the prior art includes several approaches. For example, with measurement equipment, a time .[.reference.]. .Iadd.base .Iaddend.signal generator is placed in a constant temperature vessel. With another approach, the frequency of an output is maintained by counter-balancing the thermal characteristics of the crystal oscillator to the temperature-capacity characteristic of a temperature sensing element thereby changing continuously the capacity of the time .[.reference.]. .Iadd.base .Iaddend.signal generator.
The first prior art approach has problems in that large amounts of electric power are consumed and a large space is required. Furthermore, with the second approach, it is difficult to find a temperature compensating element which has a temperature-capacity characteristic corresponding to that of the reference oscillator which is somewhat complex. In addition many types of temperature compensating elements do not have sufficient durability and stability and there are difficulties in forming an integrated circuit of the temperature compensating system.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
}
|
373 A.2d 235 (1977)
In the Matter of D. M. R., Appellant.
No. 10333.
District of Columbia Court of Appeals.
Argued February 8, 1977.
Decided April 26, 1977.
*236 James G. Heldman, Washington, D. C., with whom John Perazich, Washington, D. C., was on the brief, for appellant.
Margaret L. Hines, Asst. Corp. Counsel, Washington, D. C., with whom John R. Risher, Jr., Corp. Counsel, Louis P. Robbins, Principal Deputy Corp. Counsel, Richard W. Barton, Deputy Corp. Counsel, and Edmund A. Matricardi, Jr., Asst. Corp. Counsel, Washington, D. C., were on the brief, for appellee.
Before NEWMAN, Chief Judge, and KERN and NEBEKER, Associate Judges.
NEWMAN, Chief Judge:
Appellant, a juvenile, was adjudged delinquent after a trial on a petition alleging his involvement in offenses of premeditated murder, felony murder, armed robbery, armed rape, robbery and burglary. At a disposition hearing conducted before a judge other than the trial judge, he was committed to the Social Rehabilitation Administration for an indeterminate period not to exceed two years. He appeals asserting as error: (1) the insufficiency of the evidence to convict of premeditated murder, felony murder, armed rape and burglary; and (2) improper disposition procedures. Finding no merit to his first contention, we affirm his adjudication as delinquent. Finding his second contention to be meritorious, we vacate the disposition and remand for a new disposition.
I.
The facts, viewed in the light most favorable to the government[1], show that late one evening appellant and two friends decided to rob the murder victim, Ponder, and her friend, Fisher, as they were returning home from a local bar. They confronted the victims at gunpoint and took Fisher's wallet. When told that the victims had no money with them but had some at home, the victims were compelled to go to Ponder's apartment. One entered with Ponder to get the money, another stood watch, and appellant stayed with Fisher. At some point, Ponder recognized one of the perpetrators (Theodore) and told him so. She and Fisher were taken out of the building and while appellant guarded Fisher, Ponder was taken behind the building into a shed. Twice appellant went to the shed in a futile attempt to persuade Theodore to leave. There he saw Theodore raping Ponder. When Theodore announced his intention to kill Ponder and armed himself for that purpose, appellant made no protest nor did anything else to disassociate himself from the events. He remained at all times near the scene where Ponder was being raped and murdered. After the murder, he departed with Theodore and the third participant.
From this evidence it is clear that appellant voluntarily involved himself in the criminal activity. Notwithstanding the fact that he did not rape or shoot Ponder, *237 he is still chargeable as an aider and abettor, and liable as a principal for the acts of the actual perpetrator if his conduct in any way furthered the common scheme to commit the crimes charged. Creek v. United States, D.C.App., 324 A.2d 688 (1976). His agreement to accompany his friends in pursuit of the unlawful activity, his assumption of the responsibility of standing guard by Fisher, and his voluntary act of remaining at the scene abetted the commission of the crimes.
We find ample evidence in the record to support the court's conclusion that appellant's conduct during the commission of the felonies was sufficiently culpable to infer criminal complicity. It does not support appellant's contention that he attempted to withdraw from the activity since nowhere is there any showing that he indicated a desire to disassociate himself from the others. His approval was evidenced through his active participation in the venture. Creek v. United States, supra.[2]
II.
When the appellant came before the court for disposition hearing, he requested pursuant to Super.Ct.Juv.R. 25(b)[3] that the matter be certified to the judge who had conducted the trial. That judge was present for duty at the Superior Court although not then assigned to the Family Division thereof. Informed that the trial judge did not desire the case certified to her, appellant requested the court to exercise its discretion under Super.Ct.Juv.R. 25(b) to conduct a de novo hearing. The court declined and proceeded to disposition.[4]
Under Juvenile Rule 25(b), in order for a judge to impose disposition in a case he did not try, the trial judge must be absent, dead, sick, or disabled. The trial judge in this case was available. She was contacted in her chambers and because she had no recollection of the case, declined to handle the sentencing. Appellee has urged that the judge's rotation from the Family Division is an absence within the meaning of Rule 25(b). We cannot agree.
Although we have found no cases construing this rule, the corresponding federal rule,[5] which is substantially identical to that here at issue, lends guidance to its interpretation. The federal rule has been construed by the Advisory Committee on Rules[6] to mean physically distant and was intended to cover those situations where the trial judge had left the area to return to his regular court in another district. Where the trial judge is available within a reasonable distance from the place of trial, the federal courts have held that it is appropriate to maintain continuity by having that judge conduct the sentencing. United States v. Bowser, 497 F.2d 1017 (4th Cir. 1974); United States v. Bakewell, 430 F.2d 721 (5th Cir. 1970).
We adopt the rationale of the federal courts. The obvious intent of this unambiguous *238 rule is to grant to a juvenile the benefit of having his case disposed of by the judge who heard the evidence. The safeguards inherent in the rule are necessary ingredients of the social welfare philosophy by which the Juvenile Act was promulgated and the court has a duty to assure that the child receives all benefits promised him under the statute and court rules. Haziel v. United States, 131 U.S.App.D.C. 298, 404 F.2d 1275 (1968).
Our conclusion is all the more compelled by reference to Super.Ct.Juv.R. 107(c) which specifically allows a successor judge to review a pretrial release order where the judge who entered it is unavailable or is no longer sitting in the Family Division.[7] It is obvious that where rotation from the Family Division is deemed a sufficient excuse for substituting a different judge for the trial judge it is quite explicitly set forth in the rules.[8]
By-passing the provisions of this rule, which has the force of law,[9] portends conflicting results and invites continuous review by this court. In such instance, our responsibility is to insure fair administration of justice by scrupulous adherence to the rules of court through the exercise of our supervisory powers. Cf. Wise v. United States, D.C.App., 293 A.2d 869 (1972). We choose to do so here because we deem it incompatible with the purposes of the Juvenile Act to allow the Superior Court to ignore its own rule which inures to the protection of its wards. Rules of procedure are not mere technicalities. Faithful observance of the standards insures the preservation of basic rights and legitimate expectations of juveniles. Kass v. Baskin, 82 U.S.App.D.C. 385, 164 F.2d 513 (1948).
Therefore, we direct the Superior Court to hereafter comply strictly with the provisions of Juvenile Rule 25(b) in all juvenile cases unless and until it is amended.
Accordingly, the adjudication of delinquency appealed from is affirmed. However, the disposition imposed is vacated and the case is remanded to the trial court for further proceedings, not inconsistent with this opinion.
So Ordered.
NOTES
[1] Creek v. United States, D.C.App., 324 A.2d 688 (1976).
[2] The extent of appellant's participation is significantly different than in such cases as Bailey v. United States, 135 U.S.App.D.C. 95, 416 F.2d 1110 (1969), on which appellant relies.
[3] Super.Ct.Juv.R. 25(b) provides:
If by reason of absence, death, sickness or other disability the judge before whom the respondent had his factfinding hearing is unable to perform the duties to be performed by the Division after a finding of guilt or need for supervision, any other judge regularly sitting in or assigned to the Division may perform those duties; but if such other judge is satisfied that he cannot perform those duties because he did not preside at the factfinding hearing or for any other reason, he may in his discretion grant a new factfinding hearing.
[4] It is clear that the judge who imposed disposition did not have a transcript of the factfinding proceedings. Further, although the record on appeal does not contain the dispositional report prepared on appellant, counsel for appellant pointed out to the court during his attempt to obtain a de novo hearing that the report contained only one or two lines concerning the circumstances of the offense.
[5] Fed.R.Crim.P. 25(b).
[6] While Notes of the Advisory Committee on Rules which accompany proposed rules are not authoritative, they are somewhat analogous to a Congressional Committee Report in determining the intention of the framers of the rules. United States v. Mihalopoulos, 228 F.Supp. 994, 1002 (D.D.C.1964).
[7] Super.Ct.Juv.R. 107(c) provides in part:
A juvenile who has been placed in detention, shelter care, or released under conditions pursuant to D.C.Code § 16-2312, may, at any time thereafter upon written application to the Family Division have the order reviewed by the judge who entered the order, and a decision rendered within five days of presentation to the judge who will state his reasons therefor in writing. If the judge who entered the above order is unavailable or is no longer sitting in the Family Division at the time of the application, the judge then sitting in New Referrals Court shall review the order and may modify or terminate it and state his reasons therefor in writing.
[8] At oral argument, counsel for the government represented that the procedure utilized in this case is that regularly utilized in the Superior Court. It appears that unless the trial judge directs otherwise, the disposition is not conducted by the trial judge if that judge is no longer assigned to the Family Division. While we express no view on the desirability of such procedure, it is not sanctioned by the present rule. If change in such rule is to be made, it must be done pursuant to D.C.Code 1973, § 11-946, rather than by judicial decision.
[9] In Matter of C. A. P., D.C.App., 356 A.2d 335 (1976); Campbell v. United States, D.C.App., 295 A.2d 498 (1972).
|
{
"pile_set_name": "FreeLaw"
}
|
The great Tibetan lama Patrul Rinpoche was a widely revered and much-respected teacher, and people gathered around him to receive his wisdom and insight. His teachings were simple, direct, and profound, and in one way or another the essence of his discourse always led to the practice of compassion.
One day he said to a small group of his students: “The purpose of life is to help all sentient beings to be free from suffering. In order to do this, you need to cultivate unconditional, unlimited, and pure compassion toward all, without any exception.”
Patrul Rinpoche always encouraged discussion, debate, and dialogue, so after making this all-encompassing statement, he asked, “Do you understand?”
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
“She’s a creature of the medium,” writes Adams. “Television is her playpen. It’s where she belongs. I also knew something she’d told me awhile ago.
"She’d said to me: ‘I gotta get back on TV. There’s a Chuck E. Cheese near where I live. I’ve been taking the kids there for years. And they know I tip 100 percent because I used to be a waitress. Would you believe the other day, for the first time, they made me wait? On a line. Behind a rope. I gotta get back on TV.’”
She then told Adams’ table: “And it’ll be Oprah’s time slot.”
That's a huge deal! Do you think Rosie has what it takes to replace Oprah in that time slot?
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
New Balance – Holiday 2014 Release Preview
New Balance has some serious heat in the pipeline, and these bad boys might just be the ultimate gift for NB fans and sneakerheads alike. The Holiday 2014 preview showcases familiar silhouettes in some clever new colorways, and the theme seems to be clever color-blocking, something we can get behind. From premium materials to intricate color combos, NB has you covered. Stay tuned for more pics and info as they become available here at MN.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
{#sp1 .173}
{#sp2 .175}
{#sp3 .176}
{#sp4 .177}
{#sp5 .178}
{#sp6 .179}
{#sp7 .180}
{#sp8 .181}
{#sp9 .182}
{#sp10 .183}
{#sp11 .184}
{#sp12 .185}
{#sp13 .186}
{#f1 .180}
{#f2 .181}
{#f3 .181}
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Central"
}
|
Spontaneous Dissection of Superior Mesenteric Artery: Long-Term Outcome of Stent Placement.
Stent placement was performed in 10 patients with symptomatic spontaneous dissection of the superior mesenteric artery (SMA). A stent was placed as first-line treatment in 7 patients and as second-line treatment in 3 patients in whom conservative treatment had failed. Abdominal pain completely resolved within 2 days after stent placement, and follow-up (median 53 months; range, 11-99 months) CT angiography revealed complete obliteration of the false lumen and good stent patency in 9 patients. One patient showed asymptomatic stent occlusion at 99-month follow-up. Long-term patency of stent placement in patients with symptomatic SMA dissection seems to be acceptable.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
Q:
component render one time when click tab on drawerNavigator in react native
I'm new on react native getting issue on calling component. Whenever click on drawer navigator tab first time component render and API called But when back to the home page and again call that component API not called. I want to recall that function.
Here is my drawer navigator code :
const AppDrawerNavigator = createDrawerNavigator({
Home: {
screen: Home,
navigationOptions: {
drawerLabel: 'Home',
drawerIcon: () => (
<Icon name="home" size={20} color="#0f1f7b" />
)
},
},
PreviousInspection: {
screen: PreviousInspection,
navigationOptions: {
drawerLabel: 'Previous Inspection',
drawerIcon: () => (
<Icon name="file" size={20} color="#0f1f7b" />
)
},
},
Logout: {
screen: Logout,
navigationOptions: {
drawerLabel: 'Logout',
drawerIcon: () => (
<Icon name="sign-out" size={20} color="#0f1f7b" />
)
},
}
},
{
drawerBackgroundColor: "#fff",
contentOptions: {
activeTintColor: '#000',
inactiveTintColor: '#000',
activeBackgroundColor: '#bfc7f3',
itemStyle: {
fontSize: 12,
},
},
});
A:
react-navigation has a withNavigationFocus HOC which provides an isFocused prop to your component. You can use that to determine when a certain screen has become visible.
import { withNavigationFocus } from 'react-navigation';
class YourScreen extends React.Component {
render() {
...
}
componentDidUpdate(prevProps) {
if (this.props.isFocused && !prevProps.isFocused) {
// Screen has now come into focus, call your method here
}
}
}
export default withNavigationFocus(YourScreen)
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
Effects of twilights on circadian entrainment patterns and reentrainment rates in squirrel monkeys.
Entrainment patterns of the circadian rhythms of body temperature and locomotor activity were compared in 6 squirrel monkeys (Saimiri sciureus) exposed to daily illumination cycles with abrupt transitions between light and darkness (LD-rectangular) or with gradual dawn and dusk transitions simulating natural twilights at the equator (LD-twilight). Daytime light intensity was 500 lux, and the total amount of light emitted per day was the same in the two conditions. Mean daytime body temperature levels were stable in LD-rectangular but increased gradually in LD-twilight, reaching peak levels during the dusk twilight. Locomotor activity showed a similar pattern, but with an additional, secondary peak near the end of dawn. Activity duration was about 0.5 h longer in LD-twilight than in LD-rectangular, but the time of activity midpoint was similar in the two conditions. Reentrainment of the body temperature rhythm was faster following an 8-h advance of the LD cycle than following an 8-h delay, but did not differ significantly between the two LD conditions. These results provide no evidence that the inclusion of twilight transitions affected the strength of the LD zeitgeber, and suggest that the observed differences in the daily patterns reflected direct effects of light intensity on locomotor activity and body temperature rather than an effect of twilights on circadian entrainment mechanisms.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
Chemiluminescence properties of soybean protein fraction in the hydroperoxide and hydrogen donor system.
Whey fraction, a constituent of soybean protein, produced a photon emission in the presence of gallic acid and hydrogen peroxide. Identification of the chemiluminescence agent from the whey fraction indicated the participation of lipoxygenase in the emission. The reactivity of lipoxygenase with peroxides in the gallic acid solidus hydroperoxide system was in the order of methylethyl hydroperoxide (MEK-OOH, 4800 cps) > tert-butyl hydroperoxide (tert-BuOOH, 607 cps) > hydrogen peroxide (H(2)O(2), 455 cps) > cumene hydroperoxide (cumene-OOH, 261 cps). Emission maxima for H(2)O(2) and cumene-OOH were 670 nm, and emission maxima for MEK-OOH and tert-BuOOH were at 510 nm. The photon intensity from the gallic acid lipoxygenase system corresponded to the linoleic acid hydroperoxide value. A high correlation of photon intensity with hydroperoxide, including linoleic hydroperoxide was useful as a simple and sensitive method for the direct detection of hydroperoxides in biomaterials.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
, 7457
What are the prime factors of 563975?
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3, 67, 503
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5, 17, 29, 1249
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2, 3, 43, 1301
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2, 312967
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2, 19, 5987
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19, 93263
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3, 307, 17359
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2, 210461
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3615389
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2, 3, 17, 67, 223
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712183
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3, 67, 7411
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2, 17, 3001
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2, 676649
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19, 467, 839
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17, 19, 3299
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3, 13137217
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19, 53, 727
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2, 3, 13, 98963
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2, 158909
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3, 13, 37, 113
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2, 3, 497491
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19, 90841
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2, 3, 61757
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2, 3, 19, 31, 1181
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764021
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2, 3, 187069
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353, 2393
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2, 3, 5, 37, 2341
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28879
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2, 11, 349, 523
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7, 5381
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3, 606967
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2, 454849
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2, 283, 1289
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2, 7, 103, 229
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2, 13, 4481
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11, 827
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2, 41, 12703
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5, 43, 3821
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2, 197, 3121
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19, 47, 53
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2, 109, 14347
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263, 1013
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2, 3, 120833
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2, 5, 107, 743
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3, 7, 19, 11953
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2, 43, 1459
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23, 2281
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3, 37, 12457
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7, 355261
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5, 13, 29917
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1279111
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2, 5, 58427
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3, 5, 7, 131, 1129
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2, 7, 327001
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3, 17, 66959
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157, 1327
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2, 269, 967
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7, 19, 127, 1327
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2, 3, 326323
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2, 3, 7, 2141
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218047
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557, 877
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7, 13, 59, 4507
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2, 3, 174569
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2, 3, 118787
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2, 23, 11719
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5, 7, 229, 4637
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11, 36821
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742537
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17, 23, 1381
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2, 3, 23
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51193
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2, 179, 5521
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811, 983
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7, 283, 1109
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5, 320659
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2, 17, 7013
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2, 3, 7, 50741
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2, 5, 158231
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2, 23, 19973
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2, 5, 89, 167
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2, 5, 277, 383
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3, 23, 31, 137
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2, 3, 7, 23, 3617
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2, 3, 647
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2, 3, 271, 1753
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2, 61, 12853
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2, 11, 4931
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5, 11, 47, 59
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2, 3, 5, 23, 73
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23, 8599
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2, 72073
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2, 957557
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22853
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2, 197, 3251
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5, 8431051
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5, 19, 53, 1907
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2, 23, 1733
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2, 3, 263, 313
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3, 19, 2693
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5, 11, 406327
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17, 173, 3821
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7, 11, 13, 3203
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2, 239, 3511
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2, 96587
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3, 513749
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3, 1120513
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3, 2609, 3313
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2, 78229
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19, 166723
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2, 3, 5, 59, 197
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5, 7, 13, 181
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2, 3, 31, 97, 151
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108217
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2, 83, 14939
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3, 17, 246899
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3, 7, 11, 43
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2, 3803203
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2, 19, 89, 337
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3, 23, 61
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2, 7, 13, 21577
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2, 4261
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7, 17333
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2, 17, 311, 389
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2, 3, 7, 23, 197
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49801
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2, 5, 11, 73, 191
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3, 19, 23, 61
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3, 7, 13, 577
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3, 41, 214787
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7, 11, 2903
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2, 63977
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37, 71, 1637
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2, 3, 300821
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3, 281, 5531
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3, 49123
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2, 3, 79181
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2, 3, 1459
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17, 12413
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7, 11, 37, 499
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18685423
What are the prime factors of 122525?
5, 13, 29
List the prime factors of 2911567.
37, 78691
What are the prime factors of 4466252?
2, 7, 22787
List the prime factors of 29379327.
3, 1069, 9161
List the prime factors of 7256814.
2, 3, 1209469
What are the prime factors of 101468?
2, 25367
List the prime factors of 629459.
17, 61, 607
List the prime factors of 4548708.
2, 3, 29, 4357
What are the prime factors of 773553?
3, 11, 2131
What are the prime factors of 592740?
2, 3, 5, 37, 89
What are the prime factors of 247916?
2, 61979
What are the prime factors of 6013738?
2, 709, 4241
List the prime factors of 226753.
226753
List the prime factors of 172788.
2, 3, 7, 11, 17
List the prime factors of 312725.
5, 7, 1787
What ar
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{
"pile_set_name": "DM Mathematics"
}
|
The antiproliferative effect of cyclosporine on hematopoietic and lymphoblastoid cell lines--common mechanistic elements with interferon-alpha.
Cyclosporine, but not its nonimmunosuppressive analog cyclosporine H (CsH), caused in a variety of hematopoietic cell types a growth arrest in the G0/G1 phase of the cell cycle. This arrest was associated with a significant reduction in the c-myc mRNA levels, which could be observed already 1 hr following CsA treatment. Similarity between the antiproliferative effects of CsA and IFN-alpha was observed. Thus, the IFN-alpha sensitive human B-lymphoblastoid cell line Daudi was also sensitive to CsA while an IFN-alpha resistant variant of Daudi cells was found to be resistant to CsA as well. Inhibition of protein synthesis with cycloheximide during IFN-alpha or CsA treatment blocked their ability to reduce the expression of c-myc. Depletion of protein kinase C (PKC) activity from cells by pretreatment of Daudi cells with phorbol.12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA) abolished the G0/G1 arrest induced by both CsA and IFN-alpha. Combinations of low concentrations of CsA and IFN-alpha had synergistic effects on cell-cycle distribution and on c-myc mRNA level, suggesting that CsA and IFN-alpha differ in some features of their antiproliferative action. This conclusion was supported by the observation that a CsA-resistant variant of Daudi cells was found to retain its sensitivity to IFN-alpha. In addition, reduction of ornithine decarboxylase mRNA expression was obtained with IFN-alpha but not with CsA. Taken together, our results suggest that CsA and IFN-alpha share some common element(s) in the pathways of their antiproliferative activity. The possible mechanisms of their antigrowth effects and the clinical significance of our findings are discussed.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
On the unsteady-state species separation of a binary liquid mixture in a rectangular thermogravitational column.
This paper investigates the unsteady-state species segregation of binary liquid mixtures in rectangular thermogravitational columns. The analysis leads to a procedure to obtain both molecular and thermal diffusion coefficients from transient separation measurements. Two models are presented: first, an ideal model where buoyancy only depends on temperature and second, a general model where buoyancy also varies with composition. Steady-state measurements are not required regardless of which model is chosen. As a result, the new procedure is faster than steady-state procedures. When either the molecular or thermal diffusion coefficient is known a priori, the other can be obtained without knowledge of fluid properties such as density, viscosity, thermal expansion, and compositional coefficients.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
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1. Field of the Invention
Apparatuses and methods consistent with the present invention relate to display of a film video signal on display apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, as a screen size of a display apparatus, such as a plasma display panel (PDP) and a liquid crystal display (LCD), has increases, many users watch movies through the display apparatus at home rather than going to a movie theater.
In general, a movie showed at the movie theater, i.e., a film video signal, is generated to have 24 or 25 frames per second, and the generated frames are respectively stored in a film to be displayed on a screen by a progressive scan method. The progressive scan method is to display a single screen on the screen at once by a frame unit.
However, most display apparatuses currently employ an interlace scan method in which the single screen is divided into more than two fields to be displayed on the screen in sequence. According to a transmission type, these display apparatuses process video by 60 fields per second in case of a National Television System Committee (NTSC) standard, and process the video by 50 fields per second in case of a Sequential Couleur a Memoire (SECAM) standard to be displayed on the screen.
Accordingly, due to the above difference, if the film video signal is played by the display apparatuses, a user is not able to watch a normal film video because the number of the frames displayed per second is different. To solve this problem, video processing for changing a frame rate of the film video, and increasing the number of the frames is necessary.
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{
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Cosmic Gate & Eric Lumiere – Falling Back
Cosmic Gate immediately bringing us that amazing electric beat with that old school techno type of vocals! This song talks all about a relationship and much to how it loops in a circle like the way the song does. How they fall out of love and back into love over and over and drops on “fall in love” to a heavy melody as if to take you to that feeling of falling in love that happiness!
|
{
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1994–95 Serie B
This article contains information on the 1994–95 season of Serie B, the second highest football league in Italy.
Final classification
Results
Category:Serie B seasons
2
Italy
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Wikipedia (en)"
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On bias.
We performed a search in Medline to assess the quality of clinical journals in orthopedics from the point of view of study design. 3 levels of quality were chosen: prospective studies, random allocation or double-blind methods and randomized controlled trials; all entries were Medical Subject Headings (MeSH). Out of 25,538 articles indexed in Medline since 1966-1993 in the 8 most cited general orthopedic journals, 994 were indexed as prospective studies, while 138 were indexed as randomized, controlled trials. In recent years the number of well-designed articles has increased, as has the percentage. In a random check of 208 articles, approximately half were of a clinical type where these issues can be addressed. The agreement between the manual check and Medline indexing was good, but not perfect. It was concluded that the retrospective study representing clinical production control accounts for the vast majority of all published clinical articles in orthopedics. In recent years, a sharp increase in controlled trials had, however, occurred.
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Dedication
For Leah, who always reminds me it's not the end of the world
Contents
_Cover_
_Title Page_
_Dedication_
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Twenty-Two
Twenty-Three
Twenty-Four
Twenty-Five
Twenty-Six
Twenty-Seven
Twenty-Eight
_Acknowledgments_
_About the Author_
_Books by Katie Henry_
_Back Ads_
_Copyright_
_About the Publisher_
One
**HERE IS ONE** way the world could end:
In a peaceful corner of northwest Wyoming, under the feet of park rangers, herds of deer, and thousands of tourists to Yellowstone National Park, lies a giant reservoir of burning, deadly magma called the Yellowstone Caldera. First, there would be earthquakes, the kind you can't sleep through. Then would come the supereruption, a rare seismic event. Rare, but possible. Rare, but overdue. The park would be a lake of lava, but the real problem would be the ash, which would blanket the entire United States, coast to coast. In the Rockies, the ash would crush buildings, devastate crops, suffocate animals and people. Even a few inches would make national highways impassable, ruin farms, shut down air travel. Life as we know it would be over. The entire planet would grow colder.
Here is another way the world could end: I could fail my driving test for a third time.
"Twice isn't even that many times to fail. Two times, that's all, and my parents look at me like I've murdered something. Something cute. And fuzzy." I take a breath. "There are bigger problems in the world than me not being able to drive my sister to ballet. Millions of people don't have clean drinking water. Two-thirds of the animals on Earth might be dead in five years, did you know that? And at any time— _any time_ —a gamma-ray burst could destroy the ozone layer and kill us all."
"Could we bring this conversation back to you?" Martha asks.
We're not actually having a conversation. She's a therapist and I'm a client, and even though her office is made to look like someone's living room, we're not doing this for fun.
"Sure," I say. "Forget the world, _I_ could have bigger problems than not being able to drive. I could be an alcoholic. I could be a shoplifter. I could be selling my dad's muscle relaxants in the park across from school, did they think about that?"
"Do you think there are some fears wrapped up in this experience?"
"It's not irrational to be scared of driving. It's the most dangerous everyday activity."
"It's good to take safety seriously," Martha concedes. "And I know I've said this before, but fear can be a very useful tool. Everyone experiences fear, and there's a good reason for that. It helps us identify danger. It helps us survive."
"Yeah, exactly, we should all be _more_ scared."
"But sometimes, people experience fear that's constant, or very intense, or out of proportion to the situation," Martha adds gently. "And when fear keeps you from living your life freely, that's when it has to be addressed. Not eliminated completely. Just managed."
"My mom says I can't go to college if I don't know how to drive," I say. "Like it's the equivalent of a high school diploma. And I'm not getting that for almost two more years, so what's her rush?"
"It sounds like you're feeling a lot of pressure."
"For no good reason! I can take the bus to school, I can walk to church and your office and the library, I can get on BART if I want to go to San Francisco. I'm fine." I pause. "People are too dependent on cars. Like, sure, if a geomagnetic storm destroyed the electricity grid and society collapsed, you could use a car to get somewhere safer—"
Martha clears her throat. I keep going.
"—but we live in a city; the freeways would pile up. And gas expires, it oxidizes, so all the cars would be rusted from the inside out, anyway. You can't count on cars."
"Do you think this is a worthwhile thought pattern, Ellis?"
_Is anything you do worthwhile, Ellis?_
I shake my head.
"Let's talk about what happened during the driving test."
"Nothing happened."
"What do you mean?"
"I sat in the DMV parking lot with the . . . driving evaluator, or whatever—and _nothing happened_." I pause. "Because I couldn't turn the car on."
Martha tilts her head. "Couldn't?"
I've only been seeing her for a few weeks, but I know what it means when she repeats a word I've said. It's like when you insert your card at the train station and the turnstile spits it back out. Try again. She's looking for me to say _wouldn't_ or _didn't want to_ in place of _couldn't_. But I really couldn't. I had my finger on the button and my foot on the brake but my brain was already out of the parking lot and on Claremont Avenue, calculating exactly what would go wrong.
_You could hit a pedestrian._
_You could hit an elderly pedestrian._
_You could hit a child pedestrian._
_You could hit an elderly pedestrian carrying a child pedestrian and get arrested for manslaughter and your parents will have to pay restitution to the elderly/child victims and you'll never go to college because of your horrible guilt and will instead live in the basement for the rest of your life and befriend the rats._
Alternatively, I could humiliate myself in front of a DMV employee. At least I've got a road map for that.
"What feelings are coming up, right now?"
I shrug. "I'm fine."
"'Fine' is not a feeling."
"Is 'annoyed' a feeling?"
She smiles. "Yes. Is that what you're feeling about your driving test?"
"It's not a big deal to me. So I guess I'm annoyed it's such a big deal to other people."
"That's understandable." Martha pushes a dark, springy ringlet back from her face. "Is this something you've experienced before? Or is this a new feeling?"
For someone so serene and unflappable, she talks about feelings a lot. Never hers, though. Only mine.
"It's not new." I hesitate. "It's actually kind of constant."
"Tell me about that."
I slump back on the couch. The more information you dredge up and vomit out to someone, the more they seem to want.
_Is it really that horrible to have someone listen to you? Your parents are paying for this. You're wasting their money._
"Everything my mom and dad think is important, I don't want anything to do with. They want me to get my license. They want me to be in AP classes. They want me to hang out with girls from church more. I don't care about the things they care about. I just don't."
_Not only are you wasting your parents' money, you're using it to talk crap about them._
"It goes the other way, too," I say, trying to seem like less of a jerk. "They don't care about what I care about, either." I pause. "They don't _want_ me to care about the things I care about."
"Can you give me an example?"
I give her a look like, _Come on._ She smiles. She waits.
"Like disaster preparedness," I say. "Like the end of the world as we know it."
"Where do you think your interest in survivalism comes from?" she asks.
I shake my head. "I'm not a survivalist."
"Oh?"
"Survivalists have skill sets. Hunting and fishing and living off the land, and I can't do any of that. I'm a prepper. I have supplies, not skills. Or, I would have supplies, except my mom told all my relatives they can't give me gift cards anymore because I'll spend them on 'bizarre internet stuff,' as if she won't appreciate properly filtered water you don't even have to boil first."
"Okay," Martha says. "Prepping. Where do you think your interest in prepping comes from?"
My palms itch. I try to put my hands in the pockets of my cardigan, but they don't fit. I take them out.
"Do you know," I ask Martha, "where the word _interest_ comes from?"
"Where it comes from?"
"The history of the word. Its etymology." She shakes her head. "It's Latin, if you go back far enough. The noun form of _interesse_ , which means, literally, 'to be between.' It was more a legal term, though, not like we think of it now."
"It's impressive you remember all that."
"Well, I wrote it down," I say. "I can remember anything if I write it down."
Absentmindedly, I touch the front pocket of my backpack. That's where my notebook is. Kenny #14. The first Kenny was an eggshell-blue diary from Deseret Books, a gift from my aunt on my ninth birthday. My mom suggested I name it. I chose Kenny. She hated that so much I stuck with it for thirteen more notebooks.
Martha shifts in her chair. "How much progress have you made in your workbook?"
I've made exactly no progress in _Stress Free and Happy to Be Me_ because I buried it in my sock drawer the first day I got it.
"The workbook is one tool," she says. "It's designed to give you strategies for situations like your driving test. When you feel overwhelmed, or anxious."
Hearing that word always makes my throat tight. I'm not in denial, I know it's what I am. Martha was the first person to say it like a diagnosis, not just as an adjective. All the diplomas on Martha's office walls—Howard University, Smith College, UC Berkeley—only make it feel more official. Generalized anxiety disorder. It's not the word itself, it's what people mean when they use it.
"But maybe it's not the right tool for you," she admits. "I'd like to give you an assignment for this week."
"Okay."
"You've probably written down some facts about how the world could end. Or change drastically. Yes?"
I nod again.
"Have you looked up any of the times people thought the world would end, and then it didn't?"
No. Those people were wrong, whoever they were, whenever they were. Why would I care about things that didn't happen? I shake my head.
"This week, I'd like you to look up some end-of-the-world predictions that didn't come true. They can be from last year, they can be from a thousand years ago."
I can do research in my sleep. "So you want a list, or—?"
"Go deeper than that. Look at what happened to those people afterward. When the world kept going, what did they do? What changed in their lives, and what didn't? How did they move on?" She looks at her watch. "And then next session, we can talk about it. Sound good?"
If it means the workbook can stay buried in my sock drawer, it sounds great. I nod.
"Wonderful." She glances at her watch. "Our time's about up for today."
I grab my backpack. Martha opens the door for me.
"Have a good week," she says. "And try not to focus too much on the driving test, okay?"
But as I walk past the other offices and the eternally wilted potted plant at the end of the hallway, that's all I can think about. Me at the wheel of a car, and all the things that could go wrong. Martha calls this "catastrophizing."
_You could hit the gas instead of the brake. You could run over a kindergarten teacher or a volunteer firefighter or the Dalai Lama._
Never mind that the Dalai Lama doesn't even live here.
_What if he was giving a lecture at UC Berkeley and you murdered him, what then? It's possible. Anything terrible is possible._
When I walk into the waiting room, I expect to see the little redheaded boy who sees Martha right after me. He's usually here when I get out, destroying a _Highlights_ magazine and demanding more Goldfish from his exhausted mom. I've taken to calling him the Red Demon.
_You're a horrible person. He's a child._
He did whip a Tonka truck at my face once.
_And everyone still likes him better than they like you._
But the only person in the waiting room today is a teenage girl, sitting cross-legged in one of the armless wooden chairs, her eyes closed.
I shouldn't stare. Emily Post may not have written about therapy, but some things are unspoken. You ignore the other people in the waiting room. You do not make small talk. You keep walking when a maladjusted third grader hurls a toy at you, though it is permissible to step on his bag of Goldfish in revenge.
I shouldn't stare at this girl and her loose, long, wavy hair, the color of an old penny. And scraggly at the tips, like it hasn't been cut in a while. She's in faded jeans and a navy hoodie that's way too big for her. It engulfs her torso and hides her hands. Her feet are tucked under her legs. I wonder if she's even wearing shoes.
And as I'm standing there, staring, the girl in blue opens her eyes.
I squeak and stumble back.
She smiles, big and broad, like we're best friends reunited. "Hi," she says, and the way she says it, it's clear she remembers me, even if I can't remember her.
"I'm sorry," I say, and don't even know for what. For staring at her? For forgetting her name? "Do we—how do I know you?"
She tilts her head. "You don't know me," she says. "Not yet."
This is how serial-killer shows start. In five network-TV minutes, a grizzled detective is going to find my corpse by a drainage pipe, strangled with a navy blue sweatshirt.
The girl's still smiling. It's like she doesn't even know I'm internally debating whether she's a criminal mastermind. I have to say something. Anything. Anything not about murder.
I clear my throat. "Um. What?"
She opens her mouth, but closes it fast as we hear high heels clipping down the hallway. Martha appears in the waiting door almost inhumanly fast. She looks at the girl in blue, then at me. Her serene mask, the nonjudgmental face she wears in our sessions, vanishes. Only for a second.
Martha looks back at the girl in blue. "You're very early." She pauses, awkwardly, like she swallowed a word.
The girl gets to her feet. She is, in fact, wearing shoes. "I walked, and it didn't take as long as I thought it would."
"We'll start now," she says to the girl. She flicks her eyes to me. "See you next week."
Martha starts to usher the girl through the door. The girl glances back at me as she goes. "See you sooner than that."
She grins. Martha shuts the door behind them. I stand in the empty waiting room alone.
If we were in a session, Martha would ask me to name what I'm feeling right now. It's easier to do inside my head than out loud.
Confused. Intrigued. Nervous, as always.
I can name Martha's feelings, too, the ones on her face when the mask dropped. Surprised. Wary. Maybe even scared.
I can't do that for the girl in blue, because I don't know her.
I don't know her, but I think I will.
Two
**I TAKE THE** bus straight home. I'd rather have walked, but it's Monday, and Monday means family home evening. So I squeeze myself onto a packed 51A bus. Wedged between a pack of middle school kids drawing boobs on the wall and an elderly man who clearly regrets having chosen the back row, I think about the girl in blue.
_You don't know me._
_Not yet._
And though I rack my brain for what that could mean, even after I'm off the bus, down my block, and opening my front door, I'm no closer to figuring it out. I shake my head. I need to forget about this, for now.
Family home evening—everyone shortens it to FHE—is the one night a week reserved for family time. No extracurriculars, no late nights at the office, no holing up in your room alone. We're Mormon, and that means we're big on family. It makes sense. If you're going to spend all eternity together, you might as well become close while you're still on Earth.
I know a lot of people do this kind of thing, not just us, but we're the only church I know of to give it a name and make it a weekly expectation. Not that I mind. As far as expectations go, this is an easy one. Hang out with your family, eat something sugary, play a game or watch a movie? It's nice. I like my family.
"Ellis?" Mom calls from the kitchen. "Can you come in here?"
I mostly like my family.
When I walk into the kitchen, Mom is still in her work clothes, though she's probably been home for a while.
"Hey, sweetie," she says, closing the oven door and then straightening up to look at me. She frowns. "I wish you wouldn't do that."
I'd ask what I possibly could have _done_ , since I'm standing here motionless and silent, but I know she'll tell me.
"What's in the oven?" I ask as she walks over to me and gently untucks the hair behind my ears.
"There," she says, pushing the hair back away from my forehead and fluffing the ends like I'm some kind of prized Pomeranian. "It looks so much better that way. Don't you think?"
When it's behind my ears, it's out of my eyes. I don't care what it looks like. "It's fine."
"Or up," she says, starting to gather it into a high ponytail. "You never wear it up."
I shrug her off. "Mom, _stop_."
She lets my hair down. Steps back. She nods at a bowl on the counter next to the sink.
"Can you wash your hands and mix that coleslaw for me, please? I'm bringing it to the Jensens tomorrow. You can put it in the fridge when you're done."
She knows I don't like the feeling of cold food on my hands, but the last time I reminded her, she said, "Well, there's not much you _do_ like, is there?" And the Jensens just had a baby, which makes this an act of service. So I roll up my sleeves and start.
It's quiet, but the wrong kind. Maybe she's counting down the seconds, just like I'm counting down the seconds until my dad or little sister comes home and rescues me.
"So." I hear Mom turn toward me. "How was it?"
"How was what?"
She tries to sound casual. "Therapy."
Now I know why she gave me this job. My hands are covered in mayo and I can't walk out. I mix the slaw with shredded carrots and shredded trust.
"It was fine," I say, and can almost hear Martha: _"Fine" is not a feeling_. Mom doesn't know that, though.
"Just fine?"
Or maybe she does.
"I talked. She talked. I didn't cry," I say. "So, yeah. Just fine."
"It's a lot of money for 'just fine,' Ellis."
"It's therapy, not Disneyland, Mom."
Mom closes the oven door and checks the slaw over my shoulder. "It's not mixed enough."
"I'm not _done_ , I—"
"What did you talk about?"
I close my eyes. "I don't know."
"You don't know?"
"No."
"You don't know what you talked about for an hour?"
"I mean, a lot of stuff," I say. "I didn't take notes."
She waits a beat. "Did you talk about me?"
"Mom!"
She has the absolute audacity to look shocked. "You don't have to yell."
"Why do you always ask that?" I've stopped mixing.
"I have a right to know what's being said about me."
I shake my head and start mixing again.
"No, Ellis, not like that—here." She digs her hands into the bowl, taking over.
"Do you have to criticize every little thing I do?" I snap, but step back.
"You're being dramatic."
"You're kind of proving my point."
Her nostrils flare, but at that moment, Dad steps into the kitchen, two reusable grocery bags over his shoulders. He was smiling, but that dies when he sees the way Mom and I are looking at each other.
"Hey," he says, cautiously, hands out like a zookeeper faced with two snarling wolverines.
Mom flicks one last look at me before kissing him hello and rinsing her hands off at the sink. "I told my sister I'd call her back before dinner. Can you check the lasagna in five?"
"Sure," he says. I unload the groceries. Once we hear the click of her heels on the second floor, Dad turns to me. "What happened?"
I don't say anything for a moment.
"Come on, Elk," he says, knowing I can't resist my childhood nickname. Elk, for my initials—Ellis Leah Kimball.
"She wanted to know what I talked about in therapy."
He sighs.
"She wanted to know if I talked about _her_."
"She likes to be in the loop," he says. "Just like you."
I roll my eyes. Mom and I could not be more different. Like I'd ever host parties or stand up in front of a crowd to teach Sunday school. Like I'd ever have as many friends as she does, or know how to comfort someone who's grieving, or argue with a salesperson over a gift card balance and win.
Mom is afraid of nothing and no one. And I'm—well, there's a reason she asked Dad to check the oven, not me.
"I'll talk to her," Dad assures me, running a hand through hair that's the same deep brown as mine, the same thickness and inability to curl. My sister inherited my mom's dark yellow hair—she won't let anyone call it "dirty blond"—her slight build and light coloring. Dad was adopted as a baby, so I'm the only one in our entire extended family that looks like him. Tall and broad-shouldered, capable of tanning when the rest of them just burn. Oddballs in a family of pocket-size blonds.
There's a lot I don't like about myself, but I do like the way I look. I can stand in the back row and still see, unlike my mom. I can go outside in summer without putting on sunscreen every ten seconds, unlike Em.
I didn't always like it. Like when I was nine and at a family reunion, running around with my cousins, and one of my dad's sisters said I was like a "moose in a deer herd." I was old enough to know it wasn't a compliment. When I told Dad, he said, "You like eating venison, right, Ellis?"
"Yeah."
"And that's deer."
"Yeah."
"Have you ever eaten a moose?"
"No."
"That's because it's a lot harder to take down a moose." He winked. "Or an elk."
He talked to Aunt Karissa, and she never said anything like that again. So maybe he can get through to Mom. Eventually.
Mom's phone call and the lasagna are both done before Em bursts through the door—late, as always. Ballet slippers falling out of her dance bag, bun half unraveled, talking about eighteen things at once, as always.
"Sorry, sorry, sorry I'm late." She dumps her bag and kicks off her shoes in the middle of the kitchen doorway. I start counting the seconds until she trips over them. "Lizzy's mom drove me home but first she—oh wait, I have a permission slip for—" She turns back for her bag. "Whoops." There's the trip, seven seconds in. She retrieves a crumpled blue form. "But so anyway, Lizzy's mom wanted to ask about the date for the winter recital—are we going to Utah for Christmas this year? Because we can't fly until it's over—okay, but then so after Lizzy's mom asked, I remembered _I_ wanted to talk to Miss Orstrevsky about—ugh, these tights are killing me."
She plops down in a kitchen chair and rolls her dance tights farther up her legs. " _I_ was thinking it would be cool if we did a piece from Tchaikovsky's _The Snow Maiden_ because it's not like I _don't_ like _The Nutcracker_ but it's kind of played out."
"I hope you didn't hold up Lizzy's mom too long," Mom says. "She's very nice to drive you home."
"Don't worry," Em says to Mom, as if they aren't both biologically incapable of worrying about anything. "She loves me."
Of course she does. Everyone loves Em.
"If we could start eating before midnight, please," Mom says, and ushers us all into the dining room.
We fold our arms as Dad says the blessing over the food, then dig in. Conversation is, as usual, heavily dominated by Em. Today at school, she had to complete a ten-year plan. She thought this was exciting, which only shows how different we are. Not only do I not know what I'd do in a decade, I'm increasingly unsure the world will even last that long. But my sister's got plans.
"First I'm going to graduate high school," she reports. "Then I'll go to college on the East Coast, then I'll go on a mission, then I'll get married in the temple and become a wildlife biologist."
Mom raises her eyebrows. "I thought you wanted to be a nurse."
"Yeah, but I don't know, you have to be inside all day."
"Didn't you want to be a garbage truck driver?" Dad says, and Em groans.
" _Ugh_ , Dad, when I was, like, _six_."
"Why a wildlife biologist?" I ask her. "I mean, it's cool, but why?"
"I watched this thing on YouTube about this lady wildlife biologist who lived out in the Canadian wilderness for years tracking this wolf pack," Em says, "and she eventually made friends with them and became, like, a member of the pack and—it was so cool. She wasn't studying them, she was _part_ of them, you know?"
"I bet she didn't have any children," Mom says. Dad clears his throat.
"Maybe," Em says. "She didn't say. What's it matter?"
"I think it would be very hard to do something like that and raise children, too."
Emmy's knife squeaks against her plate. "Maybe I won't have kids."
Dad looks at Mom. Mom looks at Em. "Don't be silly, you love babies."
"Well, you just said I can't do both."
"That's not what I said. You weren't listening closely."
"Lisa," Dad says.
"I said it would be very hard," Mom says. "You'd have to think carefully about what was important to you. Or most important to you. And I don't really think that's following wolves around, but I could be wrong."
Em's mouth twists. "It was just an idea."
"It's a great idea," I jump in. Mom's always on me to hold people's tiny, extremely breakable babies, but that's because she knows I don't want to. Em's always wanted to cuddle newborns and wipe snot off toddlers' faces. Why does Mom push like this when she doesn't even _have_ to?
"Emmy," Dad says. "It's okay. You're thirteen. Don't worry about this right now."
Em stabs at her lasagna with a fork. Mom touches her shoulder.
"I didn't mean anything by it," Mom says, and Em smiles. But she smiles like she thinks she's supposed to. Not because what Mom said didn't hurt.
"You know what we should really be worrying about," I say. "Emergency food storage."
Em frowns. Mom closes her eyes.
"You don't need to worry about that, either," Dad assures Em, who's closely watching Mom's reaction.
"No one's going to get to live with wolves _or_ have babies if we can't get through an earthquake," I say.
"Okay," Dad says. "Let's not do this tonight."
"We only have three months' worth of food."
"That's enough," Mom says, and I don't know whether she means that's enough out of me, or that we have enough food.
"Bad things can happen," I say. "They do. And when people aren't prepared, they suffer. I don't want to us to _suffer_ , what's so terrible about that?"
Em looks to Dad. He sighs. "No one is saying it's bad to be prepared, but we are, and the more you obsess over this, the worse it gets for you—"
"The worse it gets for all of us," Mom cuts in. "It's not only about her."
You'd think I was holding them at gunpoint or forcing them to eat dirt. All I want is to make sure we survive. All of us, together.
"What do you think's going to happen?" Em says with a tilt of her head.
Biological weapons released into the air. Superviruses that can't be cured. Terror attacks at the university, at my school, on the Golden Gate Bridge. I open my mouth to answer.
_She's a kid. She's your little sister. You want her to have nightmares? You want her to start checking for fire exits whenever she walks in a room? You want her to be like you?_
I shrug. "Earthquakes."
Mom and Dad share a look. They know it's more than that, but I doubt they want Em to know about it, either.
"We're perfectly prepared for an earthquake," Mom says. "A power outage, a fire—this is California. We don't have hurricanes, we don't have tornadoes or snowstorms. We. Are. Prepared."
"Three months of food storage is the bare minimum," I argue. "Aunt Karissa has three _years_."
"She also doesn't vaccinate her kids," Dad mumbles. "She should not be your role model."
"Your aunt lives in the middle of nowhere," Mom points out. "If something happened—and _nothing is going to happen_ —it might be a while before help could get to her."
"We have Safeway right down the street," Em says, taking a bite of lasagna.
"We have five grocery stores in walking distance. And food banks. And—" Mom holds up her hands. "No, you know what? I'm not doing this." She turns to Em. "Emmy, why don't you go pick out a board game for after dinner? Anything you want." She quickly adds, "Anything but Trivial Pursuit."
"Why not Trivial Pursuit?" I ask.
"Uh, you know why not," Em says, getting up from the table.
"Sometimes the answers on the cards really _are_ wrong, Em," I call after her as she pads into the living room.
The second Em's out of sight, Mom grabs my wrist, not lightly. I try to pull away.
"Mom—"
"No," she says. "No more of this. I know you worry about these things. But it's irrational."
"Lisa," Dad says. "She can't control what she worries about."
"She can control what she says," Mom counters. "I know it's hard. And I'm glad you're working on it with Martha." She tightens her grip. "But you are not allowed to hold this whole family hostage because you're _anxious_ , Ellis."
There's the word. The word that always tightens my chest, but only slices my skin when she says it. She drops my wrist.
I don't always like my family, but I love them. And I'm going to keep all of us safe, whether they like it or not.
Three
**HERE ARE THREE** things my school doesn't have:
A dress code
Detention
Any real rules besides "no murder, no arson, no water guns"
Here are three things my school does have:
A campus the length and width of several city blocks
Nearly four thousand students
A halfway decent library
So though we also have an open campus during lunch, there's only one place I'll eat, and that's the library.
No one's actually supposed to eat in the library, which I understand, but it does present practical difficulties. Late in the spring semester of my freshman year, I went looking in the library stacks for a book on extreme weather patterns. It took me all of lunch to find it—the shelf it was on was in the back corner, with a wide, perpendicular set of bookshelves blocking outside sightlines. My first thought was, _This would be a perfect place for a mass shooter to hide_. My second thought was, _This would be a perfect place for me to eat lunch._
It's a perfect place within another perfect place. And maybe a public school library wouldn't be everyone's perfect place, but it's mine. Everything about the library is routine. Every time I walk inside, the steps I take are as replicable as a lab experiment, and much safer.
I walk in the A-building and up the stairs to the second floor. I push open the glass door. I smile and say hi to Rhonda the Lunch Librarian, who does not smile back. Ours is a clandestine friendship. I head straight to the reference section and scoop up the heavy maroon book on the top shelf, five books from the left: _Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology._ I make a beeline for the corner by the Meteorology/Climatology section. I sit with my back against the corner stack, the most tactically advantageous position. I spread the etymology dictionary out on the mauve synthetic carpet. I take out Kenny #14. I breathe in the solitude, the books on every side of me like a cocoon, the smell of old paper and ink and a little mildew.
And for the first time all day, I can breathe out.
I unwrap my PB&J sandwich as I flip through the etymology dictionary. Sometimes I'll go in order, word by word, page by page, but today, I skip around. _Parabola_. _Galore_. _Kestrel_.
I feel someone standing close by. Ugh. Rhonda the Lunch Librarian, here to demand I throw away my sandwich even though I never leave crumbs.
"Okay, okay, I'll put it away," I mumble without looking up, though it doesn't seem fair. Food is a human need. Books are a human need. It's cruel to make a person choose.
"Put what away?" asks someone who is not Rhonda.
My head snaps up. Standing a foot away from me is the girl from Martha's waiting room, the girl in blue. She's still in blue, actually—same shoes, same Cal Berkeley hoodie. It might even be the same outfit, which is weird, but not as weird as the fact that she's standing _here_ , in my corner where nobody else goes.
Half her body is still behind one of the other bookshelves. She's leaning in like she knows she's invading something private. But she doesn't look nearly as surprised as I feel—she doesn't look surprised at all.
I think she knew I'd be here.
"Can I sit?" she asks, indicating a vague portion of the carpet next to me.
I peek my head around the stacks. There are many available chairs in the center of the library.
"Um. Sure." She plops down but keeps her backpack on. She says nothing as her eyes move up from the tips of my sneakers to the tips of my hair. I untuck the strands behind my ear.
"Yeah," she says softly, on a breath out. "It's you."
I still have no clue how we know each other. But we must; she wouldn't say it like that otherwise. But where? Church girls' camp? Freshman-year PE? The two weeks I played soccer before discovering that I lack both hand-eye _and_ foot-eye coordination?
"I'm really sorry," I say. "I don't remember your name."
"It's Hannah," she says. "Hannah Marks. And you don't have be sorry. We only met on Monday. And I didn't tell you my name then."
_What?_ "We met on Monday?" I bleat.
"Yeah," she says, then looks concerned. "In Martha's office? I mean, in her waiting room. You came out of your appointment and—"
"No, I remember," I say. "I thought maybe we were on the same sports team, or in the same grade."
"We are. You're a junior, right?" I nod. "Me too."
I wait for her to elaborate, as if all I could possibly want to know is that she's Hannah, a junior. After a long silence, it's clear I'll have to speak first.
I clear my throat. "I'm Ellis."
"I know."
"Okay," I say. "That's kind of creepy."
I didn't really mean to say that last part aloud, but she brushes it off with a wave of her hand.
"I only know because I snuck a look at Martha's appointment book."
"That's . . . actually creepier."
She shrugs apologetically. "Martha wouldn't tell me, so."
"You asked her about me?"
"Only what your name was."
"Why?"
She blinks. "Because I didn't know."
"Why did you want to know?"
"I've seen you before," she says, though I'm not sure that answers my question.
"Where? Did we have class together?" I ask. "Like last year or something?"
"No," she says. She nods at the dictionary, still flipped open to _kestrel_. "What are you reading?"
"A dictionary."
"You're reading the dictionary?"
"An etymology dictionary," I clarify. Like that makes it better.
"Whose class is that for?" she asks.
"Oh, no, it's for . . . fun."
"Oh. Okay. Cool," she says, so now I know she is Hannah, a junior _and_ a liar. Her eyes move to my half-eaten sandwich. "Do you eat lunch in here?"
I nod.
"Every day?"
I nod, slower.
She sits back on her hands. "You should eat lunch with us."
"Who's 'us'?"
She ignores the question. "We hang out in the park. During lunch and usually after school, too. We meet under the tree across from the Little Theatre. Look for knitting needles."
I'm overwhelmed by the number of things that don't make sense here. I'll start with the most basic.
"We haven't had class together, I didn't even know your name, but you want me to eat lunch with your friends?"
"We should be friends," she says. "We're supposed to be friends."
"Supposed to—I don't— _why_?"
She considers this. "I have a couple working theories."
I should leave. I should get up and walk away from this weird girl with her cryptic riddles who invaded my secret spot. But I don't get up. It's _my_ secret spot, after all. Why should I leave?
"That's really nice of you," I say, and focus back at my book, "but I like eating lunch here."
She stirs beside me. "It doesn't have to be lunch. You could come after school."
I stare so hard at the words on the page they blur. "I have chemistry lab."
"We could get coffee."
"I can't drink coffee—look." I close the book. I've never had someone work this hard to hang out with me. "You don't want to be friends with me."
She wrinkles her nose. "Yeah, I do."
"No, you don't. I'm not fun, okay? To hang out with. I'm . . . the opposite of fun."
"Boring?"
"Boring is the opposite of interesting, not fun, the word 'fun' implies—" I shut my eyes. "Do you see what I mean? Please save yourself. Save us both."
I keep my eyes closed for a long moment. When I open them, I expect to see that Hannah's left, like any normal person would. But Hannah hasn't moved from her spot on the carpet.
"Why do you see Martha?" she asks.
My mouth drops. "You're not supposed to ask that."
"Why not?"
"It's . . . private."
"What if I guessed?" she suggests.
"Um," I say, which she somehow interprets as "Sure, go ahead."
She rests her chin on one hand. "Are you secretly convinced your entire body is made of glass?"
"No, I'm not—how is that your first guess?"
"Do you suffer from dancing mania?"
"I don't know that means."
"Clinical lycanthropy?"
"Oh my gosh, _no_ , I have _anxiety_. I see Martha for _anxiety_."
"Oh." She looks disappointed. "That's not so bad. Everyone has anxiety, right?"
I think that's supposed to make me feel better, but it only makes my temper flare. "No," I snap. "Everyone feels anxious. Sometimes. About normal things, about tests, or getting into college, or—" I swallow. "I'm anxious about _everything_."
"Not everything," she says. "I'm sure not every single thing."
"I worry that people are talking about me, I worry that people hate me, I worry that the guy sitting next to me on the bus is a kidnapper or a murderer or a Scientologist. I worry that I talk to my lab partner in chemistry too much, I worry I talk to him too little. I'm worried that I'll fail chemistry and every other class because I'm bad at school, and of course I am, I'm bad at everything, so yeah, I _do_ worry about everything—every single little thing."
I suck in a deep breath. Hannah folds her hands in her lap. "That," she says, "must really suck."
A laugh bursts out from somewhere near my rapidly beating heart. "It's not great." I sigh. "I don't mean to make it seem . . . it's not just silly stuff like that. I worry about big stuff, too. Terrorist attacks, the apocalypse, MRSA—"
"What?"
"Methicillin-resistant _Staphylococcus aureus_ , it's this bacterium that doesn't respond to most antibiotics."
"No, I know what—" She shakes her head. "The apocalypse? You're scared of the apocalypse?"
"Yeah." She closes her mouth, looking at me intently, purposefully. She looks like someone trying to do multivariable calculus in their head. Or me trying to do math at all.
"Not the Four Horsemen, specifically." She only looks more confused. "I mean, not necessarily a _biblical_ apocalypse, though it could be, but it could also be a flood, or an asteroid, or a human-created black hole. I worry about all the ways it could happen."
"The end of the world?"
"Yeah. That's my biggest one, probably. Doomsday, the apocalypse, the end of the world. That's what I worry about most."
She nods once, then again. "The end of the world. That's awesome."
It's not awesome. It is not awesome to dream about tsunamis and wake up in a panic. It is not awesome to sweat through your shirt at airport security because there might be a bomb by the baggage carousel. It is not awesome to imagine your skin peeling off in the wake of a nuclear attack.
I try to say all these things, but I'm so flustered that it comes out more like, "Bflugh."
Hannah moves closer to me. "Ellis. You and I were—" She hesitates. When she speaks again, each word is deliberate, like she's choosing them carefully. "We were meant to meet."
I shake my head. "I don't understand."
She doesn't hesitate this time. "We were meant to meet. It's fate."
_Fate_ , from the Latin _fata_ , the neuter-plural of _fatum_. _Fate_ , which broken down literally means _a thing spoken by the gods_. _Fate_ , a word that people use in both wedding announcements and obituaries.
"Fate?" I whisper. She nods, but I can't tell which kind of fate she means.
The bell rings, sudden and jarring. Hannah jumps up. She tightens her backpack straps, ready to go. The spell's been broken.
"I meant what I said. You should hang out with us," Hannah says, hand on the edge of the Human Anthropology bookshelf, two steps away from turning the corner and out of my view. "You remember where?"
"The park, a tree," I say. "But—wait—"
"Look for knitting needles," she says, interrupting smoothly. "And dead writer ladies. That's how you'll know which tree."
"That doesn't make any sense!" I say, as if one single part of this interaction _has_ made sense. "A dead writer—?"
"Dead writer ladies," she clarifies.
"Let's go, everyone." I hear shoes scuffing the floor and Rhonda the Lunch Librarian shooing kids out, from what seems like a million miles away.
Hannah looks over her shoulder. "I'll see you soon, Ellis." She moves to slip around the corner.
"You didn't answer my question!" I yell after her, scrambling to gather my things.
"Which one?" she says.
Not a bad point, since she barely answered any. "You said we were meant to meet, that it was—fate?"
She takes her time answering. "You're afraid of the end of the world."
Is that all she can do, repeat what I already know? I throw down my bag in frustration. "Yes. I am. So what?"
Hannah takes a step toward me. She leans down, and for the first time since she came into the library, she speaks in a whisper.
"So I know how it's going to happen."
Four
**MARTHA SWITCHES MY** appointment day. She tells Mom it's because she's had to rearrange her Monday schedule for personal reasons, but I know it's really because she doesn't want me running into Hannah again. Not that it would make a difference at this point. Not that I'll tell her that.
I was raised to be honest. Since I was a toddler in the church nursery, someone's always been telling me to "Choose the Right," which makes it seem so obvious. What's right should be clear. Martha might not know Hannah thinks the end of the world is coming. _Knows_. Hannah is Martha's client, and Martha deserves to know that kind of thing about someone she's trying to help. It would be right to tell her.
But when I sit down on Martha's couch on Tuesday, and she asks me how my week's been, I enter a morally ambiguous fugue state. I hear myself say, "Fine."
"The first couple weeks of school can be stressful."
"It's been okay," I say.
___She knows, she knows you're a lying liar who lies. Bail. Bail on this lie. Bail on this therapy session. Set the couch on fire as a distraction._
"I think you can give me more than okay," she says gently.
_She knows you've been stalked by a doomsday prophet. She knows you want to talk to Hannah again. Immolate this polyester blend sofa and run._
But I'm scared of fire, so I decide on something less destructive but still evasive. "I did the assignment you gave me. On eschatology."
"On—what?"
"Eschatology. The study of things at the . . . end. End of life, end of eras, end of the world. It's a good word, right? I'd never heard it before."
"It's a great word," she says. "So what did you discover?"
"It's weird," I admit, "reading all these accounts of people who are so sure the end of the world is coming—and knowing it won't. Because it hasn't."
"But they believed it, very strongly," she says. "How does that make you feel, when you read about these . . . true believers, you might call them?"
_She wants you to call them stupid, she wants you to call them gullible. Hannah knows you're stupid and gullible, that's why she found you in the library. It's a joke, a big practical joke. If you even went to find Hannah in the park, she wouldn't be_ __ _there. It's been a week. She's probably forgotten about you._
I look away. "The hoaxes are actually more interesting."
Martha tilts her head. "The hoaxes?"
"People who knew the world wasn't ending but wanted other people to believe it was."
"Can you give me an example?"
"Okay." I pull out Kenny #14 and flip through, looking for the page. "So in 1806, there was this woman named Mary Bateman. She lived near Leeds, in England, and everyone in the area knew her as a—well, as a witch, but a good one. Someone who could cure curses. No one wanted to burn her or anything. But then she started telling people that the end of the world was coming. Because of her chicken."
"Her chicken?"
"Its eggs. Her hen started laying these eggs and they all said 'Christ is coming' on them."
Martha laughs, and then I do, too. Because it is ridiculous, hearing it out loud.
"How did her neighbors react, when she told them?" Martha says.
"Oh, they freaked out. People started coming from miles around and paid money for a glimpse of the prophet hen laying its miracle eggs. Everyone started getting _real_ religious. But then, one day, two visitors dropped by the farmhouse. Early in the morning. And they saw Mary Bateman writing on a fresh egg and stuffing it _back_ _inside_ the hen."
Martha leans forward. "Really?"
"Really. It was all an elaborate hoax." I pause. "And also animal abuse."
"So what happened to all those people? The ones who had believed Mary?"
"I don't know. No one wrote about them. Just Mary."
"But what do you think?" she presses. "Do you think they were relieved?"
I shrug.
"Well," Martha says, "they were scared the world was ending. And now they knew it wouldn't. I'd be relieved."
I shake my head. "They only knew this wasn't _how_ the world was ending. I think . . ." I pick at the couch threads. "I think maybe they were more relieved before. When they thought they knew for sure. Maybe they wanted to know, even if it was bad."
"That's important to you, having as much information as you can," Martha says.
"You can't do anything unless you have all the facts. You can't make choices." No, that's not exactly right. "You can't make the _best_ choice."
"What about the choices the townspeople made?" Martha asks. "Do you think they made the best choices?"
Not the people who paid money to see fake prophetic eggs. Why would a woman who believed the apocalypse was imminent want money? What would she do with money, during Armageddon? They should have seen they were being played. But—
"The two men," I say. "They made the best choice, those two men who caught her in the lie. They didn't go along with everyone else, they didn't believe or disbelieve anything based on what other people told them to. They went and looked for themselves."
"So when you're looking for answers," Martha asks, "what do you think your next step will be?"
Hannah believes the world is ending. Maybe she's Mary Bateman in twenty-first-century clothes, a hoaxer waiting to shake me down for money. Or maybe she's a true believer, like the Leeds townspeople who desperately cleansed their souls. And maybe she's wrong.
But maybe she isn't.
"Ellis?" Martha prompts. "What will you do?"
I look at Martha straight on. "I'll do exactly what they did," I say. "I'll investigate."
My mom has this saying: "Avoid the appearance of evil."
She didn't make it up, it's a church thing. Basically, it means you should be careful about where you find yourself. It's not enough just to technically avoid breaking the rules; you shouldn't even _look_ like you might be breaking them. Like my cousin Sarah, who won't buy hot chocolate from Starbucks because people might think she was drinking coffee. My mom rolled her eyes when Sarah told her that, but I think she'd feel differently about Civic Center Park.
Everyone at school just calls it "the Park." During lunch and after school, it transforms from a public park into a bacchanalian fun-fest of drugs, cigarettes, and the occasional bottle of something clear and very alcoholic on special occasions like St. Patrick's Day. Or so I've heard.
At the edge of the park, the corner closest to my bus stop, I scan the groups of kids on the grass, looking for Hannah.
_Everyone's looking at you. Everyone sees you're alone. Everyone's looking at you and if they aren't looking at you it's because they're embarrassed for you and how alone you are._
She's nowhere to be seen, and neither are knitting needles or dead literary figures. For a second, I lock eyes with Paloma from English class, lounging with the rest of the field hockey girls, their sticks tossed in a pile behind them. She smiles at me, and I make myself smile back, closemouthed, before looking down at the ground.
_Don't stare at her. Why were you staring at her?_
I squeeze my eyes shut. I have to make a choice, either way. The longer I stand here at the edge, the more people are going to stare at me, and the worse I'll feel. Hannah mentioned being close to the Little Theatre, I think, which is almost one block south, along the park. I'm not going to happen upon her by chance. I'll have to look for her. I'll have to want to find her. With the tips of my shoes on the grass and the rest of me still on the concrete sidewalk, I wonder if I'm the person who walks forward or walks away.
I walk forward, shoes squishing into damp grass, past kids I know and kids I've never seen before, until I'm standing with the Little Theatre behind me and a particularly sturdy tree in front of me. There are three boys under it, none of whom, obviously, are Hannah.
"I'm not saying you're wrong, Theo, but—no, you know what, you are wrong," says a boy with sandy hair who I half recognize. Sam. He sat in front of me in Latin freshman year and spent the whole time drawing party hats and astronaut costumes on the portraits of Roman emperors in our textbook.
"You are wrong like people who recline their airplane seats," Sam says to the lanky kid next to him. "You are wrong like pineapple on pizza."
The boy—Theo, I guess—looks unmoved. "I don't know why you think ad hominem tactics will convince me."
"I don't know why you think I know what that means," Sam says.
"It means you're attacking Theo, not his argument," says the third boy, tan and curly haired and oddly familiar, though I don't think we've had a class together. "You might know if you hadn't skipped AP Language and Composition today."
Sam throws up his hands. "You skipped with me!"
"Yeah, but I did the reading."
From behind him, Theo pulls out a periwinkle ball of yarn and two shiny knitting needles.
Wait. Knitting needles?
Just like Hannah said. Maybe she's around here after all. I take a couple of steps closer to the tree and pull out my phone, pretending to text someone.
"Ms. Heaney's having after-school tutoring today. You should go," Theo says. "Maybe she could help you construct a better argument than 'If you don't jizz yourself over Jane Austen, you might as well be an actual monster.'"
"She's a genius," Sam says. "The way she writes dialogue. Revolutionary."
"It's just people being dicks to one another. But they're British, which makes it culture, I guess."
"You don't give her enough credit," Sam says. "So she's not all _serious_ and _dark_ and _borderline sanctimonious_ like the Victorian princess of your heart, George Eliot."
"Now, she was a genius," Theo says.
Jane Austen. George Eliot. Both writers, both dead, both ladies. Just like Hannah said. This has to be the place; she must just not be here yet. I'll wait for her. I continue to fake-text on my phone. But then I hear someone say, "Hey, are you waiting for someone?"
I look up, and they're all staring at me. I guess I was more conspicuous than I thought. And much closer to the tree.
"Um," I say.
"Because no one's walked by or anything," Sam says.
"Hannah," I blurt out. "I'm looking for Hannah, she told me to go across from the Little Theatre, to a tree, and she said to look for dead lady writers which I took more literally than I probably should have." I gulp in air.
"Okay," Sam says.
"She used us as, like, treasure map directions?" Theo says. "That's weird, Hannah, even for you."
I look behind me, but she's not there.
"She'll come back soon," Sam says, scooting over so there's space between him and Theo. "You can sit down."
"Thanks." I sit. The curly-haired boy stares at me like I'm a particularly unattractive fish at the aquarium.
"Your name's Ellis, right?" Sam asks.
I nod. "Ellis Kimball. And you're Sam . . ."
"Segel-Katz, yeah. You still doing Latin?"
I nod again.
"Of your own free will?"
"It's a lot more fun once you start translating."
He shrugs. "I'll take your word for it."
Theo shifts his knitting supplies to one hand and holds out the other. "Theo Singh."
I shake his hand and turn to the last boy, expectantly, but he's only frowning harder. Sam clears his throat. "And this ray of absolute sunshine is Tal."
"Hi," Tal says, digging his hands deep into his hoodie pockets.
"Do I know you from somewhere?" I ask him.
"No," he says definitively. So definitively I don't think it's true.
Sam turns back to Theo. "What I was going to say was, you can't say you hate Jane Austen if you've only read _Pride and Prejudice_. So you don't like that one book. She did write others."
"I don't hate the book," Theo says. "I hate Mr. Darcy."
"Yeah, because you wish girls liked you as much as they like Mr. Darcy."
"Oh hell no," Theo says. "He is literature's biggest asshole."
Tal sticks his hand up. "Bigger than Voldemort?"
"Fine, he's literature biggest non-genocidal asshole," Theo says. "Happy, Tal?"
"Almost never."
"He loves Lizzie Bennett," Sam protests. "They're perfect for each other."
"He's not even _nice_ to her for most of it—he spends the entire first half brooding in a corner and refusing to dance. And then he tries to wave it away with, 'Oh, I'm so _weird_ and _fucked up_ and how could anyone _ever love me_.'"
"You refused to dance at my bar mitzvah," Sam points out.
"Only the Electric Slide," Theo says. "Because it sucks."
"Wow, are all your opinions this wrong?"
"Screw you." Theo leans back into the grass and stares up at the sky. "You're with me, right, Hannah?"
Hannah—where? I swivel my head around. Sam sees me looking and taps my arm. He points up. From somewhere in the tree branches, a voice says, "I haven't read it. Sorry."
No way. I've only heard Hannah's voice once, and that did sound like her, but . . .
"Is she—?" I ask. "She's not in the—?"
Sam and Theo crack up. Tal tilts his face up at the tree. "Would you come down now? This girl's not here to see us."
_He hates you. They all hate you, but he really hates you. He hates you so much he called you "this girl." He hates you so much he won't even say your name._
Mom would say "kill with kindness"—which really means shut up and smile—but I don't like how he said _this girl_. I open my mouth to remind him of my name, but then a pair of blue Converse hits the grass with a thump. Hannah stands at the base of the tree, the legs of her jeans dusty and a couple of reddish leaves mixed into her hair. We lock eyes, and she brightens.
"Hey," she says, taking a seat next to me. "Awesome, I wasn't sure you'd show."
_She didn't really want you to come. She hangs out in trees and probably makes friends with the squirrels and birds, but you are a bridge too far._
"Have you met everybody?" Hannah says. "Theo, and Sam, and—"
"She's been here awhile," Tal cuts in.
Hannah looks surprised. "How long was I gone?"
Gone? She was in the tree. Wasn't she in the tree?
Theo shrugs. "Same as usual."
"I wish you'd start doing it on the ground," Tal says.
"Doing what?" I ask. "Where do you go?"
"She teleports," Sam says.
"To another plane of existence," Theo says.
Hannah shakes her head. "I'm only meditating," she says. " _I_ don't really go anywhere, my brain does."
I'm not a meditation person, despite a semester-long, mandatory "elective" on mindfulness in middle school. I can't make my mind go quiet like that. My brain stays right where it wants to, thumping inside my skull like a migraine that never stops.
"But why in a tree?" I ask.
"Because she has a death wish," Tal answers.
"People used to meditate in all kinds of places. In caves. In forests. On top of poles in the desert." She carefully pulls a leaf from her hair. "It helps. To go somewhere no one can see you, and you can't see them. It helps me see . . . things. More clearly."
_Things_ is such a vague word. It didn't used to be. It used to mean a meeting, a council, a matter of great importance. Maybe she means it blandly, metaphorically. _See things the way they are_. But that pause, that little hesitation, makes me think it might be something more.
"Do you see it?" I blurt out before the smarter half of my brain can pump the brakes. "Is that how you know— Is that how you see it?"
Hannah freezes, her fingers around another leaf in her hair. She stares at me, wide-eyed and quiet.
"What did you say?" Tal asks.
"See it?" Sam repeats.
"Oh, do you mean, is that how I see things?" Hannah smiles back at me, with the barest hint of strain.
"Uh," I say. "Yes."
Hannah crumples the leaf. "Then yes."
"It's colloquial, Sam," Theo says. "Go to class for once."
"I know what a colloquialism is!"
Tal's eyes bore into me. "Where did you two meet, again?" he asks Hannah.
"Library," I say.
"Therapy," Hannah says at the same time. I close my eyes.
"That's great," Tal says, in a tone that strongly implies otherwise. "So how—"
"Hey," Hannah interrupts, reaching across me to nudge Sam, still arguing with Theo about colloquial language. "Can you smoke me out?"
Sam puts his hand to his heart. "I'm offended. To just _assume_ I have the necessary supplies for such a thing. I am a scholar, an artist—"
She rolls her eyes. "Yeah, you're some kind of artist."
"You shouldn't insult your personal charity service." Sam pulls a film canister out of his backpack. "What would Emily Post say?"
Hopefully nothing, considering she's dead. Next to me, Sam tips a small rolled joint from the film canister into his hand.
You can't grow up in Berkeley and not know what weed looks and smells like, even if you're part of a religion that strictly forbids it. But I've never seen a joint this close. It almost feels like a setup.
"Who's got a light?" Sam says. "Mine's out."
"Hey, um," I say, trying to sound casual, "you guys know City Hall is sort of . . . right there?" I point across the street at the domed white building.
"Not like it's new," Tal mumbles, digging a lighter out of his pocket.
"But there are, I mean, there are police officers there," I say. "Who might see what you have?"
Hannah smiles at me like I'm a cute toddler. Sam laughs. "They've way got bigger problems. They're not going to bother us."
"Sam," Theo says, leaning back on his hands. "That might be the whitest thing you've ever said."
Sam grins. "I can do better—'Megan, turn off NPR and get in the Kia, we're late for Hunter's lacrosse game.'" He holds out his hand for Tal's red lighter. "Or, or—'I lost my North Face jacket at Whole Foods, so I have to replace it at REI before we go camping in Yosemite.'"
"'This casserole needs more mayo,'" Theo offers up.
"Weak," Sam says.
"Yeah, well, I'm Indian, give me a break."
I watch as flame sears the end of the joint, smoking and blackening the tip. My parents would lose it if they knew about this. I should leave. I should tell them to stop. I should avoid the appearance of evil.
But they were nice to me. Most of them. They didn't have to be, and they were. And even though the smell wrinkles my nose and I'm still half certain a Berkeley cop is going to pull up in his department-issued Prius, I don't get up. It feels good to be sitting here. It feels good to have someone to sit with.
After taking a hit, Sam extends the joint toward me like a Christmas present.
"I don't do that," I say, and cringe at how sharp it sounds.
He shrugs and passes it across my body into Theo's hand.
I feel like I need to explain myself. "It's against my health code."
"It's cool, doesn't matter why," Sam says.
"What do you mean, health code?" Hannah asks. "Like a diet, or are you asthmatic?"
I steel myself for an inevitable turn as Mormon Ambassador. It's a really fun game in which I explain that yes, I'm a Mormon, so yes, I have a health code that involves no drugs, no tobacco, no alcohol or coffee or tea. Then I have to cheerfully field whatever questions come next, no matter how insensitive or condescending. Half the people in Berkeley are gluten-free or vegan or freegans—actual, literal dumpster divers—but sure, _my_ diet's the weird one.
Before I can open my mouth, Tal says, "She means the Word of Wisdom. She's a Mormon."
I spin around to stare at him. Not because he's wrong; that _is_ what we call our health code. But it's what _we_ call it. How does he even know what church I belong to? I never said.
Then it clicks, in a tumble of disjointed, hazy, little-kid memories. Shorter hair, a collared shirt and tie in place of a hoodie, and instead of a Zippo lighter in his hand—actually, no. There was a lighter then, too.
"I do know you," I say to Tal, more accusingly than I intended. He avoids my eyes. "You're a member, you're LDS."
"What?" Theo says.
"LDS," I repeat.
"No, this is weed," Sam says.
"Latter-day Saint," I clarify, gesturing at Tal. "I'm one, and he's one, too."
"No, I'm not," Tal says.
"Yes, you are. You're the one who accidentally lit the auditorium curtains on fire at the Oakland Stake musical when we were nine."
"Shit," he mutters, and takes a drag on the joint.
"You're Mormon?" Hannah says. "I thought you were Jewish."
"No way. He gets his bagels toasted," Sam mock-whispers. "I've seen it."
"His name is _Tal_ ," Hannah says to Sam. "I have a cousin in Israel named Tal."
"It's not really Tal," I say, bits of old memories piecing together. Playing in the basement of the Oakland Ward building one Sunday when I was five. Red Kool-Aid and cookies at someone's baptism. "Your name is Talmage. Isn't it?"
Theo and Sam look at each other. They collapse into giggles.
Tal gives me the blackest of glares. "It's a nickname."
"Where did your parents get _Talmage_?" Hannah asks.
"Family name. My mom's idea."
"James E. Talmage was an apostle in our church," I add.
"It's not _our_ church," Tal says.
Hannah checks the watch around her wrist. "Oh, shit." She reaches behind the tree trunk and drags out her backpack. "I've got to go, you guys." She stands, and I experience a moment of pure panic. She's not leaving me here with these boys, is she?
"Which way are you going?" I ask, scrambling to my feet so fast I almost slip on the wet grass.
"Um—" For the first time, she doesn't look serene and all-knowing. She almost looks panicked. "You can walk me as far as Yogurt Park, if you want."
I nod.
"I have to get something out of my locker," Hannah says. "I'll meet you at the gate."
She's gone in a whirl of hair and leaves. I roll up my jacket and stuff it in my backpack. "It was nice to meet you," I say to the boys as I leave. I only make it a few feet away before Tal catches up and steps in front of me.
"Hold up," he says.
"I'm sorry I embarrassed you," I say, and then for some reason start saying _everything_. "I didn't know you didn't like your name; I mean, _I_ like your name, and I'm sorry I told them you were a Mormon, though, you know, you can _tell_ people, _I_ tell people—"
"I'm not a Mormon," he says, cutting me off.
"But I know you. I've seen you at—"
"I used to be. I'm not anymore."
_Used to be_ is different from _never was_. I stand still for a moment, trying to wrap my head around the idea of leaving the church. I know people do. I know they don't do it without a reason. But I can't quite imagine it. It's like leaving your whole family. Not just on Earth. After, too.
"I'm sorry," I say, like I've forgotten how to say anything else.
He shakes his head. "I didn't want to— This isn't about that. This is about Hannah."
"Hannah?"
"Why did Hannah invite you to hang out?"
What, because my very presence ruined his afternoon? My cheeks burn. "I don't know. Ask her."
"I don't know what your deal is or why she's suddenly decided you've got to be besties, but Hannah's dealing with a lot, okay?" he says. "More than just that thing with Paloma. A lot more."
Paloma from my English class? "Paloma Flores? What about her?"
Tal raises his eyebrows. "They broke up, right before school ended last year. In the cafeteria. Very publicly, very loudly?"
I shake my head.
"Are you sure you _go_ to this school?" Tal asks.
"I don't know why you're telling me this," I say.
"Hannah's having a hard time. And she's coping with it in . . . her own way. But it's a problem." He pauses, then leans closer to me. "Don't be part of the problem."
I hate the word _problem_. My dad uses it a lot, when he doesn't want to say what he means. He used it when we were late to Em's kindergarten ballet recital because I had to check all the doors in the house and make sure they were locked. And when it took us forever to get home from Sea Ranch because the mountain roads were too narrow and I couldn't stop hyperventilating and asking him to drive slower. "Everything's fine. We just had a small problem," he told people when they asked why we were late.
The problem was me, and everyone knew it.
I wonder if Tal understands what that feels like, knowing things would be easier for everyone if you weren't around. If you were different from how you are.
