“This one’s yours, T,” I said to Theo. “You earned it.”
Theo couldn’t help but smile. He’d been waiting for me to say that.
“I’d call it Oracle of Doom,” he said with conviction.
“Whoa,” Lu said, chuckling. “Drama.”
“Well, yeah,” Theo said with a shrug.
Everett looked to me, I nodded, and he slid the black book across the circulation desk of the Library toward me.
“Oracle of Doom it is,” he said, and handed me the ancient black pen I had used to sign out the book to begin our adventure.
I knew the drill. With Theo and Lu watching, I opened the front cover of the book to reveal the card I had signed that allowed me, an agent of the Library, to check out the book and enter the story. With one bold swipe of the pen, I crossed out my name. With that, the book now called Oracle of Doom was complete, and Everett could move it from the shelf with all the unfinished books, to the finished section.
“How are you going to categorize it?” Theo asked.
Everett took the book and held it to his chest as if it was precious, and in some ways it was, because it represented the completion of multiple disruptions.
The mystery of Baz’s death had been solved, allowing his spirit to be released from Playland. The truth had been revealed that Eugene Derby had nothing to do with the fire and Baz’s death, which also allowed his spirit to be freed. Lu’s cousin had been found, though she was never in any danger. Most important, the McLeans were safe, and Theo’s life as he knew it would go on.
It was only one book, but we finished a whole lot of stories. Not too bad.
“I believe this will go under the heading Fortune,” Everett said.
“Fortune? How do you figure that?” Lu asked. “Because Baz was a fortune-teller?”
Everett rolled off his stool and lumbered around the desk, headed for one of the aisles that held the completed books.
“In part,” he said. “But fortune can mean a lot of things. It’s about destiny and fate. Even luck. Many of the stories here in the Library are about folks whose fortunes have taken a turn for the worse. Their stories will never be finished until they come to realize that fortune is truly in their own hands.”
“Or somebody from the Library helps them figure it out,” Theo said.
“Aye,” Everett said. “Everybody needs a little help sometime.”
He slipped the book between two others on the shelf and came back to the desk.
“You all did a fine thing here,” Everett added. “For the spirits in the story and for yourselves.”
“Too bad that Daring Donna lady never got caught for what she did,” Lu said. “In real life, I mean.”
“Aye, but now the truth is known,” Everett said. “Hers is a spirit that may no longer be resting in peace.”
“What about those idiots who were drag racing?” Theo asked.
“The police are all over it,” I said. “Lu and I told them everything we saw, and there’s video from security cameras at the church and the middle school. They’re not gonna be driving anywhere for a while.”
“Then I guess we’re done here,” Lu said, and moved to get up.
“Wait,” Theo said. “I don’t know if it’s too late to make this part of the book, but I want you guys to know how much I appreciate what you did for me.”
“You’re the one who saved your parents,” I said.
“But you wouldn’t let me give up,” he said. “I felt really helpless, like there was nothing I could do to save myself. But you two wouldn’t listen.”
“We never listen to anything you say,” Lu said with a straight face.
Theo gave her a hurt look, but she smiled and squeezed his arm.
“I’m kidding,” she said. “I just couldn’t believe our lives are planned out like some movie script, no matter what a crystal ball says. Nobody’s future is written.”
“And like I said, we make our own fortunes,” Everett added.
“You think that machine at Playland is still going to spit out predictions even though Baz’s spirit is gone?” Theo asked.
“We could always go back next summer and find out,” I said.
We all looked at one another, then burst out laughing.
“Yeah, right,” I exclaimed. “Like that’s gonna happen.”
“No way,” Theo added.
“I’ll pass,” Lu said.
There was nothing left to do except get back to real life.
“What’re you thinking, Marcus?” Everett asked. “Will I be seeing you again soon?”
Theo and Lu both looked my way. They wanted to know too.
“I need a break,” I said. “We all do. It’s been pretty intense. I still want to get into what really happened to my birth parents, but I also think we should go back to being normal for a while.”
“Can’t argue with that,” Theo said.
“Sounds good to me,” Lu added.
“I’ll keep hunting for any stories that might tell us something about your folks,” Everett offered.
