So, easy choice. Time to change it up. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but… well, as much of the truth as would help me.
I straightened up as best I could, ignoring the nervous fluttering of the heart in my borrowed body. Mind over matter. “Yeah, I did,” I said simply, calmly, as if this were no different than someone confronting me in the hall at school on something I'd reportedly said. Public, teary outbursts had been rare, but still something I'd grown to expect, on occasion. The person with the cooler head — me — always won. So that was it — I just had to stay calm.
I pried at her fingers on my arm. “You mind?”
She released me, ending my ability to see her clearly, and sank to the floor next to me, or at least, that's what it looked like. The blurry space she occupied hovered above the floor in the vague shape of a person. “How did you do it?” she asked.
I ignored her. “Who are you?”
“Erin,” she said impatiently. “Did you kill someone?”
My mouth fell open. “What?”
“I thought about that. Like, maybe I could slip in as the other spirit was leaving, but since the only people we might actually be able to hurt would be ghost-talkers who would see us coming…” She heaved a disappointed sigh, as if she were talking about not being able to get concert tickets instead of, you know, murdering someone.
“No, I didn't kill anyone!” I struggled to my feet. “What is wrong with you?” I demanded. So much for staying calm.
She rose with me, and I caught a glimpse of flashing dark eyes. “What's wrong with me? What's wrong with any of us? We were cut off before our prime! Right before things started getting good. I want to feel the wind on my skin again. I want to go swimming in the ocean.”
“Yeah, because there's a lot of that happening in Illinois,” I muttered.
She ignored me. “I want that first kiss with a new guy again. I want to dance and feel the music pulsing in my chest. I want to be alive and to know it, you know?” She sounded wistful.
I might have felt sorry for her except for the fact that she was obviously crazy with a capital K, and — unless I missed my guess — mad powerful. You couldn't go around haunting people (for reasons I was still unclear about) and thinking about killing others without a serious store of energy to draw upon. Negative activities and thoughts like that would have caused a major drain and wiped out most spirits in the process, but not her, obviously.
“I want to be alive… like you,” she added, her voice taking on a darker edge.
This girl is going to kill me to get what she wants. It couldn't have been clearer than if she'd said it out loud. “We need Will. He has to be here,” I said, trying to sound as though I didn't care, even though I could feel myself trembling. It was a stall tactic, yeah, but I didn't want to be alone in this anymore. “There's this whole ceremony and everything.…”
“He can't do anything,” she said dismissively. “And even if he could, he's a total straight-edge, believe it or not.” She snorted. “He knew about you and didn't even tell me.” She sounded hurt.
I clamped down on the panic threatening to overtake me, and made another effort to sound reasonable. “Seriously, Will is the only one who can—”
“No, you're going to show me how.” She grasped my arm, tighter than before. It hurt, and I flinched away from her. Which was a mistake. Something inside me shifted, and I felt loose in my own skin — well, my borrowed skin.
Erin inhaled sharply. I could see her again, thanks to her grip on me, so it was not hard to follow her gaze and figure out what she was looking at. She was staring at her hand on my forearm, her eyes almost buggy with surprise.
And with good cause. Her hand was sinking into my — no, Lily's — flesh.
Oh, no. No, no, no. A cold stab of fear shot through me. I knew where this was going.
I jerked back from her, but all that did was pull her with me, her hand now embedded in Lily's arm. Just as mine had once been.
I reached up with my free hand and shoved her shoulder as the expression on her face changed from surprise to glowing delight. “You don't understand,” I said through gritted teeth, struggling to put distance between us. “It's a circuit. We need each other. I can't survive without her, and she can't live without me.” I vividly remembered Lily's blue face and her gasping for air when the Order had tried to separate us. It had been one of the most horrible things I'd ever seen.
“So? Now she won't be able to live without me,” Erin said, leaning into me, her jaw jutting out stubbornly.
It couldn't be that simple, could it? Like swapping out one battery for another? Either way, I didn't want to find out like this.
I tugged at her arm, trying to pull her out, but she wouldn't budge, and I could feel myself slipping aside. No, being shoved aside.
My breath caught in panic, but I shook my head. No freaking way was I giving up this easily.
“Get off of me,” I said, tugging at her arm even harder.
But Erin just laughed. “You've had your turn.”
Bitch.
Since I couldn't pull her away, I did my best to keep her from moving closer. If I refused to retreat, she couldn't take over, right? I tried to calm my thoughts and focus on my breathing, imagining the seamless bond holding Lily and me together. Her hands were my hands, her arms were my arms, her lungs were my—
There was a sudden lurch, and my vision — our vision? — skewed, went blurry.
Not like this, please, I begged whoever might be listening.
“Stop,” I panted, out of breath from the struggle. And only then did I realize I could feel my chest moving separately within Lily's. We were coming apart.
“Oh, my God!” Misty stood in the doorway, her hand over her mouth, her eyes wide with horror. “Are you okay?”
Of course she couldn't see Erin; only my… Lily's body on the floor, jerking back and forth as the two of us fought for control. I tried to answer, to tell her to call for help, but no words would come out.
No, please!
Erin grimaced and forced herself forward, leaning down, and there was an odd slipping feeling followed by a claustrophobic moment of blackness.
And then I was standing over Lily's body on the ground with Misty kneeling next to her, shouting for Leanne. Erin was nowhere in sight.
A horrible chill rushed over me, my whole body quaking with it, and I couldn't breathe. I had just enough time to look down and see a transparent version of myself in the white shirt and red gym shorts I'd wondered if I'd ever see again. Then darkness flickered at the edges of my vision before swelling up to consume everything in sight. And I was gone.
The outside of Misty's house looked the same as it had an hour before. The yard and plants thriving almost to the point of being overgrown, Misty's Jeep in the driveway, the house itself quiet and still.
For whatever reason, the tightness in my chest eased slightly at the sight, which was dumb because it wasn't like there would be flames shooting through the roof or anything as a sign of a problem. Any trouble here was going to be on the inside. Deep on the inside.
I pulled into the driveway and parked. If Misty's parents wanted to question me about being here, Alona's presence would be enough of an excuse. I was her ride home, or I could be, in theory.
I left the car and jogged to the front door to knock. Standing there on the porch, waiting, waiting, and waiting for someone to answer, I could feel the tension creeping into my shoulders and up my neck as each precious second ticked away.
Misty yanked open the door just as I raised my hand to knock again.