"I won't be," I say, and I leave Tal in the grass. And I mean it.
Hannah and I aren't problems. But we might be each other's solution.
Five
**WHATEVER HANNAH HAD** to get from her locker, it must be small. Because when she meets me at the main gate, all she has is her backpack.
"Ready?" I say. She nods and touches the front zipper compartment of her bag. That must be where it is, whatever she needed to retrieve. And it must be secret, because that touch—light, quick, confirming—that's what people do when they're hiding something.
I won't ask about it. I wouldn't want anyone asking about the mini survival bag I keep in _my_ locker. Not because I'm selfish and wouldn't share the bandages or antiseptic wipes or even the particulate-filtering respirator mask, if it came down to it. But I've also got a multi-use knife in there, and I really don't want to get expelled.
We walk up Allston Way and turn right onto Shattuck, with the beautiful art deco central branch of the Berkeley public library up ahead. That's where I would normally be right now, ensconced on the top floor where it's quiet and empty. That's where I _should_ be. I pause when we reach the library, but Hannah glides right past, as if she knows I'll follow. And I do.
"Is this on your way home?" she asks as we walk. "Or do you live up in the hills somewhere?"
"No, by the Oakland border. Off College Ave. You?"
"North side of campus."
We're taking a circuitous route for that. I guess she isn't going straight home.
_Some people have lives, some people have hobbies and friends and places to go after school. Not you, obviously, but other people have those things._
"Do your parents work at Cal?" I ask.
"Yeah, they're professors. Yours?"
"My dad's a dentist, and my mom does admin stuff for him. What do they teach?"
She laughs. "My mom barely teaches at all. She does research and has, like, one five-hundred-person lecture. My dad mostly teaches Freshman Comp but he's super popular; my brother couldn't even get into his class last year—" She shakes her head and pushes up the sleeves of her hoodie. "God, why does it always get hot _right_ when we go back to school?"
"You have a brother?"
She blows air out her cheeks. "Yeah. Do you have siblings?"
"A sister, she's thirteen." I pause. "It's nice your brother goes to Cal, you must still get to hang out a lot."
"Not really," she says, and it's almost a snap.
_They're probably having a fight and you brought it up, why would you bring that up? Shut up, Ellis. JUST SHUT UP._
We keep walking. When we hit the steep part of Durant Avenue where the ground begins to climb, Hannah turns and asks: "Why are you always looking around like that?"
I startle. "What?"
"You're never looking straight ahead," Hannah says. "You're always, like . . ." She searches for the word. "Scanning."
Oh. "Sorry," I say. "It's weird. Sorry."
"You don't have to be sorry about it," Hannah says gently. "But why do you do it?"
"It doesn't matter."
She shrugs. "I bet it matters to you."
We're at the corner of Shattuck and Durant. The traffic light is on our side, and she steps into the crosswalk, but I grab the loose sleeve of her hoodie and stop her. She wants to know? Okay. I'll tell her.
"I'm thinking about where we are," I say. "I'm thinking about what we'd do if, ten seconds from now, a nuclear bomb was dropped on San Francisco."
She steps back in surprise, then recovers. "An earthquake's more likely."
"An earthquake is easy. We're outside, far enough from a building, not under a utility wire." I point up. "We'd move away from the streetlight, then duck, cover, and wait. Like they taught us in kindergarten. This city was built for an earthquake. Half of this city was built _because_ of the 1906 earthquake."
Hannah shifts her gaze from the streetlight above us, back to me. "But a nuclear bomb?"
"Totally unprepared. Fallout shelters went out of style with poodle skirts and—"
"Jell-O?" Hannah suggests.
Maybe in her family. "So I'm thinking about what we'd do if we saw the white flash. I'm thinking about how we'd drop to the ground, right here, and wait for the shock wave to pass. I'm thinking about how Pegasus Bookstore might have a basement for storage, and whether it's concrete, because that's where we'd want to go next, to wait out the radiation. Or maybe we'd want to go back to school, because there are showers there and I don't think any conditioner, which is good."
"What? Wouldn't you want shampoo?"
"But not conditioner. It binds radioactive material to your hair." I sigh. "I'm thinking about the science test I have tomorrow. I'm thinking about how my hair looks right now and whether my mom's going to leave me alone or make some comment she doesn't think is mean but is. I'm thinking about whether this paper cut I got is going to turn into MRSA and whether the turkey sandwich I ate at lunch is going to give me listeria."
"And the possibility of a nuclear attack," Hannah says.
"And that."
"All at once?"
"All at once."
_She feels sorry for you, which she shouldn't. She probably doesn't. She probably thinks you're deranged. Either way, she's ten seconds from fleeing the scene of the disaster that is you._
Hannah doesn't run. Hannah doesn't even look fazed. She grins. "But what about zombies?"
I've never understood the fascination with zombies. With so many real things to be terrified of, things that could and do happen every day, why spend a moment's thought on something fake?
"Aren't zombies scared of fire?" I reason. "I have fire steel in my Altoids box."
"I think it's Frankenstein who's scared of—" She stops, cocks her head. "Wait, your what?"
I swing my backpack around. I unzip a side compartment and pull out an Altoids mints box, still remarkably shiny and new-looking despite being tossed around in my bag every day. I hesitate for a moment, my fingers on the lid. If I show Hannah, she'll only have more questions. But if I show Hannah, maybe she'll answer some of my questions. I open the box.
"Fire steel," I say, pointing to a two-pronged compact tool on a string. "One part's a rod, one part's the striker. When you scrape them together, the friction creates and ignites metal shavings, and that creates sparks. You can make a fire in any weather, no matter how cold, no matter if it's raining."
She pokes her finger in the tin, moving the contents around. "Band-Aids. Alcohol pads. Superglue. Is that—dental floss?"
"It's stronger than you think. You can use it as thread. Replace a shoelace. Make a clothesline or a pulley system or a trip line."
"You carry this around with you all the time?"
"We call it 'everyday carry.'"
Her eyebrows go up. "'We'?"
"Prepared people," I say. I try not to say "prepper" unless I have to. It instantly creates this image of some Unabomber type with dead eyes stockpiling peanut butter and AK-47s in his bunker. "All the emergency gear in the world won't help if you aren't close enough to it during a disaster. You never know where you'll be when shit hits the fan."
"I didn't think Mormons were supposed to swear."
"We're not," I say, returning the tiny survival kit to its pocket. "But 'when stuff hits the fan' just doesn't have the same emotional resonance. You know?"
She laughs, and we cross the street together. We're nearly to Yogurt Park now, so if I'm going to ask the question I really want to know, I'd better ask it now.
"How do you know the world is ending?"
She takes a sharp breath in but doesn't say anything.
"Is that what happens when you meditate?" I press her. "Do you see it happen?"
"It's more complicated than that."
After all I told her about the things I worry about, the things I carry around, that's all she's going to give me? I fold my arms. "That's it? It's complicated?"
"Up in the tree, I'm—I'm trying to see something. I'm supposed to be seeing something. But I can't force it."
"Literally see it. In front of you."
She nods.
"You mean a vision."
"Yes."
"Of the end of the world."
"Yes."
"Does it work?"
"Only when I'm asleep."
Not visions, then. Not quite. "So they're dreams."
She shakes her head. "I mean, I'm asleep, I'm always asleep, but these aren't dreams."
"How do you know?" I can't count the number of dreams I've been certain weren't dreams. I've woken up panicked, ready to grab my go-bag under the bed, reaching for the flashlight on my nightstand because I'm certain the world has plunged into the Three Days of Darkness from the Book of Revelation.
"Dreams are fuzzy," Hannah says. "Dreams are unclear. But you can control your dreams, you know? You can switch locations. You can make things appear by imagining them. You can change your fate." She closes her eyes. "When I go to sleep, I'm not dreaming. I'm remembering."
"But it hasn't happened. You can't remember what hasn't happened."
"I know I can't. But I am." She twists her sweatshirt sleeve. "It feels exactly like a memory. Something that has already been and can't be changed. Something . . . fixed. I don't have each second of it, I'm not reliving it, I'm seeing the parts that mattered most. Will matter most."
"What do you see?"
"The night where everything changes, forever," she says. "The night the world ends."
My heart is pounding in my chest, my pulse is in my throat and my guts at the same time, my body is defying medical science just like Hannah is defying logic and reason and I want to know more. _Why_ do I want to know more?
"What does it look like?" I ask, again, certain I don't want to know how life will fall to pieces but asking all the same. "When will it happen?"
She looks away. "I can't."
I stop walking. Why tell me this, if this couldn't give me any real information? Why tell me the world is ending if she's going to leave me powerless to stop it? My heartbeat picks up, my lungs constrict. "You _can't_?"
Hannah grabs my arm and pulls me to the edge of the sidewalk, out of the way of other pedestrians.
"I wish I could," she says in a whisper. "I wish I could, but I can't, because I don't know, either."
"But you've seen it!"
"It's so vague. It's so confusing. I need . . ." She trails off. Swallows. Focuses back on me. "I need someone to help me figure it out. Interpret it."
I shake my head. "I don't know how to do that."
Then it's her turn to shake her head. "Not you, Ellis. There's this—guy, who lives in Berkeley. Prophet Dan. He knows a ton about religion, and prophecies and things. He studied it. He helps people figure out this kind of stuff."
"Like a psychic?"
"Like it's a language, and he speaks it. But he's really, really hard to track down."
"You don't know where his house is?"
"Well," she admits, "he doesn't exactly have one."
"He's homeless."
She nods. It's not shocking. This city has a huge homeless population. It's warm year-round, we've got tons of public transport, and we've got history, too—people have been sleeping in Berkeley parks and panhandling on Berkeley streets since the hippies showed up in the sixties.
"I need you to help me find him," Hannah says. "I—I know that if we find him, he can tell us what we need to know."
"Why me?" I ask. "I don't know anyone named Prophet Dan, I don't know where he is, I don't even know—"
I cut myself off before I can tell the truth. I stop talking before I can say _I don't even know if I believe you_.
Hannah grabs my hand, and her fingers are cool and firm. "You can help me find him. I know you can, because when the end of the world comes, you're going to be right next to me."
"How do you know that?" I whisper, but I don't pull away.
"Because I've seen it."
The way she says it, so casually but so definitively, turns blood to ice in my ventricles. I freeze. She notices.
"Sorry," she says. She drops my hand. "I didn't mean to . . . Do you still want some frozen yogurt?"
I nod. Sugar is always the answer.
We walk the rest of the way to Yogurt Park in silence. I pile my cone with chocolate and mint yogurt, and enough toppings to decorate a large gingerbread house. It's not until I'm accepting my precarious, lopsided order from the cashier that I notice. Not only is Hannah not behind me in line, she's not in the store at all.
I take a giant bite and race out of Yogurt Park, but she's gone. I know she said she would only walk me this far, but I didn't think she meant it quite like this.
My brain feels frozen, and not from the yogurt. How could she dump something like that on me and then leave?
I'm about to turn the corner onto Dwight Way when I see her. Across the street, in the shade of the trees and under an unlit street lamp, Hannah is standing in the middle of People's Park.
It's not a typical park, because nothing in this city is typical. People's Park was never intended to be a park at all. It was an empty lot until the Free Speech Movement, when students and hippies and runaways used it as a meeting ground and sort of communal property—a park for the people. When the National Guard tried to clear the park, the protesters fought back. Decades later, it's still a park of the people—homeless people. Mostly men, mostly during the day. A sanctuary for people with nowhere else to go.
And Hannah is standing in the middle of men and grocery carts and bundles and used needles. All by herself. Or—no, not all by herself. She's with a tall, spindly man in a long coat, and they're talking like they know each other. She asks a question. He nods. She pulls a small, white paper bag out of her backpack. She hands it to him, and they wave to each other as she walks through the uncut grass, back the way we came.
Six
**I LIKE CHURCH,** but I don't like the minutes before church starts. I feel all this pressure to stand around and chat, like everyone else in the ward seems so comfortable doing. I'm sure it's nice if you're a new convert or a visitor or an ultra-mega extrovert like every single one of my family members. It's a warm place. A welcoming place. But I want a quiet one.
That's why I'm standing in the corner just outside our ward meetinghouse trying to avoid the eye of the newest straight-out-of-Zion sister missionary. Sometimes I wonder if the missionaries from little towns in Utah and Idaho think we're all a bunch of heathens, with our oddball congregation and our liberal-as-Mormons-get vibe. They'd never tell us that, of course. They're sweet and sunny and positive no matter what, because that's just how we do things. We fake it until we make it. We're supposed to, anyway. So I spot the girls my age, shove my discomfort down somewhere near my pancreas, and walk over.
Lia is the first to notice me. "Hi, Ellis," she says, brushing some of her waist-length hair off her shoulder. It's perfectly black and perfectly straight.
Everything about Lia Lemalu is perfect, actually. She's the president of our Young Women's class. The top of her grade at her all-girls private school. And everyone knows not to perform after her at a talent show, because her expertly executed Samoan dance routine will put any boring piano solo to shame. She's also easily the prettiest girl in our ward, and seems not to have to work for it at all, which is profoundly unfair. Or it would be, if she wasn't so nice.
"How was your week?" she asks me. "We missed you on Tuesday."
I was supposed to go to Mutual, a combined Young Women's and Young Men's church activity, but after my walk with Hannah, I couldn't do it. Not only did I feel emotionally drained, but I hate ice-skating. So I faked a headache and watched myself into a reality-TV stupor.
"I wasn't feeling great," I say. "Was it fun?"
"Cameron Wright kept trying to help Lia on the ice, even though she's a way better skater than him," McKenna Cooper says conspiratorially, wrinkling her freckled nose. "He is so obvious."
"You should go out with him," April Lee says to Lia. "You guys can come out with me and Tanner, it'll be fun."
"Cameron's okay, I guess," McKenna says. "I'm not trying to be mean or anything, but Lia can do better."
"I like Cameron," Lia says, and of course she does. She doesn't understand meanness. It may as well be ancient Sumerian to her. "Not like _that_ , though." She touches my shoulder with a warm, delicate hand. "I'd rather have skated with you."
I take a feeling I won't name and shove it down, all the way down, past my pancreas and into the quietest, safest corner of myself.
The girls keep chattering about Tuesday and boys, and what we'll do in class today. I stand there and smile, and feel like I'm drowning on land. I've known these girls since we were babies, eating Goldfish and fighting over stuffed animals. But sometimes, it feels like they've moved on without me, like everyone got a handbook in the mail explaining how to be a teenage girl, and I'm still a glue-stick-eating toddler. Not because they're mean. They aren't. But even though I'm standing right in the semicircle, sometimes it seems like they've stopped seeing me.
_You're not allowed to feel sorry for yourself. As if you'd really want them to know you. As if you'd want them to know what kind of a person you really are. They're better than you, you're—_
I shudder. Lia frowns. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," I say too quickly. "Hey—where's Bethany? I saw her mom outside."
"She got her tonsils out on Thursday and I guess she still feels pretty bad," Lia says.
"She _must_ be feeling really bad," McKenna says. "When _I_ got my wisdom teeth out _I_ still made it the next Sunday."
Lia rolls her eyes. "McKenna."
"I'm not judging! I'm saying she must be feeling awful, or she'd come."
"Come on, she was so out of it when we saw her on Friday," April says, then looks at me, suddenly panicked. McKenna grimaces. Lia stares at the floor.
They went without me. It's okay they went without me. I get why they went without me, but there's no way to explain that without embarrassing everyone involved.
Lia glances up at me, mouth open, but I beat her to the punch. "That's good, that's good she got her tonsils out."
"Yeah," April says, looking relieved. "They made her sick all the time."
"Also," I say, "think of how much less bacteria she has in her mouth now."
"What?" McKenna asks.
"The tonsils are a huge breeding ground for bacteria," I say, and then the words start to tumble, because if I stop, they might be embarrassed again, they might feel sorry for me again. "The whole mouth is, not just the tonsils. There are actually more individual bacterium in your mouth than there are _people on Earth_."
"That's . . ." Lia clears her throat. "That's really interesting, Ellis."
Lia might be a perfect Disney princess in the flesh, but it doesn't mean she can't lie.
"But you know," I say, trying to save myself, "there are also more chickens on Earth than people. So."
"Cool," April says. She nudges McKenna, who is struggling valiantly not to look weirded out. She is failing.
"Wow," McKenna says.
"Yeah," I say, letting the pit of awkwardness I've built envelop me.
My mom, in an act of true and unintended motherly love, calls to me from the front doors.
"See you in class," I say to the girls, and head over to where Mom is standing with her back to me, next to Sister Jensen.
"Hi, Sister Jensen," I say. "How are you feeling?"
"Tired," she laughs, looking down at the tightly swaddled, impossibly tiny infant in Mom's arms. "But he's worth every three a.m. wake-up, aren't you, buddy?"
Mom cradles Sister Jensen's new baby like her arms were designed for it. "What a sweet face. Look at those eyelashes."
I peer down at the baby, who looks shriveled and angry, to be honest. And you can't even _see_ his eyelashes. I don't get it. I wish I did.
Sister Jensen puts her hand on my shoulder. "Would you like to hold him?"
Panic floods my bloodstream. "Oh," I say, looking at Mom with wide eyes, silently begging her to help me. "That's so nice of you, but—"
Mom all but shoves the baby into my arms.
"Support his head, there you go."
This is how I die.
"Oh, I do miss this age," Mom says. "So precious."
"I think you'll have a newborn in your life soon enough," Sister Jensen says, and I don't have to look at her to know she's talking about me.
Maybe the baby can sense my sheer terror, or maybe he needs to be changed, because he opens his tiny mouth and wails to shake the rafters. Sister Jensen scoops him from my arms as the clock hits nine a.m. and everyone moves toward the pews.
Mom and I find Dad and Em in our usual pew. They aren't assigned, it's more of a habit than anything else. As always, they let me have the aisle, closest to the emergency exit. Right before I sit, I catch a split-second glimpse of a boy on the opposite side of the chapel, obviously out of place in a colored button-down shirt—not white—and a half-undone tie.
"Tal?" I whisper, but he's too far away to hear, and disappears in the crowd. Em looks up and frowns.
"Who?" she says.
I sit down. "Never mind."
Bishop Keller welcomes us from the pulpit and calls for the opening hymn. I hear the rustling of hymnbooks around me, but I don't bother taking one from the pews. I know this one by heart. I know most of them by heart. I close my eyes, breathe in, and sing.
It's not that it all disappears. It's not that church is some magical forcefield that banishes the nagging, gnawing voice inside my head. It's only that it's quieter, or maybe I just can't hear it as well over the organ and the voices around me. Maybe it's only that I can ignore it better at church, but even so, that's why I come here. Not for the awkward conversations in the vestibule, for all the rules, or even out of duty to my ancestors who crossed the prairie with handcarts. I come here to stand with my family and people who might as well be. I come here to feel whatever's always squeezing my lungs release, to feel my shoulders loosen and my mind calm.
I come here because when we sing _all is well, all is well_ , I believe it. If only for a moment.
As part of ward business, Bishop Keller calls one of the little girls, Caroline Collins, to the front. She's eight years old and shy, but gamely allows herself to be introduced as a newly baptized member of our congregation. Some churches baptize kids much younger than this, I know, but we wait until eight. Old enough to make a choice, old enough to read from the Book of Mormon and feel a confirmation that what's been written is true. Old enough to feel that warm feeling of peace inside, what we call feeling the Spirit.
Sacrament—our kind of Last Supper reenactment and the whole point of this all-ward meeting—comes next. Some of the boys twelve and older—but only the boys—pass through the pews first with the bread, torn into bite-size pieces, then the water, poured into individual cups. When I eat the bread and drink the mini Dixie cup of water, I can feel myself letting go of the week. I can forgive myself for not being a better daughter. I can forgive myself for being an awkward mess around Lia and the other girls. It won't last forever, but for now, I can let it go.
Bishop Keller turns the pulpit over to the first speaker of the day. The ward is a family, a collaboration, and we all speak at one time or another, on some assigned topic. Even little kids will give their testimony. I'm a much happier listener than lecturer, especially when one of the speakers is my dad.
Dad takes the pulpit. He clears his throat. He's not much of a speaker, either, but he accepts every call without hesitation or complaint.
"When I was ten, I went camping with my Boy Scout troop in Zion National Park."
Oh, it's this story. I've always liked this story.
"We were hiking, and I fell behind. By the time I'd looked up again, my troop was gone, and I couldn't tell which way they'd went. Soon, I was completely lost, and the sun was getting lower. I was standing at a crossroads, terrified and helpless. I dropped to my knees and prayed, begging Heavenly Father not to let me die in the wilderness, when I heard a still, small voice, from somewhere deep inside. It told me to get up. To walk forward. And when I did, I felt the strongest prompting to take the left fork. So I turned left, and discovered a little stream. Every Boy Scout knows that water flows to civilization. I followed the river downstream and found my way back to the world.
"Brothers and Sisters, I tell this story because it shows how important it is to listen to Heavenly Father's prompting. Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith, a fourteen-year-old farm boy, when he could have chosen a king to restore His church on Earth. No one is too young or too average to receive revelation. When the Spirit speaks to us, we must listen."
He goes on, but I can't hear him above the thrumming in my heart and the buzzing in my brain, because of course. Of course. Why didn't I see it before? It's in the word itself. _Apocalypse_. It comes from the Greek word _apokalyptein_ , meaning to uncover, to unveil what has been concealed. The word _apocalypse_ means a revelation. I know how to decide if Hannah's telling the truth. I know how to know. All I have to do is ask.
After a couple more speakers and the closing hymn, we break for the next part of services. We'll gather in smaller groups according to age and gender. Mom's in Relief Society, the women's group, Dad meets with the other Elders. Em and I are both in the Young Women's program, but she's a Beehive and I'm a Laurel, so after a short prayer and hymn, we'll split up. On the way, I stop by the water fountain in the hallway.
"Well, good morning, Sister Kimball."
I shoot up, water dribbling from the corner of my mouth. Leaning on the wall next to me is Tal, his hands shoved in his pockets, his tie threatening to unravel completely.
I swallow the water in my mouth. "I thought I saw you."
"In the flesh," he says.
I open my mouth to ask who he's here with, but my eyes snag on his tie. It looked normal from far away, but up close, it's awful—paisley patterned out of mustard yellow and a nauseating shade of maroon.
"Ugh," I say, out of instinct more than cattiness.
He raises an eyebrow. "What, you don't like my tie?"
My cheeks go hot. "Oh, no, it's—"
"The ugliest tie you've ever seen, right?" He grins. "They said I had to wear one, they didn't say it had to be tasteful."
"What are you even doing here?"
"I'm here under duress," he says. "I had to stay at my mom's this weekend. So, not optional."
"Your mom?"
"You'd know her as Sister Collins."
Sister and Brother Collins are recent transfers from an Oakland ward, with two little kids. She's older than most of the moms with kids that young, but I didn't know she'd been married before.
"I didn't know she was your mom," I say.
"I live with my dad. He's gone this weekend for some conference, and I thought I made it pretty clear I could take care of myself, but . . ." He shrugs. "Here I am."
"Oh."
"Of all the fucking weekends," he says, and I wince. I try not to be too precious about other people swearing, but a portrait of Jesus himself is staring at us from across the room. "Caroline's baptism yesterday, two hours of church today. Jesus Christ, it's never-ending."
I know it's a painting, but I swear, the Jesus-portrait frowns.
"It must have been nice to see your sister baptized."
He picks at his shirt collar. "Well, the cake at the reception was good."
Maybe he thinks this prickly-hedgehog routine is endearing, but I don't. "Yeah, sorry you were forced to hang out with your sister on one of the most important days of her life. My condolences."
He drops his eyes. "No one forced me. I was always going to go. And you're right. It was nice—it was nice to see her so happy."
That's the thing about hedgehogs. They're all spikes on the outside, but soft when you get underneath.
He looks back at me. "There. Is that better, Sister Kimball?"
Kids don't call each Brother and Sister. He's doing it to tease me. "It's perfect, Brother—" But then I stop, because I have no idea what his last name is.
"It's Santos, but—call me Tal, call me Talmage, call me goddamn Ishmael, but please don't call me Brother Santos."
"Deal, if you stop swearing in front of my Savior." I indicate my head at the Jesus portrait.
"He is entirely too white to be Jesus," Tal says, "but deal." He pushes himself off the wall. "You skipping Young Women's? Going to play with the babies in Nursery? Caroline loves doing that."
Yeah, Em, too. "I'm not a fan of babies," I say before I can think better of it. He looks surprised, but doesn't rush to offer me reasons I should be, which is a nice change. Still, I feel like I need a reason. "The crying. I have sensitive ears."
"Not to mention all the germs," he says.
"Did you know there are more germs in the human mouth than there are people on Earth?" I blurt, because I'm apparently incapable of learning from my mistakes.
"Really?" he says. "That's fascinating."
Is it? I think it is.
"Yeah," I say, "a little terrifying, but fascinating, right?"
He considers. "It's not terrifying."
"It's not?"
"We need those bacteria, right? The bacteria, mites, all of that. It's this hugely complicated ecosystem, right inside of us, everything working together. Even the tiniest part matters. Even the bacteria."
Huh. I've never looked at it that way. I grin. "Fair point, Tal." He smiles.
Sister Olsen, the resident ward busybody, appears in the chapel doors. "Don't you have somewhere to be?" she says to me. I start toward my classroom.
"Young man," I hear her say to Tal, "would you like some help finding _your_ destination?"
"Nah, I'm good," he says. "You know what they say, everything in moderation. Even Jesus."
I stifle a laugh and turn around to see him halfway out the front door, to Sister Olsen's disapproval. He catches my eye. "See you around," he says. Then after a pause, "Ellis."
As usual, it takes forever to leave church. From the way Mom clings to her friends, just needing _one more minute_ eighteen minutes ago, you'd never guess they see each other weekly, at the absolute least.
And as usual, during the ride home, the car transforms into a Broadway stage for Em to perform her one-woman show: _Everything I Saw, Did, and Thought During the Two Hours You Were Not in My Direct Presence_.
After a particularly meandering story about another girl in her age group who wants to get a second (forbidden) ear piercing, Em takes a breath, and my mother seizes the opportunity.
"Sister Olsen said she saw you talking to a boy outside the chapel," she says, glancing back over the seat. Em nudges me, grinning, and I push her elbow away. "But she didn't know who he was."
"His name is Talmage," I say, using his full name in a deliberate act of misdirection.
"Who was he there with?" Dad asks.
"Sister Collins. He's her son."
Mom and Dad look at each other. Dad focuses back on the road. "Oh," Mom says. Weird.
"Did you know she had an older son?"
"She's mentioned him," Mom says. "I think their relationship is . . . complicated."
"So he's Caroline's brother?" Em says.
"Yeah, half brother, I guess," I say.
"How do you know each other?" Dad asks.
"School." This is technically true. The park is part of school. Hannah is part of school. But my parents don't need to know about either.
"Is he cute?" Em asks.
"I— He's—" Is he cute? In a completely objective sense, yes, he is. If you like boys with holes in their jeans and dark curls and green-brown eyes, _not that I've noticed at all._ "We're friends," I force out, though we might not even be that.
"Uh-huh," Em says, and I'd strangle her if it didn't mean I'd be all alone with my parents.
"Good," Dad says. "You don't need to get involved in anything else." I roll my eyes.
"She's sixteen," Mom says. "She's old enough to date."
"Ellis can't date Caroline's brother," Em says.
I glare at her. "Really, you too?"
She looks at me with a bit of pity. "Because he's _gay_ , Ellis."
Oh.
"Emmy," Mom scolds. "Don't gossip."
"His sister told me. It's not gossip if his _sister_ told me."
I feel so stupid. Not because he's gay, it's fine that he's gay, but I thought when were inside—I thought maybe he was flirting with me. Maybe.
_Obviously not. Why would he flirt with you, why would anyone flirt with you? You're weird and awkward and no one will ever, ever like you that way. Not Tal, not—_
I shake my head to bury the thought. "What did Caroline tell you?" I ask Em.
"She said he got caught doing stuff with another boy at some sleepaway camp. And his mom—well, I think more his stepdad—wanted him to see a therapist about it, but his real dad said he didn't have to. And it was a big thing."
Mom sighs. "Oh, poor Jessica."
Jessica is Sister Collins. "Poor _Sister Collins_?" I say, with an edge. "Not poor _Tal_?"
Mom looks back at me. "You don't think it was hard for her?"
"There's nothing wrong with being gay," I say.
"Of course not," Dad says.
We believe that, my family. Not everyone in the church does. Some of my cousins say things that make me cringe, and the leadership isn't exactly progressive. But my family believes that.
"I don't mean it's wrong," Mom says, choosing her words with care. "I mean it's a hard row to hoe."
And she's not wrong. Because no matter what my family believes, even what our local community believes, it doesn't change the reality of being gay and Mormon. It doesn't change the reality that same-sex relationships are considered contrary to God's plan. That Tal could never marry a man in the temple. That until recently any children he and his husband had couldn't be baptized until they were adults. And even then, they couldn't be baptized unless they disavowed their fathers' relationship. That's the reality. And it sucks.
There are so many terrible things that the end of the world would bring. Famine, war, displacement. All those people who get to hurt Tal and people like him, all those people who think anything under the rainbow flag is immoral or shocking, well. At the end of the world, maybe they'll have a chance to see what immorality really looks like, what shock really feels like. There's not much of a bright side to the apocalypse, but maybe this is one: when the world as we know it ends, no one will care whether two people love each other.
As soon as we get home, I rush up to my bedroom. There's no road map for determining the truthfulness of a teenage doomsday prophet, so all I can do is follow the routine I learned as a child.
I shut the door. I drop one knee to the carpet, then the other. I rest my weight on the back of my legs. I fold my arms across my chest, bow my head, close my eyes.
I'm not sure how to start. I've never asked for a revelation before. My previous pleas to the universe have been, I realize, remarkably self-centered. _Please let me find my missing library book. Please let me pass this math test. Please let me be different, better, someone other than myself._ Asking for divine inspiration isn't any less selfish, but it's on another scale entirely.
I replay each second with Hannah in my mind, from the moment I saw her in the waiting room to the moment I saw her sweep through People's Park.
___I know when it's going to happen._
_It's going to happen._
_I know._
Maybe it's wrong to be doing this. Maybe it's wrong to be asking for an answer when I know my parents, my bishop, my sister would all say Hannah's wrong. That she's delusional at best and dangerous at worst. But all Hannah wants is for someone to believe her; there's nothing sinister about that. She wants someone to hear her dreams and repeat them back without fear or doubt. She wants to speak and have someone pull her words close, not scatter them into the wind. She wants someone to believe she's seen what she's seen, and what's so strange about that?
I want to be believed when I beg my family to be prepared. I want to be believed when I say I'm afraid, when I say I don't want to be in AP classes, behind the wheel of a car, with a baby in my arms. Even Mary Bateman, hoaxer and liar that she was, only wanted to be believed when she said she'd been granted something special, that she was more than a poor woman in a small town.
Everyone just wants to be believed.
And as that thought rides the synapses of my brain like lightning, I feel it. The Spirit, exactly like I felt it when I was eight years old and preparing for my baptism. When I asked if the only life I'd ever known was true, was right, was real. My parents told me I'd feel a burning in my chest, a still, small voice, a sense of utter peace. That isn't what I felt. What I felt was so much more.
Trying to capture it is like describing salt without mentioning sugar. Like painting a wall with a color you can't see. Like holding the sun in a jar or pinning down the wind. I love words. I love finding out what they mean, where they come from, cataloging and categorizing and _knowing_. But this is beyond words.
Everyone just wants to be believed. Hannah wants to be believed and I want to believe Hannah, because I'm kneeling on the carpet on my childhood bedroom gasping for air, flooded with adrenaline and endorphins and that indescribable feeling. I know. I know. I know Hannah is telling the truth.
But feeling that something is true, even _knowing_ that something is true, is one thing. Belief is another. Belief is a choice.
And I've chosen.
Seven
**I LOOK FOR** Hannah at lunch on Monday, but no one's seen her. I sit through my afternoon classes and seventh-period chemistry lab in a state of profound agony. Who cares about sines and cosines when the world is going to end? Who cares that my lab experiment bubbled over and oozed brown sludge onto the lab table? In a postapocalyptic society, no one's going to ask about my junior-year grades.
I escape the classroom as soon as my chemistry teacher dismisses us, all but trampling a tiny freshman on my way out the G-building door. _Please_ , I pray, _please let Hannah still be here, please don't make me wait another day to tell her_.
I'm panting by the time I reach the Park, but my breath stops in my throat when I see Hannah's tree with no one under it. She's not there. No one's there.
_You missed her. You waited too long. She'll never tell you what you need to know and the end of the world will come and you'll die—_
"Ellis!" someone shouts behind me. I spin back around, and there's Hannah, standing by the front gates. I must have run right past her and not even noticed. I try to say "hi" back, but I can't seem to say anything at all. And maybe Hannah has seen this moment, or maybe she can read the look on my face, because she grabs her backpack and walks over to me without another word.
And though I want to shout it the whole time she's walking over, I wait until she closes the distance.
"I believe you," I whisper.
"What?" she says. I don't know if she can't believe it, or simply couldn't hear me.
"I believe you," I say again, more firmly. As Dad would say, with _conviction_ , a word that means determination but also prison sentences.
"You do?" she says, not sounding surprised, but somehow still relieved. "You do."
"Yes."
"Okay," she says on a breath out. "Okay."
"So you'll tell me now?" I ask. "You'll tell me how it happens?"
Hannah opens her mouth, but then hesitates. She sticks her hands in her pockets, then takes them out. Suddenly, she's speaking rapid-fire. "I don't really know, I wish I could tell you, but I don't really know, that's why we need someone to interpret—they're so confusing, the dreams are so vague and weird and I have them every night but it never gets any clearer."
I put out my hands to stop her. "Okay," I say. "Please breathe." She takes a deep, audible breath in. "We'll figure it out, we'll . . ."
But I don't know how to finish that sentence. I've done so much research into surviving disasters, surviving attacks, surviving all the ways the world could end. I have no idea how to untangle a prophecy. It didn't seem like a useful skill.
She still looks like she's having trouble catching her breath. "Let's sit down," I suggest, ushering her to the Little Theatre steps, a few feet away. No one's going to bother us here. More important, no one's going to overhear us here.
"Is there anything you do know? For certain?" I ask her as she twists her hands in her hoodie sleeves. "A date, a place?"
"Just . . . feelings," she says.
"Feelings," I repeat.
"I know how I _feel_ , when it happens. I can remember that."
"So, what do you feel?"
"Cold," she says.
"Cold?"
"Because it's snowing," she explains.
"Where are we? When it happens."
"Here," she says.
I gape at her. "Here?"
"Not in the Park," she clarifies. "But in Berkeley."
It doesn't snow in Berkeley, except maybe a couple flakes way up in the hills. It's never enough to stick. I'm not prepared for a blizzard, or an Ice Age, or anything like that. I never thought I needed to be.
"What about inside?" I press on. "Like, what do you feel internally?" I pull one of Martha's favorite lines from the back of my brain. "Can you name the feeling?"
She closes her eyes. "Confusion. Panic. Like someone's ripping my heart out and I can't stop them."
I really hope that's a simile. Murderous bands of cannibals shouldn't show up until _years_ into a post-doomsday society. Months, at least.
"What about your senses?" I say. She opens her eyes and frowns. "No, keep them closed." She obeys. "You've only said what you feel. But there's more to memory than that."
Smell is the sense most closely connected to memory—I remember writing that in Kenny #11 or #12. We'll start there. "Smell. What do you smell? Breathe it in."
She breathes. "It's like . . ." She hesitates. "It's like my mom's perfume."
"Is she there?" I ask. "Is she with us?" Maybe our families come with us.
"I don't think so," Hannah says. "It's like her old perfume, when I was little. She has a new one now, but it's not that."
"Do you remember what it was called?"
Hannah shakes her head. "It was in a green bottle. That's all I remember."
Okay, well, that was a bust. "What do you hear?"
"Wind."
"What do you taste?"
"Salt."
Somewhere near the ocean, somewhere that smells like perfume. I've got nothing. One last sense, one last shot. "What do you feel?" I ask. "Not inside, but . . . touch. What do you _feel_?"
She is still for a long moment. "Your hand, in mine. I feel you grabbing my hand, and holding on tight."
That's as comforting as it is terrifying. On the one hand, I won't be alone when the world ends, and neither will Hannah. On the other hand, that means that I'll be there, unprotected, on some sea cliff. It's fated. Fate takes the uncertainty out of things, but it doesn't take the fear.
"You're sure?" I ask Hannah. "You're sure I'm there?"
"It's about the only thing I am sure of."
That shouldn't make me happy. It should worry me, that she's not sure when the world is ending, or how it's ending. It should completely freak me out that all she knows is I'll be there. It shouldn't make my heart swell. But it does.
"That's why we need to find someone who can help us interpret," she says. "Like I said before."
I nod. "I remember."
"I know you like our school library," she says, "but what about the public one?"
"Which branch?" I ask, as though I haven't made it to half the branches at some point.
She seems confused by the question. "Up the block."
The Central branch. "All the time, I go there all the time." I'm talking too fast, too eagerly. I don't even know why she's asking, but I'm desperate to be helpful all the same.
"Great," she says, nodding to match my eagerness. "That's great. I've got a lead that the guy we're looking for—"
"Prophet Dan?"
"Yeah, Prophet Dan. I've got a lead that he hangs out there, sometimes. And since you know the place . . ." She trails off.
"Okay," I say. "When do you want to check it out?"
She gets to her feet. "How about now?"
As we walk to the library, Hannah gives me the lowdown on Prophet Dan.
"Brown hair, brown beard, brown eyes," she says. "Tan-ish skin. Five foot ten. He might be wearing a red buffalo plaid coat."
"Buffalo plaid?"
"Red and black, checked."
"It's too hot for a coat, though," I say. But then again, Hannah's wearing a hoodie. I've never seen her without it on, now that I think about it.
"He'll be wearing the coat," she says. "It's kind of a protection . . . thing."
"Protection from what?" I ask, slowing down.
"Nothing real." She looks at me out of the corner of her eye. "So does it matter?"
It suddenly occurs to me that this might not be the safest plan in the world. "Are you . . ." I hesitate. "Are you sure he'll be okay talking to us, if we find him? Because if he's paranoid or something, maybe we should leave him alone."
Hannah spins and grabs my arm. I stop. "We need him," she insists. "He knows about this stuff, okay? He studied it at Cal, mysticism and religion and prophecies and everything. He's good. He's, like . . ." She pauses. "A legend."
"I've never heard of him."
She tilts her head. "Yeah, I don't think he exactly runs in your circles."
Fair point.
"Look," Hannah says, hands in front of her, like she's worried I'll bolt. "He won't judge us. He won't call our parents. And he's not dangerous, if that's what you're worried about."
"How do you _know_ that, though?" I ask.
She chews on the inside of her cheek. "We have friends in common."
It's not as much reassurance as I'd like, but it's better than nothing. I start walking again. "Well, okay, I guess."
Hannah heaves a sigh of relief. "Great. Good. How many floors is the library?"
"Six."
"I guess you'll have to check them all."
"Not necessarily," I say. "If he's really big into mysticism and that kind of stuff, all those books are on the first floor."
Hannah raises an eyebrow. "Did you memorize all the rooms in this library?"
"No," I say, feeling heat rise on my cheeks, "just the Dewey Decimal System."
"See," she says with a smile, "this is how I knew I needed you."
Well. That, and the apocalyptic nightmares.
"Wait," I say, my mind jumping back to an earlier comment. "Did you say _I'd_ have to check them all?"
"No, not if you know which floor."
I slow down, because we're just about to reach the library. "Are you not coming in with me?"
She stops in her tracks. "Oh, shit," she whispers, looking past me. I follow her gaze to the benches in front of the library. Right by the flower planters are Sam, Theo, and Tal.
"Are you okay?" I ask her.
"Don't tell them who we're looking for," she says, her eyes still on the boys.
"Maybe they could help," I suggest.
She shakes her head. "Nope."
"But—"
Just then, Sam turns his head and spots us. He waves.
"We'll just hang out for a minute," Hannah says to me as she waves back. "I'll keep watch on the door. Just in case."
I open my mouth to ask fourteen different questions—Why don't you want your friends to help? Don't you want your friends to know what you do? Don't you want to protect them, don't you—but Hannah's already walking over. So I just sigh and follow.
"I think I bombed our pop quiz in chemistry," Theo's telling Sam as Hannah and I reach them.
"The last time you said that, you got a B," Sam reminds him.
"There was a dead spider in the corner this time. It was distracting." Theo shudders.
"If it makes you feel better," Sam says, "it might not have been dead. It might just have been a shed exoskeleton, which means it's still alive, only now it's bigger."
" _Why_ ," Theo says, with a full-body recoil, "would that make me feel _better_?"
"Why do you only know the grossest things about animals?" Tal asks Sam, making room for Hannah and me on the flower planter. I sit next to Hannah, careful not to block her view of the library doors.
"Spiders aren't animals."
Tal chooses to ignore this. He turns to Hannah. "Where were you two going?"
"We were looking for you," Hannah says with such cool nonchalance I almost forget it's fake.
Tal looks skeptical. He nods over at me. "Then why does she look so uncomfortable?"
"You can have that effect on people, Tal," Sam says. Tal throws a leaf at him. Hannah laughs.
And then I think—maybe Hannah hasn't told them because the second she did, moments like this would disappear. Maybe Hannah wants more time, just a little bit more time, to pretend like everything is normal. I can understand that.
"You guys want to play Five-Word Books?" Sam asks. "It's more fun with more people, anyway."
"Sure, I'm game," Theo says.
"What's Five-Word Books?" I ask.
"Just what it sounds like," Sam says. "Without using the title, the author, or any character names, describe a book in five words and the rest of us see if we can get it."
"We play it at Quiz Bowl practice," Theo says. "But Ms. Jacobs never lets us swear or make sex jokes, which takes all the fun out of it. I'll start. Two horny teens ruin everything."
" _Romeo and Juliet_ ," Tal says. "One horny teen hates phonies."
" _The Catcher in the Rye_. Mass-murdering teen in love triangle."
"That was six words," Theo says to Sam.
"'Mass-murdering' is hyphenated."
"Fine. _The Hunger Games_."
"Orphan boy, obvious Jesus allegory?" Theo says.
" _Oliver Twist_?" Sam guesses.
"I was thinking _Harry Potter_ ," Theo says. "But yeah, Dickens did love angelic orphans."
"And corpses," I add.
"What?" Theo asks.
"Did you say corpses?" Hannah asks.
"Yes," I say. "He liked to visit the Paris morgue and stare at them. The corpses. He also went to Italy and asked— _asked_ —to see an execution by guillotine and study the headless body. He liked looking at corpses so much that one time, he went to the morgue on Christmas."
"Well, damn," Sam says.
"If _A Christmas Carol_ had ended like that, I might've liked it better," Tal says.
"What, with Tiny Tim getting embalmed?" Theo says.
"'What's today, Mr. Scrooge?'" Tal says in an awful British accent. "'Why, it's Christmas Day, sir, and the morgue is open for tours!'"
"Too dark, you guys, too dark," Hannah says. And this coming from a girl who regularly dreams about the apocalypse.
Thinking about the apocalypse makes me remember why we're actually here. Hannah said she'd keep an eye on the door, but it can't hurt if I do too. I twist around to see the entrance. Nothing. Ten seconds later, I do it again, even though I know it's excessive.
"You looking for something?" Tal asks me, flicking his eyes to the library doors and back.
"Um," I say.
"Ellis wanted to look for a book," Hannah cuts in smoothly. She nudges me with her foot. "It's cool. Go ahead. We won't leave or anything."
"I don't want to go alone," I say through gritted teeth. "You didn't tell me I'd have to . . ." I trail off at the look on Hannah's face. Just for a second, it's gone from cool and composed to something panicked and pleading. It says, _help_. Just a flicker of real need. But I see it.
No one's ever needed my help before. It's always been the other way around. I get up.
Inside, I pass by the low-cost bookstore by the front entrance—they sell books for dimes and dollars, but still, I'm guessing Prophet Dan uses the library as a place to rest, not just a place to read. I scan the checkout line briefly, but no luck.
"What's it called?" says a voice behind me.
When I turn around, Tal's standing there. I don't understand why he's here. He looks like he might not understand, either.
"Uh," I say.
"Your book," he clarifies. "The one you're looking for."
"That's okay, I don't need help."
"I'm sure you don't." He sticks his hands in his pockets. "But you said you didn't want to go alone."
"Oh." It seems wrong to default to suspicion. I try not to. "Okay."
He nods at the reference computers. "You need to look it up?"
"No, I'll . . . figure it out."
I lead Tal on a quick sweep of the first floor, and we end up in the stacks at the back, housing "Nonfiction 000-899," Computer Science all the way through Austronesian & Other Literatures.
I run one hand along the shelves as we walk through the aisles, stealing as many glances as I can at the reading tables. I don't see anyone matching Prophet Dan's description. Next to me, Tal paws through the Astronomy section. He holds up a book called _The Seven Planets_.
"I wonder if they cut the pages about Pluto out of this. Since it got demoted from planet status."
"Do you know where that word comes from? 'Planet'?" It's got such a good etymology I can't help myself. "Earlier astronomers noticed that some stars in the sky weren't fixed. They moved around. So they called them _asteres planetai_. 'Wandering stars.'"
"All stars are wandering." I must look confused, because he adds, "They only look fixed, to us. When we think we're seeing a star, we're really seeing where it was thousands of years ago. That's how fast they're traveling, and how much light they leave behind." And then I must look surprised, because he ducks his head and mumbles, "Whatever, I like stars."
Stars. Who would have guessed. It's so . . . wholesome.
"Huh," I say. "Theo's into nineteenth-century literature. Sam knows some terrible things about spiders. And you like stars."
"I do."
"You're just full of surprises." And then, in case it wasn't clear: "Not bad ones. Good ones."
"Thanks," Tal says, returning the book. "Next time you see my stepdad at church, you should tell him that. He'll be horrified."
My shoulders drop, remembering what Em told me. I can't imagine how hard that must be. My parents might not be thrilled with my general personality, but they'd never, ever treat me like that. No matter who I kissed at summer camp.
"I'm sorry," I say.
He shrugs it off. "I try not to take it personally. _I'm_ a bad influence on Caroline and Matt? He drinks, like, eight Red Bulls a day and wears tube socks with shorts. But sure, the things _I_ do are godless and unnatural."
"Is that why you left the church?" I ask. I drop my voice. "Because you're gay?"
Tal stares at me. "Who told you _that_?"
"Your sister told my sister. About summer camp."
Tal sighs. "Caroline," he says, "has an un-nuanced view of human sexuality."
"What does that mean?"
"I'm not gay," Tal says. "I'm bisexual." When I wait too long to respond, he continues. "It was a boy, at camp. But it could have been a girl."
"Oh," I say. "Okay." I drop my voice again. "Bisexual."
"You don't have to whisper," he says.
"We're in a library."
"That's not why you're whispering."
"Can I help you two find anything?" says a crisp voice behind me. I turn around to see one of the librarians, a youngish woman who always wears vintage dresses, looking at me from behind her cat-eye glasses.
"Yeah," Tal says, "we're looking for a—"
"Person," I blurt out before he can say "book." I feel him swivel to stare at me. "We're looking for a man we heard might be here."
"Jesus Christ," Tal mutters under his breath.
"Nope, not him." I wave Tal off without looking over. "A different itinerant preacher."
The librarian shifts the stack of books in her arms. "All right."
"He's a homeless man, five ten, kind of tan," I say, trying to remember every bit of Hannah's description. "Brown beard, brown eyes, red-and-black jacket—"
"I'm sorry," she says, "there's lots of guys like that. But if he's a regular, you might ask Lydia."
"Lydia?"
"Yeah, she's been coming here for decades, she's sort of like an ambassador," the librarian says. "Very friendly. She usually reads on this floor. You'll know her by the hat. Big and straw."
"Thank you," I say as she goes, then look around. There are college students juggling textbooks, older Berkeley hippies in hemp perusing the Metaphysics section, and a group of middle school boys pelting each other with paperbacks, but no women in straw hats. I choose the most central reading table and sit down. Tal sits next to me. It's not a great tactical move—if he sat across from me, we'd be able to see the whole room, between us.
"Quick question," he says, faux-casual. "Do you have any idea what the hell you're doing?"
I fold my hands. "I'm in the library, waiting for Lydia—"
"You're in way over your head."
"— _waiting for Lydia_ ," I push through, "to see if she knows how to find—"
"Yeah, I know who," he interrupts. "I've been friends with Hannah a lot longer than you have."
She said I couldn't tell the boys who we were looking for. Do they already know?
"This isn't helping her," Tal says, shaking his head. "I know it seems like it would, but it doesn't. We figured that out a long time ago."
"I believe her," I tell him. "Maybe you don't think it's real, but I do."
His eyebrows knit together. "Of course it's real. No one thinks it isn't."
Huh. Maybe he only _thinks_ he knows what Hannah's doing, because there are many, many people who don't think the apocalypse is real. And maybe I've already said too much.
"Anyway," I say, quickly steering back to our earlier conversation, "it's probably easier, being bisexual, right? For you. Than if you were gay."
"What," Tal says, long-suffering, "could you _possibly_ mean by that?"
I cringe. "I don't know. Sorry. Never mind."
"Oh, no, no," he says. "Come on, lay it all out."
"You kissed a boy, at camp, right?"
He nods.
"And your—some people were upset about that, right?"
He nods.
"And you just said it was a boy, but it could have been a girl. Right?"
"All correct," he says.
"If it _had_ been a girl, no one would have been upset. So isn't that—easier?"
He runs his hand over the table. "I think it's all hard. Being not-straight. But the ways it's hard can be different. When you're bi—if you're a dude, at least—people assume it's just a stop on the road to gay. They think you're pretending to like girls. Like their walnut brains can't process it's not an either/or situation, for you."
"Well—have you ever kissed a girl?" I ask. He shakes his head. "Then how do you know you like them?"
"Have you kissed anyone?" he asks. I shake my head. "But you know who _you're_ attracted to, right?"
Yes. No. "That's a weird question," I say, too fast, too defensive.
He holds up his hands. "All I meant was, you don't have to kiss someone to know you like them. I've had crushes on boys and girls, both, since . . . forever, I guess."
A crush doesn't mean anything. A crush doesn't _have_ to mean anything. "Crushes are different. It's not the same thing as being . . ." I falter for a second. "It's not the same as _being_ something."
_You're saying all the wrong things. You wouldn't know the right thing to say if it punched your vocal cords out. Which would be a net gain for the world._
Tal frowns, but not like he's offended or mad. Like I'm something written in code, something cryptic. _Cryptic_ , from the Greek _kryptos_ , meaning hidden.
Maybe I want to stay hidden.
Before he can ask me anything else, I steer the conversation back to him.
"So is that why you left?" I ask again. "Because you're bisexual?" He didn't have to, necessarily. Gay Mormons exist; I know some. And sometimes I wonder, _How do you stay? How do you stay when the whole system was designed without you in mind? When there are so many things you have to give up? When it's cruel and unfair and wrong that you should even have to?_ But I know how; I know why. They stay because they believe this church is true. I wonder if sometimes they wish they didn't.
"That was part of why I left," Tal says. "Not all of it."
"You could marry a girl," I point out. "If you married a girl, you could get sealed in the temple like everybody else."
He shakes his head. "I could marry a girl. But never in the temple."
"Why?"
"I don't want to get married in a place that tells me some of my feelings are part of a beautiful Celestial plan and some of my feelings are—sinful, at worst. Something to chastely _suffer through_ , at best. All of me matters. Not just the part that could marry a girl, someday."
After a moment of silence, I ask, "So then why else did you leave?"
"Why do you want to know so badly?"
"I'm just making conversation."
"That's kind of a hard-core conversation for someone you barely know."
_You're making him uncomfortable. You make everyone uncomfortable._
"Okay, whatever, sorry."
"You don't have to be sorry. But if you're only asking because you think I made a mistake, that you can _convince_ me I made a mistake, please don't. I'm good. I'm happy."
_Wickedness never was happiness_ , that's in the scriptures themselves. I believe Tal, though, when he says he's happy. Maybe the passage is backward. Can real happiness, the kind that doesn't hurt a soul, ever be wickedness? I don't know. I don't _think_ so.
"Was it because of something you read? On the internet?" I ask, because I still want to know. He rolls his eyes. "I'm not trying to be mean, but that stuff can be biased. That stuff can be really wrong."
"What should I have read?"
"There's the church website."
"Because that's sure not biased."
"They wouldn't lie."
"Just because something makes you uncomfortable doesn't mean it's a lie."
That's a pretty good line. I don't love how it's being used against me, but it's still good. I'll have to remember that, for when Hannah and I tell the world about its imminent destruction.
"Look," he says. "I didn't leave because I wanted to sin. And it wasn't because someone offended me. It wasn't because of what I read online, though I did read a lot of weird stuff. I just didn't believe. I wanted to, I tried to, I doubted my doubts and shut myself down. But you can't force belief. And when I realized I liked other boys, when I realized I'd rather peel off my skin than go on a mission, I decided I had a choice. I could live my life for the church, or I could live my life for myself." He shrugs. "I chose myself."
I wonder what's that like. I wonder what it's like to be that proud of who you are. To choose yourself, rather than change yourself.
"Are you guys—" There's suddenly an itch in my throat, and I cough. "Are you still together?"
Tal looks confused. "Who?"
"The boy you met at camp."
"No, it was just for the summer. He lives in Connecticut. And plays polo. The kind with horses."
"What does that matter?"
"He and I were not meant for eternity." He grins at me, lopsided. "I prefer my partners a little more salt-of-the-earth. And a little more local."
Before I can say anything, or do anything, or even breathe, I spot a giant straw sun hat, and a tiny woman underneath. She's carrying an improbably large stack of books, which she gently sets down on a table a few feet from us, then eases herself into a chair.
Before Tal can see her, I push myself back from the table. And before he can say anything to stop me, I walk in her direction, trying to ignore the lump in my throat.
_You're going to mess it up._
From behind me, I think I hear Tal get up too.
_Hannah's counting on you and you're going to mess everything up._
I approach her slowly, with light steps, like I'm stalking a skittish woodland creature.
_You're going to ruin it, you're going to say the wrong things to her just like you said the wrong things to Tal—_
The woman looks up. From somewhere outside my stupid body, I hear myself say, "Excuse me, I'm so sorry to bother you, but—are you Lydia?"
She blinks at me, and takes off her hat. She's not quite as old as I thought—maybe midseventies. Her face is round and wrinkled, and her mouth crescents into a warm smile. "Yes, dear. I'm Lydia."
"One of the librarians said you might be able to help me?" It's not a question, but my voice goes up at the end anyway. I cringe. Mom's always telling me not to do that. It makes you sound unsure.
Lydia doesn't appear to care. "Please, sit down."
I take the seat across the table from her. Without being invited, Tal sits to my left.
"My name's Ellis," I say. "This is my— This is Tal." He waves. Awkwardly.
"What can I do for you, Ellis?"
"We're looking for a man, and the librarian said you might know him. Prophet Dan." Tal takes a sharp breath in, so I keep going before he can interrupt. "He's got a brown beard, a red-and-black coat, likes books about mystics—?"
"Yes," she says, and sighs. "Danny. He's so young. It's so sad, when they're so young."
I always assumed he was older, one of those neighborhood fixtures. How else would Hannah have known about him?
"You wouldn't know it, though, from the way he talks," she says. "So smart. Mind like a steel trap. Now, I'm not much for all that religion stuff, but he could talk to me about botany, about birds. He never forgot a thing."
"Has he been by today?" I ask. "When do you usually see him here?"
"I haven't seen him in weeks," Lydia says, and my heart drops. "He didn't think the library was safe anymore."
The library is the safest place I can think of. I think it even qualifies as a fallout shelter. "Why wouldn't it be safe?" I ask.
"It didn't _seem_ safe. To him." She leans across the table and pats my hand. "You can't make a person believe in what they don't."
Tal shifts, and I bet he's looking at me. _You can't force belief_. That's what he said, too. But I don't know—this seems different.
"Do you have any idea where else he might hang out?" I ask. "I'd just really love to talk to him."
"I'd suggest People's Park, maybe Willard, maybe the encampment by City Hall, but I'm figuring you've looked there."
Is that why Hannah was in People's Park? Was she looking for him then, too? Lydia misinterprets my silence as agreement.
"Well," she says. "When you find him, tell him I miss our talks. And those muffins he used to bring me—carrot zucchini, who knew you could make muffins out of that? But mostly our talks." Lydia looks up at the ceiling for a moment, and blinks hard. "He's a special kid. He deserves better."
I thank her for her help, and she gives me the number of the senior center where she's living. Tal looks like he'd like to ask several more questions—of me, not Lydia—but I take a page from Hannah's book and set a brisk pace for the front doors. By the time he's caught up, I'm already outside, where Hannah is waiting, her hands twisted in her sweatshirt sleeves again.
"Did you . . . find the book?" she asks.
I shake my head, deciding to tell her about Lydia tomorrow, or whenever Tal isn't just a couple of inches to my left.
"I thought we all agreed to stop looking for _that book_ ," Tal says to Hannah under his breath.
Hannah folds arms. " _We_ definitely didn't."
"Anyone want to go to La Burrita?" Sam asks, hopping up from the bench. "I'm starving."
"When are you not starving?" Theo asks.
"Whenever I've just finished eating at La Burrita."
"I'm in," Tal says, with one final long look at Hannah.
"I have to get to therapy," Hannah says, pointing her thumb in the direction of the Martha's office.
I check my watch. "Yeah, I should go too."
Everyone's going the same direction but me, so I say goodbye to them there. But at the last second, I turn around and catch Tal by the arm. He looks surprised, but stops. The rest of them keep walking.
"I'm sorry," I tell him, "if I was weird, back there. If I said the wrong things. You didn't have to tell me those things, and you did, and I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable."
"No worries. We're cool."
"Are you sure?" I ask.
"Yeah. Look, I'm not thrilled about what you're helping Hannah do, but your heart's clearly in the right place. So I'm figuring your heart's in the right place just . . . in general."
Something warm and unnameable surges in my chest and floods the veins in my arms and legs. I take a sharp breath.
"I know," he says. "I'm as shocked as you are."
He salutes me with two fingers as he walks away.
Eight
**LATER THAT WEEK,** Hannah corners me in the hall after English class.
"I've been thinking," she says, "we should hang out this weekend."
I can't remember the last time someone asked me to hang out during the weekend. Or more accurately, I can't remember the last time someone asked and it wasn't out of obligation or pity.
"Yes let's do that yes please," I say, too fast, too eager.
Hannah pretends not to notice. "Awesome. Saturday?"
Then I remember. "Oh. I have to go to a wedding on Saturday."
"So, Sunday."
"Well, I have church. . . ."
"After, then," she says with a shrug. "It's only, like, an hour, right?"
"It's two hours. It used to be three."
Her eyes widen. "Jesus. Do you read the whole Bible from start to finish?"
I laugh. "Do you want to come with me and see? You don't have to," I add quickly. "But if you wanted to . . ."
"Okay."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah." She grins. "It'll totally freak my parents out. With any luck."
"I don't get your family dynamic," I admit.
"Me neither," she says, turning to go. "I hope the wedding's fun."
The wedding's a disaster, and we aren't even there yet.
"I told you we were going to be late," I say to Mom from the backseat of the Volvo. "I _told you_."
"Ellis, it's going to be fine," Dad says, hands on the wheel.
"It's starting in fifteen minutes and we're still on the bridge," I point out. "We're going to be late, just like I told Mom we would be."
"Weddings don't start right on time," Mom says without turning around. "And I don't appreciate you blaming me."
I slump in my seat. Who else is there to blame? Was it me who only started to get ready a half hour before we were supposed to leave? Did _I_ do that? No, what I did was check the traffic report. What I did was give Mom a fifteen-minute warning. But it was like she hadn't heard me.
"Which shoes, do you think?" she had asked, showing me two identical pairs of black pumps.
"They look the same."
She held one pair up higher. "These are suede."
"Mom, whatever, who cares, we have to go."
She shrugged so quickly it almost looked like a wince. "I'll ask Emmy."
"Seriously, if we're not in the car by—"
"I only have to do my makeup," she said, padding to her attached bath. "And my hair."
"That's going to take forever, you don't have time!"
Mom looked away from the mirror, three different lipsticks in hand. "This is one of Dad's partners getting married."
"It's not his partner, it's a junior dentist we barely know."
"It doesn't matter who," she said. "They invited us to celebrate their marriage. It's one of the most important days of their life. The least I can do is look presentable."
"The least you can do is be on time."
She glared at me, then sighed. "Why don't you put on a little makeup while you wait for me? This color would look so pretty on you." She selected one of the lipsticks and held it out. "Here."
"I don't wear lipstick."
"First time for everything," she said, pushing it closer. "Come on, I'll show you how to do it."
___Is that all I'm for?_ I thought. _To make the world look prettier? Is that all I get? Is that all she wants for herself?_
I folded my arms and turned away. "No, thanks."
I heard the lipstick clatter on the sink counter. "Fine."
And now here we are, crawling through traffic on the Bay Bridge. I check my watch.
_Thirteen minutes until the wedding starts. You're going to be late._
I didn't even want to go. I know some girls daydream about their future wedding, making mock-ups of their modest-but-still-hot bridal gowns, debating over color palettes and whether tiaras are tacky. But every time the topic comes up, my brain shuts itself off like a panic-sensor light switch.
_Twelve minutes until the wedding starts. You're going to be late and everyone will see and stare at you._
I don't daydream about my wedding. I _actually_ dream. I dream that I'm in a white dress that's slowly constricting. The light is so bright I can't see around me. I can't see my family, or the other wedding guests, or even where I'm going. All I can see is my new husband, who has a suit, a crew cut, and a blurred-out face. I asked Martha about it once, if it meant anything.
"We don't use dreams as diagnostic criteria," she said. "They don't say anything either way about your mental health. But . . ." She paused. "Sometimes they do reveal things we don't like thinking about in the daytime."
_Eleven and a half minutes until the wedding starts, eleven and a quarter minutes until—_
I try to breathe deeper. It's just a wedding. A wedding like in the movies, with the bride walking down the aisle, to have and to hold, till death do you part. My mom has already told me my temple wedding won't be like that. Not even the _till death_ part, because we marry for time and all eternity. My wedding won't _just_ be a wedding, it'll be an eternal bond to the man I'll live with forever. Having a baby won't _just_ be giving birth, either, it'll be giving a waiting spirit the chance to have a body. Everything is something more, and I know that's a good thing, I know I should be happy my life has such a clear, straight path forward.
My chest is caving, I'm breathing in air but it's not reaching my lungs. I put my head between my knees.
"If we're going to talk about mistakes," I hear Mom say from the front seat, "if you're so comfortable talking about other people's mistakes, maybe we should all talk about your grades."
Why now? Why would she bring this up now, when we're already late and I'm already upset and it's all her fault? I breathe in heavier, but only drown faster.
"Pull over," I croak.
"What?" I hear Dad say.
"Pull over, you have to pull over!" I repeat, even though I haven't done this for years, beg for him to stop the car like this. But the walls are caving in on me, I can smell Mom's perfume, feel her elbow on the back of her seat as she twists around to look at me. I'm trapped, I'm so trapped, and I need to get out.
"Dad . . ." I hear Em say, soft and hesitant.
"She's fine," Mom interrupts. "Emmy, don't worry, she's fine."
I'd protest this, but feel I should concentrate my energy on not passing out.
"She doesn't look fine," Em says.
"She's only doing it because she doesn't want to talk about failing her chemistry test."
I find some air in the atmosphere, push myself up, and look my mother in the eye.
"A C-plus," I tell her, "is not _technically_ a failing grade."
After what feels like eons, we're off the bridge and in San Francisco. And in a stroke of luck or divine intervention on my behalf, we find a parking spot right outside Grace Cathedral. I practically throw myself out the car door when I heard Pachelbel's Canon from inside the church. Em is right behind me, smiling tightly, smoothing down a nonexistent stray hair.
"This is all her fault," I whisper to Em. "We're going to be walking in with the bride herself all because Mom couldn't be bothered to—"
"Oh my _gosh_ , shut _up_ ," Em snaps. And I do, if only out of surprise. Em doesn't tell anyone to shut up. Not even when she should. She keeps her smiles sweet and her words sweeter, even when she'd rather storm or cry.
"Don't blame me," I say. "This isn't my fault, she—"
Em stops dead in her tracks, and I only put one stumbling foot forward before stopping too.
"You made it worse, Ellis," she says, and every word is a precision dart. "Why do you always have to make it worse?"
She turns and stomps up the church steps, leaving me to quietly bleed out on the sidewalk.
When we get home late that afternoon, everyone seems to split apart. Em goes upstairs to change. Dad decides to return a work call in his room. Mom announces she's going to Safeway for groceries. And suddenly, I'm in the living room, all alone.
_They don't want to be around you._
I turn on the TV, but I can't hear it, no matter how much I turn up the volume.
_Your own family doesn't want to be around you. You make their lives worse. You make everything worse._
My eye catches on the family computer. There are some things I know that they don't. There are some things I won't make worse. I walk up the stairs to my room, open the top drawer of my desk, and pull out the thin plastic card I've taped to the top.
It turns out that if you keep a bag of change under your bed for half a decade, you end up with quite a bit of money. Turns out, those coin-counting machines at the supermarket actually work, though they will steal one quarter out of every fifty or so. Turns out, you don't have to get your payout in cash. You can get it in the form of an Amazon card.
_I shouldn't be doing this on the family computer_ , I think as I turn it on and open a browser. I should do it at school, or the library, but no one is here, I have a window, and time is of the essence.
_You make everything worse._
But I can make things better. When the end of the world comes, Em will see, I'll make everything better.
I scan the order list, second-guessing and reconsidering, as always.
A solar charger.
A survival weather radio.
Several extra-large packs of dehydrated food essentials, including ramen, vegetables, fruit. Also jerky, which I find disgusting but could be bartered for matches or protection in the New Ice Age.
Various winter clothing items, the warmer the better. Snowshoes, collapsible ones.
Dozens of single-use hand-warmers. Not just to keep your palms toasty, but to melt snow, keep liquids from freezing, and heat up an IV line, if it came to that.
Enough wool socks to free every house elf in the Harry Potter extended universe.
Good enough. For now.
I click order.
Nine
**HANNAH'S ALREADY STANDING** outside the ward building when we pull up on Sunday morning. As I get out of the car, I realize I forgot to mention certain things to her. Namely, the dress code. After introducing her to Mom, Dad, and Em, I pull Hannah off to the side. "I just want you to be prepared," I say. "The other girls probably won't be wearing pants."
She startles. "Girls can't wear pants?"
"No, we _can_." There's no rule against it. Just like there's no rule against men wearing non-white dress shirts or forgoing a tie. I never thought about how many expectations are unspoken. "We can, just most girls don't." She frowns. "It's not a big deal at all, I swear."
Hannah shrugs. "These are the nicest pants I own. I don't even own them. They're my mom's."
They do look a bit big on her. But really, she doesn't own a pair of dress pants? I mean, I guess I don't, either. I've only got skirts.
Mom, Dad, and Em are already ahead of us, so I lead Hannah into the building. Before we reach our pew, Lia appears in front of us, a vision in seafoam green. Her sundress has cap sleeves and a sweetheart neckline, the kind where you could almost see the top of her cleavage. If you were looking.
_Are you looking? Why would you even be_ _looking_ _?_
"Ellis!" Lia says, reaching her hand out to me. I twitch my arm back, without meaning to.
_You're being so weird. This isn't weird, friends can touch each other and it's not weird. You're just friends. It's not weird. STOP BEING WEIRD._
Lia must not notice, because she follows through and grabs me by the elbow. My muscles turn to Silly String. She smells like citrus and clean laundry.
_It's not weird for her to touch you, but it is definitely weird for you to be SMELLING HER, ELLIS._
I breathe in deeper.
"Hi, I'm Lia." She extends her left hand to shake Hannah's, but keeps her right hand on my elbow, and warmth spreads from her hand through my arm, through my veins, into my chest.
"I'm Hannah."
Lia nudges me. "You didn't say you were bringing a friend!"
I try to think of something funny to say. I try to think of something to say, period. But I feel like my mouth is stuffed with cotton balls. "Surprise?"
"You're always full of surprises," Lia says. When she shifts her weight, her long hair brushes against the bare skin on my arm. I almost shiver.
Hannah's looking at me out of the corner of her eye. "Yeah, Ellis has a few of those."
And I stand there like I'm waiting for something just out of reach.
Lia smiles at me, then turns back to Hannah. "Lucky for you, I basically planned our whole class today, so it'll be fun. See you later!"
She waves and glides into the chapel. Sunlight streaming in from the open door catches her hair, and for a moment, it gleams. When I turn back to Hannah, she's looking at me strangely. But she's always looking at something strangely, isn't she?
"What was her name?" Hannah asks. She couldn't possibly have forgotten already.
"Lia." I'm glad I'm not as pale as McKenna or even Hannah. Otherwise, I might be blushing.
"Right. Lia."
"Are you ready?"
Hannah looks like she's got more to say, but she nods. I lead her through the doors and to our regular pew.
"Today's not like regular church," I whisper to her during the opening hymn. That's another thing I forgot to mention. "It's fast and testimony."
"What's that?"
"People are going to stand." I point to the podium up front. "And they're going to talk about why they're LDS and what it means to them." That's the idea, anyway. Sometimes it's a free-for-all.
"And the fast part?"
"It means the audience might get hangry."
Here are the first three people who get up to the mic:
McKenna Cooper's dad, bearing his bragimony—I mean, testimony—about his three perfect children and the joys of six a.m. family scripture study until the entire ward feels inadequate.
Sister Keller, who weeps through the entire thing. The only part I catch is about the Spirit helping her find lost car keys.
Sister Olsen, who takes this opportunity to reflect on what a blessing the Gospel is to our souls, and similarly, what a blessing essential oils are to our bodies, and did she mention she has some free samples in her car, if we're interested?
Here are my thoughts on these testimonies, respectively:
Why
Lord
WHY
Hannah must think this is completely ridiculous. If I didn't know us, if I wasn't _part_ of us, I'd think that. Why aren't the people with beautiful testimonies standing up? Why isn't Brother Chang talking about how converting helped him recover from alcoholism? Why isn't Sister Christiansen telling the story about how knowing she'd see her dead daughter in the Celestial Kingdom helped her survive the grief? There are so many stories about our church family seeing each other through tragedy and loss. There are so many stories that explain why we're here, week after week. Hannah isn't hearing any of them. I wish she could.
Instead, she's watching six-year-old Hunter Cannon clench the mic with sticky hands and repeat the testimony his mom wrote for him.
"I know . . ." Sister Cannon whispers in his ear, as a prompt. Lots of testimonies start with these words: _I know._
"I know the church is true," Hunter lisps. "I know Joseph Smith was a pocket."
"Prophet."
"Prophet."
"I love my family. . . ."
"I love my family," Hunter continues. "I love my mama and my dad and my sister. I love Heavenly Father and Jesus and my dog, Buster." Sister Cannon smiles and starts to pull the mic away, but Hunter latches on with both sticky hands. "And please forgive my dad because yesterday he said _dammit_ and he's not supposed to. _InthenameofJesusChristAmen._ "
Sister Cannon goes red and hustles Hunter away from the altar. Hannah snorts. Well, at least I gave her some free entertainment. To my right, my mom puts three delicate fingers on my back. At first, I think it's a signal to stop Hannah from laughing, which would be weird, since everyone's laughing. But then, I realize Mom's pressing on my spine. If we weren't in the middle of church, she'd probably demand a full-on posture check. This involves touching your hands to your head, first, then laying them on your own shoulders. You put them to your waist, then all the way down. Heads, shoulders, perfect posture.
Tal would probably try to make this about religion, but none of the other moms in my ward do things like this. He'd say my mom acts this way because the church conditioned her to think her purpose was to be a perfect mother to perfect children. But I know she doesn't believe that. I know she'd be this way no matter what religion she followed, or if she followed nothing at all. This is who she is. I should be annoyed at her. I _am_ annoyed at her, but I also feel . . . sorry for her.
I clench my teeth, but straighten my back.
Hannah is a real trooper. She sits through the entire testimony meeting, then through my Laurels class, without complaint. Hannah is such a trooper that she even lets Sister Olsen drag her to the parking lot and give her essential oils sales pitch. And maybe Sister Olsen has some latent hypnotism powers, because Hannah appears to have a religious experience with one of the bottles. She takes a deep inhale and then visibly freezes. Her eyes go glassy, and she stares straight through me, unfocused.
"Hannah?" I say cautiously. She snaps out of it and covers the awkward moment with a smile and a question.
"What's in this one?" she asks Sister Olsen.
"Eucalyptus. Very good for relaxation and clear breathing."
Hannah doesn't look relaxed. She looks wired. And her breathing might be clear, but it's way faster than normal.
"I don't have any money on me," she says to Sister Olsen with an apologetic shrug. "Or I would."
"I'd never ask anyone to spend money on the Sabbath, dear." Sister Olsen presses something into Hannah's palm. "You just take my card."
Mom invites Hannah to stay for dinner, and Hannah accepts. It's the right choice. The dinners Mom makes after we've fasted all day are comfort-food heavy, and they're always delicious. When we get home, I take Hannah up to my room.
"Wow," she says, turning in a circle to get the whole view. "This is . . . not what I expected."
"What did you expect?"
"For it to look like you, I guess."
She's not wrong. The pastoral blue print on the curtains matches my bed skirt. The bookcase is a pink floral, the rug is a pink floral, too, and there are enough pink pillows to make up a whole other bed.
"I didn't decorate it," I explain. Hannah looks at the bulletin board over my desk, with pictures and ticket stubs and a single blue ribbon from my fourth-grade spelling bee. She touches a photo of my Young Women's group at girls' camp, all of us with knee-length shorts over one-piece bathing suits.
"Lia's pretty," Hannah says, looking at me out of the corner of her eye. "Really pretty."
"She's Mormon."
"Does that mean she can't be pretty?"
"She's not gay."
"Does _that_ mean she can't be pretty?"
"It means don't ask her out, or anything."
Hannah squints like she's trying to read something very far away. "I wasn't going to. I just thought maybe—"
"It doesn't matter anymore, right?" I interrupt, out of breath for no reason. "Those kinds of things."
"Pretty girls?"
"There's no dating in the apocalypse," I say, and mentally file it in my Top Ten Most Ridiculous Statements. "When the snow comes it doesn't matter who you want to snuggle up with. Except for body heat purposes. Which reminds me, we should talk about heat sources, because—"
"I'd want to know," Hannah blurts out. I stop talking, but then she hesitates. "I'd want to know who I was. If I didn't already, I'd want to figure it out. Before the world changed."
"But you do know," I reason.
"Yeah."
"So, you're fine."
"Yeah." She nods. "I'm fine."
"Good, that's good," I say briskly. Like if I rush through the words, I can rush away from this entire topic. I sit down on the bed, and she settles in next to me. "Hey, what happened in the parking lot? With Sister Olsen?"
"It was the right smell."
"The right—for what?"
"For the last day in the world."
It takes me a second to grasp it. "It smelled like your mom's old perfume."
She nods.
"Eucalyptus," I say. "You smell eucalyptus."
She nods again.
That's all at once so specific and not nearly specific enough. Eucalyptus grows all around Berkeley. It's not a plant that was even meant to grow in our dry, fire-prone hills. It's native to Australia and was brought over in the 1900s by people who needed lumber, but were unaware eucalyptus makes for crappy houses. The lumber companies folded. The trees were abandoned. Then they spread, multiplying and surviving against the odds. Now they're in every grove, foothill, and nature preserve, filling up the air with the deep, strong smell of mint and honey.
"It's not a person," I say, slowly getting to where Hannah already is. "It's a place. We need to go somewhere that smells like eucalyptus."
"I think so."
"Do you know where?"
She bites her lip. "There's so many eucalyptus trees."
I scoot closer to her. "Will you . . . tell me about it, now? The end of the world."
She looks away. "When we find Prophet Dan, he can help us—"
"But we might never find him," I point out. "He might have left town. He might be in jail, who knows?"
Hannah bites her lip, and her eyes are suddenly glassy. _Oh, I shouldn't have said that. She thinks we can't do it without him. I'm freaking her out._
"Sorry," I say, touching her shoulder. "It's okay, though. We can do it, we can interpret it. At the very least, we can try. Right?"
She waits a moment in silence before swallowing hard and nodding. "Okay. Okay."
"So first off . . ." I clasp my hands together and focus all my attention on her. "What kind is it?"
Hannah blinks. "Kind?"
"What kind of apocalypse?" Her expression doesn't change, so I elaborate. "A meteor. A nuclear attack. The Rapture, biblical or otherwise."
"Is there a _non_ -biblical kind of Rapture?" she asks.
"I don't know, my church doesn't do the Rapture—I'm asking what we're looking at here."
Hannah thinks for a moment. "There's snow."
"I remember, but—what does that mean? A blizzard?"
"I've never seen a blizzard," she admits. "But it's a lot of snow. Falling fast."
"How much snow?" I ask. It must be a lot, and over days, weeks, months, or it wouldn't destroy the world. A freak storm in an unprepared place would do damage, for sure. Roads would close, new shipments of food and medicine would be delayed. People on the road could get stuck. They could freeze. Everything could freeze, things that were never meant to. Pipes could break and flood houses and buildings. It would be a mess. But it wouldn't be the end of the world. "Exactly how much snow?"
She wipes her hands on her jeans. "I don't know."
"You don't _know_?"
"They're dreams," she says, with an edge. "Not the Weather Channel."
I deflate like a factory reject balloon. "Sorry."
She rubs at her arms, as if she's suddenly got hives. "It's not like I can just answer any question you ask. I see what I see, and I know what I know, but I don't have every answer."
"It's okay," I say. "Just close your eyes, and tell me what you've seen."
Hannah shuts her eyes. Her shoulders rise with an inhale, then descend with an exhale. "It's snowing. In my dreams, it's always snowing."
"Okay. It's snowing."
"It's winter."
"Are you saying that because it's snowing?" It could be a nuclear winter. It isn't necessarily winter _time_. This is the apocalypse, and anything is possible.
She shakes her head. "It's winter. I remember. You . . . say something about Christmas tree lights."
"So we must be in someone's house."
"No, we're outside. I know we're outside because snowflakes are falling on me. They're melting in my hair. It's cold. It's really, really cold, so cold my hands hurt, even though they're in my pockets."
We shouldn't be outside during a storm. It's not tactically advantageous. We should be taking shelter.
"We're somewhere unpaved," Hannah continues, "because it's grass and dirt under my feet, not sidewalk."
"What do you see?" I ask her. "From where you're standing, what do you see?"
"Nothing," she says, and it's almost a gasp. "I don't see anything."
"Because it's too dark?"
She shakes her head. "I should see something. From where we're standing, I should see San Francisco."
"But you don't?"
She shakes her head again. "There's nothing there. It's gone."
Something cold grips my chest. Then it spreads, like ice water, out from my lungs, to my shoulder, down my arms and legs into my fingers and toes until I'm one shivering mass of fear. It's _gone_? An entire city is just _gone_?
"You're sure?" I ask.
She nods. "There's only snow."
I don't even know what would cause that, an entire city disappearing. A nuclear bomb? Possible, but then we _definitely_ shouldn't be outside, not even on higher ground. A superstorm so large it alters global temperatures? Glaciers moving in from the ocean and destroying the city? San Francisco has low-lying areas, for sure, but it also has hills. Lots of hills. How could they all disappear?
"And you're there," she says, opening her eyes to look at me. "That's the clearest thing. The only clear thing. Every night, in every dream, you are there with me."
She pauses, running her hand over my bedspread. "When you came out of Martha's office, you were like . . . God." She shakes her head.
"I was like God?" I joke. "I made a believer out of you?"
She cracks a smile. "Not the way you mean, but yeah. I'd been having these dreams for months, and nothing was clear and nothing made sense, except I saw this girl. I didn't know her, but I did. I'd been waiting so long for things to make sense, so long to figure out who you were. And when I finally did . . ." She lets out a breath. "That's when I knew it was real. You were real. So it was real."
A sign from the universe. A revelation in a human body. I'm a lot of things, but I never thought I'd be someone's revelation.
"And then that's when I started . . ." Then she trails off, looking away from me.
"What?"
"It's going to sound ridiculous."
"At this point, nothing does," I assure her.
She reaches into her hoodie pocket and pulls out a folded piece of notebook paper. "I started writing stuff down. Things I—well, not heard, exactly, in the dreams. Things I know."
"I don't understand."
"When I wake up each morning," she explains slowly, "I've got, like, phrases in my head. Facts. Things I know."
"But how do you know them?" I ask.
"When you wake up in the morning, you know the sky is blue and your name is Ellis. You don't have to open the curtains or check your ID. You already _know_."
"I get it," I say, then reach my hand out hesitantly. "Can I . . . see it?"
