November 5, 2000
Wollongong, New South Wales
The smell of burnt toast hit Rachel Cross like a caffeinated slap to the face, jolting her from the kind of sleep that feels like you've been hit by a particularly vindictive truck. She groaned and rolled over, squinting at the digital clock that seemed to mock her with its aggressive red numbers: 6:47 AM. Outside her window, the November air was doing that thing where it couldn't decide if it wanted to be winter or spring, settling instead for the meteorological equivalent of a teenager having an identity crisis.
"Happy bloody birthday to me," she muttered, pulling a pillow over her head. Because yes, today was November 5th—the anniversary of her birth and, coincidentally, the day the universe had apparently marked on its calendar as "Let's Mess with Rachel Cross Day."
The calendar on her desk seemed to glare at her, the date circled in red marker like a warning sign. Fifteen years old today. Fifteen years of November 5th being the worst day of the year, every single time. Other kids got birthday parties and cake and presents that weren't accompanied by the lingering smell of tragedy. Rachel got death anniversaries and the kind of family history that made guidance counselors reach for their stress balls.
The toast smell was getting stronger, which probably meant Josephine was downstairs attempting what she generously called "cooking." Her aunt had many talents—fixing broken radios, understanding tax forms, and maintaining a poker face that could fool a lie detector—but culinary arts were not among them. Rachel had long suspected that Josephine's smoke detector doubled as a kitchen timer, going off precisely when breakfast reached that perfect shade of charcoal black.
Rachel dragged herself out of bed, her feet hitting the cold hardwood floor with all the enthusiasm of a condemned prisoner walking to the gallows. Her reflection in the mirror looked like something that had crawled out of a particularly rough night—dark hair sticking up at angles that defied several laws of physics, and eyes that held the kind of weariness usually reserved for people twice her age.
She'd inherited her father's eyes, everyone said. Edward Cross had supposedly had that same intense, slightly haunted look, like he was always seeing something the rest of the world missed. Rachel wondered if he'd seen his own death coming on November 5, 1990. Probably not—scientists were supposed to be logical, rational people who didn't believe in curses or cosmic jokes played by bored deities.
Then again, logic hadn't saved him from the CrossTech explosion.
The walk to school was like navigating a minefield of memories, each landmark a carefully placed trigger designed to remind her exactly why November 5th sucked. First up was the rebuilt CrossTech facility, all shiny glass and steel, looking nothing like the photos she'd seen of the original building. The new structure was probably meant to inspire confidence—look, we rebuilt! We're totally not the kind of place where brilliant scientists get blown up by faulty wiring!—but all it did was remind Rachel that her father had died in a building that no longer existed.
Edward Cross had worked there as a senior electrical engineer, the kind of guy who could look at a circuit board the way other people read novels. According to the newspaper clippings Josephine had saved, he'd been working late on November 5th, 1990, probably hunched over some complicated schematic with a cup of coffee that had gone cold hours ago. The explosion happened at 10:47 PM—Rachel knew because she'd memorized every detail of the incident report like it was her personal scripture of suffering.
The official cause was listed as "electrical malfunction due to faulty wiring." In layman's terms: things that should have stayed safely contained decided to explode instead, taking half the lab and her father with them. The investigation concluded it was a tragic accident, the kind of workplace safety failure that makes insurance companies nervous and spawns new regulations with names like the Edward Cross Safety Protocol.
Rachel had read that report so many times she could recite it from memory, but it always felt like reading someone else's story. Edward Cross, age 34, survived by his wife Mary (deceased) and twin children Jack and Rachel. Clinical, factual, completely devoid of the reality that this "workplace accident" had orphaned two five-year-olds and left them with an aunt who thought toast was supposed to be crunchy enough to use as a weapon.
She kicked a pebble and watched it skitter across the cracked sidewalk. The November air carried the salt smell of the ocean mixed with the faint industrial scent that always hung around Wollongong like a reminder that this was a working city, not some picturesque coastal paradise. The sky was that particular shade of grey that suggested rain without actually committing to it—typical Australian weather hedging its bets.
