Recently, college scouts had started attending the Wilburton High baseball games to watch Joshua and his friend David O’Reilly play. Since the scouts arrived, I’d spent every game in near agony, both hopeful and fearful that Joshua would finally earn his scholarship to some faraway college. Each pitch, each hit, had me clawing at my wooden seat. Now, I didn’t know if either of us would survive this weekend to see another game.
Unaware of my real fears, Joshua laughed. “Maybe you do affect how I play. But it’s not like I can see you up there in the bleachers.”
His reference to my invisibility problem brought up another, far less pleasant thought. I curled up into a seated position next to him, tucking my legs beneath me on the bed.
“Speaking of Friday,” I said, abruptly changing the subject, “I think I’ve decided that I am going to go, tomorrow morning.”
Joshua’s eyebrows drew together with worry. “You shouldn’t have to go by yourself, Amelia. I can skip school tomorrow. Go with you.”
I shook my head firmly. “No, you can’t. Besides, you’d get some pretty weird looks, standing all by yourself at the funeral of a woman you didn’t even know.”
Joshua’s expression darkened further as he shifted to sit up beside me. “So, you’re really going to stay invisible for the whole thing?”
“It’s Serena’s funeral, Joshua. You read the newspaper: my mother will definitely be there. I can’t let her see me, especially not on a day like that.”
Two days ago, Jillian had found Serena’s obituary in the Latimer County News-Tribune. Other than the few details I’d learned from the TV news report, I discovered some unexpected items in the obituary as well.
The first thing out of place was Serena’s burial site: it would be the same cemetery where I’d been buried, instead of her family plot in the neighboring town of Hartshorne. Next, the obituary listed only one person as Serena Taylor’s next of kin. Not her mother, father, or little brother Aaron, but one Elizabeth Louise Ashley. My mother.
“If you want to go by yourself,” Joshua said, drawing me out of my confused thoughts, “then I won’t stop you.”
Although he spoke the words, I could tell that Joshua didn’t like the idea of me being alone at the funeral of my ex–best friend/murderer. Truth be told, I didn’t much like it either. But I couldn’t miss the funeral—just as I suspected that Serena hadn’t missed mine.
Suddenly, Joshua’s face brightened with a new idea. “You could wear a disguise,” he suggested. “So that your mom won’t recognize you.”
I released a small snort of disbelief. “What, like wear oversized glasses with a fake mustache attached?”
Joshua grinned a little. “Could I get a picture of that, please? But seriously: Jillian obviously loves to dress you up like a paper doll, so we could at least see what she comes up with.”
I was about to reject the idea completely, when I hesitated. At worst, I could turn invisible at the cemetery gates if I didn’t feel sufficiently disguised.
“All right,” I said, looking up at Joshua. “I’ll give it a shot.”
He blinked back, clearly surprised that I’d actually agreed. Then he pulled out his cell phone. After a quick text and its reply, he slipped the phone back into his pocket.
“Jillian’s in her room—she says you should just go on up so that you two can look through some clothes.”
I swept away a few leaves that had fallen onto my jeans from the plants above us and then peeled myself off of the daybed. “Don’t you think it’s a little ridiculous,” I asked him as I rose, “that the two of you text each other, when you’re less than a hundred feet apart?”
Joshua grinned good-naturedly and settled back on the daybed with his previously discarded Physics book.
“How would we have known how far apart we were, unless we texted first?”
I shook my head, moving toward the entrance of the gazebo. “I’m not sure I’ll ever understand this century.”
I heard Joshua chuckle as I let the heavy outer drapes of the gazebo fall shut behind me. I trudged through the dark backyard into the house, dragging my feet a little. Once I entered the house I turned myself invisible, just in case Jeremiah or Rebecca had decided to stay up later than their children, and made my way to Jillian’s bedroom. I knocked on her door, feeling a strange sense of déjà vu—I’d gone to her room to get dressed up only a few days ago. But considering what had happened since then, it felt like something I’d done in another lifetime.