She gives it over with both hands, like it's something fragile. I can't read most of it. Her handwriting's awful. Even what I can read is confusing and strange.
_The city disappears._ San Francisco, I guess.
_A star falls from the sky and breaks to pieces._ A meteor is a star, but they don't break when they hit land, so I don't know.
_A red sky before midnight._ I've got nothing.
___One becomes two, then two becomes one._ Ditto.
"I can see why you wanted Prophet Dan," I admit.
"I might understand the first one," she says. I gesture for her to continue. "First, there was just me. One person, having dreams, one person who believed they were real. And then I told you, and—" Her voice wavers slightly. "You believed me. So there were two. And I think, when we're up on the higher ground, when we're watching the world end and you grab my hand, we'll be . . . bound. You know? Tied together. One."
"Hannah," I say. "There's nothing here about when it's going to happen." She stares at me. "Like, the date. We can't warn people if we don't know the date."
"It's before the end of the year," she says. "I wrote that." She points to another line. "And that."
I read the line. It's only three words. _The longest night._
"That's the day?" I ask.
"No. It's night. It happens at night."
"I mean, that's the _date_? That's not actually a date."
"They're connected," she insists, taking the paper back. "It happens on the longest night."
The longest night. Maybe it's a worldwide power grid failure. A solar flare could cause that, and so could the skilled detonation of an electromagnetic pulse—maybe it's the longest night because the artificial lights never come back on. I can work with that. EMPs are the bread and shelf-stable butter of the prepping community.
"Do you see house lights?" I ask Hannah, anticipating a no, already making a mental list of next steps. Wind-up flashlights, citronella oil for outside lamps, storing cell phones in the microwave as a makeshift Faraday cage.
"Yeah. And car lights."
My list erases. "You do?"
"Yes."
So much for that. "I should be writing this down." I grab Kenny #14 and a pen off my desk, flip to a fresh page, and scribble everything she's told me so far. _The longest night. Eucalyptus. One becomes two, then—_
"Of course!" I shout. " _Of course_."
Hannah looks over my shoulder. "What?"
My dad once told me something he learned in dental school: when you hear hoofbeats, look for horses, not zebras. Basically, that means when presented with a problem, look first for the most obvious solution, not the most interesting or exciting. I was so fixated on a (literally) flashy EMP, I almost didn't see what was right in front of me. I put my finger on what I've just written:
_One becomes two, then two becomes one._
"That's it." She looks up at me, confused. I write next to the line:
_1_ ➝ _2 2_ ➝ _1_
Then, on a new line:
_12 21_
"Oh!" Hannah says, and takes the pen to add the slash herself.
_12/21_
"One becomes two," she says. "Then two becomes one. December 21st."
"Do you know what that date is?" I ask.
She looks shocked, the blood drained from her face. "Do _you_?"
"Yeah. The winter solstice. It's the longest night of the year."
"Oh," she says, recovering. "Right. Yeah."
We sit for a moment with this. A date. A real date, less than two months from now. The last day of the world we know.
"What's it like?" I blurt out. "After. Can you see after?"
"I can't see it," she admits. "I can feel it, though."
"What's it like?" I sound like a child. It's frustrating, having to ask for every scrap of information, but I can't pretend I'm not grateful to have it.
"It's . . . complicated. Good and bad. Joyful. Crushing. Like every feeling at once."
"The end of the world," I say slowly, "as we know it."
Hannah nods, solemn and sure. I grab her arm, harder than I mean to. Her eyes go wide, but she doesn't pull away.
"We have to tell people," I say.
Her eyes get wider. "We don't need anyone else. As long as you're there, things will happen the way they're supposed to."
"We might not need them, but they need us." Hannah only frowns. "If the world is ending . . ." I swallow. "The world _is_ ending. People have a right to know that. They have a right to decide what they're going to do with their last normal days."
She still looks confused, and unsure. And you can't have a prophet that's unsure. "People have a right to know," I say again. "So that means we have a duty to tell them."
We sit there, staring at each other, until a knock on my door breaks the silence.
Hannah gets to her feet and opens the door for Em.
"Mom says to help me set the table," Em says. "Ellis, are you okay?"
I must have been staring straight through her, my mind in overdrive with everything I've learned, everything I now need to do. Knowledge is power, but it's also responsibility, didn't Dad always say that? We need to make a website. We need to make flyers and pass them out, we need to get our message to the world. We need to stockpile the supplies we have and buy new ones. We need to get prepared.
But first, dinner.
After dinner, my dad asks Hannah if she needs a ride home, but she declines.
"It's not far."
Mom looks worried. "It's dark, though. I'm sure your parents wouldn't want you walking in the dark."
"You'd think, wouldn't you?" Hannah asks.
"So Andy will drive you," Mom says.
"That's very nice of you," Hannah says. "But cars and I don't mix. Thank you, though."
Then, Mom does something truly miraculous: she defers to a teenage girl.
As I walk Hannah out our front door, I can't help but ask, "Are you afraid of cars?"
"No," she says.
"It's okay if you are. I'm afraid of cars. Driving, not being a passenger, but—"
"I just don't like them, it's not the same . . ." She trails off, staring at something ahead. She walks to the end of our driveway, where the mailbox is. Then I see it. A package, wrapped in newspaper and tied with a bedraggled ribbon.
Hannah immediately grabs it, which is so odd. It was tied to our mailbox, it's probably for us. I'm about to ask if there's a label, but she's already undoing it. Inside the newspaper is one long, thin piece of scarlet string.
"What is it?"
"A gift," Hannah mutters, letting the newspaper fall to the ground. She winds the string around her left wrist.
"What for?"
"To keep away the evil eye."
"The evil eye?" I have so many questions. What evil are you afraid of? How do you know this gift is for you? What's string going to do against evil, anyway? "Who is it from?"
Hannah ties the string around her wrist, like a bracelet. "I'll see you at school. Good night, Ellis."
And then she walks into the dark, leaving me, as always, with more questions than answers.
Ten
**I DON'T SEE** Hannah the next day at school. Or the next. Or the next. I ask the boys, but they haven't seen her either. It's Thursday before I happen to spot her on my way to the bus stop. She's standing outside a restaurant across the street, talking to a man with a knit hat, a shopping cart, and very long hair. He says something to her, and it must be weird or gross, because she immediately goes to leave. She only gets two steps away before she turns back, makes an apologetic gesture, and they trade goodbyes. Then she really does leave, with a wave.
So it wasn't something weird or gross, and why did I even assume that? He told her something important.
I break my long-held rule on jaywalking, not wanting to lose Hannah in the crowd. She's practically speedwalking, and not in the direction of the Park.
"Hannah!" I call out, when I'm close enough to be heard. She whips her head around.
"Hey," she says, stopping before the crosswalk, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.
"I feel like I haven't seen you in forever," I say.
"Yeah, I've been . . ." She shrugs, apparently declining to finish the sentence.
"Where are you going?" I ask.
"Home."
"Oh. Okay." I try to hide my hurt. She's not the first person to blow me off. "See you tomorrow, I guess." I turn to go.
"Wait," she says, and I stop. "I'm coming back, I just have to pick something up."
"Oh. What?"
"A package, I think—look, if you want to come with me, you can, but I've got to keep walking."
I'm not going to pass up an opportunity to see anything that helps me understand Hannah better. Especially not something like her house. So we walk on.
Hannah's house is one of those modern Berkeley homes built on an upward-sloping street. Square windows, clean lines, so unlike the older, more ornate ones you find farther up in the hills. Hannah's house is minimalist, just like her. On the outside.
Inside, it's warm and cluttered and a bit dusty. Shoes under the dining room table, coats and jackets on the backs of chairs rather than hung up, and books on every available surface. Hannah's fluffy dog jumps to greet us, leaving white fur all over my black sweater. My mom would never tolerate a house like this. I never want to leave.
Hannah drops her backpack by the door, but I keep mine on. She leads me through the kitchen and out a set of glass doors to the back porch. I walk forward to take in her backyard, which is beautifully overgrown. The kind of place where you could curl up with a book and a sandwich and not worry about getting crumbs anywhere or accidentally squashing freshly planted tulip beds.
"This must have been the best place to be a kid," I say, turning back to Hannah. But she doesn't hear me. She moves to the porch wall, where, nearly hidden by recycling bins and a compost pail, something beige and thin is stuck in the wooden lattice.
"When were you even _here_?" she whispers, plucking the letter from the slat.
It's a basic envelope, and it's addressed to Hannah. But there's no return address. And no stamp. How did it get here? Who left it?
Before I can ask, a balding middle-aged man in a blue suit appears in the open doorway.
"Hey," he says to Hannah. "You're home early."
Hannah slides the letter into the waistband of her jeans. "You too, Dad."
"We had to get changed—Mom was just about to leave you a note." He leans over to shake my hand. "I'm Jacob."
"It's very nice to meet you. I'm Ellis."
"Like the island?" he says.
Like Ellis Shipp, one of the first female doctors west of the Mississippi, but sure. "Like the island."
"You and Mom are going out?" Hannah says, eyes flicking from his suit jacket down to his dress shoes.
"Some thing with her department. We're meeting up with Matt Mackenzie at his place first."
Hannah's impassive shrug doesn't quite hide her disappointment. "Fine."
Just then, Hannah's mom breezes into the room. Everything she's wearing is flowy but still expensive looking. That's a big thing around here. Hippie chic. Less Birkenstocks and hemp, more Eileen Fisher and locally sourced statement earrings. She smiles, and introduces herself as Isabel.
"What are you doing out here?" she asks Hannah.
"Just showing Ellis the backyard," Hannah says. "Are you going to be home for dinner?"
Her mom adjusts an earring. "I doubt it."
"You shouldn't wait on us," Hannah's dad says.
"Get whatever you two want for dinner," Hannah's mom tells her. "You've got the card number."
"Okay."
"Lock the back door before you go to bed."
"Okay."
"The dog's been fed, no matter how she acts."
"Okay," Hannah says, as the aforementioned dog paws at her. "Laska, get _down_."
Huh. Hannah's mom is nice to her—no comments about her outfit, no poking or prodding or passive aggression. But it's weird. She doesn't ask Hannah about her day. She doesn't even ask about me. Hannah's mom doesn't talk to her like a daughter. She talks to her like a roommate.
They're out the door before I can even thank them for offering to feed me, an almost complete stranger. When I look over at Hannah, she's staring at the door—past the door—eyes narrowed, shoulders slumped.
"Hey," I say. "Are you—"
"Sorry they were so awkward," Hannah interrupts, pulling the letter out of her jeans. "It's not that they didn't want to meet you, or whatever."
"Oh."
"They don't like being in the house," she says. "Which is fucked up, but I get it."
That's concerning. "What's wrong with your house? I love your house."
But she doesn't hear me. She's torn open the letter with no stamps, revealing crumpled, smudged notebook paper inside. I resist reading over her shoulder. For all of five seconds. I can only make out the first few words of each line.
**_D_** _on't keep asking around you don't understand what you're doing_
**_J_** _oin me if you believe me but this isn't helping you're the one who needs_
**_M_** _aking sure you're safe but you'll never be until_
The first letter of each line is darker, bolder, like someone was making a point. As I try to read over her shoulder, that's what I see, those first letters repeated down the page. _D_ , _J_ , _M_. _D_ , _J_ , _M_. I could read more, if Hannah's hand weren't shaking.
**_J_** _ust let go Hannah you need to let_
Hannah folds the letter up just as it came, on each original crease.
"Are you—" I ask, but then I don't know how to finish the sentence. _Okay? In danger?_
"I'm fine."
"Hannah, what was that letter? Who _sent_ that to you?" I ask.
"Sometimes I'm not even sure, anymore," she says, which makes zero sense, especially as she tucks it gently, carefully, into her backpack.
I could ask her again. I should ask her, I should demand she tell me what's going on, refuse to help her with one more thing until I'm certain I know everything. But she wouldn't tell me, and then where would I be? Certain the world was ending, uncertain about everything else. If I have to choose, I'll let the letter go.
Hannah zips her backpack. "Let's go to the Park."
When Hannah and I get to the Park, Theo and Sam are in the throes of a contentious game of Five-Word Books.
"Mice, cats, pigs, and fascism," Sam says.
" _Animal Farm_?" Theo guesses.
"Um, no. _Maus_."
" _Animal Farm_ works too."
"No, it doesn't. There aren't any mice. There are horses, human, and allegorical Marxist pigs, but no mice."
"You're the worst."
"I'm a treasure," Sam says.
"That must be why I want to bury you on a desert island and not come back for twenty years."
"Can you two go one day without a death threat?" Hannah asks them as we approach.
"Never tried," Sam says.
"Where have you guys been?" Tal asks.
"I'm going up in the tree," Hannah says, one foot already on the trunk. I didn't see her take it out of her bag, but the letter's in her back pocket again. Tal frowns, then looks at me.
I shrug. He frowns harder.
"Five-Word Books, I'm in," I say, settling down in an empty spot between Tal and Sam. "Here's one: British children create murder society."
" _Lord of the Flies_ ," Theo correctly guesses, then passes a joint across me, to Tal. "Hey, can you relight it?"
Tal flicks on his Zippo, and I try not to shrink away. I fail.
"You okay?" Sam asks.
"I don't like fire," I explain.
"That's a little weird," Tal mumbles, but sticks the lighter back in his pocket. "What did fire ever do to you?"
"It burned down the Library of Alexandria," I say.
"I don't think that was personal, Ellis," Tal says.
"That's a rough thing to be afraid of," Sam agrees. "Fire is life."
He has no idea. Surviving practically any doomsday scenario requires the controlled, skilled use of fire. The world hasn't even ended yet and I've got lighters, accelerants, and fire steel. What's going to happen when the snow comes and I'm too scared to light a match?
"Tell me something I don't know," I say to Sam.
"Sea cucumbers hurl their own internal organs at predators when they feel threatened."
Theo coughs. "What?"
Sam gestures to me. "Well, did you know that?"
"No," I admit.
He turns to Theo. "See?"
Theo ignores him, focusing on me. "Fire's not as destructive as you think. Sometimes it's not even as destructive as you _want_ it to be."
I shake my head. "What do you mean?"
"Okay," Theo says. "So one time, when I was, like, thirteen, my mom came into my room to ask me something. But then she stopped, and paused, and was like, 'I can tell you have drugs, your room smells like drugs.'"
"What did it smell like before?" Sam asks. "Masturbation and Doritos?"
Theo shoves him. "I have no idea how she did it. It was this one tiny baby joint in my sock drawer. How could she possibly have smelled that?"
"Dude, she didn't." Tal laughs. "She probably saw it when she was putting your laundry away. She already knew it was there, she wanted to see if you'd tell her."
"Yeah, well, I did," Theo says. "She can be very scary."
"So then what happened?" I ask. I can't imagine what my mom would do if she found drugs in my room. We'd probably abandon the house entirely and start over in Antarctica.
"She took the joint into the kitchen and—" Theo grins. "I'm not sure what she was thinking. I guess she meant it, as like, some big dramatic gesture, but . . . she lit a stove burner and set it on fire."
Tal bursts out laughing. It takes me a second to realize. "Oh no," I say.
"The whole house," Theo says, "smelled like the Grateful Dead tour bus."
"And what, now your parents are okay with it?" I ask, eyes flicking down to the joint in Theo's hand.
"Hell no," he says. "But I don't bring it home anymore, my grades are excellent, somehow, and they're never had to bail me out of jail." He leans back on one hand. "A little bit of denial goes a long way."
Sam sticks his hand up. "I was in denial the first time I found my dad's weed."
I choke. " _You_ found your _dad's_?"
"Sixth grade. I needed a stapler, went looking for one in his office out back, and found, like, four film canisters in the top drawer of the desk. And at first, I just shoved them aside, but then I was like, wait, he doesn't even own a film camera, so what the hell's in here?" Sam looks up at the sky pensively. "A lot of things suddenly made sense. No adult is that happy at Disneyland."
I think my mom had a borderline religious experience at Cinderella's castle one time, but I'll keep that to myself.
"It's almost like a Gettier problem," I say. "Drugs in a film canister."
"A what now?" Tal asks.
"A Gettier problem, it's a philosophy thing," I say. I can just about see the pages in Kenny #12 where I copied the information down. In red ink. "It's supposed to show that you can have a justified true belief of something, but that doesn't mean you have knowledge. You know?"
"Nope," Theo says.
"That 'nope,' but squared," Sam says.
"Okay, okay." I spread my hands out. "Sam. Let's say you're standing on the edge of a really big field in farm country. There are lots of hills."
"Does it matter that it's hilly?" Tal asks.
I point at him. "It actually does. Don't interrupt." I turn back to Sam. "You're standing by this field. In the distance, you see something that looks exactly like a sheep. So your first thought is, 'There's a sheep in the field.' Just like your first thought when you saw a film canister was, 'There's film in this film canister.' You have a justified belief in that, but that doesn't mean it's true. Because your dad was hiding drugs, and that sheep is actually a dog dressed up to _look_ like a sheep."
"Oh, this is why philosophy sucks," Tal says.
"Whatever, I'd rather go pet a dog than a sheep," Sam says.
"No, but then wait," I cut in. "Let's say there _is_ a sheep in the field. It's behind one of the hills. So your original thought was a justified _and_ true belief, even though you couldn't _see_ the sheep. But does that count as knowledge? If not, what is it?"
Two feet thump to the ground, just inches away from my hand. I pull it back and stare up at Hannah. She doesn't look like she's dropped gently from the branches this time. She looks like she's been hurtled down to Earth.
"That's not Sam's fault," she says, sinking down next to me and resting her back against the tree. "That's not fair."
I draw back, surprised by the fierceness in her voice and the tightness in her face. "It's not real, Hannah."
"It's a metaphor," Tal explains.
"What's a metaphor?" Sam asks.
"A place to keep your cow," Theo says.
I throw up my hands. "It's a sheep, not a cow, and it's a thought experiment, not a metaphor."
"It's not fair," Hannah repeats. "Someone set him up to see a sheep and then got mad when he did?"
"No one's mad," Sam says quietly.
"People don't see things out of nothing," Hannah says, even quieter. "It comes from somewhere. It always come from somewhere."
Theo touches Hannah on the shoulder. "Hey. Let's get snacks from E-Z Stop." She shakes her head, but he doesn't let up. "I was there yesterday, they got the weird Israeli peanut things you like back in stock."
She cracks a smile. "Bamba. They're delicious. Don't knock it."
Theo stands. "Come on, my treat."
Hannah gets to her feet. Sam scrambles up, too.
"You guys want anything?" Theo asks me and Tal. We shake our heads. After the three of them walk away, Tal pulls out his lighter again and starts to singe the tip of a grass blade, holding the grass close until it blackens and shrivels.
_He's going to start a fire, and you're going to get burned, or blamed, or both._
"Should you really be doing that?" I ask. I'm starting to get less freaked out about people doing drugs around me, but arson is a bridge too far.
_He's going to start a fire big enough to have its_ __ _own weather system, which is a real thing that can happen. And it's windy, so then it'll become a fire tornado, which is another real thing that can happen._
"Relax, you're perfectly safe," he says, but does stamp on the burnt grass blade. "I'm very careful."
"I've seen you light curtains on fire."
"I was nine!" he protests. "Which makes it a little more forgivable than the time I was fourteen, bored at my mom's house, and wanted to test out—for science—the difference between flammable and _in_ flammable."
"They both mean you can light it on fire."
"Yeah, I know that now," Tal says. "One gigantic steel wool fireball later."
I've only used steel wool to clean our kitchen sink but I laugh at the image. "I don't get it. Weren't you scared? Aren't you scared?"
He frowns. "Of what?"
"Getting burned. Getting . . . hurt."
"But that's the whole point of life," he says. "Isn't it?"
I stare at him. "Lighting yourself on fire?"
"Yes!" he says. "I mean, not on purpose, but everything's got danger. Everything's got risk. If it's good, anyway."
"Things can be good and safe," I say. "It's possible."
He leans forward. "Humans need water, right? Water's good. But water can drown you. I bet you like funeral potatoes right out of the oven, but that pan could burn you."
"You're supposed to let them sit for fifteen minutes before serving."
"Ellis, oh my _God_ ," he says. "My point is, everything good in the whole world could hurt you. Doesn't mean it will."
_But it could, it always could. Anything could hurt you, everything could hurt you, he could hurt you. Don't get comfortable. Don't forget all the terrible things that could happen._
_Could_ is a horrible word.
"You only want the safe parts," he goes on. "It doesn't work that way."
"It can," I say, thinking of the stockpiled supplies in my closet at home. All the facts, the knowledge scribbled down in my notebooks. I've worked for years to make myself safe, and now he's saying it's not even possible?
"It can't!" he says. "It's part of the deal. Sometimes you just get burned. Just, like, as a hypothetical," he says, "What if one day, you want to tell someone you like them. They could shoot you down. That burns. It hurts."
"But they could . . ." I clear my throat. "They could also say they like you back."
"Yeah," he says, looking down at the grass. "They could."
I look over his shoulder at Sam, Theo, and Hannah returning with armfuls of snacks, and think maybe, occasionally, _could_ isn't such a horrible word, after all.
The second I shut the front door, Mom is already yelling down to me from the second floor.
"Ellis!"
She's never upstairs when I come home. The computer is down here, the TV is down here, the only thing upstairs is our bedrooms.
"What?" I call back up.
"Come up here."
I sigh and dump my backpack by the couch. When I get to the top of the stairs, I turn left, toward the master bedroom.
"No." I whip around to see Mom standing in the doorway of my room. "In here."
For a moment, I just stare at her. Then, feeling eerily like I'm walking toward a newly constructed gallows, I follow her into my room.
It isn't the way I left it. The drawers on my dresser are open. Books have been moved, restacked. My closet door is ajar, and I always close it before leaving.
"Is there something you'd like to tell me?" she asks.
_How about get out of my room?_ I think. What she means is: "You're in trouble, and I'd like you to figure out why."
"Don't bother lying," Mom adds. "I know all about it."
In another life, my mother would have made a great lawyer. Or cop. Or CIA black-site interrogator. But this is not my first cross-examination, and I know the only way to minimize the damage is to minimize my words. So I swallow hard and wait her out.
"You were seen," Mom says, "at the drug park."
My body goes cold all over. She stares me down.
"Do you mean the dog park?" I ask, trying to sound casual, trying to keep my bubbling panic from leaking out of my pores.
"Why would you be at a dog park? We don't have a dog."
"Why would I be at a drug park? That's not a thing."
"Helen Olsen _saw you_. She was leaving the YMCA and she saw you."
Ratted on by a woman who sells essential oils out of the trunk of her Subaru. My life is a joke.
I spread my hands. "I don't know what Sister Olsen thinks she saw, but—"
"She saw you at the park next to your school, a known hangout for children to drink and do drugs."
"The park, or the high school?"
She glares at me. "She saw you with boys. Several boys. She thought they were passing something around."
I get a sudden image of Sister Olsen crouching behind a bush with binoculars and a tape recorder, like a private eye. I fight back a giggle. The giggle wins.
"Is this funny to you?" Mom says. "Are you high? Are you high right now? Let me look at your eyes." She reaches for my face, and I bat her away.
"This is ridiculous, you're tearing my room apart because Sister Olsen spied on me in a public park?"
"Oh, so you _were_ there?"
I walked into that. "Yes, but—"
"And what were you doing with those boys?"
"Just hanging out. They're my friends."
"Do these friends share your standards?"
I resist rolling my eyes. What she means is: _Your friends are not like you, and this is worse than having no friends at all._ What she means is: _Avoid the appearance of evil, even if that means you never do anything at all._
"They were nice to me. They like me. I like them."
"People will judge you by the company you keep, Ellis."
"Do what is right and let the consequence follow," I say, just to piss her off. That hymn has been quoted for a lot of purposes, but I doubt it's ever been used to justify befriending a group of stoners.
"Well, here it is." She yanks open another desk drawer and starts pawing through it. "Here's the consequence."
"Mom—"
"Go downstairs."
"But you can't—"
"Don't tell me what I can't do," she snaps. All my bubbling panic is suddenly replaced by anger, red-hot and unstable. She's blocking me from my room, the place that's safe, the place that's mine. We stare at each other, but she has to tilt her head up. That's not new. I've been taller than her since I was fourteen. But for the first time, I realize that if I wanted to, I could push her out of the way. For the first time, I seriously consider it.
"Downstairs," she says. "Now."
I swallow my pride. I swallow all my terrible thoughts. I leave her in the doorway.
Eleven
**OUR COUCH ISN'T** as nice as Martha's. I'm sure it was more expensive. I'm sure it ties the room together. But I can't sink into it. And sitting here alone, while Mom is upstairs systematically destroying my room, it's never felt more uncomfortable.
When Dad comes in the door, it's obvious Mom texted him, because he heads straight for the stairs.
"Dad," I call out to him, half rising from the couch. If he'd stop, I can explain before Mom sets the stage for Our Daughter's Downward Spiral, a three-act tragedy ending with me selling my teeth for black-tar heroin. If he'd stop, I could make him understand. But he only throws me one sidelong look before continuing up the stairs. The disappointment in his eyes socks me in the stomach. I slump back down on the couch.
After ten minutes of hushed conversation and a couple of disconcerting thumps, Dad comes back down. He sits in his favorite chair. I avoid his eyes, focusing on the dark wood of the table between us.
Upstairs, something solid and heavy lands on the floor.
"What's she doing?" I look up at the ceiling.
"She's looking at the things you bought."
Oh no. "Do you mean my new books?"
"I mean your new subzero sleeping bag."
There's another bang upstairs. My temper crackles again.
I meet Dad's eyes. This time, I don't look away. "Why aren't you stopping her?"
He does an honest-to-goodness double take. "Excuse me?"
"She's trashing my room, she's going through stuff I bought with my own money. It's not fair."
"Fair," he repeats, like he's never heard the word before.
"They're _my_ things."
"They're in _our_ house and you're _our_ sixteen-year-old daughter."
That only adds heat to the brush fire inside my chest. "So you and Mom own me like you own the house?"
"We have a mortgage, Ellis."
That's fine. The bank can raise me. I'd prefer it.
"Is this okay to you?" I ask. He shuts his eyes. Sighs. "Do you think what she's doing is okay?" I ask again, willing my voice not to crack.
"I wish she wouldn't handle it like this."
"Then do something about it."
He shakes his head, like, _Not going to happen_. I wonder if it's hard sitting upright, with absolutely no backbone.
"You're my dad." And this time, my voice does crack. "She's awful to me, all the time, and you know she shouldn't be, so why don't you ever do anything about it?"
Dad opens his mouth, but stops when we both hear the stomp of Mom's shoes on the stairs. With flinty eyes and perfect posture, she lowers herself next to me. I shrink away.
"Explain," Mom says.
I explain. Or, I explain as much as I need to. I tell them about Hannah, a girl who has dreams about the end of the world. I tell them about the way she seems to know things before I say them. I tell them that the last days are coming soon, with snow and ice.
I don't tell them what day it's coming. I don't tell them Hannah is a client of Martha's. I don't tell them Hannah has secrets she hasn't yet shared. I'm exactly as honest as I need to be, and nothing more.
When I'm done, Mom and Dad just look at me. _Bewildered_ , a word that implies being lost in the wild. That's exactly how they look. Totally lost.
Mom sighs, long and heavy. "You bought these things because your friend told you the world was ending."
"Yes."
"And you believed her."
"Yes."
Mom blinks at me. "Why?"
What an odd question, coming from her. I've heard Mom asked the same question, by family friends who are secular: Why do you believe what you do? And I've seen her smile serenely and say: _Because first I felt its truth, and then I lived its truth_.
There's no other answer to give.
"I had a personal revelation."
Mom and Dad look at each other. Then back at me.
"I prayed to know if it was true. And it is. Because when I prayed, when I asked if it was true, I felt the Spirit."
More silence. More staring.
"I felt the Spirit," I say again, because clearly they didn't hear me. "I asked for a revelation, I got a revelation, I felt the—"
Mom waves her hand, pushing the words away. "No, honey, you didn't."
My throat constricts. I force it open. "Yes, I did."
"I'm sure it seemed like the same thing," Dad says, "but it wasn't, not if it you made you afraid like this. 'Faith is the opposite of fear,' didn't we teach you that?"
I have faith. And I have fear. I believe in my religion. And I believe in Hannah.
"I prayed to know the truth," I say. "You taught me that, too. And I received an answer."
"Because you _wanted to_ , Ellis," Mom insists. "Because this is something that worries you and you want to feel like you're in control of it." She throws up her hands. "And apparently, you'd believe any crackpot on a street corner who said you _could_ be in control of it."
My eyes sting. Who is she to talk about _control_? If I want control, at least it's for something bigger, something that matters, not policing how my daughter looks and talks and feels. When I look back up at Mom, her face has softened, just a bit.
"What you felt was not the Spirit," Mom says. "What you felt was your anxiety."
I don't believe that. If she were right, how could you ever know what you were feeling was real? How could anyone trust a revelation or prompting? How could anyone trust someone _else's_ revelation? The church is built on new revelations. If I can't trust my own promptings, how can I trust any at all?
"How do you know this isn't the Spirit?" I say, my eyes flicking from Dad to Mom, then back to Dad. "How am _I_ supposed to know it isn't real, when it feels so real?"
"The next time you have a 'revelation,'" Mom says, and I can _hear_ air quotes around the word, "you should tell Bishop Keller."
"Or I can pray with you," Dad offers, "and tell you whether this is a real prompting."
Oh, of course. Men. Men with power and Y chromosomes and righteous dominion over me. The only people who could possibly tell me which of my own feelings to trust and which to dismiss as hysteria are _men_.
I stare at Mom. "Why would Bishop Keller automatically know better than me? Because he's a priesthood holder and I'm just a girl?"
"Of course not, that isn't—" Mom flounders. "This is his job. He was called to be our spiritual leader."
"Yeah, well, a year ago he was just your accountant."
"Ellis!" Dad gasps.
Mom shakes her head. "What's the matter with you?"
I have no idea what's the matter with me.
But I also know what I felt was real. And true. And mine.
"I don't care what you say," I tell my mom. Her jaw sets. "I don't care what Dad says. I don't care what Bishop Keller or the stake president or every priesthood-holding seventh-grade boy says. The end of the world is coming, and it's coming soon."
I push myself off the couch and storm toward the stairs. Mom springs up and grabs my upper arm in a death grip.
"I am not letting you do this to yourself," she says. "You are not going to hurt yourself like this. It ends now, Ellis, do you understand me? Right now."
"December, actually," I tell her. "It'll all end in December."
I feel a cold kind of triumph at the flicker of real fear that passes over her face. She steps back a half inch but doesn't let go of my arm.
"From now on," she says, and I can tell she's working to keep her voice even, "you will come straight home after school. Therapy, church, or home. That's it. No internet, no hanging out in parks, and no seeing Hannah ever again."
"Fine!" I yell, when what I really mean is _try to stop me_. Her grip tightens.
"I mean it," she says, soft and deadly. "Don't push me on this."
"Or what? You'll take away all the _freedom_ I have? You'll trash my room again? You'll yell at me, you'll make me feel horrible and worthless?" I lean in. "Or will you come up with something new?"
Then Dad is there, prying Mom's hand off me finger by finger. "Go to your room," he orders me.
"Fine!" I yell again. This time I do mean it.
Dad knocks on my door an hour later, and opens it without pausing for me to invite him. I guess I've given up any kind of privacy. He sits down on the bed next to me. I wait for him to say something. I guess he's waiting too, because we sit like that, in silence, until finally I can't take it anymore.
"Why does she hate me?" I blurt out.
Dad looks stricken. But he doesn't have to ask who I mean. "She doesn't hate you."
"She does."
"Don't say that."
"Why not?" I demand.
"Because it's not nice."
"What does it matter if it's nice, it's true!"
"It's not." I look away. He touches me on the shoulder, but I don't look back. "Elk. You don't believe that."
He doesn't know what I believe. I rub at my eye.
"Your mom doesn't hate you. She loves you, she loves you like you can't even imagine. She just . . ." He sighs. "She just wants what's best for you."
But how is she so sure what that is? How does everyone seem so sure of what's best for me? And don't I get a say in that?
"She doesn't always handle it the right way," Dad acknowledges, "but it's never because she _hates_ you. Just before she got pregnant with you, she had this dream—"
I screw my eyes shut, because I know this, of course I know this, they've only told me a thousand times.
"We'd only talked about having a baby—hadn't made a decision or anything—but she dreamed of being in a green, beautiful garden, with sky all around her, and a graceful, beautiful young woman sitting beside her. Your mom could feel how special this girl was, how pure and precious. The girl said her name was Ellis, and that they'd see each other again soon."
When I was little, I loved this story. I loved the idea that my mom had met me when I was still a spirit just waiting for a body. I loved the idea that I was fated to be born into my family, that my very existence was ordered and planned. But the older I got, the more distant I felt from the girl in the garden. Beautiful? Not especially. Graceful? Almost never.
The older I got, the more I thought my mom was given the wrong daughter.
"She doesn't like me as much as Em," I tell Dad. "You can't argue with that, even if she doesn't hate me, Em's her favorite."
"Your mom doesn't have a favorite," he says.
"Just an unfavorite."
"That's not true."
"But that's okay," I say, blinking my eyes until they stop stinging. "That's okay, I don't need her to like me as much as Em, it's okay that I'm her unfavorite. Because—" I take a gulp of air. "I'm _your_ favorite. Aren't I?"
His shoulders sag as if I've thrown him something heavy. "I don't have a favorite, either."
I used to be. He can say that all he wants, but I remember. Me on his shoulders at Disneyland, even though Em was smaller. Me helping him fix the kitchen sink, even though I only made the mess worse. Me telling the whole story of the First Crusade at the dinner table and him not once stopping me, even though everyone else was bored. "I used to be your favorite."
Dad clears his throat. He clasps his hands. "Before you were born—"
"Don't tell the dream story again, please, I know."
"This isn't that one," he says, suddenly gruff. "Just listen."
I listen.
"Before you were born," Dad says, "I didn't know a single person on Earth with my eyes."
His eyes? They're brown. Like mine. Nearly the whole world has brown eyes, and I tell him that.
"Not my exact eyes," he says. "Same shape, same color, same dark lashes. Everyone in my family has blue eyes, every single one. I never knew anyone with my eyes."
Dad is my grandparents' only adopted child, their longed-for son, a hand-picked boy chosen after the birth of their fourth daughter and my grandma's hysterectomy. His parents love him. His sisters adore him. Aunt Karissa used to dress him up like a doll; I've seen the pictures. But they don't have his eyes.
"But with you . . ." He trails off. Looks up. Tries again. "That first moment I held you, Ellis, it was—you were early, you know, and so, so small. But your nose was my nose. Your ears were my ears. And when you opened your eyes . . ." He breathes out. "It was something holy."
In my family, we don't call something holy unless we mean it. Unless we really mean it.
"You don't know what that's like," he tells me. "To see yourself in another person, for the very first time."
I grab his hand, and hold on tight, the way I used to do when he'd read to me at bedtime. Like if I gripped his thumb hard enough, he'd never turn the light off. Like if I never let go, he wouldn't, either. "Dad," I whisper.
"I don't have favorites," he says. "I mean that. I don't love you the most, I couldn't love either of you kids more than the other. But maybe—" He squeezes my hand. "Maybe it's true that I needed you the most."
Twelve
**"SO, I KNOW** this isn't our usual day and time," Martha says. "Do you have any feelings about that?"
I feel like it wasn't necessary. After sleeping the night in my still-trashed room, I came down for breakfast the next morning and told my parents that I'd thought about what we'd discussed. I'd prayed about it. And I'd decided they were right, after all. If they were skeptical of the sudden change of heart, they didn't say anything. Maybe because Em was at the table too. But Dad texted me at lunch and told me to go to Martha's after school, all the same.
"Your parents and I had a conversation this morning," Martha says.
I bite my lip.
"Do you have an idea of what we talked about?"
"Snowshoes?" I say. "Global cooling patterns?"
"We did talk about your recent purchases."
"I don't know how my mom made it seem," I say, "but I didn't steal, and I didn't even lie, because no one asked me about it."
"Do you think that's what made them concerned enough to call me?" Martha asks. "The money?"
"They think it's stupid. They think caring about it makes _me_ stupid."
"It sounds like the way they reacted to it really hurt you," she says. "I'm sorry that happened."
It only makes me feel worse, when someone tells me they're sorry. I know it hurt. But if I'm the only one who knows that, I can shove that hurt deep inside my chest cavity. I can nestle it right next to my parents' disappointment, and Tal touching my arm, and the way the light hit Lia Lemalu's hair—
I dig a fingernail into my palm. I picture sewing my insides shut with my mom's embroidery thread, pulling each stitch tight.
"Would you like to talk about what happened yesterday?" Martha asks. "Your mom didn't go into a ton of detail, but I'm thinking it was probably a tough night for you."
_If you talk, you might tell her about Hannah. You might ruin your only chance at survival, just like you ruin everything._
I shake my head.
"Are you sure?"
_If you tell her, she won't understand. Your own_ __ _parents don't understand. You can't trust them and you can't trust her._
"I did more research," I say, and ignore the disappointment on her face. "I think we should talk about my eschatology research."
"Okay," Martha says, but doesn't look thrilled. "Maybe you can tell me about a time when it didn't happen."
"But that's every time," I say. "Because it hasn't happened yet."
"That's true," Martha says. "Just tell me about one."
I don't even have to take out Kenny #14. I know the one I want to talk about.
"There was a woman named Thiota. And she lived in—we'd call it Germany now, but it was the Carolingian Empire. It was before the first millennium. And Thiota lived in a world where the Catholic Church ruled, totally. The Church was the Empire and the Empire was the Church and you didn't get to pick your beliefs. You didn't get to pick anything, really, if you were a commoner, like Thiota. Or a girl, like Thiota. You did what your priest told you. And he did what the bishop told him. And the bishop did—well, you get it, right?"
"Yes," Martha says. "A rigid society with lots of rules but not a lot of freedom."
"But then—and we don't know how old she was, or why she started, or even what she said, but Thiota started prophesying about the end of the world." I pause. "People listened to her. Even though she was a girl. And a nobody. Even though they could have listened to wealthy men with power and the whole church behind them, people listened to her. They brought her gifts. They asked for her blessing. Not just other women, but men, even some priests. She had a following."
"Do you think they were scared, her followers? Maybe they needed someone to tell them it would be all right?"
"Maybe." But I also wonder—is that all she was preaching about? Was it just the end of the world, or was it Judgment Day, too? About the meek inheriting the Earth and the rich being turned away? About justice, and fairness, and rightness?
Maybe they were angry too.
"It didn't matter that she had a following. Probably made things worse. She got hauled up in front of this big council of bishops and they told her it was heresy, what she was saying. That she didn't have the right to say it, or anything else about God, because she was just some peasant girl. They made her say some priest told her to do it. They didn't even believe her words could _be_ her words."
"And then?"
"And then she was publicly beaten and thrown out of town. And that's it."
"No one knows what happened to her after?"
"Someone did. She did. But the priest who wrote down her story didn't, because he didn't _care._ "
"Why do you think this is so upsetting for you?" Martha asks. "Thiota's story?"
"They erased her. They erased her even more than if she'd never been in history books at all. They made her an example of someone who shouldn't have dared to think she was anything more than what they told her she was. They made her a joke. They made her a footnote."
"History is long. Lots of people don't make that cut."
"But it's not fair. Why are some people allowed to have a vision and other people aren't?" I ask. "Why do some people get religions and churches and songs praising and hailing them as a prophet, and some people get dragged through the mud and treated like a joke?"
"Why do you think that is?"
"I don't know," I say, even though I do. Some people have power, or magnetic personalities, or unbelievable luck. Some people are the right _kind_ of people to change the world. Some people aren't weird teenage girls with the charisma of a chainsaw.
"If it's okay, I'd like to circle back to you, here," Martha says. I'd rather not, but I can't really say so. After all, we're here because of me.
"Okay," I say, picking at the couch threads again because I have a feeling I know what we're going to circle back _to_.
"Your mom said you'd agreed to stop talking to your . . . new friends," Martha says. "She says you came to accept that the world was not ending in December."
I nod.
"Is that what you told her?"
I nod.
Martha hesitates. She purses her lips. "And is it true?"
There's heat on the back of my neck, pressure in my shoulder blades. "What," I say, "you don't believe me?"
"I'd like to," she says, "but you answering a question with another question lowers my confidence."
I look down at my lap.
"Tell me if I'm off base here," Martha says, "but I think maybe you felt like you had to tell your parents what they wanted to hear. That there wasn't another option. So you did what you had to."
When I meet her eyes again, she's watching me carefully, waiting for my answer. I have to be careful too. She can't tell my parents what we talk about in sessions, except if I'm a danger to myself or others. I'm not going to hurt people—if anything, Hannah and I will be _helping_ people—but Martha might not see it that way. So I stare back at her, lips pressed shut.
"Ellis. I'm not here to judge you."
"No. Just to tell me I'm delusional."
"You're not delusional. That's a real condition, and it's not one you have."
"Then what do you think is wrong with me? Because you do. Everyone does."
"I think you're feeling scared. And overwhelmed. And misunderstood."
_Don't you dare cry. Don't you dare tell her she's right. Don't you dare let her see inside you, don't you dare let her get any closer._
"I think you've been feeling that way for a very long time, and I think you're so sick of feeling like that, you've latched on to something, anything that doesn't make you feel that way."
_Don't you dare believe her. You're fine, and if you aren't, you brought it on yourself. Stitch yourself up tighter and cut the thread._
I chew on the inside of my mouth. "It's not that simple."
"I'm sure it's not."
"You haven't heard her—" I stop. No Hannah talk. "I really believe this. I know what I believe."
Martha sighs. "Will you do one thing for me?"
"Okay."
"For the next week, here's what I want you to do: instead of research, instead of looking at what happened before, I want you to make a plan."
"A plan?" I have plenty of plans, plenty of ideas about how to survive the winter, plenty of lists and facts and worst-case scenarios in my head.
"I want you to consider the fact that the world may not end." I open my mouth, but she holds up her hand. "You don't have to believe it, just consider it. And I want you to think about this: What will you do if it doesn't? If you're given the gift of more days, or years, or decades, what will you do with them?"
I don't know what I'd do with a future wide-open like that. It fills me with an inexplicable, inescapable feeling of pure dread.
"Can you do that for me?" Martha asks again.
I smooth my hand over the couch cushion. "I'll try."
Mom is twenty minutes late to pick me up. I could have taken the bus. But Mom texted me after school informing me that I was to wait right outside Martha's office. So that's what I'm doing.
She finally pulls up on the wrong side of the four-lane street, just across from the office. Then she waits. And I wait. Does she really expect me to dash between the cars? Sure, maybe it's not super busy right now, but that's dangerous.
_You could get hit and die._
_You could cause a three-car collision and be named in a civil suit after one of the passengers is paralyzed._
_You could get yelled at by an angry cyclist._
It's just not worth it.
So I keep waiting. And when it's clear Mom has outright refused to circle the block and re-park on the right side, I walk the half block to the crosswalk, cross with the green light, and walk the half block back to her car.
"Hi," I say, sliding into the front seat.
"What is wrong with you?" she snaps back as I pull my seat belt tight.
"What did I do?" I ask, though I guess it would be more accurate to ask, "What did I do _now_?"
"I've been sitting in this car for five minutes waiting for you to cross."
"I would have been quicker if you'd parked on the right side of the street."
She glares at me. "You could have crossed three times while I was waiting."
"Mom! There is no crosswalk! I could have been hit by a car!"
"That's the problem with you, Ellis," Mom says, jerking the car into drive. "You want everything covered in Bubble Wrap. And if you can't have that, you shut down. Well, that's not the world. I'm not letting that slide anymore."
She has never let a single thing slide.
"It's not just about you," she says, a death grip on the steering wheel. "It's not just about your comfort. Do you have any idea how much I have on my plate? I have laundry and a meat loaf dinner just waiting to be done at home."
Oh good, meat loaf. My absolute least favorite.
"Not to mention I'm bringing meals to three people in the ward this week, Emmy needs to be fitted for new ballet shoes, and I have to train the new receptionist who is, bless her heart, completely incompetent."
I'm starting to think this isn't about me at all. I'm just a safer target.
"How was your day?" I ask, hoping she'll land on another person to be mad at.
She shakes her head. "Oh, don't even try that with me."
I wonder what her friends would think, if they saw her like this. My mom is such a smiler at church, at dinner parties, at parent-teacher conferences. She's almost aggressive in her cheerfulness. I'm the only one she gets this angry at. I'm the only person she _can_ get this angry at.
"I was just asking." I slump back in my seat.
"You couldn't care less. You couldn't care less about my day."
"Could you give me a break? For once?"
"Sometimes I feel like that's all I do."
My mother has many talents. She can bake a perfect root beer Bundt cake, embroider the most delicate flowers on a baby gown, and slice me off at the knees in six words or less. There's a lump in my throat and salt in the corner of my eyes, but I swallow it down, brush it away. She keeps going.
"I can't talk to you the way I can with— You can't handle things. Anything could make you melt down. So we walk on eggshells, the whole family, you know that? We do. We handle you with kid gloves. And now you start with this— I don't even know what to call it. A cult?"
"It's not a cult."
"No, it's not, it's a cry for attention. As if you don't get enough. As if Dad and I don't spend half our lives worrying about you, trying to figure out what on Earth to do with you."
She talks about me like I'm a rug that clashes with every room in the house. Like a cat that won't stop clawing at the curtains. She talks about me like she has buyer's remorse.
"You can blame him for this, by the way. He was the one who insisted I drop everything and pick you up."
"Maybe he thought it would be nice," I say. _Maybe he thought_ you _would be nice_ , I don't say.
"He didn't rearrange his schedule for it, did he?" Mom asks.
"If he could have, he would have," I mumble.
"He could have." Mom steals a glance at me. "He's not perfect. I know you need me to be the villain in your life, but he's not perfect, either."
Martha would call that "deflection."
I roll my eyes. I would call that "a fair response."
"I bet that's what you tell your therapist," Mom says. "I bet you tell her your father is perfect and your mother is a monster. Well, let me tell you, my mother didn't do half of what I do for you."
Grammy Kit isn't in a position to contradict this super-convenient story. She's in a nursing home in Salt Lake City.
"She didn't chauffeur me around, not when I was your age. And why do I have to do this, Ellis? Why do I have to cart you around like this?"
"Because I can't drive," I mumble.
"Because you _won't_ drive. It scares you. So you just _won't_." She huffs, gathering steam. "It's my fault. I can only blame you so much, because I allowed you to get this way. I got my license on my sixteenth birthday. I was independent. My mother didn't _care_ how my day went; she didn't pick me up, talk to me."
I watch the houses pass by, trying to imagine who lives in them. I picture myself on the second-story porch of a classic Berkeley brown shingle, in the overgrown front garden of a light blue cottage, reading on the window seat of a gorgeous modern house my mom would hate.
"So with all I do . . ." Mom says, starting in on me again, but quieter this time. "I don't think it's wrong of me to want some appreciation. Is that so terrible? Does that make me so terrible to you?"
I don't know what to say. How did we even get here? How did she take it from me not crossing the street to me not appreciating her? And I almost ask that, but then I think—is that how _my_ logic seems to other people? Is that how my catastrophizing makes me sound? Maybe this is Mom catastrophizing. Maybe—the thought catches me by surprise—maybe my mom feels like I do. Like her life is spinning out of control too. I plan and prepare and worry, and she arranges and prods and perfects.
My mom and I could not be more different.
Or maybe we could.
"Thank you," I say, breaking the silence, "for picking me up from therapy."
"All the way across town," she adds.
She's not making this easy. "Thank you for picking me up from therapy all the way across town."
Her shoulders drop a half centimeter. She looks at me. I try for a smile. She frowns. Shakes her head.
"I'm sorry you have to," I say, because maybe what she really wants is an apology. "I'm sorry I have a mental illness."
She stops at a red light and twists to look at me. "You don't have a mental illness," she says. "You have an attitude problem."
"You sent me to a therapist all the way across town for an attitude problem?"
Mom shakes her head. "Schizophrenia. Psychosis. Dementia, like Gammy Kit has. Those are mental illnesses. You do not have a mental illness."
She's wrong. I know she's wrong. If she'd take a half second to research it, or just listen to me for once, she'd know she was wrong, too.
"This doesn't have to be your life," she says, stealing a look at me. "You aren't helpless. You can change, if you want to, and I hope Martha can help you do it. That's what makes this different. You can get over this, you can have a normal, happy life. You just have to try."
I see it, all of a sudden, with the clarity of a key in a lock. My mom is _scared_. Her fears don't look like mine, but that doesn't mean she doesn't have them. And she's wrong, she's still so wrong about everything, but it's not because she's unfeeling. I thought she couldn't see the way I struggled and hurt and clawed against my brain, but she can. And it might scare her more than it scares me. She's scared I won't get to have the life she imagined I would. She's scared I'll let myself suffer forever. She's scared to see me suffer.
_I do try_ , I want to protest.
_I'm not going to get over this_ , I want to tell her.
_I can get better at living with it_ , I want to assure her.
But I just stare out the window.
The rest of the car ride passes in silence. When we reach home, I half expect Mom to beat me to the door and lock me out of the house, but she waits patiently for me to gather my things and get out of the car.
"Wash your hands when you get inside," Mom says. "I need you to grate cheese for the tuna casserole."
Tuna casserole? Mom hates tuna casserole. She can't stand the texture, and Em isn't a fan either, but it's my favorite. I ask for it on every birthday, and that's about the only time she'll make it.
"I thought we were having meat loaf."
She locks the car. "I changed my mind."
I hold up my hands and walk away from the car. I won't argue with tuna casserole.
At the top of the stairs, with the key already in the lock, Mom stops and looks at me. Her mouth is still in a hard line, but her eyes are softer. "Ellis," she says, and sighs, and I hold my breath. "I'm—" She swallows. "Your hair looks very nice today."
It doesn't. It's frizzy and messy and tucked behind my ears. But I know what she means. I know that sometimes you say one thing when you mean another.
"Thanks, Mom."
Thirteen
**MOM'S ULTIMATUM CHANGES** very little about my life. It means I have to lie more—or maybe just better.
The next Monday, as soon as I leave sixth period, I text my parents saying I'm going to math tutoring after school. It's barely a lie. I should be going, and I would be going, if the world weren't ending. But I highly doubt knowing my sines from my cosines is going to help, and sticking close to Hannah might. So I choose that.
Well, as close as I can get, when she's up in her tree. Staying on solid ground and playing Five-Word Books appeals to my need for self-preservation, anyway.
"Rodents who were monks, weirdly," Sam says, counting five words on his fingers.
" _Redwall_ ," Tal says. "God, you're right, why _were_ they monks? What were they worshiping? Was there a mouse Jesus?"
"Maybe they pray to Cheesus," I suggest. Tal laughs, and my stomach leaps for no reason at all.
"Okay, okay, I've got one," Theo says. "Exiled prince defeats demon king."
We all look at Theo blankly.
"It's _Ramayana_ ," Theo says. "The ancient Indian poem? Epic? Super important to the, like, six million Hindus of the world?"
The three of us shrug guiltily in unison.
"You are all," Theo declares, "a bunch of colonialist monsters."
"The Brazilian half of me is offended," Tal says.
"If you just say 'colonialist' I think the 'monster' part is implied," Sam adds.
Suddenly, Hannah jumps down from her tree. The boys keep playing, but she peers out across the Park, then drops down next to me.
"Hey," she says to me, low. "Do you have a dollar?"
"Yeah. What for?"
She points out a man walking through the park with his arms full of newspapers. I think it's the same one I saw her talking to before. "I want to buy a _Street Spirit_."
_Street Spirit_ is a paper run by homeless people in Berkeley. The reporters get paid for their work, and it's sort of an alternative to panhandling. A product people living on the street can sell. It doesn't cost much, and I know it helps, so I dig four quarters out of my backpack and hand them to her.
"Thanks," she says, and walks off. The boys are still deep in Five-Word Books.
"Okay, okay, how about this," Tal says. "Sociopath child slowly dismembers friend."
" _The Giving Tree_ ," Theo answers, with a touch of horror. "Jesus, Tal."
"Am I wrong, though?"
Sam nods his head over at Hannah. "What's she doing?"
I shrug. "Buying a _Street Spirit_."
"From the guy who hangs out by Ashby BART and tells you he knows when you're going to die?" Tal asks.
"That's a different guy," Sam says. "They look kind of the same, but the dude at Ashby BART's way shorter and has that green Army jacket."
"Oh yeah, you're right."
"Why is that?" I wonder out loud. "Why are all the homeless people you see men, usually middle-aged, living alone? Or maybe with a dog."
Theo scoffs. "Those are the only homeless people you _think_ you see."
"What?"
"Not everyone who's homeless sleeps in a park," Theo says. "They live in their cars, or on friend's couches because they lost their house or apartment because shit happens. Most homeless people are families. With kids. You've definitely been on a bus or in a class with one, and just didn't know it."
I'm surprised he knows this much about it, and my face must show that, because he shrugs. "My mom's a social worker. And I'm a good listener."
"Are you?" Sam asks.
"Yeah, and I'm also good at nonverbal communication," Theo says, holding up both middle fingers.
Hannah wanders back over, her nose buried in the newspaper. For a moment, I think she'll take it up in the tree with her, but she walks a few feet past me and plops down on the grass, her back to us. The boys either don't notice or have decided it's best not to bother her. I go over and sit down next to her. She doesn't look up, but meticulously combs through each page. "Hey."
"What are you doing?" I ask as she reaches the last page, then shakes the newspaper like she expects something to fall out.
"I thought maybe he'd left a note."
"Prophet Dan?" I ask, and she nods. Why would she think that, though? He doesn't even know we're looking for him.
Does he?
"I'm sorry we haven't been able to find him," I say to Hannah. "But we've done so much already, to figure out your dreams, maybe we don't . . . need him."
"We do," Hannah says. "Trust me, we do."
"Hannah," I say tentatively, "I don't think he wants be found."
Hannah's face tightens. She buries her head in her hands. That's not the reaction I was expecting, and I have no idea what to do. I touch her shoulder as gently as I can.
"It's okay," I assure her. She doesn't move, and I hear myself start to babble. "It's okay, okay? We'll keep looking, I'm sure someone's seen him. He's got friends, right? We'll find his friends, and we'll find him. He's a nice guy, of course he has friends, I mean, he brought that lady at the library muffins every week—"
Hannah perks up instantly. "Muffins? What muffins?"
"Yeah." I dig back in my brain. "Carrot zucchini muffins. That doesn't even sound like a pastry, right? It sounds like a salad. . . ." I trail off. Hannah's jumped to her feet. She zips up her backpack.
"Are you okay?"
She spins around to me. "Why didn't you tell me that before?"
"I didn't think it mattered."
"I know where we need to look," she says. "Come on."
I scramble to my feet without hesitation, then feel immediately annoyed with myself. How can she do that, get me to change my plans with two words? It's like those magnets we used in middle school science. How some were strong enough that you could feel them pulling in the smaller ones. You could actually feel the draw.
It's obvious, but I never really thought about it before: that's what "magnetic personality" means.
"Me and Ellis are hungry," Hannah says to the boys. "We're going to get something to eat."
"I'm in," Sam says, even though she didn't invite him. Theo follows suit.
"Yeah, why not." Tal shrugs. I glance over at Hannah, my eyebrows raised. She looks less than thrilled.
"We're going kind of far . . ." she says, rubbing at the back of her neck, but they're on their feet and have started a new round of Five-Word Books. She sighs. "Fine. Whatever."
"Where are we going?" I whisper to Hannah as she sets a brisk place up the block, the three of them behind us.
"The only place that would sell carrot zucchini muffins," Hannah whispers. "Berkeley Bowl."
Berkeley Bowl is not, as the name suggests, a bowling alley. It's a grocery store. It's the kind of place that lets you grind your own peanuts into butter. It's the kind of place that has kombucha on tap. It's the kind of place where just to get in you must brave three separate ponytailed men wielding petitions.
"Do you really think Prophet Dan shops here?" I whisper to Hannah. "It's kind of pricey."
She looks at me like I'm six years old. "They throw out food. Or give it out. At the end of the day."
"Why are we here?" Sam complains, and Hannah looks away from me. "This is the worst place to get free samples. One time, my mom bought nutritional yeast here. Nutritional. Yeast."
"Was it good?" Tal asks.
"Does it _sound_ good?"
Suddenly, Theo stops. "Hold up a second. Yo, Ravi," Theo calls out. A young man down the aisle wearing a red T-shirt turns, and grins broadly. He walks over to us, and he and Theo fist-bump.
"Hey, Theo."
Theo turns to the rest of us. "Our parents go to temple together." Then, back to Ravi: "What's up, man, when did you get back?"
"August," Ravi says. "I'm doing post-bac stuff at Cal. I have to get my science GPA up or the MCAT's not even going to matter."
"That blows. So you picking up study snacks or something?"
"Oh, no, I'm working here," Ravi says. "Just a few shifts, in the bakery."
Next to me, Hannah goes very still.
"Sweet," Theo says. "Any free samples?"
"I think there are some chocolate éclairs over by the customer service counter," Ravi says. "Tell them I sent you."
Theo and Ravi say goodbye, and all three boys walk off in search of the éclairs. I'm about to follow them, but Hannah's hanging behind. As Ravi passes her, she turns and taps on his arm.
"Excuse me?"
Ravi stops and turns around.
"Sorry to bother you, but . . . at the bakery, do you ever . . ." Hannah pauses. "You guys ever give out food? Maybe to the homeless?"
Ravi shrugs. "I've never closed up, but I mean, what doesn't get sold . . ." He narrows his eyes. "Why?"
"Could you maybe take me back there?" Hannah blurts out. "Maybe I could ask your coworkers?"
Ravi takes a long pause, then a longer look at Hannah's tense, desperate face. "Okay. Come on."
He leads her away, and I head in the direction of free dessert. I stop when I find Tal wandering the canned food aisle.
"You didn't want an éclair?" I ask, meeting him in the middle.
He wrinkles his nose. "I don't actually like chocolate."
That's practically blasphemy for someone raised Mormon. Sugar is our only vice.
"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry," I say. "I had no idea you were secretly an inhuman cyborg."
"If I were a robot, I wouldn't be this cold. God, it's like an icebox in here," Tal mutters, rubbing at his arms.
It is, but I appreciate that. It tells me they're committed to food safety standards. I'd rather be cold than get staphylococcal food poisoning from overheated chicken.
"That's why I love layers," I say, hugging my cardigan closer. "You never know when you're going to need something extra, especially if the fog rolls in."
"You're like an onion."
"Uh," I say. "Because I smell, or because I make people cry?"
"Oh my God," he says, horrified. "No, because you like layers, onions have—oh my God." He looks up. "Why would I say that?" he appears to ask the giant ceiling fan.
I bite the inside of my mouth to keep from laughing. "It's okay."
"For the record, I _like_ onions," he says. "I make a kickass salada de cebola, that's all onions."
"You cook!" I say. "That's a surprise. Who knew you had so many . . . layers."
He looks back down at me. He narrows his eyes. "You're enjoying this."
I shrug, with a smile. "Just a little."
He smiles back, and then we're smiling at each other, and if the silence goes on, I might say something inappropriate in the middle of a supermarket aisle. So I clear my throat and turn back to the shelf.
"Don't ever try canned onions, though," I say, rummaging through the cans with suddenly clammy hands. "They're the worst."
"Does anything canned taste good?"
"Some things are better than others." I pick a can off the shelf. "Pretty much any fruit is good. But you've got to be careful with meat."
Tal looks revolted. "No one buys canned meat."
"I've got a bunch of ham in my personal storage." And then, because canned ham probably deserves an explanation: "It's important to have lots of different kinds of foods so you don't get appetite fatigue. If you eat the same things every day, you'll get sick of them and that's just as bad for you as whatever disaster you're trying to survive."
"A disaster," he repeats, slowly. "Your _personal_ storage?" I pick at my cardigan collar. He's going to find out eventually.
"Yeah. I'm sort of a . . . prepper."
"Like for doomsday?" he asks, even more slowly this time.
I hesitate. This is a lot all at once. Doomsday can wait another day. "Like for any kind of natural disaster. Floods, earthquakes."
Tal stares at me for a moment, like he's trying to solve a riddle. "Is it your parents?"
"My parents?"
"Did they get you into it? Is your whole family a bunch of weird preppers?"
"No," I say, resenting the implication that _I'm_ a weird prepper. I'm a normal prepper, as far as that goes. When you spend practically years of your life browsing the forums, you see what weird really looks like. You meet the really hard-core survivalists, the ones with bunkers in the woods and bullet magazines to last decades. In comparison, I'm the picture of normalcy. June Cleaver with freeze-dried casseroles. Betty Crocker in a gas mask.
"My parents aren't into this at all," I say. "They hate it. They blame it all on my anxiety. As if my anxiety caused the tides to rise, and erratic weather patterns all over the world, and potential economic collapse. Like my personal anxiety did all those things."
"They don't even have food storage?" Tal asks.
Every family in our church is supposed to be prepared for a minor disaster—bottled water, nonperishable food, space blankets and lamps with extra batteries, that kind of thing. But it's not enough to make it through something big, not nearly enough to stretch through an endless winter. It's about self-sufficiency, not surviving a destroyed world.
"That doesn't count."
He shrugs. "Maybe it does."
"You sound just like them," I say. "'Oh, Ellis, we're prepared. Oh, Ellis, you don't need another pocket water filter. Oh, Ellis, don't tell us a turkey wishbone could be whittled into a fish hook, you're _ruining Thanksgiving_.'"
"That's not what I mean."
"Then, what?"
"It's the mind-set, you know? Be on alert. Be ready. Be afraid."
Maybe LDS people care more about emergency preparation than most people. But not everyone's ancestors spent years on their feet, getting kicked out of Missouri and Illinois, watching their prophet murdered by a mob. They were on alert because they had to be, I remind Tal.
"Yeah, okay," he says. "Don't oversell it. There were a lot of people way worse off than our pioneer ancestors."
"I know that."
"Like, for instance, all the Native people they trampled along the way."
"Oh my gosh, Tal, obviously," I say. "It doesn't come close. But it did happen. There really _was_ an extermination order against Mormons in Missouri. They really _did_ get massacred at Haun's Mill."
"Yeah, and then they turned around and slaughtered a bunch of random people at Mountain Meadows and stole their kids."
I throw up my hands. "It's not a competition!"
"I'm just saying, if it were, you would lose."
"And _I'm_ just saying they had good reasons for staying prepared," I say. "But I don't do this because I'm Mormon. I do this because I'm me."
He shakes his head. "You of all people shouldn't be afraid."
"Of the _apocalypse_?"
"Not if you believe it'll end with Jesus coming back to rule over Earth for a thousand years of sunshine and joy," he says.
And he's right. That's what the scriptures say. After years of pain and suffering on Earth, after natural disaster, war, and plague has ripped the world to shreds, Jesus Christ will return in glory and usher in the Millennium, a thousand years of perfect peace throughout the universe.
_But not for everyone. Not for you._
"We all still have to live through it," I counter. "There's no Rapture, you know Mormons don't believe in that. There's no avoiding what the world could become. We could all still _die_."
"But what's it matter if you die in a nuclear bombing or a flood or a zombie attack?" Tal presses. "What's it matter if you'll just be resurrected, perfect and whole, with your perfect forever family in the Celestial Kingdom?"
"Because maybe I won't!" I burst out. "Because maybe I'm not worthy. Not worthy enough. Maybe I won't make it there."
_Too much. Way, way too much, even for a friend, and he isn't your friend._
"You don't think you're worthy?" Tal asks quietly.
I knew it was too much. "I don't know. Never mind."
"Why wouldn't you be worthy?" I look away, but Tal moves so he's in my line of vision again. "Why not?"
I don't know. I should be. I follow the rules, I pray every night, and I almost never fall asleep during early-morning seminary class.
_Your family is worthy. Your family is good and kind and holy, true believers, effortless believers._
I believe. If I doubt, I doubt my doubts. I turn cartwheels to fit myself into my faith. I stay in the boat even though the water is rough and the shore looks so peaceful. I work to believe, and that alone should make me worthy. So why don't I ever feel like I am?
_One day your doubt might be stronger than your belief. One day you might not fit into your faith._ __ _One day you might not be able to live the life your family wants for you._
There's a nagging, clawing feeling in the pit of my stomach, and sometimes it feels like it could slice me open entirely. And it can't, I can't let it, because who knows what would spill out?
_A faceless man with a crew cut, you in a white wedding dress._
_A baby, or two, or three, who look like angels to everyone but you._
_Lia Lemalu's hair in the sunlight._
"I don't know," I say. "I'm just not. I need—"
"What?" Tal prods.
"Time. I need more time."
"To do what?"
"Become someone different."
"You don't need to be different, you're perfect," Tal says. My eyes widen, and so do his.
"Um," I say.
"I didn't mean that," he says quickly. "That's not—"
"I know," I say.
_Of course he didn't mean that, you're the opposite of perfect, the anti-perfect, everyone knows it, and if you thought Tal would be different you're wrong._
"You're not perfect. I'm not perfect, no one is, no one has to be. You don't have to be."
"But that's the whole point!" I say. "The entire point of being on Earth is get to a body, make good choices with it, and be as close to perfect as possible."
"God," Tal says. "Someone has done such a mind-fuck on you."
"Tal!"
"Is that really worse? Is me saying 'fuck' worse than someone beating you down with 'perfect'? Is it worse than you thinking that if you aren't perfect, you're worthless?" He shakes his head. "No one expects you to be perfect in this life, not even those old dudes in Salt Lake City. I'm not a fan of the church. You know I'm not. But that's not even _doctrine_."
"I can be closer, though, I need to be closer, because that's what a person gets judged on. How close they came. That's what determines if you go to the Celestial Kingdom with your family or—"
Then I stop, because I don't want to say it. Mormons don't believe in a binary heaven-or-hell situation. There are levels to the afterlife, different kingdoms that spirits are sorted into, and good people don't suffer eternally in a lake of fire. The highest level is the Celestial Kingdom, where families get to be together. When you're sealed together on Earth, you're sealed for all eternity. Families can be together forever—people say it all the time.
That's the key word, though— _can_. Not _will_. It won't happen if someone's unworthy, and certainly not if someone leaves the church and never comes back. Like Tal.
But as I'm standing across from him, I realize I don't believe that. I don't believe the God I love would separate a person like Tal—someone funny, and kind, and only sometimes prickly—from his mother or his half siblings, I don't believe He'd ever do that to one of His children. I know it like I know that the sky is blue and my name is Ellis. There's doctrine, and then there's belief.
Maybe my belief is stronger than I thought. Maybe it's different than I thought.
"You are worthy," Tal says. "If there were a Celestial Kingdom, you'd get there. I believe that."
Tal, who doesn't believe in so many things. Tal, who questions and doubts everything. Tal believes that.
"Thank you," I say, and it's almost a whisper.
"No big deal," he says, sticking his hands in his pockets.
"You're worthy too," I tell him. "You should get to be there too. With your family, I believe you'll get to be there—"
He smiles thinly. "It's a relief, really. I don't want to become a god and create worlds. I didn't even like building dioramas in elementary school."
That's a pretty flippant way to describe deep doctrine, and I almost say that. But then—maybe there's a reason he talks about it that way. Maybe it makes the whole thing hurt less. Everyone deserves to hurt less.
"Well," I say, and find myself stepping closer. "If I were creating a perfect world"—I swallow—"I'd want you in it."
"You don't have to wait, you know," Tal says. "You shouldn't have to wait for that."
I close the gap with another step. "For what?"
"For the afterlife. Whatever comes next. You deserve to be happy on Earth, too."
Does happiness just come to a person? Does it arrive in a package labeled and addressed? Or is it something you have to want, something you have to take rather than ask for?
An inch away from Tal's body, eye to eye, I think about how I could take it.
That's how we're standing—almost touching, barely breathing—when Sam rounds the corner and crashes straight into Tal.
"They were out of éclairs." He holds out something that looks like beef jerky, only flatter. "You guys want some dehydrated fruit leather?"
When I get home, all the living room furniture is pushed up against the walls. Em is standing in the middle of the rug in leggings, a T-shirt, and socks. She stares, unblinking, at the far wall, then throws herself into a spin. I'd call it a pirouette, but the last time I did, she patted my arm and said it was a _fouette, actually_. Her left foot doesn't even touch the ground as she spins once, twice, three times. Em is even more spectacular in practice than in recitals. In recitals, they have to make it look effortless. In practice, you can see Em's clenched teeth and razor-sharp focus, the ache in her legs she's pushing past. You can see how hard it really is. You can see how _good_ she really is.
She drops out of the spin with a sigh.
"That was amazing," I say, leaning against the doorframe. She startles and turns to me.
"I wish you'd tell Miss Ostrevsky," Em says. "She says my spotting needs work."
"Your spotting?" I doubt you can spot anything under those blinding stage lights.
"Spotting the wall. It's something you have to do when you turn." She points. "You pick a spot. You focus on the spot. And you keep your eyes on that spot as you spin."
That makes zero sense. "But you're turning. At some point, your head's the other way. How can you keep your eye on something you can't see?"
Her face lights up. "I'll show you. That's the best way to get better, right, teach someone else?"
Em takes my arm and guides me to the center of the room. She puts her hands on my shoulders, which requires standing on her tiptoes. She points at the wall. "Choose a spot, right at your eye level. Focus on it, really hard, and _don't_ take your eyes off it."
I struggle to find a spot. The wall is just one vast, perfect ocean of light blue. Eventually I find an almost minuscule dent. Em takes my hands in hers and lays them gently on my shoulders. "Keep your hands here."
I do, even though it reminds me of Mom correcting my posture.
"Start turning to the right," Em commands. "Slowly. Slower. Keep your head still and your eyes on the spot. Your body moves, your head doesn't."
This is unnatural. My head wants to turn with my body; they're attached. Ideally. I'm starting to feel for those Barbie dolls I decapitated as a kid.
"When you absolutely have to, whip your head around and find the spot." I attempt that, but stumble and lose the spot. I look over at Em and shrug.
She tilts her head. "That's supposed to prevent you from losing your balance."
"Well, you tried."
She wrinkles her nose. "You're doing it again."
"That's okay."
"Ellis, you're doing it again." She folds her arms. "Did you expect to be good at it instantly?"
It's not that. I'm good at so few things, and terrible at so many. That's fine when I'm on my own, in my room, but not with someone else's eyes on me. I don't like people seeing me fail. But Em looks serious, and I don't have anything better to do, so I fix my feet, find the spot, and try again.
I fail again. I fail a third time. But I fail with more grace.
"Miss Ostrevsky says that usually, we know exactly where our bodies are in space," Em tells me as I whip my head around again. "That's how we keep our balance without trying. But when you're spinning, your body gets confused. It thinks it's free-falling. It can't figure out where it is."
"Proprioception."
"What?"
"That's what it's called. A body's unconscious spatial orientation."
"Proprioception!" Em says with triumph, like I've given her a treasure hunt clue. "So if you don't have that, you need something else to help you stay upright. You need your eyes, and your eyes need to stay where you put them."
When she puts it like that, it feels scientific. It feels like a fact. I stare at my spot on the wall. I imagine myself as a horse with blinders. I imagine myself looking through an old-fashioned telescope. When I twist my head around, my eyes zero back in on the spot, and I remain upright.
"Hey!" Em says. "There you go."
It wasn't beautiful like hers, and I doubt I'd be able to do it in a real spin, but I stayed upright, and that's a victory. I failed, until I didn't. I kept my eyes ahead and my feet solidly planted. I kept my balance as the world around me tilted.
Em's grinning like that creepy cat clock Grammy Kit had. "I knew you could do it," she says. I should be annoyed by such self-satisfaction from my baby sister, but I'm not.
"I'll let you practice," I say. "Thanks for the lesson."
"Wait, can you braid my hair first?"
I nod, and she places herself in front of me, shaking out her long hair, blond with the occasional ribbon of chestnut. I separate the top layer. For all of Em's absurd flexibility, she's never been able to French braid her own hair. Mom can do it, but I'm better, with both Em's hair and mine. It's never seemed like a skill, something to brag about. But as I plait and fold, I reconsider. If not a skill, maybe it's a gift. Not a gift of mine, but a gift for Em. She can gift me with dance lessons and grit, and I can gift her with new words for her thoughts and beautiful hair.
I've nearly finished when I notice an odd twist in the braid, halfway up. And a strand I missed, near Em's ear. The left side is slightly uneven, now that I look closer. I almost let the braid go, almost run my hands through her hair, almost start over. But then I don't. Em can't see that it's imperfect. She probably wouldn't care that it was. It's imperfect, but that doesn't mean it's worthless.
I slip my own hair tie off my wrist and finish the braid.
Fourteen
**TEEN MOVIES HAD** led me to believe homecoming was about football and maybe a dance, but two years of real high school have clued me in: it's Mardi Gras for teenagers. At least at this school. We don't even call it homecoming.
"Why do you think they named it Rally Day?" Sam wonders aloud during lunch as he rolls a joint. The Park is packed with kids in face paint, school colors, and varying levels of intoxication.
"I think we're supposed to be rallying the football team to murder our rivals," Theo says.
"Wait, who's our rival?" Tal asks.
Theo shrugs. "Sobriety?"
"No kidding. This place is lawless," I mutter as two boys I half recognize from AP US History drink out of a water bottle I'm certain is not filled with water. "It's like a Roman bacchanalia."
"Fewer goat sacrifices," Sam points out.
Behind Sam, on the other side of the Park, Hannah sits on a bench, something small and gray in her hands.
"Be back in a second," I tell them. Tal frowns, but doesn't stop me.
I slide down next to Hannah on the bench. She looks up and smiles, but it's thin and tight.
"What's that?" I peer over her shoulder at the small package in her lap. It's badly wrapped, in what looks like a thicker kind of newspaper print.
"I think it's a present," she says.
"From who?"
She clears her throat. "Prophet Dan."
I feel a stab of betrayal. She finally found him, after all this time, and she didn't come looking for me?
"When did he give it to you?" I ask. "What did he say? About your visions, will he help us?"
Hannah shakes her head. "It was in my tree, this morning. Tied to a branch."
She's been carrying it around all day, unopened. Maybe she's scared to see what's inside. I touch the package.
"Do you want me to?" I offer.
Hannah shakes her head and unwraps. She's going painfully slow, pulling at each piece of tape instead of tearing, until finally, we can both see what's inside.
"Oh," she whispers, like she's just gotten a paper cut. Surprise and a little bit of pain.
All I have is surprise. "It's . . . a fish."
Not a real one. A stuffed toy, the kind you'd give to a little kid. When Hannah picks it up, its fins and tail flop.
"I liked fish," Hannah says softly, rubbing her thumb against its plush blue scales. "When I was little. I knew all the kinds."
How would Prophet Dan know that? Did he see it, just like Hannah sees the end of the world? I almost ask, but Hannah's curled into herself, her eyes welled up, holding the fish in her hands like it's breakable. Maybe this isn't the best time.
So instead, I pick up the wrapping paper. It's crumpled, torn, and taped back together out of order, but the print's still visible. Not that it makes much sense. Half of it seems like a menu, with words like _lentils_ and _eggplant_ and _cashew ricotta_. The other half is random adjectives.
"Giving. Evolved. Humble," I read. "What _is_ this?"
Hannah, who has been focused on the fish, looks over my shoulder. With a gasp of recognition, she plucks the wrapping out of my hands.
"Thanks Café," she breathes out.
"Huh?"
"Thanks Café, it's this vegan restaurant. All the food is called something positive." She points. "See, the tempeh Caesar salad is called Glorious, so you have to tell the waiter, 'I am Glorious' and then when he brings it to you, he says, 'You are Glorious' and it's supposed to be affirming, or whatever."
Sometimes, this city is a parody of itself.
"We have to go," Hannah says. "It's on Shattuck, it's not far."
I don't understand. It's not a clue, it's just wrapping paper. Weird wrapping paper. "Why?"
"He's been to the restaurant. Where else would he have gotten it?"
"I don't know, from their trash?"
"Pretty sure they recycle."
"But so what if he has been to the restaurant?" I ask. "I doubt he's still there."
"He might be a regular. They might know where he hangs out." She scrambles to her feet.
"Wait," I say, because I still have so many questions. _Why did Prophet Dan send you this? Why does it seem like he's hiding from you? How many things aren't you telling me?_
"Come on," Hannah says, holding out her hand to help me up.
Now? She wants to go right now? "I have class."
"Like anyone's really teaching today."
"I have a test in English." Not that my grades matter at this point—I just don't want my teacher to think I skipped it because I was drinking in the Park. It might be the end of days, but I still have standards.
"You can make it up," Hannah says. So casually, so definitively, like she's already seen the future and the future is me following her around like a puppy on a leash. Like I always have.
___No_. I don't want to trot along at her heels anymore, I don't want her to assume that I will. I don't say _No._ I only think it. But I don't move, either.
"Come on," Hannah repeats, but it isn't commanding, like before. It's more of a beg. "Come with me."
"After school," I say. I want to help her. I do. But this isn't a beehive, and I'm not a drone. "We'll go after school."
"It'll be fast. You'll barely miss fourth period."
Not every language has a singular word for _no_. Even in English, I wonder how often people actually use it as a full sentence. A straight refusal. I wonder if I can do that, say _no_ without caveats or explanation. Not just to Hannah, to anyone.
My feet stay on the grass. I literally dig in my heels.
Hannah reaches closer. "Ellis. Please."
"Hey," Tal says, appearing out of nowhere at Hannah's side. I didn't even see him walk up. I wonder how much he heard. "Can I talk to you real quick?"
Hannah frowns. "We were just about to—"
"Real quick," Tal says again, then steers Hannah a few feet away. Purposefully out my earshot. I don't try to eavesdrop, exactly, but I do watch them. Hannah's got her arms folded across her chest. Defensive. Tal's talking with his hands, and he's talking a lot. Word by word, they're getting louder, and I don't think either of them realize it. Finally, it looks like Hannah's had enough.
"You know, Tal, you don't know everything!" she shouts.
"I know you have her completely snowed," Tal says, matching her volume.
"She's helping me."
"I know you think this is helping, but—"
"Which is more than I can say for you."
I'm far away, but I think Tal flinches. He runs a hand through his hair. "Hannah."
Their voices drop, or maybe I can't hear over the pounding in my chest. Are they talking about me? I am helping Hannah, and I think I'm the only one. But the way Tal's saying it, it's like he thinks I'm not smart enough to have chosen that for myself. Like I'm helpless. It prickles my skin like hives.
"You don't know what's best for me," Hannah says, her voice rising again. "And I know you think you're her . . . _knight in stoner armor_ , but you don't know what's best for her, either."
"She doesn't even know who she's looking for!" Tal shouts. It's loud enough that for the first time, Hannah looks away. And straight at me. My heart flops into my stomach, because now I'm certain. The _she_ is _me_.
"Well?" Tal throws his hands up. "Does she?"
Hannah is silent for a long moment, eyes still on me. She spins away from Tal and stalks back in my direction. I open my mouth, ready to tell her I'm not going. To actually refuse when she asks. But she doesn't ask. She doesn't say anything. All she does is scoop up her backpack and walk away from school as the end-of-lunch bell rings, without a word.
Without me.
My afternoon classes pass by in a blur. I can't stay focused on anything, and not just because of the Rally Day chaos.
_She doesn't even know who she's looking for._
I know Hannah hasn't told me everything. But I know who we're looking for—we're looking for the only person she believes can help us survive the end of the world.
But then again—what has Hannah done, to prepare people, to warn them? Not enough. Maybe she doesn't know how. And maybe I haven't pushed her hard enough. I'm not nearly as helpless as Tal thinks I am. Maybe it's time for me to stop following Hannah around and make some decisions of my own.
I'm the last one out of the locker room after PE, and by the time I'm dressed, the field hockey girls are starting to change for their away game. I go to my locker to retrieve my backpack, and find Paloma Flores in the same bay. I've had at least four classes with her over the past two years, but I know almost nothing about her. She plays field hockey. She wrote the best opinion piece our school paper ever printed, in which she called the all-male Barbecue Club "a school-sanctioned cult of toxic masculinity." And she dated Hannah.
"Hey," she says.
I smile back. "Hi."
We watch as a senior girl walks by, glassy-eyed and cradling a half-empty water bottle like it's her infant child.
Paloma shakes her head. "This day is always such a shitshow."
"Yeah," I agree.
"All my classes were basically free periods," she says. "We watched _The Godfather_ in chemistry. That's not even about science."
"My Spanish teacher at least tried. But have you ever seen someone try to play Scrabble Español drunk?" I ask. "It's painful."
"Yeah, my tito Carlo, every Christmas. Just replace Scrabble Español with Pusoy dos." Then, off my confused look: "Card game. Filipino thing. A little bit like poker."
As she stuffs her bag in her locker, I realize this is an opportunity to learn more about who Hannah was, before I knew her. Another piece of the puzzle. Another part of the truth, since I clearly don't have it all.
"You and Hannah Marks," I blurt out, but then don't know what else to say without sounding creepy.
"What about her?"
