by Kit Alloway
“Why didn’t she leave him?” Deloise asked.
“For the same reason. And then when she did finally leave … well, he’d gotten into her head once, we both knew he’d be happy to do it again.”
“What do you mean, he’d gotten into her head?” Whim asked.
“Staging!” Suddenly Young Ben’s voice was echoing off the walls. “He staged nightmares for her while I was overseas. Made her think she was in love with him! By the time I got back, they were already married.”
Josh had heard Feodor say as much the day before, but it still horrified her. Wasn’t there anyone Peregrine had truly loved?
“That’s messed up,” Winsor said.
“Are you serious?” Whim asked Ben, suddenly interested. “Can I put that on my website?”
“No, you can’t,” Deloise scolded him. She sat down beside Young Ben. “I’m so sorry. That’s just horrible.”
“It took us years to find our way back to each other. Never could have done it without…”
“Without Alice,” Josh finished.
“Who?” Winsor asked again.
“She was Grandma’s best friend,” Josh told her.
Young Ben just nodded. “Never could have found her again without Alice. Alice gave your grandmother the cabin. It was our place, where we went to … to get away from Peregrine.”
“Oh my God,” Whim said. “This is sliding rapidly into the too-much-information category.”
“I thought I’d take that to my grave,” Young Ben said. He smiled a wet, loopy smile. “I’m so glad I got to tell you girls before I died!”
“Tell us about the cabin?” Winsor asked.
“No, he means Grandma,” Deloise said.
“No—I mean, yes. But also…” He smiled again, tears in his eyes. “Girls, I’m your real grandfather.”
All Josh could think was that if Whim’s eyes got any bigger, they were going to burst out of his head.
Deloise started to speak, then stopped. She looked at Will as if for help.
“Oh,” Will said.
“Um,” Josh added, just before her brain went blank.
“You’re our grandfather?” Deloise managed to ask.
“Yes.” Ben held her hands and beamed at her.
Whim buried his face in a pillow, but his shoulders shook with silent laughter.
“Did Mom know?” Deloise asked.
“Oh, yes. Figured it out all on her own. Such a smart girl.”
He’s senile, Josh thought. He’s … confused.
“Wait,” Winsor said. She pointed at Young Ben. “You’re her”—she pointed at Deloise—“grandpa?”
Young Ben nodded.
I can’t even remember what I wanted to ask him about, Josh thought. I have no idea why I came downstairs.
“That’s amazing,” Deloise said. “I mean, I would much rather be related to you than to Peregrine.” Then she laughed and hugged the old man. “Hi, Grandpa!”
Young Ben began crying. Whim was crying, too, for an entirely different reason.
“Are you laughing at my new grandpa?” Deloise asked Whim indignantly.
“No,” he said. “I’m laughing at your sister.”
Only then did Josh realize that her protracted shock might be hurting Young Ben’s feelings. She stumbled over to pat Ben’s shoulder. “It’s … I’m glad you’re my grandfather instead of Peregrine,” she managed, feeling awkward.
“Oh, Josh,” he said, and pulled her into his lap to hug. “You know, your grandmother was so proud of you. Both of you.”
“She was more proud of Josh,” Deloise said. “We all know it.”
“No, you should have heard the way she talked about you. Called you her little Mother Teresa.”
Josh didn’t know if Ben was making that up or not, but as she watched Deloise smile, she didn’t really care. Peregrine had never had time for Deloise.
For the next half hour, Josh listened to Young Ben talk about Dustine, about their torrid love affair, about how much he had loved Josh and Deloise’s mother, Jona. That finally reminded Josh of what she’d wanted to ask.
“Young—er, Grandpa Ben,” she said, and was rewarded by a big smile. “I wanted to ask you if anything weird happened around the time I was born, or before I was conceived.”
Young Ben kept one arm around her and the other around Deloise. “You’d have to ask your father about that,” he said and winked. Whim began laughing again.
