stuff on the head.
I tried a fourth match . . . and a fifth . . . and a sixth.
Only a few left. I paused, breathing heavily from the effort. This wasn’t rocket science. Why couldn’t I light a freaking match?
The eighth one glowed with a weird blue light for a moment, then fizzled out. The twelfth one snapped in half.
I shook the matchbox. Only two left.
Fingers shaking now, I lined up the second-to-last match, took a deep breath, and dragged it across the striking surface. Nothing. I did it again. Not even a spark.
I swallowed my unease and pulled out the last match. And struck it.
It was a dud.
I let it fall from my fingers, defeated. Outside the last of twilight extinguished without a sound, leaving only night, only blackness. It poured in from all directions, carrying only the tiniest hint of starlight.
The reason was obvious.
Whatever these matches were made of, whatever this whole place was made of . . . it didn’t burn. It didn’t work.
This world was dead.
I lay in my bed wide awake, covers drawn up to my eyes, gaping out at the shadows lurking in the corners. My stomach had coiled into a tight knot of nerves, sinking its claws into me like an irritable jaguar every time I shifted.
But that was nothing to the thirst . . . the sickening, maddening, terrifying thirst that was drying out my very soul and turning me into an empty husk. My tongue made endless circles around the inside of my mouth, the skin hard and scabbed like a lizard’s.
I tried to distract myself.
So fire was impossible here.
It made sense, in a sick sort of way.
The food couldn’t be metabolized because it had zero calories. And wood and food . . . it was all the same stuff, all some form of biomatter—hydrocarbons or carbohydrates or whatever. I remembered that from chemistry.
The food here didn’t have energy, the wood didn’t have energy, the batteries didn’t have energy, the power grid didn’t have energy. Nothing here had any energy.
A tiny creak pricked my ears from the hallway.
My body went rigid, and the breath froze in my throat. I listened, every nerve balanced on a pin.
Quiet. So quiet.
Nothing out there.
My heart thumped against the pillow, drowning out any hope of hearing it again.
Hearing what?
The city was empty, a ghost town.
Just the house settling for the night.
At last I let out my breath. The tension in my limbs relaxed. Though not fully. Never fully.
Hydrocarbons . . . made of hydrogen and carbon atoms. I strained to recall how it worked. Their bonds had energy, which got released when they burned. It was a chemical property of the molecules themselves, it was a property of physics . If those matches didn’t burn, then those matches couldn’t be made of hydrogen and carbon—
Another creak split the silence. Closer. Outside my door .
Instantly, adrenaline flooded my system, the hairs rose on the back of my neck. My heart began pounding.
Salamander?
Ever so slowly, I swiveled my neck so I could peek at the door to the hallway. What if the knob began to turn? What if someone tried to come in? I didn’t have any weapons, I’d be cornered in here like a rat—
A rat. It was probably just a rat.
Not that a rat in the walls made me feel great, but it sure beat invisible Ashley part two. Yeah, just a rat . . . just a furry little innocent rat.
Could I eat a rat?
I rolled over, disgusted with myself.
But when the sheets stopped swishing and the bed stopped rocking, the eerie silence loomed over me again. Usually, the night was alive with sounds—the whoosh of distant traffic, the whistle of wind, the hum of the furnace. Tonight, there was only silence. Only loneliness.
And it got to me.
Stop being a scaredy-cat, Leona.
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to shut everything out.
I just had to make it to morning, then everything would reset. Everything would be real again—cars honking, my parents bustling in the kitchen, my alarm blaring. My mom would wake me
I tried a fourth match . . . and a fifth . . . and a sixth.
Only a few left. I paused, breathing heavily from the effort. This wasn’t rocket science. Why couldn’t I light a freaking match?
The eighth one glowed with a weird blue light for a moment, then fizzled out. The twelfth one snapped in half.
I shook the matchbox. Only two left.
Fingers shaking now, I lined up the second-to-last match, took a deep breath, and dragged it across the striking surface. Nothing. I did it again. Not even a spark.
I swallowed my unease and pulled out the last match. And struck it.
It was a dud.
I let it fall from my fingers, defeated. Outside the last of twilight extinguished without a sound, leaving only night, only blackness. It poured in from all directions, carrying only the tiniest hint of starlight.
The reason was obvious.
Whatever these matches were made of, whatever this whole place was made of . . . it didn’t burn. It didn’t work.
This world was dead.
I lay in my bed wide awake, covers drawn up to my eyes, gaping out at the shadows lurking in the corners. My stomach had coiled into a tight knot of nerves, sinking its claws into me like an irritable jaguar every time I shifted.
But that was nothing to the thirst . . . the sickening, maddening, terrifying thirst that was drying out my very soul and turning me into an empty husk. My tongue made endless circles around the inside of my mouth, the skin hard and scabbed like a lizard’s.
I tried to distract myself.
So fire was impossible here.
It made sense, in a sick sort of way.
The food couldn’t be metabolized because it had zero calories. And wood and food . . . it was all the same stuff, all some form of biomatter—hydrocarbons or carbohydrates or whatever. I remembered that from chemistry.
The food here didn’t have energy, the wood didn’t have energy, the batteries didn’t have energy, the power grid didn’t have energy. Nothing here had any energy.
A tiny creak pricked my ears from the hallway.
My body went rigid, and the breath froze in my throat. I listened, every nerve balanced on a pin.
Quiet. So quiet.
Nothing out there.
My heart thumped against the pillow, drowning out any hope of hearing it again.
Hearing what?
The city was empty, a ghost town.
Just the house settling for the night.
At last I let out my breath. The tension in my limbs relaxed. Though not fully. Never fully.
Hydrocarbons . . . made of hydrogen and carbon atoms. I strained to recall how it worked. Their bonds had energy, which got released when they burned. It was a chemical property of the molecules themselves, it was a property of physics . If those matches didn’t burn, then those matches couldn’t be made of hydrogen and carbon—
Another creak split the silence. Closer. Outside my door .
Instantly, adrenaline flooded my system, the hairs rose on the back of my neck. My heart began pounding.
Salamander?
Ever so slowly, I swiveled my neck so I could peek at the door to the hallway. What if the knob began to turn? What if someone tried to come in? I didn’t have any weapons, I’d be cornered in here like a rat—
A rat. It was probably just a rat.
Not that a rat in the walls made me feel great, but it sure beat invisible Ashley part two. Yeah, just a rat . . . just a furry little innocent rat.
Could I eat a rat?
I rolled over, disgusted with myself.
But when the sheets stopped swishing and the bed stopped rocking, the eerie silence loomed over me again. Usually, the night was alive with sounds—the whoosh of distant traffic, the whistle of wind, the hum of the furnace. Tonight, there was only silence. Only loneliness.
And it got to me.
Stop being a scaredy-cat, Leona.
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to shut everything out.
I just had to make it to morning, then everything would reset. Everything would be real again—cars honking, my parents bustling in the kitchen, my alarm blaring. My mom would wake me
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