Remembrance by Meg Cabot (31)

David wouldn’t stop apologizing. He sounded like he was crying, practically, over the phone.

And I was making things worse by saying all the wrong things.

“Well, it’s true Jesse probably never would have gotten arrested for assaulting Paul Slater if it weren’t for you spilling the beans about the curse to him,” I said. “Which just goes to show some things really are better kept secret.”

“I’m so sorry, Suze! I was just really worried. When you didn’t return any of my messages—”

“Oh, my God, David, I was kidding.” I hadn’t been kidding, actually, but after the day I’d had, I was too tired to think before I spoke.

I grabbed a beer and a carrot from the fridge, dropped the carrot into Romeo’s cage, then went to sit by Gina on my futon couch. I’d found her watching television when I got home, though she’d muted the show, deciding my phone calls were more interesting than her recorded episodes of The Bachelor.

“He’s only going to have to spend one night in jail,” I assured David. There, that sounded better. “At least according to his lawyer.”

This failed to reassure David, however.

Jake had already contacted one of his high-powered attorneys (when you’re in a business like my oldest stepbrother’s, you keep legal counsel on retainer. I tried not to feel nervous that Jake called his “DUI Guy”) and sent him down to the jail to ensure that Dr. Hector de Silva received the finest possible treatment until his arraignment (which wasn’t scheduled until early tomorrow morning).

The Monterey County Jail was actually supposed to be one of the better correctional facilities in the state—not that any of them were that great—so Jesse had lucked out in that regard. Like so many buildings in Northern California, it was on the National Registry of Historic Places. Cesar Chavez had been imprisoned there during the Salinas Valley lettuce boycott. Both Brad and Jake had spent time in what some referred to as “The Bay Area’s Most Affordable B and B” for various small scuffles and infractions.

“Jake says the food leaves something to be desired,” I told David over the phone. “But you get to meet a lot of interesting people.”

“This isn’t making me feel better, Suze,” David said. “What about Jesse’s job? Is he going to lose it?”

I tried not to allow the unease I felt about this show in my voice. “I’m sure he’ll be able to keep his job. Everyone at the hospital loves Jesse. And this whole thing was just a misunderstanding that happened while Jesse was off-duty. The charges against him are being dropped.” I swigged from my beer. “Everything’s going to be fine. You’ll see.”

“How did you accomplish that?”

“Let’s just say Paul was more than happy to cooperate.”

Paul’s actual response—or I should say, responses—to my text telling him that he’d better drop the charges, or I’d tell the Mercedes King the truth about him and Debbie, had been less gracious than that.

Harsh. But very Paul-like. I thought it was interesting that he considered Jesse the devil when it was very clear to me, between the two of them, who was the real prince of darkness.

Of course I didn’t share the details of Paul’s texts with David, but what little I did say alarmed him anyway.

“Suze! Isn’t that intimidating a victim? You could get in trouble.”

I had a nice laugh at the idea of Paul being a victim, though truthfully I wasn’t finding anything about the situation too funny.

“David, you have no idea of the stuff I’ve done this week alone that I could get in way worse trouble for.”

“Well, what about the house? And the curse? I’ve been talking to Shahbaz—we’ve met a couple times, actually—and it really doesn’t look like there’s any way to break it. At least, not any way written about in ancient Near East culture. I’ve read about a few Wiccan curse removal practices that you could try, though. I know Father Dominic wouldn’t approve, but—”

“David,” I said, pausing with my beer midway to my lips. “You haven’t told this Shahbaz guy anything about my gift, have you?”

“No,” David said, in a voice that sounded so guilt-stricken I knew he was lying. “Well, not in so many words. But I think he’d understand if I did. He’s actually very astute, and he’s really concerned about our old house being torn down. He understands how unsettling it might be for someone to see their childhood home destroyed to make way for a subdivision, regardless of whether or not there’s a curse involved.”

