March 2026 Salem, Massachusetts — Small Cove at Salem Willows
The ocean filled the temporary silence between them, pushing up the sand and pulling it back.
“I’m not who you think I am, Becca.”
Becca’s expression scrunched up, confused. “What do you mean, you're not who I think you are?"
“I mean...” Eliza looked down at her hands in her lap. “I mean, my name is not Lils, and I am not from here. Not from this time, not from this —” She stopped to gather her thoughts. “What I am trying to say is that everything you think you know about me is not...”
“Wait.” Becca’s mouth had started to curve. “Are you about to tell me you’re a time traveler?”
Eliza looked up, shocked.
Becca was smiling now, that warm tilted smile that made Eliza melt. “Because that would explain SO much.”
Eliza's eyes widened. "Becca, I can't believe this... yes, I am. And my real name is Eliza."
Becca snort laughed. “Oh my God Lils, you're so silly. Your obsession with history goes too far sometimes!"
She was smiling warmly, the way you would at someone who you find charming and a touch strange. Like it was a little game they were playing together.
“Okay, okay, time traveler Eliza,” Becca bumped her shoulder. “Where are you originally from? Or when are you from, I guess?”
Eliza felt herself deflate a bit. What had she been expecting? Yet she couldn't help but feel a little thrill at hearing Becca say her real name all the same.
Eliza looked into Becca's green-gold eyes catching the afternoon light, the faint freckles across her nose, the easy warmth of her presence. She thought about how it would feel to actually say, I am from Salem Village in 1692. I've never tasted coffee or been kissed by anyone before you. I will be gone soon and maybe Lils will be here in my place again, and I might be killed once I go back to my time.
“It’s complicated,” Eliza managed. “But seriously Becca I... I have to make a big decision soon. Whether I stay here, or go very far away."
Becca’s smile faded slightly. “Like, studying internationally?”
“Yes, I guess you could say that.”
“Is that what this equinox thing is about? You have to leave?”
She looked at Becca, pleading for her to understand all the things she couldn't say, and nodded slowly.
Becca took everything in for a moment, looking out at the water. The tide was coming in, foaming at the edges, greenish-grey and relentless.
“But you don’t know yet? You said you hadn't decided if you were leaving or not?"
Eliza puffed out her cheeks, exhaling. “You're right, I don’t know yet,” Eliza said. And that, at least, was completely true. "But there's a lot of pressure for me to go."
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She thought about Aunt Ivy on the porch that morning. You’ll have to want it for the spell to work. She thought about the smallness of her own life back in 1692, lived inside the stifling walls of what God and men permitted. Then she thought about banana bread and Becca’s thumb tracing a small circle on her wrist. Thought about Lucy telling her how much she missed Lils, about how she could never take the place of her sister.
She felt the pull again, the compass needle inside her that never quite settled.
“For what it’s worth,” Becca said, “I hope you stay. If this is some weird ploy to get me to confess my feelings for you, it's working. I like you as more than a friend, Lils. But I think you already know that."
Eliza looked at her, smiling, and something in her chest shifted.
“Becca, I —”
“Nope, that's enough.” Becca stood up abruptly, brushing sand from her jeans. “This is getting too real. We need to do something completely stupid right now.”
Eliza blinked. “What?”
Becca was already pulling her jacket off, dropping it on the blanket. She tugged at Eliza's sweater.
“We’re going in.”
“In the—?” Eliza looked at the ocean. The nearly freezing, very cold ocean. “Absolutely not.”
“Oh, come on.” Becca was already stepping out of her jeans, completely unselfconscious, the wind whipping her hair around. She stood at the edge of the water in her underwear and looked back over her shoulder. “If you decide to go away, when will you ever get another chance to do this?”
When will I ever, Eliza thought.
In two weeks she might be back in 1692, and this would be entirely impossible. Every single bit of it.
She stood up, taking her jacket off.
“If I perish from the cold,” she said, “I shall hold you personally responsible.”
Becca’s face broke into a full grin. “That's a deal.”
The water was stunningly, breathtakingly cold.
This cold was a full-body slap, the ocean closing around her like a fist.
She gasped, and Becca shrieked with laughter beside her, and just for a moment, there was nothing else. No equinox, no spell. Just the cold and the salty air and the pure blue March sky above and Becca’s laugh, echoing all around.
Here it is, Eliza thought, treading water with numb legs. This is all I've ever wanted.
She would trade anything to keep living this life... except, would she really trade someone else's life to keep it?
They came together and kissed quickly in the salt water, briefly holding each other and bobbing up and down. They lasted about a minute and a half before the cold drove them stumbling back up the beach, grabbing for their clothes in a tangled rush. Eliza’s teeth were chattering and she couldn't feel her feet. She was fairly certain that had simultaneously been the worst decision she had made since arriving in 2026, and yet also the best.
She was reaching for her sweater when she heard the honking.
A Jeep had rolled up at the edge of the beach access road, with the passenger window rolled down.
“Oh my God.” Lucy’s voice rang out across the empty beach, carrying perfectly in the cold air. ”Eww, they’re naked!”
Holly's voice followed from somewhere inside the jeep, strangled with the effort of not laughing: “Lucy!”
“Holly, they’re naked!”
“I know,” Holly said, “and I am choosing to look away!”
Becca collapsed against Eliza’s shoulder, shaking with laughter, seemingly completely unbothered. Eliza stood on the cold sand with her sweater clutched to her chest, her hair dripping, her feet numb, staring at Lucy’s horrified face framed in the Jeep window.
“Put some clothes on!” Lucy yelled. “I’m going to be scarred for life!”
“Then stop looking, Luce,” Eliza shouted back.
Becca made a laugh wheeze sound beside her.
Eliza looked over at Becca, at the completely delighted face of her, and thought:
The real Lils deserves to have all of this too.
And Becca deserves to know the real version of Lils. The actual Lils.
The Jeep door opened. Lucy tumbled out with a towel, making a face the entire way across the sand.
“You’re so embarrassing,” she announced, throwing a towel at Eliza. “Put a towel on, Holly and I have come to kidnap you."