Free 3:59 by Gretchen McNeil

palm.
    Josie stared at her hand. She could feel the warmth of Jo’s palm. She was awake, no bones about it. This was real. This was really happening.
    She looked up and met the other girl’s eyes. “Jo?”
    Jo cocked her head to the side, as if she couldn’t quite understand what Josie said, then her eyes widened. She nodded. Then her lips moved, slowly. Josie couldn’t hear her words; her voice was just a muffled sound through the mirror. Jo repeated it, speaking even slower. Josie could just read her lips.
    “Who are you?”
    Josie opened her mouth to respond, but the image blurred again. Jo pulled her hand away. Josie did the same, just in time. The image in the mirror rippled, distorting Jo’s face in a squiggly mass of waves, then resolidified until all Josie could see was the pale, panting image of her own face in the mirror.

FIFTEEN
    3:58 P.M.
    ONLY AN ACT OF GOD WOULD HAVE KEPT JOSIE away from the mirror at 3:59 the next afternoon. She’d been restless all day at school, barely able to focus on her classes and, for the first time that week, blissfully unaware of the whispers that erupted every time she walked into a room. She didn’t care, not about Madison or Nick or her physics project or her parents’ divorce. She only cared about Jo.
    A girl who lived a life that was sort of like hers, but different. Better. A girl who was still Nick Fiorino’s girlfriend.
    An idea had taken hold in Josie’s mind. Ever since she’d learned about Nick’s brother, she’d been eaten up with remorse over the way she’d treated Nick the last few months. What if she could go back and change things? What if she could go back and be there for Nick, listen to him when he needed her?
    Maybe time travel was out of the realm of possibility, but now there was another Nick. A Nick who still loved her. Maybe she could still be there for him. Fix her mistakes with Nick, even if it was just for one day.
    Josie shook her head. She was being totally ridiculous. To do that, she and Jo would have to switch places. Was that even possible?
    Josie glanced at the clock.
Hurry up!
In her hand she held a letter, the contents of which she knew by heart. Since they couldn’t talk through the portal, Josie thought she’d write Jo a note outlining what she knew about the mirror, the flash, and the connection between their worlds. She’d spent her entire lunch hour slaving over it, rewriting it at least three times, to make sure she didn’t sound totally and utterly insane.
    Dear Jo
,
        
Since we can’t really talk, or in case you aren’t in the mirror today, I thought I’d write to you and let you know that I’m real, that this—whatever this is—is real.
        
I’m not sure where to start but here are the basics. I’m Josephine Byrne but everyone calls me Josie. I live in Bowie, Maryland, I’m a junior at Bowie Prep, and it’s 2013.
        
I’m not really sure what’s happening to us, but I know it started last week. I was in my car waiting for a train to pass. There was a flash and I think I blacked out or something. Next thing I knew I started seeing you in the mirror and . . . yeah. Then yesterday.
    Josie had originally written
I started having dreams like I was seeing life through your eyes
but she’d deleted that part. She didn’t know if Jo was experiencing the same phenomenon or not, and thought it might be better to leave out the creepy details for now.
        
Something is connecting us, every twelve hours at 3:59. It’s a portal between our universes, maybe caused by the flash at the train tracks? That’s the only theory I have right now. I don’t know how it happened, but I know that this is real.
        
I’ll be in the mirror tonight.
    Sincerely
,
    Josie Byrne
    Josie didn’t even need to look at the clock to know it was 3:59. As if on cue, the surface of the mirror rippled and rolled across the pane like the tide washing up onto the shore, then retreating into the sea. When the image came