Haunting Zoe (6 page)

“Isn’t there someone else you can haunt for a
few hours.”

He stands beside me, leaning over the desk.
“Everyone is sleeping. Besides, it’s just depressing.”

I roll my face to the side to look at him.
“Being dead?”

He frowns, not looking at me. “Watching
everyone else be alive.”

I sit up, slapping my hands down on either
side of the keyboard.

“Okay, I have a plan.”

I spin in my chair and accidently graze him.
Well, graze is the wrong word. I move through him. A chill runs up
my skin and goosebumps erupt across my arms like tiny
volcanoes.

I pull back, rubbing my arms. “Well, that was
disturbing.”

He shakes his head. “The plan?”

“Oh. Right. I think we should try going to
the cemetery.”

He leans back, looking worried. “Why? You
want me to try to climb back into my body?”

I think about that for a second. “No. I don’t
think that’s a good idea. I mean, the goal isn’t to make you a
zombie, right? Just to find your light or whatever.”

“My light?”

“Yeah, you know.” He stares at me like I’m an
idiot. “When people die they see a light.
Go into the light
and all that.”

“I don’t remember a light.”

I fold my hands on my lap. “What do you
remember?”

“About dying? Nothing. I remember opening my
eyes and the police were dragging my body out of the water. I
remember screaming and no one hearing me. Then I thought about my
mom and suddenly I was in my house, standing beside her. She was on
the floor, crying.”

That’s interesting. “How did you get into my
room?”

He rubs his forehead. “I was thinking of you,
how you saw me at the funeral. Then, I was just here.”

Convenient.

“Okay. I think we should go to the cemetery
because, well, maybe there are other ghosts there who can help you.
You can’t be the only person who ever took a wrong turn heading for
the afterlife.”

He looks up, considering it. “And you think
you could see them?”

“No, but maybe you can.”

He nods, “That makes sense.”

I stand up and head for my closet. “It’s a
place to start, at least.”

Grabbing a pair of pants and a t-shirt off
the hangars I turn to see him staring at me.

“Let’s do it.” He says, clapping his hands
together.

I pucker my lips. “Yeah, well, I have to get
dressed first so you should, you know, turn around. Or go outside.
Or something.”

He slaps his hand over his eyes. I put a
balled up fist on my hip. “Nice try Casper.”

With a frustrated sigh he vanishes and I hear
him calling from my kitchen. “Prude.”

“Perv,” I call back, slipping into my
jeans.

Once I’m fully dressed, I grab my car keys
and head out. It’s a good thing Mom is working a double shift.
She’d kill me if she knew I was heading out to the cemetery in the
middle of the night. And if I tried to explain why, she’d have me
committed.

“What are you thinking about?” Logan asks as
we drive slowly up to the front gate of Stone Hill Cemetery.

I lean over the dash, looking at the towering
wrought iron gate and the thick chains binding it closed. “You
really want to talk about my feelings, Logan?”

He slides through the door without opening it
and stands in front of my head lights. “Pathetic as it is, talking
to you has kind of been the highlight of my week. So, yeah.”

I kill the lights and slam the door of my old
yellow VW Beetle closed. “Aw, that’s kinda sweet. You know, in a
not really sort of way.”

He rolls his eyes. In three long strides he
steps toward the black iron bars and runs right into them. Stepping
back, he looks stunned. In my mind something clicks into place.

“Ghosts can’t pass through iron,” I say,
feeling smug. He turns and stares at me. I shrug. “I saw it on
TV.”

He reaches for the bar and wraps his hand
around it. As soon as he does his hand begins to smoke like its
burning. He yelps, pulls his hand back and rubs it.

“I guess I can feel some things.”

I nod and walk up beside him. “Yeah, iron is
like ghost kryptonite. Hey, we should dig up your body, then pour
salt on it and light it on fire.”

He stares at me, his nose crinkled up.
“Why?”

“To release your spirit.”

“I’m pretty released, thanks.”

“Still.”

“We are not desecrating my corpse based on
something you saw on TV.”

I frown. “You have no sense of whimsy, you
know that?”

He rolls his eyes and points to a stone wall.
“There, we can get in over there. You’ll have to climb it.”

