“Patience has never been my thing. I’ve always been about the rush. But I’m learning, Thatcher.”
We stand there on the edge of the water, just looking at each other. I want to comb my fingers through his hair. I want to bring him comfort. I want to be his solace.
He is so very alone, and when I move on—
“So did you want to go on the roller coaster?” he asks, as though he’s growing uncomfortable with my scrutiny, as though he knows the paths my mind is traveling. As though he knows they can lead to no happiness.
“It wouldn’t be the same,” I tell him, allowing the moment we were sharing to slip away. I don’t want to make things harder for him. “I wouldn’t feel the wind rushing by, tugging on my hair. Wouldn’t feel the car shaking beneath me since we wouldn’t actually be touching it.” Just like now, if I remove my shoes, I won’t feel the sand between my toes.
“Right,” he teases. “I knew you were a carousel kind of girl.”
“No way!” I swipe at his shoulder, and his body doesn’t do the repel thing. Because we’re on the same plane, I can feel him as though he’s solid. But the world of the Living is something we can only pass through, not truly experience. “Never been on a carousel in my life.”
“You’re kidding!” He appears horrified.
“Nope. Never saw the appeal. Even as a little kid. Too boring a ride.”
“It’s not boring. It’s . . . peaceful.”
“I prefer the heart-pounding thrills.” I turn my attention back to the sky. Pop! Pop! Bang! The fireworks light up the world.
Then they go silent, and the smoke catches on a breeze and blows out toward the ocean.
“Come on,” Thatcher says, taking my hand, our fingers entwining.
“Just a little more time.”
“We’re not leaving yet. Come on.” Together we walk onto the midway. We pass by cotton candy, pretzel, and funnel cake booths. I suddenly miss being hungry. Would love to experience those tastes again on my tongue.
I hear the calliope belting out the tinny music that plays at the carousel. Suddenly we’re standing before it as the horses circle round and round.
“We’re going for a ride,” Thatcher says, and he urges me onto the platform.
Placing his hands on my waist, capturing my gaze, he slowly lifts me onto a horse. His hold is more than a touch; it reaches beneath the surface to a deeper level. I feel a measure of regret when he releases me. Although I’m not in direct contact with the wooden horse, my body moves with the carousel, remembering what it would have done in life. Thatcher stands by me, smiling.
“Aren’t you going to get on a horse?” I ask.
“No, I just want to watch you.”
I hold my arms up and release a scream like I would if I were on a roller coaster, plummeting down the tracks.
Thatcher laughs, a full, deep-throated laugh that silences me. Its richness echoes around us. I hold his gaze as we circle around. Behind him are the twinkling lights of the amusement park, the sounds of excitement, the mouthwatering smells. But they’re all faint. He’s the only thing that’s real.
I wonder if we take our memories from the Prism into Solus. I don’t want to forget him, the blond of his hair, the way it curls around his ears. I want to remember the blue of his eyes, the tiny scar on his chin. I want to treasure the way his gaze never wanders from mine, the slightly crooked smile. I don’t want to lose these few precious moments of contentment that we’ve shared.
And he’s right. The carousel is so much more than I ever expected it to be. I was so caught up in experiencing the thrills of life that I missed the small things that matter most. The carousel slows to a stop, but I don’t want to leave. I just want this moment with him to go on forever.
The lights go out, plunging us into the grayness of an amusement park closing down for the night.
“We’d better go,” he says, breaking the spell that’s been holding us, but I can tell that he’s as sorry as I am that it’s over.
Twenty
THATCHER’S GIFT TO ME cost him. His energy is almost depleted as he leads me through a portal to my prism. But I don’t feel tired—I feel full and vital.
And guilty.
What I shared with Thatcher was deeper than anything I ever shared with Nick. Nick and I had fun. We sought thrills, we laughed, we joked, we made out. I love him. I don’t doubt that, but what I feel for Thatcher is a whole different level. Maybe it’s the plane we’re on, maybe it’s because we’re no longer alive so we don’t have all our other senses to rely on, to give us the physical complements that I had with Nick, so we have to go deeper for a connection. I can’t believe how much I care about Thatcher.
I still have feelings for Nick, but I have to let him go.
I’m incredibly aware now that bringing peace to those I love will mean leaving Thatcher. I’m filled with contradictory desires. I want to help the people who mean everything to me while finding a way not to leave Thatcher alone. Once my goal was to find a way to stay on Earth. I couldn’t bear the thought of being without Nick, Carson, my father.
But I know they’re suffering. I have to ease their pain. Especially Nick’s.
Nick was the love of my life. Thatcher is the . . . I don’t think I’m ready to admit that he’s the love of my death, but he’s very important to me. While I know he doesn’t want me haunting by myself, the things I need to say to Nick, the way I need to connect with him in order to let him go—
I can’t do that with Thatcher watching over my shoulder. I don’t recall ever seeing Ella with a Guide, so once we learn how to haunt, like riding a bicycle, the training wheels must come off. And Thatcher taught me what I need to do—with my dad, he showed me how to bring the sense of peace not only to the person I love, but to myself.
I can do this. I need to do this. And I need to do it alone.
I pace the floor, concentrating on the images of Nick that now haunt me—the empty bottle, the bitterness on his face, the way he talked to Carson. I have to see him.
I won’t do anything crazy, I reason. I’ll just test things out a little bit, decide for myself how I can best haunt Nick. Thatcher has given me faith in the unconscious process by letting me see my father. And being with Reena and Leo and the others—well, they’ve shown me things, too. I know so much about how everything works now—I understand more. I can reach Nick this time, surely, one way or another.
When I step through my portal, I have to let my eyes adjust. It’s getting dark outside, but I can hear leaves under my feet as I step along an uneven path—I seem to be in the woods. When my view sharpens, I recognize that I’m near Cotter’s Pond, a little body of water in Nick’s neighborhood.
I blink a few times before I see his rumpled form on the ground, leaning against a tree trunk. I move closer to him, relieved that his chest is rising and falling.
I crouch down next to him and his eyes snap open. He flips on a flashlight.
“Nick,” I whisper.
He doesn’t react to my voice but he slowly stands up, stretches his arms over his head and yawns. The corner of his gray T-shirt pulls up and exposes the left side of his stomach. Before I can stop myself, I’m standing, too, reaching over to touch his waist, to skim my fingers over his skin. And I remember so well how his body felt, how soft his skin was in all the right places, the little bit of hair on his stomach, how warm his chest was against mine, that I do make a connection—I touch him.
In that moment, emotions rush at me, flooding my heart with a surge of adrenaline and wistfulness and passion. I want to linger here, to put the world on pause, to stay frozen in our skin-on-skin contact. I didn’t know how delicate this type of moment was until it was gone and I had to fight so hard for each one.