“Oh,” I said, beginning to feel a little less like I had a slowly tightening noose around my neck. “Oh. You’re right.”
“Of course I am,” Father Dominic said. Was it my imagination or did he sound distracted? “Although it’s something you might think of doing, Susannah. If he’ll teach you how, I mean.”
“What?” I twisted the phone cord around my finger. “Go back through time and save Jesse from dying?”
“Exactly,” Father Dominic said. “It might, for all you know, be the reason why he’s still here on earth. Because he was never meant to die in the first place.”
I was so appalled that for a moment, I couldn’t say anything. Unbidden, my mind flashed back to that poster my ninth grade English teacher had hung up in her classroom, of two seagulls flying over a beach…. A poster I always seemed to remember at the most inconvenient moments. IF YOU LOVE SOMETHING, LET IT GO, the words beneath the seagulls read. IF IT WAS MEANT TO BE, IT WILL COME BACK TO YOU.
The imaginary noose around my neck tightened to a choking point.
“That’s bull, Father D.,” I yelled into the phone. “Do you hear me? Bull!”
“Susannah—” Father Dominic sounded startled.
“That is NOT why Jesse is still here,” I shouted. “It’s NOT. Jesse and I are meant to be together, and if you can’t see that, well, that’s your own damn problem!”
Now Father Dominic sounded more than startled. He sounded angry. “Susannah,” he said. “There’s no reason to use that kind of language—”
“No, there’s not,” I agreed with him. “Especially since I have nothing more to say to you.” I slammed the phone back down into its cradle. A second later, Dr. Slaski’s attendant appeared, looking worried.
“Susan?” he asked. “You all right?”
“I’m fine,” I said, horrified to find that my cheeks were damp.
Great. So, on top of everything else, I’d been crying.
“It’s just,” the attendant said, “I heard shouting….”
“It’s nothing,” I said. “I’m leaving. Don’t worry.”
And I did, without saying good-bye to Dr. Slaski. I had no more to say to him than I did to Father Dom. There was only one person, I realized, who could stop Paul from doing what I now knew he was going to do.
And that person was me.
Of course, knowing that fact wasn’t the same as actually having a plan for how I was going to stop him. That’s what I tried to come up with as I drove back to school. A plan.
It wasn’t until I was pulling into the Mission Academy’s student parking lot that what Father Dominic had said really began to sink in. Paul didn’t have anything of Jesse’s that could bring him back to that horrible night when Jesse had died. I was almost sure of it. Jesse had been murdered and his body never found—until recently, that is. His own family had believed he’d run away to escape an unwanted marriage.
What could Paul possibly have of Jesse’s that could help him get back to the day leading up to his death? Nothing. Because the only things that still existed from that time were a miniature portrait of Jesse—which I kept safe at home—and some letters he’d written to his fiancée. But those were on display at the Carmel Historical Society museum.
There was nothing of Jesse’s that Paul could possibly have that he could use to hurt him. Or rather, to save him. Nothing. Jesse was safe.
Which meant that I was safe.
The relief I felt was short-lived, however. Oh, not my relief about Jesse. That remained. It was as I was attempting to sneak back into school that my newly restored equilibrium was shaken again. Only this time, it wasn’t by Paul. No, it was Sister Ernestine who shattered my hard-won sense of calm, just as I was trying to blend in with my fellow students as they made their way to their next class, pretending like I’d been there with them all along.
“Susannah Simon!” The vice principal’s shrill voice caused several doves that had been roosting in the beams overhead to take off in startled flight. “Come to my office immediately!”
My youngest stepbrother, David, happened to be nearby. When he heard the sister’s command, he visibly paled… an accomplishment for him, seeing how pale he was already, being a redhead.
“Suze,” he asked me, looking a bit freaked. And why not? Usually when I get into trouble, it isn’t for mere tardiness. No, more often, it’s along the lines of destruction of property… and someone usually ends up unconscious, if not dead. “What did you do now?”
“Never mind,” I said, a little chagrined that I’d been busted for so minor an offense as skipping class. I was really losing my touch.