I steer into the skid. "You two were together, right?"
She closes her locker. "We dated for almost a year."
"But not anymore."
"That is what _dated_ means."
I decide to power through the skid and over a cliff. "What happened?"
Paloma leans against the locker bank. She folds her arms. "Are you interested in her, or me?"
My cheeks burn. "Neither."
She laughs. "Well, I'm taken, sorry, and if it's Hannah, save yourself the trouble. Or maybe just save yourself. In every sense."
I take a step back. "Hannah's not . . . dangerous."
"Of course not," Paloma says. "She's funny, and sweet, or at least she was, before she got so—" Paloma puffs up her cheeks with air.
"Weird?"
She blows out. "Beyond."
"Because of her dreams?"
"The one about all her teeth falling out? Lots of people have that dream."
Hannah never told Paloma about her dreams. Hannah never told her own girlfriend about her visions. Why?
"I'm only telling you so you don't get too invested," Paloma says. "Friendship or otherwise. Hannah got really into—what's it called, when you go and live in the desert because the world is evil?"
It takes me a second to locate the word. "Asceticism?"
Paloma shrugs. "Probably. Hermit bullshit. Beyond weird."
It's more than that. An ascetic isn't necessarily a hermit, though they could be. An ascetic is anyone who practices self-denial or purposefully detaches themselves from earthly pleasures. Some of it is simple stuff, like living frugally, but it can be hard-core and scary, too, like fasting for days or sleeping on a bed of nails.
"Hannah's not a hermit," I tell Paloma. "She lives in a house. She's sixteen, it wouldn't even be legal."
Paloma puts her hand on her hip. "It started with gifts."
Even more evidence to the contrary. Hermits don't give gifts, unless you count spiritual advice, which I guess I should, as a religious person.
"There was this one coat of hers I always loved," Paloma continues. "One day, she gave it to me. And I thought, okay, maybe a late birthday gift. Then came sweaters. And jeans. And books and DVDs and there probably would have been shoes, too, but we're not the same size."
Okay, that is a little weird.
"She must have given almost all of it away, her clothing, because eventually it was a rotation. Three pairs of pants. Five or six shirts. That one stupid Cal sweatshirt that doesn't even fit her. She said it was simpler. And _I_ said, is it really simpler if you have to do laundry every week?"
Now that I think about it, Paloma's right. The clothes I've seen Hannah wear could fill a single drawer. Even when she came to church with me, it was a shirt I'd already seen and her mom's pants. And that sweatshirt. Every single day.
"And fine, do a capsule wardrobe if the spirit moves you, I guess," Paloma says. "But then she stopped cutting her hair. She wouldn't go to movies, she wouldn't go shopping, even if it was just for me. Then I see Laura Jacobs wearing the earrings I got Hannah for our six-month anniversary, and she says Hannah gave them to her. I storm over to her house after school and go into her room, and it's all gone. Her clothes, except for a few outfits. Her books, except for, like, this stack of weird textbooks about mystics and hermits and whatever. Her room was basically empty. Like she'd just moved in."
No wonder Hannah wouldn't let me go upstairs.
"I _get_ big dramatic gestures," Paloma says. "But this was something else."
"What did she say?" I ask. "Did she say why?"
"She said . . ." Paloma hesitates, though I can't tell if it's hard to remember, or just hard to say. "Hannah said she didn't have a choice. It was the only way to make things right again."
"Make what right?" I wonder aloud.
"If you're looking for logic," she says, "look somewhere else."
"Is that why you two broke up? Because she gave away the earrings?"
Paloma stares at me incredulously. "We broke up because she wouldn't talk to me. We broke up because she didn't trust me enough to tell me what was wrong."
Hannah hasn't told me her secrets, either. Maybe she doesn't trust me, either. Maybe she doesn't trust anyone, even the people she cares about the most.
"Hannah's not exactly attached to the world," Paloma says, turning to go, "and that means you shouldn't get too attached to her."
Fifteen
**WHEN IT'S COLD** or raining Telegraph Avenue looks like any block in a college town. There's a drug store, a bagel shop. Stores that sell branded sweatshirts and blue books. But on a day like today—bright, sunny, and unseasonably warm for early November—Telegraph comes to life. A college kid devours two slices of pizza in one gulp, like a reticulated python consuming a goat. Vendors' carts and stands crowd the already narrow street. There's a girl doing henna body art. A lady selling tie-dyed T-shirts to tourists. A man in rainbow suspenders and no shirt hawking bumper stickers that say THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF BERKELEY and feature a Cal Golden Bear hugging a Communist Party sickle.
It smells like weed. It smells like the incense used to cover up that weed. It smells like home.
"I still don't know about this," Hannah says, her hands dug deep in her pockets.
It's been nearly a week since she walked off without me in the Park. She found me later, to apologize for pressuring me. I didn't mention what I'd overheard, and neither did she. And when she asked if I wanted to keep looking for Prophet Dan this weekend, I agreed, on one nonnegotiable condition: that she take the plunge and tell the world about her visions.
"This is a good spot," I assure Hannah. "It's a T. We'll get the people going up Bancroft _and_ everyone going down Telegraph."
She looks skeptical. But she's been skeptical of just about everything I've suggested, evangelism-wise. No, we couldn't go door-to-door, it was creepy and we'd get the cops called on us. I told her practically every eighteen-year-old boy in my church does exactly that for two straight years and no one gets arrested, but this didn't sway her.
No, she wouldn't get up and make speeches downtown, or at school, or even in the middle of the Cal campus where these things are practically expected. She isn't good in front of crowds.
No, we couldn't make flyers— _not even flyers—_ because all she knows is the date, and what good would that really do?
And then I suggested Telegraph, where she wouldn't be put on the spot and we'd still get to talk to lots of people. "Who knows," I said. "We might even see Prophet Dan."
So here we are.
"Are you ready?" I ask her.
"Not really."
"Come on, Hannah." I scan the crowds, trying to pick out someone approachable. "Shoulder to the wheel."
"What the hell does that mean?"
I put on my brightest, sunniest smile. "It means buck up, buttercup."
Here are three of the people we talk to:
A couple waiting for their friends outside a restaurant
An older man shopping at the jewelry stand
A college girl who is very and obviously hungover
Here are the people we convert:
No one. I still think flyers would have helped.
I get better, as we go along. My explanation of our message is smoother, clearer. The last time, my voice doesn't shake at all, and neither do my legs. Hannah only gets worse. Every single time, she mutters something vague about snow, and then turns her head away. Outwardly, I smile and thank them for their time. Inwardly, I'm seething at Hannah, who has to be the worst street preacher I've ever seen. And I've seen a few.
"Are you okay?" I ask finally. "You seem kind of . . . off."
"I'm fine," Hannah says. "A little light-headed."
"Do you want me to get you some water? Or maybe a bagel, Noah's is just down the—"
She's already sidling away. "I've actually got this errand, so."
"We barely started!"
"I've just got to drop something off. With a guy. It's close by."
"What do you need to drop off?"
She waves the question off. "Don't worry about it."
I hate it when people say that. I hate that they assume it's an option for me, _I hate that_.
"Of course I'm going to worry!" I shout at her, throwing my hands up. "I'm not capable of not worrying about it. It's built into my faulty toaster of a brain, _of course I'm going to worry_."
"Ellis," she hisses, eyes darting around, as if anyone's paying attention to us. This is Berkeley, we could be jousting on unicycles and we wouldn't be the weirdest thing to stare at. "Would you please chill?"
"No." I fold my arms. "No. I won't. Because there's something you're not telling me."
She chews on the inside of her mouth. "I don't know what you're talking—"
"Yes, you do," I say. "There's something big you're not telling me, there's something weird going on and I'm sick of pretending there isn't, and we only have less than two months until . . ." I take a giant breath. "If you can't trust me enough to tell me what's going on, why should I trust you?"
Hannah stands very still, her arms wrapped around herself. She sighs. She nods.
"Okay," she says. "I'll tell you."
Sixteen
**"I CAN'T BELIEVE** you hang out here alone," I say to Hannah as we sit on a chipped-paint picnic table in People's Park. "I'd be freaked out."
To tell the truth, I _am_ freaked out, even with Hannah by my side. We're two teen girls in clean clothes. We obviously don't belong here.
She looks at me with a bit of pity. "Why would I be freaked out?"
"Well." I look around the park, at the scattered mini liquor bottles. I can't see any needles, but I bet there are some. "They drink, don't they? And do drugs?"
"Some do. And wouldn't you want something to make you forget you were living on the street? If you were cold and tired and dealing with some serious shit, wouldn't you want a drink?"
"I'm Mormon."
She shrugs. "I'm not a drinker, either. But I might be, if this were my life."
I've never thought about it like that. It's always been about choices. We've all been given a body and the agency to make choices with that body. All choice takes is willpower, I thought. But maybe it's not that simple. Maybe some choices aren't all our doing. Maybe sometimes, genetics or bad luck or fate pushes our hand.
"But what about, like . . . that guy." I nod my head at an older man walking in circles around a bench, carrying on an animated conversation with no one.
"His name's Jerry."
"He's talking to himself."
"He has schizophrenia."
"And that doesn't make you nervous?"
"Why would that make me nervous?"
"Come on." She stares at me. I wait. She says nothing. "He's obviously really sick. He could attack you. He could be dangerous."
"You know, Ellis," she says evenly, "if you don't know what you're talking about, it's okay not to say anything at all."
My face burns. My spine coils.
_You offended her. You offended her and don't even know why, which only makes it worse. You are the RMS_ Titanic _in human form._
"I'm sorry," I say. "I didn't mean to—whatever I did, I'm sorry."
"Jerry," Hannah says, pushing dirt off the bench seat with her shoe, "is a lot more likely to hurt himself than me. Or be attacked by someone else. People with mental illnesses are targets way more often than they're perpetrators." She sighs. "Mental illness is—"
"You don't need to explain mental illness to me." I have one. Hannah doesn't.
"No offense," Hannah says, "but no one thinks a person with anxiety is a public menace. They save that for psychosis. Or delusions." She points at herself.
"You're not delusional."
She shakes her head. "Just because you don't think so doesn't mean other people feel the same way."
She must mean her parents. And maybe Martha, since that's got to be why Hannah's in therapy. But didn't Martha tell me that dreams don't count? Hannah's not having dreams, though, not the normal kind. She's having visions in her sleep. Is the only difference between a vision and a delusion whether someone else believes it? Does it take ten people believing it, or a million? Was every belief on Earth once a single person's delusion, until enough people with enough power believed it?
Or does it take only one person, no matter how powerless?
Hannah shifts on the bench, looking across the park at a tall, lean man in a long brown coat. He's older, with tightly coiled hair and a military-green rucksack. Hannah cups her hands around her mouth. "Chris!"
The tall man turns his head. He raises a hand in greeting as he walks over to us. "How are you doing today?" he asks Hannah.
"I'm alive. You?"
"It's like you read my mind," he says, then flicks his eyes over to me. "Hello."
"Chris, Ellis. Ellis, Chris," Hannah says.
Chris nods. "Nice to meet you."
I start to say it back, but stop short, because the rucksack slung over his shoulder is _moving_.
"Your bag," I say, as if he doesn't know it's moving. "It's—?"
The world's most adorable shepherd puppy pops his head out of the rucksack.
"Oh!" I squeal, and then feel completely ridiculous. "Um. Your puppy is very cute, sir."
Hannah hides a laugh behind her hand. Chris sets the rucksack on the ground, and the puppy wriggles out. "You want to hold him?"
I have never wanted anything more. "Yes, please."
He scoops the puppy up and places him in my arms.
This is how I die. Of joy.
"What's his name?" I ask as the puppy licks my arm.
"Frank Zappa," Chris and Hannah say at the same time.
"Like the musician?"
"Like the legend," Chris says. He turns to Hannah. "So what's up?"
Hannah jerks her head toward the basketball court. "Let's talk over there."
While Chris and Hannah talk, I play with Frank Zappa, letting him gnaw on my hair and failing to eavesdrop on their conversation. It's taking all my willpower and fear of divine retribution not to kidnap this puppy. I've never had a dog. My mom grew up rural, where dogs were meant to be useful, not pampered. My dad is allergic.
I'd never _really_ steal Frank Zappa, of course, but Chris doesn't know that. Chris doesn't know me at all, but he trusted me to take care of his most precious possession. I couldn't do that. I couldn't choose trust over fear.
Or maybe I just haven't. Yet.
Hannah and Chris head back over. Frank Zappa wriggles off my lap and bounds over to his owner. Chris pulls a leash out of his pocket and clips it to the puppy's collar. His bag looks full.
"Good to meet you," Chris says to me.
"You too," I say, then lean forward to scratch Frank Zappa behind his soft ears. "Bye, buddy."
He looks to Hannah. "No promises. I'll do my best, but . . ."
She chews her lips. Nods. "Thanks, Chris."
"Call if you hear something. You've got my number."
"I couldn't forget it," she says, and they both laugh. They wave to each other, then Hannah starts walking to the park exit near the Christian Science church and I scramble to follow.
"What did you mean?" I ask as we cross the street. "That you know his number?"
"Oh," she says, "it was my phone, first. I gave it to him."
I always assumed she didn't have a phone because her parents wouldn't let her have one, or she was taking a strong stand against modern tech. "You gave him your phone?"
"Yeah."
"Why?"
"He needed one."
_And you didn't?_ I think, but don't say.
"Hey," she says, shifting her backpack, "Do you have to go home right away?"
I told my parents I was doing a service day with girls from church. This is the perfect excuse, because Mom doesn't like the woman in charge of my Laurels group and will therefore never ask about it. Not that she'd admit it. What Mom says is, "Sister Miller is always _so_ well put-together." What Mom means is, Sister Miller is a snotty jerk who never shows up for her church-cleaning assignment.
"I've got time," I tell Hannah. "Do you want to go back to campus and try street-contacting again?"
"No. I want to show you something."
"Just for ten minutes," I suggest, trying not to let my impatience creep into my voice. What's wrong with her? Doesn't she understand how important this is? She has information no one else has access to. People have a right to know their lives are going to change.
"You said you wanted me to tell you everything," she says. "You said you wanted to know."
"Yeah, but—"
"Then we've got to get up there before the sun sets," she says, and picks up the pace.
Hannah leads me up Haste Street, toward Cal stadium, toward the Greek Theatre where we'll graduate. Would graduate. If the world weren't collapsing before our senior year even started. The streets incline steeply as we walk, until Hannah stops at a small, paved path tucked in between a university building and a Mediterranean-style house.
"Is this private property?" I ask, looking up the path.
"It's the fire trail. You're never been on it?"
"No." We haven't had a big fire here since before I was born. You can see it, though, in the Oakland hills. Large overgrown lots in prime locations, where a house once was. Even though the ash and char were cleared away decades ago, there's still a hole that hasn't been filled.
Hannah and I arrive at the top of the path, where concrete gives way to dusty dirt and patchy yellow grass. I catch my breath and look to my left. A huge hill is in front of us, the path winding up past where I can see. I take a breath, preparing to remind Hannah that I'm scared of heights, scared of falling, scared of breaking bones, and pretty much everything else associated with hiking, but she's already several feet in front of me. "Are you coming?" she calls over her shoulder. She doesn't wait for the answer before continuing up.
It's clear that either I'm going to walk forward or I'm going to be left behind.
I walk forward.
Hannah sets the pace, so we're up the hill to the first lookout point in what's probably fifteen minutes, but feels like hours to me. My legs are sore, my lungs burn, and my shoulders ache from tensing them. But I didn't fall.
"Isn't it amazing?" she says when we reach the lookout spot.
It is. From the bench off the trail, you can see downtown Berkeley, the port of Oakland with its towering cranes, all the way to San Francisco. It's hazy today, but if it weren't, you could probably see the Farallon Islands, too. In the gradually dimming afternoon light, the bay shimmers and the city gleams.
I slump down on the bench, focusing out onto the water. I don't look past the cliff, just a few feet in front of us. I keep one hand on the bench seat and one ankle twisted around the bench leg. It's bolted into the earth, and I will myself to feel that steady too. After a moment, Hannah sits down next to me. Her gaze is straight ahead, but her eyes look unfocused. Like she's seeing what I'm seeing, but her mind is somewhere else entirely.
"Hannah." She doesn't look over. "Hey. Hannah."
She blinks, then rubs at her eye with one fist. "Yeah?"
"Why are we here?"
"On Earth? You'd have a better answer for that than me."
"Why are we on this hill?"
"This is the place."
"What place?"
"The place where it's going to happen. The place where we'll be when it does."
"The end of the world?" I ask, and Hannah nods. This isn't good. It's uncovered. There's no shelter at all. This might be the worst place to ride out an apocalyptic blizzard. "How do you know?"
"Breathe in," she orders, and I do. "What's it smell like?"
Clean, sharp air. Dirt. Urban wilderness. "Lots of things."
"Eucalyptus."
You can't really smell it up here, but she's right, we passed through a eucalyptus grove as we climbed.
"There's eucalyptus all over," I remind her. "In Tilden. At Lake Anza. Down by campus. How do you know it's _here_?"
"I just do."
"You've been here before," I say, and it isn't a question.
"We used to come every Saturday," she says, brushing her hair out of her eyes. "Early in the morning, all four of us."
_Four?_ I think, but then remember. Hannah has a brother. She told me on our first walk together, but never mentioned him again. I guess they aren't close.
"It was Dad's idea," she continues. "I think he missed going to synagogue. Or, not that exactly, he was pretty done with religion, and my mom is, like, a third-generation atheist, but I think he missed that weekly _thing_ , you know? One day of real rest."
There are so many religions, so many denominations to choose from. I'd never really considered you could have one no one else shared. A church without walls. A religion without authorities. A faith for you alone.
"He made his own church?" I ask.
"It wasn't church," she says, "and it wasn't just his. It was all of ours." She stares out onto the water. "My brother called it 'the place where the light comes in.'" She smiles. Then hesitates. Then speaks. "Danny called it that because he loved watching the sun get higher and higher in the sky. My mom told him he'd fry his retinas."
"Danny," I repeat, and that's not a question, either. I know what I heard. "You said—Danny."
She looks down at her lap. "That's my brother's name. Daniel Jacob Marks."
Daniel like Dan, the street preacher we've never been able to find. Danny, like Lydia called him. D, J, M, like the bolded first letters of the note stuffed into Hannah's backpack. A name, a name she's been so careful never to mention.
"Hannah," I ask, "where's your brother?"
She's quiet, until the sound of an engine breaks the silence. I look out to my right, where a car is climbing a paved road down below. Hannah looks too.
"It would be cool to live up here, don't you think?" she says lightly. Too lightly. "There's even a house right up the path. They rent it out for weddings and things." She points up the steep dirt path, but I don't see any house.
"Where is Danny?" I repeat.
She swallows. "Around."
"That's not much of an answer."
"It's the only one I have!" she snaps, and I shrink back at the sudden fierceness.
"I'm sorry, I—"
"I'm not avoiding the question," she says. "I'm not in denial. He's not dead, he's not away, he's not even missing, really. He's somewhere close by. I just don't know where."
Oh. Oh no.
"It started in his freshman year at Cal," she says, and then her voice hitches.
"You don't have to tell me," I say.
"I want to," she says. "More than anyone else, I think you'll understand."
I know she's about to tell me something terrible, something painful, but still, my heart swells.
"It happened in his freshman year at Cal," she begins again. "Or maybe it started earlier than that, because he was always—" She hesitates. "I don't know. Sensitive. Secretive. Maybe there were always things that hurt him. Things he couldn't tell us.
"The fall started off okay. I don't remember, it's not like I was paying attention to that, but my parents say it started off okay. Even when he was weirdly quiet or getting irritated about the smallest stuff, they thought he was just nervous about college. And his first semester, he actually seemed to like it. He was taking this History of Mysticism course he was in love with, he thought he might major in comparative religion." She smiles, just a little, at the memory. "He bought, like, twelve books that weren't even required, which pissed my parents off because that academic stuff's expensive and he didn't even use his student discount."
Those must be the textbooks Paloma saw, after Hannah purged her room. They must have belonged to Danny—Prophet Dan, who knows so much about religion and mysticism and visions. Hannah lied, but not all the way. She only lied as much as she had to.
"He'd come over for dinner every week," she continues. "At first. And it was like—every dinner, something new was . . . off."
"Off?"
"Like he'd be so nervous, even though it was only us. The next week, he'd refuse to eat what my dad made and wouldn't say why. Then he left this cryptic, scary voicemail on the home phone, saying he 'knew the truth about our family,' and my parents got really worried. They told him something was wrong, he needed help. They asked him to see a doctor, a therapist, someone. Then they begged him. He wouldn't go. He started talking to me. Only me. He told me our parents weren't really our parents. Or, no, I guess they were, but they were evil and going to hurt us both."
"Oh my gosh, Hannah."
"It was awful. Because he really believed it. He wasn't telling me to be _mean_ , he was telling me because he was _terrified_."
"But how could he even think that?"
She bites her lip. "Because the human brain is complicated."
I do know that.
"So he's . . . schizophrenic? Or something else?"
She shakes her head. "He's never been diagnosed with anything."
"I mean, that _sounds_ like—"
She shakes her head harder. "Bad idea."
"What is?"
"Diagnosing someone you don't know."
"Why didn't he get diagnosed by a doctor?"
"I told you, he wouldn't go."
"They can force people. Commit them."
"Would you like that?" she says, on a razor's edge. "If someone did that to you?"
"No," I admit. "But I'm not . . . sick. Not _that_ sick."
"You could be," she says. "Five years from now. Ten. Tomorrow."
The words stick in me like needles. Like knives. I turn away from her.
"Sorry," Hannah says, and touches my hand. "I only meant, anyone could be."
Is that true? Are we all just one illness, one crisis away from losing control over our own lives?
"It was his whole life, this fear. It consumed him." Hannah pauses with the weight of that word. _Consumed_. It means—or meant, in the original Latin—something destroyed. Something broken down into parts that can't ever be rejoined.
"My parents threatened to withhold tuition if he didn't see someone. Not that it mattered. He stopped going to class. Around spring break, he left his dorm room in tatters and his roommate threatening to sue for pain and suffering. He smashed his cell phone and mailed me the pieces with a note saying I should destroy mine, too, so I couldn't be tracked. At first, he slept on friend's couches, we think. But eventually, he'd scare them, and they'd call us, and he'd leave. In April, we didn't hear a single word.
"I was coming back from Paloma's house, and it was dark," Hannah says. "This car pulls up alongside me. I didn't recognize it, so I kept walking. And it kept following me, and the driver rolled down the window. I'm thinking, great, can't wait for this jerk to start catcalling me or asking if I want a ride, but then he said my name."
"It was Danny?"
"I didn't recognize him, at first. I'd never seen him with a beard. And I said, where the fuck have you been, essentially, and he said, get in the car, essentially."
"Did you?"
"I thought—I don't know what I thought. I hoped he'd just been soul-searching, or something, gone on some road trip to clear his head. So, yeah, I got in the car."
Hannah pulls her hair back, twisting it into a ponytail with so much force it must hurt. I'm almost afraid to ask, but if I don't, she might not go on.
"And when you got in the car?" I prompt her.
"We drove around. We circled. Left turn after left turn."
That's to make sure no one's following you. If you still see them after four left turns, you're being tailed. I wonder if Hannah knows that.
"He was talking the whole time, about our parents, how I was in danger. And some stuff about UC Berkeley and an underground cult, I think, I'm not sure. He talked fast." She pulls her ponytail even tighter. "He always talked fast. Like if he didn't get it out, he'd explode. That was the weirdest part. Other than _what_ he was saying—and the beard—it was still Danny. He was all there. There was just something . . . _else_ there, too."
"What do you mean?" I ask.
"His delusion, I guess. That horrible, unshakeable, _real_ thing. This was—" She swallows. "This _is_ real to him. As real as this bench or that tree or . . ."
_Or your dreams, Hannah?_ I think.
Hannah clears her throat. "So he was saying all this stuff, and I was telling him he was wrong, that he'd lost it. I'm not even being nice at this point. It's been so many months of my mom calling his RA, calling his friends, calling the police. My dad hasn't smiled since February, I haven't slept through the night in at least that long, and I'm so angry at him even though I know it isn't his fault."
"It wasn't your fault, either."
"I yelled at him. I called him crazy. Delusional. And other things. That part was my fault."
I wince, because that does hurt a person. "You were under so much stress."
"It broke his heart. I could tell. He said he was going out of town, somewhere Mom and Dad couldn't track him or send their 'people' after him. He said I had to come, that I'd never be safe here. He couldn't leave me alone here."
"You said no."
"Over and over until I was hoarse. Danny knew he was scaring me, and I could tell that broke his heart even more. We were still driving around, circle after circle, until finally he said"—she gulps—"that it was time to go. That we had to go. That I'd understand someday."
She's breathing fast now, and when I put my hand on her arm, I can feel her heartbeat pounding under the skin. Like mine, when I'm panicking. But she's not panicking. She's reliving.
"I did understand. I understood that I was not going back home tonight, not if he could help it. I understood that he was desperate. I understood that I had to make a choice, right now, or I might not be able to make one for a while. So I reach over—" She uncurls her arm into the empty air next to her. "And then I open the car door—" Her hand swings wide. "And then—"
"Then?"
"I jumped."
There's no air in my lungs. "You jumped?"
She nods.
"Out of a moving car?"
She nods again.
"Were you okay?" I ask, like an absolute child. Of course she was, or she'd still be in the hospital. Of course she wasn't, because she jumped out of a moving car.
"The falling was okay," she starts. "It didn't feel like anything. The falling felt safe. And I thought maybe I'd fall forever but then I hit the ground and at first you don't feel it, you know?"
I don't know. I don't know anything.
"You're just staring at the road. When you stand up, your legs are weak, because you landed on them, and your hands are wet, because you landed on them, too. Your palms are all blood and dirt and asphalt and so are your knees but you don't know that yet, you can't see them. And for a second, you can't even remember how you got there, in the road. But then you hear the car door shut and footsteps and you don't really remember even then but you run anyway."
"You ran after that?" I interrupt. "All scraped up?"
She shrugs. "Adrenaline is a hell of a drug."
"Hannah, I'm so sorry, I'm so—I don't know what to say."
"My dad didn't know what to say, either, when I called and he picked me up from the gas station. It was like he wasn't sure if he should be raging or sobbing." She laughs, and it sounds forced. "I was sobbing, that's the one I chose. After the adrenaline wore off and my whole body just . . . burned."
I wonder if it's anything like what I feel when I panic. I try to imagine it, but I can't. I'm so lucky I can't.
"You're so lucky you're safe," I tell Hannah.
"Safe?"
"Who knows what he could have done."
Her eyes flash. "He'd never hurt me."
"He made you jump out of a car!"
"No one made me do anything," she says, clipping her words off. "I jumped because I had to."
"You could have called the cops," I say. "If you'd had a phone."
"I had a phone then," she says. "But I kind of wanted my brother alive."
"What?"
"Sometimes, when the cops try to deal with someone living in a different reality, they get scared. Sometimes, when a person isn't together enough to realize _they_ should be scared of the cops, bad things happen. Sometimes, people get shot."
My parents always told me to find a police officer if I was lost, or hurt, or scared. That they'd help me. I can't imagine how scary it must be to live in fear of the people who are supposed to help you. I'm lucky, unfairly lucky, to be unable to imagine.
"When he drove off—that's the last time I saw him. Mostly."
Mostly? I'm about to ask what she means by that, when she runs a hand along the red bracelet on her wrist. The one she found in my mailbox. And then it all clicks. The trips to People's Park. The packages tightly wrapped and handed over to Chris and Frank Zappa, the quiet conversations with the _Street Spirit_ sellers and the stuffed fish in her tree. The uneasy sensation I have, sometimes, when I'm with Hannah. The feeling that we're being watched.
And then, Hannah takes a breath and tells me what I already know.
"Prophet Dan doesn't really exist," she says. "We've been looking for my brother."
"Oh," I breathe out. "Hannah . . ."
"You can understand," she says, almost as an afterthought, "why I'd want to find him. Now. Before the world ended."
I try to imagine Em sick, lost, in danger. It nearly rips my ventricles apart, just the imagining. Yes. I can understand.
"Why didn't you tell me?" I ask. "You could have told me who were we really looking for."
She shakes her head. "You didn't know me, you didn't believe in my dreams, yet. If I'd told about Danny right then, you would have thought . . ." She swallows, hard. "You would have thought I was like him."
It's probably true. I hate that it's probably true. "No, I wouldn't—"
"Of course you would have." She twists the sleeve of her hoodie. "Sometimes even I think it."
"You never needed someone else to interpret the dreams," I say. "Did you?"
"I might have figured out the place on my own, with the eucalyptus, but I wouldn't have figured out the date. Even though it was so obvious."
"Because it's the solstice?"
"Because it's his birthday."
I don't have to ask whose birthday she means.
"You . . ." I pause, because I know she's just told me something huge, but why did she wait so long? "You lied to me, though. About everything."
If Hannah could lie about this, she could lie about other things.
She looks down at her lap. "I know. I'm sorry. I understand if . . . you don't feel like you can trust me."
Can I? Do I? I must, a little bit, because something in the back of my brain is already explaining this away, twisting it into something easier to swallow. Hannah lied, but because she had to. Hannah lied, but it's not like I haven't done that. Tal said I'm completely—what was it? Snowed. Like Hannah's words are relentless flurries, and they've buried me. Like she's a flesh-and-blood blizzard.
If Hannah could lie about this, she could lie about everything.
That's true. It's logical. It makes sense from the outside looking in, from a distance.
"But I swear, I didn't lie about seeing you in the dreams. I do need you." Hannah looks up and meets my eyes. She smiles. "I didn't know why, but I knew I needed you."
I'm not looking in, I'm not at a distance, I'm an inch away from Hannah, wrapped inside the center of her story. And if I shouldn't still trust her, after what she's said . . . well, fine. But I do. If I shouldn't still believe her, fine, but I do.
"I need you to help me find him," Hannah says. "Before . . ."
This isn't just a doomsday. It's a deadline. Hannah and I can survive an apocalypse, and I'm making sure my family can, too, but a person living in parks doesn't stand a chance.
"We'll find him," I promise. "We'll make sure he's safe before anything happens. He's still in Berkeley, isn't he?"
"He hasn't tried anything. Like with the car. But I think he stuck around to make sure I'm—" She looks at me. "I know how this sounds. But Danny was trying to save me. The wrong way, for the wrong reasons, but he was trying to save me."
"Maybe that's why he hasn't tried to, again. After you jumped out of the car."
"What do you mean?" she says.
"He saw that you could save yourself."
We sit in silence as the daylight fades. When the horizon is like the inside of a grapefruit, not quite orange and not quite red, Hannah stands. She offers me her hand and pulls me up, even though we both know I didn't need help. We go down the hill together.
Seventeen
**I'VE PUT MY** foot down. We're making flyers. I might not have all the details, and Hannah might not be on board, but we have a date and a location and a duty to the rest of the world. One day during lunch, I drag Hannah to the top floor of the Central Library, next to the vinyl section. No one's ever there except men with gray ponytails listening to the Doors and reliving their draft-dodging days.
At the table farthest in the back, Hannah sitting uncomfortably across from me, I make a mock-up flyer on orange paper. Orange like a nuclear warning symbol. Orange like a mushroom cloud. Orange like the apocalypse. At the top, it reads ARE YOU PREPARED? in the largest lettering I could fit. Below is Hannah's prophecy, only lightly edited. And at the bottom, and most important, is the date. December 21. Just over one month from now.
"I still don't think this is a good idea," she says. "And even if it was, every lamppost in this city is covered with flyers for weird stuff. No one's even going to notice yours."
"Ours."
"You're designing it. It's yours."
"You are just about the worst prophet in the world," I tell her.
"Uh, no, I'm not. What about the guy who had all his followers commit suicide?"
"Which one?"
"Thanks for making my point for me."
I set the marker down. "You know things other people don't. Things that will change their lives forever."
"So maybe let them enjoy the little bit of time they have." Hannah leans back in her chair. "It's not like they can do anything about it."
I believe in fate—how could I not, at this point?—but I don't believe in fatalism. I won't ever stop researching, or preparing, or making sure I'm in the best possible position to survive. It feels like giving up. I'm a lot of things I don't like, but I'm not a quitter. I don't give up without a fight, so Hannah's going to have to fight with me, whether she likes it or not.
"But don't you think they have a right to at least know?" I ask her. "To be prepared?"
I underline the question at the top of the page: ARE YOU PREPARED? It's mostly rhetorical. Of course they aren't prepared. Most people never will be. But everyone deserves a chance.
"You owe them that," I say.
Her mouth twists. "I don't owe anyone anything."
I fold my arms. "You owe me."
"Okay, that's not—" she starts to say, holding up a hand, but I cut her off.
"No, you do," I say. "I've lied for you. A lot. My parents don't trust me because of you. I've done a million things I wasn't supposed to do. I've gotten in so much trouble, all to help you."
"I didn't make you do any of those things," she says.
"That's not what I said! I did them willingly, I did them because I believe you," I say. "But I still did them _for_ you, Hannah. Don't you think you owe me _something_?"
Silence. I stare at Hannah. She stares at the table.
"Yes," she says quietly. "I owe you a lot."
There's another long silence, like she wants to say something more. But she doesn't, so eventually, I clear my throat. "Okay. So, we're making flyers."
"Okay," she says, eyes still focused on the tabletop.
"Great." I push my first draft directly under her nose, so she can't help but see it. "See, we've got your prophecy, we've got the date, we've got the spot on the hill—"
"You can't tell them where," she says, reaching over me to grab the pen and crossing it out.
"What?" I sit back as she crosses it a second time, darker. "We have to."
"No."
"Hannah."
"It's just us," she says firmly, starting to write something else. "I've seen it, remember? You and me and no one else."
"You don't know that," I protest. "What if that's the only place that's safe, what if people need to be on higher ground, what if—"
"What if, what if," she repeats. "Sometimes I think you live on the planet What If, not Earth."
"Good one," I deadpan. "You should do stand-up."
She re-caps the pen and looks at me. Her face softens. "I'm sorry. But . . . bad shit happens, okay? Whether you plan for it or not. If you spend your life thinking about all the terrible things that could happen, you're going to miss every moment that's actually good. Trust me."
When she leans back, I see what she's written on the flyer.
_LOCATION: the place where the light comes in_
I wonder if that's why she gave away her things. Her clothes, her books, except for the ones her brother left behind. I wonder if they were some sort of sacrificial offering, for not appreciating the good moments. Less ascetic conviction, more crushing guilt. But it's not her fault. It's not her brother's, either, it's no one's fault. Doesn't she know that?
"Hey," I say, pulling the flyer back toward me. Trying to be casual. "Why did you—give up so much?"
She wrinkles her nose. "What?"
"Your stuff. Like your phone, or most of your clothing, or—"
"Did Tal tell you that?" she interrupts.
"No. Look, you have a total of maybe four outfits and I know your parents are professors, so it's clearly a choice," I reason. She stares at me. I cave instantly. "Paloma told me."
"God," she huffs. "Great."
"I only want to know why. Was that part of your dreams too, or—"
"It just didn't seem fair," she says, then clamps her mouth shut.
I sit back. "Fair?"
She swallows. "My brother doesn't have a phone. He doesn't have lots of clothes. Wherever he is, he's not comfortable. Why should I get to be?"
"But he chose that," I point out.
"It's not a choice if you don't think you've got any other options."
Is that really all this is for, fairness? She gave away her possessions so things would be fair between her and someone who lives on the street? I don't know what's in Hannah's head, and I won't tell her she doesn't know her own mind, but I think it's more than that. I think she's doing this to feel close to him. Wherever he is, whatever he's doing, she wants to feel what he feels. It's the only way she _can_ feel close to him.
"So are you going to give these to people?" Hannah asks, taking the flyer from my hands and examining it.
"No, I'm going to make confetti out of them."
She gives me a look and hands it back over. "I mean are you just going to scatter them around town, or will you give them to people you _know_? People you care about. So they can be ready."
"I'll make sure my family's okay," I say. "You already know. Obviously. So who else?"
"Like maybe Tal?" she suggests lightly. Heat spreads across my face. Hannah's staring at me, searching me like I'm something under a microscope. "Or . . . Lia?"
The heat's on my neck and my shoulders now. I look down at the flyer. She sighs.
"I'm not trying to pressure you," Hannah says. "I don't want it to seem that way. But I think—"
"Yeah, I get it, you think you've got me figured out," I interrupt, shoving the flyer aside.
"I think sometimes people like us find each other," Hannah says, picking her words carefully, "because we need each other."
Is that true? Hannah and I aren't the same—not _exactly_ the same, though maybe she assumes we are. Hannah likes girls. Only girls. That's not all the way true for me, I know that, but it is all the way wrong?
I shake my head. "Based on basically _nothing_ , you think you know exactly how I feel."
Hannah moves to the chair closest to me. "I don't know what you're feeling," she admits. "But whatever it is, whatever you _are_ feeling . . . it's okay. It's better than okay. You need to know that, and I'm not sure anyone's told you before." She leans forward, all but forcing me to look her in the eye. "Whatever you're feeling, Ellis, it's _you_. And you are good. So it's good, too."
She's wrong about one thing: I have been told that before. Not in this context, not the way she means it, but I've spent every day of my life being told I was created in the image of something perfect. That there are no errors in creation. I thought I believed that, but maybe I didn't, or haven't for years. Maybe I haven't been treating myself like I believe that. I can accept that I was fearfully, wonderfully made, or I can believe that I was a mistake.
Something warm is spiraling its way through my veins. Not hot like a brand, or a fire, but something softer. Like the sun coming in through a window.
I'm not a mistake. No part of me is a mistake. I can believe that.
The word _apocalypse_ means a revelation, but that doesn't mean every revelation is an apocalypse. Or maybe it can be a little apocalypse, a _good_ apocalypse. The word _apocalypse_ means to uncover what's been hidden. Maybe this time, I'll draw back the curtain and like what I see.
I think I see it. I almost feel like I can speak it, too. I'm not all the way there, but I'm closer.
"I'll make sure," I tell Hannah, and it comes out a whisper. Soft and unsure, but spoken. "The people I care about . . . I'll make sure they know."
Eighteen
**I PLASTER OUR** flyers all around town—well, as far I can get on the bus and still make it home early enough that my lies about extra chemistry labs or math tutoring seem plausible. So that means they're mostly around campus, but I figure that's where the more open-minded people are hanging out anyway. The flyer goes up on every prepper forum I know, too, though I'm smart enough not to read the reply comments. For people who truly believe the End of the World as We Know It is imminent, they are oddly resistant to having an actual date for TEOTWAWKI. I also make a basic, free, and admittedly badly designed website with all the information Hannah's given me, plus some survival tips of my own.
It's not a lot. It's barely even a little. But it's something. It gives people a fighting chance.
I don't put any flyers up at church, though I'd like to. We're big on self-sufficiency, though, so I hope the ward will get through things okay. Most of the men were Boy Scouts. Most of the women can sew. Some of us are even descended from the original pioneers—"pioneer stock." I always thought it was kind of snotty, the way some people would drop that into conversation, as if having a great-great-grandma who buried three children on the way to Utah, or some breaded ancestor who carried children over the frozen Sweetwater River, made you a hero by proxy. But now I sit in a pew with my arms folded as my parents and sister talk to the friends they love, and pray that hardiness is an inherited trait.
There's a thump and the swish of loose fabric as someone slides in next to me. When I open my eyes, it isn't Em, like I expected. It's Lia.
She grabs my arm. "Ugh, Ellis. I've got to tell _someone_."
The hair on my arms feels static under her fingers. "What?"
"Bethany's great-grandma is visiting." She inclines her head at a blond, spindly, elderly woman talking to an even blonder sister missionary. "So I went up to introduce myself, and she asked where I was from."
I can already see where this is going. "And you said Berkeley."
"Well, I was born in Long Beach, so I said that. But then she said, 'No, I mean, what _are_ you?' And I told her, 'I'm Samoan,'" Lia continues. "And _she_ said, 'But you're so light! I'd never have guessed you were African.'"
I burst out laughing. "What!"
Lia shushes me, but she's giggling too. "Somalia, Ellis. She didn't know the difference between Samoa and _Somalia_."
"Wow. Yikes."
"She's old, I get it, and from, like, very rural Wyoming, but holy shit." Lia rolls her eyes.
I'm almost shocked by the swearing. That's so not like her. Not that it isn't justified, but Lia's so perfect. Then again—maybe that's just the armor she wears to get through the day, to get through people not understanding who she is and where she comes from. Our ward is more diverse than most I've seen, but no one's immune to mistakes. No one's perfect, not even Lia. I built her up that way, without even meaning to. I met her when I was a toddler, but that doesn't mean I _know_ her.
"Hey, Lia," I blurt out, my mouth moving faster than my brain. "Does your family have food storage?"
"Oh, yeah, some." She wrinkles her nose. "A lot of it is pisupo though." Then, off my confused look: "Corned beef."
Like I told Tal, there's danger to surviving solely off canned meat. "What about water?"
"I don't know."
"You should have water. Lots of water; tap is fine. You can fill up soda bottles, just make sure they're in a dark place."
I wouldn't normally advise that—used plastic can go bad—but it's only a month away. Better to have non-ideal water than no water at all.
"What about matches?" I ask. "Flashlights, batteries, extra blankets?"
"I'm really not sure."
"You should," I say. "It's important. If you don't, I know Sister Keller has a ton of extra supplies. You should ask her."
"How would that look, when she _just_ taught a lesson on self-sufficiency?" Lia asks with a laugh.
"Ask anyway."
"Okay. But, Ellis . . ." She shakes her head. "I don't understand why you're telling me this."
I want to tell her. I want to tell her all the facts, the whole truth, Hannah's truth. But I don't want her to be scared. I want her to be happy, in the last days she might have. I used to think facts were the most important thing. Writing them down, memorizing them, giving them to others. But maybe sometimes, facts just aren't helpful. Maybe being prepared isn't the most important thing. Maybe Lia's happiness—as short or long as that lasts—matters more.
"I heard it's going to be a really rough winter," I say. "There might be power outages."
"Where'd you hear that?"
I pause just a second too long. " _Farmer's Almanac_."
"Huh." She smiles. "You just know something about everything, don't you?"
In another person's mouth, that might sound snarky. But in Lia's voice, I can hear real admiration.
"That's nice of you," I say.
"No, I'm serious, you must be amazing at Trivial Pursuit."
"My family actually refuses to play that with me."
"Because you're too good?"
"Because I'm too competitive."
She laughs. "We should play it at Mutual, sometime. You and I could be a team. I'll take Science and Sports, and you'll do the rest."
My heart flutters under my ribs. "Deal."
"I should go find my family," she says, and starts to go.
"Wait," I call after her, and she turns back. "I—"
_When I talk to you, it feels like being a member of some special club._
"I like you," I say, and her smile doesn't fade. "That's the other reason I told you about the . . . winter. I like you, Lia."
_When I look at you, it's like feeling the sun on my skin._
"I like you a lot," I finish.
She doesn't hesitate, her smile doesn't falter. "Oh, I like you too, Ellis." She waves. "See you in class."
And then she walks away.
I take a couple of long, gulping breaths. She didn't pause, she didn't look serious or shocked or even surprised. She didn't know what I was saying to her. It's okay. That's okay. If everything I feel is okay, like Hannah said, then everything Lia feels—or doesn't—is okay, too. It doesn't mean what I felt was wrong. Or doesn't matter. Or isn't real.
_I'd want to know_ , Hannah said to me one Sunday. _I'd want to know who I was. Before the world changed_.
And I do. I already did, and no amount of shutting down my brain or locking it inside the cage I've made my body was going to make me forget it. I knew. But knowing is one thing. Saying it out loud is another. It's a different kind of knowing, the kind you can't come back from.
She didn't understand me, and that's okay. What would I even have done, if she'd said she liked me too, and really _meant_ it? I'm not sure if I'd have been ready. I think I might need more time, to get ready for something like that. I'd need to tell other people first, My sister, my friends—my parents, eventually. I'd need to sit with it in my own head, say it to myself, not just another person. I'd to live it, not just live _with_ it.
I need more days, I realize, with a kind of electric shock. I need more days in this life, the one I'm living now. But the giant cosmic clock is ticking. Time is one thing I just don't have.
Another sunny November day, another lie to my parents about math tutoring, another afternoon under Hannah's tree playing Five-Word Books. I'm getting better.
"Sea mammal obsession causes death," Theo offers.
" _Moby Dick_ ," answers Tal.
"Dude with schnoz ghostwrites flirting," Sam says.
" _Cyrano de Bergerac_ ," I say.
Suddenly, Theo is distracted by something over my shoulder. "Oh hell yes, Martin's here!"
"Really?" Sam says, turning around.
"Who's Martin?" I ask.
"I know it's not the first time I've asked," Tal says, "but are you _sure_ you go to this school?"
"Martin the Ice Cream Guy!" Sam says, and Theo points over my shoulder. I twist around. A paunchy middle-aged man is pushing a metal cart over to a cluster of kids who all have their money out and ready. "He comes a couple times a week and charges less than 7-Eleven _or_ E-Z Stop."
"Can you spot me, like, fifty cents for a SpongeJeff Yellowpants Popsicle?" Theo asks Sam, digging change out of his pocket.
"SpongeJeff?" I ask.
"They're not officially licensed, so they've got weird names," Theo says. "But FYI, Speedy the Tree Shrew tastes like Children's Benadryl." Sam tosses Theo a couple of coins and they both get to their feet.
Sam spreads his arms wide. "Martin, my man!" he shouts across the park as he and Theo leave. "Tell me you've still got Patricio the Plumber left!"
As soon as they're out of earshot, I turn to Tal and say what I've been wanting to tell him all afternoon.
"Hannah told me," I say. "You don't have to keep that secret for her anymore. She told me who we've really been looking for." He looks surprised, but doesn't speak. I guess I have to say the exact words. "Her brother."
"I'm sorry," he says. "I wanted to tell you from the second you said 'Prophet Dan' at the library. But it wasn't mine to tell."
Right here, right now, I want to tell him about the end of the world. Is that mine to tell? Or is that Hannah's, too? Sometimes it feels like she's the sun, and we're all just orbiting around her.
"I can't make your choices for you," Tal says, eyes on the dirt. "I can't stop you from helping her look. But I can tell you, it's not doing her any favors."
"He's her brother."
"And he's got bigger problems than she can handle. This isn't on her to fix. The longer and harder she tries, the worse it is." He shakes his head. "It took me and Sam and Theo a long time to figure that out. Our help wasn't help at all."
The sun's going to explode, one day. In five billion years, no matter what happens in December, the sun will burn itself out. There isn't a thing anyone can do to stop it.
"She . . ." I hesitate, then try again. "She didn't trust me enough. To tell me the truth from the start."
"It took her months to tell _us_ ," Tal says. "It's not a trust thing, it's a Hannah thing. From what she's said, it's practically a Marks family tradition to shut your friends out while you're dying inside."
_They don't like being in the house_. That's what Hannah said, about her parents. They're dealing with Danny's disappearance just as badly as Hannah is. She's obsessing over it. They're pretending it isn't happening.
"It's more than that," I say. "She thought I'd judge her."
"Honestly?" Tal wrinkles his nose, looking a little guilty. "I might have thought that, too."
"Wow. Thank you."
"I would have been wrong! Clearly, she was wrong. You're a lot less uptight than you first appear."
"Again. Thank you."
"Oh God, that's not what I meant." Tal holds out his hands. "I'm sorry, okay? Really. I am sorry on both our behalves for wrongly judging your judgy-ness . . ." He stops, noticing the grin creeping across my face. He rests his chin in his palm. "Oh, are you having a good time, watching me grovel?"
Maybe a little. I smile. "Sometimes a girl just loves hearing a good apology, what do you want from me?"
Tal goes still. He stares at the grass for a moment. "What do _you_ want?"
"It's a figure of speech."
"I know. But—" He leans forward. "What do you want? More than anything else?"
"What everyone wants. To survive."
He shakes his head. "No, Ellis. What do you _want_?"
"Survival is a want."
"Survival is an instinct," Tal counters. "Animals survive, bugs survive, bacteria survive. What are you surviving for? What's going to make it matter that you're still alive?"
What's the point of wanting things, when so many are sinful, or impossible, or both? What's the point of wanting things you can't have?
"What do _you_ want?" I ask.
"I want—" He leans back on his hands. "I want to meet my dad's family, in Brazil. I want to get to know them. I want to make sure my half siblings know me, like really know me, even though I don't live with them and who knows what their dad says when I'm not around. I want my mom to stop worrying about me."
_Me too_ , I think. Tal takes a breath.
"I want to go to college in a place with actual seasons. I don't know what I want to study there, and I want people to stop asking that like I should know already. And maybe this is petty," he acknowledges, "but I want to be fucking _happy_. I want to be the kind of happy that's two giant middle fingers at every person who told me I'd never be, unless my life was exactly like theirs. That's what I want."
What do I want? Do I want to move closer to him? Or do I want to run away? Could I want opposite things at the same time?
"Is that . . ." I dig my fingers into the dirt, as if that will keep me planted. "Is that all you want?"
"Is that not enough?" he asks with a laugh.
"Yes," I say. "But . . . is that all you want?"
Tal swallows audibly. "No."
He pushes himself off his hands and leans forward. There's an inch of space between us, and less air. Or maybe just I'm holding my breath.
"Survive for something," Tal says, low and urgent. " _Want_ something, Ellis. Want something."
We stare at each other for a moment that feels like eons. Tal reaches out for me, hesitant, like you'd do with a skittish cat. I scramble to my feet, all awkward limbs and confusion and a thrum of something warm and terrifying fluttering under my ribs.
"I'm sorry, I—" The feeling beats quicker, loud in its silence, and drowns out whatever lie my brain could think up. "I have to go."
As I walk away, I grasp for a word, a name for the feeling in my chest. I come up empty.
I wonder if there are some things even the dictionary can't define.
Nineteen
**THAT NEXT MONDAY,** Hannah finds me in the courtyard before first period.
"I've got something to show you," she says. I wait for her to pull something from her pocket, or out of her backpack, but she stands there, unmoving.
"Where is it?" I glance around, but there's nothing behind her, either.
"The City."
Berkeley is a city, Oakland is a city, even Piedmont is technically a city. But there is only one City. "San Francisco?"
"Yep."
"What is it?"
"It's not a thing," she says. "More like an experience."
I would follow Hannah into the depths of hell—I probably _will_ end up following her there—but sometimes her vagueness is truly irritating. "I can't go after school. It's family home evening."
"Okay," she says. "Let's go now."
"But . . ." I look back toward the C-building, where first-period chemistry is waiting for me. "We have school."
She rolls her eyes. "Yeah, I know. We'll skip."
My parents have never explicitly told me I wasn't allowed to skip school, but I think it was implied.
"We'll be back by sixth period," Hannah promises.
"And when my parents get the absence email?"
"It'll say you missed one _or more_ periods. You'll tell them you had a sub in history. They must have messed up the attendance sheet."
"Does that work?"
"It'll work once, for sure."
"I don't know."
"Have you ever skipped before?" she asks. I shake my head. "Don't you think you should have the experience once in your life?"
Skipping class: part of a complete and balanced high school experience. Like house parties with red cups. Or making improbable friends in Saturday detention. I'm not likely to be invited to any parties before the end of the world, and my school doesn't even have regular detention, so skipping class it is.
"Okay," I say, and Hannah's face blooms into a smile. "Lead the way."
"Uh, you don't know where the front gate is?"
My eyes go wide. "We can't go out the front!" I say, but she's already walking toward the gate. I scramble to catch up. "Someone will stop us!"
She throws a glance back at me, then skids to a halt. "They will if you look like that."
I look down at my outfit. It's jeans and a coat. Not all that suspicious.
"The way you're standing," Hannah says with a shake of her head. "You look guilty. You look like you're asking to get caught."
I shrug at her helplessly.
"Walk like you've got somewhere to be," Hannah says. "Head high, eyes ahead, stand up straight."
I cringe at that last one. _Stand up straight_. Hannah's not looking down at me disapprovingly or prodding my spine as she says it, but I hear my mom anyway. I always thought she insisted on perfect posture because she wanted us to look graceful and happy, so everyone else would see us that way. I'd never considered it could be useful to me and me alone. I'd never considered that in her own strange way, she might have been trying to show me something. Gift me something.
I touch my fingertips to my hair, to my shoulders, to my waist, then let them fall to my sides. My spine straightens. Not like a cord being yanked, but like a sail being unfurled. I draw my chin up and look Hannah in the eye.
She smiles. "Perfect."
We walk across the courtyard, past the administration building, and out the open front gate.
No one stops us.
Our BART train is crowded, so Hannah and I hang on to the straps. This is another thing I like about being tall—I don't have to stand on my toes to reach them, like Hannah does. When the train pulls into Embarcadero, the first stop in San Francisco, I look to Hannah for guidance. She shakes her head and snags two newly empty seats.
"How far are we going?" I ask.
Hannah looks out the window, into the darkness of the tunnel. "I was thinking Colma."
"That's what you wanted to show me? The giant cemetery city where the dead outnumber the living?"
"Where the dead outnumber the living," Hannah repeats. "You can be so dramatic."
"We're not really going that far, are we?"
"I was kidding about Colma, but we are going far. First Golden Gate Park. Then the Outer Richmond."
That's practically in the Pacific Ocean. "What for?"
"It's a surprise."
I fold my arms. "If I'm going all that way, you have to do something for me."
"Name it."
"Missionary work."
She looks pained. "Come on."
"We'll be in Golden Gate Park anyway. It's a perfect opportunity." Hannah wrinkles her nose, but I'm not backing down. I hold out my hand. "That's the deal. Take it or leave it."
She rolls her eyes, but shakes my hand.
Golden Gate Park should be the perfect environment for some light doomsday preaching. This is San Francisco, and we passed two other street preachers on our way here. At least we're not telling anyone they're hell-bound, like the man in the cowboy hat by the BART station was. At least we're not telling people their brains have already been infected by alien invaders, like the guy at the entrance to the park was, showing off the tinfoil on the inside of his winter coat. Ours is a friendlier doomsday. Peace, love, and armageddon. What could be better?
But the tech bros lounging on a fleece blanket and eating burritos just laugh. "Like the zombie apocalypse?" says the one wearing a Patagonia fleece. "I could do that. I'm hella good at _Overwatch_."
"Dude, the government would just bomb them," says his friend in the same Patagonia fleece, just a different color.
"They'd already be dead, man. They don't care if they get radiation, you'd just end up with something that could eat your brains _and_ give you leukemia."
"I'll tell you what's a sign of the apocalypse," says an elderly man playing chess with an even more elderly friend. "That new tower they just built downtown. A thousand feet tall. Ugly as sin."
"They said it's the tallest piece of public art in the world," the other man says.
"Public art? Carl, it looks like a damn dildo."
"Well, so does the Washington Monument, Bob."
While I'm contemplating just how many phallic-shaped buildings there are, Hannah, who hasn't said a word so far, suddenly huffs and stomps away. I race after her, leaving the two old men in a heated, dildo-centric argument.
"What is your problem?" I say when I catch up to Hannah. She's been distracted since the moment we got here, eyes darting around, not even bothering to engage with our street contacts.
She keeps walking, hands jammed deep in her coat pockets. "I said I didn't want to do this."
"You didn't, technically."
"As if you couldn't _tell_."
I'm not the prophet, here. I'm not a mind reader, either. "Hannah, wait."
"What was the point?" she mutters, walking faster. "What was the point of that?"
"People have a right to know," I say. "We have a duty to tell them, to warn them—"
She spins around. "Why?"
I step back. "What do you mean _why_?"
"The world will end," she says, steely and sharp. "Whether people know about it or not, whether we tell them or not, it's going to happen and there's not a thing they can do to stop it."
"They could be prepared."
"Prepared," she says scornfully. "God, you love that word. It's like your fucking teddy bear."
Heat creeps onto my face and the back of my neck. "Don't."
"You can't protect yourself against everything. Sometimes terrible shit just happens and there's nothing you can do."
"Great advice," I snap back. "Why don't you take it?"
She throws up her hands. "What?"
"You gave away everything you owned." She takes a step back. "You gave up your phone, and haircuts, and a normal life. You made yourself a sixteen-year-old hermit, and why? Because you've made some cosmic bargain with the universe? Because you think it'll bring him back?" I close the gap between us. "Hannah. It won't."
She turns away from me. I'm instantly hit with a wave of guilt. I didn't need to say those things. It didn't help, even if it was true.
"I'm sorry," I say, and touch her shoulder.
"What do you want?" she mutters, shrugging me off.
"Same thing as everybody," I say, trying for a weak joke. "Basic survival."
Hannah shakes her head. "Survive for _what_?"
I pause, thinking of Tal. He told me to survive for something. Hannah's using the same words, but she's not asking what I'll survive for. She's asking, why bother?
"Hannah," I whisper, but then don't know what else to say.
"So what if the world ends?" she says, quieter, calmer. "Not like it's a great world, anyway. It's mean, and cold, and so unfair that sometimes I can't believe it's lasted this long."
Her shoulders are quivering. So is her mouth. I know, without asking, that she's thinking of her brother. Alone, and in pain, and likely in danger. She's thinking of herself, alone and in pain, too, and powerless to help him. She's right. It is unfair. That word didn't always mean "inequitable." In the Old English, _unfægr_ ; it meant something ugly. Deformed. Hideous. And the world is unfair like that too. It can be so hard to see any beauty in it.
"I know," I tell her. "I know. But it's the only world we've got."
She nods, wiping the back of her hand across her nose. "I'm sorry."
"It's okay."
"That was so shitty, I'm sorry."
"I shouldn't have made you do that," I say. "You didn't want to. I'm sorry, too."
Hannah scans the park. "We can go home, if you want," she says, every word brittle. "He isn't here."
Oh. That's why we're in this park. I don't know how it took me so long to notice.
"Did someone see him?" I ask. "Did someone call you?"
"He's been here before, and it's the one place I hadn't looked in a while, so I thought—" She focuses her gaze on the wet grass. "No. No one's seen him in weeks."
"Not even Chris?"
She shakes her head. "It's never been this long before."
Hannah doesn't have to say it out loud for me to understand. Her brother has really and truly vanished. That word comes from a Latin root, _evanescere_. It means "to pass away," that polite way to say death. That polite way to speak something unspeakable.
"I'm so sorry, Hannah. I'm so sorry."
She keeps her eyes trained on the grass. We have to get out of this park. She'll only see him everywhere. I grasp her forearm lightly and take a step forward, a step west.
"Where are we going?" she asks, but doesn't dig in her heels.
"You tell me," I say. "Where are we going, Hannah?"
I've never been in the Outer Richmond, walking or driving. Hannah knows where she's going, so I follow in her stride, just a step behind. My dad always told me not to be a follower. Thinking back on it, though, there are plenty of people he'd like me to follow. Him, for one. Jesus, for another. It's such an odd thing parents do, make pronouncements that beg for exceptions.
But I listened, didn't I? I never followed anyone. I holed up in the library stacks. I made myself a nest inside my own brain. Then Hannah went and shook the tree branches, sending that nest toppling down. My parents are mad at her for doing it, and madder at me for letting her. But everything leaves its nest, eventually. Sometimes it takes a push.
We walk through block after block of houses with red stucco roofs, big sunroom windows drawing light and warmth inside. I wonder what we look like to someone sitting in the window seat. Do we look like truant kids, sneaking around the city? Do we look like the failed evangelists we are? Or do we just look like two girls, unremarkable and unnoticeable? I've always wondered what it would be like, to see myself from the outside.
We walk out of the residential streets and across an almost endless green lawn, past the Legion of Honor, into groves of cypress, bushy and tall. Then, suddenly, I hear it. I surge past Hannah, and now she has to rush to catch up with me. The ocean. I didn't know we were going to the ocean. The forest breaks, and there is the sky again, a haze of gray fog with cool blue underneath. There is the sea, dark waves and white foam, stretching so far it could be the whole world. _Sea_ is a word with no known origin. _Sea_ is a word that simply _is_.
Ahead of us is a part of the coastline I've never seen before. So much of the San Francisco waterfront is built up with piers, wax museums, and theme restaurants marketed to tourists in fleece jackets who expected California to be much warmer. This place, with its jagged, burnt sienna cliffs and silence, feels different. Pristine. Untouched. Wild.
"What is this place?" I whisper to Hannah.
"Lands End."
I wonder if there's an apostrophe in its name. Is this land's end, the stopping point of a singular place? Or is it the end of all lands?
"This way," Hannah says, and starts toward the shore. We're so close to the water that the salt sticks in my taste buds, briny and inviting. Hannah leads me to a big, deserted cliff. It's not one of the taller ones, and not as sheer of a drop, which I appreciate. Still, I'm careful to stay far back from the edge.
"This is my first memory," Hannah says, and I can barely hear her over the wind and the waves.
"What?" My hair whips around my face. I pull it back.
"This is the first thing I remember," she says, louder. "I think I was four. We came here, my whole family, after spending the morning at the aquarium. We stood at one of these lookouts. And I wanted to go down to the water, so I could see the fish. I wanted to get closer. Danny held my hand, and said I didn't have to see them, because I already knew they were there. But I still wanted to. I still wanted to get closer."
For a moment, we stand in silence, watching the waves crash against the smaller rocks below. They seem to hit harder each time, more force behind each saltwater swell. It must be high tide. When I look over at Hannah, her gaze is not out on the horizon, but down on the rocks.
"Come on," she says, lowering herself off the side of the cliff and onto a ledge.
Oh no. "Wait, stop, what are you doing?"
"Getting closer." She takes another step down, fingers gripping the plateau I'm standing on.
No, no, no. "Fine, there's a trail to the beach, use that!"
She ignores me and takes another step down.
"Hannah!" I shout. This is not safe. There were signs at the trailhead asking us to specifically _not do this thing_.
She looks up at me, eyes determined and bright. "I'm going," she says. She doesn't have to say "with or without you." I hear it anyway.
"Oh my God," I mutter, lowering my foot carefully down. It's not blasphemy. It is a genuine plea for Him to not let me die on this cliff. My foot wobbles, and I yelp, clinging to the edge of the rock with all the strength in my hands.
_Turn back, you're going to fall. You're going to fall and you're going to die._
I take another cautious step. I'm so close to the air, so close to falling. I wonder if this is how Hannah felt that night she jumped from the car. "Stop, I can't do this!"
She's several steps ahead of me, but she stops and twists her head back. "Yes," she says. "Yes, you can. Your body knows what to do, you just have to let it."
_Give up, turn back, you're going to get stuck on this rock and the Coast Guard will have to lift you_ __ _out via helicopter but only if you don't die first, which you will._
I take a shaky breath in and hold it. One step. Another step. My feet find the footholds, my fingers curl around grips I can't see. Another step. Another inch.
_You can't do this._
"You're doing great," Hannah calls back, though she couldn't possibly know that. "Almost there."
_You can't do this._
Two more steps, and there is nothing I hear but the roar of breaking waves. There is nothing I see but the rocks in front of me, the next place to put a foot, a hand, a shaky knee.
_You can't do this._
I can't. But I do. One foot in front of the other, tiny step by tiny step, I climb down the cliff.
Up ahead, Hannah has reached a plateau. She steps off it onto a freestanding rock just a few inches farther into the water, then holds out her hand for me. I take it, and she helps me over. I sink to the flat, damp rock surface, heart pounding and mouth dry.
"What the _hell_ , Hannah?" I yell above the waves. "We could have fallen! We could have _died_!"
"But look at that." She nods her head back the way we came. Keeping all my limbs firmly on the rock, I twist back. The cliff above us looks almost impossibly tall and steep. "Look what you did."
Something incredibly irresponsible, and potentially fatal, involving at least three of my greatest fears. It was a terrible idea. It was beyond dangerous. But looking back, I can't help feeling a swell of pride.
Hannah sits down on the rock, closer to the edge than I am. "Over here." I crawl on my hands and knees to join her. Out in the distance, a wave ripples in, curling taller, reaching toward us. It's so close, and I wonder for a moment if I've traded death by falling for death by drowning. The wave crests and explodes several feet below us, and the spray mists us with salt water. It stings my eyes. It freezes my nose. It prickles my skin, and something deeper, too. I wipe my face dry, but then there is another wave, another wall of mist. I breathe deep, tasting the salt, feeling something inside me split open, a seam loosening, stitches unthreading.
The water swells and breaks, again and again, covering me in water and brine again and again, and I let it. I let myself feel my finger pads gripping the rock, my hair whipping in the wind, my legs pressing down on stone. I've spent so much of my life terrified of my body, all the ways it could fail or betray me. But Hannah told me to trust my body, and I did. I climbed down a cliff, and I didn't die. I stumbled, but I didn't break. I trusted that I could save myself, I trusted myself, and I make a silent vow that it won't be the last time. I've spent so much of my life thinking the things I wanted must be wrong, because I was the one wanting them.
___A life that is different than my mother's._
_Lia Lemalu's hair in the sunlight._
_Tal's hand on my arm, warm and gentle._
Until the world ends, until the earth collapses in ice and storm, and throughout all eternity, I will trust myself. I will trust in the things I feel, because I am the one feeling them. I say these things in the name of Ellis Leah Kimball, I say these things in my own name, because I will not get another.
Amen.
Twenty
**"IS THERE ANYTHING** you'd like to talk about today?"
Most of the time, I shrug. Sometimes, I say no. On the rarest of occasions, I mention something minor, something we both know doesn't really matter. Today, I say:
"Yes."
Martha struggles to hide her surprise. "Great! What would you like to talk about?"
Something I've lived with for years and years. Something that's wormed its way into every waking hour. Something I want to be rid of for good.
"There's this voice," I tell her. "There's this awful voice in my head all the time and I can't get it out."
I think about telling her what happened in San Francisco. How the voice inside my head told me I'd never make it, I'd die, I'd fail. How I ignored it. How I climbed down anyway. But she might think me rappelling off cliffsides was a cry for help, or evidence that I'm a danger to myself. She might tell my parents. I can't let anyone take that day away from me. I need it. When the end of the world arrives, I will need that day.
"What does the voice tell you?" Martha asks.
"'You shouldn't have said that, you shouldn't have done that, your friends hate you, you don't _have_ any friends. . . .'" I trail off at the look on her face. "Just that kind of stuff."
Martha stirs in her chair. "Can you describe the voice for me?"
"Describe it?"
"Yes."
"It's . . . mean."
"Okay," she says. "What else? What would it look like, if you had to give it a shape?"
"I don't know," I say. "I guess it's like this demon. Not a joke one, a scary one. Like a demon from one of those terrifying Renaissance paintings about Judgment Day and hell and they're all clearly drawn by the same dude and all you can think is, holy crap, what happened in that guy's life to make him paint this stuff?" I take a breath. "Do you know who I'm talking about?"
"Hieronymus Bosch?"
"Um, it's like _Where's Waldo_ , except in this version Waldo is naked and you find him inside the mouth of a monster with a bird head and no torso."
She nods sagely. "Hieronymus Bosch."
"That's what it's like. Some horrible nightmare in a painting, except I can't close the book or leave the museum," I say. "It's like a demon that climbs onto my back every morning and curls up on my chest every night. It's like a monster that remembers every stupid thing I've done and says all the things my mom secretly thinks."
_Why did you say that? You shouldn't have said that, she'll think your mom is awful and she's not. She'll think you're an ungrateful monster, and you are._
"I didn't mean that," I say, scrambling. "About my mom. My mom isn't a monster, she's just . . ."
_Critical and overbearing and disappointed in you, they're all disappointed in you, confused by you, sick of dealing with you. Why shouldn't they be?_
"I'm sorry," I say, talking too quickly, talking so there isn't silence. "I know I'm being ridiculous, I'm self-aware, at least I'm self-aware, but—"
"Have you ever talked about this before?" Martha asks.
I think back. "When I was thirteen, I told my bishop. I didn't really mean to, it just sort of happened. I told him that I had these constant thoughts about how awful I was, how no one liked me and it was my own fault. I guess I wanted—" I falter, remembering. "Never mind."
Martha extends a hand. "Go ahead."
"It's stupid."
"Whatever you wanted," Martha says, "it was not stupid."
"He told me the voice I heard was the Adversary. He told me Satan was trying to keep me from living the Gospel and staying active in church. He said to ignore it, and I tried, but all I really wanted was . . ." My voice box crumples. "I wanted him to tell me the things I was hearing weren't true. He never said any of those things weren't true."
"Ellis," Martha says quietly. She waits until I look up from the carpet. She locks her eyes on me like a laser. "It's not true. None of it is true. The things you're telling yourself are not true."
"Things _I'm_ telling myself?" I balk. "I can't stop that voice, it just keeps talking, I don't know where it comes from."
"I think maybe you do."
I twist around and look out the window, at the tree, at the peeling bark on the tree, at the lines and the grooves in the bark. Anywhere but Martha. She waits for me, but I don't turn back around. I make my eyes go glassy, my heart go numb, my body go anywhere but here. When Martha finally speaks, she sounds miles away.
"It's not Satan," Martha says, and my eyes refocus. "There's no demon, or monster, or fallen angel."
My body pushes back, drags itself from outside the office, outside the universe, and plants itself back on the couch.
"The voice in your head is coming from you. Just you."
My heart stirs under its cold covering. It beats. Wrenches. Bursts.
I dissolve into a river of tears. A tidal wave, a tsunami, the kind that could wash away San Francisco or the entire world. Apocalypse by salt water. Martha reaches over and places something next to me, but I'm crying too hard to see what it is. I'm crying too hard to apologize for crying. When the tidal wave finally dies down to hiccups, I wipe my eyes with the back of my hand.
"What do you think these tears are about?" she asks.
My eyes burn. My face burns. "I'm sorry. I don't usually cry."
"It's okay to cry."
I know that. It's not like I was raised to be stoic and unfeeling. If anything, I was the oddball who shed zero tears during our yearly family viewing of _It's a Wonderful Life_ , the girl who never cried when she shared her testimony at church or sobbed around the campfire on the last night of girls' camp.
"I just don't, usually."
"Why do you think it happened now?" Martha asks.
I well up again. "You said it's me. The voice is me."
"I said it's coming from you," Martha says. "Not that it _is_ you."
"There's no difference."
"There is," she insists. "That voice is you speaking. But _you_ are more than that voice. And you are much, much more than the things it tells you."
"I don't like feeling this way," I protest. "It's awful. I hate it. And you think I'm doing it to myself?"
"I think you're experiencing very painful intrusive thoughts. I think you're engaging in a lot of self-critique. Yes, self-critique," she says, off my look. "But ultimately, this is a good thing."
"A good thing?" I cry. "It's a good thing that I'm ruining my own life?"
"It's a good thing because it means you aren't powerless. You are powerful. It means," she says, and leans in, "that you can tell that voice to shut the _fuck_ up."
My mouth drops open. "Martha!"
"You don't have to use any words that make you uncomfortable," Martha assures me. "But for me, there are some things my nicest words just can't express."
I might slip into the lighter forms of swearing, but it's always with a twist of the intestines, a healthy sense of shame. I've never really considered that you could find strength in words like that. Defiance. Righteousness. Power.
All words have power. Not just the polite ones.
"I want you to close your eyes," Martha says. I do. "And let that inner critic loose." I open them again, panicked, and she holds up her hands. "Just for a moment."
I close my eyes again. It doesn't take long.
_Martha feels sorry for you. Martha is paid to be nice to you and she can't wait for this session to be over. Martha feels sorry for you and she shouldn't, because everything that happens to you is your own fault. She said it herself._
"What's that inner critic saying?" Martha asks.
"That if I'm sad, if bad things happen to me, it's because I brought it on myself." I leave out the parts about her.
"Is that true, Ellis?"
_Yes._
"I . . ."
"Are you able to control the actions of others? Is that something you can reasonably blame yourself for? Are you in control of the entire world?"
_You want to be. You are powerless and weak and every single thing you do has catastrophic consequences for the entire world._
That doesn't make sense. I can't be both powerless and all-powerful. It doesn't make sense.
"Are you responsible for every bad thing that happens in your life?"
_Yes._
"No."
I hear Martha breathe. Not a gasp. Not a sharp intake of oxygen, like she's surprised. A sudden exhale of carbon dioxide and satisfaction. "Good," she says. "You're right. That's exactly right."
It's such a small compliment. But it warms me from the inside out.
"Let's do one more," Martha says. "I want you to picture your family. Your father, your mother, and your sister."
"Am I with them?"
"Not just yet. Picture them all together, looking back at you. Hold that image."
I draw them up individually in my mind.
My dad, in his white coat.
_The look he gave you when you told him the world was ending._
My mom, standing straight and tall.
_"We handle you with kid gloves."_
My sister, all charm and poise and goodness.
_"Why do you always have to make things worse?"_
"Are you picturing them?" Martha asks, and I nod. "If they could be here, in this session with you, if they could hear what you've told me, what would they say to you?"
_You ruined so many dinners. You ruined so many car trips. You ruined so many moments, little and large, you forced us to accommodate your fears, your needs._
_We love you, but only because we are good people. We love you, but not because you are lovable._
_You are an anchor around our necks, you are dead weight in our arms, you are, you are, you are—_
"What would they say to you, Ellis?"
"A burden!" I burst out, keeping my eyes shut as if that will keep the word shut away, too. "They'd say I'm a burden."
We sit in silence for a moment. "Is that true? Are you a burden to your family?"
_Yes. But when the end of the world comes, you won't be. You'll know things they won't. You won't be a burden. You'll be their hero._
"I don't know."
"You love your sister. You spend time with her, you're kind to her, you treat her with respect. Are you a burden to her? Is that a fair thing to call yourself?"
_Yes. But when the end of the world comes, you'll protect her. You can be the sister she deserved to have all along._
But everything Martha said was true. I do love Em, I do watch her dance, and braid her hair. Maybe—maybe the world doesn't have to end for me to be the sister she deserves.
"I guess not," I say. "No."
"Are you a burden to your parents? Is that a fair thing to call yourself?"
_Yes. Yes._
"Yes!"
Martha goes still. "Why? Why are you telling yourself that?"
I don't even have to wait to hear the inner voice. It boils up from the pit of my stomach and is out of my mouth before I can choose my words.
"I'm a burden to them because I'm anxious, and weird, and obsessive, and strange. I'm a burden because they have to drive more slowly on mountain roads, because my mom can't brag about me to her friends, because they have to spend their time talking about me and worrying about me, because they have to pay money for me to see you, because I'm sixteen and can't drive. Because I'm sixteen and can't handle anything. I'm a burden because I'm me."
We sit in silence. I blink back tears, because I am absolutely, positively not going to cry twice in the space of twenty minutes.
"Do you know," Martha asks, "the etymology of the word 'burden'?"
It's not Latin or Greek, so I'd guess proto-Germanic. Maybe something about farming. I shake my head.
"It's a great relief," Martha says with a sly smile, "to know just one word you don't. I hope you won't hold that against me."
"We all have our pride," I say, and she laughs.
"I'm not sure what language it comes from. I don't know what year you can trace it back to. But the word 'burden'—" Martha takes a breath. "The word for a _burden_ is the same as the word for a _child_."
_Burden_ and _child_ are synonyms. Or they were, for someone, somewhere. Words can be revelations, and this is another one.
"A good parent would want to carry you. And if they couldn't, sometimes, it's because they're human. Humans are clumsy. Fragile things can break. It doesn't mean we mean to break them. Sometimes, we don't even know we've done it."
Something warm and hot is building behind my eyes. I look up at the ceiling. Martha keeps going.
"They were meant to carry you. Not just when it's convenient. Not just when you were small. For your entire life. You were brought into the world to be loved, and guided, and carried. That's the deal they made, the day you were born."
Without closing my eyes this time, I picture my family, again. All together, again.
My dad, in his white coat, saying that maybe he needed me more.
My mom, standing straight and tall, telling me my hair looked nice.
My sister, all charm and poise and goodness, teaching me how to spot the wall.
Martha gets up from her chair and sits next to me on the couch. She doesn't try to hug me. She doesn't even touch me. She wants me to know she's here, walking beside me.
"Are you a burden? I guess it depends on how you interpret the word. But if you're a burden, then every child is a burden. And Ellis. Please believe me. You are a worthy burden to carry."
Everyone just wants to be believed.
I want to believe Martha.
And as I collapse into tears yet again, I think I just might.
Twenty-One
**I'VE NEVER BEEN** alone under Hannah's tree before. I've spent a lot of time alone in my life, but in places that were suited for it. My room. The library. And maybe it's just the power of association, but Hannah's tree is an odd place to be alone.
I lie on the grass and tilt my face up at the sun. The closer we get to the end of the world, the more I seem to seek out warmth. Like a cat, following sunbeams. Or a person with an in-depth knowledge of what a mini Ice Age entails. One day far in the future, the sun will explode. One day, maybe even just a few weeks from now, there might not be sunlight. So I'll soak it up now. I breathe in deep, and sigh it out.
"Are you okay?" says a voice above me. When I open my eyes, there's Tal, looking down at me, his head titled. I sit up a little on my elbows.
"Yeah. Where is everyone?"
"Sam and Theo were hungry—they're going to Thai Temple. Hannah had someone to meet. Didn't say who or where."
I bet I know who, and where. "And you?"
He shrugs. "I don't mind being alone."
"Oh." I start to push myself off the ground. "I can—"
But he's already sitting next me on the grass, a hand on my leg to stop me from getting up. "You should stay." Then, he quickly adds, "If you want to. Only if you want to."
"Okay," I say, and my palms are sweating. Am I nervous? I can't tell. My heartbeat's too fast and my stomach's twisted into a soft pretzel, but it doesn't feel like it usually does, like I've been backed into a corner or dangled outside an airplane window. For once, I'm not looking for an escape route. If I'm nervous, it's only because _he_ seems so nervous.
"Cool," he says, and we both realize at the same time that his hand is still on my leg. I take a sharp breath in through my nose. He pulls his hand away like he's touched a mousetrap. I wish he'd put it back.
"What were you doing, when I came over?" he says.
I could lie in this situation. I probably should. I don't. "Thinking about the apocalypse."
He laughs. "You looked happy, though."
"I was thinking about the things I'd miss," I say. "Sunlight. Ice cream. Hanging out with you guys under Hannah's tree."
He goes quiet. "You'd really miss us?"
"Of course I'd miss you," I say, then look away.
After a moment of silence, Tal clears his throat. "Here's what I don't understand. How are you so sure it'll—?"
"Well, the world's already a disaster, sea levels are rising every day, it's _in_ the Bible—"
"You interrupted me."
"You interrupted _me_!"
"You did it first!" He puts his head in his hand. "God, okay. I was going to say, how are you so sure it'll be a literal apocalypse?"
I roll my eyes. "Who believes in a metaphorical apocalypse?"
"Lots of people. Lots of religions. I went to this other church—"
"You went other places?" I ask, surprised. I'd assumed if you leave the church, it's because you're done with religion entirely.
"Sure. My dad goes to this Methodist church now. It's cool. The pastor's a nice lady. It's not for me, but . . ." He shrugs. "Anyway, she said they don't believe in a literal apocalypse. That the story is more like a metaphor for how tough and shitty the world can be."
"The Book of Revelation is pretty clear," I say. "There's going to be a period of tribulation. With floods, and war, and disease—"
"But we've had those things," Tal says. "A thousand times over. What if this is the worst it gets? What if this world, the one right now, is that tribulation?"
A lady pastor. Scripture that's all metaphor. A universe that's already weathered the worst, and survived. It's so different than my world, but it doesn't seem like a bad world.
"Does your dad like it?" I ask. "The new church?"
"For now. He's always trying to find somewhere that fits and it never quite works. He was raised Catholic, but everyone in Brazil is. And then he came here for college, and just happened to meet two missionaries, and—" He shrugs. "They gave him what he needed. A community. Somewhere to belong. It was good for him. But then he needed new things. I used to think, if he'd had access to everything I do, no way he would have converted. But now I think he still would have, because he needed it."
"What do you mean, access to everything?" I ask.
"The internet." Then, off my look, "I'm serious. You don't have to think the info's accurate, that's up to you, but we _do_ have a lot more information than our ancestors did. And infinitely more access to it. I mean, the temple ceremonies are on YouTube, what else is left?"
My mouth drops open. Those ceremonies are sacred. There are some things even my parents can't tell me about their temple wedding, but it's on the internet? "You didn't _watch_ one, did you?"
For a single second, he looks guilty. "I did."
"Tal!"
"I'm not saying _you_ should." He shakes his head. "It doesn't mean the same thing to me as it does to you. My point is, we have more choices than anyone else in history. Whichever ones we make, we had more options. That can't be a bad thing."
I get why he thinks so, but even the idea makes my heart palpitate. If every choice in the world is open to you, how would you ever know which one is best? How could you ever really choose? It's simpler when things are laid out for you. Choices are good, of course, but choices are scary, too. Maybe _good_ and _scary_ aren't antonyms.
"If your dad hadn't converted," I point out, "he probably wouldn't have married your mom. You wouldn't even exist."
Tal picks at a blade of grass. "That might've been for the best."
"Don't say that."