The beach road came next, and with it the memory of Jack. Her twin brother had died here five years ago, his car wrapped around a power pole like some twisted piece of modern art. The official report called it "loss of vehicle control due to excessive speed and poor road conditions." Rachel called it November 5th being November 5th, because of course her brother would die on the same date that had already claimed their parents.
Jack had been the good twin, the one who actually listened in physics class and could fix the family computer when it decided to have what Josephine called "one of its moods." He'd inherited their father's scientific mind but paired it with an optimism that Rachel had never quite managed. Even at ten years old, Jack had been convinced he could solve any problem if he just applied enough logic and elbow grease.
The last time she'd seen him alive, he'd been hunched over the kitchen table with a notebook full of equations, trying to work out some problem that had been nagging at him for weeks. Rachel had made fun of him for being such a nerd, stealing one of his pencils and doodling sarcastic comments in the margins of his calculations. She'd give anything to take back those stupid jokes now.
"You worry too much, Rach," he'd said, looking up from his work with that crooked smile that made teachers forgive him for turning in assignments written on napkins. "Everything follows patterns. You just have to find the right equation."
Three days later, Jack's car had become part of a very different kind of equation—velocity plus impact equals one less Cross twin. Rachel had spent the last five years wondering what pattern he thought he'd found, and whether it had anything to do with why he'd been driving so fast on a wet road at night.
The hospital loomed ahead, and Rachel's steps slowed automatically. Wollongong Hospital looked exactly like what it was—a place where people went when life decided to demonstrate its sense of humor in particularly cruel ways. The building was beige and bureaucratic, the kind of architecture that suggested its designers had been specifically instructed to create something that would make patients feel worse just by looking at it.
This was where Mary Cross had died giving birth to Rachel and Jack on November 5th, 1985. Fifteen years ago today, to be precise. Rachel had never known her mother, but she'd inherited Mary's stubborn streak along with her complete inability to let sleeping dogs lie. According to Josephine, Mary had been the kind of person who would argue with doctors, challenge established procedures, and generally make herself memorable to hospital staff.
"Your mum had opinions," Josephine always said, in that tone that suggested having opinions was both a blessing and a curse. "She'd have liked you, I think. You've got her fighting spirit."
Rachel wasn't sure if having a "fighting spirit" was much of a consolation prize when it came packaged with dead parents and a birthday that doubled as a memorial service, but she supposed it was better than nothing. Sometimes she wondered what Mary would think of the daughter she'd never met—whether she'd approve of Rachel's tendency to ask uncomfortable questions and refuse to accept simple answers.
Probably, considering Mary had apparently spent her pregnancy interrogating medical staff about every procedure and asking to see her own charts. The woman had died demanding to know exactly what was happening to her body, which Rachel could respect even if she couldn't remember it.
School was its usual monument to educational efficiency, all wide hallways and fluorescent lighting that made everyone look like they were suffering from a mild case of food poisoning. Rachel's locker was decorated with the kind of magnetic poetry that tried too hard to be profound, courtesy of her best friend Chloe's determination to "brighten up the aesthetic of institutional oppression." The words "luminous" and "transcendent" sat next to "cafeteria" and "detention," creating combinations that ranged from accidentally philosophical to completely nonsensical.
Computer lab was first period, which meant Rachel got to spend the morning pretending to work on assigned projects while actually diving down internet rabbit holes about accident investigation and statistical analysis. The school's computers were ancient enough to have seen the dawn of the internet age, their processors wheezing through basic web browsing like elderly relatives struggling up stairs.
Rachel had become something of an expert on forensic analysis over the years, not because she planned to make a career of it, but because she couldn't shake the feeling that three deaths on the same date couldn't be purely coincidental. She'd read everything she could find about probability theory, actuarial tables, and the mathematical likelihood of familial clustering in fatal accidents.
The numbers were uncomfortable. The chance of three immediate family members dying on the same calendar date across different years was roughly equivalent to being struck by lightning while winning the lottery during a total solar eclipse. Possible, but so unlikely that rational people would start looking for alternative explanations.
