Chapter 29

Anthony Goes to School

When I come downstairs for breakfast, Mom’s sitting at the kitchen table, drinking tea. She announces she thinks it’s a great idea for Anthony to come to school with me. Last night, he visited Wyatt after he left here and they discussed his plan. Wyatt asked Oliver what he thought and then he called both my mother and Nathaniel.

Anthony’s our best chance of spotting Mike Donahue if the culprit comes near me. Uncle Johnny showed us Donahue’s license photo but you can’t always get a good feel for what someone looks like from those sorts of pictures. Anthony saw him move, heard him speak and observed the villain close up, even if it was over twenty years ago. Anthony’s perceptions at the time were confused even on a good day, but my ghost is determined to help out by coming to school with me. So we’re going to let him.

Wyatt was a little hesitant to agree to let Anthony take over for a whole school day. He’s worried about what’ll happen if Anthony’s controlling his body while he’s going to classes and talking to his friends. Anthony has never taken over while Wyatt’s been out in public before, but we convince Wyatt that it’ll work. Anthony promises him he’ll make a quick exit and Wyatt can take over again if anything weird happens. So Wyatt finally caves. Oliver arranges for Nathaniel to visit his History class as a guest lecturer who’s an authority on supernatural legends, so he can hang around the hallways in between classes and keep an eye on things. Both Oliver and Nathaniel will be close by at all times and available by cell phone.

Wyatt picks me up in the morning and drives me to school. No one thinks Anthony’s ready to try driving. Nathaniel meets us in the parking lot and goes over a few things with Wyatt. Then Wyatt becomes Anthony, just like that. His appearance undergoes a few subtle changes. He has dark shadows under his eyes and he’s thinner with more prominent cheekbones. He looks like Wyatt might if he wasn’t sleeping well or was coming down with a cold.

While the three of us are standing around talking, Meg drives up in her car and gestures out the window for me to join her. I jog over to her parking space, two rows away from where we’re parked, to see what she wants. Glancing over my shoulder, I notice that Nathaniel and Anthony are still engrossed in their conversation. Meg tells me to hop in and I climb into the passenger seat. Then she looks down at her hands, resting on the steering wheel.

Her voice is quiet in the closed-up vehicle. “Ryan and I are going to take our relationship to the next level.”

“Whoa! Are you sure you’re ready?”

“He’s been ready since day one. And I think I’m ready now. We’ve been together for almost a year.”

I actually thought they’d already taken their relationship to the next level. They’re always with each other and they look at each other in that way. Meg and I haven’t hung out together for a while, though, so I’m obviously out of the loop.

“What does Jen think?”

“I haven’t told her.”

“But you’re telling me?”

“I remember how Matt Riley pressured you sometimes because you two were together for almost a year. It turns out you did the right thing by not giving in. I wonder if I’ll be doing the right thing when I do give in.”

“Ryan isn’t at all like Matt. He never even looks at another girl. He adores you.”

“So you think we should?”

“Meg, I can’t tell you what you should do. I’m not exactly experienced in that department. I’m experienced at saying no, not saying yes. If you do say yes, though, be careful.”

“Obviously. We both know we have to be really careful. We’re not idiots.”

“Sorry. I know you’re not an idiot and neither is Ryan. You two’ll make the right decision.”

“Thanks, Annabelle. I’ll let you know how it works out.”

I’m not sure I want to know, so I do what I often do when I’m nervous or uncomfortable about something. I make a joke. “T. M. I. Remember. I don’t want Too. Much. Information.”

She laughs. “Hey, we should get together soon, do something fun and girlie. Watch a chick flick or make s’mores over at Jen’s fire pit again.”

As if on cue, Jen shows up and taps on Meg’s window. We both get out of the car. Meg invites us all over to Jen’s house.

“Hey, Jen, Annabelle and I want to come over and toast marshmallows at your house. What night’s good for you?”

“Friday’s good. Hey! I forgot! That was so much fun last time! Meg, remember how you got melted marshmallow in your hair? That was hilarious! We should do it,” Jen agrees. We did have a lot of fun the last time we used the fire pit.

“You might not have thought it was so funny if it was your hair.” Meg has beautiful long, blonde hair and it was sticky for a week afterward. She sounds kind of annoyed, but she’s laughing at the same time. “I had to wear it in a ponytail for like a month almost.”

