Haunt Me

by Liz Kessler

  “I know.” Olly nods. “That’s what I’m trying to say. It was all my fault. You weren’t to know which ones to —”

  “No,” Joe breaks in. “I knew exactly which pills I was taking.” He waits for that to sink in. “I took the wrong ones on purpose. I didn’t remember that before. I do now. I remember.” His voice is so strange. Kind of peaceful. At peace. Like — I don’t know. He doesn’t quite sound human. It’s weird. His voice is like a song. Like — like an angel. Was this how he sang? It’s beautiful.

  Olly looks at him. “What?” he asks.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Joe says simply, steadily. “I was ill. You didn’t know it. No one knew it. And I took the pills. Nobody made me.”

  “But I didn’t check. I had painkillers in my bag, too. You took the wrong ones. I killed you, Joe.”

  This time when Joe speaks, his voice not only stills both of us; even the storm seems to take a breath and hold back for a moment.

  “I thought that, too,” he says. “I thought it for a long time. The belief ate away at me, gnawed at me like a starving animal demolishing a carcass. But I remember it all now.” He points at the bottle. “Seeing the bottle. The three of us here together. I don’t know. It — it completes things.” He shrugs. “I remember.”

  “What do you remember?” Olly asks, his voice barely more than a whisper.

  “I knew what I was doing. I saw the pills, both bottles of them, and I chose which ones to take.”

  Olly just stares at him.

  “Joe,” I interrupt. “You told me that —”

  “I know.” His eyes still on Olly, he goes on. “You told me to take the pills and leave you the hell alone. I remember that.”

  “Joe, I never —”

  Joe waves a hand to stop him. “It’s OK.” Joe finally turns to me, takes my hand. “I was wrong,” he says. “I told you Olly had killed me. I thought he did, but I’d remembered wrong. He didn’t.” Turning back to Olly, he repeats, “You didn’t kill me.”

  Olly rubs the back of his hand across his eyes. “Joe, you’re not just saying this to —”

  “To what? Make you feel better? You think I would do that? Dude, I’m the one who’s dead here. You get to live. Why should I take pity on you?”

  Olly laughs softly. “Not lost your sense of humor, then?”

  Joe shakes his head. “I went into your bedroom. I asked for pills, and when I saw them, I had a choice. Get rid of my headache, or get completely wasted and not care about anything. I chose the latter. I think on some level, I knew there was something really wrong, knew I was too far gone for pain relief. The only relief for me was oblivion — and I was the one who chose that. None of us knew what the repercussions would be.”

  There’s a pause, and I can see Olly taking this all in. Joe nods slowly. Then he lets go of my hand. Instead, he puts a hand on each shoulder and pulls me close. “Go with him,” he whispers in my ear.

  I pull away from Joe, shocked. “You’re sending me away? You don’t want me? I thought you loved me.”

  “I do love you,” Joe says. “And that’s why I’m sending you away. I have nothing to offer you.” He holds his arms wide to encompass the rocks, the sea. “There’s nothing for you here. Nothing but death, and I won’t let you choose that.”

  “But there’s nothing for me in life, either,” I insist, taking hold of his hand. “I can’t face any of them. I have no friends, I have nothing.”

  “You have got friends,” Olly says. “You’ve got me and Nia, for starters.”

  “Nia? My friend? She couldn’t wait to come gossiping to you the first chance she got.”

  Olly stares at me. “Is that really what you think?”

  “I — well . . .” My voice trails away, and I’m suddenly filled with doubt for the first time. That was what Nia was doing, wasn’t it? I overheard her. . . .

  Should I have read her text?

  “Nia wanted to tell me before I heard it from anyone else. Before it reached me on the school-gossip grapevine. She wanted to help you. She said she was going to text you. Didn’t you get it?”

  “I . . .”

  I reach into my pocket and grab my phone.

  “Read it,” Olly insists.

  I open Nia’s message.