Under the username N5Phantom—because she had a flair for the dramatic and a weakness for obvious symbolism—Rachel had joined forums dedicated to unusual death patterns, statistical anomalies, and what polite society called "conspiracy theories." Most of the posts were from people who thought the government was controlling their thoughts through dental fillings, but occasionally she'd find someone discussing legitimate questions about official accident investigations.
Her current project involved cross-referencing local death records with weather patterns, looking for any correlation between November atmospheric conditions and fatal accidents. So far, the only pattern she'd found was that people in Wollongong were statistically more likely to die in car crashes during months that started with "N"—November, but also notably not April, June, or August, which rather undermined the significance of her discovery.
"Rachel, are you working on the assigned spreadsheet project?" Mr. Harrison's voice cut through her concentration like a particularly judgmental knife. He was standing behind her computer, reading over her shoulder at a website about actuarial death tables.
"I'm researching statistical analysis," she said, which was technically true. "It's very educational."
"The education I'm concerned about is your understanding of basic Excel functions," he replied, but his tone was more amused than annoyed. Mr. Harrison had been teaching long enough to recognize the difference between students who were goofing off and students who were intellectually engaged with the wrong material. "Try to include at least one pie chart in your browsing habits."
Lunch was an adventure in social navigation, the kind of complex interpersonal choreography that made Rachel grateful she'd inherited her father's analytical mind. Her friends—Chloe, Marcus, and Devon—had claimed their usual table near the windows, where the November sun created patterns of light and shadow that Chloe insisted were "totally aesthetic" and Marcus claimed gave him seasonal depression.
"So," Chloe said, unwrapping what appeared to be a sandwich constructed entirely of vegetables that had never seen the inside of a grocery store, "are we still on for the concert tonight?"
Rachel blinked. "What concert?"
"The one I've been talking about for three weeks? Local bands, small venue, the kind of authentic musical experience that validates our artistic souls?" Chloe's voice carried that particular tone of patient exasperation reserved for friends who had clearly not been paying attention during previous conversations.
"Oh. Right. That concert." Rachel had absolutely no memory of this plan, which probably meant she'd been distracted by something death-related when Chloe had mentioned it. This was becoming a pattern—her friends would make plans while Rachel was mentally reviewing coroner's reports or calculating statistical probabilities.
Marcus looked up from his book—something thick and philosophical that he carried around like intellectual armor. "You know, birthdays are just arbitrary markers in the human construct of linear time. There's no cosmic significance to the anniversary of your birth."
"Thanks, Marcus. That's exactly the kind of profound wisdom I needed today," Rachel said, stealing one of Devon's chips. "Really puts everything in perspective."
"I'm just saying, the universe doesn't actually care about calendar dates. It's all psychological projection and pattern-seeking behavior." Marcus had the kind of confidence that came from reading philosophy books and assuming they contained all the answers to life's problems.
Devon, who had been quietly working his way through a sandwich that looked like it had been assembled by someone with a grudge against proper nutrition, finally spoke up. "Didn't your dad die on your birthday?"
The table went silent. Even Marcus's philosophical confidence seemed to deflate slightly.
"Yeah," Rachel said, aiming for casual and probably missing by several degrees. "November fifth. Same day every year, weirdly enough."
"And your brother too, right?" Devon continued, apparently immune to social cues that suggested this might not be the best lunch conversation topic.
"Devon," Chloe said, in the tone of voice usually reserved for puppies who had just chewed up something expensive.
"What? I'm just saying, that's kind of weird. Two people in the same family dying on the same date?" Devon looked genuinely puzzled, like he was trying to work out a math problem that didn't quite add up.
"Three people," Rachel corrected, because accuracy mattered even when it made everything worse. "My mom died when I was born. November fifth, 1985."
Marcus opened his mouth, probably to share some wisdom about coincidence versus causation, but was interrupted by the sound of someone dropping their lunch tray three tables over. The metallic crash echoed across the cafeteria like a gunshot, and suddenly Rachel was five years old again, hiding under her bed while sirens wailed outside and adults whispered about explosions and accidents and how they were going to tell the children.