I followed Sister Ernestine into her office, which, unlike Father Dominic’s, didn’t have any teaching awards on the shelves. No one would consider Sister Ernestine an exemplary educator. She’s a disciplinarian, plain and simple.
I got off lightly, I suppose. She’d noticed I’d been gone during religion class, which I was supposed to have right after lunch. I told her I’d had a slight medical emergency, and needed to go to the drugstore, once again invoking the ‘crimson tide’ in the hope she’d drop the subject. It didn’t have the same effect on Sister Ernestine as it had on Brad, however.
“Then you should have gone to the nurse’s office,” was Sister Ernestine’s terse response.
For my crime, I was assigned to write a thousand-word essay on the importance of honoring one’s commitments. Additionally, I was told to be at Saturday’s antique auction to help man the eighth graders’ bake sale table.
All in all, I suppose it could have been worse.
Or so I thought. Before I ran into Paul Slater.
He was lurking behind one of the stone supports that hold up the breezeway, which is why I didn’t spot him on my way from Sister Ernestine’s office to my trig class. He stepped out from the shadows just as I was hurrying by.
“The wanderer returneth,” he said.
I flattened a hand to my chest, as if doing so would cause my heart, which had practically jumped through my ribs at the sight of him, to beat normally again.
“Why do you have to do that?” I demanded testily. “You scared the pants off me.”
“I wish.” Paul’s smile was decidedly irreligious, considering the fact that we were standing only a few hundred feet away from a church. “So. Where’d you disappear to?”
I could have lied, I suppose. But what would have been the point? He’d learn the truth as soon as he got home and his grandfather’s attendant told him I’d stopped by.
So I stuck out my chin and, ignoring my stuttering pulse, plunged. “Your place,” I said.
Paul’s dark eyebrows came down in a rush as he frowned. “My place? What’d you go to my place for?”
“To have a chat,” I barreled on, “with your grandfather.”
Paul’s scowl grew even deeper. “My grandfather?” He shook his head. “What the hell would you want to go see him for? The guy’s a complete gork.”
“He’s not well,” I agreed. “But he’s still capable of carrying on a conversation.”
“Yeah,” Paul said with a sneer. “About Richard Dawson, maybe.”
“Well, that,” I said, knowing what I was about to say next would enrage him, but also knowing that really, I didn’t have any other choice, “and time travel.”
Paul’s eyes widened. As I’d expected, I’d shocked him.
“Time travel? You talked about time travel? With Grandpa Gork?”
“With Dr. Slaski,” I corrected him. “And yes, I did.”
The two words—doctor and Slaski—seemed to hit him like physical blows. He certainly looked as stunned as if I’d hit him.
“Are you…” He couldn’t seem to find the right words to express himself. “Are you crazy?” is what he seemed to settle for.
“No,” I said. “And neither is your grandfather. But I think you might be,” I went on—recklessly, I knew, but no longer caring. Not now that I knew what he was after.
“I know yo
ur grandfather is Oliver Slaski,” I stated. “He told me so himself.”
He just stared at me. It was as if, right before his eyes, I was turning into a completely different person than the Suze he’d known. And maybe I was. I was certainly angrier at him than I’d ever been before—more than the first time, even, that he’d tried to get rid of Jesse. Because he hadn’t known then what he surely knew by now…. That Paul and me?
Yeah, that was never going to happen.
“He didn’t talk to you,” Paul said finally, his blue eyes flat and cold as the Pacific in November. “He doesn’t talk to anybody.”
“Not to you, maybe,” I said. “Why should he, when you treat him the way you do… like he’s a big inconvenience, a—what do you call him?—Oh, yeah. A gork. I mean, your own father changed his name, he was so ashamed of him. But if you’d ever taken the time to find out, you’d know Dr. Slaski isn’t as far gone as you think… and he has some pretty interesting things to say about you.”
“I’m sure,” Paul said with a smirk. “In fact, I’m pretty sure I can guess. I’m the spawn of Satan. I’m up to no good. And you should stay away from me. That about sum it up?”
