“It’s just you and me, Schrödinger.” Lucy sighed and ladled Fancy Feast into his bowl as the tabby cat wended himself between her ankles, rubbing against her legs with a plaintive yowl. Raindrops tapped against the window, marking time.
As Schrödinger purred louder, Lucy muttered, “I’m feeding you, I’m feeding you.” She realized she should probably fear for her mental state—and her social life—being home alone on a Friday night, talking to her feline companion.
At least Schrödinger wasn’t talking back.
And really, the tabby treated Lucy better than she deserved, considering she’d named him after an Austrian scientist whose most celebrated thought experiment left a cat sealed in a box with a flask of poison and a radioactive agent, simultaneously alive and dead. Lucy scratched her Schrödinger behind the ears, releasing another sigh. Alive and dead was precisely how she felt this evening.
She slanted a surreptitious glance at her cell phone for the umpteenth time.
Still no text from Cole, just a message from her bestie, Claudia, asking if she was going to make an appearance at the swim-team party. Odds were Cole would be there. Cole never missed a party. Overzealous stereo systems pushed Lucy toward a migraine and she didn’t drink because of her meds, but she’d usually go with him just to feel the comfort of his hand in hers.
Not tonight. If Cole wasn’t coming to her, Lucy sure as hell wasn’t going to him. Especially after he pulled the “don’t stress” card. The way he’d doubted her this afternoon made her as angry as the cheating.
She wasn’t a glass figurine that would shatter.
Schrödinger vibrated, begging for more. “Finish what you’ve got first,” she admonished. Yikes, Lucy sounded just like her mother.
She opened the fridge, rummaging around for a little guilty pleasure. Normal parents would leave money for pizza; Professor Elaine Phelps had prepared a kale and quinoa salad before taking off for some departmental wine-and-cheese evening at the college where she taught. Her mom was a walking epilepsy-trigger encyclopedia, and because there was a possible correlation between foods that caused energy spikes and seizures, Lucy wasn’t supposed to eat sugar or carbs or anything fun.
Both her parents handled her like a live grenade despite the fact that she hadn’t had a seizure for two years. No amount of browbeating, begging, or cajoling would convince them to sign the permission slip for driver’s ed. The bicycle itself had been a huge compromise when she hit the twelve-month seizure-free mark.
Lucy huffed as her eyes snagged on a can of Coke. Her dad possessed a finely honed sweet tooth. How had he slipped that past her mother?
Hello, sugar rush.
Schrödinger traipsed after her as Lucy flung herself onto the sofa in the living room and began scrolling through her Netflix queue—mostly vintage sci-fi. Shockingly enough, the parental locks hadn’t been enabled. Her mom’s profile was comprised entirely of History Channel programs about the Roman Empire, while her dad’s was a mix of stand-up comedy, TED talks, and science documentaries.
Before her father sold out and became a banker, he’d done a Ph.D. in quantum mechanics. A few years ago, he converted the garage into a lab, where he and Lucy would run experiments together. Einstein Time, he called it. Between his business trips and her college prep, however, there hadn’t been much Einstein Time lately. She actually missed it.
Restlessness coursed through Lucy that had nothing to do with the sugar high taking hold. Scroll, scroll, scroll.
She and Cole never fought like this. They never fought. Period.
Picturing Cole enjoying the party without her, Lucy tossed aside the remote control, pushed to her feet, and began to pace. She padded into her father’s office, which was just as messy as her bedroom.
Slovenliness must be genetic.
Her eyes panned around the room and caught on the Gilbert College diploma framed on the wall beside his desk—another family tradition.
Gilbert was where her parents had met, and Lucy would be starting there in the fall. Her chest pinched. She should be thrilled. It was an excellent small college with a lauded physics department and she should feel honored to have been admitted. She did. But it was only a forty-five-minute drive from Eaton.
Lucy’s parents hadn’t allowed her to apply to college anywhere more than two hours away by car. That perimeter included New York City, where her dad worked at a venture capital firm, but her parents had vetoed the Big Apple because they said it would be too overwhelming for her.
She took a long slurp of Coke. If they had their way, Lucy would spend her entire life dressed in bubble wrap.
Schrödinger scampered into the office and pawed at Lucy’s calf. Only catnip would pacify the little beast when he got in this mood.
Her pocket buzzed. Claudia again.
Do U need a ride? I’ll let U practice ☺
Claudia had been giving Lucy driving lessons on the down-low. She didn’t know what she’d do when Claudia moved halfway across the country to the University of Chicago. Claudia had lived a few houses over from Lucy for their entire lives. She’d been her best friend—her only friend for a while there—since the day she beat up Tony Morelli for calling Lucy “Helmet Head.”
