“Actually … I’m the stagehand,” I said without thinking.
What a dumb move. I watched his eyes light up.
“I didn’t think anybody had signed up for that, but better late than never! I have a long list of things I need you to do. Wait right there.”
I made for the exit as soon as his back was turned. The play was at the end of the week and if I didn’t get out quick, I’d be working flat out till opening night.
In the split second before pushing open the door, I glanced up into the balcony … and there he was, Alexander Reade, sitting in shadow, his body completely still as he watched the figures onstage. I couldn’t see his features clearly, but I recognised the planes of his face and the locks of hair falling around his shoulders and over his eyes.
There was no question. Alex was here. In fact, he was right above me, just a few feet away in a place I’d never thought to look.
Although my first instinct was to bolt upstairs and fling myself into his arms, I decided to show a little restraint. I made my way cautiously up the carpeted steps until I reached the gallery. I could see him more clearly now and the urge to run to him was overpowering. Yet something held me back. Something wasn’t right.
At first I couldn’t figure out what. Then it hit me. Was Alex dressed in jeans? Yes, he was. Black jeans, and a black T-shirt with what appeared to be a band logo on the front. What had happened to his tailcoat and riding boots? And it wasn’t just his clothes that were different. Every time I’d seen him at Grange Hall, he always looked the same; from one day to the next his face, his hair, his clothes, remained unchanged. That was how it worked: ghosts weren’t meant to change. Except now Alex had. His hair was dishevelled and there were deep, dark shadows under his eyes. Even though he was sitting stock-still, there was an uncharacteristic nervous energy surrounding him.
I wasn’t sure how to approach him. Should I announce my presence with a discreet cough? Should I rush over? Or tap him politely on the shoulder like I would a stranger? There was no correct etiquette for this unique situation.
I deliberated for a moment before deciding to tiptoe up behind him. I wanted to reach out and touch the back of his head first, just to make sure he was real, but my hands remained leaden at my sides.
Instead, I whispered his name so softly it was barely audible.
I half-expected him not to hear me. I was scared that if he moved even an inch, he might crumble to dust or fade away into nothingness. But he heard me alright because he turned around.
As our eyes met, a swarm of butterflies took flight in my stomach, making my whole body break out in goosebumps. His face was as composed as a painting, exactly how I remembered him. His features were refined, light emanating from his eyes even in the dimness of the theatre. The loose strands of hair framing his face were the colour of burnished brass. I felt a leap of elation. He might be dressed differently, but he was still Alex. My Alex. And now he’d come back for me.
“Alex? Is it really you?” The tears of relief stinging the corners of my eyes were immediately followed by confusion. “How the hell did you get here?”
If I was expecting some big emotional reunion, I was about to be bitterly disappointed. There was a long, drawn-out pause while he frowned and searched my face. I stood there feeling like a specimen in a jar, waiting for the awkwardness to subside. Any minute now, I thought, we’ll fall into an embrace and never let go. He’ll tell me what happened, and we’ll both marvel at how we managed to beat Fate and vow to never let anything come between us again.
But that didn’t happen. In fact, nothing could have prepared me for what happened next. It was worse than my worst nightmare; worse than any scenario I could have imagined.
Alexander’s frown deepened and his eyes narrowed. “Are we acquainted?”
It felt like all my organs had travelled south at the speed of light, stopping abruptly at my toes and leaving me reeling. Alex stared at me without a glimmer of recognition. His eyes were completely blank. In fact, it felt like he wished I’d go away and leave him in peace.
My mind spiralled back to our first meeting on the wooded path on the outskirts of Grange Hall. He had looked at me with the same confusion then, when he realised I was the first living person able to see him. But things were different now, or at least they were supposed to be. Alex and I shared a history; my memories of him were precious. But he was watching me with an expression of complete indifference mingled with mild curiosity.
One thing was as clear as day: to him I was no one.
CHAPTER TWO
“How do you know my name?” he asked finally. His voice was a little raspy, like an unused instrument clogged with dust.