The door opened and, instead of Jillian, a dress greeted me. It swung slightly on its hanger, which Jillian held in front of her like an offering. The dress was surprisingly understated: cleanly cut black silk, almost retro with a wide neckline and three-quarter-length sleeves.
“Perfect,” I said quietly, running my fingers across its fabric. “Very . . . funereal.”
Still hiding behind the dress, Jillian produced a black, floppy-brimmed hat in her other hand. “This, and some oversized sunglasses, ought to hide your face.”
Finally, the dress swished aside and Jillian came into view. Without letting me cross her threshold yet, she scrutinized my face as if I had a smudge of dirt on it.
“What?” I asked, wiping self-consciously at my cheeks. “What is it?”
Jillian tilted her head to one side, still giving me that thoughtful look. “Have you always worn your hair down? I mean—did you wear it like that, when you were alive?”
I tugged at the ends of my long brown hair and frowned. “Yeah, I did.”
Jillian nodded decisively. “Then tomorrow, you’re a ponytail girl. Sleek and sophisticated—none of your usual bohemian crap.”
“Thanks, Jill,” I drawled. “You’re a big help.”
“Don’t mention it,” she muttered, entirely missing my sarcasm as she continued to study me. “A little makeup wouldn’t hurt you, either. Mascara, blush, maybe some red lipstick—you’ll look like a totally different person. I’ll leave everything out on my bed for you tomorrow morning. I’d help you get ready before I go to school, but . . .”
“The no-touching thing sort of preempts that,” I finished awkwardly.
She was obviously not as concerned by the problem as I was. Without bothering to end the discussion properly, she shut the door in my face.
“Night,” she called belatedly, her voice muffled by the wood.
Although Jillian couldn’t see me, I rolled my eyes at her door. Even with all we’d been through together, I guessed some things never changed. I took a quick peek at Jeremiah and Rebecca’s door, to make sure they hadn’t heard me talking in their house so late at night. Then I crept back downstairs, through the back kitchen door to where the gazebo—and Joshua—waited for me.
When I woke the next morning, I found myself curled as close to Joshua as I could get on the daybed in the gazebo, where we’d stayed up talking. I pushed myself into a stretch, yawning.
I cast a glance back at Joshua, and my yawn transformed into a soft smile. I loved the way he looked as he slept: frowny and disheveled like a little kid. Not as heart-wrenchingly handsome as I found him while he was awake, but somehow just as appealing. Sitting this close to him, I experienced that familiar, curling ache within my core, the one that awakened each time I really let myself look at him. Physically, it felt as though I’d slept alone in an otherwise empty bed. Emotionally . . . well, that part never changed.
My gaze drifted upward, to the mesh skylights that Rebecca had sewn into the cloth ceiling of the gazebo. I wasn’t surprised to see that it was still dark outside. On a day like this, there was no way I would sleep past dawn. I was too edgy. Too anxious.
I slithered off the bed—no need to rouse Joshua, since no one in the Mayhew household could possibly be awake yet. I stepped carefully across the creaky gazebo floorboards and parted the drapes, slipping quietly through the backyard. I almost laughed at myself as I crept into the Mayhews’ house like a cat burglar: for a girl who could go invisible, I was acting a bit ridiculous
.
Yet something about my goal this morning felt a little clandestine. Maybe because I hadn’t told anyone, including Joshua, my full plan.
With my lips pressed tightly shut, I climbed the stairs and then paused outside Jillian’s room. Did I really want to do this? Like a crazy person, I answered myself by nodding. Then, as slowly and delicately as possible, I turned Jillian’s doorknob.
Inside, Jillian was sprawled diagonally across her bed, taking up every available inch of space with weirdly angled arms and legs. And she was snoring. Loudly. I stifled a snicker: the wry, jaded Jillian Mayhew snored. That was something I could file away for later use, I told myself as I passed the foot of her bed.
A slight hitch in one of her snores made me pause, midstride. But when the jackhammer-like chorus started back up, I continued to tiptoe across the room. There, draped over an armchair, I found what I needed.