“And you guys made me call my mother to see if she could make some kind of an herbal concoction that would get marshmallow out of hair.” Even my mother thought it was pretty funny.

Jen finalizes our plans. “Okay, that settles it. We’ll meet Friday behind my house at about eight o’clock. I’ll supply the graham crackers, chocolate and marshmallows.”

“I’ll bring the shampoo, Blondie.” I giggle.

“Oh, I forgot. The only thing is, I promised Ryan we could hang out on Friday night. Can we invite guys?” Meg asks.

“Sure, Wyatt will want to come and he can bring someone from the soccer team. Maybe we can fix you up, Jen.”

“Hell no, I want to be single. It’s senior year. I’m not getting serious about anyone so don’t try to set me up with a soccer player, even if there are some hot guys on the team. I’m gonna just have fun.”

“I know,” Meg says, “we can ask Connor.”

It’s the perfect solution. Connor’s a guy so it won’t be awkward with two couples and Jen. And we’re all really good friends. At the beginning of sophomore year, Jen put the moves on Connor, but when he didn’t respond to her flirting she gave up and moved on. There were no hard feelings and we’re all still close. Fortunately, Connor’s not a major threat to Jen’s plans to stay single. So it’s settled. The six of us will get together Friday at her house, build a fire and make s’mores.

It’s exactly what I need to help me forget about Mike Donahue and his threats. I start to run back to my car to get my books and tell Wyatt about our plan, forgetting that he isn’t Wyatt at the moment. As soon as I see his brooding, serious face, still deep in conversation with Nathaniel, I remember I’m spending the day with Anthony.

I call back over my shoulder to the girls. “Maybe we can tell ghost stories around the campfire!”

I know I could win a contest with mine.

Anthony’s ready to go, so I reach into the car to get my books. He rests his hand gently on my shoulder and I look up.

“Oh, no, Annabelle, I’ll get those.” My self-appointed guardian angel lifts the books out of my hands and stacks them on top of his own. He manages to carry all of them easily under one arm. Wrapping his free arm around my waist, he pulls me toward him; then kisses the top of my head. This day is going to be even weirder than I thought.

“Hey, what the hell, Anthony?”

“Annabelle, I have to act like Wyatt. I’ve watched you two together. He’s always touching you and kissing you. What would he do if he saw you standing in the morning sun with your beautiful face looking carefree and happy for the first time in days? And your hair smells like wildflowers. Mmmmm. You smell so good.” He kisses my cheek and hugs me close to his side again.

Nathaniel smiles. “You’re on your own with that one, Annabelle. The kid has a point. He did what Wyatt would do. He did what I’d do. He has pretty good instincts. He did what any guy would do under the circumstances.”

“Thanks,” I mutter. “Where’s Jeff?”

“I know. I feel naked without him, but he can’t come to school. Oliver has only so much influence. He got me in the door, but Jeff has to stay home. Anyway, he’d be barking his head off every time he came close to Anthony. You know how he hates ghosts. No offense, Anthony, don’t take it personally. He hates all ghosts, not just you.”

“No offense taken. I’m glad he’s at home. I’ve been on the receiving end before when Jeff gets going with his hostility toward anyone who’s in the least bit ghostly. I’ll keep my distance from him, thank you.”

“Let’s go. We don’t want to be late for History class and I still have to go to my locker first.”

Anthony places an all-too-comfortable and familiar hand on my shoulder and ambles along beside me. He seems relaxed to the point of cockiness. I look up at his satisfied face and can’t help but feel happy for him. The kid lived a miserable life and is getting a chance to experience a regular teenaged day in the twenty-first century. I smile at him and our eyes connect. His are darker than Wyatt’s ever turn, but no one will notice except me. Even if they do, they’d never suspect what’s really happening. It’s way too farfetched.

We grin at each other like two people who share an unimaginable secret, because we do. As I look into his brilliant dark eyes, sparkling with eagerness, I think about how during his short, miserable life, Anthony was always restrained and locked up. Now he’s free.

I whisper, “This was a really good idea,” and my grin spreads into a full-blown, mile-wide smile.

My coconspirator smiles back.

Everyone else in History class looks bored and sleepy, but Anthony doesn’t. When he isn’t staring at me, he’s soaking up every word Mrs. Fowler speaks, as if she’s the most fascinating person on the planet. He looks in his text book. He looks down at his hand-writing in Wyatt’s History notebook. He looks up at the teacher again and then he looks at me and smiles.