"I'm not saying they don't love me," Tal says. "They do. But my dad would have a lot easier time dating without me around. And my mom . . ." He sighs. "She's got her new family. They all look perfect together. And then there's me, lurking in the corner, some reminder of the less-perfect family she used to have. I'm there, but it would be a nicer picture if I weren't. I'm like a . . ." He searches for a word.
And I know how it feels to search for something, anything, to make sense out of a painful thing. "Vestigial organ."
He raises his eyebrow. "A what?"
"Something in the body that used to serve a function but doesn't anymore. Like wisdom teeth. Or an appendix."
It's a weird, potentially offensive analogy, but Tal grins. "I'm the appendix of my family. That's perfect. I'm keeping that."
Is there anything that makes your heart jump more, than someone wanting to keep your words?
"You're welcome," I say. "Nice to be useful to someone, for once."
He fixes me with a look. "Oh, what total bullshit."
My face gets hot. "Excuse me?"
"You're great," he says. "Don't you get that you're great?"
Now it's my turn to call BS. "I'm not."
"Girl, would you learn to take a compliment?"
"Well, I'm not that smart—"
"You're plenty smart."
"And I'm not that pretty—"
"I think you're pretty," he says quietly.
My breath catches. We stare at each other for a moment. I wait for him to say something else, to do something else. He doesn't. Maybe he's waiting for me, too.
"I'm not . . . sweet." I pull at the fibers in my coat sleeve. "You can't argue with me on that. I'm not even sweet enough to be a 'sweet spirit.'"
Tal sighs and looks off in the distance. There's a power in that, in not having to explain things. Tal is from my world, so he knows that "sweet spirit" is what church ladies call girls who are not quite attractive enough, not quite charming enough, not quite _enough_.
Tal focuses back on me. He moves a little closer. "Do you remember our freshman science class?"
"We weren't in the same class," I say.
He raises an eyebrow. "Yeah, we were. I sat right behind you." He flicks a piece of grass off my shoe. "Next to Hannah."
Something lurches in the pit of my stomach. _"Hannah?"_
Both his eyebrows are raised now. "Uh, yeah, that's how she and I met."
I don't remember that. I don't remember seeing her before that day in the waiting room. Hannah said we'd never met before. Maybe she doesn't remember either.
"You're sure we were in the same class?" I ask.
He nods. "Yeah, I swear. Freshman science. Third period with Mr. Spooner. You wore your hair in a French braid every single day."
Yikes. Accurate.
"It was probably around this time of the year," Tal continues. "Like, way too early for Mr. Spooner to have been so checked out, but he was. He had us doing some experiment. And Jessica Ritter—that was the year she was in the car accident, remember? She had that giant gash on her cheek, which it wasn't so bad with the bandage on it, but when it had to come off . . ."
I do remember that. It was noticeable, and not pretty, and her friends started avoiding her. This group of boys would bark at her when she walked in the room. Like she was a dog. They used to like her. But the second she wasn't something shiny in a store window, she was worthless to them.
"That day, during lab," Tal says, "Jessica asked Max Kleinfelter for some iodine, and he said he would if she'd blow him. She told him he was a jerk, and then he said, 'You're going to have to get good at giving head, with a face like that.' And she dropped the iodine, and ran out of the room. No one followed her. No one did anything. But you . . ."
Me?
"You ripped a piece of paper out your notebook."
Oh. That's right.
"You ripped out a page and you wrote on it, saying you thought she was beautiful, a thousand times more beautiful than any of her friends, inside and out, and that you hoped a flaming piano would fall on Max Kleinfelter. You folded it up, and stuck it in her textbook, and just sat back down."
It comes back in a flood—the half-ripped paper, scribbling with the pen that bled blue ink all over my fingers, the fury I felt for stupid Max Kleinfelter and his stupid smug face, the anger I felt for Mr. Spooner not even noticing, the shame I felt for myself, because all I did was write a note. It's so odd to hear someone tell a story you didn't know they were part of. So odd to hear about yourself through someone else's eyes.
"Was your note _sweet_?" Tal says. "No, not really, you cursed someone with death by piano."
"He wouldn't necessarily have died," I point out.
"So it wasn't sweet. So what? It was compassionate, it was righteous. It was _good_. Good is different than sweet. Good is so much better."
_Sweet_ and _good_ are not synonyms. It's a revelation. A small one. An important one. _Small_ and _important_ are not antonyms.
"I sort of figured . . ." Tal hesitates. "That's why Hannah found you, when she needed help. Because she knew you were the kind of person who would."
Hannah found me because she _saw_ me. Not in some science lab, but in a dream, in the snow. Didn't she? I shake my head.
"I can't believe you remember that. I can't believe you saw that," I say.
"You're a lot less invisible than you think."
It's baffling, really, to think anyone would see me. Not as their daughter, or sister, or silent classmate in the corner. But see me, just as I am. See me, better than I see myself.
"Tal."
"Yes?"
"I—"
_Survive for something. Want something. Want something, Ellis._
"Do you know the etymology of the word 'pupil'?" I blurt out.
He blinks at me. "No."
"Can I tell you?"
"Okay," he says.
"I swear it's relevant."
"Okay," he says.
"'Pupil' comes from Latin, _pupilla._ It means a little girl, a little doll. It's the same in Greek, with the word _kore_. They gave the same word to a little doll and the center of the eye, because when you look into another person's pupil, you see a version of yourself, in miniature. But you have to be close, to do that, to see a person in a pupil. You have to get so close."
_I want to be close. I want, I want—_
I grab Tal's hand and pull myself closer. My knee is touching his, touching bare skin through the rip in his pants, my heart is catapulting itself into my ribs, and there she is, in the center of his pupil, brown and green and unblinking. There I am. What a strange thing, to see yourself reflected in another person's eyes. What an amazing thing, to see yourself like they see you.
_I want to keep seeing myself, I want to keep holding his hand, I want, I want—_
"Ellis."
"Yeah?"
"Do you know the etymology of the word 'kiss'?"
I do. Or I used to. "I don't remember."
His mouth quirks. "Can I kiss you anyway?"
_Want something, Ellis. Want something. Let yourself want something._
I breathe in. Release.
_I want to kiss him._
"Yes," I say, once, then again. "Yes."
He was the one who asked, so maybe I should have let him lean in, but I don't. I kiss him, terrified and overjoyed all once. When he kisses me back, the terror part melts away. I'm not supposed to be doing this, it's not like I don't know I'm not supposed to be doing this, it's just that I don't care. I feel like I've taken off a dress that's too tight. I feel like I've finally let myself breathe deep.
Tal breaks away. Oh no. Did he not want to? Or did he want to, but I was so bad at it he changed his mind?
_"_ Are you . . ." He hesitates. "I only want you to do this if _you_ want to do this. Not because you feel like you have to prove anything."
I don't understand what I'd have to prove. That I like him?
"I like you," I tell him. "I like you a lot, and I have for a while. I like you, and I liked kissing you, and I would like to kiss you again if that's mutually beneficial."
He barely suppresses a laugh. "Mutually beneficial?"
"Shut up, I know I'm bad at this!" I cover my face with my hands, but he pulls them away.
"You're not bad at this," he says. "It's just new."
I kiss him again, this time without hesitation. No hesitation, no terror, no fear. Not forever. Just for this one singular moment.
Words matter. Words are important, their definitions and histories are important, they mean something. Words tell every story that has ever been told, by fires in caves and castles and by prairie campfires. Under blue skies, under blankets of stars, in mountains and valleys and forests and deserts. Thousands of years, thousands of words, thousands of people who have loved each other, needed each other, grasped for each other in the dark of the world. But as I search for words, as I search for the etymology of _kiss_ and _joy_ and _fear_ and _rapture_ , nothing stays, nothing holds.
Some things are beyond words.
Twenty-Two
**IT'S NOT THAT** I lie to Hannah about Tal. But I don't exactly tell her. I've barely even seen her, after our day in San Francisco. It's like she's avoiding me, and now that it's December, this is about the worst time for her to decide she needs her space. In theory, at least.
December 21 inches closer and closer, but it's weird. It doesn't feel like I thought it would, the end of days. The closer it gets, the more abstract it seems. And the more abstract it seems, the less space it takes up in my brain. Or maybe it's just being crowded out.
On December 4, someone pulls the fire alarm during sixth period, and school basically lets out early. I should use that as an opportunity to post more flyers, maybe around campus. But instead I hang out with Tal, Sam, and Theo under the tree, watching annoyed firefighters check the school.
On December 10, both my parents are out of the house. I should be finding a way to stockpile more winter survival stuff. But instead, I spend the entire afternoon watching Em practice her routine for the winter recital.
On December 16, Tal asks if I want to skip fourth period and have a long lunch at his dad's house, which is a couple of blocks from school. I say yes, without hesitation.
I like Tal's house. It's only the second time I've been, but it's small enough that I already feel like I know my way around. It's cleaner than I expected a home with two dudes to be. The fridge is stocked, the counters are tidy, and the floor is clean enough that even my mom would approve. I've never seen my dad clean in his life, and he can cook eggs and not much else. "Oh, that's just men," I've heard my mom say. My dad's mom, too. But obviously, it's not true. I wonder what the men in my family could do if the women didn't treat them simultaneously like kings and children.
Tal's house is open plan, which I love, because it means I can sit on the very comfortable couch and still see him as he digs through the fridge.
"What about a frittata?" he asks. "Or . . . we've got leftover vatapá. It's a shrimp curry thing."
"The second one."
"Are you sure?" Tal throws me a look over his shoulder. "My dad makes it kind of spicy."
"I can handle it."
"Okay," Tal says, "but if frog's-eye salad at the ward potluck is more your style, that's cool. You don't have to prove anything here."
That reminds me of something I've wanted to ask Tal for over a week now.
"What did you mean, that first day we kissed?" I ask. "When you said I didn't have to prove anything?"
"Oh," he says. "Don't worry about it."
"I'm physiologically incapable of that. What would I want to prove?"
Tal closes the fridge door. He takes a seat next to me on the couch. "That you like guys," he says.
My stomach clenches. "What makes you say that?"
"Hannah said she thought . . ." He looks away for a moment, then back at me. "She thought I might not be your . . . type. You know?"
My stomach clenches tighter. I hold my breath. Tal notices.
"She only said that because I asked her if she thought you liked me," he says quickly. "She didn't say _why_ she thought—"
"Hannah isn't—" I interrupt him, and he stops. He waits for me to continue. And I wait for some sort of new courage to burst out, to feel like the kind of a person who could say these things out loud. The kind of person who knows who she is. I wait to feel different, to feel ready, to feel _prepared_. But nothing happens. I still feel like the person I've always been—nervous, awkward, unsure. It's only that now, I have new things to say.
"Hannah isn't wrong," I tell him. "She's not all the way right but she's not wrong. I do like girls. I also like girls. Some girls. It's not—" I smile, suddenly, remembering one of my very first conversations with Tal. "It's not an either/or situation, for me."
I exhale. It was easier than I thought it would be. And of course it was. This is Tal. He comes from the same world I do, he feels the same things, he's said these same words to people who accepted him and people who didn't. I might not be saying these words, if he hadn't come into my life. I might never have realized I could.
"Okay." Tal nods. "Okay. So you're bi, then. That's awesome."
But maybe Tal and I aren't exactly the same. If only because he's had more time to wear these kinds of words, make sure they fit right.
"I think so," I say. "It seems right, it seems like it fits, but—I'm not positive. I don't know for sure. Can I wait on that, until I know for sure?"
"Wait on what?"
"Picking a label."
"That's chill with me. But I've got to tell you," he says with an apologetic shrug, "bi girls who hate labels is sort of a cliché."
"I don't hate labels. I just know there's lots of different ones, tons of them, probably ones I haven't even heard of yet, and . . ." I search for the right words. "I only just got here, you know? Let me take a look around."
He nods. "Take as long as you like."
"Well." I take his hand in mine, and draw him closer. "I like the view so far."
We abandon lunch. And TV. And my cardigan. He doesn't push me or pressure me. We don't do anything I'd have to confess to my bishop, but it's enough. Oh my gosh, it's enough. I'm starting to understand why some people get married in such a hurry.
Together on the couch, my head against his chest, he traces a pattern on my bare arm with a warm finger.
"Your skin's so soft," he says. "How do you get it so soft?"
A sixteen-year beauty routine of rarely going outside and never doing anything dangerous. "Well, not playing around with a lighter all the time helps." His hand shifts, and I place my palm on top of it. "No, don't stop. A couple more minutes and you'll pass the Universal Edibility Test."
"The what, now?"
"Prepper thing. It's how you tell if something's poisonous." I twist around and sit up on my heels. "First you smell it. . . ." I put a hand on his shoulder and sniff at his hair. He smells like coconut shampoo and cut grass. He smells like summer.
"Then, you hold it against your skin for fifteen minutes or so, to see if there's any reaction." I run my hand over his shoulder, down his arm. You're supposed to be watching for rashes or burns, but maybe goose bumps count, too.
"Then?" He puts his arm around my waist and closes the space between us. "What's next?" he asks, like he already knows.
"Then," I say, "you can taste it. See what happens."
I kiss him, gentle and slow. Time might freeze. The world might stop in its motion. I wouldn't know. "Yep." I sit back. "I think you passed the test."
Tal shakes his head, the edges of his mouth quirking up. "So what you're saying is now you feel comfortable cannibalizing me?"
_Trying to Be Cute, Accidentally Implying Cannibalism: The Ellis Kimball Story._
"I'm saying I think you're safe," I tell him, and he grins. I settle back down against his chest and close my eyes.
"The Universal Edibility Test," he says, after a minute of happy silence. "Who knew?"
"I did," I say, my eyes still closed.
"True. And that's what I like about you," he says. "All the best parts of those survivalist reality shows, none of the worst."
My eyes spring open. I sit up, pull back. "What do you mean?"
"You'd be the best person to get lost in the wilderness with. You'd know just what to do. I bet you're great at first aid, too."
"I don't know," I say truthfully. For all the planning and preparation, I have no clue what I'd be like in a crisis. Would I be calm? Would I get hysterical? There's no way of telling.
"You've got all the practical stuff down," Tal continues. "But you're not building a bunker. You're not ready to pull a handcart to Missouri because some old dude told you the end was nigh. You're not an apocalyptic weirdo, like some people. You're not crazy."
I yank my arm out of his hand. "Don't say that."
Tal furrows his eyebrows. "That you're _not_ crazy? Why?"
He wouldn't say that if he knew what I really think—thought? Still think? I did believe it, maybe I still do. I'm not what he thinks I am—what I was—no, am.
"That's a horrible thing to say," I tell Tal.
His mouth drops open. "But—I said you weren't—"
"You shouldn't say it at all."
He holds up his hands. "Okay, now I feel crazy."
I snatch up my cardigan, coat, and backpack. "You're not! You're not, I'm—" I shake my head so hard it hurts. "I'm going. I have to go."
Tal scrambles up from the couch. "Wait, wait."
"I just remembered, I have a math test."
"Ellis."
"I have to go."
Tal's shoulders are slumped, and he's still got one foot on the couch. He looks confused. _Confused_ comes from Latin; _confused_ once meant pouring together, mixing or joining. But it really meant throwing into disorder. Upsetting something delicate.
I've been teetering on this precipice for weeks, sitting on a cliff, right at the edge of belief and unbelief. The end of the world, just one step away, but the tug of hands on my shoulders, too, keeping me earthbound. Martha telling me I'm not a burden. The salt spray in my face at Lands End. Tal's lips on mine, hesitant and hopeful. I wanted those things. I loved those things. I wished those things wouldn't end, and neither would the world. I wished it wasn't true.
But it is true. If it isn't true, then everything I've done was for nothing. Every day I spent with Hannah, every lie I told my parents, every dollar I spent on supplies, every second of my life I spent thinking, planning, preparing. If it isn't true, I'm exactly what Tal said, and worse. It has to be true. _It has to be._
"I have to go," I say again.
"I don't understand," he says, so simply and honestly it makes my heart split apart.
Of course he doesn't. No one does. And no one will, unless I tell them.
"I have to go," I whisper, just one more time, as he lets me walk out the front door.
Here are some things my high school has:
The legally required American flag in each classroom, but half of them are upside down
Substitute teachers who tell you their entire drug history, including that one time they technically died
An annual tradition called the Senior Streak, in which twelfth graders clad only in body paint run through the central courtyard
Here are some things my high school does not have:
A dress code
A debate team
A halfway decent security system
No one stopped me as I walked onto campus ten minutes after the lunch bell. No one cared when I pulled a giant stack of orange flyers out of my locker. No one questioned me as I walked through the hallways of three different buildings taping the flyers to the walls. And now I'm in the administration building itself and _still_ , no one appears to notice me. Did I turn invisible on my walk from Tal's house? Do I look so unthreatening everyone feels comfortable staring right through me? Does anyone take me seriously, or am I just a _joke_ , am I just—
I shake my head and blink back the hurt. I'm not. They'll see that I'm not.
I tack a flyer to the bulletin board outside the admin offices, a bull's-eye in the center of the other flyers. Normal flyers, the kind that don't urge you to start stockpiling water and nonperishable food. Flyers for softball tryouts. Flyers for the spring musical— _Les Misérables_ , which I would have liked to see, even if no high schooler can pull off Jean Valjean. Flyers for the state Quiz Bowl championship Theo would have gone to, if the world were not ending.
Which it is. It definitely is. Because if it wasn't, what would that make me?
I startle at the clip of shoes on the linoleum floor. I spin around and press myself against the bulletin board. It's Ms. Bayer, one of the assistant principals, and she doesn't even look my way as she shuts the door to her office and walks in the opposite direction down the hall, tapping on her phone. I didn't even know that was her office. I've only seen her in the courtyard during passing periods, clicking around in very high heels, yelling at everyone to get to class, and conversing with the water polo boys in a syrupy voice that is borderline creepy.
I stand still, feeling the blunt side of thumbtacks against my spine. I'm here, at the right place, at the right time. It's almost fate. The posters aren't enough, the posters were never enough. It's fate. I walk with purpose and quick steps around the stairs, down the hall, and straight into her unlocked office, shutting the door behind me. I fumble for the lock and turn it into place with a satisfying click.
I know exactly what I'm doing.
I run over to the phone on Ms. Bayer's desk. I scan the laminated instructions beside it. In another time, I would have hit each button slowly, uncertainly, checking and rechecking the steps, doubting and re-doubting myself.
I punch in the code without hesitation and scoop up the microphone. I flip the switch, and the on light turns green.
I have no idea what I'm doing.
"Attention," I say, too close to the mic, and it screeches. I pull it back a bit. "Attention, students, faculty, and administrators of Berkeley High School. Though mostly the students, because I'm guessing the adults are mad at me already. This is an announcement. It's not about clubs, or sports, or dances, it's about your lives. Your very lives are at stake, so listen up."
Now someone's at the door, shadowed and distorted through the frosted glass. The person tries the knob, and it rattles but doesn't turn. Someone's yelling at me to open up. Someone's yelling at me to stop, but I can yell at myself, too, and I'm yelling, _Keep going, Ellis, keep going!_
"As we speak, the world is coming to an end. Before the year is through, the world you've always known and loved—well, the world you've known, anyway—is going to end. Call it doomsday, apocalypse, armageddon, the end is near. The end is near."
I said it twice. I didn't need to say it twice. For a second, I wonder exactly who I'm trying to convince, but my own voice drowns that thought out.
"A storm will come, snow and ice and cold, and bury San Francisco," I go on. "The sky will turn red. Stars will fall. Get ready now, get prepared now, don't wait. Stock up bottled water, nonperishable food, warm clothing, nonelectric heat sources. Kiss your crush. Tell your parents you love them. Don't go out with any regrets."
There are more people at the door now, at least three, and someone flailing their arms. There's shouting, too, but it's muffled. There are multiple people outside who are all furious with me, and I should be terrified. I _am_ terrified. But I'm also grinning from ear to ear as I grip the mic and turn away from the door. Right now, I'm the one with the microphone. I'm the one with the audience. I have the voice that can't be silenced. And I'll enjoy it as long as it lasts.
"While I'm here," I say, leaning against the desk, "can I just say, this school is so freaking _weird_. I know high school is supposed to be a disaster just by definition, but have you ever thought about what you'll tell your college roommate? When she's like, 'Oh, I was homecoming queen,' and you'll have to be like, 'Oh, really? I spent homecoming watching children drink grain alcohol in a public park.' And she'll say that's very atypical, and then you'll one-up yourself by telling her about Senior Streak, and it'll be a weird conversation." I take a breath. "Or it would be, except none of us are going to college, because the world is ending in less than a week, which I think I mentioned."
Then I stop short, because I _want_ to have that conversation, as awkward as it sounds. I want to have a thousand more awkward conversations, and good ones, and new ones—I want the universe to keep spinning. But it won't. It can't. Or I wouldn't be doing this.
"For as messed up as this school is, it's the best preparation for the impending apocalypse we could have asked for," I say. "No one here cares what you do, even when they definitely should, and that's going to be true in doomsday, too. No one here stops you from taking risks or making choices, no matter how young you are or how terrible those choices are. You should hold on to that. When the world ends.
"What else, what else." I twirl the mic cord, feeling oddly like a stand-up comic and also like I'm going to pass out. "Oh, well, not that I'm complaining, I guess, but what kind of school makes it this easy for me to get on the PA system, anyway? What is our campus security team for, exactly? The guard out front didn't stop me from breaking into this office because he was playing his Game Boy. That's concerning. Who still has a Game Boy? Also, someone should tell Ms. Bayer to stop flirting with the water polo boys. That's even more concerning."
There's a click behind me, metal against metal. I spin around just in time to see Ms. Bayer throw open the door, keys gripped in one fist. She strides over to me and holds out her other hand, palm up. That's fine. I said what I needed to. More than that, I said what I wanted to.
"Thank you, Berkeley High," I say into the mic. "It's been great. Fingers crossed we all survive armageddon, because I honestly think I'd miss you."
I lay the mic in her hand.
Twenty-Three
**MS. BAYER CONFISCATES** my things and sticks me in an empty conference room. "Wait here," she orders. "We're calling your parents."
I'm not sure if that's intended to scare me, or comfort me. It does both.
When Ms. Bayer leaves, I don't hear the door lock. I briefly consider making a run for it, but there's a receptionist right outside. Even if I made it out the front door, what would be the point? As scary as this is, I got exactly what I wanted. The message went out. So why do I feel so sick?
This room is aggressive in its boringness. There's no artwork, no wall calendar to look at, and it's basement level, so the windows provide light and not much else. Occasionally, a person's legs come into view as they walk by. I settle on counting the squares in the linoleum under my feet. I've made it up to 328 when I hear someone say:
"Holy shit, Ellis Kimball. I never would've guessed you had it in you."
My head snaps up. Crouched by one of the street-level windows is Sam, and I have never been so glad to see anyone.
"Sam!"
I run over. I'm not quite tall enough. I drag a chair as quietly as possible and climb on it so that Sam and I are more or less eye to eye.
"What are you doing here?" I whisper.
"Cutting gym," he says. "I'd ask what doing you're doing here, but I'm pretty sure I know."
"Did you hear it? Did it work?"
"Oh, it worked," he says. "Radio broadcast? Doomsday? Mass hysteria? You're a prettier Orson Welles."
"Um, thank you?"
"This"—Sam holds up a flyer—"is hilarious."
Hilarious? I reel back and almost topple the chair.
"Not that it wasn't good," Sam continues, "but I think the Senior Prank is supposed to be done by seniors."
The Senior Prank also happens in the spring. "Sam—"
"Better than last year's, though. A bunch of paper cups filled with water in the quad? Uninspired."
"This wasn't—"
"I mean, was it as good as that time in the nineties they got a cow onto the C-building roof? Nah. But that's okay."
"So you're saying it wasn't as good as animal cruelty?"
"Or my brother's year, when they hired a mariachi band to follow Principal Grant around all day. It was expensive and all, but that's a prank."
"Sam!" I hiss. "This wasn't. A. Prank."
He sits back on his heels. "Huh?"
"The end of world really is coming. And I thought people deserved to know."
"Are you messing with me?"
"Hannah's had visions."
Sam gapes at me. "Hannah had what?"
"Dreams," I clarify. "More than visions. Very specific dreams about the end of the world."
Sam stares up at the sky. He makes a noise somewhere between a sigh and a groan. "Ellis . . ."
"I'm—!" I say, and press on even though he throws up his hands. "She did!"
"She's been stressed out of her mind for, like, six months! She's basically disintegrating. This isn't a game, it's serious." He jabs at his chest. "And that's _me_ saying that."
"I know it's serious. It's real, Sam."
He looks at me with a mix of sadness and disbelief.
"The end of the world is almost here," I say. And then, even though he won't get the Book of Revelation reference, "Surely, it comes quickly."
"God," he says through gritted teeth. "I really want to make a sex joke right now. But you've ruined it. You've ruined it with the apocalypse."
I laugh, even though this is possibly the least-funny situation I could find myself in, barring the actual apocalypse itself. I should probably be crying. It would make more sense. Sam reads through the flyer.
"Freak snowstorm?" he says.
"Yeah."
"So, what, buy up all the blankets at the army supply store?"
Not a bad start. "And nonperishable food. Bottled water. Alternative heat sources."
"Sounds like camping."
"Forced camping."
"All camping is forced camping to me," he says.
We sit in silence for a moment. "Hey, Sam?" I ask, and he looks up. "When you see Tal, will you give him a message from me? I might not be able to talk to him again."
"They're going to send you to On-Campus Intervention, not ship you off to a Siberian gulag."
"Please."
He stuffs the pamphlet in his hoodie pocket. "Okay."
"When you see Tal, tell him none of this is his fault," I say. "Tell him I wish I didn't have to do this. Tell him sometimes I wish I didn't believe, but . . ." I smile, thinking of one of the first conversations I had with Tal. "But you can't force unbelief."
"Okay," Sam says. "Not his fault. Wish you didn't have to. Can't force unbelief."
"One more thing." I raise myself up on my toes, as if the closer I am to Sam, the more it will stick in his brain. "Tell him that this can't be the tribulation period."
Sam cocks his head. "The what?"
"The tribulation. He'll know what it means. Tell him this can't be the tribulation because . . ." My eyes burn, and so does my heart. "Because the last three months were the happiest I've ever been."
Sam looks at me sadly. I'm not sad. I meant it.
"Can you remember one more?" I ask. "It's the last one. I promise."
Sam nods.
"Tell him I wish we had more time."
Sam reaches his hand through the crack in the window. I raise mine up. Only our fingertips can touch, but it's enough.
"I'll tell him," Sam says.
"Everything?"
"You've got a way with words." Sam snakes his hand out. He stands. "I don't think I'll forget them."
"Thanks, Sam."
"Anytime."
When he leaves, I twist my head as far as it will go, watching as he gets smaller in the distance. It feels like when my parents dropped me off at sleepaway camp for the first time. Like a tether's been cut, or a muscle's been severed, and I'm facing an entirely new existence. Alone.
I step off the chair. Rather than dragging it back to its old spot, I place it facing the door. Whatever's coming through, I'm facing it head-on.
After what feels like an eternity of staring at the door, the knob turns. Mom emerges in the doorway. I knew she'd be the one to come get me, and I kept trying to picture her reaction. Trying to prepare. Like research, but for emotions, which almost never works. I'd prepared for Mom being quietly furious, rage under a layer of carefully applied foundation. But she just looks . . . defeated. Battered and tried, her whole body waving a white flag. Being defeated implies an enemy, though, doesn't it?
It only takes one horrible second to realize that the enemy is me.
Mom jerks her head at the door. "Come on."
I stand. I reach for my backpack before remembering it's not with me. "I need to get my stuff."
Wordlessly, she hands over my backpack.
When I walk out the door, Mom puts her hand on my shoulder and guides me down the hallway, toward the glass front doors.
"We're going home?" I ask, because I thought there would be more. More talking, more discussion, more questions. No one's asked me a single question. Don't they have questions?
"Yes," she says. "We're going home."
"She doesn't want to talk to me? Ms. Bayer?"
"I explained the situation," Mom says.
"But you don't even know what the situation is!" I protest.
"I know plenty."
She's already made her mind up about everything. Not just Hannah, not just faith or the right way to fold dish towels, but everything. Including me. We walk the rest of the way to the car in silence. We start the drive home in silence, too. But then something pricks in my heart and deflates the quiet.
"So am I suspended, or what?"
I don't know why I ask. In a week, it won't matter.
"I handled it," Mom says. "Nothing's going on your record."
I don't know why I'm relieved. In a week, my record won't matter, either. I shouldn't care, why do I care?
"Then why can't I go back to class?" I ask Mom.
"We came to an alternate arrangement."
"What arrangement?"
"We'll talk about it later."
"I deserve to know what's happening to me."
Mom veers off the road so suddenly I brace myself on the dashboard. She parks. She turns off the car. And then she bursts into tears.
"I don't know what's happening to you, Ellis," she sobs. "I don't know why you're doing this, I don't understand a thing you've done."
I've never seen her cry like this. I've seen her cry quietly, artful and delicate tears at the right moments. I've never seen her collapse.
"Mom," I whisper. "Mom, please, stop."
"I want to," she says, her voice raw. "I want to understand so badly, but I don't. I don't. I don't know how to help you. I don't know what to do."
"Please," I say again, because she's scaring me. Is this what it's like, to watch someone break down? To see them sliced open by their own thoughts and know you can't do a thing to stop it? Is this what Mom has seen me do, over and over and over?
She's sobbing through each word now. "All I want is to help you and I can't. What kind of mother can't help her own baby? What kind of mother am I?"
Something hot and searing sticks in my chest. Because deep in the darkest part of me, I've wondered the same thing. All my life, I've wanted to grab on to her skirt and beg her, "Why don't you love me, _please_ love me." I've wanted to grab her by the shoulders and demand, "Why don't you love me, you should _already_ love me."
She does love me. She loves me so much it's ripping her in two. She just doesn't understand me. _Love_ and _understand_ are not synonyms.
I grab her arm. "Mama."
She looks up at me, red-eyed and blotchy-faced, that veneer of perfect washed away.
"I'm sorry," she says. "I'm so sorry." She wraps her arms around my neck, awkwardly. I hug her back, though I don't understand exactly what she's apologizing for. That can come later. You can love without understanding.
We hold each other, uneasily but tightly, for a long moment. Mom breaks away first. She digs in her purse for a napkin and gingerly wipes away the parallel lines of mascara running down her cheeks.
"Let's go home," she says.
Twenty-Four
**I WONDER HOW** much of my life I've spent on couches while someone tries to figure me out.
Days, for sure, between Martha and the therapist I had when I was eight and my teacher said I wasn't "emotionally connecting with other students." I still maintain the other students weren't connecting with _me_ , though I now acknowledge it's hard to connect with the girl who can't stop talking about the destruction of Pompeii.
If you include my parents in that list, it's got to add up to weeks, at least.
I don't understand why we couldn't have talked about this in my room, where at least I could have curled up under blankets while my parents stared at me like a zoo animal. When my dad got home, my parents claimed the entire second floor so they could whisper about me for a half hour while my body attempted to melt into the couch.
I don't know exactly what they talked about, but they must have decided something, because now they're seated in two chairs in front of me.
"First of all," Dad says, looking at Mom out of the corner of his eye, "we know you've been having a tough time."
"Psychologically," Mom adds.
"With your junior year being stressful. We know that heightens your feelings of anxiety."
"This isn't about school," I protest.
"Then what is it about?" Mom asks.
"It's about the end of the world," I say.
"Oh, for goodness' sake," Dad says.
"I feel like my flyers were pretty clear."
"They were terrifying," Mom says, "if that's what you mean."
"The apocalypse is a scary concept, Mom, so sure."
"There is no apocalypse coming," Dad says. "I thought we'd gotten past this."
"I believe there is."
Dad puts his head in his hands. Mom purses her lips.
"I know you don't believe me," I say. "That's fine. It's your right not to believe me."
"That's very kind, thank you," Mom deadpans.
"But other people had a right to know, you know?" They both look at me blankly. "The kids at school had a right to decide for themselves, too. So I had to tell them."
"How do you think you'd react," Dad asks, "if you were in class, and all of a sudden, someone came on the loudspeaker and told you exactly how you were going to die?"
"I didn't say they'd die!"
"You said the world as they knew it would be over by the end of the year."
"That's not the same as dying."
Dad shakes his head. "If someone did that to you, you would be a wreck."
Is he right? Probably. But this was necessary.
"Well," I say, and it comes out a whine, "I didn't know how else to tell them."
Mom sighs. "And I suppose there's no convincing you that you shouldn't have told them at all?"
I stare at my shoes. "Were people—were people really scared?"
"Ms. Bayer said it was—" Mom looks at Dad. "Light pandemonium."
"That's a made-up word," I mutter. "'Pandemonium.'"
"No, it isn't," Mom says.
"Yes, it is," I shoot back. "John Milton made it up as his name for Satan's hell-palace in _Paradise Lost_."
"Ellis," Dad says.
"He didn't just make it up, he stuffed Greek and Latin words together to make it up. It's ridiculous."
"Yes, that's what's ridiculous, here," Mom says.
"Lisa," Dad says.
"Do you have any idea what we just went through?" Mom says. "Do you have any idea what I had to say to that woman to keep your record clean?"
"What did you tell her?"
Dad takes over. "Mom told her it was an isolated incident brought on by extreme stress and that with some time and distance, you would be able to overcome it."
They're so sure time is limitless. I'd like to be that sure. I'd like to believe I have all the days in the world to spend with Tal and to watch Em dance. Instead, I have this sense of doom, dark and shadowed, wrapping its arms around my chest.
"I convinced her," Mom says, "you should be given that. Time and distance." She pauses. "Physical distance."
"Physical . . . ?"
Mom and Dad look at one another.
"We're going to Utah for Christmas," Dad says.
"I know that." They made those plans a month ago. Never mind that their plane won't be able to take off after the storm. "On the twenty-third. After Em's recital."
"Yes," Mom says, "but you're going ahead of us."
I recoil. "When?"
They look at each other again.
"When?" I repeat.
"Tomorrow," Dad says.
The sun explodes. The earth's core collapses.
"Tomorrow?" I whisper.
"You'll stay with Aunt Tonya until we get there," Mom says. "We'll all be together on Christmas."
"You're sending me away," I say, half accusation, half question.
"We're removing you from the stressor," Mom says. "We're taking this doomsday plot out of the equation."
I won't be here on December 21. I won't be at the top of the hill with Hannah. I won't be there to make sure things go the way they're supposed to. Panic rises. Panic reigns.
"You can't do this," I say, fast and urgent. "You don't understand what could happen if I'm not here, I have to be here, she _told_ me—"
"She's disturbed," Mom says.
"Overly imaginative," Dad says, spreading his hands. "And charismatic, I'm sure, honey, but that's why we're doing this."
"Because you want the world to end?"
"Because we want to make sure you're safe," Dad says. "For the rest of December, you'll be with family. Somewhere safe, and protected. And when January comes and the world doesn't end, you'll see we were right. And things will go back to normal."
"I have school," I protest. "You said they didn't kick me out."
"They didn't," Mom says. "Your teachers said you can email in anything that was due this week. You'll be back at school in time for midterms in January."
"They were really very accommodating," Dad says.
"And obviously, you are never seeing Hannah again," Mom says.
"It wouldn't be good for either of you," Dad agrees.
"We'll work out logistics in January," Mom says. "You're not taking your phone to Utah. We'll start with that."
"But she doesn't even have a cell phone!" I shout. "She gave it to Frank Zappa's owner!"
"What?" Dad says.
I close my eyes to stop the buzzing in my brain. "Please," I beg. "Please don't send me away. Bad things will happen if I'm not here. Really bad things. I know you don't believe the world is ending, I know you don't believe Hannah, but don't you believe _me_? I'm your daughter. Don't you believe _me_?"
"We believe that you believe," Dad says.
"But we also know you're hurting yourself," Mom says, grabbing on to my hand. "We also know you're wrong."
I wrench my hand out of hers and stomp through the living room, into the kitchen, and down the stairs to the basement, picking up my backpack on the way and slamming the door behind me. I curl up on the lumpy, discarded chair by the washing machine and dig through my backpack. My Altoids box of everyday carry is still there, though someone's clearly looked through it. My phone is not. From this spot, I can hear everything upstairs. The clack of my mom's heels, the clomp of my dad's size 12 feet. The running water as my mom starts to get dinner ready. And then I realize—they'll let me stay down here for hours. Until dinner, probably. They know I need my space.
And that means I have time. Not much. But some.
They can't hear anything in this concrete cave, not from where they are, but I still creep as quietly as I can to the basement's back door. The inside lock opens, and then I'm outside, alone, undetected. I close the door slowly, silently. I have no phone, which means this'll be a surprise. I have no real plan, either.
But I have time. I have time to find Hannah.
I'm lucky I remember where Hannah's house is. I'm less lucky that it's a mile away from mine. I'm even less lucky that it starts sprinkling as I cross the Cal campus. We could hide around here. Cal has lots of warm, dry places to hang out, and I bet the library's open late, for all those overachieving Public Ivy Leaguers. But then again, campus is so close to both our homes, and probably crawling with police officers and security guards. Maybe we'll go into the hills, disappear into Tilden Park. We only have to make it one more week. In the grand scheme of human existence, that's nothing at all.
I wipe my wet shoes on the plaid doormat. I peer up at the gray house and into the second-story bay windows, hoping to catch a glimpse of Hannah. I rap on the red door.
It creaks open just enough for me to see one wide blue eye and a tendril of long curly hair.
"Hi," I whisper.
"What are you doing here?" she whispers.
"I came to get you."
The door opens just wide enough for Hannah to slip outside. She leaves it open, just a crack. She wraps her arms around herself. She's only got a long-sleeved shirt on, no coat or hoodie. And no shoes. We're going to have to fix that.
"That was quite a performance today," she says. I guess she didn't skip fourth period.
"I had to do something."
"Oh God," she says, and sighs. "I know I haven't been around much lately, but what were you thinking, saying shit like that on the intercom? We need to lay low until the twenty-first, okay? Just be chill, just—"
"Who's inside right now?" I interrupt.
"My mom," Hannah says, throwing a look back toward the door.
"Then let's do this fast," I say. I count off on my fingers. "You need your warmest coat, and your warmest boots. Food if you can grab it, bottled water—"
"Ellis," she says, but I'm not done, and time is of the essence, so I ride over her.
"If you have anything wool, take it, doesn't matter what it is, stuff it in a backpack."
"Ellis!" she snaps, then clamps her mouth shut for a moment. "What are you talking about?"
"They're going to send me to Utah. Tomorrow. So we have to leave. Now."
She winces. "Your parents were that mad?"
"Apoplectic. Devastated. Let's go."
Hannah looks down at her shoes. "No."
No? What does she mean, _no_? "We have to," I tell her. "You need to get what you can, then we'll go back to school—I have some emergency supplies in my locker. We'll figure it out. We'll figure it all out, but you need to get your stuff and we need to go now."
"This has gone too far," she whispers. Her head shakes, and so does her voice. "I didn't mean for this happen, I swear, I just wanted to find Danny. But you took it too far."
Because I locked myself in some admin office? Because I did what she wouldn't, because I actually _warned_ people?
"They'll be glad I did," I promise. "When the snow comes, when the end of the world comes. Everyone will be glad I told them."
She shakes her head again. "The end of the world is not coming."
The earth's core cracks beneath my feet. Iron and nickel explode up like the Yellowstone Caldera.
"What?" I croak.
Hannah steadies herself on the red door. She looks me in the eye. "The end of the world is not coming."
"But . . ." My brain is spinning; the words aren't coming. "But you—your dreams—"
"Everyone has dreams, little kids have dreams, my _dog_ has dreams."
"Your dog dreams about squirrels, not the apocalypse!" I shout. Hannah throws a panicked glance behind her.
"Be quiet," she says through gritted teeth.
Why should I be? She said it herself, no one's inside but her mom, and her parents already know—
No.
"Your parents don't know about the dreams," I say, and the look she gives me is as good as a nod. "They don't know, you never told them, you never told anyone but me."
"Wait," she says, but I can't.
"Why are you in therapy?" I demand. "It's not for your dreams, it's not because your parents think you're delusional, why do you go?"
"Because I had to jump out of a car," she snaps. "Because I can't let him go. Because I've been dealing with some _serious shit_ , Ellis, you don't need a diagnosis to have _problems_."
"You lied to me," I croak.
"I never told you why I saw her, I never said—"
"You said you'd seen it. You'd said you'd seen the end of the world."
"I know!" she says, burying her face in her hands. "I know, but if I'd told you about everything all at once, you would have freaked out. You would have judged me."
"That's not true."
"I needed a way in, and then you brought up the end of the world, and I only . . ." She clamps her mouth shut. Like it's too hard to say more. She doesn't need to, I'm piecing it together myself.
"You wanted my help. You wanted me to help you find your brother and you figured out what I was most scared of in the entire universe and you told me it was happening!"
"I needed you," she says, as though _need_ makes it better. "I needed you, and I needed you to trust me, so I said what I thought would work, but then it just sort of spiraled, and you made those posters, and started telling people, and—"
"And you let me do it! Even though you knew it wasn't—"
"I know, okay? I know." Hannah rubs at her eyes like they hurt. "I guess I didn't realize how seriously you'd take it."
_"The end of the world?"_
She shushes me again. "And when I did realize, I tried to . . . back off. I swear. I went looking for him on my own, I stayed out of the Park because I knew you'd be there, I thought if I kept my distance maybe it would be better. For you."
All those days I didn't see her, or hear from her. She spent all those days alone. Because she couldn't bring herself to tell me the truth. It makes my heart ache and my teeth clench all at once.
"Yeah, if you tried that hard, how did we end up here?" I demand.
She winces. "I don't know. I kept promising myself this was it, and then I kept breaking the promise. I kept finding you, I kept wanting to find you. I kept getting pulled back in."
I thought Hannah was the sun, and I was just an orbiting planet. Or a piece of metal drawn to a magnet. It's not true. We were both the magnets.
"You kept pulling me back in," she says, and it feels close to an accusation.
"This isn't my fault!" I throw back at her. Salt stings the corner on my eyes. "You lied to me. You used me. And for _what_?"
"I can explain that part," she says, but I'm already taking a step back, then another.
"I don't want you to explain." I spin around so fast it feels like my brain rattles.
"I didn't lie about everything," she pleads. "Not everything. Wait, please."
I turn back around. She's got one hand on the door, one hand reaching out to stop me.
"I still need you," she says.
Worlds crumble. Worlds end. Words fail.
I walk away, leaving her in the doorway.
Water sloshes out of my shoes and drips down from my drenched hair as I walk in my front door, realizing too late I should have come up through the basement stairs. Dad is still in the living room, poking at his phone. His mouth drops open when he sees me. "What on Earth—why are you soaking wet?"
"I'm going to pack," I say, and it sounds flat and muffled in my ears.
"Lisa!" he calls into the kitchen. I head him off by walking into the kitchen myself.
"Ellis," Mom gasps as I grab an entire package of Oreos from the pantry. "Did you go outside? We thought you were down in the . . ." She trails off as I grab a Coke out of fridge. "That is not an appropriate snack."
"Hannah's a liar." I pop open the soda can. "She lied to me."
"What?" Mom says.
I take a long gulp. "Hannah lied to me. I'm going to pack for Utah."
Then I leave her in the kitchen, eyes wide and saucepan boiling over, and go straight to my room.
Twenty-Five
**WHEN I WAS** little, I thought America looked just like the fifty states puzzle I had. When viewed from above, I imagined, you could see each state's name in bold black letters stretched across the ground, clean borders with clear-cut lines. From my window seat in the second-to-last row, I can't tell where Utah begins. I can't feel the split second I cross out from the wilderness into home. But when the Great Salt Lake comes into view on the horizon, a little blue pool hemmed in by desert and mountains, I sigh. This is a homecoming.
I was born in California and lived my entire life in the same zip code. Berkeley is the place that raised me on its chaos and oddball charm. Seventeen square miles of hills and canyons, elite universities and tent cities. Berkeley is my hometown, and it always will be. But Utah is my home, too. A different kind of home. An ancestral home. A place of belonging. A legacy.
When I land at Salt Lake City International, I ride the escalator down with a just-returned sister missionary, exhausted but bright-eyed, in a long skirt and sensible, beaten-up shoes. Her family is just past the security checkpoint with balloons and "Welcome Home" signs, and they scream in unison when they see her. And just to their left is Aunt Tonya, staring at me with obvious disappointment.
Em was always the Golden Girl, from the moment she was born. What choice did I have but to be the Perpetual Disappointment? Every family needs one. So I've fallen on my sword. It's actually very noble of me.
The car ride to Aunt Tonya's house is silent. And so are the next few days, as I mope around her house in Spanish Fork. Or as everyone here pronounces it, "Spanish _Fark_." Spanish Fark in Utah County. Happy Valley. And yes, we're all so happy here. I'm so happy I could vomit rainbows. I'm so happy I could shove an ice pick in my eye.
It's too far from the city to get anywhere without a car, not that anyone would let me go. Aunt Tonya's kept me on the shortest of leashes, and I don't expect that to change when my cousin Sarah gets done with finals tomorrow and flies in from Hawaii. I don't even expect that to change when my parents and sister arrive the day after that, on the twenty-third.
But to my shock, today features a surprise field trip.
"I want you dressed in fifteen minutes," Aunt Tonya says, passing through the living room with a basket full of laundry.
"Why, where are we going?" I ask.
"The Renaissance."
_Of course, let me grab my corset and petticoat_ , I almost say, but restrain myself. "The Renaissance?"
"Grammy Kit's nursing home," Aunt Tonya says. "Fifteen minutes."
The Renaissance is a two-story brown-brick building on the outskirts of Salt Lake City, and you could mistake it for a real house, except for the bank of wheelchairs on the covered entryway and the sign proclaiming it "an award-winning senior care facility."
Aunt Tonya parks near the front, and I grab my bag from the backseat.
"What's all that?" she says as we walk to the building, eyes on my backpack.
"Homework stuff." I choose not to mention my everyday carry pack at the bottom, or my wallet stuffed with quarters, in case the nursing home has a pay phone and I can sneak away and call Tal, or Em, or—
No. Not Hannah. Not even if she had a phone.
"Uh-uh," Aunt Tonya says. "You're here to spend time with Grammy Kit, not hole up in a corner. This isn't a vacation."
I wonder in what joyless universe homework is considered a vacation activity. "It's for school."
"And this is for service." I follow behind her through two sets of doors, heavy and opaque. A lock clicks behind us.
Aunt Tonya moves through the hallways purposefully, greeting green-uniformed workers by name. I try to stop my stomach from flipping at the piped-in fifties music, the locked, motion-sensored doors, the smell of bleach and urine and lavender air freshener. We stop at a door that reads KIT HOLLEY.
Inside the room is a tiny, hunched woman in an easy chair. If you didn't know, you might not guess that she spent her teenage years running cattle on her family farm, or that she spent her adult years wrangling children, nursing her husband until the bitter end of pancreatic cancer, and managing their small grocery shop, all at the same time.
You also might not know what a pair of lungs she packs inside that small body, but only until she opens her mouth.
"Ruby!" She hollers as Aunt Tonya shuts the door behind us. I look around for a healthcare worker, but there's no one in the room but us. Aunt Tonya has her mouth set in a thin line. Grammy Kit is staring straight at me.
It takes me a second to realize that Ruby is me. Or at least, Ruby is who she thinks I am.
"Ruby!" She repeats.
"It's Ellis, Grammy," I say, trying to swallow the lump in my throat. It's not like I couldn't have predicted this. She doesn't remember my mom, her own daughter, why should she remember me?
"Good lord in heaven," she says. "What are you wearing?"
I look down at my outfit. The jeans are pretty standard, so it must be the shirt. "It's flannel."
"You look like a field hand."
"I'd be a pretty bad field hand."
"Nonsense," she says. "Wasn't me with that blue ribbon calf in fifty-nine."
It wasn't me, either, but why not? Whoever Ruby was, I'd rather be her than me.
"I'll let you in on a secret," I say, and Grammy Kit leans forward. "It was really a pig painted black and white."
She stares at me for a moment. Then she throws back her head and cackles. Aunt Tonya purses her lips.
"Mama," Aunt Tonya says as Grammy Kit picks at a back molar. "Ellis is going to keep you company today. I'll come back after dinner."
After dinner? It's barely noon. "When's dinner?" I ask Aunt Tonya.
"Four p.m. I can pick you up around five."
That's a long time to hang around here by myself, but I nod. Aunt Tonya shuts the door the behind her as she leaves.
Grammy Kit pokes me in the arm. "Thought she'd never leave."
"Tonya? She'll be back."
"She's gone. You can tell me."
"Tell you what?"
"About George, you goose. Did he kiss you?"
I shake my head. "Grammy Kit, I don't know any—"
"I won't tell. Swear." She holds out her hand, wrinkled and trembling. She extends her little finger. Huh. I curl my pinkie around hers, and she lifts up, then down, like a handshake. Ruby must be a friend. Or, must have been a friend, long ago, when they were young enough for pinkie swears, but old enough to kiss boys.
"Yes," I say, because what's the harm? I think of kissing Tal five days ago. Five eons ago. My eyes prick. "He kissed me."
Grammy Kit grins. "He'll have you in a white dress before supper," she declares. "And out of it before morning."
My mouth drops open. _Was that a sex joke?_
"George is all right," she says approvingly. "Doesn't tear around town in his car like Bobby." She sighs. "But oh, those eyes."
Bobby? Bobby like my grandpa Bob? I never met him, he died before I was born. I sit down on the bed, next to her easy chair.
"Tell me about him."
She blinks. "You know Bobby."
"Tell me anyway."
So she does. She never talked about him when I was younger, she'd always change the subject when Mom brought him up. Maybe it was just too painful, like tearing stitches. But he's alive in her mind, and he comes alive to me as she talks. Grandpa Bob speeding down rural roads in his truck, Grandpa Bob giving her his class ring, Grandpa Bob stealing a pig for a senior prank. She'd never have done this if she were well. But in her mind, he's alive. In her mind, there's no pain.
"It's four," she says, finally, though it's twelve thirty. "You want to watch _American Grandstand_?"
"Um. _Bandstand_?"
"Yes."
"Sure."
"I can never find that clicker," Grammy Kit grumbles. "I think they steal it."
"Who does?"
"The shopgirls."
She must mean the nursing home workers. She thinks this is her house, and also her store, and maybe some back porch where she and Ruby sipped lemonade and gossiped about boys. This is her reality, as real as the soft sleeve of my flannel shirt against her arm, as real as the bird squawking outside her window, as real as anything that has happened to her. Reality comes from the Late Latin _realis_ , meaning "actual." But before that, in Medieval Latin, _realis_ didn't mean "actual." It meant "belonging to the thing itself." I was never quite sure what that meant, but now I think I do. _Reality_ is not a singular noun, even though the dictionary says it is. Reality is a plural, a million things at once, seen from the eyes of a million people at once. Reality belongs to the thing itself, and the thing itself is us. Our reality belongs to us, and we belong to it.
I'm brought out of my head by the sound of furious, frustrated clicking. Apparently, they didn't steal the remote. "Can't get the darn thing to—" Grammy Kit hits the remote against the easy chair, which accomplishes nothing. "It's broken. I'll find the receipt."
I pry it out of her hand. "Let me give it a shot. What do you want to watch? I don't think _American Bandstand_ is on."
"The news, then."
"Do you know which channel?"
She tilts her head. "Ruby, honey, there's only four."
I bring up the guide screen and click on the first news program, on channel 758. It's national news, and two anchors are discussing the latest possibility of a government shutdown.
"She ought to be wearing a hat," Grammy Kit says, looking disapprovingly at the blond female anchor. "Imagine, being interviewed for television and forgetting your hat."
We finish the segment on the government shutdown and then a piece about an unlikely friendship between a husky and a potbellied pig before the Ken Doll–esque male anchor turns it over to weather. Grammy Kit's not likely to find that interesting, so I raise the remote, but then stop, frozen, at the sight of the national weather map.
Sun in Florida. Rain on the Eastern Seaboard. And there, hovering above the San Francisco Bay, a giant snowflake.
"Well, as you can see, Frank," the weather lady's saying to the anchor, "we've got this cold front coming in from the north—"
She keeps talking, stuff about cold fronts and air pressure and winds from the west, but I can barely hear her over the pounding in my chest and my head and my ears.
"So there's a possibility San Francisco might see snow?" Frank the Anchor asks.
"A distinct possibility, yes. And the inland areas are almost certain to see at least a few flakes."
Berkeley is inland. My home is inland. _Hannah is inland._
The anchor and weather lady are laughing, like this is a fun little surprise, but I'm whisper-screaming at the TV, "When? WHEN?"
"What, dear?" Grammy Kit says.
"When can folks expect to see that snow, Mariana?" Frank the Anchor asks.
"It might be as early as this evening, Frank," Mariana the Weather Lady says.
Oh my gosh. It's tonight.
Oh my gosh. She was right.
I turn off the TV because I can't think with it on, I can't think with Frank and Mariana joking about sledding down Lombard Street. I can't think because I don't know what to think.
Hannah lied. Hannah said she lied, she told me she lied. But there's going to be snow in Berkeley on December 21. A freak weather event on the right day and in the right place.
And I'm in Utah.
I stand up, boneless and bloodless and shaky. The end of the world as we know it is coming, and I'm not there. Hannah swore things would be all right, but only if I was there. I should be there, with her, watching the newscast and packing our go bags, making sure my family's set with supplies for at least seven days. I should be there, but I'm here, in a Salt Lake City nursing home with a woman who thinks I'm her childhood friend and has outdated opinions on women's hats.
I pace. But there's barely enough space in this room to pace, between the hospital bed, the easy chair, and the portable toilet. Three steps to the left, three steps to the right. I don't pace. I flounder.
"What are you looking for?" Grammy Kit asks.
I breathe out. "An answer."
"To what?"
"I don't know," I say. But no, I do. I know what I'm looking for, and she's the safest one to tell. She won't remember in an hour. I kneel down next to her easy chair.
"I'm looking for an answer," I tell her. "I'm looking for a sign that tells me where I should go. I'm looking for a clue that tells me what to do. I'm looking for something that tells me what I should believe. I'm looking for a . . ." I grasp for the word, near enough to snatch from the air. "I'm looking for a revelation."
Grammy Kit stares at me, long and searching. Maybe I'm only imagining it, but for a second, her eyes look sharper. "Well, doll," she says, "I don't think you're going to find that here."
The words hit me like salt waves, like cold water on your face in the morning, something brisk and urgent that says, _wake up, get up._ The sign I'm waiting for isn't coming. I have to choose, and I have to choose alone.
I've made so many choices in my life, but how many of them were really mine? I made choices because Hannah said the world was ending, and I believed her. I made choices because my parents and my church said they knew best, and I believed them. I made choices because a voice in my head said I should be afraid of the world and myself, and I believed it.
But here is something else I believe: I was put on Earth, given a body and brain— _this_ body, _this_ brain, imperfect and odd—to make choices. What's the point, if I never make a true one?
_What do you want, Ellis? Want something, choose something, Ellis._
I'm standing in this tiny room, narrow and cluttered and dark, but that isn't how it feels. It feels like the horizon line at Lands End. It feels like the sky above Utah Valley. It feels—I feel—limitless. Boundless. Or maybe just unbound.
_I want to go home._
I want to go home. I want to see the snow fall. Whether Hannah is there or not, whether the world ends or spins eternally, there's nowhere else I would choose to be.
"I'm going home," I say to Grammy Kit, because someone needs to know, and I need to hear myself say it. She blinks, then nods.
Okay. Okay. I need to keep my head. Attack the problem logically. First, and hardest, Aunt Tonya. I grab the bedside phone, scramble to find the cell number in Kenny #14, and dial. She picks up on the first ring.
"Mama?" she says, sounding surprised.
"It's Ellis."
She sighs as if to say, _You couldn't even last a half hour?_ "What is it?"
"I was calling to ask—" I should have taken a second and practiced this lie. "One of the nurses came by and told me they're doing a movie night: _42nd Street_. It's after dinner and she said I could stay for it. Can I?"
"You want to stay for it?" I try not to be offended by the surprise in her voice.
"It's basically my favorite movie," I say, and that's not even a lie. "Grammy Kit showed it to me the first time." That's not a lie, either. "Please?"
"What time should I get you?"
"I think around eight."
There's silence on the line. "All right. We'll save some dinner for you. The cafeteria there is hit-or-miss."
After I hang up with her, I poke my head out the door and flag down a nurse. "Excuse me," I say, trying to keep my voice even and not vomit all over her white orthopedic shoes. "Is there a good cab company nearby? My aunt isn't going to be able to pick me up after all."
"I'll call one for you," she says, then adds, softer, "The residents' phones can't do it. Too many escapes."
I thank her, and she promises to come get me when it's outside. Once she's down the hall, I shut the door. Breathe in, hold. Breathe out, hold. I kneel down by the easy chair again and grab Grammy Kit's hand.
"Grammy Kit," I say, and she frowns, as if I've called her Captain Crunch. Right. Ruby, I have to be Ruby. "Kit," I try again.
"Yes?"
"I have to go, okay? I have to go somewhere now."
She smiles slyly. "George waiting out back?"
Sure, that'll do. "Yes. George is waiting for me. But you can't tell anyone where I've gone."
"Oh, Ruby, you be careful."
"I will. I promise I will. But you can't tell anyone or I'll be in such big trouble you can't even imagine. Okay?"
"If your mama calls," she says, "I'll tell her you're spending the night over here."
"But I can't talk. If anyone wants to talk to me, I'm in the bathroom. Okay? You promise?"
She holds out her pinkie. I wrap it in mine. She leans in close. "Go get 'em, doll."
The internet is a beautiful thing. I know lots of people are convinced it's the downfall of humanity, responsible for everything from carpal tunnel to serial killers. And yeah, those 1940s scientists building computers the size of houses would probably never have guessed we'd eventually all keep one in our pocket and use it to watch videos of cats and/or browse apocalypse preparedness forums. Maybe they'd feel like we ruined their achievement. But I will say this for the internet: it makes it really easy to buy a plane ticket.
I bought mine at a library near the airport, too scared to go straight there and buy one at the counter. They'd take one look at my face and know something was up. They'd have American Express on the line post-haste to report me for credit fraud, even though the card is technically in my name. Even though my parents bought my flight _here_ with the same card, to boost my frequent flyer miles. And sure, it's only supposed to be for emergencies, but if armageddon isn't an emergency, I don't know what qualifies.
I'm third in line to have my ID checked by the TSA, and my hands are clammy, my ticket clutched in a death grip.
_They know who you are. They know what you're doing, they can see it on your stupid, guilty face._
Oh, not now. I thought maybe it would go away. After that therapy session, after I shut it down once, I thought maybe it would stop. But it can't, can it? It's me. It's part of me. I can't rip it out or will it away.
_They're going to catch you and detain you and_ __ _send you back to Spanish Fork; it's going to happen, you know it is._
No. That's a lie. I know the sky is blue. I know my name is Ellis. I know I'm second in line. But I don't know what's going to happen, I don't know what I don't know, _it's lying to me._
_What if the school put you on some government watch list, what if you're on the no-fly list—_
What if, what if, _what if_? What if I just didn't listen? What if I heard it—because I don't think it'll ever really be silent—but what if I just didn't listen?
I'm first in line. The ID checker beckons me forward, and I go with a smile, ticket and passport in hand. He waves me through the checkpoint without a second look, and the gate agents even smile at me as I board the five fifteen direct to Oakland.
My middle seat doesn't offer much of a view outside, especially since my window seat neighbor has the screen shut. We're getting closer to home with every passing second, and I can almost feel the change in the recycled airplane air. The plane bumps and bounces over the Sierra Nevadas.
_The plane's going to crash and you're doing to die._
I hear it, every word. But I try to hear it like white noise, sounds that can fade into the background of my mind. Just because I hear it, doesn't mean I have to listen.
_How pathetic would it be to die in a plane crash just hours before doomsday? You're going to crash and die._
I might. But probably not. It's so unlikely. Everything's okay. I focus on those words until they're the ones I hear.
_Probably not, so unlikely, everything's okay. Probably not, so unlikely, everything's okay._
"Folks, an update from the flight deck," the captain says over the intercom. "We're just about to begin our final descent into Oakland. Might be a bit of a bumpy landing—looks like they've got some snow."
There's murmurs throughout the plane.
"Snow in the Bay," says the businessman in the aisle seat next to me. "Can you believe it?"
"I always did," I reply. He frowns at me, then goes back to his book.
Abandoning propriety, I lean across the sleeping man in the window seat and push up the screen.
Outside, the sun is setting.
Outside, there are snowflakes, perfect and fragile and real, falling from the sky.
Here are some things I will miss when the world ends:
An ice-cold cone from Yogurt Park, so big it threatens to topple
Sitting in the Park with my back up against Hannah's tree, Tal beside me
Telegraph Avenue on a warm Saturday afternoon, smelling like incense and good food and home
I make this list in my head as I crisscross a snowy downtown Berkeley. It probably isn't the smartest thing to do, wander aimlessly out in the open as a criminal. Because yes, running away from home when you're a minor technically _is_ a crime. I've looked into it. I didn't really run away from home, though. I only ran _back_. But I doubt the police would appreciate the distinction, so I keep my hood up as I wander on an endless quest for a pay phone.
I finally find one in the Berkeley YMCA. Just up the street from school. Right back where I started. The very first thing I did after the cab dropped me off—several blocks away, in case my parents were already tracking my credit card—was break into my high school. Or, really, just walk inside, thanks to the staff party apparently raging in the C-building teachers' lounge. I crept down the second-floor hallway as quiet as I could, to the very last locker bay and my unauthorized second locker. Three turns of the lock, and I had my emergency bag. Enough food for three days, if you ration carefully. A space blanket. A first-aid kit the size and weight of a hardcover book. A flashlight.
In the YMCA, I dump both backpacks against the wall and dig change out of my wallet for the pay phone. I've never used one before, so it takes a couple of tries and about three dollars, but finally, I hear ringing on the other line, and I will the universe to let him pick up.
"Hello?"
Just hearing his voice makes me want to crumble. "It's me."
A pause, an inhale, a recognition. "Ellis?"
"Yeah."
"Oh my God," Tal says. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine."
"Good. Okay, good." He breathes out. "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry about what I said at my house, I didn't know—"
"I know," I tell him softly. "It's okay, I know."
"I was wondering when you'd call. When they'd let you. They didn't send you to one of those troubled teen places, did they?"
"What? No."
"Utah's full of them."
"How did you know I was in Utah?"
"I asked my sister to ask your sister. She said you'd gone to Utah, but wouldn't say more than that."
"Oh."
"It must be boring as hell. And cold as shit. Is it snowing there?"
"I, um. I don't know."
There's a beat as it dawns on him.
"Where are you calling from?"
"A pay phone."
"Jesus Christ, Ellis, _a pay phone where_?"
His exasperation makes me want to laugh and sob at the same time. "Here. I'm home."
"Berkeley?" he says. "You're in _Berkeley_?"
I nod, then realize he can't see that. "Yeah."
Another beat.
"Did your parents bring you home?" he asks. I chew the inside of my cheek and say nothing. "Does anyone know that's where you are?"
"Just you."
There's a scuffling sound on the other end. "I'm coming to get you."
"No," I say, then again, louder, because I can tell he's moving around, maybe grabbing his keys. "No, I have to—you can't come get me."
"You don't have to go home," he promises. "You can stay with me and my dad, we'll figure it out, we'll—"
"It's snowing!" I yell into the phone. "Tal. It's snowing."
I hear him sit down with a thump. "I know," he says carefully. "I know what you think that means, Sam showed me that flyer you put up, but that doesn't mean anything."
"This is the first snow in years. The first _real_ snow, more than an inch, since the nineteenth century. They said so on the newscast."
"You ran away because of a newscast?"
"I ran back," I counter. "I wanted to see it."
"There's nothing to see!" he protests. "This isn't the apocalypse, and Hannah never should have told you it was. She knows that, believe me, she feels so terrible for doing it. But this is a freak snowstorm, nothing else. What do you think you'll _see_?"
"She said I had to be with her," I tell Tal. "I know a lot of it was lies, but I don't think that was. She said I had to be with her or it would all go wrong. I know you don't believe me, I know you don't believe at all, but I have to be there."
He sighs, deep and heavy. "I'll go with you," he says. "Tell me where."
I almost do. I almost do, because I'm scared, and I miss him, and I trust him not to tell anyone else. But my breath catches in my windpipe, itchy and gnawing, so I cough instead.
"Ellis," he says. "Just tell me where."
"I can't," I say. I think this moment was meant for me and Hannah, alone. I'd assumed we couldn't get any converts because I made a terrible missionary and Hannah made a worse prophet, but maybe . . . maybe we weren't meant to convert anyone. Maybe even our failure was meant to be.
"You don't have any survival gear," Tal says, trying to reason his way out of an unreasonable situation, as always. "If it's really the end of the world as we know it, you'll die. Wherever you're going, you won't make it."
I don't tell him about my emergency bag. "I'll be okay."
"You're really going to do this?"
"Yes."
I wait for him to yell at me. I wait for him to plead with me. I wait for him to threaten to call the police, or my parents, or my bishop. He's quiet for a very long time, and I almost think the call's been dropped, when finally he says:
"I will be here." My heart bursts under my ribs. "I will be here when the world doesn't end. I will be here even if it does. Even if I'm frozen in a block of ice, when you want to find me, you'll know where to go." His voice cracks. "Right?"
"Yes," I say, more a sob than a word.
"You'll come find me?"
"I'll come find you," I say. "I promise."
And that's when the call really does drop.
One more thing I will miss when the world ends: the smell of books.
Very old books, like the ones that used to be in Grammy Kit's house, smell like tree trunks and smoke and vanilla extract. Brand-new ones smell crisp and clean, like ink and dryer sheets mixed together. If you research it, which I have, you'll learn the vanilla smell comes from the lignin in the wood paper, a complex polymer close to vanillin. The dryer sheet smell is probably the finisher they use in production. Those are the facts, and facts do matter. But when you're inhaling that scent for what might be the last time, facts barely matter at all.
Even in the library computer room, I can still smell the books. Faintly, from far away, but there. That smell, the one that's cocooned and calmed me since the first day I toddled into a library and scooped up as many books as I could carry, that smell is still there. I fill my lungs with it as I read through my email one last time.
**TO: Dr. Andrew M. Kimball, Lisa Holley Kimball, Em &m**
**FROM: Ellis Kimball**
**SUBJECT: The Things That Shall Be Hereafter**
**I'm safe. That feels like the first thing I should say. I'm sorry. That feels like the most important thing I should say. I'm sorry for using the emergency credit card. I'm sorry for escaping Utah. I'm sorry for the 16.5 years of worry. I know, from the moment I was born two months early, I've worried you.**
**I had to. That feels like the truest thing I could say. We all have choices, we all have agency and choices and the freedom to make them. But sometimes, something bigger than us pushes our hand. I feel like I had to. And I believe in the things I feel.**
**Em: It's all going to be all right. I promise. I'll see you soon. Keep yourself spinning.**
**Dad: I don't think Mom found my secondary stash of supplies. It's in the basement, in the clothes storage, behind my baptism dress. And I want you to know—I've needed you just like you needed me.**
**Mom: It's okay that you don't know how to help me. It's okay that you don't understand me. Sometimes I don't understand myself, either. I'm starting to. We'll do it together.**
**I love you. I hope I spend the rest of this short life by your side, and eternity, too. I changed my mind—that's the most important thing I can say. I love you.**
**—Ellis**
My mouse cursor hovers above the send button. I shut my eyes and listen to every familiar sound. The squeak of shoes on the beige floors. The rattle of a book cart down the hallway. The swish of turning pages. The thump of my heart beneath my ribs, beneath my skin, vulnerable and thin, but powerful all the same. Endlessly shedding and regenerating and growing. The deep layers of your skin—with your scars and freckles and birthmarks—stay with you for life. But that first layer, the one that brushes up against the world around you, that one replaces itself every twenty-seven days. Every twenty-seven days, you're inside a new skin. Every twenty-seven days, you get a new chance.
In this skin, I made choices, good ones and bad ones, and some I'm not sure about yet. In this skin, I kissed a boy and broke my parents' hearts and broke out of Utah. And if this is my last skin, well. I'm glad it was mine.
I hit send.
Twenty-Six
**BY THE TIME** I reach the trailhead, the sun's already set. I should have gotten here earlier. I shouldn't have spent as much time writing my final message to my family. But I owed it to them. I owed them something. It's just that now, I have to climb this hill in the dark.
The snow is still falling, but it's not sticking. The flakes are cold as they hit my face, but melt nearly the second after. I can't see the ground all that well, but there's no crunch under my boots, just slippery dirt. It's wet snow, "bad snow," my grandpa Jack would say, because it's not good for skiing. It's heavy, but it's practically sleet.
My feet are damp, half from the snow, half from the effort of scrambling up the hill, and I wish I had wool socks. I wish I had my headlamp, the new one. With the sun down, I can barely see my own feet. At least I have a flashlight. I don't know how Hannah's going to get up this trail without one.
I stop, for a moment, my chest seizing in a vise. What if she doesn't come? What if I'm up there all alone, and she never comes? She has to have seen the weather. She wouldn't leave me. She'll be there. She has to be there.
Just thinking about being alone at the lookout floods fear through my muscles. There are mountain lions in these hills. Years ago, one wandered into downtown and the cops shot it. In true Berkeley fashion, a funeral was held for the cat.
_You could be eaten by a mountain lion._
_You could be crushed by a storm-damaged tree._
Just because I hear it doesn't mean it's right. Just because I hear it doesn't mean I have to listen.
_You could fall off the side of this trail and smash your head open, and that's where you'll die. No one would find you. You'd be all alone._
There's only me and the snow, me and the wind, me alone with myself and all my fears.
_You'll never be rid of me. I'll always be here. You'll always hear me._
I've only been given one body. I've only been given one brain, miswired and odd and mine. But my voice—not just what spills over my vocal cords and into the world, but the things I say to myself—that's something I get to choose. I'll always hear it, but that doesn't mean I'm doomed to hear what I've heard before. There are so many words in this world. I can learn new ones.
I'm at a standstill now, blinking into the darkness ahead and the darkness behind me. Should I turn around? I could find my way back. I could find my way back home and hug my parents one last time. I could hold Em's hand as the world spins off its axis. I could end life as I've known it in the warmth and comfort of the house I was born in, with the people who brought me into life. Who protected me. And who loved me, all of them, the best way they knew how. Or I could keep walking into the cold unknown.
I walk forward.
The higher I climb, the darker the sky gets, and the wetter the ground becomes. I should have paid more attention, when Hannah and I were here before, to the terrain. But I didn't think I'd be walking alone. I'm careful as I go, sliding my feet more than lifting them. My hands are ready to catch me if I fall, because I desperately don't want to. It's amazing how much you notice when there's nothing to see. I hear the wind whipping through the trees and shrubs. It's harder now than when I was downtown, and it bites at my exposed ears and sends dirt and snow flying up to sting my eyes. I smell the eucalyptus grove as I pass through it, then nothing but cold air. I feel each patch of wet grass, each jagged rock, each stone groove in the trail, and I stick to the grooves as much as I can. They don't slip as much under my shoes.
And I sense, rather than see, that I'm getting closer. The light is better, so the trees must be thinning. There's one more turn, one more little incline before the trail flattens. Before the bench. Before the place where the light comes in. As I make that last turn and struggle up that last incline, I sense, rather than see, that I'm not alone.
"Hannah?" I whisper into the blackness, more a prayer than a call. When I round the bend, I turn to my left, and the world is bright again. All of my city is stretched before me, sparkling with light, house lights and streetlights and car lights moving down Broadway. All of Berkeley is illuminated. All of Berkeley is still there. San Francisco is hazy in the distance, but I can just make out the tops of the towers. San Francisco is still there, too.
At the cliff's edge is a person in shadow, long hair escaping from a pulled-up blue hoodie, staring out across the icy bay.
"Hannah!" This time it is a call, a shout across the wind.
She startles and spins around, but I still only see the vaguest outline of her body. She takes a step forward, then I do, then we're both running, colliding with each other in the dark.
"You came," she whispers.
"Yeah," I say, my hand clutching the cotton fabric on her arms. She's not wearing enough; where's her coat, where are her gloves? "It's snowing."
"Yeah," she says back.
"I didn't know if you'd be here."
I feel her muscles quivering under my hands. "I knew you would."
I let her go, though I don't want to, and fumble in the emergency backpack from school. I paw around until my fingers latch on to something thin, crinkly, and lifesaving. I pull it out and drape it around Hannah's shoulders.
"What—?" I feel her fingers grab the edges.
"Space blanket. Pull it tighter." It'll keep her warm for now, but not forever. "You didn't bring a coat."
She sighs, a huff of warm breath. "I had to make a break for it."
"Yeah, me too," I laugh.
"How did you get over here? The bus?"
"A taxi. Then a nonstop flight from Salt Lake to Oakland. Then another taxi."
_"What?"_
I explain, in very abridged form, my exile to and escape from Utah.
"I can't believe it," she says, her hair flopping onto my shoulder as she shakes her head. "I can't believe you did that."
"You knew I'd be here," I say. "You didn't think seven hundred miles was going to stop me, did you?"
She squeezes my arm, and that's answer enough. I look out at the city. "Oh," I say, and my breath hangs in the air like fog. "It looks like a Christmas tree. All lit up."
Hannah whips her head around, and I realize I mentioned Christmas. Just like she said I would.
"You told me you lied," I say. "You said you lied, but it's snowing."
"The dreams were real," she tells me. "That's what I was trying to tell you, before you left. I didn't lie about the dreams. Just what they meant."
"What did you think it meant?"
"Every time I woke up—" The wind howls and whips at our clothing. "Every time I woke up, I knew that I had to make it here. To this hill. When it snowed. If I came to the right spot, his favorite stop, if I was here . . ." I hear the tears, rather than see them on her face. "He'd come home."
"Danny?"
She nods. My heart aches. It was never the apocalypse. It was never the end of the world. Hannah told me what I wanted to hear, and I heard it. Hannah told herself what she wanted to hear, too. That her brother's safety was within her control. That if she gave up her possessions, or stopped cutting her hair, or gave up her days and nights looking for him, that she could protect him. This was just one more cosmic bargain she'd made with the universe. Nothing more.
"The other things—the city, the red sky, I don't know," she goes on. "They never felt real. I never really thought they would happen. But you were real. I saw you in my dream, and then I saw you in the real world, and I knew I'd see you here." She squeezes my hand. "You were the only real thing."
Hannah didn't make it snow. She can't control the weather, that was going to happen regardless. It was inevitable. But us being here wasn't. I squeeze back, as a sudden thought strikes me.
"What if this only happened _because_ you saw it?"
"What?"
"You saw us here, in your dreams, together. You thought it was fated to happen, that nothing could change it. But that meant you went looking for me, and found me, and I believed you. You created a way for it to happen, and that's the only reason it _did_ , because you already believed it would." I grip her hand harder. "What if we _made_ it happen?"
Just then, the wind picks up, sending freezing dust and snow into the air. Hannah coughs, and I shield my face.
"Jesus!" she yells, then coughs again. We huddle against each other, clinging to one another. The gales are hard enough, heavy enough, that it feels like we could be catapulted over the edge of the lookout point. I force my eyes open to see how close we are to the cliff drop. I look out toward the water, and my heart stops.
"Hannah!" I yell, dirt and snow in my mouth. She keeps her face turned away, so I shake her shoulder. "Look!"
Her head turns, and she must see what I see, because she gasps. The wind is churning the snow as it falls, and picking up what hasn't melted. The world in front of us is white and gray, all sleet and sand. For a moment—just one singular moment, from one singular perspective—San Francisco disappears into the storm.
Hannah and I are still clutching each other, half blinded, when the wind falters. Across the bay, a tower spire pokes through the clouds and the snow. As the gusts diminish, slowly, bit by agonizing bit, the city comes back into view. Still clouded, still difficult to see. But there.
Beside me, Hannah is still gasping. She's gulping for breath, over and over, like she can't get air in her lungs.
"It's still there," I say, relieved and terrified all at once. "It's still there."
Hannah says nothing. I can't see the expression on her face, but I know she just saw a dream transform into reality, then disappear into the ether just like San Francisco was supposed to.
"It's still there," she agrees, barely audible.
We're together. We're at the place where the light comes in, on the day one becomes two and two becomes one, and we saw San Francisco vanish. We're here. The world is still here.
I grasp for the answer, struggle for an explanation, but there is only cold, black air and a world that continues to spin, unchanged. Hannah's dreams were real, but the apocalypse wasn't. Her cosmic bargain wasn't, either. But the dreams were real; the dreams became reality and I don't understand why. I point my flashlight all around us, searching desperately for another clue, another fact, something to help this make sense because it doesn't _make sense_.
I shine my flashlight to our right, close to the sloped edge of the overlook. My vision snags, and my heart plummets into my wet shoes. My flashlight has landed on a large, prickly bush, just a short slide down the hill.
And a foot.
I stumble back, half screaming, half choking. My hand fumbles in the dark and finds Hannah's. I latch myself on to her freezing-cold hand and squeeze so hard she yelps.
"What?" she says. "What's wrong."
"There's—" My heart is threatening to launch itself out of its rib cage, my mouth is dry, adrenaline shooting through my veins. "There's a person."
"What?" she says again.
"In the bush, in the bush, there's—"
I shake my flashlight at the spot to direct her eyes. Now Hannah squeezes back. "Oh God."
The light stays on the foot. It doesn't move. Hannah slides her own foot toward it, tentatively.
"Hey," she calls out. "Are you okay?"
My eyes go wide. I pull her closer. "What are you doing?"
"He's not moving," she whispers. "If he wanted to kill us he would have."
"You don't know that. You _do not know that_."
"He could be hurt." She takes a step forward. Then another. I don't let go of her hand, and she doesn't let go of mine, so she's dragging me with her on each step. I keep the flashlight ahead, though my hands are shaking, and we both nearly slip on a large patch of ice right at the edge. I keep the flashlight on the foot, but as we peek down the slope and into the bush, the glow expands. There's a foot, then the tattered edge of jeans. Then a dirty hand with dirtier fingernails across a thigh. A red-and-black coat, a sweater under, a dark beard. Finally, a face, a whole person. Young. Male. Unmoving.
Hannah screams. I'm confused, because he still hasn't moved. There's no reason to scream. She drops my hand and slides down into the dark. I drop the flashlight, startled, and scramble to retrieve it. When I find it and focus it back, Hannah is on her knees, her entire body shaking like the trees in the wind. I lower myself down the wet, snowy slope, still sensing a trap, but not about to abandon her. One hand is on my flashlight, the other on a branch. The slope isn't that steep, but it's slick beneath my feet, and I don't want to fall. She's stopped screaming, but she's now crying hysterically, and I still don't understand why until she chokes out a word. One word.
"Danny."
Oh God.
Oh my God.
I sink down next to her. Hannah's got her hands on his shoulders, and she's shaking him like a rag doll.
"Stop." I reach out to her, but she bats my hand away. "Stop, Hannah, stop, he could have a—" I don't even know what he could have, but I know you're not supposed to shake an unconscious person. "Is he breathing?"
Hannah bursts into fresh, panicked sobs at that. My fingers feel numb and swollen, but I manage to snake my hand around hers. Danny's got one hand clutched to his chest, a crumpled piece of paper in his fist. I start to shove his arm away so I can check his breathing better, but as I do, my flashlight illuminates the paper.
It's orange. Day-Glo orange.
"Our flyer," I whisper to Hannah, but I don't think she hears me. "He found our—" He's here because he saw a flyer. He's here because he alone, other than us, knew what Hannah's prophecy meant. The place we were going, the place where the light comes in. He's here because he wanted to protect Hannah.
I shake my head. It doesn't matter why. It will later, but not now, because right now, he's the one in need of protection. My fingers grasp for his coat buttons and undo them. I lean forward, then recoil at the smell. He clearly hasn't bathed in a while, and even his sweater feels slick with sweat. _Pull it together!_ I scream at myself, because Hannah won't, and someone needs to. _Who cares what he smells like? Your ancestors crossed the prairie in handcarts. They forded flooded rivers. They battled locusts. Put your shoulder to the wheel, Ellis._
I hold my breath and lean in, my hand searching for a heartbeat. I find it, the thumping matching mine, which isn't good, because mine's too fast. I feel the rise and fall of lungs, too. He's breathing. His body is pumping blood. He's still here.
"He's breathing," I croak out to Hannah. "Okay?" I feel light-headed for a moment and brace myself with a hand on the grass. It comes back wet. Not like snow. Thicker, stickier—
I direct the flashlight at my own hand. It's red.
"Oh," I breathe out. "Oh no."
"What?" Hannah cries.
"He's bleeding. We have to find where he's—"
He must have slipped, at the edge. Fallen. Hit something.
"Oh God, oh God, oh God," Hannah's repeating over and over, clutching at Danny's clothes.