I wasted no time changing into the black dress, struggling only momentarily with the back zipper. After placing the floppy hat on Jillian’s vanity, I took my discarded clothes to the closet, where the rest of my wardrobe was secretly stored. I shoved my jeans and top into a bag of dirty clothes—which Jillian begrudgingly washed with hers each week—and dug around for the pair of black heels that Gaby’s brother Felix had given me as I was leaving New Orleans. I stood and slipped into them unceremoniously, trying not to think about the fact that the shoes probably cost more than my mother’s mortgage payment.
Next, I sat on the bench in front of the vanity and squinted at my dim reflection. As much as I hated to admit it, Jillian was right: I needed to do something about my face, which didn’t look a day over eighteen. Probably because it wasn’t, and hadn’t been for over a decade.
Breathing a quick prayer for good luck, I tried to re-create the makeover that Gaby had given me in New Orleans. After an additional swipe of blood-red lipstick, I smoothed my hair into a low ponytail and put on the floppy hat. With just the slightest catch in my throat, I slipped on Gaby’s huge pair of Fendi sunglasses—the ones I’d handed to Jillian the minute we left Louisiana. Then I leaned back to assess my handiwork.
I couldn’t believe how transformed I actually looked. The dress, the ponytail, the lipstick—combined, they made me look at least five years older. Best of all, the hat and sunglasses obscured my face so well that I could pass as any random woman in her midtwenties. One of Serena’s friends from work, maybe.
Satisfied, I snuck out of Jillian’s room as quietly as I’d snuck in and made my slow, stealthy way back outside. As I crossed the back porch and prepared to descend to the driveway, I caught a glimpse of the gazebo and faltered. I hated to leave Joshua there alone, to wake up in a few hours and find me gone. But if I woke him up now, he might insist that he come with me after all. So, with a guilty heart, I took the last few steps to the driveway and began my long, lonely walk.
I’d seen this place at dawn, many times. Yet today, it seemed different. More watchful, more alive, if that was possible.
Just outside the cemetery gates, I paused to inspect the changes. Every other time I’d seen my graveyard, it looked a little dilapidated and ignored—a burial place for people who couldn’t afford better. Now, the rusted gates had been polished up and adorned with a new sign that announced the name of the cemetery in wrought iron curlicues. All along the front fence line, someone had planted a thick row of irises, which bloomed in bright purples and pinks and yellows. Even the gnarled trees seemed more welcoming with rustic wooden birdhouses nailed to their trunks.
My cemetery actually looked cheerful. More like a pretty little park than a place where the poor buried their dead. But somehow, the differences made me more ill at ease than ever. Maybe because I just couldn’t imagine a living person—or even a team of living people—spending any significant time in this place. Especially when you considered all the secrets and souls that lay deep beneath its soil.
Still, the irises presented me with a solution. I made my way over to a particularly thick clump, knelt as best I could in the black dress, and plucked a few of the more vibrantly flowered stems. I laid them across the crook of one arm, careful to keep the petals off the fabric of my sleeve, and stood. Then, with just a slight falter in my steps, I entered the graveyard.
I walked slowly down the main cemetery corridor, pulling my heels up whenever they sank a little too deeply into the unpaved path. When I’d covered the overpriced shoes with a sufficient amount of grime, I yanked them off and continued barefoot. Old habits died hard, I supposed.
As I passed a freshly dug grave, in front of which someone had placed a few rows of white plastic chairs, I tried not to look at it. I would deal with that problem later.
Finally, I’d gone far enough into the cemetery that I could stop at my first destination. Funny that I remembered the location of this headstone, even though I’d only visited it once. I dropped a single yellow iris on the grave and said a quick prayer before turning away. That small tribute was the most Eli Rowland deserved, and probably the most he’d received since being buried here almost forty years ago.
Now that my respects to Eli’s grave were paid, I made my way over to the headstones I really wanted to visit. Or headstone, as the quick glance at my own was mostly obligatory. I dropped a purple flower on the small mound of my grave and then turned to the most important slab in this entire cemetery.
