“We can bring you back because you’re tethered to here. What you see in the other worlds exists only there.”

That we’re all tethered to a single place was a false assumption. As much as I wanted to remake myself in California, I was still at least partially tethered to Missouri. When someone asked where I’m from, I used the two states interchangeably. Where was the line? Ting might be tethered to that other world, but I refused to believe she wasn’t also tethered to this one. “What if we exchange something here for something there?” I proposed.