“No, Sarah!” I said. “You’re not going to hurt anyone else!”

I threw the doll to the floor, grabbed the baseball bat, and smashed her face to smithereens. The glow in the eyes faded. And I was free.

The house was free. We were all free.

Except the part where I was trapped in a burning attic.

30

The oak tree was a four-foot jump from the house. If I missed I would fall thirty feet and land in the burning bushes.

The tree itself wasn’t on fire—but some of the branches brushed against the roof, which would be burning soon enough. And then it was just a matter of time.

I gathered my strength, chose a sturdy-looking landing target, and leaped.

Surprisingly enough, I made it. It took a little doing to swing my legs up, but after a second I was scooting toward the trunk of the tree.

I scanned the branches, searching for a way down. Not an easy task–the tree was almost as big as the house, and by that point embers had drifted from the big fire and started little fires among the foliage.

“ALEXIS!” Kasey screamed. She was just an ant of a person down in the yard, flanked by Megan and Carter.

A fire truck came screeching down the street, but I didn’t have time to wait to be rescued. Flames licked at my feet.

I had to get to a new branch. The closest one was six feet away.

Could I do it? I had to.

I took a deep breath and jumped.

Just as my feet propelled me off the branch, I realized that I’d left the heart inside. I’d left Megan’s only connection to Shara in the burning attic. It was going to be caught in the fire. It would melt.

I spent a millisecond too long staring regretfully at the attic window.

When my thoughts returned to my present position, I felt for a moment like a cartoon character, hanging in midair for a moment before the plunge. Everything was in slow motion.

Then time sped up, and I fell.

Seven Months Later

The property at 989 Whitley Street was on the market for four days and sold for well above the asking price. Land is too valuable these days for people to pass up a house just because the ground beneath it, for the greater part of a century, teemed with unsettled spirits. Besides, there are spirits everywhere; you can’t avoid them. You just try to avoid the ones who want to kill you.

Mom, Dad, and I moved across town, to a condo— really a very nice little place; three bedrooms: one for me, one for them, and one empty, waiting for Kasey. We’d ditched the shadowy hallways and gone for the brightest place we could find. The walls were white, the counters were white tile, even the furniture we picked out was white and shiny. It was as though we couldn’t get enough light.

Dad bought me a darkroom pass at the community college and promised to pay the fees until I graduated from high school. So that was cool.

It took Kasey a few months to start talking again, but now she’s doing really well at the treatment center. She’s not having catatonic episodes or waking up screaming in the middle of the night anymore. The doctors tell us that in a few months she should be able to come home.

The official diagnosis was psychotic schizophrenia, and we all went along with it because the insurance company won’t pay for “made friends with the wrong ghost.”

She even has some friends, girls her own age. I’ve seen them when they didn’t know I was watching—they sit and giggle and make dumb jokes like all fourteen-year-olds do.

Leave it to my sister to come out of her shell at a mental hospital.

The police never even got involved. One thing I’ve learned is that there really is a group of government agents out there who wear long gray trench coats and don’t look at you like you’re crazy when you talk about ghosts. They hung around for a couple of days, scoured the remains of the house, took our statements, and left as quietly as they came.

They found the heart charms in the rubble, fused together, and gave them back to Megan. But there hadn’t been any more sparks.

Shara had come back to help us…but she was gone.

All of the complicated explanations we’d been cooking up for the police turned to dust, unspoken.

So anyway, life is good. I can’t believe seven months have passed. Sixteen (still no car!), broken ribs, wrist, arm, collarbone, and ankle pretty much healed, with a best friend and parents so attentive that I occasionally have to remind them not to smother me.

Not to say I don’t have drama in my life.

“No,” I said. “No, no, no, no.”

“Alexis,” Megan commanded, “sit down.” I sat.

She set the tiara on my head.

Mom squealed with delight and clapped her hands. “You’re not helping,” I said to her. “Hush,” Megan said. “Stop complaining and look at yourself.”

“Strawberry Shortcake,” I said, and then let her turn me toward the mirror.

Hmm. It was pink, all right, but not exactly Shortcake pink.

“You look incredible,” Megan gushed.

The same pink dress Megan had taken from her closet last October. Shorter haircut (but still pink). Pink shoes (Mom’s treat).

And, of course, the tiara.

“Oh my God, you love it,” Megan crowed. “I can see it in your eyes! You looooove it!”

“Yeah, right,” I said. But secretly I did kind of love it.

“Oh, Megan, you’d better get ready!” Mom said, glancing at the clock. “The boys are going to be here any minute.”

Megan cast one more extremely triumphant glance at me and disappeared down the hall.

I pushed my lips together. I was going to look in the mirror again, and I did not intend to smile. There…turn … look…

“You have such a pretty smile,” Mom sighed.

I glanced up at her. She was smiling too, and her eyes were a little watery.

“Don’t cry,” I ordered. “I’ll never go to prom again if you can’t keep it together.”

“I know,” she said, sniffling and flapping her hands in a failed effort to dry her eyes. “I know, but I just…you just…”

I gave her a kiss on the forehead. “Listen, I’ll wear more dresses, if it makes you feel better. But if you cry, I’m going to cry, and then my makeup will run, and Megan will kill us both.”

Mom laughed. The lump in my throat dissolved.

“Ready,” said Megan, stepping into the room.

“Oh, Megan, you look amazing,” Mom said. The choked-up sound returned to her voice.

Megan did look amazing. She was wearing a black dress with spaghetti straps, the simplest little thing you ever saw. But somehow she made it completely elegant.

She wore her hair in a bob that came right to her chin.

“That’s the doorbell!” Mom said, and scrambled away to answer it.

“Forgive her,” I said to Megan. “It’s her first prom in twenty years. She’s a little nervous.”

In the living room, we found Mom swooning over Carter (just a good friend…we all needed a little time to cool off after my sister, you know, tried to kill him) and Luke Birmingham (Megan’s trophy date—“strictly eye candy,” to quote her). Dad hovered on the sidelines and took photos while Mom watched the boys to make sure they admired us enthusiastically enough.

Carter came right over to me. “You look incredible,” he said.

Big smile. “You too,” I told him. He did look pretty nice. He was wearing just a plain black tux, but he was starting to get that old Carter thing back—was it just confidence? The way he walked and held himself.

“I brought you a corsage,” he said. “It goes on your wrist. I didn’t want to be a cliché and spend fifteen minutes trying to pin one on your dress.”

It was a very nice corsage. I held my arm out, and he slipped it over my wrist. Our hands touched for a moment, and I got a shiver (but hid it).

Megan waited patiently as Luke tried in vain to pin a corsage to her dress. She smiled through what was probably a frightening amount of random pin-sticking.

“Megan, did you talk to your grandmother?” Mom asked. Mrs. Wiley was off merging a few corporations in the UK. “She said to call and wake her up before you go.”