"Suze!" I heard Paul yelling. I could no longer see him, the smoke was so thick.
"Get down," Jesse yelled to Paul. "Get down and help them with the horses."
But Paul didn't appear to be listening.
"Suze," he yelled. "Shift! Do it now! It's your only chance!"
Jesse had turned and was kicking at the planks that made up the closest wall. The boards shuddered under the assault.
Shift? My mind seemed to be working only murkily, maybe due to all the smoke. But it didn't seem like I could shift just then. What about Jesse? I couldn't leave Jesse. I hadn't gone to all this trouble to save him from Diego just to have him die in a barn fire.
"Suze," Paul yelled once more. "Shift! I'm doing it, too. I'll meet you on the other side!"
Other side? What was he talking about? Was he insane?
Oh, right. He was Paul. Of course he was insane.
I heard a crash. Then Jesse was taking my hand.
"We're going to have to jump," he said, his face very close to mine.
I felt something cool lick my face. Air. Fresh air. I turned my head and saw that Jesse had kicked out enough boards in the barn wall for a person to squeeze through. It was dark through that hole. But lifting my face a little to better feel the deliriously cool breeze, I saw stars in the night sky.
"Do you understand me, Susannah?" Jesse's face was very close to mine. Close enough to kiss me. Why didn't he kiss me? "We'll jump together, on the count of three."
I felt him reach out and grab me by the waist, bringing me close to him. Well, that was better. Much better for kissing -
"One . . ."
I could feel his heart drumming hard against mine. Only how was that possible? Jesse's heart had stopped beating 150 years ago.
"Two . . ."
Hot flames were licking mv heels. I was so hot. Why didn't he hurry up and kiss me already?
"Three . . ."
And then we were flying through the air. Not because he was kissing me, I realized. No, because we were really flying through the air.
And as if the fresh cool wind had cleared the smoke from my brain, I realized what was happening. Jesse and I were hurtling toward the ground, which looked extremely far away.
And so I did the only thing I could. I clung to him, closed my eyes, and thought of home.
Chapter nineteen
I landed with such force, all the wind was knocked out of me. It was like being hit in the back with a railroad tie - which has actually happened to me before, so I would know. I lay there, completely stunned, unable to breathe, unable to move, unable to do anything but be aware of the pain.
Then, slowly, consciousness returned. I could move my legs. This was a good sign. I could move my arms. Also good. Breathing returned - painfully, but there, none the less.
Then I heard it.
Crickets.
Not the shrieks of horses as they protested being dragged from their burning stalls. Not the roaring of fire all around me. Not even my own labored breathing.
But crickets, chirping away like they had nothing better to do.
I opened my eyes.
And instead of smoke and fire and burning barn, all I saw were stars, hundreds of them, glowing coldly millions of miles away.
I turned my head.
And saw my house.
Not Mrs. O'Neil's boardinghouse, either. But my house. I was in the backyard. I could see the deck Andy had built. Someone had left the lights on in the hot tub.
Home. I was home.
And I was alive. Barely, but alive.
And I was not alone. Suddenly, someone was kneeling beside me, blocking my view of the hot tub lights, and saying my name.
"Suze? Suze, are you all right?"
Paul was tugging on me, pushing me in places that hurt. I tried to slap his hands away, but he just kept doing it until finally I said, "Paul, quit it!"
"You're okay." He sank down into the grass beside me. His face in the moonlight looked pale. And relieved. "Thank God. You weren't moving before."
"I'm fine," I said.
Then remembered that I wasn't. Because . . . Jesse . . . I had lost Jesse. We had saved him, so that I could lose him forever. Pain - much worse pain than I'd felt during my landing on the cold hard ground - gripped me like a vise.
Jesse. He was gone. Gone for good . . .
Except . . .
Except if that were true, why did I remember him?
I rose up onto my elbows, ignoring the jolt of pain that rose from my ribs when I did so.
That's when I saw him. He was lying on his stomach in the grass a few feet away, totally unmoving, totally not . . .
Glowing.
He wasn't glowing.
I looked at Paul. He blinked back at me.
"I don't know," he said as if the words had been wrung from him. "All right, Suze? I don't know how it happened. You were both here when I showed up just now. I don't know how it happened - "
And then I was on my hands and knees, crawling through the wet grass toward him. I think I was crying. I don't know for sure. All I know was, it was hard to see all of a sudden.
"Jesse!" I reached his side.
It was him. It was really him. The real Jesse, Alive Jesse.
Only he didn't seem too alive just then. I reached out and felt for a pulse on his throat. There was one - my breath caught as I felt it - but it was faint. He was breathing, but barely. I was afraid to touch him, afraid to move him. . . .
But more afraid not to.
"Jesse!" I cried, rolling him over and shaking him by the shoulders. "Jesse, it's me, Suze! Wake up. Wake up, Jesse!"
"It's no good, Suze," Paul said. "I already tried. He's there . . . but he's not. Not really."
I had Jesse's head in my arms. I cradled it, looking down at him. In the moonlight, he looked dead.
But he wasn't. He wasn't dead. I'd have known if he was.
"I think we screwed up, Suze," Paul said. "You weren't - you weren't supposed to bring him back."
"I didn't mean to," I said. My voice was so faint, it was practically drowned out by the crickets. "I didn't do it on purpose."
"I know," Paul said. "But . . . I think maybe you need to put him back."
"Put him back where?" I raged. Now my voice was much louder than the crickets. So loud, in fact, that the crickets were startled into silence. "In the middle of that fire?"
"No," Paul said. "I just - I just don't think he can stay here, Suze, and . . . live."
I continued to cradle Jesse's head, thinking furiously. This wasn't fair. No one had warned us about this. Dr. Slaski hadn't said a word. All he'd said was to picture in your head the time and place you wanted to be in, and . . .
And not to touch anything you didn't want to bring through time with you.
I groaned and dropped my face to Jesse's. It was my fault. It was all my fault.
"Suze." Paul reached out and rested a hand on my shoulder. "Let me try. Maybe I can get him back - "
"You can't." I lifted my head, my voice cold as the blade Diego had pressed to my throat. "It'll kill him. He's not like us. He's not a mediator. He's . . . he's human."
Paul shook his head. "Maybe he was meant to die, then, Suze," he said. "Like you said. Maybe we aren't supposed to mess with this stuff, just like you warned me."
"Great." I let out a bitter little laugh. "That's just great, Paul. Now you agree with me?"
Paul just stood there, looking anxious. If I could have been capable of feeling anything except despair, at that point, I would have hated him.
But I couldn't. I couldn't hate him. I couldn't think of anything but Jesse. I had not, I told myself, saved him just so I could sit and watch him die.
"Go to the carport," I said in a low, even voice. "And inside the house through the door there. They never remember to lock it. Hanging on a hook by the door are my mom's car keys. Get them and then come back and help me take him to the car."
Paul looked down at me like I was a crazy woman.
"The car?" He sounded dubious. "You're going to . . . drive him somewhere?"