My literature teacher, Mrs. Powell, passes out copies of Archibald Gracie’s book The Truth About the Titanic. Her box braids are swept up into an elegant high bun, and her suspenders and white blouse are way more fashionable than most teachers’ pantsuits. She’s by far my favorite teacher. She doesn’t put up with nonsense from anyone, but she’s always fair. And she was one of the few who didn’t reflexively turn on me after John died and Lizzie blamed me for it in front of the whole school.

“Colonel Archibald Gracie was cutting the last collapsible boat free from its ropes when the waterlogged Titanic lifted into the air,” Mrs. Powell says as she makes her way down the rows of desks. “He was pulled down by the suction created from the weight of the ship as it sank, and he was lucky enough to free himself and emerge not far from that same collapsible boat. Unfortunately, it was overturned and covered with men. He and the others hung on all night until one of the lifeboats eventually found them. They were in the Labrador Current at the time, and the water was no more than twenty-eight degrees.”

Mrs. Powell plops a copy of the book onto my desk. The black-and-white photo of the large ship on the cover reminds me of my dream. I immediately turn it over. The upper left corner is frayed, and I run my thumb over the worn bit.

“This book is not without its faults. You’ll find that the third-class passengers are often neglected and that their nationalities are generalized. Keep in mind that this is a first-person telling of what happened. The colonel died in December of 1912 from health complications related to the exposure and hypothermia he suffered in the water. He didn’t live to see this book published.”

The bell rings.

“Remember, if you keep a journal about your reading progress, you get thirty points extra credit. Some of you are in desperate need of those points,” Mrs. Powell says as everyone stands up.

I shove the book into my bag and head into the hall. There’s no way I’m reading this thing. From now on I’m steering clear of all things Titanic, avoiding the painting in the hall, and definitely not going to the dance. Done and done.

I twist my combination lock and open my locker. Blair passes with a group of girls.

“Hey, Sam,” Blair says, and stops.

“Hey?” First Niki talked to me, and now Blair?

“Sooo, I wanted to ask you about something.”

Oh man, not this. Her long lead-in is a dead giveaway. “Is it about someone in your family who died?”

Blair’s face lights up. “How did you know that? That’s crazy. The thing is, my dog died a few years ago. And ever since then my mom keeps finding these unexplainable holes in her garden. You know, almost like someone or something was digging, and she swears—”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t.”

“You haven’t even heard the question yet.”

Damn that school assembly where I announced that I could see spirits. Anywhere else, people would think I was off my gourd, but here they all think I should come check out their attics and basements for dead grandparents and stray cats. “I know. I’m sorry, but I just can’t.”

Blair crosses her arms, and for a second we just stand there in awkward silence. “Any new leads on who attacked you in the woods?”

I turn away from her and take my lunch bag out of my locker. Please just let this whole topic go. “Not that I’ve heard of.”

Blair plays with her hair. “I can’t believe you guys got hanged and this mystery woman is just gone. It’s so wrong. And my dad was saying that the police aren’t even looking anymore. Like it’s okay to just leave that psycho out there.”

“So wrong,” the group parrots.

People talk about the worst thing that’s ever happened to me like it’s nothing more than entertaining gossip. I slam my locker shut.

I turn away from them and head down the hall.

Blair snickers behind me. “Wow, someone’s in a mood.”

I pick up my pace and make a fast left around a corner, walking smack into someone wearing an old-fashioned suit and a hat. The butler from my dream. I scream and stumble backward.

He lifts his head and his hat, revealing a grinning Dillon. “Whoa, sorry, Sam.”

I exhale.

“Dude, you look like you saw a ghost. Oops. You do see ghosts. I guess that actually makes sense.” Dillon laughs at his own joke.

My chest drops a little farther from my chin and I take a breath. “Nah, I just wasn’t looking where I was going. What’s with the suit anyway?”

“Trying out costume options for the dance.” A piece of his red lacrosse jacket peeks out from under his suit jacket.

I manage a smile. “That doesn’t sound like you.”

He briefly breaks eye contact. “Girlfriend. She thought my last costume choice was total shit. ’Scuse me…was ‘not up to standard.’ ” He uses his fingers to make quotation marks.

