I didn’t get very far before I heard the first scream.
Stage One of Conn’s plan was for me to parade myself in full view of everybody: a nightmare walking around in broad daylight. If I caused enough commotion, an invisible Shade might notice. Brilliant, right? I mean, if I didn’t get killed first.
I had had just enough time to register that the fog had lifted and that it was wickedly cold. I looked around at the low row houses and caught the smell of cinnamon rolls from a bakery. I guessed that maybe I was in Andersonville, the Swedish part of town. At least that’s what it looked like, except that this street had an odd metal rail running along both sides, tacked high onto the walls of the buildings, sort of like a sideways roller-coaster track, except with a single rail. And in this world, there were more trees. The streets were cleaner. Also, everyone was dressed very formally, in a mix of tailored coats and strikingly modern accessories, like caramel-colored sunglasses and high-top boots with cutout patterns. No one wore even a trace of black.
A man strutted by in a fedora and striped suit, then skidded to a halt when he saw me. He shrieked. A few women in cloche hats were more composed, though they clutched each other and yelled for someone to call the IBI. I stood there, hoping that this was enough of a commotion, when a mob rounded the corner, carrying torches and calling me names.
It was almost as bad as high school.
I ran.
But I was running on empty. I didn’t get far. The mob cornered me in a blind alley. I wondered if Shades got last requests, and if someone would give me a cinnamon roll before going completely Spanish Inquisition and burning me at the stake.
Then I heard a pair of light feet land next to me.
It was a boy.
“You,” he said, “look like hell.”
20
“And suicidal,” he added. “Are you suicidal?”
Our eyes locked. We were the exact same height. We were almost the exact same everything. “Um, help?”
The mob hung back. Two Shades was maybe too much.
“Just ghost,” he told me.
Ghost. That was my word. “I can’t.”
“Really?” he said with amused curiosity. “Why not?”
“Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Like now it doesn’t. Like now I could use your help.”
He looked at the crowd. They were backing off, muttering that they should probably wait for the IBI, though I knew that they had been ordered by Fitzgerald not to arrive at the scene. “Very well.” The Shade shrugged. “Shall we kill them all?”
Torches dropped to the ground. People shoved each other in their haste to run out of the alley. They were gone.
He chuckled. “My name is Orion. Who are you, and why are you playing cat and mouse? Or rather, why are you the mouse?”
“I’m Darcy Jones.”
He pulled a sour face.
“What?” I asked.
“That’s a human name.”
Now that we were alone and I wasn’t about to be barbecued, I had time to see that he wasn’t exactly my male mirror image, as I’d first thought. There were differences. Orion’s eyes titled up at the corners. My chin is pointy. But he wore what I always wore—simple black—and looking at him was like looking at myself from a stranger’s perspective. Slender frame. Hair like an oil slick. Winter skin.
Orion picked up the backpack that had dropped at my feet. He handed it to me.
“Thanks.” I unzipped the backpack and dragged out a blue wool coat with a large hood. It looked like it was going to snow.
“What else have you got in there?” He yanked back the bag and rummaged through it as I put on the coat. “A brown wig. Makeup. Sunglasses. Things to help you pass as a human. Where did you get them?”
“I stole them.”
“I don’t think you’re very bright, Darcyjones.” That’s how he said my name: in one big blur. “If you can’t ghost, why weren’t you wearing any of this? Or that?” He pointed at my coat as I tried to tuck my hair under the hood. “Of course the humans attacked you.”
Stupid Conn and his stupid plan. “I was trying to find you.”
“Me? Why?”
“Not you specifically. Someone like you.”
“Someone like me,” he repeated.
“I wanted to find a Shade. But invisibility makes it kind of hard to see you.”
“A fair point.”
“So my best hope was to make a screaming target of myself and catch a Shade’s interest.”
“Ah.” He returned my backpack. “That’s quite daring. Probably the swiftest solution. Not bad.”
Huh. Stupid Conn and his apparently not-so-stupid plan.
Orion tucked a stray lock of my hair into the hood.
I pulled away. Was he flirting? No more flirting. Ever. Look where it got me the last time.
“I can do that,” I said.
“You asked for help.” Then he glanced down at my burned hands and his smile vanished. “What happened to you?”
A snowflake touched my wrist and disappeared.
It came and went silently. I was silent, too. I hadn’t practiced this, how to tell Conn’s lies. But the snow helped. A snowfall softens all the hard noises and hard corners. It’s a natural liar. I saw the sky sprinkle down a hundred, a thousand little white lies, and decided that I didn’t owe Orion anything.
Okay, he had saved my life. But saving someone and knowing her are different things. I had my reasons for following Conn’s advice.
I needed time to decide if I even wanted to go home to Lakebrook. I needed information.
I also needed Conn’s photograph. It could be the key to my forgotten years.
So when Orion said, “Let’s walk. You can tell me all about it,” I was ready.
* * *
TALKING WITH ORION MEANT talking to thin air. He strolled invisibly by my side while I muttered to myself like a crazy person. Every so often, I saw Orion’s fingers flash in and out of being. He nipped at my elbow, tugging me in one direction or another.
When I asked, he explained (with some surprise that I didn’t know already) that it was easy enough to make specific body parts appear and disappear, though harder to talk as a ghost.
“What about your clothes?” I asked.
There was a pause, then a wicked chuckle. “What about them?”
“They disappeared when you did.” That’s how it had worked for me, at Marsha’s house.