Emmaline sat on the couch in the living room watching the hovering alien ship more than a little stunned. She had tried unsuccessfully to get her mom to do something besides cry, so after a few frustrating attempts, Emmaline had dropped her book bag off at her room and traveled the rest of the way downstairs.

  Mom didn’t say it, but Emmaline thought it was implied––no school today. If an alien ship being broadcasted on television wasn’t a good enough reason to skip school, then that was just too freaking bad. Because if the world was going to end, she’d rather meet it in the comfort of her own home, thank you very much!

  So she didn’t know if the world would actually end because of the ship showing up. Honestly, Em thought it was a little exciting. Aliens were real! How awesome was that! But Mom certainly didn’t seem to feel that way. She was definitely acting like the world was going to end at any moment, and that scared Em, more than she liked to admit.

  She had texted Helen and Brad, telling them to turn on the news. She wanted to see what they thought, but she had yet to hear from them. Were they freaking out too? She’d also texted Dad, Michael, and Eric, but none of them had texted her back either.

  Emmaline eyed the phone on the end table beside the couch, willing it to ding, but it didn’t. It just sat there with a green battery on the screen doing its thing when the phone was charging. She felt a little queasy. It had nothing to do with the fear eating at her insides. Nope. She had simply never eaten breakfast. That was all.

  She abruptly stood up and marched to the kitchen. Em threw open the refrigerator and stared at the contents. It took a few moments standing there in the cold air for her to realize she’d dazed out. Em shook her head and refocused. Food. That’s why she was here, dang it! But none of it looked even a little tempting. She closed the door and opened the freezer instead.

  There was just more food that made her stomach feel like it was doing flips just thinking about eating any of it. Or maybe it was the sound of the newscaster’s voice in the other room talking about the ship just hovering there above Lake Thurmond and not a word or signal from the ship to indicate why it was there.

  What was it doing just hovering there above some stupid lake? And for over half an hour. Why that lake? Her family had a cabin there. They’d spent several weeks each summer on that lake for as long as she could remember. Of all the lakes in the world, why did the alien ship have to pick that one? It felt like a personal invasion of some kind. Emmaline shuddered at the word invasion.

  It snapped her out of her momentary funk long enough to spot a half gallon of mint chocolate chip, and it hadn’t even been opened yet. That would do. She reached in, swung the freezer door shut and went to get a spoon.

  Man, her mom would be mad when she found out. Ha! She was too worried about the aliens. Her mom wouldn’t even care Em was eating ice cream for breakfast.

  “What are you doing?”

  Emmaline froze in the middle of walking to the silverware drawer. The carton of ice cream was out on the counter in plain sight. Crap on a cracker.

  “I was hungry, and you didn’t make breakfast,” she said, knowing the lame attempt to throw the blame on her mom was never going to work.

  “Oh, okay,” Mom said as she just stood there between the kitchen and the living room with a dazed look on her face.

  Okay? Did she not see the ice cream? Of course, she saw the ice cream. It was sitting right there on the counter in front of Emmaline! There was no not seeing it. Em’s stomach felt like it was dropping through the floor. This was worse than when Brad had forgotten her birthday this year. Like way worse. Like a bazillion times worse. Emmaline couldn’t believe it, but she half wished her mom would yell at her or something. I would be better than seeing her standing there like some lost little kid.

  “Ummm, Mom. It’s going to be okay. They are just sitting there in the sky. They hadn’t done anything. I’m sure they are nice aliens.”

  The words just fell out of her mouth, not exactly sure where they had come from. For some reason, she had a huge desire to make things right, because this wasn’t right. It should be her mother trying to comfort Emmaline, not the other way around. When had the world turned so topsy-turvy?

  Mom just stood there hugging herself like Em hadn’t said anything at all. Emmaline’s heart slumped. She really wished someone would call or text her back. She had made sure to turn her ringer all the way up so she wouldn’t miss it when they did. If they did. That thought made her insides quiver. What if the aliens were doing something to block people’s calls? They could do that, couldn’t they?

  Just then, Emmaline heard the garage door begin to open up. She ran across the kitchen to the small digital screen near the garage door. She turned it on and peered at the video footage of the garage. It showed the door was halfway up with a silver car waiting for the door to finish rising. A few moments later, Em saw the BMW logo on the front grille and the faces of her dad and brother in the front seats.

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  A massive feeling of relief flooded Emmaline at seeing them. Thank. Freaking. God. Everything would be okay now. Dad and Michael would take care of this––whatever this was. And they’d take care of Mom too. Both of them were level-headed people. Though until today, she would have said the same thing about her mother. Emmaline couldn’t believe she was thinking it, but it would be nice to have a responsible adult around. This shit had gotten much too real for her. She needed someone to tell her everything would be okay.

  Emmaline heard a large sigh of relief behind her. She turned to find her mother staring over her shoulder at the screen too.

  “At least they haven’t found them yet,” Mom muttered under her breath.

  But Emmaline had heard it loud and clear, and it sent a spike of fear through her. “Who found whom? What are you talking about?”