I shake her shoulder. I need her help. "Hannah."
She only sobs.
"Hannah!" I shake her shoulder once more, but she's beyond hearing. She has to snap out of it. I don't know what to do. She has to tell me what to do. I waste precious seconds staring at her helplessly before realizing: Hannah can't tell me what to do. If anything's going to happen, it'll be because I did it myself.
We need 911. We need 911, and we need an ambulance with medicine and doctors and wheels. Doctors on wheels. Doctors on ATVs. _Jesus, Ellis, get it together._ We need to call 911, but my phone is a mile away in my dad's desk drawer, and Hannah's is with Chris and Frank Zappa. Danny's was smashed to pieces months ago.
Problem: We need a phone and we don't have a phone.
Solution: Find a phone.
Problem: No one else is on this trail.
Solution: Get off this trail.
I look up, over the edge, at the dirt path leading back the way I came. I almost start running then, but stop myself, because I have to be logical. Even when the world is falling apart, you have to be logical. It took me forever to get up that path, it's twisty and steep. It's always harder to go down something steep. Didn't I learn that at Lands End? Climbing back up was so much easier. More dangerous, maybe, but faster.
I close my eyes, trying to take myself back to the day I was here with Hannah. I shove myself into the memory. Sunshine. The bay, sparkling and blue. So quiet, except for the cars—
The cars. The road. The house at the top of the path. A house means people.
I want to run down. I want to run down, because that's the way I came from, that's something I know. But I know what I have to do. I have to run _up_.
I kneel down next to Hannah, who is sobbing so hard I wonder how she can breathe. "It's going to be okay," I say. "I'm going to get help." I fumble around in my backpack. I grab her arm, uncurl her fingers, and jam a flashlight into her hand. "Figure out where he's bleeding. Put pressure on the wound. Hard, do it _hard_."
She sobs, but I feel her nod.
"I'm going to get help. Stay here. Don't move, don't move yourself, don't move him." She cries louder. "Do you hear me? _Stay here_."
I feel her nod again.
I don't want to leave her. I can't believe I'm leaving her. But I drag myself over the edge and sprint into the darkness, up the hill, knowing I'm going faster than is safe and not caring at all. My chest is already on fire by the time the ground starts to climb under my feet, a sign that I'm starting the steep ascent. The flashlight's no real help. A single pillar of light against pitch-darkness. It's nothing. I shine it all the same. The toe of my shoe catches a rock and I crash to the earth, dust in my mouth and a searing sting in my knee.
The girl who used to live inside my skin would have curled into a ball. The girl who used to be me would have refused to go on. I get up. One foot on the ground, then the other. One step forward, then another.
It's so slow. I'm so slow. The steps are steeper and harder, each one, and the snow is clouding my vision and my flashlight beam. What if I don't make it? What if I freeze to death here, fall to my death here, what if Danny is dying, what if Hannah has gone into shock, _what if what if what if_. What-ifs don't make the path flatter, maybes don't make my legs stronger. What-ifs don't solve a single thing. I'm done with them.
I fall, slipping on wet scrub grass. I get up. I climb faster, gasp for air harder, fall again, get up again. My hair is plastered to my forehead, every muscle I have is on fire, my skin is bruised and scraped raw, but my feet feel the ground rise up to meet them. Level ground is coming. I know the road is ahead even though I can't see it. So I run on screaming tendons, I run faster than I've ever run in my life. I'm running so fast, so blind that I don't see the trail gate until it's in my gut, knocking the wind out of me.
A gate.
The gate.
I'm so close.
I clamber over it, though I'm sure there's a way around. My foot slips on one of the bars. I catch myself from falling, but twist my wrist around too far. It burns. It's fine.
My feet hit concrete. It's solid, so solid, more stable than anything I've ever felt. In the flashlight glow, I can see the other gate, the one surrounding the house, the one I'm really looking for, up ahead. This one's too tall to climb over. How am I going to get through? The snow's falling heavier, and I can barely hear the party inside the house. If I can't hear them, what chance do they have of hearing me?
On my bruised legs, I race up to the door and pound on it with the wrist that isn't twisted. "Help!" I scream, and draw back my fist to pound again, but the door eases open, just an inch. I push, gently, testing, and it swings open. I'm through it before I can even question why it isn't locked, stomping over cobblestone and grass, snow in my face, snow in my eyes, and then snow in my mouth as I pound on a smaller door, a front door, and demand to be let in.
Someone opens the smaller door. I don't know who. I don't look at their face before I stumble through the threshold and shoulder my way into the warmth and light ahead. I wonder if this is what death feels like. I wonder if I am dead.
When I brush snow and salt from my eyes, I'm standing in a beautifully decorated living room. There's a Christmas tree by the floor-to-ceiling windows, which look out onto the white world outside. Two dozen people in dresses and sport coats are staring at me, drinks in their hands and shock on their faces.
"Call 911!" I shout into the room, and it's so big the words ring back in my ears. "Someone, please, call 911!"
No one moves. Do they speak English? Do _I_ speak English? Maybe I really am dead. I turn my wrist. It hurts. I'm still alive. I'm still alive, but Danny might not be, so why aren't they calling?
"Call 911 _now_!" Still, no one moves. "I don't have a phone and someone on the trail is hurt and if you don't call, someone is going to die tonight."
Everyone pulls out their phones at once. It takes me a second to realize that what I said sounded very close to a death threat.
"It's ringing." A young woman in a sparkly red dress presses her phone to her ear. "H-hello?" she says to the dispatcher. "There's this girl, she burst into our party and said someone's hurt, I don't—"
She's doing it all wrong, she's too vague, too slow. I snatch the phone out of her hand and twist around so she can't grab it back. "The emergency is an unconscious nineteen-year-old male bleeding from an unknown source on the Stonewall-Panoramic Trail in Claremont Canyon at the first lookout point. The first good one. With the view. With the bench."
"The victim is unconscious?" the dispatcher asks.
Didn't I just say so? "We couldn't wake him up."
"Is the victim breathing?"
"He was when I left."
"Miss, where are you calling from?"
"A house, the house at the top of the hill, but the victim is at the first lookout point and needs medical attention."
"What is your name?"
What does that matter? She's wasting time. "His name is Daniel Marks and he's with his sister who's completely freaking out."
"No, Miss, what is _your_ name?"
"Ellis Kimball, it's Ellis Kimball, but their names are Daniel and Hannah Marks and you need to call their parents. Their parents' names are—"
My mouth is suddenly a desert. My throat is suddenly filled with cement. What are their names? I can't remember their names and I can't breathe and I can't stay standing.
When I stumble, I grab on to the closest thing to me, something prickly and dry that jingles as I try to steady myself against it. It's not strong enough. I'm not strong enough.
My knees buckle first, then the rest of my limbs follow. My vision pinpoints to a small spot on the green rug. It looks so comfortable, and yes, I will stay right here, this is fine, this is good, so I don't understand why someone far away is gasping, and someone else is grabbing me hard underneath my armpit and trying to haul me up. The carpet is perfect, it cushions my head like my favorite pillow. It cushions my fall like a parachute landing pad. I let go of the something prickly and dry, and it rattles and shakes.
The last thing I hear is something shatter against the floor by my head. The last thing I see is a big, golden, broken star.
Then everything is nothing.
Twenty-Seven
**IMAGINE THAT THE** universe is a film that has already been completed, and you've been given the reel. Each frame is one moment in time. A character inside that movie could only see them in order, moving from one numbered frame to the next, but you hold the entire story in your hands.
Imagine that the universe is a colony of ants living in a vast, treeless desert. As far as they know, the world is one flat plane—they live in two dimensions. But imagine that one day, a single blade of grass begins to grow. One ant climbs up it and discovers the reality of height. A brand-new world.
Imagine that the universe is one big cement block, floating in space. Inside that block is all of the past, the present, and every moment of the future . . . and us. We are inside that block, too, experiencing time the only way we can. Second to second, always in the present, stuck in an unending forward motion. But imagine you could step outside the block. You would see the universe as it really exists, time as it _doesn't_ exist, every single moment occurring at once.
That's how this feels. Like I'm outside time. Beyond it. Somewhere deep and dark, staring back at the universe with new eyes.
I blink into bright lights.
"Hey," a shadow above me says. "Can you hear me? Are you awake?"
"Yeah," I say, though I don't know if it's true for both questions. "Yeah."
"Oh, thank God," a different shadow says.
"You fainted," says the first shadow, slowly taking form as a person with two arms and two eyes behind two glass lenses. My mouth is full of cotton. My legs are full of sand.
"911?" I ask through the cotton. Was that real? Did I make the call? Or was that just a dream?
"They're on their way."
Hannah. Danny. "My friend—my friend is on the hill, and her brother—"
"It's okay," says the girl in the red dress, holding her phone protectively to her chest, like I might snatch it again. "They'll find them. It's okay."
"The world," I say. "The world is still here."
"Huh?"
"The world didn't end. Did it end?"
"No," says the guy with glasses.
"I think she's delirious," says the girl in the sparkly red dress.
My eyes feel heavy again. No, I'm staying awake. I have to stay awake.
"It's a plowing metaphor," I say. "Did you know that?"
"Okay, she's definitely delirious."
"Exactly," I say. "Delirious. _Delirium_ is the noun, _delirium_ is Latin, _delirium_ combines the prefix _de_ , meaning 'away,' with the word _lira_ , meaning 'furrow.' 'Delirious' means off the furrow, off the path." I sweep my arms out. "It's a metaphor. The whole world is a metaphor."
"What the fuck," says the blond guy.
"Mike!" says the girl. "Not helpful."
"You're the one who said her activation phrase, Lucy."
"Her what?"
"Activation phrase. Like sleeper agents have. The secret ones, from Russia."
"Are you drunk?"
"I am clearly not drunk _enough_."
An EMT, young and slim, arrives, and the guy with glasses points her over to me.
"My name's June," the EMT says, sitting down next to me on the couch. "What's your name?"
"Ellis."
"I heard you fainted, Ellis."
"I guess."
"How are you feeling right now?"
"Okay. A little . . . fuzzy."
"What have you eaten today?"
It takes me several long seconds to remember. "A piece of toast. And milk."
"When was that?"
Breakfast time at Aunt Tonya's, though it might as well have been a decade ago. "Nine a.m.," I say, and don't bother to account for the time difference.
"That's the last thing?" she says, and I nod. "You probably have low blood sugar." She pulls a little carton of orange juice from her bag, the kind my mom used to pack in my lunch for school field trips. June inserts the straw for me, and I slurp it down, only realizing when it's gone how thirsty I was. She promises we'll get me a snack in a moment.
"Is this yours?" she asks, retrieving my coat from the couch arm.
They must have taken it off me when I fainted. I nod.
"You should put it back on," she says.
"I'm not cold."
"You will be, when the shock goes away."
I don't think I'm in shock. That should feel like numbness, shouldn't it? I feel like I've grabbed hold of an electric fence. But I shrug the coat back on and zip it up.
"Is Danny okay?" I ask. "Please tell me, I won't freak out. I didn't freak out before; Hannah did, but I didn't."
"They got him off the hill," June says. "They'll take good care of him." She pauses. "Is that her name? The girl with the long hair. Hannah?"
Wait. How does she know Hannah's hair? I swing both feet onto the floor. "Where is she? Is she here?"
Before June or anyone else can stop me, I'm out the front door, through the garden, and following red lights to a paved back road I didn't know existed. Hannah is sitting in the back of an ambulance, her legs dangling over the edge, cocooned in a blanket. Another EMT is speaking to her. The snow has stopped, and the road is illuminated by the lights on top of the ambulance. They're so bright and steady, it almost doesn't look like a night sky anymore. The sky almost looks—red.
A red sky before midnight.
"Hannah!" She looks out from her caterpillar cocoon, and her face crumples. I rush over, but stop a step short, not sure if I can touch her. Not sure if I'll hurt her. Not sure what to say. "Hannah."
Her eyes are watery and puffy, and her cheeks have deep tear tracks down them, but she looks otherwise unharmed. "You're okay," she says, on a sigh of relief.
"Of course I'm okay."
"You ran up a mountain in sneakers."
"A hill," I say. "I'm fine."
"Did you see him go by?" she whispers, teary again. "Did you see them put him in an ambulance, or—"
I shake my head. "Why didn't they take you with him?"
"They said I couldn't ride along," she hiccups. "I was hyperventilating. They couldn't take care of him and me."
"He's going to be okay." I don't know that, but it's what Hannah needs to hear. It's what Hannah needs to believe.
"I'm sorry," she sobs. "I'm so sorry."
"For what?" I ask, bewildered.
"I'm so sorry I lied to you, I'm so sorry I told you the world would end."
Doesn't she see it? Doesn't she realize how right she was?
"I need to get her heart rate down," the EMT says, stepping in front of me.
"Wait, I—"
He boxes me out of the way. I'm about to object with harsher words when there's a hand on my shoulder. I turn around to see a police officer beside me, June trailing behind him.
"Are you Ellis Kimball?" the police officer asks.
"Yes." It comes out a whisper. I clear my throat. "I'm Ellis Kimball."
"I'm Officer Harris. May I ask you a few questions?"
He's phrasing it like a request, but I get the distinct impression it's not. Still, I nod, and he guides me a few feet away, toward the house. Away from Hannah.
"Are you aware your parents reported you a runaway?"
So few people seem to appreciate the distinction between running _away_ and running _back_.
"No," I say.
"No, you aren't a runaway?"
"No, I wasn't aware they reported me as one."
He sighs. "We've alerted them that you've been found. They're very happy you're safe, in case you care."
Wow. Expert guilt trip, Officer Friendly. "I do."
"You've used up a lot of resources tonight, do you know that? You and your friend."
Wow again. Find an injured person and they act like you've started a wildfire. "We didn't mean to."
"Really?" he says. "Because what I think is you and your friend were joining up with that street kid—I'm not going to say for what—when he . . . what, OD'd?"
My temper flares at how many hurtful, cruel assumptions a person can make in twenty seconds. Danny slipped and fell; that's the only explanation I can think of. The ground was slick, we found him down the slope, there was blood, why would this jerk go straight to drugs? I know why.
"That's not what happened," I say, struggling to keep my voice even. "That's not what happened at _all_."
He spreads his hands. "Enlighten me."
Here are some things I tell Officer Harris:
I went up the hill to see the snow falling.
Hannah and I discovered Danny, her brother, hurt and unconscious.
Hannah stayed behind to watch Danny while I ran up to the house to call 911.
Here are some things I don't tell Officer Harris:
I went up the hill because I thought the world was ending.
Hannah's brother, Danny, has been homeless and living with a mental illness.
Hannah stayed behind because she was hysterical, and I basically stole someone's phone to make the call.
Details.
Officer Harris takes a few notes, but doesn't seem overly concerned. "We'll have you make a full report later," he says. "Are you ready to go home?"
I don't know. I'm ready to hug Em. I'm ready to have Dad call me Elk. I'm even ready to have Mom untuck the hair behind my ears. But I've hurt them, all of them, so deeply, and I know it. I hope they'll accept why I made the choices I did, even if they can't ever really understand them. Maybe, like the end of world, family is more complicated than we give it credit for.
"Do you know how he is?" I ask Officer Harris.
"The street kid?"
Hannah's brother, who'd die to protect her. His parents' oldest child. The kind of person who'd bring muffins to lonely old ladies and leave secret gifts for the sister he couldn't talk to.
I bite the inside of my cheek so hard it tastes like metal. "His name is Danny."
"He's stable."
Relief floods me. Or, no, that's not right. Relief does not drown me. Etymologically, relief means something raised, something rising, and that's right. Relief lifts me.
"When can Hannah go see him?" I ask.
Officer Harris looks past me. "Looks like she's going now."
I whirl around. They're packing Hannah into the ambulance, closing her up inside. I dash away from Officer Harris and back over to her.
"I want to ride along," I tell the EMT.
"Not a chance," Officer Harris declares before the EMT can even blink, heading our way. I climb into the ambulance next to Hannah anyway.
"You were right," I whisper.
She blinks at me. "What?"
Officer Harris is behind me now, and I grab Hannah's hand.
"You were right," I tell her again, louder. "Everything you said was going to happen did happen, Hannah, you were right."
She frowns, and I hope she's thinking of the city disappearing in the snow, the red sky at night. And there are things she doesn't know about yet, things she didn't even see, like the star falling from the sky.
"It didn't end," she says. "The world didn't end."
"Come on, kid," Officer Harris says to me, but I'm betting he won't physically drag me away from a sick girl in an ambulance, so I stay.
"Maybe there are more worlds than we thought," I say. Hannah only frowns harder.
"I'm giving you ten seconds," Officer Harris says, like my mom used to when I was a kid. Unlike her, I hope he's bluffing.
I squeeze her hand tightly. "You found Danny. Danny is stable. Danny is safe." She inhales sharply, unsure whether to believe it, wanting to believe it.
The world might be a self-fulfilling prophecy, or it might just be a giant metaphor.
Maybe it's a Gettier problem, where nothing is quite like it appears, but that doesn't mean you can't find something true.
Or maybe the world is a small, solid block in a vast universe, part of a larger story than we can hold in our hands. Something bigger and greater than anything we can see with imperfect, human eyes. But that doesn't mean the world we can see isn't a miracle.
I lean in. "It's a brand-new world, Hannah."
Officer Harris has his hand on my shoulder, and I think he's tugging, but I barely feel it through all the layers of clothing, all the layers of fear and dread I'm just now ready to shed. With one last squeeze, I let go of Hannah.
I climb out of the ambulance and allow Officer Harris to think he's pulling me away. Everyone has their own reality. Far be it from me to disturb his. From a distance, we both watch in silence as the EMTs close the ambulance. In the sliver of the light in the closing doorway, Hannah looks back at me. I raise my hand. She smiles.
The door shuts. The engine starts. The ambulance turns the corner.
She's gone.
I look up at Officer Harris and straighten my neck, then my shoulders, then my spine, just like my mother taught me.
"I'm ready."
Twenty-Eight
**THERE ARE SO** many ways a world can end.
A nuclear war.
An underground volcano in Wyoming.
A city that vanishes for only a second, a brother who's missing until he isn't, two girls standing together on a hillside because the universe wanted them there.
It could end in fire. It could end in flood. It could end with me dying of embarrassment up at the pulpit, before I can even finish my testimony.
As I start to get up from the pew, Mom touches my arm. I stop. After a moment of hesitation, she reaches toward my ponytail and tucks a loose strand of hair behind my ear. "So they can see your face," she whispers. "I want them to see you." I smile back at her.
I walk to the front of the same church where I was blessed as a baby, and just before I reach the stairs to the podium, I hesitate. In front of my whole ward and Lisa Holley Kimball herself, I touch my fingertips to my head, to my shoulders, to my waist. I let my hands fall. I go on.
At the podium, I adjust the mic. Before, I might have just hunched over. But this is my testimony, and I shouldn't crouch just because the last person was shorter.
"I don't know the church is true," I say. I hear someone take a sharp breath in through their nose. I understand. This is an atypical script. "I don't know that Joseph Smith was a true prophet. I don't know that I'll be with my family for all eternity. I don't know that. Not a single person on Earth knows that, and not a single person on Earth knows those things aren't true, either. I can't tell you I know those things, not honestly, and I'm trying to be more honest. So instead of the things I know, I'd like to tell you the things I believe."
There are some things I _do_ know, though I won't say them out loud, here. Some things are mine to keep.
"I believe in grace," I say. "I'm grateful for every little of bit of grace I receive. I believe in trying to give it back. I believe that miracles can happen."
I don't know if I'll ever be the perfect daughter my mom saw in her dream. I don't know if I'll embarrass Em again, or make my dad sick with worry again. I don't know if I'll ever fit into my family like a puzzle piece.
But I do know they love me. I know that they've never been happier to see me, or more furious with me, than when Officer Harris brought me home. I know they've never been more baffled by anything than the story I told them about the end of one little world. And I'm lucky, because I know they believe in miracles, and you don't have to understand a miracle to accept its existence.
"I believe in goodness, which isn't the same thing as niceness. I believe in choosing what's right, and sticking up for it, even when it's hard. Especially when it's hard."
I don't know if Tal and I will be together forever, eternal companions in this life or the next. I don't know how many days, or months, or years we'll sit under oak trees and debate the afterlife, or challenge each other to Five-Word Books, or kiss in his bedroom, close enough to see ourselves in each other's eyes.
But I do know he showed up to today, to support me, because I asked. I spot him in a pew near the back, his little sister on one side, and on the other—
I nearly whisper her name into the mic. _Hannah_.
I haven't seen her since that first day after, in the hospital. And I didn't expect to, not until her brother is a little better, and her family is a little more healed. Her world is re-forming after the Big Bang, primordial ooze settling and growing into something strange and new and scary and hopeful. I'm not the center of her universe right now, not even close. I didn't ask her to come. But here she is.
"I believe in . . ." I have to search for the word, because I didn't practice this. I didn't plan it. But that doesn't mean it shouldn't be said. "Loyalty. I believe in loyalty, and being a good friend, and choosing friends wisely. That doesn't mean choosing friends who are the same as you, though it could."
Sam. Theo. Hannah, who made sure I met them. Hannah, who knew I needed them just as much as I needed her.
"It means choosing friends who love you for who you are, who see who you could be even when you can't. It means loving yourself just as much as they love you."
But then I stop again, because I wonder: If Hannah sees me better than I do, what does she see? Who does she see standing on this platform? Does she see the girl who saw who _she_ was, under all that grief and pain? Does she see the girl who came back for her, crossed mountains for her, faced every fear and more for her?
Hannah wasn't my savior. I wasn't hers. I don't think there's a word for what we are to each other, and I don't need one.
"It means loving yourself just as much as you love them," I say, and for a moment, there is no one in this room but me and Hannah. It's hard to see through blurry eyes, but I think she's smiling at me. I think she understands.
I look up at the ceiling and try to get myself under control. I've got more to say. Just a little bit more, and there's nowhere I'd want to say it but here, beneath the same rafters I've spent every week of life. Under my own roof.
"I believe in the Gospel, and I believe in being the kind of person the Savior wants us to be. I believe that this place is my home. I believe I'm the person I am because this has been my home."
I don't know if I'll stay in the church, the community, the culture that created me. I don't know if I'll live the kind of life my parents and ancestors did, or if I'll forge my own path in the dark. I don't know if I'll stay or go, though I want to stay. I want to stay just as much as I want to live happily inside my own soul. I'll stay as long as I can do both. I do know that if I'm ever forced to choose, I will choose myself.
"Belief is different from knowing. There are so many things in the world we don't know, and I used to be scared of that. I used to think I needed to know. But I don't, and I can't, and I never will. And that's okay." I take a breath. "I think belief might even be better, because belief is choice. It's something you give to yourself."
I look out into the audience. To my parents, my sister, Tal. And Hannah.
"I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ . . . and in my own name, too. Amen."
I step back from the mic, and hold myself still as silence buzzes in my ears.
In this pause, time seems to stall. My brain is ready and waiting to cycle through everything that could go wrong. Bishop Keller could faint. The Relief Society ladies could gossip about me for all eternity. Lia Lemalu could never speak to me again. But then again—Bishop Keller could applaud me. The Relief Society ladies could tell my mom they liked my testimony. Lia Lemalu could smile at me and tell me I said just what she was thinking. I don't know which scenario, one among thousands, will play out. I am in one singular moment, lived from one singular perspective, and I don't know what's ahead.
I give myself over to the not knowing, because it feels right, and I believe in the things I feel. I trust in the things I feel. I trust myself.
There are so many ways a world can begin. And here is one.
Acknowledgments
Or, a Brief List of People I'd Want on My Side in the Event of Apocalypse
Ben Rosenthal, my brilliant, insightful editor, who saw the heart of this book from the very first draft. I can't wait to tell more stories with you.
Sarah LaPolla, my amazing agent, who is always there to answer my questions, talk through a problem, and support me every step of the way.
The entire team at Katherine Tegen Books, especially Mabel Hsu, David Curtis, Liz Byer, Bethany Reis, Tanu Srivastava, Aubrey Churchward, and of course, Katherine Tegen. Thank you for making this book a reality.
My writers' group: Emily Helck, Brian Kennedy, Siena Koncsol, and Michelle Rinke. Thank you for every single piece of feedback and every single moment of friendship.
My early readers: Cindy Baldwin, Caroline Davis, Sam Galison, Naomi Krupitsky, and Michelle V. I'm eternally grateful for all your comments, expertise, and encouragement.
The Electric 18s, the Class of 2k18, and all the other wonderful, talented authors I'm lucky enough to call my friends.
The entire population of Berkeley, California. Thank you for making me the person I am today. I wouldn't have wanted to grow up anywhere else.
My family and friends, who have always supported my writing and generally tolerated my fear of heights, needles, flying, fire, small spaces, the sound chalk makes, asking salespeople for help, the basic concept of eternity, and mice.
Leah, who has made me a better and braver person since the day she was born.
Rob, who read this book before anyone else and sees me better than I see myself.
And most of all, my parents, who have been by my side through every little apocalypse.
About the Author
Photo credit Chris Macke
**KATIE HENRY** is the author of _Heretics Anonymous_ and lives and works in New York City. She received her BFA in dramatic writing from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and is a published playwright, specializing in theater for young audiences. Her plays have been performed by high schools and community organizations in over thirty states. You can find her online at www.katiehenrywrites.com.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
Books by Katie Henry
_Heretics Anonymous_
_Let's Call It a Doomsday_
_Izzy Takes a Stand_
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Copyright
Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
LET'S CALL IT A DOOMSDAY. Copyright © 2019 by Catherine Henry. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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_Cover art and design by David Curtis_
_Cover photo by Sascha Burkard and Kamyshko/Shutterstock_
* * *
Names: Henry, Katie, author.
Title: Let's call it a doomsday / Katie Henry.
Other titles: Let us call it a doomsday
Description: First edition. | New York, NY : Katherine Tegen Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, [2019] | Summary: Ellis Kimball, sixteen, whose anxiety disorder causes her to prepare for the imminent end of the world, meets Hannah, who claims to know when it will happen.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018034313 | ISBN 9780062698902 (hardback)
Subjects: | CYAC: Anxiety disorders—Fiction. | Mental illness—Fiction. | End of the world—Fiction. | Emergency management—Fiction. | Family problems—Fiction. | Mormons—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.H4646 Let 2019 | DDC [Fic]—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018034313
* * *
Digital Edition AUGUST 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-269892-6
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-269890-2
19 20 21 22 23 PC/LSCH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FIRST EDITION
About the Publisher
**Australia**
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Contents
1. _Cover_
2. _Title Page_
3. _Dedication_
4. _Contents_
5. One
6. Two
7. Three
8. Four
9. Five
10. Six
11. Seven
12. Eight
13. Nine
14. Ten
15. Eleven
16. Twelve
17. Thirteen
18. Fourteen
19. Fifteen
20. Sixteen
21. Seventeen
22. Eighteen
23. Nineteen
24. Twenty
25. Twenty-One
26. Twenty-Two
27. Twenty-Three
28. Twenty-Four
29. Twenty-Five
30. Twenty-Six
31. Twenty-Seven
32. Twenty-Eight
33. _Acknowledgments_
34. _About the Author_
35. _Books by Katie Henry_
36. _Back Ads_
37. _Copyright_
38. _About the Publisher_
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|
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Also from Zoxell: These are the Voyages
Daniel Noah Shays is a human, born on Earth to a hard-working agriculturalist couple in the South Carolina back-country. Dan’s father was a farmer, as was his father’s father, going back hundreds of years. The world had moved past agriculture a long time ago. Having eliminated food shortages and hunger with the onset of replication technology, food growers on Earth were no longer necessary. This fact did not diminish the demand for fresh, organic vegetables, eggs, dairy, and meat, however.
Search for:
Chapter 9.11 – Thunder
Given his present condition, there is not much else he can do now, but watch and wait.
Corwin had been the one to set him down this path. There is no point in placing blame, regardless of how easy it would be for him to believe otherwise. He’s accepted that his own choices in life are responsible for this current, miserable condition. It is a simple matter of cause and effect; the most basic principle in physics.
Still, polluting the mind of a child for the purpose of ill-gain is completely reprehensible. Fortunately, there was some small shred of conscience that kept him grounded enough to resist when it counted most. Of course, he’d died as a result of his defiance against Corwin’s evil.
While he was alive, he’d never once considered the possibility that there was something ELSE driving Corwin’s malice. Even if the thought had come into play, he would have immediately dismissed any non-scientific explanation as idiotic folklore. The idea was laughable, even. Now he’s left contemplating the reality of things in what remains of his disintegrating mind.
He’d never really bought into the whole good and evil thing during his lifetime. He’d decided they were sim-made concepts, manufactured to scare young sims into obeying antique customs. Perhaps some remote part of him had known that Kacey’s condition was not merely a breakthrough in human evolution. Why had he worked so hard to disprove reality with irrefutable (and mostly manufactured) science? Kacey is what she appears to be. And Hendrake, clearly, is what he …IT …appears to be.
The fire at the estate continues to rage unchecked. Deadly conditions within the gutted building make any hopes of extinguishing it nearly hopeless. Not that it will matter. Hendrake’s mechanations have payed their dividends tonight. And unless Kacey obtains some outside assistance, both she and Adam will die here tonight.
He frees the ancient Chinese weapon from its tomb of smouldering cinders, and studies its unblemished surface. There are few things capable of actually harming Hendrake; even in his measly and feeble sim form. The artifact is likely sufficient to get the job done. He may finally be able to collect some long overdue compensation, but it brings him no satisfaction. He still feels nothing; only the deep shame of remorse …and the fear of knowing that certain damnation draws near.
It is widely accepted by experts, that thunder is the sound produced by a shock wave which forms after air molecules are instantly super-heated to temperatures that approach those found on the surface of the sun, transforming them into electrodynamic plasma. Something very similar in effect presently rips throughout the cosmos; as a being of extraordinary ability slices through spacetime with the focus and intensity of a massive arc of lightning.
Her arrival is marked by an instant of blinding, golden light which illuminates all of Sunset Valley as though it were daytime. The wake created by her transit is so significant, that it causes the clouds to part, and a thunderous noise of indescribable quality and volume to erupt from the point of her appearance.
She’d had a singular objective in mind during the course of this amazing display of power – to find a boy named Adam. Leaping before looking is nothing new for her and her kind. Call it a genetic flaw. They had been well known for their deep-seated empathy and overly-demonstrative theatrics. Unfortunately, this flaw is immediately exposed upon her appearance.
Before she can inhale her first breath of Sunset Valley air, Hendrake materializes between her and the burning estate. She recognizes it immediately. This is the same evil presence that had tormented her inside the cave as a baby (see chapter 8.8). It evokes an immediate, gut-wrenching sense of dread. Her scream is drowned out by the rumbling echoes of the earth-shaking fulmination that had followed her appearance.
Kacey hadn’t prepared for this kind of reception, so she stands frozen in indecision, uncertainty, and fear. Then she screams again. The creature produces a blade, as rolling echoes from the shock-wave that had accompanied her arrival continue to spread across the valley. It seems possessed of the malevolent intent to wield the weapon with deadly force.
This is insane. No more than twenty seconds has passed, and already her life is being threatened. Kacey’s mind searches for some kind of escape. But before the beast can take a single step forward, there is a loud WOOSH! and a violent flash of steel from behind it. Hendrake’s head falls to one side, and his body to the other.
After a moment, Kacey breathes again, still wearing a mask of terror and panic. Eventually, she removes her eyes from the slain creature at her feet. A spirit stands where the monster had fallen. It too, is holding a dangerous looking blade. The spirit is barely cohesive enough to maintain itself, let alone heave a weapon. Kacey jumps nervously when the thing falls and clatters loudly onto the flagstones.
Kacey takes a few seconds to absorb the chaotic environment. She had leapt from her spot in Nowhere, the instant she’d heard Adam calling out to her. She’d actually scared herself with the method in which she’d travelled here. Before she could process what she had done, some monster from her past appeared and tried to kill her. Then a ghost with an axe cut its head off. Oh yes, and the Barimen Estate is buring to the ground. Having took mental inventory of the situation, Kacey finds herself wanting to go back to Nowhere.
She regards the unusual spirit as it tentatively and cautiously approaches her. It stops only a few feet away. It stands without moving, presumably studying her. Honestly, it is difficult to determine exactly what the spirit is doing, with it being in such bad shape.
Anticipating her question regarding its identity, the remnants of Reid Kimura speaks to Kacey for the first time in many, many years. His voice has the quality of crumbling, rusted metal grinding in her mind; as though every word further disintegrates his corroded form. Fresh tears spring from her eyes from this new shock. She speaks his name in a nervous whisper; verbally acknowledging that he has just saved her life.
Reid’s barely visible apparition regards the buring estate. He warns that there is not much time before Hendrake reforms. He will return sporting a much more resilient body. Adam still lives, inside the inferno. He estimates, somewhat wryly, that it would probably require something on the scale of a volcanic eruption to actually kill either she or Adam using fire. Kacey thinks back to the terrifying experiments Reid had subjected her to as a teen. She shudders involuntarily. As though reading her thoughts, Reid changes the tone and instructs Kacey to call out to Adam with her inner-song.
Kacey’s eyes dart back between Reid and the buring building. She’d been here only a few moments, and already so much has happened. Her confusion is staggering. But one thing remains clear. She came here to find Adam. She feels herself being lifted, both metaphorically and physically, as her voices emerge like never before. It is a rapture unlike anything she has ever experienced.
From within the warm, radiant light generated by her angelic form, she sees Reid; as whole and real as he has ever been. She smiles. Kacey gently whispers her unconditional forgiveness for everything he has ever done to harm her. Clearly, this was unexpected for him. She hardly remembers ever seeing Reid smile, even when he was a young boy. But the expression on his face now, is one of pure, disarmed joy.
Her musical voices continue to call out to Adam. But they also seem to sooth Reid’s torment. She goes on to explain that obtaining her forgivness is unimportant. She continues, reassuring him that true forgiveness is never out of reach; and the gift of perfect love will always be given freely. All he must do is just simply, and unconditionally, accept it into his heart.
After a moment, Reid closes his eyes. Then, what little bit of him there is remaining, shimmers peacefully out of existance.
Is he dreaming?
Her voices, they sound so close. Is he dead?
Adam opens his eyes, coughing smoke and soot out of his inhuman lungs. The heat in the cellar should have been sufficient to not only kill him, but to reduce his body to carbon. Kacey’s voices wrap around him, giving him the drive he needs to free himself. He struggles briefly and realizes that he is pinned beneath tons of burning rubble.
Zoxell
Up Next: Part 21 – ??
August 20, 2017
Van and Benita finally begin to heal their relationship and discover that their friendship does, indeed, have a much more complicated component. Big things await our embattled couple.
Next up – Frightening news from Area 15 is accompanied by a surprise visit from an old friend. Also, Benita receives help from a very unexpected source.
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Q:
Are the definable hyper-reals, using quantifiers only over the standard reals and natural numbers, the same as the algebraic numbers?
This question arose today at Yevgeny Gordon's talk, "Will nonstandard analysis be
the analysis of the future?" at the CUNY Logic
Workshop. Here is my way of asking it.
Consider the ordered real field $\newcommand\R{\mathbb{R}}\R$ with a predicate for the natural numbers, and a
nonstandard version of it $\R^*$, the hyper-reals, which an ordered
field extending $\R$ and having the transfer property, a map
$a\mapsto a^*$, which preserves the truth of any statement in the
language of ordered fields, allowing also the predicate for the
natural numbers. The hyper-real numbers of the form $a^*$ are
referred to as the standard elements of $\R^*$.
Question. Suppose that a hyper-real number $a\in\R^*$ is
definable in $\R^*$ by a formula $\varphi$ in the language of
ordered fields with a predicate for natural numbers, but where the
scope of the quantifiers is only over the standard elements. Must
$a$ be algebraic?
It is easy to see that every algebraic hyper-real number is
definable in this way. For example, the hyper-real $\sqrt{2}$ is
definable in $\R^*$ as the unique $x$ for which $x^2=2$ and $0<x$.
Similarly, any algebraic hyper-real (algebraic over the standard
integers) is the unique solution in $\R^*$ in a certain standard
rational interval of a polynomial equation over the standard
integers. So in fact, every algebraic hyper-real is quantifier-free
definable in $\R^*$, even without the predicate for the natural
numbers. So the question is equivalent to asking:
Question. If a hyper-real is definable by a formula whose
quantifiers have scope restricted to the standard reals (allowing a
predicate for the natural numbers), then is it quantifier-free
definable?
Meanwhile, if you think about numbers like $e$ and $\pi$, it is not
clear how to define them in $\R^*$ without quantifying over all the
(possibly nonstandard) natural numbers. For example, $e$ is the
limit of $(1+\frac 1n)^n$, and so $e^*$ is the unique $x$ in $\R^*$
such that $$\forall \epsilon>0\ \exists N\ \forall n\geq N \
|(1+\frac 1n)^n-x|<\epsilon.$$ This definition can be undertaken in $\R$, using the predicate for $\mathbb{N}$, which allows one to define exponentiation and so on. But in $\R^*$, these quantifiers are not only
over the standard numbers; we have to quantify also over the
nonstandard numbers. If you restrict to standard $\epsilon$ and
standard $N$ and $n$ only, then there will be an entire interval of
hyper-reals that are that close to those numbers---anything
infinitesimally close to $e$ will do. So the restricted-scope version of the definition will not succeed as a definition.
Similarly, it is not clear how to define $\pi$ or indeed any other
transcendental hyper-real number while quantifying only over
standard numbers.
I believe that Tarski's theorem on real-closed
fields will prove
the positive result for the special case of the question, where
$\varphi$ does not use the predicate for the natural numbers (but
still has the scope of all quantifiers restricted to the standard
hyper-reals). My reason for this expectation is that I believe we
can apply Tarski's elimination of quantifiers procedure to such a
$\varphi$ and thereby prove that $\varphi(x)$ is equivalent to a
quantifier-free assertion in the language of ordered fields. Then,
using the fact the algebraic numbers form an elementary
substructure of the reals, as ordered fields, it follows that the
existence of a solution in $\R$ is equivalent to the existence of a
solution in the algebraic numbers. And so the given number must be
algebraic.
But I am a little fuzzy on the details of how the scope-restriction
affects this argument, and so if you can affirm or refute it, I
would be grateful.
A:
$\newcommand{\st}{\textrm{st}}\newcommand{\bR}{{\bf R}}\newcommand{\bN}{{\bf N}}$
I think the limit of any definable convergent sequence $(a_n)$ (including $e$) is definable by the formula
$$\varphi(x)=(\exists x'\in {\bR}^\st\, x'=x)\land \forall N\in\bN^\st\exists n_0\in \bN^\st\forall n\in \bN^\st_{>n_0}(a_n-x)^2<N^{-1}.$$
Since the language includes natural numbers, we have all of Peano arithmetic, so I think by a similar argument, every computable (and I guess every definable in PA) real should be definable. The point is that if you allow quantifiers which range over a given set, then you automatically make that very set definable, so you have at least as much strength as you would have in the smaller structure.
Edit: The idea was first mentioned by Ramiro de la Vega in comments, which I neglected to read before writing this answer.
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The Centre will develop the dairy and animal husbandry sector to create employment opportunities in Jammu & Kashmir.
The roadmap for the same is said to be under preparation. Recently, the head of the country’s largest dairy player, Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), which sells Amul brand of dairy products, RS Sodhi met Governor Satya Pal Malik in Srinagar to apprise him of the plans for dairy development in the State.
High-level talks
According to sources in the know, the Governor expressed the desire to strengthen the milk cooperatives in the State. Sodhi, accompanied by the Board of Directors of the Jammu and Kashmir Milk Producers’ Cooperative Ltd (JKMPCL), also met the Chief Secretary of the State BVR Subrahmanyam and expressed the desire to expand the coverage of dairy sector. Amul is said to be extending support in technology, management and procurement systems.
For years, J&K’s dairy sector has been beset by challenges of low remuneration, costly milk production, competition from private dairy players, and farmers losing interest in animal husbandry.
Repeal of Article 370
It is, however, believed that the repeal of Article 370 will put the dairy sector on a fast growth trajectory. “There was no direct impact of the presence of Article 370 on the development of dairy sector. But there could be some benefits following the removal of it, since it will directly come under Centre and there could be more focused approach for dairy and animal husbandry sector. They can look to bring more youth under animal husbandry with increased fund allocation and bring the transformation. One entire level of State government is gone now. So, it will definitely improve things,” Mayank Tiwari, former CEO of JKMPCL, told Businessline.
The Central focus for animal husbandry is evident from the Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s budget speech 2019-20 in July, where she said, “We will invest widely in agricultural infrastructure. We will support private entrepreneurship in driving value-addition to farmers’ produce from the field and for those from allied activities... Dairying through cooperatives shall also be encouraged by creating infrastructure for cattle feed manufacturing, milk procurement, processing & marketing.”
Lack of support
Unfortunately, J&K couldn't ride on the dairy development bandwagon after 1970, for want of adequate support from the local governments. For decades, the processing capacities remained idle. It was in 2004, JKMPCL established and formal cooperative dairying began under the guidance from Amul.
However, till now, only two operational processing facilities exist in the State one each in Jammu and Kashmir regions. The Federation’s plant at Chashmeshahi has milk processing capacity of 50,000 litres per day (LPD). JKMPCL procures this milk from about 20,000-25,000 milk producers - mostly women who operate through Self-Help Groups (SHG). The milk is sold in retail under brand 'Snow Cap'. Even as the packaged liquid milk market is concentrated around Srinagar, there is a room for further expansion with value-added products such as cheese, butter, ice cream and paneer.
Empowerment
JKMPCL, which plans to ramp up its capacity to about 5 lakh LPD in the next three years, is also looking to set up two plants for paneer and ice-cream with Central support.
“We are seeing entrepreneurship and leadership skills getting developed in the women of this region. They can build a strong institution if provided support,” said Tiwari.
For the milk production, J&K boasts of unique agro-climatic region - similar to that of the European region. Due to this, some good varieties of cow are able to sustain and deliver the milk yield comparable to that in the European region.
The flush season in J&K differs from that in the other North Indian States. The flush season, when the milk production is at peak, begins after June and peaks till August, while the lean season begins from November to December. As most of the milk production happens through cow only, by communities such as Gujjars of plains and Bakarwals of Valley, there is a greater focus required on breed improvement and development for higher yield, which will effectively bring increased earnings for breeders.
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dnl AC_SINGLE_CXX_CHECK(CACHEVAR, FUNCTION, HEADER, PROGRAM)
dnl $1, $2, $3, $4,
dnl
AC_DEFUN([AC_SINGLE_CXX_CHECK],
[AC_CACHE_CHECK([for $2 in $3], [$1],
[AC_LANG_PUSH([C++])
AC_COMPILE_IFELSE(AC_LANG_PROGRAM([#include $3],[$4]),[$1=yes],[$1=no])
AC_LANG_POP([C++])])
])
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---
abstract: 'Waveguide mirrors possess nano-structured surfaces which can potentially provide a significant reduction in thermal noise over conventional dielectric mirrors. To avoid introducing additional phase noise from motion of the mirror transverse to the reflected light, however, they must possess a mechanism to suppress the phase effects associated with the incident light translating across the nano-structured surface. It has been shown that with carefully chosen parameters this additional phase noise can be suppressed. We present an experimental measurement of the coupling of transverse to longitudinal displacements in such a waveguide mirror designed for light. We place an upper limit on the level of measured transverse to longitudinal coupling of one part in seventeen thousand with 95% confidence, representing a significant improvement over a previously measured grating mirror.'
author:
- 'SLeavey$^{1}$'
- 'BWBarr$^{1}$'
- 'ASBell$^{1}$'
- 'NGordon$^{1}$'
- 'C Gräf$^{1}$'
- 'SHild$^{1}$'
- 'SHHuttner$^{1}$'
- 'E-BKley$^{2}$'
- 'SKroker$^{2}$'
- 'JMacarthur$^{1}$'
- 'CMessenger$^{1}$'
- 'MPitkin$^{1}$'
- 'BSorazu$^{1}$'
- 'KStrain$^{1}$'
- 'A Tünnermann$^{3}$'
bibliography:
- 'sidemotion.bib'
title: Upper Limit to the Transverse to Longitudinal Motion Coupling of a Waveguide Mirror
---
Correspondence: [[email protected]]([email protected])
1\. SUPA, School of Physics and Astronomy, The University of Glasgow, Glasgow, G128QQ, UK\
2. Friedrich-Schiller-University, Abbe Center of Photonics, Institute of Applied Physics, Max-Wien-Platz 1, 07743 Jena, Germany\
3. Fraunhofer Institute of Applied Optics and Precision Engineering, Albert-Einstein-Str. 7, 07745 Jena, Germany
Introduction {#sec:intro}
============
Major upgrades to the worldwide network of gravitational wave detectors are currently under way. New designs for the Advanced LIGO [@Harry2010], Advanced Virgo [@Avirgo2009], KAGRA [@Somiya2012] and GEO-HF [@Willke2006] detectors will provide unmatched ability to detect gravitational waves in the audio spectrum. At their most sensitive frequencies, these detectors are expected to be limited by Brownian thermal noise arising from the reflective coatings on the detectors’ test masses [@Levin1998; @Nakagawa2002; @Harry2002; @Crooks2002]. In order to help mitigate this limitation beyond the next generation of detectors, efforts are under way to develop mirror coatings with lower thermal noise [@Flaminio2010; @Bassiri2013].
In the case of Advanced LIGO, each end test mass (ETM) consists of a substrate with 19 pairs of sub-wavelength coatings which produce a transmission of for light [@Dannenberg2009]. Each layer within this stack contributes to the overall thermal noise [@Harry2002; @Crooks2002]. The approach taken by Levin to calculate the thermal noise of mirrors [@Levin1998] shows that mechanical loss at the front surface of a mirror contributes more to the Brownian noise level than loss from an equivalent volume in the substrate. Additionally, typical coating materials tend to exhibit mechanical loss orders of magnitude higher than typical substrate materials [@Harry2002; @Crooks2002]. For these reasons particular attention is being given to the reduction of coating thermal noise to improve the sensitivity of future detectors.
One strategy, to be applied for example in KAGRA, is to cool the mirrors to cryogenic temperatures. While this can potentially reduce the thermal noise of the mirrors [@Uchiyama2012], the application of cryogenic mirrors requires new infrastructure, different choices of mirror substrate and coating materials and poses the challenge of heat extraction from the mirror without spoiling its seismic isolation and thermal noise performance. Efforts in the application of cryogenics are also under way to identify suitable substrate and coating materials for ET-LF, the low frequency interferometer as part of the proposed Einstein Telescope [@Punturo2010; @Martin2010; @Hild2011; @Abernathy2011].
Apart from using different coating materials [@Granata2013; @Cole2013] or different beam shapes [@Mours2006; @DAmbrosio2004; @Bondarescu2006] such as with LG33 modes [@Sorazu2013], another potential approach is to utilise waveguide mirrors (WGMs) [@Brueckner2008; @Brueckner2009; @Brueckner2010; @Friedrich2011]. These mirrors can possess high reflectivity at a wavelength determined by their structure. In contrast to conventional dielectric mirrors, mirrors possessing waveguide coatings can exhibit high reflectivity without requiring multiple stacks [@Bunkowski2006]. A waveguide coating instead presents incident light with a periodic grating structure of high refractive index material $n_H$ on top of a substrate with low refractive index $n_L$ (see Figure \[fig:waveguide\_reflection\]). Light is forced into a single reflective diffraction order, the . In transmission, only the and diffraction orders are allowed as long as the condition in Equation \[eq:grating\_equation\] for the grating period, $p$; and the light’s wavelength in vacuum, $\lambda$, is fulfilled [@Brueckner2008]. The light diffracted into the order undergoes total internal reflection at the substrate boundary where it excites resonant waveguide modes. Light leaving the waveguide then contains a phase shift with respect to the order transmitted light, causing destructive interference such that most of the incident light is reflected [@Sharon1997].
$$\frac{\lambda}{n_{H}} < p < \frac{\lambda}{n_{L}}
\label{eq:grating_equation}$$
![Propagation of light within a waveguide mirror. The grating and waveguide layers have refractive index $n_H$, and sit atop a substrate of refractive index $n_L$. Blue arrows represent incident light and red arrows represent reflected light. In realisations of waveguide mirrors such as this, a thin etch-stop layer is placed between the grating and waveguide layers to assist fabrication [@Friedrich2011].[]{data-label="fig:waveguide_reflection"}](waveguide_reflection.pdf){width="0.7\columnwidth"}
A recent set of calculations by Heinert *et al.* [@Heinert2013] showed that a suitably optimised WGM can provide a reduction in coating thermal noise amplitude of a factor of 10 at cryogenic temperature compared to mirrors employed in Advanced LIGO.
Previous efforts to demonstrate grating structures as alternatives to dielectric mirrors have identified phase noise in the light reflected from the grating not otherwise present in dielectric mirrors [@Wise2005; @Freise2007]. This effect arises from transverse motion of grating mirrors with respect to the incident light. Incident light at angle $\alpha$ is reflected into the m^th^ diffraction order, exiting at angle $\beta_m$ (see Figure \[fig:grating\_propagation\]). The change in path length $\delta l_L$ between the reflected and incident light is then $$\delta l_L = \zeta_a + \zeta_b = \delta y
\left( \sin{\alpha} + \sin{\beta_m} \right),$$ where $\zeta_a$ and $\zeta_b$ represent the relative optical path length of each depicted ray. The phase modulation induced in the light reflected from the WGM is proportional to Fourier frequency with a phase lead over the transverse motion [@Barr2011]. The noise added to the reflected light can be enough to mitigate the improvement in coating thermal noise, as witnessed in a study of order Littrow gratings [@Barr2011]. Although WGMs also possess gratings, the resonant waveguide structure has been shown in simulations by Brown *et al.* to be invariant to transverse to longitudinal coupling [@Brown2013].
![Optical path length changes $\zeta_a$ and $\zeta_b$ due to transverse motion of a Littrow grating. Incident light diffracted into a different order undergoes a path length change $\delta l_L =
\zeta_a + \zeta_b$.[]{data-label="fig:grating_propagation"}](grating_propagation.pdf){width="0.5\columnwidth"}
**Parameter** **Value**
------------------ -----------
Materials , ,
Design $\lambda$
Grating depth
Waveguide depth
Etch stop depth
Grating period
Fill factor 0.38
Reflectivity 96%
: Design parameters of the WGM produced by Friedrich-Schiller Jena for the experiment to measure transverse to longitudinal coupling. It is similar to the one used in [@Friedrich2011], with increased reflective surface area.[]{data-label="tab:waveguide_parameters"}
There are two mechanisms by which grating mirrors can couple transverse motion into longitudinal phase changes (see Figure \[fig:waveguide\_scanning\]). The first is through transverse motion of the grating, which can in principle be minimised with appropriate suspension design. The second mechanism is the coupling of changes in the opposite cavity mirror’s alignment into the spot position on the grating mirror. This effect is of particular importance to gravitational wave observatories, where longer arm lengths can increase its detrimental impact. For this reason the second mechanism is considered in more detail in this work.
In order to quantify its transverse coupling, a WGM was produced in collaboration with Friedrich-Schiller University Jena, Germany (see Table \[tab:waveguide\_parameters\] for its properties). It was designed for light of wavelength , and consisted of an etched grating structure on top of a waveguide layer, both tantala, on a silica substrate. This article details an experiment carried out to measure its transverse coupling level.
![Two ways in which light can be scanned across the surface of the WGM. The left panel shows the effect of WGM motion with respect to a static beam, while the right panel shows the effect of light beam motion (due to rotation of the cavity mirror opposite the WGM) with respect to a static WGM. The latter effect is the one primarily considered in this article.[]{data-label="fig:waveguide_scanning"}](waveguide_scanning.pdf){width="0.5\columnwidth"}
Experiment
==========
The fabricated WGM was used as the input coupler for a [Fabry-Pérot ]{}cavity, held on resonance using the Pound-Drever-Hall (PDH) technique [@Drever1983]. The error signal provided by the PDH technique represents changes in cavity length, and this can be fed back to the laser’s frequency *via* a frequency stabilisation servo.
Cavity Length Signals {#sec:lengthsignals}
---------------------
A non-zero WGM transverse to longitudinal coupling, $\omega_1$, produces a phase shift on the reflected light. This manifests itself as an effective change in cavity length, $\delta l_W$, as the laser light is scanned across its grooves by a rotation of the ETM: $$\delta l_W \left( \theta, \kappa, \omega_1 \right) = \theta \kappa \omega_1,
\label{eq:wgm_length_change}$$ where $\theta$ is the ETM’s rotation angle and $\kappa$ is the cavity’s coefficient of ETM rotation to transverse WGM spot motion.
Additional cavity length changes are also produced *via* two geometrical effects (see Figure \[fig:mirror\_longitudinal\_effect\]). The first effect, $\delta l_s$, is due to the position of the beam with respect to the centre of the mirror’s surface. For a rotation $\theta$, a beam offset from the centre of the mirror by a displacement $y$ will receive a change in (longitudinal) path length of $$\delta l_s \left( y, \theta \right) = y \tan{\theta} \approx y \theta
\label{eq:offset_effect}$$ for small angles. The second effect, $\delta l_d$, is due to the depth $d$ of the mirror, proportional to the rotation angle $\theta$. The position of the centre of the mirror with respect to the zero rotation case, $y_d$, is then $$y_d \left( d, \theta \right) = \frac{d}{2} \tan{\frac{\theta}{2}} \approx \frac{d}{4} \theta,$$ and the change in path length this causes is $$\delta l_d \left( d, \theta \right) = y_d \tan{\theta} \approx \frac{d}{4} \theta^2.$$ The total longitudinal effect $\delta l_E$ caused by the rotation of the ETM is therefore $$\delta l_E \left(y, \theta, d \right) = \delta l_s + \delta l_d \approx y \theta + \frac{d}{4} \theta^2.
\label{eq:etm_length_change}$$
![Geometrical ETM longitudinal effects. For a given rotation $\theta$ and spot centre position offset $y$, the (longitudinal) position change in the surface of the mirror (show in blue) as seen by the reflected light is approximately $y \theta + \frac{d}{4} \theta^2$. The straight, solid red line in the figure shows this longitudinal change.[]{data-label="fig:mirror_longitudinal_effect"}](mirror_longitudinal_effect.pdf){width="0.5\columnwidth"}
Considering the ETM’s level of rotation and its dimensions and mass, it is possible to calculate the cavity length change due to the two geometrical effects shown in Equation \[eq:etm\_length\_change\] and then, from the residual cavity length change, infer the WGM’s coupling level. The phase effect associated with transverse to longitudinal coupling is expected to be independent of spot position, whereas there is a phase change about the ETM’s centre of rotation. It is therefore expected that a spot position will exist, for a non-zero WGM transverse coupling level, offset from the ETM’s centre of rotation, for which there is a cavity error signal minimum. This effect arises as a result of $\delta l_W$ and $\delta l_{E}$ combining coherently (see Figure \[fig:individual\_factors\]). The spot position corresponding to the cavity error signal minimum allows the WGM’s transverse to longitudinal coupling level to be inferred.
![Simulations of indicative cavity longitudinal error signals during ETM rotation for different levels of WGM coupling. The signals are functions of the transverse position of the reflected light relative to the ETM’s centre of rotation, the angle of rotation, the mirror depth and the WGM’s coupling level. The rotation to longitudinal coupling of the ETM (black dashed line) combines with the transverse to longitudinal coupling of the WGM (red, green and blue dashed lines) to produce cavity length changes (red, green and blue solid lines). In this example configuration, the ETM rotation is , the ETM’s depth is and the corresponding WGM coupling levels are 1:370 (red), 1:3700 (green) and 1:37000 (blue).[]{data-label="fig:individual_factors"}](individual_factors.pdf){width="1.2\columnwidth"}
Examples of WGM coupling levels yielding cavity length changes smaller than (blue), larger than (red) and roughly equivalent to (green) the ETM’s effects are shown in Figure \[fig:individual\_factors\]. For cases where the WGM’s coupling level yields a significant cavity length change with respect to that of the ETM’s rotation, coherent combination creates a trough offset from the ETM’s centre of rotation.
The Glasgow 10 m Prototype {#sec:glasgow10m}
--------------------------
The Glasgow prototype facility provided a test bed in which the WGM’s transverse to longitudinal coupling could be quantified. The prototype is housed in a Class 1000 clean room and consists of an input bench at atmospheric pressure and a vacuum envelope able to reach pressures of order $10^{-5}$mBar. The envelope consists of nine diameter steel tanks, each connected by steel tubes, arranged into two parallel arms of length , with a shorter arm for input optics situated between them.
In the experiment, laser light was passed through a single-mode fibre to provide spatial filtering and an electro-optic modulator (EOM) to impose RF sidebands on the light to facilitate PDH control. The light was then coupled into the vacuum system *via* a periscope. This configuration can be viewed in Figure \[fig:prototype\_setup\].
Tanks 2 and 3 housed a beam splitter and steering mirror, respectively, attached to double stage suspensions. In tanks 4 and 5 were sets of two triple suspension chains based on the GEO-600 design [@Plissi2000]. A viewport present to the rear of tank 5, and to the side of tank 1, allowed for light to exit the vacuum envelope for the purposes of sensing and control.
![The experimental setup in the prototype facility. The laser light is passed through input optics (not shown), a mode cleaning fibre and an EOM before being coupled into the vacuum system *via* a periscope. It then travels to tank 2 where it is reflected off a beam splitter and directed into one of the arms of the prototype by a steering mirror in tank 3. The two cavity mirrors in tanks 4 and 5 form a [Fabry-Pérot ]{}cavity. The cavity mirrors are suspended from triple stage suspensions, and the beam splitter and steering mirror are both suspended from double suspensions.\
\
The ETM is rotated in yaw using the source. It is fed to a coil driver where it is coupled into tank 5 *via* a vacuum feedthrough. Coil formers on the front edges of the reaction mass contain wound copper wire connected to the vacuum feedthrough. Magnets are attached to the back of the ETM. The reaction mass is behind the ETM, containing a hole in its centre to allow light to exit the vacuum tank where it can be viewed with the CCD camera. A larger version of the contents of tank 5 can be viewed in the panel to the right of the figure.\
\
The cavity is held on resonance by the frequency stabilisation servo. This feeds back to the light’s frequency *via* the laser crystal’s temperature below and its PZT above up to a unity gain frequency of .[]{data-label="fig:prototype_setup"}](waveguide_arm_in_prototype.pdf){width="0.9\columnwidth"}
The WGM was attached to an aluminium block of mass and suspended from tank 4’s cascaded (triple) pendulum, forming the cavity’s ITM. A silica test mass, also , with a transmission coating, was used as the ETM, suspended from a similar triple pendulum in tank 5. On the rear surface of the ETM were three magnets for the purpose of actuation, the positions of which are shown in Figure \[fig:etm\_rear\]. With optimal alignment the mirrors formed an overcoupled cavity with finesse .
![The positions of the magnets on the rear surface of the ETM. The magnet designations used in this article are shown in red text. The top magnet is positioned at the centre of yaw, near the top of the mass. The left and right magnets are positioned either side of the centre of yaw. Coils on the ETM’s reaction mass (not shown) are positioned coaxially behind each magnet.[]{data-label="fig:etm_rear"}](etm_back.pdf){width="0.3\columnwidth"}
A three-stage reaction chain was placed behind the triple pendulum of the ETM to provide voice coil actuation upon the magnets on the ETM’s rear surface. The upper and intermediate stages were identical to those of the chain carrying the ETM, howeverfor the purposes of another experiment, not reported herethe lower stage was split into two parts separately suspended from the intermediate stage. The part closer to the ETM was a aluminium block that carried the voice coils. The other part was a aluminium block required to balance the suspension.
**Parameter** **Description**
------------------------- -----------------
Cavity input power Approx.
ETM transmissivity $40$ ppm
ETM radius of curvature
ETM spot size
ITM transmissivity
ITM radius of curvature $\infty$
ITM spot size
Cavity length
Cavity finesse
Cavity g-factor
Beam waist size
Beam waist position At ITM
Sideband frequency
: Cavity parameters.[]{data-label="tab:cavity_parameters"}
Measuring Cavity Length Changes
-------------------------------
An RF photodetector was placed at the viewport on tank 1, where it could view the light reflected from the cavity. By using PDH demodulation, the signal from this photodetector provided an error signal for the cavity length. This signal was fed back to the laser *via* the frequency stabilisation servo to maintain cavity resonance. The frequency stabilisation servo’s high frequency feedback signala voltage applied across the laser’s piezoelectric transducer (PZT)provided a means of calibrating cavity length changes at frequencies greater than . Using the PZT’s frequency response, , the cavity length change $\delta l$ per error signal volt could be calculated to be .
Measurements and Analysis {#sec:measurements}
=========================
From the orientation of the WGM’s gratings, it was expected that actuation of the ETM in yaw, which would scan the cavity light across the WGM’s surface transverse to the direction of its grooves, would exhibit WGM transverse to longitudinal coupling if present.
For the purposes of actuation upon the ETM, two sinusoidal signals $V_L$ and $V_R$ (corresponding to the left and right voice coils on the ETM’s reaction mass, respectively) were produced using separate, phase locked signal generators. A signal frequency of was chosen so as to be above the suspensions’ pole frequencies but low enough to provide an adequate signal-to-noise ratio. The signals $V_L$ and $V_R$, with suitable balancing (see below), could then be actuated in- or out-of-phase to produce longitudinal or yaw actuation upon the ETM, respectively.
When $V_L$ and $V_R$ were identical in magnitude but out-of-phase, the ETM’s movement contained a linear combination of rotational and longitudinal components due to force imbalances between the voice coils. To ensure that actuation upon the ETM contained only a yaw component, the cavity’s longitudinal error signal was minimised during out-of-phase actuation by changing the gain of $V_L$. This balanced the magnitude of the torque applied by each actuator to the left and right sides of the ETM. Any WGM transverse to longitudinal coupling present would act with phase orthogonal to this voice coil actuation and would thus be unchanged by the torque balancing.
Pitch actuation upon the ETM, which would scan the cavity light in a direction parallel to the WGM’s grooves, was not expected to contribute to the cavity’s error signal via the WGM’s coupling. However, unintended pitch actuation upon the ETM would couple into the cavity’s length *via* the same geometrical mechanism as yaw shown in Equation \[eq:etm\_length\_change\]. To minimise the ETM’s pitch component during actuation in yaw, the cavity’s error signal was minimised by applying an offset voltage to the top coil. In practice, minimal pitch coupling was achieved when the offset signal was zero.
Actuator Calibration
--------------------
To calibrate the cavity’s longitudinal response to voice coil actuation, the voice coils were actuated with the balanced $V_L$ and $V_R$ signals in-phase at a frequency $f = \SI{70}{\hertz}$ for a period of . This, along with the ETM’s mass $m$, could then be used to obtain the force applied to the ETM by the voice coils: $$F = 4 \pi^2 f^2 m \delta l.
\label{eq:force_calibration}$$
Measurement of Waveguide Mirror Transverse to Longitudinal Coupling {#sec:length_changes}
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Four spot positions corresponding to $y$ in Equation \[eq:offset\_effect\] were chosen across the surface of the ETM. The input beam was aligned to the cavity axis corresponding to each spot position using the beam splitter and steering mirror nearest to the ITM, and the cavity mirrors were aligned to create a fundamental mode resonance. The voice coil signals $V_L$ and $V_R$ were set out-of-phase to produce motion on the ETM in yaw. The magnitudes of $V_L$ and $V_R$ were not altered between the longitudinal calibration and this yaw actuation, so it was expected that the previously outlined minimisation of yaw to tilt actuation would also result in minimal longitudinal to tilt actuation. The cavity length signal was recorded for a period of .
For each nominal spot position an additional measurement was taken with $V_L$ set to $\pm \SI{0.1}{\volt}$ from its balanced setting for a period of . This allowed two additional data points to be obtained for each spot position. By calculating the gradient (cavity length change per spot position with respect to the centre of yaw) of the central and inner-left spot positions, it was possible to assign an effective spot position for each of the offset points.
The spot positions used to obtain cavity error signals are shown in Table \[tab:spot\_positions\]. These positions are shown with respect to the centre of the ETM’s reflective surface. The spot positions were subject to two sources of error: the measurement of the spot positions with respect to the centre, and the error in the ETM’s centre of rotation due to misalignment between the voice coils and their corresponding magnets. The spot position error was assumed to be +/- from visual inspection of the suspensions, measured *via* the CCD camera placed in transmission of the ETM, using the known width of the ETM’s reaction mass as a calibration. The error in the spot position measurements dominated the error in voice coil alignment. Although misaligned voice coils could have lead to a change in the expected ETM force coupling (leading to a change in the centre of rotation of the ETM), it was found from separate measurements that the effect of any possible misalignment during the experiment could only account for a drop in force of %. This contributed a negligible error (+/-) to the results.
[|c|c|c|]{}\
& &\
& &\
& &\
& &\
& &\
Knowledge of the distance of the ETM’s voice coils from the centre of rotation, $y_c$; the ETM’s moment of inertia, $I$; the coil driving frequency, $f$; and the force calibration from Equation \[eq:force\_calibration\], allowed the rotation angle to be obtained geometrically using the relation $$\theta = \frac{F y_c}{4 \pi^2 f^2 I}.
\label{eq:rotation_calibration}$$ The numerical simulation tool *FINESSE* [@Freise2004] was then used to calculate $\kappa$ for the cavity parameters shown in Table \[tab:cavity\_parameters\]. This was determined to be . The WGM’s transverse displacement was then the product of $\kappa$ and $\theta$.
Analysis of the Coupling Level {#sec:simulations}
------------------------------
Using the known contribution to the cavity length signal from the rotation of the ETM, $\delta l_E$, and the cavity length signals $\delta l$ measured during the experiment, the WGM’s coupling level could be calculated statistically using Bayes’ theorem. For this experiment, Bayes’ theorem can be expressed mathematically as: $$p \left( \vec{\omega} | \mathcal{D} \right) \propto p \left( \mathcal{D} | \vec{\omega} \right) p \left( \vec{\omega} \right),
\label{eq:bayes}$$ where $p \left( \vec{\omega} | \mathcal{D} \right)$ is the probability density distribution of the experimental parameters, $\vec{\omega}$, given the observed data, $\mathcal{D}$ (the *posterior*); $p \left( \mathcal{D} | \vec{\omega} \right)$ is the likelihood and $p \left( \vec{\omega} \right)$ is the probability distribution of the experimental parameters. The observed data $\mathcal{D}$ are the measured cavity error signals for each of the spot positions.
In this analysis we are primarily interested in estimates of the model parameters. We are therefore free to ignore the constant evidence factor $p \left( \mathcal{D} \right)$ present in Bayes’ theorem when calculating the posterior. In the future it may be of interest to compare different models for the coupling level (or lack thereof), in which case the evidence could be calculated to obtain a model odds ratio.
### Model and Parameters
To obtain a posterior for the WGM’s coupling level, it was necessary to build a model and state prior belief of the parameters’ probability distributions.
In the model, the ETM’s geometrical longitudinal effect at arbitrary spot position $y$ (Equation \[eq:etm\_length\_change\]) for the rotation and mirror depth used in the experiment was combined coherently with a specified level of WGM transverse to longitudinal coupling, $\omega_1$. It was then possible to predict the total change in cavity length $\delta l$ as a function of spot position $y$, given the fixed parameters $\theta$, $\kappa$ and $d$, using equations \[eq:wgm\_length\_change\] and \[eq:etm\_length\_change\]: $$\begin{split}
\delta l \left( \vec{\omega}, y, \theta, \kappa, d \right) & = \delta l_W \left( \theta, \kappa, \omega_1 \right) + \delta l_E \left( y, \theta, d \right) \\
& \approx \theta \kappa \omega_1 + y \theta + \frac{d}{4} \theta^2.
\end{split}$$
The effect of *beam smearing* was also considered. The suspended optics contain residual displacement noise, leading to a broadening of the trough at which the ETM’s longitudinal coupling and any WGM coupling cancel (see Figure \[fig:individual\_factors\]). To model this effect, the assumption was made that the motion of the spots on the ETM followed a Gaussian distribution about their nominally measured position. Eight-hundred small ‘offset distances’ $\delta y$ were applied uniformly to the spot positions, drawn from a randomly generated Gaussian distribution. The number of offset distances was chosen as a compromise between adequate statistical significance and technical constraints. Calculating the cavity length change as a function of spot position for each of these offset positions, and combining them in an uncorrelated sum, allowed an average, ‘smeared’ signal to be modelled which more closely resembled the measurements. The standard deviation of the Gaussian distribution was an additional parameter, $\omega_2$, provided as an input to the model.
The summing of signals introduced by the modelling of beam smearing led to an artificial increase in the magnitude of the model’s predicted cavity length signals. To compensate for this effect, a further parameter was introduced: a multiplicative scaling factor, $\omega_3$, applied uniformly to the model. This factor also had the additional effect of compensating for the uncertainty in the calibrated cavity length signals. By marginalising over a suitable distribution of scaling factors, it was possible to account for this uncertainty in the analysis of the WGM’s coupling level. The model used in the analysis to predict the smeared, scaled cavity length change, $\delta l'$, was then: $$\delta l' \left( \vec{\omega}, y, \theta, \kappa, d \right) = \omega_3 \sqrt{\sum_{i=1}^{800} \delta l \left( \vec{\omega}, y + \delta y_i, \theta, \kappa, d \right)^2},
\label{eq:model}$$ where $\delta y_i$ is the $i^\text{th}$ offset distance, drawn from a Gaussian distribution with standard deviation $\omega_2$.
### Likelihood
The likelihood function assumed for the model was a Gaussian distribution, $$p \left( \vec{\omega} | \mathcal{D} \right) \propto \exp \left( -\frac{1}{2} \sum_{i=1}^{N} \frac{\left( \mathcal{D}_i - \delta l' \left( \vec{\omega}, y_i, \theta, \kappa, d \right) \right)^2}{\sigma^2} \right),
\label{eq:likelihood}$$ where $N$ is the number of spot positions and $\sigma^2$ is the (identical) variance of each of the measured spot positions.
### Priors
Bayes’ theorem requires an assumption of probability distributions (*priors*) for each of the free parameters prior to the consideration of the measured data. The assumptions made for each free parameter in the model can be found in Table \[tab:priors\]. The upper bound on coupling was assumed to be a factor better than the grating mirror measured in [@Barr2011], given the indication from [@Brown2013] that no coupling is present. The bounds on the scaling factor and spot smearing standard deviation were chosen from earlier observations of the behaviour of the signals during the experiment. All priors were assumed to be uniform.
**Parameter** **Symbol** **Distribution** **Dimensions**
----------------------------------------- ------------ ----------------------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WGM transverse to longitudinal coupling $\omega_1$ Uniform, $\left[ 0, \frac{1}{1000} \right]$ $\frac{\SI{}{\meter} \text{ (longitudinal)}}{\SI{}{\meter} \text{ (transverse)}}$
Spot smearing noise standard deviation $\omega_2$ Uniform, $\left[ 0, 3 \times 10^{-3} \right]$ $\SI{}{\meter} \text{ (transverse)}$
Calibration scaling $\omega_3$ Uniform, $\left[ 0, \frac{1}{10} \right]$
: The distributions assumed for each of the free parameters in the model, along with their dimensions, prior to the computation of the posterior.[]{data-label="tab:priors"}
### Algorithm
A form[^1] of the Metropolis-Hastings Markov-Chain Monte-Carlo (MCMC) algorithm [@Hastings1970] was applied to the model to marginalise over the three parameters. The outputs of the MCMC are a chain of samples (values at each parameter) that are drawn from the posterior distribution. A histogram of samples for a given parameter gives the marginal posterior distribution for that parameter from which the mean and standard deviation can be calculated.
To ensure the convergence of the MCMC on the posterior, a ‘burn-in’ period of iterations was performed. The convergence was verified manually following completion. A further iterations were then used to sample from the posterior and this second set is the one that we used for our results.
Results {#sec:summary}
=======
From the parameter marginalisation it was possible to produce a posterior probability density distribution for the coupling level as shown in Figure \[fig:final\_result\_prob\]. The coupling level predicted from the distribution is bounded between 0 and 1:17000 with 95% confidence, with a mean coupling level of 1:27600. The probability density distributions for the scaling and standard deviation parameters are shown in Figure \[fig:final\_posteriors\]. The scaling posterior distribution indicates a mean value of with standard deviation . The posterior distribution for the beam smearing parameter indicates a range of possible values between and .
The measured cavity length signals as well as the 95% upper limit and mean WGM coupling level predicted by the analysis are shown in Figure \[fig:final\_result\]. The phase discrepancy between the model and the measurements, as witnessed in this figure most profoundly for the spot positions around , is thought to be an artefact from the modelling of the beam smearing effect. The residual test mass motion that motivated the inclusion in the model of beam smearing may have contained some non-Gaussian behaviour.
The upper limit on the predicted coupling level, 1:17000, represents a significant improvement over previously measured grating designs such as the order Littrow grating measured in [@Barr2011], where the coupling factor was of order 1:100.
![Posterior probability density distribution of WGM coupling levels (in units of meters longitudinal per metre transverse) yielded by statistical analysis of the data. The red shaded region shows the coupling levels falling within the most probable 95% of the distribution.[]{data-label="fig:final_result_prob"}](final_prob_3.pdf){width="\columnwidth"}
![Posterior probability density distribution of other parameters used in the analysis: scaling applied to the model’s predicted longitudinal signal (left plot) and the standard deviation assumed for the Gaussian distribution used to model beam smearing (right plot). Both distributions lie well within their prior ranges (see Table \[tab:priors\]).[]{data-label="fig:final_posteriors"}](final_posteriors.pdf){width="\columnwidth"}
![Measurements and simulations of the cavity length signal for spot positions with respect to the ETM’s centre of yaw. The calibrated cavity length change per radian (vertical axis) from the measurements is shown (blue stars) alongside the model’s simulated cavity length changes per radian for the mean (red), 95% upper limit (green) and zero (black) WGM coupling levels. The simulated plots use a scaling factor of and a beam smearing standard deviation of .\
Error bars are shown on the measured spot positions corresponding to their uncertainty. The errors in cavity length change are obtained from the noise floor surrounding each measurement. The noise floors were approximately constant for all measurements, with mean value . Phase error bars are visible for the central values. The errors on each phase measurement, from left to right, are: +/-, +/-, +/-, +/-, +/-, +/-, +/-, +/-, +/-, +/-, +/- and +/- degrees.[]{data-label="fig:final_result"}](final.pdf){width="\columnwidth"}
Acknowledgements
----------------
The authors would like to thank members of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration for fruitful discussions. The Glasgow authors are grateful for the support from the Science and Technologies Facility Council (STFC) under grant number ST/L000946/1. The Jena authors are grateful for the support from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft under project Sonderforschungsbereich Transregio 7.
[^1]: *“Yet Another Matlab MCMC code”* by Matthew Pitkin. Available as of time of writing at <https://github.com/mattpitkin/yamm>.
|
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"pile_set_name": "ArXiv"
}
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.TH std::wcspbrk 3 "2019.08.27" "http://cppreference.com" "C++ Standard Libary"
.SH NAME
std::wcspbrk \- std::wcspbrk
.SH Synopsis
Defined in header <cwchar>
const wchar_t* wcspbrk( const wchar_t* dest, const wchar_t* str );
wchar_t* wcspbrk( wchar_t* dest, const wchar_t* str );
Finds the first character in wide string pointed to by dest, that is also in wide
string pointed to by str.
.SH Parameters
dest - pointer to the null-terminated wide string to be analyzed
src - pointer to the null-terminated wide string that contains the characters to
search for
.SH Return value
Pointer to the first character in dest, that is also in str, or NULL if no such
character exists.
.SH Example
This section is incomplete
Reason: no example
.SH See also
returns the length of the maximum initial segment that consists
wcscspn of only the wide not found in another wide string
\fI(function)\fP
wcschr finds the first occurrence of a wide character in a wide string
\fI(function)\fP
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{
"pile_set_name": "Github"
}
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[Roentgenographic features in pigmented villonodular synovitis (concerning a carpal location) (author's transl)].
Pigmented villonodular synovitis is a benign proliferation of the synovial membrane. Its pathogenesis is not well known. It results in an articular swelling without great pain. Its roentgenographic aspect is a combination of an opacity of soft tissue and epiphyseal damages, i.e. cortical erosions and lacunae surrounded by osteosclerosis. Hyperplasty of the synovial membrane is explicited by arthrography and arteriography. The authors report one case of pigmented villonodular synovitis in the carpus: that is an uncommon location of that disease which most often involves the knee.
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{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
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Characterization of magnetic nanoparticle systems with respect to their magnetic particle imaging performance.
The optimization of magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) as markers for magnetic particle imaging (MPI) requires an understanding of the relationship between the harmonics spectrum and the structural and magnetic properties of the MNPs. Although magnetic particle spectroscopy (MPS) - carried out at the same excitation frequency as the given MPI system - represents a straightforward technique to study MNPs for their suitability for MPI, a complete understanding of the mechanisms and differences between different tracer materials requires additional measurements of the static and dynamic magnetic behavior covering additional field and time ranges. Furthermore, theoretical models are needed, which correctly account for the static and dynamic magnetic properties of the markers. In this paper, we give an overview of currently used theoretical models for the explanation of amplitude and phase of the harmonics spectra as well as of the various static and dynamic magnetic techniques, which are applied for the comprehensive characterization of MNPs for MPI. We demonstrate on two multicore MNP model systems, Resovist(®) and FeraSpin™ Series, how a detailed picture of the MPI performance can be obtained by combining various static and dynamic magnetic measurements.
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{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
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I’m flying at 35,000 feet enjoying the modern miracle of Wifi on airplanes. I just spent the last week of my life visiting restaurant companies in the Northeast corner of the US. I feel honoured to be called upon by some of the biggest restaurant companies in the world to help them with their catering and off premise business operations. I am very lucky to do the work that comes with my job as Founder & CEO at MonkeyMedia Software and The Catering Institute.
I have been thinking deeply about catering & takeout out of restaurants for the last two decades. I’ve written about it, made videos about it, presented at conferences about it and have been evangelizing to our community that our consumers will continue to demand services for our restaurant brands where they Live, Work & Play. The off premise business opportunity for restaurants will continue to grow and increase in complexity.
In my world, I see complex manufacturing dynamics in all of the restaurants I spend time in. The way I see it, when it comes to feeding our customers where they Live, Work and Play, there are only two core service channels. (Takeout and Catering).
Now, to be clear, what I am proposing is a framework for every restaurant to consider when it comes to segmenting it’s markets, so that our operations can adapt to the complexity of order entry, conversation, manufacturing and distribution. Depending on the service channel for off-premise restaurant services & products, our operations will react and behave differently based on the occasion and order dynamics. Saying that, here’s the rub…. Our customers are not experts! We are! The look to us to tell them what to order when. And so, we will only succeed with flawless execution and our customers expect us to know our business better than them. And so, as experts, we have to recommend the right things, for the right occasion, every single time.
There is a lot to discuss here, and I am going to self publish and essay on this topic where it will be available at the Catering Institute, because I think this is the single biggest challenge that our restaurant community faces when it comes to maximizing transaction volume for our off-premise sales opportunities.
Here is what I want to say…… Language matters! And it matters a lot. If our operations are unclear on how to direct our guests based on their service demand and feeding occasion, then can you imagine how confused our guests are going to be when they place their orders? I can tell you that serving multiple markets out of a single restaurant is absolutely daunting. But, it’s also absolutely possible!
So, as you open the doors to your restaurant(s) tomorrow, I want you to think about segmenting your takeout and catering opportunities based on the market and consumer demand for more products & services for your brand.
Dine In, Takeout, Delivery, Curbside, Catering, Event Catering, Food Trucks, Online Ordering, and Group Ordering are all examples of market segmentations and the use of language. There are probably 100’s more that we have not thought about yet! Now you can see the complexity here! To many things going on at once, and not enough team members inside our organizations that understand the dynamics. This lack of understanding leads to chaos inside our organizations. We have to work on this together.
To me, it’s about feeding your customers where they Live, Work & Play. It’s about getting your customers to spend more money with your brand more often. It’s about making your brand loyalists aware of these horizontal services and getting them to think of you at the right time, for the right occasion.
Takeout and Catering are closely related cousins. Both can be available for pickup or delivery. Both of these order types can be placed online, through mobile devices, through kiosks, in-store or on the telephone.
So, I ask you, how are you segmenting those services in your restaurants and what are the best practices for the order to cash cycle of each type of transaction? I can tell you, if you don’t frame the conversation properly for your customers, they are going to walk away with a negative experience.
From what I see every single day in the field, few brands, if any are doing a good job at explaining this to their internal teams or to their customers. And so, the result is confusing and less than stellar.
Until we take the time to properly segment our markets, and develop language internally and externally that makes sense, we will continue to make it hard on ourselves.
I am going to spend some time thinking more about what I can do to help our community frame this dynamic properly so that we can set ourselves up for success and grow the off-premise sales channel for restaurants.