Of course I will. I run back to the car and
grab a flashlight off the floorboard, tucking it into my back
pocket. As I watch, he steps through the wall.

“All clear,” he whispers.

“You don’t have to whisper, no one can hear
you.”

“Oh, right. I forgot.”

I shake my head. This has got to be the
absolute top of the list of the stupidest things I’ve ever done. As
a matter of fact, this might actually
be
the list. Clinging
carefully to each stone, I climb up. Luckily it’s not very high,
but my arms still feel like lead weights when I jump over the other
side and land gingerly on my feet.

“Like a ninja,” I whisper as Logan smiles.
It’s a warm, sincere smile, something I haven’t seen him wear in a
long time—which is a shame because it looks really good on him.

“Where to now?” I ask, dusting off my hands
on my jeans.

He shrugs and starts walking. Not sure what
else to do, I follow him. We wander past the old, battered
headstones toward the newer part of the cemetery which is in the
very back. The paths are all old cobblestone, giant obelisks and
weeping angels looking down on us as we walk. We pass by a small
crypt and I shine the flashlight on the entrance. Over the gate,
carved in stone is the phrase,
Verum non est in morte
.

“What does it say?” Logan asks from behind
me.

I know the translation, not because I can
read Latin, but because I’d asked my mother the same question as we
were leaving my father’s funeral.

“It says,
In death there is
truth
.”

Lowering my light, I shine it around, over
the headstones. “Do you see anything?”

He shakes his head. “No. Nothing.”

I sigh, defeated. We walk on until we see a
big yellow back hoe parked next to a fresh grave. Logan freezes but
I walk closer, shining the light on the name etched into the
stone.

Logan Wayne Cooper.

I turn, shining the light on Logan. “Wayne,
really?”

He looks away, “My dad likes old
westerns.”

“Huh.” I step around the grave, careful not
to disturb the freshly mounded dirt or the stacks of fresh flowers.
“I hear they take these flowers and give them to the old people at
the nursing home,” I say, desperate to break the silence. He
doesn’t answer. When I glance up his back is to me. The moonlight
is hitting him at an odd angle, making him almost glow. It’s so
beautiful that for a moment I’m transfixed by it. He looks over his
shoulder at me and all I can think is how beautiful he is. Like an
angel.

Then he opens his mouth.

“What are you staring at?”

I roll my eyes. “Just wondering if you’re
going to do something or just stand there sparkling like an
idiot.”

“What do you want me to do?” he asks,
throwing his hands in the air.

I inhale slowly. “You said you thought of me,
and then you were just there, in my room, right?”

“Yeah.” He turns, walking toward me.

I shift from one foot to the other. “Well,
maybe you should think of…I dunno…heaven. Or whatever.”

“Heaven?” He snorts.

“Don’t get an attitude with me, there buddy.
I’m standing in a cemetery at five in the morning next to a fresh
grave talking to a dead guy. My tolerance has its limits.”

“Fine.” He grumbles. He closes his eyes takes
a deep breath and…

Nothing.

He opens one eye. Then his face falls. “This
was a stupid idea.”

“Your face is stupid.”

He stomps away, tugging on his hair. Then he
spins back, pointing at me. “You know, you are such a joy to be
around. I can’t imagine why you don’t have any friends.”

That hurts. “I have friends,” I whisper.

“Oh, I forgot. Gay Carlos tolerates you. That
doesn’t make you his friend. It makes you his hag.”

The pain from his words is so quick and so
sharp it feels like he slapped me in the face. I recover quickly,
the pain feeding my already growing anger.

“Listen up you pompous ass waffle. Number
one, don’t you ever talk about Carlos that way again. He’s worth
ten of you. And two, you can take your afterlife drama and shove
it. Don’t come to my house, don’t ever bother me again. I mean it.
You are on your own.” Turning my back on him I march out of the
cemetery, scale the wall, and drive home, fighting back tears of
rage the whole way.

By the time I’m settling into bed the sun is
rising, casting a red-orange glow into my room. I grab the curtains
and pull them closed, falling into bed still in my clothes. A knock
at my door wakes me.

“Hey Zoe Bowie. You up yet?”

I glance at the alarm. 8:46 Am. Son of a—

“Come on in Carlos.”