“Pretty much,” I said. “And considering that you plan on traveling back through time and keeping Jesse from dying? I’d say he’s one hundred percent right.”
At that, the flatness left his eyes—but not the coldness. He even smiled a little, though it was with just half his mouth. “So you finally figured it out, huh? Took you long enough—”
But I didn’t let him finish. I took a step forward until my face was just inches below his, and said as fiercely as I could, “Well, I’ve figured it out now. And all I can say is that if you think making it so Jesse and I never met will change my feelings about you, you’re dreaming.”
Paul looked hurt. But I knew it was all just a put-on. Because Paul doesn’t have feelings. Not if he really intends to do what I suspect.
But he was doing his best to prove me wrong.
“But, Suze,” he said, his blue eyes wide and innocent. “I’m just doing what you want. After that whole thing with Mrs. Gutierrez, you got me thinking…. I’m really trying to tread the path of righteousness. And isn’t saving Jesse’s life the right thing to do? I mean, if you really love him, you must want what’s best for him, don’t you? And wouldn’t his living a long and happy life be what’s best for him?”
I blinked at him, completely thrown by the way he’d twisted everything around.
“That isn’t—I—” I couldn’t seem to get the words out. All I could do was stand there and stammer.
“That’s okay, Suze,” Paul said, reaching up and laying a hand on my arm—to comfort me, I suppose, in my hour of need. “You don’t have to thank me. Now, don’t you think we’d better get back? You don’t want Sister Ernestine to find you skipping class again, now, do you?”
I stared at him, dumbfounded. I had never in my life met anyone as manipulative as he was… with the exception, maybe, of my stepbrother Brad. Only Brad didn’t have Paul’s smarts and was rarely able to pull off anything more twisted than a house party… and even that had gotten busted by the cops.
“You’re—you’re high,” I finally managed to stammer, “if you think saving Jesse that night—the night he died—will guarantee him a long life. Who’s to say Diego won’t try again the next night? Or the next? What are you going to do, stay in 1850 and become Jesse’s personal bodyguard?”
“If that’s what it takes,” Paul said in a sickeningly sweet voice. “You see, I’d do anything—anything it takes—to make sure Jesse dies peacefully in his sleep at a ripe old age, so that he never, ever has need of a mediator.”
The colors in the courtyard—the red roof tiles along the Mission, the pink hibiscus blossoms, the deep green of the palm fronds—spun dizzyingly around me as his words sunk in. I tasted something awful rising in my throat.
“Why are you doing this?” I stared up at him in horror. “You must know it will never work. Getting rid of Jesse won’t make me care about you. I don’t like you in that way.”
“Don’t you?” Paul asked with a smile that was as cold as his gaze. “Funny, I could have sworn, the last time we kissed, that you did. At least a little. Enough, anyway—”
His voice trailed off suggestively… but just what he was suggesting, I couldn’t imagine.
“Enough for what?” I demanded.
“Enough,” Paul said, “that you’re thinking about transferring my soul out of my body and throwing Jesse’s in here instead.”
Chapter
eight
“Don’t bother denying it,” Paul said as I stared up at him in utter shock. “I know that’s what you’ve been planning ever since I first made the mistake of telling you about it.” The heat from the hand he’d placed on my arm seemed to singe my skin. “My saving Jesse’s life is more a preemptive strike than anything else. Because the truth is, I kind of like my body. I don’t really want to give it up for him.”
My mouth was moving—I know it was, because Paul seemed to be waiting for some kind of reply.
Only I couldn’t make a sound. I was that stunned.
Because it finally made sense, now. That accusation Paul had hurled at me the other day in his kitchen. That his plans for Jesse were a lot more humane than what I’d had planned for Paul. Because he was planning on saving Jesse, whereas I, apparently, am planning on killing Paul.
Except, of course, that I’m not.
But that didn’t seem to matter to him.
“It’s okay,” Paul assured me. “I mean, it’s kind of flattering in a way, really. That you think I’m hot enough to put your boyfriend’s soul into. It proves that, whatever you say, you do like me, a little. Or at least that you like making out with me.”
