Hereafter - Tara Hudson

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      Suddenly, I couldn’t stop the flow of my words. It was like pulling a piece of thick tape from my mouth. I wanted to rip it off, tear through my explanation, so I could breathe again.

      “I have a theory, sort of. I can’t be sure, but I think I can’t be seen unless someone is, well, like me. That’s why the people on the shore couldn’t see me, and that’s why Eli can see me. Because he’s like me.”

      “Who’s Eli?”

      I was in such a hurry to get the truth out that I’d lost control of the things tumbling from my mouth. “Sorry,” I moaned. I dropped my head into my hands and squeezed my eyes tightly shut. “I’m not making any sense, am I?”

      Joshua’s response surprised me. He didn’t sound frustrated, or even confused. Instead, his voice was hushed, intense.

      “Amelia, I’m trying very hard to understand this. I know something … strange has happened. Is happening. I’ll believe your explanation. Just go slow, okay?”

      My eyes flew open and met his. His eyes were lovely, and serious; they reminded me of the night sky. I tried to shake the distraction of them from my head so I could focus on this horrible conversation.

      “Joshua, I have no idea how to say this.”

      “It’s okay. It’ll be okay.”

      I turned away from him, staring at but not really seeing the patch of red dirt in front of us. When I spoke again, I did so slowly. Painfully.

      “I think you saw me, and you can still see me, because we have some sort of—I don’t know—magical or spiritual connection. You’re like me. Or you were, at least for a moment.”

      Joshua’s eyes narrowed. “And by ‘like you’ you mean …?”

      “That you died.”

      The word “died” hung heavy in the air between us, like an ax waiting to drop.

      Joshua’s forehead wrinkled as he tried to make sense out of my words, tried to follow the convoluted path I’d laid. He may not have connected all of the pieces yet, but he would. As each second passed, I could see it happening, piece by piece. He would rip off the bandage at any moment, would either call me a lunatic or—worse—believe me.

      “Okay,” he started haltingly. “You and I have both died? Me in the river, and you sometime in the past?”

      “Yes. In the same river, actually.”

      “Wow.” He blinked in surprise but then composed himself again. “So you’re saying this ‘connection’ is the reason I was the only one who could see you? Some sort of magic, or something?” He said the last words uncertainly, as though he were trying out a strange new language.

      “I think so.” I bent my head down toward my lap again.

      “And the connection exists because you died?” he asked.

      I only nodded.

      “And you came back to life, like me?”

      A heartbeat or two passed, and then—

      “No, Joshua. Not that part.”

      For a while there was only silence. Then I heard him suck in a sharp breath. Here it was—the moment. The finale. I finished it off with nothing but a whisper.

      “You see, Joshua—I never did come back to life.”

      At the worst possible moment, I had one of those new, unpredictable sensations. I could suddenly feel the warm breeze against the skin of my legs and arms. The air felt charged, electric, like the gray sky would tear open and let thunder and lightning and all hell break loose around us. Goose bumps rose on my arms. Real goose bumps, like the ones Eli had inspired.

      I couldn’t look up at Joshua’s face, but I could hear him stammering, making incredulous little noises. Then he became very quiet and still. This stillness lasted for possibly a full minute before he spoke with an unnatural calm.

      “Amelia, are you trying to tell me you’re …?”

      “Dead.” I spoke immediately. It felt wrong to delay the inevitable any longer.

      “Dead.” He repeated the word without any inflection.

      Another heartbeat passed and then, unexpectedly, Joshua leaped off of the bench. He spun around to face me. I stared up at him, undoubtedly wild-eyed and frantic. His face, however, was expressionless. He wore a sort of mask—hiding terror, anger, disbelief, hatred? I had no idea.

      I couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t stand the frozen look on his face, the look I’d put there with the truth. He thought I was crazy, or he knew I was dead. Whichever conclusion he’d made, I would certainly lose him, however little I’d had him.

      In this moment I felt impossibly and utterly alone. Alone for eternity probably, and now painfully aware of what I would be missing.

      “I’m sorry,” I moaned—apologizing to him, to myself, to who knows who—and clasped a hand over my mouth.

      I was so lost in sorrow for myself, I almost didn’t notice it: something on my cheek. Something warm and wet, trailing its way to the corner of my lips. Without taking my eyes from his empty face, I touched one finger to the edge of my eye. I pressed the fingertip to my lips. It tasted salty.

      A tear. My dead eyes had shed a tear.

      Something about that single tear must have stirred Joshua, because his frozen expression suddenly melted. His eyes and mouth softened.

      “Amelia.” His voice was rough, and it broke. My name had never sounded more beautiful.

      Joshua reached out to me, moving his hand as if to cup it around my cheek. Without giving a thought to anything but the ache that raged inside me, I leaned into his gesture.

      Nothing could have prepared us for the moment when his skin once again touched mine.

      Chapter

       SEVEN

      I shouldn’t have been surprised. My world had changed the first time he laid his hand upon my cheek—there was no reason why it shouldn’t change when he did it again.

      Yet when his hand cupped my face for the second time, we both gasped and jerked away, stunned. My fingers involuntarily flew up to the burning spot on my cheek, and likewise he grabbed his right hand with his left. Our actions may have looked protective, even defensive, to an outside observer. For me, however, they were anything but.

      The moment his skin brushed mine, a current shot through my entire body, from my scalp to the tips of my fingers. The current made the ache in my chest, and the tingles that raced along my spine each time he looked at me, seem like low-burning cinders. My heart, my brain, my skin—all of it was momentarily engulfed in flame, a flame lit only by the spark on my cheek.

      I’d never felt anything so exhilarating. Not in death … not even in life. I knew it, deep within my core.

      Joshua stared at me, rubbing his hand. He continued to breathe unevenly, as though he’d just run a long distance. Then, still gasping, he smiled. Hugely.

      “What,” he managed to choke out, “was that?”

      “I have no idea.” And I began to laugh. “Want to do it again?”

      “Hell, yes,” he growled, and lurched forward to grab my hand from my lap.

      As it had been with my cheek, we didn’t make perfect contact. Not exactly. I couldn’t feel the

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