  Oh, God. I can’t believe what Zoe did. Are you OK? I made sure I got to Olly before she could. He’s gonna stand by you. So am I. Zoe’s a bully and I’ll never talk to her again. Let me know where you are and I’ll come find you.

  A sob leaps into my throat. I can hardly believe it. Nia is choosing me over Zoe?

  “Erin, she cares about you.” Olly reaches out to take my hand. “And so do I.”

  I stand there for a few moments before I realize I’m holding hands with both of them. One on each side. I don’t know which way to turn.

  We stand like that for what feels like forever. Then I realize that Joe’s hand is no longer solid in mine. It’s insubstantial, like air. I try to grip it, but I can’t.

  “Joe!”

  He smiles at me. “It’s done now,” he whispers. “I’m free to leave.”

  I try to grab his hand again, but I can’t. My fingers clutch at air.

  “No!”

  Joe bends toward me and closes his eyes. A second later, the briefest touch of his lips on mine. I try to touch his face, but it’s fading.

  “Go with Olly,” he says. Then he looks at Olly. “Promise me you won’t hurt her.”

  “Never,” Olly croaks.

  “Thank you. You’re my best friend. You’re my hero. You always were.”

  I can barely see him. His face is swimming in and out of my vision. He’s fading. He’s slipping away. “I love you,” he whispers. “I love you both.” But the words are little more than the whistling of the wind across the surface of the sea.

  Olly holds me close as we watch him. Smiling. Smiling all the way. As Joe fades, as he melts, as he becomes the sea and the sky and the air.

  The tide is retreating. So is the storm. We’re perched on the farthest rock we dare clamber on to.

  “Ready?” I ask.

  Erin nods.

  I open the bottle and hold it out. Tipping it sideways, I let the wind take its contents out to sea.

  I let go.

  “Good-bye, Joe,” I whisper.

  Erin grips my hand tightly. “Good-bye, Joe,” she echoes. Her voice cracks on his name, and I put the empty bottle back in my pocket and wrap an arm around her shoulder.

  We stand there a while longer, watching the wind dancing on the tips of the waves, watching the sky’s black anger melt to gray, watching till there is nothing left to watch.

  “Come on, I want to show you something,” she says. We turn away from the sea, and Erin leads me to a cave in the rocks. She tells me it was Joe’s cave.

  I never knew. He always said he had a secret place around here. I tried to find it so many times after he died. Didn’t even know what I was looking for, so I gave up in the end. I was never really sure I wanted to find it.

  But I’m glad I have.

  We snuggle together on a stone bench inside the cave. “Come here.” I pull Erin toward me and shuffle along to get even closer. As I do, my feet kick something under the bench. I reach down to pick up whatever it was that I’d kicked. It’s a book.

  I hold it up and look at it. Stare at it. I know this book.

  “D’you think it’s Joe’s?” Erin asks.

  I nod slowly. “I know it’s Joe’s,” I tell her. “I bought it for him two Christmases ago.”

  Erin reaches out for it. “Can I?” she asks.

  I pass her the book. As she opens it, I lean close so our shoulders are touching.

  She leafs through the pages, and I read each poem with her.

  She turns the last page. This poem is different from the others; the writing is scratchy and desperate, the lines dipping and slipping, the ink patchy and blotchy. I can no longer see through my tears, so, instead, I listen as she reads it aloud.
>
  With each line, I release my brother, piece by piece, from my grasp and from my guilt and from myself.

  And with every word Erin reads, I fall a little bit more in love with her.

  The door opens within about half a second of my knocking.

  “Sorry. That was a bit overeager, wasn’t it?” the woman on the other side says. She’s quite tall. Slim. Blond hair. She’s wearing stylish jeans that women her age can’t normally get away with, but she does.

  She’s got pale-green eyes. Just like Joe’s.

  She reaches out to shake my hand.

  “Hi, Mrs. —”

  “I’m Lisa,” she stops me.

  “OK, um, hi, Lisa,” I say. “I’m Erin.”

