I felt a little flame of anger. “Hey! I’m here to help you!”
“So you say.”
“It was for you, you know. Sarah gave up her voice for you so you would come back safe.” It was like he didn’t even care. I wanted to throw his hand away from me in disgust, but I still felt that charged energy, that love, that flowed from both Sarah and me. If I took that away in anger, I’d be giving up on him.
“I can hardly follow you.”
“Jezzie told Sarah you would only come back if she stopped talking, and she believed it. Now you’re here and you won’t even look at her. How’s that fair?”
“I still don’t see why you care. Why it’s your business.”
I started to tell him more about Lucca, about what I said to him that one time long ago before all the problems started, but also about how much fun we have, playing at the beach, getting him ready for bed, just being together, even without him talking. I talked about it for such a long time it seemed that the stars had shifted in the sky I could see through the window.
When Joshua spoke again, his voice was softer. “Sarah and I used to be close like that, too. When I picked up that little girl, I was thinking of Sarah, hoping she was all right.”
“So help her. If you come back to your family, you don’t have to lose each other, too. Do you know what’s going to become of them without you? Sarah’s never going to talk again, and your parents are going to fall apart. So please, please, get up. If you stay here like this, you’ll only relive the same bad memories over and over, instead of making good new ones. What about your family? Don’t you want to see their faces again?”
His breathing and hand relaxed a little more. He was getting close to sleep again.
“What for?”
“You just have to keep going. To keep them going, too.”
“I … I could try.”
“You could.…”
“Maybe. If I don’t?”
“I might have to come here again.”
A smile stretched across his face. “I think I would like that.”
“I don’t know if I can,” I said seriously. “Not like this. It might be putting me and Sarah in danger. But what will happen if you don’t is what I told you: all the people you love are going to fall apart. Their lives will be full of the darkness you’ve brought home. They will remain faceless to you. But if you get up, if you try to let a little of it go, if you make new happy memories, you can have them back. If you remember me, you can remember this again any time you want, in your mind. Or maybe you could visit me in my life.”
“You think so?”
“I do.” And I did. After all, I’d been visiting Sarah. “Just listen for me, my spirit in this house. Sit near the window. Be ready to write things down. You should be able to find me.”
“Really?”
“Really. You just need to believe it’s possible.”
“You are pretty crazy. Or I’m crazy for thinking you’re here.”
“If it gets you out of bed, it’s okay by me.”
“Okay.”
“I don’t know how long I can stay.” I gave his hand one more squeeze. “I think you have everything you need.”
“Where is Sarah? If you’re in her body, where is she?”
“I don’t know.” A feeling of panic for both Sarah and myself coursed through me.
“Get going, then. Switch back.”
I nodded. “You’ll get up?”
He nodded back.
I let go of his hand.
“The next time you see Sarah and she is Sarah, tell her that the spell is broken. Jezzie’s spell. She might even be listening, know already. Tell her she can talk now. You can get her to talk again.”
Joshua nodded.
“What about Lucca?” he asked.
“I’m not sure. I’ve tried so many things.”
“What did you say Jezzie did to Sarah? Do the opposite thing, and maybe Lucca will open up. You never know.”
Then he seemed to drift back to sleep. Maybe he’d think the whole thing had been a dream.
Can two people in different times meet in their dreams? No reason why not. No reason.
20
Now the hard part: getting back.
Could Sarah have gone to my body? Traded places? I’d had to think hard to get here, so I guessed she could only go there if it was on purpose.
I walked back to my room—in Sarah’s time, so Sarah’s room—well, our room. I lay down and buried my head in the pillow, but it didn’t smell like my pillow, though the smell was familiar. I tossed and turned. I wasn’t leaving.
Sarah, come back. I’m ready to go.
But I continued to lie there.
It was a sleepy summer day, the kind when you don’t even want to move. I went out to the porch and lay back on the swing, my tiptoes touching the floor enough to make the swing sway back and forth.
Jezzie came by. I shut my eyes as if I were really asleep.
“Sarah,” she said. “Sarah!”
I kept my eyes scrunched closed and pressed them extra tight when she shook the swing. I let my arms and legs go loose like jam.
“Huff!” She must have been convinced I was sleeping, because she left. I peeked my eyes open to check and saw her leaving the yard. I tipped my head back to stare up at the ceiling but found there was someone standing over me.
My brother. He was looking down at me, into my eyes.
“Hey, Little Bug? Is there room for me?”
Of course there was! I sat up and stretched my arms to him as he sat down. I pressed my face into his shirt and felt it grow wet with tears.
“Good work pretending for Jezzie. You aren’t such a little bug anymore, are you? How have you been?”
I shook my head and cried harder.
“You can tell me. I’m here now. Please?”
“Siena, honey? Siena, wake up.”
Mom.
I drifted from Sarah. I wiggled my fingers, trying to feel if they were mine. Mine-mine. I dared to peek open my eyes.
“Mom!” I sat up and hugged her.
