“It sounds like you knew half the neighborhood…” Laurie said tiredly. “I’m just gonna keep resting my eyes for a little bit. Let me know who comes in last period…”

           The very next thing Laurie knew, she was being jostled awake by a very visible Jace, who exclaimed quietly, “Lor, wake up. The cloakers just ran out of battery.”

           “Hm…? Did I seriously fall asleep?” She looked at her opaque arms. “Oh, great.”

           “C’mon, we’ll keep our shades on and hide out in the computer lab until school’s over. Just another half hour, and we can try to sneak out without attracting attention.”

           It sounded like a good enough plan, so they stuck to the rows of books in the back, away from the busy central tables where kids antsy for break were getting rowdy. Thankfully, the adjoining lab room full of old Mac computers was fairly sparse. The two kept their heads down, but Jace couldn’t help but continue the commentary as he and Laurie went by a boy whose eyes were glued to a classic internet Star Trek fan site.

           “And there’s Robby,” Jace whispered as they walked. “Big sci-fi nerd, but I got him to show interest in the great outdoors, too. Is that Colin and Arty?” he wondered aloud, and as they passed by the pair, Jace caught in the corner of his eye a familiar yellow video game character with pointy ears that they were studying.

           “I see Millie in the back,” Laurie noted. “She’s safe. Let’s stick by her.”

           Hoping that her presence would be enough to keep other kids away, Jace and Laurie plopped down in the nearby chairs. Millie only gave them a side-eye glance before returning to her work involving copying files onto a collection of floppies.

           “Have you two been sneaking around school all day?” she asked. “We’ll still catch up, but right now, I’m busy backing up the stories I wrote for the school paper.”

           “We won’t bother you,” Jace promised. “We’ll just spend the rest of the day… looking at long-gone early websites. By the way, this is my buddy, Laurie. Not a cousin. Also… do you know what December’s been up to, so I can finish up a, um, ‘tour?’”

           “Wait, the December? Mayor Helvetica?” Laurie replied. “You knew her, too?”

           Millie grumbled, but responded by Ask Jeeves-searching for a local news article. A story popped up on her screen, showing a smiling, victorious girl in a fancy uniform.

           Jace read out, “‘Everette Academy Student Wins Debate Championship.’ Nice!”

           Laurie smiled. “Jace, you gave good advice to an entire class. You’re amazing.”

           He blushed and let Millie get back to work, replying, “I kind of got it from you.”

           “Millie, I can barely hear you,” Jace later tried to tell the adult one over the cell phone as he and Laurie went down the busy halls filled with excited tweens and teens. “Yes! For the third time, we finished the mission. We’re going to the mall with the gang. What? Y-yeah, I mean… whatever. Not like I can stop you. Okay. Bye.” He pocketed it and updated Laurie, “Sheesh, she’s getting testy. Now she wants to keep an eye on us at the mall. I get that she can’t help spying, but, like… we don’t need a babysitter.”

           Laurie looked down at their footwear and replied, “Our socks are so dirty, we might as well just get new ones while we’re at the mall. And, uh, your shoes…”

           “Yeah, I know. Somehow, it’ll be the second time I’ve bought 90s shoes there.”

           They went through the front doors along with dozens of other students too frenzied about summer to even notice them, and their special shades had the bonus of helping to dull the bright sun, which always hit the pickup and bus loop area hard at this time of year and day. Jace started looking for Wes’ crew amid the tinted crowds.

           “It’s still kinda crazy to me that you, as a time traveler, showed up for only one school year back at DTE and found ways to help your uncle’s whole class. Even if you did have a full year to do it. But what about his closest friends? Any miracles there?”

           “I didn’t really do any single ‘big’ thing for them, but I think I improved their lives just by being around them for that year. That doesn’t sound modest, does it?”

           “Yo, Jason!” Zach’s voice suddenly called out. “And, uh… his girl cousin!”

           Jace spotted the group huddled together next to one of the school’s dumpsters—oddly appropriate—and he and Laurie quickly headed over. Celeste was there, too; everyone except Millie, in fact. Now that school was out, their smiles were wider.

           “You stuck around and came back!” Jared said excitedly. “Man, you two are lucky you got to stay out of school all day.” He groaned, “It suuucked.”

           “Hey, nice suns,” Zach complimented, and brought out his pair of shades from a case. “I don’t wear mine all the time like I used to. I think people found it intimidating.”