I felt awkward and conspicuous — feelings that had never existed between us in the past. A long pause followed as I scrambled to compose my thoughts.
“Don’t … don’t you recognise me?” I asked, unsure if I was ready to hear the answer.
“Should I?” His voice was blunt, but he softened a little when he saw the hurt in my eyes. “I apologise. I do not mean to offend.”
“We were together only a few weeks ago,” I said slowly. “We were … there was … It’s me, Chloe.”
“I think you have mistaken me for someone else,” he replied.
“But I haven’t!” A note of anguish crept into my voice and I quickly tried to calm myself before he got the wrong idea and pegged me as some kind of deranged stalker. “I was staying with my grandmother at Grange Hall. Grandma Fee, remember? We met on a walk and then …”
There was no reasonable way to finish that sentence. Then your crazy dead ex-lover tried to murder me so we banished her to the afterlife. But you went too — only that part wasn’t supposed to happen.
Alex was regarding me with some suspicion and I imagined how loopy I must seem to him. Grange Hall felt like a million years ago, as if I’d quite possibly dreamed up the entire thing. I had so many questions I wanted to ask but couldn’t. Apparently I was a stranger, and strangers didn’t enjoy the privilege of asking personal questions.
I mustered what composure I had left, forced a smile and extended my hand. “Let’s start over. I’m Chloe Kennedy. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Chloe Kennedy?”
For a second I thought I saw a flash of something in his eyes. Recognition perhaps? He frowned, as if trying to grasp a memory floating just out of reach. A second later the wistful look was gone and his eyes darkened again, filled with thinly veiled mistrust. He cautiously returned my handshake.
The moment our skin connected, I felt an electrifying jolt in my belly. I thought he must have felt it too because he quickly pulled away and wiped his palm on the leg of his jeans. That stung, but this time I was careful not to show it.
“So you’re new here?” I asked, a little too brightly.
“In a manner of speaking,” he replied, his gaze drifting back to the stage where rehearsal was now in full swing. “I mean yes. Yes, I am.”
He was a bad liar. He was hiding something, any idiot could see that. But not in a deceitful way. This was not the confident Alex I knew. He was behaving like a little boy who’d lost his way but was reluctant to speak for fear of stranger danger. Beneath his feigned calm I could see that he needed help. I just had to figure out a few things before deciding how best to offer it.
I pulled my phone from my pocket and held it out to him. “Why don’t you put your number in here?” I suggested. “Then if you need help with anything you can just ask. I’ve been at this school for years and I’d be happy to show you around.”
Sam and Natalie would have cringed on my behalf, and under normal circumstances I’d never be this forward. But this was no time for playing it cool.
He looked at the phone defensively, like he wanted to touch it but wasn’t convinced that it wouldn’t grow jaws and bite him.
“I do not carry one of those instruments,” he said, then added under his breath, “Lord knows, I keep seeing them everywhere.”
&n
bsp; Well, that was one question down. Alex might have been dressed like a normal, everyday guy, but on the inside nothing had changed. He didn’t know the first thing about technology despite his poor attempt at masking it. Inside, he was still Alexander Reade and the world he knew was Victorian England.
But we had a bigger hurdle than cell phones to conquer. It seemed Alex had no memory of me, of what we meant to each other. How could that have happened? Had he been in some kind of accident and wound up with a bad case of ghost amnesia? Could ghosts even get into accidents?
Unless he had somehow become … human. Was that even possible? No way. People didn’t just come back to life after more than one hundred and fifty years of being dead.
Did he remember Isobel, his ghostly ex-lover, and Grange Hall, or had the slate been wiped completely clean? I wished I could ask him, but I didn’t want to make him more uncomfortable when he was already wary and on edge.
By the same token, I couldn’t very well let him wander off on his own. He clearly wasn’t okay or he wouldn’t have spent the day sitting alone in the theatre. He didn’t know anything about how this world worked, which meant it was dangerous for him out there.