“Hey there,” she said, patting my back. “Hey. Are you okay?”
“Yeah.”
“I was worried. I couldn’t seem to wake you up.”
“Yeah, I was … Well, anyway, I’m back now.”
“Back?”
“Never mind.” I was so relieved, I was shaking. My mother had brought me back. Here we both were, sitting in my bed. “What—what are you doing in my room?”
“Sam called. Which was weird, it’s so late … almost midnight … but then he sounded scared or something. He asked if you were here, and I said you’d talk to him tomorrow. Then he said, ‘Could you just go check on her?’ I peeked in here, and you seemed to be sleeping, but something in his voice … He mentioned ghosts. Are you still on about that?”
I listened, I felt the air. It was still. Normal.
“No. I’m not worried about them anymore.”
“That’s a relief. Is that all he was worried about?”
“I guess.”
Mom kissed me on the forehead. “I’m glad everything’s okay. I’ll call him back.”
I felt exhausted, ready to fall onto my pillows for a good sleep. “And I know now.”
“Know what?”
“How people, you know, keep going even when something terrifying might happen at any time.”
“How’s that?”
“You have strength inside you. You can do anything.”
Mom laughed gently. “I think you’re still asleep. You don’t talk like that when you’re awake.”
And I might have been; I could barely make her out anymore, even though she was sitting right in front of me.
“Go, honey. Go to sleep.”
And I went.
21
When I came downstairs in the morning, Mom was reading something at the kitchen island.
“Check the porch,” she said without looking up.
“Huh?”
“The porch. Sam’s here.”
I headed outside.
“Hi,” I said, suddenly very aware of my pajamas. I sat down next to Sam. He had an empty bowl and spoon. “I see you’ve been cereal-and-milked.”
“Everything … okay?” Sam asked.
“Yes.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
“One hundred percent?”
“Yes! Except that I’m wearing my pajamas.” I got up, but then I turned around and gave Sam a hug, even though he was still sitting down.
“What?” he asked.
“You’re checking on me.”
“Yeah, so what?”
“So what nothing.” I smiled. “Thanks for calling last night.”
He didn’t return my smile.
“What?” I asked.
“You scared me. It’s … creepy.”
“Hey, look, I’m sorry I scared you. I’m all right. I think everything’s okay now. I’m going to get dressed. Don’t leave.”
I jumped into some clothes and grabbed my sneakers.
“Let’s get real breakfast,” he suggested when I returned. “I have money.”
We walked to the center of town, to the diner. I ordered an omelet with green peppers and onions, and rye toast and grapefruit juice.
“Hungry?” Sam asked.
“Starving.”
He shouldn’t have talked, what with his bagel and bacon and cheddar-cheese eggs.
When the food came, we got right to work eating.
“Tell me what happened with the ghosts.”
I told him, as best I could, about what had happened. He listened, raising his eyebrows at points.
“You must have dreamed that whole thing,” he said.
“I don’t care whether it was real or not. I think it helped.”
“And you think this will help Lucca?”
I nodded.
“I o no,” Sam said, his mouth full of food.
“What?”
He swallowed. “I don’t know. Why would it have anything to do with Lucca?”
“I helped them. Something should help me.”
Sam was quiet. I assumed he was thinking about our conversation. Then he said, “I should order some orange juice.”
“Sam!”
“What?”
“What do you think?”
“Oh, about Lucca? You’re talking, like, about karma or something, right? What goes around comes around? You did something good, so you’ll get good back?”
“I guess so.”
“What if the good is something else? Why would it have to be related to Lucca?”
“Because the ghost puzzle and the Lucca puzzle are related. They’re connected, I know it. We came here for a reason.” What was it Mom had said? She had a feeling something here, something on the beach, would help Lucca? And why, why had I dreamed about the house long before we were even thinking about moving?
I knew that Mom’s feelings were just regular feelings, not psychic ones. But they still meant something. Something had reached out and pulled us here from a long way away. Something that she could only vaguely sense, and something that only I would perceive.
We finished up our food.
“Want to hang out?” I asked Sam as we left the diner.
“I can’t. I have to go home. Mom wants to have a ‘family day.’ Usually that means we play a board game and watch a movie.”
“That’s okay. Thanks for the great breakfast. And thanks for coming by this morning.”
As I walked back I couldn’t get what Mom had said out of my head, about something at the beach helping Lucca. Why?
It must have been connected to last night.…
Joshua had said maybe I could help Lucca by doing the opposite of what Jezzie had done to Sarah. But how would you do the reverse? What had happened hardly made any sense.
I stopped walking, closed my eyes, and pictured that moment in Sarah’s life, Jezzie turning the invisible key and tossing it down the stone steps. I remembered the taps the metal made on the stone, heard the splash it made when it hit the water, saw the rings ripple out from the spot where it fell.
I started to have an idea, a crazy, impossible idea.
It was worth a try, anyway. Wasn’t everything already crazy?