Hi Emily! Thank you for taking the time to respond. I would certainly agree that Event Catering is more full service. However, to me, the differentiation happens at the market level. As a consumer, the need to feed for an occasion provides me with many options. However, depending on what my requirement is, will depend on the budget, quality and level of service I am willing to purchase. And so to me, and event is much more than just food. It has all of the other “event aspects” that will compliment the food. Does that make sense?
Your post is too wordy.. Either you are the restaurant business or the catering business but both do not work together. Takeout is another story. If you enjoy reading on the other hand, download A Man Short “An Insider’s Tale of T.G.I. Friday’s in the 1980s” 206 entertaining pages and the northeast vignettes will be of great interest to you. Jeff
jeff, thanks for taking the time to comment. You are probably right about the length of my blog post. It’s a longer discussion. As far as catering not working in the confines of a restaurant, I’d recommend a book to you as well…. Evidently there is a great discussion to be had… I’ll definitely grab a copy of the Insider’s Tale of TGI.http://www.amazon.ca/Get-Catering-Grow-Sales-Perspective/dp/1463598785
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{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
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Gmina Kołczygłowy
__NOTOC__
Gmina Kołczygłowy is a rural gmina (administrative district) in Bytów County, Pomeranian Voivodeship, in northern Poland. Its seat is the village of Kołczygłowy, which lies approximately north-west of Bytów and west of the regional capital Gdańsk.
The gmina covers an area of , and as of 2006 its total population is 4,321.
The gmina contains part of the protected area called Słupia Valley Landscape Park.
Villages
Gmina Kołczygłowy contains the villages and settlements of Barkocin, Barnowiec, Barnowo, Barnowski Młyn, Darżkowo, Dobojewo, Gałąźnia Mała, Gałąźnia Wielka, Gęślice, Górki, Grępno, Jasionka, Jezierze, Klęskowo, Kołczygłówki, Kołczygłowy, Laski, Łobzowo, Łubno, Miłobądź, Nowa Jasionka, Nowe Łubno, Podgórze, Przyborze, Pustka, Radusz, Różki, Sierowo, Świelubie, Wądół, Wierszynko, Wierszyno, Witanowo, Zagony and Zatoki.
Neighbouring gminas
Gmina Kołczygłowy is bordered by the gminas of Borzytuchom, Dębnica Kaszubska, Miastko, Trzebielino and Tuchomie.
References
Polish official population figures 2006
Kolczyglowy
Category:Bytów County
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{
"pile_set_name": "Wikipedia (en)"
}
|
The lateral forearm flap: an anatomic study.
The anatomy of the lateral forearm flap has been studied in 12 fresh cadaver arms with methylene blue and latex injections and arteriography. The posterior radial collateral artery was found to divide constantly into two terminal branches, an anterior and a posterior division. The anterior division is the nutrient vessel of the flap. This artery extends significantly beyond the lateral epicondyle of the elbow into the lateral aspect of the forearm (range 13 to 18 cm, average 15 cm). This allows raising a fasciocutaneous flap in the proximal forearm with a much longer vascular pedicle than the classic lateral arm flap. Other advantages include very thin skin and subcutaneous tissue and less sensory deficit at the donor site. Based on these results, this newly designed lateral forearm flap has been used in 13 clinical cases. Its main indications are whenever soft, thin, pliable skin is needed for small to moderate-sized defects.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
Q:
Define a variable with values between 1 to 100
How can I define a variable x which is true for values form 1 to 100. I have written the code for some idea that how it should work. Please help your valuable time is highly appreciated.
$('.line1').attr("x2", function (d) {
return $('.peak1').attr("x")
});
$('.line2').attr("x2", function (d) {
return $('.peak2').attr("x")
});
$('.line3').attr("x2", function (d) {
return $('.peak3').attr("x")
});
$('.line4').attr("x2", function (d) {
return $('.peak4').attr("x")
});
$('.line5').attr("x2", function (d) {
return $('.peak5').attr("x")
});
// I want to write this function by defining x value from 1 to 100 so that it would work for every equal value.
var x = 1 to 100;
$('.line'+x).attr("x2", function (d) {
return $('.peak'+x).attr("x")
});
A:
You should make a loop, like this:
for (var i=1; i <= 100; i++) {
$('.line'+i).attr("x"+i, function (d) {
return $('.peak'+i).attr("x")
})
}
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
Article content continued
Ontario’s new changes are even more crassly political, being rammed through the legislature in short order just a year out from an election. After pronouncing that an earlier decision to index the minimum wage to inflation would take the politics out of this policy, the government has moved to put the politics back in by setting its own rate, without any economic study of the consequences.
Setting minimum wage is always a tricky balance for any government. Doing it right requires a careful review of wages, employment levels and the state of the economy. While the vast majority of employers hire at wage rates above or well above minimum wage, several important sectors of the economy, including retail and hospitality, do not have the margins to allow much higher wage levels. These sectors are employers of a large number of young people and other inexperienced workers, many of whom will be hurt when wages rise beyond the affordability of their employers. Even the Alberta Department of Labour’s briefing notes admitted that the $15 hour minimum wage could lead to significant job losses. To the best of our knowledge, the Ontario government didn’t even care to get a briefing on the potential consequences of its move.
How exactly does this provincial issue go national? Already we’ve seen Ontario copycat Alberta’s $15 minimum wage. With the result of the B.C. election remaining uncertain, one can’t help but think that pro-union forces in that province are licking their chops to join the parade. There is no telling who will be next, as governments across the country could look to play Santa Claus with other people’s money.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "OpenWebText2"
}
|
Carrie Brady
Carrie Brady is a fictional character from the NBC soap opera, Days of Our Lives, a long-running serial set in the fictional town of Salem. Created by head writer Margaret DePriest, the role of Carrie has been most notably portrayed by Christie Clark, who took over the role in 1986 as a teenager. Clark remained with the series from 1986 to 1999. She returned in 2005, leaving in October 2006, and returned in September 2011 as part of a reboot of the series. Her return was short lived as she left the show the following July. On September 15, 2016, it was announced that Clark would again reprise her portrayal as Carrie in 2017. Carrie, a lawyer, also returned for several weeks in early 2018 when her mother Anna was accused of the murder of Andre DiMera. She returned in June 2019 for the passing of Caroline Brady (Peggy McCay).
Throughout the show, Carrie has been involved in classic soap opera storylines. Her romantic pairing with Austin Reed (Austin Peck; Patrick Muldoon) led them to be labeled a supercouple. She is the daughter of Anna DiMera (Leann Hunley) and Roman Brady (at the time Wayne Northrop, later Josh Taylor), though as a child she was mainly raised by her step-parents, Marlena Evans (Deidre Hall) and John Black (Drake Hogestyn). Carrie is a member of the Brady family, one of the show's two core families. She has a long-standing rivalry with her sister Sami Brady (Alison Sweeney), as Sami has routinely tried to steal Austin from Carrie. In 2011, Carrie and Sami started to get along better, but their closeness fell apart when Carrie fell in love with Sami's then-husband, Rafe Hernandez, in 2012. The affection was returned by Rafe.
Clark's portrayal of Carrie has garnered attention for Clark who was nominated for Outstanding Younger Actress at the Daytime Emmy's in 1997, and again nominated in 1998. She won a Soap Opera Digest Award with co-star Austin Peck for Hottest Romance in 1997. She was also nominated for Best Young Actress in a Daytime Drama at the Young Artist Awards in 1990, and Nominated for Best Young Actress in a Daytime Drama at the Young Artist Awards in 1989.
Casting and creation
The role of Carrie was originated by child actress Andrea Barber from August 4, 1982 to March 21, 1986. She was succeeded by Clark, who was only twelve years old at the time, on April 14, 1986. Clark remained with the serial until January 14, 1991, when producers wanted to age the character. She went on to appear on other shows such as General Hospital, and appeared in movies such as A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge. Meanwhile, the show briefly re-cast Carrie with actress Tracy Middendorf from January 10, 1992 to December 14, 1992. Producers asked Clark to return on December 18, 1992. In June 1999, it was reported by Soap Opera Digest that Clark would exit that fall, and she left on November 19, 1999.
In 2005, it was announced that Carrie and Austin would return to the series. Austin, played by Austin Peck returned in July 2005 while Clark reprised the role as Carrie on December 2, 2005. Clark left the show a year later on October 26, 2006. The matriarch of the show, Alice Horton (Frances Reid), died in 2010. The show planned a two-week tribute and brought back longtime fan favorites to the show to pay their respects. Clark was included in the tribute and returned from June 23 to 28, 2010 as Carrie. She popped up again on a phone call with Sami on February 9, 2011. In 2011, it was announced that Carrie and Austin (Austin played by Patrick Muldoon) and several other characters would return permanently. Clark and Muldoon appeared on September 26, 2011. Their return was brought about to please fans and in an attempt to lure old fans of the show back.
They remained with the show for less than a year as producers again were re-directing the show. Carrie and Austin last aired on July 24, 2012. On September 15, 2016, it was announced that Clark would return as Carrie, alongside Peck as Austin, on January 11, 2017. Clark and Peck departed on February 16, 2017. Clark reappeared from February 1 to 12, 2018. Clark returned to the show in June 2019 for the memorial of Caroline Brady (Peggy McCay), airing from June 20, 2019 to July 4, 2019.
The role has garnered attention for Clark who was nominated for Outstanding Younger Actress at the Daytime Emmy's in 1997, and again in 1998. She won a Soap Opera Digest Award with co-star Austin Peck for Hottest Romance in 1997. She was also nominated for Best Young Actress in a Daytime Drama at the Young Artist Awards in 1990, and Nominated for Best Young Actress in a Daytime Drama at the Young Artist Awards in 1989.
Storylines
1982–99
Carrie is the daughter of Roman Brady and Anna Fredericks. Her mother leaves Roman while pregnant with Carrie; Roman doesn't know his daughter exists until Anna returns with a four-year-old Carrie and leaves the girl in her father's and Marlena's care. As a child, Carrie is at one point kidnapped and held captive by Stefano DiMera, who has kidnapped many members of the Brady family at various points. She also nearly drowns during a storm and falls into a coma after a car crash. When Austin Reed moved to Salem in July 1992, Carrie is attracted to him and also becomes the roommate and close friend of Austin's sister, Billie Reed. Carrie and Austin begin dating, but Sami's interfering and Austin's career as a prizefighter causes some strain in their relationship. Carrie becomes a finalist in Bella magazine's "Face of the 90’s" modeling competition.
In December 1992, when Austin fails to throw a fight, Carrie accidentally becomes the victim of an acid attack that was intended for Austin. The incident causes serious scarring to her face. Her father Roman, who does not like Austin, tells Carrie that if she would break up with him, he will not pursue any charges against Austin stemming from his involvement with the underworld of boxing. Carrie also feels that Austin will no longer love her, due to her scars. As a result of both factors, Carrie pushes Austin out of her life. This gives her sister Sami, who was attracted to Austin, an opportunity to pursue a relationship with him. Sami Brady teams up with Lucas Roberts. Lucas is Austin's half-brother. Lucas is attracted to Carrie and Sami is attracted to Austin. Sami and Lucas scheme to keep Carrie and Austin from reuniting, so Lucas can be with Carrie and Sami can be with Austin. Meanwhile, Carrie has successful plastic surgery on her face and is willing to give her relationship with Austin another chance. During a romantic ski weekend in February 1994, Carrie loses her virginity to Austin, after almost being raped by Sami's boyfriend Alan, who goes on to rape Sami instead.
Although Carrie and Austin are a couple, Sami continues to try to break them up and pursue Austin herself. Sami even twistedly blames Carrie for the rape Sami suffered from Alan. In March 1995, Sami drugs Austin and in his delusional state, he believes Carrie is there with him (although it's Sami) and Sami sleeps with him. Nevertheless, Carrie and Austin eventually stay together and begin planning their wedding. Sami is able to stop the ceremony by revealing that she is pregnant with Austin’s child. At the time, Sami believes that Austin was the father, but she later learns that Lucas was the true father. When she finds this out, she continues to conceal the truth from everyone, even Lucas, for several years. Since Austin believes the baby is his, he feels he had no choice but to build a life with Sami and baby Will instead of marrying Carrie. However, Austin continues to be in love with Carrie. Unfortunately, the kidnapping of Will by Sami's deranged neighbor caused a situation where Sami and Austin, in order to regain custody of Will from the French couple to whom he had been sold, are forced to marry in France to satisfy the authorities there. Carrie, meanwhile, becomes good friends with Dr. Mike Horton. She also uncovered information that Austin is not Will's father. When Austin and Sami plan to wed in America, this time Carrie is able to interrupt the wedding ceremony by revealing that Lucas, not Austin, is Will's father, and that Sami knew it all along. Austin marries Carrie instead. Some time later, Austin becomes increasingly concerned about baby Will's well-being as Will's father Lucas has a drinking problem. Austin begins spending more time around Will, which means more time around Sami; much to Sami's delight and Carrie's dismay. With Austin not being home as much as he spends time with Will, Carrie begins working more hours at the hospital in which she is employed. Over time, Dr Mike Horton develops feelings for her and they slowly grow closer together. Carrie and Mike eventually have an affair, and Austin and Carrie divorce. Austin leaves Salem. Carrie accepts Mike's marriage proposal, and they move to Israel.
2005–06
A few years later, Carrie returns to the U.S. and settles in Los Angeles where she is CEO of a company called High Style. Carrie tells no one she is back in America but she is discovered by Lucas, who was attempting to take over High Style, not knowing it was headed by Carrie. He halts his takeover attempt and convinces Carrie to return to Salem as his feelings for her are reignited. Carrie returns to town and is surprised to see Austin in Salem as well. Although things look positive for Austin and Carrie's future, her sister Sami sees otherwise and, once again, schemes to break them apart and keep Austin for herself. First she is able to have Austin and his company buy out Carrie's company High Style, Austin not being aware that Carrie has any association with the small business. Carrie, feeling betrayed that Austin took over her company, grows closer to Austin's half brother Lucas. Sami, meanwhile, catches Dr. Lexie Carver having an affair with detective Tek Kramer. To ensure that Carrie will no longer want to be with Austin, Sami threatens to tell Lexie's husband Abe about Tek, unless Lexie helps her. Doctor Lexie Carver is blackmailed into telling Carrie untrue information: that Austin and Carrie both share very rare genetic markers and if they ever had children, the child will suffer extreme birth defects that could result in the baby's death.
Due to this bogus news from Lexie, Carrie decides it's best to move on with Lucas. Since she and Austin could never have children, she becomes engaged to Lucas. She soon believes she is pregnant thanks to a false pregnancy test, leading her and Lucas to rush their wedding date. Carrie finds out she is actually not pregnant and still has feelings for Austin. Carrie and Austin make love on the roof of their apartment building, although Carrie is engaged to Lucas and Austin is engaged to Sami. Austin does not marry Sami and Carrie shows signs of relief. Prior to the ceremony, Carrie expresses to Marlena that she is still in love with Austin. Although she cares about Lucas, she is not in love with him. After she secretly meets with Austin on the roof of their building to make love, Lucas, with the help of new neighbor E.J., catches them. After a bitter tirade from Lucas, Carrie is kicked out of the apartment she and Lucas share. Soon after, Carrie hands Lucas annulment papers and he signs them. However, minutes later, the Gloved Hand slides a note under Sami's apartment door, and Lucas, Carrie, and Austin discover the truth behind Sami's blackmailing of Dr. Lexie Carver to keep Carrie and Austin apart. After Sami finally admits the truth about her misdeeds, a furious Carrie attacks her. The two sisters fight, and afterwards Carrie tells her half-sister that she will tell everyone in Salem what Sami did.
Later, Carrie runs into Dr. Lexie Carver and reveals to her that she knows all about the bogus information Lexie was giving her due to Sami's blackmailing. Lexie tries to plead her case and apologize, but Carrie doesn't care and promises to pay Lexie back by reporting her to the hospital board and the AMA, upon which Lexie is subsequently fired. During dinner one night, Austin suggests to Carrie that they move to Switzerland, where he can work at the Mythic Communications division there and Carrie can reclaim High Style, her former company. Carrie agrees on one condition—that they get married first. The two immediately go to the Justice of the Peace with their signed marriage license and get married, but not before getting briefly interrupted by a drunk Sami; and Carrie disowning her. After saying their goodbyes to John, Kate, Marlena and Roman, Austin and Carrie take a plane and leave Salem.
2011–12
In September 2011, Carrie and Austin returned to Salem for the tribute to the Horton Center. Carrie mentioned that she had become a lawyer after her company Highstyle, which was division of the now defunct Mythic Communications, was forced to close down. Carrie then takes a job, as John's defense attorney. She works with brother-in-law Rafe to help find evidence that can exonerate John from the charges against him. In December, John is set free and is cleared of all charges. Carrie and Rafe continue to work together, eventually opening their own law/detective firm. Carrie and Rafe grow closer and are caught kissing by Sami and Austin. Carrie tells Rafe that she is in love with him and had separated from Austin, only to reunite following Abigail's confession that she did not truly sleep with Austin. Despite their reunion, Carrie can't shake her feelings of love towards Rafe.
After the lives of Marlena, John, Hope and Bo are threatened by Stefano, Carrie and Rafe are become trapped inside of the safe house, which is alarmed with a bomb. While inside, she and Rafe confess their love for each other, nearly having sex, Rafe admits that EJ is the father of Nicole's child, not him. After they are safe from harm, Carrie begins to feel weak and sick. She confesses to Marlena that she was late, which arose suspicions of a possible pregnancy. After taking a take home test, it confirms her suspicion. A suspicious Austin sees the test and assumes it is his baby. Austin is thrilled about the news, but Carrie isn't as much since she loves Rafe. Rafe tells Carrie that she belongs with Austin and her child, and that they won't work out. Carrie decides to return to Switzerland with Austin, and says an emotional farewell to Rafe. But before leaving, Carrie urges Rafe to reconcile with Sami, because Carrie knows that they still love each other deep down.
In 2014, Carrie supports Sami and Kate's decision to control DiMera's company.
See also
References
External links
Carrie at soapcentral.com
Category:Days of Our Lives characters
Category:Female characters in television
Category:Fictional models
Category:Fictional lawyers
Category:Television characters introduced in 1982
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Wikipedia (en)"
}
|
Sensitivity and specificity of dementia coding in two Swedish disease registries.
The authors investigated the sensitivity and specificity of dementia identification in two Swedish disease registries by using clinical diagnoses from two population-based studies as gold standards. The probability of dementia detected by the Inpatient Discharge Registry was 55% for prevalent patients and 31% for incident patients and was higher than detection by the Cause of Death Registry. Specificity was 98% for the Inpatient Discharge Registry and 100% for the Cause of Death Registry.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
Create Password
Create your referral account
Where would you like your commission checks to be mailed
TERMS AND CONDITIONS
1. All commissions are based on the final price of the moving job. Some elements of cost, such as storage fees, tolls and tips are excluded from the commission calculation, as well as any other cost not related to the labor or packing materials.
2. The commission rate is 10% for local moves and 5% for long distance moves.
3. To be eligible for the referral fee, your submission must be received within seven days of the first contact Oz Moving has with your referral.
4. If you have any questions or need assistance, please call our referral line at 212-452-6683 ext. 1104
5. Oz Moving reserves the right to change the terms and conditions of the program at its discretion.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
Q:
Where am I going wrong with this code?
FTB Direwolf20 v 1.0.21 CC 1.57
I have a turtle mining script that I am getting an error 'attempt to call nil' on line 18:
if turtle.getFuelLevel() >= turtle.getFuelLimit() - 500 then
and cannot see what's causing it. Here's the complete code:
chestFuel = 15
fuel = 14
function CheckFuel()
if turtle.getFuelLevel() ~= 'unlimited' then
if turtle.getItemCount(fuel) == 0 then
turtle.select(chestFuel)
turtle.placeUp()
turtle.select(fuel)
turtle.suckUp()
turtle.digUp()
turtle.select(1)
end
if turtle.getFuelLevel() < 200 then
print('Current fuel lvl: ' .. turtle.getFuelLevel() .. ': Refueling...')
turtle.select(fuel)
while true do
if turtle.getFuelLevel() >= turtle.getFuelLimit() - 500 then
print('Fueled Up')
break
end
turtle.refuel()
print('Fuel lvl: ' .. turtle.getFuelLevel())
end
turtle.select(1)
end
end
end
A:
Looking at the Turtle API you will see the getFuelLimit() is only implemented in version 1.6, and you are running version 1.57.
From the wiki:
Added by version 1.6 of ComputerCraft, this command returns the maximum amount of fuel a turtle may store. By default, a regular turtle may hold 20,000 units, and an advanced model 100,000 units; both values can be changed in ComputerCraft.cfg.
In builds prior to 1.6, turtles may store practically unlimited amounts of fuel.
A:
to make it forward compatible you can do the following:
function getFuelLimit()
if turtle.getFuelLimit ~= nil then
return turtle.getFuelLimit()
else
return 0;
end
end
and add a check for 0 when checking the fuel against it or set your own fuel limit
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
Q:
Prettifying exception handling in function
Can this func. not be prettified?
Can the the catch clause be left empty, I have heard it's frowned up on.
apiClient.accountList() is where the exception can occur.
public Optional<Account> getAccount(String accountUuid) throws ApiException {
try {
for (Account account : apiClient.accountList()) {
if (account.getUuid().equals(accountUuid)) {
return Optional.of(account);
}
}
} catch (ApiException e) {
return Optional.empty();
}
return Optional.empty();
}
A:
You can use Stream, assuming getUuid does not throw an ApiException.
public Optional<Account> getAccount(String accountUuid) throws ApiException {
try {
return apiClient.accountList().stream()
.filter(account -> account.getUuid().equals(accountUuid))
.findAny();
} catch (ApiException e) {
/* Log exception */
return Optional.empty();
}
}
Actually instead of collection returning methods like accountList() it more and more makes sense to use Streams, accountStream().
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
Design and synthesis of celecoxib and rofecoxib analogues as selective cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) inhibitors: replacement of sulfonamide and methylsulfonyl pharmacophores by an azido bioisostere.
Celecoxib (13) and rofecoxib (17) analogues, in which the respective SO2NH2 and SO2Me hydrogen-bonding pharmacophores were replaced by a dipolar azido bioisosteric substituent, were investigated. Molecular modeling (docking) studies showed that the azido substituent of these two analogues (13, 17) was inserted deep into the secondary pocket of the human COX-2 binding site where it undergoes electrostatic interaction with Arg(513). The azido analogue of rofecoxib (17), the most potent and selective inhibitor of COX-2 (COX-1 IC(50) = 159.7 microM; COX-2 IC(50) = 0.196 microM; COX-2 selectivity index = 812), exhibited good oral antiinflammatory and analgesic activities.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
Diary of a Wimpy Kid
Written
by Jeff Kinney Illustrated by Jeff Kinney
Reviewed by Michael M (age 9)
Hi, I'm Greg and let me get one thing straight. This is a journal, not a diary. I have two annoying brothers! Manny, who is three (Mom and Dad treat him like a prince) then there is Rodrick. He is two times worse than Manny. Oh, and there's one more person you need to know, my friend, Rowley.
He acts like a fourth grader, but don't worry, I'll fix him up in no time.
One day while I was in school and exciting announcement came that the school paper was having a comic contest! But when I won, the principal changed my whole comic! So I talked to the principal. He said it had some "minor problems." So I quit. Then Rowley won and they didn't change a single thing in his comic! So you are probably wondering why Rowley and I didn't do the same comic. Well, we got into a fight. Rowley thought of a comic called, Zoo-We-Mama." I thought it was the worse comic in the history of bad comics. So we split up and haven't been friends since.
I like this book because it tells an amazing story of a boy who grows up too fast and has little too high expectations of himself. He also thinks he's meant to be rich and famous. I also like this book because a lot of people could make connections to themselves. It also tells a really funny story, because Greg often does stuff that you wouldn't expect boys to do normally.
Will Greg and Rowley be friends again? And if they do, how will it happen? If you're looking for a good book, I recommend this one for boys and girls from ages 6-10.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
About Us
Funding Increase
Creating more student spaces
Effective immediately, the Government of Alberta is increasing post-secondary funding in Campus Alberta by $50 million.
This funding is designed to help Alberta's publicly-funded institutions address specific enrolment pressures and help ensure more students get the education they need.
The money is being awarded as a 2.6 per cent increase of the Campus Alberta grant for the 20 institutions that saw a budget reduction in Budget 2013.
Investment in students remains a top priority for Government and increasing enrolment was a continuing issue for many post-secondary institutions. Each institution will maintain a focus on putting students first and using the money where it will have the greatest impact – the classroom. Each institution will determine what programs will see increased funding.
In real terms it will allow our post-secondary institutions to continue providing the next generation of Albertans with the education and training they need to keep our economy running at full speed.
For information on how much increased funding each institution will receive, read the fact sheet.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
Q:
COUNTIFS for VLOOKUP
Hopefully this headache can get resolved. I am currently trying to find a function that will do a vlookup using multiple criteria. Something similar to how a COUNTIFS function works or a function version of a Pivot Table. It may have to do with an Array Function but I can't quite figure it out. I think the best way to describe what I am trying to do is with an example:
Report Name User Name Report Category
Report 1 John Smith Sales
Report 1 Jack Black Sales
Report 1 Connie Rae Sales
Report 1 Brain Bonds Sales
Report 2 John Smith Sales
Report 2 Connie Rae Sales
Report 3 Jack Black Inventory
The goal of the function is to be able to have it look up John Smith as one criteria and Sales as another criteria and record the reports that he used. The output would be on a different sheet and would look like:
User Report Name Report Category
John Smith Report 1 Sales
Report 2 Sales
Connie Rae Report 1 Sales
Report 2 Sales
Brian Bonds Report 1 Sales
Jack Black Report 1 Sales
The name I would type in and the function would be in the Reports Name column. Been playing with functions for a while but haven't had any luck. Figured I'd try here while I keep playing around.
Thanks,
THAT Newbie
A:
What you are asking for here is pretty complex, but if you must have a formula... Place this formula in cell B2 and copy it down. You are going to need to enter this formula with CTRL + SHIFT + ENTER:
=IFERROR(LOOKUP(SMALL(IF(LOOKUP(REPT("Z",255),$A$2:INDEX(A:A,ROWS(A$1:A2)))=Sheet1!$B$2:INDEX(Sheet1!B:B,COUNTA(Sheet1!B:B)),IF(C2=Sheet1!$C$2:INDEX(Sheet1!C:C,COUNTA(Sheet1!C:C)),ROW(Sheet1!$A$2:INDEX(Sheet1!A:A,COUNTA(Sheet1!A:A)))-ROW(Sheet1!$A$2)+1)),COUNTIF(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(LOOKUP(9.99999999999999E+307,MATCH(A$1:A2,A$1:A2,0)),COLUMN()+1)&":"&ADDRESS(ROWS(A$1:A2),COLUMN()+1)),C2)),ROW(Sheet1!$A$2:INDEX(Sheet1!A:A,COUNTA(Sheet1!A:A)))-ROW(Sheet1!$A$2)+1,Sheet1!$A$2:INDEX(Sheet1!A:A,COUNTA(Sheet1!A:A))),"")
This formula assumes the first header, on both sheets, is in cell A1 and the last (third) header, on both sheets, is in cell C1. Also, the formula references "Sheet1", so you will need to change this to the actual sheet name. You can use the images below to line up the formulas:
A couple of things to point out:
The formula uses dynamic ranges when referencing the data sheet (Sheet1), which means you can just continue to add data to the table as it comes in. However, you will need to restructure your table on the user sheet (The worksheet with the formula) as data is added.
The formula takes into account that the user may have multiple report categories (Sales, Inventory,etc.).
Let me know if this works for you and if you need me to adjust anything.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
846 So.2d 312 (2003)
T.K. by her Guardian and Next Friend, D.K., Appellant,
v.
SIMPSON COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT; John Moore, Dr. Kathryn Weathersby, Donny Maddox, J.O. Smith and M.D. Deer, Individually and in each of their Official Capacities as Members of the Simpson County School Board; Jack McAlpin, Individually and as Superintendent of the Simpson County School District; and Ernest Jaynes, Individually and as Principal of Magee Middle School, Appellees.
No. 2001-CA-01279-COA.
Court of Appeals of Mississippi.
May 27, 2003.
*314 W. David Ross, Michael S. Allred, Jackson, attorneys for appellant.
Kenneth S. Womack, Timothy Dale Crawley, Gulfport, attorneys for appellees.
Before SOUTHWICK, P.J., BRIDGES and CHANDLER, JJ.
CHANDLER, J., for the court.
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
¶ 1. T.K., through her guardian and next friend, brought suit against the Simpson County School District (District), under the Mississippi Tort Claims Act, 11-46-1 to -23 (Rev.2002), alleging that she had been sexually assaulted by two male classmates, claiming the District was liable for damages because of its failure to properly supervise students on the campus of Magee Middle School. Following a bench trial, the Circuit Court of Simpson County entered a judgment for the defendants denying all recovery sought.
¶ 2. T.K. appeals asserting that the circuit court erred by: (1) requiring her to prove she had been sexually assaulted; (2) applying the incorrect legal standard as to duty of ordinary care, and ignored the overwhelming weight of the evidence in finding the duty was not breached; (3) failing to find that there was a duty to prevent all foreseeable sexual contact; (4) incorrectly applying proximate cause; (5) allowing expert testimony of a psychometrist who stated T.K. did not display characteristics of a rape victim during an interview; (6) ignoring the overwhelming weight of the evidence in finding the defendants adequately investigated the sexual assault allegation; (7) failing to enter proper sanctions for discovery violations; (8) permitting testimony that contradicted answers to requests for admission; (9) refusing *315 to admit results of a polygraph examination; and (10) denying a motion for findings of fact and conclusions of law.
¶ 3. Finding that the circuit court did not err, we affirm.
STATEMENT OF FACTS ¶ 4. On September 22, 1997, school dismissed at its regular time of 3:15 p.m. Most students left the campus by 3:25 on school buses. However, due to a shortage of bus drivers, students on at least one bus route had to wait for a bus to complete a route, and return to take them home. Consequently, some students were left waiting at the school until approximately 4:00 p.m. T.K. was among these students.
¶ 5. T.K. testified that, at some point in time while she waited, she entered the school to use the restroom. She used the restroom and was walking down a hallway to return outside, when two male students forced her into the boy's restroom. One student removed her undergarments and attempted to rape her, but was unsuccessful. The other male then raped her. The males left the restroom. T.K. returned to the girl's restroom and washed her face. She then went outside where she looked for a teacher to report the attack, but could not find one. Another classmate testified that T.K. was crying and upset. At the time, T.K. was eleven years old, and the male students were twelve and thirteen years old.
¶ 6. T.K. did not initially report the attack to her grandmother, but that same evening, a classmate telephoned and told her grandmother that the boys had "went with her." Her grandmother questioned T.K., but she would not tell her grandmother what happened. The next day, September 23, 1997, T.K. told both her grandmother and her uncle, a Magee police officer, that she had been sexually assaulted. On September 24, 1997, they sought medical attention, but this examination was inconclusive except to show that at some unascertainable time prior to the examination, T.K. had experienced some sexual contact. T.K. and her family then reported the allegation to Ernest Jaynes, the school principal.
1. WHETHER THE TRIAL COURT ERRED IN REQUIRING T.K. TO PROVE THAT SHE WAS SEXUALLY ASSAULTED.
¶ 7. This case involves the issues of cause in fact and proximate cause. To recover in tort, a plaintiff must show both causation in fact as well as proximate cause. Richardson v. Methodist Hosp. of Hattiesburg, Inc., 807 So.2d 1244(¶ 16) (Miss.2002).
¶ 8. The circuit court found no causation in fact because T.K. failed to show that she had been sexually assaulted. There was no physical evidence that T.K. was raped, nor does it appear any criminal charges were brought. Rather, T.K. asserts that she declined to pursue criminal remedies because the District sought to avoid publicity. T.K. testified to the assault, but on at least one occasion prior to trial, she recanted her charges. Her classmate confirmed that T.K. appeared upset at the time the assault was alleged, and her grandmother and uncle testified to what she had told them. T.K. also called two expert witnesses who testified that T.K.'s failure in reporting the charges immediately, and offering different versions of events, was consistent with victims of sexual assault. The District, in its turn, called the two male students, whom T.K. alleged assaulted her, and they denied any sexual activity. The District also called its own expert witness, who stated T.K.'s demeanor in an earlier interview was not consistent with victims of sexual assault. The school principal, Ernest Jaynes, testified *316 that after interviewing the students, he believed that "something" happened in the bathroom. While he did not believe an actual rape occurred, neither did he believe T.K. was making false accusations, so he was unable to determine exactly what did occur in the boy's bathroom.
¶ 9. Based upon this evidence, the circuit court found as fact that T.K. failed to prove she had been assaulted. Factual findings will not be reversed if supported by credible evidence. Nelson v. Bonner, 829 So.2d 700(¶ 11) (Miss.Ct.App.2002). The trial court's decision is supported by T.K.'s recanting her allegations on at least one occasion and the absence of any physical evidence of an assault. The alleged attackers denied the attack, and an expert witness testified that T.K.'s behavior was inconsistent with that of a victim. Based upon this record, we cannot say the circuit court manifestly erred. There is no merit to this assignment of error.
2. WHETHER THE CIRCUIT COURT APPLIED THE CORRECT LEGAL STANDARD AS TO THE DISTRICT'S DUTY TO SUPERVISE STUDENTS, AND WHETHER THE CIRCUIT COURT IGNORED THE OVERWHELMING WEIGHT OF EVIDENCE IN FINDING ADEQUATE SUPERVISION.
¶ 10. We apply de novo review to questions of law. The circuit court's opinion stated that the duty owed by the school was "ordinary care." This is the correct standard as found by our supreme court in L.W. v. McComb Sep. Municipal Sch. Dist., 754 So.2d 1136(¶ 24) (Miss.1999). T.K. asserts that, because the circuit court noted that the lack of "bad faith, maliciousness or wanton disregard" allowed it to find that this standard was met, it applied the incorrect legal standard. As discussed below, this quotation is taken out of context. Rather than being a statement about the legal standard applied, the statement went to the weight of the evidence. The circuit court's opinion shows it was well aware of the legal standard regarding duty of care and evaluated the proof according to that standard. There is no merit to the assertion that the circuit court applied the incorrect legal standard as to duty of care.
¶ 11. As a finding of fact, the circuit court found that the school district met the standard of care "only by the slightest of margins." Findings of fact are subject to manifest error review. White v. Thompson, 822 So.2d 1125(¶ 10) (Miss.Ct. App.2002). Ernest Jaynes, the principal, testified that he was to monitor the loading of buses, and he had also directed Mrs. Onnie Lee and two unidentified male teachers to assist him. Jaynes testified that a teachers' meeting was scheduled at 3:15, so he was not present for the loading of busses. He was unable to testify as to whether the other three adults were at the bus line because he had no direct knowledge of their whereabouts at the time in question. T.K., one of her female classmates, and one of the males accused of assaulting her testified that they had not seen any supervising adults at the bus line after the assault was alleged to have occurred. None of the three teachers testified.
¶ 12. T.K. argues that the evidence fails to support a finding that supervision was present. But this argument is insufficient to meet the legal standard. The applicable case law establishes that a plaintiff, even a child, has a burden of showing that school district employees do not perform the duties to which they are assigned. Summers v. St. Andrew's Episcopal Sch., 759 So.2d 1203(¶ 39) (Miss. 2000). T.K. did not contend that there was an insufficient number to supervise *317 the bus line. Rather, the argument is that as a matter of law, students' testimony that they did not see a teacher creates a legal presumption, which the District must then rebut. T.K.'s argument is literally that because the District did not call the three teachers, who were in its "control," there could be no factual finding except that the teachers were not present.
¶ 13. Jaynes testified that, as the principal, he had done all he was required to do: he assigned three adults to supervise the loading of busses. The circuit court found as fact that the testimony of three students that they saw no teachers present was insufficient to establish that the adults were, in fact, not at their assigned locations.
¶ 14. The circuit court heard the testimony and observed the demeanor of the witnesses. T.K. had the burden of proof of showing the teachers were, in fact, not at their assigned locations. In ruling on this issue, the circuit court held that there was no "bad faith, maliciousness or wanton disregard" detected when viewing the District's witnesses. The circuit court found this to be a close factual issue, but ruled in the District's favor. We decline to second guess the circuit court from our distance of a cold record.
3. WHETHER THE CIRCUIT COURT ERRED IN NOT HOLDING THAT THE DISTRICT HAD A DUTY TO PREVENT ALL FORESEEABLE SEXUAL ACTIVITY.
¶ 15. T.K. asserts that, because she was eleven years old and unable to consent to sex, the circuit court erred as a matter of law in not finding that the District had the legal duty to prevent all foreseeable sexual activities among students, consensual or otherwise. Findings of law are subject to de novo review. Rawls v. Blakeney, 831 So.2d 1205(¶ 7) (Miss.Ct.App.2002). T.K. argues that the District admitted that some sexual activity occurred, because it took disciplinary action against T.K., as well as her accused rapists. At a school board meeting, the board required all three students, as well as Jaynes, to testify as to the facts concerning the allegation of rape. The accused rapists denied any sexual contact. T.K. testified one of the males tried unsuccessfully to rape her, while the other completed a rape. Jaynes testified at trial, that he told the school board that after interviewing the students, he believed that "something" happened in the bathroom. While he did not believe an actual rape occurred, neither did he believe T.K. was making false accusations, so he was unable to determine exactly what did occur in the boy's bathroom. The school board decided that all three students should finish the year at the alternative school. However, there was no transcript of the hearing nor a record showing what the school board decided as to the facts. Evidently, the school board accepted Jaynes' statement that he was unable to ascertain exactly what the facts truly were, but something of a sexual nature occurred.
¶ 16. T.K.'s argument is that the District had the legal duty to prevent all foreseeable sexual activities among students. No Mississippi statute or case establishes that a school has a duty to prevent any and all sexual contact. Rather, the case law anticipates that students will at times fail to respect their peers' personal boundaries and/or make bad choices. See, e.g., Summers, 759 So.2d at (¶ 43). Liability only attaches when a school fails to utilize ordinary care to prevent foreseeable injury. Id. at (¶ 44).
¶ 17. While the circuit court did not make a specific finding, its order fairly reads, and the testimony at trial established, that the District had reason to believe *318 that some middle school students might forseeably engage in sexual acts if not supervised. However, the law does not impose upon a district a duty to prevent any and all sexual activity. A school must use ordinary care. L.W., 754 So.2d at (¶ 24). Because the District exercised ordinary care, there was no showing of breach of duty. This assignment of error is without merit.
4. WHETHER THE CIRCUIT COURT ERRED IN ANALYZING PROXIMATE CAUSE.
¶ 18. T.K. asserts that the circuit court erred in its application of proximate cause. We review the application of law de novo. Rawls, 831 So.2d 1205 at (¶ 7). Proximate cause requires that the injury is foreseeable by the defendant. Marshall Durbin v. Tew, 362 So.2d 601, 604 (Miss. 1978). The circuit court's opinion does not explicitly state its finding on proximate cause, but implies a finding that it was foreseeable that a student could be sexually assaulted.
¶ 19. To recover in tort, a plaintiff must show, in addition to a breach of duty, both causation in fact as well as proximate cause. Richardson v. Methodist Hosp. of Hattiesburg, Inc., 807 So.2d 1244(¶ 16) (Miss.2002). The circuit court held that T.K. failed to show the District breached its duty of ordinary care, and she failed to show causation in fact through a showing of sexual assault. The circuit court also held that even though a consensual sexual act may have occurred, the District had no duty beyond its duty to utilize ordinary care to prevent foreseeable injuries. The District is not held to a standard which requires a guarantee that all students will refrain from any sexual contact. The circuit court correctly reasoned that without a showing of both a breach of duty as well as cause in fact, proximate cause itself cannot lead to recovery. Therefore, even assuming some error in the application of proximate cause, any error would be harmless. There is no merit to this assignment of error.
5. WHETHER THE CIRCUIT COURT ERRED IN ADMITTING EXPERT TESTIMONY OF PAUL DAVEY.
¶ 20. Paul Davey was a master's level psychometrist and licensed counselor, whose practice included counseling in sexual abuse cases. He was accepted as an expert pertaining to investigations of sexual abuse allegations. He testified, inter alia, that a videotape of T.K. showed her answering questions without evidencing the "trauma" abuse victims typically evidenced. Admittedly, he never interviewed her in person.
¶ 21. At first glance, the reason for admitting this testimony is questionable. T.K. testified and people to whom she made the allegations testified. So, it would seem the circuit court had evidence upon which to base its determination of credibility, without resort to expert testimony. However, T.K. gave differing accounts and recanted her charges at one time. To remedy this defect in the case, T.K. called two experts to testify that her actions were consistent with sexual abuse. To counter that testimony, the District called Davey. Consequently, this case involved dueling experts.
¶ 22. T.K.'s argument goes to the credentials of Davey, not the subject of his testimony. Davey testified that he had "seen" over 2800 children who had been sexually abused, and had testified in an unspecified number of trials involving child sexual abuse. The standard of review for a trial court's determination of whether an expert witness is qualified to testify on the grounds for which his testimony is offered is abuse of discretion. General Motors *319 Corp. v. Pegues, 738 So.2d 746(¶ 28) (Miss. Ct.App.1999). There was a credible basis for accepting Davey as an expert in the area pertaining to exhibited characteristics of sexually abused children. There is no merit to this argument.
6. WHETHER THE CIRCUIT COURT IGNORED THE OVERWHELMING WEIGHT OF THE EVIDENCE IN FINDING THAT THE DISTRICT REASONABLY INVESTIGATED THE RAPE CHARGES.
¶ 23. T.K. essentially argues that the District erred in not determining that her charges of rape were true. Principal Jaynes was given the task of investigating the rape charges, even though he lacked forensic and law enforcement training. One of T.K.'s expert witnesses testified that the District's procedures did not comply with educational standards, but the record does not indicate T.K. suffered any prejudice from those failures. T.K.'s delay in reporting the rape, while understandable, did hinder the gathering of evidence. When she did report the charges, she did so to a relative who was a police officer. There is no allegation that she was prevented from filing criminal charges or that law enforcement personnel were somehow lacking. Moreover, the evidence she presented to the circuit court to buttress her charges was more than the evidence available to the District, i.e., her expert witnesses who testified to characteristics of victims of sexual abuse.
¶ 24. School districts have a duty to protect students from harm under the ordinary care standard. L.W., 754 So.2d at ¶ 24). Assuming the District's actions in investigating her charges failed to comport with that duty, her injuries from any sexual assault that already occurred could not have arisen from this investigation. The District had a duty to utilize ordinary care to prevent reasonably foreseeable injuries, but the District did not have a duty to prove T.K.'s claim that she was raped. There is no merit to this assignment of error.
7. WHETHER THE CIRCUIT COURT ERRED IN NOT ENTERING MORE SEVERE SANCTIONS FOR THE DISTRICT'S DISCOVERY VIOLATIONS.
¶ 25. After T.K. presented her case, and several of the District's witnesses had testified, it became apparent that the District had not disclosed the name of a parent who complained that no teacher was in proximity to the children who were waiting for their bus. Moreover, this parent had notified the school board within days of the alleged rape. The names of parents who had made such complaints was sought in discovery. The circuit court found a discovery violation occurred, and following post-trial pleadings and a hearing, entered monetary sanctions of $1500 against each of the District's attorneys, but suspended the sanctions upon a finding that no previous violations had occurred. T.K. asserts that these sanctions were insufficient, and that the circuit court should have struck the District's answer and entered judgment for T.K.
¶ 26. A trial court's decision of what discovery sanctions are warranted is viewed through an abuse of discretion standard. Wood v. Biloxi Public Sch. Dist., 757 So.2d 190(¶ 8) (Miss.2000). Sanctions that determine the merits of a case are only applied if no less drastic measure will protect the integrity of the judicial process and deter similar discovery violations, and are generally applicable where the failure to disclose arose from a client's own behavior. Id. at (¶ 9). In this case, it is unclear that the discovery violation was the fault of the District or its *320 attorneys. The attorneys asked school officials to inspect school board meeting minutes to determine what complaints had been made. The District identified the witness in question, but only told T.K. that the witness had complained of her child having to wait for late busses, when in fact the complaint had also been that the supervising adults were not in close proximity to the children. However, the District officials testified that they would have disclosed the full nature of the parent complaint had they been instructed to do so. Given the record, there is not an unequivocal showing that the District or its attorneys intended to deceive, nor is it clear where the fault in failing to disclose arose.
¶ 27. Actual prejudice is not always considered by courts when applying discovery sanctions. Pierce v. Heritage Properties, Inc., 688 So.2d 1385, 1391 (Miss.1997). Nevertheless, the discovery violation in this case went to breach of duty and proximate cause. As discussed, T.K. could not have prevailed had she proven breach of duty and proximate cause, because no causation in fact was shown. Therefore, even assuming T.K. had established that the District breached its duty of care and the District should have known bus line supervision was insufficient, T.K. would not have prevailed. The circuit court was the finder of fact. The record affirmatively showed that, as the finder of fact, the circuit court took into account the inconsistencies between the discovery materials and the testimony of the district's witnesses. Therefore, T.K.'s case was not prejudiced, though it appears from the record her attorneys expended considerable effort in locating parents who had similar experiences to the parent who was not disclosed. The circuit court required T.K.'s attorneys to brief what they sought in sanctions and held a post-trial hearing to get at the root of why disclosure was incomplete. The circuit court then ruled that striking the answer and confessing judgment was not warranted by the facts. Given the discretionary nature of review, we hold that the circuit court did not err in choosing to impose lighter sanctions than those T.K. requested.
8. WHETHER THE TRIAL COURT ERRED IN PERMITTING SCHOOL BOARD MEMBERS TO TESTIFY IN CONTRADICTION TO ANSWERS TO REQUESTS FOR ADMISSIONS.
¶ 28. In her requests for admissions, T.K. requested the District admit that "sexual contact" occurred. The District denied this request. Yet, she and her alleged attackers were later sent to the alternative school. Two school board members testified regarding their decision to discipline the students. It appears that they accepted Principal Jaynes' assessment that, while the males denied any sexual contact and T.K. said she was the victim of assault, something did occur in the restroom. T.K. moved that the witnesses be "estopped" from testifying in accord with Principal Jaynes.
¶ 29. In considering T.K.'s motion, the circuit court noted over two years transpired from the date of the hearing to the responses to requests for admissions being answered. It further noted that requests for admissions are "lawyer drawn and to a great extent lawyer responded to, and if it were a pure legal issue we were dealing with, I would probably grant your motion, but these are questions of fact.... I will, however, consider these contradictions in the sense ... to impeach the testimony of the witnesses."
¶ 30. The circuit court's determination of what remedy or effect was warranted by the differences between the responses *321 to the requests for admission and the testimony must be viewed in a discretionary light. See, e.g., Wood, 757 So.2d at (¶ 8). Given that the circuit court was the trier of fact, and its comments show that it took into effect the differences when it weighed the credibility of the school board members' testimony, an abuse of discretion cannot be found. There is no merit to this issue.
9. WHETHER THE TRIAL COURT ERRED IN REFUSING TO ADMIT THE RESULTS OF T.K.'S POLYGRAPH EXAMINATION.
¶ 31. T.K. asserts that the circuit court erred in not allowing her to admit into evidence testimony going to the fact that she had taken, and passed, a polygraph examination in which she was questioned concerning the veracity of the allegation of sexual abuse. Polygraph test results are inadmissible either substantively or to impeach testimony. Humphrey v. State, 759 So.2d 368(¶ 48) (Miss.2000). There is no merit to this assignment of error.
10. WHETHER THE TRIAL COURT ERRED IN REFUSING TO ENTER FINDINGS OF FACT AND CONCLUSIONS OF LAW.
¶ 32. Following the circuit court's issuing its order, T.K. moved, pursuant to M.R.C.P. 52, for a particularized findings of facts and conclusions of law. The circuit court denied the motion. A trial court "has technically complied with the mandates of Rule 52 where it makes general findings of fact and conclusions of law although requested by a party to make specific findings." Lowery v. Lowery, 657 So.2d 817, 819 (Miss.1995). In this case, the circuit court issued a six page opinion and order setting forth in detail its analysis of the case. The opinion listed four elements to the case: duty owed, breach of duty, proximate cause and actual damage. The opinion clearly relates the evidence the circuit court found probative to each issue. The order complies with M.R.C.P. 52. There is no merit to this assignment of error.
¶ 33. THE JUDGMENT OF THE SIMPSON COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT IS AFFIRMED. COSTS ARE ASSESSED TO THE APPELLANT.
McMILLIN, C.J., KING AND SOUTHWICK, P.JJ., BRIDGES, THOMAS, LEE, MYERS AND GRIFFIS, JJ., CONCUR. IRVING, J., CONCURS IN RESULT ONLY.*1004
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A young girl has to face her destiny in a dark world. The path leads her to her ultimate destination.
Ara’s Tale is a perfect example of something created through passion of learning and exploration. Some expert CG animators might go in and pick at the little flaws right away, but considering that creator Martin Lubich had no professional experience nor training in CG animation, I think he did a pretty damn fantastic job on his first film!
The film took Martin over 3 years to complete, starting in 2009, he who only started digging into computer graphics in 2007.
A lot of naivety and stubbornness helped to bring this project to a successful end. A personal goal for me was – besides actually creating the movie – to learn what it takes to bring a movie into existence.
The story follows the journey of Ara, a mysterious young woman, as she travels deep into a gigantic network of caves in search of the last remaining living dragon. It is a path of destiny for Ara, which eventually leads to her destination.
I wanted to tell a simple and visually beautiful story, set into a fantastic environment and woven into it a bit of melancholy.
The beautiful thing about Martin Lubich’s project, besides the stunning look of his film, is that he created the film as an open source project, where he has made available all his production files and assets. You can also read the film’s production blog as well as Mari’s Case Study.
aras-tale.loramel.net
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Q:
How to get rid of use strict in gulp file with JavaScript
I need to remove all 'strict mode'. the below code runs without error but my 'strict mode'; does not change to ;
gulp.task('bundle', function () {
var bundled = bundle(bundler())
if (!production) return bundled;
return bundled
.pipe(buffer())
.pipe(replace(/"use strict"'/g, ';')) // problem line
.pipe(plugins.uglify())
.pipe(plugins.rename({
suffix: '.min'
}))
.pipe(gulp.dest('dist/app'));
});
A:
Looks like your regexp has a loose single quote in it.
.pipe(replace(/"use strict"'/g, ';'))
here ----^
This regexp will match 'use strict' and "use strict"
/('|")use strict\1/g
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Q:
Can someone's name be removed from software they created if they transferred ownership of the software?
Let's say that John is on Blue Team. Blue Team is a private, non-profit entity in the US that receives some funding from the federal government.
John wrote some software while on Blue Team that was explicitly made for Blue Team to use. John put his name at the top of many of the code files he wrote. This code is public on Github, but does not have a license specified.
However, John did something bad and was kicked off of Blue Team. During this process, John transferred ownership of the code repository on Github to Jane.
Some members of Blue Team would be disturbed to see John's name. Because of this, Jane would like to change all mentions of John's name to "former Blue Team member."
Can Jane do this?
Does Jane's ability to do this depend on Github's rules for repository ownership, Blue Team's policy on IP created while on paid time, or something else?
It seems likely that Jane would be able to remove John's name from the code on Github, but can Jane remove John's name from other versions of the software too? (Such as the versions of the software used internally by Blue Team.)
A:
Presumably Blue Team are all employees of some company ("the employer"), so the software is a work for hire and copyright is owned by the employer.
However in the UK and some other countries (but not in the US) authors also have "moral rights" over their work, including attribution, integrity, and association of an author to the work.
This article (by Canadian lawyer Mark H. Evans) discusses the question of moral rights in works for hire:
For example, if a former employee wrote a blog to promote a company’s services that was published on the company’s website under that author’s name, the company might find itself being sued for breach of the author’s moral rights if it were to delete the author’s name and replace it with the name of an employee who wasn’t the author but is still with the company.
On the face of it John would be in a similar position to the blog author in the quote. So for the employer (including Jane, as an employee) to remove John's name would be a violation of his moral rights to attribution.
In this case the source code is public. However in most commercial settings it would be secret:
The secrecy of the code would make it harder for John to find out his name had been removed. However lets suppose that a friend still in Blue Team were to tell him. I'm not sure about discovery rules in various countries, but presumably a serious lawsuit could get confirmation.
The secrecy of the source code also means that fewer people would see John's name there than if it were generally published. This would lessen the damages, but not eliminate them. John would probably be able to get an injunction ordering that his name be restored.
Many programs are published with a credit list, and John would certainly have a moral right to appear on such a list with the same prominence as other team members.
From later in the same article:
While moral rights are personal and can’t be assigned, they can be waived. This is an important solution to navigating moral rights in works generated by employees and contractors. And because any assignment of copyright is not an automatic waiver of moral rights, the waiver must be express.
So it depends on the contract between John and the employer. If John has explicitly waived his right to attribution then the employer is in the clear.
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Communist Organisation of India (Marxist–Leninist)
Communist Organisation of India (Marxist–Leninist) was a political organisation in India. COI (ML) was formed in May 1985 through the merger of six different groups;
Organising Committee of Communist Revolutionaries led by Kanu Sanyal
Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Kaimur Range led by Ravi Shankar.
Central Organising Committee, Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) led by Umadhar Singh
A faction of Unity Centre of Communist Revolutionaries of India (Marxist–Leninist) led by Subodh Mitra
Indian Communist Party led by U. Krishnappa
Liberation Front led by Sabuj Sen
Kanu Sanyal was elected general secretary of COI (ML). COI (ML) participated in elections.
In 2003 COI (ML) merged with Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) Unity Initiative to form a unified CPI (ML).
National question
COI (ML) held the position that India was multi-national, in which some nationalities dominated the government and suppressed less advanced national groups. The organisation supported the right to self-determination of Jammu & Kashmir, Nagaland and Mizoram.
References
Category:Political parties established in 1985
Category:Defunct communist parties in India
Category:1985 establishments in India
Category:Political parties disestablished in 2003
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The Rich, the Poor, and the Significance of Wealth Creation
Understanding the role of wealth creation brings new significance to our daily lives because we are all wealth creators, rich or poor. But how is this true? How should Christians understand wealth and poverty as it relates to our faith?
Here are a few points I’ve found helpful as I wrestle with this question.
1. Love of wealth is evil. Wealth creation is not.
There is a difference between the love of wealth and wealth creation. The love of wealth is idolatry, it’s greed – the Bible is very clear in condemning this vice. But that doesn’t mean that people are evil because they create and possess wealth. Dr. Glenn Sunshine explains this further in his series on wealth & poverty:
AlthoughScripture has some very harsh things to say about the wealthy, this does not mean that all of them are evil or under divine judgment. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Job were rich and yet were also approved by God. Just as poverty doesn’t guarantee virtue, wealth does not guarantee vice…the wealthy are not necessarily corrupt.
According to Anne Bradley, IFWE’s vice president of economic initiatives, wealth can be defined as any value added to society. It is created when a farmer creates a more efficient and sustainable growing method, or when a student starts an academic club on campus, or when a mother teaches her daughter how to bake. These are not evil activities.
Because we all possess unique God-given gifts, we all have the potential to create wealth in society.
2. Physical poverty is not spiritual poverty.
One of the most famous verses in the Bible referencing the poor is Matthew 5:3: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Does this mean the materially poor are more virtuous than the wealthy? Not exactly.
Sunshine also argues that poverty is not a guarantee of virtue or righteousness because the Bible is realistic about the causes of poverty: some people can become poor through no fault of their own, or they can make foolish decisions. In this verse, Jesus is referring to spiritual poverty, not physical poverty. Sunshine says,
The issue isn’t poverty per se, but rather the attitude of humility and reliance on God that it can produce in us. This is why Matthew’s version of the beatitude isn’t just “Blessed are the poor,” but “Blessed are the poor in spirit.”
This is not to say that physical poverty is unimportant. Though the Bible often talks about spiritual poverty, many cases refer to physical poverty, too: those who are naked, hungry, and homeless.
And scripture is very clear that we aren’t to stand idly by and not help the poor. The wealthy are condemned throughout the Bible for ignoring the destitute. We are all called to act – the question is how do we act towards the poor?
3. The pie is not fixed.
Since the Bible does not prescribe a specific system or policy for how we are to best help the poor, it is helpful to draw from economic knowledge and apply it to biblical principles to properly understand wealth and poverty.
One important principle economics teaches us is that wealth is not a fixed pie. Some view commerce as a zero-sum game: if I win, you lose. Dr. Anne Bradley explains the problem with the fixed pie fallacy in a previous post:
Many people view the economy as a pie. If I take a piece of pumpkin pie, that piece is gone forever. So what is left must be rationed out to everyone else. The economy, however, is dynamic and always changing; it’s not ‘one-size’. It grows because when we trade we both benefit. It’s not a “taking-game”, it’s a “serving-game.” And the economy is wealth-creating. I only benefit if I create something that serves others. If they don’t want it, they choose not to purchase it and thus I must redirect my creativity and resources.
The zero-sum assumption misses the fact that entrepreneurs can grow the pie of wealth through their ideas and resources. If we demonize wealth and misunderstand economics, we run the risk of actually increasing poverty. Father Robert Sirico makes this argument in his book Defending the Free Market: A Moral Case for a Free Economy:
We cannot let the fear of our own moral failings in the face of material abundance lead us to embrace views and policies that will cut off millions of our brothers and sisters from climbing out of destitution. We cannot let our own mishandling of wealth condemn others to poverty.
Debunking the fixed pie fallacy has huge implications for poverty relief methods. If the pie isn’t fixed and we all have the ability to create wealth, enterprise serves as an imperative tool in addressing long-term relief.
Finally, we are all, rich or poor, equally significant in the eyes of God. We are created with equal dignity and unique gifts. When we reach out to the least of these, we look at them with the same dignity that Christ sees in them. We are called to help the poor in a way that unleashes their gifts and greatest potential.
What are your thoughts on wealth and poverty? Is wealth creation evil? Is wealth creation a fixed pie? Leave your comments here.
Elise Daniel
Elise Daniel is a contributing writer for the Institute for Faith, Work & Economics. She is the creative director at Bellwether Communications and has previously worked with the Values & Capitalism project at A.E.I. and the Acton Institute. Her articles have been published in Real Clear Religion, The Detroit News, Relevant Magazine, and AFF Doublethink. She has a BBA in Economics from James Madison University.
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{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
---
- name: Create Gitea group account
group:
name: git
gid: 1309
state: present
- name: Create Gitea user account
user:
name: git
uid: 1309
state: present
system: yes
update_password: on_create
create_home: no
group: git
- name: Create Gitea Directories
file:
path: "{{ item }}"
state: directory
owner: git
group: git
recurse: yes
with_items:
- "{{ gitea_data_directory }}/gitea"
- "{{ gitea_data_directory }}/mysql"
- name: Create MySQL container for Gitea
docker_container:
name: gitea-mysql
image: mysql:5.7
pull: true
volumes:
- "{{ gitea_data_directory }}/mysql:/var/lib/mysql:rw"
env:
MYSQL_DATABASE: "gitea"
MYSQL_USER: "gitea"
MYSQL_PASSWORD: "gitea"
MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD: "gitea"
restart_policy: unless-stopped
memory: 1g
- name: Create Gitea container
docker_container:
name: gitea
image: gitea/gitea:1.6
pull: true
links:
- gitea-mysql:db
volumes:
- "{{ gitea_data_directory }}/gitea:/data:rw"
ports:
- "{{ gitea_port_http }}:3000"
- "{{ gitea_port_ssh }}:22"
env:
DB_TYPE: "mysql"
DB_HOST: "db:3306"
DB_NAME: "gitea"
DB_USER: "gitea"
DB_PASSWD: "gitea"
RUN_MODE: "prod"
SSH_DOMAIN: "{{ ansible_nas_hostname }}"
SSH_PORT: "{{ gitea_port_ssh }}"
ROOT_URL: "http://{{ ansible_nas_hostname }}:{{ gitea_port_http }}/"
USER_UID: "1309"
USER_GID: "1309"
restart_policy: unless-stopped
memory: 1g
labels:
traefik.backend: "gitea"
traefik.frontend.rule: "Host:gitea.{{ ansible_nas_domain }}"
traefik.enable: "{{ gitea_available_externally }}"
traefik.port: "3000"
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Github"
}
|
Q:
how to get multiple conditional operations after a Pandas groupby?
consider the following example:
import pandas as pd
import numpy as np
df = pd.DataFrame({'A' : ['foo', 'bar', 'foo', 'bar',
'foo', 'bar', 'foo', 'foo'],
'B' : [12,10,-2,-4,-2,5,8,7],
'C' : [-5,5,-20,0,1,5,4,-4]})
df
Out[12]:
A B C
0 foo 12 -5
1 bar 10 5
2 foo -2 -20
3 bar -4 0
4 foo -2 1
5 bar 5 5
6 foo 8 4
7 foo 7 -4
Here I need to compute, for each group in A, the sum of elements in B conditional on C being non-negative (i.e. being >=0, a condition based on another column). And vice-versa for C.
However, my code below fails.
df.groupby('A').agg({'B': lambda x: x[x.C>0].sum(),
'C': lambda x: x[x.B>0].sum()})
AttributeError: 'Series' object has no attribute 'B'
So it seems apply would be preferred (because apply sees all the dataframe I think), but unfortunately I cannot use a dictionary with apply. So I am stuck. Any ideas?
One not-so-pretty not-so-efficient solution would be to create these conditional variables before running the groupby, but I am sure this solution does not use the potential of Pandas.
So, for instance, the expected output for the group bar and column B would be
+10 (indeed C equals 5 and is >=0)
-4 (indeed C equals 0 and is >=0)
+5 = 11
Another example:
group foo and column B
NaN (indeed C equals -5 so I dont want to consider the 12 value in B)
+ NaN (indeed C= -20)
-2 (indeed C=1 so its positive)
+ 8
+NaN = 6
Remark that I use NaNs instead of zero because another function than a sum would give wrong results (median) if we were to put zeros.
In other words, this is a simple conditional sum where the condition is based on another column.
Thanks!
A:
Another alternative is to precompute the values you will need before using groupby/agg:
import numpy as np
import pandas as pd
N = 1000
df = pd.DataFrame({'A' : np.random.choice(['foo', 'bar'], replace=True, size=(N,)),
'B' : np.random.randint(-10, 10, size=(N,)),
'C' : np.random.randint(-10, 10, size=(N,))})
def using_precomputation(df):
df['B2'] = df['B'] * (df['C'] >= 0).astype(int)
df['C2'] = df['C'] * (df['B'] >= 0).astype(int)
result = df.groupby('A').agg({'B2': 'sum', 'C2': 'sum'})
return result.rename(columns={'B2':'B', 'C2':'C'})
Let's compare using_precomputation with using_index and using_apply:
def using_index(df):
result = df.groupby('A').agg({'B': lambda x: df.loc[x.index, 'C'][x >= 0].sum(),
'C': lambda x: df.loc[x.index, 'B'][x >= 0].sum()})
return result.rename(columns={'B':'C', 'C':'B'})
def my_func(row):
b = row[row.C >= 0].B.sum()
c = row[row.B >= 0].C.sum()
return pd.Series({'B':b, 'C':c})
def using_apply(df):
return df.groupby('A').apply(my_func)
First, let's check that they all return the same result:
def is_equal(df, func1, func2):
result1 = func1(df).sort_index(axis=1)
result2 = func2(df).sort_index(axis=1)
assert result1.equals(result2)
is_equal(df, using_precomputation, using_index)
is_equal(df, using_precomputation, using_apply)
Using the 1000-row DataFrame above:
In [83]: %timeit using_precomputation(df)
100 loops, best of 3: 2.45 ms per loop
In [84]: %timeit using_index(df)
100 loops, best of 3: 4.2 ms per loop
In [85]: %timeit using_apply(df)
100 loops, best of 3: 6.84 ms per loop
Why is using_precomputation faster?
Precomputation allows us to take advantage of fast vectorized arithmetic on
entire columns and allows the aggregation function to be the simple builtin
sum. Builtin aggregators tend to be faster than custom aggregation functions
such as the ones used here (based on jezrael's solution):
def using_index(df):
result = df.groupby('A').agg({'B': lambda x: df.loc[x.index, 'C'][x >= 0].sum(),
'C': lambda x: df.loc[x.index, 'B'][x >= 0].sum()})
return result.rename(columns={'B':'C', 'C':'B'})
Moreover, the less work you have to do on each little group, the better off you
are performance-wise. Having to do double-indexing for each group hurts performance.
Also a killer to performance is using groupby/apply(func) where the func
returns a Series. This forms one Series for each row of the result, and then
causes Pandas to align and concatenate all the Series. Since typically the
Series tend to be short and the number of Series tends to be big, concatenating
all these little Series tends to be slow. Again, you tend to get the best
performance out of Pandas/NumPy when performing vectorized operations on
big arrays. Looping through lots of tiny results kills performance.
A:
I think you can use:
print df.groupby('A').agg({'B': lambda x: df.loc[x.index, 'C'][x >= 0].sum(),
'C': lambda x: df.loc[x.index, 'B'][x >= 0].sum()})
C B
A
bar 11 10
foo 6 -5
Better for understanding are custom function what is same as above:
def f(x):
s = df.loc[x.index, 'C']
return s[x>=0].sum()
def f1(x):
s = df.loc[x.index, 'B']
return s[x>=0].sum()
print df.groupby('A').agg({'B': f, 'C': f1})
C B
A
bar 11 10
foo 6 -5
EDIT:
root's solution is very nice, but it can be better:
def my_func(row):
b = row[row.C >= 0].B.sum()
c = row[row.B >= 0].C.sum()
return pd.Series({'C':b, 'B':c})
result = df.groupby('A').apply(my_func)
C B
A
bar 11 10
foo 6 -5
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
[The thromboembolic syndrome in the surgery of rheumatic heart defects].
An experience with the treatment of 380 patients with rheumatic heart disease has shown that late stages of the disease are necessarily accompanied by the thromboembolic syndrome having exact clinical manifestations and definite stages. Pathogenesis of the thromboembolic syndrome is based on changes of the vascular bed, microcirculation and hemocoagulation parameters. So, control of factors of thrombus formation, prophylactics and therapy of thromboses and embolism are necessary in the process of surgical treatment of acquired heart diseases.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
Q:
Стоит ли учить книгу 2008 года?
Здравствуйте, хочу прочесть книгу jQuery. Подробное руководство по продвинутому JavaScript, но она 2008 года. Подскажите, стоит ли её учить? Или посоветуете что либо посвежее? Спасибо.
A:
Я бы вообще не стал читать эту книгу.
Намного полезнее будет почитать книгу по базовому JavaScript. JavaScript: Подробное руководство (Definitive Guide).
Поверьте на слово, в jQuery вы разберетесь за 15 минут.
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{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
/*
* Copyright (C) 2018 The Android Open Source Project
*
* Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
* you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
* You may obtain a copy of the License at
*
* http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
*
* Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
* distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
* WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
* See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
* limitations under the License.
*/
package android.view;
import android.graphics.Insets;
/**
* Interface that allows the application to listen to animation events for windows that cause
* insets.
* @hide pending unhide
*/
public interface WindowInsetsAnimationListener {
/**
* Called when an inset animation gets started.
*
* @param animation The animation that is about to start.
*/
void onStarted(InsetsAnimation animation);
/**
* Called when the insets change as part of running an animation. Note that even if multiple
* animations for different types are running, there will only be one progress callback per
* frame. The {@code insets} passed as an argument represents the overall state and will include
* all types, regardless of whether they are animating or not.
* <p>
* Note that insets dispatch is hierarchical: It will start at the root of the view hierarchy,
* and then traverse it and invoke the callback of the specific {@link View} being traversed.
* The callback may return a modified instance by calling {@link WindowInsets#inset(int, int, int, int)}
* to indicate that a part of the insets have been used to offset or clip its children, and the
* children shouldn't worry about that part anymore.
*
* @param insets The current insets.
* @return The insets to dispatch to the subtree of the hierarchy.
*/
WindowInsets onProgress(WindowInsets insets);
/**
* Called when an inset animation has finished.
*
* @param animation The animation that has finished running.
*/
void onFinished(InsetsAnimation animation);
/**
* Class representing an animation of a set of windows that cause insets.
*/
class InsetsAnimation {
private final @WindowInsets.Type.InsetType int mTypeMask;
private final Insets mLowerBound;
private final Insets mUpperBound;
/**
* @hide
*/
InsetsAnimation(int typeMask, Insets lowerBound, Insets upperBound) {
mTypeMask = typeMask;
mLowerBound = lowerBound;
mUpperBound = upperBound;
}
/**
* @return The bitmask of {@link WindowInsets.Type.InsetType}s that are animating.
*/
public @WindowInsets.Type.InsetType int getTypeMask() {
return mTypeMask;
}
/**
* Queries the lower inset bound of the animation. If the animation is about showing or
* hiding a window that cause insets, the lower bound is {@link Insets#NONE} and the upper
* bound is the same as {@link WindowInsets#getInsets(int)} for the fully shown state. This
* is the same as {@link WindowInsetsAnimationController#getHiddenStateInsets} and
* {@link WindowInsetsAnimationController#getShownStateInsets} in case the listener gets
* invoked because of an animation that originates from
* {@link WindowInsetsAnimationController}.
* <p>
* However, if the size of a window that causes insets is changing, these are the
* lower/upper bounds of that size animation.
* <p>
* There are no overlapping animations for a specific type, but there may be two animations
* running at the same time for different inset types.
*
* @see #getUpperBound()
* @see WindowInsetsAnimationController#getHiddenStateInsets
* TODO: It's a bit weird that these are global per window but onProgress is hierarchical.
* TODO: If multiple types are animating, querying the bound per type isn't possible. Should
* we:
* 1. Offer bounds by type here?
* 2. Restrict one animation to one single type only?
* Returning WindowInsets here isn't feasible in case of overlapping animations: We can't
* fill in the insets for the types from the other animation into the WindowInsets object
* as it's changing as well.
*/
public Insets getLowerBound() {
return mLowerBound;
}
/**
* @see #getLowerBound()
* @see WindowInsetsAnimationController#getShownStateInsets
*/
public Insets getUpperBound() {
return mUpperBound;
}
}
}
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{
"pile_set_name": "Github"
}
|
Q:
Load library into existing environment (equivalent to "local" parameter of "source")?
I am sourcing util functions in production into an environment to encapsulate (and group) the helper functions:
Helper file:
# File: Helper.R
hello <- function() {
print("Hello world")
}
Client:
helper <- new.env()
source("Helper.R", local=helper)
helper$hello() # call the helper function
How can I migrate my sourced "Helper.R" into a library without breaking the calls of the sourced functions?
What I want is something like
helper <- new.env()
library(Helper, local=helper)
helper$hello() # call the helper function (loaded from the library now)
Is there a way to do this?
A:
You can use the import_package function in the ‹modules› package (not the one on CRAN, it’s different!).
Then the following attaches a package locally:
modules::import_packge('pkg', attach = TRUE)
Alternatively, and potentially closer to what you actually want to do, you could use it as follows:
pgk = modules::import_package('pkg')
Now the package is not attached at all, and its exported objects can be accessed via pkg$obj. This is somewhat similar to base R’s loadNamespace function, but does considerably more behind the scenes.
Finally, consider not putting your helper code into a package at all, but rather distributing it as a module. This is after all what the ‹modules› package was designed for. So instead of creating a package, just distribute your helper.r code file (or folder) and then use it as follows:
helper = modules::import('helper')
See the package README and vignette for a detailed description.
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{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
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Effect of glutathione depletion on caspase-3 independent apoptosis pathway induced by curcumin in Jurkat cells.
Curcumin, a yellow pigment from Curcuma longa, exhibits anti-inflammatory, antitumor, and antioxidative properties. Although its precise mode of action has not been elucidated so far, numerous studies have shown that curcumin may induce apoptosis in normal and cancer cells. Previously, we showed that in Jurkat cells curcumin induced nontypical apoptosis-like pathway, which was independent of mitochondria and caspase-3. Now we show that the inhibition of caspase-3 by curcumin, which is accompanied by attenuation of internucleosomal DNA fragmentation, may be due to elevation of glutathione, which increased in curcumin-treated cells to 130% of control. We have demonstrated that glutathione depletion does not itself induce apoptosis in Jurkat cells; though, it can release cytochrome c from mitochondria and caspase-3 from inhibition by curcumin, as shown by Western blot. The level of Bcl-2 protein was not affected by glutathione depletion even upon curcumin treatment. Altogether, our results show that in Jurkat cells curcumin prevents glutathione decrease, thus protecting cells against caspase-3 activation and oligonucleosomal DNA fragmentation. On the other hand, it induces nonclassical apoptosis via a still-unrecognized mechanism, which leads to chromatin degradation and high-molecular-weight DNA fragmentation.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>redux</title>
</head>
<body>
<script src="main.dart.js" type="application/javascript"></script>
</body>
</html>
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{
"pile_set_name": "Github"
}
|
Q:
Does ActiveRecord save a belongs_to association when saving main object?
If I have two models:
class Post < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :user
end
and
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
has_many :posts
end
If I do:
post = Post.new
user = User.new
post.user = user
post.save
Does the user get saved as well and the primary key properly assigned in post's user_id field?
A:
ActiveRecord belongs_to associations have the ability to be autosaved along with the parent model, but the functionality is off by default. To enable it:
class Post < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :user, :autosave => true
end
A:
I believe you want:
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
has_many :posts, :autosave => true
end
In other words, when saving a User record, seek out all records on the other side of the 'posts' association and save them.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
Q:
How to understand this nested recursion?
This code has me lost. When run, it outputs sequences which I finds strange:
def print_n(number):
if (number <= 0):
return None
else:
print number
print_n(number-1)
print_n(number-1)
print_n(4)
I thought it would output this sequence:
4,3,2,1,1,2,1,3,2,1
however it actually outputs:
4,3,2,1,1,2,1,1,3,2,1,1,2,1,1
I tried to draw the stack diagram of this function but when I get lost at the second appearance of the print_n(number-1).
I can understand this program without the second appearance of the print_n(number-1), as it's just normal recursion. However, the second print_n(number-1), seems much more complicated than I expected, I don't know how to trace this function call and explain the result...
A:
Since the if block has an unconditional return, you can remove the else and the program will continue to behave the same way.
def print_n(number):
if (number <= 0):
return None
print number
print_n(number-1)
print_n(number-1)
Here, it's more apparent what is going on: You print number, and then call print_n twice using number-1. You can work backwards to derive the output.
print_n(1) prints "1"
print_n(2) prints "2" plus "1" plus "1": "211"
print_n(3) prints "3" plus "211" plus "211": "3211211"
print_n(4) prints "4" plus "3211211" plus "3211211": "432112113211211"
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{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
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ALL-CLAD Mc2 10" Nonstick Fry Pan
Mc2 10" Nonstick Fry Pan
Mc2 is All-Clad's original cookware collection
Fry Pan
A kitchen staple in a variety of sizes, the fry pan is ideal for searing, browning and pan frying everything from eggs to meats. The fry pan features a flat bottom and flared sides that make tossing foods effortless and allows for easy turning with a spatula. Great for cooking at higher heat with oils to develop foods with full, rich flavor, color and crisp texture.
This classic, slope-sided Non-stick frying pan illustrates the Master Chef line's stylish yet practical design. It's 10 inches in diameter, perfect for cooking tuna or tofu with little or no fat for a healthful meal. Its polished, 18/10 stainless-steel handle is secured to the pan by stainless-steel rivets for strength, grooved on the top and rounded on the bottom for comfort, and holed in the end for hanging on hook or peg. The long handle stays cool on the stovetop but won't be harmed by an oven's highest heat.
Essentials
Three ply, bonding extends throughout pots and pans – all the way to its rim
Instructions & manual
Frequently asked questions
If you have never cooked with All-Clad before, you may be surprised by how efficient it is. Start using your All-Clad on a low flame for all applications except boiling. Because our cookware is built to hold heat and distribute it well, you will find that low temperatures using All-Clad are comparable to medium to medium-high settings using other cookware brands.
When preparing to sauté or fry, preheat your cookware a minute or two on a low setting. Test the heat by lightly tapping the top edge of your pan with your palm. If the pan feels warm to the touch you are ready to cook. Put cold oil in your preheated pan. This helps to form a natural barrier that prevents food from sticking. Now add your food. There should be a sizzling sound when your food touches the preheated pan, indicating that the browning or searing process has begun. Leave the food for approx 1 minute to sear – do not try to push it around the pan too soon otherwise the food may tear and then stick to the pan (see below – ‘how do you prevent sticking’). Medium to low heat is all you will need.
Yes. To avoid the formation of small white dots or pits, bring liquids to a boil before adding salt, then stir well. Or, add salt after food has started to cook. Pitting does not interfere with cooking performance but can diminish the beauty of the stainless steel.
• Always cook on a low or low-medium heat.• Never use a nonstick pan under a grill.• Never leave any pan unattended on top of the stove or in the oven.• Do not use metal utensils.• Do not use abrasive cleaners or metallic scrubbing pads or brushes.• Do not use aerosol spray oils on your nonstick cookware.• Do not put your nonstick cookware in the dishwasher.• Clean any cooking residue with a mixture of baking soda and water.
Do not put your non-stick cookware in the dishwasher because high heat and harsh detergents will corrode and dry out the surface.
Almost all non-stick problems are related to a build up of visible and/or invisible layer of cooking residue on the non-stick surface. We recommend cleaning the non-stick with a paste made of equal parts bicarbonate of soda and water. Rub in a circular motion with a non-metallic scrubbing/cleaning pad recommended as being safe for use on non-stick surfaces, or perhaps a soft brush such as a vegetable brush. Then rinse well with water. If the bicarbonate of soda mixture starts turning brown, you are on the right track. Rinse well with cool water and dry. Then condition the non-stick surface by wiping a little vegetable oil around the surface with a paper kitchen towel. Wipe off any excess.
The long handles are cast stainless steel, which conducts or distributes heat poorly. The shape of the handles and the stainless steel rivets also provide a safe grip and prevent the handle from becoming too hot on the stove top. However, in the oven or grill, handles will get hot. Always keep oven gloves handy to prevent burning your hand
Yes. In fact, All-Clad is one of the best choices for this type of range since our cookware is balanced and the contact surfaces are smooth (the exceptions are our grill pans). The bonded construction and superior heat distribution help prevent scorching, which can be a problem with this style of stovetop when using other brands of cookware.
A preheated pan and lower flames are the key to stick-free stainless steel cooking. Preheat your pan on low or medium heat for one to two minutes. Tap the upper edge of your pan to test the heat. (If it is too hot, remove from the burner for a couple of minutes.) Pour 2-3 teaspoons of cold oil in your preheated pan-or enough to cover the bottom of the cooking surface. Add food, making sure that there is an even sizzling sound when your food touches the pan. This indicates that your food is cooking on contact and creating a natural barrier to prevent sticking. Allow food to cook without disturbing it until the correct doneness is achieved. The natural sugars in your food caramelize on the cooked surface, developing great flavours and lifting your food off of the cooking surface naturally. If the sound that food makes on initial contact with the pan is more of a crackle than a sizzle, your heat is too high and sticking may occur. All-Clad recommends low to medium heat for frying, braising, sautéing and simmering because All-Clad is ideally crafted to hold heat.
The ‘Stainless Steel’ collection is completely dishwasher-safe. It is recommended that before you use your Stainless Steel All-Clad you wash it in the dishwasher first to remove any manufacturing residues and this will help to keep it shiny. Do not put your non-stick cookware in the dishwasher because high heat and harsh detergents will corrode and dry out the surface. Copper-Core’ can be put in the dishwasher but it may result in some tarnishing of the copper band around the exterior. Prevent this by either hand-washing or drying the copper band immediately after the wash cycle in the dishwasher has finished.
For daily cleaning, warm, soapy water is sufficient. Clean your All-Clad thoroughly after each use. Food films left on the pan may cause discoloration and sticking.
To get rid of stuck-on food or discolouration, and stains from using too high a heat, we recommend cleaning your All-Clad with a specialist stainless steel cleaning product called ‘Bar Keeper's Friend’.
To use the Bar Keeper's Friend, simply use a soft cloth or sponge and water and make into a soupy paste. This can be used on the interior, as well as the exterior of your All-Clad.
If your water has high iron content, you may notice a rusty discolouration. Use ‘Bar Keeper's Friend’ to remove this. Please also refer to the Use & Care section of this page.
Overheating can cause brown or blue stains. Food films, if not removed, will cause discoloration on the pot when it is reheated. Large amounts of iron content in your water may cause your pot to look rusty.
Immerse in warm water. Use a fine powder cleanser with water to form a paste. Apply paste using a soft cloth. Rub in a circular motion from the centre outward. Wash in hot, soapy water, dry immediately. DO NOT USE oven cleaners or cleansers with chlorine bleach. DO NOT USE steel wool.
