At the funeral, the lady got light-headed and had to sit down. Mr. Forrester thought I said too much. That’s my mother’s problem too, my father says. That if she said a little less, people would come back and pay her a little more.

But there was so much I hadn’t told her yet. Like that I know why dead people come back. It’s because they miss having bodies. They want to be touched. They would give anything for one more hug.

And that I knew what she wished for in the back of her mind as she lay alone in her bedroom when she was young. Another soul to keep her company. Another being just like herself. And that she felt all the more guilty because of it, because she believed she had wished that first baby into being.

And maybe she had that power. Maybe she had others. Time would tell.

Like maybe when I get older, I’ll be able to look forward, not just back. Because people can change, you know?

You can leave a baby and find one. You can grow up a Boy Scout and end up a murderer.

Things happen.