This is Your Afterlife (23 page)

“Come on, there's still time! Find him, for God's sake!”

A strangled cry squeezes out of Mara's throat. Her eyes are wide and fixed on the waterhole.

A body emerges out of the churning base of the waterfall. Jimmy's body. Face down. Shirt billowing around him. His arms are floppy, offering no resistance against the current.

“Goodbye, Jimmy,” Mara says. And then she runs.

Mara doesn't stop long enough to check for signs of life from Jimmy. But I stay. I dive under. See Jimmy's blue eyes staring through me. My lungs seize and I have to come up for air. Somehow I feel guilty for breathing. That confuses me, because God knows oxygen is wasted on me. I'm dead.

I scramble out of the water and run. Run till I catch up with Mara at Jimmy's Explorer. A deep rattle troubles my chest, but I push the pain aside. Swinging into her, I shriek, “Don't you walk away! You killed him! You killed him, you killed him!”

She ignores me. If she has a conscience, she's probably ignoring that, too. Uselessly, I stand by as she unlocks the SUV and grabs her book bag from the passenger seat. Hands wrapped in a blue sweater, she locks up and wipes down the car door. Her gaze travels toward the emerald depths of the forest.

“Please, Mara, if you can hear me, think of Jimmy. Of his family.” An image of Dan's intense indigo eyes puncture my thoughts. Angry tears sear my cheeks.

Mara walks away, treading lightly as if trying not to leave tracks on the hard asphalt. Then she stops and mutters to herself. Something about not wanting to leave the car where it can be seen. Retracing her steps, she gets into the Explorer and burns rubber down the road. The car disappears around a wooded bend before I can get my legs in gear.

“You are not getting away with this!” I scream. Concentrating hard, I picture myself beside her, wrestling control of the vehicle. This time, visualization techniques do jack for me. I order my legs to give chase, but they won't move. It's like they're glued to the ground.

Groaning, I put my head in my hands. “What do I do now?”

Something warm settles on my shoulder. It reminds me of autumn sunshine. Pure. Golden. And lavender-scented. I whirl around.

“Grandie!” I squeeze her so hard she squeaks. To my amazement, I can feel plump arms circle me. Not emaciated or wrinkled disease-ridden arms. More tears flood and spill onto her shoulder. “I've missed you so much!”

Laughing, she pulls back, though she keeps a grip on my hands with vise-like strength. She wears a dress I've never seen her wear before. Ivory chiffon swirls down to her ankles. A satin sash winds around her waist. Tiny flowers are embroidered along the scalloped neckline. It takes a few more moments to put my finger on why I'm so drawn to what she's wearing—it's her wedding dress. She'd kept it in her closet, lovingly preserved. We'd buried her in it.

“I've missed you, too, sweetie,” she says, wiping my tears with a lace-edged handkerchief.

“Grandie, I've tried so hard to contact you. Why wouldn't you come when I called for you? Couldn't you hear me?”

“I'm so sorry, honey. It broke my heart when I couldn't go to you. But it was part of the deal I made.” She tucks the handkerchief into her sleeve and avoids my gaze.

“You...you made a deal? With the devil?” I whisper, afraid to say it any louder in case I conjure up a fire-spitting demon. That would not make me popular here in spirit land.

“I didn't make a deal with the dark side.” She gives a taut smile. Maybe she's afraid of invoking the devil by naming him, too. “No, honey, my contract was with myself.”

I squint at her, confused. “What do you mean?”

Heaving a sigh, she says, “How I left the earth plane. That I...I... It was my doing. I couldn't stand the pain anymore. I'm sorry.”

I gulp. It's hard to hear those words come from her directly. “Don't apologize. You died with dignity.”

She smiles gently. “Well, I decided to do that in order for both of us—you and I—to move on, we needed to grow. After my death, you were lost. You needed direction. So I decided I'd put everything in my power to bring out your natural clairvoyance.”

“
Natural
clairvoyance? Come on, Grandie. Until Jimmy came along, I was spiritually blind. You said I'd need special glasses to see ghosts!”