  She laughs. “I know.” Then she pulls her hand away. “Oh, forget that. Come here.” And before I can argue, she’s pulled me into a hug. “It’s lovely to meet you,” she says. “You’re the first thing to make him smile since . . . well. You’ve made him happy.”

  She stands aside to let me into the room. “Come on in, love. I’ll call him down.”

  She leaves me standing in their living room for a second while she goes into the hall. “Olly! Erin’s here!”

  While she’s out of the room, I have a glance around. Photos on the mantelpiece. I can’t resist.

  There’s one of two young boys, the younger one sitting on the beach, the other pouring sand over his legs, probably age about six and seven. It makes me smile. There’s another: two boys again, a few years older, arms slung around each other’s shoulders, squinting as they smile into the camera. There’s a third. The same two boys. The younger one is holding a bucket and trowel. The older one has a fishing rod in one hand and a mackerel in his other. His face is bursting with pride.

  Lisa comes back into the room. “Can I get you a drink or anything?” she asks.

  Before I have time to answer, Olly is behind her. “No time, Mum,” he says. “We need to get going.” He gives her a quick peck on the cheek, then looks at me.

  As he does, his smile is the smile of the boy in the photo with the rod and the fish in his hands. “Hi,” he says.

  “Hi,” I say back, biting my bottom lip.

  “Well, I can see you two have a lot to say to each other,” Lisa jokes.

  I laugh. She’s right. After everything we’ve been through together, now that we’re going out on an official date, I’m tongue-tied and shy.

  Lisa nods toward the cabinet next to the photos. “Did Olly tell you what he found?” she asks.

  I glance at the cabinet. It’s there. Pride of place, propped on a stand on the middle shelf. “I, um . . .” I glance at Olly. Help.

  “Erin hasn’t seen it yet,” Olly replies quickly.

  Lisa comes over and picks the book up. “I’ll treasure this forever,” she says. “Especially the last poem.”

  My throat feels dry. Does she know?

  She holds the book to her and closes her eyes for a moment. Then she turns to me. “I never knew he had a girlfriend,” she says. “A real girlfriend, you know?”

  “Mmm,” I say.

  “I’m so glad you found it, Olly. Your dad and I — well, you don’t know how happy it makes us to know that Joe found true love at least once in his life.” Then she laughs softly. “She sounds like she was a nice girl.”

  Olly looks straight at me as he replies. “She was, Mum. She was beautiful, and perfect. She was the kind of girl you can’t help falling in love with.”

  Then he holds out his hand. “Shall we?” he asks.

  I take his hand in mine. “Nice to meet you, Lisa,” I say.

  “You too,” she replies, coming to the front door to wave us off. “Hope to see you again soon.”

  “Oh, you will, Mum — don’t worry about that,” Olly replies over his shoulder with a smile.

  “So, where are we going?” I ask as we walk down the road.

  “Well, I thought I’d take you out for a really classy dinner.”

  “Fish and chips on the beach?”

  “Damn. You guessed. And then I thought we could go to the amusement park and see if I can win you a prize on the crane game. Might even treat you to some cotton candy.” He glances at me. “Does that sound OK?”

  I slip an arm around his waist as we walk. I don’t know if I can quite put into words how it sounds. I don’t know whether to admit that he’s pretty much described my ideal date. I don’t want to tell him that simply walking down the road, holding hands with a boy that the rest of the world can actually see, makes me feel more normal than I’ve felt for years.

  I don’t know if I should confess that I can’t wait to call Nia later and tell her all about our evening. Or if I can admit how good it feels to know I’ve got a friend to do that with now.

  I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to tell him how grateful I am to him for the fact that whatever happens from here on in, he will always be the one who loved Joe as much as I did, who shared my secret, who saved my life and gave me something worth living for.

  And mixed in with all that, I don’t know how to tell him that I’m scared in case being with him will always make me feel guilty.

  I don’t know how to say any of this.

  “It sounds perfect,” I say instead.

  We gobble our dinners, hiding the food from the seagulls and pinching fries out of each other’s bags as we watch the sun go down, folding the day away.

