The Ghost in Me (15 page)

I shrug.

"You're letting her get him, too, you know."

This gets my attention. I can't help it. My ears tingle, my heart pounds. I didn't realize he and I were still talking all that much.

"Who does he really know, Myri?" Roz says, studying me with a serious gaze. "The fun girl who can be the best friend in the world, or Wren, the poor Irish understudy."

My stomach flip-flops, as what she's said sinks in. I squirm at the words hanging between us.

"What do you mean,
best friend
?"

Roz turns red, shuffles her feet.

"I thought you didn't want me to be with him. And you certainly haven't wanted me to be
your friend
."

"I don't.... I mean...." She takes a breath. "Look, we're just friends--Duey and I--I know that. But the other day, I realized I like it better being friends with you." She runs her fingers through her dark hair, which I see she's cut into long layers and added more highlights. She lets out another breath. Her arms drop to her sides. "Boys can be such a hassle. Why should we even bother?"

I let out a half-laugh. "Yeah, Duey's a dork. A
nice
dork," I clarify. "He hadn't even asked Brittley out.... Or me."

"I know. I heard."

"You did?"

She nods. "He told me."

I try to explain more, just to make sure. "It wasn't supposed to become real, you know? I was trying to point out his stupidity. Not be played into it."

"I know."

"I was only trying to get him to like you again. That was my plan."

She lets out a huff, looks away. "I'm sorry I didn't give you a chance to explain."

"So, you know we're not really going out?"

Roz tips her head. "I wouldn't go so far as to think that. He really likes you."

"He does?" My heart quickens.

She nods. "At least he thinks he likes you. But right now, with the way things are, the only person he's been talking to is Wren. That's got to be a bit hard for him to follow. I know it's hard for me."

My face goes hot, as Roz kicks a pebble, lets her eyes meet mine. "She's not good at being you, Myri. And she's got you a whole new set of friends; and they don't even know the difference...." She half-laughs. "Some friends."

My throat clamps so tight, I barely manage a whisper. "Are you saying you want to be friends again?"

"Yeah," she manages. "If you stop what you're doing with Wren. It's dangerous. It's scary. You should see yourself. It's not you." She shakes her head. "Sorry I keep saying that, but have you even been there at all when she's at school?"

I let out a long breath. "More or less.... Sometimes.... I mean, the more she goes as me, the more she makes these new friends, the more I can't relate, the more it's easier to stay apart from it all."

Roz looks like she's trying to understand. "And where do you stay when you're apart? And how do you do it for so long?"

I shrug. "I don't know. I stay wherever. In bed. In the school hall. In the park, or the backyard. Wherever I want to be. I just think it, and I'm there, like a shadow, only without a body to anchor me. In a way, it's weird, because time almost stands still. It doesn't really feel like Wren's gone as long as she is."

"So, what do you do when she gets back?"

"I don't know. When I see her, I just kind of step in. But...." I pause, as uneasiness washes over me, remembering how it goes. How it's harder and harder to do that.

"But what?"

I let out a long-winded sigh, meet Roz's steady gaze. "I almost need to remember how to breathe, when I get myself back."

Roz kicks one foot, pivots on the other. "That's not good, Myri."

"But once I'm back in, she's not in control," I add, trying to sound optimistic, because to hear myself talk about it out loud scares me.

Roz purses her lips. "Myri... I love Wren, but--"

"You're right. I've got to stop. I've got to stop, before--"

"Before your brain gets turned to mush."

Chapter 33

Wren's words echo in my head--or the space of what's left of it.

Yer sure y' can be doing it? Y' can be Nelle? For the whole play?

I'd nodded, trying to show confidence.

Y' won't want me waiting in the wings? Just in case?

I shook my head. "I'll do the play on my own. I'll do it. And I'll finish it."

But now, even though I'm saying those words again upon waking. Yelling them, actually. Screaming, as if fires were burning in my blood, those words fall flat, hollow.

I grope for covers I can't grab, push against a bed I can't feel....

Somehow, I'm floating above it all--the covers, my pillow, my bed.

Because my body--

what makes me,
me
--

is gone.

Chapter 34

Wren!!!

That's all it takes. A thought of her. And immediately, I'm there. Hovering alongside, as she walks toward school with her books--
my books
--pulled close to her chest. My blonde hair flounces across my shoulders, as she walks with that youthful lankiness she hasn't been able to shake. When she pauses to watch a robin that dives across her path, a smile lifts her face. She watches it flit up into the branches hanging over the sidewalk, before walking on.

"Wren," I say, and then again.

Although she's ignoring me, she pauses, just barely, at the second call of her name, making me think I might be able to surprise her with jump back into my body. I try, but it's like meeting a wall. I'm still left hanging in this growing void of space with nothing tangible to grasp onto.

Still, I try again. And again. But it's no use. Somehow, someway, Wren has made my body rock-solid. Rigid. Impermeable to me.

"Wren! Stop!"

This time, she does, turning to face me with my eyes, that are somehow her eyes. With my smile, that is somehow twisting into her smile. My stance, that has somehow shifted into her stance.

"Wren, you can't do this."

Her eyelids flutter in answer.

Panic--churning in waves--settles in the pit of my gut, carving my insides around a gaping hole.

"Sure looks like I can be doing it."

"But you can't! You're the ghost. You're the one who's dead!" I've never said anything like that to her, not with so much anger, so much frustration, or fear.

"Not now, I'm not."