“Aaah. Well, this one works. Very authentic.”

“Really?” He’s all smiles.

“Dillon!” Blair squeals from down the hall. “I looove it!”

Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me. He’s dating her? So disappointing. And it’s weird that Jaxon didn’t tell me.

“See ya,” I say, but his attention has already shifted.

I push open the side door and follow the walkway toward the bench that’s my current favorite lunch spot.

I glide for a split second on wet grass cuttings. The concrete squares ahead of me have a trail of watery footprints. And at the end of them is a guy in an old suit, not unlike the one Dillon was wearing. He sits on my usual lunch bench with his head tilted down, a hat covering his face.

“Let me guess, you’re friends with Blair and Niki.”

No answer. He doesn’t even look up.

“Seriously, the dance isn’t for another two weeks. You guys can chill out with the costumes.” Plus, this is my lunch spot. I feel strangely territorial over it.

He stands up, his hat shadowing his eyes. There’s thick stubble on his chin. He’s older, I realize, maybe early twenties. I take a quick step backward. The wooden bench where he was sitting is wet. He’s dripping water. Salt water. I can smell the brine on the breeze. It feels like the temperature dropped twenty degrees.

Behind him Niki and Matt head down the path toward us. They seem to be arguing about something. Niki walks right through the drenched man’s body. Dread coils around me like a boa constrictor.

Matt and Niki take note of my expression. Matt looks confused.

I sprint toward the school.

“Sam?” Niki says, but I don’t turn around.

I run through the hallways toward the one place I know is full of people.

I burst through the double doors and into the crowded lunchroom. There’s an explosion of chatter. I skid to a stop. Across the room, at a round table near the window, sit the Descendants. People turn and watch as I walk toward them. Blair takes one look at my heavy breathing and starts whispering to her friends. It’s like being in an aquarium tank with people oohing and aahing and tapping on the glass.

I drop my bag and pull out a chair at the Descendants’ table. “I need to make spirits leave me alone. How do I do that?”

“Well, hello to you, too,” Alice says.

“What do you mean, leave you alone?” Mary asks, scanning the nearby area. Her face mirrors my anxiety. She lowers her voice to a whisper. “Are they here now?”

“No, but…” I stop, considering how to phrase it. Oh, screw it. There’s no sugarcoating this. “I just saw a man in an old-fashioned suit dripping salt water in front of school. Like he walked right out of the ocean after he drowned in it.”

Mary’s eyes widen. Susannah looks at the nearby tables.

“Okay, get up,” says Alice.

“There is no scenario where I’m going back outside right now.”

Alice stands, and Mary and Susannah follow suit.

“Do you want our help or not?” Alice asks.

I don’t move.

“We’re not going outside,” Susannah says. “Honest.”

I push back my chair, and we make our way out of the lunchroom in a mass of black. There isn’t a pair of eyes that doesn’t watch us go.

Alice winds us through the halls and stops in front of a nondescript door.

“Got it,” Mary says, and it swings open. Did she pick the lock?

Susannah looks both ways down the hall. “Go.” And we do. We file into the dusty room and close the door behind us.

Alice flips on the light. It’s a storage room full of file cabinets. Mary pulls out her black wool blanket and spreads it on the floor. Does she carry that thing everywhere, just waiting for something witchy to pop up?

“How do you guys know about this place?”

Alice shrugs and sits down on the blanket. We all follow.

“How’d you know how to get in?”

Mary opens her mouth. Alice puts a hand on her arm and she shuts it again.

“Why should we tell you anything if you don’t want to join our circle?” Alice asks.

“Why should I join your circle if you don’t want to tell me anything?”

Alice and I stare at each other.

“You’ve barely talked to us these past six months,” Alice says with a frown.

I hesitate. Did she want me to talk to her? I didn’t figure I mattered to her. “I know. I just…I needed a little quiet.”

Everyone is silent for a beat.

I adjust my position on the blanket. “So can you guys help me make this weird stuff stop happening? Make everything go back to normal?”

“You’re a descendant of Cotton Mather living in Salem who can do magic. There’s nothing normal about your situation,” Mary says.

“Touché,” I say.

“Why do you think we always keep to ourselves?” Alice asks.