I needed time to figure out how this bizarre sequence of events had unfolded. But first I had to get Alex to trust me. I appraised him discreetly. Even in jeans and a T-shirt, he still looked out of place. He wouldn’t survive here … not on his own anyway. It was funny how the tables had turned, I thought, recalling all those times he’d come to my rescue at Grange Hall. He’d been a stranger to me at first, but I’d trusted him anyway. Now he was going to have to trust me.
It wasn’t easy keeping my emotions in check when all I wanted was to take his hand, bury my face in his neck and tell him how much I’d missed him. But that would have to wait. The situation needed careful handling: he was giving off a restless energy now that made me wonder if he was a flight risk. I needed to show superhuman patience and focus all my attention on delivering the best performance of my life.
I gave my idea of a flippant laugh. “I’m so sorry! You’re right — I mixed you up with someone who happens to look a whole lot like you. I hope I didn’t freak you out.”
He gave me a quizzical look that felt like a laser cutting through my bullshit. For a moment I almost panicked. I wasn’t a great liar either; in fact, I was crappy at it. I’d never been able to pull off a poker face no matter how hard I tried. Already I could feel my hands starting to sweat the way they always did when I was under pressure.
“You have not answered my first question,” Alex said. His eyes travelled down to my feet, which were tapping in a nervous rhythm.
“Huh? What question?”
“How did you know my name?”
“Oh, that.” My stomach did a somersault. “Well, you’re the new guy so obviously everyone is talking about you …”
“But you said you thought I was someone else.”
Was he trying to catch me out? Unlike Sam and Natalie, I hadn’t built up experience from years of lying to my parents. The longest I’d ever kept a secret from my mom was exactly eight minutes and forty-two seconds before I cracked and told her after trying my first cigarette.
“His name happens to be Alex too,” I said weakly. “Funny coincidence, right?”
“Indeed,” he replied in an acerbic voice that told me he doubted every word that was coming out of my mouth.
“I’m Chloe by the way,” I said, realising my mistake a second too late. “But I think I told you that already …”
“You did.”
My cheeks flushed and I knew I was about to start babbling. Awkward silences always gave me a bad case of word vomit.
Thankfully, Alex spoke first. “A pretty name.”
I was sure he felt obliged to say something complimentary. Maybe he was starting to feel sorry for the crazy girl with no friends and too much time on her hands.
“Thanks. It comes from some Greek goddess. At least that’s what my mom told me.”
He nodded. “The Olympian goddess Demeter, mother of Persephone and Queen of the Harvest.”
“When I was little I wished I was named after someone cooler, y’know? Like goddess of the stars or of passion or something. The harvest seems a bit lame.”
“On the contrary,” Alex replied with no hint of humour in his eyes, “the harvest maintains the cycle of life. It gives sustenance to the earth and all who dwell upon it.”
Damn, he was good. He had me completely floored to the point that I didn’t know what to say next.
“I never thought of it that way,” I mumbled.
I realised I was looking at him the way I used to back at Grange Hall; a look that blatantly screamed, You’re the love of my life. We’re meant to be together. Nothing can come between us. Only Alex didn’t know any of that, which meant I probably looked like some sad Bridget Jones character about to run home and doodle his name all over my diary.
“I must leave you,” he said. “It was nice to meet you, Chloe.”
The distance in his voice had me on the verge of tears, but I tried not to take it personally.
He was already making his way to the stairs. Where was he planning on going? I knew if I let him walk away now, I might never find him again. He could easily wander off and be lost forever in the great state of California. I pictured him as a hitchhiker on the highway to Las Vegas, or lost in a sea of tourists at the Walk of Fame, or combing the beaches and desert scrub of Malibu. But a more likely scenario was that, not knowing how to function in the modern world, he’d end up getting into some kind of trouble, maybe even committed. It was only a matter of time before people realised he was different.
My hand flew out automatically to grab his arm. “Wait! Do you live around here?”