This was especially impressive seeing as Tony grew up to be Eaton High’s fiercest linebacker and Claudia capped out at five-foot-nothing. And Tony wasn’t wrong. Lucy had worn a helmet outside for most of her childhood in case a seizure struck. That one act of heroism—and to six-year-old Lucy it was truly heroic—had elevated Claudia to I’ll-help-you-bury-the-body-no-questions-asked status forever.
Schrödinger upped the ante to whining as Lucy texted Claudia back, begging off the party. But she didn’t text fast enough.
The tabby vaulted his ample derrière onto the desk, landing in the middle of haphazardly strewn manila folders, and sending them flying. Along with a photo of toddler Lucy missing most of her teeth.
“Schrödinger!” she yelled. The cat mewled in contrition, but it was too late.
And because the fates had conspired against her, Lucy heard the distinctive sound of a key turning in the front door. Perfect. The office looked like a bomb site.
Dropping to her hands and knees, Lucy desperately tried to gather the files as her dad called out, “Lucy? Lucy! We’re back!” She reached for the photo frame—the glass had cracked, of course, and the black backing had popped open, exposing the blank side of the photo. Except it wasn’t blank.
Liber Librum Aperit was scrawled on the back.
Thanks to her mom’s Latin lessons, Lucy did a quick translation: One book opens another. She scrunched up her nose. Her mom was the Classics professor in the family but it wasn’t her handwriting. Or her dad’s, for that matter. Weird.
“What’s going on in here?”
Lucy darted her eyes toward her dad, who hovered in the doorway.
His tie was already loosened and his suit rumpled. He looked exhausted. Harried.
“Tidying?” she replied, more question than answer, and continued trying to make some kind of order out of the chaos Schrödinger had unleashed.
“Uh-huh.”
Over her dad’s shoulder, Lucy spied her mother, brow creased in concern.
“Did you have an episode?” she asked.
Elaine Phelps was tall, blond, and patrician. The opposite of Lucy with her black curls and gray eyes. She possessed what Lucy referred to as “monastic composure.” Her mom allowed herself one cigarette every day. Rather than the habit being an example of relatable human imperfection, Lucy saw it for what it was: an exercise in discipline.
Her mother’s gaze zeroed in on the telltale can of Coke next to Lucy on the floor.
“I’ve warned you that sugar can be a trigger,” she said in a placating kindergarten-teacher voice, and Lucy’s temper flared.
“It wasn’t the sugar, Mom. It was Schrödinger.” Although the feline had conveniently vanished.
“Don’t snap at your mom, Luce,” her dad said, an edge to his words.
Sheesh. Two on one was not fair. “Sorry,” she mumbled, and lowered her eyes to avoid his glare. “Long day.” She shuffled a few folders into a pile.
Her dad stepped forward, resting a conciliatory hand on Lucy’s shoulder.
“I hear you, kiddo. And I’ve gotta head back to the office first thing in the morning.”
“On a Saturday?” she said, head flicking up.
The tension in his jaw relaxed into a tired smile. “No rest for the wicked.”
“Victor, why don’t we get you a beer?” Lucy’s mom suggested. He nodded, adjusting his rimless glasses; dark circles shadowed his brown eyes, making his pale skin almost vampiric. To Lucy, her mom said, “Leave the files. I’ll take care of them.”
Her mother couldn’t stand disorder. If she noticed even the smallest speck of brown discoloring a single petal, she would discard an entire flower arrangement. Narrowing her eyes at the picture frame, she said, “You didn’t cut yourself, did you?”
“Nope. Got all my digits.” Lucy stretched out her hands and wiggled her fingers as proof.
Her mom’s lips thinned into a patient smile. “How about some tea? To help you sleep?”
Sleep deprivation was another potential trigger.
“No, thanks.” Lucy forced up one corner of her mouth. Now didn’t seem like the right moment to ask her parents about the Latin quotation.
Once they’d gone through to the kitchen, she gingerly picked up the broken frame and slid the photo out, examining the scratch across the swath of blue sky. She bet she could repair the scratch on her computer and replace the photo before her parents even knew it’d been damaged.
Lucy also took the Coke on her way out. As rebellions went, it was pretty pathetic—but it was hers.
Schrödinger was curled at the foot of the staircase, eyes mournful.
“Nice try,” she said. “No catnip for you.”
He swished his tail.
A mixture of frustration and curiosity swirled through Lucy as she retreated upstairs to her bedroom.
She pulled out her phone again.
Her great textpectations were for naught. Fine.
Lucy might not be able to fix herself—or her love life—but she would fix this damn photo. Liber Librum Aperit, indeed.
Let’s see what book this opens.