As I watch him write in Wyatt’s notebook it dawns on me that he’s never written a word before. During his life, he couldn’t speak or read or write. Every letter he forms, every word he hears, every sight he observes today is new. He gives me a whole new appreciation for what a privileged life I lead.

He remains a model of self-control. But when he looks my way, even for an instant, his electric glances remind me he’s in awe of this whole experience. I’m seeing the world through the eyes of a boy who was deprived, during his own brief and tragic life, of everything I take for granted every day. When I think about Anthony, even the air feels new on my skin.

He’s awakening all my senses and I feel like a newborn in a teenager’s body. When our eyes meet, we’re born again together; the mute, neglected child who raged at the world around him and the girl who offered him love and true friendship.

After History, we have to separate and follow our individual schedules until noon. Later, Anthony and I meet at Wyatt’s locker before lunch and walk into the cafeteria together. When he bites into the school lunch pizza, which is pretty good for cafeteria food, I stare at his face and feel like I’m tasting pizza for the first time. The stretchy cheese tastes salty, the tomato sauce tangy with just the right hint of sweetness and the crust is like fresh-baked, homemade bread, crunchy on the outside, warm and soft and chewy on the inside—delicious. He chews, swallows and takes another bite. I’ve never experienced anything so precious with another person before and it feels phenomenal.

I cover his hand with mine and tell him, “Wait until you try the cookies. They’re my favorite.”

I want to show him the world, to introduce him to life. I never want this day to end, mostly because I know he doesn’t either. To hell with Mike Donahue, even thinking about him can’t ruin today for Anthony and me.

He rests his forehead against mine and we stare into each other’s eyes and chuckle softly. Both of us are reluctant to end the physical contact, but we know our unseen connection can never end. That’s something Anthony has proven to everyone who’s met him since his soul escaped from the hospital.

Just by being here, he’s answering a question which has burned in the minds of humans for centuries, down through the tunnels of time and inside the castles built above those tunnels by the collective imaginations of millions of us.

Yes, Annabelle, there is life after death: life and love and all the confusion and elation one soul can feel. It doesn’t matter whether you welcome it or dread it; it’s a fact.

He never says these words out loud to me, but I hear them nonetheless and their eloquence stuns me, moves me and pleases me like no other gift I’ve ever received. And in this moment Anthony and I both know it.

I’m giving him affection, sympathy, companionship, communication: all of the essential things that were tragically missing during his brief and miserable time on earth. He’s giving me a glimpse into one small part of the afterlife which awaits us all and even though there’s a lot more to it than he can show me right now, he assures me that an afterlife does exist despite countless and ancient debates. I’ll live on after my body deteriorates into dust and so will everyone I love and care about.

But we can’t forget that without Wyatt, Anthony wouldn’t be walking around in our world right now, as a free man, breathing and touching and tasting commonplace things as if they were miracles sent to us by the gods. Whoever would think of the school’s lunchroom pizza as an amazing sensual experience?

Anthony tucks our books under one arm and then interlocks the fingers on his free hand with mine. Palm-to-palm, we walk out of the cafeteria, up the stairs to my English class. At the door of the classroom, he lets go of my hand and as I turn to walk into English, he whacks me on the butt.

I spin around and glare at him. “That’s not cool.”

“I know, but I had to. I might never get another chance. There it was, right in front of me, at hand level. Sorry, it won’t happen again.” He covers his mouth with one hand; probably so I won’t realize he’s grinning. But one side of his smile peeks out, despite his efforts to hide it. “Plus, it’s the best butt in the whole school. Just ask the golf team.”

“I’ll see you after school at my locker. And keep those hands to yourself.”

“I will. I promise.” He tries to look sorry and serious, but fails.

“And stay away from the golf team. They’re obviously a bad influence.” I back into the classroom, frowning up at him the whole way until he turns and hustles off toward Wyatt’s AP Biology class.

“Always with the boyfriend troubles, Miss Blake. I don’t know how you manage such an impressive academic performance every term,” Ms. Coffman teases.

“It’s cuz I’m always thinking about stuff like Hamlet; wondering if he’s going to make up his mind to be or not to be within the next five centuries.”

“Did you finish memorizing the soliloquy?”

“Yes, I did, British accent and all, mum. Alas, is poor Yorick ready? Because, you know, I knew him, Horatio.” I do my best to sound like Cate Blanchett in Elizabeth: the Golden Age, but I sound more like Bruce, the shark in Finding Nemo.

