And then, it stops. Everything is quiet for one perfect moment, and I let out a combined laugh-scream, a celebratory rebel yell at my latest stunt. This feeling—this nervous, excited, scared, happy, blissful, terrified feeling—is what I live for.
This and Nick.
Two
IT’S A LITTLE AFTER NOON when I pull up into Carson’s driveway and honk twice. Dad said no cruising, but one little exception can’t hurt. Besides, I’m on a mission of mercy.
She opens her front door, peers out, and shrieks excitedly. With her vintage straw bag flung over her shoulder, she rushes out and quickly paces around the car, studying it from every angle.
“You’re so lucky!” she says as she finally opens the passenger door and slides in.
“I know,” I say, patting the steering wheel.
“No, I mean to have me as a BFF.” She reaches into her bag and pulls out what looks like a bouquet of withered leaves.
“Sage,” she explains, responding to my questioning glance. “For cleansing.”
I cock an eyebrow.
“Oh, Clueless Callie,” she says breezily, running her fingers through the leaves. “You have to burn this in a new space to clear out any bad juju.”
Juju, which I’m not even sure is a real word, is Carson’s thing. She claims she can feel the vibes around her—good and bad.
“You’re not thinking of doing that in my car,” I say.
“Absolutely!”
“No way! Dad is too into the new-car smell—he’d die if we covered it up with burned herbs.”
Carson pouts. “Is he still mad about last year when I burned those pine needles in his home office?”
I nod. “He said it smelled like a hippie had set up camp in there.”
“Your dad just doesn’t know the dangers of the dark side.”
“He only believes in what he can see.”
“That scares me,” says Carson. “Because there’s a lot we can’t see.” She frowns and throws the leaf bouquet back in her bag. I wonder what else is in there, besides the deck of tarot cards and the Magic 8 Ball key chain I know she always carries. She believes in being prepared for any unnatural emergency—not that we’ve ever encountered one, or ever will.
I back out of her driveway. “I dreamed about Mama last night.” As soon as I say it, I wish I hadn’t. Her face softens in sympathy.
After Mama died, for that first year or so, Carson used to insist that she felt Mama’s presence. It was the start of her obsession with ghosts, the reason why every independent project she does at school is based on some haunting legend or ghoulish mystery—and Charleston is full of them. When you live in a hazy, hot place with hanging moss and sweet-smelling flowers and thick, humid air that almost feels like a living creature, it’s easy to see ghosts everywhere you turn.
We were young, just in first grade, and the adults around us dismissed Carson’s visions of Mama as wishful thinking. I did, too, because my dad told me Carson talked nonsense. It is nonsense, I think. But she knew how hard it was for me when Mama died —the way she died—and Carson helped me through my grief, she didn’t let me wallow, and I know she is always just trying to make me feel better.
I consider lowering the top, letting the wind have its way with my hair, to distract me from Carson’s sympathy, but I can tell she just straightened her glossy brown curls. “It’s nice to dream about her,” I say, making my voice upbeat. “Memories are good to have.”
“So are guardian angels.”
Although I’m wearing sunglasses, she still manages to catch my eye roll. She knows I don’t really believe she ever felt my mom’s ghost. She was just pretending.
“Who else are we picking up?” she asks.
“No one.”
“Come on. You can’t waste this sweet ride on just the two of us.”
It’s not that I’m not psyched about the car; it’s just that I’m not the share-everything-with-everyone-I-know type. People at school think I’m antisocial, but Carson defends me, because that’s not true. She’s popular, she’s friends with a gazillion people, she gets me invited to parties and keeps me in the loop. I appreciate all that, because it seems like what I’m supposed to be doing. You know, going to football games and dances and after-parties. I make appearances, I smile and nod at people, but they don’t thrill me. I’m more into . . . experiences. Like climbing rocks at Kings Mountain State Park without ropes, or racing my car along the docks. High school just feels like a waiting room for something more real.
“It’s not wasted. We’re going to see Nick.”
“Thought he was doing that Habitat for Humanity thing today.”
“He is, but he has to eat.” I point over my shoulder to the backseat.
Twisting around, she spies the two wicker baskets resting there. “Ah, the way to a guy’s heart . . .”
I laugh. “I already own his heart, completely.”
“Calpurnia McPhee,” Carson says in a chiding voice.
“Carson Jenkins,” I reply.
“You’ve got a secret.” She reaches back—
“Whatever are you talking about?” I ask. “You know I’m crazy about Nick. That’s no secret.”
She straightens. “I’m not talking about your amazing love life.” Smiling, she holds up a hair clip before pinning back her own shiny brown blowout in a grand gesture. “You’ve already been for a joyride.”
I groan. I tossed the clip back there after my pier adventure—to make a statement, to put an exclamation mark on the end of my stunt.
“Where’d you go?” she asks.
“To the harbor,” I mumble. There’s no use holding out on her now.
“You didn’t. Please don’t tell me you went out on the pier.”
I give her a casual shrug that’s in direct contrast to my victorious smile. I’ve talked about racing on the pier, but I never had the right set of wheels for it until now.
“Not without my camera!” she shouts, and rifles through her bag until she locates her phone and turns on the camera.
“Really?” I ask. “Now?”
“No better time,” she says. “The open road is the perfect backdrop.”
She films me while I tell her how I handled the car like a NASCAR driver, and how I’m pretty sure I got up to sixty miles per hour in under five seconds.
Hearing a click, I know that she hit the Stop button. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see her admiration. I bask in it. I do things she’d never dream of doing.
“You weren’t afraid you’d get caught?” she asks.
“It was pretty early. It was just me and the spirits of the dreaded pirates.”
“Don’t say that!” She turns all serious on me.
“The historic district was a ghost town,” I say, lowering my voice for effect. “Not a soul in sight. Not even Stede Bonnet.”
I let out a ghoulish laugh and Carson swats my arm. “Stop it,” she says in a hushed whisper. “Please tell me you held your breath when you went by the oaks.”
A large gray cloud blocks the sun, and she peers through the windshield up at the sky. She’s probably thinking that my joking about Charleston’s storied ghost history has somehow caused this momentary shadow.
“Cars,” I say. “It’s a legend.”
“Callie, it’s bad luck not to.”
I love my best friend, but this is a topic we don’t see eye to eye on. I’m tired of the ghosts of the Old Slave Mart, the haunted house at 131 Church Street, the paranormal activity at the Battery Carriage House. It’s all just old-people spook talk. Something to sell the tourists on the Lowcountry Ghost Walk.