Invisible Ghosts

  I bent down to unlace my sneakers, expecting Logan to reply, but he didn’t say anything.

  “Are you seriously sulking over the PSAT?” I asked, straightening up.

  Except he wasn’t sulking. His mouth was moving, and his arms were flapping, but all I heard was silence.

  “I can’t hear you,” I said.

  I took a deep breath, trying not to freak out.

  It was happening again.

  My chest felt tight, and the panic was rising in my throat.

  Logan looked horrified. Worst of all was his mouth, open in a silent scream.

  “Logan,” I said again. “Stop screaming. Calm down. Nod once if you can hear me.”

  His mouth closed. He nodded.

  And I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding.

  “Good,” I said. “Okay.”

  Logan said something again, his lip curling with disdain.

  “I don’t know what you’re saying,” I told him.

  Logan shook his head, as though it should have been obvious. And then he turned around, bent over, and mooned me.

  “Real nice,” I said, since Logan had floated upward until his butt was level with my face. He waggled it some more, and I sighed.

  “Grow up,” I snapped.

  It was the wrong thing to say.

  Logan whirled around, leveled me with a glare, and disappeared.

  WHEN JAMIE CALLED that night, something kept me from telling him about the problems I was having with Logan. So we chatted about this weird reading comprehension part of the exam and how someone had vandalized our school’s security buggy.

  The Santa Ana winds had started up again, making the windows rattle. Every once in a while, this palm tree in our backyard would scrape against the glass, making it sound like someone was trying to get in.

  “Got any more weird superstitions for me, Cleo?” Jamie asked.

  “Always,” I said, trying to pick. “Um, do you know about sneeze prophesies?”

  “Sneeze prophesies?” Jamie repeated, as though he hadn’t heard me correctly.

  “They’re a thing,” I insisted. “If someone sneezes in the middle of a conversation, whatever was said right before it will come true.”

  Jamie laughed.

  “That would make such a good spurious correlation,” he said. “Allergy season causes an increase in prophesies.”

  “You’re such a cynic,” I teased.

  “Hey now, I used to jump every New Year’s Eve when the clock struck midnight,” he said. “Although it never made me grow taller.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “Aha!” Jamie accused. “A superstition you don’t know!”

  “It can’t be better than prophesneezes,” I said.

  Jamie snorted at the portmanteau.

  “No, prophesneezes take the lead for most ridiculous thing ever,” he agreed.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “It’s a way of controlling the uncontrollable. I mean, the second a prophesneeze happens, you know what the future holds.”

  “True,” Jamie said, “but then you start living your life by this arbitrary set of rules, and you become scared to break them.”

  “Yeah, but we do that anyway,” I pointed out. “High school is full of unspoken rules that no one wants to break. Like where you sit at lunch or who you choose as a partner.”

  “Except we broke those rules,” Jamie reminded me. “And nothing bad happened.”

  “There’s still time,” I said. I meant it as a joke, but I had no idea how right I was about to become.

  20

  “HEY, CLEO, WHAT’S your Halloween costume?” Jamie asked.

  It was the next week, and Jamie and I were sitting backstage during Gardner’s class in a pile of flashlights, blue gels, and tape. Abby and Claudia were onstage, rehearsing Act I. They were supposed to be off book, but Abby kept dropping her lines, and Gardner didn’t sound pleased.

  “You’ll see it at Sam’s party,” I said, and Jamie groaned.

  “One hint?”

  “No,” I said.

  Jamie angled a flashlight up against his chin, casting his face into blue shadows.

  “Is it spooky?” he asked, making such a terrible spooky face that I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Shhh,” he scolded, putting a finger to my lips. “You’re interrupting the rehearsal.”

  I glared at him, and he grinned back at me, pleased, mashing my lips around with his finger.

  I don’t know how we wound up lying down backstage, making out in a pile of flashlights, but suddenly we were. It was the sexiest thing that had ever happened to me. His hands were on my back, and my hands were in his hair, and I was covered in goose bumps all of a sudden, even though I wasn’t cold.