The polished stainless steel exterior of All-Clad Stainless requires very little care. It may be polished with one of the available commercial stainless steel cleaners, rubbing in a circular motion. Rinse in lukewarm water. We do not recommend using steel wool, steel scouring pads or harsh detergents. Nylon scrubbing pads are safe to use. You may wash Stainless in the dishwasher.
The pan has been used on too high a heat or the wrong source of heat for the pan which has resulted in the pan base becoming warped and distorted.
Also never put cold water into a hot pan or plunge hot cookware in cold water. Sudden changes of temperature may cause the metal to warp, resulting in an uneven base.
• If your All-Clad is left on extremely high heat for an extended period of time or left empty on a heated burner.• If your All-Clad Nonstick is cleaned in the dishwasher.• If metal utensils are used on the nonstick cooking surface.• If you use scouring pads, steel wool, abrasive cleansers, bleach and/or oven cleaners.• Salt usage may cause pitting to the stainless steel interior. To avoid salt damage, do not add salt to your food until the liquid begins to boil. Please note that the salt pitting will not interfere with the cooking performance of the pan, only its appearance.
1. All-Clad has a policy of manufacturing all of its bonded cookware in the USA. This means that it purchases its metals only from US suppliers and bonds them at its own rolling mill on-site in Canonsburg PA. It then forms them at the same location into high performance cooking vessels.2. All-Clad is the originator of bonded cookware technology and is committed to investing in bonded cookware manufactured solely in the USA.3. There are areas in which All-Clad does not manufacture in the USA. These are:- Where the bonding of metals is not required for superior cooking performance (E.g. tools, accessories).- On regular non-bonded components where making them in the USA would add to the retail price but not generally to performance.- Where manufacturing constraints exist at the Canonsburg plant (E.g electrical kitchen appliances).4. All-Clad’s tools, accessories or electrical kitchen appliances, are manufactured by select partners overseas qualified carefully by All-Clad with highest quality controls.
The cooking surface of All-Clad cookware is made from high-quality 18/10 stainless steel, a proprietary formulation of 304 grade stainless steel specially adapted to meet All-Clad specifications regarding grain size, texture, alloy content, and other physical properties that guarantee the superb culinary performance that makes All-Clad the world’s finest cookware.
All stainless steel used by All-Clad is certified to meet National Standard ISO 9000 (International Organization for Standardization) for all 304 series stainless steel intended for use with food. Every "melt" by our steel suppliers is tested and certified to meet the ASTM 240 (American Society for Testing and Materials) standards.
All-Clad's nonstick surfaces do not have harmful PFOA gases. The quality of our cookware eliminates hot spots that can damage nonstick and cause the surface to burn and flake off. When used responsibly, nonstick cookware poses no threat to people or animals and can be useful in creating a healthy and well-balanced diet.
All-Clad makes premium cookware. We are the originators of ‘bonded metal’, this allows us to combine many different metals in each piece of cookware to create the optimum in performance and durability. We use the highest-quality metals and make all of our bonded cookware in the USA.
In the world of cookware, ours is actually rated as light/moderate in weight. We have worked for the past 30 years to create cookware that is balanced in your hand, yet weighty enough to hold heat evenly, this is an important performance feature in premium cookware. Small pieces are easy to handle and the larger pieces often include a helper handle for easy lifting and pouring.
How to better use my product
How should I use my All-Clad cookware?
If you have never cooked with All-Clad before, you may be surprised by how efficient it is. Start using your All-Clad on a low flame for all applications except boiling. Because our cookware is built to hold heat and distribute it well, you will find that low temperatures using All-Clad are comparable to medium to medium-high settings using other cookware brands.
When preparing to sauté or fry, preheat your cookware a minute or two on a low setting. Test the heat by lightly tapping the top edge of your pan with your palm. If the pan feels warm to the touch you are ready to cook. Put cold oil in your preheated pan. This helps to form a natural barrier that prevents food from sticking. Now add your food. There should be a sizzling sound when your food touches the preheated pan, indicating that the browning or searing process has begun. Leave the food for approx 1 minute to sear – do not try to push it around the pan too soon otherwise the food may tear and then stick to the pan (see below – ‘how do you prevent sticking’). Medium to low heat is all you will need.
How do you Fry without Natural Fats?
Add oil, butter, or margarine to the pot or pan; just enough to cover the bottom surface.
Heat pot or pan for one to two minutes over low or medium heat.
Add food for frying.
What do I do if the food is sticking?
Check to make sure the pan is level, clean and the heat is not set too high. Low to medium heat is recommended for optimal cooking performance.
Will salt damage my cookware?
Yes. To avoid the formation of small white dots or pits, bring liquids to a boil before adding salt, then stir well. Or, add salt after food has started to cook. Pitting does not interfere with cooking performance but can diminish the beauty of the stainless steel.
Do I need to rinse the pan before first use?
Yes. Before using for the first time, wash in hot, soapy water with a sponge or dishcloth. Rinse in hot water and dry thoroughly.
Maintenance and cleaning
Do I need to use wood or nylon utensils?
No. You can cook on all of our conventional cookware with metal, plastic or wood utensils
How do you care for nonstick pans?
• Always cook on a low or low-medium heat.• Never use a nonstick pan under a grill.• Never leave any pan unattended on top of the stove or in the oven.• Do not use metal utensils.• Do not use abrasive cleaners or metallic scrubbing pads or brushes.• Do not use aerosol spray oils on your nonstick cookware.• Do not put your nonstick cookware in the dishwasher.• Clean any cooking residue with a mixture of baking soda and water.
How do I clean the nonstick coating?
Do not put your non-stick cookware in the dishwasher because high heat and harsh detergents will corrode and dry out the surface.
Almost all non-stick problems are related to a build up of visible and/or invisible layer of cooking residue on the non-stick surface. We recommend cleaning the non-stick with a paste made of equal parts bicarbonate of soda and water. Rub in a circular motion with a non-metallic scrubbing/cleaning pad recommended as being safe for use on non-stick surfaces, or perhaps a soft brush such as a vegetable brush. Then rinse well with water. If the bicarbonate of soda mixture starts turning brown, you are on the right track. Rinse well with cool water and dry. Then condition the non-stick surface by wiping a little vegetable oil around the surface with a paper kitchen towel. Wipe off any excess.
Do the handles get hot?
The long handles are cast stainless steel, which conducts or distributes heat poorly. The shape of the handles and the stainless steel rivets also provide a safe grip and prevent the handle from becoming too hot on the stove top. However, in the oven or grill, handles will get hot. Always keep oven gloves handy to prevent burning your hand
Can All-Clad cookware be used on a ceramic range?
Yes. In fact, All-Clad is one of the best choices for this type of range since our cookware is balanced and the contact surfaces are smooth (the exceptions are our grill pans). The bonded construction and superior heat distribution help prevent scorching, which can be a problem with this style of stovetop when using other brands of cookware.
How can I prevent sticking when cooking?
A preheated pan and lower flames are the key to stick-free stainless steel cooking. Preheat your pan on low or medium heat for one to two minutes. Tap the upper edge of your pan to test the heat. (If it is too hot, remove from the burner for a couple of minutes.) Pour 2-3 teaspoons of cold oil in your preheated pan-or enough to cover the bottom of the cooking surface. Add food, making sure that there is an even sizzling sound when your food touches the pan. This indicates that your food is cooking on contact and creating a natural barrier to prevent sticking. Allow food to cook without disturbing it until the correct doneness is achieved. The natural sugars in your food caramelize on the cooked surface, developing great flavours and lifting your food off of the cooking surface naturally. If the sound that food makes on initial contact with the pan is more of a crackle than a sizzle, your heat is too high and sticking may occur. All-Clad recommends low to medium heat for frying, braising, sautéing and simmering because All-Clad is ideally crafted to hold heat.
What heat setting should I use when cooking?
Is All-Clad dishwasher safe?
The ‘Stainless Steel’ collection is completely dishwasher-safe. It is recommended that before you use your Stainless Steel All-Clad you wash it in the dishwasher first to remove any manufacturing residues and this will help to keep it shiny. Do not put your non-stick cookware in the dishwasher because high heat and harsh detergents will corrode and dry out the surface. Copper-Core’ can be put in the dishwasher but it may result in some tarnishing of the copper band around the exterior. Prevent this by either hand-washing or drying the copper band immediately after the wash cycle in the dishwasher has finished.
How do I clean my All-Clad?
For daily cleaning, warm, soapy water is sufficient. Clean your All-Clad thoroughly after each use. Food films left on the pan may cause discoloration and sticking.
To get rid of stuck-on food or discolouration, and stains from using too high a heat, we recommend cleaning your All-Clad with a specialist stainless steel cleaning product called ‘Bar Keeper's Friend’.
To use the Bar Keeper's Friend, simply use a soft cloth or sponge and water and make into a soupy paste. This can be used on the interior, as well as the exterior of your All-Clad.
If your water has high iron content, you may notice a rusty discolouration. Use ‘Bar Keeper's Friend’ to remove this. Please also refer to the Use & Care section of this page.
How do I prevent water spotting?
After washing, rinse in hot water and dry immediately.
Why is my pan discolored after use?
Overheating can cause brown or blue stains. Food films, if not removed, will cause discoloration on the pot when it is reheated. Large amounts of iron content in your water may cause your pot to look rusty.
How do I clean the interior of my pan?
Immerse in warm water. Use a fine powder cleanser with water to form a paste. Apply paste using a soft cloth. Rub in a circular motion from the centre outward. Wash in hot, soapy water, dry immediately. DO NOT USE oven cleaners or cleansers with chlorine bleach. DO NOT USE steel wool.
How do I clean the exterior of my pan?
The polished stainless steel exterior of All-Clad Stainless requires very little care. It may be polished with one of the available commercial stainless steel cleaners, rubbing in a circular motion. Rinse in lukewarm water. We do not recommend using steel wool, steel scouring pads or harsh detergents. Nylon scrubbing pads are safe to use. You may wash Stainless in the dishwasher.
Technical support
Why has the base of my pan become wobbly or not even?
The pan has been used on too high a heat or the wrong source of heat for the pan which has resulted in the pan base becoming warped and distorted.
Also never put cold water into a hot pan or plunge hot cookware in cold water. Sudden changes of temperature may cause the metal to warp, resulting in an uneven base.
What will void my All-Clad Lifetime Guarantee?
• If your All-Clad is left on extremely high heat for an extended period of time or left empty on a heated burner.• If your All-Clad Nonstick is cleaned in the dishwasher.• If metal utensils are used on the nonstick cooking surface.• If you use scouring pads, steel wool, abrasive cleansers, bleach and/or oven cleaners.• Salt usage may cause pitting to the stainless steel interior. To avoid salt damage, do not add salt to your food until the liquid begins to boil. Please note that the salt pitting will not interfere with the cooking performance of the pan, only its appearance.
Various topics
Is All-Clad made in the USA?
1. All-Clad has a policy of manufacturing all of its bonded cookware in the USA. This means that it purchases its metals only from US suppliers and bonds them at its own rolling mill on-site in Canonsburg PA. It then forms them at the same location into high performance cooking vessels.2. All-Clad is the originator of bonded cookware technology and is committed to investing in bonded cookware manufactured solely in the USA.3. There are areas in which All-Clad does not manufacture in the USA. These are:- Where the bonding of metals is not required for superior cooking performance (E.g. tools, accessories).- On regular non-bonded components where making them in the USA would add to the retail price but not generally to performance.- Where manufacturing constraints exist at the Canonsburg plant (E.g electrical kitchen appliances).4. All-Clad’s tools, accessories or electrical kitchen appliances, are manufactured by select partners overseas qualified carefully by All-Clad with highest quality controls.
What is the stainless cooking surface in All-Clad cookware made of and how is it tested to ensure quality?
The cooking surface of All-Clad cookware is made from high-quality 18/10 stainless steel, a proprietary formulation of 304 grade stainless steel specially adapted to meet All-Clad specifications regarding grain size, texture, alloy content, and other physical properties that guarantee the superb culinary performance that makes All-Clad the world’s finest cookware.
All stainless steel used by All-Clad is certified to meet National Standard ISO 9000 (International Organization for Standardization) for all 304 series stainless steel intended for use with food. Every "melt" by our steel suppliers is tested and certified to meet the ASTM 240 (American Society for Testing and Materials) standards.
Is nonstick safe?
All-Clad's nonstick surfaces do not have harmful PFOA gases. The quality of our cookware eliminates hot spots that can damage nonstick and cause the surface to burn and flake off. When used responsibly, nonstick cookware poses no threat to people or animals and can be useful in creating a healthy and well-balanced diet.
Is All-Clad cookware oven-safe?
Yes. All of the All-Clad collections are oven and grill safe. Nonstick items are not grill safe, but can be put in the oven up to 500°F/ 260°C
Why is All-Clad so expensive?
All-Clad makes premium cookware. We are the originators of ‘bonded metal’, this allows us to combine many different metals in each piece of cookware to create the optimum in performance and durability. We use the highest-quality metals and make all of our bonded cookware in the USA.
Why is All-Clad cookware so heavy?
In the world of cookware, ours is actually rated as light/moderate in weight. We have worked for the past 30 years to create cookware that is balanced in your hand, yet weighty enough to hold heat evenly, this is an important performance feature in premium cookware. Small pieces are easy to handle and the larger pieces often include a helper handle for easy lifting and pouring.
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Cholponbek Esenkul Uulu
Cholponbek Esenkul Uulu (born 15 January 1986) is a Kyrgyzstani footballer who is a striker for Abdish-Ata Kant. He is a member of the Kyrgyzstan national football team.
Career statistics
International
Statistics accurate as of match played 5 September 2014
International Goals
References
External links
Category:1986 births
Category:Living people
Category:Kyrgyzstani footballers
Category:Kyrgyzstan international footballers
Category:Kyrgyzstani expatriate footballers
Category:Footballers at the 2014 Asian Games
Category:Association football forwards
Category:Asian Games competitors for Kyrgyzstan
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Syria's military has begun stockpiling chemical weapons and equipping its soldiers with gas masks near the city of Homs, opposition sources reported on Thursday.
Want regular updates on the Syrian crisis? Join Haaretz.com's official Facebook page
Open gallery view Syrian rebels in Idlib, Feb. 9, 2012. Credit: AP
Opposition activists said they had received reports that the Syrian army had transferred a significant quantity of grenades and mortars containing chemical agents to a school building in Homs.
The opposition also reported that gas masks were being distributed to soldiers at roadblocks.
Homs has become the focal point of violent confrontations between insurgents and the country's military in recent days, and opposition figures are concerned that the moves could signal the regime's intention to use chemical weapons against its citizens.
News agencies reported over 130 killed in Syria on Thursday, as Bashar Assad's government intensified its crackdown on an expanding uprising against his regime.
More on Haaretz.com:
Israel to mull tax exemptions on donations to 'Zionist settlement'
Israeli fans beg PM to hold off Iran attack over Madonna show
U.S. religious leaders seek to bridge gap between Jews and Muslims
Demonstrations were reported on Thursday in Aleppo, Syria's second largest city, which had previously not seen large-scale protests against the government.
Meanwhile, an opposition website reported that an armored brigade of the Syrian military was headed toward the city of Zabadani, which has been held for the past ten days by the Free Syrian Army, the opposition's armed wing. The site speculated that the brigade would attempt to retake the city over the next two days.
Opposition sources said the ferocity of attacks by government forces against the cities of Homs, Idlib and Daraa had reached unprecedented levels of intensity over the past two days, with hospitals and clinics bombed and doctors arrested.
British Prime Minister David Cameron on Thursday said there was a need to continue to maintain pressure on Syria's government over its bloody crackdown on the country's opposition.
"Clearly what we are seeing on our television screens is completely unacceptable," Cameron told a news conference in Stockholm. "It really is appalling to see the destruction of Homs It is quite clear that this is a regime that is hell-bent on killing, murdering and maiming its own citizens."
Cameron added that there was a need to "take the toughest response we can" against Syria.
Arab League foreign ministers are scheduled to meet in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Saturday to discuss the organization's next steps on the crisis. The Arab League suspended its monitoring mission to Syria in late January due to the rising violence.
Approximately 6,000-7,000 people have died thus far in the 11-month uprising, which has become increasingly militarized in recent months.
Read this article in Hebrew
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About
United Continental's United Airlines needs a few more airplanes -- and it's buying them from Brazil.
On Monday, Embraerannounced that it has signed a firm order agreement to sell UA 30 of its Embraer 175 regional jets, along with options to buy 40 more. At list prices, and assuming all options are exercised, the deal would be worth $2.9 billion to Embraer.
Announcing the deal, Embraer emphasized its long-standing relationship with the airline, which was Embraer's "launch customer" (the first airline to sign on the dotted line to buy its planes) for the ERJ 145 airliner back in 1996, and has been buying Embraer planes since the 1980s. (This was all pre-merger. At the time, UA was still known as Continental.)
United says it will fly the new planes under its United Express brand, and will configure them as 76-seaters offering a large first-class section, and larger overhead storage bins. The planes will replace older 50-seat aircraft -- and in addition to carrying more customers, will also be more fuel efficient.
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Round (helical) atelectasis.
Round (helical) atelectasis is a little-known form of pulmonary collapse. It is thought to occur secondary to lung compression from pleural effusion or following therapeutic pneumothorax. Its occurrence is favoured in patients with exudative pleural effusions and extensive pleural thickening. It presents radiographically as a pulmonary pseudotumour, and experience with this entity and its pathogenesis are discussed.
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Stranding
Type
Nominal Diameter
Weight
Conductor
Insulation
Shield
Tinned copper braid
Jacket
PVC, White
Voltage
1000
Catalog Search:
Website Search:
Standard Wire & Cable Company can supply you with the
right sizes, types, and quantities of product you need to keep you on
schedule and your management happy. We have been doing this for
companies since 1947.
If you need a non-stock item, don't worry. We will make it
foryou. Custom cable and custom heat shrink shapes are another of our
specialties. We will design, engineer, and manufacture to meet your
exact requirements.
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The mammalian ABC transporter ABCA1 induces lipid-dependent drug sensitivity in yeast.
ABCA1 belongs to the A class of ABC transporter, which is absent in yeast. ABCA1 elicits lipid translocation at the plasma membrane through yet elusive processes. We successfully expressed the mouse Abca1 gene in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The cloned ABCA1 distributed at the yeast plasma membrane in stable discrete domains that we name MCA (membrane cluster containing ABCA1) and that do not overlap with the previously identified punctate structures MCC (membrane cluster containing Can1p) and MCP (membrane cluster containing Pma1p). By comparison with a nonfunctional mutant, we demonstrated that ABCA1 elicits specific phenotypes in response to compounds known to interact with membrane lipids, such as papuamide B, amphotericin B and pimaricin. The sensitivity of these novel phenotypes to the genetic modification of the membrane lipid composition was studied by the introduction of the cho1 and lcb1-100 mutations involved respectively in phosphatidylserine or sphingolipid biosynthesis in yeast cells. The results, corroborated by the analysis of equivalent mammalian mutant cell lines, demonstrate that membrane composition, in particular its phosphatidylserine content, influences the function of the transporter. We thus have reconstituted in yeast the essential functions associated to the expression of ABCA1 in mammals and characterized new physiological phenotypes prone to genetic analysis. This article is a part of a Special Issue entitled Advances in High Density Lipoprotein Formation and Metabolism: A Tribute to John F. Oram (1945-2010).
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Despite assurances from Swedish politicians that the country's economy is going strong, Sweden is forecast to show the lowest GDP growth per capita in the entire EU, which in the future may affect wage development, municipal finances and pensions.
Sweden's economic growth, measured in GDP per capita, is predicted to be the worst in Europe in 2018, shared with only the UK at a mere 0.7 percent, an updated forecast from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said. This is seen as a continuation of last year's trend when Sweden ranked second-worst in the EU in terms of GDP growth.
At the end of September, outgoing Justice Minister Morgan Johansson tweeted that the Swedish economy was "going strong," hailing its GDP growth as "twice as high as the EU average." However, the report by Statistics Sweden cited by Johansson didn't feature GDP per capita, which is considered the true measure of a country's economic well-being.
Det fortsätter att gå bra för Sverige! BNP- tillväxten andra kvartalet 2018 var dubbelt så hög som EU-genomsnittet. https://t.co/PnI8Huhkyi — Morgan Johansson (@johanssonmorgan) 28 сентября 2018 г.
Economist Tino Sanandaji, a long-time critic of mass immigration of lowly-educated migrants from the Middle East and North Africa, ventured that Sweden's economic backlash is linked to demographic trends. By contrast, the list of EU member-states projected to have the highest GDP rate includes Lithuania (5.1 percent), Slovenia (4.4 percent), Hungary and Poland (4.3 percent each) and Bulgaria (4.2 percent), none of whom was as hard hit by the European migrant crisis as Sweden, which since 2015 has received over 200,000 migrants. However, other factors should be considered as well, he noted.
READ MORE: Rampant Migrant Unemployment Threatens to Further Raise Swedish Taxes — Forecast
"It's partially due to immigration, but it may also be linked to something else," Sanandaji told the news outlet Nyheter Idag, stressing that Sweden's economic stability is exaggerated. To reflect this idea, he posted an image of a train wreck on his Facebook page.
The fact is that large immigrant groups do not enter the labor market as easily as ethnic Swedes, having a higher unemployment rate. On average, it takes Sweden's foreign-born residents eight years to enter the country's labor market. A quarter of those born abroad remain unemployed, while the general level of unemployment hovers at about 7 percent and dropping to as low as 2.5 percent among ethnic Swedes alone. When GDP is calculated per capita a dilution effect is thus created. Therefore, the IMF figures reflect shortcomings in the integration of immigrants.
READ MORE: Half of Sweden's 'New Arrivals' Reportedly 'Lack Compulsory Schooling'
Fluctuations in the world economy also have an impact on Sweden, which is a large export market. Yet another factor is Sweden's unbalanced and debt-ridden housing market.
"GDP per capita is not just a theoretical term for academics. Growth is crucial for the area of wage development, for municipal finances and not least for future pensions. If Sweden continues to have a low GDP per capita, we will have more people forced to live their old age with low pensions," Sanandaji told Nyheter Idag.
The global outlook is less balanced and expansion more tentative than hoped for last April #WEO https://t.co/wXxKO3jvL0 pic.twitter.com/6kSS7MJY3Y — IMF (@IMFNews) 9 октября 2018 г.
Tino Sanandaji is an Iranian-born economist with a PhD from the University of Chicago. He is the author of several books, including "Mass Challenge" on Sweden's immigration policy, which reached the top slots of several best-seller lists.
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Interleukin-4 priming enhances a target for human complement-mediated cytotoxicity of CLL.
JD118 is a murine immunoglobulin M monoclonal antibody (mAb) under study as a therapeutic agent that is capable of potent human complement-mediated cytotoxicity (CMC) against B-cell lymphoma and leukemia targets. The JD118 antigen target was upregulated on fresh human B cells and B-cell neoplasms after brief in vitro incubation in media containing calf serum. To determine if cytokines could also lead to upregulation of JD118 antigen, alpha-interferon (alpha-IFN), gamma-interferon (gamma-IFN), interleukin 2 (IL-2), or IL-4 were added to fresh neoplastic B cells in serum-free media and changes in JD118 antigen expression were evaluated by flow cytometry (FCM). IL-4 was found to be the predominant cytokine responsible for inducing upregulation of the JD118 antigen. Marked JD118 upregulation by IL-4 was seen in 14 out of 14 chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) samples tested, with 50 to 750-fold increases in four samples, 11 to 49-fold increases in four samples, and up to 10-fold increase in six samples. One B-cell lymphoma specimen was upregulated 18-fold, but no up-regulation was demonstrated in one hairy cell leukemia and two acute myelogenous leukemia specimens tested. The specificity of the IL-4 up-regulation was demonstrated by the elimination of its activity by blocking with a neutralizing anti-IL-4 mAb. IL-4 upregulation allows JD118 mAb CMC against otherwise antigen-negative targets and argues for phase I trials using a combination of IL-4 cytokine and mAb for B-cell neoplasms.
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Q:
How to get the index of highest value containing negative number from an array in javascript?
I have an array from which I would like to get the index value of the smallest negative number value.
Eg - var arr_list = [-7, -5, -4, -2, 1, 3, 9]. In the given example I would like to get the index position of the value -2 since its the smallest negative number.
A:
loop over your array and check for < 0 and > my current value:
var arr_list = [-7, -5, -4, -2, 1, 3, 9]
var tmp = arr_list[0]
var count = 0
var index = 0
for (var item of arr_list) {
if (item > tmp && item < 0) {
tmp = item
index = count
}
count++
}
console.log(index)
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The Baked Alaska Card Loyalty Program
You simply register your card at your table and we do the rest. We ask for your birthday and anniversary to send you special offers on these occasions. Swipe your card at the end of each meal and you will accrue points to be used as you so choose. Your balance will appear on your receipt and you may use your rewards after your points have been accrued. Inquire with your server to see what you are eligible for based on your accrued points.
Each dollar is equivalent to a point. Once points are spent, you start with a balance of zero and begin accruing points again! Double Points every Monday.
Here are the exciting things that you can get with your points:
Earn 100 points: $5 off
Earn 200 points: $10 off
Earn 300 points: $15 off
Earn 400 points: $20 off
Earn 500 points: $25 off
Earn 600 points: $30 off
Earn 700 points: $35 off
Earn 800 points: $40 off
Earn 900 points: $45 off
Earn 1000 points $50 off
Earn 2000 points: a tasting menu for two at Baked Alaska ($120 value)
*Offers are subject to change and availability
Terms and Conditions of the Baked Alaska Card
Points accrued during current meal may be used after your transaction has been finalized, not during. The points on your card will expire if your card has not been used in 1 year. Offers are subject to change. This card is not transferable, but can be loaded with additional cash to be used as a gift card. Cash that is loaded by the customer to this card does not expire. This card may only be used at: No. 1 12th St., Astoria, OR 97103.
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The costs of many goods and services in Hawaii, such as housing, energy and food staples like milk, are among the highest in the nation. But in at least one regard Hawaii residents are better off than people in every other state.
According to a study issued this month by Commonwealth Fund, a New York-based health care policy think tank, Hawaii residents participating in employer-sponsored health coverage plans pay the nation’s lowest costs. That includes the amounts spent on employee contributions and co-payments. The amounts spent as a percentage of income are also among the nation’s lowest.
“It might shock your readers because health insurance is expensive, no matter how you cut it,” said Lt. Gov. Josh Green, a former state senator and physician known for working on health policy.
“We tend to be the healthiest state in the nation because we have a much better foundation than any other state,” Green said
Commonwealth Fund
The organization’s “2019 Scorecard on State Health System Performance” bears out Green’s comment. The study measured all 50 states on 47 metrics related to access to health care, quality of care, service use and costs of care, and income-based health care disparities.
Hawaii leads the nation, the study found, trailed by Massachusetts, Minnesota, Washington, Connecticut and Vermont.
“It’s No. 1 overall in the scorecard,” said Sara Collins, the Commonwealth Fund’s vice for health coverage access.
Underpinning Hawaii’s performance, she said, is the state’s Prepaid Health Care Act, a 1974 law that among other things requires employers to provide health insurance coverage to employees working 20 hours or more per week.
One result is that Hawaii’s levels of uninsured persons did not decline as much as those of others states following the passage of the U.S. Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, in 2013.
But Hawaii is still in an enviable position, Collins said, with just 5% of adults and 2% of children uninsured as of 2017. By contrast, in Texas 24% of adults and 11% of children had no health insurance.
With so many people paying premiums into the system, including young people who don’t need much care, the result is lower costs for everyone, Green said. Employee costs for premium contributions and deductibles were far lower than the national average in dollar terms and as a percentage of income.
Average employee contributions to premiums were less than half of the national average.
And employee deductibles were not only lower than the national average, but also dropping, while deductibles nationally went up.
Perhaps most notably, while spending per enrollee in most states rose, Hawaii’s declined by about 5% from 2013 to 2016. According to Green, that is in keeping with the principles of Hawaii’s system, which is not designed merely to spread costs and risk but also to provide better preventative care that reduces overall costs.
Increasing the availability of things like medication to control blood pressure can help prevent more costly problems like strokes and heart attacks down the line, Green said.
“This is an equation that works,” he said.
“Hawaii’s Changing Economy” series is supported by a grant from the Hawaii Community Foundation as part of its CHANGE Framework project.
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Q:
Was it just George that Jodie didn't like?
In the 2005 film version of The Amityville Horror, there is the following dialogue.:
It's okay, Mommy. Jodie won't hurt you. She thinks you're a good mommy. But the man who lives here...she says he's bad. She wants him to go away. He makes her do bad things.
So if George moved out, Kathy with her children could've stayed in the house and live with no problems?
A:
Jodie has been killed by her brother possessed by the evil spirit in the house.
So it seems logical that what she don't like in George is that evil spirit slowly taking possession of him.
If he were to leave the house, its difficult to know what would have happened :
does this spirit can take possession of a woman (the mother) or a little boy ? in that case it will restart again
does this spirit need some grown up man with a bit of aggressive personnality to begin the slow process of possession?
in that case they will be peaceful until one of the boy is old enough to be possessed
In my opinion, you need some kind of specific personnality for the spirit of the Reverend Jeremiah Ketcham to begin to mess with you...
Ronald Defeo was the only one possessed, not his father or his little brothers, so it must need something to begin with
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A visual treat for Friday. Thanks to a wonderful merger of the internet, modern photography technology, and a great idea… we can all sit at our computers and marvel at the intricacies of modern day Tokyo. This is the work of photographer Jeffrey Martin, and you are only seeing the tiniest slice of what he has done in the above image. The actual image is 600,000 pixels wide and encompasses a 360 degree view of Tokyo as seen from Tokyo Tower. To really appreciate it, you have to check out the interactive version on 360gigapixels.com.
To give you an idea of the scale of this thing, here is a 100% crop of the screen zoomed in all the way on a billboard featuring Pelé.
And here is a 100% crop zoomed all the way out. The red arrow shows you where the Pelé billboard is. Amazing!
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Contact Information
E-Show jewelry factory is established in 2006, located in the global biggest commodity city---Yiwu, China. We specialize in developing, producing and marketing imitation jewelry. Until now, we have branch factories. The one is mainly manufacture alloy,..
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Cyclo (His-Pro), d-amphetamine and striatal dopamine: a microdialysis study.
Extracellular levels of dopamine (DA) and its metabolites (DOPAC and HVA) were monitored in the striatum of rats using in vivo microdialysis, in an attempt to elucidate the mechanism of cyclo (His-Pro) (histidyl-proline-diketopiperazine, CHP) on dopaminergic activity. Pretreatment with CHP (0.5 mg/kg SC) (n = 5) or the equivalent volume of saline (n = 5) was followed 30 min later by 5 mg/kg IP of d-amphetamine. Dialysate samples were collected and analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography with electrochemical detection (HPLC-EC). Following the initial increase in DA caused by d-amphetamine, DA levels of CHP-treated rats were significantly lower than saline-treated rats across time (p less than 0.05). No difference was observed for DOPAC or HVA. It is therefore unlikely that CHP interferes with the d-amphetamine-induced inhibition of DA reuptake. Other neurotransmitter systems may be involved in the CHP-induced augmentation of amphetamine's behavioral effects. Our data, as well as previous findings, suggest that attenuation of the dopaminergic response to d-amphetamine might be best explained on the basis of striatal DA depletion, possibly via tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) inhibition. This study also indicates that a dissociation may exist between the behavioral and the striatal DA response to acute amphetamine. The data support the hypothesis that amphetamine releases DA from a newly synthesized, extravesicular cytoplasmic pool, and that intracellular striatal DA is present in considerable excess relative to the extracellular DA.
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{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
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Alzheimer's disease cerebrospinal fluid biomarker discovery: a proteomics approach.
There is significant interest in the identification of effective biomarkers for Alzheimer's disease. Such biomarkers could aid in the clinical diagnosis of the disease and may be useful in assessing the efficacy of various treatment strategies. The search for biomarkers often includes the analysis of changes in cerebrospinal fluid protein expression that correlate with disease. These changes can be measured using a variety of technologies for protein expression profiling. Although there is great promise in the application of these methods to biomarker discovery based on some preliminary observations, there are significant issues in the capabilities of most of these technologies that have limited their effective application. The most recent literature involving proteomic discovery of new cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers for Alzheimer's disease is reviewed.
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{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
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Faulkner, 49, has quietly become an almost ubiquitous presence at the 21st Century Fox-owned network, hosting an hour of “Fox Report Weekend” on Sunday evenings as well as serving as a co-anchor on “Outnumbered,” the noontime program that has “one lucky guy” spar with four female panelists Monday through Friday.
Faulkner may not be what viewers typically expect on their TV screen. “I challenge you to go and turn on the other cable networks to find a face like mine in primetime,” says the correspondent of female African-Americans hosting evening programs. Yet her presence at the network is very deliberate. “I chose Harris for these roles because she’s an excellent journalist with a distinct ability to handle breaking news on the ‘Fox Report’ and seamlessly transition to an issue-driven talk show like ‘Outnumbered,’” said Roger Ailes, Fox News’ chairman and chief executive, via email. “Her dedication to the news product and dynamic presence have become a key part of the network.”
Faulkner may be getting more exposure as Fox News ponders new ideas. “The more we expand into digital properties, she’s probably a natural for that,” said Jay Wallace, senior VP of news and politics at Fox News, in an interview. “I can see her getting into podcasting, radio, digital properties – really as much time as she can give.” Already, she spearheads an extra segment of “Outnumbered” that appears via streaming video, monitoring queries from the audience while the show is in the midst of its traditional broadcast.
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Q:
Use AJAX to populate page after page loads using jQuery
I would appreciate any help on this issue.
Lets say I want to load controls for different items on the page AFTER it has finished loading.
So:
Object 1
<div id="controls1" class="controls" item_id="1"></div>
Object 2
<div id="controls2" class="controls" item_id="2"></div>
Object 3
<div id="controls3" class="controls" item_id="3"></div>
How could I use jQuery to popular the DIVs with class of "controls" using an AJAX call? In this case, I guess it will have to do 3 ajax calls to popular each DIV.
My ajax to grab content is ajax.php?request=controls&item_id=
Thanks!
A:
A basic way to do this is as follows:
$(document).ready(function() {
$('#controls1').load('ajax.php?request=controls&item_id=1');
$('#controls2').load('ajax.php?request=controls&item_id=2');
$('#controls3').load('ajax.php?request=controls&item_id=3');
});
A nicer way would be to dynamically determine how many 'controls' divs you have, and load them as needed... For example:
$(document).ready(function() {
$('.controls').each(function() {
var theId = $(this).attr('item_id');
$(this).load('ajax.php?request=controls&item_id=' + theId);
});
});
Good luck!
Update:
To avoid using the custom item_id attribute, you could extract the ID you want from the element's ID, using a regular expression perhaps, like so... (warning, not tested)
$(document).ready(function() {
$('.controls').each(function() {
var theId = $(this).attr('id');
theId = /controls(\d+)/.exec(theId)[1];
$(this).load('ajax.php?request=controls&item_id=' + theId);
});
});
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{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
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Edward Dutton, 4th Baron Sherborne
Edward Lenox Dutton, 4th Baron Sherborne (23 April 1831 – 18 July 1919), was a British peer and diplomat.
Background
Sherborne was the son of James Dutton, 3rd Baron Sherborne, of Sherborne, Gloucestershire, by his wife, Lady Elizabeth Howard (1803–1845), daughter of Thomas Howard, 16th Earl of Suffolk, and Hon. Elizabeth Jane Dutton.
Career
Sherborne was a British diplomat with posts in Frankfurt, Germany and in Madrid, Spain. At the age of 51 he became the 4th baron Sherborne and inherited the Sherborne estate which had been somewhat depleted by his father. Through frugality, careful administration and his marriage to an heiress, the 4th Lord Sherborne was successful in restoring the barony's formerly strong financial position. Sherborne was President of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society 1887-1888. In addition, he was an antiquarian, an ornithologist and Justice of the Peace for the County of Gloucester.
Family
On 5 July 1894, at the age of 63, Lord Sherborne married Emily Theresa de Stern (1846–1905), daughter of Baron Herman de Stern and his wife Julia Goldsmid, dau. of Aaron Asher Goldsmid, of Cavendish Square, co. Middlesex. The Stern banking family, much intermarried with the Goldsmids, Salomons, Mocattas, Montefiores and Jessels, was one of the most prominent (extended) families of (Sephardic) Anglo-Jewry. They had no children.
Sherborne died on 18 July 1919, aged 88, and was succeeded in the barony by his brother, Frederick.
References
Category:1831 births
Category:1919 deaths
Edward
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Church Prays For Success Of Buhari In His Second Term
The Foursquare Gospel Church in Nigeria has prayed for the success of President Muhammadu Buhari on the renewal of his mandate by the Nigerian electorate during the recent presidential election.
A letter addressed to the President and signed by the General Overseer, Rev Felix Meduoye on behalf of the Board of Directors, leadership and entire worshippers of Foursquare Gospel Church in Nigeria, said: as a Church, we will continue in our duty of offering prayers for the success of your administration.”
The Church also prayed for President’s sound health and divine wisdom to guide him in lifting the country to the desired level of growth, development and progress.
“We pray that God will enable you to utilize this God-given mandate to continue to forge a strong, virile and united Nigeria irrespective of race, religion or region.
“Your victory at the presidential poll held on Saturday February 23, 2019 is a testimony of God’s divine providence over your life. We commend your administration for providing the enabling environment for a generally peaceful and successful election.
“We urge you to see your renewed presidential mandate as a call from all Nigerians to you to marshal the growth, unity and stability of our dear country. We therefore pray that God will enable you to utilize this God-given mandate to continue to forge a strong, virile and united Nigeria irrespective of race, religion or region.”
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The present invention relates to a separating and cleaning arrangement for a self-propelled harvester thresher. More particularly, it relates to such a separating and cleaning arrangement which has a rotor drivingly supported in a housing fixedly mounted in the machine and provided with an inlet and outlet opening.
Separating and cleaning arrangements of the above mentioned general type are known in the art. The rotor of a known arrangement has a casing and a rotor shaft which is surrounded by said casing and has at its both ends a bearing which supports the rotor relative to the housing. The rotor of such harvester thresher must be dismounted in the event of required repair or maintenance works or removing of a coil winder. In every such case it is necessary to dismount both the front and the rear rotor shaft bearings with their holders. This is connected with high time consumption because of adherence of the agricultural product to these parts.
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{
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
}
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banner
Sunday, March 30, 2014
Laney Briggs has long been reckless, but she's turned herself around - she's respectably engaged and she's become a Pistol Rock deputy sheriff. Everything's fine until a dead body turns up and her ex, Texas Ranger Gunner Wilson, decides to stick his boots into the town's first murder case.
A collection of three full length novels by New York Times Bestselling Author Carly Phillips
PERFECT PARTNERS No sooner had Chelsie Russell and Griffin Stuart lost their siblings in a car crash than they find themselves fighting for custody of their two year old niece. Griff wins only to discover Chelsie is the only one who can soothe the child's night terrors and fears. Chelsie and Griff bond over the little girl and their growing sexual desire is mutual. But is it enough? Chelsie's been hurt before and Griff isn't sure he can trust the woman who once tried to take his niece away. What will it take for them to realize they are ... perfect partners?
THE RIGHT CHOICE Advice columnist Carly Wexler is convinced she can map out her path to happiness and that includes marrying her best friend. No sexual sparks? No problem, or so she thinks. Until Mike Novak, her fiance's brother arrives for the wedding. Carly has never experienced desire like Mike ignites inside her and it shakes everything she’s ever believed in. Add Mike’s determination to stop this wedding of mismatched opposites and Carly is forced to reevaluate her best-laid plans. Can she accept that her unexpected love for Mike is the right choice for her after all?
SOLITARY MAN After an intense night of passion to block out shared grief, jaded cop Kevin Manning abandons Nikki Welles, convinced she deserves more than he can ever give. He returns months later to discover she's pregnant with his child, juggling work and pregnancy alone. Nikki doesn’t regret the baby she’s caring but she wants nothing to do with Kevin and his apologies. It’s time for Kevin to prove to Nikki he’s worthy of her love and capable of creating a family. But it’s up to Nikki to forgive.
After a series of girls are ritualistically murdered on the cold streets of Philadelphia, seasoned detective, Sydney Willows, is forced to work with sexy, alpha vampire, Kade Issacson. While working the case, Sydney finds herself inexplicably drawn to Kade, fighting the passion she feels towards him. Kade, determined to solve the case and mete out justice, is captivated by the independent, fiery detective. As he attempts to protect her from a very real murderer, Kade grows concerned that the beautiful, but very human detective, could easily end up dead should she tangle with supernatural forces that are beyond her control.
The investigation leads them into a dark and dangerous world, deep in the heart of New Orleans, where together, they search for the perpetrators of the Voodoo killings. Sydney soon becomes the target of the killer and ends up fighting for her life and love in the Big Easy. If she makes it out alive, will she give into the intoxicating desire she feels for Kade?
**Warning: This book is filled with several erotic sex scenes and is for adult readers only.
An erotic paranormal romance… Sexy vampire, Luca Macquarie doesn’t do love; especially not with humans. Yet, ever since he rescued Samantha Irving, he can’t deny the enigmatic attraction he’s developed for the alluring mortal woman. Concerned for her safety, he’s determined to bring Samantha back to her coven. His mission is to go find the novice witch and bring her home, nothing more, nothing less; falling for her is not supposed to be part of the plan.
Samantha doesn’t want to be a witch, yet that’s exactly what she is. After failing to elicit her magic, she escapes to the mountains in an attempt to resume a semblance of her previous human life. When an arsonist torches her cabin, Samantha’s worst fears are realized. Aware that her life is on the line, she reluctantly agrees to return to New Orleans with Luca.
In the Big Easy, Samantha and Luca embark on a spellbinding journey, searching for a mystical amulet that promises to release her obligation from an ancient, lethal vampire who’s been threatening her life. With cryptic clues and clandestine allies, will Luca and Samantha destroy the dangerous amulet before others acquire it, setting forth a chain of catastrophic consequences? And will Luca give into his erotic desire for the witch who magically captures heart?
A college student Natalie Wright. She hasn't had it easy for years , emotionally. Her one safe haven is music. Soul breaking , body quaking, lyrics sung in such a voice the emotions are conveyed onto you. Enter Ryan "Steele" Hurst , a chart topping lead singer in the rock band "Steele's Army". The bands songs are about cheapening the meaning of love . They project the bad-boy image.
Can these two polar opposites coincide with each other on a summer tour making it out unscathed ?
This is Book #2 in the Rock Romance Series and not a stand alone. Book #1 First Chance must be read first. Warning: This is suitable for 18+ due to mature content. Ryan "Steele" Hurst has made mistakes in life and overcame it all, including his not so great childhood. Natalie Wright, a college student, has made choice's that could ruin her life. Liam will stop at nothing to protect her. Layla only wants the best for her life long friend and will do whatever she can to make sure that happens. Loyalty will be questioned. Relationships will be tested. Betrayal will sting. Will Natalie survive? Will Ryan get his Happily ever after?
To live is to suffer; to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.
Friedrich Nietzsche.
Frankie...
The bitterness is consuming. It's intensity slashes and claws at my insides, it's hatred wrenching my soul as it curls and nurtures my need for revenge.
HIS torture only feeds my vice. I won't let HIM break me, only strengthen me. The pain HE gives is welcomed, it's rawness fuelling the loathing inside with each of HIS thrashes and tears on my pale skin, with every harsh truth HE breathes in my ear and with each of HIS crippling holds.
I have waited too long for this and I'll never let the bastard win.
He will have to end me before I give in.
But now HE has a weapon against me. Something I swore throughout my life I would never let in;
Love.
Tate.
Tate...
Her strength astounds me. HE doesn't seem to break her.
HIS relentless persecution and determination to bury her under his furious reign and brutality eats at my soul. It has found that dark place inside me, the pit of hell I had locked and secured away, and enriched it, demanded its flourish and ripened its ferocity. The family wrath.
She'll never give in, and I pray every night as I guide her through the darkness that tomorrow will bring the light to her soul before it is consumed, finally, by the plague of HIM.
Evil.
Jude.
Jude...
She blossoms under my torture, the soft suppleness of her skin ripping and tearing as though her soul is trying to break free from the agony.
I'll allow it, because I can. Because I need her soul. I crave the sustenance it feeds my rage with, my thirst for cruelty quenched by the sounds of her desolate screams and my hunger for blood, nourished by the slow drip of her life force at my feet.
She thinks I won't break her, so does he. They underestimate the blood that slithers through my veins. It's the blood that tenures those around me.
The bloodthirsty.
The Shadows of Sin.
Review: 4 Stars
I'd like to start by saying I had an idea
this story would be a wide ride before I started reading it, only because I'm
familiar with DH Sidebottom's work and her brand of intense storytelling.
With that being said, Fragile Truths not only exceeded my expectations
but added a level of intensity and brutality I didn't expect.
In this story, we follow Francesca, Tate
and Jude through intermittent encounters that began at a young age until coming
full circle in adulthood. Francesca finds herself caught between a new
found love, that brings about a self discovery she never expected, and a
lifelong promise for revenge.
As the story progressed I found myself
admiring the heroine of this book so much more than any previous books I've
read. No matter what was thrown at her, her strength only grew that much
more and all while discovering a love she never expected and would die for, if
needed. Her devotion and love for her family and Tate are awe inspiring and
she's willing give up anything and everything.
You'll enjoy the passion between Tate and
Frankie and you'll cringe at the brutality they each endure for that love.
D.H.SidebottomIs the author of over 11 erotic/thriller books on the Amazon Kindle site, including the Heart of Stone series and Room 103 series. The first book in the new Shadows of Sin Mafia series, Fragile Truths, written along with co-author R.M. James, has just been released.Among other ventures, she also writes the narrative, dialogue and advertising monologues for HyperSloth, an indie games company and their current game, Dream.She was raised in a loving family with one brother in Derbyshire, UK and grew up with a rowdy group of bikers who she considered her brothers as well as her friends, and who also made school life a whole lot easier. She has a wild imagination that she says is never silent and on occasion, a mind that can from time to time scare the hell out of her.Dawn is a single mum to three children, aged from 12 to 21, whom she regards as her 'life support system'...along with coffee, and is awaiting the birth of her first grandchild.She is an avid reader, enjoying a mixed genre from paranormal and erotica to horrors and biographies. Her taste in music is very eclectic, ranging from The Goo Goo Dolls and OneRepublic to Hinder and Poison and she always generates a playlist for each book.She is an eager supporter to all indie authors and helps advise, edit and beta for several upcoming writers; however her main love, apart from spending time with her children and writing, is enjoying her friends' company and figuring out how to remain upright after several beers, which she has yet to fathom.Stay connected with D.H. on Facebook R.M. James
R.M. James is so excited about having her writing dream come
true. She lives in England with her husband and seven year old daughter. She
has been married to the love of her life for 12 years and is mother to one of
the most beautiful girls to ever live. Collaborating with D.H. Sidebottom has
been so fun and exciting. Her favorite genres are erotica and young adult.
Favorite authors consists of Colleen
Hoover, Jessica Sorensen, Pepper Winters, Jodi Ellen Malpas and K. Bromberg to
name just a few. R.M.’s passion for reading and writing is shadowed only by her
love for Starbucks and film.
Thursday, March 27, 2014
Sequel to the #1 Amazon Best-Seller, The Debt & the Doormat (available for FREE)
Poppy and Jazz’s lives sound perfect on paper. Jazz has a new baby and Poppy’s getting married. But their realities are very different.
Poppy must strive to keep her cool new job with crazy hours, while trying to keep Ryan happy. Before she knows it her wedding has got out of control, thanks to her mother, the runners at work are bullying her, her parents are in financial difficulty and she’s doubting everything and everyone she ever knew.
Meanwhile Jazz is struggling with motherhood, something a credit card won’t fix. Why won’t this baby give her a break? Will Jazz be able to cope before she loses it?
And will Poppy make it down the aisle? Will Ryan even be waiting?
Review: 4 Stars
The Baby & the Bride picks up a few months after The Debt & the Doormat left off and immediately pulls you in with laughter. We continue to follow Poppy and her life of people pleasing but are also given the POV of her best friend Jazz as she adjusts to being a new mother. In this story we get to experience their ups and downs as they continue to discover their road to being official grown-ups no matter how much they try to hold on to the good ol' days of their youth.
I enjoyed the comical situations they're thrust into as they plan a wedding and becoming accustomed to having a baby in their group. Poppy's ever intrusive mother keeps everyone on their toes with her take charge, over the top persona while Ryan, the gorgeous groom-to-be, deals with family drama, due to Poppy's meddling.
The characters are just wonderfully ordinary people with typical dramas occasionally overshadowed by Poppy's constant bad luck. There were several instances I nearly fell over with laughter. This was a great comedy and would be handy to have when getting over a serious book hangover from an intense read. My suggestion is to get cozy, grab a glass of wine and enjoy. I highly recommend it.Amazon US: http://amzn.to/1mvZFBYBarnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/OWAD0T
Sunday, March 23, 2014
Poppy and Jazz have been best friends from the first week of Uni. Whenever these two get together trouble isn't far away and things haven't changed much. When Jazz gets herself into financial trouble Poppy, being a good friend, offers to help. She instead ends up being talked into swapping lives, with Jazz insisting it will be good and help her get over her broken heart.
Poppy is thrown into a new life, full of crazy housemates; there's fitness freak Izzy, horrendously beautiful bitch Grace and the slightly gorgeous, if not incredibly grumpy Ryan. Quickly, with the help of Jazz, her life is thrown upside down. Madness ensues and her need to please everyone gets her in more trouble than she could ever imagine.
Before she knows it she's got a fake boyfriend and is hiding so many secrets she's scared they'll spill out any minute. With a bullying boss, a sex crazed colleague, a mental mother and three brothers each with their own dramas, life has gotten pretty difficult for Poppy. And all of this would be much easier, if she could just stop falling over.
Will she get her life back to normal before her brother's upcoming wedding? And will she want to?
As a new blogger, I was approached by the author to review her new release The Baby & the Bride which is a sequel to The Debt & the Doormat. To learn the back story of her latest release, I immediately began reading her first story about Poppy Windsor and her agreement to help her best friend, Jazz Green, out of debt and help Jazz gain some life stability.
Little did she know how much this new arrangement of swapping lives would affect her instead. An honest to goodness people pleaser, Poppy gets herself into numerous sticky situations because she's constantly trying to avoid hurting anyone's feelings causing some very funny outcomes. Ultimately, Poppy learns a lot about herself and becomes a stronger person for it.
I can't tell you how many times I was asked what I was reading because I was laughing out loud during breaks at work, at the store or even at a concert while I waited for it the band to set up. More recently, I was explaining the book to my sister on our road trip to the Austin Book Fest and even the couple scenes I explained to her had us both full on belly laughing in the car.
Laura Bernard did a wonderful job with this story. Not only did I laugh at Poppy's predicaments but I felt like I could totally relate to what she was feeling and why she did the things she did. Ultimately, Poppy learns a lot about herself and becomes a stronger person for it.
This is a great story for when you're getting over the ultimate book hangover and need some comedy relief. I five it 4 stars. Go ahead and one-one click. The book is currently a freebie and I don't how long that will last. It's definitely one for your kindle library.
Sunday, March 9, 2014
I'm intrigued by him.But I can't get close to him either.His music strokes my soul, butchers my broken heart.I wish he'd see me, but he only sees her. It's been so long since I've had to care that I'm not sure I can do it anymore. Now, tell me, why is there a gun to my head?
*************Sydney Charell is ... interesting.I want to touch her, kiss her, posses her.But I don't understand her.She dances on poles and can't carry a tune to save her life.I feel like an outsider on the in, but I have too many secrets to hide. Naomi Knox has my heart, but I think I might need it back. I want a chance to use it before it breaks. Or splatters. Blood will be spilled; I just hope it isn't mine.
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{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
Q:
Scanner.hasNext() returning false on normal run, but true on debug
I have to read some information from files as soon as they're created in a directory. These files are created automatically by another program. For that, I'm using the WatchService to watch for file creation, and Scanner to read the file. On the main method, I have a simple while(true), and my Watcher class is called. This is the constructor:
public Watcher(String srcDir, String targetDir) throws IOException, InterruptedException {
this.srcDir = Paths.get(srcDir);
this.targetDir = Paths.get(targetDir);
this.watcher = this.srcDir.getFileSystem().newWatchService();
this.srcDir.register(watcher, StandardWatchEventKinds.ENTRY_CREATE); // this will check ONLY for new files; no
// deletions or modifications
this.key = this.watcher.take();
}
And the method called in the main loop (I removed part of the code because it's not relevant):
public void checkForNewFile() throws IOException {
String[] info = new String[6];
if (this.watcher != null) {
List<WatchEvent<?>> events = this.key.pollEvents();
newFileName = "";
for (WatchEvent event : events) {
// I kept getting errors when trying to get only the last event
newFileName = event.context().toString();
}
if(newFileName != "") {
System.out.println("opening new file...");
Scanner scanner = new Scanner(new FileInputStream(srcDir.toString() + "/" + newFileName));
String line;
System.out.println(scanner.hasNext());
while(scanner.hasNext()) {
line = scanner.nextLine();
System.out.println("splitting lines...");
String[] parts = line.split("|");
...
}
scanner.close();
}
this.key.reset();
}
}
In the method above, when I run the program normally, System.out.println(scanner.hasNext()); returns false and the while loop never happens, but when debugging, the code works fine.
I know this points to threading issues, but I'm not explicitly creating any threads, and this project doesn't even need multiple threads. Am I doing something wrong? What can I do to allow this code to work correctly?
A:
I would guess, that your code reads a newly generated file, where the content is not flushed yet and therefor is no line. In debug there is more time for the thread writing the file and flush it.
Perhaps you can play around with file locks to get rid of this problem.
|
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"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
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|
Carotid endarterectomy in the presence of contralateral carotid occlusion: the role of EEG and intraluminal shunting.
Patients undergoing carotid endarterectomy in the presence of occlusion of the contralateral carotid artery appear at greater risk for operative-related stroke or death. We had experience with 37 such patients in a five-year period. Routine intraluminal shunting without EEG monitoring was used in nine patients. Twenty-eight patients had continuous EEG monitoring during surgery. Of this group, 12 patients required intraluminal shunting based on intraoperative EEG criteria. In the early postoperative period, there was one death, and there were no instances of new, fixed neurological deficits. Life table analysis shows that 80% of the patients are neurologically stable in the five-year follow-up period. Electroencephalographic monitoring proved valuable in the detection of patients requiring intraluminal shunting, in the occasional recognition of poorly functioning shunts, and in the determination of the importance of alterations in blood pressure or cardiac rhythm on cerebral blood flow.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
In the above cited copending patent application by the present inventor, a method and apparatus for halftone screening of images using concatenated strips of an ideal angled screen pattern to form the scan lines of a desired screen is described. The present application relates to an improved method and apparatus for halftone screening of images, which is particularly useful for high speed implementation in hardware. A general background of halftone image screening is set forth below.
Images are typically stored in a memory representing tone values for each pixel of the original image. For a black and white image, the stored pixels represent the gray scale value corresponding to each pixel. For a color image, each color plane is stored as an array of pixels each representing the tone value for each pixel of the image in each respective color plane. For example, if each of the pixels of a black and white image is represented by a 8 bit digital word, then the tone value for a given image pixel may be one of 256 values between the black level and the white level.
Continuous tone images do not print well on most printing devices where typically the absence or presence of the ink on the paper is used to represent the printed image. In order to represent halftones (shades between the presence or absence of the printed ink), the original image is screened to produce a pattern, such as variable size dots which appear to the human eye as a halftone image.
In order to prepare a photograph for printing, it is first necessary to perform the step of halftone screening, which converts the continuous gray shades of the original into dots of varying size and shape. Typically, these dots are arranged on a regular grid of approximately 100 dots per inch. This spatial frequency is known as the screen ruling. Thus, one square inch of the final printed photograph will be composed of approximately 10,000 dots.
Screening to produce halftone images is well known. The screen consists of an array of dots, or halftone cells, each of which represents one section of continuous tone in the original image as a single dot of variable size and shape. A halftone cell, in turn, consists of an array of smaller screen pixels, or samples, each having individual values against which the input pixels derived from the original image will be compared. The individual values of the smaller screen pixels, or samples, of the repeating halftone cell which form the variable dots is referred to herein as a spot function.
The halftone screening step consists of a screen pattern generating step, and a comparison step between the input image and the screen pattern. The screen is usually stored as a fairly small pattern that repeats itself or is repeatedly generated by programming. At any point where the original image is greater than the screen pattern, the output is marked. At any point where the image is not greater than the screen pattern, the output is not marked. In other words, if the value of the image pixel is greater than corresponding value of the screen cell, a mark is generated by the marking engine, whereas if the value of the image pixel is less or equal to the screen cell value, then no mark is generated by the marking engine, or vice versa. In this way, the final screened image, composed of dots, is produced.
In color printing, there are four separate steps of halftone screening, one each for the cyan, magenta, yellow, and black inks. It is advantageous to angle the halftone grid differently for each of the four planes. For example, the most common practice is to angle the cyan dots by 15 degrees, magenta by 75 degrees, yellow by 0 (or 90) degrees, and black by 45 degrees. If these angles are adhered to precisely, as well as the screen ruling being precisely identical for all four planes, then optimum results are achieved.
Precise screen angles can be achieved quite easily in photomechanical systems by simply rotating the photographic screen carrier. However, when the image is processed electronically, and the screened image is to be produced by a digital raster scan recording device, the problem becomes much more difficult. Rational numbers, which can be represented as the ratio of two integers, are relatively easy to accurately represent in a digital computer. Irrational numbers, which cannot be represented as the ratio of two integers, are much more difficult to accurately represent in a digital image processing device or digital computer. The tangent of a 15 or 75 degree angle is an irrational number. Therefore, screens of 15 and 75 degrees can be expected to be difficult to generate in a digital device. Also, irrational screen rulings where the number of pixels per screen cell is not a rational number can be expected to be difficult to accurately reproduce in a digital image processing device.
Prior art techniques fall into two classes. In the first class, the angles can be approximated, but not achieved precisely. These techniques are known as rational tangent angle techniques, because the screen angles are limited to arctangents of rational numbers. As a result of the inaccuracy of the screens angles and rulings, objectionable moire patterns result. A method exemplary of this technique is taught in 4,149,194 (Holladay). The screen pattern is represented by a strip of pixels. To generate the screen pattern, this strip is repeated across the width of the image. To angle the screen pattern, this strip is shifted by a certain number of pixels each scan line. An advantage of this technique is that it is very fast. Another advantage is the relatively modest memory requirement for the screen.
In the second class of screen generating techniques, precise angles and rulings can be achieved, but only at the cost of a large amount of computation for each pixel. This technique is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,499,489 (Gall) and 4,350,996 (Rosenfeld). The device coordinate system is represented by XY space, and a halftone cell in the screen to be printed is represented by a vector in UV space, i.e. the coordinate system of the rotated screen. For each pixel, the position of the pixel in XY space is transformed into UV space. The screen pattern for that point can be determined by applying the spot function to the UV coordinates.
Although Gall and Rosenfeld describe certain speed optimizations, the disclosed technique requires many more operations per pixel than do rational angle techniques, and therefore the hardware implementation is more complex. Another technique for generating accurate screen angles is described in European Patent 0 427 380 A2 (Schiller). The Schiller patent describes a rational tangent angle method that can achieve fairly accurate screens at the cost of requiring a substantial amount of memory, typically on the order of hundreds of thousands of words.
The present invention uses a novel technique which has the simple hardware requirements of a rational tangent method yet produces halftone screens with the precision of irrational angles. The present invention provides a method for implementing a halftone screen pattern generation system for rotated screens including multiple angle and ruling combinations, and to produce a screened image formed with a rotated screen on a digital raster output device. In addition, the present invention provides a method of computing halftone screened images that can be implemented simply as a hardware circuit as well as a computer program.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
}
|
[Supratentorial-infraoccipital (or occipitopolar) approach: clinical and anatomical study].
Twenty-two patients harboring tumors or vascular lesions (AVMs and aneurysms) located at the posterior aspect of the parahipocampal gyrus and the pulvinar of thalamus operated by supratentorial-infraoccipital approach were analysed. Total resection was achieved in all five AVM patients as well as in six out of fifteen tumor patients. This approach was performed in five anatomical specimens (ten approaches); It results, along with the surgical results, allow this approach to be considered a good option for lesions of the pulvinar of thalamus and postero-medial temporal lobe which are evident at the transverse fissure.
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{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
---
-api-id: M:Windows.UI.Xaml.Controls.VariableSizedWrapGrid.SetRowSpan(Windows.UI.Xaml.UIElement,System.Int32)
-api-type: winrt method
---
<!-- Method syntax
public void SetRowSpan(Windows.UI.Xaml.UIElement element, System.Int32 value)
-->
# Windows.UI.Xaml.Controls.VariableSizedWrapGrid.SetRowSpan
## -description
Sets the value of the [VariableSizedWrapGrid.RowSpan](/uwp/api/windows.ui.xaml.controls.grid#xaml-attached-properties) XAML attached property on a target element.
## -parameters
### -param element
The target element.
### -param value
The value to set.
## -remarks
For more info, see the [VariableSizedWrapGrid.RowSpan](/uwp/api/windows.ui.xaml.controls.grid#xaml-attached-properties) attached property.
## -examples
## -see-also
[VariableSizedWrapGrid.RowSpan](/uwp/api/windows.ui.xaml.controls.grid#xaml-attached-properties)
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{
"pile_set_name": "Github"
}
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"Estoy agradecida de no tener que preocuparme todo el tiempo por mi olor a cigarrillos, Elite es la mejor opción en precio y beneficio que he encontrado en México como sustituto al cigarro"
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{
"pile_set_name": "OpenWebText2"
}
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Bartonella and Coxiella antibodies in 334 prospectively studied episodes of infective endocarditis in Sweden.
Bartonella spp. have been identified as aetiological agents in culture-negative infective endocarditis (IE). Coxiella burnetii may cause chronic Q-fever with endocarditis, 334 blood samples collected from 329 patients (334 episodes) with IE diagnosed between 1984 and 1996 in Göteborg, Sweden, were investigated for antibodies to Bartonella spp. and C. burnetii. 71 of the episodes (21%) were blood culture negative. A microimmunofluorescence assay revealed immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies to Bartonella in 13 of the culture verified episodes and in 2 of the culture-negative episodes. Three of the patients had IgG antibodies to > or = 200 in the blood culture-verified group, but none had a titre > or = 800, the cut-off level for Bartonella endocarditis. One patient had elevated antibodies to C. burnetii, diagnosing chronic Q-fever endocarditis. In conclusion, serologically verified Bartonella endocarditis is not prevalent in western Sweden and Q-fever endocarditis is rare.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "PubMed Abstracts"
}
|
SYDNEY - Evidence at the MH17 crash site has been widely tampered with as part of an apparent cover-up attempt, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said Tuesday. "After the crime, comes the cover-up. What we have seen is evidence tampering on an industrial scale and obviously that has to stop," Abbott told reporters in Canberra. "It's not an accident. It's a crime."
Abbott added that Russian President Vladimir Putin had so far been "as good as his word" by approving a U.N. Security Council resolution guaranteeing safe access to international monitors trying to secure the scene. Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 was shot down last week in eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 passengers and crew on board. Twenty eight Australians were killed. On Monday, Abbott accused the pro-Russia rebels who were controlling acccess to the crash site of leaving it looking more like a "garden clean-up" than a forensic investigation.
In-Depth
Social
A team of forensic investigators finally make it to the #MH17 crash site... 'We're just getting started'. https://t.co/IILn9iq0D5 -Keir Simmons (@KeirSimmons) July 21, 2014
- Reuters
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{
"pile_set_name": "OpenWebText2"
}
|
Different colors and patterns are used for the same image feathers. Interesting-Feather Pattern Print I really like how the feather pattern also has patterned within the imagery themselves - also how the feathers are positioned in different angles
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{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
Q:
Need to convert Fixed Width File to 'Comma' delimited in unix
Need to convert Fixed Width File to 'Comma' delimited in unix.
k12582927001611USNA
k12582990001497INAS
k12583053001161LNEU
Required output:
k,1258292700,1611,US,NA
k,1258299000,1497,IN,AS
k,1258305300,1161,LN,EU
A:
Like this:
awk -v FIELDWIDTHS="1 10 4 2 2" -v OFS=, '{print $1,$2,$3,$4,$5}' file
OFS is the Output Field Separator and I set it to a comma. The FIELDWIDTHS variable does all the magic for you.
Or you can do it in Perl like this:
perl -ne 'm/(.)(.{10})(....)(..)(..)/; printf "%s,%s,%s,%s,%s\n",$1,$2,$3,$4,$5' file
Or, in sed like this:
sed -E 's/(.)(.{10})(....)(..)(..)/\1,\2,\3,\4,\5/' file
A:
Use awk and substr():
awk -v OFS=, '{ print substr($0, 1, 1), substr($0, 2, 10), substr($0, 12, 4), substr($0, 16, 2), substr($0, 18, 2) }' file
Output:
k,1258292700,1611,US,NA
k,1258299000,1497,IN,AS
k,1258305300,1161,LN,EU
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
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|
{
"pile_set_name": "OpenWebText2"
}
|
(Or search using the keywords “accacc wifi” in GooglePlayStore or AppStore)
[Play Contents]
– Airi and Veene await your arrival!
– You can get nice and close to and licky lick kissy kiss their faces.
– Shake the smartphone for piston like thrusting movement.
– Use a combination of kissing and thrusting to make the girls cum.
– You can calibrate the girl’s size, location and angle to your preferences.
– Contains 2 stages x 2 characters x 3 sexual positions!
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
New project from Ski Mask The Slump God "The Book of Eli" available now on DatPiff!
Users who liked this Mixtape......Also liked these. Check them out!
|
{
"pile_set_name": "OpenWebText2"
}
|
You can help us modernize! The present website has been online for a very long time and we want to bring it up to date. As of May 6, we are $2,380 away from our goal of $15,000 to fund the project. The fully redesigned site will be better for mobile, easier to read and navigate, and ready for the next decade. Please give today to join dozens of other supporters in making this important overhaul possible!
For more information, contact us at the following address:
Please read the instructions below the translations before writing!
In your e-mail, always include the names of the translators if you wish to reprint something.
This website began in 1995 as a personal project, and I have been working
on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has
never had any government or institutional funding, so if you
found
the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your gift is greatly appreciated.
- Emily Ezust
Love
Language: English after the German (Deutsch)
One tender look from thy dear eyes,
Gladdens my heart and sorrow dies,
Buried beneath each loving kiss
Which speaks to me of heaven's bliss;
And when I clasp thee to my breast,
Every trouble sinks to rest,
But if thou say thou lovest me
Tears of remorse flow bitterly.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
Official sidesteps queries on cellphone locations
Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.,center, talks with Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, left, and Deputy Attorney General James Cole on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday prior to the start of the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and National Security Agency call records. Lawmakers who oversee US intelligence agencies are working to expand the government's spying powers to allow the FBI to immediately begin electronically monitoring terror suspects who travel to the United States and who already were under surveillance overseas by the NSA.
(AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
WASHINGTON — The nation’s top intelligence official on Thursday sidestepped questions from a senator about whether the National Security Agency has ever used Americans cellphone signals to collect information on their whereabouts that would allow tracking of the movements of individual callers.
Asked twice by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., if NSA had ever collected or made plans to collect such data, NSA chief Gen. Keith Alexander answered both times by reading from a letter provided to senators who had asked the same question last summer. He also cited a classified version of the letter that was sent to senators and said, “What I don’t want to do ... is put out in an unclassified forum anything that’s classified.”
Wyden promised to keep asking.
“I believe this is something the American people have a right to know, whether NSA has ever collected or made plans to collect cell site information,” Wyden said.
The testy exchange at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing illustrates the wider tension that has grown between the public and the U.S. intelligence community, following disclosures by Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old former systems analyst on contract to the NSA, about the extensive NSA collection of telephone and email records of millions of Americans.
Advertisement
The panel’s bipartisan leadership used the hearing to promote their version of legislation to change the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act. The lawmakers seek to trim NSA’s authority to access and analyze U.S. phone records and provide new protections to Americans’ privacy. They also want to broaden the government’s spying powers to allow monitoring of terror suspects who travel to the U.S. after being tracked overseas by the NSA.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., chairwoman of the committee, said the legislation would “strictly limit access to the ... phone metadata records, expressly prohibit the collection of the content of phone calls,” and limit the amount of time such U.S. phone call data could be kept.
Such records show the date and length of calls, and the numbers dialed.
But Feinstein’s proposed legislation would not stop the bulk collection of telephone and email records. A separate bipartisan group of four senators, including Wyden, unveiled legislation earlier this week to end those bulk collections.
Feinstein and the committee’s top Republican, Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, defended U.S. intelligence efforts, as did Alexander and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper — insisting that while they collect U.S. bulk records, they do not listen in on individual Americans’ phone calls or read their emails without a court order.
Alexander and Clapper spoke of wanting to cooperate with suggested changes in order to win back the public’s trust.
Clapper told the committee he was willing to consider limiting both how U.S. telephone and email data collected by NSA is used, and the amount of time it is stored. He said he’s also open to other changes, such as appointing an independent official to oppose the government in hearings before the FISA court, the secret federal court that considers all government surveillance requests.
But Alexander’s exchanges with Wyden and Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., showed the tension between the intelligence community and a bipartisan group of lawmakers who think NSA’s powers need to be drastically cut.
“Is it the goal of the NSA to collect the phone records of all Americans?” Udall asked.
“Yes, I believe it is in the nation’s best interest to put all the phone records into a lockbox that we could search when the nation needs to do it. Yes,” Alexander replied.
But Alexander said the cellphone site data — it shows the whereabouts of cellphone callers, and enables an analyst to track where they go — is different.
“The court has said hold off if you want to do cell-site data or plan to do that, you have to come back to the court,” Alexander said. “Did I answer those right?”
Alexander’s reply was an apparent reference to Wyden’s much-publicized exchange with Clapper earlier this year over whether U.S. intelligence agencies had gathered the telephone records of millions of Americans.
Clapper said no, but then had to apologize later when Snowden’s leaks revealed the bulk collection of U.S. telephone records and email data.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "Pile-CC"
}
|
Add some fun and excitement to your Quinceanera with photo booth rental in San Jose. Your guests are sure to have a wonderful time dressing up in props and making crazy faces with PhotoWorks Interactive Photobooth Rentals of San Jose.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "OpenWebText2"
}
|
Q:
How to handle "Property or field cannot be found on object in SpEL"?
How to handle Property or field <foo> cannot be found on object of type <bar> in SpEL ?
e.g. If data doesn't have placeId property on it then It shouldn't give me above error and return differentValue.
"${@block?.value?.data?.placeId ?: 'differentValue'}"
A:
That's not correct. SpEL is just an another JVM language. It's not non-typed language like JavaScript. So, what is going to happen if your Java class doesn't have some property? Right: Property or field <foo> cannot be found on object of type <bar>.
Therefore a logic in the expression must not rely on some non-Java reflection logic.
You definitely need to have there something like instanceof, but you may live without casting to get access to existing properties.
|
{
"pile_set_name": "StackExchange"
}
|
U.S. Intelligence Undercuts Trump’s Case on Iran-al Qaeda Links
To bolster the Trump administration’s case against Iran, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has given classified briefings to Congress in recent weeks alleging close ties between Iran and al Qaeda. But experts familiar with the views of the U.S. intelligence community are contradicting these claims, saying that the Iran-al Qaeda relationship almost certainly does not include active collaboration in terrorist acts and is even less evident now than it was at the time of 9/11.
“The administration is grasping at straws,” said Seth Jones of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “We are at the lowest point since 9/11 in terms of al Qaeda numbers in that country. The numbers I have looked at suggest it’s less than five [people].”
Jones, a former senior official in U.S. Special Operations Command and a counterterrorism specialist, co-wrote a study that came to this conclusion at the end of last year, and the U.S. intelligence community believes little has changed since then despite the rapidly rising tensions between the United States and Iran, experts say.
Beyond that, there is general agreement among experts that to the extent Iran and al Qaeda have a relationship, it is not one of terrorist collaboration but rather a cautious modus vivendi defined by mutual forbearance, in which they agree not to attack each other and occasionally supply harbor (in Iran’s case, to use as a bargaining chip with Washington).
Indeed, given their religious enmity, Shiite Iran and Sunni-dominated al Qaeda have been mostly at odds since the terrorist group first emerged in the mountains of neighboring Afghanistan and Pakistan. Well before 9/11, Tehran had been backing the Northern Alliance Afghan guerrillas—who were also U.S. allies—fighting the Taliban hosts of al Qaeda. After 9/11, the Iranians rounded up and allegedly placed under house arrest several al Qaeda figures who were inside Iran, and those numbers have fluctuated since then.
Skeptics on Capitol Hill believe Pompeo is making the case about al Qaeda links to avoid asking Congress for a new Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) for military action against Iran. The current AUMF, in force since 9/11, is focused entirely on al Qaeda and associated forces, authorizing the president to use force “against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons.”
Though the administration has not divulged details of Pompeo’s briefings, the implication of his argument appears to be that harboring any al Qaeda member inside Iran could be a casus belli. But even those who take a hawkish position on Iran tend to be dubious of this position.
“I haven’t ever advocated going to war over this,” said Thomas Joscelyn of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “There are certainly plenty of examples of the two [al Qaeda and Iran] being at odds, particularly in Syria and Yemen. And Iran’s detention of some al Qaeda personnel and family members became a flash point between the two sides. [Al Qaeda leader Osama] bin Laden also didn’t approve of Iran expanding its regional footprint.”
Joscelyn added: “However, humans are often duplicitous. And there’s no question that Iran and al Qaeda have had an ‘agreement’ allowing al Qaeda to operate its ‘core pipeline’ for moving money and personnel inside Iran. This fact comes from President [Barack] Obama’s Treasury and State departments, beginning in July 2011.”
Indeed, because they have shared a common enemy—the United States—many experts believe the accommodation between the two has often been subject to sudden shifts based on the mood between Washington and Tehran. After the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Tehran even attempted to swap al Qaeda figures inside the country with the Mujahedin-e Khalq, a rabidly anti-regime Iranian militant group based in Iraq. At the same time, however, there is scant evidence that, even in the most anti-American frame of mind, Tehran ever co-sponsored a terrorist act with al Qaeda; on the contrary, most of the evidence suggests that Iran drew a line there.
“My reading of the Iranian calculation was they were willing to allow, for several years, some al Qaeda members and their families on their territory, as long as they were not involved in plotting attacks,” Jones said.
There have been occasional flare-ups of suspicion. In mid-2003, when bombs tore through three housing complexes in Saudi Arabia and killed 27 people, including nine Americans, hard-liners in the United States blamed Tehran. Citing telephone intercepts, they claimed the bombings had been ordered by Saif al-Adel, one of the al Qaeda figures supposedly imprisoned in Iran. “There’s no question but that there have been and are today senior al Qaeda leaders in Iran, and they are busy,” Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said at the time. But there was never any evidence proffered that the Iranian government knew of Adel’s alleged activities.
James Dobbins, who dealt extensively with Iran as President George W. Bush’s Afghanistan envoy after 9/11, told Foreign Policy: “I don’t think there was ever any evidence of active collaboration or support from Iran, as opposed to a kind of contact, and perhaps simply not interfering with al Qaeda on occasion for whatever reason. Also it’s known that the Iranian government is divided and the left hand doesn’t always know what the right hand is doing.”
The Trump administration in recent days has also sought to make the case that Iran is collaborating with the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan; the Defense Department just published a timeline called the “Iranian Campaign of Malign Influence,” which includes alleged Iranian ties to the May 31 car bomb in Afghanistan that wounded four U.S. service members and killed four Afghan civilians.
“Iranian support to the Taliban has become more formalized and publicly known in recent years. Iran has provided material support to the Taliban since at least 2007,” said Pentagon spokeswoman Rebecca Rebarich. “Iranian support has consisted of small arms, explosives, mortars, [rocket-propelled grenades], heavy machine guns, and 107mm rockets, in addition to training in small unit tactics and the use of weapons systems.”
Jones says this claim “has a bit more truth to it. Iran plays an interesting role in Afghanistan. It has reasonable relations with the Afghan government, including a trade relationship. But Iran provides limited assistance to the Taliban—and has for years—including at training camps on the Iranian side of the border. Iran has also provided limited lethal assistance, including small arms. For a short period, they also provided technical assistance for EFPs [explosively formed penetrators]. But that stopped perhaps a decade ago.”
He added: “Still, one has to put this into perspective. The Taliban’s largest outside supporter—by far—is Pakistan, particularly its chief spy agency, the ISI.” And the United States maintains an alliance with Pakistan.
But the Iranians and the Taliban also make very strange bedfellows—considering that in the past they were deadly competitors. “Iran had almost gone to war with the Taliban after the Taliban attacked the Iranian consulate in Mazar-e-Sharif” in 1998, Dobbins said. “They had been victimizing Shia in Afghanistan and blown up their statues in Bamiyan.”
Shortly after the United States ousted the Taliban from Afghanistan’s major cities in late 2001, the Iranians helped in curtailing Taliban influence in Afghanistan, said Dobbins, who at the time worked closely with Iranian envoy Mohammad Javad Zarif, currently Tehran’s foreign minister. Near the end of talks in Bonn, Germany, Dobbins said, “we reached a pivotal moment,” one that Zarif proved key to resolving in Washington’s favor. The numerous parties to the talks had decided that the U.S.-backed Hamid Karzai would lead the new Afghan government. But he was a Pashtun tribal leader from the south, and the Northern Alliance had actually won Kabul, the capital. According to Dobbins, at 2 a.m. on the night before the deal was meant to be signed, the Northern Alliance delegate, Yunus Qanooni, began demanding the vast majority of new ministries, and the pact was close to breaking down. Frenzied negotiators met in the suite of U.N. representative Lakhdar Brahimi, where Zarif translated for Qanooni and then broke the logjam when he whispered in the Afghan’s ear: “‘This is the best deal you’re going to get.’” Qanooni replied: “‘OK,’” according to Dobbins.
“The Russians and the Indians had been making similar points,” Dobbins said. “But it wasn’t until Zarif took him aside that it was settled. … We might have had a situation like we had in Iraq, where we were never able to settle on a single leader and government.” The next month, Iran added to its political support: In Tokyo, at a donor’s conference to help rebuild Afghanistan, Iran pledged $500 million, which was more than double America’s contribution at the time. In a now familiar pattern, however, a chill swiftly followed the warming in U.S.-Iran relations. Not long after the Tokyo meeting, Bush included Iran with Iraq and North Korea in his infamous “axis of evil” speech.
Even so, Iran continued to cooperate sporadically with Washington in Afghanistan. After the fall of the Taliban, at a time when the United States had very few troops in the country, the Iranian military offered to help train and equip the new Afghan army and continued to pay Northern Alliance forces to mop up al Qaeda, Dobbins said. In addition, immediately after 9/11, there was an outreach from Tehran, and the al Qaeda figures inside Iran were rounded up. “We wanted to truly condemn the attacks but we also wished to offer an olive branch to the United States, showing we were interested in peace,” Mohammad Hossein Adeli, a career Iranian Foreign Ministry official, told my then-Newsweek colleague Maziar Bahari in 2007. Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei—against whom Trump issued new sanctions on Monday—agreed at the time. “The Supreme Leader was deeply suspicious of the American government,” a Khamenei aide told Newsweek in 2007. “But [he] was repulsed by these terrorist acts and was truly sad about the loss of the civilian lives in America.” Tehran issued a statement condemning the attacks and even supported the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan against the Taliban.
But the “axis of evil” speech cost moderates who wanted rapprochement with Washington a lot of credibility, Iranian sources said. “It destroyed the position of those who believed that helping the U.S. would pay off,” as Zarif described it to me in an interview in the mid-2000s. Nonetheless, outreach from Iran continued in the spring of 2003, with a back-channel proposal to start up broad-based talks with the United States on Iran’s then-tiny nuclear program and even its support for Hezbollah. Though such talks were rejected by the Bush administration, they eventually laid the basis for Zarif’s attempts a decade later to negotiate the 2015 nuclear compromise.
Today, with Trump’s rejection of that deal and his attempt to isolate and confront Iran anew, the country’s reformers and moderates have lost their credibility once again, and it’s not impossible that the hard-liners in Tehran are once again rethinking the relationship with al Qaeda and the Taliban. But the evidence of active cooperation remains scant at best, at least with al Qaeda, experts say.
“There are some periods over the last decade and a half where one could have been concerned about Iran and al Qaeda,” Jones said. “But I don’t understand why this is an issue now. And I cannot believe any responsible intelligence analyst wouldn’t come to that same conclusion.
Lara Seligman contributed reporting.
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