“That is so”—I found my voice at last. Unfortunately, it came out shrill as a banshee’s. I didn’t care, though. All I cared about was proving to him how very, very wrong he was—“so untrue! How could you even—what could have given you the idea that I—”
“Oh, come on, Suze,” Paul said. “Admit it. With me, it’s the real thing. Don’t tell me that when you’re with Jesse, you aren’t thinking about the fact that, cozy as things might get between the two of you, it’s all an illusion. That isn’t really his heart you hear beating in his chest. His skin isn’t really warm. Because he doesn’t have skin. It’s all in your head…. Not like this,” he added, gently stroking my arm with his thumb.
Until I wrenched my arm away, that is, and fell back a step. He looked taken aback, but held up both hands to indicate he wouldn’t touch me again. “Whoa, okay, Suze. Sorry. But you can’t deny it’s true that, when we kiss, you don’t exactly fight me off. At least, not right away—”
I felt my cheeks flame. I was so embarrassed. I couldn’t believe he was bringing this up here, at school, of all places….
…especially considering that Jesse? Yeah, this was his new stomping ground. He was undoubtedly around somewhere nearby.
But I couldn’t deny what Paul was saying. I mean, I could, but I’d be lying.
“Of course I like it when you kiss me,” I said, though I practically had to cough out every word, they stuck in my throat so badly. “You’re a good kisser and you know it.” What else could I say? It was true. “But that doesn’t mean I like you.”
Which was also true.
But it didn’t seem to bother Paul.
“Proving my point,” he said smugly, “that you want my body, but with Jesse’s soul in it.”
“I think what happened to Jesse was horrible,” I said slowly, referring to the murder. “And okay, there pretty much isn’t anything I wouldn’t do if I thought it would bring him back to life. But not that.”
“Why not?” Paul asked with a shrug. “I mean, what’s stopping you? As you’ve pointed out numerous times, I’m a reprehensible human being with no redeeming qualities… except for my kissing abilities, apparently. So why not just give my soul a yank and le
t the all-perfect Jesse have a second chance at life?”
The truth was, I really was innocent of what he was accusing me. It had never once occurred to me to do what he was insisting I’d been plotting for some time to do. Oh, okay, maybe I’d considered it in passing every now and then. But I’d always instantly dismissed the idea.
But now—perhaps because he was goading me into it— a part of me actually seemed to perk up and go Why not? Paul didn’t deserve all the great things he had. He didn’t even appreciate them! He stole from people less fortunate than he was, he didn’t treat his family with anything like respect, and he certainly hadn’t been very nice to me… or to Jesse.
Why couldn’t I send Paul off to the great unknown, and let Jesse have Paul’s body… and his life? Jesse deserved a second chance, and he’d certainly be a better Paul Slater than Paul had ever been….
Of course, Jesse wouldn’t like it. He would definitely think it was wrong to rob Paul of the life that was rightfully his, just so he could have a chance to live again.
And it would be weird, looking into Paul’s blue eyes and knowing Jesse was looking out of them.
But it wouldn’t really be like I was killing Paul. His body would still be alive. And his soul would be… well, right where Jesse’s was now, aimlessly wandering the earth, with no idea what was going to happen to him next.
But then sanity returned, cold and dampening as the water burbling in the fountain in the center of the Mission’s courtyard. And I heard myself answering Paul’s question— So why not just give my soul a yank and let the all-perfect Jesse have a second chance at life?—every bit as coolly as he’d asked it.
“Um,” I said sarcastically, “because that would be murder, maybe?”
Some muscles in Paul’s jaw tightened. “Justifiable homicide at best,” he said. “And we both know I wouldn’t really be dead. And I would deserve it, wouldn’t I? For my sins?”
“Maybe so,” I said, feeling the way I usually did after long session with my kickboxing exercise video. You know, the endorphins rushing in. Because I really had, in a way, just had a major workout. This one just happened to be an emotional one. “But the fact is, I’m not the one to judge.”