“No, not like—um—as long as we’re confessing things, I might as well tell you that I know I’m the True Dream Walker.”
It was Young Ben’s turn to look shocked. Then he shook his head slowly. “Just as smart as your mother.”
“Not really. Haley told me.”
“Haley,” Ben said with a nod. “He’s going to be the next great seer.”
That didn’t surprise Josh a bit. “No kidding. Anyway, I’m just trying to make sense of these prophesies about the True Dream Walker, and they keep talking about important things happening right around when I was born. And they never use the word ‘born,’ it’s always ‘summoned,’ or ‘arrived.’”
“You think you weren’t born?” Whim asked.
“No, I’m just wondering if anything weird happened.”
“Well,” Young Ben said, and then lapsed into thought. “The only thing I remember was that crazy woman-power retreat your mother went on with Dustine and Alice. They drove out to the cabin for three days to skinny-dip and invoke fertility goddesses or some such thing. Lauren and I laughed at them, but a month later your mother was pregnant, so maybe it worked.”
Josh had a hard time imagining her grandmother involved in such a scene. She had always been so practical. And Alice hadn’t believed in God, let alone goddesses.
“But, you know,” Young Ben continued, seeming to think aloud, “Dustine changed a couple of years before you were born. When Peregrine overthrew the monarchy and killed Mirren’s parents—that’s what gave her the courage to finally leave. That was the final straw. It sent her into a depression, though. For a couple of years she was … in a dark place. All that changed when you were born.”
“Me?” Josh asked, surprised.
“She said she felt hope again when you were born.”
“That’s so sweet,” Deloise said.
“She was a beautiful person.” Ben tightened his arms around Deloise and Josh. “Well, girls, your father should probably hear this from me. Why don’t I go talk to him for a bit?”
“I’ll go with you,” Deloise offered, and she and Ben headed down the hall holding hands.
“Just think,” Whim mused. “None of us will ever forget where we were when we heard that Young Ben was Josh and Del’s real grandpa.”
Twenty−five
“Would it be just terrible of us not to tell your family that you’re back until tomorrow?” Mirren asked Haley that morning.
They’d talked all night, sitting in the royal trimidion until the lanterns burned out and then sneaking into the house and up to her bedroom. Haley had told her everything about Death—about its purpose, about Ian, even about the transformation he had experienced and her part in it. He felt like a profound fear he’d been running from all his life—the fear of Death—had been relieved. Once he’d started talking, he couldn’t stop, as if years of unspoken words were gushing out of him.
“I know it’s selfish,” Mirren said, leaning against him on the bed. “I know everyone is so worried about you. I just don’t want to share you yet.”
“One day,” Haley agreed. He was already a little overwhelmed by having been plunged back into the World so unexpectedly. Plus, he hadn’t yet figured out how he was going to tell Josh what had happened to Ian. “Just one.”
Mirren turned her face up for a kiss.
* * *
They snuck out before her relations woke up, leaving a note and stealing the family car. First they had breakfast at a local diner, and Mirren showed Haley her favorite spots around the little town where she lived. Th
en they wandered into a gift shop and stumbled upon a beautiful wicker picnic basket, and decided to buy it, fill it up, and drive to the beach.
Haley took her to the spot where Josh’s grandmother’s cabin had once stood. It had burned more than a year before, and now a crew was excavating the spot in preparation for rebuilding. Haley and Mirren stood nearby, watching a crane pull pieces of smoke-stained cement out of the old basement.
“This is where Ian’s soul got separated from his body,” Haley said.
Mirren, standing beside him, let her head come to rest on his shoulder.
“I think that’s what went wrong with him. Most souls go straight to Death; they accept that change. But Ian’s soul hung around for so long, he got confused. He started thinking that maybe he didn’t have to go.”
“What will happen to him?”
Haley repressed a shiver. “I honestly don’t know.”
They watched the construction for a while, and then Haley said, “I’m glad they’re rebuilding. Maybe we’ll spend the Fourth of July out here again next year, like we used to.”
