I peer out my window at the maple tree, whose red buds glow in the early-morning light. My dad woke me up an hour ago. I was crying in a full sweat, and I haven’t been able to go back to sleep since.

Gracie’s Titanic book peeks out of my schoolbag on the window seat. I can’t understand how it showed up during a spell for spirits to leave me alone. Was it the spell that moved it, or was Mary right that it was a spirit? Elijah once left a book in the library for me to trip over. It couldn’t be him, could it? And yet for just a split second the idea of having Elijah back is thrilling, however far-fetched it might be. My stomach does a quick somersault.

I frown. Didn’t I just say I wasn’t going to think about him? “I swear, Elijah, if this is you…if you’ve been around and didn’t tell me, I’ll be…I will not forgive you.”

I turn on my side and jerk the covers up to make a point. I lose my grip on the comforter, though, and my fingers spring back, smacking me in the face. There. If that’s not an accurate metaphor for my life, I don’t know what is.

There’s a knock on my door and I sit straight up. “Come in.”

“Was told to tell you we’re eating at my house,” Jaxon says as he pushes my door open. “Am I interrupting something?”

I glance at my clock. There’s still another ten minutes until breakfast. “Just the usual, talking to myself.”

“Oh, well, in that case…” He sits down on my bed and kicks off his slippers. “So what’s up?”

I smile. “I don’t know, Jaxon. You’re the one in my bedroom at six-fifty in the morning.”

“I just mean…You were acting a little jumpy yesterday, and your dad told me you woke up all shaken again today. You haven’t done that in a while.”

I try to smile. I don’t want to tell him why. I want that spell we did to work and for these strange things to disappear. Return to the life I’ve been happy in recently. “I know there’s a normal out there, and I’ll be damned if I don’t find it.”

He pushes his sun-kissed hair out of his eyes. It’s only April, and Jaxon already looks like he stumbled off a beach. “You mean doing witch training with my mom isn’t at the top of your ‘normal’ list?”

I laugh. “Can you even imagine?”

“Yes. Yes, I can. When I was in fifth grade, my mom decided that I needed to learn how to cook, and she invited my entire class to her bakery. Great in theory. Everyone stuffed their faces. But by the time the next week rolled around, there was a whole group of guys calling me Muffin.”

“So you’re saying that if I did witch training with your mom, people might start calling me Witchy-poo or something?”

“Actually, you do kinda look like a witchy-poo.”

“Shut up, Muffin.” I push him lightly.

He picks up one of my pillows and smacks me in the face with it.

My mouth opens. “Oh, you’re so dead.”

I jump on him, and he falls back into a mound of down comforter. He grabs my wrists and rolls on top of me, pinning me under his weight.

He smells like pine trees. “You’re stronger than I thought. I mean, not that strong, but still.”

“You mean I’m dangerous.”

“I mean good thing for me you suck at fighting.”

I laugh, and for a brief second my stomach flutters under his. “You just better hope I don’t learn magic, or I’ll give you a tail.”

Jaxon grins. He adjusts his weight off me and onto his side, supporting his head with his hand. His eyes are focused, and the flutter in my stomach intensifies.

“Will you go to the dance with me?” he asks. “I have a sneaking suspicion we would make an awfully good Titanic couple.”

Titanic. “Wait, what?”

“The Spring Fling.”

Is Jaxon asking me out? Maybe he was flirting the other day. Not jokey fun flirting, but I-want-to-stick-my-tongue-in-your-mouth flirting. I reach out to touch his arm, but take my hand back. “Don’t you want to go with a date or something?”

Jaxon looks out the window for a brief second, and when his eyes return to me, his smile has tension in it. “I would much rather go with you. Doesn’t have to be a big deal. I just, well, I think it would be good for you to have a little fun for once. Socialize.”

The flutter in my stomach turns to anxiety. Please don’t do this. “I don’t know. I just…I don’t know.”

Jaxon pulls back to get a better look at me. “You’re not going with someone else, are you?”

I wish I could laugh at that. I wish that the major problem of my life right now was too many dance invites. “It’s not that. I just don’t think I’m gonna go at all.”

“Come on, Sam. I know it’s been a little weird at school these past few months. But you have to jump in at some point.”

I slide away from him and sit up. “It’s not just that.” It’s Ada and the dream, Alice’s bones, and a slew of weirdness that tells me I shouldn’t go anywhere near a Titanic-themed dance right now.

Jaxon’s eyes focus on me like he’s trying to sort something out. “Well, what’s it about, then?”

