My anxiety was building, and the staticky energy buzzing around me seemed to worsen. The scrolling went slower and slower until I had to sit back from the screen every few seconds to let the comments resolve in front of me.

After two more hours, I had to face it: The comment was gone. And when I searched for the account that left it, that was gone too.

He’d deleted it. Or someone had deleted it for him.

But why would anyone want the video taken down?

I couldn’t think about that right now. The important thing was just to e-mail him. I was pretty sure the address had BlackMailboxBill or Bob in it, and had involved an acronym for Citizen of the Black Mailbox. [email protected] or [email protected]

In the end, I messaged every possible combination I could think of.

That was all I could do tonight.

As soon as I’d had the thought, the lamp beside my bed flickered then went out: another omen, a warning.

* * *

*

Falling through darkness, total, complete. Cold feathering over me, a million fingers of it.

And then, light!

Shrieking past, thick drops like rain swept up a car window on the highway.

Falling is the sensation, but there is no up or down. There’s only an object with so much mass its gravity is pulling me.

A great hand, drawing me toward something velvety and dark, a surface still and glassy as water spread out below—ahead of?—me, and when the screaming bits of light hit, they ripple out, flashing, sparking, and when I’m near enough, the total silence, the cotton-eared absence of sound—wavers.

Like thousands of violin strings played all at once.

But in the same way falling has taken on new meaning, so has sound.

It is movement, waves that travel through me, invigorating as the cold.

Not painful. Invigorating.

I reach toward the pool, the mass drawing me in, and when my hand stretches out, I am shocked but not scared to realize I have no body.

I am white light, crackling in every direction, and that is what I feel.

My white light falling toward the still pool.

I know it will be warm before I hit, and when I do, I recognize the trillions of sounds humming through me as if they are old friends.

Here to welcome me, calling me by name.

M—

“Whoa there!” The man on the far side of the counter staggered back as I jolted awake, nearly tumbling from my chair in the process. It took me a few seconds of blinking to piece together who and what I was, let alone where I was.

Sallow overhead lighting. Twin vending machines full of glossy-wrapped cookies and chips. A mounted TV playing a Reese’s commercial.

The man on the other side of the counter held his YMCA card out. “Didn’t mean to wake you!” He patted the counter. “It’s summer. You kids aren’t supposed to be tired. Summer’s when you should be sleeping in.”

I looked between him and the YMCA-emblazoned polo I was wearing. If this random man thought I should be using my summers to sleep in, maybe he’d like to cut me a check. While he was at it, he could handle the minor issue of my alien possession.

I checked his card, handed it back.

He stared at the yellow rubber gloves I was wearing. I’d gotten them out of the supply closet in the hopes they’d impede my electrical charge while I researched light-discs and incessantly checked for a reply from Black Mailbox Bill. It had worked out kind of perfectly: the cheapo rubber composite was strong enough to dull my effect on the phone but weak enough for my electrical charge to still trigger the touch screen. As far as my phone keyboard was concerned, I was basically a normal human again. The gloves had helped; the searches themselves, not so much.

“Thanks, honey,” the man finally said, tearing his gaze from the gloves.

“No problem, scout,” I said.

He hesitated, visibly confused, then started down the hall. I turned my focus back to the half dozen Wikipedia pages I had open.

Perseids: the late-summer meteor shower of debris from the Comet Swift-Tuttle that orbited the Earth yearly.

Black Mailbox: a (white) mailbox on Nevada State Route 375 that supposedly marked some kind of hotbed of UFO activity.

MUFON (Mutual UFO Network): a UFO-investigating nonprofit, one of the biggest in the U.S.

I’d stumbled across plenty of UFO enthusiasts, proclaimed experts, skeptics, and devotees, but I hadn’t found a single account of an experience like the one we’d had.

“I’m here at the Crane Energy electrical substation on Jenkins Lane,” came a familiar voice, and I looked up to find Cheryl Kelly on TV, in a black blazer and red silk shirt with an enormous bow at the throat. “Where an investigation into the source of some strange burns in the surrounding field has yielded more questions than answers!

“Sources report that though a private crew has excavated upwards of seven feet in some places, officials still have no leads on who—or what—might have caused the burns. And in another new—and bizarre—twist, police are now reporting that several pieces of machinery damaged in the initial incident have mysteriously vanished. The Sheriff’s Department is asking for anyone with any leads on the missing equipment to please come forward. In the meantime, the search for answers appears to have stalled. I’m Cheryl Kelly, with Channel 11 News.”

My phone buzzed with a message, and my heart palpitated as I registered the e-mail alert onscreen.