“No chance,” Troy said. “This is home.”

Elena bounced up and down, pointing from side to side.

“What’s that?” Gabe asked.

“It’s my Star Wars dance,” she said, bouncing and pointing.

After a few seconds, he joined her. Then Troy’s friends picked it up. The dance traveled down the line. From the street, they must have looked like the Peanuts characters dancing.

There was a surge at the end—Troy was right! The line turned into a mob when Mark opened the doors. But Mark shouted at everyone and made sure the three original line members got in first. Gabe and Elena grabbed seats in the very middle of the theater.

“Oh my God,” Elena said. “This is the most comfortable chair I’ve ever sat in. I feel like a princess.”

“You look like a ruffian,” Gabe said, but his eyes were closed. “It’s so warm,” he said. “I love inside.”

“Inside is the best,” Elena said. “Let’s never go outside again.”

The theater filled up, and everyone was loud and excited. Elena got a large popcorn and a small pop, and she went to the bathroom twice in the hour before the show started. “If I have to pee during the movie, I’m using this cup.”

“It’s what you do best,” Gabe said.

“I can’t believe I made it!” she said. “I can’t believe we’re here. I can’t believe there’s a new Star Wars movie.”

“I can’t believe how much I want a shower,” Gabe said.

Elena started doing her Star Wars dance again. It worked just as well in a chair.

When the lights went down, she squealed.

She’d made it. She’d camped out. And she hadn’t given up. And now it was here. Now it was starting.

The opening crawl began. Episode VII: The Force Awakens.

Elena felt all the stress and tension—all the adrenalin—of the last four days drain out of her body. She felt like she was sinking deep, deep into the warm, plush chair.

She’d made it. She was here. It was happening.

FRIDAY

18 DECEMBER 2015

Elena woke up with her head on Gabe’s shoulder. In a puddle of spit. Someone was trying to climb over her. “Excuse me,” the person said. Why would anyone be leaving during the opening credits?

The opening credits. There were no opening credits.

Elena looked at Gabe. His head had fallen to the side, and his mouth was open. She shook his arm. Violently. “Gabe, Gabe, Gabe. Wake up! Gabe!”

He sat up like he’d been hit by lightning. “What?”

“We fell asleep,” Elena said. “We fell asleep!”

“What?” He looked at the screen—“Oh my God!”—then back at Elena. “When did you fall asleep?”

“Immediately,” she said. “As soon as the lights went off. Oh my Gahhhhd.”

“I saw the crawl,” Gabe said. “And a ship, I think?”

“We missed the whole thing,” Elena said. Her chin was trembling.

“We missed the whole thing,” Gabe repeated. “We waited for a week, and then we missed the whole thing.” He rested his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. His shoulders started shaking.

Elena laid her hand on him. On the wet spot she’d left on his sleeve. She took her hand back and wiped it on her jeans.

Gabe sat back in his seat with his hands still in his hair. He was laughing so hard he looked like he was in pain.

Elena stared at him, in shock.

And then she started giggling.

And then she started guffawing.

“Elena! Gabe!” Troy was moving with the crowd towards the door. “Was it everything?”

“I’m speechless!” Elena shouted.

Gabe just kept laughing. “We slept on the street,” he sputtered out. “You peed in a dumpster!”

Elena laughed so hard, her stomach hurt.

There were moments in the laughing when she felt totally miserable and wanted to cry—she missed the whole thing!—but that just made her laugh harder.

“What do we do now?” Gabe said. “Hit the street? Camp out until the next showing?”

“I’m going home,” Elena said. “I’m going to sleep for twelve hours.”

“Good idea,” he said, sobering up a little. “Me, too.”

Elena looked at him. At his curly brown hair and red stubble. She wondered what he’d look like when he hadn’t been sleeping rough for a few days. (She’d know this if she ever picked up her head at school.) “We could come back tonight,” she said. “We might be able to get tickets.”

“I actually already have tickets,” Gabe said, running his fingers through his hair. “I was going to come back at seven and see it again.”

“Oh,” Elena said. “Cool.”

“You can have one . . .”

“I don’t want to take someone else’s ticket.”

“It was for my cousin, and he can wait a day,” Gabe said. “You’ve been waiting a week.”

“I’ve been waiting my whole life,” she said.

Gabe smiled at her.

Elena smiled back.

“Meet you tonight?” he said.

Elena nodded. “First person here gets in line.”