My action took us both by surprise and I released him as fast as if I’d just touched the handle of a scalding saucepan. I cringed inside, knowing how pushy and desperate I must seem. But I needed to keep this conversation going. I needed to make sure Alex was safe.
“Not far away,” he said, deliberately vague.
It might have been my imagination but I sensed he was happy to be detained. Like he knew he needed my help but wasn’t sure how to ask for it.
“Hey, me too!” I said, embracing the part of “that girl who just can’t take a hint”. “Why don’t you come over to my house and I can help you get the lay of the land. If you have time to kill, that is …”
Alex gazed into the middle distance as if a sudden thought had captured his imagination. “That is an interesting expression,” he murmured. “The idea that people may kill time, when in fact the very opposite is true.”
“Right now I’m just wasting time,” I said lightly as an idea occurred to me. I needed to move this along and couldn’t afford to delve into a philosophical conversation with him. “I’m supposed to be at home working on an essay on Shakespearean sonnets. Only problem is, those sonnets are almost impossible to decipher. I have quite a laborious task ahead of me.”
I thought I’d done a good job of subtly dropping the hint, but it backfired immediately.
“I find it difficult to believe that a girl who uses the word laborious cannot decipher a sonnet,” he said.
I’d forgotten how perceptive Alex was. He’d always had the ability to see right through me.
“Anyone can read a thesaurus!” I gave a clumsy, clueless shrug. “Do you know much about Shakespeare?” I offered a hopeful smile.
“I am familiar with his work.”
“Do you think you could help me work on the essay?” I pressed on, despite the hesitation in his face. “I mean, I really don’t want to flunk and have to do summer school. My dad will kill me.”
“Very well,” he said reluctantly.
“Super!” The ditzy, oblivious act seemed to be working in my favour so I ran with it. “Do you have a car?”
A look of confusion flitted across his face. “I am afraid not,” he answered in a tone that blatantly said don’t ask
me any more questions.
“No problem,” I said. “We can take mine.”
Before Alex could change his mind, I beckoned for him to follow me and headed quickly out of the theatre. I didn’t have a plan worked out for the rest of the afternoon. In fact, I hadn’t planned further than getting him into the car. So far, I wasn’t the smoothest operator. It had only been twenty minutes and there were already a dozen things I regretted saying.
“Which of these vehicles belongs to you?” he asked when we reached the parking lot.
“That one.” I pointed to the maroon Volvo parked neatly in its usual spot. “The colour’s pretty gross, I know.”
“Indeed,” he said. “It is rather unsightly.”
I smiled to myself. It was the first uncensored thing he’d said to me and I caught a hint of the Alex I knew so well. It made me relax a little.
“It used to be my mom’s when she was alive.”
The surge of guilt was evident on his face as he took in my use of the past tense. “My apologies, Chloe, I was unaware …”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said, laughing. “She used to make fun of it all the time. She’d say we were driving around town in a giant yam.”
I waited for him to join in the laughter, but he didn’t. Instead he was peering into the back seat of my car with a look of alarm on his face.
“Who is your passenger?” he asked.
“What are you talking about?” I replied. “There’s no …”
Only there was. A young child was seated in the back of my Volvo, hunched over and staring through the windshield, her eyes wide with terror. For a second I thought she must be a junior drama student in costume, but a second look confirmed that something was very wrong. The girl’s dress was blackened with scorch marks, as was the exposed skin on her body. Her hair was frazzled and clumping together. She turned her head and gazed wordlessly at us for a moment and I saw tongues of flame reflected in her irises. Then suddenly she began to scream. “Help! Help!” Her mouth became a terrible cavity and her clenched fists pummelled the windows. She clutched her throat, spluttering violently, and we saw that the skin on her hands was scorched and bubbling. The invisible burn crept up her body, until her face became stretched and distorted. One eye closed over with red welts and the other drooped grotesquely. Bile rose in my throat as the flesh of her cheeks ran down into her jaw like melting rubber.