Valley of the Moon

“What is the problem?” I asked.

He hesitated. “It’s 1906 here.”

Joseph told me their story. It was simple enough. The earthquake. The fog. Stuck here for four months. Then I arrived.

What wasn’t simple—believing it.

“You can’t expect me to buy this,” I said.

“It’s the truth,” said Joseph.

“Well, if it’s the truth, I need proof.”

“Where’s your proof you’re from 1975?” he asked.

“Look at me,” I said, pointing to my shirt.

“Look at us. That’s your proof as well,” said Joseph.

“Show her your passport,” said Martha. “In the parlor desk. Right-hand drawer.”

He sighed, but left to retrieve it.

“I’m sure this must be quite shocking,” said Martha. “But I assure you we are just as shocked.”

I stared at her and shook my head. They were dressed this way because they were from the past? Because they’d somehow got stuck in time? It was laughable. But Martha didn’t look crazy. She looked completely sane.

“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be rude. But what you’re asking me to believe is impossible,” I said.

“I know,” said Martha.

“It’s preposterous.”

“Yes,” she agreed.

Joseph returned with his passport. It wasn’t a booklet, like our current-day passports; it was a piece of paper pasted into a leather folio.

By order of Queen Victoria, Joseph Beauford Bell is allowed to pass freely and without hindrance into the United States of America … blah, blah, blah, antiquated language. His date of birth. July 20, 1864. And at the bottom of the page—a photograph.

Unmistakably him.

When I was a child, my father forbade me to read science fiction or fantasy. Trash of the highest order, he said. He didn’t want me muddying up my young, impressionable mind with crap. If it wasn’t worthy of being reviewed in the Times, it did not make it onto our bookshelves.

So while my classmates gleefully dove into TheLion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,A Wrinkle in Time, and TheBorrowers, I was stuck reading Old Yeller.

My saving grace—I was the most popular girl in my class. That’s not saying much; it was easy to be popular at that age. All you had to do was wear your hair in French braids, tell your friends your parents let you drink grape soda every night at dinner, and take any dare. I stood in a bucket of hot water for five minutes without having to pee. I ate four New York System wieners (with onions) in one sitting. I cut my own bangs and—bam!—I was queen of the class.

As a result I was invited on sleepovers practically every weekend, and it was there that I cheated. I skipped the séances and the Ouija board. I crept into my sleeping bag with a flashlight, zipped it up tight, and pored through those contraband books. I fell into Narnia. I tessered with Meg and Charles Wallace; I lived under the floorboards with Arrietty and Pod.

I think it was precisely because those books were forbidden that they lived on in me long past the time that they should have. For whatever reason, I didn’t outgrow them. I was constantly on the lookout for the secret portal, the unmarked door that would lead me to another world.

I never thought I would actually find it.

While I examined Joseph’s passport, Martha did some quick calculations on a piece of paper.

“Joseph, if she’s telling the truth, sixty-nine years have passed out there, but only four months in Greengage. That means almost three and a half of her hours pass per minute here. She’s been here half an hour at least. That’s about four and a half days she’s been gone. Her people will be panicked. We’ve got to take her back to the fog immediately.”

If she’s telling the truth. They didn’t believe me? Martha looked stricken with worry. Real worry, not fake. Three and a half hours passing per minute? Come on! Part of me wanted to laugh. I half expected a camera crew to come busting out of the pantry. But what if they were telling the truth and three and a half hours were passing per minute here? Oh God. If I stayed in Greengage just another hour, almost two weeks would have gone by at home.

“I’ve got to go!” I cried.

“Yes, you do,” said Martha.

“No, you don’t,” said Joseph firmly. “There’s no need to panic. You’re on regular time now. I’d stake my life on it.”

“We can’t take that chance, Joseph,” said Martha.

“What the hell are you two talking about?” I asked, getting more and more confused.

“Come,” said Martha. “We’ll take you to the fog. We’ll try and explain as we’re walking.”

I looked back and forth between the two of them. If they were acting, they were putting on an amazing show.

We walked at a brisk pace, just short of a jog.

“That feeling we’ve had on full moon days, Martha … that sensation,” Joseph said. He trailed off—whatever it was he was trying to describe was not easily articulated.

“Let me ask you something, Lux. Does it feel like time is racing by right now?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

In fact it felt like the opposite. My anxiety was making time feel as opaque as stone.

“It feels like it’s passing normally, correct?” he prompted.

“Well, it’s not exactly zipping along,” I said.

“For you, too, Martha?”

“Yes.”

“But yesterday, before she came?” he asked Martha.

They exchanged solemn glances.

“What? Tell me,” I said.

“Yesterday the day was over in what felt like an hour,” she said. “It’s been like that every full moon day since the earthquake.”