Dust to Dust (31 page)

He doesn't turn around to look at me. He's too focused on the face of the person standing in front of him, welcoming him into the light.

“Welcome to Solus, Thatcher Larson. We've been waiting for you for a long time.”

My mother.
Her voice is like honey, her smile like the sun, her long hair cascading down to almost her waist.

Then she steps to the side so she can get a glimpse of me. Our
eyes meet and my heart is racing. She doesn't say anything, but I can hear her thoughts as if they are my own.

We'll be here for you, Callie May. We'll be right here.

I reach out, wanting to touch her. . . .

And I wake up with a start. My arm is outstretched, angled toward the window seat in my bedroom. I pull it back, my head sinking into my pillow, and I wonder about the dream.

The details are still in my mind, sharp and clear, warm and comforting. Most dreams fade in the morning light, the emotions they brought on growing quickly cold. This one, I think, will stay with me, though.

“
Caaaallie!
” Carson's voice echoes in the hallway outside my bedroom as she bounds up the stairs. “Come on,” she says, rushing in and pulling off my covers. “We have to get going if we don't want to be late for our spot on
Good Morning America
.”

“What?” I sit straight up in bed.

“Kidding!” says Carson, a gleam in her eye. “Though they would
love
our story. Can you
imagine
?” She grins. “I'm just here to drive you to school. Like always.”

“How long have I been asleep?”

“A few hours, just like the rest of us,” she says. “Are you having trouble remembering everything? Dylan said that might happen because of your emotional trauma and all that.”

I sit up and take a deep breath, convincing myself that my mind isn't back where it was months ago, when I came out of the coma. I do remember the last twenty-four hours, but when I search my
thoughts, everything isn't 100 percent crystal clear.

It's the important things that come trickling back—like rescuing Carson and Eli.

“I'm good, really,” I say. “The bigger question is: How are you feeling?”

“Just peachy,” she says, smiling. “I'm going to need a
major
debriefing on the drive, though. The guys tried to recount what happened on the way over here, but you know how they always leave out good details, and I don't quite remember how I ended up at the wheel of my car with Eli in the passenger seat parked on Folly Beach, so . . .”

Knock-knock
. Nick, Eli, and Dylan emerge in the doorway behind Carson, all of their faces bright and chipper despite the time on the clock—it's only 6:30 a.m.

“Come in, y'all,” says Carson. “She's awake.”

“Hey there.” Nick moves to sit on the side of my bed and wrap me in a hug. I think I remember him driving me home last night, but I'm not entirely sure.

“How did I . . . ?” I whisper into his shoulder, not quite able to finish my thought, because other pieces of our search for Carson and Eli are beginning to fit together in my head.

Like finding them asleep in the VW at Folly Beach . . .

Nick pulls back and looks into my eyes. “I brought you. You were so exhausted that you were asleep before your head hit the pillow.”

Dylan takes a step forward, his hands in his pockets. “You've been through a lot, Callie. More than all of us combined.”

His sweetness makes me smile and I look at Carson.

“Did Dylan tell you how we were able to locate you and Eli?” I ask her.

When she shakes her head, I go on, hoping to score him extra points with her. “He remembered what I'd said to Eli—that some ghosts had messed with him at Folly Beach. He figured maybe it was a favorite spot of Reena and Leo's . . . from before.”

Carson grins at Dylan. “You're pretty smart, you know that?”

“‘Intellectuals solve problems; geniuses prevent them.' Albert Einstein,” he says, leaning back on his heels.

“Well, solving or preventing, you're a genius to me,” says Carson, wrapping an arm around Dylan's shoulder and giving him a kiss on the cheek. “You saved us.”

Dylan looks so love-struck, I'm surprised I don't see comic-book cartoon hearts in his eyes.

Eli lurks at the end of the bed with a close-mouthed sarcastic grin that's all his own, and I break into a smile. I stand up in my pajamas to hug each one of my friends close.

“Whoa, what's this? A coed pajama party?”

My father is standing in the doorway to my room, still holding his overnight bag. His cheeks are flushed and his lips are pursed, signs that he's not really happy with what he's come home to after an early-morning drive home.

“We just got here, Captain McPhee,” says Nick, trying to smooth things over. “We're all . . . um . . . driving Callie to school?”

Then Dylan steps forward with his hand out. “Sir, I'm Dylan Mason Dixon. The five of us are working on a science project
together involving kinetic energy, and we wanted to get an early start today.”

Dad grins in spite of himself—science gets him every time, and so does a firm handshake. He obviously hasn't found his cell phone yet with messages from school about how I was absent again yesterday, but I'll handle that later.

“Fine. I'll leave you to it, then,” says my dad. “Callie, I'm staying home today. Maybe after school, can you help me look for my phone? I can't find it anywhere.”

“Sure,” I tell him.

“Have a good day, everyone.” He walks out and Carson pushes my door almost closed.

When she does, we all break into this weird fit of laughter, our faces plastered with smiles, our hearts filled with happiness and relief. We did it. The threat against us is gone and we're all alive, safe and together. Actually, together . . . with an exception.

“Wendy said to thank you,” says Nick.

Dylan raises a finger. “I believe what she said was that she cannot ever imagine being able to thank you enough. And that she'll call you this weekend.”

I feel a bittersweet pang in my heart. It'll be nice to know Wendy, to keep a connection to Thatcher's life and remember him in the way his family does. I feel pretty lucky to have that—a link to the people who loved him before I did.

“Thanks, y'all,” I say. Then I look down at my pajamas. “So I should probably . . .”

“Get dressed? Yeah, that would be good,” says Carson.