           As he unfolded them with a wrist snap and coolly slid them on, Celeste said with a sly grin, “The guys told me you were back in town, Jason, but I didn’t quite believe it.”

           “We didn’t get a full intro for your cuz before,” Sadie added. “She got a name?”

           “Lor… Um, Lara,” Laurie answered. “Yep… I’m on a road trip with Jason.”

           Arthur replied, “Like Lara Croft? Nice. I love Tomb Raider. Uh, for its adventure.”

           “Sure,” Ash said with an eye-roll. “That’s why you have a poster of the character near your bed. So… Jason… Still want to go to the mall with us?”

           “Mm-hm… I won’t be in town long, so… some time together would be great.”

           Laurie noticed something in the way Jace and Ash were looking at each other, but didn’t think on it too much before asking, “Which bus are we getting on?”

           “Heh, none of the yellow ones,” Jared answered. “We don’t really ride them that much, usually just if the weather’s bad or one of us is tired. Most days, we walk home together and chat, or go a few blocks and take the city bus to the mall or a movie.”

           “Middle school might suck, but being near the main line is nice,” Wessy added. “We’ll get going as soon as Luce shows up. Um, that’s my year-younger half-sis, Lara.”

           “I know,” Laurie said. “I mean, Jason told me about her. About all of you guys.”

           “Aw, I guess we left an impression,” Sadie replied with a smile. “Not trying to gossip, but Lucy’s gotten away from her DTE ‘friends’ and is pretty much working on a new social circle from scratch. But she needs time to open up to people, so we let her do stuff with us sometimes. Her last friends were pretty… shallow, to put it gently.”

           After just a couple more minutes of casual conversation about summer, the twelve-year-old edition of Jace’s mom slipped in with the group nearly unnoticeably, calling no attention to herself. She still tried to blend in with crowds, but at least the oversized green security shirt she once always wore was nowhere to be seen, and she seemed to be putting a more confident effort into her appearance.

           “Oh, there she is,” Celeste notified the others. “Hey, Luce, look who’s visiting.”

           Lucy shyly looked at Jace, waved, and murmured, “Jason… Wes missed you.”

           “Yeah, he wrote about you in his diary every day,” Zach joked.

           Not even dignifying the remark, Wessy replied, “Let’s go before we miss the bus, or it runs out of seats. We aren’t the only Cooktonners that hit the mall after school.”

           The kids began the walk towards Kettle, joining a dozen other students on the tree-shaded sidewalks who were headed in the same direction. The gang talked about the usual daily happenings on the way, while Wessy fell back to join Laurie and Jace.

           “The neighborhood hasn’t really changed much since you left,” he told Jace.

           “I can tell. It feels like I’m home again. All the memories are coming back.”

           “It’s… really good to see you again. Even if just for a little bit.”

           Slowed by the fact that they were a large group of chatting teens, everyone ended up having to make a mad dash the last hundred or so feet to get on the bus, just barely making it and joining no fewer than a dozen other kids their age on the public ride. To no surprise, the transportation turned into an impromptu school bus, which aggravated the older riders—and even more kids boarded on the next few stops. It got so loud that Wes’ group eventually stopped trying to talk over the noise altogether.

           The poor bus driver finally got a reprieve upon arrival at the mall, where the ride emptied out and the indoor plaza was stormed by excited middle and high-schoolers who needed to kick off their break right away. Comparatively, Wes and friends were fairly calm and collected; their ethos of keeping things chill when able had persisted.

           “The sign changed since I was last here…” Jace observed about the modernized Westfield Royal Valley Mall marquee over the food court entrance.

           “Yeah, guess it has,” Arthur replied as everyone headed into the air conditioned commerce palace. “Some mall corporation came in and bought the place.”

           Sadie added, “A bunch of stores had closed, and then this Westfield business came in and even more closed. But others opened, too. My dad calls it a ‘shake-up.’”

           Gesturing towards new stores, units that remained vacant, the mall arcade, and the food court with three ‘coming soon’ displays, Wessy reported, “KB Toys and Gadzooks are gone… EB Games, too—but it got replaced by an even better video game store called Babbage’s. It’s one of our favorite new hangouts.”

           “It’s really pretty much the same place,” Ash muttered.

           “The owner of the arcade hates it, apparently,” Zach said. “He thinks it’s stealing his business. But he’s probably just getting grouchy in his old age.”