“Aw,” I said, touched by the wistful note in David’s voice. “That’s really sweet of him. But I think the house is going to be saved.”

“Really? How?” David was so surprised his voice cracked.

No way was I going to tell David about Paul being the true father of his nieces—especially if he was that upset about the house—so I said only, “It looks like the demo plans have been delayed. So we’ve got time to work on some alternative strategies.”

“How did you manage that, Suze?”

“David, it’s really late here, so it must be even later there. Shouldn’t you be asleep?”

“I told you before, Suze, I’m not a child anymore. I want to help!”

“I think you’ve helped enough,” I said. “And I don’t mean that in a bad way. Really, David, I don’t know what I’d do without you. But I’ve got to go to bed. Good night.” I hung up before he could say another word.

“God.” Gina passed me the bowl of buttered popcorn that had been sitting on her lap. “It sounds like you’ve had a spectacularly shitty night.”

“Tell me about it.” I shoved a handful of popcorn into my mouth. It tasted like salty ash, but that was due to the day’s events, not Gina’s popping skills. “I just need to decompress for, like, an hour.”

“Fine.” She lifted the remote. “What do you want to watch?”

“Anything but The Bachelor. I’ve had enough of bachelors for one night.”

“Your wish is my command.” She aimed the remote at the screen and flicked through the channel guide. “Uh, looks like our only palatable choices are your favorite, Ghost Mediator, or one of those budget bridal gown shows.”

“Good God. Budget bridal gowns, please.”

She grinned. “I thought so. Budget bridal gowns it is.”

We watched until we fell asleep—well, one of us, anyway. I got up quietly so as not to disturb her, then padded to my bed . . .

. . .but was still wide awake an hour later, unable to get one image out of my mind:

Stop. Wait. Don’t.

There was a lot of blame to go around for the evening’s events, but Jimmy Delgado’s death was squarely on me. That was one soul I’d failed to save . . . not that it had been a soul worth saving.

Jesse, though. What was he doing now? Was he, too, lying awake in his cell, thinking of me? Was he warm enough? What if he didn’t have a blanket? Was he getting along with the other prisoners? What if Paul did not, in fact, drop the charges like he said he was going to? Could I really tell anyone the truth about the triplets?

These were the thoughts with which I was torturing myself when I realized I was not alone in my room.

I knew who it was before I opened my eyes.

I rose up on one elbow and stared at her. Even though I’d sensed her presence, my heart was still thumping.

“You can’t keep doing this,” I said. “You’re going to give me a heart attack.”

Lucia didn’t reply. She just stood there at the side of the bed, a soft aura glowing all around her, looking at me with those huge dark eyes. She wore the same somber expression she always wore, her mouth the same pink rosebud of disapproval.

What had I done wrong now? Maybe she didn’t like that I slept in the same room as a rat, or in an old black tank top and yoga shorts.

Or maybe she didn’t like that I hadn’t tried very hard to keep her murderer from offing himself. He was never going to get his day in court. At least, no court on planet Earth.

“How did you even get in here?” I looked around. She shouldn’t have been able to enter my apartment, the place was so barricaded against evil spirits, between the salt and the house blessings and the crosses and the mezuzahs.

On the other hand, Lucia wasn’t exactly evil.

“What can I do for you, Lucia?” I asked her. Talking to this kid was like talking to the stuffed animal she clutched in her hands, she was so unresponsive. “Is it about Jimmy? Er . . .”

I realized, belatedly, that only Becca had ever called Lucia’s killer by his name, and even she didn’t like to. Lucia herself had been too traumatized by what he’d done to her ever to mention him by anything other than “he.”

“Is it about the, um, bad man?”

I sat up in bed, careful to move slowly so as not to alarm her. There was no sound in the room except my voice, and the gentle grunts of Romeo, who’d woken and immediately begun cleaning himself in his cage.