I was happy to see that my father’s grave still looked well tended. If the mowed plot and cleanly swept marker were any indication, then my mother visited pretty regularly. A pot of slightly wilted flowers sat on top of the headstone, so I added two irises to the bunch. For lack of anything else to do, I rearranged them, moving the freshest flowers to the front and plucking out any stems that were brittle or brown.
Pleased with the new bouquet, I let my fingers trace down the headstone until they found the carved indentation of three words. TODD ALLEN ASHLEY—I outlined each letter with my index finger, trying not to think about the fact that this memorial was the only physical reminder of him I had left. Done outlining, I placed my hand flat against the stone to block out the date of his death.
“Hi, Daddy,” I said aloud, and I could hear the longing in my own voice.
“Hi, Amelia.”
The unexpected response made me jerk my head back so fast I felt a muscle in my neck wrench. I hardly noticed the pain, though; I couldn’t seem to focus on anything but the person standing behind my father’s headstone.
I’d half expected this meeting; half hoped for it, too, although I didn’t think the odds of it happening were very likely, given the tragic events of Saturday night. Still, I couldn’t help but ask the million-dollar question:
“Serena—is that you?”
Chapter
TWELVE
Serena had only been dead five days—not long enough to look so alert. More importantly, the demons themselves had killed her. She should be a mindless, shadowy slave in their wraith army right now.
Yet there she stood, not four feet away, smiling down at me with perfect awareness, as though she were still alive. She wore the same suit that I’d seen her in on Saturday morning—a shame that she hadn’t had the chance to change into something more comfortable and eternity appropriate. But she must have loosened her ponytail sometime before she died, because her corn-silk hair now floated in pretty waves around her shoulders. When the early sunlight hit it at the right angle, it glowed.
Almost like a halo.
“Hi, Amelia,” she repeated, in a voice that was simultaneously familiar and otherworldly. It had a sweet, lilting quality that spread through me like warm honey. The sound of her voice made me feel happy. Giddy, even. I couldn’t understand the feeling, couldn’t understand how she looked exactly the same and yet totally different, until something clicked in my mind.
“The light took you,” I breathed, “instead of the darkness.”
In lieu of an answer, Serena flashed me a mysterious, close-lipped smile and took a step closer to my father’s
grave.
“How, Serena?” I blurted out, too impatient to wait for her to speak. “How could you be with the light now, if the darkness killed you? I don’t understand how.”
Again, she didn’t answer my question. Instead, Serena folded her hands and leaned casually on top of the headstone. With a thoughtful frown, she cocked her head to one side and stared at me for a moment. Then the enigmatic smile returned, and she shook her head.
“You know what your problem always was, Amelia?” she mused. “You never knew how to relax. Even as a kid, you were so freaking straitlaced.”
“W-what?” I stuttered.
Now this, I didn’t expect. Maybe an explanation for how she stood here, in the living world; maybe an apology for killing me. But not this.
Serena went on with a widening grin, untroubled by my distress.
“God, do you remember when we were eleven and you let me cheat off your math exam? Our parents didn’t even have a clue, but you basically went nuts with guilt and told them in less than a day. Little Miss Good Girl, to the rescue.”
I remembered now. She’d begged me for days to let her cheat, and I’d caved. Even though I eventually tattled, the guilt burned acidic in me long afterward. Because ultimately, I’d betrayed my mother and my best friend. It was one of the few dark memories in our bright history, yet Serena was laughing like it was our best.
“Or how about the time we smoked that entire pack of clove cigarettes with my cousins behind my dad’s pool shed when we were fifteen? You were the only one who threw up, and then you insisted on taking about nine showers and staying over so your parents wouldn’t smell the smoke on you.”
Again, she spoke of one of our darkest moments. Another situation in which she’d pressured me to do something I hadn’t wanted to do . . . another situation in which I showed weakness, in one form or another.
“Why are you bringing these things up?” I asked softly.
Hearing her snicker cruelly about these memories—which were few and far between, when compared to all the good things we’d shared—I had the urge to show her how strong I’d become. But God help me, my eyes started to sting. This woman had been my best friend. Now, during our first meeting since my death, she seemed intent on rehashing the worst of what was once us.