Evie walked to the edge of the cemetery, but then she stopped, urging herself to step inside. It’s not any different than visiting Mom, she thought, but it did seem different. There was something deader than dead about this place. Only how could a cemetery be deader than it already was?
She looked around. There were no flowers or wreaths. No photos or mementos stuck into the dirt. After Mom died they’d taken art supplies and lilies for her birthday, and Evie had buried her favorite glass unicorn beside her mother’s grave, but here there was nothing. Just row after row of empty stones with names and dates etched on them. Maybe, like Maggie had said, the people in Beaumont didn’t like to remember the dead. Evie imagined putting something new or alive on each stone—but what would the people have liked? And where could she find anything living?
Then she spotted the boy in the distance, his shadowy form appearing out of nowhere. Where had he come from? She waved awkwardly, and the boy stared back at her. Then he started forward, and Evie’s pulse raced.
At first she couldn’t make out his features, but as he got closer her heart began to pound. His hair was rumpled and dark, and his eyes were a deep brown, just like the boy on the prayer card. He walked all the way to the edge of the cemetery and stopped on the opposite side of the first row of gravestones.
“Hello?” he said.
“Hi,” Evie said back, her voice catching in her throat.
The boy leaned forward. “You can see me?”
Evie took a deep breath, then forced it out again. He wasn’t dead. No matter how things might seem. “Of course,” she said. “You’re right there.”
The boy looked at himself. “I guess I am,” he said with surprise, “but I didn’t think anyone was going to see me ever again. It’s a good thing you came along.” He seemed quite satisfied. “I’m Alex. Who are you?”
Evie knew she was staring, so she forced herself to look away. “Evie Adler. My father and I just moved into that old house.”
“I used to live past those trees,” Alex said, pointing in the distance. “But I guess you could say I live here now.”
“Where?”
“The cemetery.”
Evie scowled. “You can’t live in a cemetery,” she said, but Alex crossed his arms over his chest.
“Yes, you can. Look at all these people.”
“These people are dead.”
“Exactly.”
“So I’m supposed to believe that you’re . . .”
“I died a week ago.” He gave a nod, as if everything were decided. Evie wondered what kind of boy would make up such an elaborate story when he’d just met someone. Except he did look remarkably like the boy on the prayer card. In fact, he looked exactly like the boy on the prayer card.
“If you were really dead, you wouldn’t be standing here talking to me.”
“Oh really?” Alex asked crossly. “What do you know about it?”
Evie almost blurted out that her mom was dead, but she bit her tongue.
“I know what’s possible and what’s not possible,” she said instead. “My father says there’s a scientific explanation for everything, so long as one digs deep enough.”
“Maybe there is a scientific explanation, and maybe it’s that I’m dead!”
Alex hopped onto the gravestone nearest to Evie and swung his legs back and forth. “You ought to believe me,” he told her. “Ask anyone and they’ll tell you what happened. First I was sick in the hospital for a long time, and then I got so sick the doctors said I might as well go home because there was nothing they could do for me. Then my parents took me back to our house and I lay in bed staring at nothing, really, just staring, and that’s when I died and everyone was wailing and crying because they said I was gone, but I didn’t want to be gone, so I decided I wouldn’t be.”
He said it as stubborn as anyone had ever said anything, and Evie thought of her mom. She’d been sick for a long time, too. At first she’d been able to stay home, but when the cancer got worse she’d lain in the hospital bed just like Alex described, staring at things that Evie couldn’t see. Except when Mom died, she really had been gone.
“That’s impossible,” Evie said. “No one wants to die, but everyone does it anyway. How could you stay behind?”
“I don’t know,” said Alex, shrugging. “I just stayed, and now no one can see me but you. And you don’t even believe me.” He leaned forward. “Or maybe you’re just too chicken to come over here and see the proof.”
“I’m not chicken,” Evie said, but her throat clenched as she looked at the graveyard. Alex made clucking noises from his perch on the gravestone.
“What’s there to be afraid of?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Evie said, hoping she sounded braver than she felt. “I just don’t believe you, that’s all. Besides,” she added, “there’s only one graveyard I’ll visit and that one’s back in Michigan, where my mom is buried.”
Alex’s expression changed. “Your mom died?”
“From cancer,” Evie said, before Alex could ask.
“That’s what I died from.”
Alex hopped down from the stone. “Hey,” he said. “Look here. There’s really nothing to be scared of.” He stepped across the imaginary boundary line that marked the start of the graveyard. “It’s only one more step from where you’re standing. What difference could one more step make?”
Evie looked down. It was true that one more step would take her into the cemetery, but her feet wouldn’t budge.
“We could play games,” Alex said. “Soccer and tag and hurdles, like they have at the high school track meets. I’m great at games . . .”
Evie shook her head.
“I can’t,” she said. “Father’s waiting for me in the orchard.”
Alex’s face fell. “Wait!” he said. “You’re the only one who can see me, so you have to stay.” He reached out to pull her forward, and his touch was cold as ice. Evie yanked her hand away quick.
“No,” she said, more sharply than she’d intended. “It’s too cold to stay out here all day.”
Alex’s brow furrowed defiantly. “You won’t believe me, will you?”
All Evie could think about was how solid his hand had felt. She shook her head. “Sorry,” she said, but Alex had already turned away.
“Whatever,” he muttered.
Evie watched as he walked back across the graveyard and wondered if she’d feel cold and rational like this forever. She couldn’t help thinking that when Mom was alive things would have been different.
Once upon a time she would have believed him no matter what.