LITMIR.BIZ

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of the buildings reaching up to a dark, starry sky.

      The cars, the buildings, the night sky—all things that shouldn’t be there, if you considered the fact that the last time I sat in this vehicle there had been nothing to see outside but a midafternoon snowstorm raging over the middle of Nowhere, Texas.

      I frowned and then turned toward the interior of the SUV. There, two astonished faces stared back: Jillian, sitting openmouthed and wide-eyed in front of me; and Joshua, looking basically the same, beside me.

      Another uncontrolled materialization, I supposed.

      I sighed wearily and met his eyes. “How long was I gone this time?” I asked him.

      “Gone?” he whispered, frowning. “Amelia, you’ve been right beside me for the last twelve hours.”

      

      I opened my mouth to respond to Joshua but then popped it shut. What did he mean, I hadn’t left his side? That wasn’t possible. Not after everything I’d just seen and heard.

      I tilted my head to one side, studying Joshua’s confused expression. “Did I … was I sleeping again?”

      Still staring at me intently, he nodded. “Yeah, for a couple hours, actually. But in the last few minutes, you were … shouting.”

      “Huh?”

      “Shouting. Loudly.” His eyes darted to the front of the car and then back to mine. “Even my dad said he thought he heard something. That whole inactive-Seer thing, I guess?”

      “Oh.” My voice sounded flat. “Sorry. I didn’t know. I must have been … talking in my sleep.”

      Or screaming out to my dead father.

      Across from me, Jillian whipped her head from side to side, obviously trying to shake away the fact that I’d frightened her. Then she rolled her eyes, composed her face into its far more common look of disapproval, and dropped back down into her seat. Before she sunk out of sight, I heard her mutter, “God, you’re creepy.”

      Before yesterday her words would have bothered me. Hurt me, like they always did. Tonight, however, I didn’t really have the energy to care what Jillian thought I was.

      I glanced back up at Joshua. He still watched me with that slightly unnerved expression.

      “Sorry,” I repeated in the same emotionless tone I’d used earlier.

      He gave me a small, uncertain smile. “No biggie. It was just a little, you know …”

      “Creepy.” I sighed.

      Then, with a shrug, I turned away from him to scrutinize the fabric of the headrest in front of me. At this moment, all I wanted to do was bury myself in my own thoughts. But Joshua leaned forward, trying to recapture my gaze.

      “Want to talk about it?” he offered quietly.

      “Not really.” After a beat I added, “No offense.”

      From the corner of my eye, I saw him shake his head as if to say None taken. Which probably wasn’t entirely true.

      I felt a twinge of regret, so sharp it actually hurt. I didn’t want to hurt Joshua. In fact, I wanted to tell him everything I’d just seen. But I shouldn’t. Couldn’t. Not now, when our expiration date loomed so close. Besides, I could hardly force more than a few words past the bitter taste of disappointment in my mouth.

      I just couldn’t believe it: the whole thing had been another useless, haunting dream? Standing in the field, seeing the girl, talking to my father—all an illusion? It seemed impossible.

      But if Joshua said I hadn’t left, then I suppose I hadn’t. Instead, my brain had created everything in some sort of frenzied, tantalizing fit of wish fulfillment. After ten years apart, and after months of searching for him, I guess it made a cruel sort of sense that I would imagine some mystical interaction between my father and me.

      I wanted to shout aloud, to protest how unfair it all was. And more than anything, I wanted to confide in Joshua. I didn’t want to spend my last days with him locked in some secretive prison of my own making.

      Screw it, I thought and turned to him, mouth open. But Rebecca’s voice interrupted me.

      “Holy crap, hallelujah,” she sang out from the front seat. “Ursulines Avenue. We made it.”

      “Truer words were never spoken,” Jeremiah agreed, and then pulled the car to a stop outside a redbrick building. “Troops,” he commanded, “prepare to disembark.”

      “Gladly,” Jillian groaned as her father killed the engine.

      I heard the clicking of seat belts and then the snap of someone’s door handle. Immediately, the overhead lights flooded the SUV. In the darkness, I hadn’t seen Jillian sit up again. Now, for just a moment, her gaze caught mine as we both blinked against the sudden brightness. Maybe I imagined it, but I thought I saw something strange there, in the depths of her eyes. Curiosity? Anticipation? She looked away too quickly for me to decide.

      “Ready?”

      Joshua’s whisper in my ear made me jump.

      “Y-yeah,” I stammered. “Sorry.”

      “For what?” He laughed and then leaned around me to push part of Jillian’s seat forward so that we could get out of the back row.

      Without so much as a glance at me, Jillian scrambled over the inclined seat and out of the open passenger side door. Joshua touched the inside of my elbow softly, indicating that we should follow her. I looked down at the place where his hand rested—where my skin had already started to tingle and burn. Then I sighed, so low Joshua probably couldn’t hear me, and pushed myself up.

      After I’d climbed out of the SUV, I walked over to the uneven sidewalk and waited for Joshua to climb out too. While I waited, my eyes strayed upward, to the buildings that surrounded the narrow street on which we’d parked. Each separate structure—whether made of brick or colorful clapboard—flowed seamlessly into the next; each of their wrought-iron balconies almost but not quite connecting, hanging heavy with flowering plants and ferns. Beneath the balconies, most of the windows looked dark and unlit behind tall, wooden shutters. Something about the houses gave off a well-cared-for but unoccupied air.

      The town house in front of us, however, had its shutters thrown open, and warm yellow light poured from its windows onto the street. Behind the curtains I could see figures moving. On both sides of the front door, someone had lit the gas, outdoor lanterns. Their flames flickered wildly, casting shadows onto the sidewalk and into the corners where this town house met its neighbors.

      Before I had time to survey the rest of the house, the front door flew open and an enormous crowd of people came rushing out to greet us. Leading the charge was a pretty brunette woman who could have been Ruth’s middle-aged doppelgänger. Behind her, what seemed like fifty other relatives gathered, all smiling and all talking at once.

      “Whoa,” I muttered. Joshua came up behind me, bag in hand, and subtly placed a few fingers on the small of my back.

      “Meet the Mayhews,” he said through the side of his mouth. “All nine hundred and seventy-five of them.”

      “No kidding. Did your entire family tree decide to visit for Christmas?”

      “Basically.” He shot me a sheepish, sideways look. “Which, um … kind of means we’re sleeping in the attic.”

      “Fine by me.” I shrugged, and fought the urge to add, I can’t sleep anyway. Obviously, that just wasn’t true.

      As I continued to stare at all the new faces around me, Jillian walked up to my side and hissed, “Hey, Casper—forget your bag, or do you just like wearing the same thing every day?”

      I raised one

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