“Whatever, she’s getting to be a porker,” says Eli.
My mouth drops open.
“What?” asks Reena.
“They’re talking about my best friend,” I say.
Brian and Hunter are laughing.
“As if any of you have a shot!” I shout.
Reena looks at me and smiles. “They can’t hear you,” she says, and my mind replays Thatcher’s words.
“I know,” I say quietly.
“Still, we can’t let him get away with that.” She glances at Delia and says, “Back me up.”
Then, suddenly, she’s striding toward Eli. Delia and Norris are smiling gleefully, like they know exactly what Reena’s doing.
Eli’s skin is tan from the summer sun and his teeth are gleaming white. He tips his head back to take a sip of beer, and that’s when Reena strikes. She closes her eyes and raises her hand like she’s going to slap him across the face.
Instead she smacks the can, and it bolts out of Eli’s hand and across the fire pit, landing with a thud at Hunter’s feet.
“Dude, spaz, what was that?” Brian laughs.
Hunter shakes his head, picking up the almost-full can. “Don’t waste this shit, Eli,” he says. “My brother only got us one case.”
Stunned, Eli stares at the hand that was holding the beer like it betrayed him. “I have no idea what the ef just happened,” he says, opening the cooler again. “Thing flew out of my hand.”
“Whatever, man, just don’t mess around,” says Hunter, staring lovingly at the can. “Liquid gold, baby.”
Reena is back at my side, smiling.
“That was amazing,” I say, getting excited. “You have to show me how you did that!”
“Oh, I’m just getting started.”
“Huh?” I say, but she’s already up and leaning over next to Eli’s ear.
She whispers something that I don’t hear, but it’s obvious that Eli does. He whips his head around. “Who said that?”
“Said what, man?” asks Brian, lazily leaning back on a log.
“That’s not funny, y’all,” says Eli, looking back and forth from Brian to Hunter. His eyes are big and there’s sweat beading on his forehead, though it’s not a superhot night. The temperature dips low sometimes, even in the summer, and Brian is wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt, so tonight it must be around seventy degrees, which is frigid for Charleston.
Brian and Hunter are both laughing at Eli. “Dude, you’re freaking out,” says Hunter. “Did you smoke up before you got here or something?”
“No,” says Eli. “My mom would kill me if she found my stash again. I’m dry. I just have these.”
He takes a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket along with some matches, sheltering the flame as he lights up. I notice his hands are shaking. The firelight dances across his face and makes his expression flicker from light to shadow and back again.
Norris starts clapping, and his neighing laugh echoes over the beach.
Delia tosses her head back and howls a ghostly sound, like the one I heard at Middleton Place. I look at her a little warily, but she just smiles. “What use is it being a ghost if you can’t have a little fun haunting?” she says.
My shoulders relax. She’s right. And even if Thatcher thinks it’s bad to do these kinds of tricks, I think it’s pretty entertaining. I could use some fun in my, uh, life? Death?
Eli sits down. Using two fingers, Reena pulls the cigarette directly out of his mouth, flinging it into the fire.
“Jesus!” shouts Eli. “What the hell is going on?”
“You’re being a complete freak!” says Brian as he and Hunter start to laugh again. “Did you just spit out a fresh cigarette?”
“No!” says Eli. “Someone took it out of my mouth. I’m telling you guys, there’s something weird happening . . . it’s like there’s a—”
Just then, Reena grabs Eli’s entire pack of cigarettes and throws it into the fire. Then she leans in to him again, and this time I hear her say, “Eli, those things will kill you.”
His eyes wide, he frantically glances around. He grabs his bag and says, “I’m out. You guys find your own ride home.”
Brian and Hunter start laughing again, but then they realize their ride is really leaving and they start calling after him. Eli’s long gone, though—he bolted.
Reena comes back and sits with us again.
“That was epic,” says Norris.
“Want to keep it going?” asks Delia, standing up and taking his hand. I see a stream of blue light pass between them. Is that the energy we’re sharing?
“You guys go ahead,” says Reena, lying back across the log. “I’m shot.”
Delia and Norris wave to us and then jog down the path behind Brian and Hunter, who are struggling to catch up to Eli.
“What are they going to do?” I ask.
“Just have a little more fun,” she says.
I smile. “That was great.”
“Aw, shucks, it was nothing.” She smiles at me.
“Eli’s not going to forget it,” I say.
“Well, he deserved it. Calling Carson fat. What an ass.”
It’s almost like now Reena’s our friend, too. Even though Carson doesn’t know her. Will never know her. Stop thinking about sad stuff.
“So can you show me how to do that?” I ask.
“Which part?”
“All of it,” I say. “The whispering, the moving things . . .”
“Sure,” she says, her doll face growing serious. “As long as you promise to use it for good and not evil.”
“I promise,” I say earnestly.
Reena laughs. “Callie, I’m kidding. I just used my ghost powers to knock beer around. I don’t care what you do with it. I mean, we’re dead. We need to be able to enjoy some perks.”
“Like freaking out the jerks I went to school with,” I say, smiling back. “I forgot that I wasn’t talking to—”
“Thatcher,” Reena and I say at the same time, breaking up into laughter together.
“He’s okay,” says Reena, slipping down onto the sand so that her back is against the log I’m on. “He’s just really uptight.”
“Yeah.” I wonder if Reena sees what I see. That his controlled facade hides so much pain.
“You probably shouldn’t mention that we hung out,” she says. “He wouldn’t like it.”
“Why not?” I ask.
“We just see life—or I guess death—in different ways,” she says.
“How?”
“He’s all right with it; I’m not.” Her face is serious now as she looks out into the darkness. The fire is dying, but the small flickers of light play on her cheeks, casting shapes under her glowing eyes.
I know that what she said isn’t true. Thatcher isn’t okay with death; he’s tormented by having to stay in the Prism. But I’m not sure he reveals that to everyone, and I don’t want to betray what I’ve sensed in him—the sadness he carries. “How could anyone be all right with death?” I ask.
“Right?” says Reena. “I mean, I’ll admit it: I’m angry. I’m too young to be dead. And idiots like these guys . . .” She gestures toward the fire pit. “They don’t appreciate what they have—they just act stupid all day.”
Her voice is hard, her smile gone. A stab of regret pierces me as I realize that I didn’t do much better than the soccer guys when I was living my life. In my own way, I acted stupid all day, too—I didn’t live the way I could have, if I’d only been more aware, and more grateful.
“That’s why I like spending as much time as I can on Earth,” she says. Her voice is heavy with longing. “I would give anything, do anything, to be alive again.”
Shadows are dancing on her face, her eyes almost glowing with the desire to be alive. Her intensity sends a shiver racing through me. Then she relaxes and shrugs.