  Someone cleared his throat, and I looked up, mortified.

  It was Max, carrying his phone charger and trying not to laugh. His newly hemmed Dracula cape swished around his ankles.

  “Don’t stop on my behalf,” he drawled.

  He bent down and plugged in his charger.

  “Photo to remember this by?” he asked, holding up his phone.

  “Get out of here,” Jamie snapped, shooing him off.

  Max left, cackling, but the spell was kind of broken.

  I sat up and went back to loading batteries into flashlights.

  “So, Cleo,” Jamie said. “My dad’s got this dinner with a guest speaker at the university tomorrow. We’d have the whole place to ourselves.”

  I could hardly believe it. Between play rehearsals, our parents, and our friends always wanting to do things as a group, we never had any privacy. Which was probably how we’d wound up making out in a flashlight pit.

  “What would we do at your place?” I asked, teasing.

  Jamie shrugged, the picture of innocence.

  “Well, I do have some pretty great books about ancient Egypt.”

  I TOLD MY parents I was staying for rehearsal and getting dinner after with my friends. It was an easy lie, and one they bought completely. And it wasn’t entirely untrue. I did stay for rehearsal, where I sat in the audience, watching Max flap around in his cape, having way too much fun being evil.

  We all split up at the lot, and I noticed that Abby went with Nima, climbing into his Mercedes as though it was routine. Most of the cars were already gone; it was really just the athletes who stayed this late.

  Jamie and I drove down the parkway, which felt strange without the usual crush of after-school traffic. It felt even stranger when he turned south, toward the CSU campus, instead of north into the canyon.

  The homes were smaller here, attached townhouses with numbered carports instead of backyard pools and three-car garages.

  I was nervous, all of a sudden, and I didn’t know why. Maybe it was because of the lie I’d told my parents, or the empty house waiting for us, or the three little words that fluttered in my rib cage every time we kissed.

  Either way, my heart was beating louder than I’d thought possible, and a couple of times, I was sure that Jamie heard it.

  I glanced over at Jamie. He was wearing his glasses, which always killed me, and he was smiling in a way that made his lips look impossibly full. He drummed his palms against a steering wheel, waiting for the traffic to clear. I smoothed my hair, trying to calm my nerves.

  Jamie’s house was smaller than I’d expected, but oddly familiar. I stared at his living room, trying to figure out where I’d seen it before.

  “My dad kept the furniture,” he explained, making a face.

  I could tell he hated it, seeing his old living room transported here, the pieces much too big for the space, and I didn’t blame him.

  “Please tell me you don’t want a tour,” Jamie said, looking embarrassed.

  “Well, I do now.”

  So he led me around, making up absurd names for the rooms.

  “The underwear disco,” he said, waving in the direction of the laundry room.

  “Meditation chamber” was the bathro
om.

  “Homework processing plant,” he said as we walked into his bedroom.

  His room was surprisingly ordinary. Just a guest room with a plain white duvet, a dusty treadmill in the corner, and an outdated television. Even the bookshelf was someone else’s, crammed with reference books and old Zagat guides.

  “It’s terrible, I know,” Jamie mumbled, staring at the carpet.

  I started laughing. Somehow, since Jamie’s room was such a disappointment, I wasn’t so nervous anymore. It didn’t feel like a boy’s room, and it certainly didn’t feel like Jamie’s.

  “It’s so bad,” I said. “Wow.”

  “The Zagat guides are the worst part,” Jamie said. “It’s like, here are descriptions of amazing restaurants, but just kidding, because all we eat is Panda Express.”

  My stomach growled at the mention of amazing restaurants, and I felt my cheeks heat up.

  “Um, are you hungry?” he asked.

  “Starving,” I said.

  Jamie led me to the kitchen and got out some leftover cartons of Chinese food, apologizing.

  “I see you weren’t kidding about the Panda Express,” I teased.

  “We could order from somewhere else if you want,” he said.

  “No, this is great,” I said, and then I tried to help, opening drawers in search of silverware, until he made me sit down.