  Her last words were a bit too high pitched almost like a squeak, and her heart had picked up again with a rapid pounding. She was feeling that queasiness again.

  Mom looked at Emmaline as if she had just now seen her for the first time that day. “Nothing. It’s nothing, Emmaline. Go back to your breakfast.”

  Em just stood there blinking at the woman. She wanted to yell. She wanted to scream. But her mom had adopted that dazed look again. So instead, Emmaline stomped back across the kitchen, grabbed the ice cream carton and flung it inside and slammed the door. She stood there glaring at the closed freezer door as her stomach growled.

  She heard the garage door click closed. Em refused to look, but she knew her mom had gone out to the garage. Nope, she didn’t care, and she wasn’t curious at all to see what Dad and Michael had to say about things. Nope. Instead, she grabbed the door to the refrigerator and stood letting all the cold air out while she pretended to be looking again for something decent to eat.

  A few moments later, the garage door opened again. This time, Em did look up. She found Dad leading Mom into the house. She had started crying again, and Dad was trying to soothe her and move her at the same time.

  “It’s going to be alright, Cassie. I promise. I’m going to make this alright.”

  It was good to hear Dad’s words and his reassuring calm tone. She knew they were directed at her mom, but they immediately felt like a balm to Emmaline’s soul. Everything was going to be alright, and Dad would make it so. Like she had any doubt. She wanted to speak up and ask dad what exactly he was going to do to make everything better, but he didn’t even glance her way as he led mom through the kitchen and up the stairs to their room, at least she assumed that was where they were going.

  Emmaline let the fridge door close as she just stood there in the middle of the kitchen. Wondering. Hoping. And not sure what to do. What could she do? What could anyone do? All that kept her company was the rooster clock slowly ticking the minutes away.

  She waited for Dad to come back down, or at least for Michael to come into the house, but nothing happened. She made her way back over to the garage and glanced at the video feed of the garage. Michael was just sitting there in the car, like he was lost in thought or something. His face looked deeply troubled.

  Crap on a cracker. Her big brother wasn’t cracking up too, was he? That was the last thing she needed, two responsible adults in her life losing their shit. This was really shaping up to be the worst day in the history of Emmaline.

  Not sure what else to do, she went back to stand in front of the fridge and debated just ordering something from DoorDash. At this point, she doubted her parents would care if she ordered something from McDonald’s. Emmaline gave a heavy sigh––too heavy for a fourteen-year-old.

  More ticking of the rooster passed, and then Emmaline heard the heavy footfalls of her dad on the carpeted stairs. She wasn’t going to be ignored this time. She ran over and met him as he came into the kitchen and said the first thing on her mind.

  “Dad, Mom’s going to be okay, right? She’s not acting like herself. This alien thing isn’t as bad as all that, right?”

  Dad stopped, and a dark look passed across his face. He took a moment as if gathering his thoughts, and then spoke. “It’s going to be fine, Emmaline. I’ve got a plan. It will work.”

  He then reached forward and pulled her close into a hug. Emmaline felt herself tremble in his grasp, but it felt good to be there. For the first time since things had gone wrong, she felt safe.

  She hated it when her dad pulled back. She wanted to stay in his hug just a little longer. She looked up, expecting to see his strong brown eyes looking down at her, but was shocked to find tears in them.

  “I love you, Pumpkin. No matter what, always remember that.”

  Em couldn’t speak as a lump settled in her throat. She just nodded.

  Dad didn’t seem to mind the non-response. He just nodded in return and then said. “I have some things to do. I want you to stay here. Don’t leave the house unless I say so. Okay?”

  Emmaline nodded once again, more emphatically this time. “Okay.”

  And that was that. Dad walked around her and headed straight for the garage. Emmaline watched him go. He said things would be all right. That he was going to make them right. Like maybe he was going to do something personally to make them right.

  She supposed maybe he could. He was an important person after all. Her dad ran the largest technology business in the freaking world, and had done business with the Department of Defense for years. Heck, General Riker was a personal friend of the family. If anyone could do something about the aliens, or at least know what they might be up to, he would, or at least be on the team that would know what to do.

  Emmaline nodded as if the affirm what he told her. Yes, it really was going to be alright. Feeling much more settled, Em went back to standing in front of the refrigerator door to contemplate her food options. But her mind kept wandering back to the chocolate chip mint. Seriously, if you couldn’t eat ice cream for breakfast––well, early lunch, it was getting late––when the world as you know it was ending, then when could you?

  As she opened the freezer door once more, Emmaline heard the garage door open once again. Before she could turn around, she heard someone kick off their shoes, and then Dad was talking.

  “I know you have questions, and you have every right to the answers, but now is not the time. I have to go take care of something first. I need to know exactly how bad this is going to get. When it’s done, we will talk.”

  She looked over just in time to see Dad shut the door, and Michael stood there watching him go. Her stomach growled a stubborn protest at being so slow with the food, so she grabbed the carton of ice cream and slammed the freezer door closed. She went over to the silverware drawer, pulled out a spoon, and looked up at her brother.

  “You want some? I figure if the world is going to end, no one would care if I ate ice cream for lunch.”