  The sky is dotted with tiny, wispy clouds, and the sun beams out onto them as it fades, as if giving each one a tender kiss as it leaves the day behind.

  We stop joking around and just watch. Olly wraps an arm around my shoulder, and I lean against him.

  In its last moments, the sky is red, filled with love and beauty and passion, and life.

  This sunset is just for us. I know it, deep down in my heart. Olly’s silence tells me he feels it too. It is from Joe. It is his blessing.

  Olly stands up and holds out his hand. I take it, and he pulls me to my feet. “Come on,” he says, wrapping an arm around my shoulders. “Let’s go to the amusement park and see if luck is on our side.”

  And as we make our way along the shoreline, and as he chases me and catches me and splashes me with droplets of water that make me feel alive with the shock and the cold of them, I know that it is.

  FROM JOE GARDINER’S NOTEBOOK

  IT’S RAINING HERE AS I WRITE,

  NOW THERE’S NO DAY AND NIGHT,

  JUST TIME WITH YOU AND TIME WITHOUT.

  THOSE MOMENTS WE TOUCHED

  WERE BEYOND TOUCH,

  WORDS FROM YOUR MOUTH

  SEEMED PULLED

  FROM MY MIND.

  YOU ARE COLOR, YOU ARE TASTE

  AND SMELL AND THE FEELING OF PEN

  ON PAPER, YOU ARE PERFECT —

  DO YOU KNOW HOW PERFECT YOU ARE?

  IF I NEVER SAW YOU AGAIN

  IT WOULD ALL HAVE BEEN WORTH IT —

  YOU HAVE WOKEN ME UP.

  YOU’RE ALL I SEE, AND THINK

  AND FEEL.

  IF I COULD, I WOULD TAKE

  MY LAST BREATH FROM YOUR LUNGS.

  I’M NOTHING

  BUT A PAIR OF EYES

  WAITING TO BE LOOKED INTO.

  IF ONLY YOU KNEW —

  ONE LOOK FROM YOU,

  AND I AM CHARGED

  AND FULL AND REAL —

  IT’S MORE THAN LIFE.

  I would like to thank the following people, who helped turn the spark of an idea into this book:

  Kelly McKain for an amazing evening of sharing our favorite songs, and June Crebbin for the fabulous poem, both of which kick-started the whole process so magically for me.

  Ella Frears for being fantastic to work with, for being so talented and so in tune with my characters, and for producing poems that worked beautifully and seamlessly with my book.

  Dr. Anna Morris for very generously helping me work out some medical matters concerning life, death, drugs, and brain conditions.

  My mum, Mer
le Goldston, and my dad, Harry Kessler, who both used their eagle eyes and very clever thinking to help me to iron out various problems. And my sister, Caroline Kessler, for reading it and not having any comments other than to say it was great!

  Rozzi Wright for the white sage.

  Helen Thomas and all the team at Orion for being so fantastic to work with and for making me want to produce my best.

  Karen Lotz, Kate Fletcher, Tracy Miracle, and all of the Candlewick team for being equally fantastic and for doing so much for me and my books across the pond.

  My agent, Catherine Clarke, for being the best and the only person I would ever want by my side in this writing business.

  Laura Tonge for all your support and love, for being the other half of everything — and for sharing six months in a slightly spooky rented house that inspired this book. I couldn’t do any of this without you.

  And an extra-special thank-you to Fiona Kennedy for everything you have done for me and my books for over a decade. I’ve loved working with you and will always be grateful for your commitment and passion and loyalty.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.

  Copyright © 2016 by Liz Kessler

  Cover photographs: copyright © 2017 by Dirk Wustenhagen/Trevillion Images (boy on rocks);

  copyright © 2017 by Lee Avison/Trevillion Images (girl)

  Epigraph copyright © 2014 by June Crebbin

  Other poems copyright © 2016 by Ella Frears

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.

  First published in Great Britain by Hodder and Stoughton

  First U.S. electronic edition 2017

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number pending

  Candlewick Press