When I got back to our house, I headed out down the path I had never been down before, not in this time, anyway. I tried to follow the way Jezzie had led Sarah, across the grass and over the dunes. The ocean grew closer. There! There were the steps leading into the water. They were real. Just like everything else had turned out to be.
I took off my shoes and sat on the lowest dry step with my feet in the water. So cold!
What would I find? What I was looking for was invisible.
I scanned the water with my eyes, not wanting to stir up any of the sand and make it cloudy. I studied the sand and the long reeds of dune grass. They were very hard to see through.
The grass scratched my toes as I started to walk through the shallow water, carefully lowering my feet to each step. Each was more slippery than the one before it. When my feet hit the sandy bottom just off the last step, I was standing about thigh-deep in the water.
I couldn’t see anything. But, again, I was looking for something invisible … I closed my eyes. I listened.
To the sound of water lapping against the stone.
To the wind rippling so very quietly through the grass along the dunes.
To the air itself.
I listened for things that no one would expect to hear. I could hear them.
Things I could feel, but not yet see …
I trailed my icy toes through the sand, searching, searching. After a few minutes, I felt something. Not rock or plant. It was metal. Small. I held my breath. Keeping my eyes closed, I reached down and felt through the sand until my fingers found it, too. I gathered up the object and brought it to the surface.
Only then did I open my eyes. Through Sarah’s eyes, I hadn’t been able to see it. With my own, I could.
In my hand was a little key. Bronze-colored with black patches, a Celtic-knot handle, and two skeleton teeth at the tip. Shorter than my pinky.
Maybe this was it.
Maybe this key would help my brother.
22
That night, I waited until I was sure Mom and Dad were asleep, and then I slipped into Lucca’s room and quietly closed the door behind me.
Lucca’s a deep sleeper; he used to fall asleep in his stroller on the street in New York, ignoring sirens and car horns, subway trains and street music. When I sat down next to him on the bed, he slept on.
He had that sticky look of little kids who sweat in their sleep. His Batman pajamas clung damply to his skin and his bangs were moist; his mouth hung open, his chest gently rose and fell. I smoothed his wet hair away from his face.
“Hey there, dreamer,” I whispered, “with all your thoughts so secret.”
I turned the key over in my hand. The bronze gleamed in the moonlight. The key was so solid, so real to me. Jezzie had made Sarah believe she could take her voice away, and that had been the important thing. If Jezzie had been able to use the key to convince Sarah it was wrong to talk, maybe I could use it to let Lucca know I wanted him to. And maybe soon, he’d want to.
“Hey, little brother,” I whispered.
I shook his shoulder gently, and he opened his eyes. As he woke he examined my face in the dark.
“I just wanted to tell you … I’m sorry … about how I made you feel … about talking, I mean. If that’s not why you haven’t been talking to us, I don’t want to change you, not if you don’t want to. But I would love for you to talk to me, and Mom and Dad; to go to school and play with the other kids. Maybe that doesn’t seem like so much fun to you, but it can be. So anyway, think about it.”
I rolled the key in my fingers. Lucca sat up.
“Just if you want to,” I promised. “I brought something to help … a m
agic key.”
I held my hand out to show him. His night-light gave enough light to see it, but he held his own hands up, empty, and shook his head.
He couldn’t see the key. It seemed only I could. I’d dreamed it, believed it hard enough that it had become real just for me.
“That’s right,” I said. “It’s magic. It’s invisible.”
Lucca stared at me.
“Okay?” I asked.
He nodded.
I pressed the key to his lips and gave it just a hint of a turn.
I sat looking at him for a little bit longer. Maybe this would change everything. But it would only matter if it was what Lucca really wanted.
He cuddled back down onto his pillow. I stayed until he was asleep again. Then I went back to my own room and set the key on my shelf with the other abandoned things. That was the end of what I could do—it would be up to Lucca now, to choose his own way.
23
I finished getting dressed in the morning and headed down to the kitchen, where Mom had put out a box of fruit-rings cereal. I poured myself a bowl.
Lucca came downstairs. He still had that sticky, sleepy look.
“Hey, buddy. How are you?”
He climbed up into the chair next to me. I crunched my cereal for a minute and then realized he’d probably want some.
I dumped a dry handful out on the table. “Wanna play colors? Can you eat a pink one?”
Lucca reached for a pink one and crunched it. He smiled. Probably the cereal tasted good.
“Where’s an orange one? Can you find an orange one?”
He pointed to one, scooped it up, and put it in his mouth.
“You ate it!” I acted surprised. “I wanted to eat it. Can you get me an orange one?”
He picked up another orange one and fed it to me.
“Yummy! Now, what color is this?” I picked up a purple one.
He wasn’t tricked. He said nothing. Nothing, nothing. But he looked like he was giving the matter some thought. I finished my last spoonful and went to get a plastic bowl for Lucca. I filled it with cereal, poured in a little milk, and gave him a toddler spoon.
“Do you like the cereal?” Lucca’s swinging feet told me he did.