“You? To look cool,” Mary says.

Alice actually smiles. “No, our cool points come from me being so personable.”

Mary rolls her eyes.

Susannah’s expression is calm and quiet. “When you first moved here, people told you that we cursed you, didn’t they?”

I think back to the fall and all the rumors that started then. “Something like that, yeah.”

“We don’t even know how to curse people,” Mary says. “And if we did know, we wouldn’t.”

“We’re here to find out what Sam knows, not to tell her our life stories,” Alice says.

“Because withholding information worked out so well last time?” I say.

“Samantha’s right,” Susannah says. “She might not have been talkative these past few months, but we set that precedent. Plus, she’s seeing drenched dead people at our school. Do you really think we can wait?”

“Nope,” says Mary.

“Fine,” Alice concedes, and gestures at Susannah to continue.

Susannah looks at me. “We don’t do spells just to do them. Alice reads bones so we can try to prevent bad things from happening. And my readings of people help keep us from walking into traps.”

I look at Mary, and she twists a curl around her finger. “Our families have been casting in Salem for a long time. There’s way more going on here below the surface than anyone realizes. We do our part to keep things on the up-and-up.”

Susannah nods. “Now, there’s obviously something going on with you. Don’t bother to try and argue that there isn’t. From what Alice’s bones say, it’s most likely serious. Waiting is a mistake. We might already be late in sorting out whatever it is.”

I pull at the hole in the knee of my jeans, considering her words.

Mary leans forward. “What’s the problem? You don’t want to do magic?”

“That’s definitely part of it.”

Mary smiles. “Then what did you mean when you asked us to help you stop seeing spirits?”

“I just thought…I don’t know what I thought. I just need it to stop.”

“Magic,” Mary says.

Shit. “I guess so.”

Mary stands up. “Good. Well, now that that’s settled, let’s go eat lunch. I’m starving.”

Did I just get outsmarted? I stand up, too. “There’s no other way?”

“No,” Alice says, grabbing the door handle and peering into the hall. “All clear.” She opens the door wide.

Only the hall isn’t empty. The little girl in the pink dress is standing in it; she’s got the same amused expression she wore in my dining room. I slam the door shut.

Alice flinches. “What the hell was that?”

Mary grabs Alice’s arm. “Please tell me it isn’t the drowned guy.”

“No. A girl. Old-fashioned dress.” My voice is hushed.

“Wait, you’re seeing two ghosts?” Alice looks at Susannah.

There is a small knock on the door. I jump, but no one else reacts. I can tell by their faces that they didn’t hear it.

“What can we do?” Susannah asks.

I pace in the small dusty room. “You can come over to my house tonight and help me make this stop.”

I take a deep breath and open the door again. The girl leans against the opposite wall, examining the end of her braid. The Descendants follow me out.

“Go away,” I say in a low whisper.

“Ada,” she says, and drops her braid. “My name is Ada.” She frowns at my expression. “Are you mad because I laughed about the blueberries?” She has a British accent.

“No. I just need you to leave.”

Ada seems unfazed. “My brother Fredrick has a bad temper, too. His cheeks get red just like yours. Once, he slammed the bedroom door on me. But his sleeve got caught on the latch and he fell, putting a huge hole in it. Papa was furious.” Ada giggles.

The Descendants fan out around me, blocking me from view of anyone who might wander into the hall and see me talking to thin air.

I lean down and make my voice stern. “Go away and don’t ever come back. I don’t want you here.”

Her bottom lip trembles. I try not to notice it.

“I only wanted to know if you found my boot hook. Mum will be mad if I lost it. It is the only one we packed to take to America,” Ada says with a wavering voice.

To America? How does she not know where she is? I examine her old-fashioned clothes more carefully. I swallow. “How…are you getting to America?”

She wipes at her eyes with the backs of her hands. “The Titanic. Papa says it is the largest ship in the world.”

My head spins. “And you’re here because you’re looking for your boot hook?” My voice is less confident than it was a few seconds ago, and my thoughts drift to the hooked metal rod I found in my shoulder bag yesterday. With a shaky hand, I reach into my bag and dig it out.

Ada takes it and disappears. I wish I could disappear, too.