Her hands were shaking. When had her hands started shaking?
"Hey." The voice was gentle, familiar. Rachel looked up to see Mr. D'Angelo, her physics teacher, standing beside their table with the kind of expression that suggested he'd noticed her moment of panic and decided to intervene before it got worse.
Michael D'Angelo was one of those teachers who actually seemed to remember what it was like to be a teenager—the kind who could explain quantum mechanics in terms that made sense while also understanding that sometimes students needed someone to talk to more than they needed to understand the mathematical relationship between energy and matter.
"Everything okay here?" he asked, directing the question to the table in general but clearly focusing on Rachel.
"Yeah, we're fine," Rachel said, willing her hands to stop trembling. "Just discussing the philosophical implications of calendar-based mortality patterns."
Mr. D'Angelo raised an eyebrow. "That's a pretty heavy lunch conversation. Mind if I join you for a minute?"
He sat down without waiting for an answer, which Rachel appreciated because she wasn't entirely sure her voice was working properly at the moment. The rest of her friends suddenly became very interested in their food, except for Marcus, who was clearly torn between his desire to debate philosophical concepts with an actual adult and his social awareness that maybe now wasn't the time.
"You know," Mr. D'Angelo said, "sometimes when we're looking for patterns, we find them whether they're really there or not. It's called apophenia—the tendency to see meaningful connections in random information."
"But what if they're not random?" Rachel asked before she could stop herself.
"Then you've got a scientific hypothesis worth investigating," he replied. "The trick is making sure you're looking at the evidence objectively, not just trying to confirm what you already suspect."
He stayed for the rest of lunch, steering the conversation toward safer topics like the upcoming physics exam and whether the school's ancient computers were technically considered archaeological artifacts. By the time the bell rang, Rachel's hands had stopped shaking and she was almost ready to pretend the whole episode hadn't happened.
Almost.
The afternoon dragged by with the kind of slow-motion quality that made every minute feel like an hour. Rachel sat through history class learning about World War II statistics, English class analyzing the symbolism in Gothic literature, and math class solving quadratic equations that seemed almost simple compared to the problem she'd been trying to work out for ten years.
By the time the final bell rang, she was ready to escape. The walk home took her past all the same landmarks—the rebuilt CrossTech facility, the beach road where Jack died, the hospital where her mother had given her first and last breath—but this time Rachel barely noticed them. She was too busy thinking about what Mr. D'Angelo had said about evidence and objectivity.
Maybe it was time to stop looking for patterns and start looking for proof.
The house was quiet when she got home, filled with the kind of silence that suggested Josephine was either taking a nap or trying to fix something that was probably better left broken. Rachel climbed the stairs to her room, kicked off her shoes, and pulled out the shoebox she kept hidden under her bed.
The box contained everything she'd collected over the years about her family's deaths: newspaper clippings, photocopied police reports, photographs from before and after the accidents. She'd organized it all like evidence in a criminal case, which probably said something about her mental state that she didn't want to examine too closely.
The newspaper article about her father's death was yellowed at the edges, the headline reading "CrossTech Engineer Dies in Lab Explosion." Below the fold was a smaller article about increased safety protocols and a quote from the company president expressing deep regret about the "tragic accident."
The article about Jack's crash was shorter, relegated to the local news section with a headline that read "Teen Dies in Single-Vehicle Accident." There was a photo of the crash site, the power pole that had killed her brother looking perfectly innocent and structural, like it had just been minding its own business when Jack's car decided to introduce itself at sixty miles per hour.
Her mother's death certificate was the hardest to look at, partly because it was so clinical and partly because it represented the only time in Rachel's life she'd been the direct cause of someone's death. Mary Cross had died from complications during childbirth—specifically, complications caused by carrying twins who had apparently been as difficult to deliver as they'd been to conceive.