“Thanks, Everett,” I said.
“Then we’ll say good-bye,” I said. “For now.”
The three of us got up and headed for the door that would lead into my bedroom. Part of me was relieved. I really did need a break. The idea of sitting in a boring classroom, listening to a lecture on something I didn’t care about, was actually sounding pretty good right about then.
On the other hand, I also had a wistful feeling. We were leaving a library filled with unfinished adventures. What else was waiting for us on those shelves? Where would we go next? Whose story would we try to finish? I had gotten a taste of what it was like to jump into these stories, and to be perfectly honest, I liked it. Leaving it behind made me feel as though I might be missing out.
“Lots of books in this Library,” Everett said. “They’ll all be here waiting when you get back.”
It was like he had read my mind.
“See you soon,” I said, and led my friends through the door and back to normal life.
We stepped into my bedroom and I closed the door behind us. Just to be sure, I re-opened the door and took a quick peek inside to see…my closet. Without the Paradox key, it was just an ordinary closet door.
“What day is it again?” Lu asked, half-serious. “I’ve lost track.”
“Monday morning,” Theo said. “We’ve got school.”
“Oh,” Lu said, sounding disappointed. “That. How…dull.”
It did sound dull. Perfectly, wonderfully dull.
We grabbed our packs from my bed and headed downstairs. We were alone in the house, since my parents had already left for work. It was shaping up to be a bland, normal day.
I opened the front door and stood back for my friends to go through first, but neither moved.
“What’s that?” Lu asked.
Sitting outside the door was a cardboard box about the size of a big gym bag. I leaned outside to get a closer look and saw that there was something written in bold letters on top:
FOR: MR. MARCUS O’MARA
“That’s you,” Theo said.
“Yeah, no kidding,” I said, and reached down to pick it up. The box wasn’t all that heavy. “There’s no return address. No shipping address either. Somebody must have dropped it off.”
“It’s not your birthday,” Lu said. “Is it?”
I put the box down on the floor inside the house while Theo closed the door. The three of us stood around the mystery box, staring at it in wonder.
“Well, it’s not going to open itself up,” Lu said.
I took my house key out of my pocket and used it like a knife to cut the paper sealing tape. When I lifted the flaps, a sharp odor drifted out. It wasn’t bad, but it was definitely strong.
“Ooh, weird,” Theo said. “It smells like the beach.”
“Yeah,” Lu added. “Like seaweed.”
The contents were covered by a sheet of brown paper, on top of which was a beige envelope with Marcus written in fancy, old-fashioned lettering.
“Sure looks like a birthday present to me,” Lu said.
“Yeah,” Theo said, sniffing. “Maybe somebody sent you some fresh lobsters.”
I opened the envelope and slipped out a heavy paper card that had the same fancy handwriting on it. It said:
See you soon.
“That’s it?” Lu asked. “ ‘See you soon’? Not who it’s from?”
Lu and Theo each took the card to examine it, but there was nothing more to see except the simple message.
“ ‘See you soon,’ ” I read again, as if it might make more sense the second time.
“So what’s in there?” Lu asked.
I knelt down and reached into the box to pull away the brown paper that was covering the contents. I can honestly say that I had no idea what I would find, not even with the definite ocean smell that drifted out. I didn’t think for a second that it would be something that was going to turn my world inside out. Again. The thought never entered my mind.
But it should have.
I pulled the brown paper away.
Theo gasped.
Lu let out a squeal of surprise.
I could only stare, trying to get my brain to unlock and come up with some kind of logical explanation for what I was seeing.
Theo fell to his knees and said, “It’s impossible.”
“No…no way,” Lu said, backing off as if being repelled by an invisible force field.
I didn’t pull it out of the box. I didn’t have to. There was no mistaking what it was. The scratches on its surface were proof. The smell too. I knew exactly what it was. What I didn’t know was how it got there.
We were staring at a World War II–era ammunition box. Green. Standard issue. The marks on its surface were from the chains we had fastened around it and locked tight before dumping it into the deep waters of the Long Island Sound. It was never supposed to be found, its contents never seen again.
Or so we had hoped.
But the box was here.
It was open.
And it was empty.
The Boggin had escaped.