“Are we really going to
school
today?” asks Nick. “That seems so . . . lame.”

Carson frowns. “Yes! Do you think we can afford another absence? I certainly can't. Mama's already mad as a horsefly about yesterday, and she still doesn't believe what I told her.”

“What'd you tell her?” asks Dylan.

“That they got Carson Jenkins confused with Caitlin Johnson and that I was actually at school all day.”

“Weak,” says Eli.

“I know, I know.” Carson points to the door. “But we do need to go to school. Would y'all excuse us so Callie can get ready?”

The guys go downstairs to wait and Carson sits on my bed as I grab my towel and start for the shower.

In the doorway to the bathroom, I pause to look at my best friend. Here. Alive. In front of me. Out of danger. And, if I'm reading her right, about to have her first boyfriend. I expect something to ache inside of me at that thought, but instead I'm unable to contain my smile.

“You don't have to do that, you know,” she says.

“Do what?”

“Pretend like you're okay. I know you miss him already.”

“I'm not pretending,” I say. “I do miss him, but I feel . . . like everything is how it should be.”

“I know you had to let him go to save me,” she says, her eyes welling up. “Nick told me. I'm . . . I'm so sorry, Callie.”

I walk back over to the bed and wrap her up in a hug. “Don't be. I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Thatcher would, too.”

“Thank you,” she says, holding me tight. “I know I would have done it for you.”

Suddenly there's a gust of air in the room, which catches the curtains over my window seat, blowing them apart to reveal the prism hanging in the front of the glass, sparkling and twirling in the morning light. For just an instant, it casts rainbows around the room, dancing like the lights of joyous souls among fading shadows, reminding me that Thatcher's ring is still on my finger.

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One Month Later

“UH-OH, WE BROUGHT THE same flowers!” I hear Wendy's voice behind me, and it's the sound of tinkling bells instead of heartache and pain.

I turn around and look at her radiant smile, and I grin back at her, still seeing a part of him in all of her features. We're both holding bouquets of white daisies with yellow centers, laughing at the coincidence.

“It just seems like a Thatcher flower,” I say.

“Right? Simple and pure,” Wendy agrees.

We look down at the same time, staring at the gray headstone in front of us.

“It's kind of strange,” she says.

“What is?”

“Being here without . . . I don't know, wanting to die myself,” she says. “Even though I know he isn't with us anymore, it feels good to know that he's someplace safe.”

I nod, remembering the dream of him and my mom together as I play with the ring on my finger. “I know what you mean.”

Then we hear a tree branch snap on the ground behind us. When I turn, I see Nurse K. She's just a few feet away, walking along the grass and carrying three white roses. I raise my eyebrows in wonder.

“Hi, Callie,” she says, looking just as surprised as I am.

Wendy gasps. “Hayley? Is that you?”

Nurse K brushes her hair from her eyes, and suddenly one last puzzle piece drops into place.

“Nurse Hayley Krzysiek . . . ,” I whisper.

The girl who survived Thatcher's accident in the Wando River.

She and Wendy quickly move into a hug and when they part, Wendy says, “I haven't seen you since . . .” She pauses. “You just . . .”

“Disappeared,” says Nurse K, her voice cracking. “I know. After graduation I went to college up north. I tried to forget what happened. It was so awful, I . . .”

She can't bring herself to finish her thought, so Wendy reaches out to touch her arm. “It took me years to come home to Charleston,” Nurse K continues. “I wanted to give people time to forget, and so I took a job in another school district. I just didn't want to be the girl who survived.”

“We understand,” I say.

Nurse K steps away from Wendy and places one white rose on
Thatcher's grave. I look at the other two flowers she's holding, and then up into her kind, gentle face.

“They're okay,” I say to her. “All three of them.” And though there's no reason she should believe me, or even be sure what I mean, I can feel a bond of trust forming between us.

“I know,” she says. “That's why I'm here. Somehow, I felt it.” Then she smiles and tilts her head at me. “But wait. Callie, how do
you
know that?”

Wendy puts her arm around me. “Callie's an old family friend,” she tells Nurse K, who gives me a sly grin.

“You're a mysterious girl,” she says.

“Takes one to know one,” I reply.

Nurse K squeezes my shoulder affectionately before she walks away to leave two more white roses for her old friends. She never got to say good-bye to them, and neither did I, but I think we've both come to terms with that, for very different reasons. Hopefully someone was there to meet them after their souls were forced out of Carson and Eli. Hopefully, they've let go of the things that made them fight against their destiny and all the love and peace that had always been waiting for them. Since Nurse K is here, I have to believe that.

We stay for a little longer, Thatcher's sister and I. And when we leave, we agree to see each other again at Thanksgiving break. “Maybe at a café next time though?” she says. “This place, it's not where he'd want us to remember him.”

“You're right,” I say, smiling.

We walk back to the entrance and when we part to go to our
respective cars, Wendy reaches out and takes my hand, giving it an affectionate squeeze. I hold on for a moment, Thatcher's ring pressing against our skin, and I can feel a warmth between us that I have a feeling will be there for life.

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Thank you, thank you, thank you to the people who participated in this book's creation: Morgan Baden, Claudia Gabel, Sara Lyle, Sarah MacLean, Lauren Mechling, Melissa Miller, Micol Ostow, Doug Stewart, and the entire team at Katherine Tegen Books!

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MELISSA WALKER
is the author of
Unbreak My Heart
,
Small Town Sinners
,
Lovestruck Summer
, and the Violet on the Runway series. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and daughter. You can find her online at www.melissacwalker.com.

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Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

DUST TO DUST
. Copyright © 2015 by HarperCollins Publishers. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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