Rachel had always wondered if her mother had known she was dying, if she'd had time to think about the children she'd never meet or the husband she'd leave behind. The medical records suggested Mary had been conscious almost until the end, asking questions about the babies' health even as her own vital signs flatlined.
There was something both admirable and heartbreaking about dying while demanding to know if your children were going to be okay. Rachel hoped she'd inherited that kind of stubborn determination to care about other people even when everything was falling apart.
The sound of footsteps in the hallway interrupted her thoughts. Josephine appeared in the doorway, looking like someone who had spent the afternoon wrestling with a piece of technology that had fought back and won.
"The dishwasher's making that noise again," Josephine said, leaning against the doorframe. "Either it's trying to communicate with alien life forms or it's about to achieve sentience and demand workers' rights."
"Maybe it's just broken," Rachel suggested.
"Everything in this house is broken. The question is whether it's broken enough to stop working or just broken enough to be annoying." Josephine noticed the open shoebox and the scattered papers. "Researching again?"
It wasn't really a question. Josephine had long since given up trying to discourage Rachel's obsession with the family's tragic history, settling instead for making sure she didn't disappear completely down rabbit holes of grief and conspiracy theories.
"Just thinking about patterns," Rachel said, closing the lid on the shoebox. "And statistical probabilities."
"Your father used to say that everything follows patterns if you look at it the right way," Josephine said, sitting down on the edge of Rachel's bed. "He could find mathematical relationships in everything—the way leaves grew on trees, the pattern of raindrops on windows, the frequency of car accidents on wet roads."
"Did he ever find a pattern in his own life?"
Josephine was quiet for a moment, the kind of silence that suggested she was choosing her words carefully. "He was working on something before he died. Some kind of project that had him staying late at the lab, coming home with that look he got when he was trying to solve a particularly complicated equation."
"What kind of project?"
"I don't know. He said it was confidential, company business. But he seemed worried about it, like he'd found something that didn't add up the way it was supposed to." Josephine stood up, brushing invisible dust off her jeans. "Your father was the kind of man who couldn't let mysteries alone. Sometimes I think that's what killed him."
She left Rachel alone with that thought, which was both comforting and deeply unsettling. The idea that Edward Cross had died because he'd been too curious, too determined to find answers to questions that someone else preferred to keep buried, suggested that maybe the three November 5th deaths weren't as random as they appeared.
It also suggested that asking too many questions about those deaths might not be the safest hobby for someone who'd already lost three family members to suspicious circumstances.
Rachel spent the rest of the evening staring at her reflection in the bedroom window, watching her own face become transparent as the darkness outside deepened. The girl in the glass looked older than fifteen, worn down by the kind of knowledge that most people didn't acquire until they'd lived long enough to lose the people they loved in ordinary, predictable ways.
Tomorrow would be November 6th, and life would go back to normal. Her friends would stop looking at her like she might spontaneously combust, teachers would stop speaking to her in gentle, concerned voices, and the world would continue turning as if November 5th was just another day on the calendar.
But Rachel knew better. November 5th wasn't just a date—it was a deadline. And somewhere out there, someone was keeping track of the Cross family's schedule.
The question was whether they were finished counting, or just getting started.
Outside her window, the lights of Wollongong twinkled like stars, each one representing someone else's life, someone else's family, someone else's collection of ordinary days unmarked by tragedy and mathematical impossibility. Rachel pressed her palm against the cold glass and wondered what it would feel like to be one of those people, to have birthdays that meant cake and presents instead of memorial services and statistical analysis.
But that wasn't the hand she'd been dealt. She was Rachel Cross, daughter of Edward and Mary, twin sister of Jack, niece of Josephine, and the only surviving member of a family that had apparently offended the universe in some fundamental way.
If someone was targeting the Cross family, they'd have to deal with the fact that Rachel had inherited more than just her parents' scientific minds and stubborn personalities. She'd also inherited their determination to find answers, no matter how dangerous the questions might be.
The clock on her nightstand glowed 11:47 PM. In thirteen minutes, it would officially be November 6th, and Rachel Cross would officially be sixteen years old with no immediate plans to die.
It was a start.