He pokes his head around the door, his eyes
covered by his hand. “You decent?”

I shrug, “As decent as I ever am.”

He laughs and walks in. He’s holding a drink
carrier with two tall Starbucks cups and has a bag of croissants
tucked under his arm.

“I brought fuel.” He hands me the cup. I can
tell from the smell its Earl Grey tea with honey and cream.

“Bless you, kind sir.” I murmur and take a
sip. It’s hot enough to burn the tip of my tongue a little—just how
I like it.

“Oh honey, what did you get up to last
night?”

I arch an eyebrow. “Why do you ask?”

He waves his hand over me, “Well, you look
like you’ve been held in a basement for three days and you have
bags under your eyes the size of cantaloupes.”

“Yeah, I didn’t sleep much.” I play with the
lid on my drink, unsure what to say. No way in hell am I going to
admit that I’ve been seeing Logan. As much as I love Carlos, it
just feels too crazy to admit out loud. Still, I kind of need to
talk to someone about it.

“I’ve been thinking about Logan.”

He looks surprised. Pulling off his grey
canvas jacket he scoots down beside me.

“I thought you didn’t care about all
that.”

I shrug.

“I don’t. It’s just… I dunno. Maybe it’s
bringing up old feelings…of when dad died.”

Carlos lays a hand on my knee
sympathetically. He came into my life just a few months after Dad’s
funeral. He moved in down the block and my mom made me take over a
welcome to the neighborhood pie. I remember how scared he was, how
freaked out about being in a new town, at a new school. But Carlos
is braver than me. He stepped in on day one and made himself known.
He never hid who he was or what he wanted. I wish I had that kind
of courage.

I take another drink. My head is writhing
with questions, questions I know Carlos can’t answer.

His face lights up, “I know what you
need.”

Yeah, a nice long vacation somewhere with
padded rooms and happy pills.

“That makes one of us,” I mumble.

“How about we take a drive up Skyline, have a
picnic, then go down to the Tea Room?”

I feel the sides of my mouth turn up slowly.
“That actually sounds really nice.”

He grins, looking quite pleased with himself.
“I know.” Then he lowers his gaze at me, pointing up and down. “But
first you shower and change. I’m not taking you anywhere looking
like that.”

I agree and he goes off to the kitchen to
scavenge some food for our picnic. Knowing what’s in my cabinets,
we might be dining on mustard and old soda crackers.

Forty five minutes later I’m clean and
dressed in my soft tan cargo pants and a black tank top and Carlos
has plaited my hair into a long French braid.

The drive up Skyline is a soothing one, even
with Carlos’s indie rock blasting through the speakers of his dad’s
Four Runner. The sky is clear and blue—the shade of blue you can’t
find anywhere else on earth—and the sun is bright and warm on my
arm as it dangles out the window. We drive until we hit the very
top of the mountain, a place called the Garden of the Gods. It’s a
large field filled with trees as big around as a truck. I spread
out a plaid blanket while he retrieves the picnic basket and a
bottle of sparkling wine from his trunk.

“Fancy,” I say realizing that this day’s
events weren’t as spur of the moment as he’d led me to believe.

“It’s a celebration. To the first day of the
rest of our lives.”

He twists off the top and bubbles ooze out,
sliding down the side of the bottle, which he hands me. “Sorry, I
forgot to pack glasses.”

I shrug and take a small sip. It’s smooth and
tastes vaguely like apples. “Not bad.”

He winks and takes the bottle from me.

“You sure you should be drinking?” I ask,
knowing that the drive down will be a windy one.

“I’ll just have a touch. Besides, I’m used to
it.” He takes a small sip and hands it back to me before opening
the basket. His family is one of those European types who have wine
with every meal, even the kids, so his tolerance is pretty
high.

As it turns out, he was able to make quite a
little feast with leftovers and creativity. By the time the food
was gone we’d drank about a third of the bottle and were lying
back, relaxing in the sun.

“Do you think people can haunt you?” I ask
quietly.

Carlos rolls onto his side, propping his head
on his elbow so he’s practically pressed against me. With anyone
else the closeness would feel intimate, but with Carlos it just
feels comforting.