The Camry lurches left and pops off the road, bumping and dragging stalks of corn as it plows through the Dodsons’ crop.
The stalks connecting with the metal of the car pop like gunfire. Nick is jostled and thrown as though he’s a marionette whose strings have come loose.
But he was still enough of himself to wear his seat belt.
I can hear everything, but I don’t feel anything. The bounce and jump of the car as it barrels through rows of corn, the sound of the hard ears on the windshield and under the tires . . . it’s like I’m in a movie stunt scene.
When we finally stop, Nick’s head hits the steering wheel. A trail of blood trickles down his temple, and it looks like he’s blacked out. But I know he’s okay. I know he’s alive. I know that Thatcher saved him.
I reach over and touch the blood on Nick’s forehead with my finger, tracing its dark red line carefully.
I want him to know that my death isn’t his fault. I should never have made him remember being with me—he can’t be with me, so why torture us both? I need him to move on, like he was going to move on before the accident. If I hadn’t died, he would have been free. How ironic that my death tied him to me.
When I sit up, I see Thatcher staring at us through the windshield of the car. He looks furious, and I know I’ve disappointed him. Then, for a moment, I think I see a flash of regret in his blue eyes before they cloud over, unreadable.
Sirens blare in the distance. Whoever was in the other car must have made a 911 call. Multiple doors slam, and the shouts of police officers echo through the field. I take one more moment with Nick, smoothing his hair as he starts to stir.
The driver’s-side door opens abruptly and Sheriff Curtis Simmons says, “Boy, you’re gonna have to answer to Mr. Dodson tomorrow!” Then he straightens up and shouts to the other officers.
“He’s okay!” I hear the emotion catch in Sheriff Simmons’s voice. He’s been a friend to my family all my life. He and Mama were in high school together—they’re both Old Charleston. Our great-great-way-back grandparents signed the Ordinance of Secession together just before the Civil War.
A few slaps on the back happen and a big cheer goes up. Too many times in our town this kind of drunk-driving accident ends another way.
I walk up to Thatcher, who’s standing off to the side in the field. His brow is furrowed, his lips tight.
“What exactly were you doing tonight?” he asks, his voice angry.
I bow my head without answering.
“What made Nick drive like a crazed lunatic—drunk, I might add?”
More ground gazing. It was me, I think. I had them, I was connecting and helping them in the way that Thatcher wants me to—on an unconscious soul level—and then I broke it out of anger, hurt, and jealousy. He was kissing Carson and I got so upset that I made him think of me, I made him feel guilty enough to jump into his car and tear away from the party. I turned into a poltergeist and used their tricks instead of following Thatcher’s path. It’s my fault.
“Callie?”
I look up at Thatcher slowly.
“You were haunting on your own?” he asks.
I shift my eyes away from his, and it’s clear that the answer is yes.
“What we did for my father . . .” I start. “I wanted that for Nick, too.”
“Soulful haunting doesn’t have results like this,” says Thatcher. “You must have been doing something else, you must have been—”
“I’m sorry,” I say, interrupting him. “You’re right.”
“Callie, if you hadn’t mishandled the haunting, Nick never would have been driving like that. He never would have—” He stops and tilts his head. “Did you say I’m right?”
I nod, and surprise crosses his face.
I look over at Nick leaning against the hood of his car for support. His eyes are open now, and I can see the sheriff talking to him. He’s really going to be okay.
The enormity of what just occurred hits me, and I sink to my knees.
Thatcher drops down beside me.
“Did Reena bring you to Nick?” he asks.
I shake my head no, taking full responsibility.
“You created the portal,” he says.
I nod yes. Then through the knot of tears in my throat, I push out the words: “He was going to break up with me.”
“What?”
“Nick. He . . . he told Carson tonight. The night I was going over to his house, the night of the accident, he’d planned to break up with me. I don’t know why. I don’t know what I did—”
“You might not have done anything. It might have had nothing to do with you.”
I stare at him through a veil of tears. “How could it have nothing to do with me?”
He looks back in Nick’s direction, where the EMTs are testing his reflexes. “People break up for all kinds of reasons.” He turns back to me. Sympathy and understanding are reflected in his eyes. “There’s a farmhouse over there.”
“Yes. The Dodsons’ place.”
“Let’s take a walk.”
We move deeper into the countryside, away from the road, away from the tow truck that’s hauling Nick’s wrecked Camry to Lee’s Garage. The EMTs are still tending to Nick, and Sheriff Simmons is talking to them, too. I make sure we stay within eyesight of the scene.
As we walk through the Dodsons’ field, gliding over the crop beds and moving slowly toward the little white house, I notice that the moonlight is so bright that it’s the type of phase that would cast our shadows on the ground if we were really here. Looking down, I see the soft glow playing off the tall grass, but not a trace of me, or Thatcher, is here. We aren’t trampling the vegetation or making tracks in the dirt or even rustling the corn husks. We’re floating through this world, in it but not of it.
When we get to the Dodsons’ farmhouse, Thatcher points to the wooden porch swing, which looks both abandoned and inviting with its chipped white paint.
“I used to love those,” he says.
“I always wanted one. I asked my dad for ages if he’d put one on our porch, but he never did.”
Thatcher smiles wistfully. “Come on,” he says, leading me up the rickety white steps. We sit down together on the swing, hovering over it but feeling like we’re really sitting. I focus on my feet, willing them to connect with the floorboards of the porch, and they do. We rock a little bit. The chair creaks, and I wonder if the Dodsons ever hear this swing moving. They must think it’s the wind.
Thatcher waits. Patiently. Always so patiently. I don’t even know where to begin.
“He was at a party, totally drunk before he even got there. Carson took him to a bedroom. To yell at him mostly, I think. But I managed to make them both feel my presence.”
I look out at the cornfields. I can still see the emergency lights flashing in the distance. Nick is sitting up on a stretcher now.
“It was so incredible, Thatcher. Like with my father. I felt this immense relief, peace welling up inside me. All because of you.” I give my attention to Thatcher, who is studying me intently.
A softness touches his eyes. “You’ve come a long way, Callie. But you did it on your own. I was just guiding you.”
I want him to understand that to me he’s more than a Guide. “After witnessing Ella’s merging, after my night with you . . . I no longer wanted to remain on Earth. I wanted to be where I was.”
“I’m glad,” he says.
He still doesn’t understand what I’m saying. Maybe I’m afraid to admit it aloud. After discovering what Nick was keeping from me, I don’t quite trust my own judgment. But still I say, “It meant a lot to me, Thatcher. Everything you told me, all that we shared. I know it probably wasn’t supposed to be special, but it was.”