Ashes to Ashes (Burn for Burn 3)

“I miss you,” I whisper between kisses. Then I look up at him, and my pulse quickens as I wait for him to answer.

A cocky smile spreads across his face. “Course you do. You can’t get enough of me.”

I stiffen. I come over here in the middle of the night against my better judgment, and he’s joking around like it’s nothing? Is everything a joke to him? I stand up straight and try to push him away, but he doesn’t let me. His voice gets serious as he says, “I miss you, too. You know I do. I . . . I just don’t know how to act. Everything’s so f**ked up.”

I sigh. “I wish . . .” I stop, and Reeve pushes my hair out of my eyes.

“Your hair’s wet.”

“I just had a bath,” I say, and he nods.

“What were you going to say?” he asks me. “What do you wish?”

“I wish it didn’t have to be like this. It’s so . . . complicated.” More than Reeve even knows. “We haven’t talked about Rennie once.”

He looks down at the ground. “I don’t want to talk about Rennie right now.”

I’m about to say, If not now, then when? It’s already been two weeks since she died, and I think maybe we’d both feel better if we talked about her. But Reeve leans in close to me and nuzzles his face against mine. “Why is your skin so soft?” His breath tickles my cheek.

I laugh, for what feels like the first time in forever. “I don’t know, because I’m a girl? All girls are soft.”

He kisses my cheek. “No, you’re different. You have the softest skin of any girl I’ve ever known. And you always smell really good.” He’s kissing his way down my neck. “What is that smell?”

“Bluebells.” I’m shivering, and it’s not because of the cold. His hands are at my hips, under my coat. I have to lean against the car to keep my balance. “Bluebells and . . . burnt sugar.” It’s so hard to think.

“Yeah, that’s it. Sugar. My grandma used to have a thing of brown-sugar bath salts in her bathroom. . . . One time I dumped the whole bottle into the toilet because I wanted to see if it would fizz.” Reeve kisses me, his mouth open against mine, and I have that feeling I get when I step into the bath, warm all over. I let out a sigh. Softly he asks me, “Do you want to come inside for a minute?”

I whisper back, “What, are you going to sneak me up to your room?”

He grins. “Yeah. Why not?”

I put my hands on his shoulders and tilt my head up at him. “Sorry to break it to you, but I’m not your girl Melanie Renfro. I don’t do that.” For the first time in my life, I wish I was that kind of girl.

“I know you’re not like Mel,” he says, and I feel a slight twinge of jealousy. It sounds so affectionate. So intimate. Mel. Then he says, “You’re not like any other girl I’ve ever met.”

I can feel myself flush. Shyly I say, “I don’t want your parents to see me.”

Reeve kisses me again, with the confidence of a boy who knows exactly what he’s doing. His hands move under my sweatshirt, and I don’t even care that they’re cold. I just want him to keep on touching me. When he’s touching me, everything else fades mercifully away, and I’m not thinking about what I did to Rennie, what I did to Mary. It feels good to forget, even if it’s just for a moment.

When I shiver, he stops abruptly and says, “You should go. It’s cold out here and your hair’s wet.”

“Okay.” I start to stand up straight.

“Wait . . . five more minutes.”

“Five more minutes,” I agree, pulling him toward me again.

*  *  *

The next morning everybody’s eating doughnuts by the vending machines, and I sneeze three times in a row. Reeve’s eyes meet mine and he smiles a secret smile, but I don’t smile back.

I force myself to turn away, like I didn’t see. Because I shouldn’t have gone to Reeve’s house; I shouldn’t have kissed him. I won’t make that mistake again.

Chapter Twelve

MARY

I’M ASLEEP MORE THAN I’M awake now, if you can even call it sleeping. It’s not restful, and I don’t have dreams. It’s just darkness.

When I’m awake and alert, I put everything I have into reading Aunt Bette’s books, hoping they’ll tell me something. Tonight I got about halfway through a book about how ghosts interact with the living world.

I don’t have enough energy to finish it. But I need to understand how I’ve been tricking myself. I use what little energy I can muster, and then I close my eyes and focus.

When I open my eyes, it’s morning. I’m no longer at home. I’m standing in front of Jar Island High School, in the fountain. It must still be winter, because the water is shut off.

A bell rings in the distance. I walk to one of the heavy steel doors. Once the school day starts, the janitors lock them so outsiders can’t get in. It’s a security measure. Through the window I watch a few last stragglers sprint down the hallway to their classrooms.

If I were a real girl, a living girl, I’d have to go to the main office and sign in at the front desk. But I’m not. I pass through the door like it’s nothing. Like it’s air. And I’m on the other side.

I’ve probably been doing that all along. Only I didn’t let myself notice. I think back on the days I spent here this school year, going to classes I thought I was enrolled in, doing homework I thought was assigned to me. Even dreaming of where I’d apply for college next year.

Except I’m not a student here. I never was.

The clock says 10:35. If this were a normal day, I’d be in Spanish class with Señor Tremont, so that’s where I go.

Señor Tremont’s door is wedged open, so I walk right in. He’s sitting on top of his desk. The fluorescent classroom lights are off, and he has a video going on the TV. It’s a Spanish soap opera called El Corazón Late Siempre. It means “The Heart Always Beats.” Señor Tremont normally has us watch an episode on Fridays.

Okay. It’s Friday. And it’s winter. But January? February?

I have no idea.

I glance out at the room, at the desk where I used to sit. It’s an empty desk in the back, one that was probably never assigned to anyone. I just sat there. I pretended it was mine. Just like I pretended I was alive.

That’s why whenever I raised my hand, Señor Tremont never once called on me.