  “Hold on,” he said, disappearing into the living room. After a moment, there was a scratching noise, and jazz drifted into the kitchen.

  It wasn’t anything like the jazz my dad played, the soft, inoffensive background music to his optical shop. This was a warmer, deeper music, the kind that made you pay attention.

  “Josephine Baker,” Jamie said. “I did this History Day presentation on Paris in the 1920s. The record was just supposed to be a prop, but I liked it so much I kept it.”

  “Nerd,” I teased.

  “Obviously,” Jamie agreed, pressing his lips to mine.

  It was the boldest kiss we’d ever had, our bodies sliding together like magnets. I went slightly dizzy from the force of it, and when I opened my eyes, I was surprised to hear my stomach growl, because I’d forgotten I could want something that wasn’t Jamie.

  “Dinner is served,” Jamie said, passing me a plate of orange chicken and rice.

  As we ate, Jamie kept glancing over at me. He looked happy, and a little shy, and I realized this was new for him, too. That we were charting new territory together, stepping into an unexplored universe and mapping the stars.

  We talked about our friends, and about the play—Jamie had been cast as Van Helsing, the vampire hunter, which was deeply ironic.

  “What’s it called when you try to become the character you’re playing?” he said. “Method acting? It’s like I’m doing the opposite. Method living.”

  “I think Max is method acting,” I told him.

  Jamie grinned and did a spot-on impression of Max’s Dracula voice.

  I laughed.

  In the other room, the record went quiet, and Jamie got up to flip it. When he came back in, he didn’t sit down. Instead, he put his hands on my hips and pressed his lips to mine.

  My mouth was greasy from the takeout, and so was his, but it didn’t matter. We tangled our way to the bedroom, the old record crackling through the air like electricity.

  It was the kind of music that you heard in old movies where Audrey Hepburn twirls in a pair of elegant ballet flats. The kind of music that plays in romantic scenes where two people hold hands in the moonlight.

  We melted backward onto the duvet. We kissed the way we’d started to back in that pile of flashlights, and there was no reason to stop. My heart was racing, and I didn’t know how it was possible to breathe without pulling apart, but somehow, we were.

  His toes tangled with mine, and I had the absurd thought that our feet were holding hands.

  “Oh god, Rose,” he whispered, his breath tickling my neck.

  It was like every nerve ending in my body had gathered in my spine, tensed and waiting. We rolled over until I was sitting on top of him. He stared up at me, his eyes wide. His hair was a mess, and I ruffled my fingers through it, laughing. And then, very slowly, I reached for the hem of my shirt.

  Jamie tugged off his own shirt, and then, as if checking that it was okay, unbuttoned the top of his jeans. They were tight to begin with, and far too tight now.

  I’d never touched a boy there, but I reached for it, curious, and Jamie breathed in sharply.

  “Wow,” he said, laughing.

  “Sorry,” I apologized.

  “Don’t be,” Jamie shook his head. “I just wasn’t expecting it.”

  “I’m here, aren’t I?” I asked.

  And then I reached for the button on my own jeans.

  Hold me close and make all my dreams come true, the record warbled.

  And so we did.

  We climbed under the covers, making our own warm little cave, tracing our fingers over each other’s skin in fascination. His fingers were over my bra, and then under it, and then some other places that I’d never been touched before. I reached for him, and it was as though I held his heartbeat in my hand.

  And then, out of nowhere, someone shouted in surprise.

  Jamie and I sat up, shocked.

  Logan hovered above the end of the bed, gaping down at us in horror.

  “What the hell?!” he yelled. “That’s my little sister!”

  Oh my god.

  “Logan!” I gasped, clutching the covers to my chest. “Get out!”

  But Logan paid me no attention. He glared at Jamie, his chest heaving.

  “Get away from her!” he demanded. “Now!”

  The ceiling fan sped up, whirling so fast that it was like a miniature storm had taken over the room. The papers on Jamie’s desk rippled madly, then took flight. “Logan, stop!” I said.