I pull at the edge of my comforter. Maybe I should tell Jaxon what’s going on. He’ll hate it, but at least I won’t have to hurt his feelings about the dance.

Jaxon frowns. “You’re acting the same way you did right after…Does this have anything to do with that dude ghost that left?”

My heart immediately and annoyingly starts pounding. Stop it, heart. Why should I care that Jaxon brought up Elijah? I stand up and step into my black slippers. “We’re gonna be late to breakfast.”

Jaxon stands up, too. “I’m guessing by your reaction that’s a yes.”

“It’s…I’m just not going to the dance. I don’t want to go,” I say with more frustration than I intended. Great. Now I’ve made it sound like it is because of Elijah. I turn away from his look. I hate that I’m flustered and that Jaxon can see it.

“Do you still have feelings for him?”

I walk into the hall. “I really don’t want to talk about this.” How did we even get on this topic anyway?

“That figures.” No more jokes and smiles.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You can’t even look at me when you talk about this.”

I move fast down the stairs, my pulse quickening. I can’t explain everything to him while I’m like this. I need to calm down, think it through. “He’s gone, Jaxon. And he’s not the reason I’m saying no to you. I’m just saying no. I don’t have to give you a reason.”

“Real nice, Sam.” His frustration matches mine. “I’m the closest friend you have as long as we don’t talk about anything important. But the moment I ask you a personal question, you run away.”

Damn him for being right. I cross the foyer and open the side door. “Jaxon…” Alice stands on the other side with her hand raised to knock. “Alice?”

“I need to talk to you,” Alice says, and steps in.

Jaxon looks from her to me.

“Seriously, Sam. Alone,” Alice says.

“Right, you’ll talk to her,” Jaxon says under his breath. He walks out the door, and it slams shut behind him.

How did that fight even happen?

“Looks like your morning is going as well as mine is,” Alice says.

“You have no idea,” I say.

She walks straight for the living room and I follow. We sit down on one of the white fluffy couches, and she drops her bookbag on the coffee table, which is actually an old trunk.

“I found this on my nightstand this morning.” She pulls an antique key from her pocket and holds it out to me.

I examine the metal tag. Engraved on one side is 1ST CL ST RM D33. Some of the detail is rubbed smooth. “What the…?”

“It was just there staring at me when I woke up,” Alice says, looking at the key like it has some nerve.

“Could it have come from someone in your house?”

Alice shakes her head.

“Are you saying you think someone snuck in and left it in your room?”

“It wasn’t there when I went to sleep. And no one got into my room overnight without me noticing. I’m a light sleeper. As in a piece of dust lands on my cheek and I bolt upright.”

“So you’re saying…” A chill runs down my back.

“I don’t see another explanation.” She twists a black onyx ring on her finger. “It had to be a ghost.”

I look at the key. “Spirit,” I correct her.

“Okay, well, I want you to teach me how to see them.”

“What? No way. I just asked you to do a spell to help me not see them anymore.”

“You can’t just stop seeing spirits, Sam. That isn’t a door you can shut. And if one was looming over me in my sleep, which is very possibly what happened last night, I wouldn’t even know it. You can see spirits. Maybe you’re not interested in taking it as an opportunity. But I’ll be damned if I’m not going to try. Yes, I want you to join our circle, and yes, you would make us stronger. But whether you do or you don’t, you have to stop being such a baby and realize what a gift you have.”

I set my jaw. “I get that you’re freaked out. I am, too. But do not guilt-trip me after everything that happened.”

“By ‘everything that happened,’ I assume you mean your stepmother trying to kill us.”

I stare at her hard. “Don’t do this, Alice.”

“I’m gonna do this. We’ve been keeping your secret about her. You deserve that for what you did for us. It goes without saying. But we don’t deserve you shutting us out. You’re acting like you’re the only one this happened to.”

I hand the key back to her and stand up. “I really don’t want to have this conversation.” Which is now the second time I’ve said this since I woke up.

She grabs my wrist. “Look at Lizzie. She couldn’t deal with what happened, and she shipped herself off to some boarding school. Hiding yourself away in a made-up normal world you think you want is just the same. You can’t make what Vivian did go away no matter how much you avoid us or how much you avoid magic. And yeah, there’s a price you pay for having power and keeping secrets. So stop being selfish! You can’t do this alone, and neither can we.”

I pull her hand off my wrist and walk away from her. Screw school. If Murphy’s Law is running the show today, I’m going back to bed.