“Spring cleaning,” Mona muttered angrily, rummaging through what felt like the millionth box of the day. “Spring freaking cleaning. Better known to Grandma as 'make Mona dig through fifty years of junk while she and Grandma Jill drink coffee and watch TV.'” She tossed several tattered items of clothing over her shoulder and declared, “Junk! Nothing but junk in here.”

Mona flopped onto the floor and stared up at the ceiling of the attic. She wondered how long she could goof around or daydream before it became obvious to her grandmothers that she had become bored of the task she had been given. Maybe I can try to sneak out, she mused. There's way better stuff I could be doing right now.

“Mona,” her grandmother called from below, “Are you still working on the spring cleaning?”

“Yeah,” Mona responded, struggling to hide the frustration in her voice. “Seems like a lot of old clothes, though.”

“It's mostly your mom's stuff. We stuck it up there after she moved out. She didn't take much with her.”

“Well, Mom should have thrown out her d*mned junk years ago,” Mona muttered.

“What was that, dear?”

“I said that I wished she'd have sorted this stuff better.”

“Let me know if you find anything interesting. Whatever you don't want, we'll throw out or give to charity.”


“Who the hell would want this stuff?” Mona muttered. She gave a nearby box a kick, knocking it over. Several articles of clothing, along with a book, spilled onto the floor.

Mona knelt and examined the book, then flipped it open. Inside were many handwritten pages. She quickly scanned the writing and whispered, astonished, “It's... it's Mom's diary from when she was my age!”

She turned to the first page and began to read: I had that dream again last night.


Ophelia awoke with a start. She had been having the same dream she'd had for a week. In it, Gabrielle Gibson-- her former teacher, her mentor, the one who had both blessed and cursed her with the burden she carried-- stood before her, holding a familiar book. “Undercover,” Gibson said repeatedly. “Undercover.”

Whatever that meant. Ophelia shook her head. “Undercover,” she muttered to herself. “I don't know anyone undercover; nothing was mentioned in that book she left me about undercover anything, as far as I recall. The only undercover I know about is lying in bed under the cov...” She trailed off, her eyes wide. Undercover. Under cover. She was being told to look under the cover of the book.


Now fully awake, Ophelia rose quickly from her bed and hurried over to where she had hidden the book. Cy and Lisa would be out for the day; there was no chance of her being discovered with it. Ophelia picked up the book and opened it, examining the inside front cover. Nothing. A search of the back proved similarly fruitless.

“Now what?” Ophelia muttered. “There's nothing under the covers.” She shut the book and stared down at the front cover of the book, which was a solid color, with no pattern. “Nothing on the cover, either.” She closed her eyes, thinking carefully. “Nothing on the inside covers and nothing on the outside covers. Unless she's just pulling my leg, or there's some kind of in-between that I'm not thinking of.”

Ophelia ran her fingers along the edges of the book, then opened the book again and slowly ran her hands over the inner covers. She squinted at the inner cover closely. A small corner of the inner cover was peeled up slightly. She gave the corner a slight tug, peeling back a bit more of the paper covering. Ophelia tilted the book and saw that something appeared to be written on the underside. Slowly, so as to avoid tearing the paper, she peeled away the paper that covered the inside cover of the book. Her eyes widened as she continued to pull, revealing that a makeshift dust jacket had been loosely glued to the inside and outside covers of the book. When she had finished peeling, Ophelia had before her a rather long, slightly yellowed length of paper with a great deal of small, precise writing on it, as well as a hastily scribbled down series of notes and a confusing series of abbreviations with lines and arrows pointing every which way.

Ophelia recognized the handwriting as Ms. Gibson's and squinted at the paper, struggling to read the tiny print.

“JS, GG, ED,” she whispered aloud, reading the top of the page. “The gene lives on in us.”