Chapter 17

“What did you do with the seashells?”

“Are you kidding me? Who cares what I did with the shells? The important part is that they were there at all. I’m sure they weren’t there when I went to bed, but after I had the ocean ghost dream, they were there. Seashells do not wander in on their own. They don’t even have feet.”

“You didn’t throw them away, did you?” Anita asked.

I chewed on my thumbnail. I’d made a regular three-course meal out of my fingernails today. I started with an appetizer of pinkie nail, rounded out the meal with the filling—and satisfying—index nail, and was capping off today’s anxiety keratin feast with my thumb.

“I didn’t throw them away. Should I?” I kicked myself for asking Anita for advice. She was the kind of person who would come up with some sort of elaborate ritual that would require me to burn the shells on a mountaintop while in the middle of a lunar eclipse or something.

“No. Definitely not. The shells are a message.”

“Why couldn’t she just send a freaking text? Or take out an ad in the local paper?”

“Tell me you are not mocking the spirit world. How much bad karma do you need? Maybe later you could go kick some puppies or a nun or something. Jeez.” Anita gave a disgusted sigh.

“What kind of messages are a nightmare and a pile of seashells?”

“I don’t know, but she’s clearly trying to say something.”

“Maybe she wants me to get out of her room.”

“I doubt it. I can’t see a spirit being that hung up on who’s living in her bedroom. I bet she wants you to figure out what happened. Avenge-her-death kind of thing.”

“Avenge her death? Does she think I’m some sort of teen version of Chuck Norris?”

“I doubt it. I suspect you’re the best she’s got to work with.”

I was lying on my bed with my feet pressed against the wall. I was picking at the fluff on top of Mr. Stripes’s head while we talked.

“I can only imagine how disappointed she must be to be stuck with me as her avenger.”

“Skip your insecurity mantra. I think you should hold the shells while you meditate, and maybe she’ll send you another message.”

“I don’t want another message. I want her to go away and leave me alone. I’ve got enough of my own issues to deal with; I don’t need to take on her stuff.”

“The quickest way to get rid of her is to listen to what she’s trying to say. Give the kid a break—she’s dead. If she didn’t have some kind of brain injury when she was alive, maybe she could tell you more clearly what she wants now. It’s not exactly her fault that death didn’t improve her communication skills.”

“What if it’s not a message? What if it’s something worse?”

“Worse? What makes you think a message is a bad thing? You’re so lucky. She chose you from the beyond. Nothing like that ever happens to me. I could live on top of a desecrated Indian burial ground and no one would haunt me.”

“What if I’m not being haunted?” I held my breath waiting for her to answer.

“Oh, no you don’t. Don’t even go there.”

“Go where?”

“You’re worried you’ve snapped. Taken a one-way trip down the wacky expressway. Shopping for the sweaters where the arms tie behind you. Crazy train.”

“You’ve got a huge career ahead of you as a social worker. You’ve got such a gentle bedside manner.” I acted like I was annoyed even though I was actually relieved. If Anita thought I really was going crazy, she would never joke about it. “If you ever need a recommendation so you can get a job as a counselor, let me know.”

“BFF manifesto rule number one: no bullshit. If I thought you were insane, I’d tell you.”

“You have to admit it’s a lot more likely that I’m crazy than that there’s a ghost trying to send me a message.”

“No. You think it’s more likely because you’re a skeptic. Besides, just because your dad went crazy doesn’t mean you will.”

“But I could.” I took a deep breath. “Thank God you’re coming to visit this weekend. I’ve got tons of stuff planned. You can help me figure out what to do with the shells then, okay?”

Anita didn’t say anything. Uh-oh. She wasn’t exactly the silent type.

“You are coming this weekend, right?” We’d been organizing this visit since before I even moved. It wouldn’t be too much of an exaggeration to say I’d been counting down the minutes.

“There’s this thing.”

“Thing?” My stomach fell to the floor.

“Kat is having a party on Saturday.”

“Kat has a party every week.”

“Yeah, but her parents are out of town and she’s doing this beach theme. Everybody’s going. Including Ryan. He made a point of asking me if I was going.”

Anita had a weakness for Ryan. She’d been in love with him since eighth grade. She was smart about a lot of things, but Ryan was her Kryptonite. When he was around I could actually see IQ points leaking out of her ears. Anita had been chasing him since the gym class when he spiked a volleyball that hit her right in the face. She went down with a huge geyser of a bloody nose. When she came to, Ryan was leaning over her. She figured that made him her hero. She seemed to fail to notice that he was the one who drilled the ball right at her nose in the first place. While Anita liked Ryan, Ryan liked that Anita liked him. He had a sixth sense that allowed him to tell when she was finally getting ready to move on, and then he would suddenly start flirting with her all over again. Nothing ever came of it, but it didn’t stop Anita from going back for more.

“I thought you wanted to see this place,” I reminded her.

“I do. I really do. It’s just that this might not be the best weekend. I could come some other time.”

“Dick and my mom are all ‘this is not a hotel’ about people coming to visit. They don’t want people just dropping by. That’s why we planned this.” I could tell I was whining, but I didn’t care. She’d promised to come.

“Dick’s a dick.”

“Trust me, I know. I’m living the full twenty-four/seven Dick experience.” I sighed. “I’ll talk to my mom and see if she’ll let me come over there. She’s been focused on how we have to spend time as a family, but I bet she’ll give in on this. She knows how much I was looking forward to seeing you. Maybe your mom could pick me up at the ferry.”

“Uh. That’s the thing.”

I could feel my ears getting hot. I chewed on the side of my mouth. “You don’t want me to come to your place? Are you afraid I’m going to cramp your style with Ryan?”

“No.” She hesitated. I bet Sharon the court jester was encouraging her to throw herself at Ryan. “My mom is hosting a fund-raising party for my brother’s football team.”

“So? I used to hang out at your house all the time. Your mom invited me to live with you.”

“I’m just telling you what she said. She doesn’t want extra people around.”

“Extra people. That’s great. Now I’m extra. I hope you and Kat have a great time at the party.”

“That’s not fair. Do you expect me to sit around by myself? You’re the one who moved.”

“I didn’t move. My mom moved and made me go with her.” I paced back and forth with my phone.

“So now I’m supposed to feel sorry for you? You’re living in a mansion with the hottest guy in the world just down the hall, and, oh yeah, you’re a cheerleader.”

“I never asked to live here. The mansion is haunted, the hottest guy in the world likes my friend Nicole, and, oh yeah, I might as well be a cheerleader because it’s not like I can count on you to keep me busy.” Anita started to say something else, but I cut her off. “And another thing? Ryan doesn’t like you. The closest you two will get to making out is him fucking with your head.”

Anita hung up without saying another word. I clicked my phone off and threw it on the bed. Then I burst into tears.