           “It is true that the good old arcade isn’t as busy as it used to be, though,” Colin noted. “Sure, Galaxy Hub at the park is the hot place to jam on cabinets now, but I really saw the drop-off once 3-D games on the N64 and Playstation started coming out.”

           Wes smiled wistfully. “Aw, heck, let’s drop by there first, for old time’s sake since Jason’s back. We’ll do Babbage’s on the way out. You ever been to a real arcade, Lara?”

           Laurie answered, “Yeah, sure. We still do a little arcading… where I’m from.”

           “Cabinets better not disappear for good.” Celeste cracked her knuckles. “At least not until I get my name on all the high score lists here. I still got a few to go.”

           “I never thought I’d get to see this place,” Laurie said a few minutes later, after the group had split up and chosen games to play. “Dad’s always staring at this spot when we’re at the mall, telling me how he ‘rocked’ it here in high school.”

           Eyeing the Hungry Hungry Hippos game as they walked by it, Jace replied, “It did used to be busier here back during my last visit.” They spotted Stu and Mikey playing fiercely on the Mortal Kombat cabinet, and Jace added, “Guess it still has its devoted regulars, though. Do you want to actually play anything, or… just watch?”

           “Watching is fine; I got my fill at Warren’s party. More interested in seeing what the others are doing.” They stopped for a moment when they happened upon all the girls busy with one of the few available four-player titles, The Simpsons, with Lucy playing as Lisa and being surprisingly savage with the controls. “Your mom’s in serious mode.”

           “We still game sometimes,” Jace admitted, his gaze on Arthur and Colin nearby, who were shooting dinos in The Lost World: Jurassic Park. He then noticed a figure past the arcade entrance. All the way into the food court, leaning against a pillar, was Millie, her arms crossed. “Ugh, Mill’s watching us. Let’s go further in and find the other guys.”

           They passed by Zach, showing his retro hipster side by playing the ancient Donkey Kong, and finally found Wes and Jared—who were deep into a round of Area 51, also a light gun shooter, in this case with an alien outbreak at the titular military base.

           “Hey Wes, J,” Jace said once they walked up. “Did you ever beat Vanni’s score?”

           Wes no longer wore his cap or carried a Game Boy charger, but that “ready for anything” confidence of his had become an intrinsic part of his look. He also wore big high-top shoes that gave him a boost against Jared, now the second tallest behind Celly. Mr. Reiner seemed to be coming into his own as well, no longer following the others so closely; he had found his own way to be cool, and his expensive hair cut helped.

           Wes devoted 10% of his concentration to reply, “The first day this arcade got it. Course, it’s not the same test cabinet we played back at the Hub, so her name was never actually on it. But you can still find some V-A-N’s here. Me and Luce play sometimes, too, even though it’s violent. She kind of has a mischievous side, ya know.”

           Jared said, “Hub doesn’t even have this. They got nothin’ with too much blood.”

           Laurie snickered and told Jace, “Way different story in ’22, huh?”

           He whispered back, “It’s either keep up with the times, or have half the games.”

           “Oh, these are cute,” Laurie said some thirty minutes later, about the twin bunny earrings she was looking at in Claire’s—which had dropped the ‘Accessories’ part of their name only a year ago. “I really need to ask permission to pierce my ears already…”

           “I love shopping here, even if it makes me feel tempted to maybe go too girly,” Sadie replied nearby, as she and Ash also checked out the rotating jewelry racks. “I think Celly doesn’t come in here at all because she’d be tempted, too.”

           “Jason, you know you don’t have to stick around,” Laurie noted. “Why not go see what stores the others went to? I’ll meet you at Payless in a few.”

           Noticing that Millie was once more watching from a safe distance, Jace said, “Nah, it’s okay. I can wait a little longer.” He watched Lucy for a moment, who was elsewhere in the store, looking at barrettes. “Luce does seem to be opening up a little.”

           “Ditching her toxic friends from the DTE days took guts,” Ash replied. “I mean, putting effort into a friendship is hard, too, but when you know that someone else just isn’t good for you and then actually cut them out… that’s brave.” She took a pause in her scrounging and turned to Jace. “What about you? Made any new… friends?”

           “Um, sure, Ash…” Jace couldn’t help but blush again. “Lots. I don’t think my middle school is all that different from Cookton. But there are still things I miss here.”