Everything that had happened to her so far that night, Zoe reflected, could be explained by natural causes. She would never have guessed that her mother would slap her, or that Robert would choose tonight of all nights to kiss her. And the sudden thunderstorm and her near death experiences were even more improbable. But what happened next was different.

Through the sand-glass, Zoe saw what at first appeared to be nothing. Even though the tip of the glass and much of its interior was quite clear, she just saw blackness when she looked into it.

Then she twisted it slightly, and the nothingness became edged with faint rainbows.

At first Zoe thought the glass was a sort of natural kaleidescope. She squinted and focused. The rainbows seemed to blend into the nothing and expand and swirl around, but they remained on the periphery of her vision, even as she attempted to look directly at them.

Then Zoe realized that she was not supposed to look at the rainbows—she was supposed to look through them. They were the frame of a picture. And as she realized this, the picture inside the rainbow frame began to take shape and swell, enveloping her consciousness.

At first Zoe was a startled, because she felt like she was losing control of herself. But she was sure she could see something within the rainbow-framed nothingness—little pinpricks of light. She was too curious to stop looking now. If she just looked a little closer, through the rainbows....