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else who could do that, he’d said, “Not as such.” He hadn’t said
no.
    If Dr. Moss had the technology to cross the tandem, it stood to reason that Dr. March did, too. That meant there was a chance—a small one, but greater than there had beenbefore—that I could find my way back to Aurora. Back to Thomas. Back to the self I was just beginning to discover.
    The reporter who’d conducted the interview was named Magdalena Polovsky, and her email address was listed in the sidebar of the post. I wrote her a quick email, saying I’d read her piece and wanted to talk to Dr. March as part of a school project and asking if she could put us in touch.
    It took two days for Magdalena Polovsky to get back to me, and by the time her email landed in my inbox, my insides were tied up in knots.
    Hi, Sasha.
    Thanks for letting me know how much you liked the interview! I think it’s a bit of a snooze, myself—you’d think a guy who researches
parallel universes
would have something slightly more interesting to say, but I guess not. Maybe he’s hiding all the good stuff? I bet the NSA has its claws in him good and deep. I originally tracked him down through his publisher, but he’s pulled the book—maybe he’s not writing it anymore? Not sure.
    Anyway, my editor asked me to get him to comment on that new Will Base movie about parallel universes,
An Earth Away,
and this time I had to go through this weird virtual assistant he hired. She calls herself Carla, although I’m pretty sure that’s not her real name, and in all likelihood she’s a robot. Her email address is below if you want to give it a shot. She never did respond to me, but he’s a former professor, so he probably looks more kindly on students than he does on reporters.
    Good luck!
    Lena
    I spent a long time crafting my email to Dr. March. I decided to tell him I recently discovered he’d mentored my parents, and I was hoping to talk to him in the interest of finding out more about them. I added a short note to Carla at the top, asking her to pass the message along, and settled in for what I figured would be a pretty long wait.
    Which was why I was surprised to get a response in just under two hours.
    Dear Ms. Lawson,
    I regret to inform you that Dr. March is very busy and unable to make any time to see you in the near future. This is what he has told me to tell you.
    However, for the past few months I’ve been scanning and archiving his old correspondence, and there are many letters in which he makes reference to your parents, in a fond, respectful, even paternal way. I think he’s avoiding not
you
but the pain of talking about two people whose loss he still feels very keenly, or for which he perhaps feels responsible. I try not to have opinions about his personal life, but in this case I’m making an exception, both because I believe that confronting one’s wounds is the only way to heal them and also because Dr. March could use someone to talk to.
    Dr. March keeps to a very precise schedule, so I can tell you with certainty that he will be at Helena’s in Norwood Park at noon tomorrow. He eats lunch there every Wednesday.
    Best,
    Carla
    I had to take two buses and the El to get to Helena’s, a Polish restaurant on the far northwest side of the city. I’d just stepped out onto the platform at the Jefferson Park Blue Line station when another vision hit me. A hand flew at my face, but I couldn’t protect myself as I was struck over and over again. My ears rang with the force of the blow; I tasted blood.
    Who are you?
a cold voice demanded.
Where do you come from?
I was afraid but determined not to show it. I glanced down at my wrist, at the tattoo that was both a reminder and a key to the door that would take me home again, and I said, in the steadiest, calmest voice I could muster,
Give me what I’ve asked for, and I’ll tell you.
    “Miss! Miss! Are you okay?”
    The vision skittered away, leaving behind an awful sense of doom. My heart had frozen