Page 32 of Twice

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She grinned.

“You can do it, too.”

?

It turned out, Boss, that my grandmother had the same power as me. So did her brother and her father, she said. There was no explanation, other than it seemed to pass from a loved one just before they died, as if knowing, with death looming, that it needed a new host.

“When was your first time?” Yaya asked me.

“Mom’s last day.”

“You saw that twice?”

“Yes.”

She nodded and looked to the window. “Makes sense. It’s usually a heartbreak that starts it. You want so badly to undo something. And then... it just happens.”

She shrugged. “Your mother’s power must have passed to you, just like my father’s passed to me.”

“Are we the only people in the world who can do this?”

“I don’t know anyone else. Do you?”

“Yaya, I didn’t knowyoucould do it until just now.”

“Yes, well.” She clasped her hands together. “Now you do.”

“When was your first time?” I asked.

She hesitated.

“When I was ten, just after my father passed away.”

“What caused it?”

“There was this old man in our neighborhood. Always wore a brown suit and hat. One day, when my mother went to the grocery store, he came by the house. I was alone. He asked if I liked chocolate cake. He said he would give me some if I did something for him.”

“What?”

“Something a young girl should never be asked to do.”

“Oh, no.”

She looked down. “Before he could touch me, I ran out the door. I hid in the trees all day, crying and wishing I had gone with my mother. I fell asleep on the ground. When I woke up, it was morning again and I was back in bed. Same clothes. Same breakfast. I thought I was dreaming. This time I went to the store and held my mother’s arm. I screamed when she tried to let go.”

“Did you ever see that man again?”

“Once, a few years later. I was with my friends at the boardwalk. He walked by in his brown suit and I pointed and started yelling, ‘Creeper! Creeper!’ He ran away.”

“Wow,” I said.

“Yes.”

“And after that, did you start time jumping?”

“Oh, eventually, yes. I did many things over. Not so much anymore.”

She leaned in. Her voice lowered.

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