If Orlando ignores the matter of Sorrel’s death (if he can), the Summer should be pretty good. He’s lifeguard at the private lake, which is a cushy job with minimum work and maximum pay. Since it isn’t an ocean he doesn’t have to worry about killer waves and undertows. Which means there isn’t really much to do besides stay awake. Mainly, he has to keep an eye out for kamikaze toddlers whose mothers are looking at their phones and not at them. Besides that, he teaches a beginners’ swimming lesson every morning, depending on interest, and occasionally rescues someone in a boat who lost their oars or whose motor died. But the best part of the job is that most of the lake people are older couples or families with young children so he rarely runs into anyone who knows him. He’s just the lifeguard, what’s-his-name. There’s nobody asking him about Sorrel or telling him how sorry they are. It’ll be different when school starts again. Then there will be sympathy and curiosity; the looks and the whispers. Then he’ll go back to being Orlando Gwinnet, popular student and high-school hero. Orlando’s always been sought after socially (especially by girls), but it wasn’t until Sorrel dumped him that he let himself be lured by all the attention. Parties. Cycling weekends. Dates with girls he had no interest in. Lots of dates. Did Sorrel even notice? He has no idea. If she did, he’s sure she didn’t care. He was busy, she was busy. They were all busy. What he does know is that none of it made him feel any better about the break-up. Popularity isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be.

Today he had the afternoon shift. He pedals slowly, taking the scenic route, in no hurry to get home. Maybe no one talks to him about Sorrel at work, but that doesn’t stop him thinking about her. Orlando thinks about her a lot.

He was the last of the friends to find out about the accident. Plugged into his iPod, he was doing his evening run and had just passed the barn that is all that remains of the old Inkman farm – the halfway mark – when he felt his phone vibrate. Because everyone knows he runs at the same times every day of the year – holidays included and weather no obstacle – he checked to see who it was. It was his father. His father isn’t a man to waste anything, even a phone call; it had to be important – even more important than merely making sure that Orlando was where he was supposed to be. And it was more important. “Sit down,” ordered his father. “I have to tell you something.” Bernard Gwinnet isn’t just economical with phone calls; he is a man who gets straight to the point without apologies or tears. And he’s very good at breaking bad news in a bloodless, official way. As a county policeman, Officer Gwinnet (which is what Orlando calls his father – but only privately, of course; to his face he calls him Dad or, sometimes, sir, though he’s careful never to sound facetious) gets plenty of practice. Orlando, used to doing as he’s told, sat down. Late last night… Raining like the devil… Walked into the road… Hit by a car… Pronounced dead at the scene… “That can’t be true,” said Orlando when his father was done doling out the facts. He could see Sorrel laughing as she cut her eighteenth-birthday cake. How could she be dead? His father said it was absolutely true. “You all right?” he asked Orlando. Which proved how true it was. After they hung up, Orlando stayed down at the side of the road, his headset dangling around his neck, the music still playing but very far away – in another world, another life – seeing the single wild flower growing beside him, wondering what it was. He doesn’t know how long he sat there, thinking of Sorrel, remembering… He kept trying to imagine what had happened. To picture it. How could she just step into the road without looking? How could she not have seen the lights of the oncoming car? Why hadn’t he called her last night and asked her to hang out? He could have done that. He’d been keeping his distance for months, but after her birthday he’d promised himself that he’d do stuff like that again. Make things like they used to be. Okay, so she dumped him, but they were still friends. They were friends a hell of a lot longer than they were a couple. She’d put her arms around him the night of her party; she even kissed him on the cheek. He was sure she would have come over, if he’d asked. They could have watched a film, or played cards. Instead he sat in his room watching a thriller he may have seen before and listening to the rain while Sorrel walked in front of a Ford. Orlando’s mind travelled over the same small track like a toy train, round and round and round, going nowhere and never arriving. You don’t expect your friends to die. Not when you’re in your teens. Even Orlando, the sole survivor of four children, wasn’t expecting that. Two of his brothers died before they were born and the eldest, Raylan, was unlucky. Unlucky or careless, depending on how you looked at it. Orlando might have sat there all night if a cop car hadn’t stopped to see if there was something wrong. The officer knew his father and recognized Orlando, of course. The policeman drove him home.

He coasts down Spoon Hollow Hill, picking up speed, imagining a starless, rainy night, imagining a car suddenly coming around that bend up ahead; wondering what Sorrel’s last words were, her last thought. And then, as he leans into the bend, he sees her standing at the side of the road, almost in the trees, watching him pass like a spectator at a race. He glances back over his shoulder, but there is no one there.

That’s what happens when you sit out in the sun all day, thinks Orlando. You start seeing things.

But he can’t help wondering if the dead see things, too.