“I would love that,” Mirren said.
They walked the half mile to the beach and sat down on a new plaid blanket. It was too cold to swim, but Mirren insisted on taking her shoes off and stepping in up to her ankles. She’d never seen the ocean before.
“It’s so cold!” she cried. “The sand—I’m sinking!”
She looked so beautiful to Haley, her long red hair blowing around her face, her skirt bunched in one fist, a luminous smile on her face. He didn’t think he had ever seen her so carefree.
But there was a sadness lingering in her aura, a deep red wound, and as he watched her dry her feet on the blanket, he asked her about it. “Tell me about the election.”
She sighed and told him about Peregrine’s landslide victory, followed by his sudden disappearance. “I don’t care that I’m not a queen, but I wish I could do something to help the dream walkers. Peregrine didn’t just defeat me, he managed to hobble me.” She dug in the sand beside the blanket, looking for seashells. “I waited so many years to be part of that community, and now I’m here in the World and I’m as isolated from it as I ever was.”
Haley understood. He had spent most of his life feeling isolated, too. Sure, he’d had friends, but he’d always been on the outskirts of their group, the one somebody—usually Deloise—had to remember to invite along. He’d been a pariah in school—the weird kid, the homo, the deaf-mute. In fifth grade, the principal had actually told Haley’s mother to consider teaching him at home. “He’ll never survive middle school,” the woman had warned.
Haley had survived—mostly thanks to Ian. Ian had beaten back the bullies, and when he turned his anger on Haley, Josh had beaten Ian back.
What Haley had wanted, though, wasn’t to be protected; it was to be wanted, and he imagined that Mirren needed the same thing now. Feeling inspired, he grabbed her under the knees and behind her shoulder blades and scooped her into his lap.
“Haley!” she cried, but she was laughing. “What are you doing?”
He kissed the tip of her nose. “I’m reminding you that you aren’t alone.”
She touched his face with her long, cool fingers. “You are so dear to me,” she said softly.
“I love you,” he told her. “Don’t worry. You’ll find a way to help. I know you will.”
She nodded, just a little. “I believe you.”
* * *
Mirren’s aunt and uncle were bewildered by Haley’s appearance in their yard and alarmed by their niece’s obvious affection for him. Katia was welcoming, but her constant chatter made Haley nervous. After an awkward dinner together, Haley decided it was time to go home.
They all drove over together. Haley could barely wait until the car stopped to jump out.
I made it, he thought as he ran up the back steps.
The kitchen smelled like dish detergent and coffee grounds. Haley’s favorite water bottle sat upside down in the drying rack by the sink, as if Kerstel had refused to put it away, certain Haley would be home soon to use it. He ran past the chugging dishwasher and into the living room, where he found Lauren and Kerstel watching the television with the volume on low. Within arm’s reach was a bassinet that contained not only a baby with a blue-green aura, but a small white puppy with a hazel aura.
“Haley!” Kerstel cried, and she jumped off the couch to fold him into her arms.
Lauren hugged them both, and they were full of questions about how Haley had made it home. But he felt a throb of energy from behind him, and he knew whose it was before he saw her, sitting in the hallway in a wheelchair.
Winsor.
She looked terrible. Her aura had always been a glorious combination of blue and yellow, but now it looked as if it had been broken and rearranged incorrectly, like a badly made stained-glass window, with strange grayish-purple shapes thrown in. But Haley felt a great burst of joy inside him at the sight of her soul back in her body.
“Haley?” she asked.
He let go of Kerstel to kneel down in front of Winsor. “Hi.”
She reached out a shaking hand to touch his hair. “They wouldn’t tell me where you went. They always lied to me.”
She was trembling, and Haley wished his family had just told Winsor the truth. She was the only person he knew who truly wasn’t afraid of hearing hard things; in fact, she thrived on the truth, no matter how ugly.
“S’okay,” Haley told her. “I’m here now.”
“Are you mad at me?”