"You just can't take over my life, as if it were yours. I trusted you!"

"Oh, go suck on a babe's bottle, Myri. Yer getting all worked up over nothing, when y' have all the time in the world. A whole lifetime left to be living. And y' say y' can't spare another night for me? I'll be giving yer bod back to ye, sure enough, at the end of the play."

"But you can't be there at the end of the play. You know that."

"After I kiss Duey, I'll be done then. Tonight. With the whole play. It won't matter. Ye'll be doing the whole thing on yer own tomorrow."

"It will matter. And you can't kiss him!
You're dead
." I say it again, hoping those words will sink in.

Instead, we both turn at the unexpected sound of Duey's voice, calling my name.

Running across the school yard with his backpack bouncing from his shoulders, his white-and-blue plaid shirt flaps at his sides over a white skater-tee. Cocking his arm back, he points at the body-formally-known-as-me and lobs the football clutched in his hand. "Myri, catch!"

Wren lets out half a laugh and takes two awkward strides forward. I can almost feel the stretch of my arms as she lifts them up, the pull of my fingers as she spreads them wide.

But of course, it's not me. If it had been, that ball wouldn't have brushed past my fingertips and smacked me in the chest. I wouldn't be spiraling to the ground, laughing, of all things, while the football, bounces around my body, careening this way and that, before coming to a rest at my side.

Oblivious to my wavering presence, Duey jogs past me to Wren, dishing short bursts of laughter between breaths, and I wonder when things got to be so good between us. Last I knew, we were exchanging awkward glances in the halls. How had I missed so much?

He bends to rest his hands on his knees, letting his wavy brown hair fall loose across his forehead. He flips his hair back out of his eyes. "Couldn't you have at least headed it?" he says, referring to my skills on the soccer field, which obviously don't transfer when a ghost is in possession of one's body. "Since when can you not catch a pancake throw like that?"

"Since the grass be growing at me feet. It's tripping me up being it's so thick and in need of a good trimming."

Duey shakes his head, holds out a hand, and for a moment, jealously twinges in my gut. I wonder what it would feel like to be taking it. How many times has she already felt his fingers threading through mine?

Wren grins, as she takes his hand in her own; and I drown in another wave of envy.

A tremor takes hold of me, making me feel colder, more disconnected than ever before. I look around--at the trees through my hands, at the grass through my feet, at the one ray of sun that's not obscured by the thickening sky--searching for an answer. What I can possibly do to make things right? To get myself back to the way I was before?

And then I realize, right now? At this moment?

Nothing.

Because if I did the one thing I want to do most--run through him. Through Duey. Fill him with my energy, allow him to see the truth. What would I show?

Nothing but a weak whisper of me.

Chapter 35

It's good to know that in life or death situations, best friends can be counted on.

Although I'm really not sure I want to consider myself hanging anywhere near the edge of death.

Especially when I haven't actually gone through the act of dying.

I had a tough time convincing Roz of that, though. She freaked when she saw me--not that she could at first. I had to hug her to make that happen. Much the way Wren did, I guess, when I was a baby.

Only I don't think I reacted as badly as Roz. But after kicking the wall and banging a few drawers, and sending her mother away who had come to see what was going on in the kitchen, she agreed that after school--or maybe even during, if she could figure out a way to skip out--a trip to see Mrs. Gertestky was in.

Chapter 36

"The body's grown cold to the spirit it harbored."

These are not the comforting words I'd wanted to hear.

Mrs. Gertestky stares at Roz with her large, green-gray eyes, before circling her arms in front of her. The silver bangles at her wrists jingle and chime until she rests on them on the red tablecloth, curling her wrinkled fingers under her palms.

Roz takes a seat across from her, while I stay near the doorway, wondering if the yellow glow from the candles scattered around the room looks fainter than it should, whether the shadows groping the walls look too dark.

"She's here now?" Mrs. Gertestky says, lifting her chin slightly.

"Yes," Roz replies.

Mrs. Gertestky extends her arm. "Then let's have her come forward, so we can have a proper conversation."

Roz shrugs and looks back at me. Mrs. Gertestky opens her palms, raises her hands higher. She wants me to touch them.

Easier said than done, for someone who can't feel a thing--not the table slicing through my legs when I step through it. Not the bands of rings on her fingers when I press into them.

Mrs. Gertestky's silent stare brings singes of fear to my gut, as I realize for the second time, that I might be losing everything. What if I'm even losing my ability to get others to see me? What if I'm not entirely like Wren?

I press harder. How has Wren done it all these years? Stayed in our lives, gone on living? Wandering? Being? With what has amounted to absolutely
nothing
? Nothing at all? To be in the world, but set completely apart from it?

I couldn't live like this. This isn't living--this not being able to feel the warmth from Mrs. Gertestky's skin. Not being able to hear sounds without a hollow sensation ringing in my head. Not being able to fully smell the sandalwood incense seeping from the burners on the shelves.

Mrs. Gertestky closes her eyes. "You have to want it."

I push my hand deeper into her palm, spread my fingers, then squeeze them together as if I could grab on.

She draws in a breath. "That's it. Now I can
feel
your energy. Not only see you, but feel you are there." She opens her eyes, smiles at me through a veil of sadness and pity. "It was hard enough to believe that what your friend said was true. When I first heard the story--I didn't want to believe, but now, to see you...." She shakes her head, waves an arm up. "Somehow between here and there, you are no longer with us, Myri."