Ms. Coffman cracks up. “That accent needs a lot more work, Annabelle. You sound more like the Crocodile Hunter than Hamlet.” Ms. Coffman’s a tough grader, but she appreciates my ability to make an idiot out of myself with very little effort.

Because my last name is at the beginning of the alphabet, I get called up first to recite. Fortunately, I worked hard to memorize the “To be or not to be” speech in between all the dramatic episodes of my own life. And even though my accent comes from down under and not from anywhere near Stratford-on-Avon, I speak with sincere anguish to that plastic skull and don’t forget one word. She gives me an A plus. The A is for knowing the whole speech cold and the plus is for making her laugh so hard she almost peed, because my accent sounded ridiculous.

After school, on my way to cross-country practice, I walk up to Wyatt’s locker and Anthony’s leaning against it, crunching Doritos out of a bright blue bag, a delirious smile on his shadowy face.

“Look at this chip, Annabelle! It has so much good-tasting powdery stuff on it. What a bonus!” He pops the corn chip into his mouth and bites down.

After about a minute of crunching and swallowing, he licks his lips. “Mmmmm. Here, do you want one?”

He tips the open bag toward me.

“No thanks, if I eat anything too close to when I go running, I’ll throw up. You might, too. Watch how many of those you woof down.”

“It’ll be worth it. These are great.” He chomps down a couple more chips, tips the bag up and spills the crumbs from the bottom directly into his mouth. Then he smooshes up the empty bag and throws it into Wyatt’s open locker where it will probably attract mice. Reaching into the locker, he pulls out a red Gatorade, twists it open, chugs down a few swigs and passes it to me. I drink half of it in three fast gulps and hand it back.

“Hey, slow down! That’s mine!”

I laugh and hiccup. “I left you a little.”

“Your lips are all red.” He wipes his thumb across my lips and grins. “Do you know what was the best thing about today, besides being with you?”

“No idea. What was the best thing?”

“Geometry.”

“I hate Geometry. If my dad hadn’t helped me, when I was in ninth grade, I would’ve failed it. Even with his help I got a C for the year.”

Wyatt actually takes AP Calculus for his real Math class. But for his Community Service requirement, he helps out the teacher in a freshman Geometry class. He’s that good at math. Anthony obviously shares Wyatt’s talent for math, probably because he’s sharing Wyatt’s brain at the moment.

“How can you hate Geometry? It’s so beautiful. It clarifies everything. I love it.”

Not even Wyatt feels Anthony’s reverence for the subject.

“How can you love it? It’s boring. And how can it clarify anything? It’s confusing.”

“Annabelle, geometry is the most logical thing on earth. But instead of words, it’s shapes. Every physical object can be defined with shapes and lines and their relationships to each other. Everything in the visible world is made up of these shapes and lines. It’s logic that you can see. And it’s incredible to look at and think about.”

“I’ve never thought of it that way before. My dad’s good at geometry because he’s a builder. It makes so much sense now.” How can I be learning so much from Anthony when everything’s all new to him? “I can’t believe it. I’m having a conversation about math and I’m not bored to death.”

Anthony grins and he looks so beautiful when he smiles that I want to stay with him and keep talking, but we can’t. I take out my cell phone and check the time. “You’ll be late for practice and you’ll get yelled at.”

“You’ll miss the bus to Town Forest,” he warns.

“Whoa!” I spin around and head down the corridor, toward the exit to the parking lot.

“’Bye, Annabelle. Thanks for everything!” he yells out.

I know what he means. Everything from Geometry to pizza.

Soon he’ll have to leave Wyatt’s body and his day here on Earth will be over.

Mike Donahue hasn’t come near us. I’m safe and Anthony’s big chance to be a regular high school student is just about done, but he remembered to say “thank you.” I turn around. He’s standing by the open door; watching me. Running backwards across the parking lot, I wave to him. He lifts his hand and smiles.

Then I turn and climb into the waiting bus. I feel so grateful to have been a part of his experience. I’m the one who should be thanking him.

My feelings for Anthony grow wings that lift me up and send me soaring high, past the roofs of the nearby houses and above the telephone poles with the singing wires stretched between them in the dazzling sunlight of this perfect, clear-skied afternoon. In my imagination I soar up, above the tree tops and then the clouds, into the endless blue of the sky and beyond, where Anthony will find me one day and keep me close to him forever.