He rubbed her cold hand between his. “No. I was never mad at you.”
She gave a little nod. “That’s good.”
He surprised her when he hugged her, but he couldn’t resist. He had loved her once, even though she hadn’t loved him, and he had been afraid her soul would spend eternity in that canister.
I couldn’t find you, he thought, remembering the empty feeling he’d had when he held her hand in the hospital. But you’re here now, too.
She was smiling at him when he let her go, and as he stepped back, he saw something green flicker in the energy field around her heart, lively and quick. Then it morphed into an achy gray splotch. A moment later it flashed green again, and Haley realized that Winsor’s physical injuries weren’t the only reason her aura was so muddled and disorganized.
Someone broke her heart.
He would have looked more closely, but she pointed past him and said, “Who’s that?”
Mirren was standing in the kitchen with her very confused family, watching Haley and Winsor. She was wearing her own smile, and Haley knew that she wasn’t, not for an instant, jealous.
“That’s my girlfriend, Mirren,” he told Winsor.
“Oh,” Winsor said, considering. “She’s pretty.”
“Yeah, she is.”
Then somehow word of his return spread to the upper floors, and everyone was rushing down to see him. Haley felt shy and tried to sneak toward a chair in the corner of the living room, but people kept hugging him. They were all so excited and noisy that Kerstel had to take the baby upstairs, but not before she whispered, “You knew she was going to be a girl, didn’t you?”
Haley just smiled, and Kerstel kissed him on the cheek.
“Thank you for not ruining the surprise.”
If you think that’s a surprise, he thought, just wait a few years.
Then Whim was grabbing him and hugging him so hard he lifted Haley right off the ground, and Deloise was crying and trying to show Haley her puppy, and Will was slapping him on the back. Alex was shaking his hand like it was the handle of a water pump, and even Saidy was smiling.
“Hi, guys,” Haley said, laughing.
“Dude,” Whim said. “Dude. Never do that to me again.”
Haley smiled, until Whim added, “Not everybody’s cut out to be a hero, you know?”
Whim hugged him again, so he didn’t see the smile on Haley’s face fade. But Will must have, because when his turn to hug
Haley came, he said, “Don’t listen to Whim. You’re the bravest person I know—after Josh.”
Distantly, Haley wondered how Josh would have reacted to seeing Ian again.
Almost as soon as he thought of her, she was there, hugging him so tightly it hurt, and this time he was the one picking her up off the ground. Such a brief separation, and he had already forgotten how little she was.
“I’ve been returning souls as fast as I can so we could get you back,” she told him breathlessly. “I’ve already returned forty of them. A couple more weeks and we would have been able to get you, I swear.”
“Josh,” Haley said. He put her down on the floor so he could see her face. “I never doubted it.”
That was almost true.
Josh teared up then, and Will put an arm around her, and there were too many shapes and colors in their auras for Haley to figure out everything between them, and then Deloise asked, “How did you get back?” and it didn’t matter anyway.
Haley tried to think of an answer. “I died,” he said finally.
“You … died?” Deloise asked, as a hush fell over the room.
He smiled at her. “Just the parts of me I didn’t need anymore.”
Mirren—who was the only one who had heard the whole story—put her arm around him. “He’ll tell you all about it later,” she said. “He’s still getting used to being back.”
“Well, it’s only been what, two hours?” Whim said.
Neither Haley nor Mirren corrected him.
But Katia did. “No, he got back last night. They ran off this morning and had a picnic at the beach.”
Protests sounded across the room.
“Last night!” Saidy cried.
“You couldn’t have texted?” Whim demanded.
“Thanks, Katia,” Mirren said.
“I don’t care when you got back,” Will told Haley. “All that matters is that you’re here.”
“Did you see Ian?” Josh asked, and the silence that followed was as loud as the protests had been.
At that moment, Haley happened to be holding Deloise’s puppy, who was licking his thumb, and he used the puppy as an excuse to look down at his hands. If he’d been looking up, everyone would have known he was lying.