“Because he’s gone, Lucia.” This seemed a fitting euphemism for what had happened to Delgado. Gone. He was gone. “I found him and made sure that he’ll never hurt you, or Becca, or anyone else ever again.”

Lucia only continued to stare at me in silence, her eyes gleaming as luminously as the rest of her. I couldn’t read her expression. Was she apprehensive, or reproachful?

“Tomorrow I plan on taking care of the priest who hurt Becca, too. Okay?” My voice broke a little. “Not in the same way as Jimmy, but . . . he’ll never be able to hurt anyone either. I’m sorry things got so messed up, and that they took such a long time to fix. Not that they’ll ever really be fixed, but . . . well, you know. This was a tough one, Lucia. This one was really hard.”

I reached up to move some hair from my eyes and found, when my fingers came away wet, that I was crying. Me, who never cried.

All the signs were there. My cheeks were damp. My throat had closed up. My eyes stung.

This wasn’t allergies. I was crying. Crying for Lucia.

For Lucia, or for Becca, or for me? Maybe for the triplets, too, and a little bit for Jesse. Crying for all of us.

Lucia only continued to stare at me owlishly.

I reached for my cell phone, which I kept on the nightstand, and scrolled through the photos I’d stored on there.

“Look, Lucia. I found your family. They’ve moved away from here, but not too far. They have a vineyard north of San Francisco. It looks really nice. They don’t have horses, but they have llamas. See, here’s a picture.” I held the screen on my phone toward her so that she could see. The glow lit up her face even more brightly than her own spectral radiance. “There’s your mother, and your father, and your brothers. And look, see here? After you died, they adopted two little girls.” This caused her to lean in closer. I finally had her attention.

“I’ve been wondering about it,” I went on. “Why did they adopt two girls? And I think the reason they had to adopt two is that one little girl wouldn’t have been enough to replace the hole in their hearts that you left behind. That’s how much they loved you.”

Lucia glanced from me to the photo then back again, her eyes wider than ever.

But I still couldn’t tell if she understood. I could hardly see anything myself, because of my tears.

How could I get through to her?

“Please, Lucia,” I said. “You just have to be patient a little bit longer, and then everything will be all right, I swear. Well, maybe not all right. Nothing will ever be all right for you, I know that. But I swear I’ll make things right for Becca. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

She did something then that shocked me, and I’ve been working with the souls of the dead for a long time. I didn’t know I could be shocked anymore.

But Lucia managed, by climbing onto the bed and crawling toward me, her arms stretched to reach around my neck.

Not to strangle me this time, though.

To hug me.

Even more shocking, I put down my phone and hugged her back, a dead seven-year-old who shouldn’t have even been in my room in the first place.

This was a violation of every ghost-mediator—and patient-therapist—protocol in the book. Lucia needed to cross over to the other side to be with the people she belonged to—the grandmother who’d claimed she’d been such a happy girl, and had since passed on herself, and was probably waiting impatiently for her granddaughter to hurry up and join her. Ensuring that this happened was my job.

But here I was, hugging her instead of letting her go, allowing her to lay her cheek—cold and smooth as marble—against mine, holding on to her as tightly as she was holding me. Her sadness, deep and dark as a grave, seeped into me . . .

Or maybe the only sorrow I felt was my own. Maybe it had been there all along, neatly boxed away. Maybe that’s what had been keeping me awake at night for so many years, but I’d never allowed myself to feel it, until the touch of that cold cheek to mine caused the box to open, and all the emotions I’d packed so tidily away in there came rushing to the surface.

“It’s okay, Lucia,” I whispered, rocking her a little. “Everything’s going to be okay. I promise.”

She pulled away from me slightly, then laid a hand upon my own cheek, which, unlike hers, was not cold and smooth as marble, but hot and wet.

“I know,” Lucia whispered back, gazing into my eyes. For the first time since I’d met her, she smiled. “That’s what I came to tell you.”

Then, in a burst of golden light that lit my room like a sun shower, she was gone.