“Everyone has the gift to some degree. Even your friend Aimee.” She gives me a knowing look, making me wonder just how many times she snooped around without me noticing. “But people like you and me, we were born with access to a much higher spiritual level. You had the key all along. It was just a matter of fitting it into the lock and turning. Your tarot readings were actually beginning to open you up to this world. Did you sense that?”

“I...I got a couple of visions the past few readings.” Dumbfounded, I say, “Did Jimmy have to die just so I could develop clairvoyance? It's all my fault?”

“His death was written in the stars. But it needed someone special on the earth plane to bring the truth out, and bring him peace. Jimmy was the perfect project for you, don't you think?” She shakes her head. “That poor boy was terribly confused when I found him wandering around. I believe that unfortunate head injury knocked him senseless. It takes some time for physical pain to subside after you die. But look how well he adjusted with you by his side!”

My heart flops as I think about that first night of his afterlife. “Poor guy got stuck with a rookie!”

“I knew you could help him, if only because you were a familiar face. I wanted you to develop the skills I
knew
you had. The skills I should have nurtured in you when I was alive. Reading tarot is wonderful, but you're meant for even greater things.”

“Like talking to dead people,” I say wryly. “Where is Jimmy now?”

She doesn't take her eyes off me. “You'll see him soon.”

“What about all the other dead people? There's got to be millions of them roaming around. And why does heaven look exactly like Camberwell Forest?”

“We're not in heaven,” she says breezily, then she catches my look of horror. “And, relax, this isn't hell.”

“Thank God for that.” Deep down I knew hell wouldn't be quite so picturesque or temperate.

“Think of it as a waiting room between life and death. Limbo. Some people stay here a long time.”

“Wait, you shouldn't be on some waiting list. You're practically a saint!”

“I'm not a saint, and I'm no angel either.” She squeezes my shoulder.

“You belong up in heaven, frolicking on big white clouds. This is insane. I want to talk to whoever's in charge.”

She laughs. “That won't be necessary. I'm free to go. If I want to. No one forced me to loiter here. Like I said, I made the choice to say because I wanted to finish what I started before I died.”

“Grandie, you're crazy. Don't you want to move on, see Grandpa Fred? All your friends and family?”

“Of course. I can do that now that you don't need me anymore.” She looks at me pointedly over fine gold-rimmed glasses. Funny that she even needs those things in her post-life existence. “It's time to move along.”

I frown. “Does this mean you're taking me to upstairs heaven now? We have full access?”

Her eyes widen. “Good grief, no. Not you.”

Not me? Fear cleaves into my chest like a butcher's knife. I can't bring myself to say the other “H” word aloud. Who knows? I could be fending off the flames of he...the other place in a nanosecond. “Where do I belong?”

“Here. On earth,” she says. “I don't want to sound cliché, but it's not your time. There's still a lot of life in you. See, what's happening now is you're having a near-death experience. Mara put cacao powder in the... What did she call it?”

“
Boeuf bourguignon
...” I say faintly. Oh, God. I told her about my chocolate allergy in the diner.

“She knew what effect it would have on you.”

I clutch my chest in disbelief, not sure if I'm imagining a heart throbbing inside my rib cage. “I'm...I'm still alive?”

Grandie presses her hand to my shoulder and warmth radiates from her touch. “Very much so, and you're the only one who can bring about justice for Jimmy. You're the only one who knows the truth about Mara now. You will live to tell the tale.”

“But she'll just deny it!” I protest. “My word against hers and all that.”

A bright white light floods the parking lot. More powerful than a thousand suns. But it's not scorching us. I just want to bathe in it all day. The Light becomes silvery, glimmery. Heavenly.

Grandie fixes me with a bittersweet smile. “Keira... Isn't it beautiful?”

A jag of pain stabs into my heart. “No. It's too soon. We've just found each other.”

“You don't need me anymore, sweetie.”

As soon as the words leave her mouth, a stinging sensation in my thigh makes me double over. Then there's heat. Intense heat. Followed by a cold blast that seems to reach every corner of my body.

“Grandie?” I squeak, holding my chest. Torrents of air rush in and out of my lungs. “What's happening to me?”

She walks backward, a broad smile stretching across her face. Where is she going?

“Don't be afraid, Keira. You'll be okay. Dan's looking out for you.”