  But he didn’t. Instead, he let out a miserable wail.

  The bookshelf on the wall trembled, and, one by one, the books shot out, banging against the opposite wall.

  “Watch out!” Jamie said, pressing me close, like he needed to protect me.

  “I can’t believe you!” Logan shouted. “I can’t believe both of you!”

  “Logan, calm down,” Jamie said.

  “Calm down?!” Logan yelped. “You’re in bed with my little sister!”

  “I’m not your little sister!” I said. I pulled on my shirt. “Logan. Hallway. Now.”

  Logan glared at me but went. I folded my arms across my chest and glared.

  “You are so out of line!” I accused.

  “Me?” Logan shot back. “You’re the one going to parties and drinking beer and having sex—”

  “Oh my god, we weren’t having sex,” I cut in. “And even if we were, it’s none of your business! You can’t spy on me like this! It’s super creepy to barge into someone’s house!”

  “I’m creepy?” Logan said, his chest heaving. “I’m creepy for worrying about my little sister?”

  “I’m not your little sister anymore!” I snarled. Logan’s face fell, and instantly I wished I could take it back.

  “You are too!” Logan insisted, his jaw trembling. “Little sister isn’t an age, it’s a relationship. And it means I’m supposed to look out for you.”

  “That’s what you’ve been doing?” I asked incredulously. “Crashing Sam’s party and following me around, that’s looking out for me?”

  Logan didn’t answer me for a moment. Instead, he bit his lip and stared at the floor.

  “It never used to be like this,” he said, sounding defeated. “You’ve been pushing me away ever since you met him.”

  “That’s not true!”

  “You’d rather be with him. I bet that’s why you’re losing the ability to see me,” Logan accused.

  “That’s ridiculous,” I said.

  Even though it wasn’t.

  Even though it made a horrible kind of sense.

  I hadn’t been able to see L
ogan right after Jamie’s and my first kiss. What if there was an actual correlation between falling for Jamie and my losing the ability to see Logan?

  “You’re ridiculous,” Logan accused, sulking. “You’re a ridiculous butt made of ridiculous butts.”

  It was the most brothery thing he could have said. And just like that, everything was okay between us again.

  “At least I don’t moon people,” I said, giving him a playful shove.

  Wrong move. My hands hit some kind of invisible barrier, and I bounced backward, my shoulders hitting the wall.

  “Are you okay?” Logan asked, worried.

  Jamie banged open the door. His jeans were unzipped, and his shirt was unbuttoned, and he looked panicked.

  “What happened?”

  “Nothing,” I said, rolling my shoulders. “I’m fine.”

  Jamie rounded on Logan.

  “I didn’t do anything,” Logan swore.

  “Except break into my house, and spy on us, and destroy my room,” Jamie retorted.

  “You slept with my kid sister!” Logan accused.

  “At least one of us won’t die a virgin,” Jamie snapped.

  Logan’s eyes darkened, suddenly more holes than actual eyes. Everything about him blurred, shifted, and writhed.

  “Say that again,” he growled. “I dare you.”

  I stepped between the two of them.

  “Stop it!” I begged. “Both of you! Please!”

  My shoulders were stiff and sore, and I belatedly realized that I wasn’t wearing any pants.

  “Booooooo,” Logan moaned sarcastically, feinting a lunge.

  Jamie jerked back, and Logan laughed.

  “Scared of me, huh?” Logan asked, looked pleased. “Good. Now stay away from my sister.”

  “Logan,” I warned, but he was already gone.

  Above us, the hall light flickered and then went out.

  Jamie sighed. Raked a hand through his hair. Gave me a small smile that was meant to be reassuring but mostly just looked tired.

  “I’m sorry,” I said as we got dressed. “I can’t believe Logan did this.”

  His room really was a mess. I bent down and started picking up a stack of books.

  “Leave it,” Jamie said, sounding exhausted. “It’s fine.”

  “I’ll talk to him,” I promised. “Make sure he knows he crossed the line.”