IT’S FRIDAY MORNING AND, as usual, I’m sitting cross-legged on my unmade bed, balancing a bowl of Lucky Charms on my knees and trying not to spill milk on my laptop. Again. And, just like I do every day, I’m half paying attention to the morning news show playing on the TV that sits on the corner of my dresser. The hosts are cooing over a cat that learned how to ride the bus. As interesting as that story is, it’s no match for what’s happening on my computer.
Things are heating up on We Are Not Alone, or, as its tagline describes it, Roswell’s Destination for All Things Extraterrestrial. It’s an Internet hangout for super nerds, space freaks, sci-fi lovers, and paranoid weirdos near Roswell—and, as a major alien obsessive from Reardon, an hour away, I definitely qualify.
I scroll through the forum categories—Abduction Experiences, TV Shows, Declassified Information, Equipment—and click on General Theories to check the stats for my latest post as I shovel another spoonful of chalky marshmallows into my mouth. I have 700 “likes” and just 150 “dislikes” for my totally perfect rebuttal of the claims that aliens were behind the recent disappearance of an Air America flight over the Atlantic. I mean, yes, I believe in aliens, but I also believe that planes crash all the time. (My brother, Linc, says the only thing nerdier than being obsessed with aliens is being the downer who destroys everyone else’s theories.)
LittleGreenMen: AlienHuntress OMG YOU ARE MY QUEEN
BlueSuperNova: AlienHuntress wins at everything!!!
BeamMeUp: AlienHuntress, that’s nice in theory, but it’s not totally rigorous. Planes crash all the time, but they don’t usually disappear into thin air. No one’s found any debris and …
Ugh. BeamMeUp appointed himself my own personal devil’s advocate two weeks ago and hasn’t looked back. His most recent comment is true to his pompous, know-it-all form.
Cringing, I read on. He actually uses bullet points to list all the ways I’m wrong. Bullet points! What is this, a PowerPoint presentation?
I shake my head and mutter, “Not today, buddy,” and begin typing my reply. The click of the keys keeps pace with my mom’s heels as they tap across the floor downstairs.
AlienHuntress: BeamMeUp, you think we should just assume every missing aircraft is the result of aliens? Should we amend all of Amelia Earhart’s biographies to state that she was probably abducted by extraterrestrials?
I’m getting into the groove when the morning show host’s soothing voice announces that it’s time for a check on weather and traffic, which means it must be 8:15, which means …
Shit. Class is at 8:25. And I’m going to be late.
I slip my laptop off my lap and pound down the carpeted stairs, straight through the dining room into the kitchen. My cereal bowl rings against the sink when I toss it in. My mom, who’s adjusting a high heel while shoving some gross protein bar in her mouth, scowls.
“Are you running late again?” she says with her mouth full.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry!” I shout, shooting upstairs as she sighs a long, overly dramatic “Mal…” in frustration.
My laptop whirs on my tiny twin bed. Even though my fingers are itching to get back to We Are Not Alone and the virtual smackdown I’m laying on BeamMeUp, I put some effort into picking out a normal outfit to appease Lincoln. My brother’s so eager to be a film director that he thinks he can art direct every aspect of our lives. He still hasn’t forgiven me for a sweatshirt/sweatpants combo that he claimed made me look like “an ’80s workout instructor.”
Today, I’m going with the “Classic Mal”: a pair of jeans and nondescript but fitted T-shirt. Then, on to hair. My BFF, Jenni Agrawal, a beauty vlogger who posts weekly tutorials on topknots and contouring for her adoring fans on her YouTube channel, Just Jenni, would probably try to give my locks a cute name, like “beachy waves.” But I’m honest enough to know that “As Good As It’s Going to Get” is more accurate. My shaggy brown bangs will not be tamed.
“Crap!” I mutter when I can’t find my books in the pile of clothes on the floor. They must be on the kitchen table, where I did homework last night. I go back downstairs and slide across our perpetually polished hardwood floor into the kitchen, where my books are stacked next to my mom’s giant red purse.
Sighing, I pick up the purse and open the front door just as my mom is pulling the minivan back into the driveway. The dry heat is already almost unbearable, and I immediately start to sweat.
“I swear, that’s the last time I forget!” she calls out from the driver’s-side window.
“I’m going to start charging a fee!” I shout. My toes curl nervously over the edge of the doorframe.
“Just bring it here, honey,” she calls, holding her hand out.
I push one bare foot out the door, wincing when it touches the porch. A bead of sweat drips down my forehead and my stomach starts to churn with the force of a thousand chalky marshmallows. A pair of big, invisible arms squeezes my chest and my breath gets shallow.
“Mallory!” Even from a distance, I can see that her cheeks have gone slack—her disappointed look. I despise that look, how it’s become so familiar. Before I can stop myself, I take a full two steps onto the porch so that look will disappear. But her minivan, which I know is only fifteen feet from me, looks like it’s at the end of a tunnel that’s getting longer and longer.
I’m shaking harder. It’s loud now, like someone turned the volume up on the world. The purse feels heavier by the nanosecond while the taste of cereal climbs up my throat. With one deep, shaky breath, I walk down the porch stairs and fling the purse toward her open car window. Her slender hand plucks it out of the air, and the sound of her mascara tube falling to the ground explodes in my ears. My toes catch on the sharp edge of the entryway as I haul myself through, but the pain is drowned out by the animal need to just get inside.
The door slams behind me so hard that it bounces off the frame and swings back open, like it’s mocking me. My chest heaves.
Back in the cool, brightly lit safety of my house, everything snaps into focus—the neat line of our shoes by the door, Lincoln’s tennis racket on the living room sofa, the clock on the mantel that reads 8:27.
Double shit.
I launch myself up the stairs and straight to my laptop, logging in just in time to say, “Here!” when Mr. Parker calls my name.