“Dan?” Every second that passes, I feel heavier, like I'm falling to earth.

“He's a sensitive one, isn't he? I've been watching over him, too. He'll be all right. But you have to help him through the next few months. Just as I'll look after Jimmy.”

The Light ripples like a pond. I shield my eyes as a purple silhouette emerges and sharpens. Jimmy staggers. He's confused. Distraught.

“Where am I?” he asks. The bewilderment in his voice makes my heart crack.

“Jimmy!” I cry and run toward him. He brushes past me like I'm not there.

He stalls in front of my grandmother, brow wrinkled as he addresses her. “What happened? Who are you?”

“Why is he ignoring me?” I ask Grandie.

Her lips don't move, but I can hear her clear as a bell. “As far as he's concerned, you're on a different plane. One for the living. This experience has been a way of showing you how he was killed. You're not meant to interact. But now that you know the truth, Keira, you must act.”

“I have to prove Mara killed him,” I say. “But how? It's not like there are fingerprints...or a gun powder residue or anything obvious like that.”

“Remember the keys,” Grandie intones while Jimmy himself wrings water from his shirt and looks utterly disoriented.

I frown. “What keys?”

“You have the gift, Keira. You always have. Just tap into it. Let it grow, and never be ashamed of it or try to hide it. Listen to the messages that come to you.” Her voice becomes faint. Both she and Jimmy shimmer. Their bodies flicker opaque and transparent.

“Please don't leave me!” I sob.

Air rushes into my lungs again, and a loud thrumming sound deafens me.

“Keira, live. Live for me.”

The Light behind Grandie pulsates. There's life there. Love and joy, too. I run toward it, but when I get within a foot of my grandmother, an invisible force blocks me. Like a celestial velvet rope keeping the riff-raff out of an exclusive club.

“Will I see you again? You know I've been bumbling around like an amateur without your help.” Suddenly I'm desperate to ask her everything I should have when she was alive. “Should I keep using crystals? Holy water? What about the cards?”

“You are doing just fine without props, Keira. Everything you need is inside you. I will check on you from time to time. Maybe when you least expect it.” She winks, then grows serious. “Your mother needs you, and so does Jimmy's family. You can go to them now. The Light has healed you somewhat. Dan is doing the rest.”

Dan.

Intense, sensitive, passionate Dan.

A vision of his blue eyes stirs up something raw inside me. My heart always loved him. I want nothing more than to return to Dan. Communicating with the dead is one thing.

But it doesn't matter one bit if I can't tell Dan how I really feel about him.

“Dan!” It's the first word out of my lips. Chased by a hacking cough that scorches my throat. I swallow hard. Agony. Weakly, I open my eyes. He's so close he's a blur. But his scent and the feel of his warm hands are vivid. Comforting. I glance at the EpiPen on the floor next to a lone, dirty sock. “You saved me.”

“When I saw you... Jesus, you weren't breathing! You were shaking. You had these huge bumps all over...” He tucks a lock of hair behind my ear, and I lean my cheek into his palm. “
Chocolate
did this to you?”

I run a hand over the remnants of those itchy welts. Not so itchy now. A memory of the Light flashes in my mind. It really did have a healing effect. Still, there's an ache in my heart when I think of Grandie and our very brief time together in the other realm. Then I remember something else.

“No. Yes! Mara did this to me.” I crawl onto my hands and knees before using his rock-like shoulders to haul myself up. He gives me a glass of water and I swallow it down in one hit. “But then I had a vision. I
saw
her kill Jimmy.”

He looks at me in a daze.

“Dan. Mara killed your brother.” My fingers close around his arm. Something intangible fractures inside of him. “Is she still in the house? I've got to find her.”

“I saw her drive away, and then I came to find you. But there's no way in hell you're going after her alone if she's a killer.”

“There's no
if
,” I growl, banging the glass down on Jimmy's nightstand.

Dogs in the neighborhood howl in protest as a siren echoes in the distance. Dan turns toward the sound. He throws something around my shoulders. Jimmy's blue-and-gold letterman jacket. It doesn't quite have the same comforting smell or warmth that Dan's jacket had that night we went to the waterfall.